reznikolai | I N B O X

[ Alina doesn't really think she's earned Nikolai's care yet, constantly digging at the same wound over and over again, never giving it a chance to heal. Her shoulders seize, jerking into him to hold back the doubt and guilt that comes from asking him for just one more thing when she cannot give anything back.

It's not unlike what Ravaka asks of her. Even what Ravka asks of him, things to be used and discarded when they can give no more, balancing on the thin line of being commended for giving so much and being hated for not enough.

She thought it was love once, in the twisted, narrow way she's been exposed to. But then she had felt something more, something unyielding and forgiving, greater than what she could ever be that asks for nothing of her except to be Alina.

She loves Nikolai. She doesn't think she'll ever be able to stop loving Nikolai. She had been so afraid to face it before, the confession wrapped up in too much pain, and it's not that it no longer hurts, but she knows now it's possible to forgive and heal. ]

You will?

[ Arms pinned between them, her hands curl weakly against his chest, lifting her chin to question him with wet eyes. It's such a simple promise, but not one she can think anyone else would make to her so freely. ]

I didn't want to ask after everything. [ She ducks her head again, whispering. Her breasts ache, sore pressed between them, but it's so nice to be held again. ] They just hurt, and I didn't— I couldn't fix it by myself with my hands.

[She tucks into his chest like a ship finding a harbor, and he buries his nose into her hair, inhaling her scent for the thousandth time. This is home to him, or a fragment of it. The impression of it, like a memory of a dream. Between them they've got so many broken pieces: scars and shame, half-truths and star-crossed hopes. But Nikolai has always believed that when something is broken, that doesn't mean it should be thrown out. Almost everything is salvageable. Even if it can't be repaired, from all its parts something new might be built.]

You need never hesitate to ask for my help, Alina.

[Looking up, his eyes land on the amber slant of light spilling out from an ajar door. He nods toward it.]

Is that your room? [With his arm gently cloaking her shoulders, he guides her down the hall.] Let's see if we can't make you more comfortable.

[ He says that like asking for help is so easy. Like she doesn't deserve to bear whatever cruel and unusual punishment the universe can think up for her alone. Like it isn't more frightening to be told no and left in the dark than to just grit her teeth and get through it than risk whatever answer she might get otherwise.

(Maybe it is that easy. Maybe she really does have people behind her. Maybe they wouldn't walk away. Questions to contemplate at a later time.)

She follows his gaze and nods weakly, settling into the shape of his embrace — both familiar and foreign at once. ]

Kaz and Inej are down that way. [ She nods down the hall with her chin before slipping through the threshold of her room. ] But still be quiet. They're light sleepers.

[ Her room is dimly lit with twinkle lights strung over the walls like stars. Not dirty but... messy with smaller bed covered with wrinkled sheets and a crumpled duvet, every surface sporting some assortment of art supplies, and pencil shavings swept onto the floor rather into a waste bin.

She huddles up against the door, shut behind her. Crossing her arms loosely across her chest, her thumb rubs over her upper arms nervously. She shouldn't block him in. She should let him leave if he wants before this goes to far. She wouldn't blame him. He's always enjoyed her tits, and she tries not to redden too much at the memory of an old dream where he delighted in the thought of her just like this. What is it that he said? Imagine these perfect little tits swollen with milk, but that was another lifetime, another reality. And it was just a dream, there's no telling how he'd look at her body now in reality.

Biting her lip, she supposes there is no turning back. She grips the edge of his shirt and pulls it over her head. Tossed aside, she stands bare in front of him, pinning her hands behind her back to stop her from covering up. Her tits, unmistakably plumper than usual and wet at their hardened peaks, rise and fall with a measured breath, her stomach tensing, toes curling, and fingers scratching at the door behind her so tightly wound that she's afraid she might fall apart. ]

You really... [ Her voice thin and on the edge of cracking as she whispers. ] You really don't have to do this. If you don't want to.

Edited 2022-03-15 01:57 (UTC)

[Once inside, he sets the any-tool down on the first available surface he finds, which is the desk piled with sketchbooks and strewn with pencils and paints. He drapes his coat over the back of the chair. His attention returns to Alina like a loyal dog to its master. She frets and fusses, making herself small against the door, baring herself to him, daring him to leave. As if he could ever go back. His answer flies out at once:]

I want to, Alina.

[I want you. The words hang precariously on his tongue, so ready to fall off that he must gulp them back down with a slow, steady breath. The same dream that spins through her thoughts dances tauntingly before him too, a dream Nikolai has revisited dozens of times in hours sleeping and waking. Drawing his gaze over her, drawing closer to her, he can't help but imagine her belly swollen with child underneath those achingly plump breasts. Can't help but remember all the lovely plans his dream-self has sketched, ignorant to reality and dwelling only in Nikolai's deepest desires. We need at least two, so the first has a friend to play with, the fool had reasoned. And if a third should come along, then a fourth is only reasonable, so that nobody feels left out. So many little feet pattering across palace floors, so much laughter rising up to the vaulted ceilings, no longer the lonely haunt of his own childhood.

All of it so palpable in this room, the impossibility of it so heavy against his heart.

Nikolai gently plucks her hands from the door, soothing her by tracing with his thumbs the ridges of her knuckles. The kiss he presses to her lips is strangely solemn, like a vigil held for that which will never be.]

Edited 2022-03-20 18:14 (UTC)

[ He answers again like it's so easy to give all of himself to her. He looks at her like he's desperate, but it is not predatory, not expecting anything from her or her to be something for him. It is want, it is just need for her.

Love, it's love. Something they built together, a net they wove to catch themselves, and even if she thought it was something that trapped her when she tried to escape it she knows better now to fight it. She knows to let it catch her. ]

Okay. [ She whispers softly against his lips, letting him draw her off of the door like a shy horse out of the stable. ]

I trust you.

[ With this, and what might have been. ]

[I trust you. It feels like a door that was once shoved shut creaking open again. Like the first shoot poking its head through the blackened earth after everything has burned down. In spite of all the reasons he's given her to withhold her trust, she chooses to bestow it on him.

That's love, too.

Nikolai answers with his body, scooping Alina into his arms in one smooth, well-worn motion. Carrying her as if she's his new bride, a somber mirror of the dreams that insist on fragmenting into reality. Kissing her temple with a gentleness he hasn't had occasion to grant her in what feels like an epoch. He brings her to the bed, where he sets her amid the haphazard duvet and pillows. His eyes idly wander the string of starry lights suspended above the headboard as he undresses, shirt and pants and shoes forming a pile on the floor, but he steals glances of her as if he might not be allowed.

The mattress protests his weight as he settles in beside Alina, protectively bracketing her. His arms slide around her, his head tucks into the cradle formed of her neck and shoulder. The blankets and pillow smell like her in a way that nothing in his house does anymore, and he gulps it in. Gulps her in.

A kiss pressed to her neck soon becomes a strand of them jeweled along her clavicle, dripping into her cleavage, now less modest than it once was. At last, his lips circle a nipple. The sweetness of her milk, sticky against her skin, melts against his tongue. He cups her breast, applying gentle pressure with thumb and finger to coax more out.]

Can you call me Kolya again?

[—Which is, for some reason, all he can think to murmur in this moment, stuck fast to her tit.]

Edited 2022-03-22 15:51 (UTC)

[ He doesn't need to be so tender with her. He doesn't need to be so gentle and giving, and yet he is. He always is in a way that she isn't sure she can ever repay. He scoops her into his arms, effortless to carry her across the room, marvels at her when he lays her on her bed. She can't stop herself from curling into his touch. It is more than just the warmth of another body, but something much deeper. He could help her and be more distant. He could use his hands in distant clinical motions.

Instead he plays out the life they won't have. The one where he carries her as a bride across a threshold, the one where oil lamps and starlight fill their room. The one where she calls him that, sleepily murmuring Kolya? from a cocoon of luxurious blankets as he soothes a fussy Dominik against his bare chest.

She gasps, as his mouth and hand circle her nipple. She's always been sensitive, but it's amplified now. She has to stop herself from jerking forward into him and hold back the whimper that's caught on her tongue. ]

No one else calls you that, do they? [ She whispers. They'd have no reason to, and she finds herself protective of the name, like it should only be theirs. her hands mapping the warm expanse of his back. First with trepidation, and then steadier as she remembers the paths she's learned. ]

Gentle, gentle Kolya— [ She warns beneath her breath, although for no reason. He is being gentle, his touch soft and light. She almost wants more. ] They're so sensitive, Papochka.

[Closing his eyes, Nikolai sinks into her airy whimpers, her sweet epithets. Hanging within reach is that tantalizing future they will never share together. A bassinet beside the bed where their son sleeps while papa and mama finally take a moment for themselves. Alina's belly soon to be rounded with Dominik's brother or sister. All of them composing the family his parents has failed to provide for him.

But he doesn't let himself sink into it fully, doesn't let the the fantasy swallow him whole. He forces himself to stay in the present, to feel the press of reality at the edges of this idle dream. That had been their downfall, dwelling in make believe and barricading the door against any truth that threatened to break the spell.

It's easier now. Now that they're not together, now that there's little left to cling to, it's easier to resign himself to reality. Now that time provides more distance with every passing day, it's easier to endure the ache of her absence, the Alina-shaped hole in his life.

But as soon as their paths cross, he finds himself hurtling into her orbit once more. That he isn't strong enough to resist.

When he groans softly against her breast, it's the release of all those things he aches for and knows he can't have. Alina will feel his desire in the hot press of his cock against her thigh, his leg tangling with hers. Around her nipple he whispers—]

Only you...

[—before suckling at her in earnest. He's suspiciously adept at it, knowing how best to use the tools of tongue and touch to encourage her flow, until what began as a few beads of milk eases into a steady trickle that he drinks with an indulgent sigh.]

Edited 2022-03-28 20:53 (UTC)

[ Alina presses her lips together trying to hold back a whine, about as unsuccessful as her screwed-shut eyes are at keeping fat, hot tears from rolling down her cheeks. It is not sadness. Or rather, it is not only sadness, but the relief of release too. She sinks back into the pillows, cradled by his hands and framed by his body.

She twists, biting a knuckle to quiet herself. She is not sure how she would explain this clandestine meeting to Inej. Saints aren't so weak they fall into the same traps of desire over and over again.

She pushes the thought away, but it lingers like a shadow.

She sucks in a breath, surprised when he starts in earnest. How is he so good at this? It's not as if there's anyone to practice with except for... Oh. Oh. Well. Good for Konoha for putting Nikolai's mouth to good use.

She's not in the mood for thinking how she shares Nikolai (how he is not hers to share at all any more) when his mouth is at her breast and his cock rubs at her thigh through thin layers of fabric. She groans, rolling to her side to wrap her legs around him. Her tits are overflowing but she feels pathetically empty. It's obscene how being so close to him for such a short time has left her feeling embarrassingly needy as she is reminded of all the ways he soothes her body, the intimate and skillful ways he can use his hands and his mouth and his cock to leave her shaking. Each night together and then even the nights apart chipped away at the walls that hold back the things she shouldn't say. Even the smallest cracks will always grow into something larger. ]

Ever since that dream... I thought about it, you know? [ Little drips of confessions turn into a steady flow. A hand pressed against the dam won't stop it, maybe she should let it wash her out. ] It was hard not to. Every time you came inside me after that I just wondered, what if.

[Alina curls closer, welcomes him into the cradle of her legs, and they fit together as they always have. As her warm sweet milk splashes his tongue, and his cock nuzzles into her, her voice unfurls from an oft-tended flowerbed of his memories: Like I was made for you. And in that dream he'd answered, We made ourselves for each other. Now it's an ache that threatens to split him open, yearning for wholeness amid the broken pieces of who they are.

They have never acknowledged it so directly, the desire at the root of that dream. They'd talked around the awkwardness of sharing something so raw. They'd buried it and carried on. It was the dream that planted in him the longing to be a father, but now Nikolai wonders if it was his ever-present loneliness, like a wall of clouds darkening the horizon whenever he considers the day he must resume his real life, that invited the dream in the first place.

There is so much he could say to her. A whole swell of emotions pressing against his tongue, sticking to the roof of his mouth. Luckily, the performance of his duty of sucking her tit exempts him from answering right away. After a stretch of quiet, filled with only the soft wet sounds of his task, he releases her nipple.]

I did too. [His words tip-toe out, fragile things afraid of the light of day. His gaze flickers on her face before lowering again. In this pause, he busies himself with her other breast, cupping its newfound heft, pulsing his thumb just so to surface her milk.] Against all practicality and logic and hope.

[He doesn't know what to do with all this truth. It hangs in the air around them, stifling in the still dark of night. He doesn't know what to do with the weight of wanting and knowing he can never have it. All his life he has always manifested his desires, bent the course of his life and the shape of his world to achieve his goals. But no amount of bending can make her his beyond this little pocket of time and space, or create the future they hunger for after just a taste.]

[ She's held tight, suspended in seconds that stretch into long eternities as long as he stays silent, making her wish she could take it back or hold it in even if it hurts her. Holding onto it was like trying to clutch a piece of cut glass, futile and useless, only leaving her bloodied and scarred.

And then he shares in her confession, her her whole body shudders, a tearless moan of a sob surfacing. She leans into him again, encouraging him to drink from her with long, slow strokes down his neck and back and up again. ]

We're both idiots.

[ But she does not mean it in a derisive way. It's true. Nikolai may have hidden some truths from her but she had been willfully blind to other parts. ]

I'm sorry, [ she whispers. And then again. ] I'm sorry it won't be ours.

[ Because it cannot be here, and even when... if they return home, she could accept Nikolai's proposal. She could be his wife. But it would not really be the Nikolai in her arms that drinks from her breast. The one that she fell in love with, that she still loves against all her better judgement (the thin amount of it she manages to have normally). She wonders if she will ever feel a love so messy and so whole ever again. It almost would be easier to die on the fold. ]

[With infinite tenderness he laps up the milk spilled from the breast he hasn't suckled yet, savoring each sweet bead as he used to savor each moment spent with Alina. As he still does, except those moments are fewer and farther between now, and bitter more often than sweet. Like this one, where they're cracked open to reveal their softest parts and there is no salvation from it, there is no healing, there is only this endless rawness.]

I know. [For the moment, he rests his forehead against her breastbone. Breathes in her skin.] I'm sorry too.

[Shifting their bodies as one unit, Nikolai sits and and scoops her into his lap. With her straddling him like this, her tits sit within easy reach of his mouth, ripe fruits ready to burst, begging to be tasted. He resumes his strangely solemn work, massaging her aching breasts, latching onto the nipple he hasn't tried yet. As he relieves her, his hand trails down her stomach, mourning the flatness of it. His fingers dip between her legs to linger with light strokes over the heat of her entrance — warm and wet even through her panties.]

Is this okay...?

[Doing this even though they're not together anymore. Taking what they will have to give back.]

No, [ She shakes her head quickly, nosing against his hair, breathing in the scent of it deeply. She wonders if all of him is so stubborn that their baby might have golden locks curling on their head rather than her dark hair.

But apparently that is no indication to stop, a series of soft moans escape her parted lips, echoing the pattern of their bodies. She bobs in his lap, following the path of his fingers, rolling her hips back and forth. She stifles a low whine as the fabric drags over her warm center, his thumb brushing over her clit, not enough pressure through the layers, too much friction that leaves her burning for him.

She whimpers, her skin puckering into goosebumps at the chill of the room. Warm milk dribbles down her stomach, leaking from the breast he had abandoned. ]

Please— [ She sucks in a breath, being pulled to a familiar precipice with relief on the horizon but she knows she must first summit a mountain of need. It feels impossible, insurmountable. She could not get herself there, he has to carry her. ]

Please. [ She whines again, tears spilling out of the corner of her eyes. ] Please touch me.

[ Want me. Love me. ]

[No, she says, and Nikolai pauses, heart sinking into his stomach, shame rising up. But then she rolls against him, taking his touch for her own, and — actions speaking louder than words — he resumes petting her. Please, she says, and he listens. Through the tether, stronger now than it has been for a long time, he can feel her ache as if it's his own. And it is. It is.]

Saints, I want you. [A plea breathed against her breast as he drinks of her.] I want...

[Again his fingers trace the flatness of her belly, the dribbling trails of spilled milk, and his voice cracks. The rest of the sentence is lost. Tears threaten at the corners of his eyes. Cupping her ass in two handfuls, he pulls her against him, replacing the pulse of his fingers with the grind of his cock. His breath trembles out of him, bends into a moan.

As he tugs off her underwear and pulls out his cock, as the soft slick give of her surrounds him, and they sink into each other as they have a hundred times before, that's when he feels the hot wet of tears roll down his cheeks. He wants to be strong for her, but maybe it's just as important to be weak with her.]

Edited 2022-05-14 23:16 (UTC)

Ah— ah.

[ Alina squeezes the back of his neck to steady herself as Nikolai pushes into her. She's tight, not painfully so, but she welcomes the blunt head of his cock inside of her far less frequently now. This is not the long sessions of their lovemaking where he made her cry out his name from just his fingers and his tongue multiple times over.

And still she wouldn't change it. This is what she needs. She needs him, messy and unplanned. Perfectly imperfect in its honesty. ]

I want— [ She chokes on the words. She can't hold it back now. She can't afford to lie to him. Or to herself. ] I want it too.

[ She grasps the back of his hand, pulling it back to the flat of her stomach as she begins to rock against him. ]

Can we pretend? [ She whispers it, her mouth against his temple, her hips bumping in small hitches. ] Just... just for one night.

[It's artless, the way he makes love to her tonight. Each movement, wrought from raw need. His body misses hers. His heart misses hers, at a level that cannot be communicated through words.]

Oh, love...

[That word that's gotten him in so much trouble. Nikolai doesn't mean to say it. It happens as naturally as the thump of his heart as she rocks in his lap and accepts him inside of herself. Behind this soft, sad exhalation lies so much that, for all the skill of his silver tongue, he doesn't know how to say. Isn't that how they got here? Pretending for just one night. Living in a daydream, drunk on the honey aroma of glowing blooms.

His tacit agreement is in the way he squeezes her in his arms. The way he loses himself in worshipping her breasts, kissing prayers in circles all around her rosy nipples. In the rhythm of their bodies, breath and flesh keeping time, things slide back into place. He teases like he used to, about her eagerness, about the fullness of her breasts, the sweetness of her milk. Forgetting himself, losing the shape of reality in the hazy heat of passion, he comments:]

Are you sure there will be enough for—?

[The end of the question sags. There is no baby. No little Dominik. He distracts both of them with a kiss, melding their mouths together before Alina can react.]

Edited 2022-06-22 03:41 (UTC)

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