more desperately than romantically

Mel flinches from Dana’s hands, trying to merge with the wall behind her. Dana bites back frustration; this would happen when Langdon is off. Mel’s eyes scrunch tight, face tear-streaked, fists pressed to her neck. Dana’s been doing this for what feels like a lifetime—she knows how to deal with rage, sarcasm, weeping fits, even providers walking off the job.

But this? Dana doesn’t know how to deal with a Mel King meltdown.

“Ading?”

Perlah drops to her knees beside Mel, and when she reaches out, Mel collapses into her.

Dana rises to leave; she clearly isn’t needed here.

@kingdonmicrofic | july 10 | prompt: feast | 418 words

cw: mentions of sexual content

Before

The sheepish look on Frank’s face was incredibly endearing, in Mel’s opinion.

“Yeah, so it’s not a feast, or anything.” Frank held his hands out, palms up, gesturing to the food he’d laid out on the coffee table for them. He put out slices of cheese and crackers, rolled up lunch meat and grapes, wedges of apple and rounds of cucumber. “And if you end up staying for dinner, we can order out. Um.” He cleared his throat. “That is, if you want to.”

It looked like a feast to Mel. “I’d like to,” she said with a smile. “I mean, if you don’t mind. I don’t want to impose.”

Prompt: Feast @kingdonmicrofic | 500 words | Rated E for Explicit Sexual Content | 10/31 | Princess Mel/Stableboy Frank AU

“Mel? Are you in there?” 

Mel stifles a moan. “Yes, Father,” she chokes out, trying to sound normal. 

“Are you coming down for the feast? Your birthday banquet is almost ready.” 

“Be there soon, Father,” she huffs, sitting up on her elbows. “I’m just—oh, wow—just getting dressed!”

“Alright!” 

“We have to go,” Mel urges after she hears her father’s footsteps recede.

“I’m busy.” 

“Frank, you are not—oh, hell.” 

“I’m busy,” Frank repeats, pulling away from her core. “The kingdom will have to wait, as I have a birthday gift to give to the princess.” 

“You’ve already given me two,” Mel whines, trying to dislodge Frank from his position in between her legs, but he just grips her thighs harder. 

“And does the fair princess not deserve more praise?” Frank asks, hoisting up her legs over his shoulders. “Does the princess of this beautiful kingdom not deserve adulation? Admiration?” He leans in again and licks a wide stripe up her cunt that makes Mel fall back onto the bed. “Worship?” 

“The princess,” Mel pants, “is required in the Great Hall, I’m sure she—fuck Frank—will receive more than enough praise.” 

“Wouldn’t be enough.” 

“Frank, please,” she says, raking her fingers through his hair and pulling his face away from her. “If you’re going to make me late, make it worth it?” 

Frank grins maniacally. “Does my princess have a request?” 

“She does,” Mel smiles widely. “Your princess requests an audience.” 

“An audience?” He repeats, shucking off his breeches. Her gown is long gone, and Frank scrapes his teeth against her breast, sucking on a nipple as he lines his cock up to her entrance. “Do you happen to know where this audience will take place?” 

“Oh, I think you know the place,” Mel laughs, urging him forward with her knees. “I think you know it well.” 

“I do,” he says, pushing into her slowly. “I’m very grateful my lady would take my audience, as I have many thoughts about the kingdom I’d like to share.” 

“Oh?” she gasps, the breath knocked out of her as Frank bottoms out. 

“I have an opinion on her chosen husband.” 

“Not my chosen husband,” Mel corrects, groaning when Frank starts moving. “You know that.” 

“Of course, my apologies,” Frank smirks. “Your chosen husband would be a lowly stableboy, if I remember correctly—”

“My best friend,” Mel corrects, pulling him in closer for a kiss. “My everything.” 

“Then I have opinions on the man courting her.” 

“Men.” 

“Oh, I’m sorry,” he laughs, picking up speed. “The men courting her.” 

Mel whines as he starts circling her clit and pleasure coils in her abdomen. 

“I find them arrogant, haughty, and altogether unworthy of her hand.” 

“Do you think you could do better?” Mel teases. “Do you think you could satisfy the princess?” 

Frank winks. “Oh, I know I’m up to the task.” 

Privately, Robby likes to keep a pretty close score. It’s for the best. If his sabbatical taught him anything, it’s that he can’t handle the loneliness and the disappointment anymore, so he has to do this, for his own sake, he has to keep count, a mental tally on who he can trust and who he can’t. 

Frank Langdon, he’s learned, he can’t trust. Not by quite a large margin. 

Which is maybe why he gets so annoyed when Langdon turns up at the Friendsgiving thing. He wasn’t even in the groupchat, the one Shen had started and called feastie boys🍗- it was just supposed to be the fuck-ups with nowhere better to be. Robby certainly qualifies, single and childless. But Langdon has a wife. Two kids, a dog, medical debt, a long recovery road ahead of him. It’s the holiday weekend and Langdon is supposed to be at home. He shouldn’t be here, and he really shouldn’t be all pressed up against Dr. King as if there’s not plenty of room around the table at this shitty all-you-can-eat homestyle buffet place. 

The Pitt’s misogyny is interesting, really, because the women have screen time. They’re competent doctors. They are well-written in a general sense, i.e. people with dimension and personality. The misogyny is deeper than any of that, and it’s harder to see: the writers reach for biology when they want to give a woman depth because biology is where they think women’s depth lives. The show casts women — and multiple women of color, in particular — in prominent roles and then gives them stories about their uteruses, their eggs, their panic attacks, their bleeding. All the while, The Pitt gives men stories about what it means to lead and what integrity costs. <...> The show has the same instinct: it can see gender bias when an EMT does it, but it cannot see gender bias when its own writers do it. <...> Each one of these reveals the same default: competence is male, and women who demonstrate it earn his surprise.

© “The Pitt is Weird About Women” by Emmy Writes Sometimes.

Prompt: Midnight @kingdonmicrofic | 500 words | Rated G | 8/31 | Return to Me AU

“You sure you don’t need help?” 

“Believe it or not, I can microwave popcorn,” Frank calls from the kitchen.

“Whatever you say,” Mel teases. The microwave finally hums, and Frank makes his way back into the room, settling beside her and resting his head on the back of the couch. 

“You’re still coming to the dedication next week, right?” Frank asks, eyes closed, his hand blindly searching for hers. 

“Course,” Mel says, twining their fingers together. “You’ve been working so hard.” 

Too hard. But the work is important—expanding the gorilla habitat was something his wife Abby had been passionate about when she was alive, and something Frank is determined to finish. 

“It’s been worth it,” Frank says softly, “to make Abby’s dream come true.” 

“I’m sure she’s proud of you.” 

Frank opens his eyes and turns to her. “Thanks, Mel,” he breathes, before leaning over and kissing her lightly. 

They’ve kissed a lot in the few months they’ve been dating, but Mel’s been putting off sex for one important reason: the ten inch surgical scar down her chest. It shouldn’t be a big deal, her heart transplant, but it’s been harder than she imagined gathering up the courage to tell him. 

Frank kisses his way down her neck to the high collar of her shirt, nudging it slightly to kiss her collarbone. “You wanted to tell me something?” 

“Yeah,” she breathes as he kisses further down, unknowingly getting closer and closer to her scar. “And now would be a good time.” 

Beep beep. 

“Popcorn’s done!” Mel exclaims nervously. 

“Alright,” he laughs, standing and heading to the kitchen. “I have that book you wanted to borrow, it’s in the office.” 

The book is exactly where he said it would be, right next to a newspaper open to the obituaries, which reads Dr. Abigail Langdon, 32, died in a car accident on April 12th. 

“April 12th,” Mel breathes, running a hand over her heart. Why does that sound familiar? 

A familiar pink envelope catches her eye. Her hands shaky, she picks up the envelope and flips open the letter—

Her own handwriting greets her. 

Dear Donor Family…

Before Mel can realize what she’s doing, she tucks the letter into her pocket and races down the stairs, tears streaming down her face. 

“I have to go,” she says as Frank exits the kitchen. 

“Go? Now?” 

“I promised I would babysit—”

“Alright then, I’ll drive you—”

“No!” Mel cries, making her way to the foyer. “No, I’ll bike—”

“It’s midnight—”

“I like to bike,” she says through tears, grabbing the bike he gifted her and opening the door. 

“I know you do honey,” Frank says, helping her down the stairs, “but it’s late—”

“I’ll be okay, I promise,” she says, getting on the bike and peddling, “just let me go.” 

“What was it you wanted to tell me?” Frank asks, jogging to keep up with her. 

Prompt: Gift @kingdonmicrofic | 500 words | Rated G | 9/31 | Good Omens (Angel/Demon) AU (this takes place in the Good Omens universe, no need to read beforehand, but it does help!)

“I thought you said we’d be inconspicuous here?” Frank asks.

“To be or not to be…” 

“We are,” Mel assures him.

“That is the question—”

“This isn’t one of the gloomy ones, is it?” Frank complains. “No wonder no one’s here.” 

The theater is rather deserted. She can see Shakespeare in the corner, nervously biting his thumb, looking over the crowd of twenty people scattered around the Globe. 

“You wanted something,” Mel points out, “and this is the perfect place to talk.” 

“I prefer the funny ones,” Frank says lightly, clasping his hands around his back. His tunic stretches with the movement, putting emphasis on his broad shoulders, his small waist. 

Mel quite likes the fashion of this time. She’s seen him in all sorts of ways now, after thousands of years of running into each other unexpectedly. The full plate armor was rather funny—he could barely see out of the helmet, and watching him walk straight into a tree made her laugh for at least forty years. Her favorite look might have been the skirts Frank sported in Italy during the Renaissance. Frank went by Francesca then, and her long hair was beautiful, her countenance the envy of all and the subject of many a painting.

Mel found herself jealous. Well, jealous, and also something else, something hot and bubbling in her gut that hadn’t gone away until she’d left Italy (and Francesca) behind entirely. 

“What do you want?” Mel asks. “I have to be in Edinburgh next week for a few miracles.”

“I also have to be in Edinburgh next week.” 

Mel rolls her eyes. “We can’t keep doing this, Frank.” 

“Why not?” 

“If Hell finds out that we’ve been…” Mel looks around—no one’s in the vicinity, but you can never be too careful—“fraternizing, who knows what they’ll do.” 

“It just seems a waste, both of us going up to Scotland,” he complains, adjusting his shoulders again. Mel wonders if he hasn’t had the time recently to spread his wings. She certainly gets restless when she hasn’t had the opportunity to stretch out. 

She’d like to see it, she thinks. Hasn’t seen his wings since Eden, and they were glorious. Big and strong and protective—

“We’ve done it before,” Frank continues, “Heaven and Hell don’t care how things get done, they just care that they do.” 

That is true. He’s taken a handful of her miracles when she’s wanted to go to France and subsist on nothing but crepes, and she’d taken his miracles when he’d wanted to nap for a quick decade. 

“Fine,” she agrees. “You owe me.” 

“...and lose the name of action.” 

The theater is silent as the soliloquy ends, and Shakespeare groans loudly from across the theater. “It would take a miracle for anyone to come and see Hamlet.” 

Mel looks up at Frank with an expectant smile, and he groans. 

July 9th: Gift

For @kingdonmicrofic | words: 499 | pictures: Loop / Jess Bailey, Unsplash

For the first time ever, Mel gives Frank a fake smile.

“I hope you like it!” he says, then disappears to Central. The curve on her mouth vanishes with him.

To be fair to him, he gifted her exactly what she asked for – a pair of Loops, ideally purple. Nothing more, nothing less. They weren’t cheap either.

(She’d gotten him a linen shirt for the Renfaire, his favorite flowers, a massage gift card for his back and made him a cake, three layers, four hours of lovesick labor.)