Archive of Our Own

“Carm … “ Laura’s lips fell away gently as she spoke her name.

Carmilla’s voice was low in her throat, “Laura.”

A ghostly hand ran across Laura’s shirt. It wasn’t every day she felt this way. Laura’s stomach was ablaze with knots and every touch Carmilla laid across her skin made her feel as if she had no skin at all. This is what stargazing was like, then. Looking at everything but the stars?

“I feel like I want to … “ Laura’s breath hitched as the weight on top her shifted slightly.

Carmilla moved like cat even when she was human. She purred, she rubbed, and she slinked around with liquid grace. Every stroke was precise and calculated and every smirk was sexier than the last. Laura’s sentence was lost somewhere in the air she was desperately trying to suck into her floppy lungs. Carmilla waited though, wandering hands following destinationless paths.

“Want to what, cupcake?” Carmilla asked, dropping a kiss across Laura’s jaw.

Her head rolled back infinitely further so she could just see the sky above them beyond Carmilla’s waterfall of hair.

“I want to do this. Now.” Laura managed.

Carmilla couldn’t hold back the smile tugging at her lips, “I’ve been waiting to hear that.”

“I thought vampires didn’t need permission to enter?” Laura teased, her confidence restored.

Carmilla’s smile finally broke through and was evident as she spoke, “We don’t.”

Vampires didn’t need it. But Carmilla sure did.

With her face buried in the arm of the couch and a hand squeezing at the cushion beneath her, Laura sighed, “How do you even get a knot there?”

Carmilla chuckled under her breath, “You tell me, princess.”

Laura didn’t respond. She was just letting the super strength vampire straddling her back rub the sore spots out of her muscles. Quite enjoying it too. Until all of a sudden, Carmilla stopped abruptly.

“The shirt has to go. It’s too thick.” She said, sitting up.

Laura groaned. She pushed herself off the couch and rose up, expecting Carmilla to fall back when she did, but instead her back met the other girl unexpectedly.

“You’re not making this whole shirt thing easy.” Laura commented.

“Is that so?”

Carmilla didn’t budge an inch. Instead she let her fingers crawl around laura’s front and draw her shirt up over her head. Once Laura was free from the garment, she effortlessly fell back on to the couch and relished in Carmilla’s unhindered work on her back.

For a vampire with super powers, she was surprisingly gentle. That’s something Laura never could have guessed about Carmilla. Maybe she had just expected something rougher from the leather bound woman. Scratching and biting and a grip that would make her knees weak. And sure Carmilla was no stranger to getting Laura’s lips between her teeth, but she was nothing short of careful with every part of Laura that she touched.

When it stopped being a back rub and started being something more was probably longer ago than Laura would have admitted, but there were lips where hands should be now for sure. Her grip on the couch was perhaps a bit tighter than she had remembered too. She didn’t realize it all until she let out that breath she had been holding.

“Not fond of breathing, are we?” came the soft voice pressing against the skin of her back.

“I love breathing actually.” Laura responded hastily.

Carmilla laughed and it caused shivers in ripples across poor Laura.

Laura rolled her head to the side so she could speak a little more clearly, “Sometimes I’m just surprised.”

Carmilla didn’t say anything for a minute. She drug her lips further up Laura’s back in response. A pale hand next to Laura’s head propped the vampire up as she shifted. The other hand stayed further down the couch promisingly.

Laura sighed again when she felt the other girl against her neck. Not exactly proper back rub etiquette, you know.

“Surprised that you never bite.” Laura taunted nervously.

With that in mind, Carmilla actually did bite down. Not very hard, but enough to make Laura gasp and for her body roll up against Carmilla's.

“Better?” She asked.

Laura laughed at that, “I might hate you.”

She shifted a little to the side and Carmilla let up her weight. As if choreographed, Laura rolled to her side and Carmilla slid into the space between her and the back of the couch. Carmilla seemed to wander in her thoughts for a second as her hands continued to wander.

“I’m all bark and no bite because …” She trailed off “When I get really nice things, I treat them well.”

Laura could have melted right there. If not for the fact that Carmilla spouts lovely poetry at her like a fountain of lovesick quotes, she might always melt when she said something nice.

Carmilla smiled, “I’m done breaking the nice things I have.”

“You’re really good at this. I mean …” Laura took a breath, “Really good at this.”

Bare hands pressed against bare skin felt awfully chilly for a spring night’s weather. However, the weather was a lot farther away when it was beyond walls and covers and sheets.

Carmilla smirked, “You’re not so bad yourself, Miss Hollis.”

With a little hesitation, Carmilla moved off of Laura and onto the cool, perhaps slightly sweaty, sheets beside her.

“Miss Hollis?” Laura repeated.

“I –“ Carmilla looked away and chuckled.

She tucked some hair behind her ear before laying an arm across Laura’s stomach.

“You what? You can’t keep leaving sentences unfinished, Carm.”

“It’s just an old habit.” Carmilla pulled herself just a little closer, “I missed the part of the century where first names became the norm.”

“But if you were sleeping with somebody wouldn’t you be on a first name basis already?”

Carmilla chuckled, “You underestimate just how repressed girls that liked girls were back then.”

Laura thought on that for a second. Her eyes were fixed on the ornate ceiling above them.

“What about the guys?” She asked after a moment.

Carmilla replied softly, “I wouldn’t know.”

Laura had to think even harder on that. She had no idea where she got the assumption that Carmilla had been with men before. Or even just one. She had sort of guessed that Carmilla had known about her sexuality early on. She knew herself well. But, not even one? Just to try it? Or for a strategical method? Or anything?

“Never?” Laura said to the ceiling.

“Never.” Carmilla repeated.

Sometimes Laura forgets what Carmilla is.

When everybody’s had a few too many drinks and Lafontaine is officially spouting non-sense about the bonds in different compounds and the world seems a little bit bigger than it did before, she really forgets. Nobody seemed the care that she was situated on Carmilla’s lap with a smile on her face that could rival the size of the moon.

Danny was giggling in a very girly fashion. It was really adorable. Perry was maybe even more adorable. With only two and half glasses of champagne in her system, she was half soberly attempting to keep the place in order as everybody went about their activities. Of course these things would be much more amusing to Laura had she been paying them any mind in the least.

No, she was totally focused on just how much Carmilla had to drink to get remotely close to where Laura had been after three or four drinks. Lightweight, she had called her earlier and Laura couldn’t keep herself from laughing.

Danny started to get a little concerned because Kirsch never came back from wherever he had wandered off to. Although she wasn’t interested in him in the slightest, she was still worried about him. She left to go look for him and Lafontaine took JP in suite. Perry stayed to clean up a little longer before she too wandered off.

It wasn’t a far stretch from there until Laura’s hands were lost in Carmilla’s hair. The dark haired girl still had a glass in one hand while the other stayed wrapped around Laura’s waist. Same chair, same people, different hour.

Laura’s lips were starting to get used to kissing. Something about Carmilla felt very welcoming and easy. She shifted her weight over, a little impatient to say the least. Now that she was straddling Carmilla, she noticed that the vampire had a hand underneath her shirt. Still holding her steady, but now pressed against bare skin.

She wasn’t about to let her get away with that. So she sent less than steady fingers to work at unbuttoning the ungodly tight pants that Carmilla had on. Carmilla made a low noise when they broke so Laura could get a better angle on her. Definitely an attractive noise that Laura wouldn’t soon forget.

After a couple seconds she realized that the shirt was starting to get in the way. (Although the honest answer was that she merely had zero dexterity left in this state) So she started to tug at Carmilla’s shirt. Once she got it up, she broke away from their kiss to pull it over her head.

Somehow she had forgotten about the glass Carmilla was holding and the minute the shirt was off of her, she heard the sound of it crashing into the floor.

“Fuck.” Laura gasped, peeling away from her girlfriend when she heard the shatter.

Carmilla’s head fell back as she laughed, “It’s just a glass, we’re fine.”

“I didn’t want the glass to break.” Laura stammered, her gaze unable to stay in one place.

“It’s not a big deal.” Carmilla assured her.

“How can you be sure?” Laura swiveled to look at Carmilla.

“Because I’m not drunk.”

Laura put on a righteous pout, “That’s not fair.”

“Life isn’t fair, cutie.”

Laura continued to glower. She crossed her arms in front of her and refused to look Carmilla in the eyes. She looked around the whole room instead. Wherever Lafontaine is, they must have turned off their phone, because the music abruptly stopped playing from the wireless speaker in the corner. Laura was a little put off by this so she looked back to Carmilla.

Carmilla was staring at her with an intensity that hadn’t been present before. There was something profound in her eyes.

“I love you, Laura.” She said quietly, “That’s what’s making this whole thing so hard, isn’t it?”

“What?” Laura’s face scrunched up in confusion, “What thing? You love me?”

“I have for a while?” Carmilla shook her head, “I really am an idiot.”

“A while?” Laura was in shock briefly, “Carm.”

For a minute she thought about how Laura might not even remember this tomorrow. Or if she would even care. Carmilla’s voice was a notch more serious now, “Just tell me it’s okay.”

“It’s … It’s okay.” Laura responded meekly.

She used the arm around Laura’s back to pull her into another kiss.

Carmilla wears contacts. Laura knows it. She’s always known it. She’s seen Carmilla crawl along in the dark making sure she makes it to the bed. Although boasting night vision better than that of a human, she still had awful eyesight.

Right about now Laura couldn’t see either. She had her eyes shut and her lips pressed firmly up against Carmilla’s. She remembered seeing Carmilla reading against the headboard and didn’t really vibe with the fact that the book was getting more attention than her. Somehow kissing Carmilla ended up being the logical solution.

It had started out like a game too. Laura would kiss her and say something and Carmilla would bat her away. Every time the kiss lasted a little longer than the last one until eventually, Laura got up the guts to just knock the book out of her hands. Carmilla didn’t seem all that upset with Laura’s hair between her fingers.

A hand braced Laura against the headboard and the other one had two fingers toying with the collar of Carmilla’s shirt. Her lips were the slightest bit cracked and dry, but the taste of strawberry chapstick kept Carmilla from noticing in the slightest.

In a momentary lapse, they fell apart for a little breath and Carmilla started to move away.

“Where are you going?” Laura asked in a hushed voice.

“Wouldn’t you like to know?” Carmilla smiled, “I’ll be right back, I promise.”

Carmlla slid off the bed and into the bathroom.

Laura was left with the sound of whatever movie she had intended to watch on Encore running in the other room. She briefly debated going to turn it off, but she didn’t exactly like the idea of silence right now. She thought about how they've been fighting a lot lately. Everything turned into some passive aggressive fight about something or other. She just wanted a moment for themselves that was okay. Sometimes the best time to do that was kissing. She had been staring at the headboard in thought when Carmilla came out of the bathroom.

“Sorry.” Carmilla said from the doorway.

“You’re fi-“ Laura stopped when she turned.

Glasses.

“I’m … ?” Carmilla crossed her arms and leaned against the doorframe.

“You have ... “ Laura started.

Laura thought she had never been more attracted to somebody before in her life. The glasses were nothing special either. Decently thick plastic rectangular frames. But something about that on her face had Laura in a tizzy.

“Glasses?” Carmilla raised her eyebrows, “What do you think we wore in the 19th century? I just took my contacts out.”

Laura shut her mouth firmly, not trusting it to help the situation any further. Carmilla started towards the bed from the doorway but didn’t make it very far before Laura’s impatience got the best of her. With a swift yank, Laura had Carmilla on her back, against the mattress and in a confused kiss.

Carmilla won’t complain though. Sometimes a little initiative is attractive.

After a heated albeit sloppy kiss, Carmilla managed to get herself up on her elbows and reach for her face.

“No no no -“ Laura smacked Carmilla’s hands away.

“What is your …” Carmilla smirked, “Oh … You’re into the glasses.”

“Carm don’t say anything.” Laura groaned, expecting a usual teasing that Carmilla was oh so well known for.

“No, I wasn’t going to say anything.” Her smile never fading for an instant.

“Good.” Laura nodded.

They paused for a moment, both looking at the other.

Carmilla chuckled, “Just the book and the glasses … I’m starting to think.”

“Carm, stop.” Laura smacked her on the arm, “You’re not going to get anything like that.”

Carmilla pulled Laura’s chin in and kissed her lightly.

“How about like that, sweetheart?”

“That can work.”

Carmilla isn’t always in control.

That’s not a lesson Laura wanted to learn.

But here she was. Wondering – why am I enjoying this?

Her hands were gripping tightly onto the pale skin of Carmilla’s back and her legs were shaky with anticipation she had been unable to hold back. She wanted to curse herself for feeling this way, but something about that fucking hero complex had gotten her good.

Carmilla was always gentle, right? Nipping down Laura’s neck like it was hers. Hell, it was hers. They’re still living together. Still thinking about it. Still stressed. Still in need of a release right now.

Where were they going to get that?

Ice cream?

Partying?

Carmilla’s fingers were past the point of no return. Somewhere close to inside her but not just yet. Even when she was angry fucking, she was still a tease.

Laura gasped when she felt it. Still angry about how badly she wanted it. Her head fell back against the pillows and she wondered if this was going to hurt them in some way. She let out another breath she had been holding in and dug her nails in because on some level of processing she knows that Carmilla likes that.

Carmilla was surprised when she heard Laura speak.

“Carm.”

Carmilla didn’t respond. Her mouth was stopped somewhere along the nape of her neck, and her fingers were slower now, waiting for a response.

“We can’t.”

“We can.” Carmilla’s voice is rough and forced.

“Sure … sure we can.” Laura let out a breath, “But I don’t want to.”

Carmilla stopped. Her hand was free in a heartbeat and for a split second she just hovered above Laura. And then all at once she was gone. Up and over to the other side of the apartment, like none of it had happened at all.

Laura took in a long deep breath. Maybe Carmilla was in control.