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

[theresalwayshope]

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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[theresalwayshope]

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.

[priordivergence]

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.

[theresalwayshope]

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.

[priordivergence]

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.

[theresalwayshope]

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.

[priordivergence]

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.

[theresalwayshope]

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.

[priordivergence]

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.

[theresalwayshope]

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."

[priordivergence]

"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."

[theresalwayshope]

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.

[priordivergence]

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.

[theresalwayshope]

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.

[priordivergence]

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.