Summary: After Zig shows up in London, he and MC (Natalie) have a heart to heart.
Note: I am beyond happy that Zig showed up in London. Now I just need us to actually get the option to get back together with him.
She’s dreaming. That’s Natalie’s first thought when she sees Zig standing in the doorway of her flat. Clearly she must be dreaming, or possibly hallucinating. She hasn’t been sleeping well lately. Maybe she’s overly tired?
She blinks a few times, shaking her head. Zig is still there when she looks up again.
“You’re not a dream,” she murmurs.
Zig makes a choked sound, looking torn between tears and laughter.
“No. I’m here.”
Tentatively, she reaches out, resting her hand on his chest. He’s warm, solid and steady under her fingertips. He covers her fingers with his and squeezes.
“You’re really here,” she whispers, and suddenly the dam she’s been fighting so hard to hold back bursts and tears start rolling down her face.
Zig gently pulls her into him and she goes to him without hesitation. It still feels so natural, even after the last painful words they’d exchanged and the time apart. All she’s wanted these last few weeks is for him to wrap his arms around her, to feel that familiar comfort.
“I’m here, baby,” he says, his voice thick with emotion. “I’m here.”
They sway back and forth, her face buried in his chest. She’s soaking his shirt with her tears, but he doesn’t seem to mind. One of his hands runs soothingly through her hair. He keeps softly murmuring that he’s here, and that he’s sorry for how they’d left things.
“I’m sorry too,” she says, every time, because she is. That last conversation hadn’t been one-sided.
Natalie eventually realizes they’re still standing just inside her flat and the door is wide open. She releases her grip on his shirt to scrub the dried tears off her face and ushers him in, locking the door behind them.
For a long moment they just stand there, a little uncertain how to be. Zig breaks the silence first, taking her hand.
“I know we need to talk,” he begins. “I just missed you so damn much. I booked the first flight I could find and-”
Natalie presses gentle fingers to his lips. She suddenly realizes she doesn’t want this conversation, not quite yet.
“We do need to talk,” she agrees. “But it can wait for a little bit. I just…”
She swallows hard and quietly admits, “I just want you to hold me right now.”
Zig wraps his arms around her and buries his nose in her hair. “That’s all I want too.”
She leads Zig to the couch, keeping her fingers laced tightly with his. She doesn’t want to let go, not even for a second. They curl up on the couch together like they never stopped, like no time has passed. His arm wraps around her waist, their lips just inches apart.
“I wanted to call, or text, but I didn’t want to make things harder for you,” Zig says, resting his forehead against hers.
“It probably would have,” she admits. “It’s been… rough.”
He lets out a shaky breath. “Yeah. It has been.”
Natalie loses all track of time as they lay there. She’s not in any hurry to interrupt this quiet bubble they’re in. She doesn’t dread the conversation they need to have, exactly, but she wants to make this moment last. For right now, she can pretend he’s just come to visit her in London and they have everything else figured out.
Finally, when Zig shifts against the couch and moves his hand to rub slow circles across her back, Natalie lifts her head up. He blinks at her slowly, familiar desire in his eyes.
“Zig,” she murmurs.
Her eyes flicker down to his lips and she leans in, bringing her mouth to his. It’s slow and tentative at first, like they’re learning each other all over again. Natalie threads her fingers in his hair, playing with the soft strands. Zig trails his hand down, his fingers dipping under the back of her shirt. His touch warms her skin and makes her sigh into his mouth.
She flashes back to their first kiss, that fiery passion and impatience in the bar. That passion is still there but now there’s so much more to it, to them, love and respect and even now, after everything, this unshakable commitment. They kiss again and again, still soft, still slow. Zig’s tongue flicks against her lips and she opens up to him, groaning quietly. She can almost taste the hint of desperation on his lips.
She gets it. She’s a little desperate too, for this to go differently than their last conversation. A quiet whimper leaves her throat and she kisses him harder.
“Natalie,” Zig groans.
He holds her tighter, burying his other hand in her hair.
“I’m so glad you came,” she whispers against his mouth. “I wanted you to come.”
He smiles a little. “I half expected you to throw me out,” he admits.
“You didn’t really think I’d do that, did you?” she asks.
Their kisses slow, his hand trailing lazily down her side before resting over her hip.
“I hoped not. But that last conversation… didn’t go like either of us had planned,” Zig says carefully.
Ah. Here it is. Well, she knew they couldn’t avoid this topic forever. It was the whole reason they were here in the first place. Natalie sighs and reluctantly pushes herself upright. Zig looks at her in confusion.
“I can’t have a serious conversation about this when you’re kissing me,” she says.
A telltale smirk creeps across his face. Natalie lightly whacks him with a pillow.
“I saw that,” she laughs.
Zig laughs too, then sits up next to her. They sober almost immediately, the last few weeks weighing on them both.
“How was Japan?” Natalie asks after a moment.
He looks at her in surprise. “It was okay.”
She shakes her head, lacing her fingers with his. “No, really. I want to know,” she says earnestly. “We got here because neither one of us was really listening to the other.”
So he tells her, talks to her about Tokyo and some of the people he’d met over spring break, about how busy and exciting it was. As much as she hates to admit it, as horrible as she feels, her heart sinks a little hearing him talk about it with so much enthusiasm. In the back of her mind, she’d half-hoped that he’d hate Japan, or that she’d hate London. Not that either of those options would necessarily fix things, but… she’d still hoped, thought that maybe it would make some decisions easier.
“Hey,” Zig says, interrupting her thoughts. “You okay?”
“Tokyo sounds incredible,” is her answer.
Zig tilts her chin up, searching her face. Natalie sighs.
“Okay,” she says. “I guess, seeing you show up here and saying you couldn’t do this anymore… I thought that meant you’d hated it there.”
“I didn’t hate it,” Zig says slowly.
“I know,” she says, so quietly she almost can’t hear herself.
Zig raises an eyebrow. “You didn’t hear anything I said for the past sixty seconds, did you?”
“Uh…” she scrambles. She hadn’t. This was what she got for getting too far into her own head.
Zig laughs quietly. “Natalie. I said, yes, Tokyo was amazing. I want to take you there.”
She feels defeated all over again, but Zig keeps his hand on her chin, running his thumb along her jaw.
“I also said I can’t see myself living there,” he continues. “There’s a reason my mother told me I shouldn’t move somewhere sight unseen.”
She frowns, thinking back to seeing his posts on Abbie’s feed. “But your posts… you sounded like you couldn’t wait to go there.”
“I couldn’t, at first,” he agrees. “But I got home, and the more I thought about it, the more I realized I couldn’t see myself there long-term.”
“Oh.” Natalie sits back on the couch, trying to process his words.
Zig sits back with her, his shoulder pressed against hers.
“So… what will you do?” she asks.
“I’m still figuring that out.” He looks at her a little sheepishly. “I’m trying not to jump right into something so big this time.”
She can understand that. “Yeah… I think I need to work on that too.”
Zig slips an arm around her shoulder and she leans into him instinctively.
“What about you?” he asks. “How’s London?”
“It’s fun,” she says. “Different. There’s so much to do and see. The job at Quill would be…”
Natalie laughs a little shakily. “It would be an incredible opportunity. But it’s so far from everyone. Everything.”
“Would you like it?”
Natalie glances out her window at the city sprawling below her. “The job? Yeah. I think I’d love it.”
She looks up at Zig. “But where it is? I honestly don’t know. And I have to let them know soon.”
Zig presses his lips to her hair. “Whatever you decide… I’ll be there for you,” he says. “I want you to be happy.”
“I want you,” she blurts out, the words coming almost without thinking. But she means them.
Frustratingly, she can feel herself start crying again. What she wouldn’t give for an easy answer right now. She wants this job, but she doesn’t want it to be in London. She wants Zig, but she wants him to live somewhere where he’s happy, where they could both be happy.
“Hey, hey,” Zig says. “Natalie. Come here.”
He tucks her legs over his lap and holds her close.
“Can’t someone just tell me what to do?” she asks, her voice muffled against his chest.
He murmurs to her soothingly, running his hand up and down her back, until she tilts her head up to look at him. His expression is so soft and reassuring and familiar that it makes her heart ache. She kisses him slowly, relishing the feel of his lips.
She thinks about London, about home, about Quill, about job offers in the States that she’s looked at late at night, about her friends and her family and Zig. She’s always been somewhat of a homebody. As much as she loves the idea of living abroad… her heart clenches at the thought of being so far away for so long. Maybe someday, she thinks. But now… right now, she realizes, she wants to be home, and that isn’t London.
“What are you thinking about?” Zig asks softly, tucking her hair back.
She cups his face in her hands, feeling a sense of calm wash over her. “I think-no, I know. When this semester is over… I want to go home.”
She hears his sharp inhale, feels it against her cheek.
“You’re sure?” he asks, his brow furrowed.
“I am,” she says resolutely. “London is amazing, but it’s too far. I want to be near my family. My friends. My life.”
She kisses him again, soundly. “I want to be near you.”
“I want to be near you too,” Zig says immediately. “But I want this decision to be for you. I don’t want you to feel like you have to turn this down to be with me.”
“I’m not,” she reassures him. “It’s a lot of things. This is what I want.”
Zig can’t stop the smile from spreading across his face at her words. Neither can she. Natalie slides her legs on either side of his and loops her arms around his neck.
“Zig?”
“Yeah?”
Her heart pounds. God, she’s almost as nervous as the first time she said it to him.
“I love you,” she says in a near whisper.
Zig blinks rapidly. “I love you too, Natalie. I never stopped.”
They’ll have more to figure out in the coming days, she knows. But for now, she feels the most certain about her future she has in a long time. She’s happy, and that’s a good place to start.