Chapter Text
They end up spending the rest of the day together.
Colin showers (he borrows one of Penelope’s fluffy pink towels and it smells like her) and luckily a pair of trousers and a T-shirt are dry enough for him to put on, as his joggers are ruined.
He comes into the living room and she’s curled up on the sofa with her laptop, in the pile of blankets and pillows that he hasn’t tidied up yet. She asks if he wants to watch a film and he says yes, and then later she asks if he wants to order food and he says yes again.
And they waste the day like that, eating and watching movies, the pale autumn sun filtering prettily through the flat until suddenly it is dark, and the day has slipped away from them entirely, and Colin can’t remember the last time he felt this peaceful.
She goes to work the next day and he spends the morning listlessly in the flat, absently picking up her belongings and looking at them, thinking idly about how her pussy tasted. He feels strangely… itchy. Like when he’d missed a hole in his mosquito net whilst trekking through the Amazon and had ended up eaten alive, his skin burning for the rest of the trip.
Colin is late for lunch with Ben. Before he was supposed to leave, Colin lay around on her sofa daydreaming uselessly, and his mind started to wander to the previous night. The feel of her thick thighs around his face, how her pussy had tasted (salt and earth; delicious). How she had sucked his lower lip when she kissed him - inartfully but hungrily, all her self-consciousness and defences totally dissolved. There was something precious about how she had felt in his arms, so pliant and willing and trusting, and he still cannot quite believe that she had opened herself up to him in that way - him! Colin! The family fuckabout, who has been chasing his own tail for years with nothing to show for it. Well, now, here, finally, there is something to show for it: he helped Penelope experience something new. He helped her feel pleasure, and it was so, so beautiful. He feels proud that he made her feel safe enough for that, to let her guard down with him. All his whoring suddenly feels… worthwhile.
Having these thoughts makes his cock hard for reasons he cannot quite understand, but he learned a long time ago not to over-analyse his boners - it only takes the fun out of them. Instead he jerks himself off remembering how she had looked perched above him, all soft rolls and expansive cream skin, hair spilling over her shoulders like a goddess, and he comes quickly.
This time, he has tissues to hand.
It makes him late to lunch with Benedict, but he figures it’s Benedict, and he has half-an-hour leeway because Ben has never once been on time to anything, so it is rather astonishing to see his big brother already sat at the lunch table, checking his phone with an impatient look on his face.
Colin gets a sinking feeling in his gut. “Sorry,” he says immediately, as the waiter shows him to the table. He is always apologising to his family, but never usually to Ben. Ben doesn’t need apologies, doesn’t ask for them, but Colin has an odd feeling like one is necessary. “I got caught up.”
Ben rolls his eyes. “It’s fine,” he says, getting to his feet. He squeezes Colin’s face and kisses him hard on the cheek, as he always does, before ruffling his hair.
“Very cool haircut,” Ben says, as they sit down, one eyebrow raised. “I didn’t realise mullets were back in.”
Colin smoothes down his hair with both hands, trying to undo the damage Benedict’s hug has done to his hair. “Yeah, well, they are,” he says sulkily, and immediately feels guilty. He does not know why he feels like a scolded child. He shouldn’t feel like a scolded child - this is Ben, not Anthony.
When he’s in London, Colin always tries to see Ben first. It sort of… inoculates him to the rest of the family - all their expectations and questions and disappointments. Ben knows what it is like to feel aimless, without purpose (he is an artist - almost sillier than how Colin spends his life). Ben does not judge Colin’s sluttiness (being almost as much of a slut himself, and the only other sibling beside Colin not in a serious relationship). Ben gets Colin in a way the rest of them don’t.
“How are you doing?” Ben asks, his light blue eyes flicking over Colin’s face. “You look terrible. I don’t just mean the haircut - you look exhausted.”
“Jesus, Ben, can you lay off? I only just sat down!” Colin snaps. Colin does not snap, and he does not yell. He does not know what is wrong with him. Benedict gives him a look, and Colin immediately feels awful. “Sorry, it’s just… of course I’m exhausted. I’m jet-lagged and I’m sleeping on Penelope’s sofa because I’ve been so rudely kicked out of my own house.”
“It’s not really your house, though, is it?” Ben reminds him, drily. “It’s your mum’s house.”
“I should have just had lunch with Anthony,” Colin says, his words lashing out. “You’re riding me about as hard.”
Ben winces. “Low blow. No need to be a brat.”
“Then why are you being such a prick?” Colin fires back.
Ben puts his hands up. “OK, fair enough. I’m sorry. I’m just worried about you, I guess.” There is genuine concern on his face, and it makes Colin feel even more annoyed and exhausted. His skin starts to itch again.
Colin rubs his eyes. “OK, now you’re just being Mum. There’s nothing to worry about.” He picks up his menu with one hand, fiddling with his silver chain with the other. “Can we just order some lunch? I’m starving.”
Ben picks up his menu. “Fine. Sorry.” They peruse the menu for a second. “How is Penelope? Is it alright staying with her?”
Colin tries to keep his face smooth as he looks at his menu, his brain immediately flooded by the image of her in her robe, how her gorgeous tits had bounced when he pulled away the silk. He can feel his cheeks heating as he looks over the pho options. “Yeah, it’s fine,” he says lightly, eyes glued to the menu.
“Why have you gone so red?” Ben asks, and he puts a hand on Colin’s menu, flattening it against the table so Colin has to look at him. His eyes are sparkling in curiosity and amusement, and for a moment things feel normal. This is Benedict - gossipy and silly and teasing. Colin’s body starts to relax for the first time since he sat down. “Did something happen?”
Colin sucks in his cheeks, and he doesn’t have to say anything for Ben to understand. His brother’s eyes widen.
“God!” Ben leans back in his chair. He pulls a face of disgust.
“What?” he asks defensively. “She’s a very pretty girl.” He knows Benedict is not that cruel, but what Penelope said last night about how the world treats larger women has stuck with him. He feels strangely protective of her.
“It’s not that,” Ben says, wrinkling his nose. Colin’s hackles go down. “It’s just… she’s like our little sister. Bit off-putting to think about.”
“She is not our sister,” Colin insists hotly.
“Fair enough,” Ben concedes, and rubs his jaw. “Well. Don’t tell Eloise.”
Colin rolls his eyes. “Yeah, no shit. I know maybe it doesn’t seem like it to the rest of you but I do actually value my life.”
Ben laughs at that, and the waiter comes over to take their order. Once the man has gone, Ben spreads his hands flat on the table, and leans forward. “So how did it happen?”
“Uh, she caught me touching myself to…” he lowers his voice, highly aware of the other patrons of this Vietnamese restaurant. “To some pretty specific porn.”
Ben groans and puts his hands over his face. “Col …” he says, laughing.
Colin can’t help laughing too. It is pretty ridiculous, and it feels good, normal, to be having lunch with Ben and laughing over his sexual misadventures.
“Only you could go from having a girl catching you wanking to convincing her to have sex with you,” Ben says, shaking his head. “Jesus.”
“Actually she asked me, ” Colin says, and he can’t help how his mouth curves up at the memory of her sweet, determined little face as she propositioned him.
Ben looks genuinely impressed. “Good for Penelope,” he chuckles.
Their food arrives, and they are quiet besides some appreciative slurping. It is not as good as the pho Colin had in Hanoi, he decides, but it is pretty good.
“Is it going to be weird with you staying at Penelope’s flat for the next two weeks?” Ben asks. “We don’t want any awkwardness at mum’s birthday.”
“Nah, no awkwardness,” Colin blows on a spoonful of broth to cool it. “We’ve both agreed it’s just sex, and then in two weeks I’ll be gone again,” he mumbles through a mouthful of noodles and beansprouts.
“Of course,” Ben says, and for some reason that makes Colin feel… annoyed. Itchy, again. Of course, it’s just sex . It’s Colin, so it’s just sex. How could it be more than that? He knows he is the one who said it first, but when Ben agrees, it sets his teeth on edge.
A thought invades his mind unbidden: Penelope deserves more than just sex.
Colin tips his pho towards him, slurping directly from the bowl in an attempt to distract himself from this odd and unsettling thought.
“Well,” Ben goes on, poking his spoon around in his soup. “The vibes between the two of you have always been sort of… weird. I suppose this is one way to deal with it.” His lips twitch.
“What do you mean the vibes have been weird?” Colin asks, swallowing. The broth is not fully cool - it burns on the way down, and he winces.
Ben pulls a face. “Seriously? You don’t know?”
Colin frowns. “No.”
“Every time you two are in a room together, she walks you like a fucking dog and we all have to pretend not to see your boner,” Ben says. “Frankly, it will be a relief for all of us if you two finally fuck it out of your system. It’ll make Sunday lunches a lot less uncomfortable.”
Colin’s face burns, and he feels annoyed again. “She doesn’t - she doesn’t walk me like a dog,” he says hotly.
Ben laughs, and Colin wants to punch him - which is surprising, because Colin doesn’t shout, and he doesn’t snap, and he never gets the urge for physical violence.
“Sure,” Ben says, with an infuriating expression on his face.
“What about you?” Colin says, desperate to move the conversation away from Penelope walking him like a dog (it is in fact making his cock twitch, which isn’t exactly proving Ben wrong). “I’ve revealed my various humiliations. Come on; gimme one of yours. It’s only fair.”
To his amazement, Benedict blushes . Colin tries to think if he’s ever seen Benedict blush before, and he cannot recall it. The entire family once walked in on him having sex with one of his exes in the dining room at Aubrey Hall, and even then he had just waved cheerfully, cock out, whilst the rest of them had run away screaming.
“The biggest humiliation of them all, I’m afraid,” Ben tells him, attempting wryness but there is a goofy smile on his face. “I’ve fallen in love.”
Colin has the strangest sensation, as though the table is tilting away from him. It is as though he is on a boat travelling through choppy waters, the world heaving and tipping around him.
“Wow,” he says, his voice brittle and hollow. “Tell me everything. Who is she?”
Benedict gets this dreamy, floaty look in his eye, and Colin tries to assemble his face into an interested, engaged mask and pray that Benedict does not notice he is wrecked, adrift, lost at sea, floating on driftwood upon stormy waters.
He barely hears what Ben says, except that her name is Sophie and that he is thinking of asking her to move in with him. She is helping him get set up at the gallery her friend owns. Benedict thinks she is the one .
Colin nods and congratulates his brother and tries to work out why, exactly, he feels so seasick.
Penelope asks Edwina to meet her for coffee because she feels like if she doesn’t tell someone what happened with Colin she is going to explode. When her boss asks her how her weekend went, she almost blurts out I sat on my best friend’s brother’s face, and so decides she needs an outlet ASAP, before she gets herself fired. Or arrested.
Edwina’s office is close to Danbury Publishing House, so they meet at the coffee shop on the corner and once they have their flat whites in hand and are walking around the nearby park, Penelope lets it out.
As she speaks, Edwina’s eyes get more and more round, her mouth sucking into a little O shape.
“You can’t tell Kate,” Penelope finishes. “Because she’ll tell Anthony, and then Eloise will find out and-”
“She’ll kill both of you,” Edwina finishes.
Penelope nods, chewing the inside of her cheek. She feels a little bit sick about the Eloise of it all, if she is honest - if it had been anyone else but Colin’s face buried in her pussy, Penelope would have been on the phone telling Eloise about it before she’d climbed off him. It feels… wrong that she isn’t allowed to have this conversation with her very best friend.
“Do you think - do you think I’m being pathetic?” Penelope asks desperately, because there is a secret, sad part of her that worries that this is true.
“Pathetic like how?” Edwina asks, sipping her drink with a frown.
“Pathetic like… I’m agreeing to have sex with the first guy who shows interest in me,” she says, and her voice is low, small. “Like I’m so desperate that I’ll fuck anyone who looks at me.”
The thing is, when she had been perched on top of Colin Bridgerton’s pretty mouth, she hadn’t felt pathetic. She had felt powerful. For the first time in her life, her body had felt like the source of something good: pleasure, power, the moans Colin made against her skin.
Edwina squeezes her arm, her eyes sympathetic. “I mean, why do you think I lost my virginity, babe? You think you’re the first person to fuck someone because they feel desperate?” She gives Penelope a wonky smile. “Sorry to say it but you’re not special.”
Penelope smiles ruefully, her fingers flexing on her coffee cup. “Yeah, but…” She fiddles with the cardboard sleeve. “I feel kind of ashamed.” Because Penelope has always been taught that, hasn’t she? As a fat girl, her desire was something shameful. Disgusting, even.
Edwina shrugs. “Yeah, but you shouldn’t be. I bet Colin doesn’t feel ashamed right now. I bet all Colin is thinking is how lucky he is that there’s a hot twenty-four-year-old with a great rack who wants to bang him.”
Penelope snorts and almost spits out her mouthful of coffee. “Edwina,” she laughs. Edwina doesn’t usually talk like this, and Penelope supposes that’s because Penelope doesn’t usually talk about this kind of stuff. She supposes that usually there is no stuff to talk about, and Penelope has a tendency to shut down this kind of sex talk with others, her own inexperience embarrassing her, making her feel left out.
Edwina’s pretty brown eyes sparkle. “And honestly I think he’s got it right. Maybe instead of being ashamed you should be thanking God and the universe for this very sexy opportunity that’s been dumped in your lap.” She raises an eyebrow. “Because what do you mean Colin fucking Bridgerton has offered to spend two weeks fulfilling your every sexual fantasy? If I were you, Pen, I’d stop worrying about shame and start thinking about what I was going to let him do to me.”
Penelope laughs, and with a twinge she realises that she’s also missed out on this in all her years of virginity - this openness, this intimacy with her friends. It feels sort of nice and sad all at once.
“Honestly, I can’t believe you came into work today,” Edwina goes on. “I’d be calling in sick with my ankles around my fucking head.”
“Maybe you’re right,” Penelope laughs, feeling better than she has all day.
“I know I am. Do it for me, Pen,” Edwina says. “Let Colin Bridgerton pop your cherry, and then call me afterwards to tell me about it, OK?” She takes a sip of her drink. “The very best thing about having sex for the first time is talking about it afterwards.”
When Penelope comes home from work, the itchiness under Colin’s skin goes away and his heart picks up to see her. He feels silly, like a dog greeting its owner (fucking Ben - he cannot get the image out of his head), but he can’t help it.
“How was your day?” he asks, running his hand through his hair. He doesn’t want to seem like he’s been waiting for her, but he has, of course.
“Good,” she says, kicking off her shoes and dumping her bag in the hallway. She hangs up her coat on the rack and it immediately falls off. She makes a harrumph noise and leaves it there, stomping into the kitchen. Colin has to fight the urge to immediately jump to his feet and hang it up for her - he is not her dog (he will do it later, when she isn’t watching).
She pours herself a glass of water and chugs it at the kitchen island. “How was your day? Were you just on the sofa all day?” she asks, eyeing him suspiciously.
“No,” he insists hotly. “No. Well - not all day, at least,” he adds, with a wonky grin. She takes a drink of her water to hide her smile, but he catches it anyway, and something flutters in his chest. “I went for lunch with Ben. He was telling me about Sophie?”
He doesn’t mean for it to be a question - for it to sound so needy - but it is, and it does. Her face softens; she puts down her glass.
“He didn’t tell you?”
“We don’t really speak when I’m away,” Colin admits. It’s true. It wasn’t always this way, but recently it’s gotten too… sad. Seeing the family group chat - all of them sending pictures of their partners and kids and Sunday lunches - only makes him feel more sad and alone when he’s away. He feels like he is stuck behind glass, watching them all move further and further away from him, never able to follow. He knows it is ironic, because he’s the one on the move - he is the one running - but he feels so left behind.
And it was OK when he had Ben on his side of the glass. It didn’t feel so lonely with his brother by his side.
But now Ben will get married and have kids and move on, and Colin will be left here, with his stupid mullet and his (all-too) regular monthly standing STD check-up, watching the rest of his family live their lives. Whilst he does… what, exactly?
“Are you freaking out?”
Colin is snapped out of his reverie. Penelope is looking at him, and he feels suddenly as if he is under a microscope, as if she is peering into his very cells, his mitochondria and membranes dissected in her eyes.
“A little.”
Does she see everyone so clearly, or just him?
She sighs, and sets down her glass. “I felt the same when El moved in with Phil,” she says. “I know it’s different - you’re older, and the pressures are different for women, of course, but it’s hard feeling like the people you love have parts of their lives they can’t share with you. It’s like…” She leans against the counter, her eyes searching the room as she looks for the words. She really is awfully pretty, he thinks. “It’s like everyone’s on this train, moving forward on the track, and you’re stuck at the station with all your bags still trying to buy a fucking ticket. It’s hard. I get it.”
He stares at her. “Yeah.” He feels a strange ache in his belly when he looks at her, something that feels like desire but he knows it isn’t, it tastes different on his tongue. Longing maybe. Or something… else.
He tries to pull himself together, shake it off. He gives her one of his charming smiles, his eyes blinking slowly so she has plenty of time to look at his lashes. “You know, you’re pretty wise for someone so short,” he says, teasing, wanting to make her blush and squirm.
Except she doesn’t. Her chin tilts up, and she meets his gaze. “Yeah, I am pretty wise, actually,” she says forcefully, and as she glares at him, and Colin feels his cock twitch, he realises that he might just be (monumentally, disastrously) fucked.