A/N: I really thought I was done with the AE/AU arc (that takes place from Stellarlune 37 onward) but lately the idea of telling it from Keefe's perspective has been on my mind. I thought it might be interesting to explore his thoughts and emotions and how they led to what happened between him and Sophie. My mind couldn't let it go, so I finally decided to just write it!
***Just a reminder, this arc (in 4 chapters this time) gets a little spicy, but also shows how Keefe's struggle before and after the 'incident' is both similar and different compared to Sophie's. And again...spicy, occasionally, but NEVER explicit.
Keefe had never, in all his years of knowing Sophie, been as surprised by her as he was when she appeared outside his hotel room that night with Dex and Tam.
Dripping rain water all over the carpet.
And as she lunged forward and threw her arms around him, he didn't even care that she was soaking wet. He just wrapped his arms around her waist and held on tight.
Oh, how he'd missed her.
After a moment—during which they broke apart and he ushered all three of them into his suite—Keefe began to realize that her emotions felt different, somehow. He hadn't realized right away, since his own emotions had swelled up at seeing her again.
She was somehow both happy and sad at the same time. Excited but wary.
And...fluttery?
But maybe that was just nerves. Feeling awkward because he'd left her that letter.
That was probably all it was.
But then when he turned to look at them more closely, they were all shivering from the cold—Sophie especially.
So he pulled himself together and tried very hard not to be hopeful.
"I'd ask if you guys missed me," he said with a smirk, "but I know Tammy Boy didn't, and I assume Dex did a little, and I can definitely feel how much Foster missed me." He beckoned them to follow him as he headed toward the bedroom. "I also assume you're here for a reason, so why don't you change into some dry clothes before we talk?"
"Oh, yes please," Dex agreed. Tammy shrugged but looked like he'd love to be wearing dry clothes, even if he did have to borrow them from Keefe.
"Good, because Foster's practically turning blue."
Keefe felt Sophie's gratitude, only it felt so warm and her flutters picked up again.
Did she...?
He was afraid to even think it as he glanced at her. There was a strange sort of longing in her expression and he didn't know what to make of it.
Or...he was afraid to take it at face value, anyway.
So he quickly looked away and turned to rummage through the dresser, pulling out clothes for each of them.
"Jeans are super uncomfortable, so I'll just grab some pajama pants and t-shirts. Foster, I'm sorry, they'll be a bit big on you, but if you don't mind wearing mens' pajama pants you'll be a lot warmer."
Keefe let Dex and Tam take turns using the bedroom to change, but showed Sophie to the bathroom.
The hotel's laundry service had dropped off his clean laundry earlier that evening. It was still sitting neatly folded in a laundry basket on the couch, so he set aside the clothes and brought the empty basket over by the bathroom just as Sophie was opening the door. But then...
She walked out of the bathroom, self-consciously tugging at the hem of the over-large t-shirt. The clothes were big and baggy on her, and yet somehow, she had never looked more attractive. Keefe couldn't quite place it, but it felt oddly intimate, somehow, seeing her wear clothes that were technically his.
He hadn't expected that and was momentarily caught off guard, his imagination trying to go places he refused to acknowledge. He felt his cheeks warm and hoped she wouldn't notice. Forcing himself to focus, he cleared his throat. "We can go to the laundry room and toss these in a dryer," he explained. "So when you leave again, you'll have dry clothes."
But just saying those words was so hideously painful, he knew that when she was ready to leave, he'd be begging her to let him return with her.
In truth, he'd known it from the moment he'd opened the door and seen her standing there.
Her mood shifted downward at the same time his did, even if she tried to hide it while tossing her rain-soaked clothes into the hamper.
She'd missed him. He'd known she would—he knew he was one of her closest friends, even one of her favorite people, though not quite ever in the way he wanted—but still, it was hard for him to see the evidence of that on her face.
So he set the basket down and stepped closer to her. "I've really missed you," he whispered.
And then there was no mistaking the way she got very fluttery and her face flushed with color as she whispered back, "I've really missed you too."
Could it really be?
Had his letter brought her 'out of the oblivion', as Ro would put it?
Had she realized she felt the same way?
He tried to fight down the hope rising in his chest, but he was struggling with it this time. "Sophie?" He asked, looking in her eyes, searching her face as though the answer would be written there.
But before Keefe could figure it out, Tam stepped out of the bedroom and said, "Okay, where's this laundry room?"
Keefe sighed and stepped back, reluctantly tearing his eyes from Sophie's. Tam and Dex were both heading over to dump their wet clothes into the basket.
Keefe couldn't care less about them borrowing his clothes.
So why did seeing Sophie in them make his heart race?
Snap out of it, he told himself sternly.
"It's in the basement of the building," he answered Tam. "I could have the front desk come get it, I pay for laundry service, but elven clothes might attract their attention, so we'd better do it ourselves. Not that I know how. And I think you need human coins to put in the dryer to get it to work."
"I can handle that!" Dex said. "Human tech is pretty easy to manipulate."
"You need Foster to show you how to work a dryer?" Keefe asked, smirking at Sophie. Please say no.
"Way more fun if I figure it out on my own," Dex said cheerfully.
"Well I'm coming with you," Tam said. "I gotta see this. I don't even know what a dryer is."
Foster giggled and made to follow them, but Keefe reached for her hand. "Can you hang back with me?" he asked quietly. "They'll only be gone a couple of minutes and then I assume you'll get to whatever it is that brought you here." He was going to have to figure this out.
He couldn't bear to let himself feel this hopeful just to eventually discover that he'd miscalculated.
She smiled up at him as Tam and Dex left the room without her.
"But first..." He stepped closer to her and put his arms around her, hugging her again.
Partly because he wanted to and partly to see how her emotions would react.
Foster's emotions were always stronger than everyone else's. But she was aware of this and usually tried to hold back, control them when he was around, because she worried about overwhelming him.
But as she wrapped her arms around his shoulders, hugging him back, it almost felt like she was letting go. Intentionally allowing herself to feel everything she was feeling, without restraint.
And while there was an undercurrent of some less pleasant emotions—sadness, frustration, maybe even some anger—they weren't the bulk of what she was feeling. He didn't have a clue if they even pertained to him or if they were a result of something else entirely.
But mostly she was putting off so much warmth. She was feeling fluttery, but it was more than that.
Somehow jittery and at home, excited and comfortable, all at the same time.
There was that strange mixture of happiness and longing that felt all too familiar to him, because it was how he always felt when he was around her. So happy to be near her, yet also longing to be closer.
Something had definitely changed over the last few weeks, and Keefe didn't know exactly how or why. And there was time to ask all about that later. But right now?
He pulled back slightly, looking at her in wonder, especially when he saw the warmth reflected in her brown eyes. "Sophie..."
But that was all he could get out. He was so wholly overcome with emotion—with joy—that he found himself feeling a bit choked up.
And that was okay.
He didn't need words right now.
So he did the most natural thing in the world.
He kissed her.
And it was everything he ever hoped it would be, yet also so much more.
To feel how perfectly aligned their emotions were.
At last.
After all the waiting, and the hoping, and the hurting.
To finally be able to hold her close, not just as a friend giving another friend a comforting hug like they'd done so many times before, but truly holding her, forming this new connection as he felt her soft lips against his own...
He drew her in even closer and her arms tightened around his neck. He knew that she was experiencing the same joy, the same bliss.
He could feel it.
And also, apparently, the same lack of awareness of the passage of time, because before they knew it, there was a knock on the door.
Tam and Dex were back.
So they broke apart, and Keefe barely managed to tear his eyes away from Foster as he opened the door.
They all went to sit down and Foster began to explain everything they'd discovered. If it hadn't been for the kiss they'd just shared—and the adorable blush she couldn't hide—the news she was giving him would have been overwhelming.
How did his mom just keep getting worse?
Then he explained that his Empathy seemed to have settled back down to its usual level. He could feel Sophie's emotions without contact—he gave her a small smirk as he said that—but couldn't feel Dex's or Tam's. However, his newer abilities seemed to have sort of gone numb.
And Tam removed the shadowflux from Keefe's heart.
As they discussed what to do next, trying to figure out where to dump the shadowflux and what the next move should be, Keefe felt Foster's mood start to plummet.
But he had no idea why. Had he said something? He didn't remember saying anything upsetting, and hadn't heard Dex or Tam say anything either.
But when Keefe took Foster's hands in his and tried to make her promise not to hold on to any of the mysterious power source, he felt it more clearly. A deep grief and disappointment were taking hold.
It made Keefe queasy.
Did she regret the kiss?
Had she just missed him, and gotten caught up in the moment and kissed him without thinking? And now she wished she hadn't?
But that didn't really make sense. He didn't think he'd misread her emotions to that degree.
Right?
So even while he begged her to destroy the power source, nervous but determined to stop his mom at all costs, he felt his own mood shifting downward in response to hers. He was worried, now, that he'd somehow already lost her, and it made him desperately sad.
He looked at her, hoping his expression conveyed his confusion, wanting to find a way to talk things through with her.
But for some reason he felt a spike of anger from her after they locked eyes.
How had he possibly screwed things up so fast?
And how could he fix it?
Keefe got up reluctantly and showed Tam where his trash can was, had Tam put the shadowflux in an empty water bottle, and put the trash out in the hall.
Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Dex and Foster talking in hushed whispers.
"Well...I guess we're done," Tam said as he and Keefe walked back over to them. "As soon as our clothes are dry we can get out of here."
"Yeah...thanks again for the weird Shade tricks," Keefe mumbled, not looking at Tam. He was watching Sophie and Dex, trying to figure out what they were discussing that had her emotions fluctuating.
Were they talking about him?
Dex, without taking his eyes off Sophie, asked Tam if he wanted to go sneak in to watch a human movie rather than just sit around waiting on their clothes to dry.
Tam looked skeptical. "It's not like we'll understand what they're saying," he pointed out.
"Oh, yeah, I know English, but I guess you don't. But...might be fun anyway." Dex replied pointedly.
Ah. He must have picked up on the tension between Keefe and Sophie.
Great.
Keefe heard Tam agree, and they decided to go out for a couple of hours and explore London.
Dex, in a suspiciously nonchalant voice, said "Sophie, you should stay here, tell Keefe about everything else that's been going on."
And then they were gone, out the door again.