Work Text:
As a kid all you heard when it came to you and your little habit was, “Stop it.”
Picking and biting at your lips was something that had haunted you for as long as you could remember. Cracked and broken skin on your lips were almost a constant and it haunted you still even now.
After you’d been ill with the flu or a cold, or something your lips liked to taunt you. Even just after being out in the cold for too long without applying some lip balm.
It was a fucking pain.
And because they used to be in such a bad condition, you just assumed that once the dead skin was off you’d be fine. So picking at them and biting them seemed like it was helping.
Oh how wrong you were.
So that was when you got constant ‘Stop it’s from your parents and when you caught yourself doing it you said a silent ‘stop it’ to yourself.
And the past few days you’d fallen back into that bad habit because you’d just got over a cold. So when you were at work today, stressing out over a client, you caught yourself staring at your laptop with your elbow rested on your desk and your fingers on your lips, picking at a little piece of dry skin you’d found.
Stop it.
Then you caught yourself biting them later when you were trying to actually make the custom design for your client. Another ‘stop it’ filled your mind.
Then again on the phone to another client who was being rude.
Stop it.
And again, when you were driving back home to your boyfriend who’d just flew back in from a series of shows he’d done.
STOP IT!
All you wanted to do was be able to kiss your boyfriend, but no way would he want to go anywhere near you if your lips split. Thankfully the first day or two when Matty was back home your lips held out.
You tried your best to control your habit and with Matty distracting you from work stresses it became a little easier. But when you were at work and he obviously wasn’t around you fell back into old habits.
And after a particularly stressful day at work, you did the worst.
You accidently split your lip.
Never had you not wanted to go home to Matty more. He was affectionate with you in the best of ways and he almost always wanted a kiss and a cuddle when it was just the two of you alone together.
But you didn’t want to kiss him with your lips in the state they were. Despite trying every lip balm, lip scrub, and moisturizer, nothing had helped over the past few days they still fucking split.
You hated it, and you hated that it made you anxious for Matty to see you like that. Thankfully, he’d never seen you like this before but something in you made you think he’d want nothing to do with you.
Maybe it was your old anxiety creeping back in. Or maybe it was just the fear of rejection.
Whatever the reason, it made you want to hide yourself from the person you shouldn’t be hiding yourself from.
“Hey.” You called when you got home, knowing Matty was around somewhere.
“Hey.” Matty calls back from the lounge, “How was work?”
When you walk in and see your boyfriend with his long mop of curls, you smile saying, “Stressful.”
“Bastards being picky again?” Matty grins when his brown eyes connect with your Y/E/C ones.
You chuckle remembering you’d complained about your clients to him on multiple occasions. You loved your job but god you met some pretentious people along the way.
“Not more so than you when it comes to buying your vintage clothes.” You tease him, throwing your coat down on the settee before leaning over him and kissing the top of his head.
Matty playfully scoffs, “I’m not being picky, I just have taste.”
“Sure, that’s what we’ll call it.” You giggle as Matty pulls you down onto his lap so he could give you a hug.
His arms wrap around you and he buries his head into your neck. You smile, feeling him kiss your skin a few times but you just bury your nose into his soft curls that smell like his expensive almond conditioner, as you ask, “How’s your day been?”
“Boring without you here.” Matty tells you and even though he’s just being kind, it makes you smile.
As you ask, “How are the boys?” Matty’s lips slowly trace their way up your neck and to your jaw.
Your anxiety set in a bit then, knowing exactly where they were headed.
“They’re alright, I suppose.” Matty tells you, he kisses just under your ear before he says, “Wanna see you apparently.”
“Well that’s no shock, they do love me more than they love you.” You joke.
Matty chuckles a little at that and kisses across your cheek as he whines, “You’re mineee.”
You giggle at that and throw your head laughing back just before his lips reach the corner of yours.
Matty chuckles too hearing your laugh and he kisses under your jaw whilst it’s exposed to him. Your laugh was so adorable, and he’d never tire of hearing it.
“Do you want a brew?” You ask the love of your life as you get up out of his lap.
Matty smiles, looking up at your gorgeous face, “I’d love a coffee please.”
You nod and head to the kitchen feeling a little relief that you’d got out of that one. You didn’t want him to be repulsed by the thought of kissing you, so you’d rather avoid kissing him instead.
But that turned out to be what gave you away.
That night you went to George’s for a Chinese with them all. Adam brought Carly with him so you ended up talking to her for most of the night to try and avoid PDA.
You just received passing kisses on the head or on the cheek that night, even when you crawled into bed later you just tucked your head under Matty’s chin and let sleep take over you quickly.
The following day you avoided them too and you thought you were being subtle about it. Sometimes you playfully dodged his kiss and kissed his cheek instead, and other times you made him kiss your cheek when he went in for one, because you’d put lip balm on.
But the day after you were still doing the same despite not being in a playful mood or having anything on your lips.
You were standing in your kitchen with Matty’s arms around your waist making the both of you an omelette for lunch. You’d told Matty to just take a seat at your kitchen table as he kept trying to distract you with hugs from behind and trying to lean over you and kiss your face.
You laugh but instruct him once more to sit himself down. After another minute of him pestering you, you nudge him with your hip to move himself over to the table and he finally lets go of you and lets you finish your delicious creation.
He says a thank you when you place it down in front of him and he was going to give you a kiss until you practically whipped yourself back to the kitchen counter, just ruffling his hair
“Hey.” Matty says to make you look over at him, and when you do, he asks, “What’s up?”
You put your own lunch on your plate and when you sit down on the seat at the end of the table, you say, “Nothing, why?”
Matty points out, “You’ve not let me kiss you for the past two days.”
You go quiet then feeling bad because you haven’t kissed your boyfriend. And for the fact you’d not been honest about it and its leading him to ask questions like, “Have I done something?
“No Matty.” You tell him softly, never wanting to make him think that.
You look into his gorgeous brown eyes and you can see he’s just curious about your behaviour. Usually you’re all over each other, but you have been pretty distant and with him only being back for 3 weeks it hurt your heart not to have him the way you wanted him.
But you’d rather not have the anxiousness that came with you being overly self-aware of your lips against his.
“Then what’s up?” Matty asks, watching as you avoid eye contact and just concentrate on your food.
You glance at his plate and see it’s going untouched, so you gesture to it saying, “I promise I’m fine, just eat before it goes cold.”
“Don’t tell me you’ve gone off me?” Matty says after a few seconds.
And when you just take a deep breath to try and think over another excuse, Matty asks, “Oh my god, have you?”
“No.” Your eyes snap up to his in panic. You didn’t want him to think that at all, so you repeat, “No, never.”
“Then what’s up?” Matty chuckles and then noticing your look of panic he makes light of it asking, “I’m feeling very affection starved.”
You close your eyes, sighing, “Matty.”
“Come on, love.” Your boyfriend chuckles before taking your hand and asking again, “What’s up?”
“Is it not obvious?” You ask, feeling like your lips were really disgusting right now.
Matty shakes his head, “I’ve got no clue why you won’t let me kiss you.”
After a deep breath you tell him the truth, “My lips are a fucking state.”
“Your lips are fine.” Matty frowns a little confused, looking down at them. “What do you mean?”
You say in a vulnerable voice, hating having to point it out, “Matty it’s split.”
Matty glances back down at then again and he reaches up to cup your jaw. You resist the urge to pull away from his reach because after all he was the person who knew you best.
His thumb comes up and runs across your bottom lip then and he shakes his head, “It’s tiny.”
You shake your head a little so his thumb drops. He was being polite; it wasn’t tiny at all. The only highlight was that it was starting to heal.
You follow up with, “I hate it, they feel all dry and disgusting.”
“You’re thinking they are a lot worse than they are Darling. I don’t hate them at all.” Matty says, scooting his chair a little closer so he could easily trace your lips again.
He softly asks, a little more sympathetic, “Did you really not want to kiss me because of that?”
“It’s vile.” You shake your head.
“It’s not.” Matty says and then adds, “You’re my girlfriend, I wanna kiss you all the time.”
You put your hand over your lips and shake your head.
“Stop that.” Matty bats your hand away but as soon as he retreats you cover your lips again.
“Stop it.” Matty insists, pulling your hand down and keeping hold of it, “You don’t have to do that.”
You try to pull your hand away but when he doesn’t let you, so you just bring your other one up when you say, “I do because you keep looking.”
“Only because I want to kiss them.” Matty grins at you.
You shake your head and look back down. Noticing your plates are still full, you try to change the subject by saying, “The food’s going cold.”
“It’ll get colder if you don’t give me a kiss.” Matty grins.
You sigh then, still feeling conscious and you’re about to protest but your boyfriend doesn’t let you retreat again.
“Y/N.” Matty says before you can protest, “I want to kiss you all the time.”
He then makes a pouty face at you then and puckers his lips making kissing noises at you. He gets you giggling within seconds and your heart swells with how lovely he’s being towards you.
Matty can obviously tell it’s something you’re not comfortable about. But he didn’t care in the slightest.
He loved you with the whole of his heart and he’d do everything he could to make you love yourself as much as he loved you. And if that meant kissing your pretty lips every second of every day, he would do.
You chuckle at your boyfriend puckering his lips at you and you ask, “Even wanna kiss me when my lips are mingin’?”
“They’re not mingin’.” Matty assures you before he just abandons his chair and just kneels on the ground in front of you.
He still has a hold of your hand and he gives it a little squeeze before he assures you, “I love you Y/N, course I wanna kiss you.”
You smile at him then and when he actually goes go for the kiss Matty is really happy you don’t stop him. Your kiss was just as sweet as it usually was and Matty felt the excitement bubble away inside him like it always had at the mere thought of kissing you.
But Matty just kept his one sweet, making sure you were calm and relaxed. And he was pleased to know you were.
When Matty pulls away, he smiles, “See…? Wasn’t so bad, was it?
Your cheeks go a little hot then, seeing how much adoration was in his eyes. You don’t hesitate to tell him, “I love you.”
“I love you too.” Matty grins, before cheekily asking, “Can you have another one?”
You giggle at his one-track mind, but you decide to make him wait. You pass him your plate and say, “After you warm up my eggs.”
Your boyfriend takes it with a laugh and grabs his own plate. But he steals one more kiss from his gorgeous girlfriend on the way back to the stove.
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