(jaylor au) clandestine meetings in beautiful rooms

Keep Your Eyes Open

His hands are tangled in my hair, his lips are against my skin, leaving trails of gold wherever they touch. His breath is warm, and I know how it feels to be alive. To be set free. To be born again.
"You're the best thing," he murmurs against my skin. "That's ever been mine."
"I'm yours," I tell him as I feel him grin. "Both with and without the sparkly dresses." He looks up at me, brushing my hair away from my face.
"We are meant to be together," he tells me. "We are meant to rule. We are meant to be King and Queen. Not Alexander. Not Corrine."
"Well... what are we going to do about it?" I ask him, pulling away gently. "How far are we prepared to go?" He looks at me, his eyes glowing.
"For you, I'd do anything." He lips press against my neck. "I'd run away with you, I'd cross oceans with you."

I smile, taking his hand. "Then let's go." I kiss his cheek, before leading him back through the dark passageway.

The sun will rise soon, I know from the pink clouds dancing across the sky.
"You're going to be unstoppable, you know that?" Joe asks as the two of us walk through the trees. "One day, you'll be Queen, and you'll be a force to be reckoned with." His hand is in mine, and I smile.
"Imagine the two of us together." It's a subject of conversation that the two of us haven't delved too far into, because of the danger it brings. We know the consequences, know the danger of even thinking these thoughts.
"I only want to be Queen with you at my side." It's so strange here. On the outskirts of the village, dressed in clothes that would makes us appear no more than peasants. It's perfect. The people in the village pay no attention to us, they're already starting their days.
"I've not been here in so long," I tell him as we stop walking to sit on the edge of town. There's an old, crumbling wall that the two of us sit on. We turn towards the sun, and I take his hand in mine.

"Look where we are," he whispers as we both watch the sky explode into an incandescent mess of yellows, of pinks and oranges. "In an old, empty parking lot from centuries before us... Look what we could be." He paused as he turns to look at me. "We could leave it all behind us, Taylor. We could run. We've got money, we get far enough away that they could never find us-"
"It's not as easy as that," I sigh. "If it were, I would have left so long ago."
"Why? Why isn't it that easy?" I can't bare to look at his eyes, so I look down at the patch of wildflowers blooming at our feet.
"It's just... not."
"Taylor, we could. It's not that hard to simply vanish. We could run and never look back. No one could find us."
"Joe, I want to do that with you." I pause, taking a deep breath. "Of course I do. Believe me when I say that I want that to happen. I want it with you. I want it all. I want you. But I can't just... abandon everything."
"Why? You hate it in there. We could be free. We could be everything we want, and we wouldn't have to love in secret." He's desperate, it's written in his voice. I close my eyes, taking a shaky breath.
"I'm sorry. I can't - not right now. Maybe when thing have settled down a little bit-"
"It's never going to settle down, Taylor. There's always going to be something like that happening, because that's just how it is as a Royal." He says, as if the whole situation can be seen as black and white. It's not like that. There's this huge grey area.
"They wouldn't let us go, Joe. They wouldn't let me go."
"By the time they realise, they won't even know where to start looking. We'll be halfway across the world by then."
"It's complicated."
"Is it? We head for the hills and never look back. It's not that hard, Taylor. It can be us. Against the world." I'm so desperate to find some sort of hope in his words, some sort of way for it to work. Find some... belief that it might work.
I turn to face him, the sunlight dancing in his eyes. I place a hand on his cheek and smile.
"Of course I want it to be us against the world. I want it more than anything else. But I can't leave, not just yet. Not after everything that just... I can't. I'm sorry. One day, we'll leave. I promise. I'll leave with you and we really won't look back. We'll leave all of this behind us. Any steps we take to get to where we're going... we'll just... forget it all."