Melinda Bobbin (blowthehouse) wrote in snitchers, @ 2018-03-06 14:39:00 |
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Entry tags: | char: kirley duke, char: melinda bobbin |
Who: Kirley Duke & Melinda Bobbin
When: Tuesday, March 6th
Where: Kirley's Flat
What: Talking about their relationship, their feelings, Melinda's condition, and what it all means.
Rating: Low
Status: Logged, Nearly Completed
Kirley's birthday party had gone perfectly. Melinda had been planing it for weeks, throwing a great deal of money and work at it to make the entire night perfect. His friends, bandmates, family and some fans had been there, all to celebrate him.With pizza, cake, beer, bowling, and balloons, Mel hadn't stopped smiling all night. But there was a lingering thought in the back of her mind, a very serious thought that she needed to talk about.
She'd let a few days go by, not wanting to mar his birthday and detract from his happiness. But by Tuesday, Mel was dying to sit down and talk to him before everything got too far away from her. Kirley had promised he was hers, but how far would that promise extend if he knew the truth about her? About what she'd done the other night?
Tuesday night, following her meeting, Mel had headed back to Kirley's. She kissed him hello before slipping off to change into a pair of his boxers and a tank top. Mel joined him in the living room and tucked herself up against him, taking comfort in his warmth and scent.
But where was she supposed to start? All the questions and confusion Mel had swimming around in her brain were bumping into each other and making it all but impossible to find a starting place. "Baby," she asked quietly. "Am I your girlfriend?"
Well, that was as good of a place as any.
---
Kirley was still riding the high of his birthday party. It had been... perfect. He'd had amazing parties before, with music and lights and fireworks and everything one could imagine, but nothing had compared to what Mel had done for him. It was the kind of party a ten year old would have, but it was perfect for him. It was fun and he got to spend that time with all the people that were important to him. People that knew him for him, and knew that he had to turn the rockstar off at some point and just be simple for a bit.
Even so, he could tell that something different was going on with Mel, and had been since the moon. There was something unspoken, something lingering. He didn't know what it was, but if there was something she needed to talk about, he wasn't going to rush it. Uncomfortable conversations were never something to look forward to.
He hadn't been expecting her Tuesday, knowing she had her meeting, but he was happy to see her walk through the door. He was doodling in a notebook, jotting down lyric ideas, when she curled up into his side, wearing his clothes. Turning his head, he kissed her hair and set his book aside. It could wait.
Her words took him by surprise. A girlfriend? They were extremely close, and the feelings were there. But did they want labels? She'd already called him her boyfriend, but being that it was on the full moon, he didn't know how much she'd actually meant it. "Do you want to be?" he asked. "I've never had one of those before."
---
"The fact that you've had a wife, but not a girlfriend really speaks to the sort of person you are," Mel teased him gently. It was so easy to relax against him. Mel's body fit against his like a piece of a puzzle. They were two of the weird, confusing pieces that seemed to fit together even if you couldn't find any other pieces like them. She wound herself around him a little, tangling their fingers together, draping one leg over his. Mel squirmed around a bit until she found the perfect spot, making it hard to tell where she ended and Kirley began.
Did she want to be his girlfriend? Yes and no. Mel wanted to know she was his and he was hers, but what did that look like for them? "I think I do," she said quietly. "I like being with you and..." And she loved him. Mel hated herself for not being able to say it. The words terrified her, forcing her to recall Jonathan and everything he'd done to her. Kirley wouldn't do that, Mel knew, but giving someone that sort of power over her?
"I had a boyfriend once and he.. sort of figured out that I have a hard time saying no to my boyfriends. I mean, the wolf in me does. So when I'm with someone that I care about, really care about, and they tell me to do something, I can't ignore them. It's, um, sort of complicated and all, but I told myself I wouldn't have another boyfriend. Then you came along and I started to feel things for you and now? Now I wish I normal so I could say, yes, I want to be your girlfriend, without worrying about it."
---
He had to laugh. "We were very very high," he grinned. Though Kirley was no stranger to a good time, he hadn't been that high since he'd married Lou, and didn't plan to be again.
Sinking down into the couch as she twisted herself around him, he nuzzled into their comfortable position, his fingers running through her hair. Picking up his wand from the couch cushion beside him, he waved it towards the record player and soft music filled the flat. Had he known she was coming, he would have lit some candles. It seemed like a soft music and candles sort of conversation.
His brow furrowed as she let him in on more of what her wolfishness meant. To have no free will against a person who was supposed to care about you was an awful thing, especially if the person took advantage of that. "I'd ever do that do you," he said softly. "I'd never make you do anything you didn't want to do."
---
Even though she knew that, it felt good to hear. She needed reassurance from Kirley that he wasn't going to hurt her. She needed to know in her heart of hearts that if she told him what she was feeling, he'd hold it close and protect it, not use it against her.
She could feel her heart pounding against her ribs. They'd been sleeping together for so long and that had turned into a friendship unlike any she'd ever know. What was happening between them felt fast, but it was the result of years and years of build up, of growing closer and learning more about each other. It had been so slow, but now she was facing the final step and Mel was terrified.
"I know," she told him softy. "You're different than others. You make me forget about that part of me. You make me feel human." Mel sighed softly as his fingers moved through her hair. Wolves, she'd learned over the years, needed to be touched. They needed physical comfort more than any other kind. Kirley seemed to understand that without her having to tell him. He was a natural partner. "I have to say something to you and I'm really scared. So, please promise me that no matter how you feel about it that you'll be kind and not freak out on me, okay?"
Mel paused, just long enough for Kirley to agree. She should've turned to look at him, but for all her Gryffindor bravery, Mel found herself incapable. "I-- I--" The words died on her lips as her panic took over. She couldn't do it, couldn't bring herself to admit it. Closing her eyes, Mel sighed to herself. She was hopeless.
---
He frowned and nodded, confused about what she might have to tell him that would make him freak out. Did she have a dozen children she was hiding from him? Nothing seemed so terrible as that, so how bad could it be?
Then she could even say it, and his confusion grew. "Baby," he said, his voice soft as he lifted her chin to look at him. "Look at me. Talk to me."
---
His eyes calmed her. Mel looked into his perfectly blue eyes and felt his gentle touch on her jaw. She could do this, she told herself. Kirley was the one person she could say anything to, share anything with.
Quietly, her voice barely above a whisper, Mel spoke. Her gaze never left his as she said the fateful, scary words.
“I love you,” she told him.
---
It made sense now, her telling him to not freak out. Her saying those words never even crossed his mind. And yet...
"I'm not good with feelings," he said, his thumb running slowly along her jaw. "I put my emotions into my music, and that's easy. But saying things out loud to people has never been anything I was good at. But you... you bring something out in me that I didn't know was ever there. I find that when something happens, you're the first person I want to tell. When I wake up and you're not there I feel like I'm missing a bit of myself. You let me be me, with no expectations. So even though I'm not good with feelings, I know exactly what I feel right now."
Leaning in, he brushed his lips gently over hers. "I love you too."
---
Mel realized halfway through his speech that she'd been holding her breath. He could have broken her heart right there. If he had rejected her Mel didn't think she'd be able to come back from it. Funny the power a single person held in their hands. But, her perfect Kirley, he didn't push her away. Instead, he said exactly what she was hoping to hear. Mel's smile widened into a bright, happy grin. She blinked quickly, trying to hide the happy tears from spilling over her cheeks, but it was pointless.
Burying her face into the crook of Kirley's neck, Mel held him close. "I love you," she said again with a small laugh. "I know I just said it, but I've been thinking it for almost a week and I needed to say it again. And again. I love you so much, Kirley."
---
He laughed, a deep rumbling in his chest as she hid herself against him. "I love you too, baby," he said softly, taking her hand in his. It felt good, saying it to her. Love was a word he had always shied away from, reserved for a very select group of people. Mel was one of those people now.
"So you managed to hold it in for nearly a week? I'm impressed."
---
Pulling back to look at him again, Melinda leaned in to kiss him quickly. "I did. Since the day before the moon. But I think I knew before then. I think I've known since that morning," she told him gently. That morning had changed everything and would remember it for the rest of her life.
Sighing happily, Mel settled against Kirley. She wanted to live in this moment a little longer. The bright, happy, and perfect moment where they loved each other and weren't going to ruin it with 'what now' and 'other people' and the dozen other issues that made their love more complicated than most. For one, brief moment, Mel wished they could be normal. She wished the could be happy with each other and no one else. But that wasn't who they were and even if it would be nice, she let go of that wish instantly.
"Pretty sure you have to call me your girlfriend now," she told him with a smirk.
---
“I think that’s when it all started, that morning,” he agreed. That morning, that beautiful morning, really had changed everything. He’d never imagined it happening, but now couldn’t imagine how his life would be if it hadn’t.
He laughed again, hugging her a bit tighter into his side. “A girlfriend. What will people think?”
---
Given what she did for a living and who she was, Mel suspected people would have plenty of thoughts. Kirley Duke settling down was enough of a story. His name was already in every paper, every magazine. His conquests were discussed on a daily basis and Mel had already experienced one or two fans over the years acting poorly towards her. But to actually come out and say they were together? Mel wasn't sure how she felt about that. It'd be painting a target on her back and making life more difficult for him as well.
"That's the thing," she said. "I worry about what people will think. I don't want to stop what I do. I love my job. I always assumed I'd give it up one day, but when things started to sag and wrinkle, not when I'm still young and hot. And.. there's... there are people that I don't want to stop seeing either. I guess I'm just not sure what loving each other means for us. I'm not sure what it's supposed to look like for people like you and me."
---
“It’s supposed to look like whatever we want it to look like,” he said simply. “I was joking, love. I don’t care what they think. I don’t want you to quit your job, and I don’t want to change my habits either. You and I... I don’t think we’d ever be happy just being with each other. Not sexually at least.”
The thought of just being with one person, even someone he loved, was not appealing at all. There was so much about his life he loved, so much he didn’t want to give up, and didn’t see why he had to. They’d fallen in love with each other the way they were, why did that need to change?
“I just want us to be us.”
---
"I can't just be with you," Mel said. "You're amazing, you know that. I wouldn't be so eager to jump into your bed after all these years if that weren't the case, but there's this, I don't know, need I have." Mel supposed that defining what they were and weren't went hand in hand with admitting their feelings for each other. She wasn't fond of big conversations like this, but Kirley was the exception to that. He always would be.
"Being a werewolf isn't easy. It really fucks with you. Last week, I was with someone the night before the moon and I almost lost control. It scared me because I've never felt like that before, but I talked to Remus and he said it wasn't unusual. He told me that I'm going to want rougher sex sometimes, that I'm going to crave more physical sex depending on the moon cycle and I can't ask that of you. You're... I love you too much to be with you like that. You're the person I want to hold me as I heal from the moon, the one I want kissing me better and whispering to me while we fall asleep."
Melinda worried so much about hurting Kirley. She was terrified he wouldn't understand and how could he? She barely understood it. There were two sides to Mel and she struggled each day with balancing them. "You make me want to be human, but I need to let the other part of me out sometimes too."
---
Kirley sighed and looked down at their hands. "I love all of you," he said. "Every single bit. But I know that I can't be what that part of you needs. You I don't mind a bit of roughness now and then, but that sort of thing... if you've found someone who can do that for you, be that for you, then I'm glad. I just want you taken care of."
It stung a bit, that he couldn't be everything she needed, but then again, neither could she. He needed and wanted things that she couldn't provide. "I'll always be here for the morning after."
---
There wasn't much that would make Mel cry. But Kirley loving her that much, accepting a part of her that Mel struggled with every day? It was more than she could possibly have hoped for. His words struck her to her very core and Mel felt her eyes water up and the tears spill over. She leaned up to kiss him, her cheeks wet as she poured every ounce of her love and emotion into the kiss. No matter what happened, Mel knew that she loved him. However it looked for them, even though it was bound to get messy at times, she loved him.
"That was the best thing you could have ever said to me, baby. I don't know what I'd do without you." She kissed him again and again, peppering his cheeks and neck with soft, feathery kisses.
---
Wrapping his arms around her, he couldn't help chuckling a laugh into the kiss. There was just so much emotion there, emotion that he wasn't used to, didn't know how to deal with, so he just had to laugh.
With his arms around her, he leaned them back to stretch out on the couch, holding her close before propping himself up above her. "No crying," he murmured, wiping her cheeks with his thumb before pressing a soft kiss to her lips. "Keep it up and I'll start crying. Then we'll really be in trouble."
---
"We can't have that," Mel said with a smile. Her heart was practically bursting. Looking up at Kirley, Mel realized that she would be perfectly happy staring up at him for the rest of her life. If she'd had that thought a year ago, Mel would've run away screaming. If she had realized that a month ago, it would've freaked her out to no end. But now, with the love and support he was so freely giving her, Mel found that she wasn't even a little scared.
"We're already in trouble though," she pointed out and moved her hands to his hips. 'Kirley Duke, Bachelor Extraordinaire, has a girlfriend. Your poor fans are going to cry themselves to sleep when people find out. And given how adored you are, Diagon Alley will flood."
---
“Those poor poor lads and lasses,” he grinned, cupping her cheek. “Their fantasies ruined. How ever will I live with myself.”
He grinned again, then sobered a bit, looking down at her and shaking my head. “Never mind the fans, do you know what the lads are going to say? They are never going to let me live this down.”
---
Idly running her hand up and down his arm, Melinda felt herself relax. Kirley calmed her, he always had. When he was close, Melinda felt a sense of peace she didn't know anywhere else in the world. "You don't have to tell anyone," she offered. "People can wonder all they want, but this can be for us. We've been telling everyone for years we're just friends, right? So if you don't want that to change, I'm okay with it, honestly."
Kirley had so much more to lose by coming out. His fans would be upset. He had a family, he had his band. And, honestly, what did she have? Mel knew there was only one person she'd tell, no one else really needed to know about her personal life.
---
Easing himself down, he laid his body on top of hers, nuzzling his face into her neck. “Maybe we should keep it from the public for a bit, but not everyone else. The band can know. My family. Your friends. But I know if we go announcing things, even though the Weekly has been spouting off their shit, our managers will likely completely lose it.”
He placed a kiss against her neck then, his lips moving over her soft skin. “But I for one plan on marching into the studio and announcing that I am in love with the most wonderful woman. And then swallowing my pride as Myron will undoubtedly do a victory dance all over the bloody room.”
---
Who would she tell? Her friends weren't... well they were friends, sure. People that Mel drank with and ate with, but she'd never been super close to them. Kirley was the first person she'd considered a real friend. She could tell Lilith though, she supposed. This seemed like the sort of thing she should share with her cousin. And she'd have to tell Cassius, but that was a whole other issue.
"Keeping it quiet sounds perfect," she said, grinning as he settled down on top of her. "Are you ever going to tell me what your mother said, by the way? Or do I have to wonder about that until your next birthday?" She giggled as he kissed her, her fingers moving through his hair lightly. This was perfect. Utterly and perfectly perfect.
---
He grinned against her skin, then lifted up on his elbow a bit so he could look down at her. "Well I can tell you that my sister is your biggest fan right now, because the entire birthday breakfast was focused on you and I, and not a word was asked about who she was seeing."
Kirley cleared his throat, readying himself to recap the conversation from the breakfast. "My father is completely smitten with you. My mother has always been the more skeptical one. She, of course, has read about you in the papers. But she knows I lead an... unconventional lifestyle, so as far as that goes it was the usual 'As long as you're safe' speech. But as for you personally... She was impressed that you came to the house to personally invite them to the party. Having not met them before, you stepped into the lion's den on your own. She liked that."
---
"Well, Gryffndor," she said by way of explanation. Going to Kirley's family home had been terrifying. They didn't know her and Mel knew exactly what sort of thing was said about her in the press. She had no way of knowing beforehand if Kirley had told them anything about her. But having his family at his party was important and Mel could subject herself to something terrifying if it made him happy. Leaning up again, Mel brushed her lips, nipping gently at his bottom lip.
"Do you want to go get some dinner? I haven't eaten in like two hours, I'm starving. And if we don't get off this sofa now, our pants are going to be coming off. Not that I object to you being pantless, but fooooooood."