Under Control.

chapter forty one.

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Before the storm, briefly, there is, peace.

The morning starts with Julian waking wrapped around Nora, warm and sleepy and well rested, too. He feels achy in that delicious way that's satisfying, a sultry reminder that settles in the body and echos throughout the day.

There's a calm inside of him that's new. It's strange and a bit unnerving, but at the same time, he recognises it for what it is — a reminder that the world tilted last night, his and hers together, set back to being terrifying and beautiful rather than just regret-filled, with faraway longing.

Together, they had made a choice, and so that was the world they were waking into this morning.

A second chance.

'What time is it?' Nora had been awake for almost as long as Julian. She'd recognised the shift in his breath even if she hadn't been aware of it when she had. She just did, because that was how things were, with him. But she'd let him come-to slowly, at his own pace, and waited until the morning was slightly less harsh upon him before she invited him to speak.

'Uhhh,' Julian's voice first thing in the morning was softness with a rasped edge, and it was Nora's favourite sound. 'Dunno,' he murmured with a hazy chuckle, his arm that was coiled around her middle tightening, his lips that were pressed behind her ear dragging slowly over the shell of it, her nape, her jaw, before landing finally on her lips.

Nora shivered at the mere presence of him behind her, all around her, and Julian felt it. He felt it and he smiled, and then he tucked her under his own body and the tangle of the sheets, just in case she was cold and not simply taken by him, and it all.

'Do you have soundcheck?' Even though there was a part of him that wanted to forget — forget the gig and all the cameras and the threat of being watched, and judged — Julian couldn't be mad at Nora's gentle, caring question. Her eyes were wide, and her fingertips were tracing his pouting lips, and she was only wondering because she wanted to help. And he knew that.

'Yeah,' Julian nodded then tucked his face into the crook of her neck, like hiding there forever might have been a real option, even if it wasn't. 'Noon.' He mumbled his answer across the jut of her collarbone, his lips against her soft, salty skin, and then, he looked up.

'We could shower? Maybe get some breakfast if we've got time? Or, if you want to, I mean.'

There was a splinter of something unsure wavering behind Nora's big, grey eyes, because the truth was that even though they both knew now that they were in this thing together, neither of them had yet said as much aloud. And Julian didn't want that — didn't want there to be any wondering left between them, not anymore. And so, he decided to fix it. Because at least then, he thought, maybe he could start his Not Good Very Fucked Up Day by being decent, with her.

'We got time. I'll make time,' he says it while he's looking right at her and taming his gaze not to wander to the slipped sheet between them. 'It's just you, for me. Alright? I know that's not what we decided before I left. But that's what I decided for myself. Since Colleen — since we got back? Only you, Nora. Okay? That's, um, that's where I'm at. And I wanted you to know, I guess.'

Between Julian finishing what he had to say and Nora starting, there was a beat of silence so loaded that Julian felt like surely she must have been able to see his heart rattling against the cage of his ribs. But then she traced the shadows under his omni-tired eyes, and she smiled.

'Me, too. I was...I was scared,' Nora starts, and Julian can't help but to spill over the top of her.

'I know, I know. And I get it. But you don't have to be. I'm — that's not gonna happen again, okay? I promise.' It's a run-on whisper of words that pour from him, punctuated by the trembling touch of his roaming hands. 'I promise,' he says it again, like a kind of prayer.