patterns_bloom | For Cassidy

For Cassidy

Alana's hands are already exploring Cassidy's chest as soon as she shuts the door to her room. She'd told him she wasn't opposed to sex, and not only is she willing, she's downright enthusiastic. She nips his ear between her teeth, pushing him against the door with her hands on his thin shoulders. Alana thanks her lucky stars that she's wearing her tallest heels; at 6' tall, Cassidy dwarfs her mere 5'1".

Her living room behind her, should Cassidy be distracted enough to glance at it, is neat as a pin. Decorated tastefully in sage green and white, the room hosts two plush chairs and a just-as-plush couch with soft throws. The seats are set up around a polished coffee table to facilitate conversation. A gas fireplace rests in the corner, waiting to be turned on. Dark bookshelves lined with color-coded books and silver and blue vases flank an open doorway, which teases at a bedroom beyond.

Alana tries to arrest Cassidy's attention by sucking on his collarbone.

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He eyes her as she sits up so formally and he wilts, exhaling a sigh. Yeah, he's definitely fucked this up.

"Well. Y'see, Alana, the thing is--"

just say it

"--I'm a 119-year-old vampire."

Alana blinks at him. Twice. She draws a slow breath, and exhales through closed lips. Her thoughts about his revelation don't show on her face, but her pensive expression definitely means that she's thinking.

Soon, she comes to a decision. She reaches out and grasps his hand.

"Only in Milliways, right?" Alana says, a smile curving her lips. "Thank you, so much, for your honesty, Cassidy. That must have been really difficult." She tilts her head, appraising him. "I've never been with a vampire before, but I'm still willing to try."

In that moment of silence Cassidy expects to be thrown out at any second.

So when Alana takes his hand instead, it's...pretty jarring.

He looks at her in disbelief, a bit at a loss for words.

"What-? You mean-- you're not gonna tell me to fuck off?"

Being a vampire is the least of Cassidy's sins. But he's gotten this far, and maybe there's a chance for him to do better.

"No," Alana says, squeezing his hand. She tries to be reassuring with her smile. "You are what you are, and have been for quite some time, if I'm guessing correctly. I'm not offended at your existence."

He snorts a bit of a relieved laugh at that.

"Okay."

A beat.

"But I'm not, like-- magical or sparkly or shite like that, like the vampires you might've heard about in books or movies or whatever. I don't have fangs and I'm not gonna bite you, so you don't hafta worry about that."

Alana's answering laugh is also relieved, though hers holds shades of amusement, too. "Not sparklely. Got it," she says, beaming at him. "But if you don't have fangs, how do you bite people?"

He's relieved that she's relieved, too, and still laughing.

"Ooh, well," he says with once again a series of sheepish expressions of the you don't wanna know kind, "messily, but I don't bite people. In general. Trust me, it's not romantic at all. Besides, I'm fine with other sources of blood, an' I only really need it to heal an' to just, y'know, keep living."

He counts off on his fingers. "Other things that aren't true: garlic, I love garlic, garlic bread is one of my favorite things; mirrors, I can see myself perfectly well, how d'ye think I put my fabulous outfits together every day; crucifixes, a symbol of centuries of religious oppression but they're not gonna burn me face off; sleepin' in a coffin, turnin' into a bat, fuck that nonsense; and....I think that's it. Oh, but sunlight, that's not good, not good at'all. I mean I can still go about outside, but I need to cover up every inch of skin, wear shades, sunscreen, all that. ...So. There ya have it."

That actually kind of felt good to get out of the way.

Alana blinks at the deluge of information, but eases into a smile when he finishes speaking.

"Well," she says. "I think you've answered all of my questions, and some I didn't know I had. Thank you for telling me, Cassidy. I appreciate that you feel that you can be open with your secrets."

Then she presses a shy kiss to the corner of his mouth.

Cassidy does have a tendency to ramble, but at least the information was pertinent and there were no tangents.

The little kiss is a surprise, though. A pleasant surprise, as is everything that Alana's done thus far. Cassidy isn't really used to it. Or thinks that he deserves it.

"Well. Thanks for not tryin' to stake me."

Another pause.

"That also isn't true, by the way," he adds wryly.

And then he just goes ahead and kisses her, slow and deep, cupping her cheek in his hand.

Alana's about to answer, but then Cassidy kisses her, and all the thoughts fly out of her head. She doesn't protest the return to making out, at all. She scratches his scalp in small circles with her fingernails, parting her lips to his. Alana's breath is hot and sweet, and Cassidy's fills her lungs. She moans into his mouth, teasing his tongue with hers.

He tips his head and leans into the kiss, passionately meeting her tongue with his own as he sweeps the pad of his thumb over her cheekbone. Encircling her shoulders with his other arm, he holds her close, content to indulge himself and let her indulge as well.

Eventually, after a few long, heated moments, Cassidy gently breaks the kiss and strokes Alana's hair.

"Shall we continue this in the bedroom?" he asks, his voice low and rough, like gravel, smoke, and whiskey.

"Yes," Alana says, arching into him. Her own voice is deep and husky, fueled by passion. She stands from the couch, her knees a bit wobbly, and leads him through the bookcase-flanked door, kicking her heels off along the way.

The night promises to be long and wild.

He beams at her with a toothy grin and gets up, following her with his eyes set on her cute behind. Which he reaches for to give a playful little goose. Because he can't resist.

Look, he may be old, but he's not exactly mature.

And there are a couple of good things about being a vampire in this situation: a century of experience, and stamina.

So once their clothes are shed, they roll themselves up in each other, and have quite a wild night indeed.

*

The sheets are rumpled and tangled. The mattress might have ended up slightly askew. And Cassidy might have accidentally knocked over the bedside lamp in his enthusiasm, sorry Alana.

But after Cassidy flops onto his back, sprawling out with a groan and a look of bliss on his face, all becomes mostly quiet and still in the room.

Mostly still and quiet, yes. Their soft breathing fills the room as the companionable silence stretches. But, eventually, Alana breaks it.

"Mmm," Alana says, stretching her arms above her head and arching her back off the mattress. She rolls over and loops an arm across his shoulders, pressing a kiss to his ribs. "That was good."

Cassidy utters a rough chuckle. "Aye, it was pretty damn good," he hums in agreement.

He folds an arm around her and lazily runs his other hand through her hair.

"Y'know, if someone told me yesterday that I'd end up in bed with a hot gun-toting psychology professor, I'd've laughed in his face an' called him mad."

Alana laughs softly. Her fingers skate abstract patterns over his barw chest. "I'm glad I could surprise you," she says, beaming at him. "And you surprised me, too, in many, many ways. I bet we each still have surprises in us yet."

He closes his eyes for a moment.

"Oh, aye, I'm just full of surprises," he murmurs. Rather ambiguously. But it's still true.

He opens his eyes again and stretches, putting one hand behind his head.

"What about you, then? What's your story?"

Alana's fingers stop moving. She sighs, and rests her cheek on his pectoral muscle. "My story is depressing, I'm afraid. Do you know Hannibal Lecter?"

Cassidy could tell her a thing or two about depressing, but this is not the depressing Olympics, and he's actually concerned about her when her tone shifts.

"Hannibal Lecter?"

Thank goodness Alana can't see his face because what, the serial killer from the movies?

"Know him? No, I-- never met him."

what

"Why? What's he got to do with you?"

Alana buries her face in his chest, drawing a deep breath through her nose. Her shoulders tremble for a moment, and then she raises herself up on her elbows to look him in the eye. Her gaze is filled with steel.

"Back home, Hannibal Lecter has me pinned in his office, lying in wait to kill me. I've been avoiding going home to face him for a year and a half, waiting on someone who has promised to return with me. I'm bored out of my skull."

"Whoa-- wait-- what?"

His mind races to process this. It's almost as absurdly trippy as going to Star Wars world.

"Jaysus, so you-- you've pretty much been trapped here? By a killer?"

"Yes," Alana says, her breath escaping her in a quiet sigh. She clenches her fists against his chest. "My fear of him has held me back. And to make matters worse, he comes here, from my future, and tortures me about it. I recently talked to Security, and they told me that that is outside business and to call them next time it happens."

"Now, hang on a sec-- a future Hannibal comes here," he says, pausing, as if to make sure he's got that right. To let it sink in.

"So, like, the future where he knows what's happened to you. What he'd done."

His voice takes on a bit of an edge.

"And he's been holdin' it over your head for all this time?"

"Exactly," Alana says, setting her jaw. When she speaks, her words are a shade bitter. "There was a long time where he wouldn't tell me whether I'd even survived or not. He used to tease me about some huntress. Then he told me that lived after all, and had had a child, though he wouldn't tell me who with. All while insisting that he couldn't tell me anything, because that would change my future."

That's fucked up.

"What a right bloody bastard," he mutters, a slight curl to his upper lip.

Cassidy isn't generally a threatening presence, though his appearance and attitude lend him an air of a typical 'bad boy' or some degenerate punk. But there is always something dangerous lurking just beneath the surface. And sometimes it shows.

He brushes her hair over her shoulder and sweeps his hand down her arm.

"D'ye need help?"

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