ailerons | sb: au inbox.

long time no snowball

( hashtag no homo, naturally. you don't go to a back-alley club and expect a follow-up with the man you sort of fucked through the tight cunt of a sloe-eyed woman bodying both their dicks in fat, churning tandem, which means danny never questioned who jake was until he was two weeks post-nut, post-high, belated clarity.

opportunity calls. so: )

you knew that whole fuckin time didn't you

[ It's not an immediate reply. Twenty minutes, stretching almost to the thirty mark, before: ]

Yup.

[ One word, full stop. Yeah, he knew. Didn't stop Jake from grabbing him by the scruff of the neck when Danny licked into his mouth, his smile warping the shape of the kiss. Like it was all just another set-up to another larger, more brutal joke. ]

Been staying here long?

[ Easy breezy. Almost small talk, even. ]

( twenty-six minutes, thirty-two seconds. okay, cunt. noted. )

long enough to kiss your ex on her pretty lips

( both lips. )

you two cruising for a third any time soon? i still swallow
jake
is it jacob or jake

Jake.

[ Also, ]

She's not my ex.

You know, you're going to have to refresh my memory, because I remember you having better manners than this, [ Well. Whatever the hell passed for better manners, anyway. ] Dan.

[ Like a little punchline. Like Jake's grinning along the wires. ]

Saw you first, free man.

[ Did she? Doesn't matter. Jake elicits in her the fast-car, open-highway feeling, always doubled any time she plays her cards actually right and sees a stranger's expression crumple upon realizing the rich-girl ditz in dance shoes might just have a real good poker face. Of all the secrets that bend ballerina body toward trouble, though —

This one's never made her scared. Only sure they have a similar ability to wield a smile like a lockpick. But then he went away, and she hates that he went away. Did he really do anything so awful as to require prison? It had all seemed so melodramatic. It's all just stuff. Money and property flow around here more prolifically than champagne.

(Maybe she should identify herself, but nah.) ]

my bad jake, hard to keep track

( also times two, tit for tat: )

did i? i didn't realize copping a handful of your dick or a mouthful of your jizz counted as better manners

( nice dick. hard and barely flagging, less than a quarter of his effort spent in the mouth of the woman danny never bothered to learn the name of, either, before he held out his tongue and she passed it on to him like an heirloom: here you go, son. his reward for better manners, maybe. )

You know, I Spy isn't usually my game.

[ No identifiable name. That's fine — Jake's played a lot of hands blind.

His next message comes through at a delay. A flick of a wrist, a turn of a playing card face-up: ]

Tag. You're it.

[ Sent with a photograph: blurry, low quality by necessity, a series of books nestled on a shelf easily identifiable as a smaller study in the manor. But one title's in sharper relief than the rest. Histoire du Chevalier des Grieux, et de Manon Lescaut. A love story of escalating crimes. Tracking it down in person, opening it, reveals nothing but a playing card tucked into the front fold. The Jack of Spades. Written on the back: a smiley face, and little else. ]

[ Oh. She thrills, immediately, to the surprise: hardly anybody just plays with her, this outdoor animal of a girl held many years hostage in sprawling estates and made to behave. It snaps into being with an of course, muttered, her laugh startling hard and bright like a semi-precious gemstone, half-muffled against the back of her hand.

Jack, Roza determines, needs an adventure. Or two. ]

My favorite tragedy! Next to Pretty In Pink.

[ A photo for a photo. This one depicts an unusual piece among assorted statuary, which is half-hidden between greater works (because it's ugly) and beloved by Roza (because it's ugly). It depicts a Dacian dog, cast in bronze, quite old. It extends its furious little face past its body, straining with unmistakable tiny dachshund rage. Its maw is slightly open so that its brownish teeth are on display; one has fallen off, giving its normally ferocious countenance some charm.

The Jack of Spades is held neatly betwixt those teeth. But to remove him is to dislodge a secondary clue, too heavy to remain intact inside the statue's jaws without a preceding companion: out spills a packet of seeds. The photo on the packet depicts a graciously vibrant set of velvety petals in tangy orange-yellow, like arms held aloft over a puff of white and pink. (She had contemplated roses of similar naming, but that's just being obvious.)

Roza thinks he might find it strange, but only 'might', because reputedly, an orchid is a delicate, difficult thing, and so often the artistry everyone now knows that he performed was exactly this. It's from her perspective as a dancer she particularly came to appreciate his talents; charm as its own labor, planning as its own discipline. There is a temperature and a sense of nurture to a good heist. Also included is a piece of folded-up paper, shaped like an origami crane, on which her broad cursive spreads from side to side:

In case of serious boredom, break packaging. ]

Edited 2025-06-04 22:46 (UTC)

[ It's a cute dog. (She always did have brighter eyes than the rest.)

Jake's reply doesn't come until the next day. In-between the hours, maybe after breakfast, maybe when Roza returns to her room wearing someone else's cologne. The same playing card, left in the pocket of a coat that rests further back in her wardrobe — less of a statement about where he's been, and more what he wants to see her in. The accompanying photograph comes around noon: a view of the sunrise at a spot near the lake, taken earlier. The waters painted in glinting orange and sherbet yellow, just like the photo on the packet. ]

It's never boring with you around, Odette.

[ Thumbed out like a sly grin, golden charm not even steel bars and cold iron cuffs could take away. Too honed by half. ]

Busy tonight?

[ More accurately: whether she'll be alone, in those early hours before the sun rises. It gets cold out near the lake. ]

For you, I have plenty of time!
Besides, I miss being a swan. Maybe the water will turn me back.

[ His choosing settles the part of her brain already scheming to get him pinned down in person, to layer her knowledge of the past with Jake as he is now. She tried to look up articles about what changes people when they're incarcerated, but none of them really seemed appropriate.

(When she thinks about prison too hard a cold and sharp static slits a black hole in her brain and pulls out a physiological reaction, shaped like a tremble that radiates through hands and wrists and forearms, mysterious and unpleasant. The kind of thing that makes somebody at the dinner table say, finish your drink, the great cure for all enigmatically-sourced neuroticism. Blot that strangeness right out, like a reverse eclipse, something dark hidden behind a brighter, newer star. It passes.)

She attributes this need for direction, in part, to her current joblessness. Roza is the least scheduled she's ever been in her life. The circumstances of her ostensibly temporary hiatus from the Company remain undisclosed, but the dance industry gossip mill churns certain she did something. She has too many of those blips of bad behavior dotting her record of public opinion, symptoms of pressure demanding relief at any cost.

But all that feels far away. It's smooth sailing down to the lake, the appointed coat on, misty-grey silk skirt-set and black lace tights beneath it. The water moves in the low light of early, early dawn, the deep blue edge at the far horizon more premonition than reality. The creaky calls of morning-riser birds follow her. ]

There you are. Look at my hostage, [ is Roza's greeting, occuring in tandem with the bounce in her step and sunbeam on her face, no matter the hour. The card is aloft between thumb and forefinger. She has drawn a flower crown on poor old Jack. Any attempt to retrieve him results in his being instantly drawn back past her shoulder, though, held behind her body as her grin widens. ]

[ Misty-grey silk skirt-set, black lace tights. The coat he picked. His grin matches the slope of hers: wide, golden, another follower of the sun. He's a broad figure, a silhouette by the lake; a dark collared shirt, jeans, boots with perfect posture amid the gathering dew. Some thick jacket that looks a little wrong, somehow, in all the decadence that crawls along Saltburnt's walls. One thing that fits just as well as it always did: the way he looks at her, alight and alive, when she flashes him the Jack of Spades.

Jake makes a move for it. A play, more like: he enters her orbit, she twists away to hold it behind. Call, response. He snakes an easy arm around her waist, using that bodily momentum to bend her into a dip, one broad palm fitted securely to the middle of her shoulder blades as his nose hovers near hers. Well-executed more due to her instincts than his — but Jake Seresin makes all his bullshit look easy, gift rather than skill.

Lowly (playfully): ]

You sure about that?

[ A beat, for the glad show of it all. To look at her lashes up close. And then, inevitably, he rights them both, back to standing in full, his palm smoothing down her spine then lazily falling away.

Jake hasn't lifted the card back. But somehow, as if by magic, there's a new card that he shows her, held between his fingers: the Queen of Hearts, Jack's redder, more gleeful pair. ]

Now you know.

[ And isn't that just peachy keen? Allison — her name had been Allison, not that Jake bothers to share that. She'd had dark hair, too. ]

How long did it take you to figure it out?

[ Wrong to say Jake ever tried to hide it. Ani, Anora. But lying by omission's practically his entire trade, carrying that golden glint in his eyes even when he's opening his mouth and tasting his own come, like he's always some false step ahead. ]

Oh!

[ Roza hovers, held, in that state between grip and gravity, liking the way time seems to transform itself into an indulgent meander; the moment's not long at all, but in it she finds time to look at him with intention, his nearness a clear and true bell rung inside her. She thinks: he's different now, but not too different. It makes her happy to believe this. The blood in her veins moves warmer, faster, all that red making for insulation against the early-morning chill. The raven's-wing black of her hair falls free behind her, having been inadvertently tucked in her coat collar.

Her laugh is immediate and uninhibited, and she thinks they both knew it'd come quick — one of those near-noiseless giggles that plays on the quiet breathiness of her natural voice, more vibration in her sternum and ribs than it is real sound. ]

You would have made me one hell of a pas de deux partner, you know that?

[ Even while upright, she lingers at the edges of his personal space. The Jack between her fingers is now in closer proximity still, tapped light against his chest, by way of gesture. She sets speculative eyes on the unexpected new card, lower lip briefly catching between her teeth, which is one of an abundance of youthful gestures someone once tried to train her right out of and failed. ]

Bet I can get that one off you, too.

Edited 2025-06-07 19:18 (UTC)

not long

( specifically: fifteen days, cum digested, broken down into worker bee enzymes that fueled his idle thumb-through of a text thread with ani. one old picture, half his face in frame. jake, as it turns out, has an exceedingly memorable jawline. danny wonders how many times it's been punched.

but he says, ) a few days ( because danny doesn't lie by omission, he just lies. )
didn't get your number obviously so i couldn't follow up til now

you here for business or pleasure? secret third thing that starts with an a?

Admiration?

[ Less than anyone would think, given how much that jaw works overtime. Shit-eating grins and shouldering between thighs and bright, flaring teases. Playing obtuse on the deflect, always hiding his hand. ]

You really should be talking to the president.
Hear he's back in town.

[ It isn't Jake's bruises she's wearing. Enough sharp eyes know that fucking score. ]

not my type

( speaking of lies, that might be a lie or a tease. ashley colchester is a single squint away from sharing jake's face, the a and the b of two roads diverged. )

heard from good authority that his attorney general is a real cunt though
thoughts?

[ His tongue clicks against teeth. A rise, a call, all playful faux-disappointment: ]

Maybe you would've made one hell of a thief.

[ Different, now, but not too different. Hair a little longer, jaw a little sharper — broadened by time, the physical realities of seeing ten minutes of sun a day, too much time to kill between sleep and staring up at cinderblocks. Older, maybe; the sunlit shine of a smile, angled in a new direction. But one that reaches all the way up to his eyes. Always, always, even as he makes a small, contented hum. The backs of his knuckles skim across her temple; he thumbs a stray sweep of hair behind the shell of her ear, the seaglass of his attention looking carefully at the sweep of her throat it reveals.

She looks, he thinks boldly, exactly the same. Bright, clever, raw. Told to be one thing and shown another. Jake grins back and the texture of it sits right along side her gestures, the ones they failed to take away. His is youthful, too. ]

Try it.

[ He mimics her motions, tucking one arm behind his back. Walks backwards away from her, grinning from ear to ear, right into the chase of it all. A buoyant repeat of the classics:

Tag, baby. You're it. ]

[ Contact brings the hummingbird energy of her to a loose-limbed standstill. Those incremental rays of dawn drifting in catch and curve smooth, inky blue on the angles of their faces, hers trained upwards in appreciative focus. The air is different in this place, and she tastes it in her mouth. Like night-blooming lilac, scent sweet enough it transcends that sense alone. The waning stars are damp with the foggy light pollution, as though shy, as Roza supposes she once was. In the moment, all historical diffidence has completely bled away, leaving behind the bare-faced forgetfulness of the self. Her implanted anxiety withers without its inventor here to tend it. Roza's lapse in motion remains imbued with potential — momentum waylaid only because he's touching her, as though it were waiting for permission to pounce.

It comes, and she responds. Immediately. Her mouth makes an o shape, indignation exhaled in a little huff, always willing to be wound up, ]

Maybe. Maybe? [ The tigerish stalk toward him starts at matching pace. She can feel her heart move differently in her chest, hit by anticipatory adrenaline. ]

Forget the card, it's you I'm after now.

[ More like she has ambitions of multitasking, but Roza's priorities have shifted. One after the other. She's pretty sure he can predict her, but like a good dance, this game has choreography.

No preamble tension in her body or bearing warn him of sudden bolting escalation. Which means her shoes go skidding somewhere into the history of lakeshore escapades, possibly never to be seen again, adieu and rest in peace to that particular pair of Ferragamos. Grass and morning dew tag the places black lace leaves bare, all the way up to her calves. Her coat flags behind her, unbuttoned. Rather than move directly at Jake, Roza endeavors for an angle to capture him from the left. She plants the ball of one foot against the slippery ground and swings sidelong, reliant on strong legs and learnt grace.

She moves with her hands out, quick, just maybe quick enough — ]

Edited (edit monster strikes again) 2025-06-12 00:58 (UTC)

[ —she pounces. Caged. Caught red fucking handed.

He hits the dew with a rumble of a laugh, back hitting the grass. Air leaves his chest in a warm puff of breath, a hazy exhale in the cool morning light. Some clean feeling fissures through his expression as his hands immediately move in response, palms bracketing her sides, fingers wide and thumbs spread. Tightening, a fraction, as the pads of his digits press the thick fabric of her coat further, more insistent, as if all he's doing is warding off the chill. ]

Roza. [ He rolls the syllables inside of his mouth on purpose. Like he knows what they taste like; knows what she tastes like, as he looks up at her. ] What big eyes you have.

[ A beat. Held, extended, by two kinds of people who know how to lift a partner in a game. Jake looks, very quietly, into the planes of her face, and then grins. A little hungry, a little sharp; a hand skates down, dirty the way a joke is dirty, to palm under her coat. Shamelessly smoothing over the skirt at her ass. ]

Don't tell me I'm distracting you.

[ An abrupt but easy turn, so that he's the one bowed over her now, longer hairs falling in front of his eyes, a denim-clad knee between her thighs. Keep them guessing, hold an ace up your sleeve — beginner's tricks. Ones that she already knows, but Jake shows off anyway. Everyone needs to be reminded sometimes, don't they? That it exists this way, sometimes? Easy? Plain? Won, but not bled for? ]

Edited (can i say "goading flirtation question choice" without sounding like a psychopath....) 2025-06-16 06:21 (UTC)

[ Her own breathing whooshes away with the sort of half-wild joy that colors eyes and mouth, makes her grin hard and real, like it hurts, but in only good ways. Triumph has given her greater exuberance, drawn from lording her (temporary, a knowledge that exists in the hindquarters of her lizard-brain, not her direct consciousness) position of power over him. The scrunch of her nose is to suggest wolfishness. Like she's a howling thing, soothed sweet for just one second by a hand flitting down the silk of her skirt.

She has intentions. Big plans for Jake Seresin, some of them involving more of his hands, her mouth, and some acts of theft in the middle, although those are increasingly less prominent on her ambitions. Only he uno cards her, and smugness segues to a sigh at her own complacence. Foiled, only, well,

This has its benefits, doesn't it, even as she makes a sound crossed between laugh-peal and whine of girlish indignation.

Or maybe this was her real goal all along, to be laid underneath him on some grassy hill, sunrise starting to say its name along the changing horizon, a long indigo beast with a back covered in stars. She feels happy, she thinks, and wonders vaguely if it's fair of her to be so when he's only so freshly freed, when she suspects there are many pieces of a life he has left to assemble. At least this one can slot simply in her place, and does so willingly; fondness shadows her when her smile turns smaller but no less sincere, head canting back so the sharp sides of her jaw tilt forward. She looks at him from under her eyelashes this way. ]

Only a little.

[ Roza's body knows what it wants, as always, before her brain does, which is to let the shape of her spine convex-curve outward, shoulders and ass firmer against ground, clothed breasts and stomach brushing against him. Her thighs part, his knee strong between them. She presses there just enough so that her eyes change with the sensation, which laces through each vertebrae in order to make her shiver. So he can see. ]

You'll have to try harder.

[ How 'bout them apples?, says the lift of her eyebrows, bid for playful imperiousness only somewhat at a loss thanks to her new angle. (There are few positions she can't brat from.) ]

Edited 2025-06-20 02:02 (UTC)

[ So he can see: the shine in her eyes, the soft ripple down her spine; the coat that she wore, that he left his instructions in, pinpricks of lightening sky in the corners of his vision. Jake's mouth cuts brighter, wider. The denim of his knee, solid thigh blatantly pressing back — maybe an offered anchor as much as it is a coax and call, another invitation to play with higher stakes. Win big. Stay up all night. What's there to lose, in a place like this?

Lightly, his hand wraps around the swell of her calf. His mouth hovers nears hers, but never quite makes contact. Up, then, his calloused palm smoothing from calf to warm bend of her knee, the pad of his thumb catching over textures and curves in the lace. He's leisurely with it — luxuriating, a little, the way men sometimes do with pretty things. ]

You want me to try harder. [ Not mean. The affectation of flatness, ruined in a heartbeat by the wink he flashes at her. But the sharpness inside of him grows more obvious, a fishhook as he places a kiss to her cheek, sweet even as he bears his body down a fraction. The obvious shift of weight; the push and grind between her legs.

Neither of them, really, are so sweet. Wild animals never really are. It's nice to try it on for size anyway, Jake's mouth nudging at her jaw. The scratch of his stubble as he murmurs, warmly, into the shell of her ear: ]

What are you thinking about?

[ This time of morning— too early for an audience, he's sure. Not so early that there's the promise of privacy. He hums lightly, the noise a rumble that echoes in his chest. From the lace of her tights, Jake, whose nucleus is hard-wired to want more even when the going's good, to nurture and build in the face of his flightless ambition, lets his hand roam her side. The dip of her waist, the flare of her ribs. Further, all the way, until his thumb pulls at the plush shape of her bottom lip. ]

Because I'm thinking about making you come all over my hand. [ His brows lift back, too. Head tipping, almost puppyish. ] And seeing how quiet you can be.

she said you're thinking italy. after this.

[what happened to hello...good morning...]

[ Hello, good morning, hey u up... ]

Sure. We might.
In bocca al lupo, Koby

Looking to share recommendations?

Edited (my html oops) 2025-06-23 09:53 (UTC)

gesudheit. no, all my italy recs are shitty dive bars in the nasty parts of rome. u take ani there i'll assassinate u just curious. i might be in italy too for a while.

You'd have to catch me first.
Which might be hard, on account of your short legs

Interesting use of "a while", Special K.
Business or pleasure?

🖕🖕🖕 my legs are proportional, fuck u dunno. whatever you'd call "going into hiding", i guess.

;)
I know a guy if you need new documents
Or a worse haircut.

Did she ask you to stay?

your barber does fake ids? you really do know everyone, huh. not here. later. once you two have gotten the honeymoon sappiness out of your system.

Javy does passports. My fake ID guy's a butcher.
What can I say, people just love to know me

[ A beat. It's one of those sentences that deserve a little more thoroughness. Everything that later. implies. Do you know what you're doing? How much trouble are you in? What are you bringing home?

Instead: ]

Sunday night dinners start at 6:30
Hope you like branzino.

And you should pack earplugs.

and none of them got just one job? figures. what's your cover story gonna be? master thief and magician? sleight of hand bullshit?

[the beat weighs like a stone in koby's stomach, has him gnawing at the ragged edge of a thumbnail. and then -- effortless, accepting, unquestioning, and the stone's in his throat now and he fires back too fast:]

you can say no. you can tell me to fuck off or ask why the fuck i'm running NOW ani didn't but you can.

[ Ani didn't, but you can. That's his girl. There's only one question worth asking, anyway: ]

Are they going to be looking for you?

eventually. yeah. to the ends of the earth, she told me once.

[you're mine, you'll always be mine, hands in his hair, voice in his ear. there's nowhere you can go that i won't find you.]

don't think she's actually THAT smart, but. she'll be pissed off and have a lot of money, so. like i said. you can say no.

You really think I'd stay married if I said no?

[ Facetious. Never one to let something hang in the air if there isn't a joke he can flash at the same time. As if that's all it would take, to sever Jake Seresin's grip on hard-won loyalty. Includes Koby too, now. Just not for the reasons everyone thinks it might. ]

I also have a guy for running away from people who want you worse than dead.
Relax. We'll take care of it.
Stick around as long as you want

yeah, i do, dumbass. some shit's sacred. the way she talks about you is one of them.

[blunt, to the point, the way he never is -- because it's too important, because jake's the only one who'll do what must be done, if it comes to it.]

i don't want alvida knowing i'm with you. so if it starts looking like she's catching on or getting close or something i'm disappearing. and you gotta make sure ani doesn't try to find me. okay?

[ Torn between the glow of a phone screen and the cherry-red of his cigarette, Jake frowns down at both. Behind the closed balcony doors: rustled sheets, the slope of an outstretched calf. Jake glances over his shoulder through the panes of glass, expression small and quiet and heavy. Some shit's sacred, same way promises are. You don't make 'em if you don't plan on keeping them.

A long beat. Then, ]

She'll miss you, Koby.
You sure you want that?

[ Not a yes. Not a no, either. ]

no, i don't WANT that, dumbass 😤 what i want is for u to have to deal with me roasting your pancake skills every morning until i'm 40 and to steal ur wife for sleepovers in my room with the dogs and the fancy booze u get from who knows the fuck where

[veiled in sarcasm, the truth: koby wants that so badly it's like blood in his mouth, crushing his ribs, aching in it's impossibility. the kinda want that hurts, that can kill if you aren't careful.]

but i don't want alvida anywhere near you guys i'd rather go back to working nights on my knees in nassau and barcelona like she wants me to so if it comes to that yeah.

Says someone who's never had my pancakes
Or seen what I look like while I'm making these pancakes.

[ That yeah. is doing a lot of work. In the dark of the night, Jake thinks: Alone isn't such a good look on you, Koby. ]

I'm only going to tell you this once:
You're not going back to a life where you wake up scared shitless every day because you think you're being noble.
I told you. We'll take care of it.
That includes you.

smarmy and full of teeth. it's like i'm there.

[a beat, a prickle:]

i'm not scared. i've been doing this for a real long time, jake. longer than you wanna know. and i'm not trying to be noble. i care about maybe five people in the whole world and ani's one of them. if you have to choose, i know who you're gonna choose. and i'm telling you that's exactly what i want, if it comes to it. that's all. but if you don't gotta choose and you can take alvida's bitch ass out without getting caught, i wouldn't be mad.

[ Whatever finishing school she shoved herself through as a younger pretty thing has not remediated a natural tendency to need like a stray animal, composure a little undone by affection where given. This proclivity isn't only emotional; some unusual physical sensitivity coats the network of her nerves. Consequently her breathing fast becomes a sound-tangled huff with the change in friction, lids of her eyes lowering. Unsteady, and not especially shy about showing it. The kiss is sweeter for its near-chastity, context excluded; with it, pressure makes her want to rise up against him and get greedy. Her mouth is slightly open, the pink-red valentine of her tongue visible at the back of her bottom teeth, right where they get sharp.

Roza's expression transmits her easy receptiveness during the exploratory course of his hand. Like a flower face opening when its season comes calling, this welcoming comes naturally; she would ask him touch her, she thinks, any way he wants. But she doesn't need to say it out loud; the upward flex of her pelvis is its own language. ]

Wouldn't you know it —

[ Her own arm comes coasting up to drag the edges of her nails gentle across the side of his hand, down to wrist, in twirly little patterns that will fade in seconds, sandcastle-brief, etched in white across skin. More sensation-building than real scratch. (As far as she's concerned, this is the primary reason for a good manicure.) ]

Same page. But you might need to gag me. [ This is itself a dare, be it via the tearable lace of her tights or her equally flimsy underwear or just the warm flat of his hand. ] I like to talk too much, you know.

[ And because some hedonistic suffering is good for the soul, and he's in jeans, which aren't always so forgiving: ]

See if I can't make you ache a little, too.

sb: au inbox.

text — un: cunt

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@manon

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au shenanigans | text; un: kboy88

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