Memories of Home

xxi. in love & in ruins

Notes:

Wow! We got here. ummm... it's the SMUT chapter. 

Had major, major writer's block trying to come back to our two faves here ....wanted desperately to give them the reunion they deserved which took some ( no - A LOT) of mental back and forth of how I wanted to do it - but, hey....we got there somehow (I think)!

Official Warning: Sexual Themes Ahead

Smoke floated through the early morning hours in the wake of Harry's departure. MJ watched as it unfurled like the reality that was slowly beginning to dawn on her again.

Everything moved in slow motion. Everything but the memories. Those began to hit her at full speed.

So many...moments...blurring into this present one. Each chaotic and heartbreaking one ran across her brain. Each one that had led her here. Led them both here.

She gasped as she tried to process it all. Reality still held so many questions and only one truth.

That there was a ghost waiting for her out there, on that rooftop. A ghost that she could finally name.

Her eyes shifted upwards, her muscles braced as she processed it all, searching.

Across the rooftop, she could make out the way his shoulders heaved with slow, heavy, breaths, carefully inhaling, waiting to see what the next moment would hold. 

She took one more long, slow, inhale herself before she allowed herself to say the name that had been on the tip of her tongue, at the edge of a dream, for so long and so often, that she wondered if was more like a memory...

But the only thing that mattered was that she remembered it now.

Her voice trembled as she called out the name that had always been waiting to be said:

Peter

The shadow turned slowly towards the sound of her voice.

Her heartbeat quickened. Again, louder.

"Peter. PETER!"

His body automatically moved at her voice, lunging in her direction as hers scrambled towards him. As they ran towards each other, the last few steps felt like the longest of all.

Then all she could register was crashing.

She felt the air rush out of her chest as those strong arms enveloped her, sweeping her up and crushing her to a body with muscles that trembled against her own. Hands brushing all along her, checking her for injuries, and shaking across her skin, cradling her face in his hands so gently like she was a bird that would fly away if he didn't touch her...and finally bringing her chin up to meet his own eyes. That face from her dreams.

The freckles. The unruly eyebrow. That smattering of curls that she loved so much. His breath in disbelief, 

"It's really you.."

She watched as his lips formed the words and it cracked something in her heart. They had both been alone for so long. Peter more than anyone. She was never going to let him be alone again.

"I'm here. I'm here." She found wetness seemed down her cheeks, as his thumbs gently brushed them away.

"I told you I'd come find you.. You took too long, you know that Peter?"