theresalwayshope | i don't need you, i don't need you...maybe i do... (rp for priordivergence)

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i don't need you, i don't need you...maybe i do... (rp for priordivergence)

When Allison dreamed these days, she dreamed of Tris and her glass prison.

As long as Allison could remember, the Priors were a good, if odd family. Before she knew about werewolves, they struck her as a good Christian family, reserved and maybe a little strict, but they were kind people, and the few times she'd met Caleb and Beatrice, they were nice. Off and on, amidst all the moving, the Priors were always there. Andrew Prior worked for the FBI and bought weapons from Dad on a regular basis, Natalie Prior was a retired cop...

Beatrice came to live with them around the time they arrived in Beacon Hills. Victoria and Chris called it a behavioral problem...one Allison never saw...but after the world went mad, and werewolves were real, she discovered 'behavioral problem' meant 'trauma while hunting.'

It brought them closer together. Allison was encouraged when the other girl told her to call her Tris instead of Beatrice, when she asked to learn archery, when she would patiently sit and listen to her talk about her problems with Scott, things she couldn't tell Lydia for fear of the stern looks she'd get. Tris was more than a friend through those terrible months after Gerard showed up.

She was present when Scott couldn't be. She knew her world when Lydia couldn't. She was always there, always ready...always exactly what Allison needed her to be.

Like an anchor when she needed someone to pull her away from the brink of death itself...

After the surrogate sacrifice, Tris told her about the dreams to try and make her feel less alone. About the crows, the fire...the box filling with water to drown her.

Now, with Dad home and safe, with the Darach gone and Deucalion redirected...with the Alpha pack gone and everyone's parents alive, Allison was bolting upright in bed in a cold sweat, still trapped in that glass box from someone else's dream, choking on water and mistletoe again while Tris stood outside, banging uselessly on the glass to try and reclaim her own nightmare.

It drove her from her bed to creep through the apartment to Tris's room. She couldn't help it, she was still shaking...and Tris understood. Needing a place where no one else could see, where it was safe to be weak...when Tris woke screaming from her own nightmares, Allison bore her up, and when Allison could no longer stand up under the weight of being the Argent family matriarch...

Tris was fragile, but she was strong.

Just like Allison.

She knocked softly on her door before easing it open and poking her head into her bedroom.

"Tris?...you awake?..."

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Drowning, always drowning. Whether it's in the tank or up against the rocks. I know what it really means, the fear of betrayal and loss of control. I wish that knowing, understanding made me less afraid. Instead, I just curse my own weakness more. The knock that signals Allison is welcome, giving me reason to stay awake.

"I'm always awake," I say, a bad joke.

As Allison enters, I flick on my bedside lamp. I hope she doesn't ask what it is that I dreamed. I can't bring myself to say that it had been not of my own tortures, but of Allison's, of how cold and still she'd looked in that tank. How I'd hated it.

It was a bad joke, but true all the same: Tris looks alert and ready, even in her nightshirt, her hair loose around her shoulders. She'd talked about cutting it for a long time after she came to live with the Argents, but Allison had talked her out of it more than once, and probably would again. She liked Tris's hair, and when it hung like it did now...well, she looked pretty.

Silently, Allison slid into the room and shut the door. Making a sheepish face, she padded closer to Tris's bed.

"I, uhm...God, this is really stupid, but can I sleep in here? I can't...I mean...you know."

Because Tris knew nightmares. She knew how to do this...Allison was still trying to figure it out.

I nod and budge over on the bed. After the losses they've suffered from Gerard and the Kanima, the Argents have had no reason to keep me on. My parents would have received me back, displeased that I still loathe guns but pleased that I can at least shoot arrows from my bow and bolts from the crossbow. My fraternization with our supposed prey would displease them, but at least I would have skills.

Instead, with their family decimated, Allison and Mr. Argent have kept me on, taken me to their estate to France, and given me a room and bed of my own.

Allison, especially, has given me a sense of safety. Maybe, on good days, a sense of worth.

In gratitude for that, I will do anything they ask.

"Any time, always."

Allison breathed a sigh of relief, accepting the silent invitation and sliding carefully under the covers beside Tris. Immediately, the warmth of the bed enveloped her, and the sweet smell of Tris's shampoo on the pillow, her warm scent on the sheets, flooded her with a sense of well being that immediately relaxed her.

Smiling, she tucked an arm under the pillow as she got comfortable facing Tris, scooting closer so their faces were close, noses nearly touching...

Perfect.

"Thanks." she murmured softly, reaching over to make sure the comforter was tucked securely over Tris's shoulder. "I feel better already...guess Deaton was right about that anchor stuff, huh?"

"It's not just useful for Scott or Isaac," I agree.

With Allison, it suddenly becomes easier, more acceptable, to snuggle down into my own covers. The deep charcoal comforter and ivory sheets are no different than the ones my father would have given me, though the bed is bigger and softer. My walls are still blank and austere where Allison's first order of business had been to personalize her room. I'd only seen her room blank and plain once before, matched to a time when Allison had been the same and Gerard had sought to make killers of us.

In those days, he'd forced me to mold trembling hands around a gun and tried to make me shoot.

"Bad dreams again?"

Allison nodded, heaving a sigh once Tris snuggled down...even scooting closer, so now the tips of their noses did brush when they breathed the right way, making Allison smile a little each time it happened.

"It's...stupid." she assured her, trying to dismiss it even as one hand slid under the covers to find Tris's, to seek comfort in that linking of fingers. "Probably what Deaton said, you know? The...darkness around our hearts. Maybe nightmares are just a side effect of the ritual. I'll be fine, just...thanks for letting me stay."

I squeeze her hands and listen, even as I know that there's more to it than that. It's hard to live unaffected by so much darkness, by bad memories and fear. I haven't had to bind myself to the nematon to know that.

"You're allowed to be scared, you know," I promise. "I won't tell anyone."

Allison's features cracked a little at her reply, flooded with warmth as those small, thin hands tightened around hers with such strength, such certainty she could almost feel it bleeding into her, not hard and steely like Gerard and her mother tried to form in her, but cool and sturdy like stone...smooth lake rocks, sliding under her skin, powerful and unmoving, but malleable under the flow of water and the rush of air through the ages, with a coolness that could be chased away by warmth under the heat of the sun.

Tris's touch gave her the strength of stone, and that promise was pure, radiant sunlight, warming the chill within her.

"Do you really believe that?" she asked softly, no more than a breath kept secret and safe in the air they shared, lost in the quiet thickness of the comforter that kept them warm. "I'm the head of my family now, and you'll lead yours one day in your mother's place...but I don't..."

She lowered her gaze, and in the low light of the room, silent tear tracks glistened on her cheeks.

"How are we supposed to be strong for everyone else when we...when I'm so terrified all the time?"

I shake my head at the idea of leading the Prior family someday. Generations of Priors had stood strong and resolute and my leadership would almost certainly crumble our family down to nothing. My hatred of those we hunt has been compromised, if ever I had any in me. No matter the color of their eyes, there was nothing glorious in watching the sheer, human pain that flooded them in the moments of weakness and loss. They may have been werewolves, but I hadn't been able to ignore the purely human fear and terror they expressed.

Tobias' face comes into my memory and the words he'd taught me. "Everyone's afraid of something," I remind her, my gaze fixed on the unadorned expanse of my wall just above Allison's ear in my line of sight. "It's not about getting rid of fear...It's about having more courage than fear."

I turn over on my back, "It's in our motto, you know. Everyone knows that we believe in ordinary acts of bravery, but there's another line too: We believe in acknowledging fear and the extent to which it rules us."

Allison shifted closer as Tris rolled on her back, body tucking against her side just a little without even thinking. As cold and as frightened and as lost as she felt, she was the moth to Tris's flame, drawn by all that quiet courage that she didn't even know she had, that impossible strength that hid in empathy and flourished with a little loyalty...

Sometimes just thinking of her made Allison ache in ways she couldn't even name.

"And you believe that. Like it's law...like it's religion." Allison mused, her tone making it clear she was enchanted by that part of her. Shifting a little, she propped herself up on one elbow, resting her head in her hand as her free hand found itself resting on Tris's shoulder, fingers tapping out a nameless beat against her sleeve. "And because you believe that so...totally, you become it. I wish I could be more like that...more like you. You're..."

Courageous. Vibrant. Remarkable. Beautiful.

Only some of what she felt had words, and the rest just sort of clogged in her throat, leaving her to simply stare down at Tris with eyes that shone with an emotion very close to adoration.

Sometimes I wish I could tel Allison that she thinks far better of me than I am. There's much that's been said and not been said that makes it clear to me that she carries so much admiration and adoration for the people she holds dear. For her father, for Scott, for Lydia, they're deserved. For me, they aren't.

"I believe it as much as you believe in your family's creed." Sometimes the words give me strength and sometimes they are chains. "But there are times when I wish I believed it more. Maybe I'd be braver when it counts."

Maybe I wouldn't be haunted by the visions produced by the fear serum that had formed the base of my training. It doesn't matter that it's hypocritical to what I've just asserted, but it's easy to see the best in someone else and the failings in myself.

There were too many words stuck in her throat to answer, to tell her she was wrong. It all felt right in her head, in her heart...but to put it into words didn't seem to work because they didn't come, because...maybe they weren't right.

There was no real definition for Tris in her head, because she was more than a friend and closer than a sister. There was no real description for how she felt, because she'd been in love before and this wasn't like that. It was so different, it wasn't joy and light and the warmth of the sun, it was blood and shadows and stolen, secret moments like these.

There was no clear way to explain how she saw Tris, because if it didn't come out right, it could ruin everything. If it came out like only wanting her, if it offended her...if it came out as anything less than wanting to open herself up and gather Tris inside where she'd be safe, where she'd be part of her, where Allison could draw all that purity of spirit into her own heart...

So instead of speaking, she shifted...hesitated...then leaned over and let her forehead rest against Tris's. She left her eyes open, looking into hers, looking straight into her where the nightmares lived, where the strength flowed like water...where they shared breath, where they couldn't hide, and it almost felt more powerful than it might have if she kissed Tris outright.

She looked into Tris, let Tris look into her...and just stayed, wishing for the world to stop so she would never have to move from that spot.

Edited 2014-12-23 05:42 (UTC)

In a way it's not necessarily any more contact than we'd had while lying on our sides but the words we've exchanged, the feelings, are what make this moment so intimate. Our hands are still linked and Allison's staring into me with a gaze that's soft, but still searching. I don't believe there's anything to be found for me, but maybe that's not what matters. It's what Allison thinks she finds.

I'm glad for the dark that softens the blush I know is mantling my cheeks. I can feel the heat off of her skin and it sends sparks along my nerves, as if she can read my mind and strip me down to my bones.

I don't know what she expects me to find in her or if it's the same as what I see. In Allison there's more strength and courage than I'll ever see in myself. She's suffered so many losses and stayed strong despite them all. Her hands hold a bow with determination where a gun still sends tears down my cheeks. Allison is composed, dignified.

When she leads her family, it will be with grace and a wind of change.

The thought of leading mine fills me, simply, with terror.

In the dark, she saw some of it, well hidden in nothing but the light from the hall filtering under the bedroom door, the digital display of her alarm clock...that admiration reflected back at her, that fear...that dusky shading of a blush in her cheeks, and for some reason it was the blush that made Allison smile just a little.

It made her feel braver, in that moment. She felt anything but dignified, she felt suddenly seventeen years old again. Young, oddly weightless, like she could float away without Tris's hand to anchor her down.

Only in these kind of stolen moments does Allison ever feel this way anymore: like a kid. Carefree.

Actually brave. Not willing to kill or die, but bold and wild and unfettered...

Taking a deep breath, she let her smile grow...let herself be brave...and closed the distance completely, mouth pressing to Tris's in a soft, chaste kiss.

It's not a surprise exactly. Surprising only because what's happening is real but the gesture itself feels as natural as breathing. It feels as right as drawing back on a bowstring or running along Scott and his pack. It's Allison and I lean my head up to return the kiss, still shy and chaste in the gesture.

Suddenly, the bed feels warmer, cozier. Allison's presence makes me feel safer and like the nightmares can be chased away. If not forever, then at least for as long as we're tangled up together like this.

Finally, I feel brave again.

Allison felt it, too: not just brave, but safe as their lips met, and the bed became more than just a secret place. It was a haven, warm and protected, full of good secrets that couldn't hurt anyone. Secrets like the way her mouth felt against Allison's, the way everything she felt was no longer clogged in her throat and chest because it all came loose with that gentle press of lips.

It flowed free when the kiss ended, then began as Allison kissed her again.

And again, eyes falling shut and her hand touching Tris's cheek.

And again, her hand sliding up to gently curl in Tris's hair, warm and soft as it slid through her fingers.

And again, with only a little hesitation as she finally kissed Tris a little harder, gently catching the soft bow of her upper lip between her own.

I lean my head up, chasing after the warmth that Allison exudes from beyond her skin. Somewhere, deep in her heart and soul, that warmth is born. She's good all the way through, kind and warm and steeped in hope.

And she is very, very good at kissing. There's so much comfort in the simple press of lips and the slide of my hands up her back My heart is speeding up, somewhere between fear and excitement.

"Why did you do that?" I'm not angry or surprised but I never thought Allison would be the one to kiss me, not when she'd sworn forever that she loved Scott.

Allison didn't know how to answer, hovering over Tris and looking into those wide, guileless blue eyes filled with such an innocent question. It was perfectly justified, too, because something like just...randomly kissing her was a good way to ruin a great friendship.

She couldn't say she didn't know, because she did. She couldn't say she couldn't help it, because she could have. She didn't have to kiss Tris, didn't have to take that risk...

"...it's how I feel." she finally replied, fingers running through Tris's hair again, smoothing it away from her forehead. And it was: kissing her, touching her, pushed the nightmares so far away she could almost forget them. It made her feel so brave and so still inside, she could almost forget she was ever afraid to fight, to lead, to stand against the threats the newly activated Nemeton would bring.

She wanted to lose herself in it. She wanted to lose herself in Tris, to anchor herself with her strength of sun-warmed stone, to free herself in the cage of Tris's arms.

The answer hung for a moment, as Allison licked her lips and felt a little frisson of excitement when she tasted Tris there.

That bright little thrill drove her to lean down and kiss Tris again, soft but open and eager as she shifted in bed, letting her body stretch out over Tris's, straddling her thighs so she wasn't crushing the other girl with her weight.

I haven't been kissed in such a long time, since before I came to the Argents and my parents restricted me from speaking with Tobias. Enough time had passed that I'd forgotten just how wonderful it can feel. Allison feels so warm and safe and there's no reason to resist the urge to lean up against my pillows to kiss Allison again, catching fingers in her hair and moving it away from her face.

"It feels right," I say, looking up at her. Even in the dim light, Allison's eyes catch a glimmer of moonlight in them, filling her with life and beauty. "Doesn't it?"

I'd never thought to consider if I felt that way, but now that Allison's kissed me, it feels as if something's fallen into place.

Allison's eyes widened a little, but she nodded...she was vaguely surprised because Tris found the words for it: it feels right. On her lips, it didn't sound weak or trite or insufficient.

It was perfect.

That perfection bloomed in her chest with a sudden, sweet ache as she felt Tris's place in her heart sort of settle and click home. Tris's features in the dark, smooth and unmarred by fear or worry were another beautiful secret that belonged to her alone, and she felt suddenly greedy for it.

"It feels right." she echoed, punctuating the words with another kiss...longer, greedier...and paused to look into her eyes again. "It feels like..."

Like you're mine.

They were scary, heavy words, but Allison wasn't afraid of them. They just felt too large to say just yet, too immense for this small, safe place they'd made in the dark together...so she let them rest, settle in her mind and her heart as she kissed Tris again, a hand sliding out of her hair to caress her cheek, her neck, her collarbone...

Breaking the kiss, Allison leaned in, pressing her cheek against Tris's for a moment just to breathe in the smell of soap and skin and something sweeter, something that was just Tris, then bowed her head as her hand gently pushed aside the neck of her shirt...just enough so she could lay a soft, reverent kiss against each of the three crows tattooed just below her clavicle.

I feel claimed by Allison's kisses, but not as a possession. She stakes a claim the way that Isaac does for Scott, finding quiet and powerful ways to make it known where his loyalties and pack mates lie. Allison has staked her claim with Scott's pack and priorities and I'd been wrapped in with them. Now I'm part of that pack too, brought in with Allison's kisses.

She claims me as an equal, as someone dear, an ally.

We are as bound as true wolves to our pack.

The sense of that bond and the depth of it brings goosebumps to my skin as Allison marks my tattoo with kisses. I'd gotten it in my first month among the Argents, an expression of homesickness. Now, with Allison's touch it feels fuly healed at last.

Allison can hear it in the way Tris breathes, in the way that lean and sculpted body gives under her touch, shifts to let her mouth brush over skin. For all the violence she still fears, for all the scars she still carries, Tris's strength is not all inside. She's been training far longer than Allison, she's the real thing where Allison is little more than a toy soldier.

She could break Allison without breaking a sweat. She tenses at a simple hug, to feel her body warm and pliant beneath her touch feels like a declaration as heavy and as large as the one locked inside her own chest.

Both emboldened and unsure, she pressed one more gentle kiss into Tris's skin, drifting away from her tattoo and brushing her lips against the center of her chest, just below her collarbone.

"Should I stop?" she murmured softly, nuzzling just a little at that soft hollow of skin above the place her lips had been.

I can still remember the last time I went under my fear serum and the fear of intimacy that had dogged me. It sets tension into my stomach, fighting with the warmth and want that Allison inspires in me.

"I..." Breathe in. Exhale. "No, don't stop."

Running fingers up into her hair, I sit up a little more and cup Allison's face. Tipping her up for a kiss.

She felt a little tense as she kissed Allison, and that bothered her. She didn't want any fear or discomfort between them, not in this warm, dark, safe place. There was no room for it here, she wouldn't let there be.

She was strong here, with Tris. Strong enough to push those shadows away.

So Allison kissed her back, cupping Tris's face as she shifted to stretch out a little more, covering her body with Allison's, warming her, sheltering her, protecting her as she broke the kiss to nuzzle and kiss a path along her jaw and neck. She felt bolder, braver as she shifted to curl a hand against her hip, just to let it rest there...to let her have a chance to push her away.

"I've got you." she whispered against Tris's skin, meaning it for the first time with no sense of fear. "I'll take care of you."

"You do..." It's more realization than statement. All my life, I've been told that I can only trust myself. If it's down to a werewolf or my own life, I can't wait for friends or family or lovers. All I've got is my wits and a gun--or now a crossbow.

Mission before blood. Those words form the basic truth of all of the hunting clans, beyond individual mottos and crests. We are hunters, ultimately alone no matter how many omegas we use as our example of its fallibility.

But not here. Not with Scott and his own strange pack. Not with Allison, who's surrounding me an keeping me warm and making me aware, for the first time in my life, that it's almost Christmas.

"We've got each other."

We've got each other...she had Tris, and Tris had her, whether it was to pull her away from Death itself or just to let her into her bed, to keep the dark at bay. They were connected, pulling each other towards the light in an endless loop of salvation that left her feeling suddenly, strangely light.

She felt like she could float away right then, but she let Tris keep her anchored, as was her place in Allison's world now. She let the warmth of her body as she smile and bent to kiss Tris again, deep and insistent this time as she shifted so she was no longer straddling both of Tris's legs, just one as the hand on her hip slid higher, tracing over an exposed strip of skin where her sleep shirt had ridden up.

She hesitated only a moment, then let her hand move higher, under her shirt, carefully but eagerly tracing up the slope of her waist and over the lower curve of her ribcage.

I understand the shift in her posture and my skin thrills from her touch as much as it does from the realization that I'm not afraid. In my family, it is discouraged to want, but in this moment I do, deeply and selfishly. Allison is warm above me, her touch certain. It doesn't matter that I've barely ever been with anyone, because I trust Allison.

Trusting and wanting and indulging in both of those things. They are foreign luxuries in our world. Finding them with Allison is significant and real. I'm not embarrassed for how small or thin I am, not with her.

I am selfish and brave and I replicate the gesture along Allison's stomach, slowly spreading my fingers across her abdomen and up.

As her hand slid across Allison's belly, she remembered those same fingers, touching her so gently now, wrapped around her shoulders like a vise to hold her under the water...the same fingers that kept her upright when she emerged, the fingers that held a crossbow with such confidence and grace that it made her envious.

She knew, now, that it wasn't envy that made her chest so tight. It wasn't jealousy that stole her breath and made it hard to think...it was such a fine line, one she didn't know she was crossing until it was too late and Tris became the rock on which she stood.

Shifting a little, Allison sat up slowly, tugging Tris with her...and as the weight of her body shifted, she forgot how to breathe for just a moment as she sat back, Tris's leg trapped beneath her and teasing with a friction that made her so warm she didn't need covers, so warm that Tris's fingers almost felt cool...

Allison watched her hands drift back down to Tris's waist, letting her hands slip down over her hips for just a second as she scooted closer, pulling her in...and this time her breath caught audibly as their bodies drew nearer, as her hands slid back up and under Tris's top to curl around her waist, thumbs caressing her bare stomach.

Lifting her gaze, she watched Tris's face as she finally caught the hem of her shirt and slowly started to drag it up and off over her head.

I laugh then. It's so unexpected that I freeze and then laugh again, raising my arms above my head for her to pull my shirt off and away. I'm not scared that losing my shirt leaves me practically naked. In any other situation, I'd say I feel vulnerable. Not with Allison. With Allison, I'm eager to feel as much of her skin against mine as I possibly can.

It's safe here. Safe to be vulnerable. Safe to want, selfishly. I don't have to be unerringly brave or unendingly selfless. Whoever Beatrice Prior becomes in the dark, when no one is looking, she's safe with Allison.

Feeling daring, I slide my hand further up under Allison's shirt, cupping a breast, wondering how she'll react and move. Wondering what it will do for the warm press of her leg that feels good but simply isn't enough.

"Are we going to...?"

And is it all right? I want it, but I don't want to be something we regret.

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i don't need you, i don't need you...maybe i do... (rp for priordivergence)

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