Arvil’s eyes flickered to her fingers on his chest. He pulled her further into him, digging his face in her hair and breathing her in deeply. He didn’t want her to go, but he didn’t want her getting behind in her work.
“Why had you been crying?” he asked in a hoarse voice, remembering what had caused them to argue. “What made you cry, Daisy?”
Daisy let out a shuddering breath and leaned into him. She rested her head against his chest, taking a deep breath.
“I— I thought you were upset with me. I thought I had done something wrong,” she whispered, her voice muffled by his shirt. “You stopped initiating touches, and I thought you were maybe disgusted by me for who-knows-what-reason… I’m sorry…”
Arvil cursed under his breath. “So you cried because of me,” he murmured, tightening his hold on her. “I will never be disgusted of you, Daisy. I just wanted to make you comfortable. I’m sorry if I made you feel like that…”
“I should at least be trying to make this work. This obviously isn’t an idea position to be in, but I don’t have to act like such a jerk. I’m sorry, Arvil, you deserve so much better than I’ve been giving you,” Daisy mumbled. “And I do feel comfortable around you most of the time. I don’t mind hugs or hand holding or any of the things we’ve done. It’s just hard for me with this wedding because I’ve been dreaming of the perfect wedding with my perfect husband for as long as I can remember. So this… It’s been hard to realize that I don’t always get what I want in this aspect…”
Arvil pulled away to cradle her face gently in his hands. “I know I can’t provide you with a perfect husband and a perfect wedding, but I want to at least come close to that,” he started softly. “I don’t want you to feel like I’m caging you in, or plucking your wings. I don’t want you to look back on our wedding and regret it. I really, really don’t, Daisy. So I want us to do whatever we can to turn this into your perfect wedding—or close to it, anyway. So for the…” he paused, those words harder to speak than the previous ones, “Time we spend together, we can look back and be happy about it instead of being upset.”
Daisy blinked up at him slowly. His hands were soft on her cheeks, and he felt gentle against her even though they were still pressed against the wall. At his words, she blinked again, feeling her eyes begin to sting, and nodded slowly.
“Thank you, Arvil. Thank you. I don’t— I don’t deserve this. Not after the way I treated you. And yet you still manage to be kind to me,” she whispered. After a moment of just looking into his eyes, she pressed herself up and kissed him softly, murmuring her thanks again when she pulled away.
Arvil rubbed his thumbs against her cheeks, releasing a breath he didn’t know he was holding. “We live on misunderstandings. It’s okay, Daisy. And you’re right; you don’t deserve this. You deserve more than what I can give you,” and then she pushed herself up and pressed her lips against his and he wanted to pull her into a longer one again. Instead, he kissed her eyes, her cheeks, her nose and her forehead before he pressed their lips together again. “Let’s not get upset with each other without any proof, yeah?”
Daisy nodded, eyes still closed from when he’d kissed them. Her lips tingled from the intensity of their earlier kiss and now from the last one.
“Yeah… Yeah, okay,” she sighed, opening her eyes. “I’m— I'm sorry, Arvil.”
Arvil didn’t know what he was doing. At this point, he was sure she was attracted to him at least. But he didn’t want his feelings clouding his judgement.
“If you’re truly sorry, then enjoy yourself as best as you can,” he murmured, caressing her cheek again. “Yeah?”
“Mmhm. I’ll try,” Daisy agreed, giving him a small smile. She glanced behind him at the clock and cringed. “But I really do have to get going now. I wasn’t lying when I said I had work to do.”
Arvil nodded and stepped back to let her go. “I don’t want you losing that promotion because I held you back,” he joked. “Go.”
Then he paused, as if remembering something. “Wait, what about lunch?”
Daisy blinked and glanced over at the food. “Oh, right… Well, maybe I can work on things with my phone,” she mused, brushing herself off. “Do you want me to stay?”
“Is that even a question, Daisy Riley?” Arvil quirked an eyebrow, running a hand through his hair to fix it. “It might have gotten cold so if you want, I can have it reheated.”
“Oh, sure. It probably has by now. We spent a lot of time… doing other things,” she said with a slight cough, rubbing a pink cheek.
“Other things as in… arguing, or making out?” Arvil quirked an eyebrow in amusement, loving the pink on her cheeks. “Or both?”
Daisy rolled her eyes, lips quirking up in slight amusement. “If I tell you then I’ll have to kill you,” she declared.
“How are you going to kill me?” Arvil wondered, pretending to think about it deeply. “With your mouth, or your gorgeous looks?”
The blush in Daisy’s cheeks deepened slightly, and she huffed. “Oh, come on… That’s not fair,” she mumbled under her breath, stepping past him to get to the food.
Arvil chuckled, letting her sidestep him to get to the food. “Why is it not fair, I wonder?” his eyes twinkled mischievously. “Because it’s what you were planning to do?”
“No,” Daisy muttered, grabbing her food before making her way to the couch. “That’s not what I meant.”
Arvil stopped the flirting immediately and grabbed his own food, following her to the couch. “How… are you, Daisy?”
“I’m… I’m good. Better, now that, you know…” Daisy started, glancing over at him with a small smile. “Now that I don’t think I upset you.”
Arvil smiled back at her, glad she was feeling better. "You should know that I don't get upset at anything small," he murmured. "So if you can't think of anything that might have upsetted me, then I'm not upset."
“Good to know,” Daisy sighed in relief, nodding slowly. “Weren’t you going to reheat the food?”
“Ah, yes,” Arvil snatched the food from the table before he stood up. “I’ll be right back. Don’t go anywhere, darling.”