Work Text:
One gentle touch and I'm helpless
It's all too much for my senses
One simple prayer denied me
When you're not there, beside me
The sun and the moon and the stars
In the sky are laughing
They've seen it all before.*(c)
*
It is a slow Monday morning at work, the pub closed to visitors but the staff are all there, cleaning, tidying up, accounting, and ordering supplies for the next week. It is the usual routine they have done hundreds of times by now, everyone knowing what they are supposed to be busy with, indeed not at all unlike a crew on a ship, pirate or otherwise.
Everyone except Ed, that is, because Ed is sitting at the bar with a glass of lemonade, contemplating if he actually feels like a cup of freshly brewed black tea and debating with himself whether he should send Stede a message, asking him to give him instructions on tea brewing or if he would look like an absolute idiot doing that. Stede is at work, probably rehearsing; the last thing he would need now is to get distracted by texting Ed tea recipes.
They were together a couple of days ago, almost traditionally now after a performance at The Revenge on a Friday night, not long ago by any means, and yet it feels like it has already been ages. Ed sighs rather dejectedly into his glass of lemonade, idly rotating the coaster with his index finger and brooding over his life. It isn’t like he has only had one-night stands with other men before; with some they did meet a few times, more times than they have been with Stede so far, in fact, but with none of them Ed ever felt this constant, relentless longing to see, to talk, to touch, to send a message at least, to receive a text in response. It was always casual; Ed lived his life, did his job, and then had his fun, which he completely forgot about the following morning. It is different with Stede for some reason because he cannot get Stede out of his system, and, what is even more alarming, he doesn’t want to get Stede out of his system.
“Why the long face?” Auntie’s voice brings him back to the pub and his unfinished glass of lemonade.
“Why the long face?” Ed echoes, startled.
Auntie huffs. “I don’t know, I’m asking you that.”
With a shrug, Ed shakes his head. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he grumbles evasively.
He is perfectly aware that Auntie won’t buy any of it. Sometimes he asks himself why in the world he even hired her eight years ago, the impossibly righteous, nosy, and principled woman who bosses everyone around this pub, Ed himself included. Then he remembers he needed someone exactly like that, still quite fresh out of prison and with his goddamn past haunting him day in, day out. If they were on a ship, she would make an excellent first mate, and this was precisely the person Ed looked for to help him manage the pub business and not let him get stuck in the vicious circle of depression, self-accusation, endless ruminating, and missing Izzy fucking Hands so much he ended up crying his bitter tears on Auntie’s ample bosom once, a very long time ago.
“It’s that fancy actor of yours, huh?” she asks, dusting off the shelves above the bar which contain various liquors.
“He’s no fancy actor of mine,” Ed retorts sourly.
Auntie harrumphs. “So that’s what’s been bugging you, that the fancy goldfish is too hard to catch?”
She is so awfully right Ed feels inexplicably annoyed with her. “Look, I don’t want to talk about that, alright?” he says moodily and finishes his glass of lemonade in one gulp.
“You should never trust married men with children who tell you they don’t even have sex with their wives anymore because – oh, poor things – their married life has turned into a nightmare and all the rest of the blah-di-blah,” Auntie states grumpily.
“Auntie,” Zheng, to whom Auntie is actually the real auntie and who has been harassed by her plenty of times exactly like this, says warningly.
Ed hates to hear it, hates the very idea of it, hates that she must be speaking from enough experience to be right, but he can’t quite ignore the notion. If he is honest enough with himself, this is what frightens him, yes.
Meanwhile, Auntie puts the duster on the counter with perhaps a bit too much force. “What?” she asks, unperturbed, hands on her hips. “Those are the worst type, believe me; a very cosy position they’re in, with a wife at home providing them with all the comforts of married life, mending their socks and washing their underpants, and then a lovely sweetheart on the side to have enough passionate sex with, with no obligations.”
Zheng sighs. “Not all men are like that, and you know it.”
“Of course, not,” Auntie huffs, though she doesn’t exactly sound particularly convinced. “But the chances of your meting a man not like that are pretty slim.”
“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” Ed hisses, unable to take this conversation any longer.
He slams his empty glass on the counter, grabs his jacket, and strides out of the room, annoyed with Auntie for her unasked-for wisdom of ages, with Zheng for trying to find well-meant excuses, with himself most of all for not being able to help his falling for Stede, even with Stede for being his bloody self, sweet, and charming, and confused, and so fucking earnest in everything that Ed wants to believe him more than anything else in the world.
*
“Slim, fucking slim,” Ed mutters under his breath as he sits on an old, washed-out log on the beach. “Fucking slim chances.”
He is feeling a bit like a lunatic; no, screw that, he is a lunatic for allowing himself to be like this, to give in to Stede’s charms so fucking easily, to turn into a sixteen-year-old yearning sack of flesh and bone, again. Stede isn’t Izzy, of course; Stede is everything Izzy wasn’t and could never be, but there is one similarity between them – just like Izzy, he might not be able to give Ed what he wants so desperately, for his own reasons. Auntie is right, he supposes; family men don’t abandon their wives and children all that easily, and then there is always the question of morale and if Ed himself wants to be complicit in ruining an honest man’s marriage, no matter if it is a happy one or not.
Jesus fucking Christ, he mutters under his breath and shakes his head. How in the world has he got himself into this mess so quickly?
Angrily, he hurls a stone into the waves, hoping he could let go of his own complicated feelings just as easily, but that doesn’t happen, of course. What does happen, though, is that there is a ping of his phone, signifying a new notification. Ed reaches out for it so fast he nearly drops it, his heart lurching in his chest in a controversially unpleasant and yet exciting manner.
There is Stede’s name lighting up on the screen, and Ed finds himself staring at it for a few moments, feeling as if his very soul has just been taken out of his chest, exposed to Stede’s charms, and then stuffed back inside, leaving him some other version of himself, a version Ed doesn’t know, doesn’t understand, and has no idea how to live and deal with. Then he swallows and opens the message.
I’m unexpectedly free tonight, Ed reads, hearing Stede’s voice in the middle of his head, and his heart does those wonderful fluttering things again, as if the weight of the whole world has been suddenly lifted off his chest to make it soar. The dentist’s appointment’s been rescheduled, so I thought that if you’re free by any chance, I’d love to see you.
I’d love to see you, Ed reads and rereads it, again and again, just to make sure, just to justify this longing he has been feeling ever since he saw Stede for the first time, just to tell himself that Stede wants him, too.
It is always I would love it with him; not yes, or cool, or awesome, or anything of that sort, no. It’s I would love it, Edward, him repeating the word love so many times it almost starts sounding normal to Ed, as if it should be this way, everything done with and out of love.
Ed takes a deep breath, shifts his eyes back to the rolling waves of the sea, peaceful and blue today, and realises, with surprise and a certain amount of uneasiness, that the colours of the world shine again, and the breeze is fresh and tender on his face, and the sound of the waves rolling up on the shore makes a sweet melody. The uneasiness is there because it is Stede’s doing again, alighting Ed’s world with just one message, and it feels frightening just how easily he can do it, how easily he can make Ed’s world turn as if Stede were its axis.
There is another buzz, signalling one more message.
Sorry about the short notice; I understand, of course, if you’ve got something else already planned.
Softly, Ed huffs to himself, somehow almost able to taste Stede’s own uncertainty even through the pixels on his phone screen.
I’d very much love to see you, too, Stede, he types, smiling, then sends the message. I’m at the beach, actually, our place, so if you feel like it and if you’ve your car at hand, come join, how about that?
Share the location? Stede asks almost immediately, and it makes Ed’s heart sing again.
*
It takes Stede about an hour to get there, which Ed spends lounging on the beach, with his leather jacket spread beneath him on the sand, enjoying the warm sun and the pleasant breeze. The weather has been surprisingly fine this June; not too hot, not cold or rainy, but the proper, almost idyll summer it is supposed to be at this time of the year, and it only adds somehow to Ed’s already infatuated state – it seems like everything simply cannot be anything but perfect when Stede is around. Ed tries to caution himself, reason with himself, remind himself that he is a forty-year-old man who is supposed to be cleverer that that, reminding himself that this was what he actually told Stede, that he is mature enough to realise what kind of affair it is; and yet Ed wonders whether he is mature enough, or if he is once more a smitten, yearning, desperate idiot that he was at sixteen, willing allow himself to be dragged into yet another mess, and happily so.
Lost in thought, he doesn’t even notice Stede approach and becomes aware of his presence here on the beach only when Stede pushes a small bunch of field flowers right under his nose.
The smile which greets him as he opens his eyes is dazzling, Stede’s eyes just as rich, vivid blue as the colour of the sky above, and it takes Ed’s breath away for a couple of heartbeats, so much so that all he can do is lie there and stare, feeling almost bewitched and impossibly, helplessly longing.
“Hello, handsome,” Stede finally says, voice so soft as to be almost a whisper.
A bit shakily, Ed exhales, then reaches out to place his hand on the back of Stede’s neck, and pulls him down.
“Come’ere,” he murmurs before finally kissing Stede, slowly and thoroughly, all the uneasiness, worries, doubts, frustrating existential questions seeming to drain out of him at last, leaving nothing else behind except gladness at the touch and desire for more.
Kissing Stede turns out to be a new experience each time it happens, and it is another thing which efficiently keeps Ed hooked on it. It started cautious and hesitant that first time around, and progressed to eager, as if Stede had been deprived of something which was vital for him and finally had a chance to revel in it, and then it turned to passionate kisses full of underlying appreciation and adoration. This one is different again, tenderness so intense Ed can almost taste it on his own tongue, and it fucks with his head, but it fucks with it just so sweetly. It makes him feel loved and desired and cared for, something which, Ed knows by now, he craves to compensate for that acute lack of love from his childhood, which he later was so desperate to get from Izzy. Stede, the wonderful man that he is, seems to be willing to give it freely, with nothing asked in return. He simply wants to love so much, and the desire is so intense it is palpable, and this, too, is fucking addictive.
And Ed can’t help it, can’t resist it, has no inner strength to stay on his guard, to be what he promised Stede to be – mature about the whole thing. This whole thing suddenly seems to be bigger than him, first disarming him with Stede’s impossible tenderness until he loses control completely and then consuming him, body and soul.
And this is what is frightening.
They stay on the beach for a while, Stede spreading his own fancy jacket beside Ed’s to be able to lie next to him, and Ed is both surprised and pleased to see it, knowing how much Stede appreciates some fine fabric. He is pleased to be worth a ruined jacket, for Christ’s sake, whatever it tells about him.
“What’s your plan for the rest of the evening?” Ed asks when they are finally able to keep their hands off each other for a while, forbidding himself to hope for more and yet unable not to hope all the same.
Stede has his own life, he reminds himself for the umpteenth time over the past couple of weeks. Stede has his own problems to solve, not just work-related ones, but wife-and-kids-related ones, too, and those must be adding enough headache to his already confused state. He doesn’t own Stede, and Stede isn’t obliged to spend his every spare hour with Ed. He knows all this, but, goddamn it, how hard is it to stay reasonable when he is falling so uncontrollably in love with this sweet, caring, somewhat shy man, dressed in some fancy summer trousers and a red linen shirt.
A bit uncertainly, Stede shrugs. “I was supposed to have some complicated tooth job done, so I was actually going to stay in the city taking painkillers the whole night, but seeing it’s all been cancelled…” he trails off, as if waiting for something from Ed.
It is only a little belatedly that Ed realises that he still must be feeling insecure about this entire thing, afraid to seem too clingy or pushy or doing or saying something wrong, hence his hesitance.
“So you might as well have the evening off?” Ed asks helpfully, unable to hold back a smile.
Stede nods, smiling back at him, looking relieved. “If you haven’t any other plans.”
Ed lifts himself on his elbows, cocks his head. “No other plans,” he confirms. “You have me at your service and your disposal.”
With a laugh, Stede drops his eyes, but he is radiant, and oh god, does it suit him. There is a mild blush creeping up his neck and cheeks, and it looks so impossibly sweet Ed is left speechless for a few moments. No, Stede Bonnet deserves so much more than a one-night stand, he deserves more than a fling, more than a brief pleasurable affair. He deserves this, being flirted with, and teased, and kissed ever so slowly, and given flowers, and these lazy evenings on the beach, and all the June sunsets; he deserves to be courted, unhurriedly and with a flourish; he deserves romance, and those kisses in the moonlight, and these unexpected dates. And, Ed suddenly realises, it isn’t only Stede who has never done any of it; it is Ed himself, too, who has never had a taste of it. Despite all his experience between the sheets, despite that not-quite commitment he and Izzy had going on for years, despite the numerous lovers he has seduced and who have seduced him, Ed has never really been in love like… well, like this. So maybe they both deserve it, this taking things as slow as they can and enjoying the moment.
Stede brings him out of this reverie by suddenly reaching out to place something on Ed’s head, and it is only after a moment or two that he realises what it is – a wreath made of the flowers Stede has brought, forget-me-nots trembling with the turn of Ed’s head somewhere in his side vision. Nimbly, he catches Stede’s hand mid-motion and, on the spur of the moment, brings it to his lips, pressing a kiss to his knuckles.
“How do I look?” he asks, lifting his chin but keeping hold of Stede’s hand.
The look Stede gives him… Ed could swear if he stared into his eyes long enough, he would be able to see stars there, it is so smitten.
“Like a flower pirate,” Stede murmurs. “Or like a mer… like a merman king?” he asks, grinning. “You’d make a hell of a nice merman, I believe.”
Unable to contain laughter, Ed sits up and pulls Stede closer to himself and into another kiss full of smiles and giggles, the flowery crown still perched on his head. Those giggles get muffled soon enough, though, as he slips his fingers into Stede’s thick curls to hold him fast, and the other hand beneath his shirt, feeling the twitch of Stede’s muscles with his fingertips.
They would have taken it further, perhaps, but for the sudden barking of a dog somewhere too close for comfort. As they part, they see a couple of girls walking along the waterline towards them, a small but lively Jack Russell terrier zooming in front of them and yelping at the waves like the mad little bugger that he is. With a sigh, Ed takes his hands off Stede, allowing him to sit a bit more decently and rearranging his own legs so that the erection he is sporting wouldn’t be so obvious.
“Sorry!” one of the girls shouts at them in a high, giggly voice as they pass.
“No problem!” Ed shouts back and salutes them, then notices how blush creeps up Stede’s cheeks.
It makes him look even more charming somehow, and Ed cannot say for the life of him what is so charming and special about a forty-year-old man blushing like he is some Romeo from the Shakespear’s play. For a while, he simply looks at Stede who is gazing at the faraway horizon, taking in his image, those blond curls falling in gentle wavelets over Stede’s brow, his fair eyelashes which are sun-faded at their tips, a scatter of pale freckles across his nose, the line of his throat merging into his collar bones visible beneath the undone upper buttons of his red shirt, taunting and tempting. He does have the air of some romantic hero from a novel, Ed suddenly realises, what with his appearance and the whole image, the type Ed could never have imagined he could fall for, and yet here he is, staring at Stede and appreciating every single line of his face and body like a besotted fool.
Another revelation he has, and one just as unexpected, is that he doesn’t want a goddamn fling. What he wants is to have this man beside himself every single day of his life, to touch him at his leisure, to make him blush like this, to gaze at him to his heart’s content, to have sex and then fall asleep beside him, their bodies tangled together so beautifully, and then to wake up in the morning to Stede making freaking breakfast in his kitchen and brewing tea, of all things. He could never have thought he would come to like drinking tea, either, and here he is.
Stede takes him completely by surprise when he turns his head to give Ed a look, catching him staring longingly.
“What?” he asks, his voice a murmur and a smile stretching the corners of his mouth just so mildly, turning Ed’s insides into fuzzy mush.
For a few heartbeats, Ed doesn’t answer, continuing to stare, unable to take his eyes off the curve of Stede’s lips and off the vivid blue of his eyes. Then he leans in, though he does it much more slowly this time, taking Stede’s face into his hands as if he were some precious thing that requires worshipping, and presses a kiss to his lips; a kiss so full of yearning and appreciation and tenderness that it threatens to tear Ed from the inside if he doesn’t let it all out.
“I missed you,” he whispers, a confession which is perhaps harder to make than a love confession would have been.
I miss you means I need you, and I need you means I depend on you, and Ed is terrified of letting another person become someone like that again.
He feels Stede’s fingertips slip along the side of his neck to the back of his head with so much affection Ed wants to howl.
“Edward,” he murmurs into the space between their lips, and his voice sounds like a caress, sealing Ed’s fate with its sheer tenderness. There is another soft press of his lips, and then, “I miss you, too. I miss you every single day when I’m not with you, Ed, I--”
Ed doesn’t let him finish, feeling that if he heard another word like that, spoken with so much fondness, he would simply fall to pieces right here, and he can’t, he shouldn’t, not yet anyway. He promised Stede he would be mature about the whole thing, and he has been able to do anything but that, daydreaming and longing and yearning and craving and willing to do anything Stede could possibly ask him to. Instead, he kisses Stede again, and again, and again, holding him and holding on to him with such intensity as if Stede were going to pop out of existence the next moment should Ed let go.
And it is suddenly he, and not Stede, who is needy and desperate and feeling completely out of his depth about this whole thing. Oh, how tables have turned.
*
It is a considerable journey back home from the beach, and it has never ever felt this long to Ed before – all he can think of is getting back to his flat and making love to Stede. Inwardly, he almost laughs at himself for the choice of words – it is the way Stede called it the other night, making love, sounding so sentimentally old-fashioned and yet so very much like Stede; and this is what Ed is dying to do. He never used to call it that way – he fucked other people, or other people fucked him, they shagged, had sex, buggered each other, but no one ever made love to him, he believes. Not until he met Stede.
Another thing which genuinely delights Ed is that Stede seems to be losing his inhibitions, slowly but surely finding his footing in this affair they are having, growing more confident with every kiss he gives Ed. It is almost funny how it started completely the other way around: Stede was nervous and flustered and ever so cautious, afraid to make a fool of himself as he confessed, and how now it is Ed himself who seems to be lost and helpless the more confident Stede becomes, as if it was so much easier to have control over his own feelings and emotions while Ed still managed to retain control in bed.
He is certainly losing control now, being the subject of Stede’s kisses, softest and gentlest, and his hands on his body, which pull off his t-shirt to place the fondest of touches on his skin, to stroke and to squeeze and to leave Ed breathless and begging for more. He feels like clay at the hands of a master, soft and pliant and giving, allowing himself to be moulded into something else entirely by Stede’s caresses, something he has never been and something he has no idea how to control. So he just gives himself over completely, body and soul, feeling unravelled bit by bit, inch of skin by inch of skin where Stede presses soft, eager kisses.
Ed has had passion before, has been the subject and the giver of it in bed; he has had wild nights on which he was made to cry out his pleasure and plead for more; he has been devoured and fucked so thoroughly he couldn’t quite remember himself; but there has never been this tenderness, never so much of it; and what Stede is doing to him now seems to be slowly killing Ed in the most wonderful of ways possible, as he holds Ed tight, arms wrapped around his body and hands drawing caresses on every single part of his skin they can reach; lying on top of him and kissing him breathless; rolling his hips just this deliciously, making Ed’s cock throb and leak and Ed himself almost whine with how bloody good it feels; gripping handfuls of Ed’s hair into his hands and pulling just this wonderfully; whispering those feverish words into Ed’s ear or against his cheek or his mouth, words which are full of tenderness and affection and adoration, Stede’s voice shaky and suffocated, delirious almost; pushing in, slick and thick, sliding all the way inside, slowly, oh so fucking slowly that Ed groans plaintively; pushing in and then lying down atop of Ed between his spread legs until he can once more wrap his arms around Ed’s shoulders and hold him there, and fuck him, slowly and thoroughly just by rolling his hips in an endless, fluid motion. Ed cannot bear it anymore because Stede’s cock doesn’t just hit his prostate; it keeps brushing against it again and again and again, constantly, making his dick twitch and pulse between their tightly squeezed bodies, and Ed does cry out continuously, breathless and shaky, unable to contain it. Feeling high, he opens his eyes to stare at the dimmed lights on the ceiling as Stede makes love to him, feeling Stede’s arms around him, Stede’s hands in his hair, Stede’s lips on the side of his throat kissing and sucking, Stede’s voice calling his name, Edward, repeating it like a prayer, Stede’s body over himself, the weight pinning him to the mattress among the tangled sheets, Stede’s cock inside him, just the right size and the perfect shape.
There are scattered thoughts of Izzy in Ed’s head, untimely but persistent, memories of how it was with him; never like this, never with so much almost palpable affection Stede seems to radiate from the very pores of his skin. Izzy simply fucked him, and with time they even managed to adjust to each other well enough for it to feel truly good, truly pleasurable, but there never was this, adoration, appreciation, tenderness, hungriness, yearning so strong Ed doesn’t know what to do with it or how to survive it except to surrender and become one, become this very longing itself. It was never like this with anyone at all, and Ed screws up his eyes tight, digging his own fingers into Stede’s golden curls and begging him for more, begging him to make love to him.
When he comes, he actually dry-sobs, feeling choked and completely, heavenly undone. Stede holds him close without pulling out while Ed rides the highs of his orgasm, shaking and with his muscles vibrating as if an electrical current was sent through them, gripping on to Stede almost spasmodically.
“You make me fucking happy, Stede,” he mutters helplessly, his voice raw and sounding strange and foreign to his own ears.
“I’m here,” Stede murmurs, mingling words with kisses. “I’m here.”
Ed wants him to be here always.