triangularity | Open RP post for Maggie Garcia

"I'm invading in your world, Maggie," he murmurs softly, stroking his knuckles lightly along her cheek, showing a delicacy towards her that very few other people have ever experienced from him. But for her, it's a part of who he is now.

He nods at that, leaning in to kiss her temple. "I'm with you to support you and whatever you need... and maybe become the next hottest thing in zombie eradication but first making sure you're okay," he says with a grin.

"We'll help them. Okay? We. Together."

And he knows he will. He's learned working together and he's learned leaping from one world to another. He can handle this.

She closes her eyes, leaning against him. "Love you. So glad you're here. Alaric might be prickly and overprotective of me for a little while, but he should be okay once he's had chance to see how good you are to me."

Seth might be in for an uncomfortable first week or two at Maggie's, but she trusts Alaric to get with the program eventually.

"Promise you'll stay right here if I fall asleep?" She'd like to wake up to the immediate reminder that she hasn't lost him after all. That she didn't dream him appearing in her room.

"What? Someone finds me worrisome and side eyes me? I've never lived with that for all my life," he teases, knowing he's going to deal with suspicion from a lot of people. Especially given it's obvious they have feelings for one another. If they're going to show others that.

"So how are you going to explain this? Me? Us. Any of it." He pauses before adding. "Or do I have to be a good boy around others until we've had time to prove our feelings?"

He hates the idea. He hates it so much but he hasn't lost her, so if that's what he has to do, so be it.

"Of course," he says, pressing a kiss to her brow and then to her lips tenderly. "I'm not going anywhere any time soon."

"Easy enough." She snuggles into his side, head resting on his shoulder. "I do try to keep my new relationships out of the public eye until they've had a chance to get at least somewhat serious. It's a well-known fact that I hate the Garcia heiress media circus. And some people I've dated have been even more averse to it. I think only a couple people knew Buffy and I were together before she died. I always felt a little like a secret agent, dating her."

So really, it's fine. No pretending to care less than he does. "No one but Alaric, who's interested in me and likely to protest as much because he's hurt as because he's protective, will be too surprised."

She wasn't with Seth before her last trip home, so she had no reason to tell Alaric anything about him before. She hasn't seen Alaric since she was dumped out of Wonderland and back into her room at the Agora yesterday, let alone since Seth showed up. There was no way Maggie could have predicted this.

"I haven't had the chance to catch up with Shaun or Georgia yet, so I don't know if they remember you."

It does make it easier.

"Good. I mean, I guess I could have tried but we both know how crap I am about hiding my emotions. Someone would look at you wrong and we both know I'd have something to say about it." Which brings up another point that he guesses he's needs to think about. "I'll try and not do it with Alaric. No promises, but I'll do my best."

Which might mean he can actually say nothing, or he'll defend himself, and Maggie, and cause a whole world, or two, of trouble.

There's a smile at that though. "I hadn't thought about them yet. If they don't, we'll handle it. And I mean that," he says, leaning in to kiss her softly. "We. Together. We handled Wonderland, we can handle this."

"Last time I was here, it seemed like Alaric and I were starting something. But then I went back to Wonderland. And fell for you. I haven't seen him since I got home this time." So please be as gentle as you can with the man who helped put Maggie back together after Dave died.

"Let me sleep for a few, then we should probably face my parents and Mahir." She's exhausted, but it's so nice having him here.

"How long do they think you were gone?"

He hates asking it because depending on how long its been, he knows her parents were likely hurting, but it also is important in the grand scheme of how bad this could be with Alaric.

"Because if it's been a while, not much cover is needed. Love at first sight or something," he says, smiling a bit. He never could make things that easy for anyone but only she knows that. "But if its been like no time... he's going to be hurt no matter what I do."

Because he's going to maybe think she was leading him on.

"I wasn't gone any time at all, and he's going to be hurt, and I hate it." She turns her face to press it into his shoulder.

"He deserves better, but it's not like I can explain that I was living in another world for a year and fell in love with someone there. He would just be more upset that I'm making up transparent lies as excuses. I'm very glad you're here, regardless, but I'm dreading telling Alaric. I'm going to give him as close to the truth as I can. That I'm sorry, and I love you, and I thought we weren't going to be in each other's lives anymore, but you showed up and took care of me while I was recovering."

"If you want, you can put the blame on me," he offers. He's used to being the one to blame, so setting it up so that this Alaric hates him and not her doesn't bother him all that much.

"Maybe tell him I couldn't handle things, it got too serious or something for me and I bolted. But then, thinking about living without you..."

And that there is the truth. He couldn't imagine living without her and he hates the idea of that. Maybe that's how, somehow, they found themselves here together.

"So I came back and begged you for a second chance. Then it doesn't seem to come out of nowhere? You know him well enough to know what might make it easier, at least."

He'd rather worry about it being easier for her, but he's learned enough to know he has to think about her friends and how she'd take care of them.

"Don't need you to be a scapegoat, darling. But thank you. I'm definitely going to claim we'd broken up for some reason, and that you came running when you found out I'd been hurt. But I think there's a middle ground that doesn't entail you unilaterally running out on me." She tips her head to rest on his shoulder again and sighs.

"I'm exhausted," she admits.

He snorts at that, stroking his hand along her arm. Just needing to keep her close to him.

"The truth is that there is a time I would have problem done just that," he admits in a soft voice. Before her. Before Chloe and Lucifer and his bonds in another world that wasn't his own. Before Wonderland.

Not that even he would, he had. More than once, if he was honest.

Bend up slowly, he kisses against her hair softly. "Then go to sleep," he whispers softly. "I'll be right here with you."

Maggie stands by what she says about being too squeamish for ribs. Two years on the Barge, plus Flotilla, but she still shies away from any meat that comes from a mammal.

But collard greens and peach cobbler she can manage, and she adds roast chicken and mashed potatoes. Maggie doesn't do anything without thinking through her angles. This isn't an impulsive question, and Raylan deserves something special if she's going to ask it. Whatever his response.

She focuses on cooking rather than the low thrum of nerves, and she'll be there to greet him with open arms as soon as he's through the door. "Hey, darling."

Raylan never minded when dinner didn't have red meat, understanding her issue with it completely, and was always just happy to eat her food. It warmed him just as much as it filled his stomach, gave him a peace that he didn't get often without pancakes and Willa across from him. So when he got her invitation, there was no hesitation in accepting her very kind offer.

He didn't get a lot of meals with company sometimes and he really did enjoy it.

"Hey yourself," he says warmly as he steps into her hug, wrapping his arms around her and pressing a kiss into her hair, not eager to let her go. Her hugs were just as magical as her smiles. She'd already reassured him that everything was alright, so he trusted that, and stayed light.

"It smells amazin' in here."

Raylan is always such an appreciative audience.

Maggie laughs, muffled against him. "You're worth spoiling. We should eat before it gets cold," although she doesn't let go quite yet. Instead, she pulls him down for a kiss. She can never quite resist that, given the opportunity. She spent so long worrying about her virus, building careful walls to keep her people safe. Kisses are special.

He's easily pulled down and enthusiastic about kissing her, humming as it breaks with a broad smile. Kisses were always special; he knew how much the gesture of it alone meant to her and it didn't hurt that they shared a love of each other.

"I think you might be a little bias on that opinion but I'll take it and fight the judge in court over it. Lead the way, darlin'."

He would follow dutifully behind and take a seat at the place she gestures him towards with a low whistle at the spread.

"Let me do dishes afterwards? Least I can do after all your effort."

"You can do the dishes," she agrees without protest, "although I make no promises I won't stand behind you being distracting."

Fair warning.

She gestures him to sit while she sets the last of their dinner on the table, leaning over his shoulder to kiss his cheek and murmur, "Love you," before she joins him.

And she'll wait until the dinner is well underway before she says, "So, I've been thinking and I want to ask you about something."

"You're a distraction no matter where you are," he says, flirting shamelessly with his broad, endearing grin. Manners abound, he doesn't touch anything until she's sat with her, eyes glittering happily over his smile and the "Love you too" that follows hers. But once she's sat down, Raylan digs in, showing his enthusiasm for a good meal the best and only way how - by tucking in.

That and he didn't exactly eat the best or the most often, so he was almost perpetually peckish if not outright hungry.

"Should I be scared?" He was only teasing though - Maggie almost never dropped something heavy on him.

"Nothing bad, but important." She looks uncharacteristically nervous for a second before she goes ahead and dives in. "We're going to get into all the logistics if you say yes, but first, I want your initial impression. And any answer is okay."

She takes a slow breath, but her voice and her gaze are steady when she asks, "How would you feel about something more permanent? If what's between us isn't just on the Barge?"

It's that look of nervousness in hand with her emphasis on 'important' that has him wiping and clearing his mouth, brow furrowed gently in his attention on her as she lays out all the addendums and 'just in case's. He's set out enough of those himself to recognize them.

But what she suggests is so far out of left field of his expectation that he has to blink a little.

"I-" He would love something more permanent but he didn't dare get his hopes up too much as to how far that statement really went. There were a lot of things to contend with, not least of which was her virus, her commitments and her connections here. Of course he wanted that, a hint of, a chance at what Mason and Maggie had been able to find, with all the trust he had for her that she wouldn't turn around and leave him because she couldn't handle worrying about him out on the job. Maggie's dealt with worse, Maggie trusts in his ability to take care of himself. Maggie only every made him better.

"I would be interested to hear what depends on it. Is that somethi- I mean; are you sure? Your family, your parents -" Let's get into those logistics.

"I can't leave my world behind completely. It would destroy my parents and fuck up my team. But if I work out communication and transportation, I could have a home base somewhere else. I could be in touch with them all the time. I could go back for nice long visits, then come home to you." Say the word, and she'll work on sorting things out to make it possible.

"Iris could probably manage a lot of the logistics of that. She isn't the settling down sort, but she loves me and she eats impossibilities for breakfast." The one thing she has to be up front about is, "It's not safe until I have a deal, to take care of the virus. But I think most of it could be managed other ways. If it's something you want too."

It was a spark of hope in his chest he hadn't left room for previously as Maggie asks if it's something he wanted. Everything was complicated - his world wasn't without it's own, but they were less life or death and more Ex's and Oh's. Less complicated. Less important too - he didn't doubt that Maggie would handle Winona with easy, venomous grace.

Dinner was momentarily forgotten about, utensils weightless and barely there in his hands as he watches her from across the table.

"It's somethin' I've wanted since you told me I could stay. After Mason." Her accepting him for him after all that was a massive thing for Raylan. Maggie made a safe space for him without looking down on him for needing one. "I-.. I don't know that I can wait here-" He wanted to be fully honest with her. "But I can wait."

Would that be good enough? Could she handle that amid everything else that was going on with this offer, with this life on the Barge?

Maggie reaches out, taking his fork and setting it down so she can pull his hand toward her and lean in to kiss it.

"If you need to leave, it's okay. But we'll make a plan for that too. I may not be able to visit, but I'll have Iris relay messages for me. Letters and silly video recordings. I can get dropped off not too long after, from your perspective, even if I'm here a long time. But I don't want you wondering - what's going on in my life, am I still planning a future with you... you deserve to know all of that for sure. You deserve to see and hear that I'm thinking of you."

Raylan lets her move him, watching her like she was made of light and goodness, a hint of reservation and hesitation behind it all, but that should be expected. Plenty of people had promised him this, alluded to it, strung him along on the hope that if he just hung in there, he'd be rewarded with their company and their love. Something to come home to, something to live for. Of course, Raylan Givens would go on living without something other than his job to live for, he wasn't built to quit, but he'd rather not be lonely.

Not if he get the chance to be happy.

"I'd like that. I know me steppin' out means I miss everythin' here but-" Well he had a lot of reasons. A lot of deep rooted in his soul reasons. "I'd love to see you, even if it has to be in video for a little bit."

He could start looking for a house, something he thought might be to her liking -

"I-.. If we do this. When you're.. there with me, in Miami. Will it be just you and me?"

"I'm not going to forget about you, or move on, just because you're not on board anymore, darling," she promises, tone light but gaze steady on his. She gives his hand a squeeze. "And I'll make sure you know it."

As for his question, Maggie hums in consideration. "Other relationships, you mean? I'm fine with not adding any new ones, if you'd rather not? I don't feel the need to go looking, if I have someone to share my life with. But I'd feel... honestly, awful, asking Iris to help with logistics for this, and then breaking up with her. She deserves better. I can't use her and make her feel like she doesn't matter." Iris, especially, Maggie can't break up with over this. But missing Tim is still an ache, even if he never wants to stay still long enough to share her home; she'd like snatches of time with him. She's had a year to come to terms with that. And Fitz is just starting to think about a future. She'd like to be a part of it, at least occasionally.

"Would you be okay with me having intermittent visits with the few people I'm already involved with? In a perfect world, I'd love being able to cook dinner or breakfast for all of us if someone stops by Miami to see me. But what do you want, or need? You feeling comfortable matters to me."

Edited 2024-02-25 08:01 (UTC)

[The first package Maggie sends Raylan after he leaves contains a handful of polished stones in rich blues and greens, a delicately carved wooden goose in flight with its wings outstretched, a packet of tea, half a dozen gold-dusted chocolate truffles, a little gold key without any corresponding lock... and a video file, which will explain the seemingly random assortment.]

This month's flood is absolute fairy tale nonsense. Saying nice things summons up nice things, and vice versa. Like those stories where jewels and pearls or snakes and bugs would pop into existence. Since I'm not feeling particularly spiteful, I'm having a great time.

It's also been good for some over-the-top romance, and I didn't think you should miss out just because you're not here. I know we don't really do poetry together in this life, but I was thinking of Mason and his Mags. So I figured I'd try this and see what turns up. For old time's sake. And for future.

[She'll give him a crooked smile before she raises a book and reads the same poem Mags read Mason that first night she took him home, right before they kissed: Wild Geese, by Mary Oliver. Every once in awhile she has to reach out and catch something as she speaks.]

I'm good at carving out exactly the sort of place I want for myself, but I could be happy in lots of places. You're the place I'm choosing. I can't wait to see what that looks like, darling.

Open RP post for Maggie Garcia

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For Raylan (roads not taken)

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After Raylan leaves the Barge