Chapter Text
Gendry: I don’t know if you care—but my show is Friday in the East Gallery by the bay.
She hated herself a little bit—seeing how defensive the text was, as if he didn’t think she’d want to go. Because of course she’d want to go—she had to, couldn’t not, really, not after he had worked so hard, not after the hours she had spent posing.
She dressed carefully, putting on a blue dress that she’d gotten as a hand-me-down from her mother (it had fit her mother when she was twelve and was one of the only pieces that Arya even fit into). She didn’t think she’d ever worn it to the studio, or when out and about with him. She washed her hair, and clipped it back, thinking idly that she’d need to get a haircut before her final performances for her dance classes because it was a little too long and would only get in her face while she danced. Then she left, walking slowly east in the opposite direction of Gendry’s studio.
There were a lot of people in the gallery, drinking wine and laughing and looking at the paintings. Many of them were wearing dark clothing, some had piercings or tattoos or strange makeup and almost all of them ignored her when she walked into the room. She didn’t mind though. She wanted to be a wallflower here. What if they thought the art was bad and laughed at her?
Her breath caught in her throat when she saw the first one. It was the one from when she’d sprained her ankle and made fun of him for always making her look away. Purple and yellow seemed to spread up her leg and she felt like it was a blight—a curse somehow making its way up...that was her body, wasn’t it? She’d never seen it that way before. Pale and smooth and precise, the shading of her shoulder, the way her neck arched slightly over the floor as she twisted her head.
And there was another one—another her, in a different style this time. Splotches of color as she leapt through the air, as if she were moving too fast to really be captured, and yet you could tell that she was there, leaping, and that her leap was something incredible to behold.
There was the one of her curled in on herself—and the one where she’d lost all feeling in her foot because the blood had drained out of it—and the one where she’d started narrating the lives of the ducks at Gendry because she’d been so bored and all of them were her, and all of them were beautiful.
She made her way down the row of paintings, hearing words like “a lovely idea” and “really got style” and “the model was fantastic,” until she’d reached the last one—the one where she’d been in a standing split, unable to keep a straight face because all she could think of was that dream where he’d painted her cunt. And you could see it in her face—the twinkle in her eye, the embarrassed amusement in the way she was—had she been biting her lip that day? She couldn’t remember. And yet there she was, her lower lip sucked in between her teeth. Her eyes were huge and grey in her long face and took up every ounce of energy and—
“I didn’t think you’d come.”
She turned slowly, looking up at him. His arms were crossed over his chest, and she could tell he was trying not to look upset, and trying also not to look relieved, but he somehow couldn’t hide either emotion.
“I—” she started, but how could she finish it? How could she apologize—right here, right now, in the middle of his shindig, without somehow—no. She wouldn’t ruin it by saying sorry. She couldn’t. She needed to stop thinking that way. Sansa was right. If he didn’t let her try and make amends, he wasn’t worth it. “I’m sorry. I...it’s complicated. And I want to explain it to you. Maybe after this is over?”
He jerked a nod and made to leave. Then, because she knew he couldn’t stop himself, he said, “I’m glad you came.”
“Me too.”
He left. She waited, wandering up and down the row of paintings several more times, taking sips of wine in a fine imitation of an art critic and noticing little details that she hadn’t noticed before. Freckles in just the right places, the way that whenever her face was forward, he had—as he’d said—spent too much time on it. And there was no denying it—these paintings were beautiful—every last one of them. Gendry and his eyes, and his hands—his vision and his art—he had made her beautiful—more beautiful than Syrio had with his choreography or Mycah with his words of love and his lips on her throat.
She felt him approach more than heard him and turned to see him standing a few feet back from her, watching her look at the paintings.
“They’re lovely,” she said.
“Thanks.”
“You should think about becoming an artist or something. Go to school for it or something.”
His lips twitched in an almost-smile. He gestured towards two armchairs in a corner and she followed him there, putting her wine glass down on one of the little tables.
She sat, perching on the edge of her chair, hardly able to breathe. She waited for him to say something, but he didn’t. So she had to.
“I’m sorry,” she said, “For running out like that. For not calling you back, or letting you know what was going on. I didn’t really know myself. And that scared me. But I think I do know what it is now.”
“Oh?” he said, nodding, his face completely neutral.
“Yeah.” She didn’t elaborate, not while her head was spinning. He was angry, she could tell—so angry and she needed to make him understand but…
No, he wasn’t angry because she had been upset. He wouldn’t be angry at her for her own troubles. He was just...he was angry. He was an angry person—he’d said so himself. He was hard to know, hard to be close to because he—
“I didn’t mean to make you upset,” she said at last. “I mean—I didn’t mean to make you feel like you’d been abandoned, or that I didn’t want you in my life anymore, because that’s not true. That would never be true. I just...I didn’t really know what was going on. And I think that made everything worse. Certainly it did, because when I figured it out, I realized what a big fucking mess I’d made, and realizing that I’d hurt you really...it made it all worse.”
Gendry seemed to go limp in his chair, every ounce of defiant anger gone and suddenly he just looked weary.
“What the fuck am I?” he muttered. “That you’d feel worse about making me feel like shit than whatever shit made you feel like shit to begin with. Why the fuck do you even go near me?” He ran his hands over his face and she noticed—
“What happened to your hand?”
“What? Oh,” he let out a snort. “You slammed it in my door. Broke three of my fingers.”
Arya’s hands flew to her mouth in horror. “Oh gods. I am so sorry. Gendry—it wasn’t your—”
“Nah. It was my right hand. I’m a lefty.”
“Me too,” Arya said, a smile crossing her lips.
“Really?”
“Yeah.”
He grinned at her, but not for long. A moment later his face was sad again. “Arya—I’m shit. I really am. You shouldn’t—”
“You’re not,” she said vehemently.
“I am—whatever I did to make you upset—I’m sorry. And I’m more sorry that I compounded that by making you feel bad about all of my issues.”
“Yeah? And I’m sorry about what I did to make you upset. And I’m more sorry that I compounded it by making you feel bad about all of my issues.”
Gendry blinked at her. “We’re a mess?” he suggested.
“A big one,” she agreed. “But I don’t think it’s bad. Because we’re not in denial about it or anything. If anything...I think it’s good. Because you actually really help me push through my shit and...and maybe that’s what made it so horrifying when…” she made a face, knowing he’d know what she meant.
“What did I do, by the way?” he asked, and she knew from his tone that he knew.
“You called me beautiful.” She stared at him dead in the face and watched as nervousness spread there—then pained confusion.
“Arya. You are though.” He spoke the words slowly, carefully, as though he were afraid she would cry and run away again.
She closed her eyes. It didn’t hurt this time. She’d known it was coming—but all the same, she almost couldn’t believe it. She didn’t know if she could believe anyone telling her she was beautiful anymore. But if she could believe it of anyone—she’d believe it of Gendry.
“I love you,” she said. “That’s why it hurt as much as it did. As it does. I don’t know. It’s...body shit, you know?”
Gendry was looking down at his hands, his left hand weaving through the fingers of his right. “Why?” he asked. “I’m toxic.”
“You know, I think you say that because it’s easier to blame yourself for the shitty people around you than it is to just admit they were shitty to you.”
His head jerked up and he stared at her at her and for a moment, she thought it was his turn to flee. But he didn’t . This time, it was his turn smile wryly. “Maybe.”
“This is why we aren’t bad for one another. This is...we help. We want to help the other. To keep the other one from hurting—and…” she gulped. “And I think we can do that. I think we can. I think we can be there for one another and—”
“You don’t have to try and convince me, Arya,” he said gently. “I’ve been in love with you for a while. I just didn’t think you—I don’t know. I think I’m a bit of an idiot, really.”
She felt the grin creep up her face again, wider than it had been in months—years maybe. “Well, you are,” she said. And she leaned forward and kissed him.
*
They ended up back at Gendry’s apartment, as it was closer than her dorm room. It was like something out of a movie—or maybe just out of someone else’s life. At no point in her own life had she ever held someone’s hand, walking hurriedly down the street because they needed a room and fast. At no point in her life had she felt so confident, so sure that this time—nothing would go wrong, because they’d fucked up well and good before, but now they knew where they were and why they were.
Gendry had to release her hand when they reached the front door of his apartment building and she saw that his hands were trembling as he jammed the key into the lock and pushed it open with the elbow of his right arm, finding her hand with his left again as he led her up the stairs. His hand was shaking even more when he pushed open the door to his apartment, but the moment that she had closed the door behind him, everything was different. He threw his keys on the kitchen table as she sprung at him, her arms trembling around his neck, pulling herself up onto the tips of her toes as he bent down to kiss her, groaning as he did. He tasted like wine and cheese and Gendry—that same Gendry underneath everything else that she’d kissed how many times now? But it was all the better because he had picked her up and was carrying her down the narrow hallway to his bedroom, kicking the door open behind him as he did, never once breaking the kiss, or stopping the way that his tongue was massaging hers, as if all he wanted was to keep them connected as much as possible the entire way.
He lost his balance—she rather expected on purpose to land them on his bed and he bit her tongue.
“Ah—fuck.”
“Ow!”
“Sorry—I—Hang on.” He twisted slightly so he was no longer underneath her and got up going into the bathroom. She heard the faucet running and a brief hiss. When he came back, he had his right hand wrapped in a towel and a sheepish expression on his face. “I sometimes forget my fingers are broken.”
“Sorry about that,” Arya said, reaching for him. He settled down next to her, smiling wryly.
“Yeah. I mean...I just need to not do stupid things with them—like putting both our weight on them.”
She laughed, and kissed him, and he reached up and held her face with his good hand, his fingers so soft, so gentle against her skin. He broke the kiss and traced her lips with his fingers, eyes flickering between hers and she felt warm, she felt safe and she felt her stomach twist in anticipation as his expression turned wicked. He bent down and kissed her on her neck, sucking and nipping and, as if his lips had some magical heating ability, the blood flowing between her head and the rest of her body was somehow, suddenly, inexplicably on fire—and she didn’t care—couldn’t care because it felt too right, having his lips on her neck, his hand at her waist, gently pushing her back so she was lying on the bed.
He was covering her—fully and completely now, propping himself up with his good hand while he ran the thumb of his right hand along her collarbone, kissed her neck and she was sure that tomorrow it would look like she’d been hanged because he was giving her a positively thorough ring of hickies, but she didn’t care, she was breathless—running her fingers through his hair, her legs along his, feeling the skirt of her dress ride up but what did she care—she couldn’t care at all. Clothing didn’t matter around Gendry—not when he’d already seen everything, painted everything. He probably knew what she looked like naked better than she did.
His lips had moved from her neck now—moving lightly now, ghosting over the upper curve of her breast as he struggled with the buttons on the front of her dress. He cursed quietly. Arya laughed.
“You know, I was going to be a whole lot more impressive with all this before you broke my fingers,” he teased.
“More fool you—getting your fingers stuck in the door. You need to sort out your priorities.” She reached down and ran her own fingers through his hair, then undid the buttons on his behalf. He sat up, letting her shimmy out of the dress. Then, for good measure, she unhooked her bra.
“And there goes my opportunity to impress you with my impressive one-handed bra-removal skills,” he said dryly.
“Well, we’ll have to have a rain check then,” she shrugged. He was staring at her, the same way he had the last time, blue eyes wide, face awed. “You act like you’ve never seen them before,” she said, shifting to her knees so her eyes were on level with his.
“It’s different—painting,” he mumbled. He glanced down and ran a thumb over her nipple. Arya shivered slightly. “Like—I don’t know. I can’t explain it. It’s not...it’s not sexual, painting you naked. I don’t think about...I know what everyone thinks, but it’s not that way, you know? I mean, was posing for me a sexual thing?”
She shook her head.
“So—this—” and he looked down at her chest again, and let out a groan. “This is a whole different matter.” He bent his head and kissed the top of her breasts, then, looked up, his eyes asking a question. She nodded and his lips drew the tips of her nipples into his mouth, so tenderly, so gently, sweeping his tongue over her flesh. She sighed, closing her eyes, gripping his shoulders and letting herself do nothing—feel nothing except the way her nipple was now on fire and the way her clit was throbbing between her legs. And then his mouth was gone, and he switched breasts, and the cool air on the wetness his mouth had left behind raised goosebumps, and now with every tiny movement of his face, of his hands, of his hair against her skin, she felt it—as though every rise and fall of her flesh was somehow designed to capture him, bring him closer to her, make her more alight than she had been before. And all the while, his mouth was on her tit, and—and it felt like no matter how much she tried to pay attention to everything else, every other sensation filling her body, she couldn’t because he was there, sucking, licking, biting—
She hissed.
“Bad?” he asked.
“Do it again?” she replied, unsure. He nipped again and, not unexpected this time, the sting of his teeth felt right.
“Should I stop?” he asked her. She shook her head and felt his lips quirk into a smile against her breast as he nipped again.
“You’re a biter, aren’t you?” she asked.
“Oh yes,” he said, grinning. “I terrorized people as a toddler.”
“While I would love to hear that story, I don’t particularly want to think about you as a toddler right now.”
“Oh?”
She pulled away from him, placing two fingers under his chin and bringing him back up to a sitting position. She shook her head and kissed him. The hand with the broken fingers came up to cup her chin, and she reached down and tugged his t-shirt up, pulling it up over his head and tossing it aside.
She’d never seen him shirtless before—not once. And she found that she quite liked it. All the muscles his t-shirts had threatened were there, defined and bulging and the sight of it made Arya’s mouth water. She pushed him down so he lay flat on his back, then sat astride him in just her underwear, feeling the press of his cock through his blue jeans, and running her hands over the panels of muscles on his stomach, on his chest, feeling the texture of his chest hair, circling the flat disks of his nipples with her fingers, watching as they puckered under her touch.
“Fucking shit, Arya,” he breathed up at her, eyes full of wonder, and she grinned, pinching his nipples gently between her fingers. He let out a hiss. She smiled, and lowered her mouth to his chest, rubbing her lips in the short curls on his chest before before taking one of his nipples between her teeth and sucked, licked, nipped. Gendry let out a hiss, and she felt his hips rise underneath her as he tried to rub his cock between her legs. She chuckled against his skin and sat back up.
His eyes were closed now, his lips slightly parted, and a flush was high on his cheeks, his neck, even parts of his chest. Arya lifted her hips and his eyes snapped open even as he made a whimper of protest. But Arya ignored him, finding the button of his jeans, and the fly, and tugging them and his boxers down his legs. The great idiot had left his shoes on, and so she left them at his ankles.
She’d known just by feeling it through layers of clothes, but his cock was big. And as she stared at him, she saw him smile wolfishly out of the corner of her eye. It was that smile—more than anything—that made her do it. She slipped back up the bed, lowered her head over it, and took him into her mouth. He let out another yelp of “fuck, Arya” and she heard the sound of his head hitting the pillow as he dropped it back down, while she sucked him into her mouth, bobbing up and down, letting her tongue trace the thick veins, her hands cupping his balls as she did. She felt him shifting slightly—kicking off his shoes and heard the thump of his pants hitting the ground as well. She let her lips catch along the tip of his penis as she pulled away, her tongue circling the head, feeling salty moisture dribble out before taking him in as far as he would go again. She felt the bob of it, the weight of it when she pulled away again, the way it twitched when she found a spot just where the head met the shaft and she smiled, and sucked, and sucked until—
Gendry pulled away from her, twisting his hips so she couldn’t reach his cock anymore. His pupils were so blown that his eyes were more black than blue and he drew her mouth to his with his broken fingers, slipping his unbroken ones between the cotton of her underpants and the—
She gasped as his fingers circled her clit, warm and sturdy and so very there and she felt like there was an electric current going through her body, rolling through her once, twice, again and again and—gods on earth—she—
She pulled away—not quite ready to come—not just yet—not when they hadn’t even—
She made a pretext of stripping away her underwear, letting him see her fully before leaning down and kissing him again. It was a slow kiss, a gentle one—a lazy one—and for a moment, she felt her heart calm down, her pulse slow slightly, her breathing steady. And when Gendry broke the kiss, he pressed his forehead to hers.
“Arya?” he asked. She knew what he was asking, and she nodded. He reached sideways, and she heard him opening a drawer in his bed stand. He reached his other hand around and then muttered, “Ah fucking—”
She glanced sideways, then let out a giggle. He couldn’t open the condom foil—the splint on his fingers wouldn’t let him. She took the condom out of his hands, and opened it, then she slid down and pressed a close-lipped kiss to the tip of his cock, a small drop of cum rising to meet her lips, before rolling the latex down him.
“Thanks,” he muttered.
“Least I could do, considering I caused the problem,” she said. Then she scooted back up the bed and straddled him, feeling the way his dick slid up the crack of her rear. Then, she looked down, lifted herself slightly, and guided him into her. They both hissed, and she saw Gendry’s eyelids flutter. She closed her eyes for a moment, feeling the stretch of him, the warmth of him, that distinct feeling of a cock inside her, twitching even though they were both perfectly still. And oh—she could love him, she really could, because this was right, this was how they were supposed to be—right here, together, fused and whole and right.
She kissed his neck, tasting the salt of his sweat and feeling the way his pulse was racing through her lips. And then they began—rocking together, moving as one, shifting hips and matching little gasps of one another’s names. They began slowly, so gently, so carefully, sharing little kisses. She reached up her hands to cup his face, to run fingers through his hair, and his hands rested on her ass, squeezing with one hand, guiding rhythm as she rose and fell over him. His breath was coming in shorter and shorter spurts, his eyes were squeezed tightly shut, and he let out a moan and she felt heat inside her, throbbing as he stilled his thrusts and tightened his grip on her hips for just a moment as he came, quietly, with a whispered “Arya…”
They stayed still for a moment, as Gendry breathed, and pressed his lips to the dip between her collarbones.
“Gods, Arya,” but he kissed her again, like he didn’t know what else to say, like her name was the only word he knew. She lifted herself off him gently and helped him unroll and tie the condom. Then she curled herself around him, holding his face to hers as they kissed. It was a slow kiss—though she felt something urgent in his lips and felt his hand drift down between her legs. He ran his fingers over her cleft, circling his thumb over her clit and she felt the muscles of her cunt clench. He rubbed, and rubbed, and rubbed, circling one way, and then the other, slipping his fingers along her outer lips, then her inner lips, then back up to her clit, gentle one moment, then insistent the next and Arya was trembling, shaking, and—
She came apart, feeling as though she were falling, as though she were flying, as though everything around her was moving except Gendry and his warmth and his hand on her clit. Her body pulsed, her heart throbbed, and all she could think was if the world ended—that moment, the two of them together—she would die happy, perfectly and pristinely happy.
They fell asleep in one another’s arms, spent and content. And when Arya woke the next day—the happy feeling hadn’t dissipated. If anything, looking over at Gendry, his face slack in sleep, one arm under her head, the other resting in the curve between her hip and her rib cage, she felt it increase.
*
She spent the rest of the weekend in Gendry’s bed, alternating between sleeping and fucking and smiling quietly at one another in a way that would ordinarily have made Arya want to vomit, but which somehow just felt right. Gendry’s smile, it seemed, was a balm—and even though she knew the weekend would come to an end, she couldn’t really think about it because she was here with him, and he was here with her—and finally, it seemed, they understood one another, and every little piece of frustration and nervousness faded away, leaving Arya feeling warm and peaceful.
On Sunday night, she kicked herself out, though.
“You could stay,” he suggested, watching her as she dressed for the first time in two days with a marginally forlorn expression on his face.
“I need to finish my Targaryen essay,” she sighed.
“Who cares about Targaryens? They’re all secret Baratheons anyway.”
Arya rolled her eyes and he grinned at her. “And I should probably rest a little bit before tech week,” she added.
“Tech week?” Gendry asked.
“For my final performances. Next Thursday and Friday.”
“Oh,” he said, frowning. “So that means you won’t be free, then?”
She shook her head, trying not to let her heart sink. “Not really. I should actually write my essay. I should have finished it already. I meant to last week, but I was a bit of a head case… Don’t you have finals or anything?” she asked, suddenly curious. She realized she didn’t actually know what classes he was taking.
“I have a web-design project that will take me forty-five minutes. But my critiques are over at this point, so I’m completely free.”
“Well—watch Not-So-Silent Sisters VI and think of me,” she suggested, grinning, leaning down and kissing him even as she buttoned up her dress.
“I don’t know if that would be a good idea,” Gendry teased.
“Oh?”
“Yeah. They’ll be boring in comparison.”
She raised her eyebrows at him. “What, are you trying to get good boyfriend points with me or something? We’ve sent each other dozens of pornos. I know you watch them.”
Gendry rolled his eyes at her. “Think about it this way—porn is porn. But you’re art. And as great as porn is—” he reached out rubbed some of the blue fabric through his fingers, “Art is better. You’re better.”
“Smooth.”
“I rather thought so.”
“Text me later?” she asked, kissing him quickly.
“Obviously.”
*
And so on Thursday she danced—danced precisely, arching and bending, and swaying, and leaping as she was supposed to. The theater was full to bursting, and the wail of the guitar solo seemed to be a breath of air as Arya pranced across the stage, elation in her bones, joy in her heart.
She knew Gendry was in the audience. And Jon, and Sansa, and Shireen, and Dev, even. Jon’s friends from his master’s program were there too—Gilly and Sam, and Grenn and Pyp and Satin and Edd, whom she hoped would take inspiration from the Tears of Lys and write some good music for a change. Sitting in the front row was Sandor Clegane, looking thoroughly grouchy, and she couldn’t see his face fully because of the shadows in the audience, but she thought she might see something close to approval when she leapt her way in a ovular path around Hot Pie and Lommy and their mirroring jigs. But none of that really mattered—not even Gendry, though when she stood still, when she was waiting in the wings to come back on stage, she looked for him in what sliver of the audience she could see.
Because she was dancing, dancing as she’d never danced before, dancing as only Mycah had ever seen her dance—and she was flying.