I'M YOUR PUPPET; invincible

chapter 3

    He could hear the slight rattle of metal on metal from downstairs—no doubt a sign that Loren was cooking something.

    He pushed up from the bed, running a hand through his hair. As his feet padded against the floor of the home—a home that was so her—he could not help but smile. Even amidst the simplicity of it all.

    He found her, then, in the kitchen. Back to him, her short hair tied into something of an attempted bun. She was dressed in a matching set of shorts and a sports bra, her skin slick with the remnants of sweat.

    He crept across the floor, feet hardly making a sound, before wrapping his arms around her. Pressing her back to his chest, his chest growing warm as she dropped her head back against his shoulder with ease.

    This was all new to them—the relationship and the emotions between them being spoken so openly. So easily. Yet, even with the freshness of it, they acted as if it had always been this way. As if the emotion they felt for one another had always been so tangible and within reach.

    "Did you go on a run?" He asked quietly, lowering his face. His nose brushed the length of her neck, smelling the perfume she always wore.

    Loren nodded. Hummed, "Mhm. Just a light one."

    "You could've woken me up."

    Laughter bubbles from her chest. "You hate running."

    "But I love spending time with you."

    "And you also love spending time sleeping."

    He didn't disagree with her. He loved sleeping and, though he wouldn't say it, part of it was due to the fact that he dreamt of her.

    Almost absentmindedly, his hands dropped from where they wrapped around her. Falling, lowering. Grazing her abdomen before, with a slighted breath, he rested them there.

    A thought came to him, then. It left his lips far before he could think to stop it. "Do you want kids?"

    Mark expected her to stiffen. To pull away and tell him to stop talking. But she didn't. She only tipped her head to the side—still resting against his shoulder—and her nose grazed the side of his neck. She let loose a breath—light, as if the topic did not pain her as he may have thought.

    "I do," Loren murmured quietly. "Want kids. I've always wanted three."

    Mark lifted his head just slightly, just enough to find her green eyes. "Really?"

    "Mhm."

    He could picture it, then. As if it had always lived in his mind, festering and building until it came closer to reality. Close enough for him to picture it in its entirety and realness. In the way that he could imagine the weight of a baby in his arms—a baby with his hair and her eyes.

    He could imagine it. Every bit of it. Finding out she was pregnant and feeling excited. Getting to see her grow with pregnancy and preparing a room just for their child. Being by her side and holding her through labor, watching as she brought a life into the world. Getting to hold their baby, their love in a physical, tangible form.

    "I'd like that," he found himself saying.

    She blinked up at him. "Yeah?"

    "Yeah," he said with a nod, turning her around with his hands on her waist. "I think I'd love it, actually."

    Loren smiled. Small and real and her.

    Some time later, they found themselves fulfilling a promise to Oliver. Dressed in their suits, soaring far ahead of the younger boy, cutting through the sky above the city.