Rajun Cajun Swamp Rat

"Fuckssakes," Pietro grumbled, pressing his lips against Remy's once again, grabbing him by the front of his shirt, and dragging him down with him as he fell onto his back on the bed. No weird pressure on his knee, Remy's weight against him, just feeling warm and secure...like they used to be. Problem solved. For that moment, it was what he needed.

Remy hesitating was irritating. Frustrating.

He knew he was being unreasonable, he knew they needed to talk, but he genuinely couldn't handle it at that moment. Absolutely touch-starved and self-isolating for more than a decade, he needed the reassurance. They could talk tomorrow. Fuck, if it really came down to it, he would see if Emma would set aside some time to talk to them together, couples counseling. Tomorrow.

Thin fingers clawed their way over Remy's chest and over his sides, hands sliding up his back to dig his fingertips in, dragging them down roughly to his lower back.

The swear and grumble made him grin into the kiss for the way it hit right in the nostalgia. And then in that same place he was very quickly on top of the other man. It was so, so clear that Pietro did not want to hear him talk in any way, shape, or form at the moment and so he did exactly what his speedster wanted. Remy pressed him against the mattress, glad the knee was out of the way, and got his fingers once again tangled up in Pietro's hair. Maybe it was a mild obsession but it was one of the man's most distinct features aside from his eyes and his attitude and he'd missed every inch of him. Hell, if Pietro wanted him to paint his toenails again he'd do it just to be close to him.

Kissing was preferred, though.

He made a faint noise at the fingers that dug into his skin and responded by sliding a hand down the still-slim body to the hip of his uninjured leg. Careful but increasingly desperate he drew the leg up and over his own hip, slotting them together in a way that was achingly familiar. Remy kissed Pietro and didn't know what was going to happen next, just hoped that it wouldn't stop.

Not everyone in the rpc is a shipper or their muses are on the Aro/Ace spectrum ; I observe there are some muns (especialy eith female or female presenting muses) may feel intimidated by the idea that they need to engage in shipping to get interactions

you can't leave me again | i'll break

"...me, too," he mumbled, inching closer again, noses brushing, seeking contact still; he didn't want it to stop yet. "...and I promise not to make shit difficult on purpose. Bad habit of mine I've been working through..."

It was partially true. He said several times to Emma that he was "working through it", but it was definitely something he had yet to put into practice. But for Remy...he would.

Words were already frustrating again, and while he knew they absolutely definitely genuinely needed to have several serious discussions...for the moment, he just needed the attention. He needed the affection. It almost felt silly how quickly he was clinging to this person that had practically abandoned him for over a decade, but he couldn't help it.

Remy was his person.

They should talk about so many things before they were in the same bed. Before they were kissing. But there was a part of Remy that pointed out that they were already in Pietro's room, he already had the speedster in his arms, and he was asking for more.

Twelve years of celibacy really skewed that internal balance.

"Avec plaisir." He said quickly before he pressed their lips together once more. If not for his knee, he would have already pulled Pietro onto his lap to make things easier but he wasn't willing to risk the pain. Instead he twisted his body to get closer, leaned in and got the fingers of one hand tangled in that soft, white hair.

There was an urge on top of all the other urges to start talking again but he shouted himself down inside and instead focused on getting his other hand on Pietro's waist. He was warm and firm and real and alive and perfect in every way. Fantasies had not done him justice. But he wouldn't be himself if he didn't push at self-sabotage.

"Still good, cher?"

Nerves pricked at the hairs on the back of his neck again, staring at Remy on his bed. Fuck, Maximoff, you aren't a teenager anymore...hell, you weren't even this anxious back then. Limping a little, he stepped over to the bed and sat himself down, leaning heavily against Remy, his head against his shoulder. He'd lie down in a moment.

"...I know I said I was pissed at you," he mumbled, "but I'm sorry I was being a piece of shit to you when you showed up. Pissed off or not, I could have been nicer. Just...took me a bit to get there. Which is also annoying because everything felt so slow..."

He was rambling. Not unusual for his more anxious moments, but even his rambling felt slow. Time dragged to a crawl...but it was okay. For now, anyway.

"Ugh...Emma's going to have a fucking field day with me in my next session. She's been pestering me to talk to you for weeks...I just. I couldn't. The thought just fucking hurt..." He turned his head, hiding his face against Remy's shoulder. "I'm still pissed. I'm sorry. Going to be working through it for a while, I think..."

It wasn't going to stop him from continuing to be the master of mixed signals though, his hand moving to Remy's thigh and giving it a squeeze...perhaps with a bit more fingernails clawing, but it was the thought, right? Keep him close. Can't let him go again.

"It ain' exactly unreasonable bein' all pissed off." Remy pointed out as he slipped his arm around the younger man. He held gently, careful not to shift him too much lest he put too much pressure on the injured knee. Sure they were sitting but he was understandably a little worried. "Appreciate de apology, but it ain' needed. Ain' sure dat anyone could'a been nicer t' de boyfriend dey ain' seen in over a decade."

The Cajun chuckled at the mention of Emma and nodded. "Well. She a smart lady. Been t'inkin'a reachin' out t' see if she got room t' see one mo' dysfunctional mutant'a a certain age. Been hard t' reach de t'erapist in France."

Remy wanted to keep going, to keep working at being better. He'd already done it for the two of them but maybe it could be more targeted. He could be better for both of them, even while Pietro was still pissed at him. Which would take time. Thankfully, he was used to Pietro's mixed messages so the hand on his thigh was a different and separate interest. It was the same person who once climbed into his bed half naked and drunk before they'd even started flirting, after all.

"Anyt'in' y' want." He agreed and lifted a hand to guide them into a far less painful kiss. Softer, sweeter, less likely to draw blood he kissed Pietro for a long, slow moment. Remy couldn't help it. Everything about the speedster made him want to slow down, to savour every moment. "We c'n work all dis out," he said after the moment passed, "All'a it. Gonna be a lotta work, but ain' afraid'a work. If y' willin' t' give dis one a chance, he willin' t' do whatever it take. Promise."

"...I'm going to hold you to that. Dead serious."

Instinct was to keep hanging on. Keep clinging. Don't let him go, he might vanish again, can't have that. But that wasn't reasonable. Pietro needed to change, he'd gotten dirty up on the roof and he felt grimy, and it wasn't like Remy was going to really go anywhere immediately. He was making that perfectly clear, wasn't he? His hands wanted to fidget again, settling for flexing and clawing lightly at Remy's back before he leaned away and slowly let him go.

"...get comfortable. You're staying here tonight." It was not a request. "I need to change. Just...don't say anything about the scars, okay? They're relatively recent, haven't quite healed over completely..."

Oh, moving away from him was harder than he'd thought it would be, but he wasn't going far. Just over to the dresser, just to get another pair of pajama pants and a tank top; Remy was like a walking, talking hot water bottle in winter at the best of times and a bonfire in hell at the worst—the man ran hot, what else could he say?

The only reason he was resorting to pants at all was because of his knee.

He kept his back to Remy for the moment, stripping out of his long-sleeve shirt and his sweats with the now scuffed knees in favor of a plain tank top and blue plaid pj pants. Just comfortable things, no expectations being set...not that it would really stop either of them if the night diverted that direction, would it?

He wasn't sure why he'd changed so slowly. Very unlike him. Maybe it's because he was thinking too hard, or maybe he was genuinely letting exhaustion set in. But scars painted a picture words sometimes had a difficult time helping to visualize. A spiderweb of angry, raised scarring along his back, just below his right knee practically encircling it, old scarring from over a decade ago that had to be revisited from time to time to address a poorly-mended femur and rebuilt kneecap. Familiar but faded pinprick scars on his neck, just below the base of his skull.

One day they would be gone, completely, but some of the old pain would remain. Frost had told him more than once a lot of it was mental, allowing his trauma to recreate the pain even after the cause was healed. Maybe she was right. It would explain why most of his injuries as a child vanished without a trace within days.

Healing was a process he really didn't care to bother with for years.

"Wouldn' have it any other way."

Remy felt an immediate urge to pull Pietro back into his arms but kept himself from doing it right then. Some day he would be able to do that, to pursue the man he loved, but for now he needed to be calm and wait. Which was helped by the fact that he was told in no uncertain terms that he wasn't going anywhere for the night.

"Ain' gonna say not'in'." He agreed easily, smiling as he sat on the edge of Pietro's bed. His own sweats weren't in too bad of shape given they'd been on the roof for only a little while and he wasn't too concerned unless Pietro was concerned. That meant he had an excellent view while the speedster changed at a regular speed. If he was being completely honest, he didn't even notice the scars at first. He noticed that his body had filled out a little more, still slim but less than he had been and there was something good about seeing that. It had been something of a hobby to see if he could put some weight on with that metabolism but between Speed metabolism and Teenage metabolism he'd never been able to make much headway.

The scars were more than he expected and he catalogued all of them with a deep, sad feeling. Especially the small, faded scars right on his neck. In Remy's mind he could remember them being vivid and still bleeding, could remember how they'd needed to leave the damn thing on while they patched Pietro up.

He remembered all of it up until the point where he'd left the medbay and gotten blackout drunk in their room.

Shame and guilt started to wrap their way around him like old friends when Pietro turned again. Remy brought his attention back to the present and smiled as best he could, "Well if y' need t' get off it, got dis here bed all convenient." He patted the space beside him like he wasn't the guest. "C'mon, y' need y' rest."

The trembling and fidgeting just wouldn't stop, and it was becoming more difficult to tell if it was simply nerves or if it was his body reacting to pain. Could be both, for all he knew. He shifted his weight off his right leg, effectively leaning against Remy more as well. He could feel how hard his heart was beating, how warm he was. He smelled the same, only with less cigarettes and alcohol.

The world slowed down, and for the first time in years it didn't feel like a bad thing.

Just for a moment—which for Pietro felt like hours—there was a sense of peace. Exhaustion finally catching up to him a bit, Pietro let his head drop onto Remy's shoulder, shifting to tuck it up under the taller man's chin. Both arms slid around Remy as well, gripping the back of his shirt, hanging on for dear life. If he let go, Remy might vanish again.

"...it was like...I woke up from a nightmare...still trying to cope, still trying to heal...and you were just gone. I didn't know what to do with myself. I even tried reaching out to my father again, you know? That went...as expected. Then he left, took Wanda with him. I lost contact with Clint...deep cover, hiding from Fury for years. Jean-Paul...his sister was getting worse, I haven't heard from either of them in almost ten years. Over and over and over and over and over again I was left behind. Everyone I ever cared about was just gone. All I've had were these...people...they barely tolerate me, and the closest thing I have to a friend is my fucking therapist..."

He didn't know why he was unloading like this, repeating some things, elaborating on others. Part of him wanted to make Remy hurt; it was petty, it was childish, but it was definitely there. A larger part of him simply wanted Remy to genuinely understand.

Things had just gotten worse.

Pietro curled so perfectly against him and he wrapped his arms around him in return. He didn't squeeze or cling or let his fingers twist in the fabric of the speedster's shirt because he didn't want to make him feel trapped. He did hold on firmly but experience told him that if he wanted to get away Pietro could do that easily. Even so he hoped that he never had to let go.

The words did hurt, but it wasn't malicious. It was just true. Remy turned his head and pressed a kiss against Pietro's hair while he continued to hold the man close.

"I'm sorry," he said, already aware he was going to be apologising for a very long time, "Ain' wanted t' hurt y', dat were never de point." But he had, he knew, and he accepted that he'd caused that hurt. He and his therapist had gone over that in great and excruciating detail more than once but it was worse actually seeing the pain he'd caused. That didn't change the fact that he had been the one to cause it.

"When dis one left, don't t'ink dat dere were any kinda way we coulda talked 'bout dis proper. We ain' had de tools we have now. We ain' managed t' get away like we planned an' we was fallin' back in wit' dis cycle'a debts an' obligation. First it were me who dragged y' back in 'cause Gambit owe de X-Men fo' gettin' y' back. Den y' was recoverin' an' ain' had time t' stop an' not be some kinda heroes. Dis one were killin' hisself slowly every day an' weren' even really here fo' y' while doin' it. An' I'm sorry fo' dat on top'a everyt'in' else. Y' needed me an I was weak."

Remy closed his eyes and just breathed a moment. "Should'a taken y' t' Paris an' changed our names an' lost our phones. Still probably ain' de right t'ing but maybe we could'a figured out den. But it ain' happen like dat an' dis one? He gonna spend as long as y' need makin' it up t' y'. Gonna prove dat he here t' stay."

And, of course, he was going to cling to that hand like a lifeline. Not because he was particularly afraid of falling (it wouldn't have been the first time, really), but the anxious feeling that Remy was just going to leave all over again, just as he was letting himself be open again, just would not go away. Not yet.

It irritated him just how much he'd missed him, how deeply he'd let this person carve their way into his chest. He'd opened himself up to the hurt, knowingly, and he was doing it all over again.

Was he stupid? Maybe.

The thing that made him the angriest was the fact he was limping. It made him feel pathetic, especially having to move as slowly as he already was to walk along with Remy as they made their way down from the roof, to the attic, to the second floor and the far end where Pietro insisted his room be...as far away from the students as possible without just insisting he be moved off-site entirely. He fished the key from his pocket, always keeping it locked because it was bad enough there were multiple telepaths in the building, but even the rest of them were horribly nosy...

He was rather quiet though, opening the door and letting Remy step inside first, before closing and locking it behind them again. His emotions were all over the place, and for the briefest of moments he felt timid, like he was seventeen all over again.

Their trek through the mansion was quiet, partly because of the hour and partly because he wasn't entirely sure Pietro wanted to hear him talk. He would have helped with the limping, were he allowed to, but instead he simply didn't draw attention to it. There was concern, but they could talk about that later.

Hopefully.

Remy did go in the room first and looked around at the space as he tried to get a sense of how his-- Pietro had been living. Not Well was more or less what he'd been told. But he didn't have long before the lock clicked and there he was, pulling them back together again.

It was perfect.

Okay, it probably wasn't, he considered, but it was Pietro and they were kissing and that was all Remy had been thinking about for twelve years. He pulled the speedster into his arms and hadn't felt anything quite so right, even with his heart pounding hard against his chest. It felt like the first time all over again and in many ways it was. They were different and yet they fit together so well.

"Been missin' y' so much." Remy murmured softly, holding on tighter. "Ain' been right wit'out y'."

"Shut up." It was a demand, a hissing whisper against lips that were still far too close and refused to stop fucking moving. It wasn't out of anger, not really, simply out of frustration. Communication was good, absolutely, no argument there....but for the moment, it was complicating things for Pietro, specifically. His chest hurt, his leg hurt, everything hurt in different ways and he didn't know what to do with himself.

So he kissed him again, slower, a bit more careful and purposeful, taking his time with it in spite of the pain shooting up through his knee making him want to vibrate his leg through the roof.

If he were thinking a bit more clearly he may have suggested they head back inside.

Okay.

The break was perhaps a bit more abrupt than necessary, but then again so was his breathless mumbling of "...myleghurtssofuckingbadweneedtogobackinsidewecangotomyroom--"

Remy shut up.

There were people who would have loved to know that trick but for the time being there was only one person who could get him to effectively quiet down on command. Especially given that the person in question seemed to want to occupy his lips which might have been the most effective technique.

It was slower, softer, and the thing of his dreams. His fingers moved back to comb into the soft white hair but he didn't push further and also didn't have the chance to before the kiss was broken abruptly and he was given one of the first run-on statements of the past decade. He took a moment to decipher it and then nodded. "Okay. Let's get y' back t' y' room. Ain' wanna hurt dat leg."

The Cajun sat up, careful given their location, and looked up towards the windows that led into the attic. While in no way carrying Pietro, he stood them both up with care and made sure they both had good footing before he offered his hand.

"Let's go, cher."

Without much thought to how the action could be interpreted (not that he cared in the moment), Pietro was suddenly on his knees, straddling Remy's waist with a hand firmly against his chest, fingers splayed. It had been years, Pietro knew damn well he was stronger than he looked, even if he was still in recovery. Even if Remy wanted to move, he wasn't getting away easily.

Pietro knew him better than that, though.

"No more secrets. No more lies. No more "better off dealing with it alone" bullshit. Fuck your pride. Fuck my pride. We talk, like fucking adults. And if you fucking bail on me ever again, I'm hunting you down to the ends of the Earth and I will fucking kill you. Are we clear?"

Ah, the most loving of threats.

And he did love him. He'd never stopped, no matter how much he'd wanted to hate him. It was what made this all so much more difficult than it needed to be.

"I can't do it again, Remy. I just can't. I can't fucking handle being left behind again and again and again, I can't fucking do it. I wanted to fucking die, do you understand? I don't feel things like "normal" people. Everything is a catastrophe unless it's a world-ending disaster, I cannot handle you leaving again. And right now, at this very second, you are so incredibly lucky that I'm not pissed enough to put your ass through the roof into the basement."

Then, impulse took over. He wasn't about to give him a moment to speak. Not yet, anyway. Instead his hand moved to grip Remy by the jaw, holding him still and leaning down to press a crushing kiss against his lips. Not ideal for a reunion, especially with his leg screaming in pain, but he was simply punctuating his point.

The sudden change in position was not actually as surprising as it might have been with anyone else. There was a sort of familiar vertigo that came along with Pietro moving them around on the faint slant of the roof. An aching familiarity in the firm hand on his chest and the weight that pressed him against the rough shingles.

Almost on instinct he moved his hands up to help support the speedster, especially since his leg had been bothering him. "Easy..." Remy managed to murmur but then fell silent in the face of The Rules.

Everything was reasonable. He agreed on every point. They weren't barely adults they were in their thirties and they needed to be able to act like actual mature adults despite the strength and volatility of some of the emotional states he knew they would both be working through. Especially when he was again confronted with the facts of what his departure had done. The hurt he had caused.

Remy was about to say something, to agree or to reassure or to apologise again, but was promptly cut off. The hand on his jaw was hard enough to bruise and so was the kiss that followed. It was harsh and inelegant and full of all kinds of emotions and none of that stopped him from leaning up just as much as he was allowed to kiss Pietro right back.

When the kiss broke at last Remy waited for a few long moments to see if he was allowed to talk but when there were no further threats he reached up to cup Pietro's cheek. "Ain' got no complaints. Ain' got no objections. Real glad y' ain' puttin' dis body t'rough de roof all de way t' de basement." He finished off with a little smile, "Gonna try real hard t' make sure it ain' gonna come t' dat."