We can be monsters together 🍁

The trees thinned. The canopy lifted. And as dawn cracked open the horizon, Adam tilted his head and murmured:

“There.”

You followed his gaze. A clearing. A little cottage of old stone and wood. Crooked chimney. Moss on the roof. Windows clouded with dust. Overgrown herbs tangling the walls.

Abandoned.

But alive.

Your breath caught.

Adam watched your face rather than the cottage, trying to read you in every twitch of expression. He always did that now—looked at you like you were the map and he was lost without you.

“Does it… please you?” he asked quietly.

Please you. As if that were the world’s greatest priority.

“It’s perfect,” you whispered.

His shoulders dropped, something between relief and awe.

You stepped toward the cottage, and his hand hovered at your back, not touching, just near. Ready. Always ready. When your ankle wobbled on a stray stone, his fingers brushed your waist instantly.

He snatched them back just as fast, like the touch had burned him.

“Sorry,” he muttered. “I—did not wish to presume—”

“Adam,” you said softly, “you’re allowed.”

His eyes dipped to your waist where his hand had been.

Then back to your eyes.

Then away again, like he didn’t trust himself to look too long.

You pushed the door open.

The hinges screamed, dust spiralling in the sunlight, but nothing collapsed. Inside, the air smelled of old herbs and forgotten summers. A single semi-wide bed sat against the far wall. A table with one chair. A hearth, soot-stained but sturdy.

It wasn’t much.

But after everything, after rope and bruises and torches, it felt like salvation.

Adam stepped in behind you, ducking automatically even though the doorway was just wide enough for him.

He scanned the room slowly, methodically—checking corners, shadows, places where danger could hide. Only when he was certain it was empty did his posture ease.

And then he looked at you again.

Not the cottage.

You. Always you.

“Is it enough?” he asked.

“It’s more than enough,” you said.

He nodded once, as though committing himself to the task of becoming worthy of that answer.

The next hours blurred. Cleaning, sweeping, fixing the hearth, coaxing life back into the neglected space. Adam did most of the heavy lifting, literally and figuratively.

He repaired a cracked beam with his bare hands.

He cleared the chimney in one climb.

He patched a hole in the floor using stones from the garden.

Every so often he glanced at you, expecting… something. Maybe fear. Hesitation. Second thoughts.

Instead, you smiled at him. Every time. It lit him up in quiet, devastating ways.

And when you brushed dust from your cheek, he stared like the act was scandalous. When you pushed your hair behind your ear, his breath faltered.

When you bit your lip while arranging the shelf, he made a small sound and pretended he hadn’t.

You felt it. All of it.

The desire simmering under his restraint. The longing so potent it made the air thick. The fear that wanting you too openly might scare you away.

The certainty that wanting you at all was already too much.

He kept his distance, barely, but his body betrayed him in small, helpless ways.

The way he leaned toward you without meaning to. The way his gaze dropped to your mouth whenever you spoke. The way he inhaled as though breathing you in was the only thing tethering him to earth.

By evening, your legs ached, your back throbbed, and your ankle pulsed, but the cottage felt like yours.

Like something you and Adam had built together with sweat and stubbornness and the refusal to die when others wanted you to.

When you lit the hearth with new flames, Adam stared at it like it was a miracle.

“You look…” he began, then stopped, flushing.

“How do I look?”

His throat bobbed.

“Like you belong here.”

“You belong here too,” you said.

His breath hitched, soft and sharp, like the words pierced something deep inside him.

He looked away.

Then back.

Then away again.

“May I sit?” he asked, gesturing to the edge of the bed.

“As if you need my permission,” you laughed.

“I do,” he said simply.

You crossed the room and sat beside him.

The bed dipped unevenly, your combined weight was almost too much for the old frame. It creaked dangerously.

You both froze.

“…well,” you said. “That’s ominous.”

“It has endured worse,” he said sternly, as if defending its honor.

You snorted.

Adam stared at your smile like he wanted to gather it up in both hands.

“You are tired,” he observed softly. “Your leg pains you.”

“Only a little.”

His brows knitted. “You do not hide pain well.”

“And you worry too loudly,” you countered gently.

“I cannot help it.”

He reached for your ankle, then paused, checking your face for permission.

You nodded.

His fingers were warm as they traced gently around the swollen joint. He was careful, achingly so, touching you like you were made of paper and he was all thumbs. But his touch was also hungry in a way he didn’t understand how to hide.

“Does this hurt?” he murmured.

“Only when you stop.”

His head jerked up, eyes wide, pupils dilating.

“You should not… say such things,” he said shakily.

“Why not?”

“Because I—because I cannot think when you—because…”

He broke off, breath trembling. You tilted your head, studying him.

“Adam. Look at me.” He obeyed instantly.

The tension in him coiled tight, like he feared the next words might undo him entirely.

“I want…” he began, then swallowed. “I want to be near you. Closer than this. I want…” His hand flexed helplessly on your ankle. “But I do not know how to ask.”

“You don’t have to ask,” you whispered. “Just come here.”

His breath left him like you’d punched it out. But he moved. Slowly. Carefully. Like approaching a wild and dangerous dream.

He shifted until he sat fully beside you, thigh pressed against yours, shoulders brushing. His body heat wrapped around you like a blanket pulled tight.

Your pulse stuttered.

“Here?” he asked, voice wrecked.

“Closer,” you said.

He swallowed hard.

You moved first, leaning gently into his side, tucking your head beneath his jaw. He made a broken, helpless sound, one hand rising automatically to your back as though pulled by instinct.

“I—this—are you comfortable?” he stammered.

“Not quite,” you murmured.

He went still. “What should I—?”

“Lie back with me.”

He did not breathe for a full second.

Then, “yes.”

You shifted, guiding him, and he obeyed like your touch rewrote the laws of his world. He lowered himself onto the bed, slow and tense, waiting for panic or refusal.

None came.

You followed, lying beside him so your bodies touched from hip to shoulder. His eyes fluttered closed in something like agony.

“This is…” He exhaled shakily. “This is more than I thought I would ever be allowed.”

“You’re allowed,” you whispered.

You weren’t sure who moved first, maybe both, but suddenly you were half atop him, head tucked under his jaw, legs tangled, his arm banded around your waist.

His hand splayed over your ribs, holding you, guarding you, needing you.

Your breath warmed his neck.

His chest rose too fast beneath your palm.

“Where do my hands go?” he whispered, voice hoarse with want.

“Anywhere,” you breathed, “as long as you’re gentle.”

He made a low sound, deep, reverent, almost pained, and slid one enormous hand up your back, fingers tracing each notch of your spine like he was memorizing you.

You felt his desire—hot, bright, restrained to the point of shaking.

“Are you well?” he whispered.

“No,” you teased faintly. “I’m ruined.”

His breath stuttered. “I am trying to be careful.”

“You are,” you said. “And it would be very easy for me to forget what care even is.”

He groaned—quiet, tortured.

Your nose brushed his throat. His fingers curled into your hip. Your lips grazed his collarbone by accident...or maybe on purpose.

“Do not stop,” he whispered.

So you didn’t.

You pressed a soft kiss to the warm skin where his neck met his shoulder. He shivered violently.

“Please,” he breathed.

You pulled back just enough to see his face. His pupils were blown black. His lips were parted. He looked undone.

“Adam,” you whispered, “come here.”

He kissed you.

Desperate.

Hungry.

Terrified of wanting, incapable of stopping.

You kissed him back, matching him, guiding him, showing him he didn’t have to hide. His hands slid up your sides, trembling, then steadied.

He deepened the kiss until you were breathless, dizzy, clutching at his shirt, pulling him closer because closer wasn’t close enough. His body curved around yours, fitting you to every line of him like he was afraid you might slip through his fingers if he didn’t hold on.

When you finally broke apart for air, foreheads pressed together, breath mingled, he whispered:

“If the world tries to take you from me again… they will find I am not as gentle as you think.”

Your leg brushed his again.

His hand tightened, almost imperceptibly, at your waist.

A breath caught, yours or his, you couldn’t tell. You lifted your head. He was already looking at you.

Slowly, as though afraid the moment itself might shatter, he lifted a hand and cupped your cheek with the backs of his fingers, trembling so gently it made your eyes burn.

“You should sleep,” he whispered.

“So should you,” you answered.

His throat worked.

“You make that… difficult.”

“Do I?”

“Yes.”

His voice was raw velvet. He exhaled a sound like prayer.

“You keep looking at me like—”

He broke off, breath shaking.

“Like you want.”

You swallowed.

“I do,” you said. “I want you.”

It knocked the air out of him—literally.

He shuddered, full-body, like something had slipped loose inside him.

“…tell me how,” he whispered, voice hoarse with a kind of terror that was not fear of you, but fear of his own longing. “Tell me what you want from me and I will do—anything—”

“Adam,” you murmured, brushing your thumb along his jaw, “you don’t have to do anything. You only have to be here.”

His eyes fluttered shut.

He leaned into your touch as though he had been waiting his whole life for that small, simple gesture. When he opened his eyes again, they were darker—wide, unguarded, full of painful, beautiful need.

“May I…”

His voice broke.

“May I kiss you again?”

“Yes,” you breathed. “Yes, please.”

He kissed you like he was learning the shape of prayer.

Soft at first, then deeper, heat blooming through both of you like something waking after years asleep. His hands framed your face, slid into your hair, pulled you closer, closer still.

Desire curled low in you, warm and molten, and you felt him feel it. His breath caught against your mouth, a tiny, helpless sound he tried to swallow.

Your fingers slid under the edge of his shirt without thinking, just to feel him, just skin to skin.

He flinched. Not away. Toward.

“Is this…” He swallowed hard. “Is this allowed?”

“More than allowed,” you whispered. “Wanted.”

He made a low, broken noise you would think about for months.

You shifted, rising slightly so you could straddle his thigh—not fully, not boldly, just enough that your bodies aligned in a new, devastating way.

Adam froze.

Every muscle locked.

“You have to tell me,” he said, voice shaking like he was balancing on a knife’s edge. “If I should stop. If you’re frightened. If I’m too much—”

“Look at me,” you said softly.

He did.

You held his gaze and guided his hand to your waist.

Then lower, until his trembling hand rested against your heat, hips jerking up to meet his fingers. The hunger in his eyes darkened, deepening into something feral and starving—like a man who had spent his whole life watching a feast from behind a locked door.

Adam," your voice was a whisper. "You're going to make me come undone under you. Here. Now."

He gasped, actually gasped, like the contact had broken him open.

“This…” he choked.

“This is what I dreamed. This is what that book described—what men do when they...when they want—”

You kissed him to quiet the spiral.

He kissed you back, desperate and reverent and sweet all at once. His hands roamed with aching care, as though memorizing you, shaping your silhouette with gentle palms and trembling fingertips.

When your shirt slipped slightly off one shoulder, he groaned into your mouth, a sound of pure, stunned awe.

“Beautiful,” he whispered.

Not to flatter. Not to seduce. Just truth.

Your fingers slid into his hair, tugging gently, and he shivered.

“Adam,” you breathed. “Lie with me.”

Not a command. Not a demand. An invitation. His breath stuttered long and hard.

“Are you—are you certain?”

He sounded wrecked. As if one wrong word would unmake him.

“Yes,” you said simply. “I want you close. No fear. No distance.”

He gathered you into his arms like something precious and lowered you back onto the bed. The mattress dipped under his weight. Your breath tangled with his.

The world shrank to the space between your mouths.

He braced himself carefully above you, chest hovering an inch from yours.

“I will be gentle,” he promised, voice shaking. “I will be so gentle.”

“I know,” you whispered.

He kissed you again, deeper than before.

Slower.

Hotter.

Your hands roamed.

His followed.

Every movement cautious at first, then bolder as he learned the shape of your desire. His mouth slowed against yours, breaths ragged, as though he didn’t know how to handle the intensity of wanting someone so much.

His careful fingers undressed you, slowly. Memorizing each seam and button as if to be able to do this again and again with his eyes closed and his hands behind his back.

"Gods," he breathed, barely. "You are going to unmake me."

He finally rested his forehead against yours, panting softly.

“We should stop,” he rasped.

“Yes,” you agreed.

Neither of you stopped. He kissed you again instead, feverishly, helplessly. You laughed breathlessly against his lips.

“Adam—”

“I know,” he said, breaking away only to mouth along your jaw. “I know we should. I am trying.”

“You’re failing,” you whispered.

“I am,” he admitted, nearly groaning. “Completely.”

You pulled him down until your bodies were flush, chest to chest, thigh to thigh. The touch unraveled him entirely, in an instant he was lost, stripped of every hesitation until there was nothing left in him but want for you.

He made a sound so low and rich it vibrated through you.

“I want you,” he whispered into your skin, reverent and shaking. “I want...everything.”

You gave it to him in that moment. Guiding him deep inside of you, a new fullness bloomed through you, a sensation that rooted deep in your bones.

He shuddered, a sharp, broken gasp tearing from his throat as he nearly collapsed, catching himself on his forearms to keep from crushing you.

"If there is a God listening," he whispered, "I pray he looks away. I want this moment to belong to us alone."

He held you like you were the first warmth he’d ever known.

You didn't need to guide him; Adam's body seemed to understand instinctively, moving with a reverence that stole your breath. His fingers found yours, weaving together until your palms pressed flush, his eyes locked to yours as though he could read every shiver you felt.

"I love you," he whispered, a confession torn from the deepest part of him.

His hips moved slow, calculated, stealing the air from your lungs with each movement.

"I've been trying to bury it," he said, "God, forgive me." It was a plea. "But I can't. Not when you're in my arms, not when you look at me like this."

Tears stung your eyes as you clutched his fingers.

"I love you," you breathed, a vow carved from bone. "Before this night, before this life, always."

He broke with a quiet, wounded sound, sinking against your as if you were the only altar he had ever known. His face pressed against the curve of your throat, like a man collapsing into safety for the first time in his life.

You remained entwined, bodies still joined in the quiet afterglow, listening to Adam's harsh, uneven breaths softening. Each exhale drawing him back from the edge he'd shattered upon.

For a long moment, neither of you moved.

The world felt impossibly small, narrowed to the heat where you were joined, the tremble in his arms, the way his forehead pressed to your temple like he feared you might vanish if he lifted it.

“Are you—” His voice broke, low and wrecked. “Did I… was I too much?”

You stroked his back, feeling the shaking beneath his skin. “No,” you whispered. “You were perfect.”

A fractured sound slipped from him, half-sob, half-laugh, relief hitting him so hard his whole body sagged into yours.

He held you tighter, almost fierce in the way his arms closed around you, yet unbearably gentle, always too gentle, as if every inch of you were sacred.

“I didn’t know,” he murmured against your skin, voice shaking, “that anything in this world could feel like… like that. Like you.”

Your fingers threaded through his hair, tugging slightly so he’d lift his head. He did, reluctantly, eyes blown wide and soft and reverent. You brushed your thumb over the corner of his mouth, still swollen from kissing you breathless.

“And you?” you asked softly. “Are you alright?”

He nodded, then shook his head, contradiction wrapped in honesty.

“I am undone,” he confessed, voice raw. “Completely. I do not think I will ever recover from you.”

Your breath caught, part laugh, part gasp. “Good.”

He huffed a broken laugh of his own, leaning in until your noses brushed, until you tasted his breath on yours.

His hands found yours where they rested against his ribs. He laced your fingers together, palms pressed flush, holding them there like a vow.

“I did not know my heart could hold this much,” he whispered. “I did not know I had a heart to hold anything at all.”

You felt tears sting your eyes again, gentle, grateful ones. You squeezed his hands back.

“You have one,” you said. “And it is mine.”

He broke then, just a little, shoulders shaking, breath hitching as he pressed his forehead to yours, a quiet sound escaping him, something like worship.

“I love you,” he breathed, the words torn from somewhere deep and long-starved. “I love you. God forgive me, I love you so much it frightens me.”

Your hands tightened around his.

“There’s nothing to forgive,” you whispered. “Only something to keep.”

He shuddered, sinking fully against you, chest to chest, heart to heart.

He kissed you then—soft, trembling, reverent—as though the world had finally given him something he was terrified to break.

You kissed him back with all the steadiness he lacked.

When he finally pulled away, he didn’t go far. His thumb stroked your cheek; yours brushed the curve of his jaw. You lay there tangled together, breaths mingling, heat shared, limbs entwined, the world held at bay for just a little longer.

“Stay with me,” he murmured into the hollow of your throat, voice gone soft and sleepy and unbearably tender. “Don’t let this be a dream.”

You curled closer, your hand slipping up to rest over his heart.

“It isn’t a dream,” you whispered. “I’m here.”

His arms tightened again, protective, disbelieving, in love.