Changed Equation
by Fair Hearing
(wardofcourt at gmail dot com)

Of course it would be June. Another cliché. But the part of you that used to sneer at clichés has been considerably humbled, over the past two weeks, once you learned so many of them were actually true. Even after so much experience, it's a strange feeling to be proved wrong. But not, this time, an unwelcome one. No, not at all.

You decided to walk to La Selva's today instead of driving, even though it was over a mile away from the office. There's just something too light, too buoyant in you to sit in that stuffy car, suffer through the lunch hour traffic, when it's cliché June outside and everything in the world is cliché beautiful. Because it's harder, when you drive, to remember the night before, the places he touched, the things he whispered in your ear. But easier when you feel the warm breeze on your face.

And so you don't notice the rhythm of your footsteps, or the way you swing your briefcase in time, or the way people on the street give you odd looks. You can't help it. Somehow everything reminds you of him.

"Mr. Edgeworth," the store owner had said in surprise when the bell dinged over the door. "We haven't seen you here in a while."

You'd apologized as you picked out peppers, baby spinach, Belgian endive, ginger root. You'd been busy, you said, but you planned to come by more often now, and what, in his opinion, was his best dark chocolate?

Afterward, when you got back to the office, you didn't even slow down at the front desk. You went right down to the parking garage, put the groceries in the back, and got in the driver's seat, letting the top down as soon as you turned the key. The whole way home, your heart was hammering like you were committing a crime.

Without even letting your secretary know. Shameful. Irresponsible. But you couldn't stop smiling.

When you got home, you turned on the radio in the kitchen, the fancy digital one that you'd never used, to the first station that came in without static. There was some incomprehensible song on about "love" and "above" and "baby now I believe" with far more bass to it than melody, but you didn't change it. By the time you started chopping the parsley, you were humming the chorus.

Everything was done by five, as you'd planned, but you'd already checked your watch three times before then. Somehow that managed to register, even though the pleasantly thick fog that surrounded you, as faintly alarming, so you'd decided to arrange the books in your bedroom alphabetically by author. And so you were sitting there, cross-legged on the floor, staring at a pile of hardcovers, when you heard the key in the lock.

Ridiculous how you scrambled to get up, knocking over more books in the process. Ridiculous how you dashed to the front hall and stopped short when you saw him: a piece of mail between his teeth, another in his hand, brow furrowed as he read. Most ridiculous of all, that swooping feeling in your stomach when he turned and looked at you: his eyes widening, the letter fluttering free from his mouth.

Astonishing how you once lived without it, this ridiculous life.

"You're home early!" he'd exclaimed, crossing the floor in two long-legged strides to pull you into a hug. In the air-conditioning, warmth seemed to come from him in waves; you drew in closer, slid your hands inside his jacket to feel the smoothness of cotton across his back. When he let you go, with a kiss to your jaw, you knew from the heat of your face that you were flushed. Bless your Irish complexion: the only part of you that could speak with ease.

But he didn't comment; he had seen past your shoulder, into the dining room.

"Holy shit, Edgeworth." He circled the table, touching the silver candelabrum gently, picking up the tiny salt spoon from its bowl. "Did you do all this?"

You didn't answer. It was good, in fact, that he was distracted: you couldn't stop staring at him.

He was examining the food so closely that his nose almost touched the plate. "What is it?"

"Oh." You shrugged one shoulder. "It's, uh... it's a salad."

He pulled out his chair and sat, his back very straight and his hands placed neatly on the table. "I feel like I'm in an eight-star restaurant." He looked around him, then up at you: smile crooked, eyes bright. "You're amazing."

You couldn't wait anymore. You pulled a chair over, sat down beside him. Then you cleared your throat, so that you'd have to end up saying something. Maybe you'd never be able to say what you meant, true. But it had never been clearer to you that it was worth it to try.

"I missed you today," you said finally, and you looked up into his eyes. Somehow that made it easier. "I got your email and I wanted to see you, but I knew you were busy, so I... I wanted to do something for you."

He said nothing, for a minute. Then a slow, dazzling grin spread over his face, and that was it. You were helpless, now. You couldn't have said anything more even if you tried to.

But luckily, you didn't need to.

"Come here," he whispered, and pulled you onto his lap, and all at once he was kissing you, slow and deep. You closed your eyes to feel it better, because it was everything you'd been thinking about all day today, and yesterday, and the day before. Everything hot and wet, everything Phoenix. Phoenix rubbing his tongue rough and soft against your tongue; Phoenix putting his hands on you.

This was what you couldn't get enough of. It felt somehow like dreaming, or floating: like something you couldn't name, something you'd never known before.

At one point he paused and licked his lips, pressed his forehead against yours. "Baby, what about your dinner," he murmured.

Such a horribly cliché pet name; you couldn't believe he'd said it; it made you shudder all the way down to your toes with warmth. "It's okay," you said breathlessly, pulling him back, "I don't care, we'll microwave it" -- when it had been a cold dish to begin with. But you would have said anything to have him on you again.

And the next words you would say to each other, once you finally made it to the bedroom, would be the most ridiculous cliché of all; and those were the ones, you had discovered, that were the best. Yes, astonishing that you had lived so long without the ridiculous. Without, you had realized at last, the miraculous.

A/N: This was also originally written for the Phoenix Wright Kink Meme, with the request "I want Edgeworth high as a kite and over the moon at the prospect of seeing Phoenix." Also as a weak ersatz present for my title-provider, who's actually a better cook than he is. (It's true!)