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benjaboyisatwink · 7 hours ago

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Guys read this pleeeaseee! it's sooo good. I really felt seen by this reader's actions, I'd do the same (in this hypothetical, fictional situation with this fictional character, obviously) and honestly? A stalker buying me groceries and care packages in this economy would make me pretty happy ngl can't really complain abt that

𝐛𝐥𝐚𝐜𝐤 𝐜𝐨𝐟𝐟𝐞𝐞, 𝐨𝐧𝐞 𝐬𝐮𝐠𝐚𝐫

pairing: stalker!simon "ghost" riley x gn!reader synopsis: you thought you were just being paranoid, looking over your shoulder every time you walk home from the café after the closing shift. a movement here, a shadow there—a stalker, you concluded. but when strange things started happening inside your house, you knew you were not dealing with just any stalker. [wc: 3.9k]. note: i saw this prompt by @andromacheofappalachia and immediately though of ghost because that man has high potential to become unhinged. this took longer to write than i thought because i couldn't decide whether to use ghost's or reader's POV, so after going back and forth, i did both! turns out, i'm capable of writing happy(?) endings after all. tags: stalking; possessiveness; creepy behaviour; caring behaviour?; fluff?; coffee shop AU; break-in; mw3 spoilers; ex-military!ghost; reader is a college student; age gap

masterlist

living in the big city—those words had always sounded enticing to you. but when you actually moved to go to college, you didn't expect city life to be this hectic. three months in and the glamour had worn off, revealing the rusty infrastructure beneath.

you lived in a dingy apartment near the local park, with a broken entrance door and flickering hallway light. yet you worked to the bone just to keep that roof over your head and to put food on the table. still, it was home and you were determined to at least make it until graduation.

the coffee machine hissed angrily as you wiped sweat from your brow. your eyes were bloodshot because you were up late finishing an essay last night. three midterms were coming up, rent was due in two days and the morning rush had brought in a tsunami of caffeine-hungry customers.

your fingers trembled slightly as you packed another portafilter with mediocre coffee grounds. the double shift you took yesterday did a number on your muscles.

"large oat milk latte!" you called out, forcing a bit more brightness into your customer service voice. today was not your day and it was only getting started.

the sky was gloomy, as it usually was during the cold winter months. outside, the streets were wet from rain. shallow puddles on the ground splashed beneath people's shoes as they walked by. contrasting the cold hues, the café's warm lights shone from its windows, painting gold onto the damp pavement outside.

when the morning rush passed, you were finally able to breathe. you attempted to mend the broken vanilla syrup pump which was your colleague's doing when the door chime ringing caught your attention. another customer.

you fixed your messy hair and smoothed out the beige apron that you wore over your oversized sweater. a man walked inside the cosy café and you gave him a smile.

"hi, what can i get you?" you asked, keeping your voice warm despite the slight undertone of exhaustion.

you'd never seen this man before, he was definitely not one of the regulars. despite the large volume of customers and seeing new faces every day, there was just something very distinct about this one.

he was big—tall as he was buff. his head, mostly hidden under a grey beanie, showed tufts of blond hair that stuck out. though his face was mostly obscured beneath a black surgical mask, the man owned the most beautiful pair of deep-set brown eyes you'd ever seen. under the café lights, they almost looked like caramel candies.

and yet, they were also the most tired pair of eyes you'd seen all week, like he hadn't had a good night's sleep in days. there was just something about them that you likened to yourself, eliciting sympathy from you.

he mumbled his order, his voice rough and kinda hot, with a distinct manchester accent, "black coffee, one sugar. takeaway."

quick and simple.

"of course, coming right up."

you worked with swift hands, movements steady and habitual. your mind was too preoccupied with an internal debate—how can he look so attractive when i can't even see his face?—to notice that his gaze never strayed from you the entire time.

after making the coffee, you handed him his drink and threw in a free cookie. "on the house," you said calmly, before turning your attention to the next customer, who happened to be a regular. you greeted her warmly and soon got started on her usual.

why did i do that? you thought as you worked on making the next drink. you knew you were going to have to pay out of pocket for that, yet you still gave a random guy a free cookie.

perhaps it was those damn eyes or...

you didn't want to think too much about it, so you settled with a simple 'just because' and 'kindness begets kindness' to justify your spontaneous action.

the man paused for a second as he silently accepted the freebie, casting you a final, lingering glance before heading out the door.

the days blurred. your life was mostly made up of lectures, essays, some group projects, and of course, your job at the café. during off-peak hours, when your manager wasn't present, you would be hunched over at the table near the counter, studying in your free time. a packet of your favourite strawberry milk would always accompany you.

you noticed that the man from the other day had started showing up every now and then. a repeat customer was always great for business, so you gave yourself a pat on the back for giving him that cookie (which you assumed was the catalyst).

he always sat in the quiet corner by the window, alone. his order never varied either—black coffee, one sugar.

still, it was nothing out of the ordinary to you. the café gained and lost regulars all the time, and this man was no different. until two months later, when it was the third time this week that the man sat at the café, ordering nothing but his usual.

you moved towards his table. "can i get you anything else, sir?"

he met your gaze directly for the first time that day. "no, thank you."

nodding, you collected his empty cup with a smile.

"you're here a lot," you said, the observation slipping out before professionalism could catch it. a warmth crept up your face. "sorry, that was—"

"i am," the man agreed, cutting off your embarrassment. "quiet place to think."

you nodded, clutching his empty cup and silently hoping you didn't offend him. "well, we appreciate the business."

later that day, your manager scolded you, something about the ice machine not working. you tried so hard to hold back words that might cost you this miserable job.

you were determined not to let a bad day at work ruin the rest of your evening, so you bought a small tub of ice cream on your way home. in your mind, you could already hear your mother's voice scolding you for eating ice cream in the middle of winter, but you didn't care. a sweet treat is a sweet treat.

tugging your hood lower, you picked up your pace as you walked towards your apartment building. it was late and the streets were quiet. luckily there were a handful of other pedestrians in the vicinity to ease your nerves. you were never the biggest fan of walking alone in the dark.

eventually, you couldn't shake the feeling that someone was staring at the back of your head. a glance over your shoulder showed nothing but shadows. how strange.

your hand dug into your pocket and grabbed your keys readily. as you passed the alley near the old laundromat, you could've sworn you saw movement for a split second. tall, broad—there and then gone again.

your building loomed ahead, the familiar cracked steps promising safety. the entrance door was still broken, so you were quickly able to bypass that. but that also meant that whoever was following you could too.

nearly running, you fumbled with the keys when you reached your front door, your fingers stiff and clumsy from the cold. paranoia crawled into your mind and the feeling that someone was out there became impossible to ignore.

finally your lock turned and you darted inside, slamming the door shut behind you before promptly locking it. your heart was racing in your chest and you tried your best to get rid of that uneasiness in your stomach.

silently, you pressed your ear against the door, trying to discern if there was actually someone that followed you home. no footsteps followed, no knock, no voice. your peephole showed only an empty hallway.

with a sigh, you slowly backed away before peeling off your jacket. everything was okay.

what you weren't aware of was the dark figure lingering at the end of the hallway outside your door, eyes fixed on where you had just disappeared into your apartment.

a few days later, it began.

you were still half-asleep with the taste of toothpaste clinging to your tongue, before freezing the second you saw it: a paper bag on your counter. you didn't remember putting it there and you definitely remembered locking your door last night.

apprehensive, you took a peek inside. there was a loaf of bread, fresh strawberries and the expensive tea you only let yourself buy on payday. there was no receipt and no explanation.

maybe i left it there, you reasoned with yourself. maybe you bought it and you just forgot. stranger still, when you opened your fridge, you swore there were more things inside than yesterday.

the next week, it happened again. this time, the package was in your bathroom, arranged carefully beside the sink. it was an entire stock of your favourite skincare products that you so frugally used to make them last as long as possible.

that night you slept poorly, waking up every hour with the feeling that your apartment wasn't entirely yours anymore.

by the third time, you stopped trying to make excuses. you came home to find a cardboard box on your bed. inside was a soft blanket, a six-pack of your favourite strawberry milk and a book you'd mentioned wanting in passing to a customer at the café weeks ago.

suddenly, the air in your apartment felt different. every shadow in the corners seemed darker, like it was hiding something, someone. you found yourself checking behind the shower curtain, under the bed, inside the wardrobe.

absolutely nothing. it made you feel like you were slowly going crazy. when you turned off the light that night, the smell of cigarette smoke lingered faintly in the air.

within the same week, you had asked your landlord to change the lock of your apartment, but he didn't grant you permission, so you settled with installing a chain lock to your door.

it had been another long day. your wrists ached from scrubbing tables and your back was sore from standing on your feet for way too long.

rent was late again. you could go on and on about the disproportionate increase of living costs vs. minimum wage, but that wouldn't help the headache you were starting to feel.

by the time you stepped into your apartment, you allowed your mind and body to decompress. you tossed your bag onto the couch, letting out a long, tired sigh.

that's when you saw it. another brown paper bag sat neatly on your kitchen counter.

you hadn't gone shopping in weeks, yet there it was. a bag of fresh persimmons, a carton of eggs, even a loaf of sourdough from the bakery down the road (the one you couldn't afford anymore) and of course, your favourite strawberry milk drink.

the first and second time this had happened, you freaked out. now… you didn't know what to feel. you had reported it to the police the moment it became suspicious, but you were told that "without substantial evidence" they "'aren't able to take any action", so you dropped it. cops were unreliable anyways.

in the beginning, you were unsettled and paranoid, as you should be.

but after months of feeling invisible, worn down by bills and loneliness, the thought of someone caring enough to notice what you liked and needed… it was warm and comforting.

besides, with money tight, the gestures seemed almost luxurious considering that you could barely afford most of these things anymore.

so you didn't tell anyone and kept quiet about the situation.

lieutenant simon riley thought he was fucked up in the head from the torture he went through all those years ago. but after the shit that happened with makarov and losing his best friend, he reached new lows.

unable to function properly in the military and therefore becoming 'useless' to the higher-ups, john price recommended an early retirement for him. it took a lot of convincing (and a physical altercation between him and the captain), but simon finally agreed to leave the military for his own good.

then it started with a singular cup of coffee. it was supposed to be a nothing day. no scenic routes, no side-quests—just coffee.

for some reason, simon had chosen to take the long way home, with no real destination in mind. the streets were quiet and wet from rain under the pale winter sky. shallow puddles on the ground splashed beneath his boots as he walked.

his civilian life still felt… foreign. there was no hum of comms in his ear, no target to watch, nor the persistent feeling that his life was in imminent danger. this was new, but he was starting to get used to it.

then he saw a café.

it was small, wedged between a laundromat and a shop with a flickering neon sign. warm light shone from its windows, painting gold onto the wet pavement. he stepped inside with no reason other than to escape the rain and grab a quick cup of caffeine.

you were stood behind the counter, hair a little messy, wearing a beige apron. there were dark circles under your tired eyes and simon guessed it was from long nights and too many shifts. typical city dweller—you wouldn't be the first overworked person he'd met that day.

yet when you caught his gaze, you smiled. a genuine smile, like you meant it. not the fake, dead-eyed customer service smile he learned to ignore.

"hi, what can i get you?" you asked. he heard the fatigue in your voice, but still you tried to sound friendly.

"black coffee, one sugar. takeaway," simon muttered without much courtesy.

"of course, coming right up."

his eyes were glued on you as you worked.

after he paid and you handed him his drink, you suddenly added a cookie to his order. "on the house," you said, before another customer stepped forward to order.

simon was caught off-guard. people didn't just… give like that. not to strangers, let alone to intimidating men his size with a demeanour that screamed leave me the fuck alone. you just slid the cup across the counter along with the packaged cookie, your fingers brushing his. you didn't flinch nor pulled away.

something shifted in him. simon told himself it was nothing, that he'd forget you the second he stepped outside.

but that night, lying in bed, he kept replaying the sound of your laugh when you greeted the next customer and the way you'd tucked the cookie into his hand for whatever reason.

in his world, it was rare to be looked at without suspicion or fear. it was rarer still for someone to see him and offer kindness anyway.

the next day, he found himself walking the same route. just in case. by the end of the week, he knew your schedule and near the end of the month, he stopped telling himself it was all a coincidence.

you'd given him a cookie once and now he wanted everything.

it's been over a month and simon had become a regular at the café.

he watched from his corner table, steam rising from the untouched black coffee before him. his eyes tracked your movements through the reflection in the window, a habit from years of surveillance work that civilian life couldn't erase.

the dark circles under your eyes had deepened since yesterday, he noticed. your posture communicated exhaustion, but the smile you put on your face remained genuine, like you were intent on pushing through another day with a grin.

he'd been keeping an eye on you for a while now. first out of curiosity for the person who gave him a free cookie. but eventually, he noticed the quiet determination that radiated from your hunched form as you studied textbooks during off-peak hours.

fascinating, he though to himself. he hadn't seen this kind of buoyancy in a person since johnny's passing since the military. something about that stubborn resilience had triggered his attention.

and attention, for simon, had always been a dangerous thing to give.

his fingers tapped a silent rhythm against the weathered tabletop, counting your footsteps as you moved between tables. twenty-seven steps since you last greeted a customer, nineteen since you'd discreetly massaged your lower back when the manager wasn't looking.

he knew your schedule by heart now: monday and wednesday classes until 14:00, work until 20:30, tuesdays and thursdays in class until 17:00, friday double shifts at the café, weekends varied.

simon also knew you lived in the apartment near the local park, with the broken security door. he often stared at the window that faced the alley, curtains too thin to hide your silhouette studying late into the night.

he sipped on his now-lukewarm coffee, watching as your manager chewed you out (again) for something out of your control (again). your face remained carefully blank, but simon caught the slight tremor in your hands and the way your jaw clenched in irritation.

"pathetic," he muttered under his breath, though whether that was directed at you, the manager or himself remained unclear. simon was a former special forces lieutenant who served for almost twenty years, yet here he sat, obsessing over a college student like some lovesick teenager.

but they aren't just any student, he tried to justify. they're... different.

simon followed you home that night, keeping to the shadows as you trudged through the downpour of rain. you didn't see him, you never did. he watched you fumble with three different keys before finally finding the right one and disappearing into the your unit.

the urge to follow you inside had been almost overwhelming. he wanted to see the private spaces where you existed when no one was watching, where you kept your socks, what your nightly routines were.

but the time was not right yet.

soon, he promised himself.

simon had observed you for neaarly two months now and frankly, the urge to break into your apartment was impossible to resist at this point. he'd spent nearly every night watching you through your bedroom window, imagining what your private space looked like.

after weeks of deliberation, he made a move.

the front door lock was laughable. one turn of his pick set and it gave with a soft click. simon slipped inside, shutting the door behind him quietly. this felt familiar, like the countless missions he went on in the past.

your apartment was small, nothing fancy. wallpaper peeled in the corners of your walls and the radiator pipes made little rattling noises. but it felt like you. cosy furniture and decoration, along with the overwhelming scent of you.

he stood there for a moment, letting the quiet settle. he'd imagined this space a hundred times from the outside and now he could see it all.

simon moved with slow care, eyes scanning over the living room. a second-hand couch stood in front of a small TV and on the coffee table was an unfinished cup of tea next to a stack of textbooks with sticky notes jutting from the edges.

in the kitchen, he checked the cupboards and noticed that there was barely enough food to last the week. a small crease formed between his eyebrows. i knew they weren't eating properly, he thought. that won't do.

he drifted into your bedroom last. the bed was unmade, your sweater was tossed over a chair and the faintest hint of your perfume clung to it.

without thinking, simon's touched the fabric and held it up to his face to take a long whiff. your scent stirred something deep inside him.

he didn't touch anything else. at least, not yet. tonight was about learning and mapping the space, much like the recon missions he used to go on.

before he left, he set a small paper bag on the kitchen counter, containing a loaf of fresh bread, strawberries and some nice tea.

simon locked the door behind him—you would never know he'd ever been there. but now that he crossed the threshold once, he knew it wouldn't be the last time.

after he first broke into your apartment, simon had been keeping an extra keen eye on you, trying to discern your reactions.

at first, he noticed how skittish you seemed, looking over your shoulder every now and then, as if you were waiting for something. he almost felt bad.

he knew that you contacted the police, but he also counted on the fact that law enforcement would not put investigating a supposed break-in incident on a random college student on their priority list.

at one point, you put a chain lock on your door, but of course, that didn't deter him from sending his packages. if he could pick locks and hack into complex security systems, a simple chain was definitely not stopping him.

no matter what you tried, you weren't going to get rid of simon that easily. he was a man on a mission, determined to take care of you.

a part of him said he was just trying to do something nice for the person he was interested in, but he couldn't exactly deny that the thrill of it all felt intoxicating. it became almost impossible for him not to break into your apartment at least once a week so he could watch you sleep in the dead hours of the night. he'd just stand there, looming over your bed, staring at your peaceful, slumbering face.

not creepy at all.

you knew you had a stalker at that point, though you weren't privy to the identity of said person. simon knew that you knew, and he knew that you weren't aware it was him. he still went to the café almost daily and nothing changed in the way you interacted with him, luckily.

then one day, as if you gave up, the prevention efforts stopped. it was quite bizarre how quickly you adapted.

that wasn't too difficult when you realised how much more comfortable life became. your fidge was never empty anymore and you rarely had to worry about doing the groceries.

you stopped double-checking whether you locked the door before bed and sometimes you even left the balcony door unlocked on purpose. i'm just too lazy, you found excuses for yourself. though, the guilty part of you knew exactly why you stopped being so vigilant.

the mysterious packages were no longer surprises. they became part of the rhythm of your life. hell, at times you'd even catch yourself tidying the apartment before you left for classes or work, arranging your living space so it looked welcoming.

simon noticed it too; breaking in barely took any effort now and your apartment felt a little cosier than when he first trespassed. he almost felt proud of himself, for being able to stalk you to this extent without getting into any legal trouble.

then one night, as he entered your home while you were asleep, he found a tupperware of homemade brownies on the kitchen counter. the post-it note attached to it read "thank you :)". this made simon raise an eyebrow in slight surprise.

it was as if you were thanking your fucking stalker for dropping off care packages at your apartment. the thought almost made him smile.

that was when he noticed a vacuum flask next to the plastic container and another note:

black coffee, one sugar.

#b's fic recs #please read it #b's thoughts

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