LUCKY PENNY .

❝  i’ll always want to listen to you.  ❞

❝  any time spent with you is time i treasure.  every second.  ❞

❝  my favorite color changes but it’s always the same,  whatever color you’re wearing.  ❞

❝  whatever matters to you matters to me,  you’re important to me.  ❞

❝  you’re so strong.  and brave—but i wish you knew you don’t always have to be.  i’m here,  if you’re ever willing to let me help shoulder those burdens.  ❞

❝  i’m not staring,  i’m admiring.  ❞

❝  i’ll always be yours,  in one way or another.  ❞

❝  you don’t ever have to worry with me.  i’m here for good.  ❞

❝  you are more beautiful than you know.  ❞

❝  you have a beautiful mind and a wonderful soul,  don’t ever let anyone make you think differently.  ❞

❝  i’m happier when you’re here.  ❞

❝  you’ve become my joy.  ❞

❝  whatever else happens,  if i have you,  i’m content.  ❞

❝  well,  i do feel a little better now that you’re here.  ❞

❝  you do make me happy,  it’s important you know that.  ❞

❝  you will always be my priority.  ❞

❝  i love you forever.  ❞

❝  you don’t know how glad i am to see you.  ❞

❝  you look wonderful.  ❞

❝  i want you to feel safe with me.  ❞

❝  i’m not letting you go until you say it out loud.  you’re beautiful and strong.  you deserve to believe it.  ❞

❝  sometimes you amaze me—i mean you always do.  but you have such intuition and real wisdom about things.  i like understanding the way you see the world.  ❞

❝  you carry yourself with such grace.  ❞

❝  you have a way of lighting up even the darkest moments.  ❞

❝  a tender heart is a courageous thing to preserve.  don’t ever be ashamed of having one.  ❞

❝   being around you makes me a better person.  ❞

❝  i hope you know just how full of worth you are.  ❞

❝  you always make me see things differently.  i appreciate your perspective. ❞

❝  i’m just enjoying you.  you look happy today and i like seeing that.  ❞

❝  you’re very valuable to me.  ❞

❝  you can come to me with anything.  anything at all.  ❞

❝  there is not a place in the world i would rather be than right here with you.  ❞

❝  come here,  come sit in my lap and tell me about your day.  ❞

❝  come put your head in my lap and tell me something new.  ❞

❝  i love it when you smile at me like that.  ❞

❝  i don’t think i can share you with anyone today.  ❞

❝  i’ll take you anywhere you want.  just tell me where.  ❞

❝  bored? of you?  impossible.  ❞

❝  if you like it i’ll get you one.  ❞

❝  your happiness matters greatly to me.  ❞

❝  you deserve to reach the goals you want in life.  you deserve to obtain anything you wish.  ❞

❝  you’re doing well.  you’re just discouraged and tired.  ❞

❝  you need to rest,  you don’t have to do it all today.  ❞

❝  the way i love you goes beyond description.  even those words don’t seem like enough.  ❞

❝  you come first.  you’re always my first choice.  ❞

❝  no,  if you’re upset that’s what matters right now.  talk to me.  ❞

❝  i want to share in your joy.  i want to be part of all things that make you happy.  ❞

❝  all of my best moments are the ones that have you in them.  ❞

❝  i would give you anything you ask of me. ❞

[ COMFORT ]  sender discovers receiver brooding and quietly approaches to carefully hug them from behind. 

[ SOOTHE ]  in the midst of a tense moment,  receiver turns away to conceal their emotions but sender wraps their arms around them and holds them from behind. 

[ CLOSE ]  sender reaches out and pulls receiver into their lap as they’re walking by. 

[  STOP  ]  sender reaches out and takes receiver’s face into their hands,  drawing them away from what they’re doing so they can just look at receiver for a moment.  

[ GIVE ]  sender greets with receiver with a gift. 

[ BRING ]  sender takes receiver out for the day to pamper them. 

[ ATTENTION ]  sender peppers a series of caresses over receiver’s face in an attempt to make them laugh or smile. 

[ COAX ]  sender knows receiver has had a lot on their mind,  so they hold them for a while to help them relax and hopefully open up. 

[ CARESS ]   sender sits by quietly while receiver works,  petting their hair and simply providing company. 

[ RELAX ]  sender gives receiver a massage. 

[ LOOK ]  for receiver to catch sender gazing adoringly at them.

@bejmns​ SAID ::  ❛  imagery .   to  send  my  muse  a  risque  photo .

            THE CONTINUOUS BUZZ AROUND the carrier commonly went numb to the ears after the first few days. Yet Pete appreciated the odd occasions where he could be a little more on his own, with less of a crowd roaming around his head at all times. It’s a nice change of atmosphere, for as much as the atmosphere around this place could change. But being entirely on your own? Not much of a chance. Lieutenant Floyd sat beside him, preoccupied with something of his own. Maverick was fidgeting with the silver wrapper of a snack he’d had moments prior. His phone laid on the table the two of them were seated at, right next to an empty water bottle. It buzzed as the screen lit up.

             PENNY B. — [ IMAGE ATTACHMENT ] 

             Bob glanced over when he heard the faint noise of the phone’s buzz. Maverick casually reached for it, pulled it closer and unlocked his lockscreen to check the message.

             Bedroom mirror. Matching lingerie pieces. Silk bathrobe, teasing some curves. She wore the robe on one shoulder. The other was bare, bra strap lowered nearly to the fold of her arm, as if to tease the recipient…

@ofhrdcks​​ SAID ::  tell me you love me or something, don’t just stand there!

             PETE MITCHELL, where are those days when you wouldn’t shy away from the ladies and win them over like it was nothing? Those were the days, right? Those days when Nick Bradshaw was the wingman in more than one context. The embarrassing scenarios Pete had found himself in were plenty enough, Goose could likely write a novel about it.

             He snapped back to reality when a car horn sounded in the far distance. Penny was still watching him, curiously awaiting some kind of response. What was she saying again? Don’t just stand there?

              Shifting his weight from one leg to the other, it felt more and more as if he were a deer caught in headlights. Sure, Penny isn’t the first woman in his life, but she might really be the first significant one. The tables surely had turned on this once-a-fling. Had he ever said those three words and genuinely meant it before? Sure, he’s thought about them, and quite often these days Penny’s name was somewhere inbetween them. But saying them out loud? Not even ejection sounded nearly as dreadful.

            PENELOPE BENJAMIN  ...  oh , how she should have known better after more than twenty years of experience when it was about him. her heart should have known better, and despite how much she claimed to be over all of it, that it was fine  ...  it wasn’t. she knew it. he knew it, in a way  ...  he had to know it, somehow.

some, if given the opportunity, would erase all that was lived and turn the other way, rewrite their lives without the person that began it all, the one to first ever turn the key and get the pass farword to the heart. she should be one to regret him, for having her heart broken and broken again   ⸻   leaving for his own mistakes and reckless behaviour that made him piss yet another superior.  &&. although he deserved all of it, the inumerous punishments and the inconstancy his life had became, he had done the one thing no one else had ever been close to  ...  her heart. it was his, she was his. albeit, he never seemed to be hers.

            OH, HOW OFTEN DOES THE THOUGHT cross his mind now that he had her back in his life? There was no Florida without Penny Benjamin. And even when he was all the way across the country, she never really left his mind. If she did, would he not have found love elsewhere by now? A thing like that works in mysterious ways. Worse than rocket science. Maverick sat at the kitchen table at Penny’s place. She’d been keeping an eye on him ever since the crash. How (or why) he got out of that monstrosity alive, he still doesn’t know. What he does know is that Penny didn’t deserve to suffer any of its consequences. The pen in his left hand lingered near the piece of paper before he began scribbling down his words.

             Dear Penny,

             How long have we known each other? Since ‘86, a little over thirty years. With a fifteen year break. Thanks to the Navy. You all the way here in San Diego. Me, up there in Virginia. You know now. You never left my mind all those years. Why else do we keep finding each other? Maybe I’m a bit of a sucker, thinking of love in my old day. Sounds nice, as much as it sounds like something not made for people like me.

              I remember our first night together. We thought it’d be nothing. I thought it’d cost me my career. In the end all I lost was my heart to a girl I’d keep disappointing for many years to come. Me, your first time. You, my first true love. And only one for that matter. Does it matter?

              How you keep finding it within you each time again to embrace me as if nothing happened last time we met… Penny, dear. I can’t ask this of you again. Not after all this. I could have left you and Amelia in ways far worse than what I have to do now. I have never been a man of religion, but by the time you finish this letter, I hope you can still be grateful for my guardian angel out there.

              Thank you for all you have done for me in the past weeks and months. The love. The tenderness. The balance. The recovery. I do not want for you to witness me like that ever again. You try to hide it. Everyone always does. But I know that I scared you real bad. That is the risk I take with this life. That is not a risk I want you to take for having me in your life.

              Love makes one a fool.                  Maybe I’m a fool for leaving.                  Maybe I’m a fool for loving.                  But loving you was never a mistake.

                                                                                            Pete.