occhi_bella (occhi_bella) wrote in fic_variations, @ 2007-07-07 20:09:00 |
|
|||
Current mood: | accomplished |
Current music: | Fairly Odd Parents |
Cross-posted to occhi_bella and unknown_fandom.
Title: Brief Encounter
Author: occhi_bella
Fandom: Sleepy Hollow (movie)
Character/Pairing: Ichabod/Katrina
Rating: T
fic_variations Prompt/Claim: the four seasons, fic 1 of 3
Word Count: 785
Spoilers: Yes.
Disclaimer: Sleepy Hollow and its characters do not belong to me.
Fall would always be his favorite season, for it was during that season that he’d met his one and only love, and the missing part of himself.
He’d arrived in the village of Sleepy Hollow in November, sent to investigate a series of macabre and grisly murders that had occurred there. It had been many years since he’d been out of the city and in a backward country town such as the one where he’d grown up. He dreaded that nearly as much as the gory nature of the killings he would be investigating; but he was determined to prove himself. His superiors had sent him there, more likely to be rid of him than to put him to any test as they had claimed. No one was interested in the reforms to the justice system that he advocated, nor did they put any stock in his ‘experimentations’, as they so politely called the scientific methods of detection that he favored. This was his one chance to prove the value of those ideas and methods.
More than the crisp chill of autumn made Ichabod Crane shiver as he stood in the center of the main street that ran through the tiny hamlet. The town was strangely empty and eerily silent. Faces appeared in second story windows of houses, peering at him for only fleeting moments before windows were promptly sealed shut, curtains drawn. This was a grim place, shrouded in darkness and gloom, that did not welcome strangers. Already he could not wait to accomplish his task and leave, and he set off for the large house at the edge of town purposefully.
Dry, brittle leaves scraped against the ground as the wind swept them along, lifting and swirling them. The fall harvest was over and the brown fields were barren and dried as far as the eye could see. Pumpkins with carved faces and candles shining fiercely from inside lighted the way along the curved, sloping road that led to the home of Baltus Van Tassel, the town elder that Ichabod had been ordered to report to upon his arrival.
Darkness and gloom were left behind as he stepped into the Van Tassel home and found himself in the midst of a warm, bright room where a festive party was in progress. Moving through it uncomfortably, his stomach in knots and his hands trembling, he kept to the outskirts of the merry crowd, not wishing to be noticed. He was never comfortable in social gatherings such as this one.
Suddenly small warm hands caught his cheeks and he stiffened as he found himself in the grasp of a young woman wearing a blindfold and lamentably the center of attention and whatever game she was playing. A sweet, rich voice asked him if he was Theodore. He blushed and managed to stammer that he was only a stranger.
“Then have a kiss on account.”
Soft, sweet lips pressed against his cheek and the floral scent of her hair wafting into his nostrils as it swept his face intoxicated him. The material of her dress brushed against his legs and his torso and his skin flushed warm underneath his clothing. Scent and feeling and texture conspired to rob him of his wits. And when she stepped back after giving him the kiss on account and removed her blindfold, his jaw dropped open as he found himself staring at the most startling big brown eyes he’d ever seen and a lovely face framed by long blonde curls that cascaded down around her shoulders. He was dazzled by her.
The playful gleam in her eyes softened into an expression of kindness and understanding as she regarded him, taking him aback somewhat. But somehow he finally managed to speak, unable to utter more than that he was looking for Baltus Van Tassel. And discovered that this girl was his daughter, Katrina.
Katrina. Katrina Van Tassel.
Lost in wistful daydreams when he was alone, he absentmindedly wrote her name over and over in his ledger in the days to follow, and drew sketches of her with and without the blindfold. Often he would scold himself, aware that his dreams were in vain. But he couldn’t help himself. He could still feel the warmth of her hands as they cupped his cheeks, the touch of her lips when she gave him the kiss on account. The more time he spent with her and the more he discovered about her, the more certain he was that she belonged by his side forever, as his wife. She even shared his love of cardinals.
No, he’d been done for at the start, with that first brief encounter and that sweetest of all kisses.