Chapter Text
There are boxes of clementines
in the kitchen and the thing is that
I love you again.1
˚ ✦ . . ˚ . . ✦ ˚ . ★⋆. ࿐࿔
Strap of her bag bites into her shoulder, pinching her tender, slightly sunburnt skin uncomfortably, but Feyre pays it no heed. She weaves through the market stalls with a grace that can only be bestowed upon those who know these plains well. She strolls through slowly, greets the vendors with easy familiarity, because she knows these people, even if it has been two years since she was last here.
In this small village in Northern Italy, time slows, and change is rare. These are the same faces that she greeted every morning for four months, the people that she traded stories with over morning espressos and flaky pastries. The families who did not laugh at her even when her Italian was broken and messy, but taught her the art of language and communication with a patience that she had never been granted as a child.
The sights and sounds and smells are just as vibrant and palpable as she remembers, from the delicately woven baskets to the leather wallets, the rich sun-dried tomatoes to the deep roasted coffee beans. It’s busy and bustling and loud, but Feyre doesn’t care. The sun is warm but not yet strong, and she has not felt this kind of bliss for a long time. She is happy to let the crowd sweep her away.
So perhaps it is fate that lands here, at this exact time, at the very place that they met two years ago, because she has always believed that everything happens for a reason.
Still, she is not expecting to see the face that belongs to the girl that she had once called her friend, the warm brown eyes that land on her and linger in the way eyes do when your consciousness takes a second to catch up. When they do, though, they illuminate in recognition, crinkle at the corners like worn newspaper.
Of course she would be here. Why wouldn’t she be? After all, it was her family’s home that Feyre had spent so many nights in, getting drunk on orange wine and Aperol with her bare feet nestled in the grass.
Feyre peers over the stall, mesmerised by how the silvers and golds catch the light of the morning sun.
“Beautiful, aren’t they,” a soft female voice notes from beside her. Feyre looks toward the owner of the voice to find a beautiful blonde woman, not dissimilar in age to her, gazing down at the jewellery that she herself was just admiring. “I’ve always been more of a gold person myself,” she says conversationally, in a way that makes it seem like they are old friends. Angling her face toward Feyre, the girl then asks, “What about you?”
“Silver,” Feyre replies, and her bangles clink on her wrist as if answering the question themselves when she goes to push her hair out of her face.
“It suits you,” the girl affirms with a smile.
Feyre blushes. “Thank you.”
The girl’s eyes sweep over her, assessing, but not predatory. Merely curious and playful. “I haven’t seen you before. Is this your first time here?”
Feyre nods her head in confirmation. “My first time out of the country, actually. I’m here on an art program.”
“Signora Carlucci?”
“How did you—”
“I’ve met her students all the summers I’ve been coming here,” she tilts her head to the side and her blonde hair cascades across her face. “I’m surprised. She usually likes having boys.”
“Oh, um,” Feyre stutters.
The girl laughs, a light and tinkling sound, but somehow Feyre doesn’t feel like she is laughing at her expense. “It’s a nice change. I’m surrounded by enough boys already, trust me,” she quips with a wink. “I’m Morrigan, but everyone calls me Mor.”
“Feyre,” she returns, warmth settling in her stomach.
Mor’s smile widens imperceptibly. “Nice to meet you, Feyre. Here, hand me your phone so I can give you my number. I don’t want you holed up in that house all day every day, as beautiful as it is.”
Feyre hands Mor her phone with a quiet, “Okay.” Stunned, because she has never made a friend this quickly in her life. Mor taps away happily at Feyre’s screen, and hands the phone back.
“We’re having a barbecue tomorrow night. You should come, if the Carluccis can spare you,” Mor tells her with a sly smile. Feyre finds herself agreeing without even registering the nod of her head. “Great, I’ll see you tomorrow, Feyre!”
“Feyre!” Mor exclaims, and there is a sudden tightness in her chest that persists despite her measured breathing. The blonde crosses over to her, flings her arms around Feyre in that carefree, haphazard way she always used to do, and all Feyre can do is return the gesture tentatively. “I can’t believe you’re back! What are you doing here?”
Feyre tucks her hair behind her ear, only to keep her hands busy. It is a fruitless endeavour, as the breeze undoes the action soon after. “I’m on vacation,” she offers.
Mor’s beaming smile dims imperceptibly. “You should have texted,” she says, soft and bright, but still, something about it breaks Feyre’s heart. “I missed you.”
Feyre swallows tightly. “I’m sorry,” she replies, not yet strong enough to admit to her friend that she missed her too. That she has thought about her, about them, every week for the past two years, wondering if things could have worked out differently.
“It’s okay,” Mor tells her, and her honey eyes soften towards her, telling her that she understands. That she, they, can read between the lines of these unspoken words, that Feyre does not have to fracture her heart and weld it back together all over again. “Where are you staying?”
“In Signora Carlucci’s annex. She’s away the whole month, so she’s asked me to house sit.”
Mor smiles brightly. “I knew you were one of her favourites.”
Silence coats the atmosphere around them and it is an alien, foreign thing to two girls who used to talk and laugh for hours on end. It is not uncomfortable, Feyre thinks, rather unfamiliar.
“Cassian and Azriel are home,” Mor announces after another few short moments of quiet, with the white noise of the buzzing market and the zephyr surrounding them. “I know they’d love to see you, if you want to come and say hi.”
Feyre doesn’t miss how Mor skirts around mentioning her cousin. She wonders how much she knows, what she knows. “That would be nice,” Feyre finds herself agreeing.
Mor beams, and Feyre knows that despite all the hurt, she’d still have given anything to see that smile again. To hear Cassian’s bellowing laugh, to see Azriel’s quiet and contained grin. Her friends, who she’d spent all summer with, who made her feel like a part of their family.
And Rhys… his smile could have brought Feyre to her knees. Memories still so fresh in her mind she can almost taste them.
“How about tonight?” Mor asks. “I know it’s last minute, and you might have plans, but Cass is cooking spaghetti, and you know how terrible his portion control is.”
Feyre doesn’t try to stifle her smile at that, nor at the memory it conjures.
“Feyre!” Cassian booms from the kitchen. “You must come here immediately and taste this sauce for me.”
“Coming!” she announces from the garden, forfeiting her position at the ping-pong table, leaving a huffing and puffing Azriel high and dry.
She sweeps into the kitchen, lands herself next to Cassian’s towering figure as he dips a teaspoon into the bubbling pot on the stove. Sticking it in front of her nose, he instructs her, “Blow on it.”
“Kinky,” she responds with a wink.
“You’re spending too much time with me and Rhys,” he jibes.
She does as she’s instructed, and then lowers her mouth to the spoon to taste the sauce. A cornucopia of flavours erupts on her tongue – rich tomato, spicy chilli, roasted garlic, fresh basil. She closes her eyes and hums, swallowing the sauce and savouring the warmth that trickles down her throat. “Wow.”
“Good, right?”
Feyre nods enthusiastically.
“It’s Rhys’s grandma’s recipe, but everyone knows I do it better than him,” he tries to whisper, but his attempt is futile. Subtlety had never been Cassian’s specialty.
“I heard that!” Rhys calls from the living room as he sorts through the copious display of books stacked on the bookshelves. “Stop trying to corrupt her, Cass.”
“I’m not!” he shouts back, and then, quieter, he adds with a wink, “we all know who Feyre’s favourite is anyway.”
Feyre blushes, and she refuses to look over towards the living room, where she knows Rhysand is still eavesdropping on their conversation.
A sizzling noise emerges from the stove, and both Cassian and Feyre’s attention turn towards the pot of spaghetti, which is boiling over.
“Whoops,” Cassian offers. “Will you drain that for me please?” He bats his eyelashes at Feyre and grins ridiculously.
“You don’t need to do all that,” she mocks him with a light shove. “Pass me the sieve.”
The spaghetti pours out of the pan in endless streams, and there is so much of it that she thinks she might have to get another sieve to fit it all. “Jesus, Cass, you know there’s only five of us, right?”
“What?” he starts, turning around. “Oh, did I cook too much?”
Feyre rests the heaving sieve over the sink and shoots him a deadpan look.
“Well, Feyre,” he shoots her a sly grin. “I hope you like leftovers.”
It’s nice to know that some things never change, Feyre thinks. “If you’re sure it’s not an imposition—”
“Don’t be silly,” Mor interrupts. “We’d love to have you back with us. I’ll see you at seven?”
“I’ll be there,” Feyre confirms.
Satisfied with Feyre’s answer, Mor winks and skips away, her blonde hair rippling over her shoulder with the movement, leaving Feyre alone amongst the early market-goers.
⋆.˚ ☾⭒.˚
Feyre passes the rest of her time in the morning busying herself with all the chores Signora Carlucci left her to do whilst she and her husband were away. She waters the indoor plants, feeds the cats and the chickens, sorts the mail, sets the sprinkling system on in the garden. She still marvels at the size and beauty of the estate. Each corner of the house kept its own little secret, from the centuries-old mosaic on the atrium floor to the sparkling chandelier in the living room. Feyre could see why Signora Carlucci would pay good money to have somebody look after her home.
Feyre wasn’t greedy by any means, had even initially refused to accept the money that her former teacher had offered her, saying that it was enough that she got to stay there for free, but she was a stubborn and persistent lady. It was a battle Feyre knew she was never going to win.
She paints in the garden in the afternoon, picks a partially shaded spot beneath the great weeping willow. The dappled sunlight lands in honeyed drops on her canvas and she paints the simple scene in front of her: the wrought iron dining table and chairs with their chipped white paint, russet hues bleeding into the paintwork from the rust. The backs of the chairs are intricately swirled and they cast twisted shadows on the cropped grass beneath them. Shadows that remind her of the tattoos of three men she used to know.
Signora Carlucci had left Feyre all her art supplies to use freely, and Feyre chose the rich, decadent oil paints that she could never have afforded on her own. The wind dances through her hair and rustles the leaves of the weeping willow, making the sunlight sparkle before her.
She’s always thought that this place was magical. It still feels like a dream that she is here again.
In the evening, Feyre slips on a long dress – a light, woven cotton in a pale shade of blue that doesn’t stick to her skin in the cruel Italian heat. She lets her freshly washed hair flow freely down her back, dabs on a little makeup and perfume, and spends far too long staring at her reflection in the mirror for someone who has never cared too deeply about the way she looks.
The sun still beats down with unrelenting strength, but the ten-minute walk across the village and up the driveway to the villa is mercifully shaded by worn, crumbling buildings and magnificently tall trees. Gravel in the driveway crunches under her feet, and she notes the two cars lined up in the driveway, a rental car from the airport which must be Cass and Az’s, and Mor’s little Fiat 500. No black four-seat convertible, confirming what she’d already guessed from Mor’s earlier invitation.
She finds herself underneath the great stone archway, greeted with the deep, rich brown of the wooden front door with its heavy black iron knocker. A bunch of wildflowers she’d picked up from the local florist earlier this morning wrapped in parchment paper resides in her right hand, and her left, shaky and wavering, reaches up toward the door. The metal of the knocker is surprisingly cool underneath her fingers, and without any more second-guessing, she knocks three times.
To her relief, it is Mor who answers the door. “You came!” she notes excitedly. “Oh, I’m so happy you’re here Feyre. Cass and Az are beside themselves.”
Her heart thuds against her ribcage, and her sweaty palms cannot only be attributed to the scorching heat. “They are?”
Mor smiles. “Well, Cassian is. Azriel’s joy and excitement is a little more contained, as you can imagine. Are those for me?” she gestures to the bunch of flowers in Feyre’s hand.
“Oh, yes, sorry,” she stumbles, handing over the bouquet. “I bought them at the market this morning after you invited me here.”
Mor lowers her nose to the bouquet and closes her eyes, blonde hair sweeping down in front of her face. “Wildflowers are my favourite.”
“I know,” Feyre responds, blushing. “I remember.” I remember everything, she itches to add.
Mor lowers the bouquet and there is kindness and a slight sense of nostalgia in her eyes when she says, “Thank you, they’re beautiful. Come in.”
She and Mor make small talk on the short walk into the kitchen, chatting about when they got to Italy and how long they were planning on staying, and then Mor opens the kitchen door and starts to step into the threshold, and Feyre wavers. Nervous, now, to see these boys, and worried that it’s been too long, that she’s changed too much, or they’ve changed too much—
“You coming?” Mor probes, looking at Feyre expectantly over her shoulder.
“Yeah,” she breathes shakily, and then, in a steadier voice, “let’s go.”
“Boys!” Mor starts to announce. “Feyre’s—”
“FEYRE!” Cassian’s deep, booming voice shouts from the other side of the archway that leads into the living room. When he emerges, he is sporting a grin so wide it must be hurting his cheeks, and Feyre can only smile back. His joy had always been an infectious thing.
Clearly unperturbed by the many months that have passed since he last saw her, he launches toward her, smothers her in a bear hug that makes it difficult to breathe. “My sauce-tasting connoisseur. I can’t believe you’re really here.”
He lets her go, eventually, but not before Feyre’s arms had wrapped around him too. “It’s nice to see you, Cassian,” she says. It sounds strangely foreign on her tongue.
“Cassian?” he echoes. “No need for the formalities, Fey Fey. Don’t forget, we’ve all seen each other in our underwear,” he teases with a wink.
Feyre remembers that all too well. Sunny day in June, only three weeks after she’d met them, and she’d arrived at the villa in the afternoon without any swimwear. They were all in the pool already, but strangely, none of them had swimwear on either. No, they were stripped down to their underwear, splashing and laughing, and Cassian had come up behind her, picked her up and dumped her unceremoniously into the pool in her sundress. She’d laughed despite the water that had shot up her nose, and had taken her dress off so that it could dry in the sun.
Before she can start to get too shy about the memory, Azriel appears behind Cassian and offers her a discreet smile. “Hi, Feyre,” he says in that soft, rumbling voice of his, and to her surprise, he steps towards her and envelopes her in his strong arms. Az never had been known for physical shows of affection, so it stuns Feyre into near-silence.
“Hi,” she returns shyly, stepping out of his embrace when his arms drop.
And when Cassian loops his arm through Feyre’s and announces she’s going to help him make a salad because Morrigan is useless (earning him a glare from said woman), she cannot remember why she was worried to begin with.
⋆.˚ ☾⭒.˚
The evening passes much quicker than Feyre had expected. Conversation and wine flow freely, and there are no awkward silences or stilted pauses. With every minute that passes, Feyre feels herself relax infinitesimally.
She learns about their lives now, what each of them are doing since she last saw them. Learns that Mor is training to become a lawyer, and Azriel is doing a master’s degree, and Cassian started teaching kickboxing classes which led him to owning his own gym. Mercifully, no one mentions Rhys, and Feyre wonders if there is an agreement, spoken or unspoken, between them not to talk about him.
She still wonders, of course, and he lingers between the lines of their conversation, even if he isn’t brought up by name. She wonders, too, why they are here without him. Wonders if she’ll see him at all in the month that she’s here for.
Azriel’s phone rings from across the room, and he excuses himself to pick up the call whilst Cassian, Feyre and Mor start to clear the dirty dishes off the table. Az returns five minutes later, and when Cass asks who was on the phone, he shifts awkwardly and looks to Feyre with a somewhat guilty expression before he says, “It was Rhys.”
Even just the mention of his name has her heart jumping in her throat.
“What did he want?” Mor asks warily.
“He… he’s on his way here. Driving through the village now.”
It’s Mor’s turn to look at Feyre now, panic and shock written all across her face.
“I thought he wasn’t coming for another week?” Cassian asks.
“I thought so too. He’s been allowed the whole month here, though. Apparently he can work from home, or something. He was going to surprise us, but knowing the two of you he wanted to check the house was still standing before he arrived.”
Feyre stands utterly still, finding it hard to breathe. “Does he know I’m here?” she squeaks.
“I didn’t mention it,” Azriel replies, and she almost whispers her thanks to the man that she had always trusted to be discreet.
“I should go,” she announces.
“No, Feyre, please—please don’t go. I’m sorry, I didn’t know—”
She plasters a smile on her face and turns to Mor. “It’s fine, I know you didn’t know.”
“Stay for dessert?” Cassian pleads. “I made tiramisu.”
She falters, because she’s always had a weak spot for Cassian’s desserts, and he’s clearly made an effort with tonight’s dinner. “I—”
Nearby sound of gravel beneath rubber cuts through the room, and she’s too late, too late, and there is silence in the kitchen for the first time in the evening as Mor’s eyes dart around the room and Cassian busies himself with the dishes and Azriel presses his fingertips to his lips.
The car door opens, and then shuts, and then the front door is creaking on its hinges, and Feyre’s heart is beating double time.
“Surprise!” she hears from the hallway, voice muffled by thick stone walls. The kitchen door starts to creep open, and Feyre braces herself. “I bet you weren’t expecting—”
Rhys pauses in the doorway, and she knows she is the first thing he sees, because his eyes been stuck on her since he opened that door. For a few long moments, there is just silence whilst they hold each other’s stare.
“Feyre,” he croaks, voice broken. “What—”
She springs into action quicker than she thought possible. “I’m really sorry,” she says, breaking his gaze even though his has not faltered once. “I have to… I have to go and feed the cats.” It is a feeble lie, but they have the grace not to call her out on it. “Thank you for dinner, it was lovely.”
“You’ll come for tiramisu another time?” Cassian offers gently.
A pained smile pulls at her lips. “Of course.”
She starts to move towards the door where Rhys is still stood, still looking anywhere but him.
“I’ll walk you out,” Mor announces, and turns hot on Feyre’s heels.
Feyre doesn’t look at Rhys as she walks past, not even as he steps out of the way for her, not even when she can still feel his eyes burning into the back of her skull.
“I’m sorry,” Mor says quietly when they’re outside and the front door has shut. “I would’ve told you if I knew. Really.”
“I know,” Feyre tells her. “It’s okay, I promise, I just—I wasn’t expecting him and I… I need—”
“I understand,” Mor saves her from her rambling, and something eases in her chest, even though she still doesn’t know what Mor knows, and why she might understand. “You’ll come back though, won’t you?”
“Yeah,” Feyre breathes, but the word feels empty. She didn’t think his presence could still affect her this much, and she is weaker than she remembers.
Mor takes her hand, squeezes it, and the gesture is as comforting as it is heartbreaking. “Please come back. We really did miss you.” He eyes are sad when she adds, “Rhys did too.”
It sends fissures all across Feyre’s fragile heart. “Mor,” she breathes, somewhat of a warning.
“I know, I know,” the blonde reassures. “But this house is always home to you, and we will always welcome you with open arms.”
“Thank you,” she rasps, and overcome with emotion, she wraps her arms around her friend, because she supposes she can call her that again, and Mor reciprocates the gesture.
“Do you want me to walk you home?”
Feyre shakes her head. “It’ll be good for me, to clear my head.”
“Okay. Text me when you get home, okay?”
“I will,” Feyre confirms, bidding Mor goodnight with a tight smile that is mirrored on her friend’s face.
She turns around, and she doesn’t look back as she makes her way down the gravel driveway.
˚ ✦ . . ˚ . . ✦ ˚ . ★⋆. ࿐࿔
I say “again” because
I don’t know how to say
I never stopped.1
1The Side Effects of Eating too Many Clementines, Alessia De Cesare