A groan rumbles in your throat as your eyes creak open. You hadn't meant to doze off. You've just been even more tired than usual, with a sudden influx of missions and written reports to balance between.

Part of you briefly feels bitter at the reminder of the last few missions you've had this week. They've taken away more time from you than you would've liked. It's been putting a limit on your time with Rafayel, much to both of your dismay. Though maybe a little more for him, if the pretty words he's been using to try to entice you to stay in his arms are any indication, to which he's had varying success (and only adds to his despair whenever you push him aside). Despite how much you want to relent and give in, you have to stand your ground. Sometimes, at least.

A displeased grunt leaves you. You should've gone to see him today. You were so tired, though, and far too spent to gather the energy to head all the way over to his place, wanting to seek refuge in the comfort of welcoming sheets as soon as you were dismissed. Now you wish that you could've taken a nap with him, though. Ugh.

As you silently mourn the chance loss, you instinctively reach for your phone.

Your eyes widen to an almost comical degree when you turn it over.

Twenty-three missed calls.

You don't even open the collection of texts piling on top of one another, your eyes barely latching onto the last few of the bunch as you scroll down. You brief a few of them, from please pick up soon and im omw over rn dont you dare leave your place (dont question how ik you're home rn kk bye).

The sudden panic building in your stomach sparks. You hardly spare the time to process them as you scramble to hit call on one of the missed attempts, hastily springing back to your tired feet to start preparing for the worst.

The first ring doesn't even finish its tune before he picks up.

"Rafayel," you hissed. You struggle for a moment, cursing under your breath as one of your well-used guns tumbles from your grasp through your distress. "What's wrong? Please tell me you're okay—"

"You got me a ring?"

"…Huh?"

Your mind completely halts. Nothing processes.

"In the mail," he breathes, ignorant of your dumbfoundment. You hear the distant sound of a swerving car in the background. "I swear that I actually didn't mean to open it. Well, alright, that's a lie, since I did mean to because you've asked me to open your packages for you the last few times you sent them here, so I decided—"

Wait. Wait. No. No, that can't be right. A sudden, cold feeling builds in the pit of your stomach as you gradually stop listening, because what?

Yes, you had a ring custom-made, molded to fit the build of his finger perfectly, with small but invaluable words engraved along its interior where they would press their reverent promise against his skin. Yes, you've been waiting since the day you were notified that its finalized form was on its way, impatiently fidgeting in what felt like every damn second, your nerves alight.

What it was absolutely not meant to do is be sent to him directly, because you were going to wait for when the moment aligned for it (in how long, you really didn't know: days? months? years? whenever the tide was right and your anxiety would dwindle enough to allow it, so probably forever), so you don't know why it would have gone directly to him when—

When you almost always ship your purchases to his place. Which is what you've been doing ever since he offered his house as a shelter for your things after you resided in how crammed your own place has become. So you likely didn't even think about the address you input, with impulse, and your head full of equal parts unrest and spellbound thoughts of what the future holds for you two, causing an error in your usual sharpness that would have otherwise made you double and triple check.

For a moment, your arms drop to your sides as you still.

Ah.

Well then. It's not like there's any use in denying it now, is there? Never mind how your heart is beating rapidly against the enclosure of your ribcage so vigorously, despite how irrational its aggression is. Your heart pounds tensely to the beat of familiar doubt, as if it doesn't know the answer to the question that's stuck itself against the roof of your mouth, waiting with a facade of patience to mask the restlessness that's been hiding beneath each layer of your skin since you had the damn thing made.

No, never mind all of that, because now it's also just setting in that he's accelerating on the road to get to you like a madman.

"For the love of everything," you grit through your lingering panic, pressing the phone back against your ear. "Focus on the road, Raf!"

"Focus, they say," he mutters incredulously, like you were the insane one here. "Focus. Like every crevice of my soul isn't beckoning me towards the call of your own to get to you faster than these stupid streets allow. Focus!"

He scoffs, but then there's a tilt in his voice. Something unbearably delicate leaks through his mock dramatics, soft, firm, yet unsteady, somehow all at once. "I'm focused on what actually matters, cutie, and that's getting to you, now, so that you can answer the question and tell me exactly what this means."

For a moment, you don't say anything. Yet, in your silence, something in you loosens in the wake of his own anxious hope even as he attempts to veil it with his pushiness.

"You know what it means," you eventually land on, because nothing else feels right to say. Not until he's in front of you.

"Yeah?" he asks. The lilt in his tone is still there, yet it sounds maintained. Like he's trying to ground himself. "I'm not so sure. I think I need my bodyguard to help me decipher it. I think I need to know if we agree on my thesis here."

He's teasing you, but you know it runs deeper than that. You can hear it. It doesn't matter how he tries to conceal it or if he tries to spin it back to you. Beneath the playfulness, you don't miss the emotion outlining the edges of his voice, and quietly realize that he must be feeling that same temporal, misguided dread. As if you would ever even think to give him this kind of false hope. As if your question and his answer, the one you know is waiting for you, would be anything other than what you're thinking right now.

There's a resolved shift in your heart. It barely slows, still thump thump thump-ing in its awareness, yet the mood of it swings as it's grounded in the certainty of what it already knew in its depths.

It just needed a quick reminder of the devotion that's long been embedded in it.

In your heart's confidence in the answer, your voice settles enough to lend to something more teasing, yet the tenderness of your affection seeps through.

"You're in luck," you start. "Because I think I can help you prove it. So, do me a favor and don't crash before I get the chance to ask you something really important when you get here, alright?"

There's a sharp intake of breath on the other end. A moment passes, then another, before you hear the shaky sigh that follows, sounding close to relief. In the backdrop of your mind, you take note of it and resolve to make sure that there'll be no more room for doubt of your loyalty when he gets here.

Something flutters warmly in your chest. You'll have all the time in the world to show even more of your love for him, and he for you.

"Got it, cutie," he finally wavers, nearly breathless. Somehow, you get the sense that he's grinning like an absolute love-stricken fool.

If your lips can't help but twitch to do the same, then, well. That's entirely for him to see when he gets here, and for him alone.