Michelle ,, 20s

“Who the fuck are you?” you ask the moment you enter the car, before you’ve even buckled yourself in. The man sitting next to you, in the driver’s seat, scowls, though you quickly get the distinct impression that it's just his face. He stares at you, rolls his eyes, then turns back to face the wheel.

And with that simple display, you know exactly who he is, even without the mask. How many times had you been on the receiving end of that exact look? Likely only a handful, but it only took one for it to leave an impression. You have to fight the smile threatening to creep onto your face as you finally buckle yourself in and your ‘husband’ starts to drive.

“You know…” you start, eyeing the way his hands seem to tighten on the steering wheel the moment you begin speaking. The smile can’t be fought now, and it pulls across your lips smugly. “If I had a face as pretty as yours, I wouldn’t go covering it up all the time,” you watch for his reaction, but there is none, not really. Ghost, no, Simon, lets out a puff of air that some might consider a laugh, but you think he needs more practice.

“Rather leave that up to you,” he says nonchalantly, looking away to check his blindspot as he takes a corner. Your smile doesn’t falter, but you do take a moment to blink. Had that been a genuine, actual compliment? Or was he just trying to get a rise out of you like you were out of him. You purse your lips, and let out a rueful little laugh.

“S’a good answer,” you tell him. “You already have this obedient husband thing down. Somebody’s trained you well,” you go on, attempting to get a further glimpse into his life beyond the face you’d never seen before, seeing as nearly none of it was on paper, let alone in the dossier Laswell had handed you.

Simon lets out another not-quite-laugh.

“Love your job, never work a day in your life,” he responds, like he’d researched for this mission by reading every corny wife guy instagram account to ever exist. You can’t hold back your genuine laughter at that one.

“Surprisingly devoted, for a man who didn’t even get out of the car to help me with my bags,” you comment.

“S’not my fault you packed a whole Primark.”

You sniff at that.

“It’s a whole Harrod’s, thank you.”

Simon grunts, and you spend the rest of the drive to the airport in a somewhat comfortable silence.

–

The drive out to the cabin from the airport is quiet. The ‘cabin’, as Laswell had called it, stands proud as perhaps the understatement of the century. It’s modern, big,  maybe too big, and from the driveway, where you and Simon stand looking up at the ceiling to floor windows of the living room, you both grimace darkly.

“Laswell said she vetted the place,” you say, more to assure yourself than him. “I’m sure she wouldn’t have put us up somewhere we can be so easily targeted.”

Simon looks down at you, before pulling up the mask he has tucked beneath his chin, covering off half his face once more.

“Nothing else out here, s’a good vantage point,” he states, looking around at the snow planes coming, before frowning at the woods that seem to back onto the house. “That worries me more than anythin’ else,” he says nodding to them.

You second that worry, but you don’t say it out loud, instead moving back to the car, and climbing in. Simon stays staring at the woods for a moment longer, before he too moves back inside the car, delivering it into the garage once you find the clicker.

“I’m going to turn on the heating, have a reccy…” you say, turning back to your ‘husband’ as he looks over at you, somewhat sardonically.

“Guess I’ll grab the bags,” he grumbles. You smile widely, facetiously.

“You don’t mind, do you dear?” You begin moving toward the stairs that lead up to the main house, and Simon only rolls his eyes. “I’ll give a shout when I find the master room.”

You easily find your way to the main room of the house, the one with the large, two story high floor to ceiling window, and you can’t help but grimace once again, keeping yourself as far from it as possible as you turn the house’s central heating on. You’re annoyed to find that he’s right, and you can turn the windows to only reflect, giving them a double sided glass effect. Still, you move away from the room as fast as you can. Maybe Simon was comfortable enough with a massive sign on his head that reads ‘snipe me!’, but you were far more sensible than that. You imagined.

You make your way upstairs, opening every door and peeking inside until you find the master room, its door already thrown open, and you frown, finding both your bags, and Simon’s laid across the seat at the end of the bed.

He’s already unpacking his things.

“What are you doing?”

Simon looks at you blankly.

“M’unpacking?”

You stare at him plainly for a moment.

“You know there’s about ten rooms in this house, right? We don’t need to share,” you tell him, trying not to sound as panicked as you feel. You give yourself away by staring at the expanse of his arms as he reaches up to tuck some shirts at the top of the wardrobe. He grins, widely, meanly.

“Now, now, love, what married couple don’t share a bed, hm?” he asks, eyes sparkling just a little. You huff, turn on your heel and leave. Right before you exit the bedroom entirely however, you do pause, popping your hip and curling your hand around the doorframe in a way you know garners his attention, if the way he seems to stop and turn to face you is anything to go by.

“Don’t go through my underwear, Simon,” you tell him lowly, flirtily, shooting a glance back at him. Simon straightens somewhat, but seems to otherwise stare at you dumbly for a moment.

“No point, if you’re not in ‘em,” he says after only a few seconds' delay. You turn back even more, and plaster on a smile.

“Good answer.”

–

The country club, the skiing club more like, is alight, despite the damn near white out weather, as Simon had called it. Despite your doubts, he fits in rather well as a socialite's husband who hates being dragged to these sorts of things. As it is, you think he really does hate being dragged to these sorts of things, so that certainly doesn’t hurt.

“There’s my man,” you whisper side on to Simon, who at least appears to be enjoying the buffet lunch. He pauses, and squints at you.

“Thought I was your man,” he states, mood seemingly turning grumpier, but he flicks his eyes toward the direction you nod in either way. You grin smugly, and round on him, letting your hand slip up his torso and curl around his neck ever so slightly, feeling him stiffen under your touch, but he never takes his eyes off of the man you’d pointed out.

“Looks like a prick,” he says.

“He is a prick, but hopefully, one I can get the drop on.”

Simon’s lips quirk, and slowly, his eyes track down to you. He lowers his chin.

“Like being on top, hm?”

You glare at him, and lift your hand from his neck to lightly tap the side of his face in a mock-slap. You smile brightly at him when he returns your glare.

“You’ll never know.”

You separate from Simon, feeling the way his hand attempts to reach out for you, perhaps to grab your wrist or something of the like, but you walk right on up to Magnus, readying to make niceties.

It does not go well.

Actually, it goes extremely well, so well that you barely even notice Simon in the corner, eyeing the two of you darkly, glaring at you. It’s the car ride home that goes poorly.

“‘My husband and I are staying up on the mountain,’” Simon mimics your voice somewhat insultingly as he pulls into the garage. You glare at him.

“You’re a sore loser, did you know that?” you snap, climbing out of the car, and slamming the door behind you.

“Sore loser?!” Simon states, clambering out of the car somewhat ungracefully, like the more annoyed he gets, the less aware he is of the length of his limbs. “I’m your bloody husband, woman,” he grumbles, lowering the volume of his voice when you turn back to him, eyes blazing, one eyebrow raised.

“Fake husband,” you remind him. “And you can fix your tone with me or you’re sleeping on the couch!” you shake a finger at him. Simon huffs, throws his hands up in the air, then spins on his heel, walking toward the still open garage door. “Where are you going?!”

“For a walk!”

“Fine!”

“Fine!”

–

It’s almost two hours later, you’re starting to get worried when at last you hear a knock on your door.

“About time, you insufferable meat h–” you cut yourself off, freezing somewhat when the man you find at your door does not, in fact, turn out to be Simon at all.

“Magnus! Gosh I’m so sorry…” you amend yourself, glancing over the man smiling smugly at you from the doorway. He doesn’t appear to have anyone else with him, so you keep up the pretense of a rich heiress a little longer. You can’t quite believe your luck. Magnus grins sympathetically at you. You adjust the dressing gown a little tighter around you.

“Trouble in paradise?” he asks. His accented voice would be pleasant, if it hadn’t also been the one giving orders behind the whole operation you were trying to take down.

“Oh, no, well… yes, a little. Husband went ‘for a walk’,” you say, rolling your eyes somewhat, and just hoping perhaps Simon wasn’t as far as he seemed. Magnus brings his hands from around his back, and you hold back a flinch just in time to see the wine bottle he produces.

“Vino?” he asks. You grin, like a spider descending on her prey.

“Of course, please, come in.”

–

Turns out, Magnus isn’t just the man giving orders. He’s damn good with a knife, too. Unfortunately for him, so were you. You managed to get him good in his arm, but not before he’d gotten you good in return.

You scramble to your feet, the sound of glass shattering making you grind your teeth. Your arm is dislocated, and there’s still a knife in your calf muscle, but that doesn’t stop you. You’d had worse, and all things considered, you were still on top of your game.

You grab your discarded gun off the floor, knocked from your hands in the scuffle, and stalk your way toward the broken window, unjamming the thing one handed, which might’ve made you feel pretty hot, if your shoulder wasn’t currently throbbing painfully, and you hadn’t just been stabbed. You spot Magnus easily, attempting his escape, dark clothes on white snow. He’s making for the woods at the back of the property, and given he only just managed to get away from you, he’s doing a fairly good job of it too.

You wait until he hits the tree line, ignoring the urge to aim for the treebranch above him; you don’t need another Salzburg. If you can just get a clear shot on him now, it would be easier for you when you eventually make your way out to him, even in the heavy snow that had started falling, the thicket would at least give you some privacy with the body. In the moments before you pull the trigger, you think briefly about the repercussions. Handguns weren’t exactly your forte, all things considered, you could miss the killing shot entirely, it may be better for you to get in close first…

Then again, he had stabbed you.

You fire, and watch the body drop heavily, instantly into the snow. He’s not dead, not yet. He wouldn’t be going far though, so you stow the weapon in your dressing gown pocket, and grabbing a cushion, you clear the remaining shards of shattered glass, before gingerly following him out the window.

You have a moment as you limp toward the crawling black mass to be thankful for the thick bootie slippers you’d put on earlier, waiting for Simon to come back, and another moment about two minutes later to curse yourself for not stopping to put on wellies when the melting snow starts seeping into your socks.

The crunching of your footfalls alert your attacker as you approach, but you don’t give him the chance to turn around. You palm the handgun once more and fire off a final shot, watching as the body falls still entirely, and dark red joins his black clothing in the snow. Good thing he hadn’t brought any guards with him, the idiot.

You limp the final few steps toward the body, grunting when you drop down into the snow beside the now dead Magnus, using your one good arm to force the body onto its back. You’re not stupid enough to believe there’s going to be any further useful information on him, but you do find a pack of cigarettes and his phone.

By the time you’ve opened the pack of cigarettes, popped one in your mouth, and have started rooting around in the dead man's other pockets once more to try and find his lighter, only to come up empty, you hear the familiar crunch of snow approaching you at a far more rapid pace than you’d been moving at earlier. Probably isn’t wearing slippers, you think. Probably hasn’t been stabbed, you think.

“Got a light?” you ask. Your partner, who blinks slowly, gun trained on you, though he’s not aiming at your head, so you think it’s half-hearted.

“The fuck happened?!” Simon asks. You look between him and the dead body.

“I killed him,” you say simply, removing the cigarette from between your lips. “He stabbed me.” You want to see how little information you can give him before he helps you, but he’s not having it. He raises his gun, his scowl intensifying. You’ve never seen a face that suited glaring so much. He’s handsome, you think, especially with a weapon in hand.

“What the fuck happened?” he asks again, emphasising each word like it’s an order, like you hadn’t told him the truth already. You roll your eyes.

“I told you what happened. Do you think that’s not what happened?” you ask, genuinely curious about what else he thinks might’ve gone on here. His eyes flicker quickly between you and your rapidly rigor mortis’ing friend. “We need to move the body inside. My arm is dislocated and I’ve been stabbed. Either give me a light or give me a hand.”

Simon’s eyes are back on you quickly, and honestly, you didn’t think he could frown any further, but incredibly, he manages it.

“Why the fuck was he here?” he asks. You’re tired of this now.

“Lieutenant Simon Riley, SAS, Task Force 141, you’re not going to fucking shoot me unless you think military prison dinners are really just that worth it.”

He blinks at you, and after a moment's hesitation, he lowers his weapon.

“The fuck was he doing here?” he asks again, though this time, you think it’s more rhetorical, because he holsters his gun and looks you over once more before he trudges moodily over to you. You force yourself to stand, though you’re slow in your struggle, and by the time you’ve started to move to take your attacker’s feet, Simon has hauled the body over his shoulder.

He’s still glaring at you.

“Where?” he all but barks.

“House,” you tell him, and without so much as another word, he begins walking. You watch after him for a moment, blindly pocketing the cigarette, and limping painfully after him.

You’re glad you don’t have to tell him not to use the front door, but you do almost let out a laugh watching him dump the body like a sack through the broken window. He climbs in after it, and you’re forced to have his audience as you clumsily fail to haul yourself over the window sill.  Your still bleeding, still stabbed calf is as unhelpful as ever, and your dislocated arm is only making things worse.

He doesn’t move to help you, and you grunt in annoyance as you finally somehow manage to throw yourself back over the threshold, immediately tripping ungracefully over the body still lying at its base. He does see fit to steady you then, hands shooting out to catch your fall. However, he also sees fit to forcibly manhandle you onto the nearest flat surface, the coffee table, a choice you find less than thrilling. He crouches down in front of you, glancing over your injured leg thoughtfully, before he carefully lifts it to rest on your thigh. At that point, you watch as he braces your leg with one hand, and takes a hold of the knife in the other. Then he twists ever so slightly.

That you find a little more exciting.

You honestly don’t really mean to punch him, but he is lowkey torturing you. He falls back with a satisfying shout of surprise, but he’s back on his feet in a flash, gun in hand again. You grumble in pain, clutching at your calf briefly, before straightening up and batting the end of the barrel away with the back of your palm.

“I thought we talked about this,” you say exasperatedly, hissing at the pain in your leg. “Fuckin’ prick, that hurt,” you scold, fishing out the loose cigarette from your pocket.

With the gun still trained at your head, you lean over to grab the matchsticks kept by the fireplace. You feel ridiculous as you light up with the most comically large matches you’ve ever seen, but somehow, neither of you find it in you to laugh. You put out the match and take a long drag.

“He stopped by to share a glass of wine,” you say when you’ve finished blowing out the smoke. “My enemies don’t always come at me on a battlefield, soldier.”

That gets his attention, and the gun lowers, though doesn’t get returned to its holster, you note.

“He came around to have a glass of wine with a married woman when her husband was out the house?” he asks. You laugh, actually laugh.

“Fake married woman, not that he knew that. And some husband you are! You weren’t even here to stop this from happening,” you reply, gesturing to your stab wound. “You’re just an inconvenience at this point.”

You think perhaps it’s the first time he’s ever been described as such, if his almost offended expression is anything to go by. The gun finally gets put away. You look up at him curiously, and he seems to return the favour, evaluating you, sizing you up, before seemingly giving up and looking over at the body beneath the windowsill. You’re still bleeding, worse now, and with your uninjured leg you kick his shin.

Simon’s head snaps back to you, nostrils flaring and he opens his mouth, but you cut him off.

“You don’t happen to know any field med, do you?”

“Why are you asking questions you already know the answer to?” he practically growls. You shrug up at him and take another drag of your cigarette.

“I don’t know, seems like we’re all doing that today.” You point at the body and at him. “You, him…”

He blinks at you blandly.

“First aid?” he asks.

“In my pack, upstairs,” you tell him.

You avoid punching him in the face again while he patches you up, though it comes close when he tries to keep the knife that had previously been in your calf. You come to an understanding when you offer him a cigarette instead, and by the time he’s none-too-gently popped your shoulder back into place, you’ve made the call out to your people, managing to get through the coded conversation without feeling like a cliche.

“You were supposed to be here,” you say then. He holds his hand out to you expectantly. You stare at it, eyebrows raised.

“Cigarette,” he demands. You’re not much of a smoker, so you hand him the box and watch in mildly infuriated silence as he pulls a lighter from his jeans and lights it up.

“So you did have a light,” you state. He ignores you.

“Are you fuckin’ off now?” he asks instead, gesturing to the phone you’d shoved in your dressing gown pocket. You blink at him.

“No,” you tell him. “Are you?”

That seems to get some kind of response out of him that isn’t a glare or a snarl. He takes a drag of perhaps his tenth cigarette, and grins. You frown.

“Those are mine,” you grumble, nodding at the pack of cigarettes and he finally tears his eyes away from the screen to look at you sardonically.

“Think they’re your friend’s, actually. Think he’d want me to have them,” he tells you, nodding to the corpse currently decomposing on your living room floor.

“If you’d actually been here when he’d attacked me, the only thing he’d want you to have is a bullet,” you reply tartly. Simon takes another drag, and focuses back on his program.

“He could try.”

You’re annoyed now. You pick up a cushion and toss it at him, taking him somewhat off guard, and he turns to look at you with something akin to betrayal.

“He can’t do much of anything right now. He’s dead. Idiot,” you tell him petulantly. Simon lazily rolls his neck in the direction of your attacker again, and looks him over.

“Clean shot, for that distance–” he says thoughtfully. You make a face, and interrupt him.

“Is that a compliment?” you ask, somewhat bewildered. Simon’s gaze flickers back to you, annoyed, but he goes on anyway.

“Considering Salzburg…”

You toss another cushion at him, one he seems to expect this time. He catches it, and you glare. He lowers his hand, and the cushion, back to the sofa, and after another drag of his cigarette, he blows the smoke off to the side, continuing to grin at you.

“What?” you ask, annoyed. Simon only leans back against the settee, making himself more comfortable.

“Wanna get married?”

You cock your head at him, taking him in where he’s seated himself more toward the centre of the small roof top. Likely nobody could see him from that spot, and you want to assure him that’d picked this particular demountable building for the sole benefit that the far side, the one you sit along now, was positioned in such away it was hidden from anyone below, who would only see it, and approach it, from its west face. You refrain from informing him of the effort and thought you’d put into the gesture. You could tell him a million things under the sun, but a man like Simon, he had to find them out for himself. 

That philosophy had kept you going a little in the early weeks of what you were tentatively labelling a ‘relationship’. You hadn’t had that conversation with Simon yet, and truthfully, you’d only been on the one date with him, one time, but in that time you’d spent with him, and the phonecalls, texts messages and emails since, you were confident in saying that Simon was the sort of person who never left you wondering where you stood with him. Somehow, without either of you really having had the time, moment or reason to open up to one another, Simon had managed to give you a clear sense of what things were between you.

You chortle breathily, blowing air out of your nose as you stop leaning back on your palm, rolling your eyes lighty as you turn ever so slightly more to face him, shuffling your back against the large metal box of a cooling unit. You look up at him, and he stares back expectantly, before seemingly not being able to hold your gaze, and he slides his eyes away from you, to the left.

He did that a lot. You had noticed Simon’s habit for staring, for simply looking long and hard, sometimes with a glare, other times absently, but still seeming to look on the outside as though he was deep in thought. But you couldn’t help but notice lately, ever since your date, where you’d seen his face, and knew what he looked like when he smiled, frowned, pursed his lips… you think the two events, your date, and Simon’s increasing inability to sustain eye contact with you, likely has no real correlation between them, but you’d never noticed him break eye contact so much before.

Sure, you’d not really met or spoken to him in any amount of real focus prior to the paintball game you’d been invited to, but you know for a fact there was a time in which you had both existed within close proximity. When you had been initially helping out Price and Johnny with a lead around a year ago, you recall being quite startled by Ghost the first time he entered the weapons locker rooms, minding his own business, but his height, width, and silence nearly earned a full on yelp out of you.

You also remember a brief meeting, Johnny attempting to introduce you properly. You’d raised a hand and a smile in greeting as you’d moved closer to where Johnny and Ghost had stood, but then someone was calling your name, deperate, and urgent, and you’d forgotten the meeting, busying yourself with whatever task had then come to hand.

“Well, we could make out if you’d like… I just figured even if we found the time and space to see each other while I’m here, I assumed you’d probably prefer at least the optics of professionalism…” you tell him, shrugging your shoulders. The nature of your time spent with him, as precious and rare as it was, didn’t matter to you. Simon scoffs.

“And you believe that includes not speaking at all…?” he sounds like he’s damn near pouting.

You look his way, to find him squinting at you from beneath his mask, this time his gaze not dropping, his eyes flickering across your features like he can read your thoughts written across your face. You purse your lips slowly.

“I mean… No… That wasn’t on purpose…” you mumble, frowning slightly at why you had not even questioned the unspoken and not even really thought-through rule for this impromptu meeting, that you’d just stay as quiet as you could. You frown deeper.

“I talk,” Simon tells you, moodily, almost defensively, but then you catch the way the light dips into the eye hole of his mask, see the way the corners of his eyes, smeared with eye black, have scrunched up slightly.

You smile, and shake your head.

“To be honest, I’m more surprised you’re the one who couldn’t hold it in the end,” you muse with a small shrug. Simon adjusts his leg, bringing his arm to rest over his bent knee. “Would have thought you’d really like the quiet here– It’s so still,” you go on, a little wistfully, looking away from him off the edge of the roof.

“Prefer to hear you talk,” Simon says without any fanfare, simple, blunt, but truthful. It still nearly knocks the air out of your lungs, and you turn your head back to look over at him, a soft smile already pulling across your features. He shrugs, like your expression is mirthful, eyerolling, and not pure adoration. “Tell me something,” he says after a short beat, voice softer, like he hadn’t expected to say the words either.

You look him over thoughtfully, tyring to come up with anything to start rambling about, your latest mission perhaps, but then you get a better idea, and you settle in more comfortably against the cooling unit, bringing both knees up to your chest, and leaning forward with both of your arms casually folded over the tops of your knees.

“I come from an extremely rural part of Louisiana,” you tell him, seeing how his eyes immediately gain an intensity, a focus and interest that you find distracting enough, to the point you just might not be able to concentrate if you continue looking at  him. You turn your head, just a little, eyes dancing over his boots.

“Middle of nowhere. My family was so deep in that backwater bayou, I didn’t even hear English ‘till I was eight or nine… spoke a real twisted up Cajun dialect up until then… s’why my accent’s so strong, even though I’ve not been back in about a decade,” you tell him, though you don’t feel too worried about him wondering why your accent was the way it was. He seemed charmed by it, if not unbothered, but ready to assuage any self consciousness that you were occasionally prone to feeling when people in England or France struggled to understand you.

When you had emailed last, you’d mentioned a story of being accidentally shot at once, because the people you had shown up to rescue had not been able to decipher your accent in their adrenaline and panic. Simon, surprising you a little by responding with perhaps one of the few ways that actually made you feel better, had told you that in the UK, his own accent was considered shockingly strong, if not outright stereotypical at times. You’d been intrigued to hear this, Simon’s voice was just Simon’s voice to you, although perhaps at times it had something of an almost scary edge to it. But you kind of liked that.

You’d emailed back that you’d never had trouble understanding him, and unable to help yourself, you’d asked him to tell you honestly if he’d ever found it difficult to understand you. It had been a silly, girlish thing to do at the time, especially at your age. You knew even as you wrote the words, any reply other than no would have added to your canon fodder the next time you got frustrated or embarrassed about your legibility.

Simon’s reply had once more been simple, blunt, and truthful.

‘Only when you’re speaking French,’ he’d written.

You smile a little at the thought of the email exchanges.

“Not much to tell, honestly. Fished a lot, studied hard… I was the first person in my family to get a high school diploma…” You admit. “I think I broke their hearts when I went straight out and joined the army… To be honest, don’t think I knew what I wanted,” You frown, then clear your throat. “I think I just wanted something to do, and I wanted to do it as far away from anything that looked like home,” you say quietly, trying to recall if you’ve ever told anyone any of this before.

Surely you had brought up bits and pieces in the past, but you’d never just told anyone like this before. You fiddle with your fingers, running your slightly-too grown out nails tips against the pad of your thumb, absently feeling for bumps.

“I felt like if I had stayed there even a second longer, I would’ve started sinking in all that swamp mud. Little by little at first, but then I’d stop noticing, and one day, it’d just swallow me whole,” you blink back out of your reverie as you shake your head just slightly, shooting Simon an apologetic smile.

“I was so different back then,” you say with a little laugh. “Except for my shooting,” you add. “That’s always been sharp.”

Simon actually laughs at that, a rough sound, slightly muffled by his mask, but it’s nice to hear all the same.

“I was so shy… Because of where we lived, I spent most of my time on my own. Ended up convincing myself that I liked it… found out the truth my first few days at boot camp,” you laugh louder, remembering how quickly your personality seemed to flip.

“I can’t imagine you…” Simon speaks up before you can verbally start apologising for your dour topic. You blink, frowning slightly as he trails off, not uncertain sounding, but not finishing his sentence regardless. You cock your head at him.

“Can’t imagine me, what?” you prompt, waiting curiously.

Simon grunts to himself, and shifts his arms only to lay them exactly where they had been. He’s uncomfortable, you realise. You wonder if he thinks his choice of descriptor might offend you. He remains silent for almost a full minute longer, frowning darkly into the nothing space ahead of him, but certainly thinking hard. You can practically hear the cogs turning.

“I can’t imagine you…” he says again, eyes flickering back to you this time, and he cocks his head just slightly to the side, as though trying to imagine you. “Any other way,” he finally offers, but the way his tone peters off tells you he’d thought it sounded better in his head.

Deciding that you could briefly, sneakily, break the rules of appearing professional, you begin to push yourself away from the cooling unit at your back, away from the edge of the roof, shifting inward to the centre of the ceiling top, where Simon sits. His eyes never once leave you as he watches you move closer to him, settling yourself in a mirrored pose, only, you take the liberty of leaning in slightly, laying your torso against his shin, waiting for him to show any sign of discomfort, before letting him take your weight, one hand coming to wrap loosely around his calf.

Simon looks down at you, your position slightly slumphed forward on his bent leg actually far more comfortable than it probably outwardly appeared.

“That was a good one,” you assure him, pressing your cheek into his knee just a little. Simon seems to hum quietly, looking down at you without moving his head. You nod. “It’s nice to know I’m enough as I am,” you murmur quietly. Simon’s words really do mean a lot to you, despite his clear and apparent desire to have said something perhaps more… grand. But then you wonder if he could have done it. You squeeze his shin just slightly.

“I swear to god I’m not usually this clingy or insecure,” you tell him then, feeling like a contradiction as you cling to his leg and tell him how you like knowing you’re enough. Somehow you know without seeing him, that Simon is smiling at you.

“Well, tha’ makes one of us, then,” he replies, his gazes watching you closely as your face breaks into a smushed up grin, still pressed against his knee.

“How did you end up in the Legion?” Simon asks then, the hand he has resting atop his knee, dipping down just a little lower, and then his gloved fingers are resting over your braided back hair. You hum.

“Well, first I joined the Army Rangers,” you say, peeking up at him, finding him staring down at you curious, almost shocked. “I excelled, not gonna lie,” you inform him, only half smugly. Simon’s fingers on your hair twitch, like he’s attempting to stroke it. “Honestly, I did… that’s what really broke my heart about it all…”

Simon’s twitch turns into a proper little pet then, the material of his gloves slightly catching on your flyaways, but you don’t mind.

“I made it past both selections, worked so hard… and then when I’d been officially passed, I was informed I wouldn’t be allowed to graduate,” you sigh. You’d long gotten over the anger and sadness that your US Military career had brought you, but it still got to you sometimes. “Apparently, even though they occasionally allow women to go through the training, the Rangers are still strictly male only. Some bullshit… I was so angry, I nearly left the army entirely…”

Simon’s fingers move more confidently now, and although it feels like an unfamiliar motion for him, he’s adjusting rather well to it. You look up at him again, finding him still focused on your face.

“Then Antoine reached out– he was my old CO in the Legion–” you explain. Antoine had died some time ago, but he’d made himself proud. “He’d somehow seen my results from Ranger selection… I think someone passed them along to him, but I never found out who… He convinced me to bring my Ranger training to the Legion, go through the special forces process here… best thing that ever happened to me,” you say matter of factly.

Simon’s hand stops moving then, and you look up at him.

“Rangers aren’t shit anyway,” he tells you, audible disgust clear in his voice. You laugh.

“Yeah, you know, I never see ‘em out there with us!” you play along, but Simon seems very serious. You risk reaching up, mimimng pinching the cheek of his mask. “You’re sweet,” you tell him gently. Simon’s glare doesn’t fully let up, but his eyes soften a little.

“Just think you’re way too capable to be passed over for somethin’ stupid like not being a man,” he makes a ‘tsk’ sound.

“Think I’m gonna keep you,” you tell him matter of factly. Simon clearly raises his eyebrows behind his mask, and then he shakes his head.

He begins to speak, only getting one syllable into his first word when you’re both startled apart.

“LT!? Hey, Ghost, where are ye!?” Soap’s voice shouts from somewhere surprisingly close. You and Simon scramble apart, getting to your feet, but you stay low as Soap’s voice sounds even closer now. “LT! Someone said you disappeared this way! Need ye in the ops room!”

Simon glances back at you, debating how exactly you’re supposed to say goodbye, but you wave a hand and shoo him off.

“Go, go, before he comes up here!” you snicker quietly, hand over your mouth. Simon straightens, nods, and quickly disappears over the edge of the demountable.

“Fuckin’ Christ, LT! Scared the shit out of me! Where the hell were you?”

You don’t hear Simon’s reply, but you peek over the side when you hear Soap’s voice grow quieter.

“Oh, LT, you see who was passing through base?” Soap glances up at Simon, who stares straight ahead. “Doe’s here! Not sure where she’s got to, though… anyway, seeing as you got yourself a not-so-little crush on the wee deer… perhaps while she’s here, you should go on an’–” Soap’s yapping is cut off by Simon saying something, but whatever it is, it doesn’t deter the Scot.

“Aye, come on, Simon… just trying to help…”

You let out a breath, laughing quietly to yourself. You were going to have to tell Simon to play it more cool, or risk Soap becoming overly suspicious… but then again, you can’t quite bring yourself to believe Johnny has it in him to put all the pieces together…

“Captain Price?” a gentle voice flows through the room. John turns his head to see the soft smiling face of the nurse that's been in and out of your room all day, checking vital signs, bringing meals, medications, blankets. The nurse makes her way into the room until she’s standing in the empty space between yourself and John. “Seems like you two are all set to go,” she chirps with a small smile, looking between your confused form in the hospital bed and John’s large frame neatly folding the last of your clothes into a duffel bag.

“What?” you start, your brows just barely pinched and nose scrunched, “You’re sending me home? With him?” you ask, your tone teetering the line of confusion and denial as you jab a thumb in John’s direction.

John sighs, remembering the way he ran a heavy hand over his face with an inward sigh. The fear that nestled deep into his stomach and wrapped its cold hand around his heart when the doctors finally told him your official diagnosis ‘Temporary amnesia.’ Days prior as he stood in the hospital’s hallway, rocking on his heels with crossed arms demanding answers. A mission gone wrong, a few too many blows to the head, and the confused look on your face that he’s sure is now permanently burned into the deepest corners of his brain confirm his worst fears. 

You don’t remember him.

The doctors said it's only temporary, but how could they be so sure? How long would this last? How much would you remember? John knows the answers to all of these questions, of course. It's only temporary, you should be back to your old self in a few days time. You remember family and close friends– even your family dog. Despite his best efforts to bite his tongue, take his emotions and bury them as deep as he could manage, John is still consumed by his own selfish desire to be included in those that you can recall by voice alone. After all, he's been sleeping in a leather recliner that was as comfortable as a thorn in his ass, right by your side for days, just for you to not even remember his name.

The nurse nods softly with that same small smile you’ve been getting from every hospital staff that comes in the room “Yes, dear. It’ll do you some good to get back home with your husband.” 

Despite your best grumbles and arguments with the nurses that this strange man is in fact not your husband. Following their argument that he absolutely is your husband, and their assurance that they wouldn't just send you home with any old stranger– all backed by official documents that you refused to look at– there you are in the passenger seat of his old pickup. The low hum of the engine fills the cab as an awkward silence stretches between you and this unfamiliar man in the driver's seat.

“Smells like cigarettes in here,” you grumble quietly, met with a quiet snicker to your right.

“Cigars, actually,” the Brit rumbles in what's meant to be a gentle tone, but you catch the underlying bitterness blanketed over his words.

“Reminds me of my dad,” you start, looking at the pavement in front of you “I think,” you’re met with that wall of thick silence yet again. When the truck rolls to a stop at a red light, you can feel his eyes on you. It’s the same moody steel-blue that's been boring into you for days now.

“What?” you snap, making sure to click your tongue against your teeth at the end of the word to drive your annoyance home. “You’re looking at me like– like you know me, or something,” you turn your shoulders so that you’re facing the brunet front on. You understand enough to know that John does know you to some extent, but as hard as you may try, you simply don't recognize him. Those damned eyes dance across your features, you can see it, you’d probably punch him if he didn’t look away as fast as he did. John clears his throat and dips his chin down as he shifts in his seat again, his palms circling the steering wheel absently as he just barely shakes his head. 

“Nothing,” his voice gravely from years of smoking and barking orders.

You huff, and look around the cab of the truck.

“What’s your name?” you try to make your voice sound as demanding as possible, earning a breathy chuckle in return. 

“John,” he states. After a beat, he gives you a sidelong glance “Do you know your name?”

“Yeah?” your brows pinch together in a mixture of confusion and amusement, but you can’t blame the guy for asking. “John?” you hum thoughtfully. “I like that name.” 

John grunts with a smirk ghosting his lips.“Figured as much, love.” 

Pulling into the driveway of your shared home, John gets out without a word and grabs your bags from the backseat. He begins walking towards the front door and waves you closer with a few fingers and a nod. Stepping inside, the house smells eerily familiar, something you can’t quite place even as you try your hardest to remember. John starts off in the living room, motioning to your photos on the mantle and adorning the walls.

“Any of these look familiar yet?” he turns to look at you over his shoulder, turning front on when you shake your head, ‘no’. “They told me to show you pictures. Supposed to…” he blows out a sigh, then shrugs. “They’re supposed to remind you…?” 

The bedroom door creaks lowly as it’s pushed open, but John’s broad shouldered frame is blocking the majority of your view to the room. Entering the room fully and side stepping the Brit in front of you, your eyes scan the room slowly. A few things you recognize on the right side of the king sized bed. Your favorite blanket, trinkets on the bedside table, a few articles of clothing on the floor.

“These are mine…” your voice carries an almost defensive tone as you hold up your favorite pair of shoes– simple black canvas and rubber soles. “Why do you have my things?” you ask, voice growing more suspicious, a single eyebrow arching high as you address John.

“I–” John hesitates in an attempt to keep you calm, not to overwhelm you with everything at once. “We’re– uh– you’re…” he stops suddenly, pausing for just a moment. He wags an index finger at your coiled frame. “Do not throw that shoe at me,” he raises his eyebrows and dips his chin just enough so that his eyes meet yours with a stern, almost paternal expression on his face. You watch him for a moment longer, before dropping said footwear with an agitated huff. 

Sitting atop the plush mattress, you cross your legs and gather your thoughts.

“We what?,” you shrug, waving your hands between yourself and John as you try to find the right words. “We live together, sleep in bed together?” You trail off, looking at the left side of the bed that you have to assume is his given the toes of a pair of very large combat boots tucked under the nightstand, an ashtray on the dark oak, a simple black watch, and a framed photo of the two of you. Your nose wrinkles at the photo. Why is that there? You decide against addressing it right this moment. After all, you’ve been told everything would come back in due time. 

“Yes,” he returns with a slow nod. “You and I share a home,” frustration starts to creep into his voice, not at you directly, but at the fact that you simply can not remember your life together. “We have for a few years now. Your toiletries are in the washroom, clothes in the wardrobe, your photos are all over the walls…” John stares at you, slightly bleary eyed. “Do you really not remember the past decade?” his volume rises, and he takes a few steps closer to you “This is our home,our life– I don’t understand why-” John stops himself. This isn't your fault. He sucks in a slow breath through his nose to calm his frayed nerves and collect himself before he snaps again.

Looking around the room, you watch as his eyes land on a notebook. Cherry red leather, and with cream colored pages. You assume it's his, given the fondness with which he looks over at it.  He walks over to the side table, and picks up the book, turning it over once in his hands, before taking a step toward you, and holding it out.

“You should look at this when you’re ready,” he reaches over to open his nightstand, grabbing out a half smoked cigar and a lighter. “Gonna step outside for a moment, if you need me…then I’ll cook dinner,” he grunts, around the thick cigar in his teeth. 

Thick boots crunch against the gravel as the brunet exits the house, tugging the sliding door closed behind him with his middle and ring finger. Despite the slight humidity in the air, John feels cold, clammy. A thin layer of cool sweat covers his forehead as sickness hits him in waves, but he breathes through it. In. Out. He swallows down his nausea. In. Out. Then, he’s coughing, gagging just enough to make his eyes water.

Bending over, John braces one hand on his knee, the back of the other planted firmly against his lips. Even on his worst days, John Price has always felt it necessary to be the strongest man in the room; mentally, physically, emotionally. For the good of his men, for himself, for you. With a grumble, he manages to  pull himself together.

He drags himself back inside, and goes about finding all of the ingredients for a meal to prepare, chopping the vegetables in a way he knows is all wrong, before trying to look it up online, only  to find a dead phone in his hand. With that, the fearless SAS Captain finally breaks, and trudges his way upstairs to hunt you down.

At the door to your shared bedroom, he stops, watching as you dig through his bedside table. Chuckling quietly, John crosses his arms and leans against the door frame.. He doesn't blame you, can’t say he wouldn’t do the same if he was in your shoes.

“Find anything interesting?” he asks lowly, with a barely there smirk. You look over your shoulder, an eyebrow raised as you hold up three polaroid pictures of yourself and John, each one more indecent than the last.

His lips part in surprise.

“Put those down,” he stands up straight, uncrossing his arms. If he were wearing pearls, he'd be white knuckling them right now. Clearly spotting his embarrassment, you, place the photos back down again without a word. You straighten up, and turn to face him fully, in a way that he understands to be silently asking what he wants.

“I uh… I need some help with dinner…” the brunet starts, but trails off. Do you even remember how to cook? Should he push you this much, so soon?

A foggy memory comes to you as you cross the threshold into the kitchen. Bits and pieces of a particular meal that you can only assume was one John was left in charge of, given that with what you can recall, he's waving a towel at the smoke alarm to stop that god awful beeping and there's a chatted pot sat deep in your kitchen sink. You can’t help but chuckle to yourself when remembering that flustered look on his face. 

“Something funny?” John asks as he moves a few things to the kitchen table, giving you a place to sit while you work. 

You grin, showing the slightest bit of teeth “You don’t know how to cook.” you tease in an almost juvenile tone as you take your seat at the dining table to chop the vegetables correctly this time.

The Brit scoffs loudly in genuine offense “What?,” he grunts, pulling his chin back and furrowing his brows just enough to bring out the wrinkle between them, “I’ll have you know I’m a bloody fantastic cook! As a matter of fact, you love my–” “What about that time you burned your tea?” you hum, turning your nose up and giving him a sidelong glance. “Oh, fuck off,” John grumbles, though there’s no malice in his voice. “Out of everything you could possibly remember about me, that's what you chose?” the brunet chuckles, shaking his head as he retrieves a baking dish from the lower cabinet with a quiet grunt. 

“Come on, JP, I’m not doing it on purpose,” you say, still grinning down at the vegetables. 

John falters, causing him to almost drop the dish in his hands. ‘JP’ is a nickname you gave him…god, ten? Twelve years ago? He turns his back to you under the guise of needing to peel and chop potatoes. In reality, he doesn't want you to see the tears prickling the corners of his eyes. “Can you say that again?” he asks behind a grunt, clearing his throat.

“What?” you ask, looking up to see the back of his head and those broad shoulders. “JP?” “Yeah,” he starts as he pushes the prepped spuds into boiling water. “You know what that stands for?” his hopeful eyes flicker up from the water to meet yours.

Your eyes scan the room absently as you try to remember the meaning behind your words. Truth be told, it was just muscle memory, a slip of the tongue. You shake your head slowly, seeing the hope in his eyes slowly dissipate. 

“Anyways,” John says after a moment. “Pass me that bowl, I’ll finish up here.” 

The meal is warm, homey– nothing like the abnormally bland hospital food the two of you had been eating for the last week.

“Please don't slurp your food, dear.” you hum softly, keeping your eyes on your plate. A request you’ve had to make countless times before, given John has learned to practically inhale any meal he gets.

John holds his spoon in his mouth, giving you a sidelong glance like a child that’s just been caught with his hand in the cookie jar. After a beat, he speaks. “I’m just… voicing my appreciation for such a delicious meal, love,” he says with a shit-eating grin on his face, not having the nerve to meet your eye after such a cheeky comment. 

“Your next meal will be a knuckle sandwich, keep on,” you say in faux sternness, waving your fork at him to exaggerate your point.

The light conversations and small joking tones feel so routine, so comfortable– Like you’ve done it countless times before. They make you realize something. 

This is your home. 

“So, we’re married, huh?” you murmur, the two of you tangled together on the couch after a particularly funny joke– told by you– led you into a laughing fit right into his arms.

John nods with a low hum of agreement, a gravely tune that brings you some familiar comfort. 

“Show me something that proves it,” you shift your position to look him in the eye, a hand planted on his chest for stability. 

John takes no offense to your request, he can’t imagine how confusing this all must be for you. He sucks in a small breath, giving you a tight lipped smile, “Bring me your notebook,” he says softly as he brushes a tuft of hair from your eyes with his index finger. “The red one I showed you earlier.” 

Pushing off of him, you start down the hall towards your shared bedroom. Photos on the wall that once looked like they were filled with strangers, now seem a bit more recognizable. Particular faces, hairstyles, the way their individual personalities shine through the captured moments. You slow your pace just enough to really analyze each photo, until stopping in front of one in particular. You see a noticeably younger version of yourself and John, your apparent husband, smiling back at you, the two of you posing excitedly with a marriage certificate.

You then tiptoe to the next photo hanging a few feet away, a few unfamiliar faces sprinkled through it, but three of them stand out to you. Soap, whose arm is thrown around John’s shoulders, Gaz, who's clearly laughing at whatever was happening in the moment, and  of course, the ever so lovely Ghost, who's giving the camera double middle fingers with a sarcastic grin and death glare. The photo seems to be taken in their younger years, given the lack of John’s facial hair. 

Ignoring the rest of the photos, you shift your focus back to the task of retrieving that cherry red notebook. “Ghost, Soap, Gaz,” you whisper to yourself in hopes of keeping the names stuck to your memory, “Gaz, Ghost, Soap.” Picking up the notebook, you start back down the hallway and pluck the photo of John’s teammates from the wall, along with the photo of the two of you as newlyweds before making your way back to him. 

“You found it?” John asks gently, his eyes falling to the framed photos tucked under your arm, “What ya got there?”

Sitting beside him with a newfound familiarity, you tuck yourself into his open arm and hold the photo for the two of you to see. 

“Tell me what you see, love.” John murmurs beside your ear, pressing a gentle kiss into the curve of it.  Hesitantly, you plant an index finger right under Soap’s chin in the photo

“Soap,” you whisper, pulling your gaze towards him for reassurance. You’re met with a smile that brightens the Brit’s eyes and an encouraging nod.

“Go on,” John murmurs. “What’s his last name, hon?” 

“MacTavish,” you say confidently with a proud smirk, pointing out the rest of the men.

“And who's that? Such a handsome devil, that one,” John asks as he points to himself in the photo with a grin. “Though, if you ask me, he needs to grow some goddamn facial hair.” 

“Hmmm,” you muse. “Think he needs to deflate that ego while he’s at it.”

 Loud laughter barks out beside you. Turning your head with a smirk, you see John with his hand curled against his mouth, laughing into it.

“Ah, always could take me down a peg, you could,” John manages between now wheezing and raspy laughs. 

Pulling out your wedding photo at an alarming speed, you decide to give John a slight ribbing. “But this one?” your tone raises a pitch, faux confusion crossing your features. “No way that’s you.”

John is genuinely offended, what do you mean that’s not him? Sure, he didn’t have as much muscle back then, and he kept his face clean shaven as a Lieutenant, but he can’t look that different. “What?”, he breathes, his hand on his chest rather dramatically. 

You hold back a grin and swallow your laughter, “Uh- yeah. That’s far too handsome to be you.” you turn your head to look at him, biting the inside of your cheeks to hold back your grin. 

John’s offense melts from his face, replaced by a very unamused stare and a parted mouth, “I promise you, If I could stand to live without you, I’d ring your bloody neck.” he says through playfully gritted teeth, giving you a slight shake by the collar, “You’re the one who married that scrawny bloke!” he taps a finger against the framed photo, his tone rising to keep his laughter in check. “Willfully, might I add. Very gladly, actually. You were the one–”

“Okay!,” you laugh out, giving him a playful shove, “Okay, so I was on my hands and knees just begging you to meet me at the altar, huh?” John huffs, his lips pressed in a firm line as he pretends to smooth out his shirt “Yes you were.” he says, his voice teetering the line of gloating as he turns his nose in the air pridefully. 

Calming down, John leans down and presses a feather light kiss just below your ear, “How about this,” he moves a bit of hair from your neck. “You tell me my full name, then we’ll look in that book of yours, hm?” 

You don’t have to put as much effort into recalling his name as you’d done with his teammates. “Johnathan–” 

“–Wrong,” John says, causing your eyebrows to shoot up. You quickly realize he’s joking, and your expression falls rather unamused, “I’ll shave that damn mustache of yours.” the threat is empty, one you’ve used countless times that he’s learned to brush off. 

“Johnathan William Price.” you say firmly, smacking your hand on the couch like you’ve just locked in your answer on an episode of family fortune. “Final answer,” 

“Oh my, family fortune has a spot with your name on it, love, I’m sure of it.” John says behind a gentle grin, his chin tucked down and shoulders slumped just enough to keep his eyes on yours 

As the laughter passes, you finally decide to finally take a look at your notebook. You don’t miss the hopeful look in John’s eye or the stiffness filling his shoulders as you flip open the scarlet cover. 

Fingering through the pages, one in particular catches your eye– sketches.

“These are you,” your voice is a wistful murmur as you run your index finger over the messy graphite adorning the pages. Small candid busts of John in natural, domestic scenes.  The first is a view of John shaving, his neck stretched out as his razor runs along his jaw, his steel eyes set firm to the mirror, and his lips pulled into an oh-so-focused line.

An avalanche of memories hit you square in the chest, all flooding back at once. Your lover in various positions– shaving, cooking, cleaning, laughing. That smile, oh that smile. Not the polite, tight lipped ones he passes out like candy. No– the smile he saves just for you. The smile so wide his eyes are practically forced closed, crinkled in the corners, like they are now. His teeth on full display, with a deep chuckle behind them. The smiles given to you during impromptu dances in the kitchen, quick kisses during showers, those rare but much needed slow mornings, full of whispers and stolen touches. 

Continuing to flip through the pages, you read the various handwritten notes John has left you in sharp handwriting that is uniquely his, the way he angles the curves of certain letters instead of keeping them smooth and round. Most are lengthy, reassuring of his love for you, his yearning, his apologies for always having to pack up and leave on a dime. You’re understanding, of course– you knew what his job entails, but those notes made those grueling nights bearable. 

Looking up from your notebook, you find his gaze already on you. John’s eyes are wrinkled at the corners, they’re softer than usual– warmer. Your eyes slip slowly along his features, moving from his eyes, to the freckle on his nose, to the hopeful smile on his lips. 

“What?” you mutter, your voice a barely there whisper, like if you speak too loudly he’d be gone with the wind.