#windows cloud hosting | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

missmaymay13 · 2 months ago

Text

the night we met - q.hughes

⸻⸻⸻⸻⸻⸻

q.hughes x fem! oc | 25k

warnings : talks of su!cide, depression, anxiety, abu$e

summary: In a city of noise and pressure, two quiet souls—Quinn Hughes, the Canucks captain burdened by expectation, and Ava Monroe, the lonely daughter of a billionaire—find each other at their lowest. What begins as a silent connection in the dark becomes a lifeline, as they quietly piece each other back together. Through whispered confessions, found family, and healing love, they learn that sometimes, the gentlest stories are the most powerful—and that the right person can bring you home without ever saying a word.

a/n: I’ve working on this for a little bit now and I wanted to make sure I was happy with how it came out. I say it every time but I think this is my favourite thing I’ve written so far. I really hope you guys enjoy this.

masterlist

⸻⸻⸻⸻⸻⸻

From the outside, Ava Monroe had everything. The kind of everything that was splashed across glossy magazine covers and whispered about at exclusive dinner parties hosted in candlelit dining rooms with ten-thousand-dollar floral centerpieces. She lived in a sprawling mansion perched high in West Vancouver, with sweeping, cinematic views of the Pacific that made the sunsets look like they were painted just for her. The marble-floored foyer echoed with each step beneath her designer heels, and there was always someone paid to anticipate her needs—a private chef who prepared meals she rarely had an appetite for, stylists who dressed her like a mannequin, tutors who guided her through a curriculum designed to craft the perfect future. Her world was curated like an art gallery: everything polished, everything perfect.

But no one ever asked her if she felt at home in it. In truth, Ava had felt like a guest in her own life for as long as she could remember—present but not wanted, displayed but not held. A beautiful ghost wandering through a museum of someone else's making. Her every breath felt choreographed, like she was part of a play she never auditioned for.

Her name carried weight. Ava Monroe. Daughter of David Monroe, real estate tycoon turned international mogul, whose face was on the cover of Forbes more than it was in her life. And her mother, Sally—a socialite whose reputation for elegance was only matched by her absence. Together, they were Vancouver's power couple, untouchable in their glass tower of privilege. But Ava? She was the glass. Transparent. Fragile. On display, but invisible. A footnote in their empire.

From the outside, it looked like the dream. But inside, it was a mausoleum of unspoken words and unmet needs. A house that echoed with the absence of love. A girl who grew up surrounded by beauty and yet felt none of it belonged to her. Money was the answer to every problem, but it never asked her how she felt. It bought silence instead of comfort. And Ava—young, soft, desperate Ava—learned how to exist quietly within it. Learned how to smile for the cameras while dying in the dark. Learned how to shrink her soul until it could fit into the cracks of other people's expectations.

Money masked the emptiness. But it never filled it. It never could. It could buy her everything—except the feeling of being wanted.

She remembered the gold trim of her bedroom walls better than her father's laugh—if he even had one. The sound of his voice was a memory blurred by distance and business calls, always clipped and impatient, never warm. She couldn't recall a single bedtime story or a moment where he looked at her like she was something more than a fleeting responsibility. And her mother—God, her mother's perfume—that suffocating cloud of white jasmine and vodka, always seemed to arrive before she did. It clung to the drapes, to Ava's pillows, to her hair, long after her mother was gone. Longer than her embrace. Longer than her love, if it had ever existed at all. Her mother's touch was cold, her gaze colder. Ava used to press her small hands to the windows and watch her leave, praying she'd come back softer. She never did.

Ava's childhood was a mosaic of jet lag and hotel suites. She'd stood at the base of the Eiffel Tower, floated in gondolas down Venetian canals, and tasted sushi in Tokyo that melted on her tongue like snow. Her passport was thick with stamps by the age of ten. But none of those places felt like home. Home was a concept Ava didn't understand. Not really. Her childhood home in Vancouver was more like a museum—perfectly curated, but hollow. A stage built to impress, but never to comfort.

Her father was always gone. He existed in phone calls, scheduled meetings, and brief appearances in tuxedos at charity galas. When he was home, he was on his phone, always pacing, always tense, and Ava quickly learned that the way to his attention was through perfect grades or crisis-level tantrums. He preferred the grades. It cost less to reward her than to soothe her. When she got her first A+ in primary school, he handed her a bracelet worth more than some people made in a year, kissed her on the forehead, and left the room. She kept the bracelet in its box. She wanted his words, not his money. But words were too expensive for him.

Sally Monroe, meanwhile, was more ghost than mother—a haunting, a flicker in the corner of the room, a presence that came and went like perfume dissipating into stale air. She floated in and out of the house, high on champagne and attention, always late, always dismissive, like motherhood was a performance she never auditioned for. Her stilettos clicked across marble floors like a metronome of neglect, and her laughter echoed through hallways Ava was never invited into. Ava can still hear her words like a wound that never scabbed over, each syllable slicing deeper than the last.

"You ruined my body, Ava," she once spat, wine glass in hand, eyes glassy and unfocused.

"If I didn't have you, I could've been someone," she slurred another time, brushing past her daughter like she was a smudge on her perfect reflection.

"Why can't you just be normal for once?"

Ava would replay those moments in her head, over and over, like a broken record. The cruelness wasn't random—it was ritual. Her mother's disdain was the wallpaper of her childhood, unavoidable and slowly peeling away at her self-worth. Every glance in the mirror became a question: What was so wrong with her that even her mother couldn't love her? And still, some pathetic part of her held onto hope—that one day Sally would walk through the door, take Ava's face in her hands, and say she was sorry. That she was proud. That she wanted her.

But apologies were for people who felt remorse. And Sally Monroe never looked back.

Words sharpened like razors over time, and Ava bled internally for years. She bled in silence. She bled with a smile. Every glance in the mirror felt like she was trying to live up to a version of herself that never existed. She would stare at her reflection and wonder what exactly about her had made her mother unravel.

The only solace she ever knew was Brenda.

Brenda was the nanny who stayed far past her job description. She was the one who tucked Ava in, made her soup when she was sick, brushed the knots out of her hair while humming lullabies. Brenda was the one who held her after nightmares, whispered that she was special, that she was loved—words no one else ever said and meant. Brenda was home. When the world felt too loud, Ava would crawl into Brenda's arms and let herself feel small, feel held. Brenda was the only person who ever looked at Ava like she mattered. Not as a responsibility. Not as a paycheck. But as a person.

And then one day, Brenda left too.

Ava was fifteen. Her parents claimed she had to go—"boundaries," her mother had said with a smug twist of her lips. Ava didn't eat for three days. Her silence screamed at them, but no one listened. Brenda cried when she packed her last bag. Ava sat on the stairs, arms wrapped around her knees, watching her only source of love walk out the door. It was the first time she thought about disappearing. The first time she wondered what death felt like.

That's when the darkness started to curl around her, quiet and relentless. It wasn't a sudden collapse. It was a slow, steady erosion. Each day chipped away at her until there was nothing left but skin stretched over silence.

By sixteen, the depression was a thick fog that clung to her skin, seeped into her lungs, made every breath feel like drowning. The anxiety followed like a shadow. Panic attacks in the middle of the night, the overwhelming sense that she was suffocating inside her own skin. Her heart would race for no reason, hands trembling, chest tightening until she gasped for air like she was underwater. She wore silk and diamonds, but her ribs felt like they were collapsing.

She sat in therapy offices decorated in muted pastels, nodding while older women scribbled notes and offered her lavender tea and affirmations. Ava learned how to lie in those offices. Learned the right things to say so they'd stop probing, stop calling her parents, stop suggesting medication that her mother would scoff at anyway. The therapists saw her as a sad rich girl. Nothing more.

No one noticed she was slipping. Maybe they did, but they didn't care. Or they thought she'd be fine. She was Ava Monroe, after all.

At school, she was the quiet girl with perfect hair and vacant eyes. People wanted to sit next to her, invited her to parties she never showed up to, tagged her in photos she wasn't in. No one really saw her. The friends she made wanted status, not connection. They clung to her for the proximity to power, the name, the lifestyle they thought they could sip like champagne through her. They smiled in selfies and whispered about her when she turned her back. Her name got her into rooms, but her presence was irrelevant.

She deleted her social media when she turned seventeen. The silence was better than the noise. She didn't want to see the curated versions of people pretending to live happy lives, or the forced smiles of people who didn't know what it meant to ache.

Most nights, she lay in bed staring at the ceiling, counting the cracks in the paint until her vision blurred. The silence was oppressive, curling around her like a second skin, smothering her slowly. She would lie motionless, the hum of the city outside her window reminding her that the world was still spinning, even if she wasn't. Each night bled into the next like watercolors running down the page, indistinguishable in their loneliness.

She often imagined what it would be like to simply vanish. To evaporate into the night air like breath on cold glass. Would anyone notice the absence of her quiet footsteps? The unoccupied chair in the lecture hall? The unread text messages on her phone? She doubted it. The idea that she could disappear without disrupting anything was both terrifying and oddly comforting. Some nights, the thoughts spiraled into places too dark to speak of—into fantasies of escape that stretched into eternity. A long, uninterrupted silence.

But something always tethered her to the edge. Sometimes it was the faint sound of Brenda's lullabies echoing in her head, like the memory of warmth. Sometimes it was a stranger's smile on the street or the way a poem broke open her chest just wide enough to let a sliver of hope in. A foolish, desperate hope that someone—anyone—might look at her one day and actually see her. Not the name. Not the money. Just her.

She never told anyone about those thoughts. Who would she tell? Her mother would laugh. Her father wouldn't even pause his call. And everyone else? They only knew how to love her shadow, never her soul.

There was no one to tell. So she carried it all alone, night after night, in a bed that felt too big, in a world that felt too empty.

Not Ava Monroe, the heiress. Not Ava Monroe, the girl with a platinum card and a perfect smile. Just Ava.

She turned eighteen and moved into her own condo in downtown Vancouver, a sleek place her father paid for and never visited. It was cold. Quiet. She painted one of the walls just to feel like she owned something in her life. She chose a soft green. Brenda would've liked it. The color softened the sterile white that made everything feel like a hospital.

University came next, more out of obligation than ambition. She studied literature because it felt like an escape, a place where pain was beautiful and loneliness had purpose. Her classmates admired her writing, but they never knew the stories came from somewhere real. She wrote about girls drowning in oceans of expectation, about mothers who forgot how to love, about the sound of being forgotten.

On weekends, she wandered the streets of Vancouver, alone with her earbuds and playlists of sad songs. Sometimes she sat at cafes and watched people laughing over lattes, wondering what it would feel like to belong to someone's world like that. Other times, she would walk along the seawall in Stanley Park, letting the crashing of waves drown out the noise in her head. She liked rainy days best—something about the grey skies made her feel less alone, like even the weather understood her.

She was twenty-one now. Twenty-one and still haunted by a childhood that looked perfect in pictures. Twenty-one and still trying to figure out who she was beneath the layers of privilege and pain. Twenty-one and still waiting for someone to stay.

The thing about being hollow is that it echoes. It makes everything louder. Loneliness. Grief. Desperation. The ache of never being chosen.

And Ava Monroe's whole life had been one long, aching echo.

⸻⸻⸻⸻⸻⸻

The city of Vancouver glittered under grey skies, caught in that strange, beautiful limbo between rain and light. The kind of grey that wrapped itself around buildings like a heavy blanket, soft and suffocating all at once. For Quinn Hughes, the skyline had become a blur—glass towers that reflected versions of himself he no longer recognized. Faces he used to know stared back from the mirrored windows: the hopeful rookie, the quiet brother, the boy with wide eyes and big dreams. But now, the reflections were hollowed out, distorted. He no longer knew which one was real.

He sat in his high-rise apartment overlooking the city, the window cool against his shoulder as he leaned into the silence. His breath left faint fog on the glass, fading faster than the thoughts in his head. The world outside moved with its usual rhythm—cars zipping through puddles, cyclists hunched against the drizzle, pedestrians rushing somewhere with purpose, umbrellas bobbing like tiny shields against the storm. But inside, Quinn felt still. Stuck. Forgotten.

The hum of the refrigerator was the only sound. The kind of silence that pressed against your chest and made you question if the world would even notice if you were gone. He hadn’t spoken to anyone all day. Not because no one called—he just didn’t answer. Some part of him hoped someone might show up anyway. But no one did.

The loneliness wasn’t loud. It was quiet and creeping, like fog under a doorframe. It seeped into his bones and made everything feel a few shades colder. He had the view, the prestige, the life people envied. But none of it meant anything when the only voice he heard was his own, echoing through empty rooms.

He blinked slowly, letting the rain blur his vision, and for a moment, he imagined the skyline disappearing. The city swallowed by mist. And him, sitting there, unnoticed. A ghost in a glass tower.

They called it an honor. They said it was a privilege. They said he earned it.

But when Quinn was named captain of the Vancouver Canucks, it didn’t feel like a crown. It felt like a shackle.

He remembered the headlines. The social media storm. The debates.

He’s too quiet. He’s not vocal enough. He’s not a leader. He hasn’t won anything.

People questioned his worth like it was a commodity they could bid on. They dissected his posture, his words, his facial expressions like analysts on a mission. Every move he made was magnified, every mistake weaponized. He was under a microscope, and the scrutiny burned.

He tried to drown it out. He told himself it didn’t matter, that he didn’t owe the world anything more than his effort. But it mattered. It mattered more than he wanted to admit.

Because all Quinn Hughes ever wanted was to be good enough.

Not just for the team. Not just for the fans. For his brothers. For his parents. For himself.

He grew up with a stick in his hands and the weight of expectation already on his shoulders. Being the oldest meant being the example. The one who knew the right answer. The one who paved the path not just for himself, but for everyone who came after. Every step he took was supposed to be a guide for his brothers, a light to follow. But what people didn’t understand was that he had paved that path with pieces of himself—with sleep he never got, with tears no one saw, with bruises he never let anyone treat.

Every time someone praised his poise, they didn’t see the nights he stayed up wondering if he was enough. Every time someone called him steady, they didn’t see how hard he worked to hold the cracks together. Each season, each game, each injury chipped away at him like erosion on a cliffside—slow, relentless. There were days when his body moved on autopilot, when he looked in the mirror and felt like a stranger was staring back. The boy who once dreamed with fire in his chest now looked at his reflection with tired eyes, wondering when the light inside him dimmed.

He wore his role like armor, but underneath it, he was breaking.

There were mornings he couldn’t get out of bed without pain shooting down his spine. Nights he iced his knees in silence while his teammates laughed across hotel hallways. Games where he played through injuries he should’ve rested. And still, when the final buzzer blew and the Canucks fell short yet again, he took the blame.

Always, it was Quinn.

He bore it in his posture, in the way his shoulders slumped when no one was watching. In the way he lingered on the ice after practice, skating until the rink emptied and all that was left was his shadow. He bore it in the bags under his eyes, the ache in his muscles, the distant look that had settled into his face.

And yet, no matter how hard he pushed, how much he gave, it never felt like enough.

His life looked like a dream from the outside. The penthouse apartment. The cars. The designer suits. The headlines. The cheers. But inside, it all felt empty. Like he was moving through a world made of glass, afraid to breathe too hard in case it shattered.

He tried to fill the void. With late nights and loud music. With drinks and shallow company. With bodies that meant nothing, tangled in his sheets, saying all the right things in the moment and disappearing before morning. But when the sun rose, so did the silence. And the ache.

It was always there.

The ache of being needed, but not known. The ache of being seen, but not understood.

Quinn carried the team like a secret. He never wanted the credit. Just the weight. He thought maybe if he carried enough of it, he could finally prove something—to himself, to the critics, to the kid he used to be who dreamt of the NHL and didn’t know how lonely dreams could become.

He watched the city pass him by from his window. Rain streaked the glass. The clouds hung low. Everything was tinted in shades of grey. His phone buzzed from the counter. Another text. Another obligation. He ignored it.

Sometimes, he wished he could disappear for a while. Not forever. Just long enough to remember who he was beneath the layers. Beneath the jersey, the title, the expectations. He didn’t even know what he liked outside of hockey anymore. Who was he when he wasn’t on the ice?

He closed his eyes and tried to remember the last time he laughed—really laughed. The kind that made your chest ache and your eyes water. The kind that felt free. Unfiltered. Nothing came.

He hadn’t laughed in a long time.

He had teammates. He had family. He had people. But the truth was, Quinn Hughes felt more alone now than he ever had in his life. And he didn’t know how to ask for help.

He didn’t know how to say that the pressure was crushing him. That every game felt like walking a tightrope with no net. That every loss carved something deeper into his chest. That sometimes he stood under the shower for an hour just to feel something real.

There was no off switch. No escape. He was Captain Hughes now. He had to be calm. Composed. Controlled.

But inside, he was drowning.

There were moments, late at night, when he’d walk the seawall alone with a hoodie pulled over his head and his breath fogging in front of him. Moments when he’d sit by the water and wonder what life would be like if he weren’t Quinn Hughes. If he were just... someone. Anyone. Free to feel without the fear of letting someone down.

Because that’s what it always came back to: letting people down.

He thought of his brothers. Jack with his bright smile and boundless energy. Luke with his quiet brilliance. They looked up to him. They always had. And that scared him more than anything. Because what if they saw the cracks? What if they saw how tired he was? What if they saw that some days, he didn’t want to lace up his skates? That some days, he resented the game that had given him everything and taken just as much in return?

He hated that part of himself. The part that felt bitter. Burnt out. Hollow.

He turned from the window, the sky outside darkening with the promise of another cold Vancouver night. The apartment felt too quiet. Too sterile. He poured a drink, not because he wanted one, but because it gave his hands something to do. The whiskey burned down his throat. It didn’t help. It never did.

Quinn sat on the edge of his couch, elbows on his knees, the glass dangling loosely from his fingers. He stared at the floor and wondered how much longer he could keep doing this. Keep pretending. Keep performing. Keep carrying.

He wanted something different. Something real.

He didn’t know what that looked like. Not yet. But he knew what it wasn’t. It wasn’t the headlines. It wasn’t the jersey. It wasn’t the cheers that faded as quickly as they came. It wasn’t the way people only saw him when he was winning.

He wanted someone to see him when he was losing.

Really see him.

Not Captain Hughes. Not the defenseman. Not the franchise savior.

Just Quinn.

And maybe, one day, someone would.

But tonight, the only sound was the rain.

And the hollow echo of a man trying to hold himself together.

⸻⸻⸻⸻⸻⸻

The air inside Rogers Arena was thick with loss. It clung to the walls, to the empty seats, to the damp gear hanging in open lockers. The kind of silence that followed a season-ending defeat was unlike any other. It wasn’t loud. It was heavier than that. A kind of grief that pressed itself into the bones of the room, into the stitching of the jerseys, into the very air itself. And in the middle of it all, alone under the dim fluorescent lights of the locker room, Quinn Hughes sat perfectly still, still in full gear.

His skates were unlaced but still on. His gloves, damp with sweat and frustration, sat clenched between his knees. The rest of the team had long cleared out—some silent, others trying to shake it off with forced laughter and hollow reassurances. Quinn hadn’t moved. His eyes were locked on the floor, seeing everything and nothing all at once. The same square of tile beneath his skates stared back at him like it had answers he’d never find.

The Canucks had missed the playoffs.

Again.

He ran through every moment of the game like a looped reel in his head. The fumbled breakout. The missed stick lift. The turnover in the second period that shifted the momentum. The bad line change. The penalty that cost them the equalizer. What if he had blocked that shot? What if he had skated faster? Thought quicker? Passed sharper?

What if he was just better?

It was always him. He could’ve done more. He should’ve.

He leaned forward, bracing his elbows on his knees, his head cradled in his hands like it was the only thing keeping it from splitting apart. The weight of his helmet pressed into his forehead, the hard shell biting into his skin, but he didn’t take it off. It felt safer somehow, like a shield between him and the failure echoing in his bones. His fingers gripped at his hair through the fabric of his gloves before letting go, too tired to even hold himself together. His breathing was shallow, each inhale an effort, like even his lungs didn’t want to take up space. The room felt massive and shrinking all at once, like the walls were closing in on him while stretching into an infinite, hollow void. His pulse thundered in his ears, louder than the silence, louder than the thoughts shouting in his head. And still, he didn’t move. Couldn’t. Because moving meant facing it. And right now, he wasn’t sure he could survive that.

They made a mistake.

Not just naming him captain.

Drafting him.

Quinn didn’t know when those thoughts started to grow roots in his chest, but they were in full bloom now. What if he was a bust? A wasted draft pick? All this time, everyone talked about his skating, his vision, his composure—but what did any of that matter if he couldn’t get his team there? If he couldn’t lead them?

What if he was never meant to be enough?

What if he peaked too early?

He slowly peeled off his gloves and dropped them to the floor with a soft thud that echoed louder than it should have in the empty locker room. His fingers trembled, tingling from the cold sweat that had long dried against his palms. The ache in his knuckles pulsed like a second heartbeat. He flexed them slowly, like the pain might root him back into his body.

He stared at the gloves for a moment, his chest tightening. They looked so small on the floor. So defeated. Just like him.

He exhaled shakily, the sound catching in his throat. Then he braced himself against the bench and pushed himself up. His legs screamed in protest, muscles stiff and bruised from the game, from the season, from everything. The weight of his gear felt unbearable now. The jersey that once filled him with pride now felt suffocating, like it was pressing down on every bone.

His shoulder pads creaked as he moved, the Velcro at his sides sticking stubbornly as if even his equipment didn’t want to let go. The familiar routine of undressing after a game felt foreign. Wrong. His body went through the motions, but everything inside him was numb. Disconnected.

He didn’t bother taking off the rest. Just the gloves. Just enough to stand. Enough to move.

And so, step by step, like a sleepwalker, he drifted toward the showers. Not with purpose. Not even with intent. Just the instinct to hide somewhere the world couldn’t see him fall apart.

The water hit his skin, hot at first, then numb. Steam rose around him, curling into the air, catching the yellow of the overhead lights. He leaned his forearm against the tile and rested his head against it, eyes shut tight. His breath stuttered.

And then the tears came.

They ran down his cheeks, hot and quiet, blending seamlessly with the water cascading from the showerhead. He didn’t sob. He didn’t make a sound. He just cried. The kind of crying you didn’t even know you were doing until it had already broken through. His shoulders trembled under the pressure of all he carried, all he never said aloud.

He didn’t know how to do this anymore.

He didn’t know how to keep pretending.

How to wear the 'C' like it didn’t burn his chest.

How to keep skating when he was skating on empty.

He stayed under the water until it ran cold, until his skin was numb and his chest felt hollow, the ache in his sternum blooming deeper with each passing second. The icy spray carved through the steam and sliced against his shoulders, but still, he stood there. Rigid. Breathless. Hoping that if he just stayed a little longer, it would rinse away the guilt, the weight, the disappointment he carried like a second skin.

He tilted his face toward the stream, letting it pour down over him, blinding his eyes and filling his ears until the world outside was muffled into nothing. He wished it could drown everything out. The voices. The headlines. The pressure. The relentless whisper in his own head telling him he was a failure. That he’d let everyone down. That he was just pretending.

When he finally moved, it was mechanical. He reached for a towel without looking, barely registering the shivers that had taken over his body. Each motion was slow, deliberate, like his limbs were moving through molasses. He got dressed without looking in the mirror—he couldn't bear to. Not tonight. Not when all he would see was hollow eyes and the wreckage of who he used to be.

The locker room was even quieter now, echoing with emptiness. He grabbed his keys from his cubby and made his way down the hall, his footsteps the only sound bouncing off the concrete walls. The back exit opened with a metallic click, and he stepped out into the cold embrace of the night, where even the air seemed to exhale with grief.

He drove through downtown Vancouver like a ghost. The city glowed with artificial life—streetlights, neon signs, headlights weaving through traffic. His hands gripped the steering wheel tight, knuckles pale. He turned off the music. He couldn’t stand the sound. Not tonight.

When he pulled into the underground parking lot beneath his building, he didn’t move right away. He stared at the elevator doors, engine ticking as it cooled. His eyes burned.

Then, slowly, he shifted the gear into park, turned off the ignition, and stepped out.

But he didn’t go to the elevator.

He walked. Back up the ramp, through the quiet lobby. Past the sleeping doorman and out the revolving door. Into the cool night, where the mist clung to his hair and the scent of the sea drifted in from the harbor.

His feet took him to the waterfront without thinking.

He sat down on a bench facing the water, a familiar spot tucked just far enough from the streetlights to feel hidden—like the world had deliberately carved out a pocket for solitude. He didn't need light. Not tonight. He needed the shadows, the quiet, the place where he could unravel without the risk of being seen. The night stretched out before him like a great velvet curtain, draped in shades of sorrow.

The moon hung low and full, its glow casting a pale sheen across the surface of the harbor, soft and eerie like a whisper. The light shimmered on the dark water like spilled silver, rippling with every subtle breath of the breeze. It felt like something ancient was watching—not judging, just witnessing. Bearing quiet testimony to the ache in his chest.

Waves lapped quietly against the edge, a rhythm too soft to offer comfort, but enough to remind him that time was still moving even when he wasn't. Even when it felt like everything inside him had come to a halt. His breath came slow and fogged in the cold air, a small trace of life in a body that felt otherwise hollow.

Across the harbor, the city looked like it was sleeping. The lights in the high-rises twinkled like constellations behind glass, but there was no warmth in them. They were cold and distant, a mockery of connection. From here, the skyline looked soft, like someone had taken an eraser to its sharp edges—like the whole world had blurred, and he was the only thing left in focus.

There was no one else around. No footsteps. No voices. Just Quinn and the darkness and the distant, indifferent city. No hum of conversation. No rattle of a bike chain. No hint of movement on the quiet street behind him. Just the low thrum of the city breathing somewhere far away, out of reach.

The silence wasn’t peaceful. It was vast. Cold. Like standing in the middle of a frozen lake with nothing but the creaking ice beneath your feet. The kind of silence that made every heartbeat echo too loud, every breath feel like a scream in a cathedral.

And in that space between heartbeats, he let himself sink into the stillness. It wasn’t comfort he found there, but a numbness that offered a temporary shield from the thoughts clawing at the edges of his mind. He didn’t cry. Didn’t breathe deeply. He didn’t feel worthy of either.

He just existed. Quiet and alone. A silhouette on a bench, washed in moonlight and regret. A man with the weight of a city on his shoulders, with no one to help him carry it.

And somehow, that felt like both a punishment and a mercy. Because in that solitude, at least he didn’t have to pretend. At least out here, in the dark, he could stop performing for a world that only loved him when he was winning.

Quinn slouched forward, hands clasped together, his breath visible in the air. He stared at the reflection, wishing he could fall into it. Dissolve into the dark and start over. Be someone else.

The thoughts returned.

What if he never lived up to who he was supposed to be? What if he let everyone down? His team. His family. Himself.

He pressed his fists to his eyes.

He wasn’t good enough. He wasn’t even sure he ever had been.

He didn’t see her at first. His eyes were still on the water, lost in thought, in shame, in questions that never seemed to end. The world around him had blurred, dulled to nothing but the rhythmic lapping of the tide and the slow rise and fall of his breath. The bench, the ground, the sky—it all felt far away. He was so deep inside himself that the rest of the world ceased to exist. So when the wooden slats shifted just slightly beneath him, when the gentle weight of another person settled quietly on the far side of the bench, it felt more like a ripple than a presence. A shift in the atmosphere. A soft reminder that he wasn’t, in fact, entirely alone in the dark.

A girl had sat down beside him.

She wore a grey sweater, hood pulled up over short brown hair. Her hands were folded tightly in her lap, her shoulders drawn in like she was trying to take up less space. She didn’t look at him. Her gaze was fixed straight ahead, on the water, on the moonlight that shimmered across it.

Her eyes were glassy. She’d been crying.

Despite choosing to sit on the only occupied bench in a stretch of empty ones, she didn’t acknowledge him. It was almost like she didn’t even register that he was there. Or maybe she had—and chose not to care. She made no shift to the side, no polite nod, no glance of curiosity or apology. She just sat, arms crossed tightly around herself, a human question mark curled inward.

Her shoulders were hunched so tightly it looked like she was folding into herself, like she wanted to disappear. The kind of posture that said: don’t look at me, don’t ask, don’t speak. Her body language broadcasted it louder than words ever could. She didn’t seem to want to be seen, and yet she had come to this exact bench, as if drawn by some unspoken gravity.

She just sat there, staring at the water like it held answers. Like if she stared hard enough, long enough, the waves might part and whisper something she needed to hear. Something to make staying feel like less of a mistake.

And Quinn didn’t say anything either.

For a long time, they sat in silence.

The kind of silence that wasn’t awkward. Just heavy. Weighted with things neither of them could say. The occasional car drove by behind them, its tires hissing on the wet road. Somewhere nearby, a gull cried out and the water lapped softly against the shore. It was the only sound that felt honest.

He didn’t know who she was.

But she looked like she was drowning too.

Ava Monroe had never meant to sit on that bench.

She had never meant to be anywhere at all, not tonight.

The fight with her mom had been brutal. Ugly. The kind of words that didn’t just hurt—they hollowed her out. Scarred deeper than fists ever could. Ava had gone to her mother out of desperation, aching for some kind of connection, some shred of maternal warmth, a single thread to hold onto. But all she got was venom, sharp and cold and unforgiving.

The words weren't just cruel—they were confirmation. Confirmation that every terrible thing she had ever believed about herself was true. That she was a burden. That she wasn’t wanted. That she wasn’t enough. Her mother’s voice didn’t just echo in the room—it rooted itself in her chest, in the hollow spaces already carved out by years of neglect and silence. It made her feel microscopic. Like her existence had always been some colossal inconvenience.

Ava left that house feeling like a ghost. Like a girl made of glass. Each step home felt heavier, more meaningless. There was nothing left in her—no fire, no fight, not even the quiet defiance she used to carry just to get through the day. She felt like she didn’t belong anywhere, not even in her own skin. Like the world had gone on without her a long time ago, and she’d only just realized it.

"You’ll never be enough."

"You ruined everything."

"You were a mistake."

The words sliced her open, deep and surgical, with a precision only a mother could wield. She didn’t flinch. Didn’t argue. Didn’t cry. She just stood there, frozen in place, absorbing every blow like a sponge, letting it soak through her until she was heavy with shame. It was like watching her own soul disintegrate in real-time. Her hands hung limp at her sides. Her heart didn’t even race—it just slowed, like it had given up trying.

She moved on instinct, her body carrying her out the door and down the street like she was sleepwalking, like something detached had taken over and was pulling the strings for her. The city was buzzing around her, but she didn’t hear it. Didn’t see it. She was a shell.

When she got back to her apartment, the lights were too bright. Too artificial. They revealed too much, illuminated all the places inside her that were cracked and bleeding. She walked past the mirror without looking. She knew what she'd see: nothing. Just hollow eyes. A stranger.

And then she saw the bottle. It was just sitting there. Quiet. Waiting.

She picked it up.

Stared at it.

Her hand shook as she unscrewed the cap. She poured them out into her palm, white tablets spilling like tiny bones into the center of her hand. The weight of them felt enormous. Final.

She sat on the floor, cold and silent, and stared at her shaking hands. Her breathing came shallow, like the room had been drained of oxygen. Her thoughts were louder than ever, a storm behind her eyes: You’re a failure. A disappointment. A mistake. Unlovable.

The silence was so total, it felt like the world had already moved on without her.

And for one long, harrowing moment, she almost let go.

She shook them gently, the pills rattling like distant thunder in the quiet room—a sound so small, yet impossibly loud in the silence.

Her fingers shook.

Her breathing was shallow, barely there, each inhale catching like her lungs had to think twice before choosing to keep going. The silence in the apartment pressed against her ears, not soft or gentle, but brutal—the kind of silence that made your skin crawl, like the walls were whispering all the things you were too afraid to say out loud.

It was too quiet. Too still. Like the world had stopped moving just to watch her unravel. The ticking of the clock felt like a taunt, counting down a life she didn’t want to keep living. Her heart didn’t feel like it beat anymore—it thudded, dull and mechanical, like a broken metronome.

Everything inside her felt empty and echoing, like she had become a hollow thing, carved out piece by piece by the people who were supposed to love her. She didn’t even cry. There weren’t tears left. Just a vast, suffocating stillness, as if even grief had abandoned her now.

But something stopped her.

A voice she couldn’t name. A feeling in her chest. Like someone was holding her wrist. Telling her to wait. To breathe.

She put the pills back in the bottle.

Put on her sweater.

Walked.

And now she was here.

Sitting beside a stranger.

Alive, but unsure why.

She didn’t know who he was. Didn’t care. All she knew was that he was as still as she was. As broken. That something about the way he stared at the water made her feel less alone.

They didn’t speak.

But their silence was the loudest thing either of them had heard all night.

Minutes passed. Maybe an hour. Neither of them moved.

Quinn glanced at her. Just once.

And for a second, she met his eyes.

Just a second.

But in that second, he saw her pain. She saw his.

And for the first time in what felt like forever, they both breathed a little deeper.

Together.

The night didn’t fix anything. It didn’t heal them. But it didn’t break them further, either.

And sometimes, that’s enough.

That night, they didn’t fall apart.

They just... sat. And survived.

Side by side.

⸻⸻⸻⸻⸻⸻

Quinn looked across to her one more time.

Really looked.

It wasn’t just the way the moonlight framed her face or the way her sweater hung like armor against the night. It was the stillness in her body, the haunting in her eyes. There was something about her—something not loud, not obvious—but deeply known. A ghost of a memory wrapped in velvet pain. A shape he hadn’t seen in years but still knew by name, as if she'd been waiting on the periphery of his life all along.

His eyes traced the soft outline of her jaw, delicate and trembling like it held back a thousand words. The faint sheen of dried tears clung stubbornly to her cheeks, catching the moonlight like salt-crusted silver. But it was her expression that stunned him. That deep, quiet devastation. The kind of brokenness people learn to wear like perfume—undetectable unless you’ve worn it too. She didn’t just look sad. She looked emptied. As if she’d bled out every last feeling and was only now discovering what it meant to be a shell.

And the way she held herself, shoulders slumped like her bones could no longer carry the weight of being alive—it almost looked rehearsed. Like she'd practiced disappearing. Like she’d spent years perfecting the art of looking okay while silently screaming.

And then it clicked.

Of course he knew who she was.

Her last name was practically stamped into every corner of the city.

Monroe.

David Monroe. Real estate titan. Investor. Philanthropist. A name stitched into the very fabric of the city. His empire touched everything—commercial towers, luxury condos, high-profile foundations. And the Canucks? They were just another line on his ledger. A silent but steady benefactor of the organization, his influence loomed like the skyline his company had helped build. Every player knew that name. You couldn’t be part of the team without brushing shoulders with the Monroes.

Every year, they hosted a lavish charity gala—an affair of such extravagance that even seasoned veterans couldn’t hide their discomfort. Held in a grand ballroom glittering with crystal chandeliers and lined with tables draped in silk, the event was a performance of wealth and image. Silver champagne trays floated between guests, the air filled with the soft clinking of crystal flutes and rehearsed laughter. The players would show up in tuxedos, practice their media smiles in the car, and take photos for the press like it all meant something. They thanked the Monroes with polite handshakes and obligatory small talk, careful not to overstep, careful to appear grateful.

It was the kind of night where everything sparkled, except the people who had to pretend to belong there.

Quinn remembered her father clearly.

David Monroe was the one standing on stage, smiling beside ownership and management, when Quinn first pulled on the Canucks jersey on draft night. A handshake, a picture. Flashbulbs. Cheers. Everything about that moment had felt like a coronation. Quinn Hughes, savior of the franchise. Golden boy.

But he didn’t remember seeing her.

Not until now.

And now that he had—he couldn’t unsee her. Ava Monroe, the invisible girl behind the empire. The one who should've glowed under the same lights, been photographed on red carpets, toasted by men in suits, wrapped in everything that came with a name like hers. But she hadn’t. Somehow, she had slipped through the cracks of her own legacy, choosing shadows over chandeliers. Sitting beside him now, she looked like a ghost aching to be felt, not seen—like someone who had spent her whole life being too visible in the wrong ways and invisible in all the ways that mattered.

There was a haunting in her presence, the kind that made you want to apologize without knowing what for. And Quinn did. He wanted to say sorry for a world that forgot her. For a father who used her last name like currency while letting his daughter starve for affection. For the cameras that had never panned her way. For the years she must've spent wondering if her life was even her own.

And then, just as the recognition settled into his bones, she looked up.

Tear-stained eyes. Silent. Red-rimmed.

And she knew.

Of course she did.

Quinn Hughes. The prodigy. The captain. The promise.

The man who was meant to lift the city. To carry its hopes like a crown and wear its failures like chains. To lead the team through the fire and still emerge smiling. To be the one who fixed everything, even when he was the one silently falling apart. He was the face on the banners, the name in the headlines, the reason kids wore number 43 jerseys. And no one ever stopped to ask what that weight might be doing to the boy underneath it all.

She blinked at him, slowly, and something passed between them—something unspoken and deeply human, like the kind of look you give someone when you both know what it means to want to disappear. A silent understanding that didn’t need translation. A breath of shared grief, heavy and unrelenting, that wrapped around them like a fog neither of them could escape. In that fragile second, it was like they were looking into a mirror made of pain—different stories, different scars, but the same hollow ache behind their eyes. The world didn’t shift around them, but something inside did. Something wordless and aching that whispered, I see you. I feel it too.

Both of them had grown up being told they were meant for greatness.

Both of them knew what it felt like to suffocate under that weight.

Both of them were breaking.

The emptiness echoed between them like a heartbeat. A soundless ache that needed no explanation.

And then, after a pause that felt like it stretched out forever, Quinn swallowed hard, the tension in his jaw finally giving way. He turned his body slightly toward her, hesitant, uncertain, but needing to say something before the silence drowned them both.

"I—"

His voice cracked, and he had to start again.

"I don’t know if I’m good enough for this," he said quietly, almost like he was confessing it to the ocean. "I don’t know if I’m good enough for anything. At all. And I feel like I’m slowly falling apart and breaking."

The words sat in the air, raw and trembling.

She didn’t respond. Not with words.

A tear slipped down her cheek. Another.

"My, uh... my thought was that this would be my last night," She said, her voice barely a whisper. Her voice was thin. A ghost of itself. "It almost was."

Quinn’s breath hitched, but he didn’t look away. He couldn’t.

She looked down at her hands, still clenched tightly in her lap, knuckles white. The air around them suddenly felt sharper, like the world had stilled to listen.

Quinn turned his head just slightly, not wanting to push, but needing to hear her.

Ava swallowed hard, her throat raw. "I had them all in my hand. The pills. I sat on the floor of my bedroom, staring at them. And for a second, it was the only thing that made sense. Like I could finally stop the screaming inside my head. Like I could finally rest."

She took a shaky breath, then another, like her lungs were relearning how to function. Her voice was a flicker, something barely lit. "But I didn’t. I don’t know why. Something in me—some tiny, quiet part that still believed in something—just... wouldn’t let me. Maybe it was fear. Maybe it was hope. Maybe it was nothing more than habit. But I couldn’t do it. My hand was trembling so hard I thought I was going to drop everything."

Her stare fell distant, glassed over again. "I was sitting there, on the floor, holding my life in one hand and everything I hated about myself in the other. And all I could think was... no one would notice. Not really. My phone wouldn’t ring. No one would come looking. The world would keep spinning and I’d just be another girl who didn’t make it. And for a moment, that felt like peace."

She paused, her voice breaking on the next exhale. "But then something happened. Something I can’t explain. Like the tiniest part of me screamed. Like my own soul refused to be snuffed out without one final fight. I put the pills back. I stood up. I walked out the door. I didn’t even grab a coat. I didn’t know where I was going, but I knew if I stayed one second longer, I wasn’t going to make it."

Her eyes finally flicked up, not to look at him, but past him, to the water. "So I ended up here. Still breathing. But not really living. Just... floating. Empty. I didn’t want to be found. I just didn’t want to disappear without someone knowing I was ever here in the first place."

The words hung between them, bare and bleeding. A confession not meant to earn comfort, just to be heard.

She didn’t cry when she said it. She sounded hollow. Like she’d already cried all the tears there were to cry.

And Quinn didn’t speak.

He just listened.

Because he knew what it felt like to be so tired of being alive that even breathing felt like a burden.

The honesty clung to the air like smoke. Fragile. Heavy.

Another tear traced the curve of Ava's face. But she still didn’t say anything. She didn’t need to. Her silence said enough. It said: Me too.

And maybe that was the first moment they truly understood each other. Not because of their names. Not because of who they were supposed to be. But because beneath all of that—the legacies, the expectations, the titles—they were just two broken people whose pain happened to echo at the same frequency. Two souls who had come to the water's edge not to find answers, but to surrender. And yet, somehow, they'd collided. Quietly. Gently. Without ceremony. Just a breath between strangers who were anything but.

Their silence wasn’t passive—it was deliberate. Thick with everything they couldn’t say. A communion of ghosts sitting side by side. Each aching, each unraveling, each choosing not to fall apart simply because the other was still sitting there. Still breathing.

And in that aching silence, something passed between them—not a promise, not a rescue, but a thread. Fragile. Unspoken. I see you. I feel it too.

As if pulled by gravity, they shifted.

Slowly. Quietly. As if afraid to shatter whatever had taken root between them.

They moved closer.

Ava’s shoulder brushed Quinn’s.

The contact was barely there, but it was enough. Enough to ground them both.

Quinn didn’t flinch.

Neither did Ava.

That small touch, that simple warmth, threaded something through them—a fragile thread of safety in a world that had offered them nothing but cold.

It wasn’t romantic. It wasn’t dramatic. It was real.

Their bodies didn’t shift again. They didn’t hug. They didn’t hold hands. They just sat, shoulder to shoulder, their pain seeping into one another, until it didn’t feel so sharp. So singular.

They were two souls trapped under the same foot of pressure.

Two hearts with too many cracks.

Two people who had spent years suffocating in silence, and somehow found breath in each other.

Ava closed her eyes and leaned just slightly into his side. Not enough to be a plea. Just enough to say, I’m still here.

Quinn stayed still. But his head dipped ever so slightly in her direction. His shoulder curved toward hers. His eyes remained on the water, but his thoughts were finally somewhere else.

And in that moment, they both felt it.

A shift.

The beginning of something neither of them had words for.

A presence. A tether. A reason.

They sat like that for a long time. The world moved on without them—cars passed, waves rose and fell, the city lights blinked in patterns too fast to follow. But they didn’t move.

Minutes turned into hours.

The pain didn’t disappear. But it dulled. Muted.

Like someone had finally lit a candle in the dark.

And though they didn’t say another word, they didn’t need to.

The silence had changed.

It was no longer a void.

It was a shelter.

And sometimes, that was enough to begin again.

Just as the wind picked up, brushing past them like the breath of something ancient, Quinn turned his head slightly toward her. His voice was soft, barely there. "I see you," he said. Three words, but they felt like a lighthouse cutting through fog.

Ava didn’t answer right away. But her breath hitched, and then steadied. She turned her gaze to him slowly, her eyes tired, but no longer empty. "I see you too," she whispered.

They didn’t say anything else. There was nothing left to say. So they leaned gently into each other, the contact quiet but constant, and let the silence settle around them like a blanket.

The night stretched long, and the darkness never lifted, but they stayed. Two shadows on a bench, side by side.

And somehow, that night—that fragile, fleeting night—was enough for them to choose to stay a little longer in the world.

Enough to make it through one more sunrise.

⸻⸻⸻⸻⸻⸻

The first light of dawn broke slowly, as if unsure whether it was welcome. It crept over the horizon in soft hues—faded gold, gentle blush, the faintest whisper of blue. The waves caught it first, the gentle lapping of water at the harbor edge shimmering like liquid gold. Then the sky followed, spreading it across the city like the slow reveal of a secret.

Neither of them had moved.

Quinn and Ava sat shoulder to shoulder on that old wooden bench, the air around them still heavy with the weight of everything that had passed between them. It wasn’t the kind of silence that screamed. It was the kind that exhaled—soft, worn, exhausted. The kind that said, you’re still here, and so am I.

The cold had settled into their bones, deep and aching, but they hadn’t noticed. Not really. Because something warmer had wrapped itself around them, invisible but steady. A shared understanding, a tether. The gravity of the night had forged something fragile and indelible between them—something they didn’t understand yet but felt all the same.

The silence between them had shifted from one of pain to one of comfort. From a quiet cry for help to a quiet offering of presence. No more apologies. No need for explanation. Just breath in the cold. The subtle rhythm of two people choosing, again and again, not to leave. Shared breath. Shared survival. And in that stillness, the beginning of something neither of them could name, but both of them needed.

The sunrise wasn’t beautiful. It was quiet. Muted. The kind of sunrise that didn’t demand attention, just offered presence. There were no vivid streaks of fire across the sky, no brilliant crescendo of colors. Just a slow, tender brightening. The world easing itself into wakefulness. It rose like a sigh—tired, cautious, and real.

And that, somehow, felt perfect.

Because that morning wasn’t about beauty. It wasn’t about spectacle. It was about surviving the night. About making it through the hardest hours and finding, somehow, that the sky still turned. That the sun still rose. That breath still came.

The light didn’t feel triumphant. It felt earned. Like something cracked open quietly and let the day slip in.

Quinn shifted slightly, straightening his back with a quiet exhale. He rubbed at his face, the exhaustion of the night finally catching up to him. Ava followed, stretching out her legs, feeling the pins and needles in her feet as blood returned to limbs left too still for too long. Her fingers flexed slowly, grounding herself back into her body.

They didn’t speak.

There was no need.

What could they say that hadn’t already been said in silence?

Instead, they exchanged a glance. A quiet, reverent thing. A moment of mutual understanding that needed no words. It lingered, not rushed or fleeting, but long enough to say everything that mattered. There was something sacred in it—a silent bow of gratitude, a recognition of shared survival. They didn’t smile. Didn’t cry. They just looked at each other with the kind of raw honesty that only exists after darkness has been witnessed together. It was their way of saying, I see you. Thank you for staying.

And softly, Quinn spoke again. His voice was hoarse. "I see you."

Ava met his eyes, her own rimmed with a different kind of tear this time—not despair, but something gentler. "I see you too."

It wasn’t dramatic. It wasn’t cinematic. But it was enough.

Ava stood first. Her body protested, stiff and cold, but she didn’t mind. She tucked her hands into the sleeves of her hoodie, glanced down at Quinn, and gave the smallest of nods. He rose with her, slower, heavier, but he stood.

They didn’t hug.

They didn’t exchange numbers.

They didn’t make promises.

They just parted ways.

She walked one way, toward the edge of downtown, her steps slow, as if her body was still catching up to the weight of what had just happened. The hoodie swallowed her small frame, the sleeves too long, her hands still hidden inside them. With every step, she felt the echo of their silence, the comfort of it, trailing behind her like a ghost she wasn’t quite ready to let go of.

He walked the other, toward the towers he called home, his hands in his pockets, shoulders hunched, not from the cold but from something deeper—an ache, a lingering presence pressed into the slope of his spine. The bench faded behind them, but the feeling of it stayed—like warmth that lingered long after the fire had gone out.

The city slowly came alive around them—joggers blinking against the light, dog walkers tugging sleepy pups along wet sidewalks, the hum of traffic stirring awake. The world resumed its rhythm as if nothing had happened, as if two broken souls hadn’t just sat in the quiet and saved each other without saying so.

And neither of them looked back.

But both of them carried it. That night. That moment. That bench. A memory soft and sacred, stitched into the fabric of their morning.

They didn’t need to say it aloud. There was an unspoken agreement between them now. A silent pact forged in the dark: this night belonged to no one else. It was not for telling. Not for sharing. It was theirs. Only theirs.

And somehow, that knowledge was enough to steady their steps.

That should’ve been the end.

But it wasn’t.

Because somehow, a week later, they both ended up back at that same bench.

It wasn’t planned. Neither of them expected it. Quinn had taken the long way home after a game, a loss that twisted in his chest like a knife and refused to loosen its grip. His body ached, but not from the ice—from the weight of the night, the disappointment of another failed attempt at being enough. He didn’t want to go back to his apartment. The silence there wasn’t just silence; it was sharp, punishing, an echo chamber of regret. The lights were always too bright when he walked in. The air always too still. The emptiness too honest.

So he drove with no destination, his hands on the wheel but his thoughts miles away. His chest heavy. His eyes burning. He didn’t know where he was going until he got there.

That bench.

The one that had held him when he couldn’t hold himself.

The one where someone had seen him and stayed.

And Ava—she hadn’t planned it either. But she couldn’t stay in that house. Not after the latest fight. Not after hearing the same accusations echo off the walls. Not after being told she was ungrateful. Spoiled. A waste.

She had walked out into the night without a destination. Without a plan. Just a desperate need to breathe. To exist somewhere her pain wasn’t questioned or ignored. She didn’t know where her feet were taking her. Only that she needed to follow them.

And like something pulled from a quiet promise, from the magnetic pull of shared grief, they ended up there. As if the bench itself remembered them—held their pain from nights before, waited patiently beneath the city’s noise for their return. It wasn’t just a coincidence. It felt fated, like a hidden current in the universe had gently ushered them back to each other, back to that sliver of peace they had carved together in the dark. A place that didn’t demand anything but presence. A place that somehow knew what they needed before they did. They arrived without purpose, without preparation, but their steps mirrored the same ache, the same longing—to not be alone with the weight they carried. To be met in the middle of their ache without question. And again, the bench made room. Again, they sat. Together.

At the bench.

At the edge of the world.

Within minutes of each other.

Their eyes met.

Quinn’s breath caught.

Ava’s shoulders, tight with tension, eased.

She sat first.

He followed.

And that night, they stayed until the stars faded.

It became a rhythm. An unspoken routine.

They never texted. Never called. Never asked, will you be there?

But somehow, they always were.

Maybe not every night. But often enough that the bench no longer felt like just a bench. It became something sacred. A place of reckoning. Of retreat. Of quiet rebuilding.

They brought coffee sometimes. Wore warmer clothes. Sometimes one would arrive to find the other already waiting, and nothing needed to be said. The presence alone was enough. Familiar. Reassuring.

And each night, they shared a little more.

Quinn spoke about the pressure of being captain. Not in the way reporters asked about it, but in the way it sat on his chest at 2 a.m., making it hard to breathe. He talked about the fear of failure. The guilt of losing. The exhaustion of being everything to everyone and still feeling like nothing to himself.

Ava listened. Not as a fan. Not as a girl dazzled by his fame. But as someone who knew what it meant to crumble. To carry weight you never asked for.

And Ava, in turn, spoke of her loneliness. Of growing up in a house full of noise but no warmth. Of disappearing behind her father’s money, behind her mother’s scorn. Of wanting, so desperately, to be loved without condition.

Quinn didn’t offer advice. He didn’t tell her to be strong. He just listened. Sat with her in the stillness. Let her be.

And so it went.

Sometimes they talked. Sometimes they didn’t. Some nights were filled with stories, confessions, tiny truths whispered into the dark. Other nights, they just sat side by side in silence, their presence saying everything their mouths couldn’t.

They didn’t touch. Not beyond the occasional brush of shoulders. Not beyond the quiet comfort of nearness. It wasn’t about that.

It was about knowing.

About being seen.

About sharing pain without having to relive it.

They came as Quinn and Ava. Not the captain burdened by expectations and headlines. Not the heiress veiled in privilege and shadowed by neglect. Just two souls stripped of their titles, peeled back to their most human selves. Two people with fractures in their bones and too much weight in their hearts—weight that made it hard to breathe some days, impossible to stand on others. And yet, they stood. Or sat. Or simply were. They didn’t need to perform. They didn’t need to impress. They didn’t need to be anything more than exactly what they were in those moments: quiet, unraveling, healing. The bench didn’t care about what jerseys they wore or whose name came on checks. It welcomed them as they were. And together, they began to stitch the pieces of themselves into something new—not flawless, but whole in a different kind of way.

And little by little, something began to shift.

The bench became a bridge.

They laughed sometimes. Quiet, soft laughter. The kind that didn’t echo, just lingered in the air like a promise. It wasn’t loud or forced—it was shy at first, like they were rediscovering what it meant to feel light for even a second. Ava would tell him about old books she loved, the ones with pages yellowed from being read too many times, stories that had been her escape when the world felt too cruel. She’d describe the characters like friends, like pieces of herself she never knew how to share until now.

Quinn would talk about skating. Not just the game, but the movement. The way it felt to glide when the world grew too heavy, how the ice made sense when nothing else did. He spoke about the quiet before a puck dropped, the clarity in motion, how for just a few seconds, everything else fell away and he could breathe. Sometimes he brought her old playlists from the locker room, laughing about the bad ones, smiling over the ones that stuck. Ava once brought him a thermos of chamomile tea because she said it smelled like peace. They didn’t make it a big deal. But he drank every drop.

Some nights she’d bring a book and read aloud, her voice soft and even, Quinn listening with his eyes closed, as if the sound alone was enough to stitch something inside him back together. Some nights he’d point out constellations, giving them wrong names on purpose just to make her roll her eyes and laugh, really laugh—head tipped back, teeth showing, that rare kind of laugh that healed something hidden.

They didn’t need plans. Just the bench. Just each other. And the quiet joys they built, one breath at a time.

And the pain didn’t vanish.

But it changed.

Because now, they weren’t carrying it alone.

They were still broken.

But broken didn’t mean empty.

And in each other, they found space to heal.

Quietly.

Softly.

Without rush.

Without expectation.

Without fear.

The world still didn’t know about those nights. No one ever would. And that was the point.

It was theirs.

Just Quinn.

Just Ava.

Two shadows who collided at the edge of their breaking point, and stayed long enough to remember what it meant to begin again.

⸻⸻⸻⸻⸻⸻

Eventually, they moved on from the bench.

It wasn’t sudden. It was a slow drift, like everything else between them. A natural, quiet shift from one space to another. The bench had become their place, their anchor—but like all things born from pain, it wasn’t meant to hold them forever. Healing required movement, and without realizing it, they’d begun to crave something more than the comfort of shared silence. They wanted light. Warmth. A kind of closeness that didn’t depend on the shadows.

Quinn had been pestering her for weeks.

"You haven’t seen it? Seriously? Ava, it’s the movie," he’d say with mock indignation, hand over his heart as if she’d personally offended his taste in cinema.

"I don’t know," she’d reply with a small shrug, teasing but cautious. "I’m not in the mood for something sad."

"It’s not sad. Okay, well, it kind of is. But in a good way. In a ‘you’ll cry but also feel seen’ kind of way."

He’d keep bringing it up at the end of their nights at the bench, each mention softer, more coaxing. Until one night, she sighed, smiled faintly, and said, "Fine. Let’s watch your movie."

That night, they didn’t go to the bench.

Instead, they found themselves in his apartment. It was the first time she’d been there. He had tried to tidy up beforehand, but it still looked lived in—soft piles of laundry, a few mugs on the counter, books stacked haphazardly beside the TV. It smelled like pine soap and popcorn, and it felt safe. Not perfect. Not curated. Just like him.

They sat next to each other on the couch, sharing a worn fleece blanket Quinn had pulled from the back of the couch, its corners frayed, edges soft from years of use. He’d made popcorn, which she’d half-spilled trying to get comfortable. They laughed about it, brushing kernels off the floor, her giggling melting into his quiet chuckle. The room buzzed with the easy kind of energy they didn’t get to feel often—light, open, effortless.

The Perks of Being a Wallflower.

They watched in silence, the kind that meant they didn’t need to fill the space between them. It was the kind of quiet that felt sacred, a quiet formed not from awkwardness but from complete ease. The room seemed to hold its breath with them, lit only by the flickering of the screen and the faint rustle of popcorn shifting in the bowl on Ava’s lap.

Occasionally, Ava would glance sideways at him, not just watching him, but seeing him. The way he leaned forward during the emotional scenes, how his hands twitched slightly during moments of tension, the way he mouthed his favorite lines as if they were prayers. He didn’t just watch the movie—he felt it, deeply, letting it thread through him like a song he knew by heart. His eyes were wide, glassy even, but soft. Focused.

He didn’t talk during it. Not once. Just sat there, wide-eyed and still, like he was living it again, like he was seeing parts of himself on the screen he didn’t often show. Every so often, his chest would rise with a slightly deeper breath, and Ava would mirror it without thinking. They were in their own quiet rhythm, bound by a story that wasn’t theirs but somehow spoke to both of them anyway. The silence between them said more than any words could have—it said, I’m here. I understand. And that was enough.

When the final scene faded and the music swelled, neither of them reached for the remote. The room sat in silence for a while, except for the soft hum of the credits and the world outside.

"You were right," Ava whispered.

Quinn didn’t look away from the screen. "Told you."

She nudged his shoulder with hers beneath the blanket, a small gesture of warmth. He glanced at her, and for a second, the smile on his face wasn’t weighed down by anything at all.

The hockey season was long over.

For a few months, the noise quieted. The headlines stilled. The fans moved on to other sports, other distractions. And Quinn—he had become visibly lighter. The stress lines in his forehead softened. The haunted look in his eyes began to fade. His days were slow. His nights were gentler. He took walks. He cooked. He laughed more.

It was like the pressure had been peeled off, even if only temporarily. He could breathe again. He could be Quinn, not Captain Hughes.

But with the end of the season came the inevitable.

Summer. And Michigan.

He hadn’t talked about it yet, not out loud. But it had been lingering. A quiet shadow at the edge of every day. A low hum behind every laugh. A weight pressing down on his chest when the nights got too still. It was the kind of thought that crept in during the softest moments—when her head was tilted back in laughter, or when she was watching the world pass outside his window with that faraway look in her eyes. The thought that he was leaving. That time was slipping through his fingers like sand, grain by grain, and soon this fragile pocket of peace they’d built would dissolve. He felt it in the silence between them. In the long pauses that stretched a little longer each day. It was a countdown, not just to his departure, but to a shift he didn’t know how to navigate. And the worst part was—he didn’t know how to tell her. How to put into words the ache of loving something so gentle and knowing it couldn’t last in this exact way forever. So he kept it tucked away, a secret pulsing in his chest, waiting for the courage to speak it out loud.

He was going home. To his family. To the lake. To the place where he could hide from the world for a while.

But not from her.

He didn’t want to leave her.

Ava had been his quiet salvation. His rock. The person who never expected him to be anything other than human. When the weight of the captaincy crushed his chest, she never once told him to be strong. She just sat with him in the dark and let him breathe. When the headlines screamed his name or fans threw blame like darts, she didn’t flinch. She didn’t care about stats, didn’t ask about press conferences, didn’t bring up hockey unless he did.

With her, he wasn’t a franchise player or a golden boy. He wasn’t a fixer of broken teams or the hope of a city. He was just Quinn—the boy who liked quiet nights, who sometimes needed to be held without asking, who laughed softly when she rolled her eyes, who listened to the same song on repeat because it made him feel less alone.

She gave him space to fall apart. To speak without being judged. To not speak at all and still be heard. She made silence feel like safety. And he needed her—more than he ever realized—because for the first time in years, he didn’t feel like he was holding the world alone. He didn’t feel like he had to.

And he knew, in that complicated, painful way, that she needed him too.

So the night after the movie, when they were sitting in the kitchen sharing a bowl of cereal at 1 a.m.—because Quinn claimed cereal always tasted better after midnight—he finally said it.

"I have to go home next week."

Ava looked up slowly, spoon halfway to her mouth.

He saw it instantly—the flicker in her eyes, the stiffening of her shoulders. She tried to smile. She tried to play it cool. But she wasn’t very good at hiding how she felt.

She dropped her head, focusing on her bowl. "Oh. Yeah. That makes sense."

Quinn hated how her voice changed when she tried to be brave.

Without thinking, he reached across the counter and touched her hand. She froze.

Then he stood and walked around to her side of the table, crouching down in front of her like he couldn’t stand the space between them any longer. And then—he hugged her.

Their first hug.

He wrapped his arms around her tightly, and she buried her face in his shoulder, arms hesitating before folding around him like she was afraid he might vanish. When she finally did hold him back, it was with a grip that trembled, like she was holding onto something fragile but vital. Her hands curled into the back of his sweatshirt, and he felt her breathing grow uneven against his chest.

His fingers pressed gently into her back like he was trying to memorize the shape of her, not just physically, but emotionally—every piece of her he’d come to know and need. He didn’t want to let go. Neither did she. It was one of those moments that stretched beyond time, where the ache of goodbye wrapped itself around the warmth of presence.

They weren’t just hugging—they were trying to stay whole, just a little longer. Trying to carry the memory of this moment into the spaces where their hands wouldn’t be able to reach. And in that grip, in the silence, in the tremble of their bodies against one another, they both knew: letting go was going to feel like breaking.

He held her there for a while.

"I’ll call you every night," he murmured. "Okay? Every night. I promise."

She didn’t respond. Just nodded against his chest, but her arms tightened around him, just slightly. Like she was trying to memorize the shape of this moment, hold it in her body so she wouldn’t forget what it felt like to be needed like this. Her breath hitched once, and then again, and he could feel the way she was trying not to fall apart entirely. But she was trembling, and so was he.

And for the first time in a long time, Quinn cried. Quiet tears. The kind that slipped out without warning, catching on his lashes before falling onto the top of her head. His chest ached with the kind of sadness that didn’t shout—it simply settled, low and slow, into every part of him. He didn’t sob. He just let the tears fall, like something inside him had finally run out of ways to hold it all in.

He didn’t know how he’d be okay without her. How to wake up without her quiet texts. How to fall asleep without her voice lacing through the dark. He didn’t know how to let go of someone who had found all his broken pieces and made him feel like they weren’t something to be ashamed of. He didn’t know how to leave when every instinct in his body was screaming to stay.

So he held her tighter. As if that could freeze the clock. As if maybe, just maybe, if he held her long enough, time would pause, and they wouldn't have to say goodbye—not yet. Maybe not ever.

He kissed the top of her head. She didn’t pull away.

Michigan was quiet.

It was green and warm, the trees stretching overhead like old friends. The lake glistened with sunlight that bounced in a thousand directions, and his childhood home looked the same, down to the worn wooden steps and the wind chime that clinked softly when the breeze passed through. He fell back into the rhythm of home, but it didn’t feel quite the same.

His mom met him at the door with a long, wordless hug. She didn’t ask anything. Not yet.

But she saw it.

She always saw everything.

She watched him during those first few days. Not closely, not with suspicion. But with the gentle curiosity of a mother who knew her son had been hurting. She noticed the way he checked his phone constantly. The way he lingered near the window after dinner. The way his moods shifted in the evenings, how his restlessness would suddenly vanish around midnight.

She noticed the smile, too.

The one he wore when he slipped out to the dock. The one he didn’t even realize had crept onto his face.

And so, she didn’t ask.

She let him have that secret.

Each night, like clockwork, Quinn would sit on the dock with his phone pressed to his ear, feet hanging over the edge, toes brushing the cool wood worn smooth by years of childhood summers. The water below reflected moonlight like shattered glass, shifting gently with the breeze, a quiet mirror to the thoughts swirling in his head.

He would talk quietly, his voice softer than it ever was in the city. Some nights, he laughed—those rare, low laughs that came from somewhere deep, bubbling up like relief. Other nights, he spoke in hushed fragments, sometimes pausing between words just to listen to the sound of her breathing on the other end. And on some nights, they said almost nothing at all. Just stayed connected. Just were. The silence never felt empty with her. It felt held.

He would eventually lie on his back, letting the wood press into his shoulders, the lake air cool on his face. The stars above him stretched endless and quiet, like someone had thrown glitter across black velvet. His phone rested on his chest, warm against his heart, Ava's voice still ringing in his ears like a lullaby. Some nights she read to him. Some nights they made up constellations and gave them stupid names. Some nights they listened to the same song over and over again, letting the lyrics fill the spaces where words couldn’t reach.

And always, always, he stayed until the last word, the last laugh, the last breath of her presence faded into sleep. Because even from hundreds of miles away, she was the only thing that made him feel close to whole.

They talked about everything and nothing.

About books. The ones they’d read as kids, and the ones they never finished because life got in the way. About the sky—how it looked different in Michigan than it did in Vancouver, how sometimes clouds held stories and the stars made promises. About what they ate that day, even when it wasn’t exciting, even when it was just cereal or cold leftovers, because the mundane started to feel sacred when it was shared.

They talked about the ache in their chests that showed up when the world grew too quiet. About what it meant to long for someone you hadn’t known forever but who felt like home anyway. About the strange beauty of missing someone who wasn’t family, who wasn’t a lover, but who had become something more essential—like a lighthouse, like gravity, like air.

Sometimes they didn’t need words. Sometimes it was just the soft rustle of wind through his phone speaker, the distant sound of a car in the background of her call. They filled the spaces not with stories, but with the simple assurance: I’m here. I haven’t gone anywhere. And that, more than anything, kept them both afloat.

One night, he asked her to describe the bench to him.

"It’s lonely without you," she said.

He closed his eyes. "You’re not alone. I’m there. Just on the other end of the line."

And she believed him.

Other nights, he read to her. Passages from his favorite book. Descriptions of the lake. The way the water caught fire at sunset. They’d fall asleep on the phone more than once, whispering until their words faded into breath. There were no rules. Just the comfort of knowing the other was there.

His mom never interrupted. But sometimes, she’d step out onto the porch and see him there, lying on the dock, eyes full of stars. His silhouette, outlined by the faint silver of moonlight, looked younger somehow, like the boy he used to be before the world placed so much weight on his shoulders. The phone was always pressed gently to his ear, and she could see the subtle curve of a smile tugging at his lips—soft, unguarded, the kind of smile she hadn’t seen in years.

And her heart would ache in the best way. Ache because she recognized that someone, somewhere, was reaching into her son’s darkness and lighting a candle. Someone was listening to him, truly listening, in the way only people who have learned to sit with pain know how. She didn’t know what they talked about. She didn’t need to. The way his shoulders relaxed, the way his breathing slowed, the way he lingered in that same spot long after the conversations ended—all of it told her what she needed to know.

She’d watch for a moment longer, letting the quiet scene imprint itself in her memory, before stepping back inside. Because what he had out there on that dock wasn’t hers to claim or question. It was sacred, healing, his. A piece of peace she’d prayed he would find, even if it didn’t come from her.

Someone was healing her son.

Not fixing him. Not changing him.

Just holding the broken parts gently enough that they stopped hurting so much.

She didn’t need to know who it was.

But she hoped they knew what they meant to him.

And maybe, just maybe, what he meant to them.

Because when Quinn finally came back inside each night, his shoulders were lighter. His smile was softer. His eyes were clearer.

And for the first time in years, he looked like someone who believed he could be okay again.

And all because somewhere out there, someone was assembling him again.

Piece by piece.

With love that didn’t need a name yet.

With care that didn’t ask for anything in return.

And with the quiet, powerful promise of a connection strong enough to survive even the distance between them.

Quinn and Ava. Still broken, but still healing. Holding onto a thread of connection that reached across state lines and time zones, woven through whispered phone calls, unspoken understanding, and the memory of arms that didn't want to let go. They weren’t whole yet, but they didn’t need to be. Not when they had each other—soft, steady, and there. Even miles apart, they found their way back to one another, night after night, word by word, breath by breath. And that was enough. For now, that was enough.

⸻⸻⸻⸻⸻⸻

Ava’s summer had gone differently than she’d imagined.

She had pictured long walks along the waterfront, more quiet calls with Quinn, late nights under moonlight where healing happened slowly and gently. She imagined space to breathe, mornings without pain, silence that wasn’t sharp. She had imagined peace—not total, not perfect, but something close enough to quiet the ache inside her.

But life had other plans. And it started, as it always seemed to, with her mother.

It was a Thursday night. The air outside was humid, heavy with the weight of July. The kind of heat that clung to skin and made the air taste like metal. Inside the Monroe house, the air felt even thicker. The windows were closed, the blinds drawn, and the silence had a pulse of its own—waiting, watching. Ava was curled up by her window, her favorite spot when she needed to forget where she was. She had headphones in, a playlist Quinn had made her playing softly, anchoring her to something safer, something real. The soft hum of the music, his careful curation of lyrics that understood her better than most people did, made the world feel just a little less cruel.

Until her name rang out through the house.

"Ava!"

Her mother's voice, sharp and slurred, cut through the melody like glass against skin.

The spell was broken. She sighed, carefully removing her headphones and sliding off the windowsill. She padded down the stairs on bare feet, moving like a ghost through her own home. Every movement was familiar. Predictable. This wasn’t new.

In the kitchen, her mother stood swaying, wine glass in hand, her eyes glazed with the kind of fury that had nowhere else to go. Her lipstick was smudged, her hair wild, her expression twisted with something bitter and ugly.

"What?" Ava asked, her voice neutral, steady—a mask she had learned to wear early.

"What the hell is this attitude? Don’t talk to me like that," her mother snapped, slamming the glass down on the granite counter with a sharp crack that made Ava flinch.

"I wasn’t," she replied calmly, standing her ground. "You called me. I just came down."

"God, you think you’re better than me now, huh?" her mother snarled, eyes narrowing. "Since when did you get so full of yourself? So fucking self-righteous."

Ava stood still. She could feel her heart racing, but she wouldn’t show it. Not this time.

"I don’t think I’m better than you. But I’m not going to let you keep doing this to me."

Her mother tilted her head, mock confusion bleeding into rage.

"Doing what, exactly? Raising you? Giving you a roof over your head? Feeding you?"

"No. Tearing me down. Making me feel like I was a mistake. Like I’ll never be enough. I’m not your punching bag. Not anymore."

And in that moment, the air in the room shifted—no longer merely still, but suffocating. It pressed against Ava’s chest, a living thing, thick and trembling with unspoken violence. The flicker of rage in her mother’s eyes wasn’t new; Ava had seen it before in a hundred quiet slights and shouted insults. But tonight, it looked different. Not just angry—unhinged. It crackled like static in the air, raw and unchecked, simmering beneath the surface with a force that threatened to spill over. Her mother's pupils were blown wide, her jaw clenched tight, lips curling with disgust. Something inside her had snapped, and it wasn’t going to be restrained. Ava felt it—like standing on the edge of a storm, knowing the lightning was already too close.

She moved quickly, her fingers wrapping around Ava’s wrist with a grip so tight it made her wince. Her mother’s nails dug into her skin, leaving crescents that would still ache days later. And then, before Ava could speak again—

Smack.

A hand across her face. The sound cracked through the room like a whip, sharp and unnatural, echoing off the cold tile like the slap of thunder before a storm breaks. Time slowed for a moment as the pain registered—an immediate, searing bloom that spread across her cheek like wildfire. The heat radiated outward, red and raw, and her skin stung like it had been scalded. Her eye watered involuntarily, the shock stealing her breath before the ache could even fully set in. Her body rocked with the force of it, a sway that felt more like being untethered than being struck. But she didn’t fall. She didn’t scream. She just stood there, heart pounding in her ears, a storm behind her ribs, staring into the space between pain and defiance where her voice had finally risen—and her mother had tried to silence it.

She looked up.

Straight into her mother’s face.

"You are embarrassing," she said, her voice low and controlled. "And I’m done letting you walk all over me. Maybe your life turned out shitty, but that’s not my fault. That’s yours."

Another hit. This one harder. Her head snapped sideways, pain blooming just beneath her eye. She didn’t cry. She only straightened again, breathing shallow but steady.

And then, the front door opened.

The heavy click of the latch was jarring in the silence.

"What the hell is going on?"

Her father’s voice rang out, low and commanding, but beneath it was something heavier—a tremor of disbelief, of dawning horror. David Monroe stood in the entryway, framed by the glow of the hallway light, his presence suddenly too large for the space. His suit was slightly wrinkled, the tie loosened like he’d just barely made it home, briefcase hanging forgotten in his hand. But it wasn’t the tiredness of his long day that defined him in that moment—it was the way he stood utterly still, like his world had just been cracked open. His gaze swept the room and landed on his daughter—on the redness blooming across her cheek, the bruise beneath her eye, the fear she wore like a second skin. And just like that, the tension rolled off him in waves, not from stress, but from rage—cold, deliberate, and deeply paternal. The kind of rage that only exists when you realize you’ve failed to protect what matters most.

Sally spun to face him, her expression crumbling into something falsely fragile.

"David, it’s not what it looks like, I swear! She was yelling at me—completely out of control. You know how she gets when she thinks she’s right about something. She wouldn’t stop. She kept pushing and shouting and—I didn’t know what to do! I felt threatened, David. I really did. She was coming at me, and I just—I panicked, okay? She was acting like a completely different person. I’m the one who felt unsafe in my own home. She made me feel like the villain, and all I’ve done is try to be her mother. She’s been impossible lately, and I—David, you have to believe me!"

But he wasn’t looking at her. He looked at Ava.

And he saw everything.

The flushed cheek. The swelling bruise already forming. The tear that had slipped down without her noticing. The way her wrist was still red and marked. And more than that—he saw the resignation in her eyes. The fatigue. The pain she no longer even tried to hide.

He dropped the briefcase.

"Get out."

"What? David, she—"

"I said get out."

His voice didn’t rise. It didn’t need to. It cut through the room like a blade—cold, controlled, and laced with a fury so precise it chilled the air. The stillness in it was more terrifying than any yell could ever be, because it held finality. A reckoning. It wasn’t a threat. It was a promise. A boundary drawn not in anger, but in protection. And in that silence, in that unwavering tone, the whole house seemed to hold its breath, because everyone knew: there was no coming back from this moment.

"Go pack a bag. Go to your sister’s. You are not staying here. Not after this."

Sally sputtered, tried again to protest, but it was useless. Ava didn’t even look at her.

David moved to his daughter as if on instinct, something primal and protective rising from within him that left no room for hesitation. His arms wrapped around her, pulling her close, and for a heartbeat she remained stiff—rigid with shock, with pain, with disbelief that this moment was even happening. But then something in her broke open, not from weakness, but from the exhaustion of holding everything in for so long. She gave in, crumpling into him like a wave folding into the shore, her hands gripping fistfuls of his shirt like a child who had waited too many years to be caught.

Her body trembled against his, and David felt it all—every sob she wouldn't let out, every bruise he hadn’t stopped, every silence he hadn’t noticed. Guilt rushed through him like ice, swift and sharp. He had failed her. Not just tonight, but for years. He’d left her in a house where her pain went unseen, unheard, unanswered. And now she was breaking in his arms and all he could do was hold her, whispering apologies he knew weren’t enough.

"I’m so sorry," he breathed, his voice thick, cracking at the edges. "God, Ava, I’m so sorry. I should have seen it. I should have known."

She didn’t say anything. She didn’t need to. Her weight against him said everything. The way her fingers curled into his chest, desperate to hold on, desperate not to be let down again.

He tightened his grip and lowered his head, pressing it to hers as though he could somehow shield her from every blow she’d already taken. And in that moment, all he wanted was to go back—to every missed sign, every late night, every moment he hadn’t been there. But he couldn’t. So he stood there instead, rooted, holding his daughter like a lifeline, like a man trying to say with his arms what his words never could.

"I’m sorry," he whispered.

She didn’t speak. But she didn’t pull away either.

He held her tighter.

"This is over. She will never lay a hand on you again. I swear to you."

She closed her eyes. Let herself believe it. Just for a moment.

"I should have protected you," he said again. His voice cracked. "I should have been here."

And she finally spoke. Quiet. Steady.

"Then be here now."

That night, everything changed.

Sally left in a storm of haphazard packing and venomous muttering, her suitcase dragging behind her like a carcass of bitterness and regret. The sound of the wheels scraping across the tile echoed through the hall like an exorcism. When the door finally slammed shut behind her, it was as if something rancid had been purged from the walls of the house. The silence that followed wasn’t empty. It was reverent. It was peace reclaiming its place after years of torment. It was the first exhale after holding your breath for too long.

David stayed by Ava’s side, almost afraid to leave the room, afraid she might disappear or that the strength she showed might crumble if she were left alone. He hovered at first, unsure, guilt still clawing at his chest. But Ava didn’t push him away. She didn’t say much. She didn’t have to. Her presence allowed his, and that was enough. He made her tea with trembling hands, fingers fumbling with the kettle like he hadn’t done something so ordinary in years. He found the first aid kit in the hallway cabinet and pressed a cold compress gently to her cheek, his touch reverent, like he was tending to something sacred. And when he apologized, again and again, Ava finally reached up and placed her hand over his.

"Stop," she whispered. "I heard you. I need you to be here. Not to say it. To show me."

And he nodded, eyes glassy, heart breaking open in his chest for the girl he hadn’t known how to save. That night, they sat in the quiet for a long time. No TV. No distractions. Just two people slowly stitching together the space between them.

Ava went to bed in a room that finally felt like hers. Not a prison. Not a trap. But a place where her voice had been heard. A room where the shadows no longer whispered her worthlessness back to her. A place where, for the first time in years, she didn’t have to brace for a door slamming or a voice rising.

The bruise on her face took a week to fade. But the thing that bloomed inside her that night—the fury, the clarity, the self she thought had been buried for good—that stayed. It grew roots. And with every passing day, she stood a little taller, spoke a little louder, breathed a little deeper.

Because for the first time in her life, Ava wasn’t afraid of taking up space.

And for the first time in a long time, she believed she might actually deserve it.

⸻⸻⸻⸻⸻⸻

From that day on, David Monroe became a different kind of father.

He didn’t announce it. There were no grand speeches, no dramatic gestures to mark the shift. It was quieter than that. More intentional. He started coming home early. Left his phone face-down during dinner. Took a step back from the relentless machinery of the company and let his second-in-command carry the weight he’d once insisted on shouldering alone. Where there used to be boardrooms and flights and conferences, there were now shared breakfasts with Ava, long walks through Stanley Park, and slow mornings that allowed space for conversation. He asked questions. He listened. Really listened. And most importantly, he looked at her like he was seeing her—not the heiress, not the troubled teen, not the reflection of his failings—but his daughter. His child.

And in the small moments, Ava started to feel it too.

Not everything was fixed. But the tension that once lived in the walls began to soften. Her room didn’t feel like a cage anymore. The echo of slamming doors had disappeared. Her face healed, but more than that, something inside her had started to mend. It wasn’t linear. Some days were harder than others. But for the first time in her life, she believed that healing was possible. That she was allowed to take up space without apologizing for it. She smiled more. Laughed, even. The guilt that used to settle on her shoulders like wet sand began to lift.

And when Quinn returned from Michigan, as if drawn by some invisible pull, they found each other again.

No texts were exchanged. No call to meet. There didn’t have to be. The connection between them was something unspoken, something carved into the marrow of their bones. It moved in whispers, in intuition, in that aching familiarity that exists between people who have seen each other at their absolute lowest. Their bond defied explanation—it had always existed beneath the surface, simmering gently, waiting for the moment they would need it again.

So when the air in Vancouver turned warm and humid, and the sky burned soft at the edges with the promise of summer's return, they simply showed up. At the bench. The one by the water where everything began. The same wooden slats worn down from years of weather, still creaking under weight, still welcoming. As though the universe had gently reached out with an invisible hand, nudging them back toward the only place that ever felt like sanctuary. It didn’t need to shout or point—just whispered softly: go now. They're waiting.

There he was, sitting with his elbows on his knees, looking out at the water like it held the answers to questions he hadn't yet asked. Ava didn’t make a sound as she approached, but he turned anyway—as if he felt her there before he saw her. Their eyes met, and something settled in both of them. Relief. Recognition. That aching kind of warmth that only comes from being missed.

They said nothing. Just moved toward each other like gravity had decided for them. He opened the blanket he had brought, and she stepped into it, sinking into his side like it was the most natural thing in the world. His arm draped over her shoulders, her head rested gently against his chest. They laid there in silence, the water stretching out before them, the stars quietly blinking in the sky above. The city buzzed behind them, distant and irrelevant. In that moment, it was just them.

Two quiet souls with too much history and not enough words.

They didn’t need to speak. They never had.

Their breathing synced, rising and falling in a rhythm so effortless it felt orchestrated by something bigger than them. His fingers moved gently against her arm, drawing absentminded circles that whispered reassurance against her skin. Each pass of his fingertips was a soft reminder that she wasn’t alone, that he was there, and that the silence between them was anything but empty. Her hand, slow and deliberate, found the hem of his sweater—that familiar place where fabric met warmth—and curled there, anchoring herself in the presence of someone who had seen her unravel and hadn’t flinched.

They had been apart for months, but this—this space, this contact, this hush that wrapped around them like a cocoon—made time feel irrelevant. It wasn’t just comfort. It was communion. Like their hearts had never stopped whispering across the distance, tracing constellations in one another’s absence. And now, reunited, they could finally hear what had always been there. That steady hum of knowing, of safety, of belonging. A closeness that asked nothing, proved nothing, but simply was.

It was the kind of reunion that didn’t require explanation. Just presence. Just breath.

And then came the night of the Monroe Gala.

It was an annual tradition, always hosted in the grand ballroom of one of Vancouver’s finest hotels—chandeliers dripping with light, golden accents reflecting off the champagne flutes, soft classical music humming beneath the din of polite conversation. The Monroe name was printed on every wall, gilded on every place card. Cameras flashed as donors and dignitaries arrived, each trying to catch the attention of the city's elite.

But this year, something was different. Ava stood next to her father the entire night.

David hadn’t asked—he insisted. And for once, she didn’t mind.

She wore a simple black satin gown, elegant and understated, the fabric catching the light with every graceful movement she made. It flowed around her like a whisper, the kind of dress that didn’t need embellishment to draw attention. Her hair was swept into a soft bun, a few delicate strands framing her face, and her makeup was minimal—just enough to highlight the natural beauty she was finally learning to own. But it wasn’t her dress or her makeup that turned heads. It was her presence. The way she carried herself with a quiet, unshakable strength that hadn’t been there before. A stillness that commanded respect without demanding it. She wasn’t just attending the gala; she was reclaiming the space she had once shrunk inside of. Every step she took was a silent declaration.

David kept a proud hand on her back, steady and constant, as he introduced her to guests. It was protective but not possessive, proud but not overbearing—a father who had come to understand his daughter’s worth in the way he should have all along. For once, his presence beside her didn’t feel like a spotlight; it felt like support. And Ava, radiant beneath the golden chandeliers, met each handshake and greeting with grace and a poised confidence that made people pause, look again, and wonder who she truly was beneath the satin and silk.

"This is my daughter, Ava," he’d say with a smile that reached his eyes. "She’s doing incredibly well in school. Top of her class. Strong as ever."

No one brought up Sally. Not once. Not in passing, not in whispers behind champagne glasses, not in speculative glances. It was as if the woman had been erased from memory, a name swallowed by the elegance of the room and the power of Ava’s presence. And David, for all his pride and poise, didn’t let her shadow stretch across this night. He didn’t allow it. This was Ava’s moment. Hers alone.

She smiled, nodded, shook hands, posed for the occasional photo, but her mind wandered.

Because across the room, Quinn was there.

Tall, composed, dressed in a sharp navy suit. His hair was slightly tousled in that effortless way only he could pull off. He looked different here—not out of place, but dressed in armor. His hands tucked into his pockets, his expression polite but reserved. He mingled with his teammates, with the Canucks GM, with sponsors and fans. But his eyes were scanning the room.

For her.

Their eyes met across the ballroom, and it was like the world stilled, folded inward, until the only thing that existed was the space between them. They didn’t smile. They didn’t wave. They just watched each other, a kind of watching that felt like remembering and longing all at once. Ava’s breath caught in her throat, her heart aching with the pressure of everything she couldn’t say. And Quinn—his posture steady, his eyes unreadable but soft—looked at her like she was the first quiet breath after drowning. It was a silent conversation layered with everything they had endured in the months apart. A quiet, aching kind of yearning that throbbed in the stillness.

I missed you.

I know.

I’m here.

So am I.

As the night wore on, they moved through the space like magnets drawn by a thread. David introduced Ava to a dozen important faces, but each time she turned, she could feel Quinn’s gaze finding hers. When he laughed at something Brock Boeser said, she caught the moment his smile faltered just slightly—because she wasn’t beside him. And when she shook hands with Tyler Myers, she felt Quinn watching, his gaze unreadable.

Eventually, the inevitable happened.

David and Ava approached a small cluster of men—Quinn, the GM, Brock, and Elias. Golf was the topic of choice, spoken with that kind of lighthearted competitiveness that only athletes could pull off. The laughter was easy, the posture relaxed. Ava stood a step behind her father, her eyes immediately finding Quinn’s.

He didn’t speak. Neither did she.

They just gravitated toward one another until, somehow, they were side by side. The space between them dissolved with a familiarity so profound, it felt rehearsed by the universe itself. Their arms brushed once—a fleeting stroke of fabric against skin that made Ava's breath hitch. Then again, slower this time, as if the universe was drawing their lines closer. And on the third, they didn’t pull away. They stayed.

Shoulder to shoulder, standing like twin sentinels in a crowd of strangers, the contact was quiet but absolute. A low pulse of warmth spread from where they touched, down their spines, into their lungs. Ava felt her anxiety melt just slightly, the noise of the room dimming, her thoughts softening. Quinn tilted slightly closer, the smallest gesture, like a lean into gravity. And together they stood—not speaking, not shifting, simply existing in the kind of silence that nourished.

For a moment, neither of them listened to the conversation. They didn’t hear the jokes about sand traps or the groans about bad swings. They were simply there. Together. Anchored.

David turned and, with the proudest smile, said, "Gentlemen, this is my daughter, Ava."

She extended her hand politely, introducing herself with a poise that made her look older than she felt. Quinn gave the smallest nod, his lips twitching, like he was trying not to smirk.

"Nice to meet you," he said softly, eyes never leaving hers.

They had to pretend.

Pretend like they didn’t know every jagged edge of each other’s trauma—each wound, each scar, each moment that nearly broke them. Like they hadn’t fallen asleep on the phone night after night, their voices the last thread tethering each other to sleep, murmured goodnights passed like fragile lifelines. Like she hadn’t once read him poetry in the early hours of the morning, her voice trembling over words not her own, until they cracked open something inside him that he hadn’t dared to touch in years, and he cried—not just from the words, but from the way she saw him, really saw him. Like he hadn’t once driven across the city at midnight, headlights cutting through fog, just to be near her, just to sit on the floor of her room and say nothing while she stared blankly at the wall, her silence heavier than any words. Like they weren’t each other's refuge in a world that had offered them far too many reasons to stop trying. Like they weren’t still carrying pieces of each other in places no one else could reach.

They had to pretend like they weren’t tethered by something deeper than most people in that room would ever understand.

Like if it weren’t for Quinn, Ava wouldn’t be here.

And if it weren’t for Ava, Quinn would have walked away from the game he loved.

They stood quietly, shoulder to shoulder, both masters of silence, both carrying more than anyone knew. And while the rest of the room buzzed with noise and expectation, they existed in their own bubble. One glance. One breath. One heartbeat.

That was enough.

For now.

⸻⸻⸻⸻⸻⸻

Somehow, later that night, Quinn and Ava found themselves away from all the eyes, tucked behind velvet curtains and down a quiet hallway, onto a narrow balcony that overlooked the city. It felt like they had stumbled upon it by accident, but both of them knew better. The pull between them had always been magnetic, quiet and deliberate, and it had led them here—out of the spotlight, away from the polished smiles and the swirling conversations. Just the two of them. Just how they liked it.

The air was crisp and cool, the summer breeze biting at her bare shoulders, and without a word, Quinn slipped his suit jacket from his shoulders and draped it gently over her. Then, like gravity had always meant him to, he stayed close. His arm wrapped around her back, resting just above her waist, drawing her into his warmth. She leaned into it with a sigh, one that felt like it had been trapped inside her all evening.

The city lights glittered below them, casting soft gold and silver glows onto their faces. Neither of them spoke at first. There was no need to fill the silence. The world outside buzzed with energy and expectation, but here—on this hidden balcony—time felt suspended. They turned toward each other slowly, their gazes meeting in a softness reserved only for the quietest of truths.

Their voices, when they came, were hushed. Gentle. Full of intimacy. It wasn’t what they said—it was how they said it. Like they were catching up on lifetimes rather than hours. As if the conversation from the night before, curled up on Quinn’s couch in hoodies and tangled legs, hadn’t happened just twenty-four hours earlier. As if time with each other never felt like enough.

He told her about his mom asking questions. About Luke and Jack teasing him, but softer than usual. She told him about her father pausing in the middle of breakfast to ask her how she really was. How she answered him honestly.

They laughed quietly, shared fragments of their lives, their voices slipping between them like the breeze winding around their bodies. Ava’s hand found his. Their fingers interlaced without fanfare, like they were meant to. Like they always had.

They craved each other’s presence in a way that neither of them could quite articulate. It was an ache in the bones, a whisper that lingered in the quiet moments when the world slowed down. It wasn’t dramatic. It wasn’t desperate. It was patient and persistent, like the tide returning to shore. Every brush of their hands, every shared look, every heartbeat that seemed to echo in tandem reminded them that the world felt more bearable with the other nearby.

It wasn’t overwhelming, but it was all-consuming in the gentlest way—like warm water rising slowly around them until they were submerged in comfort. Being together didn’t feel like fireworks or explosions. It felt like exhaling. Like the pause between waves. Like breathing after forgetting how to. It was the soft kind of safety that asked nothing, yet offered everything. It was steady. It was healing. It was home.

Eventually, they knew they had to go back. The world would start to wonder. So they disentangled slowly, reluctantly, the weight of the party pressing back against their little sanctuary. They stepped inside, the heavy doors closing behind them like a secret, and returned to the crowd, slipping seamlessly back into their silent game of eye tag.

Longing looks drifted like invisible threads across the room—delicate, deliberate, and too soft for anyone else to notice. They passed between them in glances that carried weight, in stares that lingered just a second too long. Ava could feel him in the room like a current beneath the surface of calm water. Even when her back was turned, she knew exactly where he was. It was instinctual now, the way she tracked him without searching, the way her body seemed to orient itself around his presence.

Quinn was woven into the night, stitched into the seams of her awareness. Like his gaze had painted itself onto the architecture of the ballroom—carved into the corners of mirrors, hidden in the shadows between chandeliers, echoing in the hush between conversations. He was there in the stillness. In the pause before the music swelled again.

Every time their eyes met, it felt like the rest of the world blurred, like the space between them collapsed into memory and possibility. It was quiet, desperate longing. Not just for touch, but for the kind of closeness they weren’t allowed to show here. The kind they could only hint at through parted lips that said nothing, and eyes that said everything.

When the night came to a close, and the last of the toasts had been made, David began his rounds. He shook hands with the team, warm and gracious, all the pride of a father written into his smile.

And Ava stood there, just a few feet away from Quinn.

So close. Yet still oceans apart.

She stared at him, and he stared back. Neither moving. Neither speaking. Just holding on through the space between them. And in that glance, they said everything they couldn’t say out loud.

Stay.

I will.

⸻⸻⸻⸻⸻⸻

Fundraiser after fundraiser. Event after event. Gala after gala. It was always the same.

There was a rhythm to it now—the way Ava and Quinn would find themselves orbiting the same glittering rooms, under the same glowing chandeliers, surrounded by clinking glasses, velvet gowns, and the quiet murmur of old money. These were nights meant for appearances, for networking and public smiles. And yet, for them, they had taken on a different meaning. They became a ritual of sorts. A dance.

They never arrived together. They never left together. But they were always there. Always watching.

She stood by her father's side, poised and elegant, every inch of her radiating a quiet, cultivated grace. The dress she wore shimmered beneath the golden chandeliers, catching the light each time she moved, but it wasn’t the fabric that made people pause when they looked at her—it was the composure, the soft confidence in the way she held herself. The kind of strength not learned overnight but forged through fire and healing. There was something magnetic about her silence, a steadiness in her stillness, like she didn’t need to speak to be understood. David often rested a hand gently on her back, not to guide her, but to show the world he was proud.

Across the room, Quinn lingered with his teammates, half-listening to stories about summer golf trips and rookie antics, his drink untouched, the condensation leaving faint circles on the bar. His posture was casual, familiar to those around him, but his eyes—they betrayed him. They moved past people, past clinking glasses and shallow chatter, to find her. Always her. No matter where she was in the room, he found her. Even if she was half-turned, speaking to someone else, he knew. Like her presence lived in his peripheral vision. Like a magnetic pull beneath his skin.

And when their eyes met—briefly, quietly—everything else fell away. The world dimmed. The noise dulled. It was just them, across the distance, tethered by something invisible and unshakable. The kind of connection that didn’t require words or permission. Even in a crowded ballroom. Even in a sea of faces. The invisible string between them never faltered. It only grew stronger, more certain, more sacred.

They had mastered the art of silent presence. Of being near, but not too near. Their glances were small offerings. Wordless affirmations. I'm here.

Sometimes, Quinn would catch her in mid-laugh, head tilted back slightly, eyes crinkled at the corners, and his chest would tighten. Sometimes Ava would look up to see him politely declining a drink, his fingers tracing the edge of the glass, and she'd know he was counting down the minutes until they could be alone.

Every so often, someone would notice. One of Quinn's teammates. An old family friend of Ava's. Someone would glance between them and furrow their brow.

Eventually, Brock and Petey began to catch on. It wasn't just in the obvious ways—not just the glances or the quiet way Quinn seemed to tune out everything but a single presence across the room. It was deeper than that. It was in the ease of his movements during practice, in the softness of his voice when he spoke to the trainers, in the subtle calm that had settled into his shoulders like a long-held burden had finally been set down.

They saw the change in him before they saw her. The lightness in him. The subtle peace. The way his temper didn’t flare as easily. The way he lingered longer in the locker room, not because he was avoiding something, but because he had somewhere he wanted to be afterward. The way his phone would buzz mid-conversation, and he’d glance at it, eyes lighting up in a way neither of them had seen in a long time.

Petey noticed it first after a morning skate. Quinn had sat on the bench longer than usual, sipping his water, a small smile tugging at the corner of his mouth for no apparent reason. Brock picked up on it later, when Quinn turned down a night out in favor of heading home early—again.

There was something different about him. Something quieter. Something warmer. Something that felt like the first breath after breaking the surface of a deep dive. They didn’t know who she was yet. But they knew what she was doing to him.

And they were grateful for it.

“You’re different lately,” Brock had teased once, nudging him with his elbow after a press conference.

Quinn shrugged. “Just focused.”

Petey raised an eyebrow. “Focused, huh?”

He said nothing more, just offered a faint smirk and pulled his cap low. But they knew. Of course they did.

They didn’t push. They didn’t need to. Because they remembered the nights Quinn went silent in the locker room, the way he would sit with his head in his hands, shoulders hunched and trembling slightly, eyes distant as though he was somewhere far away. They remembered the nights he left the arena without a word, ghosting through the exit like he wanted to disappear into the dark, burdened by invisible weights that the rest of the world never saw. They remembered the sting of watching him crumble under the pressure, carrying the weight of a franchise, a name, and expectations so heavy no one his age should have had to bear them.

And now, he was present. He was grounded. He stayed after practices, laughed more freely, smiled without flinching, and leaned in during conversations instead of drifting out. He moved through the world with a kind of steadiness that was new, earned, and deeply felt. There was a fullness to him, a quiet confidence that hadn’t been there before, like he had finally allowed himself to be held by something—or someone—other than the game. And whatever or whoever had given him that, they weren’t going to interfere. Because Quinn wasn’t just surviving anymore. He was healing. And they weren’t about to question the one bright thread that had started to stitch him back together.

And David Monroe—the man who spent a lifetime reading contracts, reading negotiations, reading people—read his daughter the same way.

He noticed the subtle tilt of her head when Quinn entered the room—that barely perceptible shift in her body that spoke volumes. He noticed how her shoulders relaxed ever so slightly, how her stance softened in the way that people do when they feel safe. The shift in her voice when she greeted him was unmistakable, too—a quiet warmth that hadn't been there before, a kind of familiarity laced with unspoken joy. There was a glint of something softer in her eyes, something David hadn’t seen in a long time: hope. It shimmered beneath her lashes when she looked at Quinn, not flashy or bold, but real.

And maybe it was in the way she leaned in slightly, even when they weren’t talking. Maybe it was in the way her laughter carried just a little further when Quinn was near, fuller, less guarded. Maybe it was in the way she always seemed to know where he was, even if her back was turned. Whatever it was, she didn’t have to say a word. David knew. He knew in the same way a father knows when something inside his daughter has changed—not in fear, not in pain, but in healing. In comfort. In love.

But he never asked.

Never pushed. Never demanded to know.

Instead, he offered something rarer: trust.

He’d excuse himself from conversations at just the right moment. He’d conveniently get caught up with a donor when Ava and Quinn found themselves standing nearby. And most notably, he’d offer, again and again, with quiet confidence:

“Quinn, would you mind driving Ava back tonight? Her driver’s been rerouted.”

Even when they both knew that wasn’t true. Even when her driver was parked right outside. It was never about logistics. It was about space.

David offered it to them the way a father offers love when he doesn’t quite know how to say the words. With open doors. With quiet knowing. With the kind of steady, behind-the-scenes support that didn't demand acknowledgment or praise. He made space for them gently, without ever announcing it, always a few steps behind, always watching without hovering. He knew enough not to interrupt something still delicate and forming, something unspoken and sacred. But he could feel it—the gravity between them—and rather than stand in the way of it, he simply stepped aside.

In the way he lingered in conversations a little longer when he saw them drawn together. In the way he made himself scarce just as Ava started looking around for an escape from small talk. In the way he mentioned Quinn’s name with familiarity, like someone already considered family. He didn’t overstep. He didn’t press. He just made sure they knew he saw them. That he trusted them. That they were safe, and they were seen.

On the nights Ava stayed at the Monroe home, David would pass by her room, the soft spill of her laughter filtering through the crack in the door. Her voice, light and unguarded, speaking into the phone like it was the most natural thing in the world. It didn’t take much for him to recognize the voice on the other end. He’d seen Quinn smile that same way, phone in hand, thumb brushing the screen, eyes warm with something he rarely let the world see.

And then there were the late nights.

The soft creak of the front door. The shuffle of feet on the tile. Her silhouette slipping out into the quiet dark, only to return hours later with the faintest curve of peace around her mouth. She never said where she went. He never asked. But he could see it in her eyes. The steadiness. The gratitude.

Her chauffeur confirmed it once, in the casual way longtime employees do.

"Nice kid comes around a lot," he’d said, leaning against the car as David stepped out one morning, his tone casual but warm with unspoken approval. "Shows up like clockwork. Never loud, never late. Always polite—calls me sir, if you can believe it. Keeps to himself mostly, but he's careful with her. Stays in the car sometimes, waits until the lights are on before driving off. And when he does walk her in, he never lingers longer than she wants him to. Just makes sure she’s safe. You can tell he cares, even if he doesn’t say much. Been doing it for months now. Since before the summer started, even when school was still in session. Honestly? Feels like he's been here longer than that. Like he's part of the rhythm of the place now."

David had only nodded.

He didn’t need confirmation. He just needed to know she was okay.

And when it came to Quinn Hughes, he knew she was.

He’d always admired the young defenseman. Not for his stats, not for his name. But for the way he carried himself. Humble. Quiet. Steady. The kind of man who didn’t demand the spotlight, but still lit the way for others. The kind of man David hoped his daughter would meet one day, when she was ready.

And now, it seemed, she had.

David never said anything. Not directly.

But one evening, Ava walked into her apartment, tired from class, her shoulders heavy with the day. And there, on her kitchen counter, was an envelope. Small. Unassuming. Her name printed on the front in familiar, slanted script.

Inside, a single ticket.

Canucks Family Suite.

Next to it, a bouquet of lilies. Fresh, fragrant, wrapped in soft tissue and tied with a satin ribbon.

And tucked inside the bouquet was a note, folded neatly. In her father’s handwriting, blocky and precise:

I’m glad you’re happy. Enjoy the game, sweetheart. Tell Q I say hi.

Ava stood in the center of her kitchen for a long time, the note pressed to her chest, her fingertips brushing over the familiar scrawl of her father’s handwriting as if it were something fragile and precious. The air around her felt still, suspended, as if the world had paused to give her this moment—this moment where the past and present met in a quiet, breathtaking kind of peace. Her eyes stung with something tender, something deep and sacred, a soft ache blooming in her chest that had nothing to do with pain and everything to do with being seen. Truly seen.

It wasn’t permission. It wasn’t approval. It was deeper than that. It was trust. It was understanding. It was a father’s love given not with conditions or expectations, but with a steady hand and a hopeful heart. It was a message: * I trust you. I love you.*

And in that stillness, Ava felt something inside her settle. A lifelong ache she hadn’t realized she’d been carrying softened, just a little. It was love, quiet and sure. The kind that didn’t ask questions. The kind that didn’t need to be proven. The kind that just... was.

She didn’t text him to say thank you. She didn’t need to. He already knew.

That night, she wore the jersey Quinn had left for her. The one that still smelled faintly of his cologne. The one that had become a second skin on nights when the world felt too sharp. She tucked the ticket into her bag and made her way to the arena.

The family suite buzzed with polite chatter, children balancing popcorn tubs on their laps, partners snapping photos through the glass. Ava sat alone, her hands folded neatly in her lap, eyes trained on the ice.

And then he skated out.

Helmet tucked under one arm, his stick resting against his shoulder, his eyes flicked upward—toward her.

Just once.

But it was enough.

He smiled. Slow. Soft. The kind of smile that reached the corners of his eyes.

And this time, she smiled back.

Wide. Unafraid. Home.

A few rows down, David watched the exchange, his heart quietly swelling with a kind of warmth he hadn't felt in years. His hands were folded in his lap, but his grip softened as he took them in—his daughter and the boy she hadn’t quite named yet. His chin tilted upward slightly, like he was catching sunlight, though it was only the gentle glow of the rink lights reflecting in his eyes. And what he saw wasn’t dramatic. It wasn’t grand. But it was everything.

There was something so gentle in their exchange, so sweet and unguarded, that it rooted itself deep in his chest. The way Quinn looked up like the world paused when he saw her. The way Ava smiled back without a hint of hesitation. That silent thread between them—invisible to others but so very visible to a father who had learned to look—wasn't just connection. It was care. It was safety. It was the soft, tender shape of something real beginning to bloom.

And David—a man who once wondered if he’d ever get to see this kind of light in his daughter again—felt nothing but gratitude. For the quiet between them. For the steady presence Quinn had become. For the fact that in a world that demanded so much of both of them, they had found each other.

He smiled too.

Because this—this was all he had ever wanted for her.

Not perfection. Not prestige.

Just peace.

And someone to hold her steady when the world tried to pull her apart.

And he smiled too.

Because this—this was all he had ever wanted for her.

Not perfection. Not prestige.

Just peace.

And someone to hold her steady when the world tried to pull her apart.

⸻⸻⸻⸻⸻⸻

Eventually, it happened.

After a week of distance, of nothing but texted good mornings and tired, late-night voice notes, Quinn returned from a stretch of away games in the States. A week apart wasn’t long in the grand scheme of things, but it felt like an eternity to both of them. After so many nights spent orbiting each other’s presence, to suddenly have nothing but a phone screen was a sharp absence.

So when he finally got back to Vancouver, there was no hesitation. No ceremony. Just the quiet thud of the door closing behind him and the soft, wordless pull of Ava’s arms as they collapsed into each other in the dim comfort of her apartment.

They ended up in her bed, legs tangled beneath the covers, the low hum of a television show playing in the background. Neither of them paid attention to the dialogue. The screen flickered, casting soft colors across the room, but their world had narrowed to each other—to the warmth of bodies reunited, to the gentle exchange of breath in a space that finally felt whole again.

Quinn laid on his side, one arm tucked beneath his head, the other curled gently around Ava’s waist. She faced him, her fingers resting lightly against his chest, eyes tracing the sharp curve of his jaw, the dimple in his chin, the soft slope of his nose. It was quiet, reverent almost, the kind of silence that said everything.

Their foreheads pressed together.

Like an anchor. Like a prayer.

As if the touch could absorb all the ache, all the exhaustion, all the pieces of the past still lodged deep inside.

Quinn's fingers gently brushed a piece of hair from her face, tucking it slowly behind her ear with the kind of tenderness that made her stomach flutter. His hand lingered there, the pad of his thumb grazing the curve of her cheek like it was something sacred. It was such a small gesture, but it was full of reverence—as though he were memorizing her, as though her softness was something he needed to commit to memory in case the world ever tried to make him forget. His eyes searched hers, not in question but in quiet certainty, and when he finally took a breath, it trembled slightly, his voice low and raw and steady. The words that followed were barely above a whisper, but they rang through her like a cathedral bell, reverberating in her chest, anchoring something deep and aching inside of her with the weight of truth.

"I love you so much, Ava."

It wasn’t rushed. It wasn’t dramatic. But it held weight. A gravity that made her heart still for a moment.

Her eyes met his, glassy with something close to awe, and she reached up, cupping his face in her hands with a gentleness that nearly broke him.

"I love you so much, Quinn."

And then their lips met.

Soft. Slow. Healing.

Like the breath after a storm. Like the beginning of something safe and endless.

In that kiss, it was as if they were transported—to a different place, a different version of the world where nothing had ever hurt them, where every crack had been mended, every bruise gently kissed away. It wasn’t just a kiss, it was a release. A surrender. A soft unraveling of everything they had held in for too long. It was warm and still and whole, the kind of kiss that stitched them back together from the inside out. In that moment, their bodies remembered safety, their hearts remembered peace. Every aching memory, every lonely night, every self-doubt and lingering wound faded into the background.

For a few heartbeats, they forgot what it meant to carry pain. Forgot what it was to be broken. There was only the hush between them, the taste of belonging, the way their souls seemed to fit together like pieces that had always known where they belonged.

They were just two people who loved each other.

And for the first time, that was more than enough.

⸻⸻⸻⸻⸻⸻

Ava attended every game she could. If she could make it, she was there. She sat quietly in the family suite, tucked between executives and loved ones, her eyes always scanning the ice for #43.

And it was inevitable, really, that eventually she would run into Ellen Hughes.

It was during a highly anticipated game—the Canucks versus the Devils. A Hughes family reunion of sorts, with Jack and Luke skating for New Jersey while Quinn stood on the opposing blue line. The suite was buzzing with excitement, filled with friends, distant relatives, and family friends.

Ellen had made her rounds with practiced warmth. She greeted the WAGs, the team staff, the donors and their spouses. And eventually, her eyes fell on a girl she didn’t recognize.

She was sitting at the far end of the suite, small and tucked into her seat, her body angled slightly away from the crowd as though trying not to draw attention. But there was something about her posture—something familiar. She wasn’t avoiding people. She was just comfortable in her own space.

Curious, Ellen approached.

"Hi there," she said with a soft smile. "I don't think we've met. I'm Ellen. Quinn's mom."

Ava's head snapped up, and her heart immediately jumped to her throat, thudding so hard she swore Ellen could hear it. Her breath caught, and for a split second she forgot how to speak, how to move, how to be. She hadn’t expected this moment—not so soon, not like this. Her eyes widened slightly, and a nervous flush crept up her neck, blooming across her cheeks as recognition dawned. Of course she knew who Ellen Hughes was. Quinn had spoken of her with reverence and warmth, had mentioned her kindness and strength. And now here she was, standing just feet away, reaching out not with suspicion, but with genuine interest. Ava forced a smile, her palms suddenly clammy, and willed her voice to be steady, to not betray the storm of nerves unraveling inside her.

"Oh," she said, standing quickly and smoothing her sweater. "Hi. I’m Ava. Ava Monroe. My dad’s David Monroe—he's one of the team's silent donors. I… I sometimes come to games with him."

Ellen nodded thoughtfully, but her eyes didn’t move. They stayed on Ava.

There was something about her. Something that tugged at Ellen's chest in a way she couldn't quite explain. A familiarity, a presence. A quiet gentleness that felt known, though she was sure they had never met. The girl’s posture, the way she sat with graceful reserve, like she was holding something close and sacred—Ellen couldn’t look away.

And then the players took the ice. The lights brightened, the music swelled, and her son stepped onto the rink. The roar of the crowd rose up like a wave, but Ellen barely heard it. Her eyes were on Quinn. And his eyes? His eyes were searching.

Not for his father. Not for her. Not for the fans.

They locked onto the far edge of the suite.

To her.

And in that one look, everything else fell away.

Ellen watched as his face softened, his shoulders relaxed ever so slightly, and the tension that had built during warmups dissolved like ice under the sun. His expression wasn’t just love. It was longing. A yearning so deep, it was visible even from all the way up here. A look that said, There you are. I can breathe again.

It hit Ellen like a memory—a summer evening by the lake, Quinn laid out on the dock, his eyes turned toward the stars with that same quiet peace. That same softness.

And now she saw it again.

Not because of the game.

Because of the girl.

And Ellen saw it.

The look.

The look that lit his entire face.

She followed his gaze and then looked back to Ava. And suddenly, it all clicked. The jersey wasn’t just a Hughes one. It was a game-worn #43. His first one. And Ava wasn’t just some donor’s daughter.

She was the girl.

The one who had existed only in quiet murmurs for months. The one whose name hadn’t been spoken, but whose presence had echoed in every shift of Quinn's energy. The one Ellen had wondered about late at night, when she noticed her son checking his phone more often, when she heard the smile in his voice during calls, when he talked about "someone" who made things feel easier.

She was the one who had pulled her son back from the edge. Who had reminded him, not with grand declarations but with steady hands and soft silence, that he didn’t have to carry the weight of the world alone. The girl who had entered his life like a whisper, and yet managed to soften every sharp edge he carried. The girl who brought stillness to the storm.

And now, seeing her here, Ellen understood everything.

Every look. Every shift. Every softened breath her son had taken over the past several months.

This was her.

The one who had become his home.

After the game, as players filtered off the ice and families began gathering their things, Ellen watched as Ava lingered. She didn’t move to leave like the others. She stayed in the back, her coat draped over her arm, her gaze fixed on the hallway leading to the locker rooms.

And when the crowds began to thin, Quinn reappeared.

He wasn’t obvious. He never was. But he moved with intention. He walked right past the others. Right to her.

And the way he looked at her—that same quiet, awe-filled expression he wore that summer on the dock, when the world was still and the stars were just beginning to shine, like he was seeing the whole universe unfold before him. But this time, he wasn't looking at the sky—he was looking at her. With a reverence that made it seem as if she held constellations in her eyes, like every part of him had been waiting for this one second of clarity. There was no mistaking it, no downplaying the depth of it. That look held stories, memories, hopes he hadn’t dared to name. It was a gaze filled with yearning, with a kind of stillness that only comes when you find the thing you didn’t even know you were missing. It was the look of a man who had come home—and found that home in her.

That’s when Ellen knew.

This girl. This quiet, kind-eyed girl.

She was the one who had been stitching her son back together.

And when Ava began to make her way out, ready to quietly leave before anyone could say anything, Ellen stepped in gently.

"Why don’t you come with us?" she asked, her voice warm, inviting. "We’re going out for dinner. Nothing fancy. Just family."

Ava blinked. "I… I wouldn’t want to intrude."

Ellen smiled. "You wouldn’t be. Please."

There was a look in Ellen’s eyes—soft, knowing, and impossibly kind. A look filled with gentle recognition and something deeper than just polite interest. The same look David Monroe had when he realized the truth, when he saw the way his daughter smiled with her whole heart for the first time in years. It was the look of someone who understood exactly what was unfolding, even if it hadn’t been said aloud. A mother’s intuition, quietly affirming what she had already pieced together long before introductions had been made.

Ava felt the weight of it settle over her chest—not heavy, but grounding. She felt seen, not just as Quinn's quiet constant, but as someone who mattered on her own. And in that moment, she felt the doors to something bigger opening, something she had always tiptoed around. A family, a place, a seat at the table. She felt welcome.

So when Ellen extended the invitation, Ava couldn’t say no. Not because she felt obligated. But because she wanted to. Because this, whatever this was, felt like the beginning of something sacred.

They went to a quiet restaurant downtown. One the Hughes family knew well. A booth in the back was waiting, and Quinn reached for her hand beneath the table as they sat. She gave it a gentle squeeze.

Dinner was easy.

Ava was quiet, like Quinn, but she listened well. Asked thoughtful questions. Laughed at the right moments. And slowly, the Hughes brothers started to lean in a little more. Ellen and Jim exchanged a glance across the table.

They watched the way Quinn passed Ava the pickles from his plate without asking, and how she did the same with her tomatoes. How they shared a single glass of water, how Ava refilled it halfway through without a word. How they leaned into each other during the lull in conversation, foreheads brushing like they couldn’t quite believe they were still allowed to be near.

It was like watching a dance.

Soft. Natural. Magnetic.

And when dinner ended, and they all stood to leave, one by one the Hughes family pulled Ava into tight hugs.

From Jim’s strong embrace to Luke’s teasing grin, to Jack’s quiet "Glad you're here. Really."

And then Ellen. Who held her for a little longer.

As if saying, Thank you.

For bringing their Quinn back.

⸻⸻⸻⸻⸻⸻

After dinner, they parted ways outside the restaurant. The night had cooled, the sidewalks quieter now, as families dispersed and city lights blinked sleepily overhead. Quinn and Ava didn’t speak much as they walked. They didn’t need to. Their hands were still intertwined, fingers laced with the kind of familiarity that spoke louder than any words.

Somehow, without planning, they ended up at the bench.

Their bench.

The same one by the water. The one where it all began.

The moon hung low and bright above them, casting silver reflections across the calm harbor. The city buzzed behind them, but here, it was quiet. Safe. Like always.

They sat side by side, shoulders brushing, the hush of waves lapping gently below. Quinn leaned forward, elbows resting on his knees, while Ava curled slightly into his side. Her head found his shoulder, and his cheek rested against the top of her head.

For a while, they didn’t say anything. They just listened—to the water, to the cars in the distance, to their own hearts beating in rhythm again.

"You know," Ava murmured after a while, "I didn’t think I’d ever feel this again. Safe. Loved. Not just by you… but by the world. By your family."

Quinn turned his head, brushing a kiss to her temple.

"You were always worthy of it. You just needed someone to remind you."

A small smile tugged at her lips, and she leaned further into him.

"You did more than remind me. You showed me."

He looked out at the water, his voice a whisper.

"You saved me too. I was drowning and didn’t even realize it. And then there you were. Just... quiet and strong and exactly what I didn’t know I needed."

She tilted her head to look up at him. "Do you think we would have found each other if everything in our lives had gone differently?"

He considered that, then shook his head gently.

"No. But I think we found each other exactly when we needed to. Broken, but still whole enough to see the light in the other."

She reached up and touched his cheek. "You were always the light, Quinn."

He closed his eyes for a moment, holding her hand against his face.

They stayed there until the sky began to shift—the deep navy of night giving way to pale hints of morning. The first signs of a new day stretching out before them.

And as the sun began to rise, spilling warmth across the horizon, they knew.

They had survived the darkness.

Together.

And now, they had a future.

Hand in hand, they sat on that bench. Their bench. Not as two people weighed down by the past, but as two hearts who had found their way back to themselves—through love, through healing, and through each other.

This was their beginning.

And it was everything.

422 notes · View notes

chilling-seavey · 3 months ago

Text

Fantasy Island (gr63)

↳ A/N This is arguably one of my most favourite things I have written and it's incredibly special to me. I hope you enjoy <3

↳ Inspired By: Fantasy Island (1978 series/2021 series)

↳ Summary: A tropical paradise where your greatest fantasies come to life, no strings attached. Upon your arrival to the sunny weathered beaches, in the cloud like king size bed, you find your greatest fantasy waiting for you.

↳ Pairings: George Russell x Stranger(kind of?)!Reader (NO use of y/n)

↳ Word Count: 25.4k

↳ Warnings: 18+, smut, touches of magical realism, arguably infidelity but not really (because Fantasy Island is not 'reality'...or is it?), mentions of an unnamed girlfriend, oral sex (m and f receiving), spanking, leaving marks, dirty talk, praise, mirror on the ceiling, really steamy passionate romantic sex, public sex, shower sex, brief breeding kink, lotsss of "I love you", unprotected sex.

Through the small window of the plane, the picturesque tropical island was revealed, standing out from the crystal blue water with its sandy white beaches and lush green forests. It looked like a photoshopped sliver of paradise and as the biplane coasted down towards the water, you already felt the stresses start to ease from your shoulders.

A weekend on Fantasy Island. The place rumoured to allow your largest fantasies to come true for a few days, no strings attached. It knew what you needed better than you knew it yourself, so you were told. Once you left the island, life would return to how it always was but, for now, your focus was on rejuvenation and getting your mind off of everything.

With your suitcase in hand, you stepped out of the small plane and onto the wooden dock, feeling the warm tropical breeze ease your muscles and relax your body. You almost completely forgot why you craved to come there after only the first breath of salty sea air. The woman waiting for you at the end of the dock greeted you by name with a smile and a handshake, her airy white sundress rippling around her knees as you approached.

“Welcome to Fantasy Island.” she said, holding out her arms as if to show you the island right then and there.

You thanked her politely as you admired the bamboo beach huts and patted loungers just at the edge of the sand. You followed her to the red jeep that was parked a bit of a ways away from the dock and you sat in the passenger seat as she drove you farther into the island and towards the resort. She spoke to you about the island and how she had been gifted the job as operator from her father before her; it was a busy career to run the island and she lived alone to dedicate her life to it.

The island and the resort were all free for you to roam and she offered no cautions about the jungle or safety in the ocean, explaining how nothing was dangerous there. It felt all a bit surreal to you but your mind was focused on the spa that must be awaiting you at the resort. After a long and agonizing week - not to mention months - you felt that you were overdue for some quiet relaxing rejuvenation.

The host guided you into her open air office at the edge of the resort overlooking the main beach and sparkling waters. A golden retriever met you at the steps and you gave him a scratch behind the ear as you followed the personable young woman into her space. She gestured you into the seat on the opposite side of her desk before taking her own chair behind it.

“It seems you have had quite the tiring little while, is that so?” she asked, not wasting another minute on the small talk that had filled the drive over.

You smiled politely, “Yeah, you could say that.”

“So tell me, what can the island do for you?” she folded her hands together on the top of her desk.

“Well,” you cleared your throat, “I dunno really.”

“You must have come here with a purpose; this is Fantasy Island after all. What is your fantasy?”

Your heart seemed to beat harder in your chest and you glanced out towards the beach as if to buy yourself time. With a small breath, you finally spoke, “It’s silly to say it aloud.”

“Believe me, I have heard plenty of fantasies in my career here. Nothing will surprise me.”

You turned back to her, lingering on her understanding smile and kind eyes and you felt yourself drawn to open up to her, “I am in love.”

She nodded you on.

“I am in love with a guy who will not love me back. Who cannot love me back. Who...hardly knows I exist on this planet.” you started. It was hard to talk about and to reflect on your reality and she let you have a moment to piece together your thoughts. “These last months, and these last weeks especially, have been filled with me trying to accept that he is dating someone else. It’s literally all over social media and it’s hard to avoid and hard to look at. Really, really hard...and...exhausting. I just want to have a weekend where I can shut everything out and not think about how much that fact hurts me.”

The host smiled at you and nodded slowly in understanding as if she already knew all of what you were going to tell her, “So your fantasy is to forget that your love is unrequited?”

You sighed thankfully that she understood, “Yes, exactly.”

“Well Fantasy Island can certainly help you with that.” she assured you easily.

“If this works, I owe you my sanity.” you said.

The host smiled at you, “You will be pampered, relaxed, and rejuvenated by the end of your stay, I guarantee. You will feel like a whole new woman.”

She directed you to your room across the resort and with final thank yous and welcomes, you started off down the wooden boardwalk to your suite. Your suitcase clacked along the boards beneath your feet as you took your time to locate room 215, looping around the centre courtyard that was filled with brightly coloured flowers and waving palm trees. Finally, you reached your room and turned the handle without the need for a key. The moment you opened the door and stepped foot over the threshold, a refreshing soft gust of cool air tumbled over you as if you crossed through a cloud.

Compared to the heat of the tropical island you were on, the slight breeze of air conditioning was relieving and you sighed contentedly and set your suitcase against the wall. The bamboo flooring cushioned your sandaled feet as you stepped farther into the room and the floor to ceiling windows billowed the sheer white curtains into the light painted space. The sun that filled the blue sky lightened the room perfectly and you rounded the corner from the small entryway to take in the three-sided beach side views of your bedroom…only to find someone already sitting on your bed.

The white sheets were pulled tightly and cradled his body like the softest most irresistible cloud, matching the white fabric pants and half open button-up that he wore. He was staring out the open windows to the beach, his eyes just as perfect blue as the ocean with the slightest hints of green that pictures never did justice. He had one leg tucked up under him and the other hanging lazily off the end of the king size bed patiently.

Your breath froze in your chest when he finally turned his head to look at you from a few short metres away. His gaze sent shivers down your spine and you felt your heart squeeze in your chest in a feeling that you couldn’t place as yearning or anxiousness. A peaceful smile came to his soft lips and he lifted two filled champagne glasses from the small tray that rested with him on the soft bed.

He held one out to you, “Come here, gorgeous. I’ve been waiting for you.”

You stayed frozen in place for a moment, almost dizzyingly, staring at him in disbelief. Was this real? The man you had only dreamt of for months now sitting right across from you, beckoning you over with a glass of expensive champagne and that swoon worthy smile. You reached carefully to pinch your thigh to test if this really was a dream, only to find bare skin under your hand instead of your floral skirt you had worn on the plane. You looked down with a gasp, more than stunned to find yourself in a striking blue lingerie set and topped with a thin white satin robe left open around your shoulders and down just past your waist.

“Well? Don’t make me drink both of these on my own.”

You looked back over to the young man still sat on your bed, his outstretched hand gently swirling the bubbling gold liquid around in its flute. He nodded you over and you took a few cautious steps across the room towards him and took the glass from his hand. When your fingers brushed his, you shivered, the warmth of his skin feeling so real and so addicting and as your heart hammered in your chest, you sat down on the end of the bed beside him.

Your eyes stayed locked on his, still in near disbelief, and you reached out your free hand to brush over his cheek to make sure he was really truly there. When your palm caressed his face and he leaned into your touch sweetly, you let yourself breathe his name in awe, “George.”

“Yeah, darling. Was your flight okay?” he asked softly, taking your hand from his cheek and kissed your knuckles.

“Yeah.” you mumbled, fearing to blink as if he’d disappear from beside you in an instant.

“Good.” he laced his fingers with yours and lifted his glass to his lips with his other hand to take a sip.

You watched him quietly, mirroring his sip with your own glass, welcoming the fizz of the bubbling champagne that grazed your tongue and the warmth of his hand in yours on his lap. The sea air that breezed into the room ruffled his sandy brown hair and his gaze drifted past you to the beautiful beaches beyond the open windows.

“George,” you spoke his name softly, hesitantly, still wondering how on earth he was sitting beside you at a tropical island resort, “do you know who I am?”

He tore his gaze from the beach view to your face again and he smiled at you, giving your hand a squeeze, “Of course. What kind of question is that? You’re my girl.”

Your name fell from his lips like an irresistible melody, like the sweetest sound you had ever heard, and the way he smiled at you as he spoke it made your heart flutter. He took another sip of champagne and you let your eyes wander down his unbuttoned shirt that ruffled gently in the warm breeze through the open windows and the streaks of sunlight rose his light dusting of freckles over his nose and tops of his cheeks.

“It’s breathtaking here.” George spoke calmly, his fingers still resting lazily in yours, “I’m just looking forward to a perfect weekend vacation with you.”

“With me?” you couldn’t help but confirm.

“Yeah.” George chuckled lightly, gently taking his hand from yours to reach for the small tray still resting on the bed and he lifted a chocolate covered strawberry from the dessert plate. He held it out to you with a smile and fed you a small bite as he answered your question, “No one else I would even think of, sweetheart. You’re my one and only after all. This weekend is just for us.”

As you ate your bite of strawberry, he took the last bit for himself before setting the greenery back on the plate with the rest. You both sipped your drinks and you couldn’t help but reach out to touch him as you let the alcohol warm you, resting your hand against his chest to feel his heartbeat under your touch.

“I love you.” you breathed ever so quietly, testing the waters with the eight letters you had been dying to confess.

George raised his hand over yours and you could feel his heart race under your palm, staring into your eyes as he answered with an honest, “I love you too.”

Your heart fluttered at his words and the smile that came to your lips only had him smiling back at you. He took his hand from yours to dust his finger across your lips and down your neck and along the collar of your white silk robe.

“You look so beautiful today.”

Butterflies filled your stomach at his words and you stared back at him even if his eyes were on your chest. Having him simply looking at you was enough to make you blush. You replied easily, “So do you.”

“I’ve missed you.” George whispered, tracing your collarbones gently before sliding up the side of your neck. His touch left goosebumps rising across your skin at his slightest touch.

“I’ve missed you more than you know.” you admitted quietly.

His eyes raised from his fingers to your eyes and then, as he smiled adoringly, dropped his gaze to your lips. His stare alone could make shivers tear down your spine in the most addicting way and his large hand slid over your jaw to cradle the side of your face. The anticipation was nearly nauseating as his thumb brushed over your cheek and his eyes didn’t waver from your lips even as he licked his own. You wanted to kiss him more than anything, to feel his perfectly soft sculpted lips on yours enough to make your knees weak, and you had tried to imagine it for months but never expected to be face to face with him like this.

No words had to be spoken as you both leaned in and his hand on your face guided you to tilt your head slightly to the right and let his lips brush against yours. This first shared anticipatory breath was electrifying and, as his lips finally slotted with your own, the warmth of the tropical island air was nothing compared to the fire that burst in the depths of your stomach. You inhaled into it, savouring the taste of his lips on yours as his kiss froze motionlessly for a few seconds. When he leaned back from it and your lips parted with a soft smack, you couldn’t help but grab the front of his shirt and pull him back in for another kiss. You could feel him smile into it as your lips met again, sharing a few lingering kisses that tasted like expensive champagne from the glasses you each still held in your hand.

Your heart raced in your chest as your hand slid into the back of his hair and you nipped gently on his bottom lip. He let a pleasant hum fall between you, tilting his head a little more to deepen your kiss and part your lips with his own. The champagne and strawberries were forgotten about as you quenched your cravings through his tongue and soft lips, letting him lead into each kiss that made your stomach flutter with desire.

When a few more moments passed, he pulled back from you with one more tender kiss to your pouted lips and gave you a small smile as he took the champagne flute from your hand and set it back on the tray. Almost impatiently, you watched as he lifted the small tray from the sheets and leaned over to rest it safely on the bedside table, giving him a comfortable range of motion to lean in towards your lips again. You shared a few soft kisses before you both opened up to permit your tongues to join once more and you greedily held his face in your hands like he was your most prized possession.

George held himself up with one hand against the mattress as his other rested gently against the side of your neck, although you were too hung up on the gentle flexing of his jaw that moved smoothly along with each passionate kiss. The soft smacks of his lips on yours was addicting and you slid your hands down his neck and along his exposed chest as your breathing started to fall in time with his.

“Mm,” he pulled back ever so slightly and looked at you from under long lashes, “I love kissing you.”

Your cheeks flushed pink just as he leaned in for more, capturing your bottom lip between his and then your top and then nudged his tongue into your mouth. You felt as light as air as you pushed your mouth on his harder and opened up to let his tongue nudge strongly against yours. You could taste the sweetness of the strawberries and the sharpness of the alcohol in his mouth and each breath you shared just made it more addicting. You couldn’t get enough of him.

His hands traced the collar of your satin robe and you let him push it off your shoulders and to the bamboo flooring, leaving you in only the blue lingerie set that hugged your body perfectly. You felt on fire, drawn to him in every single way, and you tugged on the material of his white button-up to keep him close as your lips locked in messy passionate kisses.

But George was leaning back from you again despite the grip you had on his shirt and he shuffled onto the bed a little more and he curled his finger at you to call you over. With an eager smile, you crawled up the end of the bed and met him in the middle, resting on your hands and knees over his outstretched legs as you leaned in towards his lips again. His hands found your hips and he eased you down onto his thighs, making you flush pink behind strong kisses.

He left you with a few single kisses to your lips before meeting your eyes as his hands rubbed over your waist and along the thin garter belt that was wrapped around your middle. He was gorgeous and the way he looked at you made your stomach twist with eager butterflies, desperate to feel his lips on yours more and more.

“I want to make love to you.” George breathed, his words sending shivers down your arms and a flutter between your legs, “Right here with this beautiful view of the ocean and no one to disturb us all weekend.”

“All weekend?” you chuckled softly.

“Yeah.” George whispered, soaking up your body with his hands skimming over each curve of your skin and his lips trailed slow kisses down your neck. “I want to make love to you all weekend…never leave…keep you right here with me.”

You giggled shyly, tangling your fingers in the back of his hair as his lips blessed your skin, “Maybe we should start with an hour and see where it takes us.”

George hummed against your skin, leaving wet kisses over your collarbones and across your shoulder, “And then order room service.”

“Alright.” you agreed shyly.

“Okay.” George smiled at you on his lap and he leaned in to kiss your lips once more.

Between delicious slow kisses, you spoke quietly, “Are you sure?”

George chuckled softly against your lips, “God, baby, there’s nothing I’d rather do.”

Your heart skipped a beat in your chest and your whole body flushed with an ache for him, raising your hands to the side of his neck as you kissed him strongly a few more times.

He pulled back slightly again, rubbing his hands up and down your thighs, “Are you sure? You seem so hesitant today, sweetheart.”

You shook your head quickly in reassurance and pulled his lips on yours for a few more quick kisses, “I’m so sure. All I want is to make love with you…I’ve been waiting so long.”

George nipped at your bottom lip through his smile and slid his hands up your back with a peaceful inhale as his lips slotted with yours again. He sat up straighter so your chests were pressed up together and you let your tongue push against his hungrily, letting yourself fall under the bliss of quenched thirst little by little.

The sounds of the waves on the sand rushed faintly through the open windows and the chirping of wildlife rustled through the trees around the resort but you were much more focused on the soft sounds and gentle breaths that George made behind your kisses. Your hands slid down his chest again and started to unbutton the rest of his white shirt slowly. He broke your kiss to watch you for a moment, how your fingers worked the small buttons ever so gently and ever so slowly, really trying to savour every moment. His eyes lingered on your face next, hands held to your hips, not tearing his gaze away even when you pushed open his button-up shirt to reveal his toned chest and abs. Your fingers drank him up in gentle touches and you noticed small shivers rising over his skin as you glided your fingertips down between his pecs and over the chiseled dips of his abs.

George raised his hand up to glide his fingers over your jaw, “C’mere.”

He gently guided your chin up to lean in and kiss your lips, sharing slow open mouthed kisses that were barely heard behind the tropical summer breeze. You left your hand against his stomach and let your other tangle in the back of his hair, holding him close to prevent his lips from ever leaving yours. In a bit of excited bravery, you moved your kisses along his smooth jaw and down his neck in slow savouring movements to make him shiver, tasting the salty sea air on his skin.

George hummed pleasantly, tilting his head to the side slightly to give you room along his neck and you left wet kisses over his warm skin and down to the dip of his shoulder where his open shirt rested.

“Can I leave marks?” you whispered between gentle kisses.

“Mhm.” George agreed easily, sliding his fingers in the back of your hair. “As much as you want.”

You smiled giddily against his skin and moved back up right under his jaw, peppering soft kisses there until his head dropped back a little more. His one hand fell behind him to prop himself up in the middle of the bed and his other stayed in your hair, focusing on the feeling of your lips on his skin until you found your spot and sucked.

George’s soft shaky sigh was infused with an ever so quiet groan and you smiled into it, tugging gently at his skin with your teeth before easing the forming bruise with a solid lick. You repeated the same routine twice more until his breathing was falling heavier and his hand was tightening in your hair to pull your lips up to his again.

“You’re gorgeous.” you whispered into his mouth between lazy kisses. “You’re so fucking beautiful.”

“I love you.” George breathed.

“Oh my gosh, I love you.” you replied easily, your voice struggling to not waver with emotion and you covered it up with another hungry kiss.

You shifted on his lap to kiss along his neck again and down his chest, soaking up each inch of his body like it was heaven sent. George was breathing shallowly, watching you kiss down his tanned torso and sneak a lick over his nipples before moving farther and his hand in your hair only helped guide you down.

Your lips trailed wet open mouthed kisses between his abs, feeling the stiff muscle under your fingers in the wake of your mouth before shuffling back on his lap a little more. You brushed over the waistband of his thin white slacks and you could already see him tenting the fabric from underneath. He gasped lightly when you dusted your fingers over his growing erection and when you glanced up at him for permission he nodded you on eagerly. He shifted obediently on the mattress as you untied his pants and shuffled them down slightly as you leaned in to press your lips against his stomach again. Your eyes met as you looked up at him for a brief moment, trailing slow teasing kisses down his abs and eagerly followed the line of hair that led you from his navel and down to his pelvis.

“Oh my gosh, baby.” George breathed, watching carefully as you tugged his pants down his thighs.

He wasn’t wearing any underwear and you bit your lip eagerly as his dick was let free, eyeing him up for all his worth as he stood tall right in front of your face. You shoved his pants down the rest of the way and he nudged them off his ankle and to the floor and tugged his shirt open wider as you situated yourself between his legs. Your whole body tingled with desire as you draped your hair over one shoulder and leaned down to his lap.

George inhaled sharply as you let your tongue lick over the head of his dick and his mouth fell open with a soft groan as you wrapped your lips around him and sucked softly. He made your mouth water in the most addicting way and the way he fit in your mouth was better than you ever imagined in your dreams. You moaned around him before pulling back with a small suction to leave a few wet kisses to the tip. Your eyes raised to his again as your tongue teased over the slit and rubbed along the underside of his tip and he looked like a true angel when his eyes fluttered closed and head fell back with a steady moan.

“That’s so good.” George mumbled, lazily bunching your hair back from your face to hold back as you went down on him. He leaned on one hand against the mattress again, staring down at you as you wrapped your fingers around the length of his cock and gave him a few testing strokes enough to urge him to bite down on his bottom lip.

You were nearly drooling down your chin at the sight of him so it was no surprise when you didn’t wait long to ease him into your mouth. Your tongue led the way, tracing each curve and gentle vein as he filled your mouth and your hand. George’s soft shaky hum had you starting to stroke him off in steady movements, letting your hand and your mouth work together around his thick length. He didn’t pressure you at all but you soon pushed your mouth down deeper and choked yourself quietly on him on your own free will.

“F-Fuck, darling.” George whimpered, breathing heavily as his head dropped backwards. “Feels so good.”

You gave him a small moan of your own as you bobbed your head a little faster around him, muffling the sounds of your wet gags as he took up your mouth. Your spit was trickling down from your lips and slicked up his dick and the grip your hand had on the base, only making the whole situation wetter. It was blissfully perfect as you laid on your stomach between his spread legs and sucked him off in savouring steady motions with the warm ocean breeze ruffling into the room through the open windows and white sheer curtains.

He tasted so good in your mouth - arguably better than the expensive champagne and chocolate covered strawberries - and you hollowed your cheeks to really taste the essence of him and the hint of salty precum that was oozing from his swollen tip. You sped up a little more, bobbing your head in long messy motions in time with your hand until each stroke grazed the back of your throat and your soft muffled wet gags had George’s hand tightening in your hair.

“Oh- That’s it, darling. That’s it, gorgeous. Don’t stop.” George panted out, staring down his body to you as you kept your pace.

The pet names made you melt and they sent your racing heart soaring, not to mention the pretty moans that fell from his throat that sounded like an angelic symphony all on their own. You shifted your hands to his thighs and eased them back towards his chest slightly, even though he was still propped up sitting. George slouched back onto his forearm while leaving his other hand still in your hair, his legs bent and pushed back slightly to give you room to suck him off. You dropped your hand down to his balls and rolled them gently in your hand, just enough to have him groaning loudly as his eyebrows furrowed in bliss. But your mouth kept working around him, taking every inch you could time and time again even as you choked yourself on him a little.

“Don’t stop.” George repeated breathily, his voice a little strained, “Please, baby, don’t stop. Shit.”

You gave him a small moan in content as you kept going, eyes raising to his face even as his hand started to move you a little harder down on him by your hair. You didn’t mind as you wanted to please him and worship him the best you could so you took it gladly. His moans turned into whimpers and you could feel his thighs starting to clench as his hips habitually rolled up against your face and pushed himself deeper still.

You gagged around him loudly but only sped up more despite his quick, “Sorry, love.”

Without a break for even a single word, you kept going, giving him nice sloppy head and fondling his balls just enough to have him shuttering underneath you. George shifted again on the mattress and you used your free hand to grip his hip and hold him in place, glancing up through your lashes as his head lolled to the side and he licked his lips before biting them through his furrowed expression.

He hummed lowly again, his hips trying to move in time with you but you held him down as he whimpered, “Oh, sweetheart, I’m gonna cum. Please. You’re gonna make me cum, baby.”

You kept going, keeping him perfectly pleasured by hands and mouth and your moans only sent vibrations down his whole length and he exhaled deeply. You could feel his dick start to twitch in your mouth and you glanced up at his face as he started right back at you with a hazy lust over his expression, his cheeks tinted pink and his jaw clenched through a shaky whimper.

With a few more quick sloppy bobs of your head, his thighs and his balls were tensing and in a mere second, his head was falling back with a beautiful trembling, “Oh-“

George’s fingers clutched the sheets and your hair as he came, his dick pulsing in your mouth in time with each steady spurt and you raised your hand from his thigh to jerk him off right down your throat. You sputtered around him a little but never dreamt of complaining as he groaned and whimpered and filled your mouth with the warm salty cream that you shamelessly dreamt about tasting.

He fell into beautiful soft moans as he finished, head lolled to the side with dreamy bats of his eyelashes and his hand in your hair slipped down to caress your face as you pulled off of him with a soft slurp. You kissed over his thighs and hips and then along that thin line of hair that led you right back up to his torso. George’s chest was heaving and he gave you a soft smile as you leaned in to kiss him, swallowing up his pleased hums into your mouth as your tongues pushed messily together and lips smacked ungracefully.

George shifted up from his forearm to his hand against the mattress and slid his other arm around your waist to hold you close, mumbling between kisses, “You’re so good, baby. Mm, I love you so much.”

“I love you more.” you answered easily, already falling into more of a comfortable state of mind after the initial shock that the island brought you.

George shifted underneath you and carefully flipped you over on the white down-filled sheets of the king size bed, making sure you fell gently in the cradle of his arms. His lips stayed on yours for a moment longer before he moved down your neck, following the same path you took although he seemed to know your most sensitive spots with near ease. His lips under your ear had you shuttering, your arms wrapping around his back to cling onto the material of his white shirt as your legs slotted together.

This was heaven, you were sure. Only a mere hour ago you were escaping to this island broken hearted and now, the man of your dreams was wrapped up in bed with you overlooking a picturesque view of the ocean. George’s lips suckled on your neck, the sensation shooting shivers down your spine and you clung onto him tighter. He moaned softly as your hips habitually rutted against his bare thigh and he worked to ease the hickey he left on your skin with a warm lick before shifting down to the dip of your shoulder to make another.

The tropical breeze cooled his saliva left behind on your neck by his wet kisses and little licks and you felt more in tune with your body than ever by how it was reacting to even the slightest touch. The sun warmed you both and you could feel how its rays soaked the material of George’s white button-up and sparkled in his eyes when he glanced up at you. You ran your hand through his sandy brown hair and he eased farther down your body to leave another hickey on your collarbone and then finally reached your chest.

“You look so beautiful, I don’t wanna take this off you.” George said softly as he traced the curve of the lingerie bra you wore as it hugged your breasts and contrasted its perfect blue against your skin.

You shared a small smile with him as he shifted down your body, only stopping to suck a hickey into the flesh of your breast before moving down your stomach in wet kisses. Your head finally dropped back from staring at him intently, letting the cloud-like pillow catch your fall as George’s hands soaked up your hips and he covered you in slow meaningful kisses.

The image staring back at you from the ceiling was a surprise but you soon clued into the fact that it was your own reflection staring back at you. It showed everything in a whole new angle and you felt your insides clench at the sight of George, naked except for his open white shirt, laying between your legs.

He snapped the band of your garter belt gently at your waist and you tore your eyes from the mirror on the ceiling to his sweet face.

“Let me?” he asked.

You nodded him on and shuffled onto your elbows as he unclipped the straps from the garters and gently pulled the belt off your hips. He left the strip of lace around each of your thighs and sat back on his knees to pull the belt down your legs, before pausing to kiss your shin and your knee and your thigh as he lowered your legs back down to the bed. You left them bent and spread as he settled between them to press a kiss to the front of your panties.

Still covered, you didn’t feel too exposed to him as you laid back on your forearms and watched him kiss slowly right down between your legs. The gentle touch had you taking your bottom lip between your teeth, watching how he left strong lingering open mouthed kisses right over your clothed clit, trying to play it off casually. Your heart was hammering in your chest and you forced yourself to take a deep calming breath of fresh salty ocean air to stop from getting too in your head as George kissed lower.

Over your thin panties, George dipped out his tongue slightly between meaningful kisses and you felt his heavy warm sigh against your skin between a deep impatient, “Mmmm.”

His lips found your inner thigh and he sucked a hickey into your flesh before mirroring it on the other side and then trailed kisses slowly down your legs as he sat back on his knees again. George’s fingers linked in the sides of your panties and pulled them down too, his eyes drinking you up even as you tried to cover yourself with your hand shyly and he dropped your underwear to the ground too.

“Mm mm.” George scolded sweetly with a hum as he gently pushed your hands away, “Don’t hide from me, gorgeous. Let me see you.”

“George.” you breathed nervously.

“Don’t be shy, baby, I got you.” George whispered, leaning back down to kiss your hips and the dip where your pelvis met your legs. “Trust me.”

“Yeah.” you agreed easily, shifting your hand into his hair instead as he nudged your legs open wider.

It felt like you had known him for a lifetime despite the fact that it had only been short of an hour since you laid eyes on him for the first time. The trust came surprisingly easy that way and eager fuzzy warmth spread through your chest as he trailed teasing slow kisses closer and closer to your cunt.

You hadn’t realized how horny you were for more of him until that moment as his agonizing slow kisses over your flushed skin caused your insides to clench pleadingly and a soft impatient whimper fell from your throat. George’s arms looped around your thighs and pulled your legs over his shoulders as he licked his lips and admired your body laid out for him.

Almost shamefully, you had dreamt of that very moment for months but only ever figured it was to happen in your imagination. Now, laying naked on a tropical king size bed, you felt more blessed by the sight of George settling between your legs than the white sand beaches and perfect ocean view just beyond the open windows of the hotel room.

“So perfect.” George whispered. “So beautiful.”

He glanced up at your face as he let a thick string of spit slip down from his lips and fall onto your throbbing cunt, the simple action making you gasp softly, only doing so again, louder, as his mouth followed suit. He gave you wet open mouthed kisses right down your folds as his hands found a nice grip around your thighs, keeping your legs open to let him have his way with you.

“Oh my God.” you breathed out, letting your eyes raise up to the mirror on the ceiling to watch him at another angle. Your mouth fell open as his tongue lapped at your dripping arousal and swirled it and his spit around a bit more. “George.”

He hummed softly for you to feel the vibrations from his lips as he licked and sucked greedily over your folds, smearing your wetness over his mouth. You held your hand in his soft brown hair, watching him intently through the mirror as his head worked between your legs. With only the slightest touch, he could make you feel so damn good. You only craved more.

George slid his tongue right up between your lips and let out a dreamy sigh before pushing it inside you. Your legs flinched and he held them open and in place as he fucked you with his tongue and his nose nearly brushed your aching clit.

“Oh God.” you whimpered, “Fuck, baby-“

George flicked his tongue faster inside you, moaning greedily into your body as your hips rutted against his face. But then he pulled back suddenly, eyes raising to your face even as you stared up at the mirror reflection on the ceiling, and he slowed right down, dragging his tongue in calculated patterns between your folds. You spread your legs a little wider and George only grinned as he shifted along with you and held your legs back closer towards your chest in two large hands.

It didn’t take you long to feel his precise motions of his tongue were actually spelling out his name letter by letter, first and last, over and over. He was claiming you as his in the quietest, filthiest, most discreet way; a way for just the two of you to know. He was making you drip but you craved more.

You tugged at his hair with one hand and reached down to spread yourself open between two fingers with your other. George chuckled against you, moving to wet open mouthed kisses over your cunt before taking his hand from your thigh to push your fingers away and take over himself.

He kissed over your clit, keeping his movements slow and gentle as his swollen lips pressed like heaven against your aching core. You were breathing hard in pleading anticipation, staring down your body again to watch his tongue drop out to press down against your clit. Your sharp gasp had him smiling proudly, his eyes locked on yours for a moment as he kept his tongue pressed down strongly in place.

“Please.” you breathed out, trying to rock your hips to get him to move but he held you in place by your waist. You tugged at his hair, whining pleadingly, “George, baby, please-“

George pulled back with a wet slurp and he licked his lips before bringing his right hand up and slid two fingers in his mouth. You exhaled deeply in anticipation, watching as he slicked up his middle and ring finger in spit with his eyes locked on yours. His left arm slid around your lower stomach to hold you down as his right hand slid down between your folds to collect more of your wetness around them.

Your feet were resting against his shoulders as you kept your legs bent back to give him room and you couldn’t tear your eyes away from your spread legs as he rubbed his fingers through your arousal until you could hear the thick sound of wetness. George rubbed his fingers between your folds a bit stronger, swirling them around your entrance teasingly, watching how your muscles cleaned for him.

“Okay, gorgeous,” George whispered before slowly easing his middle finger inside you, “just relax.”

You hummed peacefully, letting your head fall back gently against the pillows as he pushed his single finger all the way into you. He groaned softly at the gentle squeeze of your body and started easing it out and then back in, watching how your arousal clung to his skin with each gentle thrust.

“That’s it.” George breathed, landing a kiss to your inner thigh as his finger worked slowly back and forth and you stayed perfectly still for him.

But then he was adding his second finger and you gripped tighter in his hair, whimpering shakily as the slight stretch pushed across your muscles. Right away, his tongue dropped down to your clit, easing the slight discomfort with reassuring licks that made your walls clench around his fingers.

“More.” you pleaded softly, “Please, baby. Please, Georgie.”

“I got you, sweetheart.” George hushed you gently.

He started to pump his fingers into you slowly and, at the same time, licked strongly over your clit. His mouth was so warm and his fingers were so slender that you couldn’t even form words for a moment, simply staring up into the mirror with an open mouth as he found home between your bent legs. The sight of your hand in his hair felt surreal enough as it was and as his tongue flicked faster over your core, you couldn’t help but grip tighter to the strands with a soft groan.

George’s fingers nudged themselves deeper and curled upwards in steady strokes, caressing you from the inside out as his mouth only stimulated you more at your clit. His left arm that was tucked under your thigh and across your abdomen held you down for him and he helped himself to your body with pride. Your legs slipped back over his shoulders as his fingers fucked into you faster and the pleasure had you almost folding into yourself, legs wrapping around his head as your fingers tugged at his hair and shaky moans fell from your lips.

George basked in it, humming contentedly against your most sensitive spot as he kept his steady pace. Your legs were nearly clutching his head between your thighs but he didn’t falter, fingering you in rapid flicks as his tongue swirled messily over your clit, and the room started to fill with your moans and gasps growing louder and louder. You couldn’t contain yourself - he felt far too good and nothing like you had ever imagined before - and despite your pleasurable sounds that were taken by the island breeze, you didn’t dare to stop.

“George.” you cried out to the ceiling, ankles linking behind his shoulder blades as you nearly tugged him right into your body. With one hand in his hair, your other grabbed the material of his white shirt over his shoulder to pull on too, somehow desperate to have him impossibly closer as your toes curled. “George.” your head tossed back against the white sheets as your back tried to arch off the bed in overwhelming bliss that tightened in your stomach. You stared up into the mirror to watch him between your legs as your hips pushed up against his mouth and his fingers moved at their quick consistent pace while his mouth moaned hungrily around your clit. You swore you were seeing stars as he brought you close and with a few more shallow pants and whimpers, your mouth was falling open with a soft cry of, “O-Oh- George-“

He drank you up with ease, pulling his fingers out to rub at your clit through your orgasm so his tongue could taste every sweet drop that pooled out of you. He groaned pleasantly, slurping and sucking hungrily at your pussy as your legs trembled and your body shuttered with pleasure. You pulled at his hair and his shirt, messing his hair and crinkling the fabric as your eyes rested shut and you basked in the warm waves of beautiful pleasure that washed over you with the tropical breeze.

George shifted out from the lock of your ankles and you let him shuffle up your body between your spread legs to kiss your swollen lips. Right away, his tongue met yours in sloppy blissful harmony and at the taste of yourself in his mouth, you pushed your head up to kiss him harder. He moaned softly into it, letting his hand cradle your jaw for a moment as he licked his way through your mouth before tugging at your bottom lip with his teeth.

When he pulled back again, you huffed in protest, arms draping lazily over your head as you stared at him longingly. George moved gently but persistently as he sat back on his knees between your spread legs and your eyes dropped to his hand that wrapped around his dick and he stroked it a few times, just enough to show off how hard he was again. You habitually pushed your thighs together tightly as you watched him touch himself but mere seconds later, he was patting his thighs.

“Come here, sweetheart.”

The gentle instruction could have melted you and as you moved to sit up, George shuffled closer to the middle of the king size bed on his knees. He held out his hands to you to help you scoot forward and up onto his thighs and you couldn’t help but let your lips find his neck again as you pushed off his unbuttoned shirt from his shoulders.

George caressed your hips, your body so close to his you could feel his dick pressed up between your legs to rub against your clit when you moved. You groaned against his neck as your hips rutted lazily against his just to feel the hard shaft of his cock rubbing blissfully against your sensitive core.

“God, you’re so pretty.” George mumbled as his hands soaked you up greedily. “You ready, baby?”

“Please.” you agreed easily.

“No condom,” he whispered to you as you shuffled up onto your feet on either side of him and he spread his knees slightly, “because I know how much you love to take it raw.”

“Yeah.” you breathed into his neck as your arms wrapped around his shoulders, speaking before you could really think about it, “Put a baby in me.”

George chuckled softly as his hands groped your ass and you settled teasingly on the head of his dick and lingered there a moment to feel the anticipation of what was about to happen for one more moment. You had waited so long. He left a few wet kisses on your neck and lifted his lips up to your ear to whisper, “As you wish.”

His large hands helped to guide you down on his dick, staring up at your face to watch how the strong stretch to your muscles made your expression tighten as you sank down on him. Regardless of the slight pain, you focused on the fact that you could feel every curve and every vein on his thick cock as your body sheathed him perfectly. You could feel yourself salivating as you only got him deeper and deeper, staring into his lustful blue eyes in the light of the afternoon sunshine that danced in through the wide open windows and his hands cradled your body carefully and lovingly. George was biting his lip strongly, his eyes locked on yours despite the quiet deep groans that fell from his chest as you squeezed around him so tightly.

You finally bottomed out, ass pressed against the tops of his spread thighs, and you were nearly sure he was at your cervix. You let out a shaky sigh and held your hands snugly on his shoulders to steady yourself to ease back up his length a little and then drop back down. George hissed softly at the sudden motion but gladly followed your small bounces with his hands on your waist, groaning as he leaned into your chest to kiss over your lace clad breasts that bounced gently in his face.

“Fuck, darling, you feel so good.” George whispered against your skin, his breathing heavy already and only falling weaker as he lazily started meeting your halfway with little thrusts.

“Shit!” you squeaked softly, sliding your hands from his shoulders to wrap your arms around his neck as your lips dipped down to find his.

George moaned against your mouth, easing you up and down by his hands as his hips kept soft thrusts in time with it and you held yourself steady on your feet against the mattress and moved with him. You kissed sloppily for a few seconds before having to pull back to breathe and your head fell back with a shaky sigh. George went for your neck, kissing and sucking over your skin as you stared up at the ceiling mirror above you and followed each of your gentle bounces and how he moved right with you.

“You’re so fucking wet, sweetheart.” George said against your neck, “You take my cock so well, my love.”

His dirty words had you moaning for more, trying to bounce on him faster. George shushed you softly and stopped you completely so you were placed right down on his lap, and he tucked your legs around his waist before shifting off his knees to sit against the sheets. He draped his legs out beneath you and wrapped his arms around your body as well and squeezed you close to feel more of him. No instructions needed to be shared as you wrapped your arms around his head and nuzzled into his neck and started grinding right down on him in strong circles.

“Oh, good girl.” George panted. “Oh, fuck, baby, that’s my good girl.”

“You’re so big.” you whined against his ear as your right hand tangled in the back of his hair and your grinding turned into messy little bounces. “F-Fuck, baby, I can feel you so deep-“

“You’re so perfect. You’re so fucking perfect, darling. C’mere.” George leaned his head back slightly to find your lips and you whimpered pleasantly into the off centered kiss before your tongues met and led you into deep passionate lazy kisses.

With cheeks flushed pink, you felt as though you had reached the peak of life’s blissful offerings right there, that nothing on earth could be this incredible. The taste of his lips, the heat of his touch, the steady stretch he pushed so deep inside you; it was heavenly. Sitting entangled together in the middle of the king size bed was where you had always dreamt to be, and your eyes fluttered closed as his lips found your neck and you ground down on him steadily. You wanted to feel everything and to bask in each second that passed because who knew how long you would have him to yourself. You wanted him forever, to never leave, to fit together as one until the end of time. You couldn’t think of letting him go. Not after this.

Your thoughts seemed to spiral and your hips slowed down on him until you were barely moving, simply clutching onto him and staring into space against his neck. George sensed your change and slid his hands up your hips and to your face, cradling your cheeks in his hands to bring your lips to his for a few tender kisses.

“I love you.” he whispered.

“I love you.” you replied just as quietly.

“You are my everything.” George breathed, his lips brushing yours as he spoke so closely. “You are the love of my life.”

“George.” you said bashfully, trying to hide the blush of your cheeks that he kissed over.

“I mean it,” he whispered against your ear, “I love you.”

It was as if those three words sparked an eternal flame in your stomach, soaring up through your heart and your chest and through your cheeks and right down to where he was tucked deeply inside you. You had him. All of him. For an afternoon, for a weekend, and what felt like was to be a lifetime. You shivered in his arms, held by him right up to his chest until you felt completely encompassed and the warm ocean air wafted through the billowing sheer curtains and wrapped around the both of you like a ribbon to tie you together for the rest of time. It felt so easy with him, there, like that, and you slid your hands out of his hair and down his jawline, keeping your eyes on his.

“I love you, my sunshine.” you breathed, caressing his cheeks with your thumbs before leaning down to kiss him again.

George locked your bottom lip between his two, savouring your few kisses between gentle wet smacks of parting and breaths of meeting, and secured his arms around your body. He lifted you up slightly and you clung onto him, focussing on his lips on yours as you wrapped your legs around his waist and he gently laid you down onto the fluffy white sheets. He pushed deeper into you, urging your head back against the pillow and you broke your kiss with a soft gasp, staring up into his eyes as he repeated that action, easing into you again so you could feel every inch of him.

“There.” he cooed, pushing in deep again. “Good?”

You nodded, “So good.”

“Okay.” George smiled softly and leaned down to kiss you.

You let your lips lock with his, arms raising to drape around his shoulders as he thrusted steadily into you. He was nearly pulling out all the way before pushing back in deep but he still managed to kiss you right through it, sharing heavy breaths and soft moans between your lips. With your hands on his bare back, you could feel his muscles tensing and moving along with him and you felt how the sun kissed glow of his skin under your fingertips was soft with touches from

paradise. George dropped his head to your neck with his forearms rested on either side of you and moved his hips into yours in intoxicating curling thrusts that tingled every single nerve in your body.

The reflection in the spotless mirror above you only made your body flush hot in desire as you stared up at it from over George’s shoulder. You could see every inch of his bare skin that way and could follow your hands as you soaked up his body down his back and to his thighs, pulling him in with hands and ankles linked behind his back. With each deep curling thrust into you he was groaning against your ear, filling your soul with the bliss of his pleasure that you were bringing him. It made you crave more of him; having him on top of you and inside you wasn’t enough anymore.

Your hands pressed into the muscles of his back like he was moldable sand and your linked ankles pressed the heels of your feet into his bum to pull him deeper with each rock of his hips. Your teeth had trapped your bottom lip and you stared up into the mirror to watch him have you right in the centre of the king size bed. He smelt like the ocean, like the salty fresh air, like freedom.

“More.” you whispered before you could think. “I want more of you.”

George hummed against your neck and left a fleeting kiss under your ear, “Hang on, sweetheart.”

You reached for him as he sat back from you on his knees and pulled your legs out from around his waist. He lifted them up to his shoulders and sent you a small smile as he rested one hand down gently on your lower stomach and pushed his hips into yours again. He could get so much deeper that way and your eyes nearly rolled back in your head when he nudged against your innermost muscles.

“Better?” George asked softly.

The afternoon tropical sun that came in through the large open windows glinted against his abs and the muscles of his torso in the thin sheen of sweat that was forming. His sandy brown hair was ruffled messily on top of his head and falling over his forehead as he stared down at you with blue eyes like the ocean. They sparkled.

“Yeah.” you answered, sliding your hands up his arms.

George leaned back down over you and your ankles linked together behind his neck as your eyes met and he thrusted slowly into you again. You could see him slightly clench his jaw as he sheathed inside you all the way and his soft groan urged your hands to hold tighter to his biceps. He found his pace again with deep curling thrusts that had your eyes fluttering closed and your teeth to sink into your bottom lip with a pleased whimper.

“Gonna go faster, darling.” George whispered.

“Please.” you agreed with ease.

His hands gripped tighter to the sheets on either side of you to ground himself slightly as he sped up, pulling back to thrust into you faster and used the slight spring in the mattress to his benefit.

“Yeah.” you sobbed out without thinking, letting your gaze drift past him again to the mirror.

You could feel his warm breath and his soft grunts in time with his thrusts against your cheeks, but you didn’t tear your eyes from the sight of him in the reflection above you down to your legs hooked over his shoulders. He kept pulling back to push down into you again and again, focusing harder rather than curling because having you bent so much already had him teasing your g-spot. You were waiting for it, your breath constantly freezing in anticipation in your chest, and you looked back at his face with hands clung onto his arms. He kept your eye contact, sharing breaths as he shifted slightly higher and tried a bit of a newer angle to watch how your mouth dropped open slightly.

“Right there?” George asked with a soft chuckle.

“Uh huh. Right there.” you nodded quickly.

“Okay, baby. I got it.” George whispered, holding himself up on his hands beside your head as he pulled out of you just long enough to shove back in.

“Oh God.” you cried out.

“Tell me if it’s too much.” George breathed.

You only shook your head as he continued, fucking down into you in quick thrusts to hit that perfect spot inside you each time. As he got harder, the faint crash of waves on sand from the beaches were hidden behind the steady slap of his skin on yours and your breaths mixing between shared soft grunts and moans. Your hands moved from his biceps to his waist and you followed each of his messy movements eagerly, savouring each delicious thrust as you tried to pull him impossibly deeper.

“Mmm, you feel so good.” George mumbled. “Are you close?”

You couldn’t deny the lust in his voice that only helped his perfect strokes to make you near dizzy and you could only nod out a shaky, “Mhm.”

“Yeah?” he taunted breathlessly, his accent thick with lust, “I want to make you cum, baby. I want to feel your pretty pussy cum for me.”

“George.” you whimpered at his words.

He only worked harder, keeping that consistent pace that had your toes curling and your nails digging into his back. He wouldn’t stop staring at you, even when your face screwed up in pleasure and your pleading moans fell from your lips.

“Feel me.” George whispered. “Feel how deep I am…how good it feels…feel my body on top of you.”

“George.” you cried shakily.

“How much I love you.”

“Oh my God-“ your voice was wavering as you felt your stomach tighten and your muscles clench down on him.

“That’s it, gorgeous.” George praised, not hesitating for a moment through his consistent pace and perfect angle. “Fuck, you look so pretty. Shit, baby, I wanna put all my love into you…always.”

“Please, George, please, baby-“ you cried out shakily.

He groaned lowly, eyebrows furrowing in perfect pleasure, his skin slapping filthily with yours until you could feel him twitch slightly inside you. He bit his lip strongly, letting you scratch up his back in your efforts to cling onto something.

“Cum with me, darling.” George panted. “On 3…okay?”

Your pleading whimper was agreement enough.

George couldn’t help but thrust into you a little faster, “Okay, gorgeous. 3…”

You stared up at him, focussed on nothing else in the world but the addicting fullness he could give you and the raw pleasure that ripped through your body. He was a wonder on top of you and you slid one hand to the back of his neck.

“2…”

It was hard to hold back but for him you would do anything, especially as he stared into your eyes under those long lashes and wisps of brown hair. You didn’t even need to touch yourself to feel close, already wanting to let go even if he was making you hold it for a few seconds longer.

“1…”

George barely caught a breath and didn’t even wait a full count before rushing out a, “Now.”

You didn’t need any other instruction; that simple word was enough to send you over the edge. Your right hand flew to his hair to have something substantial to grab onto as you came and he shoved right into you and held it there for a few seconds as your muscles squeezed down on him. George’s head tossed back slightly as he let a loud moan fall from his throat and you felt the first spurt release inside you. You whimpered pitchily, eyes screwed shut and back arching blissfully off the perfect white sheets. George easily slid his arm under your waist and pulled back just enough to push nice and deep inside you again as he whimpered and groaned and filled you up with warm shots of cum.

It was heavenly, especially feeling how he pulsed inside your tight muscles with each burst, and his face of pleasure was nothing short of perfection. You cried his name blissfully, not caring if any strangers could hear you through the open windows from the beach, and your moans were sung through the summer breeze. You clung onto him as he held you close, leaning up slightly to swallow his pleasant moans with your lips and you kissed lazily for a few moments as the intensity of your orgasms subsided.

Both of you pulled back from your kiss at the same time to breathe, sharing soft smiles as George carefully let your legs rest down against the bed. He slid out of you and reached a hand down to soothe your sensitive wet body with gentle touches as he shuffled onto the sheets beside you. You left your legs spread lazily and let your eyes linger on his face while he rubbed his fingers softly over your folds and finally down your thigh, smearing the mix of your cum over your flushed skin and linked his finger in the lace band of your garter. With a pleasant hum, you leaned in towards him and kissed his lips softly, smiling into it as he melted against your touch and kissed you back.

His hand raised to your chin, holding you there as you shared lingering breathless kisses before he left one more to your nose in conclusion. With a tired sigh, he laid flat beside you and you both stared up into the mirror above as you steadied your breathing and tried to compose yourself over what just happened.

George seemed to read your mind as he broke your silence, “That was incredible.”

“Yeah.” you chuckled softly. “That was...amazing.”

George leaned in to press a kiss to your cheek before he was shuffling the white sheets up around your bodies to keep somewhat decent with the wide open windows and ocean breeze that left you exposed. You moved carefully with him as he draped his arm around your shoulders and you cuddled into his side while sharing a down-filled pillow. Your arm tucked around his middle and you slid your fingers over his abs and rested your hand against his chest, smiling to yourself at the feeling of his strong heartbeat under your palm. He kissed your forehead and brushed his thumb over your bare shoulder lazily, letting his eyes close with his cheek against your head as if ready for a late afternoon nap.

Your eyes drifted up to the mirror again as your head rested on his shoulder and you let your eyes soak up the image of the two of you together. It looked surreal, like a painting created of the brightest and most vibrant hues of the sun and the ocean and the sand, although you were sure there was no better composition on earth. George’s eyes were closed, long lashes resting against his flushed cheeks, and his nose was pressed to your head like he was trying to inhale your scent into his dreams. You didn’t move an inch as you stared up at him and let your eyes trace each curve of his muscle and the lines of his body and up his opposite arm that was lazily tucked up behind his head of messy brown hair. He was peaceful...serene...tranquil, and a sight more breathtaking than any corner of the remote island you found yourself on.

In the silence only taken up by the distant crash of waves and songs of tropical birds, you spoke, “Whoever put that mirror up there was a fucking genius.”

George’s lips turned up into a smile and he shifted slightly without opening his eyes, leaving a kiss to your temple. You let your eyes close too and cuddled closer into him, even as your body shifted and started to push out some of the thick creamy liquid that had claimed you from the inside out. Your soft flat hum had him kissing your head again and his fingers danced along the back of your neck in feather soft patterns.

“You feeling okay?” George asked in a whisper.

“Never better.” you answered easily.

You leaned your head back slightly and stared up at him as he met your gaze and he dipped down to kiss your lips, once, twice, three times, and then dusted one over your cheek as your head found his shoulder again.

“I love you.” he breathed into your hair.

“I love you.” you smiled softly, savouring the feeling of his warm skin pressed against your own.

Your legs tangled together under the white sheets, wrapped up in each other’s arms, with breaths and hearts in steady time. Time felt infinite. The thought of leaving that very crease of the mattress was dreadful to you and you forced yourself to take it minute by minute; caressing his chest with your thumb. His skin was warm and tasted salty with sweat when you kissed him. You trailed slow kisses over his collarbones and along his neck and breathed him in, the faint lingering scent of his cologne and the natural pheromones of his body that only drew you in more and more.

“I want to stay right here with you forever.” you whispered dreamily.

“Mm,” George smiled and rubbed his hand tenderly over your back, “Me too.”

You tightened your arm around his body and linked your leg over his two, ignoring the warm ache of your hips and the thick cream that dripped out of you and onto the sheets below. George shifted slightly and rose his arm up with a stretching groan until his muscles tensed for a moment underneath you. He sighed deeply and dropped his arm above his head, his eyes blinking open to meet your gaze through the mirror on the ceiling. You both broke into bashful smiles in the reflection and he kissed your head once more before taking his arm from around your shoulders and started to move away from you.

“Where are you going?” you asked quickly, reaching out to grab his arm again.

“Relax, my love.” George chuckled as he sensed the slight panic in your voice and he stroked your cheek lovingly, “Aren’t you hungry?”

You hadn’t realized it at first, too preoccupied by him, but when he said it you realized how hungry you actually were. You smiled up at him and nodded and he dipped down to kiss you once before you let him shuffle away from you and to the side of the bed.

The white sheets rested around his waist, showing off the toned muscle of his back and the few red scratches that marked him as yours. Still laying in the middle of the bed, you reached out a hand to rub over his back and his waist as he lifted the corded phone from the bedside table to call the resort restaurant.

He sounded so professional on the phone as he ordered you each a burger and fries and you rolled over to hide your blissful blush against his shoulder. Your arm snaked around his body and held him close and his hand rested gently over yours against his chest. He thanked the person on the phone before hanging up and rolling over to tackle you down again into the cloudlike king size bed, showering you in kisses to make you laugh gleefully into the tropical air.

There you laid together, sharing kisses and caresses as the minutes passed by and the waves greeted the shore in rhythmic whispers in the distance. Something about his naked body pressed up and entangled with yours was heavenly and you felt as light as the sheer white curtains billowing in the warm breeze.

A quarter hour later, there was a knock on the door and both of you glanced across the room to the direction of the small entryway. George was propped up over top of you but you eased him to the side so you could retrieve your order, leaving him with a few quick kisses before grabbing your silk robe from where it had been tossed to the floor. He flopped back onto the bed as you tied up your robe and hurried over to answer the door.

The island host was standing on the other side when you peeked out, the room service trolley at her side, and she sent you a knowing smile and a whisper of, “How are you enjoying your stay so far? It looks like you’ve been having fun.”

You hand raised instinctively to the side of your neck that was littered in hickeys but you didn’t feel an ounce of embarrassment. You only grinned at her and replied softly, “It’s…incredible. Is this real?”

“It is not a dream, I can assure you of that.” she said with a gentle laugh.

“How is this real? How could he tell me he loves me so easily…and make love like he meant it?” your words fumbled out of you before you could think.

She only offered you a, “Don’t question the workings of the island. It’s here to give you what you need. Nothing more. Nothing less.”

You glanced behind you quickly to make sure George wasn’t overhearing before you turned back to her and asked quietly, “I have never felt this…at ease in so long. Peaceful. My heart feels so full. I…I can’t believe this.”

“You’re glowing.” the host complimented.

“He’s everything I dreamt about and more. He’s…so perfect.” you whispered, resting your cheek against your hand as you held onto the doorframe. “I’m dizzy in love.”

“Well, I’m glad the island could help you!” she slid the small trolley between you, “I just wanted to check in and bring your dinner along with me.”

“Before you go,” you spoke up quickly.

She stopped herself from leaving and waited for your continuation.

You shuffled nervously, anxious for the answer she would give you to the question that burned in the back of your mind. Finally, you asked, “What happens when I leave on Monday morning? Will this just…be forgotten? Will I go back to being nothing to him?”

The host sighed, a kind smile unwavering from her face, “Just live in the present and take it minute by minute. We’ll cross that bridge when we get to it.”

You bit nervously on your bottom lip but before you could answer, a hand was resting on your waist and George was standing right behind you, wrapped in the white down-filled duvet.

“What’s taking so long over here, darling? I’m starving.” George said lightheartedly, sending a small smile to the host of the island as he stood right up close beside you.

Without answering him directly, the host just directed more towards you a blanket request of, “Just focus on having a relaxing and calming stay this weekend. You know where to find me if you need anything.”

You and George both thanked her and she headed off down the wood path through the resort once more. He slid his arm tighter around your middle, “What was that all about?”

You leaned your head back against his shoulder to meet his gaze, “Nothin’. Just telling her how much we have enjoyed ourselves so far.”

George gave your hip a squeeze and your bum a little smack and pressed a strong kiss to your neck, “Come on, gorgeous. Let’s eat.”

You were sure there was no better bliss than waking up tangled in sheets and George’s arms. You stayed in bed for over an hour, cuddling and drifting in and out of sleep as the sun rose over the horizon. After a filling breakfast at the resort restaurant with all your favourite foods lined up along the buffet and piled on your plate, you were guided to the spa. George didn’t leave your side all morning, always staying within arms reach and holding your hand as you checked into your appointment.

The lady led you down the bamboo lined hallway to the large dark room near the end, lined with candles and infused with natural scents of eucalyptus and sage. The two single beds were resting in the centre of the room and the lady left you to prepare for the massage.

“I thought I was going to have to do all of this by myself.” you admitted quietly, watching as George untied his robe and laid it over the small chair by the wall.

“Would you rather be by yourself?” he asked.

“God, no.” you answered easily.

George laughed lightly.

You both undressed to your underwear and draped your spa robes neatly to the side. With your arm over your bare chest, you shuffled onto the massage bed, trying not to shy away from George’s obvious staring from a few feet away. Both of you were perfectly aware that your skin was marked up in love bites and his back donned red scratches, but on Fantasy Island, no one would give a second glance. It was your fantasy after all.

The thin linens were tucked up your back as you laid on your stomachs and you waited for the two masseuses to enter, letting the warm air and the soothing spa music to relax you.

“I’ve never had one of these.” George spoke softly.

You turned your head to look over at him on your left, “You haven’t?”

“Not like this. Just work-related massages…sports massages…this is nicer.” George smiled over at you and reached out a hand from under the blanket. You did the same and your fingers linked together lazily for a moment as you shared a smile from opposite massage tables.

When the masseuses came into the room, they got you both situated and set up their shared selection of oils and creams. With your head facing down in the cushioned face cradle, you couldn’t see George but even just knowing he was right there beside you was enough to ease any stresses you still had left over from your last few months. The two men worked on your backs first, slicking up your skin in warm oils and working their hands along your muscles beautifully.

George’s soft groan from your left made you smile to yourself quietly, keeping your eyes closed as you focused on the pressured hands of your masseuse.

“Ugh, fuck, that’s good.” George groaned, his voice muffled by the linens. “Ohh, yeah.”

“Baby,” you chuckled shyly and reached out your hand towards him, “Stop.”

“Stop what?” George mumbled, lazily taking your hand in his.

“Stop...being so loud.”

He only hummed, resting his face back into the bed just as his masseuse pressed his thumbs down into his shoulders. George’s deep moan nearly shot shivers down your spine and right between your legs and you gripped tighter onto his hand. You laid side by side on your individual beds, holding hands between you, and basking in the comforting warmth that relaxed your body and your mind.

Despite the pleasing deep touch of your masseuse over your stiff muscles, you could really only focus on George’s soft moans and groans that he let out with his tension into the linens. You really were looking forward to your massage but now, you were more looking forward to getting back to the room.

When the hour and a half was up and the two masseuses left the room to let you rise when you wished, both you and George sighed deeply at the same time. You shared soft laughter between you and glanced over at each other from where you were now laying on your backs. The linens were pulled up your chests, keeping you decent and keeping George’s abs covered to stay somewhat warm. Your hands reached out to find each others again and his thumb rubbed over your knuckles gently, eyes lingering through the dark candle lit room.

“This was better than I expected.” George admitted.

“You sure you didn’t want a mud bath or something instead?” you chuckled.

George shook his head, “No way. This was perfect.”

With one more squeeze of your hands, you both slowly started to get up and slipped on the robes again. George tied the cloth belt around his waist and you stepped up to set your hand on his arm and pushed a quick kiss to his lips.

“What was that for?” he chuckled, sliding his arm around your waist to pull you close and kiss you again before you could answer.

“I just love you.” you shrugged. “And this weekend.”

George brushed his hand over your messy hair and down your jaw, “I love you too.”

“I feel so slimy from the oils.” you whispered as he leaned in to kiss you softly again.

“Shower?” he offered between gentle kisses to your waiting lips.

“Yeah.” you agreed quietly, resting your hands against the front of his robe as you gladly accepted his kisses.

“With me?” George tried.

You smiled wider and slid your arms around his waist to cling onto him in a tight hug, “Yes, please.”

He cradled your cheek in his hand and kissed you deeply, capturing your bottom lip between his two in slow kisses that made your heart race. You pulled him closer until your robe clad bodies were pressed up against each other and shared lingering kisses for a few more seconds.

Finally, George took your hand and pulled you out of the massage room and into the hallway of the spa, the bright sunlight blinding you slightly as you stepped out into the light, but he just led the way over the soft flooring. A few doors down near the end of the hall were the private change rooms and he pulled you into one without a word. You couldn’t stop a small giggle from falling from your lips as he locked the door behind you and let your body drape around him.

The set up of the small change room was that of a full bath with additional lockers and seating areas and a sauna in true spa fashion. Along the far side was a full wall of windows framing the bathtub and the glass stand up shower, providing a full view of lush foliage right out towards the white sand beaches and crystal blue ocean in the distance. You let your eyes take in the scenery as George’s arms snaked around your waist and his lips found your neck in wet open mouthed kisses. He didn’t seem bothered by the massage oils that lightly coated your skin.

You set your hands on his biceps underneath the soft white fabric of his robe and smiled to yourself as his touch sent shivers down your spine, “Baby, you were moaning so loud during the massage.”

George chuckled against your neck, “So what? It felt good.”

You hummed softly and he lifted his head up to push his lips on yours. You gladly accepted his kisses, staying slow and gentle.

In a whisper, he spoke, “Did it turn you on?”

“Maybe.” you teased.

“All I could think about was having your hands on me like that…with those oils and creams and rubbing it into my body…all over…can you blame me?” His hands slid into yours and your fingers linked lazily together at your sides. His eyes stayed locked with yours as if purposely rising that anticipation between you as your lips rested only millimeters apart. His gaze dropped to your lips then back up. “God, I just want you all over me.”

Your robe dropped before you could even think, his hands and yours at fault to the sudden action before the rush to undress really started. George yanked his robe off too and your eyes stayed locked as you both pushed your underwear down and kicked it to the side. You nearly lunged for him, his arms welcoming you eagerly as your lips met messily and your slick skin met in a perfect warm embrace. His moan wasn’t unlike the ones he had let out during the massage and as his tongue pushed into your mouth, he grabbed your thigh and hiked your leg up around his waist.

Right in the middle of the room you stood together, in the light of the afternoon sun, bare bodies slick in oil pressed together and hands gripping onto flesh as you kissed. You were sure you were leaving more scratches against his back, clinging onto him tightly as he kissed the air from your lungs. His handprints smeared over your warm skin, muscles eased from your massage and now craving him more and more as he drank you up in his hands.

“George.” you breathed into his mouth.

“Come.” he whispered, leaving you with a bite to your bottom lip before taking your hand and pulling you after him into the large glass shower.

Your eyes lingered on his bare body as he turned on the water and set the temperature, fully exposed to him all naturally in the light of the tropical sun streaking through the window wall framing the shower. He was glowing, not only from the oil that slicked up his skin, but from the paradise that looked so good on him. He was a vision and you still couldn’t believe your luck as he turned back to you, captured your chin in his hand, and parted his lips to lock with yours passionately.

George grabbed your hips and pulled you into the stream of warm water, blindly kissing through it as the oil was washed from your bodies slowly and your hair was damped to fall over your shoulders and foreheads. You wrapped your arms around his shoulders and tilted your head to the side to kiss him deeper, pushing your tongue against his eagerly as your chests pressed together and bodies moulded together.

George leaned back from your lips and reached a hand up to push his soaked hair back from his face before setting it back around your waist, “You know, baby…”

You stared at his lips as he spoke, watching how he formed each word.

“That full body massage was so good but...it was missing one thing.”

“What’s that?” you giggled softly.

George’s hand slapped down hard against your ass, the water on your skin causing the sound to echo loudly through the shower, “This perfect part of you. I should pick up the slack.”

You shared soft laughter at his ridiculousness as you both leaned in for more kisses and his hands groped the flesh of your bum, pulling you tighter against him. His dick was pressed against your thigh and could feel how hard he was getting. It only made you tug his lips on yours stronger, letting the water cascade over both of you steadily onto the marble floor. The soft rush of the shower water was the perfect backdrop to your steamy kisses, muting the world around you even if it was on display through the large picture window overlooking the greenery and the distant beach.

George slowly walked you out of the stream of water and pushed you back against the glass, moving his kisses down your neck before he was dropping to his knees. You exhaled deeply in anticipation, letting him lift your left leg up to drape over his shoulder and his eyes stayed on yours as he kissed over your inner thigh briefly. His large hands slid up your hips and back down to your thighs and your ass, squeezing and rubbing and massaging until you were relaxing under his touch.

“That’s my girl.” George whispered, kissing over your hips slowly. “Just relax.”

You pushed your hand through his wet hair lazily, scratching your fingers through the roots just as he sucked a hickey into your thigh. You hummed softly, letting your head roll back gently against the window and your eyes fluttered closed as he slid his hand between your legs. He rubbed slow stripes back and forth over your folds, just enough to feel how wet you were while still teasing you agonizingly slowly.

“George.” you breathed, trying to push your hips towards him, “Please, baby.”

He shuffled closer on his knees, stretching your leg a bit farther over his shoulder to spread you open for him to lean in and swipe his tongue along your folds. Your breath shuttered in your chest as he licked his lips free of the taste of you and let his eyes raise up to yours as he moved back in again. His tongue glided strongly between your legs, parting your lips to taste some of the sweet arousal that pooled out of you and he moaned pleasantly against your damp skin.

“Holy...fuck, George.” you whimpered shakily, dropping your head to look down at him with our hand in his hair as he suckled and licked and kissed over your cunt.

His large hands slid up your thighs and around your body to grope your ass. Your hips pushed off the window slightly towards his face and gave him room to spank you lightly before he grabbed tightly to your flesh and pulled you closer to his mouth.

His tongue slid up to your clit and he swirled strong circles over it to make your fingers grip tighter to his hair as your whole body flinched. A soft shriek fell from your lips and you scrunched your nose up as he found a steady pattern with his tongue. His hands stayed on your ass, massaging your flesh as he pressed strong swirls against your clit and finally let one hand move to spread you open between thumb and forefinger.

You squealed his name as he sucked hard over your clit, your heel pressing against his back between his shoulder blades to keep his face between your legs. Both your hands gripped tightly in his wet hair as you rolled your hips against his face and he stared up at you behind long lashes, not faltering for a moment. His mouth made filthy wet sounds against your body as he sucked and licked his way through your most sensitive spots, yet was muffled by the drone of the shower still running just behind him.

“Baby,” you cried out softly, moaning softly through the glass shower, “George…sweetheart…Geor-G-George, baby-“

He only moaned louder against you, pressing his tongue down harder and flicked it back and forth faster and faster as his hands squeezed your ass. You tossed your head back against the glass, biting your lip desperately as you whimpered and moaned through the echoing shower, and rubbed your hips harder against his face.

“God, you taste so,” George paused for one more strong lick, “so fucking good.”

He rose up from his knees no matter how much you tried to keep him there with your hands in his hair and your leg around his back. George only shifted your leg from his shoulder to his waist and he pushed you back against the window harder, trapping you snugly against his body. His hard cock naturally fit between your legs and you couldn’t help but try to rut your hips against it desperately, letting out a strangled little cry just as he leaned in to kiss you again. You could taste yourself on his mouth and you held his face in your hands as you sucked on his tongue and lips and savoured his sloppy kisses.

You couldn’t even worry about what anyone else might see from the outside of the window as you were far too concerned with what was happening inside. The layers of foliage would hopefully disguise you enough. With your bare body pressed against the glass wall, George held you there strongly by a hand on your shoulder as his other dropped between you to angle his dick between your legs.

“Yes. Please.” you whispered to him, tugging your leg up higher around his waist to spread yourself open and he slid the tip between your folds, back and forth. You bit your lip again, arms draped around his shoulders, staring at his concentrated face as he watched himself tease you. But in a sudden instant, he was pushing strongly inside you.

Your jaw fell slack at the stretch, whimpering softly as his eyes rose to yours and he groaned lowly between you. He fit inside you so perfectly that you couldn’t hide the hint of a smile that grazed your face. George’s hands dropped to your ass again and he hoisted you closer until your tiptoe was barely left on the wet tile floor, your body pressed flush against his as he was buried nice and deeply inside you.

“You’re so fucking gorgeous.” George whispered, his lips grazing yours with how close you were, “And you feel so incredible, sweetheart.”

“Fuck me.” you blurted out quietly, staring him right in the eyes.

“Of course.” George chuckled softly, leaning in for a sloppy kiss as he hiked you up higher against the window and you let your other leg join around his waist. He shuffled in place to make sure he had a good grip on you and he pushed your back against the glass, having been warmed by the tropical island heat.

He rolled his hips into you slowly at first, his hands gripping tightly to your ass to pull your body into each motion. Your breathing was falling shallow and in time with each other, staring into each other’s eyes in your close proximity, and your hand slid into the back of his wet hair. George started to thrust into you deeply, pulling out and pushing back in with long slow strokes that had you moaning pleasantly at the beautiful stretch. His lips captured your gaze and you couldn’t help but stare at the perfect shape of his cupid’s bow and the plush enticing curves begging for a kiss, entranced by the sight of him and his every detail, especially as his teeth sunk gently into the supple pink flesh of his bottom lip.

He pushed a little stronger into you, groaning lightly between you as he did so and you linked your ankles together behind his back to keep him nice and deep. His eyes stayed on your face, your body shifting slightly against the window with each strong slow thrust, up and back down, again and again.

“More, baby, please.” you begged quietly.

George’s lips perked up at the corner in a small smirk before he pushed into you stronger.

“Yeah-“ you breathed, gasping as he shoved into you harder. “Shit-“

“Good?” he asked breathily.

“Harder. Faster. Gimme more.” you ordered, wrapping your arms around his shoulders tighter as his hips pushed against yours with more force. You moaned softly as he picked up speed, your eyes locked as he fucked into you sharply.

George’s hands on your ass kept you open wide for him to use and his heavy breaths fell in rough pants infused with quiet grunts and moans with each snap of his hips. He kept his legs spread slightly to keep balance in the shower and held you against the window for support as he bounced you on his dick in time with his hard thrusts.

“George! Fuck! Yes!” you squealed, clawing up his back as your forehead fell gently against his. “Oh my God!”

“Fuck, you’re beautiful. You’re so fucking perfect.” George mumbled between you.

You pushed your lips on his, both of you moaning through ungrateful kisses as he fucked you against the window. One of his hands moved to press against the glass beside your head, his tongue fighting its way into your mouth through your shared groans as you clung onto him desperately.

Despite the water that was still running through the shower, the wet clap of your skin together overpowered it with ease. You had to break your kiss to breathe, gasping in pleasant overwhelm as your head fell back and his lips met your neck, your fingers tangled in his hair to keep him close.

“Oh, George-“ you cried shakily.

“Say my name, baby.” he groaned into your neck.

“George.” you repeated in a tone dripping with lust.

“Fuck.” he grunted, grabbing one of your breasts in his hand as he pounded into you harder.

“George!” you gasped, tugging at his hair as your head fell back against the glass. “Oh, George, baby, I’m gonna fucking cum!”

But then he stopped suddenly and didn’t even give you a chance to complain before he was setting your feet down on the ground and spun you around to face out of the large paned window. Your hands instinctively went to the glass just as he slid his dick between your legs and you pushed your hips back to help him inside you again. Your shaky moan at the return of the stretch and his hands finding your hips and his lips meeting your neck.

His hands kept your legs straight and together, creating the tightest little spot for him to squeeze into and right away, he was fucking into you roughly. Your hands squeaked down the slightly steamy glass as your chest pushed out a loud moan and you tried to push back on him for more. His breath was hot against your neck, one arm around your middle and the other gripping one of your breasts as he pounded into you, groaning hungrily against your wet skin.

Your eyes struggled to stay open but you let yourself take in the beautiful nature that surrounded the resort, displayed right before you out the window wall of the spa shower. From the breeze ruffling the trees to the muted crash of waves onto the sandy shore, it was beautiful and serene and not a person in sight to stumble upon your steamy shower scene.

The shower only echoed the filthy loud clap of George’s skin on yours that grew only louder as he sped up. You reached a hand back to tangle in his hair, arching your back for him to have him ramming into your g-spot perfectly.

“Oh, fuck, baby!” you squealed. “Right there! Please, please, please!”

George’s teeth sunk into your shoulder gently, moaning loudly against your flesh as your pussy squeezed around him tightly. You were just so warm and wet he couldn’t get enough, his hips snapping against yours at nearly record speeds, driven by fierce desire.

He clung onto you possessively, groaning against your ear, “That’s it, beautiful. Cum on my cock. Come on. Show me how much you love me, baby girl.”

“Geo-o-o-rge-“ you sobbed out blissfully in time with his rough thrusts, tugging harder at his hair over your shoulder as your other hand dropped to swirl messily over your clit. “F-Fuck!”

“Good girl, sweetheart.” George praised, his warm jagged breath sending shivers down your neck, “Shit, you’re squeezing me so fucking tight, darling.”

“Cum inside me.” you whimpered. “I want it so fucking bad!”

“You’re so fucking dirty, baby. I love you so fucking much.” George groaned, smacking your hand away from between your legs to take over for you. His slender fingers rubbed rough circles over your clit as he pounded into you from behind and your whole body shuttered with overwhelming pleasure.

You couldn’t even speak for a moment, breath knocked from your lungs, and you just stared out the window with your mouth hanging agape. Finally, your chest heaved with a sudden inhale and your legs trembled beneath you as warmth spread through your stomach and you rushed out a pitchy, “Fuck, George, I’m cumming!”

He held you upright in his arms as you came around him, your moans and cries echoing through the shower, as he fucked you through it as your pussy clenched down on him so hard he nearly stumbled. He followed seconds later, shooting thick shots of cum deep inside you with loud groans let out against your neck, his hands gripping your body wherever he could reach. You breathed heavily, your muscles pulsing around him to accept him all as his dick twitched inside you with each messy spurt.

“I love you.” you whimpered out, eyes falling closed as he kissed your neck through the tapering off of your orgasms.

“Mm,” George smiled against your wet skin and he gave your hips a little squeeze, “I love you.”

You leaned your head back against his shoulder and led his lips to yours for a proper kiss, staying there for a few more seconds just to savour the moment. The running shower swallowed the sounds of your kisses and washed away the thick white cream that dripped out of you as he pulled out. But he dropped to his knees behind you and spread your ass in his large hands and leaned in to lick up the mess that was leaking out of you.

Your eyes nearly rolled back in your head, pressing your hands against the glass to keep yourself upright as he licked and sucked over your aching and sensitive pussy to help clean you up. He wasn’t there for too long and he sat back to spank you hard and then massaged your flesh with his snug grip. George left a few kisses over your thighs and ass and hips as he stood and then went back for your neck.

You hummed through your pleasant smile, leaning your head to the side to give him room as his arms snaked around your waist and he swayed you side to side ever so gently. His gentle kisses on your neck felt like heaven and you couldn’t dream of ever leaving his embrace. He smiled gently against your wet skin and rubbed his hands over your stomach lovingly.

“Let me wash you up.” George whispered.

You let him pull you over into the stream of the shower, the water still perfectly warm, and you didn’t stray too far from his arms as he reached for the shampoo bottle. The water poured over you both, along your shoulders and down between your bare bodies pressed chest to chest. You couldn’t stop staring at him with your arms around his waist, sharing a smile as he lathered his hands in shampoo and rubbed them into your hair, scratching perfectly over your scalp. His lips pushed onto yours in little gentle kisses as you took the shampoo bottle yourself and slid your own soaped up hands into his brown hair. You shared little smiles between kisses, letting the warm water rinse the suds from your skin and out of your hair and tried not to get soap in your eyes.

The shower was your haven for the good side of a half hour and when you had washed each other clean of massage oil and plentiful bodily fluids, the feeling of domesticity was thudding in your heart. George turned off the water and grabbed you each a towel from the small bench just outside the shower and you dried off and redressed into your robes.

For the remainder of the day, you relaxed by the resort pool with bottomless tropical drinks and perfectly hot temperatures. You in your strapless bikini and George in his swim shorts, you laid side by side on the beach chairs and tanned in the afternoon sun, proudly ignorant to the hickeys that littered both of your bodies. No one would give you strange looks anyway; certainly not on Fantasy Island. You were there to live your absolute best life, no matter what that was defined by. It also meant you didn’t get a sunburn no matter how long you laid out in the direct sunlight, returning into the resort hand in hand for dinner with matching perfect tanned glows.

On Sunday, the final day, you felt as though you were set for life. This was it, wasn’t it? Him and you forever in paradise? The booked flight set for the next day or the entire reason why you needed to get away in the first place seemed to be the last thing on your mind. Making love to George all over the island seemed to have that effect on you and waking up to his sleepy peaceful face just made it all even better. He knew how to touch you to forget all of your stresses and all of your worries.

And the morning hike around the forestry and the hills of the small island certainly kept you distracted too. George thrived like that, wearing only shorts and his sneakers as the guide led you both through the trees and up steep terrain to see all that the island had to offer. It was a beautiful slice of paradise, that was for sure, but your eyes stayed drawn to the man sticking by your side and how his toned muscles were slick in a thin layer of sweat from the heat. He didn’t complain once when you slid your hand into his, even when the path got thin and he had to hold his arm behind him to keep your grip.

Lunch was had as a picnic on the top of the island with a scenic view of the crystal blue ocean all around. It was truly picturesque and with your legs dangling off the side of the mountain top side by side with George, you were sure there was nothing better. He told you so too as he kissed you sweetly and held you close while you admired the view.

By the time you returned to the resort, it was time to clean up for dinner. You shared the shower in your room - strictly to wash this time however - and then picked out the nicest clothes you had with you to wear. In a floor length thin summer dress, you felt like an island princess. Your prince wore khaki shorts and a white button up tucked into the waistband and when he came up behind you in the bathroom mirror, he set a thin crown of white tropical flowers over your hair. He wore a matching flower tucked in the pocket of his shirt.

The sun wasn’t quite set when you reached the restaurant hand in hand and it cast a lovely yellow-orange glow over the island and George’s smiling face as he held the door open for you. You ate at a table for two overlooking the ocean, sharing a bottle of wine and then a dessert after a satisfying meal, and held hands over the table as often as you could. People might have thought you were honeymooners.

As the sun set, you found yourself walking along the shore together, strolling quietly and admiring the gentle rush of waves on the sand and the warm tones of the evening sky. George’s hand was snug in yours, a place where he seemed to fit so perfectly, although his gaze was focused out over the water. You were staring at him, absorbing the line of his jaw and the volume of his hair and the way you could nearly see the setting sun reflected in his sparkling eyes.

You fell to a stop, your hand in his urging him to stop too and he turned to face you.

“What is it?” he asked.

You smiled, welcoming him closer and your hand that wasn’t in his slid up his chest and to the side of his neck, “Nothing. I just wanted to look at you.”

George didn’t reply. Instead, he leaned in to kiss your lips ever so gently. Once, twice, and a third time that lingered a little longer than the prior two.

Before he could pull away, you pulled him back in for more, draping your arms around his shoulders and his snaked around your waist. To the sound of the ocean waves, you kissed the sun down, not a soul in sight on the long stretch of empty beach. Your bodies were pressed together as if never wanting to be separated and you shared sweet tongueless kisses on the sand.

Finally, when George managed to escape your lips, he turned just behind him and you followed his gaze. There was a small set-up that you hadn’t noticed before; a small group of blankets and pillows laid out neatly on the sand under a little white mesh canopy and framed in fairy lights. The small wooden table held a fresh pitcher of water and two glasses each with a slice of lemon on the sides and a plate of fresh fruit. Fantasy Island always delivered when you least expected it.

“How romantic.” you said sweetly, cuddling into his side as his arm draped around your body.

George looked back at you and dipped down for a few more kisses, raising his hand to your jaw to keep you there a moment longer. When he pulled away, he brushed his nose over yours and whispered, “I think we should go for a swim first.”

“With what bathing suits?” you laughed lightly.

George only stepped back from you just enough to untuck his shirt from his shorts and started to unbutton it. You watched him silently as he took another step back towards the ocean and then another, finally pulling his shirt from his shoulders and tossed it haphazardly in the direction of the blankets.

“We don’t need any.” he answered as he walked backwards ever so slowly towards the ocean, his hands unbuckling his belt and then unzipping his pants. He paused just long enough to push them down, right along with his boxers, and your cheeks flushed pink at the sight of him bare in the setting sun and darkening sky. His clothes made a messy pile beside the small table from where he had thrown them and he curled his finger in your direction to get you to follow as he waded backwards into the lapping waves.

You glanced down the beach, left and right, to make sure there was really no one in sight. It nearly appeared that the island was vacant except for the two of you. Silent, dim, and empty. You pulled your dress over your head before you could second guess, dropped your panties and unclipped your bra, and hurried after him into the water.

The silent island welcomed the sudden splash of waves as you both waded ungracefully into the water, sharing excited laughter as your arms reached for each other. You grabbed onto his forearms and tried to lean in for a kiss as you both moved deeper into the warm ocean, but George stumbled over his feet and fell backwards, pulling you down into the water with him in a huge splash.

You broke the surface again and burst into shared laughter, still thrown on top of him in the waving sea. His hand pushed your wet hair from your face and let your laughter melt away on your lips as your eyes met through the moonlight.

George pulled you in first by the back of your head, kissing you strongly as you were mostly submerged in the salt water. His other hand held himself up on the sandy bottom of the shallow water and your legs stayed tangled with his in the same messy position you had fallen into. Your kisses were messy through your smiles and made a bit wetter by the salt water that splashed around you, but it was nothing less than perfect.

You set your hand on his chest and pulled back from your kiss just long enough to say, “We should get away from the shore a bit more.”

George only leaned in to nibble teasingly at your bottom lip before you were shuffling up again and wading deeper into the ocean hand in hand. When the warm water reached your chests, he scooped you right up into his arms by your thighs and moved in for more kisses. Under the water, your legs wrapped around his body with ease and your arms draped around his shoulders to cradle his head in your hands and kept his mouth on yours. The waves, stained in the faintest orange tones from the sun just peeking over the horizon, splashed around the two of you like you were two pieces of a single marble statue, breaking against your bare skin and spraying gentle specks of salt water over your faces and into your hair.

George felt warm. Despite the humid tropical weather and the just as pleasant ocean you were in, the warmth of his body felt almost refreshing and comforting. He was warm and living and yours. His large hands slid up your back, letting you float in front of him in the water as his hands traced your body and up into the roots of your hair.

He inhaled into your kiss as if to breathe you in and you felt his chest push against yours before falling again. You tilted your head to the side to kiss him deeper, your damp hair tumbling over one shoulder as your lips locked in slow passionate kisses. George moaned softly into your mouth, just as both of you pushed out your tongues. They met between your kisses and you shared soft laughter at how in sync you were, but didn’t waste a single second that was to be spent embraced in a kiss.

You shuffled slightly, shifting your legs more comfortably around his waist in the warm salt water and just enough to dip your hips down to graze against his dick. He was still mostly soft but the touch of the curve of your ass had him sighing deeply into your mouth and his dick twitched ever so slightly underwater. You linked your ankles together behind his back and reached a hand down to wrap around his length, lazily stroking with barely your fingertips as your kiss continued above water.

George’s hand slid from your hair along your neck and right around to your throat where he squeezed gently, urging you to gasp softly into his mouth. His teeth sunk down into your bottom lip and he soothed it with a lick before he moved his kisses down your neck and his hand dropped lower to your bare chest. He greedily cupped your right breast in his hand, groping it snugly as his teeth sunk into the skin of your neck and his tongue swiped up the lingering taste of salt water.

“George.” you breathed out, letting your head fall back slightly to give him room at your neck. You blindly wrapped your hand around his dick between you, feeling him harden second by second as you stroked him slowly.

“God, darling,” George groaned softly against your neck and he kissed right up under your ear to make you shiver, “What are you doing to me?”

“Make love to me before the sun goes down.” you requested gently, tilting his head up by his chin to kiss his lips again.

“Right here?” George chuckled softly between kisses.

“Mhm.”

Your thumb swiped over the head of his dick and you traced the slit at the end lazily back and forth as your eyes locked in your close proximity through the rising night. His breath shuttered in his chest and your lips met again in a few lingering kisses as he kneaded your breast for a moment and then slipped his hand under the water. You kissed lazily as you touched each other, gentle fingers rubbing and stroking and finding the familiarity in each other’s bodies once again.

George moved down your neck, kissing and sucking over your skin as you let your gaze drift back towards the beach. You did a quick scan to make sure there was no one else around, although Fantasy Island was a place that always seemed to anticipate your next moves. The beach was completely vacant.

By only the light of the sliver of sun and away from the luminescent glow of the resort in the distance, it was hard to see much apart from each other’s faces and certainly nothing under the water. You moved blindly together as George steadied his feet on the sandy ocean floor and you moved to carefully angle yourself right against the tip of his dick. His hands gripped onto your waist and he almost pulled you down on him, smothering your sweet gasp with his lips on yours as you sheathed around him so perfectly.

“Oh my God, George.” you breathed, rising your hand against his chest quickly when you bottomed out.

The sea water made for a bit more friction between you as it tended to wash away that natural lubrication but that didn’t matter; it still somehow felt more than incredible. He felt more than incredible.

George’s low groan was heavenly and you pulled his lips on yours by the back of his neck. You shared a few sloppy kisses before your heels pressed into his bum to urge him deeper and your hips ground down strongly on him. He pulled a hand from the water to grab your breast again, squeezing your flesh to let his mouth dip down to wrap around your nipple as his hips pushed back against yours.

“Fuck.” you breathed out, your head falling back as your hands gripped tightly to the back of his head and tangled in his wet hair. He sucked on your breast and formed beautiful little love bites over your flesh as his free hand was held around your waist and was grinding you down in time with him.

The sun finally disappeared behind the horizon, setting the beach into near darkness apart from the rising moonlight and the haze of light from the distant resort. It was quiet and serene and filled you with an indescribable warmth. The waves only got slightly larger as you tried to rock yourself on him, rubbing your bodies together ungracefully in the ocean water.

“Give me your legs.” George whispered, shifting slightly to hook your knees over his arms and his hands found your waist again.

You kept yourself steady with your hands on the back of his neck, staring down into the blackness of the water surrounding you as he lifted you up slightly and then eased you back down on his cock. The trembling whimper that fell from your mouth was his praise enough and he repeated the same action slowly, letting his hips push forward to meet you halfway each time.

“God, my love, you feel so good.” George breathed between you.

You rested your forehead against his gently, “Don’t ever pull out.”

He chuckled lightly, “No way, beautiful.”

Your fingers tugged gently at the hair at the nape of his neck, “Ever.”

“Ever.” George agreed easily, nudging his nose against yours to kiss you properly.

The moan you let out into his mouth had him fucking you a little faster, bouncing you on his dick the best he could in chest-deep salt water in time with the messy thrusts of his hips. Your tongues met and lips clashed and you shared shallow breaths and pleasant moans together as the waves crashed around you.

The moon rose over the horizon, pairing beautifully with the star speckled sky that reflected into the dark nighttime ocean you found yourself in. The stars fluttered and danced over the waves that rocked around the two of you and they sparkled in George’s eyes when he looked at you so close that you could feel his breath on your cheek. Your lips grazed, sharing feather soft kisses in your distraction, and your fingers scratched lovingly through the back of his hair.

George slid his hands down to your bum and pulled you down all the way, groaning softly against your lips as he rocked your body against his in strong curling motions. You sighed shakily, focusing on the feeling of his thick cock buried so deep inside you it was nearly heaven but the friction from the water seemed to be a bit of a hindrance of getting you any closer. You clung onto him tightly, trying to get more out of it as you rocked your body against his in time with his thrusts. It felt good but you wanted more.

George’s lips found yours again and you kissed passionately as he guided your motions with ease in the water. You slid your hand down between you and tugged lazy circles over your clit, whimpering pleadingly into his mouth for more. But he took your hand out of the water and pulled you closer, letting you rut up against his body instead.

“Use me.” he instructed softly.

You wrapped your arms around his shoulders and buried your face in his neck as he fucked you slowly and let you rub against his abs with each thrust. You could only go faster, whimpering against his salty skin as you were nearly humping his body amidst the waves, desperate to edge yourself on and to get closer to that release. George’s hands groped your ass and bounced you faster on his dick, breathing hard against your shoulder and let out a trembling groan as you clenched down around him.

“Oh, sweetheart,” he moaned, “I’m gonna cum.”

“Not yet.” you whined softly.

“Just trust me.” George said sweetly against your ear. “I’m not going to forget about you, okay? Trust me.”

You only nodded, pulling his lips back on yours for more kisses. George was nearly using you, grinding up into you in steady strokes that had him groaning into your mouth in time. The water splashed around you more as he sped up, his teeth sinking into your bottom lip as he gripped your ass tighter and pushed on harder.

“Fuck.” George said through his teeth, his dick throbbing inside you.

You were so focused on it and his lips that you barely noticed him starting to move until your chest emerged from the warm water. He was walking you back towards shore, still trying to fuck you through each step with his hands on your bum and his hips pushing desperately into yours. Once he reached calf deep water, he eased you down onto your back against the wet sand, keeping your legs hooked over his arms to leave you spread as he stayed nice and deep inside you.

“Okay?” he asked breathlessly.

You nodded him on, holding onto his biceps as he started to thrust into you again, taking you on the beach as the shallow water rushed around you in steady waves. His moans were beautiful, his forehead resting against yours as his hips did all the work, causing splashes of water and slick smacking of skin on skin to rise across the silent beach.

“Shit, baby.” you cried out softly, digging your nails into his arms. “Don’t stop.”

George let his eyes find yours, keeping your strong eye contact as he fucked you quickly on the tropical shore under a blanket of stars. The sand didn’t stick to you and in fact it didn’t feel itchy at all. Fantasy Island was full of perfected versions of things and the white sand beaches that cradled your body in the tide was no different. George dipped down to kiss you a few times through his quick thrusts but pulled back to breathe, licking his lips as he stared down at you.

“I’m gonna cum, baby.” he warned softly, his voice wavering, “I’m gonna cum so fucking deep inside you.”

“Yeah. Please.” you whimpered, welcoming his body on yours as he shifted down to his forearms on the sand on either side of your head. “Oh my God, George, come inside me. Please.”

“Yeah-” he groaned, going faster and faster and faster until his jagged breaths were falling still and his eyes were nearly rolling back in his head. “F-Fuck me-”

Your hands dropped to his waist and you tugged his body towards you so he was inside you as deep as he could possibly go, your mouth falling open as he shot thick spurts of cum right into you. It wasn’t the first time but it certainly felt just as good as ever, your own pleasant moans tumbling from your lips as he claimed you through shaky groans and little grunts, rolling his body into yours to really finish himself off.

“Oh, God, baby.” George whimpered.

He leaned down to kiss you right away, capturing your bottom lip between his two for a few strong kisses before he was moving down your neck. The tide splashed shallowly around your bare body as George pulled out of you and easily slid down your body with hungry kisses to land between your legs. He nudged them open a bit farther and watched as the water splashed up against your thighs and the curve of your ass and the moonlight glinted off the thick white cream that trickled out of your cunt. George licked his lips and dived right in, showering you in kisses over your folds before he was licking up the reminisce of his love making.

Your hands found his hair to hold his face between your legs as he worked to finish you off next, the initial sensations already being enough to let your head drop back against the wet sand beneath you with a soft moan. His lips found your clit and he gave perfect attention to your most sensitive spot, shooting blissful ecstasy down your limbs as he kissed over it before sucking softly through his own pleasant moans.

“Fuck, George.” you breathed his name to the tropical night sky.

The island felt as though it was echoing your moans and his hungry slurps and wet kisses across the water and through the trees, the emptiness of the land around you made the place feel like your very own private oasis. His tongue on your clit dampened you more after the ocean had tried to leave you clean and he took his opportunity to slick his fingers in your arousal and the sticky mess of cum he claimed you in, and pushed two digits inside you.

Your trembling “oh” fell from your lips shakily, your breath shuttering in your chest as he pumped them into you steadily and his tongue swirled lazily over your clit.

George’s eyes raised to yours as he fingered you tenderly and tasted the salt water on your warm skin behind the sweet flavour of your body. He was a beautiful sight between your legs, bare like the essence of man and stained in sea water that splashed up around him in small choppy waves and circled your body in the aftermath. You were one. He was yours. He was all yours in the light of the moon and the glow from the small camping set up left a few metres up the beach.

“Fuck, baby. Fuck, George-“ you sobbed out, trying to keep your legs back from encircling his head. “Faster.”

He followed your orders, fingering his cum back into you in quick thrusts before he was shoving his fingers deep and flicking them eagerly against your slick walls. His tongue picked up too, rubbing quickly over your clit until you were nearly soaked in spit as much as ocean water.

“Yeah.” you whimpered, only growing in volume as he kept up, “Yeah. Yeah. Yeah! Yeah! Yeah, baby, yeah, baby- please don’t stop, I’m gonna cum!”

George nuzzled his face deeper into your cunt, devouring you until you were seeing stars in more than just the night sky above you. Your moans were turning insistent and loud and you tugged at his hair harder, trying to rub up against his face.

“Oh my-“ your voice fell quiet as that warm tightness in your lower stomach was starting to burst. Your muscles clenched down hard around his fingers and George kept his pace going until your back was arching off the sand and shallow water with an ever so quiet whimper, “Oh, s-sir-“

If he hadn’t already came, that title certainly would have finished him off and he moaned loudly against your body as you writhed underneath him and soaked his fingers in your liquids. Your whimpering carried across the waves and the sand and he lapped up every drop until you were pushing his head away with over sensitivity. George kissed your hip and then shuffled up over top of you to kiss your lips. Your arms draped around his shoulders and you tasted yourself on his tongue along with the salt water that was left behind from the ocean.

“You’re perfect.” George whispered between slow kisses. “You’re so fucking perfect, sweetheart.”

You took his face in your hands and caressed his cheeks, staring up into his blue eyes that sparkled with the fairy lights up the beach and you told him an honest, “I love you.”

George smiled and dipped down to kiss you once more, “I love you more.”

A slight chill brushed over you and you shivered in the open air, pulling George closer.

“Are you cold, baby?” he asked gently against your ear, petting his hand over your head.

“Just a bit.” you shrugged, rubbing your hands up his bare back.

“Come on.” George shifted off your body and helped you to your feet with his hands in yours.

You hurried back up the beach together in your nakedness, trying to cover yourself up the best you could in fear someone was to stumble upon you. But the beach was empty and you were perfectly alone, giving you all the space you needed to settle on the soft pile of blankets and pillows together to dry off. The sand never stuck to your wet skin which was incredible and you patted yourself dry before shuffling into your dress again, leaving your bra and panties to the side. George pulled on his shorts once he had dried off and then joined you under the small canopy of lights.

Out of the water, the tropical air felt much warmer once again and even without the sun, it was pleasant and comfortable. George arranged the pillows a little to lean back on and he gently pulled you down with him to cuddle up at his side, his arm around your shoulders. His bare torso was claimed by your hand, fingers dancing over his abs and along his pecs.

George watched you stare at him, his fingers tangling in the ends of your damp hair lazily, and he breathed steadily and peacefully in the tropical night. He leaned down slightly to kiss the top of your head and when you looked up at his face and pushed another kiss to his waiting lips, it sort of sunk in that it was your last night on the island. You frowned to yourself and snuggled closer to him, resting your head on his chest as your arm hugged his body close.

“I love you.” you whispered.

“I love you, my beautiful, stunning, incredibly gorgeous woman.” George replied sweetly, rubbing his hand up your arm that was around his middle. He kissed your head again.

“Georgie.” you breathed.

He hummed in reply, letting you continue.

“I don’t want to go home tomorrow. I don’t want to say goodbye to you.”

“Don’t think about that right now.” George tisked, stroking your hair away from your face. “We still have all night.”

“I can’t help it.” you mumbled.

He moved his arm as you shifted up to look down at him laying beside you and he draped it under his head, staring worriedly back at you from your obvious uncertainty. Your heart had that familiar ache back, that same ache that you came to the island to cure in the first place. The fact that it was still there made you even more upset and you looked away from him and across the beach with a shaky inhale.

George spoke your name softly, reaching up to gently turn your head back towards him by a finger under your chin, “Talk to me then, sweetheart.”

“I want to live forever with you.” you spoke as strongly as you could, letting your thoughts fall into the night air, “I want to marry you and have babies with you and live life with you.”

“God, my love, I want that too. So badly.” George whispered, caressing your face in his hand and he swiped his thumb over your cheek. “We’d have such pretty kids too, don’t you think?”

Your bottom lip trembled and you scrunched your eyes closed with a bow of your head to keep him from seeing your emotion.

George tisked sadly and sat up a little, lifting your head in his hands so you were looking at him and his thumbs brushed the few stray tear drops from your cheeks, “Don’t cry. Please don’t cry.”

“I’ve been waiting so long for this...to tell you that I am in love with you...that you are my other half and all my perfect dreams rolled into one stunning man…” you set your hand against his bare chest with a shaky sigh.

“Baby, I’m not perfect.” George chuckled gently.

“To me you are.” you whispered.

He leaned up to kiss your lips softly, ever so gently, sharing a few small chasté kisses as his hand looped around the back of your neck. When you pulled back from his lips, you rested your forehead against his and you both sighed softly in unison.

“My heart beats for you.” you breathed, taking his free hand from the blankets to rest against your chest over your thin dress.

George smiled softly at the feeling of your strong heartbeat under his hand and he wrapped his arm farther around your shoulders for a closer hug. You nuzzled your face into his neck and with the hand that wasn’t holding yourself up on the ground, tucked it around his back.

“I don’t want you to go either.” George finally whispered, his voice barely audible over the rush of the waves crashing upon the shore nearby.

You held him tighter as if never wanting to let him go, shifting to hold him with both arms and you let out another sob into his shoulder. His hands rubbed up and down your back and he shushed you lovingly, holding you as you cried. You didn’t care who heard you, letting your sorrow echo down the empty beach and over the dark ocean to the ends of the island.

George’s bare skin was warm and addicting and you held him close as if savouring each inch of his body for any future reference. Your tears dripped onto his shoulder and your sobs muffled into his neck, shameless crying out your emotions to the person you wanted more than life itself.

“You’re breaking my heart, sweetheart.” George whispered, his voice wavering.

“Don’t let me go, Georgie.” you begged.

“Darling.” George sighed, holding you tighter. “Oh, sweetheart, I’m right here.”

“Are you real?” you asked softly, repeating the very first question you asked him when you walked in on him sitting on that cloud-like king size bed. You sat back on your knees and took his face in your hands as if to analyze him, from the line of his jaw to the tears shimmering in his blue eyes. “Are you really you?”

“Yeah, baby.” George whispered. “But...tomorrow...when you get on that plane...I’ll be back in Monaco and I won’t have any memory of this. At all. I will wake up at home and think that I was just in the city the whole weekend with memories they gave me to fill in the gaps.”

You sniffled as he took your hands from his face and kissed your knuckles one by one as you breathed out a shaky, “You won’t remember me?”

He shook his head.

“You won’t remember this island or making love all afternoon and all night?”

George left your hands with one more kiss as he smiled sadly and raised his eyes up to yours, “None of it.”

Your nose scrunched up in near agony and you couldn’t help but press a hand to your heart as if to try and dull the pain. You rested your forehead against his and he held your one hand in both of his as if he never was going to let you go. You had twelve hours left together but it didn’t feel like enough. Time was slipping by like sand in an hourglass.

“Listen,” George leaned back from you to meet your teary gaze, “let’s have some water and just...cuddle quietly for a bit. It’s beautiful out here.”

You nodded weakly and wiped your eyes with the heel of your palm as he shuffled down the blankets towards the small wooden table. He lifted the water pitcher, only to reveal a small pot of ink topped with a thin silver sewing needle. You moved to sit properly on the blankets as George grabbed the two newly appeared items from the table and stared at them for a moment. He looked over at you.

“What is that?” you asked quietly.

You could nearly see his brain turning with thoughts, his eyebrows furrowed in the cutest little expression as he pieced together the two small items in his hands. Finally, he disregarded the water and he hurried to sit at your side once more.

“Photographs and notes don’t work.” George explained quietly as if someone on the empty beach would be listening into your conversation, “They both will go blank the second you leave the island, right?”

“Right.” you listened quietly.

“But they can’t erase something that is permanently part of someone.”

“I dunno...they made lingerie randomly appear on me.” you mumbled.

George laughed lightly and shifted to sit crossed legged, “Clothes aren’t permanent.”

“What are you doing?” you asked cautiously.

George set the end of the needle between his lips so he could unscrew the cap of the ink bottle. He carefully took the needle in his fingers once more and then held it in the flame of the candle to disinfect it, “I’m going to tattoo your name on my body so I can force myself to remember you.”

You swore your heart skipped a beat as you stared into his eyes through the warm faded light of the fairy lights surrounding you, “What? Are you sure that’s gonna work?”

“Worth a shot.” he shrugged. He dipped the sharp point of the needle into the black ink.

“What if it doesn’t?” you mumbled, watching carefully as he shifted across from you and pulled his right foot onto his opposite thigh over crossed legs.

George glanced back up at you with an honest smile, “Then you better be damn good at convincing me.”

“George…” you started but he already pressed the tip of the sewing needle into the skin of his ankle. Your eyes widened as you fell into silence and he spelt the first letter of your name with a steady hand and a few dips of ink.

It was honestly as romantic as it was slightly stupid. The lines were a little wobbly and his cheeks were flushed pink as his teeth bit hard into his bottom lip through the sharp pain of the stick and poke tattoo he was giving himself.

“When you get on the plane tomorrow-” George hissed softly as the needle poked a nerve but he carried on, “you’re going to ask the pilot to take you to the airport in Nice.”

“George...I dunno…”

“Hey,” he looked up at you seriously, “don’t George me, okay? Do you want me? Did you mean that? That you’re in love with me and you want me for life?”

“Of course.” you answered easily.

“Good because it’s too late now...I already have half your name inked into the side of my foot.” George said, wiping the excess ink and bit of blood off his lower ankle with the edge of one of the blankets you were sitting on. Two full letters were pressed ungracefully into his skin.

You smiled softly at him and he returned it as both of you leaned in for a few gentle kisses. He told you he loved you in a whisper as quiet as the tropical breeze ruffling through the starry night and you said the same, kissing him once more before he focused back on his task at hand.

“When you get to Monaco…” George continued as he worked, his words a little strained at the pain he was injecting into his body, “you’re going to find the café that’s directly across from the Casino…I go there every morning for breakfast. Got that?”

You nodded.

“You’re going to wait for me there.”

“What if I miss you?”

“Find a hotel and try again the next morning.”

“What if she’s with you?”

There was a pause and George glanced up at you before dropping his head back down quickly to his ankle, “She won’t be.”

“How do you know?”

“I don’t want to think about her right now, sweetheart.” George protested gently yet firmly, “Especially not when I have you here.”

“What if you won’t leave her for me? What if you don’t remember and this doesn’t work and you won’t believe me when I try to convince you-”

George reached out for you quickly, “Baby, baby, baby, baby, stop.”

You took a shaky inhale, “Georgie, I can’t go through that rejection to my face. Through a screen kills me enough, I…I can’t.”

“Stop. Listen to me, okay? Listen.” George held the needle carefully in his right hand and slid his left up to hold the side of your face. “You’re the only one I want. You’re the only one I feel such a connection with. You’re the only one I’ve fucked unprotected.”

The both of you shared soft chuckles.

He spoke strongly, “You are mine.”

“But are you mine?” you tried.

“Yes.” George said straightly. “I’m yours. My heart is yours.”

You nodded and he sent you a tight smile before turning back to the ink pot and his stained skin. The ocean breeze ruffled through his messy brown hair and you took that quiet moment to admire him in the light from the string of lights that twisted together above your heads.

You spoke without thinking, “I want this to work.”

“I know. Me too.”

“I want this to work so badly I might cry.”

George glanced up at you and your nervous expression and he smiled sweetly, “No more crying, darling, look.”

You followed his gaze back down to his ankle that presented the uneven inked lines spelling your first name across his skin. He wiped it clean with the edge of the blanket and raised his foot up as he doubled over to blow a soft puff of air over it, nearly falling over in the process.

“You’re a part of me now.” he whispered, his gentle voice carried by the tropical breeze.

“I love you.” you breathed. “You’re insane.”

He raised his eyes from the fresh tattoo to your face and he leaned in to kiss you softly, “I love you too.”

You spent the night on the beach, cuddled up in the set up island of blankets and pillows on the sand. You slept in each other’s arms until the fairy lights burnt out and the moon set and tide turned and you woke up to a beautiful sunrise. You didn’t question how the sun could both rise and set over the same horizon since on Fantasy Island even the craziest things seemed to be made into reality. If only it was at all easy.

George let your head rest on his chest as the sun came up, his hand twirling through the ends of your hair as he laid back on the pillows and you laid with him. As the day rose and the chirp of animals and birds filled the beach, you let your eyes close once more to focus all your senses on the man in your arms. You inhaled him strongly, savouring his soft natural scent with the ever slight lingerance of his evening cologne and the remanence of salt water.

He kissed you good morning, letting you taste his lips and his tongue as much as you wanted between slow sensual kisses as his hands gripped your body closer. You kissed the sun awake until it was well above the horizon and it was time to return to your room.

Step by slow step back to the resort was painful and you held George’s hand tightly the whole way. He had pulled his shirt back on from the night before and it hung open off his shoulders, still giving you a perfect view of his abs that you teasingly ran your finger across as he unlocked your hotel room door.

Your suitcase was already packed and waiting by the door when you stepped inside and you took one last look at the room in which you met. George’s arm slid around your waist and he kissed your neck from behind, swaying you slightly in place and you both seemed to stare dreamily at the king size bed as if it were calling you back. The sheets were pulled tight, unslept in, since you spent the night on the beach and they were taunting you to come ruin them.

As if to interrupt your forming ideas, the host of the island appeared in the doorway and greeted you politely to usher you to the plane. George took your hand and you grabbed your suitcase in your other and you trailed behind her as she led the way to the dock. When she wasn’t looking, too busy greeting the pilot, George lifted his right foot up slightly to show off the small black ink tattoo of your name still on his ankle. You smiled at him and he raised your joint hands to his mouth to kiss yours sweetly.

The pilot took your bag for you to load into the plane and you were permitted a moment to say your goodbyes.

You turned to George and both of your hands fell into each other’s, your eyes meeting in the bright sunlight that warmed the island like the very same day you arrived there. He smiled at you, his expression obviously hesitant, and you mirrored his attempt at a grin back.

“I love you.” you whispered, taking your hands from his to wrap around his shoulders.

George let out a sigh and snaked his arms snugly around your waist, “I love you too. So much. Don’t forget that.”

You nodded and slowly slid back from his embrace, pausing just long enough to share a kiss. Or three. You rested your foreheads together with soft sighs and your eyes closed for just a moment as if to savour your last few seconds together. It could very well be your last time.

“I’ll wait for you.” you breathed.

George nodded and brushed your noses together, “Okay.”

You dusted your lips over his and you both opened up ever so slightly and ever so slowly for one last kiss. You felt the warmth running through you, shooting near electricity down your spine until your lips broke apart with a soft smack. With a gentle lick, you tried to memorize the taste of each other for one last second before you were being ushered down the dock.

George stuffed his hands in the pockets of his shorts and stood with the host as you boarded the biplane and found your seat. The pilot closed the door and buckled up and started the engine. The propellers whirled to life and he glanced back at you,

“Where are we headed, ma’am?”

You looked out the window of the plane, catching a last glimpse of George who stood on the end of the dock with the host. The wind from the plane propellers ruffled his hair and his eyes squinted in the bright sunlight but he smiled and raised his hand in a last wave as the plane pulled off across the water.

“Nice, France.”

You sat in the corner of the coffee shop, suitcase at your side, and gaze unwavering from the glass entry doors across the brown trimmed café. There was no food or beverage in front of you since you were far less than hungry; your stomach churned with anxieties from landing in a strange city for the farthest stretch of a chance you could take. It all felt ridiculous. You felt foolish. None of this had to be real.

Finally, through the front windows, you saw a white convertible Mercedes pull into the parking lot and instantly your heart was in your throat. From the distance, you could just make out the figure of the man as he parked the car, donning sunglasses and a soft styled mess of brown hair, and your stomach erupted in butterflies. He looked just as perfect as he had on the island but the scattering of hickeys down his neck were missing and the sunkissed tan was more faded as if he had never been there. Your eyes followed him as he hurried across the parking lot and into the shop where you sat. He was alone.

He didn’t notice you - you were now a stranger after all - and you let yourself have a moment in the background to admire him. He wore another white button up tucked into creased slacks, looking so effortlessly stylish. The designer watch was a given and the near noon-day sunlight glinted off the silver fastenings as he approached the counter.

You were too far away to hear him order but you made out some sort of breakfast sandwich and a drink amidst the café radio music playing through the speakers and the chatter that surrounded the small sitting area. When he pulled out his credit card and waited for the machine to prompt his payment, he haphazardly bent down slightly, raised his right foot, and scratched at his ankle with a confused scowl. A blur of black was caught by your eye before it disappeared under his pant leg again as he sighed and stood up straighter once more, raking his fingers through his hair in near tired confusion.

You stood before you could second guess, taking a hesitant step towards him as he tucked his card back in his wallet. He didn’t notice you. No one else did either.

“George.”

Your own voice startled you, especially with how wavering and unsure it was...how nervous you sounded. It would be easy to pass as an adoring teenager like that.

His eyes raised to yours at the call of his name and his gaze alone sent those perfect shivers down your body. He seemed to give you a once over as you took another step closer as if he was trying to place where he had seen you before.

“George...I…” you struggled to find the words, as if the long plane ride had not been filled with you making up scripts in your mind as to what you would say to him in this moment. His confused expression made you nervous and you could feel the tears of disappointment and frustration already brimming in your eyes. You could only gesture haphazardly to his right pant leg before you were at a loss for words.

He slid his wallet into his pocket, face full of confusion, and followed your quick gesture to his right ankle. The random appearance of that messy blank ink tattoo had startled him that morning and he looked back up at you slowly, eyebrows furrowed gently in the middle as to how you knew it was there. This stranger in a coffee shop.

He breathed your name in the form of a question; the same name that had been inked into his skin at a time he didn’t remember. The blessing of your name from his lips felt like the warmth of that familiar tropical breeze and the memories of your fantasy weekend together seemed to flick like pages of a storybook between you.

You could nearly see his features soften with his realization and you let a gentle smile tug at your lips, your voice a breath of relief, “George.”

♡ Enjoying my content? Support my writing here :)

♡ None of the original writing on this blog may be reproduced, reposted, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the author.

266 notes · View notes