ikissdhimbck | OOM: Room #100 -- for Tommy Gavin

"Um."

She probably looks like one of his shiny firetrucks, chin tucked toward her chest, eyes downcast. He's deferring to her, and she has no idea what to do with that.

"I've never — I mean, I–I didn't know there was different ways of — more ways'n we've already — that's–that's all I've ever ... "

She'd laugh if she didn't feel so foolish.

Her voice drops conspiratorially, as if there are others listening in and she's sharing something meant only for his ears. Or, perhaps, she's halfway hoping he won't hear her at all.

"I'm not used t'callin' the shots in bed."

And he might look a little annoyed and impatient with her inexperience, with his jaw set and his eyes narrowed. But he's just thinking.

Changing tack again. This is going to take some imagination.

"Alright."

He gets up and slides off the bed. Striding across the room, he grabs her white Stetson off the hook and comes back, holding it out toward her.

"Put this on."

She bends her knees, draping an arm across her breasts when he leaves her. Manufacturing modesty in the cold room.

Her eyes never stray from his when she takes the hat, cautious fingertips and confused eyes. She sits up, running her good hand through her hair, and settles the Stetson on her head.

He lies down across the bed, flopping onto his back. Looking up at her with a challenging gleam in his eyes, he then says,

"Get up on me. Look, you call the shots in every other aspect of your life, don'tcha? You're a goddamn outlaw, honey. Show me you can do what you want and enjoy yourself while you're doin' it."

She eyes him over her shoulder, mouth pulling into a smile. The challenge makes her chortle — a quick, amused scoff — turning away to shake her head.

When she turns back, there's a spark to match her crooked lips.

"Y'want me t'take advantage of you?"

She's back to quiet playfulness, teasing, ribbing. Rolling onto her hip, she crawls astride him.

"And you're okay with that?"

"Yes! Please! Take advantage of me anytime you want."

He stares up at her, skimming his palms up her thighs.

"Tell me what to do..."

Raising himself up onto his elbows, he doesn't break his gaze.

"Push me around..."

He sits up, cupping her cheek in one hand, bringing his lips close to hers.

"Rough me up..."

His eyes narrow, and the corner of his mouth pulls back.

"--If you can."

Darkening eyes shift between his narrowed gaze and his mouth, mirth teasing the corners of her lips.

She's the captured mustang, and he just knocked down the whole damn pen.

Tilting her head, pushing back her hat, she steals a kiss. It's slow and thorough, answering his every challenge. She pushes him to the bed, hovering over his body.

"I think I can manage that."

Her smile is molasses. The leather tie from her hat traces his windpipe; hair, breasts, ghosting over his skin. This kiss is rougher, though no less thorough. Her teeth drag at his lip when she pulls away, voice husky.

"Don't. Move."

He doesn't reject the outlaw, and so the outlaw is what he will get. Rope, and grit, and steel; strong hands, and strong thighs. She wanted to know what made him tick, and so she'll draw the answers out of him with every inch of her body.

He would dance a jig of joy if not for the fact that, well, he's flat on his back with a cowgirl on top of him, kissing him like she wants to eat him up. Her forcefulness thrills him. The tickle of her hair, the warmth of her breasts, the sting of her teeth make him want more.

In the shadow of her broad-brimmed hat, his eyes still gleam with a certain defiance at her order to stay put. Just to make her work for it. Just to push her as far as he dares.

There's a joke — or maybe a taunt — in there somewhere about not making her work too hard. It's enough work as it is getting excited when he's all impatience. However, seeing as how she's too nice to tease him like that, all he'll earn himself is wild frustration and a stubborn will if he pushes her too hard.

He will stay put.

Or else.

She's standing by the table in the corner of her room almost half an hour later, wearing nothing but her blouse (buttoned just enough to cover what's important, hem just grazing the tops of her thighs), and that Stetson. Watching him, a pleased smirk hanging off her lips, ankles crossed in leisure. She nurses a bottle of juice.

Her throat's sore.

Be careful what you wish for.

Tommy's never been a big believer in old adages, but sometimes a fantasy coming to life is too much of a good thing.

And of course, he doesn't believe in too much of a good thing, either.

Almost half an hour later, he's sprawled out across the bed, his head hanging halfway off the mattress, blinking dazedly up at the ceiling and seeing nothing but stars. Parts of him are actually hurting right now. He's pretty sure he'll find bruises in unexpected places tomorrow. But that's exactly how he likes it.

When his vision clears, he slowly tilts his head so he can see Kate better.

Those bare legs stretching out from under her shirt...mmmph.

With a groan, he flops his head back down again and runs a hand through his hair.

"Y'know," he croaks, "if I knew you could do that, I would've suggested it a long time ago."

Her grin spreads.

"Happy, then?"

Her lungs still feel like they're on fire, and she's half afraid to try moving, for fear her knees might buckle. She takes another grateful swig of juice, clearing the sand from her voice, and sets the bottle down.

Padding her way back to the bed, she stands at his head, combing her hands through his hair.

"I think you're a bit of a bad boy yourself, Tommy Gavin."

"Mmmhmm," he purrs.

Grinning up at her, he preens like a tomcat as she strokes his hair.

"Me? A bad boy? ...Yeah, well, I wouldn't argue with that."

He reaches up and tugs at the hem of her blouse, lifting it a little so he can peer under it.

She slaps his hand.

Snickering, she smooths the fabric back into place.

"Mind your manners."

She bends down to kiss him, nudging his nose with her chin. Her hair slides around their ears, keeping them curtained in on this moment.

She settles on the edge of the bed beside him, just far enough away that he'll have to roll over to be able to reach her.

"Y'know, y'haven't told me what you've been up to since I've been gone."

The reprimand only pleases him even more, his grin turning impish. Still, he's rewarded with a kiss, which is not the best kind of discipline for Tommy at all. Breathing a warm hum against her lips, he melts contentedly back into the mattress.

His body will protest if he rolls over, so he'll stick to his current position and just fold his arms behind his head. He can still see her legs from here. That's good enough for the time being.

"What've I been up to?" he sighs thoughtfully.

The horrors at the back of his mind creep toward the front.

"Not much, really. Just work. Family stuff. Waiting for you to come back."

"Well, shucks. I'm at the top of your li'l ol' list?"

She pulls her cowboy hat off, playfully tossing it over his privates to cover him up. She bites back a cheeky smirk, as if she's just won some carnival trick.

"That can't really be all."

It's been two months.

He chuckles, adjusting the hat when it lands on him.

"I'm serious, I didn't do anything much. I came here once looking for you but found Dug instead. He missed you pretty bad. More than I did, that's for sure. If you ain't ever seen a sad dog before, Dug was one sad dog. But he made me his substitute master and felt better after a game of fetch, though."

Uttering another soft chuckle, he runs the pad of his thumb along the hat's brim.

Kate is shocked.

"So easily replaced."

Hand to her heart, the river of tears she'll be crying from here on is implied by the look on her face.

"My poor boys, sad without me. Though I notice he ain't here now. Pro'ly 'cuz he's holed up on somebody else's lap, bein' showered in treats."

Kate would feel cheap, except he's such a cute dog. She can't be mad at him for that.

Stretching herself out on the bed, she lies down perpendicular with Tommy, using his chest as a pillow. She turns her head enough to catch his eyes, lips twitching.

"I'm glad, though. That nothin' much happened with you. Seems like I missed a helluva lot with everybody else."

"Substitute, I said," he insists with a laugh. "Temporary substitute. And I'm sure he'll come running back to you once he catches a whiff of your return. ' Cause I mean, your lap is pretty irresistible."

With another impish smirk, he moves his hand from the hat to her head, smoothing back her wild curls. The smirk fades, though, at her comment, and his hand becomes still for a moment.

The thing that happened... He wasn't the only one who experienced it. And Kate has lots of friends. They might have told her.

His hand resumes stroking her hair. But he doesn't meet her eyes. Under her ear, his heart will thump harder at the recollection of what he saw.

Her grin slowly slips away.

She watches him carefully for a long time. Even if his face wasn't an open book to her, his body is telling her the whole story.

She lifts her head, draping her arm over him; gingerly scooting closer until she has him in something like an embrace, chin propped on his breastbone. She simply watches him, moving only to press a kiss to his heart.

At some point, her eyebrows arch.

His breathing quickens. He can't bring himself to smile even as she drapes herself over him, presses her lips to his skin. Though the haunting is long over, he still remembers the chill in his bones and the dreams that exhausted him with fear.

"There was a..."

What was it? How would he begin to explain it?

"It was just-- I dunno, some kinda-- thing that went around, scaring people, like a ghost or something. Never mind, it was stupid."

His Adam's apple bobs in a hard swallow. He still can't look at her.

"An evil tree god?"

Yeah, she heard.

She doesn't press him to look at her, and she doesn't press him to speak. Her fingers start to etch shapes along his ribs, slow and comforting.

"Sneakin' around an' makin' y'have bad dreams? I was told there was some sort'a confrontation in an abandoned buildin' — y'weren't taken, were you?"

"...Is that what it was? I dunno."

He closes his eyes and rubs his forehead, pinches the bridge of his nose, and sighs.

"I didn't hear anything about an abandoned building or-- people being taken? Jeezus. No. Me an' Lou stayed away from this place for like, I dunno, a couple of weeks until the whole things blew over. He was acting really weird and I couldn't sleep at all 'cause that thing, whatever it was, would show up in my nightmares and-- Christ, I've had really goddamn intense nightmares before, but nothing like this. This stuff got into my bones."

He covers his hand with hers, pressing her fingers flat against his side.

Shaking his head, he utters a dry chuckle. "It's stupid."

"S'not stupid."

Her free hand cards through his hair, slow and soothing. She peppers kisses across his breast.

"I ran away."

She lets the admission hang there, the corner of her mouth pulling into a wry smirk.

"It wasn't that the job couldn't wait. I was here. I saw the strange mist, an' the chill, an' folk were takin' ill, an' I — I couldn't stay. Them dreams y'describe? I had someone get inside my head, few years back. It was 'round this time'a year. He was — sentencin' me t'death. An' it felt — real. Everythin' felt ... Every year since, on All Hallows' Eve, I have these nightmares that I'm talkin' t'dead folk. But it's real, it feels real. Last year — it was my daddy."

She tucks in her chin, pressing her mouth against him for a few seconds. The memories are clearly playing through her mind. She takes a breath, and rests her cheek against his heart.

"He rejected me. For what I've become. Y'know, he was the only thing I had — the only family I can remember. It'd always been him an' me, an' — he was jus' so disappointed. Maybe it is stupid, but I — things started turnin' here, an' I couldn't bear the thought'a facin' him again. So I ran away."

His eyelids flutter open. And he listens.

Not expecting to hear any of this.

He folds his arm around her shoulders, his other hand resting on the back of her head. It'll take a while for him to figure out what to say, but...

I have these nightmares that I'm talkin' t'dead folk.

So he's not the only one. He's not the only one.

He continues to hold her as if he's just found her for the first time.

"Wish I knew what was goin' on before it was too late. I would've gotten the hell out, too."

Tilting his head to the side, he tries to catch her eyes.

"D'you-- d'you think it was really him-- your dad-- in your dream? Or was it just-- y'know, like, your worst fear playing out in your head?"

He sincerely wants to know what she thinks.

Her face twists with regret.

"M'sorry. I should've–I could've said somethin'. I abandoned y'all, like a coward."

She drops another kiss to his chest, though it's a poor salve for running away. The shame twists in her gut, and when he looks down, asking about the dream —

"I reckon it was really him. How can I know? This place's filled with such strange things, sometimes I can't tell what's real anymore. But I know what it feels like t'have a bad dream, an' I know what it feels like t'honestly hold a conversation with somebody. I could touch him. He could hold me. It wasn't like any other nightmare I've ever had before. We talked. We really talked."

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