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Bob didn’t expect to take up reading again after moving into the Watchtower.
It had been a long time since he’d even picked up a book. So many blank and blurry years between adolescence and adulthood in which he was too high or too drunk — too much too much too much — to even think about an old hobby he’d developed to avoid listening to the sounds of his parents arguing.
He had loved reading, once. Even though it started as nothing more than an escape, a way to fill his head with thoughts of someone else’s life instead of dwelling on the tragedy of his, he grew to love it, and there was seldom a time where he would be found without a book in his hands.
Over time, though, the reading just felt ineffective; like putting a bandaid over a stab wound. The books he bought grew dusty and unopened on his shelf until he sold all of them to pay off only a fraction of the debts he owed to the men he’d begged for drugs – for something to make him forget. Books couldn’t do that. But then, of course, neither could the drugs; not forever, at least.
Then came the experiment, the cold steel of the examiners table and the piercing pain of needles and serums, until – nothing.
Then, there was light.
Yelena.
If only for a few hours, Bob felt purposeful again. A lost ship finally headed for shore, toward the lighthouse that beckoned him to land. Even though she hadn’t let him stay behind in the Vault, he knew he wasn’t going to leave with them. He’d decided early on, maybe from the moment he’d touched her hand, that he’d do just about anything to make sure she – and Ava and John – got out. Because they deserved to live, and he – well.
The memories of what happened after return to him slowly, fuzzy and far away. A room and a broken glass. The blurred shapes of a failed Captain America and Russian equivalent. Yelena’s terrified expression, her pleading words. Darkness. So much darkness.
A hand within his own and arms surrounding him.
Yelena hadn’t been lying when she told him they’d stick together. They – The New Avengers, Valentina had called them – took to him quickly, ensuring he was there right alongside them with every new change.
That included staying in the Watchtower.
Bob understands why – he knows he’s a liability. While he’s still fuzzy on the extent of what he did, he knows he was dangerous; that he hurt people, including this team. Still, he couldn’t help but feel as if what they’d been through had connected them all in some irrevocable way. And maybe they – this group of battered and beaten, but not broken, heroes – simply wanted him there.
As unbelievable as that sounded, Bob hoped it was true. That maybe he’d finally found people who saw him as more than an inconvenience — as something.
And even though hope had never panned out well for Robert Reynolds, he had something most people didn’t: he had Yelena Belova.
Bob had never met anyone like her. There was this light to her, something that drew him to her instantly; a moth to a porch light. After who knows how long trapped in darkness, Yelena was the first bright spot in this new world he’d woken up to.
When she touched him, his skin — once so bruised and bleeding at the hands of others — begged for more.
Yelena promises him they’ll stick together and Bob is only a little surprised at first to find that she means it. He finds himself in her company more often than not. They move onto the same floor of the Watchtower, because Bob doesn’t feel deserving of being given his own and Yelena claims she’s never needed much space anyway.
It’s odd, at first. Sharing this space with someone he’d technically only just met a few weeks before moving in together. The only people Bob has shared a living space with were his parents, and it had ruined him for reasons he is slowly coming to understand were not his fault. At least, that’s what Yelena tells him, if the topic ever comes up – and Bob is starting to believe it, too.
In the beginning, they don’t stray far past what Bob believes the relationship for normal roommates is, even if they are far from normal. They eat breakfast together, then meet with the rest of the team in the main common area for dinner. Sometimes they’ll curl up on opposite ends of the couch and watch old movies Yelena has never seen before. He learns things about her: how she loves boxed macaroni and cheese, her appreciation of American music from the 80s, her birthday (January 3rd) and favorite color (green) and her strange affinity for guinea pigs.
It feels like yet another thing he doesn’t deserve, these wonderful little pieces that make up this larger than life woman. They are precious stones handed to him painstakingly and Bob has made it his job to hold each part of her gently, to protect anything and everything she’s willing to share with him.
Despite how quickly Yelena had learnt about the deepest, darkest parts of him, it still takes a little longer for Bob to share his own stones. They’re old and chipped and unpolished, but Yelena treats each one of his with the same care and respect that he does with hers.
After years of being put down for his simple existence, it’s hard to give so much of yourself to others without the fear of being ignored. He should have known he wouldn’t have to worry about that when it came to Yelena.
The topic of his reading, though, happens by mistake. It’s the one thing he avoided over the course of the few months they’ve spent together. He always felt silly when he considered what others might think of him – invincible and unbeatable, over six feet tall and curled up with a simple paperback. He was afraid that might be the final straw for Yelena – a stupid vulnerability she would never let him live down. He could take the teasing from Walker, Ava, maybe even Bucky, but he would be mortified if it came from Yelena.
Bob isn’t sure if he’ll ever grow used to the way she constantly surprises him, though.
It’s late at night and Yelena returned from a mission with her shoulders sagging, wincing at every step. Bob tries not to worry so much when the team goes out on missions – usually because a majority of them are set up by Valentina for a much needed PR stunt, opting in her favor.
Sometimes, though, there come threats that leave Bob pacing the tower, his nails digging into his palms as he wears a hole through the floor, thoughts of Yelena somewhere – beaten, bleeding, dead – playing on a loop in his mind, only stopped when she returns intact and ruffles his hair as she passes him in the hallway on her way to the shower.
Tonight, Yelena has retired to her room with yet another threat extinguished by the New Avengers, giving her just enough peace to get a good night’s sleep. The anxiety that he’d had since Yelena left earlier that evening is still slowly trickling away, so he decides to take his current book out to the living area they share and escape the stifling walls of his room.
Sitting on the couch, he devours almost a hundred more pages and is ready to read more in spite of the fact that it's past one in the morning. He’s so engrossed in this world – one he’s already visited before, when he was younger and still believed in magic – that he doesn’t even hear the sound of Yelena’s door creaking open or the padding of her feet against the tiled floor until she’s entering the living room and says, “I didn’t know you liked to read.”
Bob jumps, book slipping from his hands onto the floor by his feet. He curses, snatching it up quickly. He grips it close, fingers trembling slightly as his cheeks warm.
Yelena blinks over at him and he’s unsurprised to see her wide awake. He should have known better than to believe she might be sleeping – they were the same in that way, as they are in many others.
“Bob?”
He’s brought back by the sound of her voice, something like a tether drawing him back in. He clears his throat, shrugging.
“Yeah, I do,” he replies, running his thumb soothingly across the pages. “I just never talk about it, I guess.”
Yelena tilts her head as she makes her way toward him on the couch. She takes up her usual spot on the opposite end and curls her legs up to her chest.
“Why not?”
Bob lets out a rueful, almost pitying laugh.
“I don’t know,” he lies. At Yelena’s knowing look, he sighs, moving his eyes down to the book in his hands. “I didn’t want to annoy you.”
Yelena’s expression never changes, though it remains that soft and steady look that he’s grown so used to. It’s not a look of pity, even if Bob feels like the most pitiable creature on the planet most days. He’s waiting for the shoe to drop, for her to finally realize just how much of a nuisance he really is.
Instead, she simply says, “You could never annoy me, Bob.”
Something within him aches at the words. He had spent so long trying to make himself feel smaller to avoid the wrath of his father and the indifference of his mother. He stayed quiet at dinner, didn’t talk about his day at school, and he never brought up the books he was reading. As silly as it seems now, he had been afraid Yelena would feel just as irritated with his passion for reading as his parents used to be, believing it to be a waste of time. He’d been so worried about it that he’d forgotten that this was Yelena – ever surprising and never flinching in the face of Bob’s faults.
Bob did not have to hide himself from her, because Yelena knew him. And he wanted her to know him even more.
“Okay,” he nods, swallowing down the glorious lump of emotion in his throat. Yelena mirrors his gesture before pointing toward the book in his lap, his hands still trying to hide it from her.
“So what are you reading?” she asks. After a split second hesitation, he holds it up for her to see.
She reads the title slowly, quietly to herself. It’s so endearing Bob can’t help but grin.
“I’ve never read it,” she tells him casually when she meets his gaze again. His mouth drops open slightly at her confession and she furrows her brows. “What?” she asks.
“I just can’t believe that,” he says, laughing quietly in disbelief. “I grew up with these books.”
Yelena’s mouth twitches up in that sarcastic, gorgeous smile of hers. Bob’s pulse picks up and he places his hand against his neck in an effort to slow it down.
“Well, not a lot of reading happens when you’re being trained as a child assassin in the Red Room,” she says. There’s humor in her voice as she says it, and a laugh on the tip of her tongue. They’ve grown used to this kind of joking, a way to help cope with everything they’ve been through. Bob once made a joke about how boxed macaroni would have been the best post-meth induced hysteria meal and Yelena had laughed so hard a part of Bob’s chest had brightened in the midst of her smile, even with the weight of the memories.
So, he laughs, and what little tension remained in Yelena’s frame in mentioning her own lost childhood vanishes as she wheezes out a chuckle.
“Well,” Bob eventually responds, after a quiet moment, laughter still permeating the air as peace settles into Bob’s bones. He holds the book up for Yelena to see. “If you ever want to read it, it’s here for you.”
Yelena shrugs her shoulders, frowning slightly. If it weren’t so dark, Bob might have been able to confirm whether the darkening of Yelena’s cheeks was his imagination or not.
“Reading in English is hard, sometimes,” she confesses quietly. She pulls at a thread on her sleep shorts but doesn’t look away, doesn’t drop her head in shame like he had. So strong, always. “I never really finished learning how.”
Bob nods, humming in understanding. Yelena’s first few years in America are slowly unraveling, through small stories or references. Sometimes, Yelena voluntarily shares the information. Other times, different anecdotes are dropped by Alexei over dinner without warning, leaving Yelena silent and distant for the rest of the night. Bob knows her father never has any ill intent when sharing them, but he also knows Yelena. And he knows just how hard it is for her to give that kind of information away on her own, let alone listen to someone else do it for her.
“But, thank you for offering, Bob,” Yelena finishes, flashing a kind, close lipped smile as she rests her head on the couch cushion she’s leaning against.
Bob isn’t sure what sparks the idea in his mind – well, he does, he just can’t admit it, not yet (coward coward coward). Maybe it’s the disappointment in Yelena’s gaze as she stares at the book in his lap. Maybe it’s the way he knows she’d do it for him if he asked.
And maybe it's because he would do just about anything to keep that light inside her from dimming.
“I could read it to you,” he offers and stills under Yelena’s gaze as it snaps back up to his own. She sits up straighter, considering him. And as mortified as Bob feels, he can see the way he’s piqued her interest. Her chin tilts slightly in consideration and Bob knows. So he continues. “If you want me to.”
A pause. Then, a nod. A soft smile.
“I’d like that,” she tells him, voice genuine and unshielded.
Bob nods. “Okay,” he repeats, running a hand through his hair, trying to keep everything from trembling. “Okay.”
Yelena watches him patiently, dropping her cheek onto her bent knees. Bob sighs inwardly, breathing deeply. This was Yelena. There was no reason for him to be afraid.
He turns the book back to the front page and let’s himself settle deeper into the couch across from her as he begins.
“When Mr. Bilbo Baggins of Bag End announced that he would shortly be celebrating his eleventy-first birthday with a party of special magnificence, there was much talk and excitement in Hobbiton….”
They don’t mean for it to become a regular occurrence, but it does.
They get through almost half of The Fellowship of the Ring before the sun comes up and Yelena suggests they try to get some sleep before breakfast. The next night, though, after returning from a meeting with the rest of the team and Valentina, Yelena has so much anxious energy thrumming through her that the only thing Bob can think to do is sit her down on the couch and finish the book with her. If the calm look on her face once he’s read the last words – and down into the Land of Shadow – is anything to go by, he’d say he was successful.
It’s only a few weeks later that they read another book together.
One night, Yelena sits in his room silently, cleaning her gun while he lays on his back on his bed and watches her. The way the grease stains her hands as she cradles the weapon gently, meticulously pulling it apart and taking the time to polish and shine every piece. A ritual of sorts, more sacred than anything Bob has ever seen.
It isn’t until she’s done that she wraps the gun in a cloth and places it on his nightstand. Then, standing, she roams over to the stacks of books he’s finally unearthed from beneath his bed, leaning precariously against the wall. He has yet to get a bookshelf.
For a long moment, she considers each of them, fingers brushing against their spines before she taps one and pulls it out. She comes around the bed and flops down beside him, handing the book to him.
“This one next,” she announces, folding her hands and placing them on her stomach, watching the wall above them as if she is gazing at stars. And what else is there left for Bob to do besides open the book and begin reading.
“Serene was a word you could put to Brooklyn, New York….”
“They are all so dramatic,” Yelena interrupts one night as she stirs the macaroni in the pot. Bob tilts his head at her. She waves over to the novel. “What did he say? ‘You said I killed you – haunt me, then’? It is very dramatic.”
Bob nods. “Gothic fiction,” he explains succinctly, shrugging. “Guess it’s just more entertaining that way.”
“But it is not realistic,” Yelena adds, moving to lean on the counter Bob is currently resting against. “If he really loved Cathy, why did he leave for so long? Why couldn’t he just tell her?”
Bob’s chest tightens as he takes in her words, the genuine question in her eyes. Her eyes – shifting from green to hazel beneath the light, sharp and alive. He shakes his head, gaze unmoving.
“Maybe he was scared,” he offers, voice lower than he means for it to be. Yelena tilts her head closer and Bob never wants her to stop looking at him. “Maybe he thought she wouldn’t love him back.”
Yelena nods slowly, considering his words, and a strange expression crosses her face. It makes Bob feel caught, makes him want to tell her everything.
There’s a sudden splash and Yelena jumps, moving to stop the boiling pasta water from causing anymore damage. Bob lets out a shaky breath, pressing his hand into his pounding sternum. Once Yelena has the water back under control, she turns to him and nods once for him to continue, and Bob does. Neither of them move closer to one another for a long while and Bob tries to be thankful for it.
He reads, “‘Be with me always – take any form – drive me mad! Only do not leave me in this abyss where I cannot find you!’”
He doesn’t look at Yelena when he’s finished, but he can feel her eyes on him, and he knows they’re thinking of the exact same thing.
They’ve taken to reading together almost every night.
Bob buys so many books he can’t possibly stack them up against the wall anymore, so he gets a shelf. Worn wood and creaking at the weight, it's perfect for the novels with cracked spines and sun damaged pages.
Most nights they spend reading in Yelena’s room. Usually, she’s working on something – reloading a weapon or reporting on their latest mission. But there are times when Bob can use what she has deemed the baby dog eyes to get her to sit beside him and simply listen while he reads. He’ll catch her everytime, with her eyes shut and a small smile on her lips, and he can’t help the way his heart calls out to hers. Every single time.
Yelena always chooses which book they read, and no matter if Bob has read them before he’ll pretend as if he hasn’t. He can always tell she knows he’s lying, though. He is a very bad liar.
One night, they sit beside one another, their shoulders brushing. The contact sends a thrum of longing in him, the way blood pulses through veins. Still, he brings no attention to it and continues reading.
Until a heavier weight settles onto his shoulder and soft hair tickles at his jaw. He pauses abruptly and looks down carefully, gazing upon the sleeping face of Yelena. Lashes fanned gently against her round cheeks, lips parted softly as she breathes. Something in his chest snaps into place with finality, and still the momentousness of it is subdued.
There is only this moment, precious and shining and lovely, just as she is.
Bob doesn’t move for the rest of the night. He only wakes in the morning to a crick in his neck, his finger nestled between the pages to save their spot, and the warmth of Yelena where she remains nestled at his side.
There are Bad Days, as they’ve both taken to calling them.
Bob’s come more often and are sporadic in the way they occur. Most Days he wakes up normally, until a single memory sends him off the deep end and he’s caught in the darkness again. His father’s fist against his ribs, the bruises on the inside of his elbow, the pain of the serum as the needle pierced his skin. Hunger. Darkness. Cold. Darkness.
Yelena always gives him the space he needs to feel, to figure out how he wants to go about the Bad Day. When he asks her to stay, she does, sitting beside him in silence when he says nothing or telling him stories of their Good Days when he asks. Bob had known nothing would be fully healed, even after gaining this almost-family, this purpose, but Yelena had been right. Things were lighter with her at his side.
Yelena’s Bad Days are not always noticeable. Oftentimes, she’ll remain in her room or spend hours sparring in the gym on another floor. She goes to Bob sometimes to apologize for not being there that day, to which he assures her there is no need for her to say sorry. At the end of her Bad Days, Yelena will sit beside Bob on the couch and he’ll put on the old cartoons she once told him she watched when she was younger and still believed in magic.
This Bad Day is different, though.
He hears it from Bucky first. Early in the morning, Bob sits alone at the kitchen table, failing to read when the elevator pings with the man’s arrival. He calls Bob into the elevator quickly before pressing a random button.
“Her sister. Natasha?” he asks, and Bob nods, already feeling a pit grow in his stomach. “She died four years ago today.”
Bob lets out a shaky breath in response and Bucky nods.
“Alexei has been drunk since five in the morning, so John and I will keep an eye on him,” Bucky relays, wincing, “but Yelena – ”
“I’ve got her,” Bob confirms, without even waiting for Bucky to finish. The man simply pats him on the back.
“Don’t leave her alone,” he says just as Bob steps out of the elevator back onto their floor.
For the first hour of the morning, Bob waits with bated breath for Yelena to exit her room. The breakfast he’s made for them grows cold and he finds himself unable to eat. After the second hour, Bob reheats a plate of eggs and bacon before padding out to her room. He knocks on the door and softly calls out Lena? Unsurprisingly, there’s no answer. He leaves the breakfast at her door and lets her know it's there for her. Nothing but silence greets him.
The day passes like molasses dripping from a bottle. Bucky calls twice to check in and Bob’s chest grows tighter each time he relays the same message of unresponsiveness. At some point, Bob peeks down the hallway and a small piece of his heart stitches itself back together when he sees that the plate he’d left in the morning is now empty.
Eventually, the sun sets and Ava pays a visit, a pot of soup in hand. Bob tries again at Yelena’s door, reminding him he’s there, I’m right here, Yelena. Right here.
No answer.
Ava and Bob eat their soup slowly, in silence, only broken by the sound of the elevator arriving once more as Bucky and Walker are forced out of it by a drunk Alexei Shostakov.
“Yelena!” he bellows, laughing hysterically, tears running down his face. “Куколка! Where are you?”
They all try to stop him, but even three Avengers and one Bob cannot possibly stop this man from reaching his daughter. Still, they try, and it isn’t until they all hear Yelena’s broken voice tell them to Stop that they finally do.
She’s still in her pajamas from the night before. Her hair is a mess around her tear stricken face. Bob wants to wrap her in his arms and fly them both away, far away from here and all the things that could ever hurt her. But the loss of her sister would remain with her always, and there was nothing Bob could do to save her from that.
“Let him come in,” she tells them, running her sleeve under her nose. The four of them let Alexei go, and he seems to have sobered up immediately as he trails into the room after her.
Another hour passes as the four of them sit around the small table Yelena and Bob share their meals at. There’s not much to talk about beyond some soft questions.
“Did you know her?” Ava asks Bucky at some point. “Natasha Romanoff?”
Bucky clenches his left hand, the gears whirring silently.
“Yes,” he says in a whisper, a hint of regret in his tone. Then, “They’re so different.”
No one has to ask who he’s comparing Natasha to.
Alexei emerges eventually with red rimmed eyes and a gentle smile sent their way.
Ava, Bucky, and Walker enter the elevator together, and before Alexei can go with them he squeezes Bob’s shoulder and tells him, “You are good for her, Robert. You take care of each other. She does not know how much she needs it.”
Then, they’re all gone, and Bob remains standing, considering those words.
She comes to him just past midnight. He’s still awake and sitting on the floor with his back against the side of his bed when he hears the knock. She enters immediately when he grants her permission and she doesn’t waste time before moving to sit beside him.
There are no words said for a long while, just the noise of their mutual sighs.
Then, “I wouldn’t be here if she hadn’t died.”
Bob turns his head to look at her, her own gaze trained forward at the wall.
“So many people would still be lost if it weren’t for her,” Yelena explains. Bob watches as tears begin to gather at the corner of her eye. Her chin trembles as she lets out a pained laugh. “But I am the one that is lost now. Now that she’s gone.”
Bob wants to reach out, to take her clenched hand in his and peel back her fingers, press the words into her palm. I’m here. I’m here. I’m here.
Instead, he waits until Yelena turns her face to his and confesses, on the border of a sob, “Who am I, without her?”
Then, she breaks, pressing her fist into her mouth to stifle the noise, until it's just too much, and she’s falling forward as the grief slams her against the rocks again and again and again.
Bob pulls her to him immediately, without even thinking, and she sinks into his hold, pressing her face into his shoulder as she shakes apart against him. She reaches up to grip his back as he tucks her head under his chin and runs his hand up and down across her back. He does not shush her, and he does not tell her it will be okay. They both know it will be, tomorrow or the day after. There will come so many more Good Days they won’t be able to count them. But right now, not being okay is okay, and Bob is here no matter what. He will continue to be here, as long as she allows him.
Yelena trembles and whimpers and cries against him for a long while, but Bob doesn’t care. He only holds her close and steady, until she can pull herself away from the rocks.
When all that’s left are hiccuping breaths and the occasional tear, he asks, “What can I do?”
Yelena removes her head from his shoulder and watches him, eyes glassy and tired but still so alive. After a brief pause, she murmurs, “Read the one about the sisters again.”
Bob nods and painstakingly pulls himself away to reach the shelf of books. He pulls one out and returns to her side. She burrows in close immediately and Bob pushes away the way it makes him feel – nothing mattered more in this moment than making sure Yelena was comfortable and taken care of.
He wraps one arm carefully around her shoulders and uses the other to open the book, pulling Yelena close each time they mention the bond of the two girls.
“The family Dashwood,” he reads, “had been long settled in Sussex….”
The tears continue, but the bright light of Yelena’s growing smile is enough to keep Bob going.
“Do you believe in God?” Yelena interrupts with a question.
Bob shuts the book gently and considers it for a moment.
“My dad did,” he says, absentmindedly, to which Yelena scowls immediately a fierce protectiveness overtaking her eyes. He reaches out with his elbow and bumps it against hers, murmuring, “Easy. He’s already dead.”
Yelena scoffs. “Died of a heart attack. Deserved worse.”
Bob probably shouldn’t laugh, but he does.
It’s a quiet night and they’re sitting out on the terrace of the tower. Not exactly sitting but laying on a blanket Bob had spread out for them. It’s not easy to find stars in New York, but the lights of the city and Yelena laying beside him are more than enough for him.
“I don’t think I ever did, though,” he answers. Yelena turns her head to look at him but Bob’s remains facing the sky. He shrugs lightly, thinking about the new book they’re reading and the very similar thoughts he’d once had in his own head. “I couldn’t understand how God could let so many horrible things happen to good people.”
Yelena nods, her hair fanning out around her. It’s gotten longer, recently, and a strand of it falls onto her forehead. Bob clenches the book in his hands to avoid reaching out and brushing it away for her.
“But,” he continues, chewing on his lip as he thinks it over, “there must be – something else out there.”
Yelena shifts onto her side and Bob finally turns his head to fully look at her. Her cheek is pressed up against her arm where she rests her head against it and her eyes sparkle beneath the city lights. Her expression is open and warm and so beautiful Bob can’t breathe. How lucky is he to just have her looking at him.
“Why do you say that?” she asks in a whisper. Bob can’t help the smile that grows on his face, the answer already on the tip of his tongue.
“I think the things that happen in life sometimes are supposed to happen,” he says. “As awful as most of those things are, sometimes – sometimes it leads us to something better.”
Yelena shivers as a chill sweeps over them and Bob moves closer, hoping the heat of his body will transfer to her through the touch of their knees.
“Just imagine if I had decided to go to India or Dubai, instead of Malaysia,” he continues. “Or if you’d never started working for Valentina.”
Yelena finishes the thought for him, “We never would have met.”
Bob nods, his curls growing unruly atop his head if Yelena’s grin is anything to go by.
“I don’t know what it is or could be. Fate or divine intervention or but a bunch of fucked up decisions that just happened to work out,” he says, which makes Yelena laugh quietly. “Whatever it was, though – I’m grateful for it.”
HIs fingers brush against Yelena’s in the small space between them, and for the first time, Bob feels brave. He lets them interlock, her palm small and cold within the warmth of his own. He’d give it all up, gladly, for her.
“Because it brought me to you,” he finishes off. He does not turn away, does not run or let his gaze roam off elsewhere. He simply lets his eyes trail across her face, selfishly. Yelena’s eyes are wide and blinking, the light reflected in them like falling stars against a hazel sky. There’s something in them he’s never seen before, vulnerable and raw and pleading.
Still, she does not remove her hand from his. She only uses it to pull him closer and whisper between them, “Keep reading.”
Bob never could say no to her. Using his free hand to hold the book up again and continue.
“Life,” he reads, “although it may only be an accumulation of anguish, is dear to me, and I will defend it.”
It happens between one page and the next.
Yelena has taken to Austen, which Bob found surprisingly unsurprising. A Romantic at heart, no matter how much she tried to hide it. It was just another thing he loved about her.
The reading had only brought them ever closer over the year they’ve spent together in each other's company. While they did more than simply read, there was a quiet vulnerability that came with it each time they did. A comfort in knowing that, whenever they needed it, there would always be a book to share between them, to connect their already connected souls even more.
They both knew it was only a matter of time before something happened. They’d grown more tactile. Sometimes, Bob would lay with a book in his hands and his head in Yelena’s lap as she brushed her fingers softly through his hair. Other times, Yelena curled up with her head on his chest and his arm around her waist as he read.
They had woken up in recent mornings with arms slung around shoulders and ears pressed to hearts. On multiple occasions, Bob would trail off as he read, distracted by the way Yelena’s hair glinted beneath the moonlight and the small smile on her lips that only grew brighter the later into the night it got. Even in the times Yelena caught him, as the pauses grew longer and longer, Bob allowed for the meeting of their eyes to linger before he returned to the pages.
And he swears, sometimes, he can feel Yelena’s eyes on him, too.
Tonight, though, Bob isn’t the one who’s reading.
Yelena, with Bob’s encouragement, had finally decided to try reading on her own. With his help, she had begun working on more of her English. Her accent remained, which he was happy about, but the pride in his chest grew every time she’d tell him she finished another book on her own.
She offered to read, tonight, and Bob had never been prouder of anyone in his entire life.
They’re sitting on the couch, Yelena leaning back against the arm rest with her legs in Bob’s lap. Bob placed a blanket over the chilled, pale skin of them and kept his hand resting on her ankle, hoping his warmth was enough.
He leans into the soft way her voice curls around the words as a world is painted before them, of ladies with parasols and sailors with broken hearts. Eventually, the fight within Bob is lost and he turns his eyes to Yelena, to the small furrow of her brows and the way her lips mold around the words. There’s a stirring within him and it feels like nothing their books have ever described love to be.
Then again, Yelena and Bob were alive and real – and so was this.
“...It was proof,” Yelena breathes, “of his own warm and amiable heart; which she could not contemplate without emotions so compounded of pleasure and pain, that she knew not which prevailed….”
Yelena trails off, breathing deeply as she turns her gaze up from the page to meet Bob’s own, already and always connected to hers. They’re so close, Yelena’s nose just a millimeter away from his own. He reaches out to take the book from her hands, not breaking their gaze, and Yelena uses the freedom to reach up and cup Bob’s face in both of her palms.
There are no words to say; they’d already shared so many.
No one leans in first. Instead, as they do everything, they lean in together.
It’s a simple brush, petal-like and soft, as Bob lets his hand curve around her waist and Yelena’s fingers travel into his hair. There is no crash of thunder, nor is there the spark of fireworks.
It is a kiss. Just a kiss. They were never ones for dramatics, anyway.
For a long while, Bob keeps one palm against her back while the other holds the book. Yelena keeps her forehead resting against his while her fingertips run reverently along his cheeks and jaw.
“Will you finish it?” she asks, tucking her face into his neck and sighing, like she’s finally returned home. “I want to hear your voice.”
Bob nods, lips brushing against her temple as he cracks the book open and does what she asks.
Half agony, half hope, he considers as she presses her hand above his heart.
He supposes he understood that once before.