Work Text:
“I don’t want one
I want a mutually assured destructive life
Seizing separate culture
To take me over
Moving silent like radar
Take me over, and blow my mind now
Full disclosure, coming sponsored by no one
Take me over, and blow my mind now”
- Fugazi, “Full Disclosure”
“Whoa.”
Claire stopped short at the front door of the restaurant, looking at the sheer blizzard of snow falling from the sky outside. Leon drew up behind her and likewise looked out, over her head.
“That came out of nowhere,” he said.
“I didn’t even know it was supposed to snow tonight,” Claire said, her hand on the bar to push open the door. “Great. Wonder how much we’ll get.”
“You still want to go to the bar?” Leon asked.
“Of course,” Claire replied. “I just got paid. I’ve got all of three fifty burning a hole in my pocket,” she joked. She hadn’t paid for dinner, and they both knew damn well she would not pay at the bar. Leon wouldn’t let her. It was the way it was when they were together, and Claire could accept the little things; every so often he would push to pay for more. He’d tell her he would pay her house off, pay her car off, make her student debt a thing of the past. Claire rejected him every time.
“C’mon, we’re standing right in the doorway,” Leon said, reaching above her to push the door open. A gust of cold air hit them in the face, along with the assault of huge, fat snowflakes.
“Ugh,” Claire said, pulling her hood up, hurrying over to her vehicle. Leon was behind her, and they made their way to their respective sides of the SUV, getting in. Claire stuck her key in the ignition and started the vehicle, pulling her hood down off her head. She took her glasses off the top of her head and put them on her face, and scowled out her covered windshield. She turned on the windshield wiper blades to dispel the flakes of snow from sticking to her windshield, and shifted into reverse.
“This kind of weather reminds me of home,” Leon said, as she went to pull out of the parking lot.
“Yeah, because you’re from a frozen hellhole,” Claire said. “Like this place.”
“You don’t find anything about Long Island agreeable, do you?” Leon asked, in amusement.
“Not really,” Claire replied calmly. “There’s like a month from spring into summer where I like it alright.”
“Picky,” Leon accused, but it was good natured. They drove along in silence for a few minutes; Claire was not doing her usual of flying at 60 in a 30 and Leon looked over at her.
“Claire,” he said.
“Yeah,” she replied, distractedly.
“You can’t see a goddamned thing, can you?” he asked, mildly.
Claire huffed some. She was hunched over the steering wheel slightly, windshield wipers on high, squinting out of her glasses. “No,” she admitted. “Not really. This weather coupled with my eyesight isn’t doing me any favors. Glasses be damned.”
“Pull over,” he said. “Let me drive. Visibility’s shit but at least I’m working with 20/20, or better than it, from my last government sponsored eye exam.”
Uncharacteristically of her, Claire did not fight. Normally Leon’s commentary on her driving drove her up a wall; this seemed less him snapping at her and more him trying to help her. Leon more oft than not took issue with her driving; saying she was changing lanes erratically, she was going too fast, she was cutting people off, she was going to fucking kill them. Claire pulled over to the side of the road and put her hazards on, then climbed out the driver’s side door into the wind and snow. She and Leon passed each other in front of the vehicle and then they were getting back in, snow blowing thickly into the car as they shut their doors. Leon pushed the seat all the way back and turned the hazards off.
“Just tell me where to go,” Leon said, and Claire still had to lean forward to squint out the windshield to make out landmarks, but they eventually made it to where they were going in one piece. They got out, Leon handing Claire’s keys back to her, and they made their way to the front door of the building in blowing snow.
Leon pulled open the door and Claire hurried in, and he came in behind her. Behind the bar, the bartender stood up off the cooler he’d been leaning on, looking surprised. They were the only people in there.
“Someone actually braved the weather,” the bartender said, sounding impressed.
“We were already out,” Claire said, walking up to the bar, brushing the snow off her coat. “Might as well. I’m the local genius who had no idea this was going to happen and hadn’t checked the weather.” Leon was drawing up behind her, pulling out a chair. Claire was engrossed in brushing snow off her bangs, her sleeves, and looked over to realize Leon was indicating the chair to her. She sat down, smiling at him, and he sat down next to her, leaning forward and folding his hands on the bar.
“Well, I guess we can all be snowed in together,” the bartender said genially. “I’ll even let you pick the music.”
“Is that a promise?” Leon asked.
“You don’t want to hear his music,” Claire interjected.
“Sure. You can connect to the Bluetooth,” the bartender said with a shrug. “I don’t care. What can I get you?” he asked. Both Leon and Claire were silent for a moment, contemplating.
“Do you know how to make a Lunchbox?” Claire asked.
“Yeah. What kind of beer you want?” the bartender said.
“Busch,” Claire replied, and Leon looked over at her.
“Number one, what the hell is a Lunchbox,” he began, “and number two, Busch? You drink that at home. You don’t want something fancier?”
“They have Busch on tap here,” Claire said, wiggling her eyebrows. “And a Lunchbox is fancy. And tasty.”
“What is it?” Leon asked again. “I’m automatically doubtful of anything that includes Busch as an ingredient.”
“You know what,” Claire called to the bartender, “make him one too. Two Lunchboxes.”
“Sure,” the bartender called back. Leon looked at Claire, and she just smiled back.
“Live a little,” she said.
“I live plenty,” Leon countered. “I live so much it’s actively killing me. All to end up drinking a Lunchbox.”
Claire was shrugging out of her coat, putting it on the back of her barstool. She reached up and pulled her hair out of its ponytail, only to regather it and pull it back up, twisting her hands, pulling it into a sloppy knot. The bartender came back down the bar and set the two drinks in front of them. Leon regarded his suspiciously.
“This looks like juice,” he said.
“Just try it,” Claire said, picking hers up and taking a drink. “Mmm. Yeah. Just like I remembered.”
Leon picked up the pint glass and took a swallow, then looked at it. “I still can’t figure out what the fuck this is. It tastes like sugar and vaguely of Busch and I feel like I could slam it easily, which is probably somehow dangerous.”
“It’s amaretto, orange juice, and beer,” Claire said, smiling at him. “High class. The classiest Busch has ever been.”
“I don’t know why I’m surprised by you knowing ways to class up Busch,” Leon said. “I shouldn’t be.”
“I went to brunch with some coworkers once,” Claire said. “Some fancy place in Manhattan. I felt underdressed and out of place. Everyone else drank Mimosas. I drank these. Except with Bud Light. A place that fancy didn’t have Busch.”
“Tragedy,” Leon said in amusement. “I feel like if you drank enough of these you’d regret it.”
“Probably not as much as drinking a ton of Mimosas,” Claire countered. “Champagne’s evil. Tastes good going down and bites you in the ass the next day.”
Leon picked up his pint glass and took another drink. “This is like Mickey’s with orange juice,” Leon said. “A less classy man’s Brass Monkey. Ever drink that?”
Claire looked at him skeptically. “Like the malt liquor? Like Mickey’s, like Olde English? I don’t think so.”
“We did, in high school,” Leon said. “Inspired by the Beastie Boys.”
“I didn’t even hear a Beastie Boys song until I went to college,” Claire said, and Leon looked at her with an eyebrow raised. “That’s not rural Alabama music.”
“You were sheltered,” Leon said in amusement. “And now look at you. Worldly. Wise. Cultured. Drinking fancy Busch drinks outside the big city.”
“I guess,” Claire said skeptically, taking a drink. “I’m just a redneck north of the Mason-Dixon.”
“Look out, world,” Leon said. “Claire Babbie Redfield’s on the loose.”
……………………………………………………………
The snow was still coming down. Claire was on her fourth Lunchbox. The bartender had in fact given Leon control of the music and after much haranguing from Claire, he kept it fairly mild with Fugazi, a band that was less insane than most of what he listened to, and that they’d discovered Claire actually kind of liked. She did have kind of a soft spot for angry, raging punk music, no matter the decade. Leon told her it was because she was secretly an anarchist at heart. Claire just liked people who railed against The Man. Not for the first time, she considered the irony of her suiting up to go to protests, of learning and educating people about systems of mutual aid, all while sharing her bed with a man owned by the government, a man dedicated to the status quo. The bar was still empty, the bartender sitting in a stool down at the far end of the bar, engrossed in his phone.
“What do you want out of life?” she asked Leon unceremoniously, hand on her drink, looking over at him appraisingly.
He looked back at her evenly. “Not to die,” he said.
She frowned at him slightly. “I mean, we’re all going to, someday,” she said.
“Yeah, someday. Not next week. Not a few days from now. I have to spend a lot of time occupied with it.” He had humored her with the first drink and accepted the Lunchbox, but after that he’d moved on to drafts of something else—an IPA, beer Claire typically didn’t touch with a ten foot pole.
“There’s got to be more to it than that,” Claire said. “We could leave here tonight and someone could slam into us and kill us both. I don’t want to die either but there’s more to life than that.”
“I don’t think about it,” Leon said. “I do very little thinking about the path of my life. I don’t control it and it’s easier not to think about it.”
Claire looked over at him, shifting in her seat. He often stymied her attempts at trying to gain more insight into him by claiming this was just a path he was on and he didn’t reflect on it. “Alright, then, what did you want out of life at 21? Before the government.”
Leon sighed some, looking out at the bar in front of them. “Normal things. To be a good cop, to be a good son, to settle down. I didn’t have any lofty aspirations then, either. My brain doesn’t work like yours.”
“I know thoughts occur up there, sometimes,” Claire said, still looking at him. “You just don’t like to let on that they do.”
“There’s not much of a point,” Leon said, looking away from the bar and back over at her. “My thoughts are just about the only thing about me that I still own at this point. They’re not always exciting. They’re not always fit to be discussed. They’re mine, and half the time they’re not worth talking about.”
“Do you resent me for leaving you behind to get picked up by the government?” she asked.
Leon gazed at her, blinking measuredly. “I didn’t want you to go. You knew that. I still look back and wish you hadn’t. I don’t feel like you did yourself any favors by going to Europe to chase Chris. But…” He trailed off, looking above her head. “You being there or not being there wasn’t going to stop the government from finding me and Sherry. You being in Europe just meant they didn’t find you, too. If you’d have been there, you probably would have been handed the same shitty ultimatum I was.”
Claire nodded. “The government ate everyone up but me. I always wondered why not me. Why was I left to be a civilian? Why was I excluded from the good fight?”
Leon looked at her. “I know why.”
Claire took a drink. “Oh? Enlighten me.”
“The shit you did in Europe,” Leon said. “I think they knew they couldn’t control you. You weren’t going to follow orders. You’d already tasted being in control of what you wanted to do. I was just there, still malleable, still ready to take an order. They’d send you out to do something and you’d just do whatever you wanted. You do what you want. You do what you think is a good idea, whether or not it actually is.”
Claire hummed. She tried not to think of her time in Europe after Raccoon, after life on the run much these days; she’d been through years of therapy once she’d finally accepted she needed it to handle what she’d done. Every once in a while she’d be doing something mundane; peeling potatoes, washing her hair, making photocopies—and she’d stare off into space, and the thought would cross her mind unbidden--you’ve murdered people. You’ve tortured people. And then she would take the thought and stuff it down into the recesses of her brain, forcing herself to think of literally anything else. She had blood on her hands, and yet there she was, sitting at a bar in Long Island, like life was normal. She didn’t bring it up much. She’d discussed it once or twice with Leon. She’d discussed it once or twice with her coworker Calvin, who’d also killed people in Afghanistan. She’d discussed it with Chris. It was an odd thing, to kill people, and then years later be standing in aisle 8 of the grocery store, looking out at the canned tomatoes in front of you, suddenly remembering what it felt like when a fingernail gripped in pliers came loose from a hand.
She wondered how Leon felt, given his line of work. He made comments about having the government shrinks fooled. Sometimes he seemed like he drank a little too much, determinedly having whisky after whisky, until he was drunk. His thoughts were his own, and half the time they weren’t worth discussing. She wondered if that was his subtle way of telling her to quit fucking prying.
“They thought I was insane,” Claire said matter-of-factly.
“Trust me, the government likes you ruthless,” Leon said, his tone somewhat correcting. “But they need to be able to know you’re going to listen, too. I think they knew you wouldn’t.”
“And you do?” Claire asked.
“For better or worse, I’ve always been good at following directions,” Leon said. “Maybe I’m not good at thinking for myself, and that’s the real core issue.” He looked off into space. “My brain doesn’t work like yours,” he repeated. “It’s why you made it out of Raccoon with barely a scratch on you, with a survivor in tow. It’s why I didn’t fare so well.”
“There were other issues at play,” Claire said in an undertone. “You were better at life after Raccoon. I was a child. I didn’t know how real life worked.”
“We were both children,” Leon said. “Just because I knew how to get utilities turned on and how to get a money order didn’t mean I was an adult. I was an older child than you, but I was still a child.”
“I still feel like a child, sometimes,” Claire said.
“Good,” Leon said, and Claire looked over at him, her eyebrows furrowed in confusion. “Don’t stop. Feel like a child forever. Someone has to. The alternative is not great. The world probably needs more people who can experience childlike wonder, even if they feel like fucking idiots for doing so.”
Claire looked over at him; his solemn face, his perpetual stubble, the shadows under his eyes that never seemed to go away no matter how much sleep he got. He’d told her once the government was aging him before his time; ten years from now she was still going to look like she belonged on a college campus and he was going to look like her father. “Let’s run away,” she said, abruptly.
“Sure,” Leon said benignly with a sigh, leaning back in his chair. “And go where?”
“I dunno,” Claire said. “I’m sure you could have us assume other identities before you split from the government. I’m sure you could set it up on the side in your spare time. I’m sure you could orchestrate us an entirely new life. Just disappear, one day. Go somewhere that doesn’t honor extradition to the US. Vietnam. Nepal. Montenegro. Live off grid.”
Leon looked over at her. “You think they wouldn’t find me?”
“We’re resourceful,” she said. “We’re crafty. We lived on the run before. We could do it again. What’s so great about this life, anyway? I hate Long Island and you’re property. I’m sure we could do it better on our own.”
“I don’t think you understand the things I’ve seen, sweetheart,” he said, and his use of the not-oft used pet name made her heart twinge. It seemed like he reserved it for when he was trying to be gentle with her but tell her something she didn’t want to hear. “They don’t let it just walk away. They’d find me. They’d find you. Sure, we could probably hack it for a while. Several months. But they’d find us. And they’d haul me right back. I’m not sure what they’d do to you, but they probably wouldn’t be happy with me.”
Claire looked at the pint glass her hand was wrapped around. “Life is not fair,” she said, and she was aware she sounded every bit the child she felt like when she said it. “It almost seemed easier after Raccoon, playing house with Sherry.”
“Yeah. There for a minute, it was a happy little family kind of fucked up,” Leon said. “It wasn’t bad, all things considered. I don’t know how long we could have done it, but at the time, we made it work.”
Claire thought of herself at 19, running the domestic side of their life in hiding; entertaining and consoling Sherry, trying to cobble together meals, washing clothes in a bathtub. She thought of Leon leaving every day to go work shitty under the table manual labor jobs, coming home sore and with splinters in his hands. “You deserve a life,” Claire said, plainly.
“I have a life.” He picked up his beer, took a drink. “It’s just not what I thought it would be. But it’s a life, and it’s mine, for better or worse.”
“A real life,” Claire tried again.
“We rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance, perseverance character, and character, hope.” He looked over at her. “Romans.”
It took her a second to realize he was quoting the Bible to her. She frowned. “I don’t believe in that and neither do you, anymore,” Claire said.
“My brain still turns to it,” Leon said. “Catholicism dies hard. The Bible’s got a notable quotable for just about anything shitty happening to you. My mother reminds me of this endlessly.”
“How full of perseverance, character, and hope are you?” Claire asked, knowingly.
“Probably plenty of perseverance. It’s a work in progress,” Leon replied. “I’ll let you know when I’m done.”
“Sure,” Claire said, gazing out into space. “A work in progress.”
“I work very hard at it,” Leon said, picking up his beer. “I have no choice.”
…………………………………………………
It was still snowing heavily when they left; accumulating in piles and drifts. Claire’s car was covered, and Leon told her to get in while he cleaned off the windshield and hood with her snow brush from the backseat. She watched him cleaning the SUV off, hands in her lap, heater not yet warm. He got in a few minutes later, and looked over at her.
“You ready to guide me home?” he asked. “Can you see well enough to do that?”
“Yeah,” she said. “I know the way by heart from here. I come here often. After all, there is Busch on tap.” Leon shifted into reverse and backed out, then began to creep through the barren parking lot, snow obscuring the view out the windshield.
Suddenly he cranked the wheel over hard and stepped on the gas and Claire sat up straight, her eyes wide, and the SUV whipped around in a donut in the frozen parking lot. She looked over at him, eyes wide, and he looked back at her with a smile.
“Is it really an empty snowy parking lot if you didn’t whip a shitty?” he asked her.
Claire looked over at him, then laughed some. “Didn’t what?” she asked, smiling back at him.
“You’ve never heard that?” he asked. “Whippin’ shitties? Doing donuts in a parking lot?” He let off the brake and went forward again, this time facing the opposite direction, and performed the action again; cranking the wheel, gassing it, and the SUV whipped around on the snow. Claire laughed, holding onto the door handle.
“You of all people,” Claire said. “Mr. Slow-The-Fuck-Down-Claire-You’re-Going-To-Kill-Us is doing donuts in a parking lot.”
“When I was a teenager my girlfriend used to scream at me and tell me I was going to kill us,” he said in amusement, finally heading for the exit of the parking lot. “She couldn’t handle a little fun.”
“I’m sure you were a nightmare,” Claire said, smiling faintly.
“I was not,” Leon said, turning out onto the street. “I tried so hard. I was very concerned with keeping her happy. But I was just a kid. I wanted to have fun.”
“What’s fun?” Claire asked dryly, looking over at him.
“I dunno,” Leon replied. “I don’t know if I remember. I suspect it’s related to whippin’ shitties in a parking lot, though.”
……………………………………………………
They returned to her house, and given that it was about 10:30, they began to make motions of getting ready for bed. They sat down on the couch and pulled off their shoes, and then Leon headed for the bathroom and Claire headed for the kitchen, getting her nightly glass of water. She went into the bedroom and set it down on the bedside table, then began shedding her clothes to put her pajamas on. If it wasn’t still snowing in the morning, Leon was going to have his work cut out for him shoveling snow. Claire sure wasn’t going to get out there and do it, and Leon seemed bound and determined to do it for her, working in her front yard while she gazed out the window at him and wondered why he seemed to take so much solace in shoveling snow until he sweat with the exertion of it in the cold.
Claire was standing there with her pajama pants on, shirt inside out in her hands in front of her. She worked on turning the shirt right side out to put it on, and she heard Leon come into the room behind her. A moment later she felt his hands on her waist, sliding around to the front of her. His hands were still slightly chilled from being outside in the cold; hers were too. She froze with the shirt in front of her, feeling him come up behind her, hands on her stomach.
He leaned down and kissed her, and she leaned back and sighed a little into his mouth. One of his hands left her stomach to come to the shirt in her hands, removing it, dropping it down onto the floor. His hand returned to her, both of them then sliding up her torso to her breasts, taking them in his hands and kneading them, palming them. Claire leaned back further, moaning a little, one of her hands coming up to alight on the back of his head as he kissed her, mouth deep over hers.
His fingers tweaked gently at her nipples, raising them into taut buds. In her mind, Claire wondered what she was in for. Was he going to tease her, make her beg for it? Was he going to issue orders? Would it be one of those occasional times where he didn’t say a word to her, just handled her body like only he knew how to? Leon pulled away from her mouth and moved to her jaw, her neck; Claire’s eyes drifted shut and she leaned her head to the side, to give him more access. One of his hands left her breast and traveled back down her stomach, into her sleep pants, down to her pussy. He insinuated his fingers into her folds, looking for wetness and finding it. His fingers spread the lubrication around, and then he slipped a finger inside her, drawing a gasp out of her. He took her breast in his other hand and squeezed, his finger pumping in and out of her.
He hadn’t said a word. Maybe it was going to be one of the silent nights. His finger slid out of her and up to her clit, and again she gasped as he massaged it, the sensation threatening to make her legs wobbly.
His hand not occupied in her pants slid down to the waistband of said pants, fingers hooking in it to pull them down, along with her underwear. Claire shimmied a little and they fell down to the floor around her ankles. The hand that wasn’t currently pointedly teasing her clit moved back up her body, to her throat, and closed around it firmly. Claire moaned a little, her head lolling against him.
“You wanna come?” he asked in her ear, lowly.
“Yes,” she breathed back. He kissed her again, a hand on her throat, a hand between her legs, making her knees quiver. His mouth broke away from hers and for a moment he just hovered there, his lips close to her lips, her breath catching at his fingers at her clit.
“Lay down,” he murmured to her, his hands releasing, moving away from her. Claire stepped out of the puddle of clothes at her feet and climbed up onto the bed, lying down. Leon rounded the bed and approached from the foot, lowering himself between her legs, placing them over his shoulders.
Claire’s breath was short, watching him. Was he going to let her come or was he going to keep her on edge until time had no meaning, and she was desperate for release? One of his hands slid on top of her, atop where her pubic bone was, and he opened his mouth over her pussy, his tongue licking her from bottom to top with aplomb repeatedly. He slid his tongue down inside her, in, out, in, out; the hand not occupied in holding her down to him moved back to her clit, fingers pinching, rubbing.
Claire moaned gratefully, her hips swerving gently even in spite of the pressure of his hand holding her down. She reached one hand up behind her to fist in the pillow behind her head, and the other she put on the back of his head between her legs, holding him to her. He was so fucking good at this; and he could do it for what felt like hours, until Claire was hysterical, until there was a sopping wet spot on the bed, until tears were coming out of her eyes.
His tongue and his hand switched; he moved his tongue up to her clit to flick over it rapidly, his fingers moving to her opening, sliding inside. Claire was gasping, her body undulating, her lip caught in her teeth. He crooked his fingers inside her, his tongue fast over her flesh, and she looked down at him to find him looking up at her.
“Say my name, Claire,” he uttered, momentarily stopping his attention to her pussy, but then he was right back at it, sucking at her clit, his fingers searching inside her.
“Leon,” she keened, her legs tightening up on him. “Oh, Leon.”
He hummed, going back to lapping at her with the flat of his tongue, fingers sliding into her all the while. Claire let her head rock back, her fingers splayed across the back of his head. It felt so good, and she was reasonably worried he would stop, that he would toy with her. He loved doing it. He loved getting her all wound up with nowhere to go.
“Leon,” she moaned. “Please don’t stop,” she gusted. “Please, I’m gonna come.”
He hummed against her again, his lips closing around her clit and sucking, and her body moved against his mouth. “Then come,” he said, his breath hot on her pussy. “Say my name. Let me hear you.” His tongue went right back to driving her into insanity, pushing her closer to orgasm.
Her back arched, her hips rocking. “Oh fuck, Leon,” she panted haltingly, her eyes squeezing shut. “Oh yes—please—“
His hand and his mouth traded places again, fucking her with his tongue, his thumb rubbing tight circles over her clit. She held onto the pillow and his head for dear life, her breath and voice rising, her body undulating helplessly on the bed. He switched his attention to her pussy again, and her voice rose on a long, trembling note.
“Oh God,” she sang, her orgasm seizing her. “Fuck, Leon--oh--“ She was vocalizing incoherently then, his tongue at her in big, broad licks, her legs shaking. He slid a finger back into her, her walls clenching and unclenching around the digit. He kept at her until she began to jerk, until it felt like too much—sometimes he did this too. Sometimes he kept going while she whined and writhed, her body overly sensitive, pushing her limits; holding her down; pushing her until she was coming again, tears leaking from her eyes. Finally he stopped, and Claire laid there limply on the bed, trying to catch her breath.
To what end, she didn’t know, because Leon pushed himself off the bed, from between her legs. He stood and began to take his clothes off, watching her the whole time. She gazed back at him, wondering why she was bothering trying to control her breathing, because she knew what was coming next. He shed his clothes and got back up on the bed, once again coming between her legs. One hand was on her knee, and the other was idly jerking his cock, looking her over.
“You want this cock?” he asked her.
“Yes,” she murmured back.
“Good girl,” he said, sliding his hand down her thigh. “I’m gonna give it to you.” He shifted between her legs, rubbing his cock between her folds, sliding it back and forth in the wetness. It rubbed against her still sensitive clit, and she moaned, her hand coming up to hold onto his forearm bracing him above her. He took his cock back in his hand and slapped it lightly against her pussy, and she moaned again.
“You’re so fucking wet,” he said. “You want it, don’t you?”
“Yes,” she said.
“Are you gonna ask nice?” he said, switching back to rubbing his cock between her lips.
“Yes,” she said. “Please. I want it.”
“That’s a good girl,” he said, and he eased into her, just the head at first, and she gasped desperately. He slid all the way in, his hips against hers, and she let out a whimper, fingers tight into the muscles of his forearms. This was new, this was different—he was making demands of her, but he was less forceful about it, and he was giving her everything she wanted without teasing, without making her beg for it for minutes. Every time Claire thought she knew what to expect, he switched it up on her.
Slowly, deeply, he began to fuck her. Claire moved her hips against him, and for a moment he moved one of his arms down, scooping under her ass, encouraging her against him as he thrust into her powerfully. He leaned down and kissed her, an unhurried, easy kind of kiss. His arm came back out from under her and moved up her body, to her throat. He squeezed, and moved his mouth from hers.
“You better say my name, Claire,” he said near her ear, then drew back.
“Leon,” she murmured, gazing up at him. His hand tightened minutely around her neck.
“Louder,” he said.
“Leon,” she whimpered loudly, and he ground against her. She could feel him against her cervix and she moaned. He pulled out and thrust back into her, making her body quake. “You feel so good,” she said in an undertone, her hands going up to his shoulders, gripping. Leon hung his head, looking down at their union, at his cock moving in and out of her.
“I’m gonna fuck you all night,” he said. “Until you can’t take it. Until you can’t come anymore.”
Claire’s head swam; he was probably not kidding. He’d said similar to her before and he’d roused himself over and over again to fuck her until close to 4 in the morning, until she’d finally more or less collapsed with exhaustion, a shaking, sweaty lump on the bed. He’d do it, and she’d let him. A soft, rapturous sound was escaping her every time one of his powerful thrusts hit home, her breasts bounding.
“You’re gonna like it,” Leon said, looking away from his cock moving into her and back to her face. “You’re gonna beg me for it. You’re gonna let this cock ruin you.”
Claire nodded, gazing into his face. She was already ruined; it’d already happened. She didn’t know if it was going to be possible to share her bed with anyone else ever again. She’d been ruined since the first time he touched her.
“Do it,” she whispered. “I’m yours.”
“You are mine,” he said, releasing her throat, getting closer to her by lowering himself to her. Claire mewled and wrapped her legs around him, his slow, deep thrusts robbing her of breath. “Good girl. You’re so fucking tight…your cunt’s so fucking tight on my cock…” Her arms slid around his back, their faces close. “I fucking hear you coming in my head. I can’t stop it. I hear you begging me for this cock,” he went on.
“Leon,” she moaned, fingers tight in his skin. “Please…give it to me…”
“I love filling you with my come,” he said. “I love coming on your tits. I love coming down your throat, and you swallow it all like a good girl,” he said, and the pace at which he thrust into her was increasing slightly.
“Leon,” she said softly, gripping onto his shoulders.
“You’re such a good girl,” he said, pushing himself back up. His hand came to her chin, his thumb on her lips. She parted them and took the digit into her mouth, sucking. “You let me make you fucking filthy,” he murmured. “I jerk my cock thinking of all the ways I can make you dirty.”
Claire moaned, gazing up at him, and he took his thumb out of her mouth and brought it down between them, to her clit. His thumb began to rub insistent circles around it, and his eyes bored into hers.
“Give me another one, Claire,” he said. “I wanna see it. You’re so fucking pretty when you come. Lemme see it.”
Claire’s clit was still sensitive, and she whined at the dual sensations of his fingers on her and his thick cock thrusting into her deeply. Her mouth fell open and she gazed up at him, her eyes locked on his.
“That’s it baby,” he growled. “Just like that. Like you can’t think of anything but this.”
“Leon,” she said, her voice high.
“Come on this cock, like a good girl,” he said. “Let me hear you. I need to fucking hear it, Claire.”
She was gazing into his face, her eyes unfocusing; they really wanted to roll back in her head, her eyes squeezing shut, but he was giving her orders, and as per usual, she was complying. “Oh Jesus, Leon,” she gasped, feeling release building in her again. He thrust into her, staying all the way in, pushing up against her while he fondled her clit. “Fuck,” she whined, feeling him pushing so deeply inside her.
“Come on,” he urged, pulling back out of her and thrusting in pointedly. “Give it to me, Claire.”
For long moments she writhed, vocalizing mindlessly, his cock inside her and his fingers at her pushing her up to the precipice. Her hand came back to his forearm, gripping it, feeling the tense flex of his muscles under his skin. She panted, voice rising, staring dazedly at him the whole time. He gazed back at her, intent.
“Oh—“ She seized up and came, the tensing sensation giving way to the fluid feel of her orgasm taking hold of her, her body working against his. Her voice rose to a point, her moans and whines high and wild, her breath short, and still he gazed into her face relentlessly, watching her fall apart underneath him, her pussy gripping him in spasms. “Jesus, Leon,” she managed, and his hand came up, fingers wet with her, and his thumb brushed across her cheek.
“That’s my good girl,” he said, and he thrust into her so hard it served to rob her of sound, and then he did it again, and again, setting up a pace that was rapid and rough, her body bouncing with every impact into her. She held onto him with everything she was, her legs tight around him, her uneven fingernails digging into the skin of his forearms. She looked at him, at his head once again hanging to watch his cock moving in and out of her.
“Fuck me,” she said, haltingly. “Give it to me—fuck me—“ Words other than this bit at her tongue, but she could not say them, so instead she just asked him to give her everything he had, to pound her into the mattress, to leave her an insensate, mindless mess on the bed. She felt like this was them saying I love you, his cock so deep inside her and so forcefully so it almost hurt. Claire had long ago stopped trying to rationalize whether or not this was normal, or healthy. It just was. She didn’t challenge it; and his thoughts were his own. They were the last thing he owned, in this world. She wasn’t going to question it, so she loved him on his terms, less with words and declarations and more with her body.
“You like it like this,” he said, his voice hoarse. “I’m gonna give it to you—I’m gonna shoot my load in this tight little cunt—I’m gonna fuck you so hard you can’t breathe—“
“Give it to me,” she said, her voice just above a whisper. “I want it.”
Leon’s hand came up and caught in her hair, and pulled; she let her head follow the motion, her body at his whim. He thrust into her one last time, pushing in as far as he could go, and he groaned. Claire could feel him releasing in her, the pulsing and twitching of his cock that let her know he was making good on his promise to come inside her, to fill her up. She clung to him, his hand still tight in her hair, her throat dry.
“You okay?” he asked after a moment, his usual post-coital check in. She had long ago come to realize that he did this every single time, even if he wasn’t tying her up, even if he wasn’t slapping her ass with a belt or his hand, even if he wasn’t using his teeth and hands to leave bruises on her. His hand loosened in her hair, and Claire was free to move her head again, to angle it back downward, to look at him.
“Yeah,” she replied. He lowered himself to her and worked his arms underneath her, then rolled. She was on top of him then, him laying back on the bed, his cock still inside her. Claire let herself lay there limply, her hand coming up to stroke at his hair. They were quiet for long moments, laying there together. “You’re going to have a lot of snow to shovel in the morning,” she said after a while, quietly.
“I’ve already thought about it,” he replied. “You need a snowblower.”
“Maybe,” Claire replied, her fingers tracing along his collarbone.
“For my sake, anyway,” he said. “You probably don’t care if you own one. I need to get one for the house.”
“How much are they?” Claire asked.
“That’s not your concern,” Leon said. “I expect you won’t even use it. This is a purchase to make my life easier.”
“You could just leave it alone,” Claire said. “Nobody said you had to do this when you came here.”
“Nobody did,” Leon said. “But I can’t leave it be.”
“A work in progress,” Claire said, echoing his words from earlier in the evening.
“One must imagine Sisyphus enjoying the boulder,” Leon said dryly.
“Does Sisyphus enjoy the boulder?” Claire asked.
“No, but he’s rolling it for all of fucking eternity, so may as well get with the program,” Leon said, still dry. His hand became insistent on her head, and she lifted it; he kissed her long and fervently. He was still inside her; Claire fully suspected he was biding his time until he could get hard again, and then he was going to make good on his promise to fuck her until she couldn’t take it anymore. In some ways he kept her guessing, and in others he was predictable in that he did what he said. His other hand moved down to her ass, gripping, palming.
She drew back from his mouth, looking at him with lightly lidded eyes. “If we fuck all night, I don’t know how enthusiastic you’re going to be at shoveling snow,” she said in an undertone.
He gazed back at her evenly. “Perseverance,” he said. “I can do anything I put my mind to. Including fuck. Including shovel snow. If I stop moving, I’ll go crazy.” His hand squeezed her ass again, and then slapped it lightly. “I’m a man of my word.”
“I think Sisyphus must enjoy the boulder,” she said. “At least a little.” She leaned forward and kissed him again, and he made a noise into her mouth, hand tight into her flesh.
“Maybe,” he replied, when their kiss broke. “If rolling the boulder includes you coming, I enjoy it.”
Claire quirked a corner of her lips at him, and rolled her eyes a little. “I think it takes slightly less effort, but sure,” she said in amusement. “It does require effort.”
“I guess we’ll find out,” Leon said, wrapping his arm around her, squeezing. Claire shifted some and his arm tightened around her, holding her to him. “You ain’t goin’ nowhere.”
Claire smiled. “Get your mind off wintertime, you ain’t goin’ nowhere. Whoo-ee, ride me high,” she said. Leon looked at her in semi-aroused confusion. “Bob Dylan,” she added.
“Fitting,” he said. “I don’t mind you riding me high.”
Claire continued smiling at him, and laid her head back down, feeling his hands roam over her body, gripping here, massaging there, as he tried to rouse himself again.
Perseverance, then. A work in progress. Ways of telling him she loved him without saying it. Claire let it all happen. She pictured it as helping Sisyphus roll the boulder.