Rules were meant to be broken.
Summary: They aren’t friends, nor enemies. Just two people in the small town of Lehigh, Stark County, that have crossed paths a few times in their life. Yet, they have rules when it comes to their hook-ups. Strict rules. But what if he decides to just forget one rule?
Contains: mentions of sex, slight jealousy, Gator being a dick, a dash of fluff if you squint your eyes
The first thing you noticed was the sound of coffee being made. The faint click of ceramic somewhere beyond the bedroom, followed by the soft scraping of a cupboard door opening and closing. Your eyes stayed close for a second, trying to figure out if this was the infamous limbo state of a dream mixed with waking up, where the lines were still blurred.
But then your brain caught up, there actually was someone in your kitchen. Someone who had no business in being there.
Opening one eye, you inspected the other side of the bed. It was empty. Well, mostly. The imprint of him was still fresh in the mattress, the thin blanket crumpled to the side, like you’ve seen so often after he left at night.
Except this wasn’t the middle of the night. You turned around to stare at the ceiling. Blinking once. Twice, for good measure.
“Oh, fuck,” you whispered under your breath, another faint clink coming from the kitchen.
No staying over. Well, this rule certainly was out of the window, it seemed.
There was a familiar ache in your muscles you didn't particularly want to think about yet as you sat up slowly, dragging the blanket with you. Thinking about the soreness would lead to thinking about last night, which would then lead to thinking about him. And thinking about him would lead to the very obvious question of why the hell he was still here.
So, without any thinking at all, you grabbed the first piece of clothing you could find and pulled it over your head. The scent of him enveloped you immediately. That cheap cologne mixed with the faint smell of this gas station beer he downed on the way over to your house after his patrol shift. It was his shirt, of course it was.
"Great," you mumbled, like a mock to yourself.
As you walked out of the bedroom, the smell of coffee grew stronger. And when you rounded the corner to enter the open living room-kitchen area, your hunch was - to your demise - confirmed. There he was, standing in your kitchen wearing only his briefs.
His back was facing you as he leaned against the counter, one hand wrapped around a coffee baby pink mug that you were fairly certain belonged to you. His hair was a mess, his shoulders loose in a way you had never seen them at work, and he looked—
Comfortable. That was the problem.
Gator Tillman did not look comfortable in other people's houses. He looked like he was waiting for someone to tell him to leave, like he was always halfway out the door.
"You're still here," you noted, as if you needed to confirm the obvious fact once again.
Gator glanced over his shoulder, his eyes already traveling down your body, before finally meeting your gaze. Despite liking the sight of you wearing his shirt, his expression didn't change.
"Yeah," he stated. His stupid smirk already made an appearance this early in the morning. He leaned back against the counter, one hand braced next to him against it as if he had any right to be here.
You frowned as you were waiting for him to add anything. "That's it?" you bickered. He lowered the mug, swallowing the coffee. "What do you want me to say?" he chuckled lowly.
"I don't know. Something." You gestured vaguely between him and yourself. "Like... why you're still in my house would be a great fucking start," you accused.
Gator looked around, pouting in his sarcastic way you saw so many times, then back at you.
"I was making coffee," he stated the obvious. "I’m not blind, I can see that," you muttered. "Then I guess you got your answer," he smirked at you, crossing one leg over the other as he seemed to make himself even more comfortable.
You glared at him. He stared back with that stupid, infuriating little smirk. The one that made you want to kiss him and slap him in equal measure.
You sighed deeply as you made your way towards him behind the counter to make yourself a cup of coffee. "You were supposed to leave," you muttered again, the coffee machine brewing in front of you.
He snorted out a chuckle. "Was I?" You nodded. "Huh," he huffed very sarcastically. "Gator," you sighed. "What?”
"You're not supposed to stay," you sighed as you realized that every other rule you both established would soon follow to be gone. He took another, insufferable slow sip. "Didn't know that," he debated, shrugging his shoulders.
You narrowed your eyes. "Stop being annoying, you knew," you spat as you took your coffee for a sip.
He still smirked when he rasped. "Maybe I forgot," he drawled lowly, leaning closer just to piss you off.
"You forgot? Overnight?" you argued, but didn’t even bother to lean away from him. He is your non-exclusively exclusive hook-up after all, and you’d never admit but, oh man, does he make you feel good every damn time.
"Yeah, must've," he muttered into his cup. Neither of you moved as you stirred your coffee, neither of you would admit to liking the feeling of this rule being gone.
Then Gator nodded toward the cupboard behind him. "You got sugar?" he asked way too casually. You blinked at the sudden change of subject, head snapping up. "What?" you asked with furrowed eyebrows.
"Sugar," he repeated. You closed your eyes at his audacity for a second. "I know what sugar is, dumbass," you barked, causing him to huff out a laugh through his nose. "Then why'd you ask?" he chuckled. "Oh my God, I didn't ask anything!"
"You looked confused." God, how he loved to rile you up and how much you wanted to rip his fucking head off.
"I'm confused because you're standing half-naked in my kitchen drinking my coffee, when we clearly agreed to ‘no staying over’," you explained as calm as you could.
Gator glanced down at himself, then back at you. "Yeah, baby, you noticed that, huh?" he cooed.
You closed your eyes, trying to calm yourself from throwing something at his head. "Jesus fucking Christ," you breathed in a whisper as you turned around to walk to your bathroom.
And behind you, you heard him laugh again. Quietly, but enough to know he loved every second of this.
And that was almost worse than everything else.
Twenty minutes later - and a pep talk in the mirror - you were sitting across from him at your kitchen table. You weren’t entirely sure how that had happened, but Gator had found eggs in your refrigerator. And made toast. Somehow, you’d both ended up eating breakfast.
It was deeply unsettling, yet too comfortable to say anything against it.
"You eat like a fucking twelve-year-old," you said, watching him scrape the last of the eggs onto his toast. Gator looked up at you, frozen mid-chewing.
"Is that supposed to be an insult?" he asked way too smug.
"Observation. Thought I’d let you know, if you ever find someone you’ll date. Figured you want to learn manners first, before you embarrass yourself at breakfast,” you replied. There was an undertone in your voice that you swear you swallowed before speaking, but somehow still ended up being there.
He took a bite, keeping his eyes closely on you.
"Sounds an awful lot like you’re already jealous," he drawled, grinning at you.
You rolled your eyes joined by an overdramatic sigh. “You wish,” you muttered, taking another bite of eggs on toast.
Gator chuckled, realizing you were absolutely lying. And you wished, you never said anything.
"You doing anything today?" he asked after a moment of silence. You choked on a piece of toast, eyes flicking up to his in disbelief.
"Why do you wanna know?" you muffled between chews. Very unsexy, but his eyes held something close to admiration at the sight of you so… domestic.
“Isn’t that a normal topic between friends?” he chuckled lowly. You glared at him as you chewed your last bit. “Well, you doing anything today?” he repeated, leaning back in his chair. He crossed his arms in front of his chest, the veins and muscles instantly drawing your eyes in them like a magnet.
"No,” you muttered as you forced yourself to find his eyes again. “Good,” he said.
Gator was already up on his feet, collecting the empty plates and placed them in the kitchen sink, you only could stare in disbelief.
“I need to get groceries, you wanna come with me?” he asked, smug as hell as he walked towards you.
No spending the day. That was another rule you agreed on, the second rule about to be broken, because you knew you couldn’t turn that offer down, even if you tried.
“What? It’s not like I’m not gonna end up in your bed again tonight, might as well do something together until then,” he said, walking closer to you.
Your breath hitched, your thighs already pressing together. “We agreed on not doing stuff like that,” you breathed, your eyes dropping down his body for a second. “Like what?” he scoffed. “Like we’re a thing,” you replied, swallowing thickly. “A thing?” he repeated with a huffed laugh. “Yeah,” you hummed.
You couldn’t deny the affect he had on you. The magnetic force that pulled you towards him, and vice versa.
He slowly walked behind you, careful not to brush his shirt still on you. He leaned down to your ear, making sure you heard him inhale deeply to smell himself on you.
“Y’know, when you moaned my name so deliciously last night, right before you came all over my dick,” he hummed lowly into your ear. You swallowed again, doing your best to hide the fact how turned on you were again. “... that was when I realized I fucking hate those rules.”
His knuckles turned white on the backrest of the wooden chair, his lips brushed your earlobe just enough to make your breath stutter.
You could feel the grin on his lips.
“And when I saw you walk out of your bedroom wearing my shirt,” he groaned, a low sound following. “… that’s when I decided to throw every rule out of the window.”
You turned your head to meet his gaze, so so close.
“So, are you coming to the grocery store with me or not?” he drawled lowly. Your eyes flicked down to his lips, a smug smirk forming instantly as if he already knew you would never say no.
“Fine,” you whispered and his smirk only widened. He leaned closer, barely an inch between your lips. “Good,” he whispered, matching your tone.
His hand slowly wrapped around your throat, not to grab but to gently hold you there as he closed the small distance between you. His lips captured yours in a slow kiss, both of you inhaling deeply. There was no denying now that either of you were fighting any feelings between you two.
You found yourself being carried into your bedroom under the premise to both get dressed for the grocery store. But before either of you could do that, you had to straddle him on your bed, his hands all over you, moaning his name like a prayer on your lips.
Only this time? Both of you knew after today, there would never be any more rules to follow. Some rules really were meant to be broken, if it meant finally letting go of hiding.
