A House, Currant, Maine, Saturday

[smilestopscars]

Earlier in the week, Kathy had requested Ezra to tell her when he was free to be visited at home in Currant. And today, well, he was free for a visit: the house was empty, Lock was off in Boston with Bianca, and Ezra had nothing in the way of obligations happening. So he'd told her that.

And now he was just waiting around, lounging on the couch, reading a book. Easy Saturday, just like he liked it.

[ooc: NFB. Primarily for the one mentioned, but open also for texts/calls/whathaveyou!]

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[spin_kick_snap]

"Because I'm a tough-as-nails independent woman who takes no guff from anybody?" Kathy suggested, sounding hopeful.

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Ezra shrugged, but just barely. "I don't see those two things as mutually exclusive," he said, quietly. "They're usually better when they're not, even."

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Kathy nuzzled his throat, dropping a soft kiss there before resting her head again. "Go on?" she invited. "I'm listening."

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"I don't know how much more I have to say about it," he warned her. Although it was light and soft, as far as warnings went. "Because I think it's pretty obvious. Being strong doesn't have to mean being hard. And being gentle doesn't mean having to be a pushover."

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"Sometimes I just like to hear you talk," Kathy said. "Explain things, even ones that are obvious. We don't always see things the same way."

Beat.

"Even if we do this time. Which is good because I'd like to be strong, but there's no way I think anyone would call me hard."

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"Hard is rarely a good quality, anyway," Ezra replied. His head tipped back against the back of the couch. "None of my friends really have it, and I like it that way."

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Kathy did not make the obvious joke, though mostly because they were having a good, semi-serious talk and didn't want to derail it. "Sometimes, I think if I were harder, maybe I would have survived LA the first time," she murmured. "Or come back better. Less...fragmented, kinda."

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"Maybe." He wasn't going to lie to her about that. Being tough could keep you away from harm. "But I don't know if you'd still also have had all the people you did, before and after. Soft's more inviting. Easier to get tangled up in."

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Kathy idly began weaving tiny braids in Ezra's hair as she thought about it. "Especially after," she agreed. "Though, I think I would have liked it better when I first came back. Those first few months it was just so-"

She stopped and shook her head. No use going over those cold days. Not anymore. They were over now and that was what mattered.

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"It's over," he replied, agreeing with what she'd left unsaid. At least as much as anything was fully over when you ended up carrying it with you for always in your brain. Anyway.

"You are what you are, darling."

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"And I am soft and hopefully entangling," Kathy said. "I want...I want a community. Where everyone around me loves me and know they're loved in return. I want to belong to people, if that makes any sense at all."

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"It does," Ezra sighed.

Often, he might've played it off like it didn't. But he belonged to Ava and Lock and they belonged to him, and there was no question about it. So he did get it.

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Kathy had half-expected him to play it that way, in fact. Had wondered if he was going to give her a glib answer about foxes not answering to anybody. His honesty had her hugging him tight for a long moment in appreciation.

"What is it that you want?" she asked. "Do you know?"

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Ezra exhaled another quiet sigh. There was a long silence, where he just drew haphazard, slow shapes against her back in place of saying something.

Words weren't easy to come by.

"I just... want to be worth something."

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Kathy was patient, quiet while he found the words. She knew that Ezra and Dante both had gotten exasperated with her wordwalls, like she'd taken up the whole room with them and then left the two of them feeling flattened. And so she'd started moderating herself, choosing silence over speech more often, waiting until she knew how to say what she wanted to say, rather than spilling words everywhere.

And so, rather than babbling out a million thoughts and feelings, she went with the simplest statement she could make.

"I wish I could convince you that you already are."

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Ezra's hand stilled against her back. The other one joined it, and they clasped together before coming to rest against the small of her back. He'd closed his eyes, and he felt her weight against his chest as it rose and fell with his breathing.

"I didn't say I'm not," he said, quiet, trying for light.

It was just that he was worth different things to different people.

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Kathy tilted her head, hair tumbling over her shoulder, looking at him with dark eyes. "Ez, if I kiss you right now, would you believe I was kissing you for the right reason?"

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Ezra could feel her looking at him, and so his eyes opened again.

"There's only one reason for you to kiss me," he said. "And that's that you want to."

He was pretty sure he knew what she actually meant. He just didn't read into it as much as she maybe was afraid he would.

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"That's the only reason I would," Kathy told him.

She was never worried he'd think that she was promising more than she intended to with a kiss, but she did sometimes worry that he'd think she was motivated by something else. Like using kisses to make him feel better.

In another place and time, maybe she even would have.

But now, as she leaned in slowly, giving him time to turn away before her lips landed on his, it was entirely because she wanted this.

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Ezra shortened some of that slowness by using the hands clasped at her back to pull her closer in. Not forcefully, just... making it known he wasn't going to turn away.

And he reached up to meet her.

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Kathy was glad of the reassurance. She knew Ezra gave off the air of always being up for it anytime, but she had a memory of a conversation in a supply closet that said otherwise.

She kissed him, slow and soft. Not pushing, not taking, not even asking for more. Just enjoying the moment of softness between them.

[smilestopscars]

Ezra wasn't pushing, either. This was still a little fraught, but at least he knew how to kiss her. Slow, soft, gentle.

Breathing her in.

[spin_kick_snap]

He most definitely knew how to kiss her. Even now as she did her best to keep their kisses light, almost chaste, she couldn't deny that heat slid pooled in her lower belly at the touch of his mouth on hers.

One day, she hoped things would be less fraught between them. She was doing her best to make it so, even. But until then, she wouldn't give these kisses up for anything.

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Ezra also hoped things would one day be less fraught between them. He also hoped for a lot of other things, however, including that people would stop moving into an almost literal hellhole he couldn't bear to follow them to.

You couldn't always get what you hoped for.

But there was still this. The softness of her lips against his, the warmth of her under his hands, through the fabric.

[spin_kick_snap]

She understood that hope. She understood it very well. And she hoped that one day, he'd work up the wherewithal to try again, to find their house would be open to him, too.

And if he never did, she'd keep taking portals to his place, bearing smiles and baked goods, because she wasn't going to let a stupid city break what they'd been working so hard to build.

At last, she pulled away, resting her forehead on his, and couldn't help but smile.