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threeguessesTitle: the syntax of things
Authors:![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
lowriseflare and threeguesses
Rating: R
Word Count: 5, 822
Summary: The one with the I love you.
AN: Probably we should just take this opportunity to apologise to e. e. cummings.
the syntax of things
One thing Sam knew going in: five-year plans notwithstanding, McNally is not a girl you want to spook. Like. Ever. But it's just—they've been doing this for a while now, is the thing, three months back on the job, Christmas and New Year's gone by (she let him kiss her, midnight at the Penny; Sam nearly dropped his beer bottle in shock), and he's a little— he's tired of waiting for her to catch up.
(Things he's done, lately, instead of laying it out for her: cleaned three years' worth of accumulated crap out of the closet in the front hallway. Spent a stupid amount of time lifting at the gym. And taken her to test-drive no fewer than six different economy sedans only to have her get cranky over their collective shittiness and refuse to crack a smile again until he took her home, planted her in front of an Office marathon, and ordered a pizza with extra sausage, the way she likes.
He's got the cleanest apartment in Toronto, McNally still can't decide on a fucking car, and Sam's about ready to climb out of his skin.)
It's been getting more and more difficult too. Like, Sam's used to watching himself in bed—not staring too long, not letting it get too serious—and that’s fine. That he can handle. But lately it's just been everything. On shift, a false-alarm lockdown at an elementary school, when she picks her ridiculously-slow way over the playground, not messing up a single snow fort. At the dealership, when she gets snotty and flips one of the complimentary pencils at his head. On his couch, when she's upside-down watching Top Model because "Tyra really looks like an alien like this". Everything. When she's sleeping or eating or taking a shower; when she's doing nothing at all.
Today's Saturday and sleeting—they stayed late at the Penny last night and worked this morning, both of them, came back here and passed out on the couch. It's dark when Sam wakes up. TV's flickering softly; Andy's gone, his arm asleep where he's pretty sure she was lying on it. After a second he hears the toilet flush and she pads back out into the living room, bedhead and her jeans tucked into her socks. "Hi," she says, around a yawn.
Sam smiles, scratches a bit at his chest. "Hi."
"We slept."
"Uh-huh." He glances at the clock on the cable box, tries to remember what he's got in the fridge. The blood creeps back down toward his hand, pins and needles. "How do you feel about dinner?"
Andy considers. "I..." She's literally bending over backwards, fingers laced and palms out; she'd crack every joint in her body if she could figure out how to do it, and Sam thinks she's actually gotten pretty close. "Feel as if I would like to eat some?"
Andy-speak for feed me; Sam heaves himself up off the couch, fishes around for the remote. There's some sort of dog show on, handlers running around in a circle. Andy clucks her tongue at the close-up of the Bernese, hits the power button on the bottom of the screen (and Sam didn't think she'd be the type, exclaiming over fluffy things, but there it is. She coos at babies in the supermarket too; "it's the little hats, okay?" she said one time when she caught sight of Sam's expression, which—not really why he'd been looking).
"Any feelings on what kind of dinner?" He has some peas, probably, maybe some chicken. Disgusting tolerance for takeout combinations aside, McNally's got pretty simple tastes.
"Anything." Then: "Or, you know, popcorn. The second Lara Croft's on at nine."
Sam rolls his eyes. "No way." They split his egg McMuffin after shift, haven't eaten anything since.
"But Sa-am: shark punching." She steps up into his space and leans a bit, palms scrubbing at her eyes. "Shit. Tell me we aren't working tomorrow."
"Nice try." Sam tugs a little, gets his arms around her. She smells like the hand soap in his bathroom. "On again at seven."
Andy groans into his shirt, muffled and put out. "Seriously, what is with these mornings?"
Sam's actually pretty sure what's with these mornings is that Noelle was working them until Noelle started throwing up like clockwork every day at eight-thirty, but so far nobody's confirmed that particular theory for him and he's not looking to start rumours. "Bet your Pops had to blast you out of bed with a foghorn every morning to get you to school on time."
Andy grins, tilts her face up so he can get at her mouth. "That assumes I ever got to school on time."
"Ah." Sam nods and gives her what she's after, kisses her friendly and soft. Her body's sleep-warm against his. "McNally," he mutters, when she widens her stance a little, slides her hands up inside his undershirt; he keeps waiting to get to the point where he's not ready to go twenty-four hours a day with her, but it, uh. Hasn't happened yet. "Dinner."
"Fine, fine." She trails him into the kitchen and boosts herself up on the counter, snagging a banana. It's her favourite food-preparation position, at least that Sam can tell (he figures it has something to do with limiting the tasks he can assign to her, which: nice try).
"How do you feel about fries?" he asks. He's got a bag of the junk kind sitting in his freezer, bright orange with zero nutritional value; he bought them on impulse last week when they were working opposite shifts. Apparently that's a thing he does now: think about her in the frozen food aisle. He minds less than he would've expected.
"Well, you know." She leans over to drop a mushy piece of banana into the green bin. "It's not popcorn, but..." When he pulls them out she switches her tune fast, mock-gasping in delight. "Curly fries? Oh my god, I—you are my hero." She reaches up into the cupboard above her for a pan. "Like, I'm pretty sure you've been body-snatched, but it's cool. I can deal."
"As long as the alien clones support your junk food habit, eh?" He takes the pan from her, auto-pilot, but he's not—he's pretty sure what she was going to say just then, and— well. The rookies throw it around all the time (just yesterday Diaz brought Nash a cup of coffee at the tail-end of her night shift; "omigosh, love you, seriously") so it's not like she would have meant—
So. No point in dwelling then. He sets the bag of fries on the counter, starts looking around for the scissors.
(It's not like he's never said it to a woman before: Jodie, who he dated back in the Academy; Corinne, who he lived with in Montreal. It's been a while, though. Lately Sam's been trying to remember how he did it and can't, really, only that it felt like a non-event, the natural progression of things. He doesn't remember thinking about it that much.)
They're not in the basket on the counter, the scissors, or the mug of mostly-dead pens over by the phone. He's about to say screw it and use a steak knife when Andy pulls her stocking feet up onto the counter and opens the drawer underneath her, digs until she finds them. "Here." Then, off his expression: "What? That's what you wanted, right?"
Which—yeah, but the fact that she knew where to look—
(He knows where shit is at her place, too, he guesses. Once they finally got her stuff moved in, halfway through their suspension and with two different breaks to check the integrity of her new bed, she tossed him her extra set of keys. "It's just for, like, emergencies," she called over her shoulder, something terribly pressing that needed her attention in the dining room all of a sudden. "Like if I get locked out or something. And you're still my partner, technically. So don't, you know. Get any ideas."
"Sure thing," Sam said, no comment. Emergencies, right, except Nash lives twenty minutes closer than he does, so.)
"Yeah." He takes the scissors, blade-out because McNally never paid attention in kindergarten; she holds her pen wrong too, writing callous on her inner thumb. "That's what I wanted." And shit, he sounds way-the-fuck too serious; McNally may be slow on the uptake, but she's not— He turns his attention to the fries, cutting off a corner and pouring half out into the pan. Authentic southern style taste, the label proclaims.
(One thing Sam is sure of, with Jodie and Corrine: he didn't blurt it out in the kitchen because they knew where the scissors were.
Remembering that, though— really doesn't cut the current urge.)
"Oooh." Andy leans over and chucks the last bits of banana, balancing herself with one foot against Sam's hip, the toes of a sock curling into his pocket. She crams two of the fries into her mouth, frozen.
"Disgusting," Sam pronounces, flicking on the stove to preheat; Andy shows her him her pulpy tongue in retaliation. (Only then it takes Sam half a beat to respond, because eye-contact is apparently not a thing he's handling well right now, half-chewed food or no.)
"Disgusting," he says again finally, too slow. Andy swallows her mass of frozen potato, makes a face.
"Okay, seriously," she frowns. "What gives?"
"What?" he says, recovering, reaching for the olive oil. "Nothing."
"Really?" McNally rolls her eyes, glances around like she's looking for something else to snack on. He watches her consider a clementine, then decide it's too much work. "Cause you're acting like a freak."
Sam laughs a little, gets the chicken in a pan to brown up. "Body snatched," he reminds her.
"Oh, right, I forgot." She waits a beat, then: "Seriously? You're going to pull a Stoic Swarek?"
That gets his attention. "Pull a what?"
"Hey, I didn't make it up," she says, grinning like she actually did make it up, as a matter of fact, and she thinks it's pretty clever. She reaches out and grabs at the edge of his shirt, pulls until he's standing between her knees. "Yo," she says.
Sam snorts. "Yo." That gets another grin out of her; there's eyeliner or mascara or what have you smudged underneath her left eye. The oil's making popping noises. Something inside him just sort of—gives. "Can I try something?" he asks quietly. "Without you getting completely—freaked out?"
McNally raises her eyebrows, gives him this look like I think you know you can, which—true, but not so much what he's getting at. Sam flattens his hands on her thighs.
(God, he doesn't know why he's so—like, it's a nice thing to hear, right? Conceivably people enjoy being told, so really—
He thought about saying it in bed, actually, where she likes to hear all sorts of things he guesses she wouldn't otherwise—that she's beautiful, perfect, that he likes her just like this; good girl, which he gets away with just about nowhere else—but it felt too... Sam doesn't know. Like a cop out.
So.
Here they are.)
"Okay," he tells her, and from her expression it's beginning to dawn on her they aren't talking about sex positions. "I'm gonna say this, and you're going to count to ten before you respond, alright?" He's pretty sure she isn't going to actually run, but: precautions. He rubs his hands down over her knees, takes a breath. (And it's Andy, seriously, it is just Andy, this morning he watched her hop around while trying to shave her bikini line in the shower—not to mention Sam is almost forty years old, christ, he is a grownup, and there is no earthly reason why he can't just tell a girl he--)
"I love you." It actually comes out a lot easier than he expected.
Well.
She doesn't run.
She opens her mouth and closes it again before she remembers she's supposed to count—which she actually does, like it's procedure she's been trained in, how to keep calm during emergencies. He sees her mouth the five, lips just barely moving. Sam watches the whole time.
And it is—uh. It is a long ten seconds.
(She wanted to meet his sister, month or so ago: "She's young," Sarah said, when McNally got up to go to the bathroom, half-eaten caesar salad and her dark eyebrows arcing in that way that turns her into the spitting image of their mother. Also: "Your face does a nice thing when you look at her."
Sam doesn't know why he's thinking about that right now.)
Finally, Andy blinks. "Um," she says, and raises her chin at something behind him. "Chicken's burning."
Sam lets out a breath he didn't notice he was holding, rolls his eyes (it's more or less the exact reaction he was expecting, so. No big deal). "Yeah," he tells her through a sigh, leaning over to flick off the stove top, "it definitely is." He doesn't even have time to start looking before Andy's handing him an oven mitt, this expression on her face like she's been lobotomized.
(So, you know. Not everyone likes to hear it then. That's fine.)
He's halfway through turning the fries before she speaks again: "I'm not—" He looks over and she's got her feet back on the counter, knees up under her chin. Her face is sharp and serious. "Like—Sam."
Sam closes his eyes; one, two, three and open. "McNally," he answers. Only she's staring at him like someone died, so— "Try not to over think it. I wanted to tell you, so I've told you. Alright?"
"But Sam—" she's talking on a rising whine now, definitely panicking. Probably he's going to have to take some steps here.
"McNally," he says. "I mean it. End of discussion." He gets the fries back into the oven and the burnt-ish chicken (blackened, sure, it can go with the authentic southern fries) in there to finish off. "Look, I think there's still a bag of salad in the drawer in the fridge. Check and see if it's too brown to eat, will you?"
Andy brightens marginally at being presented with a task, hops down and finds herself a bowl. They eat sitting on the stools at his kitchen counter (well. Sam sits on a stool at the counter; McNally jumps up so many times to get stuff she forgot she needed that she basically wolfs her entire dinner pacing his kitchen floor: mustard. Ice. New knives, to replace the two she drops onto the tile). She still won't look at him hardly at all.
(He's not sorry he said it. It's the truth; it has been the truth for a while, on top of which he meant what he told her back in the crappy cover apartment: no going back.
Still—)
Sam pushes the rest of his fries onto her plate (salt, is what that authentic seasoning is; it is salt), scratches a bit at the back of his neck. "McNally," he says quietly. "You want me to take you home?"
Andy brings her head up so fast it's almost comical, knocks her third knife onto the floor. "What? No, I—" She finally looks at him, three parts deer-in-the-headlights, one part flinch, like maybe she's worried he's going to level some more feelings her way (which—yeah, Sam thinks he's about done with that for now. Maybe they can try again in, oh, say, five years). Then she looks down at the knife, as if she's just noticing. "Crap, I'm sorry," she blurts, and suddenly she's all movement again, hopping off her stool. "I'll do the dishes, I swear."
"McNally," Sam scrubs a hand over his face. "You don't need to do that."
"No, I'm good, I promise." She pushes her hair out of her eyes, earnest. "I was a dishwasher for a bit in high school; I mispronounced names too much to be a hostess, apparently, plus I couldn't make my bangs do the—the—" she gestures. "The weird poufy thing everyone had going on, so—"
Jesus christ, she's like a one-woman french farce. "McNally."
"—so these dishes are like, no problem, really, just— Don't take me home." Out of the blue, like Sam's going to make her leave or something. "I'm sorry, I'm not— don't take me home."
"Okay, okay," Sam says, holding up his hands. "Just thought you might want some, you know." He shrugs, tries grinning at her a bit. "Time and space."
It takes her a minute to smile back, that look on her face that she gets when she thinks he's acting like a weirdo, Sam, seriously. McNally sticks a fry in her mouth and chews.
She does, though—smile. Just halfway at first, then bigger, shaking that dark pretty head.
(Something in his chest relaxes. Just a bit.)
In the end they watch Tomb Raider anyway, Andy's head in his lap and both of her arms wrapped around a throw pillow like a life preserver, one of his hands sifting cautiously through her hair. "That feels nice," she mutters quietly, so he keeps doing it, and by the next commercial she's passed out cold.
(She sleeps when she's stressed out, McNally: when shit was going down with Callaghan she started nodding off everyplace, two minutes at a time until somebody nudged her awake. In the car and doing paperwork, twice during parade; at first he just thought it meant she wasn't sleeping through the night but then he realized it was literally the only way she could power her thoughts down, her body's way of pulling the plug.)
"McNally," he says, when the credits are rolling. One of the Pirates movies is on next and Sam's got no intention of sitting through it; her skull is hard and heavy against his thigh. "Come on, sweetheart. Bed." And normally he'd put her over his shoulder or something, let her stay as asleep as possible, but he's not—somehow it doesn't feel like that kind of night.
He watches Andy shove herself up off the couch instead, do the blind-man stumble to the bedroom. He figures she's going to pass out again immediately, clothes and all, but she pauses in the doorway; Sam looks up from taking off his socks and she's just standing there, back-lit from the hallway so he can't see her face. She's still clutching that throw pillow.
"Did you—" She licks her lips, starts again. "You, uh. You meant it then?"
That makes him laugh. "Yeah, sweetheart. I meant it."
He hears her sigh. "Okay," she says, and it sounds a bit like she's pep-talking herself ("You can do this," she told the mirror, the morning their suspension ended; Sam raised his eyebrows, kept brushing his teeth). She shoves a hand through her hair. "Okay." Then she's dropping the pillow, toeing off her socks and jeans, tugging off her shirt. She climbs into his lap, warm and naked, arms slung around his shoulders.
Sam touches up her back (and he doesn't know why—three words and suddenly he's careful with her). "McNally. We have shift tomorrow."
"I know," she says softly, that voice again like she thinks he's pissed at her, like she thinks he's gonna tell her to get lost. "But." She buries her face against his shoulder, nose bumping his collarbone, her breath hot and damp on his skin. "Unless—do you not want to?"
"Andy—" Sam sighs low and quiet, fits his fingers into the familiar notches of her spine. "I always want to. But you don't—you don't need to prove—"
Andy shifts forward in his lap, an invitation. "I'm not proving anything," she says. She nudges him backwards, one hand breaking their fall against the pillows. Sam hits the mattress with a quiet thud. Her mouth trails down the line of his jaw, teeth scraping at the stubble on his chin, just lightly. Andy rocks her hips.
(and god, he does, he wants to. It's probably not such a bright idea.)
But Andy's already wrestling off his jeans, hooking a thumb in the waistband of his boxers, quick cold fingers everywhere. Only then as soon as he's naked, she just hovers, not touching, hands good and chaste on his shoulders. She's looking, Sam realizes, and man it's weird to have his shtick turned around on him like that.
She doesn't do it for long, though, like she can't hold the eye-contact (and Sam tries not to take that as a sign of...anything), leans down to kiss him instead, warm and careful and serious.
And just—
(She's almost never serious in bed, is the thing, once sang the entirety of Bloodhound Gang's Bad Touch while sitting on his cock—focused sometimes, slow and sleepy where neither of them can really lift their arms—but never like this, desperate and breathless, kissing like one of them's going off to war.)
Sam's about to stop it, take her out to the kitchen and sit her down at the breakfast table, have some sort of a talk—please don't leave me, for example—when she buries her head in his shoulder and whispers, "say it again".
And that is—that is not what he was expecting. Sam blinks once into the dark. He slides his palm across the crown of her head, tugs gently at her hair until she's looking up at him. "I love you," he tells her quietly. McNally kisses him back.
(And in bed, there you go, maybe he should have—)
She opens her hips a bit, sliding closer—still all tongue and teeth and urgency, two hands at the sides of his face. "Andy—" he starts, but she's got her eyes closed tight, bottom lip between her teeth like she's concentrating. He feels her slide forward to line them up.
"Shh." It takes her a minute to work herself all the way down—she's not as wet as she normally is, a little skittish underneath his hands. Sam strokes his thumbs across her hips. She gets there, though, deep and tight and ridiculously, unforgivably warm, and once she does she raises her head to look at him.
"Sam," she says, dark eyes wide open. "Again."
Again, christ. Sam honestly can't tell if she likes hearing it or not, the way she's just— He slides one hand between them, gets two fingers on her clit and presses down; while she's still gasping he gives her her 'again', low and serious, and the look on her face definitely isn't fear.
So.
She's not moving on him very hard yet, is mostly just keeping him deep, shifting against his fingers (and Sam thought it was on account of her not being ready, but down between them things are suddenly very—and she's still not moving, so). He starts rubbing, slow circles, until she's tipping her hips at him, a low whine starting up in the back of her throat. This time Sam doesn't need to be told: "I love you," he says, and she closes her eyes and clenches on him. Just like that. Not hard, and she doesn't make that much noise—he's willing to bet it's not the best she's ever had—but she definitely—
"Jesus, Andy," Sam pants. When she opens her eyes she still looks about a million times too serious, but also a bit smug, like maybe she likes seeing what that just did to him. Like maybe she doesn't hate hearing—
"Andy." He rubs his hands up her back, feeling more than a little wrecked. "Sweetheart. What do you want?"
"Don't know," she says immediately—only she does know, she must know, because she's nudging them over, rolling until he's on top. (She likes the weight, McNally, likes it this way more than he might have guessed she would: "What are you worried about, hurting me?" she asked, the second or third time he got her underneath him, Sam up on his elbows and Andy pulling him down, cover apartment freezing cold and neither one of them willing to get out of bed to fix it. "You're not hurting me.")
Sam gets her hands up on the pillow and laces his fingers through hers, starts moving slow and shallow. Andy breathes in. "Say it again."
Sam closes his eyes for a second. "Andy." And god, he'd feel stupid, repeating it like this, except for how it's definitely—it's working for her, jesus christ, sharp knees coming up around his rib cage, wet and hot and open down between her legs. Her feet are icy cold against his hipbones. He'll tell her as many times as she wants. Andy whines, like she's impatient to hear it; Sam rocks his hips until she gasps. "I love you, sweetheart, I—"
"—love you," Andy mutters, almost absently.
Both of them go absolutely fucking still.
"I—" Sam recovers first, shifting onto his elbows and trying to get a look at her face. He's still holding her hands, fingers laced tight and twisted, the prick of her nails. "Andy." She's got her eyes screwed shut again, like she's embarrassed; a fresh wave of shock rolls itself up Sam's spine. "Really?"
(And it's a dumb thing to say, christ, is it ever a dumb thing to say, but he seriously didn't think—he had a head start, is the thing, months and months of a head start. He reminded himself of it all the time, how he had to take it easy, wait for her to catch-up.)
"Um." Now it's fear, the look on her face—definitely fear. Her eyes are wide-open in the dark, fathoms and fathoms deep. "Sa-am," she whines, turning her face into his neck. And just—he's about to work his hand through her hair and make her look, make her start explaining (scared or not, he just—he needs to know), when: "Yeah." Hot against his collarbone, so quiet he could have misheard. But then she starts nodding, over and over, and— "Yes."
"Yeah?" Sam feels himself start to grin, something knocking loose and wide-open in his chest. (He'd only ever pictured telling her, before; how that would go, how it would feel. He'd never, ever let himself imagine what it would actually be like to—) He kisses Andy's ear, about the only part of her face he can see right now. She's still nodding, stuck on repeat, and okay, that's a whole lot of yeses being directed Sam's way, but: "Just—sweetheart. Can you say it?"
Andy sighs noisily into his shoulder, huff of warm breath against his skin. "Sam," she repeats (and god, he is—he is grinning himself stupid, he really needs to—). "I just did." She tries misdirection, rolls her hips up hard and dirty; she knows she can get a twitch out of him that way, and she does, but—
Uh-uh. Sam shifts his weight, lifts his head up so she can't keep hiding there. "McNally," he tells her softly, letting go of one of her hands so he can push her bangs back off her forehead. She slides one restless foot down the back of his calf. "Say it again."
Andy looks up at him and scowls, her own words back in her pretty face. "Ugh," she says—head dropping back onto the pillow, hand coming up to fist in her hair. "Fine." She squeezes her eyes shut one more time, takes a deep breath and opens them. "I love you," she says, fast like they're at work and she's admitting some colossal fuckup, something she was hoping she could fix on her own. "Happy?"
(And Sam, uh. He really is.)
"Oh yeah," he tells her, starting up the rhythm again; Andy's hips stutter against his for half a beat longer than normal before she finds what he's after, pushes back. "I'm ecstatic." And even though Andy rolls her eyes at that (and she's blushing, actually, just a little), all the sarcastic intonation in the world can't undercut the way Sam's grinning, so. He's pretty sure she knows exactly what he's about now.
(He doesn't especially mind.)
"Is that why you wanted to hear it?" he murmurs, leaning down to kiss her. She's twisting her mouth against a smile, stubborn. (And god, he hasn't—now that the shock's wearing off he just wants to touch her everywhere, lay her out on the bed and suck a mark on her stomach, take her out to dinner and sit with his arm around her chair all night, all his fucked-up possessive instincts kicking in at once.) "You can take it but you can't dish it out?"
"Shut up." She's lost her battle with her grin. "I said it, didn't I?"
"You did," Sam tells her, and his voice goes serious again by accident. Andy's face shifts into something open and lovely in reply, that aching tension back (and jesus christ, the way she's looking at him—has she always looked at him like that? and where the fuck was Sam when she did?)
Andy wiggles her hips, biting her lip. "Sam, please." Her knees come up again, thighs spread wide and wanting, cold feet planted flat on the mattress. Sam gets himself low and deep.
"Easy, sweetheart," he tells her—more intent now, going harder until she whimpers, and he'll just—he'll give her whatever she asks for. He'll give her whatever she needs. "I got you."
(He knew from the first night in the apartment—knew from the night of the blackout, actually, and then patently refused to know it again for a year—that they were going to be absurdly compatible this way, her gasping and her legs around his waist. He used to give himself a headache not knowing it, the Bath & Body smell of her sticking to his clothes.)
Sam gets his mouth on her neck and her shoulder, fights the urge to bite hard enough to bruise. Normally she pushes off the headboard for leverage but she's got her skinny arms muscled tight around his neck, nails whisper-light at the back of his skull and slippery all the way down her thighs. Her hips come up off the bed, looking for pressure: Sam pushes deep and holds there, lets her ride him from underneath. "Fuck, Sam," she whispers, eyes sliding shut and then opening again, her whole body wired to go off. She is close. "Right—just—stay stay stay—"
Sam stays.
"That's it," he tells her softly, because he can (and she loves him, jesus fucking christ, Sam doesn't—) "Good girl."
This time she, uh. Makes some noise.
And god, she's beautiful like that, body snapping back into an arch, pretty long neck and pointy chin (it's good, this one—Sam can tell, the way she's clenching so hard and so wet). She keeps him close the entire time, arms vice-tight and shaking, grinding herself through the aftershocks.
"There," he soothes. She's got her belly pressed right up against his, stomach muscles jumping. "There you go, sweetheart."
Andy, though—she doesn't seem to want to be soothed. Is actually pulling her knees back, heels up off the mattress and absolutely no leverage for herself (but christ, it gets him so ridiculously deep—). "Come on," she pants, and fuck, she has literally—she has pretty much folded herself in half, is what she's done. "Come on, come on, go."
And just—Sam tries for nice, he does; gets a shaky hand in her hair and makes sure she doesn't knock it on the headboard or anything—but god, there's no way. Like. No way. Andy's clawing up his back, clutching and desperate, this low whine that won't quit and her thighs splayed just enough— Which all would have been fine, actually (Sam was handling it; biting her neck but keeping it soft-toothed, keeping it friendly) except then she leans in, close to his ear, and whispers, "I really— More than anything, okay?"
So. There's going to be a mark there.
"Andy." He comes hard and sudden, a feeling like he's ripping apart at the seams— like there was a missed stitch in him someplace he never knew about, a loose thread that she yanked. Andy rubs lazy circles at the back of his neck. Sam rests his forehead against her collarbone to catch his breath, lifts up enough to swipe his tongue over the bitten place. "Sorry," he mutters.
"Don't be," she tells him; then, as he's making a move to roll off her: "Don't."
Sam doesn't.
They stay like that for a while, quiet. Sam can feel her heart behind her ribs. She tilts her face up so he'll kiss her, slow and easy; he messes with her hair a bit longer, licks his way into her mouth.
(more than anything, more than—)
Sam grins again, he can't help it. He smiles right against her lips. "You're a very unpredictable woman," he tells her. He feels her laugh all the way down his spine.
Authors:
lowriseflare and threeguessesRating: R
Word Count: 5, 822
Summary: The one with the I love you.
AN: Probably we should just take this opportunity to apologise to e. e. cummings.
the syntax of things
One thing Sam knew going in: five-year plans notwithstanding, McNally is not a girl you want to spook. Like. Ever. But it's just—they've been doing this for a while now, is the thing, three months back on the job, Christmas and New Year's gone by (she let him kiss her, midnight at the Penny; Sam nearly dropped his beer bottle in shock), and he's a little— he's tired of waiting for her to catch up.
(Things he's done, lately, instead of laying it out for her: cleaned three years' worth of accumulated crap out of the closet in the front hallway. Spent a stupid amount of time lifting at the gym. And taken her to test-drive no fewer than six different economy sedans only to have her get cranky over their collective shittiness and refuse to crack a smile again until he took her home, planted her in front of an Office marathon, and ordered a pizza with extra sausage, the way she likes.
He's got the cleanest apartment in Toronto, McNally still can't decide on a fucking car, and Sam's about ready to climb out of his skin.)
It's been getting more and more difficult too. Like, Sam's used to watching himself in bed—not staring too long, not letting it get too serious—and that’s fine. That he can handle. But lately it's just been everything. On shift, a false-alarm lockdown at an elementary school, when she picks her ridiculously-slow way over the playground, not messing up a single snow fort. At the dealership, when she gets snotty and flips one of the complimentary pencils at his head. On his couch, when she's upside-down watching Top Model because "Tyra really looks like an alien like this". Everything. When she's sleeping or eating or taking a shower; when she's doing nothing at all.
Today's Saturday and sleeting—they stayed late at the Penny last night and worked this morning, both of them, came back here and passed out on the couch. It's dark when Sam wakes up. TV's flickering softly; Andy's gone, his arm asleep where he's pretty sure she was lying on it. After a second he hears the toilet flush and she pads back out into the living room, bedhead and her jeans tucked into her socks. "Hi," she says, around a yawn.
Sam smiles, scratches a bit at his chest. "Hi."
"We slept."
"Uh-huh." He glances at the clock on the cable box, tries to remember what he's got in the fridge. The blood creeps back down toward his hand, pins and needles. "How do you feel about dinner?"
Andy considers. "I..." She's literally bending over backwards, fingers laced and palms out; she'd crack every joint in her body if she could figure out how to do it, and Sam thinks she's actually gotten pretty close. "Feel as if I would like to eat some?"
Andy-speak for feed me; Sam heaves himself up off the couch, fishes around for the remote. There's some sort of dog show on, handlers running around in a circle. Andy clucks her tongue at the close-up of the Bernese, hits the power button on the bottom of the screen (and Sam didn't think she'd be the type, exclaiming over fluffy things, but there it is. She coos at babies in the supermarket too; "it's the little hats, okay?" she said one time when she caught sight of Sam's expression, which—not really why he'd been looking).
"Any feelings on what kind of dinner?" He has some peas, probably, maybe some chicken. Disgusting tolerance for takeout combinations aside, McNally's got pretty simple tastes.
"Anything." Then: "Or, you know, popcorn. The second Lara Croft's on at nine."
Sam rolls his eyes. "No way." They split his egg McMuffin after shift, haven't eaten anything since.
"But Sa-am: shark punching." She steps up into his space and leans a bit, palms scrubbing at her eyes. "Shit. Tell me we aren't working tomorrow."
"Nice try." Sam tugs a little, gets his arms around her. She smells like the hand soap in his bathroom. "On again at seven."
Andy groans into his shirt, muffled and put out. "Seriously, what is with these mornings?"
Sam's actually pretty sure what's with these mornings is that Noelle was working them until Noelle started throwing up like clockwork every day at eight-thirty, but so far nobody's confirmed that particular theory for him and he's not looking to start rumours. "Bet your Pops had to blast you out of bed with a foghorn every morning to get you to school on time."
Andy grins, tilts her face up so he can get at her mouth. "That assumes I ever got to school on time."
"Ah." Sam nods and gives her what she's after, kisses her friendly and soft. Her body's sleep-warm against his. "McNally," he mutters, when she widens her stance a little, slides her hands up inside his undershirt; he keeps waiting to get to the point where he's not ready to go twenty-four hours a day with her, but it, uh. Hasn't happened yet. "Dinner."
"Fine, fine." She trails him into the kitchen and boosts herself up on the counter, snagging a banana. It's her favourite food-preparation position, at least that Sam can tell (he figures it has something to do with limiting the tasks he can assign to her, which: nice try).
"How do you feel about fries?" he asks. He's got a bag of the junk kind sitting in his freezer, bright orange with zero nutritional value; he bought them on impulse last week when they were working opposite shifts. Apparently that's a thing he does now: think about her in the frozen food aisle. He minds less than he would've expected.
"Well, you know." She leans over to drop a mushy piece of banana into the green bin. "It's not popcorn, but..." When he pulls them out she switches her tune fast, mock-gasping in delight. "Curly fries? Oh my god, I—you are my hero." She reaches up into the cupboard above her for a pan. "Like, I'm pretty sure you've been body-snatched, but it's cool. I can deal."
"As long as the alien clones support your junk food habit, eh?" He takes the pan from her, auto-pilot, but he's not—he's pretty sure what she was going to say just then, and— well. The rookies throw it around all the time (just yesterday Diaz brought Nash a cup of coffee at the tail-end of her night shift; "omigosh, love you, seriously") so it's not like she would have meant—
So. No point in dwelling then. He sets the bag of fries on the counter, starts looking around for the scissors.
(It's not like he's never said it to a woman before: Jodie, who he dated back in the Academy; Corinne, who he lived with in Montreal. It's been a while, though. Lately Sam's been trying to remember how he did it and can't, really, only that it felt like a non-event, the natural progression of things. He doesn't remember thinking about it that much.)
They're not in the basket on the counter, the scissors, or the mug of mostly-dead pens over by the phone. He's about to say screw it and use a steak knife when Andy pulls her stocking feet up onto the counter and opens the drawer underneath her, digs until she finds them. "Here." Then, off his expression: "What? That's what you wanted, right?"
Which—yeah, but the fact that she knew where to look—
(He knows where shit is at her place, too, he guesses. Once they finally got her stuff moved in, halfway through their suspension and with two different breaks to check the integrity of her new bed, she tossed him her extra set of keys. "It's just for, like, emergencies," she called over her shoulder, something terribly pressing that needed her attention in the dining room all of a sudden. "Like if I get locked out or something. And you're still my partner, technically. So don't, you know. Get any ideas."
"Sure thing," Sam said, no comment. Emergencies, right, except Nash lives twenty minutes closer than he does, so.)
"Yeah." He takes the scissors, blade-out because McNally never paid attention in kindergarten; she holds her pen wrong too, writing callous on her inner thumb. "That's what I wanted." And shit, he sounds way-the-fuck too serious; McNally may be slow on the uptake, but she's not— He turns his attention to the fries, cutting off a corner and pouring half out into the pan. Authentic southern style taste, the label proclaims.
(One thing Sam is sure of, with Jodie and Corrine: he didn't blurt it out in the kitchen because they knew where the scissors were.
Remembering that, though— really doesn't cut the current urge.)
"Oooh." Andy leans over and chucks the last bits of banana, balancing herself with one foot against Sam's hip, the toes of a sock curling into his pocket. She crams two of the fries into her mouth, frozen.
"Disgusting," Sam pronounces, flicking on the stove to preheat; Andy shows her him her pulpy tongue in retaliation. (Only then it takes Sam half a beat to respond, because eye-contact is apparently not a thing he's handling well right now, half-chewed food or no.)
"Disgusting," he says again finally, too slow. Andy swallows her mass of frozen potato, makes a face.
"Okay, seriously," she frowns. "What gives?"
"What?" he says, recovering, reaching for the olive oil. "Nothing."
"Really?" McNally rolls her eyes, glances around like she's looking for something else to snack on. He watches her consider a clementine, then decide it's too much work. "Cause you're acting like a freak."
Sam laughs a little, gets the chicken in a pan to brown up. "Body snatched," he reminds her.
"Oh, right, I forgot." She waits a beat, then: "Seriously? You're going to pull a Stoic Swarek?"
That gets his attention. "Pull a what?"
"Hey, I didn't make it up," she says, grinning like she actually did make it up, as a matter of fact, and she thinks it's pretty clever. She reaches out and grabs at the edge of his shirt, pulls until he's standing between her knees. "Yo," she says.
Sam snorts. "Yo." That gets another grin out of her; there's eyeliner or mascara or what have you smudged underneath her left eye. The oil's making popping noises. Something inside him just sort of—gives. "Can I try something?" he asks quietly. "Without you getting completely—freaked out?"
McNally raises her eyebrows, gives him this look like I think you know you can, which—true, but not so much what he's getting at. Sam flattens his hands on her thighs.
(God, he doesn't know why he's so—like, it's a nice thing to hear, right? Conceivably people enjoy being told, so really—
He thought about saying it in bed, actually, where she likes to hear all sorts of things he guesses she wouldn't otherwise—that she's beautiful, perfect, that he likes her just like this; good girl, which he gets away with just about nowhere else—but it felt too... Sam doesn't know. Like a cop out.
So.
Here they are.)
"Okay," he tells her, and from her expression it's beginning to dawn on her they aren't talking about sex positions. "I'm gonna say this, and you're going to count to ten before you respond, alright?" He's pretty sure she isn't going to actually run, but: precautions. He rubs his hands down over her knees, takes a breath. (And it's Andy, seriously, it is just Andy, this morning he watched her hop around while trying to shave her bikini line in the shower—not to mention Sam is almost forty years old, christ, he is a grownup, and there is no earthly reason why he can't just tell a girl he--)
"I love you." It actually comes out a lot easier than he expected.
Well.
She doesn't run.
She opens her mouth and closes it again before she remembers she's supposed to count—which she actually does, like it's procedure she's been trained in, how to keep calm during emergencies. He sees her mouth the five, lips just barely moving. Sam watches the whole time.
And it is—uh. It is a long ten seconds.
(She wanted to meet his sister, month or so ago: "She's young," Sarah said, when McNally got up to go to the bathroom, half-eaten caesar salad and her dark eyebrows arcing in that way that turns her into the spitting image of their mother. Also: "Your face does a nice thing when you look at her."
Sam doesn't know why he's thinking about that right now.)
Finally, Andy blinks. "Um," she says, and raises her chin at something behind him. "Chicken's burning."
Sam lets out a breath he didn't notice he was holding, rolls his eyes (it's more or less the exact reaction he was expecting, so. No big deal). "Yeah," he tells her through a sigh, leaning over to flick off the stove top, "it definitely is." He doesn't even have time to start looking before Andy's handing him an oven mitt, this expression on her face like she's been lobotomized.
(So, you know. Not everyone likes to hear it then. That's fine.)
He's halfway through turning the fries before she speaks again: "I'm not—" He looks over and she's got her feet back on the counter, knees up under her chin. Her face is sharp and serious. "Like—Sam."
Sam closes his eyes; one, two, three and open. "McNally," he answers. Only she's staring at him like someone died, so— "Try not to over think it. I wanted to tell you, so I've told you. Alright?"
"But Sam—" she's talking on a rising whine now, definitely panicking. Probably he's going to have to take some steps here.
"McNally," he says. "I mean it. End of discussion." He gets the fries back into the oven and the burnt-ish chicken (blackened, sure, it can go with the authentic southern fries) in there to finish off. "Look, I think there's still a bag of salad in the drawer in the fridge. Check and see if it's too brown to eat, will you?"
Andy brightens marginally at being presented with a task, hops down and finds herself a bowl. They eat sitting on the stools at his kitchen counter (well. Sam sits on a stool at the counter; McNally jumps up so many times to get stuff she forgot she needed that she basically wolfs her entire dinner pacing his kitchen floor: mustard. Ice. New knives, to replace the two she drops onto the tile). She still won't look at him hardly at all.
(He's not sorry he said it. It's the truth; it has been the truth for a while, on top of which he meant what he told her back in the crappy cover apartment: no going back.
Still—)
Sam pushes the rest of his fries onto her plate (salt, is what that authentic seasoning is; it is salt), scratches a bit at the back of his neck. "McNally," he says quietly. "You want me to take you home?"
Andy brings her head up so fast it's almost comical, knocks her third knife onto the floor. "What? No, I—" She finally looks at him, three parts deer-in-the-headlights, one part flinch, like maybe she's worried he's going to level some more feelings her way (which—yeah, Sam thinks he's about done with that for now. Maybe they can try again in, oh, say, five years). Then she looks down at the knife, as if she's just noticing. "Crap, I'm sorry," she blurts, and suddenly she's all movement again, hopping off her stool. "I'll do the dishes, I swear."
"McNally," Sam scrubs a hand over his face. "You don't need to do that."
"No, I'm good, I promise." She pushes her hair out of her eyes, earnest. "I was a dishwasher for a bit in high school; I mispronounced names too much to be a hostess, apparently, plus I couldn't make my bangs do the—the—" she gestures. "The weird poufy thing everyone had going on, so—"
Jesus christ, she's like a one-woman french farce. "McNally."
"—so these dishes are like, no problem, really, just— Don't take me home." Out of the blue, like Sam's going to make her leave or something. "I'm sorry, I'm not— don't take me home."
"Okay, okay," Sam says, holding up his hands. "Just thought you might want some, you know." He shrugs, tries grinning at her a bit. "Time and space."
It takes her a minute to smile back, that look on her face that she gets when she thinks he's acting like a weirdo, Sam, seriously. McNally sticks a fry in her mouth and chews.
She does, though—smile. Just halfway at first, then bigger, shaking that dark pretty head.
(Something in his chest relaxes. Just a bit.)
In the end they watch Tomb Raider anyway, Andy's head in his lap and both of her arms wrapped around a throw pillow like a life preserver, one of his hands sifting cautiously through her hair. "That feels nice," she mutters quietly, so he keeps doing it, and by the next commercial she's passed out cold.
(She sleeps when she's stressed out, McNally: when shit was going down with Callaghan she started nodding off everyplace, two minutes at a time until somebody nudged her awake. In the car and doing paperwork, twice during parade; at first he just thought it meant she wasn't sleeping through the night but then he realized it was literally the only way she could power her thoughts down, her body's way of pulling the plug.)
"McNally," he says, when the credits are rolling. One of the Pirates movies is on next and Sam's got no intention of sitting through it; her skull is hard and heavy against his thigh. "Come on, sweetheart. Bed." And normally he'd put her over his shoulder or something, let her stay as asleep as possible, but he's not—somehow it doesn't feel like that kind of night.
He watches Andy shove herself up off the couch instead, do the blind-man stumble to the bedroom. He figures she's going to pass out again immediately, clothes and all, but she pauses in the doorway; Sam looks up from taking off his socks and she's just standing there, back-lit from the hallway so he can't see her face. She's still clutching that throw pillow.
"Did you—" She licks her lips, starts again. "You, uh. You meant it then?"
That makes him laugh. "Yeah, sweetheart. I meant it."
He hears her sigh. "Okay," she says, and it sounds a bit like she's pep-talking herself ("You can do this," she told the mirror, the morning their suspension ended; Sam raised his eyebrows, kept brushing his teeth). She shoves a hand through her hair. "Okay." Then she's dropping the pillow, toeing off her socks and jeans, tugging off her shirt. She climbs into his lap, warm and naked, arms slung around his shoulders.
Sam touches up her back (and he doesn't know why—three words and suddenly he's careful with her). "McNally. We have shift tomorrow."
"I know," she says softly, that voice again like she thinks he's pissed at her, like she thinks he's gonna tell her to get lost. "But." She buries her face against his shoulder, nose bumping his collarbone, her breath hot and damp on his skin. "Unless—do you not want to?"
"Andy—" Sam sighs low and quiet, fits his fingers into the familiar notches of her spine. "I always want to. But you don't—you don't need to prove—"
Andy shifts forward in his lap, an invitation. "I'm not proving anything," she says. She nudges him backwards, one hand breaking their fall against the pillows. Sam hits the mattress with a quiet thud. Her mouth trails down the line of his jaw, teeth scraping at the stubble on his chin, just lightly. Andy rocks her hips.
(and god, he does, he wants to. It's probably not such a bright idea.)
But Andy's already wrestling off his jeans, hooking a thumb in the waistband of his boxers, quick cold fingers everywhere. Only then as soon as he's naked, she just hovers, not touching, hands good and chaste on his shoulders. She's looking, Sam realizes, and man it's weird to have his shtick turned around on him like that.
She doesn't do it for long, though, like she can't hold the eye-contact (and Sam tries not to take that as a sign of...anything), leans down to kiss him instead, warm and careful and serious.
And just—
(She's almost never serious in bed, is the thing, once sang the entirety of Bloodhound Gang's Bad Touch while sitting on his cock—focused sometimes, slow and sleepy where neither of them can really lift their arms—but never like this, desperate and breathless, kissing like one of them's going off to war.)
Sam's about to stop it, take her out to the kitchen and sit her down at the breakfast table, have some sort of a talk—please don't leave me, for example—when she buries her head in his shoulder and whispers, "say it again".
And that is—that is not what he was expecting. Sam blinks once into the dark. He slides his palm across the crown of her head, tugs gently at her hair until she's looking up at him. "I love you," he tells her quietly. McNally kisses him back.
(And in bed, there you go, maybe he should have—)
She opens her hips a bit, sliding closer—still all tongue and teeth and urgency, two hands at the sides of his face. "Andy—" he starts, but she's got her eyes closed tight, bottom lip between her teeth like she's concentrating. He feels her slide forward to line them up.
"Shh." It takes her a minute to work herself all the way down—she's not as wet as she normally is, a little skittish underneath his hands. Sam strokes his thumbs across her hips. She gets there, though, deep and tight and ridiculously, unforgivably warm, and once she does she raises her head to look at him.
"Sam," she says, dark eyes wide open. "Again."
Again, christ. Sam honestly can't tell if she likes hearing it or not, the way she's just— He slides one hand between them, gets two fingers on her clit and presses down; while she's still gasping he gives her her 'again', low and serious, and the look on her face definitely isn't fear.
So.
She's not moving on him very hard yet, is mostly just keeping him deep, shifting against his fingers (and Sam thought it was on account of her not being ready, but down between them things are suddenly very—and she's still not moving, so). He starts rubbing, slow circles, until she's tipping her hips at him, a low whine starting up in the back of her throat. This time Sam doesn't need to be told: "I love you," he says, and she closes her eyes and clenches on him. Just like that. Not hard, and she doesn't make that much noise—he's willing to bet it's not the best she's ever had—but she definitely—
"Jesus, Andy," Sam pants. When she opens her eyes she still looks about a million times too serious, but also a bit smug, like maybe she likes seeing what that just did to him. Like maybe she doesn't hate hearing—
"Andy." He rubs his hands up her back, feeling more than a little wrecked. "Sweetheart. What do you want?"
"Don't know," she says immediately—only she does know, she must know, because she's nudging them over, rolling until he's on top. (She likes the weight, McNally, likes it this way more than he might have guessed she would: "What are you worried about, hurting me?" she asked, the second or third time he got her underneath him, Sam up on his elbows and Andy pulling him down, cover apartment freezing cold and neither one of them willing to get out of bed to fix it. "You're not hurting me.")
Sam gets her hands up on the pillow and laces his fingers through hers, starts moving slow and shallow. Andy breathes in. "Say it again."
Sam closes his eyes for a second. "Andy." And god, he'd feel stupid, repeating it like this, except for how it's definitely—it's working for her, jesus christ, sharp knees coming up around his rib cage, wet and hot and open down between her legs. Her feet are icy cold against his hipbones. He'll tell her as many times as she wants. Andy whines, like she's impatient to hear it; Sam rocks his hips until she gasps. "I love you, sweetheart, I—"
"—love you," Andy mutters, almost absently.
Both of them go absolutely fucking still.
"I—" Sam recovers first, shifting onto his elbows and trying to get a look at her face. He's still holding her hands, fingers laced tight and twisted, the prick of her nails. "Andy." She's got her eyes screwed shut again, like she's embarrassed; a fresh wave of shock rolls itself up Sam's spine. "Really?"
(And it's a dumb thing to say, christ, is it ever a dumb thing to say, but he seriously didn't think—he had a head start, is the thing, months and months of a head start. He reminded himself of it all the time, how he had to take it easy, wait for her to catch-up.)
"Um." Now it's fear, the look on her face—definitely fear. Her eyes are wide-open in the dark, fathoms and fathoms deep. "Sa-am," she whines, turning her face into his neck. And just—he's about to work his hand through her hair and make her look, make her start explaining (scared or not, he just—he needs to know), when: "Yeah." Hot against his collarbone, so quiet he could have misheard. But then she starts nodding, over and over, and— "Yes."
"Yeah?" Sam feels himself start to grin, something knocking loose and wide-open in his chest. (He'd only ever pictured telling her, before; how that would go, how it would feel. He'd never, ever let himself imagine what it would actually be like to—) He kisses Andy's ear, about the only part of her face he can see right now. She's still nodding, stuck on repeat, and okay, that's a whole lot of yeses being directed Sam's way, but: "Just—sweetheart. Can you say it?"
Andy sighs noisily into his shoulder, huff of warm breath against his skin. "Sam," she repeats (and god, he is—he is grinning himself stupid, he really needs to—). "I just did." She tries misdirection, rolls her hips up hard and dirty; she knows she can get a twitch out of him that way, and she does, but—
Uh-uh. Sam shifts his weight, lifts his head up so she can't keep hiding there. "McNally," he tells her softly, letting go of one of her hands so he can push her bangs back off her forehead. She slides one restless foot down the back of his calf. "Say it again."
Andy looks up at him and scowls, her own words back in her pretty face. "Ugh," she says—head dropping back onto the pillow, hand coming up to fist in her hair. "Fine." She squeezes her eyes shut one more time, takes a deep breath and opens them. "I love you," she says, fast like they're at work and she's admitting some colossal fuckup, something she was hoping she could fix on her own. "Happy?"
(And Sam, uh. He really is.)
"Oh yeah," he tells her, starting up the rhythm again; Andy's hips stutter against his for half a beat longer than normal before she finds what he's after, pushes back. "I'm ecstatic." And even though Andy rolls her eyes at that (and she's blushing, actually, just a little), all the sarcastic intonation in the world can't undercut the way Sam's grinning, so. He's pretty sure she knows exactly what he's about now.
(He doesn't especially mind.)
"Is that why you wanted to hear it?" he murmurs, leaning down to kiss her. She's twisting her mouth against a smile, stubborn. (And god, he hasn't—now that the shock's wearing off he just wants to touch her everywhere, lay her out on the bed and suck a mark on her stomach, take her out to dinner and sit with his arm around her chair all night, all his fucked-up possessive instincts kicking in at once.) "You can take it but you can't dish it out?"
"Shut up." She's lost her battle with her grin. "I said it, didn't I?"
"You did," Sam tells her, and his voice goes serious again by accident. Andy's face shifts into something open and lovely in reply, that aching tension back (and jesus christ, the way she's looking at him—has she always looked at him like that? and where the fuck was Sam when she did?)
Andy wiggles her hips, biting her lip. "Sam, please." Her knees come up again, thighs spread wide and wanting, cold feet planted flat on the mattress. Sam gets himself low and deep.
"Easy, sweetheart," he tells her—more intent now, going harder until she whimpers, and he'll just—he'll give her whatever she asks for. He'll give her whatever she needs. "I got you."
(He knew from the first night in the apartment—knew from the night of the blackout, actually, and then patently refused to know it again for a year—that they were going to be absurdly compatible this way, her gasping and her legs around his waist. He used to give himself a headache not knowing it, the Bath & Body smell of her sticking to his clothes.)
Sam gets his mouth on her neck and her shoulder, fights the urge to bite hard enough to bruise. Normally she pushes off the headboard for leverage but she's got her skinny arms muscled tight around his neck, nails whisper-light at the back of his skull and slippery all the way down her thighs. Her hips come up off the bed, looking for pressure: Sam pushes deep and holds there, lets her ride him from underneath. "Fuck, Sam," she whispers, eyes sliding shut and then opening again, her whole body wired to go off. She is close. "Right—just—stay stay stay—"
Sam stays.
"That's it," he tells her softly, because he can (and she loves him, jesus fucking christ, Sam doesn't—) "Good girl."
This time she, uh. Makes some noise.
And god, she's beautiful like that, body snapping back into an arch, pretty long neck and pointy chin (it's good, this one—Sam can tell, the way she's clenching so hard and so wet). She keeps him close the entire time, arms vice-tight and shaking, grinding herself through the aftershocks.
"There," he soothes. She's got her belly pressed right up against his, stomach muscles jumping. "There you go, sweetheart."
Andy, though—she doesn't seem to want to be soothed. Is actually pulling her knees back, heels up off the mattress and absolutely no leverage for herself (but christ, it gets him so ridiculously deep—). "Come on," she pants, and fuck, she has literally—she has pretty much folded herself in half, is what she's done. "Come on, come on, go."
And just—Sam tries for nice, he does; gets a shaky hand in her hair and makes sure she doesn't knock it on the headboard or anything—but god, there's no way. Like. No way. Andy's clawing up his back, clutching and desperate, this low whine that won't quit and her thighs splayed just enough— Which all would have been fine, actually (Sam was handling it; biting her neck but keeping it soft-toothed, keeping it friendly) except then she leans in, close to his ear, and whispers, "I really— More than anything, okay?"
So. There's going to be a mark there.
"Andy." He comes hard and sudden, a feeling like he's ripping apart at the seams— like there was a missed stitch in him someplace he never knew about, a loose thread that she yanked. Andy rubs lazy circles at the back of his neck. Sam rests his forehead against her collarbone to catch his breath, lifts up enough to swipe his tongue over the bitten place. "Sorry," he mutters.
"Don't be," she tells him; then, as he's making a move to roll off her: "Don't."
Sam doesn't.
They stay like that for a while, quiet. Sam can feel her heart behind her ribs. She tilts her face up so he'll kiss her, slow and easy; he messes with her hair a bit longer, licks his way into her mouth.
(more than anything, more than—)
Sam grins again, he can't help it. He smiles right against her lips. "You're a very unpredictable woman," he tells her. He feels her laugh all the way down his spine.
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no subject
Date: 2011-10-14 09:43 pm (UTC)The part where he asks if she wants to go home and she freaks out...it just did twisty things to my stomach, is all I'm saying.
I mean, when you two write, it's always funny and sexy and Sam loves Andy, but this was SWEET, too. And just...so so good. And as long as love is being professed: I love you two.
no subject
Date: 2011-10-15 09:22 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-10-14 09:50 pm (UTC)But for seriously...I love this!
"once sang the entirety of Bloodhound Gang's Bad Touch while sitting on his cock".
Yeah, this made me laugh and then I tried to picture if she would all straight face and no mistakes or if he would purposely try to mess her up and then decided that Sam would make it his mission to make her mess up because its too good of an opportunity to pass up.
My god! She just needs to hear it, Sam! And then she says it back and he gets all possessive. Cuz before that he doesn't want to spook her, of course, but if she says it back then maybe it's okay to get her a tattoo of his name on her shoulder or something. Or not. Maybe just holding hands in the grocery store or something. Take it slow. You know.
I digress. Bravo, ladies, bravo!
WHAT'S NEXT?
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Date: 2011-10-15 09:35 pm (UTC)NEXT ON DECK: the one with the other thing (we decided to revert to dirty dirty porn for a spell).
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Date: 2011-10-14 11:44 pm (UTC)Anyway, anyway, wrapping this up now. Well done, basically, aaaand ... you're both awesome. <3
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Date: 2011-10-15 09:40 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-10-15 02:11 am (UTC)I need to read a fic like this every fucking day to survive! I think I read this one like, 10 times already!
"Again"
I think I'm gonna diiiiiie!!!!!
Seriously, I love you both! You guys are awesome! Your fics are like the BEST!! You guys should post a new one every single day! NO! Better, every hour!
:D
Kisses from Brazil!
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Date: 2011-10-15 09:41 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-10-15 03:12 am (UTC)Adorable fic, ladies!
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Date: 2011-10-15 09:42 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-10-15 05:01 am (UTC)I have to admit, I expected Andy to try and bolt or Sam to have to sit her down (please don't leave me) but this was SO MUCH BETTER.
Also: "What are you worried about, hurting me? You're not hurting me."
LOVE this line because obviously Sam never wants to hurt you, Andy because HE'S ONLY LOVED YOU SINCE FOREVER.
Also, it was kind of hilarious how neither could believe that the other loved them and that Sam's first reaction was, "Really?"
We can just say that the whole thing was just made of WIN.
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Date: 2011-10-15 09:49 pm (UTC)Me: We should totally write one where Sam breaks down and confesses to feelings.
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Date: 2011-10-15 08:11 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-10-15 09:50 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-10-16 02:26 am (UTC)"and she loves him, jesus fucking christ, Sam doesn't—"
- I can't even express my love for this line. I feel like the first time she says it, he's gonna fucking cry or something LOL.
"I really— More than anything, okay?"
- I died. Can this happen on the show please because I realllllly need to see Ben Bass' facial reactions when she says this.
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Date: 2011-10-17 07:13 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-10-16 09:52 pm (UTC)One thing you guys are incredibly good at, besides ALL THE THINGS, is fleshing out the story so that it gives it history and depth and weight in addition to being super, super hot. The details, man! Like Andy kissing Sam at the Penny during New Years Eve, or Sam thinking of Andy in the frozen food aisle, or Andy meeting Sarah -- simultaneously adds to the story and MAKES ME WANT THOSE INDIVIDUAL STORIES, WHAT ARE YOU TWO THINKING?! New Year's kiss in front of everyone? YES. DO WANT.
BRB I am welding together trophies and medals, 'cause YOU TWO ARE TOP CHAMPS.
ps; if we don't get an actual-factual ILU from Sam next season -- and we must, we must, that has to happen, right? -- this story will be my canon.
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Date: 2011-10-17 07:17 pm (UTC)Oh my GOD, we must be getting an ILU next season-- like, christ, how long has he been pining? Like a year, right, it was about a year? And god knows how long the time jump is going to be (you better not jump over the ILUs, Show, I am warning you here). Point is: THAT'S A LONG TIME FOR FEELINGS TO STAY BOTTLED UP.
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Date: 2011-10-17 06:35 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-10-17 07:19 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-10-18 02:56 am (UTC)Great job! Keep them coming!! (Haha... okay I won't go there. Keep the stories coming.) :)
P.S -- When I read your stories I didn't have time to comment so consider this a warning that I'll be going back and expressing my love. Because they are all worth rereading, and telling you they make my life better.
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Date: 2011-10-22 05:58 pm (UTC)Just
Date: 2011-10-20 04:14 am (UTC)Andy here is so adorably young, and Sam just needing to get out the I Love U is quiver worthy.
Re: Just
Date: 2011-10-22 06:00 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-10-21 09:09 pm (UTC)Because they are basically LIVING TOGETHER. And they have COUPLES CODE. And she KISSED HIM IN FRONT OF EVERYONE AT NEW YEARS. And he has been thinking about it FOR A WHILE. Since about 108 unless I am very much mistaken. And she is FREAKING OUT, but only because SHE FEELS THE SAME. Do not get me wrong, the sex was SMOKING HOT, but I couldn't get past all the FEELINGS IT MADE ME FEEL. So basically, as usual, A+++++ to you both. My favourite thing about your fic is that there is always backstory. Even though you're only giving us this moment, you've basically given me 6 months of background fic. I do not know how you manage it, BUT PLEASE NEVER STOP.
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Date: 2011-10-22 06:07 pm (UTC)(The backstory is totally the most fun to write: we keep going back and filling it in. For instance, this "I love you" was backstory from...gosh, I think the one with the baby-making?)
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Date: 2011-11-26 10:21 pm (UTC)Oh god, isn't that the truth? That is Sam in a nutshell. TOTAL SAM. Giving himself a headache with his NOT KNOWING ANYTHING.
Great take on this milestone. They're so stupidly ADORABLE.
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Date: 2011-11-28 06:55 pm (UTC)