When I get excited [China Girl and Xanthus backscene]
Who: China Girl and Xanthus Where: Their flat When: A couple years ago (Note: This is a backscene!) Status: Complete
China Girl stood in her little kitchenette, covered in flour with a deep frown on her face. Why was a pie so hard to make? China Girl rarely felt so domestic as to attack a project such as baking, but something had inspired her that morning. She had decided that they would have a pie for supper. It hadn't seemed important at the time that she had never made a pie before. She wasn't stupid, she'd figure it out. Only she hadn't. She stared down at the unappetizing blob before her that seemed miraculously burnt around the edges and uncooked in the center in anger and dismay. Food had no right to be so difficult.
Xanthus had blown into the small flat, as he always did, all energy and direction. That ended when he saw his girl in the kitchen, looking very domestic and very glum. Her back was to him, and so the only thing to be done, really, was to wrap his arms around her from behind and bury his face against her neck. "Where's my smile?" he demanded, laughing.
She leaned back into him automatically, her body unconsciously molding to his larger one, but the pout stayed on her face. "S'this stupid pie," China Girl huffed. "Turned out all lumpy and 'orrid." Her voice held an edge of whine in it, but, in all honesty, she was soothed by Xanthus's presence. He could always cheer her.
"Don't think about it." he loved to hear her, the strange, galloping rhythm and cut consonants of her speech. His hands moved over her belly, then slid upwards. She'd laugh, and smack him, but at least it would get her off this pouting. "Think about 'ow I'm about to grab you up, carry you off..."
She, of course, smacked his hands away, but was unable to completely kill the grin he inspired. After all, she was trying to be mad. "Lay off," she scolded. "Food ent s'posed teh be so contrary!" She tried to maintain her frustration, but it was difficult with the feeling of him grinning idiotically behind her.
He laughed again, then, his hands taking her close and his mouth smearing over her neck. "A 'course it is. Just to cross you, yeah? What..." a pause. "What's that s'posed to be, anyhow?"
She had been just about to give in, to relax and melt into his arms until that last sentence. Instantly, she turned in his arms and shoved his chest away. "S'a PIE, ya great git! Even if yeh di'n hear me say it 'fore, yeh should tell jes by lookin' a' it!" Her small, bony hands pounded at him for emphasis as she flew into indignation.
He laughed then, laughed his heart out, taking her hands and holding them up close to his chest. She was beautiful when she was angry, all stammered pronouncements and little cries of indignation. He adored it, and gathered her up against his chest, "Bu' darlin', it doesn't look nothing like one..."
With that she gave a cry and wrenched her hands away from him. "Well, yeh kin bloody well taste it, then, if yer eyes're so bad." Her face was bright red with offense as she reached behind her, grabbed up the mess of failed pastry and tossed the crumbly, sticky mess into his cheeky grin.
It only made him laugh, and lick out his tongue to taste it. He grabbed her up again, pushing her back against the counter now, taking her red face in his hands. Kissed her soundly, sweetly, and didn't stop, even when she bapped at him over and over. Nothing like kissing her, not really...
Even as she beat at him and kissed him through the awful, sticky mess, China Girl was laughing. He was such a sight all covered in goo and crust, she couldn't help herself. Just to add insult to injury, she reached behind her, fumbled around a bit, and found a handful of fluffy powder. Even as she ground the flour into his hair she giggled and pressed closer into him.
Her kisses were the best, they were what kept Xanthus coming back, even when the world needed him, the cause needed him, even when he was worn out and sore. Just her - her cheery face, the sound of her laughter, and those delicious kisses. Stilll, the flour was going to far! With a whoop he swung her up and over his shouder, marching off to the bedroom and tiny bathroom.
That made China Girl shriek with affront and laughter. She pounded on his back and kicked her feet, but nothing that would seriously jeopardize his hold on her. The last thing she wanted to was to be released. "Oi! Lemme go, yeh big lout!" She demanded it, but meant not a word.
"Big lout, am I? oh ho ho!" he whooped, finally shoving the curtain for the tiny shower aside and plunking her down into it, pressing in himself. "Say the word, you'll get it cold." he threatened, grinning.
She yelped at the threat and squirmed, half-heartedly trying to get past him and away from the threat of icy water, although in actuality, it was he that would receive the spray, as she was standing directly underneath the shower head and was too short to be caught in its path. Still, as she feigned terror, she was giggling and pressing against him a bit more that she was pulling away.
He didn't really plan to spray the water on them at all. Why soak them both? He didn't really care about the flour in his hair, and the sticky mess he could just wash off his face. Really, he'd just wanted to press to her, to get her somewhere where she couldn't wriggle away. His hands moved over her belly, around her, over her ass, pulling her hips up close to him.
China Girl continued to laugh and wriggle, but she was doing it only to tease at this point. "Don' yeh dare," she stated, but let herself be pulled inevitably closer to him, like a small asteroid to a star. She knew it was only a matter of time before she was brought all the way in and consumed. The thought made her eyes darken and her laugh go a little deeper in her throat.
And then all there was to do was kiss her some more. Oh, Xanthus was aware of his hands on her, slipping under her top, pushing her back against the wall of the shower so that they could carefully explore her. But really, all his thoughts were on her mouth, that sweet little mouth. "Missed you." he muttered, between kisses.
"Yer own fault fer leavin'," she answered, but as she kissed him back, she knew that he was aware of her not saying "I missed you, too." She didn't have to say it. She just had to lean into him and let her body mold to his. It said more than enough. She pulled away from the kiss in order to lick some pie off his cheek. "Mmm. Don' taste 'alf bad."
A laugh, and Xanthus dipped out of the shower to scrub the stuff off his face. "Damn." it took a bit of doing, but soon he was pulling her out, fresh-faced and grinning. "You missed me, din'ya?" he kissed her, pressing her back toward the bed. "I'll bet ye did."
When he stepped out, she snatched a towel hanging nearby and expertly cleaned off the pie bits that had gotten onto her. It didn't take her long, and when she was done, she stood and watched him clean up, arms crossed, grinning smugly. She smirked cheekily at him as he tugged and maneuvered her. "Wot's there teh miss?" she teased. "Great useless lout." Her eyes and kisses and smile belied her words.
"Wench!" his hands grabbed, he was cheeky and fresh, and he pulled her close, hands roaming over her body. "Useless! How useless am I, eh?" his hand took hers, pressed it against him. "You like livin' without me, then?"
"Wouldn' say that," she conceded. As a bit of an apology, she pressed a soft kiss to his throat. "Got teh 'ave someone teh do the 'eavy lifting," she suggested as her fingers stroked him, feather light.
Now it was is turn to pretend offense, and Xanthus tore her hand from him, turning away with a ferocious pout. "Oh, is that all! I see! Well, y'could get any thug fer that!"
Playing along, it was now China Girl's turn to come up behind him and twine her arms around his waist. She pressed her face between his shoulder blades and scattered kisses. "An' wot thug do as well wiv Dirt, then? Who'd set Rosie on his knee and tickle 'er?" She let her hands trail lightly over his stomach. "I s'pose," she sighed in mock defeat, "Yer 'bout the best o' the lot." She punctuated this with a light nibble.
He pouted, and this time it was a bit more real, his inner fears coming to light a bit. "An is that all? Rosie, an' Dirt? I mean...what about you? What'm I for you?"
China Girl wasn't good at talking about how she felt. Every now and then she felt this need for reassurance coming from him, and she never quite knew what to say. Her hand stilled and her voice got a bit quiet. "Y'know I need y'round." And then she darted away from the subject again. Her voice was cheerful and teasing. "Got t'ave somebody teh eat my pies." It wasn't all that he needed, but it was the best she felt she could give.
He knew, he knew she was doing her best. She tried, bless her, and after the wolrd had fallen apart, what more, really, could you expect of a person? Still, he hade a brood setting in, an pulled away from her to sit on the edge of the bed. "Wish I could give ya more, China Girl." he whispered, face stricken.
She couldn't find words for him. She didn't have it in her to say whatever it was that he needed to hear. But she went to him and edged between his legs to wrap her arms around his neck. "Don' fret," she told him. "Yeh give me plenty. More'n plenty." She pressed a kiss to his forehead and then covered the now slightly damp spot with her own brow. "Don' go anywhere," she whispered.
He wanted to tell her that he'd always stay - that he was hers, only hers, that a life with her and Dirt and Rosie was all he wanted. Though, how could he? Perhaps in a better world, the world he was fighting to create, he could settle down with her, give up the fight and just try to be happy. Instead he sighed, his arms looping loosely about her waist. "I won't." he promised, but then followed it a second later with "Well, besides the rally tonight. I should get going soon, actually...."
At his words, China Girl grew stiff in his arms. "Xan..." She pushed sightly away from him so that she could look him in the eye. "I wish yeh wouldn'. I mean, I know yeh 'ave teh do wot yeh can, but does it 'ave teh be so...out in the open?" She frowned at him, brow furrowed in worry instead of anger. Her hands rested on his shoulders, as if unconsciously trying to keep him from standing and leaving.
A sigh. Lately it always came back to this. At first he hadn't noticed - he'd been too silly over her, too engrossed in the deliriously comforting domesticity they enjoyed, too caught up in their life together to notice the cracks, her unhappiness over his cause. It bothered him, but what could he do? "Of course we do, poppy. We can't just keep silent, with injustice all around us!" he dres her close then, his mouth on hers, his tongue and lips and hands trying to tell her to listen, to see. "It's everywhere, and if I don't fight it..."
"If yeh don't fight it, they won't 'ave reason to come after yeh." She pulled back, trying to make him see, to understand how much danger he was in. She wouldn't let him distract her from this. "Xan, there's nothin' teh stop 'em. If yeh make too much noise, they'll shut ye up!" She couldn't find a way to tell him how much she needed him, couldn't find a way to make him understand how important he was to her, but she could tell him how concerned she was that he would be hurt.
"And if I don't fight, nothin'll ever change." he told her, just as he had every other time. As long as the fight needed to be fought, he would fight it. It was just what needed to happen, and no matter what else he might want - home, family - that would have to wait. "We need to radicalise, sweetheart. It's the only way to effect real change."
She'd heard this before. She'd heard him say it a thousand times. She was tired of hearing it. All she ever heard was that he was going out and putting himself in danger - asking to be taken by the Candidacy. She pulled away out of his arms. "Just you shut your mouth!" She couldn't think what else to say. She'd heard it too often. She couldn't hear it one more time. When she turned back to him, her eyes weren't full of anger but shiny with fear. "Oh, baby, just you shut your mouth."
What more could he say? That he loved her, that only the terrible urgency of his mission could ever take him from her? She knew all that, of if she didn't there was no way he could make it any clearer. Or could he someday, somehow, get across what he really felt: that a man who gave up his principles so easily didn't deserve her, didn't deserve anything. It wasn't the time for that. He just pulled her down with him, onto his lap, one hand curling around the back of her neck and bringing her close, face tilting up toward her. She knew how to shut him up, in the end. She always had.