#Rothwell temperance band

[paulharness12345]

Carol concert

[oneshallop]

Butterflies at AO3

Lucy yanked her arms from the sleeves of her coat. She was snarling. “You took too long! Lockwood could have been seriously injured.”

“I know, I just. I was overwhelmed, and I was scared—" Holly tried to explain.

“It was a simple job. You unclip one end of the chain and then the other, and then you lay the chain down on the ground in an interlacing circle!”

Lucy huffed out a short breath. For any of the younger agents of the Rothwell band she would have held her temper, but Holly always drew out the worst in her. She was obviously steeling herself now: the way she stiffened her shoulders, the roll of her lips as she pursed them. Holly looked perfect even after a ten-hour stakeout.

“We’re all scared, it’s a part of the job. You can’t use that as an excuse.”

“Lucy,” Holly said quietly. “Why is it that, no matter what I do, I am never good enough for you?”

The candor of the question lanced Lucy’s anger. This was as out of control as Lucy had ever seen her, but then Holly did something that threw her off even more: she wrapped an arm around the curve of her waist, tipped her head up, and then she kissed her.

Lucy blinked, frozen.

Holly’s lips were warm and incredibly soft. She had never kissed a girl before; in fact, she had never kissed anyone before. Were all lips this giving? A kiss: the most intimate of touches, willingly given. The whole world filled with nothing but the resonant echoes of your beating heart and the rasping of your partner’s breath. Lucy thought that the first shy touch of Cupid and Psyche could not have felt more obscenely private.

Holly had uncharacteristically left the curtains open. Lucy could see their reflected figures in the big window of the living room. Holly was taller than she was, and yet she did not tower over herself. Holly had met her, tentatively asking, halfway. Holly was wearing Lockwood’s jumper—which Lucy resented—but she was also wearing her old coat. She looked better in it than Lucy ever had.

“Holly?” Lucy asked. Later, she would think back on this moment and wince: she sounded years younger than her age. A girl adrift at sea in unfamiliar tides.

Holly smiled, a bitter twist of a thing. She ran her thumb over Lucy’s lips, and then she stepped away.

“It’s okay, Lucy,” said Holly, like she was soothing a lost child. Comforting, even though she was the one with a sheen in her eyes. “Do you know, I think I left something in my room.”

Holly’s voice was quite steady, but she turned away so Lucy couldn’t see her face. She fled the room.

Lucy could only stare after her. “I, uh, sure,” she said, long after Holly was gone. “Whatever you need.”