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g1rld1ary · 3 months

Note

hiiii🩷 i love your work and i wanted to request a drabble. i don’t know if you’ve done something like this before or not so… also im new to the whole requesting thing.

so it’s basically a lockwood x reader where lucy and george don’t know lockwood has a kinda secret gf. and one day she shows up to the door of 35 portland row and lockwood has to explain to them that he has a girlfriend. (he didn’t tell anyone to protect her or smth).

opening doors - lockwood x reader

wc: 1980

cw: mentions of an injury, one use of 'my girl' but otherwise gn i think?

an: thanku for requesting baby!!! sorry its taken a while but i lovedddd this request and writing this!! i know i changed the end a little bit but shh hopefully its ok!! xoxo

Dating whilst ghosts roamed the streets of London was hard. Dinner dates were a precarious decision and you had to be sure if you were spending the night pretty quickly for your own safety (against ghosts, men were still another question). Dating a ghost hunter? That was harder. Yes, he wasn't exactly a 'ghost hunter' but that was close enough from the stories your boyfriend told you; brushes with death were a common occurrence, much to your chagrin.

You couldn't count the number of times you'd sat up all night in your bedroom, waiting for a call to confirm that he was alright and alive after a case. But Lockwood was Lockwood and each time, just as your eyes were starting to close on their own, your phone would ring and you'd be startled awake, picking up as fast as your arms would let you. He'd open with an affirmation that everything was fine and he was sitting in the library with a hot cup of tea, ready for a chat with you.

This had been your routine for the six months you'd been dating, and while it had ruined your sleep schedule, you couldn't be happier. Lockwood had turned your world upside down after your chance encounter at your university while he was investigating a case, giving you adventures and the most love you'd ever felt. You were similarly obsessed with him, rambling on about your day over the phone and attaching to his hip whenever you could get together.

This was all true, except for the last four days. Lockwood told you on Sunday they had a high-paying case on Monday night and hadn't called you since. No confirmation he was alright, let alone alive, and it was killing you. He'd never forgotten, not once over six months. This ignited a panic in your stomach, anxiety clawing through your chest as you had to continue on with your week acting like you could think of anything other than your boyfriend.

On the fifth day, you'd had enough. And so, on Friday afternoon after your class had let out for the weekend, you marched to Portland Row for the very first time. Lockwood didn't want you around his business, saying he wanted to keep 'the best thing in his life' separate and as safe as possible. You didn't mind, you had a tiny apartment all to yourself that you were more than happy to host him in, but it did make your expedition more scary than it otherwise would have been.

Still, you steeled your nerves and rapped on the front door, picking your nails nervously as you waited for someone to answer. That person happened to be an unimpressed-looking boy who you recognised from Lockwood's tales as George.

"Can I help you?" He asked, wearing cartoonishly large rubber gloves that made you want to laugh.

"Is Lockwood here?" You took his lead to skip the pleasantries, none of it being even vaguely interesting to you until you knew your boyfriend was alright. George hesitated.

"He's not seeing anyone right now."

"Why not?" You all but cut him off, desperation making you forget your manners. He narrowed his eyes, clearly choosing his words clearly.

"He had a nasty accident on our last case. He's only gotten back from hospital today and is on strict bed rest. If you have a professional inquiry, you're welcome to return later or speak to me or my other colleague, Lucy Carlyle."

"Can I speak to Lucy?" You needed to talk to a girl. Clearly, George was not the most emotionally sensitive member of the company, and if you tried bartering a visit with him you had an inkling you'd start crying. If Lockwood's descriptions were anything to go off, Lucy was much more likely to understand you.

George let you in, clearly reluctantly, leading you to the kitchen. He awkwardly made you tea, leaving you to drink it silently as he went to fetch Lucy. You took the moment alone to take in the kitchen, a soft ache settling into the edges of your heart. It was so cozy, so lived in that it almost upset you. Lockwood and Lucy and George. They were the residents of 35 Portland Row, they got to wake up to one another every morning. They got to bicker over the jam and tea. You woke up alone, going about most of your days in silence unless you started talking to yourself, but you were really trying not to make that a habit.

It wasn't that you hated Lockwood keeping you a secret, it made complete sense. He was in a dangerous profession and had an even more impulsive nature, making for a risky lifestyle. And as he'd unwillingly told you, he did have people who occasionally came after him. Lockwood didn't want you caught in the crossfire and you understood, you were grateful, even. But looking at the life he led without you, you couldn't help but regret it a little bit. Portland Row was the kind of place you didn't even have to try to be able to imagine as your home.

You were interrupted by George returning with Lucy in tow, both clearly unprepared for a client. George was in some sort of cleaning gear, the aforementioned gloves and an apron over his shirt, and Lucy looked like she'd been working out but not for long, only a slight sheen on her features and her clothes still mostly light and moving.

"Hi, I'm Lucy," She greeted, a warm (if somewhat awkward) smile on her lips, "How can we help you?"

"I need to see Lockwood, please."

"You know we're not idiots, right?" George snapped, "Actually, I'm much more competent than him." Lucy shot him a dark look, elbowing him in the ribs as they sat across from you.

"What he means is that despite it being Lockwood's name on the sign, we're all fully qualified to talk to you and take your case. I'm not sure what George has said, but Lockwood is--"

"He's my boyfriend." You cut her off, unable to stand any more delay. You were met with dead silence, both agent's jaws dropped open.

"What?"

"He's my boyfriend," You affirmed, "We're dating and I need to see that he's ok."

"That's not possible." George shook his head, "He's never mentioned you."

"Not that we don't believe you, but can you tell us more? We just don't want to let any random person into our house, I'm sure you understand," Lucy added and you nodded instantly, more than aware that Lockwood had made enemies during his time with his company.

You started speaking, spilling the exact timeline of your relationship, details of your time together, vague suggestions that he'd told you about his family, anything you could think of to prove that you were really together. Then, like a lightbulb illuminating over your head, you reached into your coat pocket for your wallet. Sitting on the inside was a Polaroid of you and Lockwood, him kissing your cheek as you laughed. George grabbed it, examining it in disbelief. Even Lucy stole a glance or two before turning her focus back to you, new sympathy in her eyes.

"Will you please tell me what happened to him?" You begged, reaching out for Lucy's hand. She held yours firmly, speaking in a soft voice as she explained the incident.

"We were on a case on Monday and Lockwood took a leap down some stairs to get away from a ghost. He fractured his patella. It's fine, the doctor said he got pretty lucky all things considered, no surgery needed or anything. He was just kept in hospital for a few days because -- as I'm sure you know -- Lockwood isn't good at following instructions, especially orders not to get out of bed for a week. He only got back this morning which I assume is why he hasn't communicated with you." You nodded slowly, taking it all in.

"Can I see him, please?"

They both nodded quickly, leading you up the stairs to where you assumed Lockwood's bedroom lay. Lucy knocked before cracking the door open, smiling softly at her boss.

"We've got a guest here for you."

"A client? Can't you talk to them? I'm not in my professional clothes!" You could hear him rustling in the bed sheets, presumably pushing himself up to be sitting and smiled a little.

"Better than a client, I hope?" You said, stepping through the doorway. You watched Lockwood go through a thousand emotions in an instant, but his face settled on elation, holding out his arms for you.

You rushed to his side, wrapping him up in your arms as tight as you could.

"What are you doing here?" He asked incredulously, a laugh escaping his lips.

"Someone didn't call me after his case," You replied, sliding into the bed next to him to hold his arm.

"And someone didn't tell his coworkers-slash-friends-slash-housemates about his secret partner he's had for half a year!" George cut in.

"Sorry, Georgie," Lockwood gave him a megawatt smile, "Had to keep my girl safe, you understand." You grinned, pushing yourself even closer to him. George grumbled something but Lucy was already pushing him out the door, giving the two of you some much-needed space.

Safely alone, you pressed a kiss to his cheek.

"I'm glad you're okay. I was so scared."

"I'm sorry, lovely. I couldn't get to a phone in the hospital, but I thought about you all day every day."

"But now your friends know about us," You said and Lockwood nodded with a smile that made your insides melt.

"They do," He paused, "So d'you think it's time for you to finally spend the night here?" You grinned.

"Really?" You could almost feel the sparkle in your eyes. Lockwood nodded again, a matching look on his face. You didn't bother confirming, instead pressing your lips to his desperately.

Dinner at Portland Row was exactly how you'd imagined it; loud and chaotic and absolutely perfect. George and Lucy arguing over the tiny details of a case story they were telling you, Lockwood butting in with a flashy description of the action sequence. You laughed along, compliments spilling out as you tasted George's cooking. It was too easy to see it happening perpetually, and you had to stop yourself from getting too comfortable on your first visit.

You settled in for the night next to Lockwood. You were in Lockwood's bed with him. You weren't sure if you'd stopped smiling all night.

"I like being here," You said into the dark, looking at the vaguely Lockwood-shaped shadow next to you.

"You could stay here more often, the others love you already."

"Really?"

"Yeah. I mean, all that we've gotten out of keeping us a secret is worry. If people come after me, I promise that I'll do everything to protect you, but we shouldn't waste all our time being scared of something that may never happen. I love you," He said. You faltered, breath hitching slightly. He'd never said that before. Maybe it was slow, maybe it wasn't, but you knew Lockwood was so scared of committing to his feelings, this was everything.

"I love you too," You replied, hearing the smile in your voice as you said it. It was the easiest night of sleep you and Lockwood had ever had.

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maraschinomerry · 1 year

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Hi! Could you please write a Lockwood x reader fic involving the prompt: You aren't well, but you don't want to skip training and make them worry, so you continue on as usual, thinking it's not that serious. But that's proven wrong when you faint right in front of them mid-fight. Mixed with the dialogue: "You hold it like this and- why are your hands trembling?" Thank you in advance! 💙

Pretty Boy

Pairings: Anthony Lockwood x gn!reader

Content: mild swearing, whump (fainting as in the prompt), mentions of not eating or sleeping, cute flirty ending

A/N: thank you for such a great request!! I've actually also just got over being not well while I was writing this (I'm fine now and wasn't this bad!) so it was weirdly cathartic 😅

Word count: 2.3k

The blissful quiet of the kitchen at 35 Portland Row was shattered by an incredibly loud, almost violent sneeze. You threw your arm across your face just in time to catch it. That was weird. You never sneezed.

"Bless you," Lockwood frowned over the top of his magazine.

That was day 1.

On day 2, you were all out on a case, in a dilapidated Victorian house. In a divide-and-conquer strategy for such a big place, Lockwood and George had headed upstairs while you and Lucy stayed on the ground floor. Fumbling around in the dim light of the dining room, Lucy threw open the curtains to let in what was left of the evening sun, accidentally unleashing a cloud of dust which shimmered in the beam of your torch. You both coughed a little in surprise.

Your coughing didn't stop for the rest of the night.

Day 3 was spent relaxing, recovering from getting home in the early hours of the morning after a gruelling fight with a pair of Type Twos. Or rather, everyone else was relaxing. You were in your room, fluctuating between wrapping your shivering form in your duvet and throwing it off so you wouldn't melt into a puddle. The bowl of soup you'd made yourself for lunch grew cold where it sat untouched on your bedside table.

A sleepless night heralded the arrival of day 4. Your symptoms had mostly abated by the evening, and you desperately hoped to claw back a few hours of rest. By dinner time, bleary-eyed, you forced yourself downstairs to try and get at least one meal of the day. Fortunately, the kitchen was empty, so at least you didn't have to explain your recent lack of presence to anyone. Unfortunately, none of the contents of the fridge were even remotely appealing right now. You settled for a slice of toast which you took back upstairs. Two bites in, you felt your stomach flip. Great. The rest went straight in the bin.

A gentle knock sounded on your door the morning of day 5, after another night of tossing and turning without ever drifting off.

"Yeah?" you called wearily.

Lockwood poked his head in, dressed in a loose Henley T-shirt and sweatpants. "Morning. Just thought I'd check you were alright, you didn't come down for training." Oh shit. You and Lockwood had been doing weekly training together for months - it started not long after you joined the agency, when he'd come down to the basement for practice and found you already there, and you'd ended up sparring. It had happened a few more times, and eventually you fell into the habit of both going down on Friday mornings so much it became an unofficial appointment.

"Oh, sorry," you swallowed a yawn. "I lost track of what day it was. Give me five minutes."

"I sort of assumed you weren't coming down dressed Iike that." He nodded to your fuzzy pyjamas with a smirk, and you tugged shyly at the hem of the top. "Have you had breakfast?"

"Yeah." That was a lie. Lockwood studied you for a moment, and you wondered if he could see right through you, but then he nodded to himself.

"Alright, see you downstairs." He began to leave, but popped back at the last second. "I'm not saying the pyjamas are a bad look, by the way, they're cute, just maybe a bit warm for fighting in." He grinned again, and disappeared. What was that supposed to mean?

—

Five minutes later, as promised, you traipsed down the basement steps in runner shorts and a tank top. This was the last thing you wanted to be doing right now, but you loved getting one-on-one time with Lockwood and knew how much it would hurt him to break the tradition and how concerned he'd be about you if he found out you'd been ill.

Lockwood gave you another puzzled look. "Are you sure you're okay?" He'd seen you this low energy before, but normally only the day after a case.

You gave the most convincing smile you could muster. "Fine. What's the plan?"

He furrowed his brows once more, before apparently deciding against whatever he was thinking. "Okay, there was a new move I figured out on the last case. I thought I could teach you and see if you think it's any good?" That last part sounded so open and vulnerable. You could imagine what he was thinking - was it a fluke? Was it him overselling his talents? Did it look ridiculous? He got like that sometimes, needed snapping out of it. Reassuring. Your smile was more genuine this time.

"Sounds good, it certainly seemed effective."

You tried your best to concentrate while Lockwood demonstrated the move, really you did, but you were running on empty and the basement was so delightfully cool. Maybe if you just lay down on the floor for a bit, you'd sort yourself out.

"Did you get that?" Lockwood's voice cut through the fog of your thoughts, and you dragged your eyes up to meet his, which were nodding to your hands. You hadn't the slightest idea what it was he expected you to have got.

"Uhh…"

To your relief, he mistook your distraction for confusion and stepped closer to help, carefully off to one side to avoid the blade as his hands rested over yours.

"You hold it like this and- why are your hands trembling?"

You barely registered the alarm in his voice, or the uncontrollable tremor that was indeed present and spreading up your arms. Nothing in your body seemed to be responding properly any more. Did you still have hold of the rapier? Why was your chest so tight, not allowing any air in? An invisible wad had trapped in your throat, and you desperately sucked in a breath through your nose. Gosh, Lockwood smelled good. Lavender and bergamot. And he was pretty, too. So pretty. Those deep dark eyes, gazing at you with so much longing. No, not longing. He didn't do that, did he? Plus, he was frowning too much for longing. Concern? You didn't like it when he frowned. You tried to pout, but your lips didn't move. That was annoying. So were the lights. Had they always been this bright? It hurt. Everything hurt. You needed to leave. Now.

Panic took hold of the last working corner of your brain and sent a jolt of electricity down to your legs which finally reacted, carrying you shakily towards the stairs. You muttered something incoherent, mouth not quite as functional. The effort drained the last dregs of energy, and your legs stopped working again.

"Whoa, whoa-" a voice behind you gasped, hasty footsteps echoing. Who was that? There was someone else down here, wasn't there? You couldn't remember. Wait. There was a pretty boy, right? He seemed nice. You tried to tell him you were okay, you wanted to. As you pitched backwards, the silhouette of the pretty boy swam into view, blocking out the harsh lights above. That was better.

Everything went black.

—

You were laying somewhere warm and soft. That was odd. And it was less bright behind your eyelids. Where were you? Hadn't you been down in the basement? With the cold floor and the cold lights… and the pretty boy? Was he still here?

You tried to call out for him, succeeding only in a groan. The surface beneath you shifted by your feet in response, and your eyelids fluttered open a fraction. There he was. Framed by the golden rays filtering through the window behind him and dappling across his dark hair.

"Hey, pretty boy," you murmured. Proper words; that was more like it. Next step: opening your eyes fully.

Ah.

The pretty boy was Lockwood, brows knitted upwards as he shuffled further up what you gradually realised was your bed.

"Hey." His voice was thick, with the hint of a shake. "How are you feeling?"

You groaned again, moving to sit up. Lockwood instantly reached out, one hand on the small of your back and the other lifting the pillows to prop up behind you. "Been better."

Under any other circumstances, you think he'd probably have laughed. As it was, he huffed out a breath and you spotted a brief tic in his jaw. "That's a mild way of putting it. You collapsed in the middle of training. I had no idea what happened, I thought…" His gaze dropped to his lap as he trailed off. The silence clenched tightly around your heart. Eventually, he spoke again, still not looking at you, voice cracking and barely above a whisper. "I was so worried about you."

The tension in your chest pressed down further, and you thought you actually heard your heart shatter.

"Hey, Lockwood, look at me." You raised a hand, still trembling but for an entirely new reason, up to cup his cheek. At last, he looked. Those beautiful dark eyes were watery, and his nose ruffled as he tried to hold back the tears. "I'm okay, see? I'm here, I'm okay, and I'm so sorry for making you worry."

A warmth spread over the back of your hand as he brought his up to meet it. His fingers curled over yours, thumb rubbing calmingly across your knuckles. Whether the calming was for you or him, you couldn't say. "But are you sure you're okay? People don't just collapse like that, and you've been out all day." Your eyes widened a little as you glanced at your alarm clock. Almost 6. Wow.

"Honestly, it's nothing serious. Kind of stupid, actually; the irony is it all happened because I didn't want you to worry." That made him chuckle. That was promising. You continued. "I was ill - I don't know if it was a cold or flu or what - but that wasn't great to begin with, and then with it ruining my ability to eat and sleep I just… didn't have anything left to give."

You don't know what reaction you expected from Lockwood: frustration, confusion, disappointment perhaps. You certainly weren't expecting him to look quite so… guilty? "Why didn't you say something when I came to find you? We could have cancelled training." It came out sharper than you were expecting. Oh. There was where the guilt came in.

"I didn't want to break the tradition."

"To hell with the tradition if this is what it does to you!"

You faltered. Was it just your current condition, or had your mouth gone very dry? "Wait, I'm sorry, I didn't mean…" You took a steadying breath. "It's not just that. I don't mean it like it's some obligation. I love our sessions! Getting to have that time just for us, having it be our thing, it's the highlight of my week. And it's been a pretty shitty week so I wanted this one thing to be nice."

The fire in Lockwood's words died out, and he almost visibly deflated. His free hand reached up unexpectedly to brush a strand of hair from your face.

"Well, I'm glad it means that much to you, but next time will you please tell me when something's wrong? I can survive missing our date more than I can survive missing you."

Hold on.

You were definitely still ill. Your cheeks felt warm and your heart was pounding against your ribcage. That was the only possible explanation. Definitely nothing to do with the fact that the boy you'd been in love with for months had just called your training sessions a date. Oh god, you'd infected him too, his face was flushed. "Date?" you breathed.

"Only if you want it to be, of course, I don't want to jump to conclusions. Although you did call me 'pretty boy' barely five minutes ago, so I'm sure even George would agree with the legitimacy of my hypothesis." Oh, how you'd missed seeing that smirk he'd grown all of a sudden.

"I'm not entirely sure you can take the high ground on this one, love, when you said even more recently how you couldn't survive without me."

"I think so long as I'm right I can. Especially since, if we're going off who said something last, you couldn't even argue without calling me love."

"I wish we were still holding rapiers, I've got a chance of beating you at that."

Lockwood laughed, all earlier emotions replaced with nothing but tender affection. "Get some sleep, and then we can test that theory." He made to leave, but where your hands were still entwined you tightened your grip a little.

"Will you stay? Please? In case I didn't make it clear enough with fainting, I haven't been doing so great at the whole sleep thing."

When he nodded, you wriggled over to one side of the bed, allowing him to slip under the covers behind you. Everything about him felt cosy, and you snuggled towards that feeling. It took him aback for a moment until he draped an arm over your stomach, gently tugging you closer so the two of you slotted together like you'd been designed to fit one another from the start. His breath tickled your ear, but its constant rhythm slowed yours in turn. Your eyelids grew heavy.

"You know," you mumbled sleepily, "you could take me on a proper date. Only if you want to, of course, wouldn't want to jump to conclusions."

He squeezed you playfully. "I think I've got enough evidence to consider it. Lunch tomorrow if you feel up to it?" You hummed a contented agreement. As your eyes drifted shut, a feather-light kiss pressed against your temple. "Good night, love."

"Good night, pretty boy."

#lockwood & co fanfic #anthony lockwood x reader #anthony lockwood #gn!reader #lockwood & co

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lewkwoodnco · 1 year

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Hi I want to request Anthony Lockwood×fem!reader with the song False God, I want it to be best friends to lovers, with the miscommunication trope. Like they were best friends and started falling for each other, and try to hide their feelings. Then then after a case they got into an argument, about Lockwood throwing himself in danger again and he kisses her, but she just gets even more confused and mad, she thinks that he only did it because he wanted to distract her from what happened, so she gets even angrier. The argument gets even more heated and they start even yelling at each other, then they stop talking to each other for days, and the reader just has enough and leaves and Anthony is heartbroken, and tries to find a way to get her back. The ending is happy. He gets her back, and they confess to each other.

I'm sorry this is very confusing. You can obviously add more things, so there is the miscommunication trope, and also, so the plot suits the song more. Thank you, you're amazing, I absolutely loved the I can see you fic, and it was everything I hoped for when I requested it.

False God - Lockwood x Reader

A/N: No worries, its not confusing at all! I'm really glad you liked the i can see you fic cuz its one of my favs too!! hope you like this one toooo :) 4k!

She groaned, shifting in her window seat, forehead fused against the window pane. It was too bright to be looking straight ahead at the glowing skyline, so she was staring down at the pavement baking in the sweltering heat. Summer was in full force, and today it took form by enveloping 35 Portland Row and every building in a five-mile radius with its heat. It was too hot to think straight, too hot to do anything but brood and stew in resentment. Even as she unseeingly looked out at the shimmering roads, all she felt was the same agony growing inside of her being reflected back into her eyes. Loving Lockwood truly was a special kind of hell.

It had been a funny sort of week. On Monday, Lockwood had used a napkin to wipe some sugar off her nose after she had bitten into one of Arif's doughnuts, and he looked just as confused as her when he realised what he was doing. On Wednesday's job, she tripped on a loose floorboard so badly that her knees buckled under her, leading to some very ungraceful stumbling in Lockwood's arms, and when she was finally able to find her feet she brushed past him, face beet red, mumbling an apology.

On Thursday, Lockwood was bandaging up a scrape on her wrist, and she had been so transfixed by his swift, confident movements that she hadn't even realised he was done until he snapped the first aid box close. Later that night, while they were scouting out a new location, his fingers drifted on the edge of her bandage occasionally, as if checking to see if it was alright. Part of her love-addled brain couldn't help but hope that he was checking if she was alright. He apologised profusely each time, stepping back in an attempt to at force at least some physical distance between them. She nodded absent-mindedly, trying to soothe the somersaults her stomach made when she felt his rapier-calloused fingers graze her palm.

So when they were dividing themselves up for Friday's case, a part of her knew it wasn't smart to team up with someone in front of whom she became a stuttering, vacant fool. It wasn't that she daydreamed about him or felt butterflies in her stomach, but there was something about him that short-circuited her systems when he got too close. But now, Lockwood looked so cool, so nonchalant. She couldn't avoid him forever. She had to work through whatever this was, and spending time with him was how she was going to do it.

"Yeah, sure, those teams sound great. Lockwood and I together works." But even as she raised her mug to take a sip, she briefly met Lockwood's gaze, and the look in his eyes triggered this sudden vision of the entire mission going up in flames. Her eyes darted away, and when she looked back, he was looking at something on the thinking cloth interestedly. She struggled to take a sip of her tea with the lump in her throat. Must have been a trick of the light. Not that it helped her get it out of her head.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Lucy and George were starting on the first two floors, so Lockwood and her took the elevator up to the third floor. Two floors away, they could no longer hear George and Lucy's footsteps or voices, as if they were in an entirely different building. They split up, and she was relieved for the distance between them, the chance to finally think straight for a while.

However, they weren't having much luck. She ran her fingers over the walls for what felt like the hundredth time, frowning and straining her ears. Every time she felt like she had just gotten the right focus, Lockwood would shift somewhere behind her and break her concentration.

"Quit it."

"What?"

"The shifting. I can't hear."

"What shifting?"

She pulled her ear from the wall to look at Lockwood and immediately felt her spirits dry up. Lockwood was looking at her questioningly, not far from the position she had left him in, and right behind him was a Spectre a split second away from lunging at Lockwood.

It all happened so fast; even now she wasn't quite sure how she had managed to recover her wits so quickly. She barrelled towards the ghost, fingers closing over Lockwood's bicep as she closed her eyes and thrust her rapier in front of her, hoping her blade met the visitor before she did. There was a hissing sound, and then silence. She opened her eyes to see the Spectre gone, and Lockwood looking as pale and shaken as she felt. His lips quivered, forming amorphous words, and she feared she might break down if she looked at him being vulnerable for too long.

She turned detachedly, sheathing her rapier, considering the objects around them until she found one with overwhelming psychic charge. She pulled out her iron net and draped it over the source, and the temperature went up considerably. By then, Lockwood look mostly alright, if a little nervous.

They returned to the elevator, and as the doors shuddered to a close he tilted his head towards her, coughing awkwardly, though his eyes were still fixed to the floor. "You didn't need to...foolish t-to, what you did there...erm-"

"Lockwood, shut up. I'd die for you." She hadn't meant to sound so aggressive, but it made her heart stumble erratically when she saw him sprawled on the floor, moments away from certain death. It made her want to strangle him for being so stupid, then fling her arms around him and hold him close. For so much of her life she had felt like an island, alone and desolate, and she had so little, but Lockwood would forever be something for her to keep, even if it was only all in her head.

She looked up, startled by the dark look in his eyes, rushing to get the words out, but it was a bit too late. "And Lucy. And George." Even she could hear how flimsy that sounded, echoing in the starkly lit rattling elevator. Yes, she would lay her life on the ground for them, but with Lockwood, it was just...different. Anything to do with Lockwood just had to be complicated.

"I know. But still. Thank you."

She gasped, scrambling to her feet, hand clutching the sleeve of his coat before her brain caught up to what she was doing. It was almost comical, the way she had to blink at her hand and Lockwood's face before realising what she had done. She dropped her hand immediately, straightening, but Lockwood's expression didn't change. It was a weird mix of curiosity, contemplation and what looked to be worry. So it hadn't been a trick of the light.

She inhaled, raising her chin to meet his gaze. His eyebrows raised imperceptibly and she felt the air around them shift. She blinked hesitantly, much less confident than she was a few moments ago.

They silently boarded the elevator again, which was miraculously still working, and an uneasy feeling starting to grow in the pit of her stomach. For once, neither of them had made any effort to sweep the electricity between them under the rug, so now it hung in the open, the elephant in the room. It was pure insanity - no, idiocy, to acknowledge the charged air between them. She didn't know about Lockwood, but she was having a hard enough time dealing with the urges that compelled her to run to his side at the first sign of danger.

This was new territory, and these uncharted waters frightened her so. As soon as her attention drifted elsewhere and this tension between them took a backseat, she would look into Lockwood's eyes or feel him brush against her, and she would be certain that it was only a matter of time before she was pulled under. It made her head spin, and yet, she craved it.

Her hand trembled as she pushed her hair back from her eyes, and Lockwood reached out and interlocked her fingers with his own, still staring straight ahead at the dull metal doors. His stoic expression belied the intimacy of the action, and she felt the first strains of annoyance begin to bubble up. How could he just stand there so unaffected, as if he had every right to make her fight for her own breath?

The elevator doors opened to the ground floor, and not a moment too soon. The thick floors had meant that the two groups had no idea what was going on with the other group, and Lucy and George were fighting by the skin of their teeth to stay alive among the hoard of ghosts surrounding them. Lucy was keeping the visitors back while George ducked and rolled around the lobby, frantically looking for sources. Lockwood and her joined Lucy, and soon enough they had the upper hand.

Once the final source was neutralised, they sat in silence, only the sound of them catching their breath filling the room. From the corner of her eye, she saw Lockwood tugging at his rapier that was somehow embedded in the wall, before he suddenly stilled. He was looking in her direction, a familiar fear clouding his eyes. Somehow, a part of her realised exactly what was happening.

She turned, hand on her rapier, stopping short. She certainly felt the chill, and there seemed to be a haze in the air, but she couldn't quite make out anything tangible. She reached out, almost as if in a trance, before she had the wind knocked out of her.

One minute she was standing, and the next she was lying on the floor, a figure crouching over her, blocking her vision, as if shielding her. A few moments passed before the figure looked up and straightened, kneeling now, light falling on the gaunt face of Lockwood. George was sheepishly holding up a musical box draped in a silver net. "Sorry, missed a source. They should all be gone now."

Lockwood turned back to her, offering a hand to pull her up, but there was this weird sort of static buzzing between her ears now. She propped herself up on her own, shoving him, and walked away fuming while he toppled over in an undignified manner.

Fucking Lockwood.

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The air of the group was fraught with tension on the way back. She signed the report with such force that she ripped a hole in one of them, and she kept rebuffing all of Lockwood's attempts to try to talk to her. Now, they were back at 35 Portland Row. She went straight to the kitchen and started making tea, slamming the drawers, uncommonly violent. Lockwood stood a few feet away from the table, closer to the door, as if furiously working out what exactly he wanted to say to the floor. She saved him the trouble.

"What the hell was that?"

"It was a Phantasm."

"Yeah, I guessed. I mean the part about you rushing in without any equipment."

"I was out of flares and my rapier was stuck. I didn't choose to do that."

"No Lockwood, you did choose. You made that choice when you decided to run in-"

"What the hell was I supposed to do? Watch you get ghost-touched?"

"-throw all caution to the wind, playing the hero-"

"I only play the hero because I have to. You're all my responsibility."

"-because never mind the three people who work in your agency, live in your house, and care so deeply about you that they wouldn't know what to do with themselves if you died-"

"So I'm just supposed to stand around and watch the rest of you die?!"

"-but no, the great Anthony Lockwood has bigger plans, like being an absolute - you won't even look at me!"

She sat down at the table, cradling her growing migraine, muttering to herself. "God, I can't talk to you when you're like this."

"Like what?" Lockwood gripped the chair opposite hers aggressively.

"This! You get so-so distant, like you couldn't be more disinterested in other people. In me. You detach yourself and step away and I know it's all a lie." She felt her heart rate further destabilise. "I see it when you look at me, like I'm some fresh, exciting thing to marvel at. You can get mad at me, or hate me, or strangle me, but I never bore you, Lockwood."

He bent forward by two inches, angling her head in his hand, pressing a bruising kiss to her lips. It couldn't have lasted longer than a second, but they were both breathless when they broke away, faces no further than a few inches apart. Her rage was barely quelled, if not aggravated. Her face was white with anger. Even now, all he wanted to do was distract her, as if he knew it wouldn't take much. In a brief flicker of panic, a part of her worried that he knew how she felt, that he knew all along, and all of this was some sick game to screw her over. She wanted to smash his facade, watch him come undone the way she was on the inside, goad him into feeling something. "Go on, then. Do it."

"Do what?" Her breathing was uneven. The past few weeks of fleeting stolen glances were bad enough, but with his face so close to hers, she could feel her brain turning into jelly. Part of her knew what she was about to do wasn't fair to him, but their relationship had gone too haywire for her to care. There was nothing fair about the way he consumed her anyways. Whoever said it hadn't loved anybody as hard as she loved Lockwood: nothing is fair in love.

"Get rid of me. Wake up to happier mornings where I'm not around, since I'm such a burden." She wasn't entirely aware of what she was saying, or if she meant it. She was grasping desperately for any respite from the brutal assault of her emotions, so all she could do was the one thing she did best - withdraw. She leaned back, welcoming cool, grounding air into her lungs as her tears threatened to spill over the ruins of their crumbling friendship. It was as though she had been struck for having the sin of hubris, for believing her and Lockwood were built to weather the storms of affection beyond platonic love. "Fire me, whatever. Oh, you'd just love that, wouldn't you? Being all official and important? Because all Anthony Lockwood cares about is being the biggest prat in the room, whether it be by throwing his precious life away-"

"So my life is 'precious', but yours is fair game?"

"I didn't say that!"

"You didn't NEED TO!" Lockwood was gripping the chair so tightly he looked just about ready to smash it into bits. He took a few ragged breaths, as if physically trying to control his emotions. "Words only express so much-"

"But they express just enough for you, don't they?" she said bitterly. He set his jaw, hardening against the venom of her words. She placed a hand on her forehead weakly, stumbling out of the kitchen up to the attic. There she sat now, cynically judging the trees for being too green.

Over the next few days, she stayed in the attic, forcing down morsels of the food Lucy brought up to her, preferring to communicate non-verbally. After three days, she began to feel as cold and long-forgotten as that tea she was in the middle of making that day. She watched them gear up and lug their equipment into cabs from the window, but none did so as resolutely or with as much mechanical efficiency as Lockwood. She missed them, she missed working, but she wasn't about to go running down the stairs to Lockwood's room, begging for forgiveness. No; she had more pride than that.

Instead, she wiled away the hours staring at the clock and then staring out the window, until her eyes ached. It was so hot, time seemed to be slowing to a stop. The seconds hand ticked occasionally, when it felt like it, and her shirt plastered itself on her back. The heat was so oppressive and glued her eyelids shut, and it felt as though the whole room was submerged in molasses. It just wasn't the right kind of weather to reconcile.

Occasionally, her thoughts drifted to when she first joined the agency, and the words of advice Lucy had given her. "Lockwood, er, he's hard to read," she had said. "Best to leave him to it, most of the time. It takes a special kind of trust to really get to know him. You need a lot of blind faith, and it's certainly not easy terrain...but I think it's all worth it in the end."

Still, she couldn't live at the window forever. Which is why she went down to the kitchen after a fitful sleep on the third night, gingerly choking down some toast, when the rest returned from the job. Lucy hugged her from behind and George immediately set out four cups as he started to brew some tea. Despite all that, Lockwood still regarded her as stiffly as before, speaking into the distance rather than to her.

"I'm not going to fire you, if that's what you're waiting for."

In that moment, when Lockwood disowned any kind of feeling for her yet again, the last vestiges of her hope slipped away. She thought she knew him. Hell, she thought she loved him. But life was full of mistakes and disappointments, and this was yet another she had to contend with. "Fine. I quit."

Even Lockwood was momentarily stunned as she slipped past him up to the attic, blurrily throwing in anything that looked vaguely like hers into a her bags. Lucy had followed her, trying to talk some sense into her, but it all fell on deaf ears. Only George was in the kitchen by the time she was done packing, and he looked oddly forlorn as he waved at her distractedly. The door to the library was open as she shouldered past the memories of the life they had on her way to the front door. Lockwood was in his chair facing the fireplace, back to the door, glaring a hole into his book, looking as furious as she was just a few days ago.

She didn't have anything to say to him, which was just as well, because he clearly didn't have anything to say to her. She stepped out into the night, twisting sprigs of lavender in her hair, walking off into the night. George came up to the library, sighing loudly at the door, and Lockwood jerked up irritatedly.

"What?"

"Couldn't wait till after tea, could you?"

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Three weeks later, her memories of the three of them were more diluted than she would have liked. With the little savings she had, she managed to rent a cramped apartment which didn't leave much room for decoration, which was just as well, as she didn't have many mementos. She wasn't the best at preserving memories, so all she had were some odd photos on the few times she remembered her camera.

Lockwood was in the pictures too. As hard as she tried, she couldn't just cut him and his presence out of her life; they were too irrevocably tied together. Some nights, before sleeping, she would trace the outline of his face on the one focused photograph she had of him, and wonder if she'd still recognise his voice. In spite of herself, she wondered if he ever thought about her the way she dreamt about him.

The summer heat faded, and these days rain drizzled from the sky like a leaky tap. In her case, that also meant a leaking roof, and the constant drip of the water into the bucket drove her nuts. It was the little things like the leaking roof and the refrigerator with a loud hum that never allowed her to truly rest, always kept her on the edge, that made her new life distinctly more uncomfortable than her old.

She heard a faint disjointed knock on her door. She opened the door to see a gaunt and wane Lockwood, significantly paler than she remembered. She was speechless, not quite sure what to do, and he just seemed relieved enough to see her in person. He still stood the same way he did when meeting new clients, with an air of formality, and she half-expected him to shake her hand. Instead, he pulled her into a hug; a proper one, where his arms went all the way around her. The kind of hug that made you want to cry.

She gripped the sleeve of his coat not unlike the way she did all those weeks ago, and she was suddenly aware of how little the weeks passed meant. Nothing had changed between them, except for this deep yearning tainting the fervour of their grip on each other. He still felt this need to protect her but sucked at communicating, she still reached out to him instinctively in danger but yelled at him for not putting himself first. Strife and misunderstandings were still rife in their relationship, but she had never missed fighting and loving someone the way she had missed Lockwood.

"I'm sorry," he was mumbling into her hair. "I don't know why it took me so long to realise you felt the same way I did. I guess we just express fear in different ways."

"You always were slow."

He pulled back, softly smiling in a way that erased some of his wrinkles. But the smile slipped away, and she felt the worry tugging down the corners of his mouth. "It's just...I've never felt this way about anyone before. I don't know how to express it all the time so sometimes it just feels easier to convince myself it's not there. But it Smooths things over, you know?" He inhaled shakily, tracing her cheekbone with his thumb. She could feel how hard it was for him to admit all this. "I felt it most when you were gone. It...it weighed on my mind. Never let me be fully at peace." His lips quirked into a small smile. "Much like you. I'd do anything for you, and I think that scares me."

"It scares me too. I guess the only way I could think of handling it was proving you were more scared than me. As if that would somehow make me strong and not...weak. Or vulnerable." She sighed, as if all the exhaustion of the past few weeks had all caught up to her in this very moment. "You make me crumble, Lockwood, but I've never felt stronger."

His eyes unfocused as his hand on her cheekbone slipped. "What if I can't protect you? What if I can't drive away every single visitor in time? What if you get hurt? How do people live like this?"

She held his hands, stopping his spiral. "I think I have enough experience driving away people who are more than a little obsessed with me."

He laughed, pulling her into a hug. What once felt overstimulating was now oddly comforting. The beat of his heart, the rhythm of his breath, the vibrations of his laughter...she wanted to feel that every day for the rest of her life.

"What I did...it really was different. You do realise that, right?"

"Yes."

"I had my rapier with me."

"You did."

"You didn't have anything."

"Hmm, I panicked." He continued hastily under her stern gaze. "What I mean is, I will try to be more careful. Promise." He put on his most angelic expression. She rolled her eyes. She took his hand as they stepped out in the final drops of summer rain. Life together wasn't always going to be smooth-sailing, or even remotely manageable, but she had a feeling that they would be alright.

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