it is not dying

by violentdarlings

Summary:

Will gives them another six months.

Notes:

I don't even.

Title from 'Tomorrow Never Knows' from the Sucker Punch soundtrack. Me Before You belongs to Jojo Moyes.

Chapter 1: it is not dying

The morning before they’re due to leave for Switzerland, Will wakes before dawn, the dark oppressive, the sound of Louisa’s voice ringing in his ears. Not the bright bell of her laughter, or the low fervent pleading she uses when she wants him to do something (and he’s man enough, to admit that it works), but the hysterical sobbing she’d unleashed in Mauritius. God, the sound of it, it’s enough to drive a man mad.

Nathan is there after dawn, his lips compressed into a thin line, the suitcases already packed in the hall. Will doesn’t speak, and neither does Nathan, the routine between them familiar enough by now that they do not need to speak. Will can’t imagine not doing this every day, except he can, and he thrills to it.

And suddenly it’s time and Clark isn’t there and he’s never imagined he’d have to do this without her.

Will rolls outside and stops sharply, nearly crunching over Nathan’s foot (who’s come to ‘see him off’ with suspiciously red eyes). By the front of the castle are his parents, his mother as white as the grave, looking as if she’s aged ten years overnight. Or perhaps the age has crept up on her ever since the accident, and Will had not noticed it until this moment. And his father… flawed, as ever, but there’s nothing to be done about that now.

Abruptly, Will thinks of Louisa, Clark, with a sudden visceral desire that feels like the strongest thing in years. Almost stronger than the desire for all this to end, almost stronger than the fear of what might happen next. It eclipses the need to protect her from any further attachment to him, to minimise as much as possible the impact his death will have on her. Louisa. She will not come to watch him die.

“Will?” his mother says, and Will twitches his finger and thumb. It is the closest he can come to clenching his fists.

“Six more months, and not a minute longer,” he snaps, and wheels his chair around sharply. He heads back into the annexe, past Nathan’s stunned expression, ignoring the sound of muffled crying behind him. He’s not sure whether it’s his mother or his father. It could be either. It could be both. He doesn’t care.

Louisa.

 

His mother must call her, because she flies into the room not an hour later, her hair a mess and her coat buttoned up wrong. She stops at the threshold, her hand on the doorframe as if she needs the support, and Christ, her eyes. “Clark,” Will says, because he has to say something, and the tears in her eyes overflow like she only just needed a word from him to break.

“You bastard,” she says, and Will tilts his head back, accepts it.

“I know,” he says, but Louisa isn’t listening. Will just watches as she stumbles forward, and then another step, and another, until she’s close enough to touch, if only he could.

“God,” she chokes, and her knees give out from underneath her. It physically hurts Will not to be able to lift her up, cradle her in his arms, and he’d thought he was used to pain by now. “Will,” she says, like his name is an invocation, and lays her head on his useless knee, wraps her arms around his calves like he’s the only thing anchoring her to the world. “Will. I was so scared.” Will swallows, and his eyes are stinging.

“I know, Clark,” he says again, because he’s an idiot and he doesn’t know what else to say. Clark looks up. Her eyes are red and her cheeks are blotchy and he thinks she’s never been prettier. She pulls herself up by the wheelchair, climbs onto his lap, presses her cheek to his collarbone and inhales like she’s breathing him in.

“Your mum says six more months,” she says, and fucking hell, her eyes look like they’re filled with stars. Will nods, because there aren’t words. “Thank God. Thank you, Will.”

Six more months. The last six endured for this day, and look what he’s gone and done. All for this shaking, tear-stained girl curled into his lap and mumbling thanks to a God that he doesn’t even know if she believes in.

Maybe she’s willing to believe. For him. And isn’t that a terrifying thought.

 

Clark refuses to get off his lap, and Will is secretly pleased, but things have to be discussed. He calls his parents and Nathan in, and Louisa adjusts her seat across his lap until she can make eye contact with the others. Her breath stirs rather distractingly against his cheek, but Will can manage. Nathan is fighting down a smile, Will’s dad looks bewildered, and he cannot read his mother’s expression at all.

When the others have gone, and it’s just him and Clark again, Will moves his chair until they’re in front of the gardens. “I’m going to come and live with you again,” Louisa says against his neck, and Will turns his head to see as much of her as he can.

“What?” he asks. “You didn’t mention that.” She hadn’t; she’d discussed everything else, calmly and reasonably, with his parents and Nathan, but she hadn’t mentioned that.

“It’s not their business,” Louisa replies. “It’s ours.” Will has to look away for a moment.

“We won’t both fit,” he says, when he’s sure his voice will be level. Clark flutters an eyelid open.

“In the annexe?” she asks teasingly. Will butts his forehead against her cheek rebukingly.

“In my bed,” he elaborates, and Lou opens both eyes to peer at him.

“Will Traynor, I am not sharing a bed with you!”

“You have before,” he reminds her, a smile tugging at his mouth. Louisa’s mouth falls open in outrage.

“Will!” Her voice rises to a shriek. Her cheeks are red again, this time with indignation, and he wants to kiss her.

“Clark,” he returns, tilting his head back. Louisa’s eyes flick down to his mouth and back, so fast Will thinks he might have imagined it. It’s gratifying, how much she obviously likes him, because Louisa’s never been able to hide her feelings. She leans forward, until he can smell the scent of her skin and her hair, see the individual strands of her eyelashes. “Clark,” he says, “we shouldn’t.”

“Why not?” she asks. Will rests his forehead against hers. He’s so tired. He can’t imagine enduring another six months of this.

“Because it’ll make it worse for you, when I go,” he replies. Louisa’s expression softens.

“You’re wrong,” she says gently, and this time when she leans in, Will can’t bring himself to pull away. Her mouth is soft, and all the kisses they’ve had up until now have been gentle. Will doesn’t want gentle. He wants to crush her in his arms and lift her off her feet and sometimes it doesn’t seem real, what’s happened, but Christ it feels real now.

 

It’s only later that it occurs to him that the old Will (the real Will, as it can’t help but think of it) would have never had a chance with Louisa Clark. Louisa as she’d been, scared and scarred and paralysed on the inside just as Will is on the outside. Will never would have looked at her twice, and Clark never would have let him within arm’s reach.

The old world versus the new one: to be the man he was, or to have Clark in his life. It’s a question for the philosophers more than it is a question for Will; thinking about it makes his head hurt. The only people he could imagine talking to it about is Clark herself, and she would take it poorly, or Nathan, but somehow Will doesn’t want to.

Things change, and they stay the same. Louisa moves into the spare room properly, and Will can drive his chair past it whenever he likes and see the wardrobe left open carelessly, her bright dresses and shoes peeking out. He does this multiple times a day. Louisa doesn’t notice, or if she does, she’s kind enough not to comment. He worries that she’ll become sick of him, being by his side day in and day out, but she seems to be revelling in it. She makes multiple cups of tea, sings to herself while she vacuums, and practically dances around the annexe like she had that last night in Mauritius, before everything went to shit.

And she feeds him his breakfast and his lunch and his dinner and it’s bearable, because it’s her. She kisses him occasionally, she seems to not want to overwhelm him, and he hasn’t found the words yet to let her know he’d be quite pleased if she never stops kissing him. At night, after Nathan’s helped him into bed, she’ll settle in the chair by his bed (or occasionally, on the bed itself) and read; after a night or two, he asks her to read aloud. She flushes pink but does as he asks, and that’s how Will reads the Hobbit for the first time, in the tones of her voice, seeming more real than anything he’s ever read before.

He begins to count the days again, but rather than counting down, he is counting up. Every day spent with Clark, with her to smooth the edges of his life like balm on an open wound. It is not bearable, not precisely, but it is not as bad as it was. Even the spasms and the pain seem to be lessened, it feels like he can lift his hand just a fraction more, when she’s there. He knows it’s a scientific impossibility, that it’s his perception of his condition rather than his condition itself that changes. It doesn’t matter. It feels real, and Will’s come to put a great deal of stock in that.

 

He’s in bed, and she’s reading. She’s talked him into the first Harry Potter book, and to Will’s surprise, he’s not hating it as much as he thought he would. But more than a boy wizard’s adventures, Clark is what is captivating him, the fall of her hair over her eyes, the smile in her voice as she reads.

He must have said her name because Louisa closes her book, her voice a little breathless, and comes over to kiss him. Will turns his head so her lips touch his mouth instead of his cheek, and he feels her smile against his skin. He wonders if he could emboss it into his flesh, a permanent reminder of when she loved him, against the day that she might not.

“Cheeky,” she says fondly, and he smirks at her. She adjusts his pillows gently. “Good night, Will.” She leaves, and like every night for the past week, he listens to her settle in for the night. The flop of her down onto the mattress, the snick of the lamp being turned off, the muffled thump as she twists in the sheets trying to get comfortable. All the tiny independent motions he knows she takes for granted, that most people take for granted, but that he’d kill to perform, now. God. To just once feed himself dinner.

He must sleep, because he’s aware of waking up, something altered in the atmosphere of the annexe. There’s a noise out there. Will listens, flicking a glance at the clock; only half an hour has passed. He’s not quite sure what’s going on out there. All is dark, so Louisa hasn’t gotten up for a cup of tea or to use the loo.

And then there’s a gasp, and a sweet, broken little noise almost like a whimper, and Will knows exactly what it is happening out there. The memory of that hasn’t been taken from him yet, thank Christ. He listens, intent, aware of his skin prickling strangely, aware the sensation is nothing more than his mind playing tricks on him. The rustling continues, and the noise, and he fancies he hears irregular breathing from down the hall.

Fuck. He’s an arse. Just because she’s his… whatever, that’s no reason to listen to her get herself off. Hell, she could be thinking of anyone, it’s wrong to listen. Brad Pitt or he doesn’t know, whoever else girls fucking think of in the dark; hell, she could be thinking of her ex, someone whole and vital. Will looks at the ceiling, studies it like the cure to spinal injury is written on it, and resolutely tries to think of anything but Louisa.

“Oh, God…” And he’s lost. His imagination fills in the blanks; Clark, in glorious technicolour, the fullness of her breasts like they’d been in the red dress, her back arched, her chest heaving with exertion. Her hips snapping up against the hand tucked between her legs, her teeth sunk into her lower lip to try and keep quiet. His Clark is fucking herself out there just a few scant metres away from him.

Once, he’d be hard as nails from this. Would be reaching down to grasp himself and fuck his hand to the rhythm he imagines she’s touching herself to. But those days are over. Will’s read a thousand and one articles and papers on sex after disability (covertly, when Louisa wasn’t around, because there are some things a man can’t bear), and though some of the information was sort of relevant, other parts were downright frightening. (He could have easily lived without learning what an electric rectal probe is.) Yes, he can feel below the level of the spinal injury. Yes, he can get an erection. He knows this, from several humiliating moments with Nathan that they have both sworn never to speak of again. (Nate introduced him to the concept of a pinky promise and had gravely linked his own digit with Will’s unmoving one. Will had tartly retorted that it wasn’t much of a threat, to lose his pinky, considering it and the rest of the fingers on that fucking hand weren’t good for much. Nathan had laughed. This is why Will likes Nate, as much as he likes anyone.) Things don’t exactly work as they used to, but they still are, to a degree, theoretically possible.

And Will would rather swallow ground glass than attempt any of them. Jesus. The very thought of it is enough to bring on the beginning of a headache. He’d loved sex, before, as much as he’d loved anything that felt good and got his heart rate up. Skiing, mountain climbing, sky diving, sex. All things there aren’t any more of, in his life. What does he have? A finger and thumb that work, a little. His parents. His sister, not that he sees her. Nathan. And Louisa. Clark, out there, wanking with the thoughtless casualness of the able bodied. Christ. It’s a good thing he loves her, otherwise he’d be bloody annoyed –

“Will.”

Either his mind is starting to go or she just said his name. No, not said, fucking moaned it, moaned it like she’s just come with her hand on her cunt thinking about him. Him. Fucked up, mangled, quadriplegic Will Traynor. Not the old Will. Lou never knew the old Will. She wants him as he is now.

She goes quiet, so that must be the end. He hears the soft snore of her breathing soon after, and it takes him a long time to fall asleep.

 

In the morning, Nathan goes through the routine with Will only half paying attention. It’s all right. Nathan is used to it, from the time before Louisa, and even the time after her. Like so many days before, Nate does what needs to be done without bothering Will with an excess of chatter. That’s Clark’s department.

The day passes. Louisa feeds him lunch out in the garden, and Will looks at her hands involuntarily, wonders where they were on her skin last night. Louisa scolds him gently for being distracted, and Will snarks back, and for a while it is like nothing has changed, except everything has.

She has her bumblebee tights on and a black skirt, and a jumper with stars and suns printed on it. It’s one of the ugliest things he’s ever seen. Clark can ever be relied upon for bizarre clothing choices. And to think, once he’d thought he was capable of loving those slim, beige and cream women, each one a slightly altered duplicate of the one that came before. He can’t compare them to Clark. Louisa is a different species entirely, some rare and wild bird he has managed to cage, for a time.

She lies beside him on the bed, the world a dark emptiness banished by the tiny halo of the lamp. Louisa is reading, but he thinks she might be falling asleep; she keeps rereading lines.

“I heard you, last night,” Will says, staring up at the ceiling. He can feel Louisa tense beside him; he’s got his arm draped over her shoulders, although not by any movement of his own, and she’s definitely awake now.

“What are you talking about?” she asks, and her voice is stilted. Will shifts his head to look down at her.

“You know what I’m talking about,” he says, and Louisa’s face turns a brilliant shade of red. “Don’t blush, Clark, it’s perfectly natural.”

“Shut up,” she growls. It’s adorable, actually, like a kitten pretending to be fierce. Oh, but his Clark is fierce. He’s learned that, by now. “I hate you, Will.”

“No, you don’t,” he says. She scowls at him.

“I do,” she says, and stretches up to kiss him. “I hate you very much.”

“So much,” he observes, “that you’re here in my bed with my arm around you.” Louisa nods vigorously.

“Precisely,” she says, and when she kisses him again, this one is slower, deeper. Like sinking into the water at Mauritius, like falling into sleep. There is a new note to her voice, forced disinterest, perhaps, when she adds, “Why are you bringing it up?”

“I want you to do it for me.” It’s not what he’d intended to say, and certainly not what Louisa is expecting to hear. She chokes on air for a moment; Will eyes her, mildly distressed for the patency of her airway, and greatly distressed at what he’d been idiot enough to say.

“And you wonder why I hate you,” she manages, and the sudden tension in Will drains away. She’s not angry, or disgusted. She’s not going to leave.

“I know,” he agrees, to cover how relieved he is. “I’m a brute.”

“You are,” she says, but she won’t meet his eyes. “Will,” she murmurs. “Why do you want me to do… that?” Will contemplates it for a moment.

“Because,” he eventually says, with complete honesty, “I thought it was the sexiest thing I’d ever heard.” Louisa is pink in the cheeks again, but it is an entirely different kind of blush. “And I wanted – I wanted to see it up close.”

“It’s not decent,” Louisa says after a moment; he hears her mother in her voice. “It’s… people don’t… I shouldn’t have done it.”

“Why not?” Will asks frankly. “I used to.” Clark laughs quickly, but there isn’t much humour in it.

“Of course,” she huffs, “but you’re a bloke. Girls aren’t supposed to.” Will can’t help it, he laughs, and Louisa looks scandalised.

“I’m sorry, Clark,” he says conciliatorily. “I wasn’t laughing at you, I promise. But who told you that nonsense?” Louisa’s shoulders hunch.

“Well… no one,” she admits. “But it doesn’t seem right.”

“Yet you still do it,” Will observes. Louisa shrugs.

“Well, you’ve seen me let loose on a packet of jammy dodgers, haven’t you? It’s established I have no self-control.”

“Now that, Clark, is bullshit.” Louisa smiles after a moment, and Will understands it would not be wise to continue the current vein of conversation further. Not when that faintly speculative gleam is in Louisa’s eyes.

“So,” she says, almost coyly, although his Clark is incapable of coyness, “you liked it, then?” The shyness in Louisa is almost irresistible; Will wants to poke at it a bit.

“Very much,” he replies, letting his voice drop low, his eyes on hers. Strange, how this seductiveness business comes back to a bloke. “I’d like to watch you, Clark, but only if you’re comfortable.”

She’s quiet for a time, and Will realises she’s actually considering it, and oh fuck, he’s not prepared for this. “Can I keep my clothes on?” she asks, and Will’s heart hurts a little, at the tentativeness in her voice. Because fucking hell, she shouldn’t have ever been made to feel like she has to ask.

“Of course, Clark.”

“And you won’t –” Her voice fails her, but she’s strong, his girl, she carries on. “You won’t laugh, if I don’t – don’t do it like everyone else does?” Will grits his teeth. She’s going to be the death of him.

“I couldn’t care less how everyone else does it, Clark. It’s you I want.” Louisa bites her lip. She’s wavering, he can see it. “I could talk you through it,” Will adds spontaneously, and there’s a spark in Louisa’s eyes gone almost as quickly as it appears. But Will is an expert at reading the things that people try to hide, and he sees it. He’s not sure why this suggestion appeals to Louisa, but by God, he’ll run with it.

“Okay, then,” she murmurs, and Will waits for a moment. But her hands are still, and he realises he’s going to have to talk her through it. The reality of it isn’t as terrible as he’s thought it would be.

“Okay. Clark, kiss me.” Her mouth falls open in surprise, but she comes closer, does as she’s told. He wonders what else she’d do, his girl, this sharp-tempered big-hearted creature who thinks she loves him. Her mouth tastes like toothpaste and girl, and she kisses sweetly, almost delicately, but there’s nothing delicate about it. Will licks into the sweet of her mouth, bites her lip gently, and nearly purrs when her hands come up to cradle his head, to pet at his hair.

“Good,” he says a little breathlessly, “but your hands are in the wrong place.” She pouts.

“But I like touching you,” she says, and Will grins.

“I know, Louisa,” he says, and her eyes widen a fraction, he so rarely calls her by her first name. “But this is about you.”

“No,” she counters. “This is for both of us.”

And for once, Will is lost for words. “All right,” he manages, “for both of us. Now. I want you to touch your cheek.”

“My cheek?” she asks, brow wrinkled in confusion.

“Yes. Your cheek. And then down to your neck…” He talks her through caress by caress, until her palm is hovering over her breast and she’s staring down at it like she doesn’t know how it got there.

“Will,” she says, her voice pleading, “this is –”

“We can stop,” Will says immediately, but for all she accuses him of contrariness, there is a streak of it in Louisa; she firms her jaw and shakes her head. “All right,” Will murmurs. “Put your hand down your shirt – yes, like that. And touch your – never mind, I see you don’t need any direction there.” Louisa grins.

“I still like to hear your voice,” she says, and Will smiles back at her.

“Very well, then.”

 

“Jesus, Will,” Louisa’s panting. Will’s focus is narrowed down to the sweat on her forehead, the needy jump of her hips against her hand, the unfocused look in her eyes. “Come on, please.”

“I don’t think you’re ready,” Will says faux-seriously, and Louisa makes a noise like she wants to throttle him.

“Will. You’ve been teasing me for hours –”

“Forty-one minutes, actually –”

“And if I wasn’t already sure you are a sadist, I am now. Please.” Will chuckles.

“Very well, then. You may do as you like.” Louisa sighs.

“Thank you,” she says, and Will watches, fascinated, as her hand moves beneath her truly hideous pyjama pants in a rhythm he can almost feel in his bones. She’s stretched out beside him, her head on his shoulder, and she’s making these incredible breathy noises like she’s about to die from how good it feels.

“Are you going to come, Clark?” Will asks, almost dispassionately, except he can’t remember being so affected before in his life. Louisa nods, and her eyes flick open, and her want is written all over her flushed face. It’s like the sound of his voice is enough to bring her to the edge.

“Yes,” she says, and her eyes are desperate. “Yes, Will.”

“Then come here, and kiss me,” he replies, and she leans up and meets his lips with her own. It brings her closer, he can feel the movement of her hand against his hip, and with a stuttered little cry she comes, her body arching and Will drinks down those broken little gasps she makes against his mouth.

She goes limp, although not as limp as he is (gallows humour is a wonderful thing, he muses absently), her head slipping a little on his shoulder. Will kisses her forehead. “Oh, Clark,” he mutters. “You gorgeous fucking thing.” Louisa makes a little noise like a laugh.

“You’re not so bad yourself,” she replies, and just for a moment, Will believes it.

 

Later, when she’s snoring gently beside him, he recalls something that, in the heat of the moment, he hadn’t realised before. You’ve been teasing me for hours, she’d said, like it had been his hand in between her legs, his fingers teasing her nipples into peaks. That she’s followed his commands, even to the very point where she’d been begging to come, but she’d done what he asked.

It’s terrifying, suddenly, how the world suddenly opens up a fraction, as though there are things that might happen that he’d never considered before. It’s terrifying, what’s she’d do, for him. And, he’s realising, what he’s willing to do for her.

He doesn’t bring it up the next day. They go about their routine as if nothing has changed, except that night, after Nathan has settled him into bed and departed, Louisa comes into Will’s room without bothering to knock, and there’s no book in her hand.

He’s not angry. He’s pleased to see her. He watches as she dims the light a little, as she climbs onto the bed beside him. “Good evening, Clark,” he murmurs, and sighs when she brushes her knuckles against his mouth for a kiss. “You’re looking ravishing this evening.”

“And you’re a flirt,” she retorts tartly, but she’s smiling. There is a new ease to her. “I’ve been thinking.”

“Always a dangerous task,” Will says seriously, and Louisa makes a face at him. “About what?” Louisa steals one of his spare pillows, hides her face in it until only her eyes peep over the top.

“Last night,” she says, her voice muffled. Will feels like his pulse is speeding up, although it might just be his mind playing tricks on him.

“What about it?” he asks evenly. Clark shifts until her whole face was obscured.

“Maybe we could do it again?” she asks the pillow. Will fights down a smile.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t quite catch that,” he replies. “Could you repeat yourself?”

“You damn well heard me,” Louisa grouses, pulling the pillow away from her face. Will thinks he might never get tired of the blush in her cheeks. “I’m not saying it again.” Will relents. It’s been very brave of her to bring it up, all things considered.

“What are you waiting for, then?” he asks. “If you’re waiting for me to give you a hand, Clark, you’ll be waiting a while.”

“Ha ha,” she says dryly, but sobers quickly. “No. I thought, maybe, you could talk to me? While I… like last night. If you wanted.”

If he wanted… Jesus fuck, he loves this girl. “If you want me to,” Will replies, keeping his voice measured. It wouldn’t do, to appear overeager. He shows parts of himself to Louisa that no one else ever sees, but not even she can have everything. “Just like last night, then?” Louisa shakes her head, and she won’t meet his eyes.

“I thought… maybe… oh hell,” she mutters, and whips her shirt off in one quick motion.

She’s not wearing a bra.

Will’s mouth goes dry. It’s been so long since he’s seen a girl’s tits, and this isn’t just any girl, this is Clark. Fuck. She’s perfect, all pale skin and soft fullness and Christ, her nipples, rosy pink and just made to be kissed. He’s never been more aware, of the emptiness of his hands, of the uselessness of his fingers, but God, she’s glorious.

He realises he’s been staring, and raises his gaze to meet her eyes. She’s still pink, but he thinks it might be arousal more than embarrassment now. “Go on, then,” Will says, his voice a trifle unsteady. “You know what to do.” Louisa ducks her head.

“Tell me,” she replies, and Will sharpens his expression, puts a hint of steel in his eyes.

“Clark,” he says, and watches her shiver. “Put your hands on your breasts.”

He’d always preferred the cruder terminology before, but Clark, she’s different. Different to all those girls that Will had fucked, in his other life. And the gentler phrasing pays off: Louisa touches herself tentatively, at first, before she gains confidence, her eyes starting to cloud with pleasure.

“Good,” Will says, and Louisa smiles, a half-savage thing. “You’re doing well, Clark. Now. Put your fingers on your clit, and get yourself off.”

“How?” she asks, and Will nearly snarks, do you need me to draw you a diagram? Because you’ll be waiting a while. But he holds it in. He knows what she means.

“Hard,” he replies. “Fast. Five minutes or you don’t get to come at all.” He’s walking a fine line here, he knows. But he wants to see how far she’ll let him push.

“Bossy,” she says, but her hand is already skimming down her stomach to disappear into her pyjama pants.

“I like things done right,” Will replies, and Louisa smirks; it’s pure filth.

“Will,” she says, and there’s a cajoling note in her voice. “Will you do something for me?”

“It depends,” Will replies. No sense in letting her know he’d move heaven and earth for her, if he could only move himself. There is mischief in Louisa’s face; it’s not the first time he’s ever seen that wickedness in her, although certainly the first time in this setting. “What do you want?”

She doesn’t reply. She leans over him. He can see her so much better, up close; the little blemishes on her skin, the small softness of her stomach. She’s not perfect. And yet, she is. Her eyes dart down to his mouth. Ah. He knows what she wants.

Louisa lowers herself until Will can fit one rosy, peaked nipple into his mouth. And yes, he remembers how to do this, the pressure of teeth and tongue and lips, and he thrills to how Louisa has her hand on her other breast, mimicking what he’s doing with his mouth.

She comes in three minutes flat, with his teeth on her breast and her eyes wide open, looking down at him, sweat beading her brow and his name on her lips. And later, she sleeps curled around him in the dark, closer than she’s ever dared to come before, wary of where her limbs go so she doesn’t cut off his circulation or put too much pressure on his skin.

Will never slept so little at night before he met her, but he doesn’t regret it in the slightest.

“Jesus, mate,” Nathan says the next morning. Will just smirks at him. Louisa is sound asleep, in her pyjama pants and a singlet, her hand holding fast to Will’s shirt. “What did you two get up to last night?”

Will grins. “I could tell you, but I’d have to kill you.” Nathan laughs.

“It’s like that, is it, Mr T?” Gently, he loosens Louisa’s grip. She rolls over and snuggles into her pillow. It’s nauseatingly adorable, but Will can’t bring himself to care about the stupid grin on his face.

“Well, Nathan, are you going to stand there all day?” Will asks, but Nathan is unflappable; he just shrugs.

“I suppose we’d best get moving.”

Louisa wanders out just as Will is about to have breakfast. Her hair is tousled and her T-shirt is off to one side, her collarbone and shoulder peeking out. “Morning,” she mumbles, and leans over and kisses him on the mouth, right in front of Nathan. She smells like toothpaste and cotton.

“Good morning, Clark,” Will replies.

“Yes, it’s a lovely day outside,” Nathan chimes in. Louisa’s head flies up and she stares at Nathan with a comically startled look on her face, and then ignores both Will and Nathan when they start to laugh.

It’s not the life he wanted, but Christ, they almost make it worth it.

Chapter 2: an open heart is an open wound to you

Notes:

Me Before You belongs to Jojo Moyes.

And all of the steps that led me to you

 And all of the hell I had to walk through

 But I wouldn’t trade a day for the chance to say

 My love, I’m in love with you

- The Words, Christina Perri

 

The wedge comes on a Tuesday.

But before that, there are other things.

 

The third time it happens, Will has had the day from hell. He wakes up with a headache and the worst spasms he’s had in weeks, and Nathan is running late due to a traffic jam, and Louisa puts the wrong jam on his toast. Will swears viciously at Nate when he gets him in the chair and asks his Clark, his beautiful girl, if there’s a brain between her ears and does she expect him to fucking tell her everything. He feels like an absolute prick for it, later, when he hears muffled noises in the bathroom and Clark emerges ten minutes later with her mascara all cried off and her eyes are red. But he doesn’t know what to say. Sorry seemed inadequate, and all the other words he wants to say to her leave him raw and open, and he just can’t today, he just can’t.

Nathan seems to have forgiven him by lunchtime, but Will can’t forgive himself. Later, he and Nate are sitting in the garden, beers cracked and looking up at the stars. It’s the kind of thing Will never would have done before, with the kind of person he had no cause or reason to meet before, but he doesn’t mind it now. The vastness of the sky is a comfort, somehow. Surely he is not the only person to have ever felt this way, this infinite futility, this shame at his own lack of control.

“Nathan,” he says finally, and Nate looks over at him. There is something guarded in his face, as though he doesn’t know whether to expect a friendly word or abuse. And isn’t that dreadful, that he, Will, caused that.

“Yeah?”

“I’m sorry,” Will says, and it isn’t so hard to say, once he’s managed to spit it out. Nate’s face softens, and he claps Will on the shoulder once.

“It’s all right, mate,” he replies, and they sit like that until the beer is gone.

Clark, though, Clark is harder. Will hears her rustling about in the spare room. It’s past nine and she still hasn’t come in to see him. He’ll have to be the one to reach out for her.

“Louisa?” he calls, and waits. There is a stillness nearby, as if Clark is deciding whether she will come to him. But after long moments that feel like years, there is the sound of her feet padding down the hall, and she comes around the corner. And Christ, hell, fuck, she’s beautiful. But she doesn’t look happy. It’s like they’re drawn to one another like the poles of a magnet, and neither of them always completely happy about it.

“What do you want, Will?” she asks, and Will considers it for a moment. He raises his arm two inches, the most he can manage, in a mute gesture for her to come closer, and something changes in Clark’s face, but she’s still closed off. “What, Will?” she persists, and Will looks away from her.

“Please come here,” he says to the wall. He can’t look at her and say these things. Usually she understands. And for a moment the horror of it swamps him, the thought that one day she won’t understand, or even worse, she just won’t come.

But there is the sound of feet slipping off their shoes, and a moment later Louisa is lifting the covers to climb in beside him, lifting his useless arm up and slipping it over his shoulders. Will sighs. He hadn’t realised that the scent of her, the warmth of her skin, could ease tension in him he wasn’t even aware of.

“I shouldn’t have spoken to you that way,” he says to the top of her head. Clark shifts until she’s looking up at him.

“No, you shouldn’t have,” she agrees. Will swallows.

“I, ah. I promise I won’t do it again.” Clark is shaking her head.

“I don’t want that from you,” she says. “I don’t care if you shout at me. I’ve never cared. But ignoring me for the rest of the day – that was what hurt, Will. That’s not who we are. That’s not the way we do things anymore.” Will blinks.

“I wasn’t ignoring you,” he tells her, surprised she could even think that. “I was ashamed.” Louisa wriggles up a little until she can put her cheek against his.

“I know you were, love,” she says, and the endearment trips so easily from her tongue, like she’s been saving it up for months. “It’s all right now.”

Is it that easy, he wonders? Can it really be that simple? He fucks up and she forgives him, just like that? Maybe that’s all right for now, but what about the next time, or the time after that? Will she forgive him then?

“Of course I will,” she says, and he realises he’s spoken aloud. “My beautiful idiot.” Will gives her a tired smile.

“Watch who you’re calling idiot, Clark,” he says, but there’s no real bite to it. He’s too tired for all of that. He closes his eyes, and a moment later there’s butterfly kisses on his nose, his chin, his eyelids.

“It was a shit day for you, wasn’t it?” she asks softly. Will sighs.

“Really shit,” he says, and feels Clark give one last kiss to his forehead.

“You can tell me when it’s bad, you know,” she says quietly. “Or when you’re scared. I don’t mind.” Will exhales.

“Thank you, Louisa,” he says finally. “But I don’t want to talk about it right now.”

He feels her shift against him. “Then what do you want to talk about?”

The answer comes to him like a lightning bolt. “Tell me something good,” he replies, wanting to exist in nothing more than the soothing black of his eyelids and the beloved rhythm of her voice.

There is quietness, as though she is trying to figure out what to say. But eventually, there is a rustling, and a soft, barely there exhale of, “Will…”

Will’s eyes pop open without any conscious input from his brain. One of Louisa’s hands is hidden under her skirt, and the other has slipped down the front of her shirt. And this was not what he had in mind, but it’s not like he disagrees. This is something good.

“Louisa!” he says, and it’s his turn to sound scandalised, although he’s more amused than anything. Clark is wearing a smile like the serpent in Eden, and he’s not sure when his girl learned to seduce, but he really fucking likes it.

“Will?” she questions, like it’s perfectly normal to be touching herself on his bed, still dressed in her clothes. Will laughs.

“Never mind, Clark,” he says. “I’m an idiot. Ignore me. Go right ahead.” Louisa’s smile widens, and Will settles back to watch the show.

 

The next morning dawns bright and clear, and when Will opens his eyes the pain of yesterday seems a distant dream. Today is going to be a good day, he can just feel it, with Clark wrapped around him like a limpet and drooling just a little onto his chest. “Clark,” he murmurs, and Louisa mumbles something rude-sounding at him. “Clark.”

“What, Will?” she asks without opening her eyes. Will grins.

“Nathan’s going to be here soon, and I really think you should put a shirt on.” Louisa groans, then shoots upright, her eyes suddenly wide. Her bare breasts are lovely, and she still has hold of his hand.

“Nathan? Where? Shirt?” Will twitches his thumb against the back of her hand, and she squeezes it back automatically.

“Not yet,” he says patiently. “But it might be a good idea.” Louisa nods, and finds her shirt somewhere on the floor. She’d stripped down to her underwear to sleep overnight; he’d been up late just looking at her in the dark, like an idiot.

And just like Will had thought it would be, the day is good. Louisa gets the jam right, Nathan gets him through the morning routine with a minimum of fuss, and the sun is shining.

It still isn’t enough. Not when he considers the alternatives, not when Louisa has to leave for a few hours to have dinner with her family. That leaves Will to have dinner with his ever divided parents, and Christ almighty, his mum has no idea how to feed a quadriplegic.

No, that’s not entirely true. She just doesn’t do it like Clark does, and Will is finding that Clark is the benchmark by which he’s judging the rest of the world.

“Are you still paying her?” he asks abruptly; his mother’s hand twitches and a spoonful of soup hits the table. She gazes at him reproachfully, as if it was his hand that spilled it.

“Louisa?” she asks, and Will gives her a withering expression perfected on Clark in the early days.

“No, the maid. Of course I meant Louisa.” He can’t help the bite in his voice, even as he doesn’t really enjoy the fleeting expression of hurt on his mother’s face.

“Yes, we are,” she replies after a beat of silence. “Just for her usual hours, of course. Not for any… extra duties.”

Will is starving, but it doesn’t stop him from glaring at her and wheeling his chair away from the table in sullen silence.

A pity, really. The soup was rather good.

Clark comes back shortly after eight, and sees immediately that something is wrong. “What is it?” she asks, dropping her bag on the counter. Will scowls.

“Mum,” he mutters crossly. Louisa turns around.

“What’s she done now?”

“I don’t want to talk about it,” Will says, still cranky that his mother might even dare to imply that Clark is with him for less than honest reasons. Louisa shrugs.

“I see, then,” she replies, her voice suspiciously light, and Will turns his chair to eye her sharply. “I’ll just put this leftover chicken and potatoes and chocolate mousse that Mum gave me into the fridge, here. If you’re not hungry.”

And this is why he loves her.

He’s still hungry after, so Louisa puts her shoes back on and beckons him to follow. She sneaks into the main house, Will trailing behind in his chair, and together they liberate a Tupperware of cold soup from the kitchen. Will accidently wheels himself into a table and Louisa trips over an ornamental hatstand, and as lights flick on upstairs they are fleeing out into the cold night air, Louisa on his lap and the soup container cold against his side and them both laughing like hyenas.

She heats it up in the microwave and they eat it straight from the Tupperware, sharing a spoon, her feeding him and her feeding herself. And somewhere in the middle it becomes totally normal, to be chortling in a dark kitchen with a girl and a soup container, barely able to do a single thing for himself but so damn happy to be alive.

(Nathan finds them later demolishing a carton of ice cream from the freezer in much the same manner, and just shakes his head mutely before calling them both as bad as each other, and grabbing another spoon.)

And it was a good day.

 

And then:

“I’ve been thinking,” Louisa says idly, and Will gives her a sidelong glance.

“Should I be alarmed?” he asks dryly. Clark doesn’t rise to the bait, or even crack a smile, which is how Will knows that whatever she’s thinking about, it’s serious.

“We don’t do much here, do we?” she asks, and Will’s heart feels like it’s leapt into his throat. This is it. She’s come to her senses. He’s surprised it’s gone on this long. But then, she’s a stubborn girl. Almost as stubborn as he is.

“Correct,” Will replies stiffly. “If you’re looking for a more active partner, Clark, I’m afraid you’ve rather come to the wrong place. Your former boyfriend might be more up to that sort of thing.” He regrets it as soon as he says it, his bloody bad habit of lashing out when he’s hurt or scared, but Louisa doesn’t appear to be even listening.

“Would you like to change that?” she asks. Will swivels his chair around so he can look at her properly.

“What did you have in mind?” he asks, surprised. Clark grins, and he doesn’t like it one bit.

“Well…”

 

“It’s ridiculous,” Will declares ten minutes later, when she’s stumbled through her idea. His whole body feels like it’s thrumming, but he can’t for the life of him work out why. He hadn’t known how much he wanted it until she’d said it loud, how much he missed the sheer bloody thrill of it, but he can’t. How could he? “It’s impossible.”

“Why?” Clark counters. “You have the software, you can use a computer. You have me to be your hands for everything else. What more do you need?”

There is so much wrong with that statement, but he decides to focus on the main problem. “I’ll be gone in five months,” he tells her. Louisa juts her chin out mulishly.

“Five months, one week, and three days,” she corrects him, and Will sets his jaw.

“Five months give or take a week,” he retorts, and Clark looks mollified. “That’s not very long to get back into it.”

“We don’t have to tell them that,” Louisa points out.

“You’re just hoping I’ll change my mind again,” Will snaps. Clark has the nerve to look offended.

“I am not!” she says, outraged, and Will arches an eyebrow. “I mean, I am,” she says, backtracking, and Will turns his chair away. “I don’t want you to die! You know that! Oh, Will, you know what I mean.”

“I do,” he says. “I was just teasing you, Clark.” Louisa sniffs.

“Not very funny,” she mutters rebelliously, and Will twitches his good hand at her. She’s so attuned to his needs by now that she sees even the smallest of motions, and obligingly she comes closer.

Will looks out at the gardens. “No one will take me seriously,” he informs the greenery, something like hope and terror and possibility and apprehension rising in him. “A quadriplegic asset stripper? There’s never been one. Ever.”

Arms come around him from behind. She can only touch his elbows with her arms stretched around the chair, but he appreciates it nonetheless. “You never know until you ask,” she murmurs, her breath stirring against his ear, and Will swallows.

“I’ll think about it.”

Once he’s started, he can’t stop. He’ll never be a CEO again, he knows it. But he can do better than Freddie Derwent, surely. Better than Randall, without a doubt. He’s sharp, he’s clever, and he was damn good at what he did, before. Mainly to finance his life of adventure, to be sure, but he’d liked it. And better to do something for the next five months than sit around and wait for Clark to get tired of him. He’s still convinced that she will, once the gloss of it wears off and she sees what he’s truly like.

Louisa. Imagine how it’ll look on her CV, PA to an asset stripper in a company like his. They’ll be lining up around the block to be asking her to work for them, once he’s gone.

Will is content to pretend to himself that it is this last reason that is the one that makes him agree to go to London.

 

The logistics have to be sorted out, first. Louisa presents him with a list of suitable hotels, and Will doesn’t know how to tell her how grateful he is that she asks his opinion. Once he’s decided, Clark books a hotel for the night and an agency nurse in London. (They run through forty profiles before he and Clark can agree on one, a stocky, Scottish lad called Jeremy who works through an agency in London. Clark likes his employment record. Will just appreciates the Led Zeppelin T-shirt he’s wearing in the photo.)

Will gets the unenviable task of calling Andrew and organising a time to come in.

“Jesus, Will,” Andrew says, his voice distracted and harried, “what the bloody hell do you want to come in for?” There is muffled voices down the line, and then static; Will winces. “I have to go, Traynor. Call my secretary for a time, yeah?” He hangs up. Will fumes for a few minutes in blessed solitude. There was a time that jumped up little wanker wouldn’t have dared so much as to sneeze in his presence. Now look at him.

Clark, when he tells her of this later, just laughs. “They think you’ve been tamed,” she says, chuckling, and Will grins in manic delight. So they think the old dog’s been defanged, do they? They’re in for a beautiful bloody shock. Disabusing his former colleagues of this notion is going to be the most fun he’s had since Alicia’s wedding, Mauritius aside.

Nathan arrives early on the day in question and gets Will up and into a suit in record time. Will looks down at his hand and sees his thumb and finger shaking. “Did we know they could do that?” he asks Nate. Nathan looks down.

“Probably just a spasm, mate,” he replies. Will’s not so sure.

Clark nearly bloody blows him away when she comes out of her room. She’s wearing a grey pinstriped skirt, a white tailored shirt, and a matching jacket to the skirt is thrown over one arm. Her hair is pulled back neatly and her heels are a demure black. She looks like every dirty naughty secretary fantasy he’s ever had, and a few he hadn’t thought of besides.

And then he notices she’s wringing her hands. “God,” she’s saying, “I have no idea what I’m doing. Who knew tights could be so constricting?” Despite everything, Will grins.

“They can’t all be of the bumblebee variety,” he replies lightly. Louisa manages a strained smile.

“And the world is poorer for it,” she retorts. From behind Will, Nathan emerges from the bathroom; he can see him reflected in the glass of the windows. “Hi, Nate.”

“Looking good, Lou,” he says. Louisa flaps a hand at him.

“Coming from you, I’m almost flattered,” she replies. Will watches them with interest. His two best friends. “Is it breakfast time? We’d better get a move on if we want to be in London before Christmas.”

Will shakes his head. The thought of food combined with the butterflies in his stomach is enough to make a man sick. “I can’t eat.” Louisa’s eyes take on a flinty expression.

“Will Traynor,” she says, “I’ll not have you fainting in front of that uppity new CEO bloke. You’ll eat, or we’re not going.”

“Bossy little thing, isn’t she?” Will remarks to Nathan, who is hiding his grin behind his hand.

“Well, someone needs to knock some sense into your head, once in a while,” Clark grumbles. Will turns his chair towards the kitchen.

“Make some toast then, Clark. And if you drip jam on my shirt, there’ll be hell to pay.” He’s guessing Louisa is making a face at him behind his back, based on the strangled snort Nathan hastily emits.

 

They’re almost at London when the nerves hit hard. Will looks over at Clark, her knuckles white on the steering wheel, and it’s a comfort to know he’s not the only one terrified. “Louisa?” he asks. She looks over at him.

 

“Yeah, Will?”

“This is mental,” he replies. Clark shrugs.

“You’re the one who’s always telling me to live well,” she says. “To live boldly. You have to admit, this is pretty fucking bold.”

He has to agree with that.

She finds a park a handful of streets away from his old office. Will rolls out of the car, and Jesus, London. It’s busy and crowded and Will feels instantly claustrophobic, after the quiet of Stortfold. It’s no consolation to him that Louisa looks as if she feels the same. “You used to work here?” she asks, staring up at the buildings that seem as tall as the sky.

“Just around the corner,” Will replies, and begins to roll down the uneven path. A moment later, Louisa falls into step beside him, wobbling a little in her high heels. Will slows down a touch.

Refreshingly, London has not changed in the slightest. The same tired businessmen and women and the same students with their headphones in and even the same homeless people tucked around the corners. Will lets it calm his nerves, but Clark doesn’t have the same luxury; she’s never spent enough time here to feel at home in London. The tap tap tap of her heels on the pavement get faster as they approach; Will has to increase his speed to match her.

His building hasn’t changed, either. All glass and concrete and people rushing in and out. Clark stops outside of the entrance, and Will lifts a curious eyebrow. “Waiting for me to lead the way, Clark?” he asks, and when Louisa turns red, he realises this is exactly what she’s doing.

“I’ve never been here before,” she says, and Will twitches his thumb at her. Smiling, she lays her hand on his elbow, and they take the elevator up.

 

“What can I do for you, Will?” Andrew asks. Will looks around. The office that had once been his has, unlike the city outside, changed drastically. There is an unfamiliar framed photograph on Will’s old desk, his qualifications are no longer on the wall. But Will can almost feel his old role settle over him like something comforting and heavy, like coming home.

“I’d like to come back to work,” he says, and the contrary part of him relishes Andrew nearly choke on his coffee.

“Come back?” he splutters, very nearly splashing coffee on his tie. “You mean, my job?” Will cracks a wry smile.

“I hardly think so,” he replies dryly. “I think my CEO days are long over. But I managed clients, before I was a CEO. I would like to do that again.”

After the initial shock has faded, Andrew is his usual straightforward self. He leans forward, his eyes penetrating. Will knows that expression. Will taught it to him. “You said at the wedding that nothing had changed much since the accident, in terms of your physical condition,” he says bluntly. Will nods. “Then – forgive me, Will, I don’t mean to insult you, but I don’t see how you’re fit.” Will meets his gaze head on.

“I’m not asking for full time hours,” he says. “I can’t manage that. But part time, at least. As for being fit, I have everything I need to perform at the same level as an able bodied individual.”

The conversation goes on for some time. Will has missed this, debating his point with someone… well, like him. Clark and Nathan he speaks with often, but they don’t have the inherent sneakiness and years of training that he and Andrew share. It goes on for well over an hour, Will’s mouth getting drier and loath to ask Clark to assist him with a drink. But eventually, Andrew holds up a hand. “Will,” he says. “I’m tempted, I really am. But the answer’s no. Now, if you excuse me, I have a meeting.” Will bows his head. It was always a long shot.

“I see,” he says. “Thank you for your time, Andrew.” He begins to turn his chair away, but he stops. Clark is pink in the face and something in her expression does not bode well.

“So that’s it?” Louisa asks. Andrew looks at her as if it is the first time he is seeing her. Will sighs.

“Clark, don’t,” he murmurs, but she isn’t listening. Clark’s eyes have got that vaguely frightening clarity to them that Will hasn’t seen since Mauritius, but that he knows well enough to be wary of. Will has the sudden impression that Andrew, a CEO of a Fortune 500 company, is no match for Louisa Clark on a rampage.

“You’re throwing away a prospective employee with years of experience and a proven work record because, what? He’s paralysed?” Andrew has gone a disturbing shade of off-white.

“That’s not it at all,” he begins, but Will could have told him that once Clark gets onto an idea, she holds onto it pretty damn hard.

“That’s exactly it. Unless the real reason is that you’re threatened by Will, and that’s a pretty poor reason not to employ someone.”

“Miss…”

“Clark. Louisa Clark.”

“Miss Clark. It’s a matter of practicalities.”

“I don’t think so,” Louisa counters. “I think you think that a quadriplegic man can’t do what you do. And that is just… so wrong. If you and Will were builders or carpenters or, I don’t know, gardeners, then it would be relevant. But you work in an office. I don’t pretend to know how you do what you do, or even what it is. But Will was the CEO of this company, which must mean he was pretty damn good at it.”

Andrew sits down heavily. “He was,” he admits. “He was the best.” Will has to look away for a moment; out of the corner of his eye, he sees Clark’s expression soften.

“So what’s the problem?” she asks, and Andrew looks trapped, when Will looks back at him.

“The clients won’t respect a man in a wheelchair,” Andrew says finally, and Will respects him a little more for the way the other man looks him dead in the eye when he says it. Will turns his head just a little, and despite the situation, can’t help but smile. His Clark has an expression like thunder mingled with deep satisfaction.

“Why don’t you let them decide that?” she asks. Andrew studies them both for a long minute.

“Mondays and Thursdays, Will,” he says abruptly. “You’ll be given a small portfolio of clients to manage. On your time off you’ll be available for consultation via telephone. And this…” He points at Louisa. “This young lady will be your PA?”

Will nods. Andrew stands.

“Well, then,” he says crisply. “I suppose we’ll see you Monday morning. Now, if you’ll both excuse me. Will, you know the way out.”

When he’s gone, Will looks over at Louisa. She looks as stunned as he feels. “Did he just say yes?” Will asks her, and a broad smile comes over her face.

“I think he did.”

 

Will’s not sure how they hold it in until they get to the hotel. Well, they don’t, not exactly. Will fairly races back to the car, Louisa nearly running beside him. Louisa’s hands are trembling on the steering wheel and Will feels mildly dizzy. Something that feels remarkably like happiness is bubbling up inside of him. It’s only when they’re in the hotel room that it bubbles to the surface. Safely ensconced behind closed doors, Will laughs for a moment, almost breathless. Clark eyes him suspiciously.

“Have you gone crazy?” she asks. Will grins.

“No, but you are. You’re absolutely mad. You told a CEO to his face that he was prejudiced against the disabled.” Louisa arches an eyebrow.

“I did not!” she replies. “I merely implied it.” Will shakes his head.

“You convinced him,” he marvels.

“No,” Clark counters. “You laid the foundation. I just summarised your points.” Will laughs.

“Come here, woman.” Louisa hesitates a moment, and then swings herself onto his lap. He likes it best like this, when he can look her so close in the face, see all the tiny imperfections in her that make her infinitely lovelier than if she was without flaw. Will leans his head forward, and Louisa wraps her arms around him. “None of this would have happened without you,” he murmurs into her neck. “I’d be – I’d be dead without you.” He feels her shudder.

“I don’t want to talk about that,” she says unsteadily. Will shakes his head, hard enough for her to feel it.

“That’s not what I meant. You brought life back into the world, Clark. I was as good as dead, before you.” He hesitates. “I – oh, damn it. I love you.”

She pulls back. Her eyes are damp and she is smiling so broad that Will can’t help but smile back. “You’ve never said that before,” she says softly.

“Well, don’t you think it’s about time?” he asks tartly. Louisa ducks her head.

“Shut up,” she says. “I love you too, you know.” Will’s eyes might be stinging.

“I do know that,” he replies gently. Louisa’s eyes flick down to his lips.

“Doesn’t mean I’m not going to tell you every day,” she declares. Will’s heart contracts, or maybe it’s just the beginnings of angina. Or maybe she’s the best thing left in the universe. “I’m going to kiss you now.”

“I’d be emphatically disappointed if you didn’t,” he replies.

Her mouth is sweet and God knows what he tastes like right now but she doesn’t seem to mind. Her fingers settle through his hair and Will nearly purrs. He doesn’t remember being this sensitive before the accident. There hasn’t been much exploration in exactly how sensitive he is below the level of his injury. He had considered it, early on, when there was still something like hope, that he wouldn’t be stuck like this forever.

It’s different, like this, than the times in his bed. She’s completely pressed up against him, her knees spread and on either side of his hips, her skirt ruched up. He can feel every tiny movement of her body, so when she grinds down on him shamelessly, he twitches a little at the feel of it. “What’s the matter, Clark?” Will asks, his voice dropping, relishing the way she shudders against him. He’s not sure how or why she developed this fondness for his voice, but he’s not arguing with it. “Did you want something?”

“You know what I want,” she says, and Will smirks.

“I do,” he replies, “but you’re not the only one who likes to listen.”

“Sadist,” she accuses. “I want you to fucking touch me, is that enough?”

“That’s a good start,” he says gently, “but it’s not possible.” Clark’s eyes brighten, and hell, he knows that look.

“Maybe,” she says, and looks at his good hand, considering. “Maybe not. Let’s try something.”

On her instruction, Will lifts his hand and lets it fall to his lap. He can move it a little, enough to brush the hem of her skirt, to feel the heat rising from her skin. Louisa looks at him, her pupils dilated, her eyes wide. “Will,” she says, and she’s pulling up her skirt, she’s rolling down her tights. “Will, God, please.”

He doesn’t even know if he can but he’ll be damned if he won’t try and maybe that’s enough. She helps him move his arm until his fingers are brushing something slick and soft and Jesus, he can smell her. His thumb finds the hard bud of her clit and Louisa gasps, her head falling back. She is splayed on his lap and she’s the sexiest thing he can ever remember seeing. He’s studied her well enough by now, but it still takes a minute before he finds the right rhythm, the one that makes her sink her teeth into her lip and bite down to keep her cool. “Don’t you dare, Clark,” he tells her.

“What?” she pants, breathless.

“Don’t be quiet,” he says. “I want to hear you when you come.”

“You, ah, better be listening, then, because it’s about to happen in about thirty seconds.” Will raises his gaze from where his hand is up Louisa’s skirt, delighted. And true to her word, in less than a minute, she’s pushing her hips into his hand, her voice babbling out a stream of delicious incoherent words, her head braced against his shoulder and her breath harsh against his neck.

“That was quicker than usual,” Will says, when she stops shaking. Louisa is already flushed, but her skin darkens another shade.

“Well,” she says, obviously flustered, “it was you this time, wasn’t it? Oh, stop it,” she says crossly, when he smirks. “You’re indecently pleased with yourself.”

“I am,” he replies. “It’s been far too long since I’ve done that.” Anyone else might be jealous, but if Clark is, she doesn’t show it.

“I can tell you’ve had a fair bit of practise,” she says. Will tilts his head.

“Clark,” he says. “I want to…”

“You want to what?” she asks, and he adores this, the things that are new when he experiences them with her.

“Bring my hand up to my mouth,” he directs. A quick flash of want streaks across her face.

“Why?” she asks.

“You know why.”

“Maybe, but I want to hear you say it.” A slow smile comes over Will’s face.

“I want to know what you taste like,” he tells her, and a moment later her small hand is bringing his hand to his lips. And fuck, the taste of her cunt, Jesus, he remembers it like a bullet to the brain, like a bolt to the heart. Tart and sweet and so much better than anything else before, because this is Clark.

He laps at the slick of her until the taste is gone, and then he lets her wrap her arms around him and curl up against him in the chair. “Jeremy will be here soon,” he tells her, and she nods.

“You know,” she says softly against Will’s neck. “I’m not going to keep doing this forever.” A cold fist settles over Will’s heart.

“What do you mean?” She shrugs.

“I mean,” she replies, “At some point, you’re going to have to let me touch you back.”

And that is a thousand times worse than what he was expecting. She’s not leaving. She wants to touch him.

Christ.

Notes:

Thank you to everyone who responded so positively to this and my other Me Before You fics. There will be at least two more chapters on this fic, so stay tuned.

Chapter 3: i know the sound, i know the sound (of your heart)

Notes:

Loving the shit out of the MBY OST.

Me Before You belongs to Jojo Moyes.

Jeremy knocks on the door an hour later. By that point, Clark has aired the room out a little and Will has recovered from his shock to have lunch ordered from room service.

(“Will? What the hell is joues de boeuf confites?”

“That would be beef cheeks, Clark.

“Beef… what?”)

“Hi, Mr Traynor,” Jeremy says when Louisa opens the door. He smiles at Clark briefly, but most of his attention is on Will. Will likes him immediately. “You’ll want to see my ID.”

“Please,” Will replies, and Jeremy withdraws a badge from a lanyard around his neck. Once Will is satisfied, Jeremy pins it back in place.

“So, I read the folder you sent. I understand you need complete assistance with activities of daily living. Anything in advance I need to know?” Will tilts his head.

“This is Louisa,” he says. “She’s my…”

“Girlfriend,” Clark supplies. Will’s mouth falls open in surprise. But if Jeremy picks up on any weirdness, he doesn’t show it outwardly.

“I meant in terms of your condition,” he says blithely, “but it’s nice to meet you both. Shall we get on with it, then?”

It’s weird, running through the routine with a stranger. But Will had become accustomed to it when he was in hospital after the accident, and occasionally there’s an agency nurse who comes when Nathan is sick or on holiday. And he can hear Clark out in the hotel room, fiddling with the radio, tripping once over the coffee table. It’s not that strange.

When he’s presentable again, he rolls his chair out to find Clark in a bright dress and a pair of her ridiculous heels, and of course her bumblebee tights. “I see you’ve changed,” he says, nodding to Jeremy as he heads out the door.

“I couldn’t come to London and not wear the tights!” she says. Will inclines his head.

“You’re quite correct,” he replies. “I take it we’re going out this afternoon, then?” Clark shrugs.

“Only if you want to,” she says. “What did you used to do, when you lived in London? Don’t be sarcastic,” she adds. Will closes his mouth. “You know what I mean.”

“I do,” he says, resigned. “When not working or indulging in adrenaline fuelled pursuits –”

“Or seeing numerous near-identical blonde girls with boring tights and little dogs in their handbags. Don’t forget that.” Will tries to be annoyed, but it’s hard, with Louisa.

“Clark,” he says in exasperation. “Are you going to let me finish?” Louisa grins.

“Apologies. Do go on.”

“Thank you. As I was saying, I used to –” He stops. He tries to think of something he used to do before the accident that didn’t involve work, adrenaline, or Alicia – or other girls, for that matter. There isn’t anything. Not a single thing.

He doesn’t realise he’s been silent for too long until Clark comes close and gently touches his arm. “I have some ideas, if you’d like to hear them,” she says softly. Will moves his chair back a little so he can rest his head against her elbow, and she wraps her arms around his shoulders.

“I’d like that,” he says, his voice a little muffled against her dress, and he stays like that, letting her ground him, until she’s finished talking.

 

He should have known that Clark would have researched this as thoroughly as she’s researched everything else. But in the end, after all the ideas she has of exhibits and museums and art and wine tasting and everything else, Will picks. He takes her to the Ciné Lumière and watches her gasp, cry, and laugh her way through a French film she never would have considered watching, before him. He’s still in his suit, so he doesn’t need her to help him change for dinner at the hotel restaurant, a little booth as private as is possible considering he can’t actually sit at any in of the regular chairs.

He never wants it to end. But soon enough they have to head upstairs, because he’s absolutely exhausted from the day and Clark isn’t looking much better.

Jeremy comes back around eight to help him into bed. Clark is off changing into her pyjamas. “It looks as if I’ll be spending more time in the city,” Will says as Jeremy swings his legs into bed. “I’ll be needing someone to help me on the days I’m here. Clark can’t do everything.” Jeremy stills where he’s taking off Will’s shoes, but quickly continues.

“If you’re asking if I’d be willing to do this again, the answer is yes. You seem like a decent bloke. Call the agency with the days you need, and they’ll get everything organised.”

“It’s that simple?” Will asks. Jeremy shrugs.

“We try and make it as easy on people as possible. Most folks have enough stuff going on without more stress.”

“You’re right about that,” Will agrees dryly. Jeremy nods.

“It’s been a pleasure, Mr Traynor,” he says. “I’ll see you and Miss Clark in the morning.”

Will listens to Clark let him out and lock the door. She appears a minute later and climbs into bed beside him. She doesn’t even ask, anymore. She trusts him to tell her if he wants to be alone. Will’s slowly remembering what it feels like to be trusted with his own feelings.

Louisa snuggles into his side, draping his arm over his shoulder, and Will closes his eyes, breathing the scent of her in. From here he can just see that expression of supreme peace she always gets on her face when she rests her head on his chest. “Thank you for today,” he tells the top of her head. Clark shrugs.

“I hardly did a thing, Will. It was all you.” He knows it’s not true, but he appreciates her saying it anyway.

“I was surprised.”

“When that wanker agreed to let you come back to work? You shouldn’t have been. I don’t really understand what you do, but you were pretty good at it, by all accounts.” Will kisses the top of her head.

“As astonishing a revelation as that was,” he says dryly. “And you’d better not call him a wanker to his face, when you’re my PA. I was more referring to you being my girlfriend.” Suddenly serious, Clark twists until she can look up at him.

“Well, I am, aren’t I?” she asks. “We live together. We do everything together –”

“More than most couples do,” Will mutters as she nuzzles back into his shoulder.

“And we share a bed in which we do unspeakable things to one another,” Clark continues, utterly ignoring the last thing he’d said. Probably for the best, really. “That’s the definition of a relationship, Will.”

“Hmm,” Will says. “I don’t recall being consulted.” But he’s smiling. If Clark wants to be his girlfriend, he’s not stupid enough to argue with her. “So in one day, I got a job and a girlfriend,” Will clarifies. Louisa nods. “I feel like we should celebrate.”

“What do you think we’ve spent half the day doing?” she asks. Will smirks.

“Didn’t you mention something about unspeakable activities in a bed?” he replies. Clark snorts.

 “Twice in one day, Will?” she asks. He tilts his head to rest on hers.

“To be fair, it was quite a day,” he says. Louisa shifts until she can meet his eyes.

“It was. I have one regret, though.”

“Not ordering the beef cheeks?” he asks, and she shudders.

“Ew, no. That I was too preoccupied with the film for us to sneak in a bit of surreptitious making out in the back row.”

“I can’t access the back row,” he reminds her. “No ramp.” She scowls.

“You know what I mean,” she says impatiently. “We were the only ones in there. No one would have cared.”

“Most people don’t go to see a film in the middle of the day,” Will agrees. “But you’re right. You were rather… absorbed.” Clark giggles against his chest.

“It was good. We should do it again.” Will kisses the top of her head, all he can reach at the moment.

“It does look like we’ll be spending rather more time in the city,” Will comments. Clark makes a sudden strangled noise.

“Jesus. How are we going to tell your mum? She thinks we’re at a concert tonight, for Christ’s sake. She’ll hit the roof.”

“Let me handle Mum,” Will replies comfortably. “She’s so pleased that you convinced me to stick around a bit longer, she’ll agree to anything.” Clark is silent.

“I didn’t really convince you,” she says eventually. “You just… changed your mind, for a bit.”

“For a bit,” Will confirms. Louisa looks up at him.

“Another five or so months,” she says, her eyes keen and diamond bright, and Will swallows. It has suddenly become harder to breathe.

“Yes,” he says. “Just another five months.” But there is something about the words that ring hollow, as though he’s the only one he’s trying to convince.

“Well, then,” Clark says, coming close enough that he can count her eyelashes, “we should make every minute of it count.”

“I knew you were the sensible one for a reason,” Will says, and turns his face up to kiss her.

He never spent so much time kissing, before. Kissing was always the precursor to the main event, a quick stop on the journey, but never the destination. Alicia had tried to kiss him a few times, after the accident. it had always felt wrong and unnatural, being passive, waiting for her to come close enough and then being unable to touch her or fuck her or do all the things he wanted to. But it’s different with Clark. Maybe because she’s only ever known him like this, and he’s only ever known her in this life, or perhaps simply because she’s Louisa, and everything is new with her. He doesn’t know. All he knows is that he could spend hours kissing Clark, wringing those sweet little noises out of her throat, sharing her oxygen.

Usually she has her hands on herself, either of her own volition or under his direction, or on his face or hands. He’d thought, up until now, that his motionless body and scarred skin was a deterrent to her touching him. That she didn’t want to, that it was just his mind and heart she was attracted to, not his traitorous body. But she’s said she wants to touch him, as though every bit of him is something she wants to hold with her hands and make her own. “Clark,” he says softly, and she pauses from where she’d been thoroughly mapping his pulse point with her tongue. “I can’t think when you do that.” It’s true. It’s high enough that he can feel it completely, and it feels like heaven, overloading his battered nervous system with sensation. The mental arousal can’t make its way past his spinal cord injury, he’s read, but he’s also read that it’s different for everyone, and it feels pretty damn good from where he’s sitting. Lying down. Whatever.

“And you need to think… why?” Clark asks. “That brain of yours never shuts up, does it?” Will smiles briefly. She’s right.

“One of us has to do the thinking,” he says, and is rewarded by a nibble along his jawline for his pains. Will has to close his eyes for a moment to marshal his thoughts. “You remember what you said? Earlier today?” Clark sighs.

“I stand behind what I said. Aragorn is clearly the hottest guy in Lord of the Rings.” Will pauses.

“…are you sure that conversation was with me, Clark?” he asks. Louisa looks confused for a moment.

“Ah, shit. It was with Treena on Facebook. Sorry, Will.”

“Never mind,” Will says. Clark flushes.

“You mean what I said after you…”

“Fingered you on the chair while you were splayed on my lap?” Will asks dryly. Clark turns a deeper shade of red.

“Will!” she says, scandalised. “God, don’t say fingered. It sounds like we’re in a bad porno.”

“What other term would you find more acceptable?”

“I don’t know!” Louisa exclaims. “Can we go back to the original topic?”

“Fine,” Will relents. “What you said. About wanting to touch me.”

“Yes…” Clark says, obviously waiting for him to continue.

“Did you really mean that?” Louisa nods.

“Of course,” she replies. “But only if you’re comfortable with it, Will. It’s just… you make me feel so good. I want to be able to do that for you.” Will nods, but he doesn’t’ speak for some time. He wonders if, if, if he’s brave enough to let her put her hands on him, he might get hard. Might come. Jesus.

“I’m not sure if I’m ready,” he confesses at last. Louisa’s eyes soften.

“We don’t need to go… all the way at first. Oh, stop snickering,” she says crossly. “You’re worse than a teenager.”

“I prefer to think I’m better than a teenager,” he retorts, still chortling.

“I bet you were an awful teenager,” she says, her breath tickling his ear. “Rebellious and rude and intent on showing girls your castle to try to get in their knickers.”

“Try?” Will says in disbelief. “It was a very effective strategy, thank you very much.”

“I’m sure it was,” Clark says, but there’s a little glint in her eye that suggests she does not entirely believe him.

“Clark,” he says, because he loves bantering with her, he really does, it was the foundation of their relationship long before there was any touching involved, but Christ, he wants her hands on him. Craves it like he used to crave the adrenaline rush of jumping off a cliff or falling from a plane; Will’s been addicted to feeling scared since long before he met Louisa Clark.

“Yes, Will?” she asks, and God, he’s going to have to say it out loud. It’s not like he can do the actual moving part himself. His face feels like it’s on fire.

“You could, ah. Touch me. If you wanted to.” Clark’s smile is brilliant, involving her whole face; her mouth and her cheeks and her eyes and those beloved, infinitely expressive eyebrows.

“I am touching you,” she points out, looking down to where she’s curled against him. Will scowls at her.

“You’re being deliberately obtuse,” he informs her tartly. “I meant with your hands. On my body. Is that clear enough?”

“No need to get stroppy,” Louisa says, utterly unruffled by his sarcasm. Time was, she’d flinch away from him when he got mean. He likes these times much better.

She starts slow. She keeps kissing him, and Will tries to sink into it, because he really does like kissing her and because he knows she’s trying to distract him. But he can’t relax. Every fibre of his body is on edge, waiting, so when she undoes the first button of his shirt, his finger and thumb twitch involuntarily.

“Don’t be nervous,” she says. “I’ve undressed you before.” Will huffs.

“When I had a fever and you needed to cool me down,” he reminds her. “Or when you gave me a wash. This is different.”

“This is different,” she agrees, and somehow she’s gotten all his buttons open and he didn’t even notice. She pushes the sheets back until his whole chest is bare in front of her, and Will wants to cross his arms over his chest to shield him from her view, but of course he can’t. He just has to lie there while she studies him and try not to stress while his stupid brain tries to convince him that her very gaze is enough to make his skin itch.

“Can I touch you now?” she asks at last, and Will nods. He’s not angry, that she’s asked again. He knows well enough how much Clark values consent, given her history. His beautiful girl.

“Yeah,” he replies, his voice husky. “Please do.” Clark smiles.

“I should take your clothes off more often, if you get so polite when I do,” she says teasingly, and a moment later Will gasps when her hand skates down his neck, just to above the level of the injury.

“Jesus.” Clark pauses for a moment, but she doesn’t stop. She replaces her hand with her mouth, her teeth nibbling at his skin, and Will can’t think, God, this is too much. It’s been two and a half years since he tried anything this intimate, it’s been so long, and in that time he’d made himself forget how good it had felt to be touched again like he’s a man. Like he’s Will. But he remembers now.

His girl is a thorough little thing, and Will has never appreciated it more. She explores every inch of his chest with hands and lips, helps him shuck his shirt until she can run her little fingers over his biceps and his forearms, all those places usually covered by clothes. She’s intent on her task, and it’s only after what feels like hours of this that Will realises he’s talking. Well, not so much talking, but making noise, something like gasps and moans and prayers all mixed together, and that Clark is only touching him now with one hand.

he looks down to find the other between her legs, her hips moving, and she flushes when she realises she’s been caught. “I’m sorry, Will,” she says, as though it’s not the hottest thing he’s seen for weeks. “I shouldn’t have. I’m being selfish.”

“You have my permission to be selfish anytime you like,” Will tells her, and watches happiness come back into her face like a trickle and a flood.

She goes back to kissing his right nipple and fucking her hand, little broken noises spilling out of her mouth, and Will doesn’t dare close his eyes for a moment.

 

After Clark comes, and Will’s brain feels like it’s about to melt from sensory overload, Clark helps him back into his shirt and pulls the covers up around them both. He wants to thank her, but knows she would take it ill; she genuinely doesn’t see why he should be grateful. In her mind, they’re equals.

“Who does Treena think is the hottest guy in Lord of the Rings?” Will asks, just as Louisa is about to, he can tell by her breathing, fall asleep. Clark, startled but amused, lets out a very unfeminine snort.

“Legolas,” she says, like it’s mental that anyone fancies a blond elf over a scruffy Ranger. Will nods gravely.

“That’s insane,” he replies. “It’s quite clearly Aragorn.” Clark grins.

“And this is why I love you,” she says, kissing his cheek. Will bites his lip until he can trust his voice not to waver.

“Because we have the same taste in men?” he asks lightly, and Clark buries her face in his chest. He can feel her shaking with suppressed laughter. “I love you too.” It’s getting easier to say, every time he does it.

He falls asleep soon after, soothed by her breathing and the fingers gently combing through his hair.

 

They’re late getting back to Stortfold in the morning. More correctly, by the time they get home it’s past midday, and Louisa’s phone has vibrated eight times with missed calls, presumably from Will’s mum. Sure enough, she’s waiting by the entrance to the annexe, looking absolutely furious, her fists clenched, when Will rolls out of the car.

“You were due back three hours ago,” she says stiffly. Just for a moment, Will wants to tell her that they’d overslept because he was up late with his half-naked girlfriend, but he decides against it.

“Traffic was hell,” he says instead, blithe and utterly ignoring his mother’s fury. “Wasn’t it, Clark?”

“Awful, Mrs Traynor,” Louisa says sheepishly. “I’m sorry. I couldn’t pick up the phone while I was driving, it’s dangerous.”

“And it’s not like I can pick it up,” Will says. “No hands.”

“You have hands!” Clark says at once.

“They just don’t work so well,” Will replies. Clark flushes, which means she’s thinking of something dirty, and of course Will’s mind immediately joins hers in the gutter.

“I can think of a few things they can manage,” Louisa says quickly, and rushes past Will’s mum into the annexe, their bags in her hands. Will grins, and doesn’t care who sees it.

“Mother,” Will says in lieu of an actual goodbye, and moves his chair past her.

“I worry,” she says from behind him. Will closes his eyes briefly.

“You shouldn’t,” he replies. She makes a noise like a sad little laugh.

“When you have children of your own, Will, you’ll learn that you never stop worrying about them, no matter how old they get.” Will wheels around, suddenly furious.

“Don’t you mean if?” he snaps. “Or perhaps never is more appropriate. You’re going to have to go to Georgina for your grandchildren, Mother. You won’t get any from me.” She just smiles, and Christ, she looks old.

“Is that so?” she asks, and has the nerve to look significantly past him into the annexe, in the direction Clark has just gone. Will is sure steam must be coming out of his ears like a goddamn cartoon.

“It is so,” he says with some force. “By the way, I got my job back. Clark and I will be living in London part of the time from now on.” Her mouth falls open in shock. “And Louisa is my girlfriend. You are no longer the most important woman in my life. Deal with it.”

 He rolls into the house, and tries not to care when he hears her start crying behind him.

 

Clark is unpacking their suitcases and sorting out the clothes to be washed. She doesn’t look up when he approaches. “You made her cry,” she says, but there’s no accusation in her voice. It’s just a statement of fact. Will bows his head.

“I know I did,” he says. “I didn’t mean to. I just… I didn’t mean to.” Clark continues sorting the whites from the colours.

“Your mum isn’t the enemy, Will,” she says softly, and all the fight drains out of him.

“I know, Louisa,” he says tiredly. “She just makes me so angry.” At that, Clark does look up, her eyes keen.

“She’s not who you’re angry with,” she says. “It’s the situation you’re mad at. Don’t blame your mum just because she loves this version of you and you don’t understand why.” She goes back to her task.

Will has to go into his bedroom, ostensibly to cool off for a while. But mainly because he doesn’t want to admit that, as is often the case, Louisa is right.

He’s thinking of going around to the main house and apologising when there’s a knock on the front door. Will rolls over to it – it’s been left ajar, thanks to his previous stormy entry. There’s a delivery man with a parcel. “Will Traynor?” he asks. Will nods.

“I’ll take that, thank you,” he says, and the man reddens.

“Sorry, mate. I need a signature.” Will takes a deep breath, counts to ten in his mind, and then calls for Louisa.

She signs the docket quickly enough, and the man escapes, looking very relieved to be doing so. “I didn’t know we were expecting a parcel,” Clark says. Will shrugs.

“It’s a surprise,” he tells her. “A present.” she arches an eyebrow.

“For me?” she asks, obviously pleased. Will grins, his former bad mood evaporating.

“For both of us, hopefully,” he says. “If we use it right, it’s something we can both enjoy.” Clark is eyeing the parcel with consideration.

“Let’s open it, then,” she says, with almost childish glee. Will smirks.

“No. It’s for later, not now.” She pouts, and Will rolls over until he’s by her side. He beckons, and with a sigh she drops the parcel onto his lap. It’s large but light. He knows exactly what it is and what it’s for.

And that’s how the wedge arrives.

Notes:

Thanks for the feedback, guys! :)

Chapter 4: you know, you might surprise yourself

Summary:

Will and Louisa's first day at work.

Notes:

Me Before You belongs to Jojo Moyes.

The weekend passes mostly without incident. Will (with no little amusement at first, and then with increasing worry) watches Louisa unpack and repack their bags for London no less than six times. Eventually he convinces her to come and watch Spirited Away with him for the third time – it has proved to be one of her favourites. But even while she watches, she keeps stealing glances at the bags piled neatly in the hall.

“Clark,” Will says in exasperation as Chihiro and Haku fly through their air, “you’re not even pretending to pay attention. This is your favourite part.”

He’s not expecting Clark to burst into tears. “Jesus, Clark,” he says in horror. “Was it something I said?” She shakes her head.

“No,” she says, wiping her nose on her sleeve (Will cringes inside). “It’s nothing.” Will moves his chair until he’s right by her side, wiggles his good hand until she latches onto his fingers and holds tight.

“If it’s upsetting you, it’s not nothing,” Will says as gently as he can. Louisa sniffs. After several minutes, and much sobbing, Will works out that she is proud of him for taking this step and worrying about all the scary businesswomen with their designer suits and afraid she’ll let him down and also a bit hormonal and quite a bit hungry. He could have lived without realising that it’s possible to feel so many things at once. (He also could have lived without those truly eye-opening facts about Clark’s menstrual cycle but hey, he’s her boyfriend now. It’s his job to listen. Even if it’s way too much information and he’s quite sure Running Man never learnt this much about the mysterious workings of Clark’s feminine anatomy. This is why Will’s a much better boyfriend than Patrick, even if his legs and arms don’t work. And also better looking.)

“Hey,” he soothes, and Clark jumps up and curls up on his lap without so much as a by your leave. Will grunts. She’s quite heavy considering his muscles aren’t what they used to be and his hands and feet are burning quite badly today, but he wouldn’t tell her to get off him for the world. He also wouldn’t tell her she’s heavy for the world, either, but that’s because he’s not an idiot. “If you’re hungry, we can order something in. that way you don’t have to make it.” Clark sniffles again.

“Okay,” she says, her cheek damp against Will’s shoulder.

“I don’t know what to do about the rest,” he says. Clark manages a wet sounding laugh.

“I’m being silly,” she says.

“Yes, but I like you anyway,” Will says honestly. He hesitates a moment. “You’re worth a hundred of all those stuck up city girls, Clark,” he says. “You know that, right?” She shrugs. “Clark.” He waits until she meets his eyes. “You’re worth more than a hundred. A million. In all the universe, there is no one who can equal Louisa Clark.” She mops at her eyes.

“I know you think so,” she says, and kisses him on the forehead. “And that you think so makes me very happy, Will. I just… you’re not the only one who feels insecure sometimes, you know.”

“I know,” he tells her, and while she goes to order them Indian food from down the road, he goes to his computer.

 

By the time they get to London on Sunday afternoon, even Will is feeling the nerves. The car is packed full of everything they might need, for all they’re coming back on Tuesday morning. (Clark had made a list. It had been adorable.)

He looks out of the window at the London skyline as Clark brings up the last of their bags up from the car. (She’d waved off the concierges’ attempts to assist her. Sometimes she’s enchantingly working class. She’d punch him if she knew he’d thought that.) “That’s the last of it,” she says. Will smiles and turns his chair around.

“Good. There’s something for you in the bedroom.” Both of Clark’s eyebrows go up.

“Something for me?” she asks, already heading towards the other room. “Is it chocolate?” Will chuckles.

“I’m afraid not,” he says. “But there’s chocolate in the mini-bar, if you really want some.” He waits for the squeal, and he’s not disappointed. A moment later Clark comes racing out, her hands full of the business suits he’d had the hotel boutique organise.

“Will!” she nearly shrieks, and he winces. “Sorry,” she continues at a more reasonable volume. “What are these?” Will tilts his head.

“You were worried about those stuck up girls in their fancy suits,” he replies. “So I thought if you had a couple of fancy suits of your own, you might feel less intimidated. I hope they’re all right. I had to guess at your sizing.” Clark’s eyes are looking distinctly watery again; Will points a finger at her imperiously. “None of that,” he warns her. “There’ll be no crying today. Otherwise I’ll have to cry too, and it’s just undignified to see a grown man in a wheelchair weeping.” It does the trick; Louisa is too busy laughing and calling him a brute to start crying, thank the Lord.

Two of the four suits fit, the grey one and the black with pinstripes. They’ll have to make arrangements to get the others sent back. “I hope you brought your tights,” Will says as she tries on the shoes he’d picked out. She looks up.

“To wear to your office?” she asks in disbelief, and Will allows himself just a moment to feel a satisfied sort of glow at the phrase ‘his office’. He has an office. He has a purpose again. He hadn’t realised how much he’d missed it.

“Perhaps not,” he concedes, and adds with a straight face: “It’s a shame. I really think that bumblebee tights is a style that could stand to come back into fashion.”

Clark throws a scarf at him.

 

“I don’t miss this getting up early business,” Will grouses at Jeremy when the other man knocks on the hotel door at seven in the morning. But his heart isn’t in it. Rather, his heart is located somewhere in the vicinity of his throat.

“You and me both,” Jeremy agrees as he changes Will’s catheter bag and straps the new one to his leg. “Worst part of nursing, the early starts.” Will cocks his head at him.

“Really? I would have thought it was the exposure to other people’ bodily fluids.” Jeremy grins.

“Nah, you can get used to that with time. But I never get used to dragging my arse out of bed at five thirty. It’s just unnatural.”

“You’re not wrong there,” Will says dryly.

Clark is in one of her new suits and her new heels and one of her old scarves. One of her ridiculous butterfly clips are pinned into the sensible bun she’s got her hair in. Will fights down a smile. Even now, Clark is still her weird, quirky, amazing self. “You look fantastic,” she says, before he gets the chance to say the same.

“And you… scrub up all right,” he replies. She pulls a face at him. “Very well, better than all right. Any breakfast going?”

“I made toast and tea –”

“Terrible tea,” Will interjects. Clark points a spoon at him regally.

“It’s full-bodied,” she says, like that’s another word for ‘builder’s tea’.

“Confident tea,” Jeremy volunteers as he leaves the bathroom, drying his hands. “Tea that knows what it wants and isn’t afraid to go after it.” Clark giggles, and Will decides that while Jeremy isn’t Nathan, he’s not at all bad. He accepts the beaker with his meds that Clark puts near enough to his face that he doesn’t need help with the straw. He likes the way she does that.

“The jam here tastes weird,” Will informs Clark. “I remember from last time.” She nods.

“Rich people jam,” she tells him sagely. “Luckily I brought your favourite from home. For good luck.” Will snorts.

“Luck? More like to keep me from slipping into a hypoglycaemic coma before lunchtime.”

“You’re not diabetic,” Clark replies.

“I could be diabetic. I might get diabetes from the amount of sugar you keep putting in my tea.” Clark scoffs.

“I know exactly how you like your tea.”

“Yet you continue to make it too strong,” Will mutters. He’s not truly annoyed. It’s a stress thing, bickering with Clark, and she seems to be appreciating it as much as he is.

“Ha! Too strong! You’re hilarious.”

 

“It’s it just me, or is it cold in here?” Clark asks no one in particular. They’re alone in the elevator. “Also I think I feel sick.” Will ignores her.

“I bought and sold companies,” he tells his reflection in the polished metal wall of the elevator as it rises inexorably up. “It’s not that hard. I can do it in my sleep.” Clark pats him on the arm.

“That’s the spirit,” she says. “But seriously, I think I’m going to throw up.”

“That’s not helping.”

Nor does the fact that, when they emerge from the elevator, half his former employees are there staring at him like he’s the ghost of Christmas bloody Paralysed. Will glares at them. Now is not the time to be doing the Christy Brown, but God knows he’d like to.

“Will!” Andrew appears from behind a corner and for the first time in living memory, Will’s pleased to see him. “Bugger off,” he tells the others, and as one they all scarper. Will fondly remembers the days people would run away from him in fear. “Didn’t your mothers ever tell you it’s rude to gawp? Come on, Will, Will’s fiery PA. I’ll show you to your office.”

It’s okay. It’s nothing like his old office, the one he’d had when he was a CEO, but it’s better than the closet he’d had when he was first starting out. It’s tucked in the corner, affording it a measure of privacy that Will appreciates. He’d sent over the relevant software to be installed on the computer the week prior, and all the necessary information on his new clients is on the laptop, so he doesn’t have to worry about turning pages. There’s even a small desk for Clark in the corner. He can see her smiling out the corner of his eye. “Never had a desk before?” he asks in an undertone, and Clark’s smile broadens into an all-out grin.

Andrew leaves, after advising Will that ‘I expect you remember where everything is, but don’t be afraid to give me a shout.’ Will had nodded. He does remember where everything is. He wheels himself behind his new desk and wonders how the hell he got here.

“He’s funny,” Clark whispers after Andrew goes, as though even this small compliment is somehow traitorous to Will. He grunts, waiting as the computer loads.

“It’s what makes him good,” he replies. “No one feels threatened by him because he’s funny, and then out of nowhere they’ve agreed to let him buy their company for half of what they were originally asking. Or they’ll think he’s easy-going because he’s funny and then he eats them alive.” Clark looks up.

“Were you like that?” she asks. Will shakes his head.

“No. I was just ruthless. People were afraid of me.”

“So nothing much has changed,” Rupert says from the doorway. Will stiffens, as much as he can.

“Rupert,” he says coldly, and is gratified to see the other man flinch.

“Will,” he says in lieu of a greeting. “What the hell are you doing here?” Will tilts his head forward. His hands are burning a little and his feet quite a lot, his spasms aren’t too bad today and his lungs are clear of the wretched pneumonia he so loathes. He’s stuck in this fucking chair for the rest of his life, but by God he’s more than a match for his former best friend, Alicia’s husband.

“Came back for a while,” he says breezily. “Turns out you don’t need hands to do this job. Who knew?” Clark makes a suspicious noise rather like a laugh turned hastily into a cough.

“Why?” Rupert asks, and Will feels just a touch sorry for him, for the honest confusion on his face. But not so much, when he considers it.

“Professional fulfilment?” Will ponders. “Started to go a bit broke? Clark wanted to see the office? Pick any of them. The end result is the same, and we’ve got work to do. I hope Alicia enjoyed the honeymoon. And the mirror.”

When Rupert has gone, looking both confused and offended, Clark collapses into giggles. Will allows himself one self-satisfied smile. “You’re a bad man,” Louisa wheezes, and Will’s smile widens just a fraction.

“I know, Clark,” he replies. “Now sit up straight. It’s time to get to work.”

 

By the end of the day, he’s exhausted. It’s a lot more mental work than he’s had to do in quite some time, but God, it feels good. He’s called all five of his new clients to introduce himself, analysed their companies and the best way to go about acquiring them. There’s one that owns this gorgeous little piece of prime real estate that Will just knows he’d be able to sell for a fortune…

He hardly wants to leave by the end of the day. But it’s past six and they’ve been at the office for over nine hours. Will had been surprised by how little assistance he’d needed. Jeremy had turned up at midday for a discreet quick change in the gym change rooms on the twenty-first floor, and then Clark had patiently fed him lunch at his new desk. Will had resolutely ignored the first five gawkers who strolled by to see the infamous Will Traynor fed his lunch like a goddamn baby, but that hadn’t lasted long. He’d soon begun to level a scorching glare on all those who dared to look in his direction, except for Clark of course, and had been inordinately pleased to see the vast majority of them scurry away like frightened rats. So he’s still got it, then, even if he is trapped in this bloody thing.

Andrew had dropped by around two to ‘see how you’re settling in’. Will had been dictating a letter at the time through his voice recognition software. “Fine,” he’d said, cutting the letter short. Andrew had looked around the office like he still couldn’t quite believe Will was there.

“And you have everything you need?” Will had smiled wryly.

“I’ve been in this chair for the past two and a half years,” he’d pointed out. “I’ve had time to get used to it.” He hadn’t bothered to mention that before Clark most of what he’d done was sit around and hate the universe. Andrew doesn’t need to know that.

“And how are you settling in, Miss Clark?” Andrew had asked. Clark had levelled a dazzling smile at him.

“Very well, thank you,” she’d replied. Will had attempted to communicate with his eyes ‘mine, fuck off’ to Andrew, who had appeared to get the message. They’d always communicated best in unspoken terms, after all.

And after the long, taxing day, where Will had been reminded a hundred times of all the things he can’t do anymore but just as many times of the things he still can, he’s lying on his side in bed, a pillow behind his back and Clark against his front, the lamplight soft and golden. She’s wriggled herself back against him, curving her body against his so that he can bury his face in the curve of warmth of her neck and occasionally press a fond kiss to her shoulder.

But he doesn’t feel fond right now. He wants to cap off this impossible day with one of his favourite things, if Clark is willing.

“You asleep, Clark?” he asks softly. She makes a soft adorable snuffling noise, but she’s definitely conscious.

“Mm, no.” Will grins.

“Good,” he says. “There’s something I want to do for you, Clark, if you’ll let me.” She cracks open an eyelid.

“What is it?” she queries, rubbing her eyes with her fist. It’s adorable.

“You don’t have to do much,” he tells her. “In fact, you just have to lie there.” He pauses. “Actually, first you have to open that parcel.” She looks more awake at this.

“Finally,” she says. “I’ve been dying to know what’s in it.” Will smirks as she climbs out of bed.

“Go and get it, then.” She comes back with the package, already tearing into it. The contents fall out onto the bed.

“… What on earth is it?” she asks. Will rolls his eyes.

“It’s a wedge, Clark. A sex wedge. Surely you’ve come across them in your research?” Clark goes a little pink and opens and closes her mouth several times without saying anything. “Now, you need to roll me over and put the wedge under my chest. But I swear, after that, all you have to do is lie there.”

“Oh, only after all that?” she mocks gently. Will makes a face at her. Together, they roll him over until he’s lying flat on his stomach, and then she helps him wriggle down a little. She props the wedge under his chest until he’s looking up at her. His arms are down by his sides, useless, but it doesn’t matter. He doesn’t need his hands, for this. “Now what?” she asks, and Will grins.

“Lie down. Put your head on the pillow, and put your legs on either side of me. That’s it.” Clark is flushed crimson, as is often the case, but she’s done as he’s asked. He can smell the sweet feminine scent of her rising up from her skin, and other things, sharper things. “I’m going to need you to take your knickers off,” he informs her, and for a moment he thinks she might refuse. But she hooks her thumbs into the elastic of her underwear, flicks them off and onto the floor carelessly.

“Oh, Will,” she says softly, like she’s only just realised what he’s going to do. Surely this isn’t the first time. Surely someone, even Running Man, idiot that he is, had got down between Clark’s legs and licked at her until she screamed.

Will takes a deep breath. This isn’t the best position for his breathing, but he’ll be all right for the short term. Clark is spread out in front of him like the best banquet in the world; the pale of her skin giving way to crisp dark hair and pinkness and slick. It’s the prettiest cunt he can ever remember seeing in his life.

“I’ve been thinking about doing this for months,” Will tells, and drops a butterfly kiss onto her inner thigh. Clark’s leg starts to tremble, and her breathing picks up. It’s music to his ears. “Since before the wedding. Since before Mauritius. But I wanted to wait for a really good day. Today, Clark, was that day.” He hears her make a soft breathy noise like a sigh, and looks up. “What is it?” She’s smiling.

“Will Traynor,” she says fondly. “You talk too much.” Will presses another kiss an inch higher, and Clark squirms. Jesus, he’s missed this.

“Would you prefer I do something else?” he asks. “I could get up and leave, if you wanted.” She stares at him, and only after a few moments does Will realise he’s phrased it like he could leave, if he’d wanted. He’d forgotten. Just for a moment, he’d forgotten he isn’t just like everyone else. “Oh, Louisa Clark,” he says softly. “The things you keep on giving me.” When he looks up, Louisa’s eyes are gem bright and her hand is in his hair.

“Only everything you deserve,” she replies, her fingers stroking against his scalp, somehow soothing and arousing at the same time.

“Sweet talker,” Will accuses gently, and then before she can reply, licks into her.

He’s not prepared for how she reacts. She curses, her voice low and urgent, her head falling back onto the pillows, and Will drinks in every tiny detail of her reaction. “Fuck, Will.” He hums against her in agreement and her hips arch up, bumping his nose. “Sorry,” she pants, but Will couldn’t care less.

When she pulls her shirt over her head and tosses it aside, he has to look up. This is the first time he’s seen Clark completely bare, and it’s brilliant. She’s deliciously curved in ways no woman he’s been with before has been. Alicia and Tanya and all the others had been slim, and aware of it, and had maintained their figures with an almost vicious pride. But Louisa… her hips flare out in a decidedly sensual way, her stomach is a little round and her thighs are soft and steady when she drapes them over his shoulders. Every one of his senses is completely occupied by Louisa, and he never wants to leave.

He knows she’s close when she starts squirming and arching underneath him, when she’s begging him to let her come, her teeth clenched and her voice just a hiss in her throat. One hand has a vice grip in his hair and the other is at her breast, her hips snapping up towards his face, and Will redoubles his efforts. He’ll be damned if he’s going to get her this close and then not take her all the way.

When she comes she doesn’t scream, but she does say God so many times Will thinks she might have mistaken him for a deity. He doesn’t continue, knowing how sensitive she must be, lying his head down on her thigh and waiting for her to ease her way through the aftershocks. She’s trembling. He’s entranced.

“I didn’t know it could feel like that,” she says, confirming his prior theory that he’d been the first, or at least, the first that was any good at it. Will grins.

“Stick with me, Clark,” he advises. “It can get so much better.” She eyes him for a moment.

“Maybe you could do it again?” she asks, a little smile breaking over her face, and Will laughs.

“Created an addict, have I?” he jokes, but he bends his head to do as she’s asked. This is one task that he doesn’t mind in the slightest.

The second time, somehow, is even better. He’s had time to learn the rhythms of her body, what she likes, what she’s not so fond of. She likes a hint of teeth and steady, firm pressure; she likes long licks from her cunt all the way up to her clit, throbbing underneath his tongue. She likes to anchor her hands in his hair and rock her hips up against his face, leisurely at first, as if savouring the sensation, and then with greater urgency.

It didn’t have to be this way. He recalls other ways of achieving this; one of his preferred, before, had been to have his partner sit astride his face, grinding down against his tongue. And maybe he and Clark might do that, someday, when she’s more comfortable. He had thought the exposed nature of the position might have been too much for her. He doesn’t know for sure, of course, and he might just be being overly sensitive, but it’s Clark. He adores her. He wouldn’t hurt her or make her uncomfortable, not for his legs back, not for anything. He’d much prefer to err on the side of caution, at least for now.

So he flicks his tongue against her until she’s mewling, bucking up with sharp, staccato, uncontrollable little movements, her eyes always on his face between her legs. He angles his head, takes her clit between his lips and sucks, and it’s enough, by the judge of the noises she’s making, to tip her over the edge.

“Jesus, Will,” she says, when her breathing steadies enough for her to talk. “You’ve going to be doing that every damn day from now on.”

She manoeuvres him in the bed until he’s in his former position, except on his back. “Did you want me to?” she asks, her hand dropping to the waistband of his pyjamas, and Will moves his good hand just enough to still her fingers.

“Not tonight, Clark,” he says. He wants tonight, and today, to be all about the things he’s capable of doing, not the things he’s not.

“Not tonight,” she agrees, and assists him onto his side again, so that he’s framed by the pillow on one side and her as his little spoon on the other. “But not ‘not ever’?” Her skin is salty with sweat and her heart is still thumping hard; he can feel it even through her clothes.

“Not ‘not ever’,” he decides, before he can think better of it, and drifts off to sleep.

 

“How did it go?” Nathan asks when they get home the following morning. Will shrugs as he rolls out of the car. Louisa is looking tired, and Will’s skin is feeling a little prickly. It better not be fucking AD after he’s just got his job back. There’s no reason it should be. Both Clark and Jeremy took exemplary care of him in London. But still.

“Good,” Will replies shortly. “Can you check my BP?” The amusement fades quickly from Nathan’s face. The professional is back, if only for now.

“Sure, mate. Come into the bedroom.” Nathan straps the cuff to his arm. “Did you have your meds this morning?”

“Yes.” Nathan is silent for a moment. They have both a manual and an automatic blood pressure machine, but Will knows Nathan prefers the manual, says he trusts his ears more than a machine.

“A hundred and twenty on seventy-five,” Nathan says after a minute or two of silence. He pulls the stethoscope out of his ears and surreptitiously places his fingers on the pulse in Will’s wrist. “You’re okay, Will. Have you got pain?” Will takes stock for a moment.

“Just the hands and feet, at the moment,” he says. “I don’t need painkillers. Clark can help me with it later.”

“Okay.” Nathan studies him for a moment; Will wonders what he’s seeing.

“Yes?” he finally enquires sharply. Nathan shrugs.

“You look… really good, mate,” Nathan says, and Will has the distinct impression that it is costing Nathan a great deal, to peel back the layers of professionalism for a moment to tell Will what he’s really thinking. Oh, he knows Nathan will always be honest with him, but this is different, further even than the beer-accompanied chats in the garden.

“Thank you,” Will says, because he can’t think of anything else to say. Nathan nods quickly, as if covering his emotions up again.

“You’re welcome,” he says, and turns to go. “I dropped off some more meds,” he calls over his shoulder. “They’re in the cupboard. I’ll tell Lou, as well.”

“Nathan, wait.” Will doesn’t remember giving his brain permission to utter the words, but he ploughs on regardless. “You’ve. Had a lot of paralysed patients, yeah?” Nathan nods. Will swallows harshly, and spits the words out. “Have any of them… I mean. Have you met anyone whose carer was also their partner?” Nathan stares at him as though he’s speaking another language.

“Yes and no,” he says, with an air of greatly weighing up his words. “Among older people, it’s quite common, for a wife to care for her husband, or vice versa. There’s nothing to say it can’t happen, but it can put stress on the relationship, particularly new relationships.” Nathan pauses. “She wouldn’t go even if you told her to,” he says abruptly. “The time for that is past, Will. Lou knows what she’s getting into. She’ll stay with you as long as she can.” Will sighs.

“That’s what I’m afraid of,” he replies, and turns his chair away. After some time, he hears Nathan go.

 

Will spends the afternoon in a relaxed sort of haze, and Clark’s about the same. His hands settle down, and she puts cold cloths on his feet for a while, which helps. (She also drops a fond kiss to the top of each foot and the back of each hand, but he’s not telling anyone that.) They watch a film and she stretches out along the sofa, and Will sits his chair alongside it so she can put her head in his lap. Around four his dad pokes his head in. There’s a few minutes of awkward conversation followed by Clark going to have a shower. He knows she doesn’t really like his dad. That’s okay. Sometimes he doesn’t really like his dad either.

“Your mother thought you might like to join us in the main house, for dinner,” his father says. “As a celebration, of sorts.” Will gazes steadily at him.

“If I wanted to celebrate I’d be doing it here, in the annexe, with my girlfriend,” he says, and perversely enjoys the way his dad’s hand jerks in shock, so hard it sends some of his tea slopping onto the floor. It’s always comforting, to see that even the ‘able-bodied’ don’t have full control of themselves sometimes.

“Your… girlfriend,” he says, as though Will has just announced that his life dream is to move to Antarctica and raise penguins. “Louisa Clark. Is now your girlfriend.”

“Yes,” Will confirms. “Mum didn’t tell you?” His dad shakes his head. “Is it going to be a problem?” His father’s eyebrows go down, with some effort.

“No, not at all,” he says. “Only… we are still paying her, you know.”

“And?” Will asks. “She deserves it. And she has a family to support. You know that.”

“Yes, but…” It’s irritating. Will doesn’t want it to drag out any longer.

“She’s not with me because of the money,” he says in exasperation. “She’s with me because she loves me and I love her.” For the second time that day, the tea hits the floor. “For God’s sake,” Will says, unamused, but then he takes a good look at his dad. His eyes are wide, almost glistening, and his mouth is slack. “Dad,” Will says, moderately alarmed. “Please don’t be having a stroke. One paralysed individual in the family is more than enough, believe me.”

It seems to snap his dad out of his spell. A moment later Will finds himself being roughly embraced, his father lurching forward into a half stand, half crouch, one hand ending up on Will’s back and the other cradling his head like he’s a kid. It’s horrible. It’s weird. It’s… honestly not as bad as he’d thought being hugged by his dad might be. At least he doesn’t have to worry about where to put his hands.

“You love her,” his dad says, pulling away, and now his eyes are looking distinctly wet. “And she loves you. Will – this is marvellous. I don’t care what you say. We’re having a celebratory dinner tonight. Anything you want. Anything Louisa wants.” He hasn’t seen his father so enthused about anything for years. “I’ll organise it. Will you tell Louisa?” And he’s up like a shot, out the door, a smile a mile wide on his face.

Weird.

After the shock has settled, Will wheels his chair over to the bathroom and calls out Clark’s name loudly, since he obviously can’t knock on the bloody door himself. She opens the door, her hair wet and dripping, a hastily wrapped towel around her slipping a little. “Are you okay?” she asks. Will grimaces.

“After a fashion. We’re going to be having dinner with my parents, and I want you to do something for me.”

“What?” she asks, and Will grins with too many teeth, a shark’s grin, he’s been told.

“Wear your brightest dress? And the bumblebee tights? Come on,” he says, reading unwillingness in her face, “give me something pretty to look at while we’re stuck there with my mum and dad. Let’s give the fuckers something to talk about.”

Clark grins back at him, whether in happiness at the memory or in sheer perverse joy at the thought of helping him mess with his parents. Maybe both.

“I think I have just the thing.”

Notes:

Tell me honestly, is there too much sexy times in this?

Chapter 5: gonna win you over

Notes:

Bit of a filler chapter. Thanks to everyone who gave me feedback / food for thought / thoughts regarding the last chapter.

Edit: I'm an idiot and forgot to warn for spoilers for After You in this chapter. So if you haven't read that, then spoiler alert.

The dress is awful, and also perfect. It fits Clark’s figure very well, but that’s the kindest thing that can be said of it. It’s a riot of colours and she wears her bumblebee tights with it and a pair of glittery ballet flats. “Perfect, Clark,” Will approves. “But do you want to know where it would look better?”

“Don’t say on your bedroom floor.” Will tuts in disapproval.

“I’m paralysed. You’re supposed to pretend all my bad pickup lines are good.” (He’s thrilled that she doesn’t.)

“The day I do that will be the day that I leave you to pursue my dreams of becoming a circus clown.” Will nods.

“You’d be good at it, you’re clumsy enough.”

“Ha ha,” she says dryly from the mirror where she’s putting her earrings in.

“But you will. Leave me, I mean,” he elaborates when she raises an eyebrow at him. Clark looks at him steadily.

“Not for a long time yet,” she says. “Now, are you going to escort me into your parents’ house, or does a girl have to take herself?”

“I suppose I could escort you,” he says, and lets her take his hand. “Gird your loins, Clark. We may not escape this one alive.” Clark sighs theatrically.

“Well, we all have to face our fate sooner or later,” she replies. “At least I’ll be in good company.”

“My parents?” Will asks. “’Good company’ is not the term I’d use.” She squeezes his hand.

“No, you, idiot,” she replies.

“No wonder I have low self-esteem, with you being cruel to me all the time,” Will says.

“Behave or I’ll spill boiling soup on your bits,” she retaliates. Will winces.

“All right, I’ll desist.” Louisa nods, satisfied.

“Good. And no Christy Brown.”

“You never let me have any fun.”

 

Later, Will considers these selected excerpts the heights of the evening:

 

“Mother, Father. To what to I owe this unexpected pleasure? Oh, Dad. You still haven’t stopped smiling. Are you channelling the Joker?”

Louisa, mortified, kicks him surreptitiously in the ankle. “Shut up, Will,” she says out the corner of her mouth.

“Clark, do stop kicking me. I’m paralysed. My mobility is already compromised enough.”

 

And:

“Soup, I think, Clark.”

“You hate soup.”

“Yes, well, it matches my general feeling towards this gathering quite well then.”

 

Not to mention:

“We really need to talk about Miss Clark and her involvement in your finances,” his mother murmurs, as if saying it softly will lessen the implications behind what she’s saying. Louisa stiffens and Will scowls directly at his mother, who is examining her pudding like it holds the secrets of the universe.

“Quite right, Mother,” Will says, relishing the two startled looks and the one mutely telling him to behave. Clark knows him too well. “Louisa. It no longer seems pertinent to continue to pretend to be charging you for the spare room, considering you sleep in my bed with me most nights. Don’t worry your head about it.”

His mother’s eyelid twitches. Will has the distinct feeling he might be pushing his luck, but that’s hardly going to deter him.

 

Clark’s off calling her sister, and Will has no idea where his dad is, when he wheels over to his mother, sitting alone at the dining table. She has her hands wrapped around a mug of cooling tea and she’s staring into space.

“Mum,” he says quietly, and her head flies up like she hadn’t heard him approach. Although how she couldn’t notice he doesn’t know, the chair makes enough bloody noise to wake a cemetery.

“Yes, Will?”

“Your tea is going cold.” She looks down at it in surprise.

“Oh, I suppose it is. Thank you.” She takes a sip, makes a face, and puts it back down.

“We need to talk,” Will tells her, and is unsurprised when her shoulders stiffen and her chin goes up like she’s hearing a case. News from Will is rarely good news for her. “I’m going to be paying Clark from now on to be my PA when we go to the city. You don’t have to do it anymore.” Will’s mum looks up at that.

“And who’ll keep an eye on you when she’s not available?” she asks. “Couples need time apart, Will, you know that. Otherwise the little things that bother you about each other will become big things.” Will thinks fleetingly of Alicia’s habit of cutting her toenails on the sofa, and shudders.

“I know that,” he says, fighting down impatience. “I don’t need someone with me all the time, Mother. I’m not a child.”

“No,” she replies steadily. “I’m aware of that. I also know you wouldn’t do a thing to hurt that girl if you can avoid it, which is why I’m not afraid of a recurrence of the rusty nail incident.” Will winces.

“Then what are you afraid of?” he asks before he can stop himself. His mother turns away, but not before he sees the glitter of tears in her eyes.

“I just don’t want you to get hurt,” she says rather sadly, and Will, for the first time in what feels like an age, feels sorry for her. She didn’t ask for this, any more than he did. He raises his good hand just a fraction, and she looks down at it like she doesn’t know what to do.

“Mum,” he says very gently, “if you want to hold my hand, you’re going to have to be the one that reaches out.” She sits very still, and for a dreadful moment Will thinks she won’t. But of course she does. She’s his mum, and he knows that she loves him, and he loves her, not that he’d ever be able to admit it. She wraps her hand loosely around his own, and Will squeezes her fingers as best he can. “Listen,” he tells her. “I know you don’t want me to get hurt. But I am hurt. No, listen. I’m never going to get better. I will probably get worse, very soon, and that – that scares the shit out of me. But Louisa, she makes it better. I don’t have forever to spend with her. So I’m going to do as much as we can together now, against the day that I won’t be here to nag her into living well.”

There are tears in her eyes, but for the first time in a long time, she doesn’t look sad. “Do you want to know something dreadful?” she asks. Will considers it for a moment, but finally nods. His mum draws in a deep breath. “I’ve never known what it is to love someone like you and Louisa love each other. I love you and Georgina, of course, but it’s different. This is different.”

And Will had thought only hours it was impossible to feel sorry for his mum. He was wrong.

“I love you too,” he tells her, his voice like gravel in his throat, and she nearly lights up with joy. And to think he’d thought it impossible to say. You can love someone and not like them much, he’s found.

“That wasn’t so bad,” Clark says later as she climbs into bed beside him. Will nods gravely as she lifts his arm up so she can curl into his side.

“You’re right,” he agrees. “The food was spectacular.” Clark elbows him gently.

“I meant spending time with your mum and dad,” she specifies. Will grunts.

“Oh. That.”

“Yes, ‘oh, that’,” Clark mimics gently. “I have to say, though, I’ve never seen so much food in one place. Were they planning to invite the whole town after we left?” Will smirks.

“I think Dad got a bit overexcited,” he replies.

“You think? He went through four glasses of port in the two hours alone that we were there.” Louisa chuckles.

“You wouldn’t want him to dehydrate,” Will says primly, and Clark’s chuckle becomes a full blown laugh. She quiets quickly, her breathing deep and even, and he thinks she might be asleep.

“My mum’s never loved anyone,” he says suddenly. He can feel Clark’s eyes blink open against his chest.

“She loves you,” she says immediately.

“Yes, of course,” Will says impatiently, “but that’s not what I meant. She’s never loved anyone the way you and I love each other.”

“That’s sad,” Clark says after a moment, but he has the feeling she’s not getting it.

“It is, but that’s not the part I keep thinking about. I didn’t know how to love, not truly, until I met you. If that motorcycle had never hit me, if I wasn’t paralysed from the neck down, I never would have met you.”

“You don’t know that,” Louisa says quietly, and Will snorts.

“Yes, I do. And even if we had met, I was such a wanker that I would have offended you somehow.”

“Don’t be like that,” Louisa says. “You’re still a wanker, and you offend me all the time.”

It takes Will a minute to stop laughing. “What I’m getting at,” he resumes, “very poorly, I might add, is that you’re worth it. All of it. Meeting you is worth all of this.” Louisa looks up at him.

“If not for that night in the maze,” she replies, “I would have had the balls to leave Stortfold. So I wouldn’t have been here to lose my job at the Buttered Bun, and have to go the job centre, and get the job here with you. So what I’m saying, is: you’re worth it. That awful night and everything that came after it is made bearable because of you.” Will blinks rapidly.

“We’re a right pair of sooks,” he mutters roughly. Louisa lets out a mildly hysterical sounding giggle.

“We are,” she agrees. “I won’t tell anyone if you don’t.”

“Pinky promise,” Will proposes gravely. Louisa blinks.

“How the hell do you know what a pinky promise is?” she asks. “And don’t tell me knowledge is power.” Will grins.

“Nathan,” he replies simply. Louisa smiles, but links her little finger with Will’s own all the same.

“Of course.”

 

He’s standing on the beach at Mauritius, and his wheelchair is empty. Dimly he realises this is a miracle, but he doesn’t have the wherewithal to focus on that now. Clark is ahead of him, and she’s smiling, and she’s got her hands out in front of her as she backs into the water.

“Come with me,” she invites, and Will is powerless to resist her. He follows, until the water is up to his chest, but she is still out of reach.

“Clark,” he calls. “You’re too far away.” She laughs, the sound of it trailing on the wind like the chime of a bell.

“This isn’t real,” she tells him, and she’s so far ahead, and he can’t breathe, and the water feels like it is on fire.

Will screams,

and he wakes up screaming. It’s dark and Clark’s on her feet turning the light on and everything hurts and this, this is why he wanted to die. “Will,” she’s saying, she’s come back, she’s cradling his head in her hands and her face is as white as death. “Will, love, what is it?”

He can’t tell her. His feet and hands and forearms and calves are on fire, as if flames are licking at his flesh, melting his skin and charring his bones. It’s been so long since it had been this bad. He’d thought, stupidly, that Clark was like a good luck charm keeping it away.

She’s holding his hand and phoning Nathan with the other. Will can hear the irritated note in the other man’s Antipodean accent change into concern. He’s telling her what to do, which of the painkillers to get him, the heavy duty ones they try not to use anymore. And she’s putting a straw to his lips and telling him to drink it all, and she’s putting cold cloths on his hands and feet, and oh Jesus what if he’d been alone but he never wants her to have to see him like this.

She must have crushed up a sleeping tablet in the water as well because sleep pulls him back under, into darkness as absolute as night, when he’d thought he might never sleep again from the pain.

When he wakes up, the clock tells him it’s almost ten, and Louisa isn’t beside him. Will has the sudden, horrible fear that she’s left. “Clark!” he calls, unable to silence the note of panic in his voice. There is a thudding sound, rather like a dropped book, and a moment later Louisa is hurtling through the door to drop to her knees by his side.

“How are you feeling?” she says breathlessly all in a rush. Will grimaces.

“My mouth tastes like something died in it and my head is pounding. Also where the hell is Nathan?” Louisa reaches over out of his line of sight and comes back with a glass and a straw. Will drinks, grateful for the taste of something other than dust and fear.

“Nathan’s been and gone,” she tells him. “He checked your observations and told me to let you sleep. I did your tubes and gave you a wash. You didn’t bat an eyelash.” She looks momentarily guilty. “I think Nathan thought I’d overdosed you on sleeping tablets. But he said one of those and two of the pain ones, and that’s what I did.”

“Good girl, Clark,” Will says weakly. Louisa flushes. “I’m sorry you had to see that.” She stops flushing and starts to look cross.

“Well, I’m sorry I get teary and eat all the cake when it’s that time of the month,” she replies. Will manages a faint smile at that. “Don’t give me that smile, Will Traynor. I can ‘I’m sorry’ you until sunset if I have to.”

“Fine,” Will relents. “I’ll shut up and behave.” Louisa smiles tremulously, but Will has thought of something else.

“How am I going to go back to work tomorrow?” he asks. Louisa’s face clouds over. It’s obvious she hadn’t thought of that.

“The same way we did on Monday,” she replies. “Nate will get you up this afternoon and we’ll drive down together.” Will winces.

“What if it happens again?” he asks. Louisa squeezes his hand.

“We’ll deal with it.” But it’s not enough.

“Fuck,” he says, and then says it again. “Fuck. Fucking hell. I can’t do this.” Louisa turns his head until he can’t help but look at her.

“Yes, you can,” she says. “You’re going to rest this morning and go back in there tomorrow like you’ve come back to take over again. And I’ll be with you.” She pauses, and brushes a kiss on his forehead. “I’ll always be with you.” Will closes his eyes and breathes in the scent of her.

“Come up here and let me hold you,” he says hoarsely. “Just for a moment. Just for a little while until Nathan gets here at lunchtime.” Louisa curls into his side, and puts her head on his chest. “Were you scared?” Will asks her, and after a moment, she nods. “Me too.”

 

“About time you woke up,” Nathan cracks gently as he gets Will onto the shower chair. “Thought you’d sleep forever.” Will manages a sliver of a smile.

“Clark mentioned you thought she might have OD’d me,” Will replies. Nathan shrugs as he wheels the chair into the bathroom; Will can see his reflection in the glass. Will is long past feeling weird about being completed naked while Nathan is fully clothed; beside, Nathan always swathes him in towels for the transfer. When Will had commented on it once, Nathan had muttered something about keeping his temperature level, but Will knows it’s just as much for his dignity.

“I didn’t really think that,” Nathan says abruptly fifteen minutes later, when he is carefully drying between the toes of Will’s left foot so his skin doesn’t break down. Will raises an eyebrow, accustomed by now to Nathan’s fondness for chewing over a thought in his mind before he says it. “She’s a good girl. Bright.”

“Funnily enough, Nathan, that’s what I said,” Will replies as Nathan switches feet. “But aren’t you going to give me a lecture about how I’ve been overdoing it lately and I should take better care of myself.” Nathan shakes his head.

“Nah. I don’t think that’s what caused your pain overnight. I think you could probably work in the city more often than you do now and not see too many ill effects.”

“Then what?” Will asks. He’s sincerely curious. Nathan turns away and picks up Will’s shirt, having dried him from top to toe.

“I don’t know, mate.” There’s genuine perplexity in Nathan’s familiar, blunt voice. “I’ll let you know when I work it out.”

 

Will leaves work the following day feeling tired but satisfied. He’d woken up without pain, which is always a bonus, and Jeremy had been on time to get him ready, and even having to meet with Andrew at four o clock hadn’t dampened his enthusiasm. Having to report to someone like he’s fresh out of university again isn’t exactly enjoyable, but Will rather relishes giving his ‘boss’ enough information to keep Andrew satisfied while keeping much of Will’s plans hidden. Let them think that he’d learned nothing in the two and a half years since his accident. Will knows infinitely more about human nature and what people are willing to risk than any university could ever teach.

As for Clark, he only requires her to be his hands a few times during the course of the day, to help him with lunch and seal envelopes. Little tasks. The rest of the time, Louisa is tapping away dutifully at her laptop. He knows she’s working on her bridging course, the one that her sister found for her online. Will also knows perfectly well that Clark can’t study online forever. At some point, his girl is going to want to spread her wings and see the world, and he’s of no mind to stop her.

In the evening, Clark gets him ready for bed, because Jeremy’s unavailable. Will hates it. Hates being dependent on her – on anyone, but especially on her – hates that she has to change his catheter bag and clean up after him and manhandle him from the chair into bed. Clark’s a sturdy enough girl, as these things go, but even bearing that in mind she’s still not really built for the kind of heavy lifting that comes to easily to Nathan. So he hates it. Well, not all of it. What he told her ex is correct: she does give one hell of a bed bath.

When he informs her of this, while she’s changing for bed (and doesn’t he love that she’s comfortable enough to change in front of her), she makes a face at him.

“You are unequivocally and undeniably a bad man,” she tells him as she climbs into bed.

“I never claimed to be otherwise,” Will replies. “Besides, if I’m a bad man, what does that make you for staying with me?” He buries his nose in the soft place where her neck joins her shoulder, wisps of her hair tickling his nose. But oh, the scent of it, like being enveloped in Clark.

“Mad as a March hare?” she asks, wriggling a little until her arse is pressed firmly against certain delicate areas of his anatomy.

“That was a rhetorical question,” Will tells her, and she just makes a happy/contented/vaguely cross noise into her pillow. Jesus. He just hopes she doesn’t squirm.

(Of course she bloody squirms. it’s no wonder he doesn’t get any sleep.)

 

When they leave the hotel in the morning, for a change they go out the front entrance of the hotel instead of through the care park. It’s a mistake. Will notices the throng of people standing on the pavement almost immediately, holding video cameras and oversized microphones and Styrofoam cups of coffee. He communicates this to Louisa with his eyes, and in unison they skirt around the pack, increasing their speed subtly.

It’s no good. They’re spotted as they attempt to slip away.

“Will! Louisa!”

“Oh, bloody hell,” he murmurs in an undertone, and a muffled curse from Louisa suggests that she agrees with him.

Shortly before he was meant to leave for Switzerland, his information and story had been given to the press, who’d been mistakenly informed that he’d gone to Dignitas. Will had thought it would die down when they’d realised he hadn’t, but if anything the story had gotten bigger. Apparently a man killing himself is far less interesting that the reasons a man chooses not to kill himself. Will doesn’t really get it himself, but then he’s not a journalist.

There were times when he could have cheerfully throttled the person who told the press about him. Clark swears up and down that it was her ex (apparently this has been corroborated by Katrina, who had extracted a confession from Patrick when she’s gone round to give him a black eye). but for the most part, it doesn’t bother him who it was. The end result was the same. He’d been hounded nonstop, Clark’s family and his parents had been harassed. Hell, even Georgina had sent a tersely worded letter from Australia to say she’d received calls from English newspapers about him. He knows she would have just loved that.

For a few days his name and his family’s and his Clark’s had been dragged through the mud, and then a bomb had gone off somewhere abroad inside a shrine. The world had been successfully diverted from the subject of assisted suicide and Will Traynor for a time, and he’d hoped that things would remain that way.

He should have known that the peace wouldn’t last.

Louisa picks up speed; Will keeps pace with her easily in his chair. “Just keep walking,” Will tells her quietly. And even as the staccato rhythm of her heels on the pavement gets faster, in spite of everything the shouting mob are still gaining on them.

“It’s not fair,” Louisa says, and she’s got that mulish look on her face that always spells trouble for him. And anyone else within a five kilometre radius.

“Indeed it is not,” Will has time to reply, before the throng is upon them.

Will doesn’t like to be around too many people, and he knows that Clark gets skittish around groups of men she doesn’t know, which isn’t surprising, given her history. Neither of them are comfortable with this. And fucking hell, the questions they ask, about his personal life and his decision not to go to Switzerland and are they together and who is Clark wearing, for Christ’s sake. It’s ridiculous. It’s invasive and wrong and he can’t do a damn thing about it. Once, Will would have liked nothing more than to tell the whole bunch of them to fuck off. And once, he might have even done just that, but he’s employed again now. He has to behave himself a bit more. He’s resigned himself to never doing the Christy Brown in public again, even though he’s earmarked it for whenever his mother becomes excessively unbearable, although she hasn’t been too bad lately.

Poor Louisa. Her hands are bunched into white-knuckled fists and he can practically hear her grinding her teeth from here. She doesn’t cope with unfairness or injustice nearly as well as Will does. He sees the exact moment that the last of Clark’s control evaporates. She swings around sharply and unexpected, and two of the cameramen (or camera people, Will supposes is more politically correct) almost drop their equipment in their haste to not trip directly into Louisa.

“You people are vultures,” she hisses. “Why can’t you just leave us alone?” She stares at them for a moment, her chest heaving, her eyes like knives.

“Clark, don’t,” Will tries to tell her. But as usual, she’s not listening. Will briefly entertains a happy fantasy of leaping to his feet and delivering a satisfying punch to the cameramen’s equipment, but quickly discards it in favour of stopping Clark from doing just that. Will reverses his chair and moves close enough to her that he can put his hand on her wrist. Louisa looks down as though she doesn’t know where the touch has come from, and then her gaze softens when she realises it’s him. She slips his hand down until she can wrap her own around his.

“Yes, Will’s my boyfriend,” she says without looking back at the paparazzi. She keeps her gaze on him, like he’s the only important thing left in the world. “Please leave us alone now.”

And when she turns and walks away, her hand still tucked in his as Will rolls his chair alongside her, none of them dare to follow.

 

“Really,” Clark says, eyeing the newspaper with disdain, “you’d think my mother just decided not to give me a name.” Girlfriend of paralysed man begs press to leave them alone, says one headline. Will resolutely ignores the rest. “As for begging… did I beg, Will? Did I in fact beg?”

“You did not,” he confirms. “It was more of a strident order.” Louisa beams, evidently satisfied with this answer.

“What a load of horse shit,” she concludes, stepping away from the blurry snaps of them both that decorate the front pages of the tabloids.

“I couldn’t have said it better myself,” Will agrees. “Is this enough of an outing for one day? It’s bloody cold for September.” He follows her out of the corner shop and down the cobbled path. The tourists are beginning to trail off for the year.

“Unseasonable,” Louisa comments sagely as she puts the ramp down on the car. “Downright unnatural.”

“Mum says we were on the news last night,” he comments halfway back to the castle.

“How embarrassing,” Louisa says dryly.

When he rolls down the ramp and towards the annexe, he’s surprised to see there’s a girl sitting by the front door; she looks young. In fact, she can’t be more than fifteen.

“Who’s this, then?” Louisa asks. There’s no guile in her voice, she’s just genuinely interested. Part of why he loves her.

“I saw you on the news,” the girl says, and looks Louisa up and down like she’s not particularly impressed with what she sees. “I thought you’d be taller. And you weren’t… dressed like that.” In his secret heart of hearts, Will has to agree with her. Mustard yellow is decidedly not Clark’s best colour.

“Who are you and what are you doing here?” he asks anyway, because agreement over Clark’s (lack of) dress sense is no reason to accept some random girl wandering about the property. The girl straightens her shoulders, tilts her head until she’s staring at a point somewhere over Will’s left shoulder. He’s struck with a sudden sense of déjà vu.

“My name’s Lily,” she replies. “I’m your daughter.”

Notes:

Yes, I'm a terrible person. But don't hate me too much. My computer ate fifteen hundred words of this so I stayed up late to finish it.

Since the timeline is a bit skewed, I'll be addressing the Lily situation in the next chapter.

Chapter 6: caught off guard by you

Will’s first reaction is disbelief, followed by ‘hell fucking no’, followed by more ‘hell fucking no’. The girl doesn’t seem disheartened by this reaction.

“My mum said you didn’t want me,” she says, “but I didn’t believe her.” Will had laughed then, completely bewildered and utterly disbelieving.

“How could I want you when I didn’t know you existed?” he asks.

“Right back at you,” the girl shoots back. “It’s not like I asked to find out that my real dad is some random guy on the news.”

“Perhaps we ought to take this inside,” Clark suggests, and Will glares at her.

“Oh, no. Definitely not, Clark. She’s not my daughter.”

“My mother’s name is Tanya Miller,” the girl – Lily – offers. Will’s brain stops for a second. Tanya Miller.

“Whether she is your daughter or not,” Louisa snaps, “this is not a conversation for out here. You want your mum or dad to come along into the midst of this?” She turns a smile on the kid. “Come in, Lily.”

“Thanks,” Lily replies. Will’s left on his own front porch, wondering how the fuck this is his life.

“What are you doing?” he hisses to Louisa as she sedately fills the kettle. The girl is off using the loo. “We don’t know who the hell this girl is? And you’re inviting her into the house?”

“Look at the size of her,” Louisa replies calmly. “She can’t be more than fourteen. I could knock her out with one elbow.” Will considers this for a moment, thrown by the thought of Louisa striking anyone in anger.

“Nevertheless,” he resumes, as Clark sets out two mugs and his beaker, “no tea please Clark, what you do to loose leaf is unholy – she could be anyone. She could be like that movie we saw last week, with the girl who was actually a crazy lady pretending to be a kid.”

“Orphan?” Clark asks. “The one you screamed in.”

“I did not scream. It was a manly shout.”

“You’re correct. It wasn’t a scream. It was more of a high pitched shriek.” Will frowns at her.

“Have you got anything to eat?” Lily says, appearing from nowhere. If Will could jump from surprise, he would have.

“Would you like a biscuit?” Louisa asks. Will attempts to communicate to her with his eyes alone how this is a Very Bad Idea. Lily shrugs.

“I suppose so,” she says, with the air of someone ungraciously conceding a point. “Have you got any chocolate ones?”

It turns out Louisa does indeed have chocolate ones hidden away in a kitchen cupboard. Will wheels his chair over to the dining table and watches Lily goes through seven of them and a large mug of tea. Something about the savage way she devours them leads Will to suspect that she has not eaten in some time. When he inquires as such, she shrugs. She does that a lot, with the insouciance of the young.

“Not since tea last night,” she says offhandedly like it’s not a big deal, to go roughly eighteen hours without food. His next question, about where her parents are, is met with less welcome. Lily purses her lips, hunches her shoulders, and refuses to answer. Will trades glances with Louisa, and receiving no help from that quarter, sits in silence for a bit.

Louisa puts the cup closer to his face so he can drink, and Will closes his lips around the straw. Lily is openly staring, and Will glares at her.

“Doesn’t that frustrate you?” she asks frankly. “Needing someone else for everything. I’d hate it. It would drive me crazy.”

“You can get used to it,” Will informs her. Clark makes an odd noise almost like a muffled laugh. “Not that I have done so yet,” he adds, staring pointedly at Louisa. She appears to be contemplating the depths of her mug, but the corner of her mouth is twitching. “Hilarious,” Will tells her sourly, before focussing on Lily again. “So, your mother is Tanya Miller.”

Lily nods. “She married this twat called Francis Houghton a few years ago. I hate him. He’s a wanker.”

“So he’s your stepfather,” Will clarifies, and Lily shudders.

“God, no. He’s not anything of mine.”

“Hmm,” Will says. “And where exactly does your mother think you are at the moment?” Lily shrugs again. It’s starting to annoy him.

“At a friend’s house,” she says succinctly. “I was meant to come home last night. They’re probably freaking out because they don’t know where I am. I took the bus down here last night and hung out in that weird maze until this morning.” Will hears Louisa draw in a sharp breath. Mutely, he twitches his hand, and she comes over and wraps her own around his. He can feel her fingers trembling. Lily looks at them oddly.

“That’s very dangerous,” Will tells her. Lily scowls.

“Really? A maze is dangerous? Is the Mad Hatter going to leap out and assault me from behind a hedge?” Louisa shudders.

“That’s enough,” Will says sharply. “Give me your mother’s phone number. I want to speak to her.”

The girl’s face closes over. It’s disturbingly like looking into a mirror. Will has seen that same reserve in his own expression, like shutters coming down over his eyes, hiding away from the light. “You don’t believe me,” she says, and she’s standing up, grabbing her bag. “You know what, I should be going anyway.” And she’s out the door before either Will or Louisa can stop her.

“Fuck,” Will says. “This is ridiculous.” Louisa is very pale.

“Will,” she says. “We’ve got to go after her.” Will rolls his eyes.

“It’s only Stortfold out there,” he protests. “How much trouble could she get into?”

He knows he’s fucked up the moment it comes out of his mouth. Louisa’s eyes go cold for a moment, cold as a winter storm, and she pulls away from him. Will moves forward, following her, reaching for her the only way he can; with his good hand, just a couple of inches.

“Clark,” he says gently. “I’m sorry. I wasn’t thinking.” Her face is drawn and tight, and he can see ghosts move behind her eyes. Sometimes he forgets that just because Louisa has full control of her body doesn’t mean she isn’t as fucked up as he is. “We’ll get the car and go after her.”

 

She’s not hard to find. Lily’s stomping down the street with a face like thunder. Clark pulls up next to her, the car motoring gently along. “Lily,” Will calls through the open window. “Stop. We need to talk about this.”

“Why?” she asks sullenly. “You don’t believe me. You don’t want me. Why do you care?” Will signs.

“I do believe you, all right?” he says. “But this is a bloody lot to take in. Let me call your mum just to let her know you’re all right.” The girl turns, and she’s close to tears.

“She doesn’t care,” she says. “She’s got the twins now and they’re her chance at having a real family and she doesn’t want me.” And damn, now the kid’s crying. “Nobody wants me,” she says, and she’s stopped walking.

Clark pulls the car over and puts it into park. She gets out of the car and strides around to Lily, and unceremoniously takes her in her arms. The girl stiffens for a moment and then begins sobbing onto Clark’s shoulder. “Shush,” Louisa tells her softly but firmly. “That’s not true. Your dad and I going to look after you and make sure you’re all right.”

Will opens his mouth to say the complete opposite and that he is bloody not the kid’s dad. But when Clark glares at him, he can’t bring himself to contradict her. Mainly because he knows how scary Clark can be when she’s cross. So what he does say is, “Let’s go home.”

 

“Hello, Tanya?” he asks. Louisa is out making more tea and Lily is apparently trying to help, God help them.

“Yes. Who is this?” Will draws in a deep breath.

“It’s Will. Traynor.” There’s a beat of silence.

“Will? What on earth are you calling me for?” And suddenly he’s angry. Properly, steaming mad.

“Perhaps regarding the fact that you had my child and neglected to tell me?”

“Is she there? Is she all right?”

“Yes,” Will clips out. “She caught a bus and spent the night in a maze to see me. Tanya, why the hell didn’t you tell me we’d had a child?”

“Because you were so keen to see me,” she snaps down the line. “You dumped me and wouldn’t even speak to me. As far as I’m concerned, you don’t deserve to have a child, much less Lily.”

“Lily?” Will asks. “Would that be the daughter you sent off to boarding school so you could, and I quote, ‘have a real family’?”

“You’ve been listening to her, then,” Tanya says tautly. “As far as she’s concerned I’m the big bad bitch who had the audacity to want a life of her own as well as being Lily’s mother.”

“How terrible for you,” Will drawls. Tanya inhales sharply.

“God, Will. You’re still such an arsehole.”

“And you’re a self-absorbed cow,” Will replies calmly. “If you never told her, how did Lily find out that I’m her father?” There’s a pause for a moment.

“I saw you on the news last night,” Tanya finally says, sounding incredibly reluctant. “I told Francis – my husband – that you were Lily’s real father. She must have been listening.”

“She must have been,” Will agrees, absently feeling a bit sorry for the kid. No wonder she was a bit messed up. It must have been hard to find out via eavesdropping that your real dad is a crotchety bloke in a wheelchair.

“She came out of her room about half an hour later, said she was going to a friend’s.”

“And you just let her?” Will demands. “Without knowing where she was going or when she’d be back?”

“She said she might stay over!” Tanya defends. “It’s not like it was a school night. Honestly I was just so pleased she had a friend, she’s the most antisocial child I’ve ever met –”

Hmm. Maybe the kid was his after all.

“Shut up, Tanya,” he says, and after a few squawks she subsides into outraged silence. “Here’s what’s going to happen. She can go to boarding school during the week. On the weekends, my daughter can come and stay with us here. But first, you can damn well send me a copy of her birth certificate. Understood? Good. I’ll have Clark text you the email address you can send the certificate too. Now, not that this hasn’t been fun, but I think my girlfriend needs rescuing from my daughter.”

And with deep satisfaction, he hangs up.

Lily’s expression when he tells her she can stay the night is priceless. Her eyes widen, her mouth drops open, and she drops the tea towel she’s holding, although thankfully keeps hold of the mug. “Really?” she asks, and Will nods. Just for a moment he fears she might launch herself towards him for a hug, but she’s not that kind of kid; she settles for a nod that he returns. “Thanks,” she says. Clark is behind her, beaming at him.

“You did good,” she murmurs in his ear later. “Shame, though.”

“About what?” he asks. Clark’s grin is pure wickedness.

“That we won’t be able to, ah, have some fun tonight, with Lily in the next room.” Will frowns.

“Damn it,” he replies. “I didn’t think of that.” He didn’t think it was possible for Clark’s sweet face to look so evil, but there is it.

“Welcome to parenthood,” she says mischievously, and Will shudders.

“God, I need a drink.”

Clark makes him tea instead.

“I can be quiet,” he tells her later. “It’s you who’s the noisy one.” Clark makes a scoffing noise in her throat. Will’s lying on his back and Louisa is beside him, and they’re listening to Lily clunk around in the spare room. “She’s probably going through your wardrobe,” he mutters to Louisa after a particularly loud clatter.

“No, she’s just smashed her ankle into the side of the bed,” Clark replies calmly. “I do it all the time. Usually, though, I don’t say ‘shitting clusterfuck’ like she just did, though.”

“Really?” Will asks, emotionless. “It sounds like something you’d say.” Louisa grins at him.

“Oh, you’re definitely not getting any tonight,” she replies, and despite his – as he feels – irrefutable logic and persuasive coaxing, she refuses to budge. “Imagine if your daughter –” Will cringes inside. “– yes, your daughter stumbles in here looking for the loo and finds me with my shirt off. She’ll be scarred for life.”

“So don’t take your shirt off,” Will points out very reasonably, and Louisa gives him a look that strongly says he might be pushing his luck. “Fine. Turn the light off, then, if you’re not going to put out.”

As usual, Louisa is right, because some time around ‘hell fucking no’ o clock, Will wakes to someone patting his shoulder gently. He squints in the dark. “Clark?” he asks, although that doesn’t make sense because he can feel Louisa beside him in the bed on the other side to his patted shoulder.

“Duh, no,” Lily says, and Will relaxes.

“Oh, it’s you.”

“You want me to turn the light on?” she asks, and her voice is uncertain.

“Don’t worry about it, it’ll wake Clark if you do,” he replies, and then pauses. “You can turn it on if you want to,” he concedes, belatedly realising that the kid might have a preference of her own.

His concern is misplaced. She snorts in a distinctly strident fashion and perches on the edge of the bed, as far away from him as she can get.

“It isn’t catching,” Will says dryly.

“What?”

“Paralysis. It isn’t catching.” There’s a disturbance in the air beside him, almost like Lily had moved to shove an elbow in his direction before thinking better of it.

“Hysterical,” she says, her voice just as dry as Will’s. He hears shades of himself in her. Then again, he sees bits of himself in Clark sometimes, and he’s pretty certain he’s not related to her.

(God, he hopes not.)

“What can I do for you at this obscene hour, Lily?”

“That room smells weird.” Will nods, even though he’s perfectly aware she can’t see it.

“Clark’s perfume.” Personally, Will likes it, but that’s because he can’t help but associate it with Louisa.

“And her clothes are. Um. Interesting.” Will knows exactly what she means.

“Don’t worry. Terrible taste in clothes isn’t catching either.”

“Are you really my dad?” she asks, all in one word, like she had to blurt it out to say it. Will’s good hand twitches.

“I don’t know,” he says honestly. “We’ll find out soon. Until then, I can be your friend. Or something. If you wanted.” Fuck, he’s bad at this.

“Like I’d want to be friends with some old bloke like you,” Lily sniffs. Will grins into the dark.

“Of course not,” he replies. “I’d expect nothing less. Good night, Lily.”

“Good night, Will.”

“I thought the two of you would never fucking shut up,” Clark mutters from under a pillow a few moments after Lily has gone. Will shifts his head to peer at her in the dark.

“Ah, you’re awake too. Are you going to put out now?”

“Go to sleep, Will.”

But he can’t. He might have a daughter, for Christ’s sake. How can he in good conscience leave his daughter in five months? Clark, he knows, will be devastated, but she’s adaptable. She’ll survive. But a kid… a kid who’s only just found her (possible) dad. How badly would it fuck her up if he killed himself, even in the relatively civilised way Dignitas provides?

There aren’t any easy answers. There haven’t been for a long time.

“Will, mate,” Nathan says as he walks into Will’s bedroom the following morning, “there’s a teenager out there making tea.” Will blinks sleepily up at him.

“What are you… oh, yes,” he agrees, the memory coming back to him all at once. “She might be my daughter.”

“You might… have a daughter,” Nathan repeats, as if parsing the phrases of a foreign language. He swings Will’s legs out over the side of the bed and lifts him onto the shower chair. “What did you do, find her in the back garden like a Cabbage Patch Kid?”

“No, the stork dropped her off last night,” Will counters blandly. Nathan is shaking his head.

“At some point, you and Lou have got to stop surprising me,” he says. “I’m not as young as I used to be. One day soon the pair of you will shock me into a coronary, and then where will we be?”

“You’ll be having a coronary,” Will summarises dryly. “Clark and I will probably be laughing ourselves stupid.” Nathan scowls at him in the bathroom mirror, but there’s no true anger in it.

“Hilarious.”

Before breakfast, while Clark is introducing a confused Nathan to a speculative Lily, Will checks his emails on his computer. And that’s how, quietly and calmly while opening the file that Tanya’s sent him, that Will learns he has a daughter. Well, a daughter who is his according to Lily’s birth certificate, and he’s got no reason to doubt it. He’s suddenly grateful that Tanya Miller was never the kind of girl to be content to put ‘father unknown’ on a birth certificate. The prim prissiness that had pushed him to dump her in the first place has finally come in handy. Short of a DNA test, this is the most conclusive evidence Will could have asked for.

And yet.

He’s not ready to be a father, for fuck’s sake. To a teenager.

“You’re my kid,” he tells Lily gruffly while Clark’s helping him with breakfast. Louisa’s hand twitches (Nathan’s gone to see another patient) and she spills tea on his leg. “Really, Clark?” he says reproachfully.

“As usual, perfect timing,” she mutters, but he can tell she’s not really cross. Something about the smile she’s hiding behind her hand tells him otherwise.

“I rather thought so.” Lily is frozen, sitting with a spoon halfway to her mouth. She’s wearing one of Louisa’s T-shirts (Clark had insisted on washing the girl’s clothes) and she looks impossibly young. And she’s his. “Say something,” Will says tartly. Lily closes her mouth.

“Fuck,” she says, and Will grins. This might not be as terrible as he’d thought.

“I concur,” he replies. “As your father I should probably tell you to mind your language, but I can’t help but agree with you.”

“I always thought Martin was my dad,” Lily says meditatively. “Until my mum told me he wasn’t.” Will makes a mental note to ask who the hell Martin is later. “She wanted me to act like Stupid Fuckface Houghton was my dad.” Louisa makes a strangled noise in her throat that Will is quite certain is a suppressed laugh. “But I hate him, and he hates me.”

“I’m sure he doesn’t hate you,” Clark says, ever the peacemaker. Lily wrinkles her nose.

“He does hate me,” she insists. “You can tell, you know, when someone’s just putting up with you, even when you’re little.”

Will doesn’t like to think about that. “We need to make a plan,” he tells Lily. “You have grandparents, you know. And an aunt. They’ll want to meet you.”

“Will they?” she asks, and there’s a sort of desperate hope in her voice that hurts Will somewhere deep in his chest. “So I can come and visit some time? I won’t be a nuisance. I can stay out of your way.”

Will is going to be having serious words with Tanya. “I’ll have to talk to your mum first,” he says, and Lily’s face falls. “Not because we wouldn’t love to have you – wouldn’t we, Clark?”

“Of course we would,” Louisa agrees, and Will smiles briefly at her before turning his attention back to his daughter.

“But because we need to sort out arrangements regarding custody, and finances, and –”

“Other boring grown up stuff,” Lily interjects, and Will nods.

“Very boring,” he confirms. “But it has to be done. We’ll do things the right way, Lily, because you are my daughter, and I won’t stand for anything less.”

“It doesn’t matter anyway,” Lily says sadly. “Mum won’t let me come and stay with you.” Will smirks.

“You leave Tanya to me.”

 

The reality of it sets in after Lily leaves in the car her mother had had sent down for her. (Evidently Tanya hasn’t done too badly for herself, after all.) Will finds a quiet spot to be by himself for a minute and have a private breakdown. Of course, Clark wanders by after less than five minutes. She has always had an unerring ability to sense when he feels like the world is crashing down around his ears.

“What’s the matter?” Louisa asks gently, sitting down on the nearby sofa and waiting for him to speak. Will draws in a deep, shuddering breath.

“I can’t go to Dignitas,” he says, and the words feel like they’re being torn out of him. “I can’t, oh God, it wouldn’t be fair to Lily. For Christ’s sake, she’s just a kid. And you heard the way she was talking – her life’s been hard enough already.” Louisa wraps her hand around Will’s, and he hold onto her as tightly as he can. “But I’m scared, Clark. I’m so scared to live.” He’s surprised, to hear her soft chuckle.

“Dearest,” she says, and lays her head on his shoulder. “You and every other member of the human race.”

“Most of the rest of the human race doesn’t have to worry about AD and infections and dying by degrees for years,” Will grumbles bitterly.  Louisa lifts her head off of his shoulder, only to smack him on the arm.

“You’re not dying,” she says with some force. “I do not give you permission to die.” Will manages a smirk.

“Oh, well, if Clark forbids me to die, I suppose I must have to live forever,” he mocks gently. “God forbid I disobey an order from my Clark.” Louisa grins.

“Now, that’s the attitude I’m looking for,” she says brightly, and leans up to kiss him. “If your daughter does come to stay, our nocturnal adventures will be sadly curtailed,” Louisa informs him. Will ponders it a moment.

“We’ll still have London,” he replies. “And surely she’s still in school.”

“Yes, most fourteen year olds tend to still be at school,” Louisa says dryly. “She boards at the school during the week and comes home for the weekends. I don’t think she likes it much.” Will sighs.

“We’re going to have to make a time to meet with Tanya and discuss all of this,” he says, unwilling but resigned. “Do you know, I haven’t seen her in almost fifteen years. I wonder if she’s changed.”

“What was she like before?” Louisa asks.

“Well-behaved,” Will says after a moment to think. “Appropriate. But I didn’t really love her. And the more I pulled away, the harder she clung. I was an arse, in the end, to get the message through to her that it was over.”

“What did you do?”

“Kissed someone else,” Will says ruefully. “And made sure she found out about it. She confronted me. She was quite ballsy, back in those days.”

“She might still be,” Clark comments. Will cringes.

“God, I hope not,” he says fervently, and Louisa laughs suddenly. “What?” Will asks suspiciously, untrusting of the cheerful and slightly evil glint in her eye.

“Wait until you tell your mum that you got someone up the duff fifteen years ago,” she says. “I look forward to watching her give you ‘the Talk’ because obviously you missed a few of the points the first time.” Will scowls at her.

“I hate you,” he says firmly, and Louisa’s only response is to kiss him on the mouth. “I moderately dislike you,” he amends, and Louisa just drops her lips to nip at the pulse in his throat. “All right,” Will says hoarsely. “I love you. You’re marvellous. And a wanton tease.”

“And don’t you forget it,” Clark replies.

Notes:

So it was weird writing a Lily who is still in character without the added complication of the blackmail that is in After You. Tell me what you think.

Chapter 7: it is being

 “Steven,” Will’s mother says, setting her tea cup down on the table. Her expression is utterly calm, and that’s the frightening bit. “I appear to have finally lost my mind. Or did our son just not inform us that he has a daughter?”

They’re sitting in the annexe around the kitchen table; Will, Louisa, his parents, and Nathan, for some reason. His dad looks like someone’s just slapped him across the face with a limp fish. His mum has no expression at all.

“I did just tell you that I have a daughter,” Will points out, his gut tightening uncomfortably. It’s a subjective sensation, but he can still feel it. “There’s no need to be dramatic, Mother.”

“Behave,” Clark says softly, squeezing Will’s hand. “It’s a shock for them.”

“You mean you… will have a daughter?” his dad asks tentatively. “That Louisa is… going to have a baby?” Now it’s Clark’s turn to splutter.

“I am not going to have a baby!” she says sharply.

“What would be so wrong with us having a baby?” Will asks mildly. “If it were physically possible, of course.”

“It is physically possible,” Nathan chips in. “it’s not easy, but it can be done.”

“Not helping,” Will says through gritted teeth, scowling across at Nathan, who just sips his tea sedately. “What are you even doing here, anyway?”

“One of my patients is in hospital,” Nathan replies blithely. “I’ve got a free hour. Lou said it would be cool for me to hang out here in between clients.”

“Thanks, Clark,” Will mutters.

“Anything for you, darling,” Louisa chirps.

“Can we get back to the original topic of conversation?” Will asks. “Mum, Dad, I have a daughter. Her name is Lily. She’s fourteen.”

“How can you be sure?” his dad asks. “That this girl is your daughter?”

“I’m on her birth certificate,” Will says, exasperated already this early into the conversation. His mother makes a frustrated noise.

“Oh, Will,” she says, like he’s disappointed her deeply. “Ink on paper. That’s all the evidence you have?”

“I’m not stupid, Mother,” Will replies, injured, and his mother’s lips purse. “I’ve spoken to her mother.”

“Well, if you’ve spoken to her mother…” Camilla says in a tone of deep disbelief. “Then that’s all right. Because no one’s ever lied on a birth certificate before. Who is this woman? Can she be trusted?”

“Debatable,” Louisa murmurs.

Will glares at her. “Between you and Nathan, this is going to take all day, and we have to get to London at some point,” he tells her. “And you’re being decidedly unhelpful.”

it takes all morning to convince his parents. By the end even his mum is looking slightly more cheerful; his dad is completely thrilled about the idea of having a granddaughter. “See? You didn’t get murdered,” Clark says cheerfully as she packs their things for London. “My parents didn’t kill Treena for getting knocked up with Thomas. Why should yours be any different?” Will scowls.

“I still don’t know how it happened,” he mutters resentfully. Louisa’s head jerks up, her eyes sparkling with glee, and Will curses the opening he’s given her. “No. Clark, don’t you dare –”

“When a boy and a girl love each other very much,” she begins, and screws up her face. Will moves his chair over to her, but he’s too slow, and Clark’s on a roll. “No. It was more like, when an arrogant arse and a stroppy spoiled girl are middling fond of one another, they get into bed and – ” Will stops his chair close enough to Louisa that it’s  no distance at all for her to sit down on his lap, still chortling at her own joke.

“I meant,” he says over her snickers, and she wraps one arm around his shoulders to snuggle into his chest. “I don’t know when it happened. When we were stupid enough to forget protection, for God’s sake.” Louisa shrugs.

“It happened to Treen,” she says. “It could have easily happened to me.” Will winces.

“Rather extenuating circumstances, I think,” he retorts, and Clark nods.

“True. But still.” She tilts her head up so she can meet his eyes. “You have a daughter,” she says softly. “That’s no small thing. And she’s… well. She’s got her own way of doing things. That’s not necessarily a bad thing. She’s like you, in that respect.”

“And in others, I think,” Will says dryly. Clark shrugs.

“Well, that’s why she’s got us. To help her tone down some of that Traynor arrogance.”

Will rolls his eyes, and butts his forehead gently against Louisa’s. “Noble of you to sacrifice yourself to the cause,” he says softly. Clark smiles.

“No place I’d rather be,” she replies, and for the first time, Will actually believes it.

 

This is how it ends:

Maybe Will never goes to Dignitas, and maybe he lives to forty-one or fifty-three, and maybe he marries a former waitress or maybe they never feel the need to define themselves by other people’s rules.

Maybe a waitress from Stortfold has a baby, or maybe a stepdaughter, or maybe a whole bushel of kids, or maybe none at all. Maybe she never finishes her course, or becomes a fashion designer, or an advocate for human rights.

Maybe a girl called Lily becomes a doctor, or a lawyer, or a stripper. Maybe all three.

And maybe on the day Will Traynor’s eyes close for the last time, somewhere someone is being born, or getting married, or falling in love. Maybe tragedy is only the other side of triumph.

Maybe there is no end.

Just another beginning.

Notes:

And so we come to the conclusion of this fic. A massive thank you to everyone who loved reading this as much as I enjoyed writing it, everyone who commented or kudosed or bookmarked.

I intend to keep writing in this series. There's at least a handful of one shots I have rattling around in my skull, so stay tuned! :)

Series this work belongs to:

• Part 1 of it is not dying