For Reasons Wretched and Divine

Amber eyes and Tattooed lines

He's in a rush today, and he hates it, and himself a little too.

A new smiley face was inked into his stomach, every time he moved, his shirt brushed against it, and while it normally gave him a surge of satisfaction to feel, he had no such luck when he was in the diner.

He tried to stay in the calming building for at least forty-five minutes every time, but he had only been in for less than twelve when he stood up to leave, feeling guilty and carrying his plate to the counter.

Jim was absent from his seat in the corner, and all the men that gathered to gossip were gone too, but the restaurant was far from empty, but no one was focused on Happy for the first time, and he didn't mind it one bit. He understood Jim's trepidation at the biker's now usual appearance and growing interest in his waitress that was practically his granddaughter, but Happy could say with a clean conscious that he not a shred of ill intention towards Sunshine. He just wanted to be in the aura she gave off, and maybe to get close enough to see if she always smelled like peaches.

His phone buzzed in his pocket; it was Juice, again. He shoved the phone back down and leaned impatiently against the counter, looking for Sunshine.

"Hey, Happy, you leaving already?" She rounded the corner to the counter, and she hip-checked a cupboard closed on her way, the motion of her body burning its way into Happy's mind.

"Yeah," he said, sounding as forlorn as he felt.

She nodded and made his change, long-fingered hand reaching out to give him the quarters when he saw something on her arm that definitely wasn't there before. He had seen her bare forearms before, and it's not that he didn't pay attention to her body, he most definitely did pay attention, but she had on long sleeves that day, and now they were pushed up to her elbows.

Her hand was shockingly small in his as he gently cupped the back of her hand in his palm, index finger and thumb on either side of her wrist as he carefully turned over her arm to see.

Her skin was so soft and warm that his brain almost short-circuited, but he fought it.

A flower bloomed on the inside of her forearm, bold black lines and proper shading, the center of the flower was a deep red that faded out into her dark skin, each petal equidistant and geometrically even. The edges were a little raised still, showing the young age of the mark.

It was a good tattoo; Happy couldn't find much else wrong with it other than the fact that he hadn't been the one to do it himself.

"It's a magnolia for my parents. It was their thirtieth-anniversary last week," Sunshine said, not trying to pull her hand away, and Happy was met with the unfettered force of her amber eyes. It always caught him off guard when she looked at him like that, like she was seeing more than just his face, and he always felt a little bare under the direct pressure of her gaze.

"It looks good on you," Happy said, voice rumbling, reveling in the way his thumb fit in the dip of her wrist, and he reluctantly let go.

"Thanks," she whispered, still absolutely incapable of receiving compliments.

Happy pocketed the change and slid a twenty-dollar bill her way, which she accepted with an eye-roll.

She told him that he didn't have to give her that much money every time, but he had shrugged his shoulders.

"It stung a little more than I thought it would," she mused, tapping a blunt fingernail against the center of the flower, tracing the stamen.

"Yeah," Happy tapped the top of his head and the snake that was coiled on his skin. "This one too." For a split second he almost lifted the hem of his shirt to show her the new addition of ink to scar his skin, but he didn't have any way of passing off the smiley faces as anything innocent, so he didn't mention it.

Sunshine grinned.

"I think I'll keep all of mine below my chin," she said drily.

"Where's your sense of adventure, Sunshine?" Happy asked as he walked out the door, using her name for the first time in conversation.

He liked the way it rolled off his tongue more than he was caring to admit.

"Good question," he heard her sigh before the door closed.

Notes: Most of the chapters will be like this, small little snippets of moments I think Happy would deserve if he was written more like a character and not a two-dimensional hitman with an alarming lack of personality.