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belleetlabeast · 3 years ago

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AMAZING! I freaking love it and I can’t wait for more. I’m just a sucker for a Bradshaw x Mitchell!daughter pairing.

daydreaming - ii

summary: Tess tries to figure out what Rooster wants from her. It doesn't end well.

bradley bradshaw x tess mitchell

word count: 5k

warnings: swearing, fluff, angst (happy ending in pt 3 i promise), small age gap (about 5 years), daddy issues, best friends to lovers and it's very complicated.

a/n: once again, i was sure this was only going to be two parts and now it's three. so.... sorry?

i debated talking about Tess's mom in this fic and decided against it cause it doesn't add or take anything away from the story. i just imagine Carole took her under her wing after she found out and the two of them kept Bradley and Tess close so they would always have some sort of family around.

italics are flashbacks, regular text is about one year after the mission

part ii is brought to you by Coca-Cola, Shania Twain, and ABBA

masterlist || pt.I || pt.III

Tess’s feet pounded heavily on the sidewalk by the time she reached the Hard Deck. Penny’s house wasn’t far from her bar and Tess’s head had been a mess for nearly a week, spinning out of control since the second she laid eyes on Bradley. She cleaned her room, bathroom, kitchen, and Amelia’s room all before noon and still, there was no reprieve from the tsunami that her mind had become.

Months ago, she’d read in a blog post about connecting mental and physical health - its clever title Running From Your Brain: All the way you can connect your body and mind was what drew her in - that running was a great way to clear one’s mind, so, after digging through still unpacked boxes and every closet in Penny’s modest home, she laced up her dusty sneakers and headed out into the early California afternoon, hell-bent on calming the raging storm.

Moments after the initial high wore off and her lungs started fighting that burn from rough breaths, it seemed like it was going to work, like the Bradley shaped shadow that was following her around had finally subsided. It was only her, the sun, and the pavement beneath her cushioned toes. The pain of her breath washed away any other thought, because how could you think of anything else when your entire body was screaming at you to just stop. Tess always relished in this sort of feeling, she loved being able to feel the muscles in her body change and shape themselves anew, molding themselves into what was needed to complete the task.

Bradley always teased her about never becoming a pilot, and he would tell anyone that would listen that she had a preternatural sense up in the air. ‘It’s scary how much of a natural she is’, he would always say.

Tess didn’t know if it was just pure genetics, or if it had something to do with the fact that she took her first ride in the cockpit of an F-14 when she was just five years old. Her mom had nearly lost her head when Tess came home that night and immediately started sharing all about how daddy had taken her up in his plane. Pete let her sit right up in the front with him, she was so tiny he was able to buckle her into his seat with him, and he was confident in his ability to keep her safe - it was just a short fly around the island after all.

Tess wasn’t allowed inside a plane again until she was twelve.

Then Mav taught her to fly his Mustang when she was sixteen, a month before she got her driver's permit - he insisted she learn to fly before she learned to drive. She was a natural, and Tess would never forget that first time she snuck out of the house and into Bradley’s Bronco, nearly getting caught by Ms. Henderson’s yappy chihuahua, the two of them a giggling mess all the way to the runway. He snuck them through security and she got them into the air before anyone caught them. The sound of his silence and awe was something she still dreamt of.

She expected someone to be waiting for them once they landed, expected a good, stern talking to about how dangerous it is to steal a plane and fly without any kind of clear pattern. But only Maverick was waiting when they touched down, arms crossed over his jacketed chest, fighting a smile as Bradley and his daughter walked sheepishly toward him.

The one thing Pete was sure to never forget was how Bradley reached out his hand and grabbed Tess’s, putting himself in the line of fire, fully ready to take any and all blame for the night’s activities. Pete could only point to the exit, following them on his motorcycle all the way to Tess’s house, making sure she was inside before he cruised away.

None of them brought it up again.

Tess let out a small curse as the ball of yarn that had become her mind once again became unraveled. The image of Bradley sitting outside her childhood home pulling at all the loose ends.

Tess and Bradley avoided any serious conversation about their relationship like the plague. For years and years it was just something fun while they were together, something simple, and Tess liked to think they remained best friends for all of these years because of it.

But suddenly, it was holding hands out in public, kissing in front of anyone and everyone, a hand always somewhere on her body, as if he needed to be grounded by her. He was with her every second he wasn’t training, searching her out, spending hours sitting at the bar while she worked, sneaking into Penny’s house in the dead of night because he couldn’t sleep without her. Small, absentminded things that were never there before but Bradley acted as if they had always been like this. Like it had always been so easy.

It made Tess want to vomit.

All those years pining after him, waiting for him to just notice that she was so deeply in love with him, waiting for him to stop running away from her for just a second long enough to see her see them see the good in staying.

Tess knew how much he loved his job, how much he loved flying and she would never fault him for that, but he was so scared of leaving someone the way Goose left Carole.

The way Goose left him.

So what was different now? What was so different about this mission that had him clinging to her every night, every second he was around?

And why was she getting her damn hopes up?

But by the end of the run that was supposed to help clear her mind Tess felt no relief and instead had one extra question buzzing around her brain.

Who the fuck runs for fun?

She pushed the wooden doors open, knowing Penny would be in there doing her usual daily bookkeeping, and promptly fell to the ground, something she wouldn't dream of doing on any other day had she not cleaned said floors the night before. There was nothing quite like scrubbing a sticky floor for hours to distract from the chaos of life.

“Fuck. Running,” she managed to get out between labored breaths. Amelia appeared above her, lights casting an angelic glow around her head, and handed her a glass of water. “You’re an angel.”

Amelia just laughed and walked back over to her spot at the bar. “You’re welcome. Mom’s in the office if you’re looking for her.”

Tess sat up to take a sip, eyes blurring for a moment at the sudden movement, before focusing on the back door, and the ocean that waited just outside, which she was sure could cool her off much faster than the small glass in her sweaty hands. So she stood, dusted invisible dirt off her running shorts and placed the glass on the countertop as she walked by, making sure to ruffle Amelia’s hair as she passed, just for good measure.

“Tell you mom I’m good to close tonight when she comes back out.” Tess popped her shoes off when she got to the back door, briefly hoping that they and her socks wouldn’t stink up the place while she took a quick dip, “and can you grab me a towel from the closet? I’m going to go jump in the ocean to cool off.”

“Enjoy the view,” was all Amelia said, waving a hand without turning around, head buried in some textbook.

Tess was only mildly confused about that statement until her eyes adjusted to the bright sun and she was met with a team of abs and wet, sweaty sun-skin that had her jaw dropping in utter surprise. The team of aviators playing right where the water was cresting the sand didn’t notice her walking towards them, and she was thankful for the couple minutes she got to just stand and watch them play some strange version of football, sure it was something Maverick cooked up.

She spotted Bradley quickly, picking his tall, golden haired head out from the crowd while she slowly meandered down the sand and laughed as he scored a touchdown, chest bumping his teammate while Hondo blew his whistle and Tess’s mind was once again an ocean of questions she had no answers to.

And Tess had never been happier. Or more terrified.

The worry that pelted her chest every time she thought about this mission left her gasping for breath in the middle of the night. Bradley and Maverick refused to tell her more than the sheer basics and it had her laying in bed every night for the past week staring at the ceiling while the fan made slow rotations above her, memorizing the feel of Roosters muscled shoulders under her arms, fingers tracing lines across his back while his sleeping head rested on her chest.

Maverick spotted her after another play and ran up the beach to where he had a chair and towel set up, almost as if he knew she would show up (or maybe it was just a spot for the old man to rest when the young ones wore him down), abandoning his team in favor of sitting with her. They protested - loudly - but he waved them off without a second glance.

“Hey kid,”

“Hey, Mav,”

He reacted as if he’d just been punched in the gut, and Tess tried not to let it affect her. She’d kept him at an arms distance since he came back - it was just another tidal wave of questions she knew she wouldn’t get answers to. She was used to him disappearing for periods of time, that was par for the course with a father like hers, but it was always accompanied by a note, a text, a call, a damned email even. This time he was just gone. No calls, no communication at all. And Tess was at her end with him.

She still remembered the first time he left, still felt the sting that everyone else’s dad’s and mom’s and whoever lived with them all the time - were there for them. That even the ones whose parents were separated still had two homes to go to. Tess had one home - a good home - but her dad never had a home base. He was constantly switching, moving around from place to place, and it seemed like he was always gone and out of her small reach. On a boat in the middle of some ocean where contact was impossible. Even the other girl in her class - Jessica P, the name still made Tess want to roll her eyes - whose mom was in the Army, got to exchange letters while she was gone, or make phone calls and send pictures, something Jessica never let anyone forget.

On show and tell days she would bring in those letters and pictures from far away places, and then rub it in Tess’s face that she never got anything of the sort from her dad, even though Tess was absolutely sure - even at eight years old - that her dad’s job was way cooler than anything Jessica’s mom was doing, or would ever do.

She would always come home crying on those days, and Rooster - he was still just Bradley back then - would find her after a couple minutes, when she didn’t show up in his backyard like she always did after school, and hold her and tell her that her dad’s job was way cooler, and that Jessica P must be the dumbest person in the whole elementary school. And it always made Tess laugh, and even though they never really talked about their dads because it always made Bradley so sad, he would talk about all the cool things the pilots did, and he would make up stories about all the crazy things their dad’s got up to in the air.

And that was her dad. Tess got used to him not being around, got used to him showing up out of the blue, to her being shipped off to visit him whenever he had a spare moment. She knew that he loved her, knew that he wanted to be there for all the milestones, but something in him kept him away, kept him pushing towards the job in front of him. Kept him running away.

And just when she got used to him not being around, the constant ache of not having him around, Bradley joined the Navy.

“Have a nice run?” He teased, taking in her disheveled state, though the mischief in his words never quite reached his eyes.

“Fuck no, it’s so humid it felt like I was inhaling water every time I took a breath,” she laughed with him, coming to stand next to the chair he sat down in, hands on her hips while she observed their game, “what are they playing?”

“Dog fight football,” he told her, smiling at his invention, “gotta play offense and defense at the same time… You should join them, take my spot.”

“Ha, yeah right, I came out here to cool off not get even sweatier,” and she tried to calculate how quickly it would take her to run into the water before she was caught, but her odds didn’t look promising with that giant wall of aviators in her way. So, she watched Bradley again, having the time of his life with his old and new friends and her gut twisted again. “How bad is this mission?”

“Well, if everything goes to plan, not bad at all,”

And if that was supposed to make her feel better, it sure didn’t.

“So… you and Bradley?” He asked tentatively, like if he pried too hard she would come crumbling down.

“Yeah, I guess” Tess said in a huff of air, unable to help the smile that graced her lips.

“When did that happen?”

She shrugged. “I guess it’s always kinda been there.”

“Tess,” the tone of his voice made her want to run, sprint as far from him as possible because it sounded sad and like a warning and like he was about to say something she didn’t want to hear, sounded like he was about to tell her it wasn’t a good idea. To stay away from him because it wasn’t going to end in sunshine and rainbows.

But to stay away from Bradley Bradshaw would be like trying to breathe underwater.

“Sweetheart-”

“Hotshot!” Hangman spotted her before Maverick could say what he wanted to say, and Tess was thanking whoever for the perfectly timed interruption. “Get your ass over here!” His yelling alerted the rest of the crowd and then Rooster’s eyes were on her and she barely had time to get out a short string of curses before he was sprinting up the beach for her.

“Bradley! Don’t you dare!” She held out a hand and when that didn’t slow him in the slightest she turned tail and ran. Tess sprinted towards an unclear direction, looking back every couple seconds to see him getting closer and closer and she couldn’t help the screams and laughs that escaped her while he chased her.

He caught up quicker than she anticipated, arms coming around her waist and she was both surprised and impressed that they didn’t immediately topple into the sand. Instead, he spun her around and then repositioned an arm so it was under her legs to carry her bridal style over to the waiting group.

“Ew T, you’re so sweaty,” he commented when she brought her hands up around his neck to stabilize herself, but the smile on his face betrayed his words, and him lifting her slightly to place a kiss so sweet and gentle it had her toes curling, negated his words completely.

“You’re one to talk Bradshaw, I’m practically slipping off of you right now,” she laughed against his lips. And what a slip it would be, she thought, his taught, rock-hard abs under her body.

“Don’t pretend you don’t like it,” his efforts earned him a laugh so full of sunshine, her head chucked back into the light, his whole body warmed.

He only put her down once they reached the group of pilots, all yelling and cheering that she was joining the game, and once she was on her feet again, Tess ran over to give Phoenix a hug while Rooster was yelling for a time-out to the other team.

Tess made sure to send a look over to Hangman, two fingers coming to squinted eyes before she pointed at him, making sure he knew she was coming for him and he smiled motioning for her to come and get it.

They had a funny relationship, her and Jake. He had an ‘I’m the best and I know it’ attitude that never quit, but she saw through his facade the second they met. He flirted with her and she flirted right back, but she put him in his place so fast his world shifted on its axis and ever since they’ve developed a teasing friendship. Hangman knew he could let her have it cause he knew she’d give it right back to him. And Jake knew from the second Bradshaw’s eye’s landed on her, that she was completely off limits.

“All right, I’m quarterback-“

“Of course,” Tess interrupted Bradley, rolling her eyes at his macho display. The rest of their team tried and failed to hide their laughs throughout the small huddle that they now formed.

“Oh, alright Hotshot, tell me how you want it then,” his voice was rough as gravel and she hoped that the sun blocked the fact that she was turning bright red. It didn’t, and Rooster made a note to tuck that line away for later.

“You can still be quarterback, I’m gonna be your running back,” she pointed to her chest and then around to the group, assigning everyone their positions one by one until she got back to Bradley, “I’m gonna run up the left side, Nat you go right and try to distract Hangman. From what I’ve seen he more often than not leaves his left side completely open and just has Coyote hanging out back there. Now, I’m way faster than Coyote so, B, as soon as Hangman lets go of the ball, you throw it to me and I’ll be home free.”

Tess had never seen a group of Naval Aviators so quiet before.

“Holy shit, I’m so in love with you,”

Her heart might as well have been a puddle of pink heart shaped goo. A blind man seeing the sunshine for the first time couldn’t hold a candle to him at that moment. And Tess could only stare back, everything she was about to say taking an escape route from her open mouth.

She tried not to let everyone around them know that this was the first time he had ever said anything like this to her. She loved Bradley, had been in love with him for as long as she could remember. But Bradley Bradshaw didn’t love like that. His dad died before he was five years old, Maverick crushed his dreams, ripped the carpet out from under his feet and delayed his dream career, his mom died too young and he was not going to put someone else through that pain or loss that he’d been through his entire life.

It was different than saying I love you - they said that all the time. He said he was in love with her.

Thirty years of waiting and Tess was hoping for something a little more romantic, but fuck if that wasn’t the most Rooster way to do things. Flying by the seat of his fucking pants.

“Shit, I think I might be in love with you too,” Phoenix said with a laugh, breaking the silence that still fell over the group. Everyone laughed along with her and started getting hyped up, patting each other on the backs and chest bumping their way over to their new positions.

Tess could only look at Bradley and try to decipher that look behind his sunglasses. He trailed her all the way to her starting position, right behind him, and didn’t turn around until Fanboy was calling for his attention. Everything about his expression was unreadable.

Life moved in slow motion until the hike, until Fanboy released the ball to Bradley and she took off running straight for Jake. Hangman’s ego played into her plan perfectly, he held onto the ball until she was close enough to touch him, and as soon as the football left his fingertips she turned, catching Rooster’s throw to her chest and dodged Coyote’s outstretched arms all the way to the endzone. Or, wherever Hondo decided the endzone was.

Tess threw the foam ball into the sand while Hondo blew his whistle and then turned around to rub it in Hangman’s face that she bested the bastard, but her celebratory dance (which may or may not have included a tongue and fingers pressed to her forehead in the shape of an L) was cut short when Rooster ran up to her. His arms wrapped around the bottom of her thighs and he hoisted her up to the sky.

He spun her around, once, twice, and then set her down in the sand.

Tess looked up at him, that darkness taking over her green orbs, sucking the sunshine out of his chest as she turned and walked away from him.

Bradley stared for a moment, watched her walk away, watched her run her hands up and over her face into her ponytailed hair, watched her shake out her hands, wondered if he actually saw a slight tremble through her fingers or if that was just his imagination playing games with his head.

He didn’t bother explaining to the group when his feet finally caught up to the rest of his body and he took off down the beach after her.

He reached out a hand to her, landing on her upper arm that she brushed off quickly, like he’d just electrocuted her. “Sweetheart-”

“Don’t you dare.” She turned, a pointed finger coming up to tell him to keep his distance, or else, and he looked to her face, to the tears streaming down her cheeks.

He couldn’t remember the last time he saw her cry.

Other than his mom’s funeral, where even there she only shed a few tears when everyone had gone and left.

No, this was a rare side of Tess that even he rarely got to see.

“God!” She yelled, bringing her balled up fists to her eyes. “What the hell is wrong with you!?”

“Honey, I don’t-”

“Bradley!”

His spine snapped straight. As rare as it was to see her cry, it was just as rare that they used each other’s first names. Neither of them really knew how it started, but as kids they came up with so many different and funny nicknames for each other that it started to feel weird to say the other’s given name out loud. And her voice when she said it… it sent ice cracking down his veins.

He stared at her again, sure that any words that came out of his mouth right now would be the wrong ones, that his words would only unleash the angry beast that hid behind her eyes.

After too long of a pause, she finally whispered out, “what do you want from me?” and Bradley swore he felt his heart crack in his chest.

Tess couldn’t take it anymore. Her own heart felt foreign in its place, like it was someone else’s, like it didn’t fit in its spot anymore. Like it didn’t belong there.

The question danced on his tongue: “what are you talking about?” but he stopped himself before he could ask it. Because he knew what she was asking, what she needed him to say, but he wasn’t sure he could bring himself to say it. To do it. To finally put his money where his mouth was.

He just confessed that he was in love with his best friend and he couldn’t bring himself to finish the job. Snug on that perch. Same old Rooster.

They stared in silence again and when it became too much, when it became obvious that she wasn’t going to hear what she needed to hear she finally said what she’d been holding back all this time.

“You’re a coward.” Her head shook as she said it, bottom lip trembling while she blinked the tears that crested her eyes back into her head. And when he continued to say nothing she turned and walked away. Headed for the Hard Deck and for once in her life, hoped that he wouldn’t follow.

He didn’t.

Bradley begrudgingly followed Tess back to their group of friends that had now completely taken over the back of the bar, fingers lazily curled around hers while she led him through the crowd, past Hangman who was showing off to some girl at the dart board, past Coyote holding his hand over his eyes, much like that first night they’d all arrived in Miramar. Phoenix and Bob still played pool at the blue table, though it seemed that more socializing was happening than any actual game.

Tess smiled and danced her way over, head bobbing to the music coming out of the old jukebox, giving a little shoulder shimmy as she made eye contact with Halo across the room, singing the words to her friend.

It was part of her birthday surprise, having absolutely anyone and everyone he could manage to get a hold of back in this bar, where she met most of them for the first time. He even managed to get old friends from their school days crammed into the tight space. The smile on her face had been well worth the weeks of headaches, scheduling, and secrets.

Bradley pulled her closer, lifting their joined hands up for her to spin under, which she did easily, hand landing gently on his exposed wife beater, green eyes just as gentle on his face. His free hand fell gently into place on her lower back, keeping her hips close to him.

“Having a good time?” He asked, swaying her slightly to the gentler song that now played.

“The best. Thank you.”

Her lips pursed and he leaned down to place a sweet kiss onto them. Even after all this time, every time he kissed her it still felt like the first. Like that late summer in his Bronco, right before her senior year, right as he was about to leave for flight school and she had done nothing but complain all summer about how she still hadn’t had her first kiss yet. So he did the only thing he could think to do, he grabbed her face - probably a bit too rough, but she was starting to grind as his nerves - and he kissed her like he’d never kissed anyone before.

And Tess would never tell anyone this, but she never wanted to be kissed by anyone else ever again. Every first kiss after that was a pale gray compared to the searing fireworks of colors that erupted over her body that night sitting outside her house while the sun set in front of them.

“Anything for my girl,” he said against her lips once he pulled away.

“Hotshot!” Jake called, interrupting Bradley’s mission to get her out of this bar as quickly as possible. “Come get your ass kicked!”

Tess looked over to see him waving her to the darts board. They had a running competition going. She was up by one game and there was no way Jake Seresin was leaving California again before that changed.

“One of these days,” Rooster mumbled, pressing his lips to hers a few more times, not quite ready to let her move away from him.

Tess laughed. “He’s so good at interrupting us.”

She pulled away, dropping from the tips of her toes she needed to stand on to reach his face, and grabbed the beer from the hand that wasn’t on her, taking a swig.

“It’s like a radar goes off in his little pea brain.” He grumbled, and Tess let out a laugh he wanted to get tattooed on his heart.

“I better go before he causes a scene,” she said without moving her feet, as if she was waiting for any excuse not to go. “Try not to miss me too much,” she winked and walked off, his beer still in her hand.

Rooster watched her walk away, hips swaying in a way he knew was meant just for him, and it wasn’t until she reached Jake that he realized she stole his drink. He laughed, shaking his head at his wife who was now shit talking with Hangman and Coyote, the former's conquest of the night long gone and forgotten. The word - wife - still felt fresh in his mind almost a year later. The day he asked her to marry him played like a movie every time he saw her.

“Did I ever tell you,” Maverick said, appearing to Rooster’s left, “what she made me promise right before the Uranium mission?”

He looked down at Mav, who’s eyes didn’t stray from his daughter from the moment he walked through the doors.

“No, I don’t think you did,”

---

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