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Published:
2022-04-21
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2022-04-28
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2/2
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My Cup Runneth Over

Summary:

The aftermath of THE kiss and the preface and aftermath of THAT DOORFRAME scene. Told from Abigail's perspective. I do leave a bit up to the imagination. I loved writing these characters and would definitely love some feedback or comments. I may do a Villanelle x Eve fic next because we did NOT deserve that ending. Anyway, enjoy! As always---I don't own these characters.

Chapter 1

Chapter Text

Sunday March 11

Astonishment and joy. Astonishment and joy.

There are things I cannot speak of candidly in the day to day ledger. Secret things that I prefer to hold close and shelter, gifts and wonderments for me alone. I will write them instead in this small black book and I will keep it in between the pages of my Atlas, a place that Dyer will never go, for he has not the imagination nor spirit to long for the openness of other as I do. He is yoked to what he believes is his lot and has never thought to think beyond it. At times I pity him for his lack of ingenuity but today I am glad for it, for he cannot imagine the true nature of what exists between Tallie and I.

Oh…

Tallie!

Even now, as I write this by a low candle in the close, hot stench of the outhouse (where I must go so as not to be discovered) my lips burn with the memory of hers. I am unmoored---a boat set adrift by a strong wind, tossing on a tumultuous sea. Tallie is the thunderstorm that has illuminated all my dark and cast my whole being into the open. I am wholly undone. She has opened a door I cannot shut. What is to come?

I am still unsure if earlier today was not some type of fever dream. I can feel the heat rise off the back of my neck as I think of Tallie once again. How a rush of blood had crept into her cheeks at our indiscretion and fanned across her fair face, coloring it a dusky rose. She is all the color and fire of the sky at a day’s end, and I cannot help but want to draw close to her warmth. Am I to be an Icarus I wonder? I can only hope the wings I feel that are propelling my heart upwards towards her are not made of wax, catapulting me to sure destruction.

I think though, that perhaps the flight is worth the falling. This peculiar rising that I feel is better a feeling than I’ve ever had the good fortune to encounter. I feel as if I have been sleeping and have just awoken or started to dream. I fear I shall not sleep tonight, as every moment will now be spent wondering after her and waiting for her return.

Sunday March 26

I see her small and swift in the distance. Even from afar, I can tell it’s her, I’ve memorized her gait, she moves like a river. Every time she appears up over the ridge I startle; my heart leaps at the sight of her. Her returning is both unexpected and routine. Every time she leaves I feel as if I shall never see her again and every time she reappears it feels like I’m seeing her with new eyes. What a wonder.

Now she’s stomping across the field, her hair blowing wild about her face and the dog bounding with glee up the path in front of her. My chest grows tight and close and the hand that I have placed there cannot calm the galloping of my wayward heart. Then she is at the door and blows in with such force that I must take a step backwards. Her color is high and her eyes are shining, wet. She draws the back of her hand slow across her brow and closes her eyes against it with a deep sigh. When she opens them again they meet mine for a second of quick, hot blue before dropping to her shoes. A coldness starts to creep up my back. She is wound tight and stiff and does not lean into my orbit.
She is upset, I can feel it in the way she stands, so drawn into herself.

I cannot do or say as I want because Dyer is here. He greets her cordially and remains sunk and doleful in his chair for 30 minutes past. Tallie and I stand with the whole room between us, forcing pleasantries and talk of news and the weather. He finally rises, touches the brim of his hat and sets off. Both of us watch him leave, rooted to our spots until he vanishes over the ridge. Once we are sure he is gone I bridge the gap between us. She crosses her arms, angles herself away from me. I grab her wrist and pull her gently closer, tilt her chin up so her eyes are forced to meet mine.

“Are you… are you cross?”

She does not answer, only pulls away slightly and averts her eyes again. Her jaw tenses and relaxes quickly, a fluttering of wings, something she told me that she does when she is trying to calm her quickened blood.

“Oh”. I stiffen and almost lose my breath at the thought of it. Surprise. “At----at me?”

She finally looks up of her own accord, and the blue of her eyes burns hotter than before, a thousand cloudless summer skies.

“Abigail”. She breathes my name so softly under her breath that I have to lean into her exhale to hear it. She finally steps into my space.

“You have destroyed me”. Her voices raises a little and I can see the wetness of tears shining on her cheeks. “I am useless”. Here her voice gains strength, thunders out of her. A roar. “I am listless. Doleful. Unreasonable. I feel as if I am wanting for something but cannot name what it is I wish for..” She pauses. Looks hard into me, unblinking. Misery.

I swallow hard. “What is it you want of me?” It comes out more abrasively pleading than I meant.

She breathes out through her nose; a slight, measured sound. “Be gentle with me, Abigail.” Her eyes look wide and almost fearful.

I am chastened. I step closer to her, make myself soft, lower my voice to almost a whisper.

“Tallie, what do you want?”

“I want to lay bare for you all of the hoardings of my imagination. The things I have been playing over in my mind for the hours… the days that I cannot see you.”

I say nothing and hold myself very, very still. For a while, our breath is the only sound that passes between us. Then she speaks again.

“I cannot eat or sleep. Your kisses swept through me like the measles did that poor village last spring, laying waste to everything in their path. I had told myself to abolish all desire for comfort or any sort of happiness before immediately abandoning that resolution. I am,” she shakes her head, frantically searching for the words in exasperation and then finally finding it, she flings it out of her mouth. “Unhinged”.

I am still silent. I can not pull the words from my mouth that furiously swim in my mind, spring from my heart. I open my mouth and only breath comes out.

“Abigail”, her eyes catch mine, flashing. “Say something.” She says it forcefully, and suddenly unbinds my tongue.

I almost cry out when she grabs at my elbow with her free hand.

“How was I to know what was happening to me?”

The words come out quick and hot, sharper than I want, but I keep going.

“There is no instruction book for this, at least not one that I am aware of. Something rises in me when you approach, like hair on the the back of a dog. The thought of you has buoyed me this week. I have taken shelter in it, the way the chickadees take to the depths of the evergreens to keep the snow and ice and wind at bay. I believe we are now encountering a species of education that proceeds from being forced to confront that which we never before have acknowledged. Will never be able to…publicly acknowledge.”
A heaviness hangs between us that I cannot name.

She smooths her dress, steps back. Takes a breath, swallows.

“Can we share some tea?” This is said barely above a whisper and I can see she is trying to steady herself, pulling back from the brink of whatever precipice we had just been standing on.

“Of course”.

She slumps into the same chair she sat in last week, languid and cat-like. I can feel her eyes on me, stripping me to the skin. I turn my back to her, trying to quiet my riotous blood.

I hear her blow through her lips as I pour the tea.

“My nights have been tortuous. I have lain in my marriage bed and my body has been cold for—-“ she trails off and I hear her exhale again. Her matter of fact tone has been betrayed by this pause and I can hear her trying to slow her breath. When I look back she closely examining her nails, her teeth worrying her bottom lip.
I put the cups on the table with clumsy hands, trying not to spill the fresh brewed tea. I turn to her and she lifts her eyes to mine, then drops them to the floor.
I stoop to where she is in the chair and catch her chin, search her eyes. To speak in this moment takes every bit of my energy and it still comes out like a strangled, breathless whisper.

“For…what?”

She stands to meet me and brings her lips in close to my ear. I feel the energy shift in the room. Her breath is ragged and hot against my jaw.

“For want.” An endless beat, an exhale borne of nerves and then, more than I could have hoped for. A special heat.

“Of you”. Our eyes meet again and then her hands are suddenly at my face and she is pulling me towards her with a desperate urgency. Her lips are on mine again and again, meeting and parting, like I imagine the sea meets and parts from the shore.

She pulls away from me slowly and presses her forehead to mine. We pant in tandem, recovering from our sudden passion. So many unspoken things linger in the silent air between us. A wild flurry of warmth has started to swirl in my abdomen and the feeling makes me bashful. I feel the blush bloom across my cheeks.

“How are we to live this way?” Tallie asks in a smaller voice than I have ever heard her use. “How am I to suffer the endless minutes away from you? To pretend as if I don’t want to spend each day with you and you alone? The other parts of my life have dulled in comparison to the brightness of the hours spent in your company.”

I let out a small laugh, trying to hide that I too, have begun to cry.

“Oh Tallie”, I say thickly, “You are a poet.”

She says nothing, just presses her wet cheek to my own and closes her eyes, inhaling deeply.

I take her hands in mine.

“Tallie, I’ve never believed in romantic love. I’ve always thought that there was only a certain gentle fondness that comes from sharing a life and learning to enjoy small blessings together. You---” I pause, acutely aware that I am about to lay myself bare. “You have awakened parts of my heart that I did not know were lacking. Our affection for each other is something wholly different than anything I’ve ever---” my voice breaks, as my chest grows ever tighter and then uncoils all at once. I feel my words fall away, swallowed by the enormity of the emotion I cannot yet speak aloud.

“My Abigail”. My name, spoken like a hymn. She smiles and it is the one that I think she keeps hidden at the corner of her mouth, just for me. “You are more than I ever thought possible.”

This time I am the one who reaches for her. That same soft smell of rosewater and green, wet earth. The warm, biscuity smell at her hairline. This kiss is gentle and sweet and she gives a soft sigh at our parting, drawing close again with a small smile.

“I have to go”. She says it low, and she looks out from under her lashes with a sentiment so curious in her eyes that my heart nearly stops. She moves slowly to the door, slips out the way she came in. When she reaches the threshold of the field she pauses--- and I can see her shoulders heaving quickly. She looks like how I imagine Diana from the classics looks after a battle, with her wild hair and strong figure, framed just so by the setting sun. I am leaning against the doorframe and admiring her when she is suddenly no longer there, but she is upon me. She is kissing me and kissing me and kissing me. Her kisses are hungry and hot, answering the question that my first one posed so timidly last week---yes, yes, yes. She pushes me against the doorframe and for the first time are bodies are so close that no light can get through. Tiny stars of spark run through me, the feeling of the snap of touching your hand to harness metal in the cold of a dry winter’s day. The palm of her hand is against my stomach, small and burning like a coal and then it is suddenly pressing into my womanhood with an excited fervor. I yelp with astonishment and can’t help but look down at it. She gently grabs my cheek and picks my face up to hers again.

“I believe that intimacy increases goodwill, and if that is so then every moment we spend together will make us more cheerful workers. Wouldn’t our farms benefit from that?” She says this quietly, our noses touching, the breath from her words a warm rush against my skin.

I can’t help the small crying laugh that escapes my lips. I smile helplessly against her, my body humming, a chasm of desire opened within. She presses forward.
“Wouldn’t our husbands?” Her voice is low and husky. Goose pimples rise on my skin. Our heavy breathing fills the room as she moves her hand against my skirt. I tilt my hips into her.

“All our burdens will be lightened”, I manage in a whisper. She stops for a minute and draws back to look at me and the emotion I had seen in her eyes earlier is no longer veiled. She moves quickly and is at me again, drinking of my lips as if she has an unquenchable thirst and I am the only source of water. I find her drawing soft gasps and moans from me that escape from my throat without any forethought. A boldness arises in me and I lean down to roughly pull her hips snug against mine. I bury my head in her neck and propel her back against the door frame, acutely aware of every inch of her, suddenly impatient at all the cloth between us. I find myself gathering bunches of her dress in my greedy fists and gasping into her ear as she returns my insistent pressing.

She slides a hand up my back, toys with the strings of my dress, parts from me to gaze from under her eyelashes, a lazy half smile on her lips.

“What about Dyer?” This in the lowest voice possible because I can not steady the frantic shaking of my breath.

Her lips find my ear again.

“Why do you think I brought my dog? He will let us know when friend or stranger crests the ridge. We will have more than enough time to get decent”.
I know not what it is that passes in the ensuing look between us, but it feeds me with enough bravery to take her hand and lead her to my bed. We sit down there together, and she kisses me long and hard. It is enough to make me cry out again.

She grabs my hand and presses it to her breast so I can feel her quickly pounding heart.

“If a marriage is the joining of two souls in the eyes of God and heaven, then are we not that? My soul is surely more bound to yours that it ever was to any mans.”
My words are stuck again, but she doesn’t care this time. Her hands are working at my dress and she is bringing her lips up to my ear. She holds herself there, as still as a winter forest, her eyes on the door. For just for a moment I let myself feel a slight bolt of fear.

All my anxieties vanish with her next words, whispered so sweetly that the angels would weep.

“So be my wife.”

______________________________

Afterwards, when she leaves, I feel emptied out, hollow. All my goodwill has been burned up by our transgressions and I am melancholy again. It’s as if she was never even here.

Again, I ask myself——

What is to come?

When I close my eyes and think of her, the rising returns.
An empty vessel, filling again.
Icarus, ascending towards the sun.
Just for a moment, my cup runneth over.