Chapter Text
“Oh my god, this is the worst pain I’ve ever been in!” Ava howls, face buried in her hands, and Beatrice masks her exasperated sigh by blowing her bangs out of her face.
“Ava, it’s just a lower back sprain. You overexerted yourself with that final Halo blast; I told you to try and throw more from your Latissimus dorsi, and not to twist at the waist. Did you twist at the waist?”
Ava looks up, wearing her patented dramatic scowl. “Of course I twisted at the waist, Bea, you keep saying Lattice dorsey like that shit means anything to me.”
“It’s—” Beatrice huffs. “The Latissimus dorsi are the muscles under your shoulder blades, the ones we keep working on because they’re so important and you keep trying to lift with your trapezius.”
“Is that this thing?” Ava slaps her lower back, wincing as she does. “Because I hate it. I didn’t realize back muscles could hurt this bad!”
“No, your trapezius is—never mind. It’s not there.”
“Then what is this? Can I cut it out with a grapefruit spoon? Would that make it hurt less?”
“I…what? No. It’s just a lumbar issue, Ava. Rest and massage will be sufficient. You’ll be fine.”
Too late, Beatrice realizes what she said, and she watches helplessly as Ava’s face lights up with an idea: eyebrows raised, mouth already quirking upwards with that wicked little grin that always promises trouble.
“Oh, a massage?” she outright purrs, and Beatrice suddenly finds it very difficult to swallow. “Wanna give me a back rub, Bea?”
“Um.” Beatrice can’t answer that, not without unpacking a whole lot of baggage first, but luckily—or unluckily—Ava seems to have already made up her mind, wriggling out of her sweatshirt to reveal the mesh panels on her exercise tank top and leaning against Beatrice’s side, batting her eyes and pouting dramatically.
Beatrice has already steeled herself against Ava’s relentless need for touch—she was incapable of feeling anything below the chest for twelve years, of course she’s going to be starved for it—but her breath still hitches as it escapes from her lungs, the lump in her throat impossible to ignore.
“Sure,” she manages to say, because years as a nun have ingrained into her that service is more important than the servant, and the Halo Bearer’s needs vastly outweigh the demands of her own mere flesh.
Ava squeals in excitement, as if she wasn’t just proclaiming her imminent death via back pain, and pitches face-first onto the bed, the mattress springs groaning beneath her. She reaches back and thumbs at the area just above the waistline of her pants.
“Right here, that’s where it hurts,” she says. “Just the whole area right above the ass crack. Please don’t look at my ass crack.”
The bed is barely big enough for the two of them to sleep in, and with Ava spread-eagled like this there’s nowhere for Beatrice to perch that won’t involve somehow being on Ava. So that’s going to be an issue.
“I’m going to sit on your upper legs, is that all right?” is what Beatrice says, and she has to recite a brief Hail Mary in her head as Ava wriggles her ass in response.
“Get on here, Sister Badass. Ride me like a pony. Just, y’know, gently. Massage-y.”
Beatrice obeys, straddling Ava’s upper thighs, and slowly pushes the hem of Ava’s shirt up to expose a strip of bare skin, her fingers trembling despite her best efforts to remain calm.
You’ve given plenty of lumbar massages, she reminds herself. This is no different. It’s just Ava.
Beatrice has watched Ava for months now—as an intruder, as an enigma, as a pupil, as a friend. She’s watched her train, watched her expand her skills, watched as atrophied limbs have bloomed into something full and strong and alive. Beatrice has watched Ava probably a little too much, but that transgression pales in comparison to how much she has wanted, gluttonous and greedy and lustful want, the kind of primal need that would cast humanity out of the garden.
“...Beatrice?”
“Sorry!” Beatrice snaps out of her reverie, face burning hot as she looks down to see Ava yanking at the hem of her top.
“Should I take this off? You can get a better angle.”
“Oh, no need—” Beatrice’s protest dies in her throat as Ava lifts her head up off the mattress and pulls off the top anyhow, balling it up and shoving it under a pillow as she settles back down on the bed. Normally Beatrice would tell her to at least toss it towards the laundry basket, but she’s already lost in the valley between Ava’s shoulderblades, where the Halo pulses faintly under her smooth pale skin. Before she knows it, Beatrice has reached up, her fingers skimming along the circumference of the Halo, and she feels Ava sigh softly in response.
“Is this okay?” Beatrice whispers, reminded suddenly of the holy quiet of a confessional.
“Yeah,” Ava nods, arching into her hand. “It’s nice. I think the Halo likes you.”
“Well, that’s good to know,” Beatrice murmurs, her thumb arcing along its curve. “By the way, this is your Latissimus dorsi.” She traces along the edge of Ava’s shoulderblade, down across her lower back. “It starts just under your scapula and wraps around here.”
“Good to know,” comes the muffled response. “I didn’t realize massages came with anatomy lessons.”
“Just thought I’d point it out.”
“And in Latin, too. So smart, my Bea.”
Beatrice exhales through pursed lips as quietly as she can. “Thank you, Ava,” she says.
“No prob, Bob.” Even with her face buried in the pillows, it’s clear Ava is grinning. “Now, not to be impatient or anything, but you did promise a massage, so…”
“Yes. right.”
Beatrice lets herself indulge in the smooth span of Ava’s skin, watching the way she shivers just so slightly under the touch, and gently pushes the pad of her thumb against the taut muscles just to the side of Ava’s spine.
The reaction is immediate; Ava almost jumps up, back arching into Beatrice’s pelvis, and she lets out a groan that seems to rattle the entire apartment.
“ God,” she gasps, turning her face to the side. “Not so hard, Bea!”
“I barely touched you,” Beatrice replies, wincing at the way her voice croaks.
“Go gentle on me, I beg of you,” Ava sighs. “I’ve never had a massage before. Never had back pain, either.”
There isn’t much Beatrice can say to that, so instead she loses herself to the task, focus narrowing until the bigger picture dissolves. It’s easier to hone in on the details, on the movement of her thumbs as she digs into the muscles again, searching for the tightrope-thin balance between gentle touch and firm pressure.
Ava can’t seem to remain still, writhing beneath Beatrice’s legs as she whimpers into the pillow. “Bea,” she mumbles, stretching out the vowel like a brat, “it hurts.”
“It’s going to hurt until your muscles relax,” Beatrice manages to reply, her eyes fixed on the constellation of freckles scattered across Ava’s lower back. “Everything is seized up, that’s why it’s so sensitive. Do you trust me?”
“Of course I trust you.”
“Well, it’s a matter of kneading the knots out. If you just try to breathe through the discomfort, I promise you’ll come out the other side feeling better. Keep still enough and you can sometimes feel the muscle groups relax.” Beatrice digs a knuckle into Ava’s flesh by way of demonstration, and Ava nearly levitates off the bed, her cries muffled into the linens. But Beatrice doesn’t let up, moving her fingers in small circles around the spot as she steadies Ava’s waist with her other hand, and soon she feels Ava tense up beneath her and then relax just as abruptly, all but melting into the mattress with a positively filthy-sounding moan.
“There,” she almost sobs. “Oh, shit, Bea, right there. Please.”
Beatrice obeys—how could she not?—and increases the pressure, shifting her hips for a better angle and only pausing for a moment when she realizes she’s all but grinding against Ava’s ass. She puts that revelation away for now, narrowing her eyes as she hones in on the knots and pockets of tension at the small of Ava’s back. Every time she shifts the muscle, Ava moans and writhes against her; and every time Ava lets out a whimper, Beatrice has to tighten her mind’s window of focus because otherwise she’s go completely and irrevocably insane. Ava’s hips won’t stop shifting in response to Beatrice’s ministrations, and at one point she digs into a particularly deep knot and realizes that Ava is biting down on her pillow, her whole body shuddering as the tension flares and finally recedes.
“ Beatrice,” she pants, arching off the bed. “Boy howdy, you are good at that.”
And then Ava looks back over her shoulder, eyes glassy and cheeks pink, and Beatrice has a flash of what she imagines must be Hell.
“You’re welcome!” she blurts, all but tumbling off the bed in her haste to avert her eyes. “I’m glad it helped. Are you okay now?”
“...Bea?” Out of the corner of her eye Beatrice sees Ava reach for her, and she can’t , she just can’t, there are so many reasons why she can’t and every one of them is fading with each passing second.
“I’m fine,” Beatrice clears her throat, plucking her towel off the hook on the back of the door. “Just need a shower. It was a long training session.”
“Don’t you want me to rub your ba—”
“—No, I’m fine, thank you!” Beatrice calls over her shoulder as she all but flees to the apartment’s tiny bathroom, shutting the door just a hair too loudly behind her, sagging against it as the fever finally crests and splits her mind wide open. She foregoes her normal cold shower and instead turns the tap as far as it will go in the other direction, breathing in the steam in great silent gulps as she surrenders to the need that’s been clawing its way out of her skin for months now. Her fingers find her clit and she nearly comes undone at the slightest touch, biting down onto the flesh of her other hand to keep from making a sound; her knees buckle, thighs quivering with effort, and she leans back against the uneven tiles as she chases the tightening coil of pleasure until it finally snaps.
It takes another fifteen minutes to come down to earth and feel any semblance of control again, and when Beatrice emerges from the shower she sees Ava chopping something by the stove, and she lets her eyes linger on the outline of Ava’s spine through her shirt.
If Ava notices that all the hot water is gone, she doesn’t say anything. It’s as much of a miracle as Beatrice is probably going to get, and far more than she deserves.