Shameful | Congressman!Kylo x Reader

Chapter 42: Chamomile and Lavender

Ya llegamos. We've arrived.

I know I always thank y'all for your patience, but truly. Thank you. Glad you're here. Hope you've been so so so well.

On the menu tonight: easy romance, pretty buildings and interiors, laziness, fuckloads of mezcal, a tourist-free Mexico City, butt stuff...

(for those who aren't down with the butt stuff, I've included asterisks before and after so you can avoid!)

Made a Spotify playlist just for this chapter; give it a listen ;) also linked in my linktree in bio! username: readshameful. https://open.spotify.com/playlist/4wzaRRC1cxfQfUKA6V1ArH?si=7a6a89dc475f4eb9

—

Me gustas cuando callas porque estás como ausente,

y me oyes desde lejos, y mi voz no te toca.

Parece que los ojos se te hubieran volado

y parece que un beso te cerrara la boca.

Pablo Neruda

—

I nap steadily through the flight to Aeropuerto Internacional Benito Juárez. The kind of pleasant half-sleep where surroundings blur and twist quietly in your periphery – the sounds of soft music climbing through my and Kylo's shared headphones (I drift off to The Soul Superiors, rouse to Bermuda Triangle, fall back into floaty bliss to Otis Redding), other passengers shifting, beverage service. Everything's taken on the feeling of chamomile and lavender – lazy and trisyllabic; comforting, warm, sweet, and soupy.

The overhead chime and scratchy passage transmuted through the speakers denotes our arrival. I fully awaken with a sharp inhale through the nose, twitching slightly. Everything jumps into focus. I stretch my neck and look to my right: hazy, damp tarmac stretching out the window. To my left: Kylo shutting his book (Sabbath's Theater) with one hand. His lips curl into an inviting smile, his eyes glitter.

"How far'd you get?" I ask quietly, nuzzling into his shoulder and motioning toward his book. His skin's so shockingly warm through his shirt that I almost drift off in that moment.

"Hi. G'morning." His voice is chocolatey, roasted espresso; his smile gluttonous and dreamy. "Um–" He turns the book over. "One page. Still learning how to read." He threads his hand through his hair self-consciously, adjusting his posture. I can tell he's still eager to impress me – with jokes, with his appearance (picture of perfection, nonetheless), with his gifts. That realization imbues me with a sense of hi-octane, sunshine-yellow power.

I laugh into his t-shirt.

"Missed you," he says quietly, smoothing his hand over my thigh. "Dream anything good?"

I shake my head slightly. "One of those half-sleeps. Where you can still kinda –" I pause to yawn, "– hear everything. It was nice, though."

He feigns displeasure. "So you could've helped me sound out my words these whole five hours?"

We disembark twenty minutes later – Kylo insists on carrying our bags, and scoffs at me when I try to take my complimentary first-class blanket with me ("I have... fucking... a dozen Oaxacan wool blankets at this place, baby. Leave the dish rag.").

He knows exactly where we're headed – his friend's friend's friend's driver waits in a big black Audi outside – and the hour-long drive to Colonia Cuauhtémoc begins.

The sky's still an all-encompassing, blinding, hazy grey whose thick tendrils crawl over the top of the buildings that whiz past, but it's still beautiful. It's still the Mexico I'll come to know for the next six days, alongside my lover (who's currently splayed out next to me in the backseat of this car, elbow and back resting on the window, watching me watch the city float by).