danielle r. rookwood (curador) wrote in valesco,
@ 2011-09-01 22:12:00

Entry tags:

danielle rookwood, donovan rookwood, elizabeth fortescue, gabriel corner, group, juliet nott, rachel corner, rhys nott, rian kettleburn, rose knightley, thomas mccormack

Rookwood Wedding! Open to Guests!
Everything had gone off without a hitch.

Danielle wanted to cry for more than their vows, she was just so elated that the ceremony hadn't been interrupted by someone angry at the both of them, anyone who found it wrong for them to be together. It felt like all these months of turmoil and tears had been pointing towards this day, and Danielle was going to love every second of this day.

Her hands rested behind her back as she listened to her father's story about his wedding day. Danielle rocked on her heels with a smile on her face, so happy that she was going to have stories to share with her family, their future children, and anyone else who was willing to listen. The party was small, just their closest friends and family (Rian had come! He'd come!), and it was just what Danielle had always wanted. The wedding was supposed to be about her and Donovan, it had always been Donovan, and to have her fantasy come true was astounding.

And it wasn't even the felix felicis they had given all of their guests as favors, talking.

She was about to comment on how her father seemed to be getting misty eyed when a hand rested on her waist. Danielle turned and smiled brightly at her husband, and excused herself from her family to pay some attention to him.

"Have I told you how handsome you look today?"

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coverstory
2011-09-03 12:46 am UTC (link)

It was a happy day, in his mind. Gabriel had never thought he'd see the day; Donovan Rookwood a married man. Of course, they'd all joked about his best friend and Danielle getting married straight out of Hogwarts, but when she'd decided to go to Columbia, he had thought that was that. Gabriel was a smart man, he knew what his friends wanted and needed in life, and even with Donovan's few years of doubt, he'd always say (and loudly) that he knew it would be him and Danielle.

Of course, he'd never been able to figure out his own life quite as easily, but he was more than happy with what he'd come into. Gabriel smiled across the room as Jonas began to pick up his guitar, as he had promised to serenade the group of friends. His foot was bouncing, honestly excited that this day had finally come, and it was an evening without any worries at all. His mother had the children, Rachel was looking more lovely than ever, and he...

...well, Gabriel had taken a sip of the golden potion the Rookwoods had provided to their few guests. Merlin knew that the lot of them needed some liquid luck these days.

He pushed his chair out from under him, and put his hand out to his wife when she turned. Gabriel grinned his most charming grin, and bowed his head slightly, "I said, dance with me."

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malengled
2011-09-03 01:14 am UTC (link)

She looked at him, startled and perhaps a bit shy. There was no real reason to be, she thought. They had danced before, of course, several times. One would have thought Rachel would have grown accustomed to the activity with her husband, but the truth was that that was one of the times she felt most vulnerable with this man, as if all her secrets, thoughts, desires, even fears, were laid bare for his taking. Yet, somehow, along this mad and puzzling journey they'd taken, she'd gone from fearing Gabriel would never bother with them, to fearing he would, only to exploit them, to slowly, perhaps uneasily, trusting he would handle them with care.

That, in and of itself, terrified and pleased her. Contrary to the very last.

After being whisked to the floor, her hand in his, the other slipped
tentatively on his shoulder, she gave herself a moment to appreciate. The
music, the setting, yes, also the handsome man she was with, that her
children were safe at home... With the smallest of sighs, she settled against
him and smiled in a way she thought covered her hesitancy well. "This is nice."

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coverstory
2011-09-03 11:43 pm UTC (link)

Gabriel's arm wrapped around Rachel, probably a bit more tightly than was appropriate, and if he wasn't feeling so lucky then he would've sworn he'd get quite the scolding for it. He gazed down at her with a smile, a proud smile at that, and let out his own breath. His life was pretty wonderful right now, he could not deny.

"It is," he agreed, twirling them around a bit, earning some comments from the small crowd. Gabriel's grin widened even more, and he let out a sigh of his own. His wife was the loveliest woman he'd ever laid eyes on, and Gabriel was more than proud to call her his. Why, he should let her know that! "I love you."

They didn't say it very often, or at all, and in the moment Gabriel was really wandering why. He felt his ears heat up in the most pleasant of ways, "You're the first woman I've ever said that to," he admitted, smiling pleasantly, honestly. He liked talking this way with her, he liked catching Rachel off guard, like now with his words---and with the quick dip he dropped her into, holding her securely in his arms. Gabriel moved his face close to hers, "You're the first and the last."

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malengled
2011-09-05 02:57 am UTC (link)

It was difficult, to bite back the protests, the denials, the rejections, that immediately rose up her throat, nearly out her mouth. If she had learned anything in the last year and a half, it was that this man was hers, for better and most certainly for worse. If he'd stood by her side through their vicious fight the summer past and its aftermath, stood by her on the days she was simply the worst version of herself, there was no room for reasonable doubt that he meant what he said.

Never in her life had someone given her that so unconditionally, without reserve, or even expectation, and to her mind, it was a gift with which she risked being extremely careless.

And yet, even after all this time, those three words were the only ones Rachel could never seem to manage to Gabriel. Such a small thing, really. Three syllables, though they meant the world. Over the months, with no small amount of intensely private shame, Rachel learned it was not necessarily that she was afraid she herself would be hurt, but the certainty that she would hurt him. Trying to warn him, trying to make him see reason, had never worked, because he never believed that there was that side of her that deserved to be unloved, that deserved so much of the hurt she'd doled out in the past.

His arm was snug around her waist and though there was comfort in being so close to him, there was also that spike in the beating of her heart, that tingle along her spine that made her the slightest bit uneasy, threw her just off her stride.

Striving for amused, she laughed lightly as he lifted her out of the dip, trailed her fingers ghostingly across the nape of his neck when the two had straightened. "You know I simply don't know what to say when you talk like that."

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coverstory
2011-09-05 03:53 am UTC (link)

"Tell me you love me," he said without hesitation, without considering how loaded the words were to come from him and to hear from her. Gabriel was not stupid, he was quite aware that his wife, though he knew it in his heart, had never actually spoken the words to him. There was no need to doubt Rachel's feelings, he felt how she felt and was quite content with how they lived their lives.

No, he had said it, requested it, really, for her. Gabriel knew that she believed him and his words, his feelings, but there was still that guard up around his wife that he couldn't quite break through. Strange, wasn't it? They were married, they had a child together and were raising two others, but he still was not able to convince her that it was okay for her to be in love with him. Or at least, admit out loud to herself and the world that she did. What harm would it do, really? Love only made things better, especially when it was reciprocated as fiercely as Gabriel's love for Rachel was.

The music had stopped, but he hadn't noticed, and Gabriel was an expert at ignoring the cat calls from his best friends. There was no way they'd be able to break his attention now, as he strongly gazed into Rachel's eyes.

He pulled her closer, pressing his forehead to hers so that their lips almost touched as he spoke, "Say it, Rachel, you'll only gain more happiness. I live to make you happy, to love you. Love me."

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malengled
2011-09-05 05:24 am UTC (link)

Rachel bit back a gasp as heard the demand, more impassioned than she could remember him being. When he'd greeted her from Ibiza, it was calculated coolness and tepid relief. When it was Benjamin, it was the absolute devotion to her needs. It was not, had never appeared to her to be, a so-called selfish thing from Gabriel, that he would need to hear these words as much as she needed to never say them; that she could give them to him, and he would derive happiness from it. "I—"

There was that hot sear of panic low in her belly, impossible to ignore. As much as part of Rachel wished to blame him, to cry out that Gabriel had done something to bewitch and ensnare her, he hadn't. Her body, heaven knew, had gone willingly. Her mind, with time, had been won. But it was her heart, that curious and soulful entity, which remained firmly out of grasp. It was a thing bruised more times than she cared to remember, acting purely out of self-defense. Without reason, without rhyme, having stitched itself back together in a senseless pattern with each passing wound. Yet even that most stubborn organ sighed and inched and fell into love when she'd least expected it, hadn't been looking for it.

It was cowardly, undeniably so, but easier to close her eyes and press her face to the crook of his neck, to not see him as she began to lay herself bare as she vowed she never would when he'd taken her to wife.

"I love you," she murmured against his shoulder.

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