[Fic] Wearing the Wolf Skin
Muse: Mat
Word count: 2413 words holy crap I know
Prompt: Old gypsy woman spoke to me, said, "You're a wolf, boy, get out of this town." for paperskin
Notes: idk, I just took the wolf imagery and ran with it. Also, this takes place immediately before this fic.
Mat knew what he wanted when he looked at her. The whiskey he had been drinking burned at the back of his throat, mixed with bitter anger from his argument with Leon. The teenager’s words kept echoing in the back of his head, and he couldn’t shake them. He’d show her. He’d fucking show her what he could do. He could fall in love, could make it more than just about himself and what he needed. He could learn to care about people, and the woman across the room nursing a drink was just the woman he needed to do it.
She seemed to almost draw back from him as he came near, and he did his best to smile broadly at her. He knew he was charming-that’s what gave him his confidence when he was on the hunt. Not the hunt. This wasn’t a hunt, he kept reminding himself. This was going to be love. He was going to fall in love with her. “Hey,” he said softly, smiling. There was a kind of a weird art when doing it like this, flipping the trick coin so that it landed heads up and he won the bet. But it also meant something. It meant he was genuinely interested. It meant he wanted to be with her, not just for the night but for the rest of the nights from here until... until a time he didn’t want to think about right now.
She smiled back and as they talked and drank, stepping around each other in an elaborate dance, Leon’s words wouldn’t leave his head. She was wrong. She didn’t know anything and he would show her.
...
“Is this seriously all that you’re bringing?” she asked with a laugh when he showed up at her door, a duffel bag in his hand. “Are you having cold feet, Mister Commitment?”
“Hey, that’s not fair, this is a big step for me,” he protested, smiling despite the jabs she was taking at him. “I wasn’t the ‘move in’ type before you.”
“Aw, yeah, talk the talk.” She leaned in and kissed him and for a moment, everything was perfect, like it had never been before. She was perfect, fit into the situation perfectly and when she drew back it was like a wave crashing over his head. He wanted that moment to go on forever, wanted to pretend she was every single girl in the world, but she pulled his arm, dragging him into the apartment.
It was quaint and well-furbished and perfectly her, and that was what he loved about it the most. That’s what he told himself. He loved it not because it was another step, something he had never done before, but because it had her in it, and he loved her. He loved her he loved her he loved her. He really really did.
“Come on!” she cried as she tugged his arm again. “Come on come on I cleared out a drawer for you and everything and I want to show it to you.”
“Did you repaint it or something?” he chuckled. “I mean. A drawer’s just a drawer.”
“A drawer is not just a drawer,” she protested, dragging him through the mounds of weird knick-knacks on the counter and the musty-smelling couches and chairs. “It’s a space that I’ve reserved for your stuff, that’s all yours. This is a step for me too, you know, and I’m trying to make it as smooth a transition as possible.”
“Hey, I was just poking fun,” he said, and she whirled around and grinned at him, and then drew him in and kissed him again, and there it was again, that wash over perfect feelings and this moment could last forever if he wanted it to. She could be anyone and he could be anyone and it was perfect the way it was.
And then she stepped back and everything was still perfect and her smile was radiant as she lifted her arms. “Well, this is it,” she said, the nervousness slipping into her voice and something was clicked, something switched and he couldn’t help smiling. She was nervous and that was somehow endearing. “This is my room.”
“I’ve seen it,” he chuckled. “Several times.”
She punched him in the arm, and then pulled him close and kissed him up his neck and along his jaw line and that was perfect and she was perfect and everything was perfect.
...
The bed was too small for the two of them.
She had apologized for that several times, and he had repeatedly told her it was no big deal, that he liked being this close to her. And so here he was, late at night, with her curled up body pressing against his, in her small room, her scent all over his body, in the pillow, in the air, her warmth against his side.
But the thing was, he did like being this close to her.
He liked it a lot.
It was an odd sensation, being so intimate that he couldn’t move away, couldn’t look away, and it scared him more than a little. He wanted to push her away, wanted to climb out of bed again and be alone, but he also wanted to wrap his arms around her and hold her close to him, run his fingers over her body until he knew every inch of her, breath in her scent until it was all he could smell, all he would ever smell. They had talked quietly until she had fallen asleep, and now the soft chorus of her breath in his ear made him want to thrust himself from the apartment and also made him want to sleep next to her like this forever.
It was working.
He was falling in love.
Mat didn’t know exactly what that meant, wasn’t sure what to do about the confusion of feelings swirling in the pit of his stomach-he wanted to leave, needed to leave because this wasn’t him, this wasn’t what he wanted or needed, but as he thrust himself from her bed, she moaned and turned over and he froze in the dark, staring down at the dark figure of her sleeping body.
And then he lowered himself, wrapping his arms around her and drawing her in close, and she murmured and placed her head in the crook of his shoulder. And he took her hand in his.
And Mat just laid there, their fingers entwined, her breath easing him into sleep.
...
Mat had been living with her for a month and nine days when he came back with arms full of groceries, and saw her sitting rigidly on the couch. The air of the apartment was already one of tension, as if it knew that something was going down. He lowered the heavy bags to the floor and just looked at her. “Hey,” he said finally.
The smile she gave him back was tight, unsure, borderline totally fake. His heart had seemingly stopped beating-everything was focused on her small frame sitting on that couch, nervously picking at her nails. “Hey,” she said back. “Mat.” She paused, and normally he would have put in a joke that yes, that was his name, but he knew that wasn’t going to make this situation anything less than it currently was. She gestured at the chair opposite her. “Sit down.”
He sat quietly, suddenly feeling like a criminal on trial. The chair she had chosen for him to sit in was stiff-backed, wooden, and didn’t have arms so he just folded his hands in his lap. She seemed to be taken a second to look him over, to choose her words carefully, and all he could do was sit there under her scrutiny. He felt uncomfortable, too big for the chair, too big for the apartment and he realized for a second that he had just left the groceries lying on the floor and the frozen vegetables were probably thawing. He didn’t dare move, because that’s when she started to speak.
“You’re a complicated guy, Mat,” she said, sitting back into the couch.
“How do you mean?” Mat asked, looking away from the plastic bags on the floor to her face. He had made it his life’s mission to be able to read a girl’s face once he was dating her, and right now he couldn’t tell anything about what she was thinking or where she was going with this.
“You tell me,” she shrugged and relaxed, spreading her arms along the top of the couch like there were people sitting on either side of her.
“I’m not sure I understand your double-speak,” he said, not daring to move a muscle. Where the hell could she be going with this? What had he done wrong? He hadn’t done anything wrong. He had dedicated himself to her, and he was living with her and what more could she possibly want that he hadn’t given?
“Do you remember the first time we met?” She was smiling as she leaned forward, crossing her legs and putting her hands on her shins. “Do you remember what I said to you?” Mat squirmed just a little bit, trying to recall that night. He had been pretty drunk, pretty angry at Leon, pretty intent on getting her into bed. There wasn’t a whole lot of room in that situation for schmoopy details about who had said what things to whom. Luckily, she continued without pausing, without looking to him for the answers. “I said, ‘You’re not one of the good ones, are you?’” She half-chuckled, shaking her head, the look on her face one more of slight regret and disgust than amusement. Mat’s stomach had dropped out entirely, leaving a cavernous yawn of anticipation and fear. She lifted her head to look at him. “Do you remember what you said back?”
He shook his head slowly no. He could barely remember having this conversation, much less the specifics of what he said back. That laugh that wasn’t really a laugh came again, and he tightened his folded hands, until it looked like he was praying. Maybe he was, but he didn’t know what praying felt like any more.
“You said, ‘No. I’m not.’ You admitted that you weren’t good, and I still took you home, I still went out with you after that, I still let you move in with me.” She shook her head. “Mat, I can’t do it any more.’
He sat frozen for a minute before actually comprehending what she was saying, all of it. “I don’t... what did I do wrong?” He couldn’t have done anything wrong. He had given up everything for her. He had become domestic for her, broken ties with Leon...
The girl’s words floated back to him, the last words he had exchanged with her. “You’re not gonna change, Mat. This girl isn’t any different than the rest. Being in the same situation isn’t going to change you.” But he had changed, or at least he thought he had. Everything had been going correctly and now...
She shook her head. “You’re just not right for me, is all. Or I’m not right for you. I’m not what you need right now. You weren’t meant to do this.” She gestured to the apartment, the walls of which seemed now to be closing in on him. “I’ve seen it in your eyes, before you roll over to go to sleep. Some nights you look so happy and you adore me and I adore you, but some nights when you roll over there’s this... wild look in your eyes. You’re trapped here, and it’s driving you crazy.”
“I don’t feel trapped-”
“You might feel it, Mat, but I know you are. You’re like a wolf in a cage, and one day I’m afraid you’re going to turn on me.” There was a fear in her eyes that was real, and as Mat reached out to touch her she recoiled, drawing her knees up to her chest and wrapping her arms around her legs. “Get out, Mat,” she half-whispered. “Please.”
“I don’t...” he couldn’t seem to move. This was wrong, this was all wrong.
“Get out,” she repeated. “Please.”
Shakily, Mat got to his feet and moved without really knowing where he was going. He stepped over the plastic grocery bags at the door and stood in the hallway for a moment, the door closed behind him, just breathing. The air tasted like salt, fresh but biting, and for a moment Mat realized he was free.
He was also alone.
He turned took a step forward, then stood stock-still, listening. In the apartment behind him, he could hear her crying softly. He didn’t know what to do, so he turned around and put his hand on the door knob, and then he walked away.
...
The circle remained unbroken. Mat had broken out of nothing, and now was only breaking a few ribs, from the feeling of it, as another set of men much stronger than he was beat the shit out of him. He had asked for it, after all.
He had loved her but she had pushed him away. He didn’t know how to do it, couldn’t love like a normal person. Was there a way that normal people loved? Did that make him a sociopath, not being able to love? Is that why having the shit kicked out of him felt so so good?
Mat closed his eyes, tasted the blood as it dribbled down his chin, coating his tongue and his teeth. This was perfect. This was how it was meant to be. This was the way things were supposed to be.
He snarled as he was dragged to his feet by his shirt collar, and her words echoed in his head. ‘You’re like a wolf in a cage, and one day I’m afraid you’re going to turn on me.’
She was more correct than she could ever know. And that’s why he had to stay the way he was, the snarl transforming into a massive grin as he blinked through the droplets of blood in his eyes.
A fist drew back and landed on his face, and he blacked out, dropping into a freezing puddle as his entire body went limp. The lone wolf was still smiling as the rain came down in the alley, his teeth traced the blood of his kill.
Word count: 2413 words holy crap I know
Prompt: Old gypsy woman spoke to me, said, "You're a wolf, boy, get out of this town." for paperskin
Notes: idk, I just took the wolf imagery and ran with it. Also, this takes place immediately before this fic.
Mat knew what he wanted when he looked at her. The whiskey he had been drinking burned at the back of his throat, mixed with bitter anger from his argument with Leon. The teenager’s words kept echoing in the back of his head, and he couldn’t shake them. He’d show her. He’d fucking show her what he could do. He could fall in love, could make it more than just about himself and what he needed. He could learn to care about people, and the woman across the room nursing a drink was just the woman he needed to do it.
She seemed to almost draw back from him as he came near, and he did his best to smile broadly at her. He knew he was charming-that’s what gave him his confidence when he was on the hunt. Not the hunt. This wasn’t a hunt, he kept reminding himself. This was going to be love. He was going to fall in love with her. “Hey,” he said softly, smiling. There was a kind of a weird art when doing it like this, flipping the trick coin so that it landed heads up and he won the bet. But it also meant something. It meant he was genuinely interested. It meant he wanted to be with her, not just for the night but for the rest of the nights from here until... until a time he didn’t want to think about right now.
She smiled back and as they talked and drank, stepping around each other in an elaborate dance, Leon’s words wouldn’t leave his head. She was wrong. She didn’t know anything and he would show her.
...
“Is this seriously all that you’re bringing?” she asked with a laugh when he showed up at her door, a duffel bag in his hand. “Are you having cold feet, Mister Commitment?”
“Hey, that’s not fair, this is a big step for me,” he protested, smiling despite the jabs she was taking at him. “I wasn’t the ‘move in’ type before you.”
“Aw, yeah, talk the talk.” She leaned in and kissed him and for a moment, everything was perfect, like it had never been before. She was perfect, fit into the situation perfectly and when she drew back it was like a wave crashing over his head. He wanted that moment to go on forever, wanted to pretend she was every single girl in the world, but she pulled his arm, dragging him into the apartment.
It was quaint and well-furbished and perfectly her, and that was what he loved about it the most. That’s what he told himself. He loved it not because it was another step, something he had never done before, but because it had her in it, and he loved her. He loved her he loved her he loved her. He really really did.
“Come on!” she cried as she tugged his arm again. “Come on come on I cleared out a drawer for you and everything and I want to show it to you.”
“Did you repaint it or something?” he chuckled. “I mean. A drawer’s just a drawer.”
“A drawer is not just a drawer,” she protested, dragging him through the mounds of weird knick-knacks on the counter and the musty-smelling couches and chairs. “It’s a space that I’ve reserved for your stuff, that’s all yours. This is a step for me too, you know, and I’m trying to make it as smooth a transition as possible.”
“Hey, I was just poking fun,” he said, and she whirled around and grinned at him, and then drew him in and kissed him again, and there it was again, that wash over perfect feelings and this moment could last forever if he wanted it to. She could be anyone and he could be anyone and it was perfect the way it was.
And then she stepped back and everything was still perfect and her smile was radiant as she lifted her arms. “Well, this is it,” she said, the nervousness slipping into her voice and something was clicked, something switched and he couldn’t help smiling. She was nervous and that was somehow endearing. “This is my room.”
“I’ve seen it,” he chuckled. “Several times.”
She punched him in the arm, and then pulled him close and kissed him up his neck and along his jaw line and that was perfect and she was perfect and everything was perfect.
...
The bed was too small for the two of them.
She had apologized for that several times, and he had repeatedly told her it was no big deal, that he liked being this close to her. And so here he was, late at night, with her curled up body pressing against his, in her small room, her scent all over his body, in the pillow, in the air, her warmth against his side.
But the thing was, he did like being this close to her.
He liked it a lot.
It was an odd sensation, being so intimate that he couldn’t move away, couldn’t look away, and it scared him more than a little. He wanted to push her away, wanted to climb out of bed again and be alone, but he also wanted to wrap his arms around her and hold her close to him, run his fingers over her body until he knew every inch of her, breath in her scent until it was all he could smell, all he would ever smell. They had talked quietly until she had fallen asleep, and now the soft chorus of her breath in his ear made him want to thrust himself from the apartment and also made him want to sleep next to her like this forever.
It was working.
He was falling in love.
Mat didn’t know exactly what that meant, wasn’t sure what to do about the confusion of feelings swirling in the pit of his stomach-he wanted to leave, needed to leave because this wasn’t him, this wasn’t what he wanted or needed, but as he thrust himself from her bed, she moaned and turned over and he froze in the dark, staring down at the dark figure of her sleeping body.
And then he lowered himself, wrapping his arms around her and drawing her in close, and she murmured and placed her head in the crook of his shoulder. And he took her hand in his.
And Mat just laid there, their fingers entwined, her breath easing him into sleep.
...
Mat had been living with her for a month and nine days when he came back with arms full of groceries, and saw her sitting rigidly on the couch. The air of the apartment was already one of tension, as if it knew that something was going down. He lowered the heavy bags to the floor and just looked at her. “Hey,” he said finally.
The smile she gave him back was tight, unsure, borderline totally fake. His heart had seemingly stopped beating-everything was focused on her small frame sitting on that couch, nervously picking at her nails. “Hey,” she said back. “Mat.” She paused, and normally he would have put in a joke that yes, that was his name, but he knew that wasn’t going to make this situation anything less than it currently was. She gestured at the chair opposite her. “Sit down.”
He sat quietly, suddenly feeling like a criminal on trial. The chair she had chosen for him to sit in was stiff-backed, wooden, and didn’t have arms so he just folded his hands in his lap. She seemed to be taken a second to look him over, to choose her words carefully, and all he could do was sit there under her scrutiny. He felt uncomfortable, too big for the chair, too big for the apartment and he realized for a second that he had just left the groceries lying on the floor and the frozen vegetables were probably thawing. He didn’t dare move, because that’s when she started to speak.
“You’re a complicated guy, Mat,” she said, sitting back into the couch.
“How do you mean?” Mat asked, looking away from the plastic bags on the floor to her face. He had made it his life’s mission to be able to read a girl’s face once he was dating her, and right now he couldn’t tell anything about what she was thinking or where she was going with this.
“You tell me,” she shrugged and relaxed, spreading her arms along the top of the couch like there were people sitting on either side of her.
“I’m not sure I understand your double-speak,” he said, not daring to move a muscle. Where the hell could she be going with this? What had he done wrong? He hadn’t done anything wrong. He had dedicated himself to her, and he was living with her and what more could she possibly want that he hadn’t given?
“Do you remember the first time we met?” She was smiling as she leaned forward, crossing her legs and putting her hands on her shins. “Do you remember what I said to you?” Mat squirmed just a little bit, trying to recall that night. He had been pretty drunk, pretty angry at Leon, pretty intent on getting her into bed. There wasn’t a whole lot of room in that situation for schmoopy details about who had said what things to whom. Luckily, she continued without pausing, without looking to him for the answers. “I said, ‘You’re not one of the good ones, are you?’” She half-chuckled, shaking her head, the look on her face one more of slight regret and disgust than amusement. Mat’s stomach had dropped out entirely, leaving a cavernous yawn of anticipation and fear. She lifted her head to look at him. “Do you remember what you said back?”
He shook his head slowly no. He could barely remember having this conversation, much less the specifics of what he said back. That laugh that wasn’t really a laugh came again, and he tightened his folded hands, until it looked like he was praying. Maybe he was, but he didn’t know what praying felt like any more.
“You said, ‘No. I’m not.’ You admitted that you weren’t good, and I still took you home, I still went out with you after that, I still let you move in with me.” She shook her head. “Mat, I can’t do it any more.’
He sat frozen for a minute before actually comprehending what she was saying, all of it. “I don’t... what did I do wrong?” He couldn’t have done anything wrong. He had given up everything for her. He had become domestic for her, broken ties with Leon...
The girl’s words floated back to him, the last words he had exchanged with her. “You’re not gonna change, Mat. This girl isn’t any different than the rest. Being in the same situation isn’t going to change you.” But he had changed, or at least he thought he had. Everything had been going correctly and now...
She shook her head. “You’re just not right for me, is all. Or I’m not right for you. I’m not what you need right now. You weren’t meant to do this.” She gestured to the apartment, the walls of which seemed now to be closing in on him. “I’ve seen it in your eyes, before you roll over to go to sleep. Some nights you look so happy and you adore me and I adore you, but some nights when you roll over there’s this... wild look in your eyes. You’re trapped here, and it’s driving you crazy.”
“I don’t feel trapped-”
“You might feel it, Mat, but I know you are. You’re like a wolf in a cage, and one day I’m afraid you’re going to turn on me.” There was a fear in her eyes that was real, and as Mat reached out to touch her she recoiled, drawing her knees up to her chest and wrapping her arms around her legs. “Get out, Mat,” she half-whispered. “Please.”
“I don’t...” he couldn’t seem to move. This was wrong, this was all wrong.
“Get out,” she repeated. “Please.”
Shakily, Mat got to his feet and moved without really knowing where he was going. He stepped over the plastic grocery bags at the door and stood in the hallway for a moment, the door closed behind him, just breathing. The air tasted like salt, fresh but biting, and for a moment Mat realized he was free.
He was also alone.
He turned took a step forward, then stood stock-still, listening. In the apartment behind him, he could hear her crying softly. He didn’t know what to do, so he turned around and put his hand on the door knob, and then he walked away.
...
The circle remained unbroken. Mat had broken out of nothing, and now was only breaking a few ribs, from the feeling of it, as another set of men much stronger than he was beat the shit out of him. He had asked for it, after all.
He had loved her but she had pushed him away. He didn’t know how to do it, couldn’t love like a normal person. Was there a way that normal people loved? Did that make him a sociopath, not being able to love? Is that why having the shit kicked out of him felt so so good?
Mat closed his eyes, tasted the blood as it dribbled down his chin, coating his tongue and his teeth. This was perfect. This was how it was meant to be. This was the way things were supposed to be.
He snarled as he was dragged to his feet by his shirt collar, and her words echoed in his head. ‘You’re like a wolf in a cage, and one day I’m afraid you’re going to turn on me.’
She was more correct than she could ever know. And that’s why he had to stay the way he was, the snarl transforming into a massive grin as he blinked through the droplets of blood in his eyes.
A fist drew back and landed on his face, and he blacked out, dropping into a freezing puddle as his entire body went limp. The lone wolf was still smiling as the rain came down in the alley, his teeth traced the blood of his kill.