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queer-obsession · 15 hours ago

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(secret) santa, baby - part 8 of a shigaraki x f!reader fic

Shigaraki doesn't want to participate in the office's Secret Santa exchange, but when Toga promises to make it easy on him, he gives in. But making it easy for him makes it a lot harder for you -- you're the one who got his list. Office AU, no quirks. A fic in 12 parts. Divider by @ wcnderlnds

part i part ii part iii part iv part v part vi part vii

part viii (gift-wrapping)

You don’t know what the last-minute staff meeting is for, but the email looked important, so you show up outside the building’s biggest conference room on the hour, as ordered. As soon as you set foot inside, though, you know this was one you could have skipped. There are piles of gift bags and rolls of wrapping paper on every table, as well as packets of tissue paper and spools of ribbon and actual jars of confetti with scoops in them. On the whiteboard at the front of the room, someone’s written REMEDIAL GIFT-WRAPPING.

You didn’t think your gifts were wrapped that badly. Tomura hasn’t complained. Then again, Tomura doesn’t know you’re the one leaving his gifts, so he wouldn’t know who to complain to if he had a problem. In spite of showing up on time, everybody else somehow got here before you, so you hesitate just inside the doorway, looking for an empty seat. Before you can find one, something moves in your peripheral vision, and you glance over to find Twice beckoning to you. He’s sitting with Spinner, Dabi, and Tomura, and they’ve got an empty seat nearby.

A few weeks ago, you’d have found somewhere else, but you’re much more comfortable with Tomura and his friends than you were before. Seeing them outside of work at Toga’s party probably helped. Seeing them the next morning, waking up with bedhead and low-grade hangovers that could only be cured with diner food, moved them firmly from the category of scary coworkers to people you could call friends. And waking up at one end of Toga’s couch to realize that you’d spent the entire night sharing it and a blanket with Tomura moved him from Secret Santa recipient to something else.

You’re not sure what else, exactly. You’ve been keeping a close eye on him since the Secret Santa thing started, just so you could figure out good times to sneak down to the basement and leave things on his desk, but for the past few days you’ve felt different about seeing him out and about. Instead of being relieved, and using your next free second to race downstairs and plant a gift, you’ve gone to talk to him. Or you’ve stayed put wherever you were and hoped he’d come talk to you. He’s different at work than he is out of it, but now that you’ve seen him the other way, you can’t fail to see that the person who slept on the couch with you is there when he’s here, too.

Work doesn’t bring out the best in him, and work-related holiday festivities are even worse. You can hear him complaining as you make your way over. “I don’t need to learn gift-wrapping. The stuff I leave is fine.”

“No. Spinner’s gifts are fine. Yours look like you’re dropping off a sperm sample,” Dabi says. He’s organizing the pile of gift-wrapping supplies and ignoring the way Tomura swears at him. “It’s not going to kill you.”

“With everybody else here, Toga’s probably not just picking on us,” Spinner says. He spots you coming over and waves. “Hey. You got an invite, too?”

“My gift-wrapping must be worse than I thought,” you say. You drop down into the chair between Twice and Tomura. “Hi.”

“Hey.” Tomura glances quickly at you, then goes back to screwing around with a mostly-empty roll of ribbon. “You have a gift in your mailbox. I saw it when I checked mine.”

You didn’t put a gift in his mailbox today – it’s on his desk again, waiting for him whenever he gets back. You dropped it off after you saw him walk back on the way to the conference room. “I’ll look after we’re done with this. Does this happen every year?”

“No. It’s new.” Tomura scowls. “It sucks.”

“Hi everybody!” Toga’s standing on a chair at the front of the room, waving to catch the room’s attention. “Thanks for stopping by. It’s come to my attention that some of you guys don’t know how to wrap a gift to save your lives, and even though it’s the gift that counts, the way it’s presented matters, too! So for the sake of your Secret Santa recipients, we’re going to go over the basics of gift-wrapping –”

“And we’re going to practice on these,” Midoriya announces, holding up a clear plastic bin that’s full to the brim. “The gifts from the toy drive. Which we need to wrap anyway.”

“I told you we weren’t in trouble,” Spinner says to the group at large.

“No, we’re just free labor.” Tomura’s scowling worse than before. “I can’t wait to count my papercuts afterwards.”

“To help with this,” Toga continues loudly, “every table has at least one person who knows what they’re doing. Compress and Yaoyorozu will go over the basics, and then your group’s expert will help you get going.”

Where’s your table’s expert? You glance around, only to find everyone else looking at you. “We need to work quickly,” Iida announces, even louder than Toga. “It’s imperative that we get these gifts mailed this afternoon. If they’re delayed by the storm, they won’t reach their recipients in time. Do you want to be the reason why needy children go without presents this year?”

“Hey! Iida! That’s kind of harsh,” Midoriya says hastily. Dabi is snickering. “Just do your best, everybody!”

There’s a bin of toys under the table. Compress and Yaoyorozu order everybody to start with something in a box, since they’re easier to work with, but you have a bad feeling you’re the expert, and the things that are weirdly shaped are going to take longer. You take out a plastic dinosaur toy and get to work, listening with half an ear to the instructions. You don’t want to contradict anything they’re saying. It’ll slow things down, and based on the size of the toy bin, you can’t afford that.

You overhear the other supposed experts at the other table, and they seem pretty comfortable giving instructions, but you decide to keep quiet unless somebody asks you something. And somebody does. “Are girls born knowing how to gift-wrap or something?” Spinner asks, staring at the dinosaur toy you’ve successfully mummified in candy-cane wrapping paper. “How did you do that?”

“Practice, I guess?” You don’t really remember somebody teaching you. “It was probably just watching my mom.”

“Maybe you should handle all the weird-shaped shit,” Dabi says. He abandons the box he’s wrapping and starts sorting the toys in the bin. “I want to get out of here sometime this year and that’s not going to happen if you put me in charge of that.”

You nod and pick up the grotesque-looking nutcracker at the top of the pile. To your surprise, everybody else settles down to work quickly – even Tomura, who’s still scowling, and handling the wrapping paper like it might take a bite out of him. The other tables are chattering, but everybody at yours is quiet. Focused. When Midoriya swings by to pick up any wrapped gifts, he has to make two trips to collect all of them from you.

It’s not until you’re starting on the second round of presents that Tomura speaks up. “This isn’t so bad,” he says, and you almost amputate your finger in shock. “I thought it was going to be like that movie.”

“Which –” Dabi interrupts himself, then makes a weird noise. “The one where the guy’s cheating on his wife?”

“And he’s trying to get the clerk to gift-wrap that ugly necklace he bought for his mistress before his wife gets back?” That scene made you cringe. There are lots of scenes in Love Actually that make you cringe, but that one stands out. “Did he actually cheat on his wife or was he just trying to cheat?”

“He’s cheating.” Dabi measures out a huge scoop of glitter and drops it on top of the present he’s wrapping before he tapes the wrapping paper down. “My dad pulls shit exactly like that. Except he was fucking my boyfriend, not his secretary.”

You almost choke on thin air. “He – what?”

“That was ages ago,” Twice says. “They didn’t talk for like – five years. Then Dabi’s sister made them go to family therapy and now Enji makes up for it by giving Dabi money whenever he asks.”

“And when he doesn’t,” Spinner says. Dabi is making a face. “You’re better off, dude.”

“You know how Shigaraki hates Christmas? That’s how Dabi feels about Valentine’s Day,” Twice says. You probably would, too, if your dad had hooked up with your boyfriend. “If you’re still around by then, you can hang out with us. We always celebrate by maxing Enji’s credit card.”

If you’re still around by then. What does that mean? “Sounds fun,” you say, watching as Dabi adds two scoops of glitter to his next present. “Uh, what are you doing?”

“It’s there. We’re supposed to use it,” Dabi says. “The kids will get a kick out of this shit.”

“Yeah, but their parents will hate it.”

Tomura takes a scoop of glitter and pours it in the gift bag he’s been screwing around with. “It’s not about them.”

You remember who the gifts are for all at once. Kids in foster care, whose parents probably suck as a rule. They deserve to have some fun, and you’ve never met a kid who wouldn’t go crazy over a glitter bomb. When you start wrapping your next present, you add some glitter to it, too.

At some point the department heads come looking for all their employees, which is how you find out that Toga didn’t clear the meeting with anybody before she called it. Most of your table takes the opportunity to flee – Dabi first, then Twice, and Spinner after a second’s hesitation. Tomura stops halfway out of his chair when he realizes you’re not getting up. “Aren’t you leaving?”

“My supervisor hasn’t come looking for me yet,” you say. “And there’s still a lot to do.”

You know there’s work waiting for you back at your desk, but it shouldn’t take too long, and Iida’s guilt-trip about the presents definitely got to you. You empty the rest of the toy bin onto the table and grab a box with a model train printed on the front. A chair scrapes next to you as Tomura sits back down, and he lifts the train box out of your hands. “Give me that. I can’t wrap the weird ones.”

You stare at him. You can’t help it. “What are you doing?”

“My supervisor hasn’t come looking for me, either.” Tomura shrugs. “It’ll be faster if I help.”

“You hate this stuff,” you say.

“I’m not going to be the reason needy kids don’t get presents this year.” Tomura’s Iida impersonation is pretty on point, especially when he adds in Iida’s trademark hand gestures. You laugh. “And I haven’t gotten a paper cut yet. Nobody will put up with my bitching next year if I don’t get at least one.”

He says that, and it sounds like him – but somehow you don’t buy it. He’s not making eye contact, and his ears are turning sort of red, and your heart kicks up a weird, fluttery jolt. “If you want to hang out, you can just say that,” you say. “You don’t have to do – I know you hate doing this.”

“This is what you’re doing,” Tomura interrupts you. “That’s the important part.”

That one’s hard for you to parse, so hard that Tomura manages to wrap the train and start on the next gift before you can get even sort of a handle on it. And once you do, you’re not sure you want one. Tomura hates Christmas. Every Christmas thing you’ve seen him do has been done under pressure or threat, and he just got a golden opportunity to escape. Why would he give it up to hang out with you?

There’s one answer. An obvious answer. One you’d believe if it was coming from anybody but him. “I can use the help,” you admit. “Thanks for keeping me company.”

“Yeah.” Tomura reaches for the wrapping paper at the same time as you do, and your hands collide. You thought he’d flinch. You thought you’d flinch. But your hands stay still, poised against one another, for a long moment before Tomura draws away, his fingertips skimming the back of your hand as he goes. “Any time.”

<- part vii

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queer-obsession · 15 hours ago

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i think that tobio is the type of person who speaks in absolutes. he's always been frank—sometimes to a fault. but it translates to the way he speaks in terms of certainty. he deals in whens, not in ifs.

WHEN i go pro. WHEN i join the national team. WHEN we win the match.

and this conviction carries over to your relationship.

you've barely started dating, barely gotten your toes across the threshold of that new relationship—still giddy with nerves and thrumming with possibility—and tobio completely takes you off guard with some of the things he says.

WHEN you meet my family. WHEN we move in together. WHEN we get married.

and it's all so overwhelming to you; not because you don't want those things, not because you don't like that he's saying them, but just because you've never had a partner who's as forthright as he is—especially not so early on in the relationship. and though it's largely down to inexperience—you're the first person tobio has ever said these things to, after all—there's something so endearing about the fact that you know he really means it.

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queer-obsession · 18 hours ago

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queer-obsession · 18 hours ago

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(secret) santa, baby - part 7 of a shigaraki x f!reader fic

part i part ii part iii part iv part v part vi

part vii (staying in)

“I think everyone else is asleep,” you say, glancing around Toga’s living room. “We can probably turn this off.”

“Still awake,” Spinner says from the armchair, which he stole when Magne left after the end of the third movie. “I’m watching.”

“Yeah? What just happened?” Tomura asks.

“He’s giving everybody weird haircuts,” Spinner says. Close enough. “I have to pay attention. Aiba likes this guy’s movies. She says he’s –”

He yawns. “Nostalgic. I’m watching.”

“Okay, but nobody else is,” you say. “Shouldn’t we call it?”

Tomura glances around the room. Magne left after making everybody sit through Love Actually and Twice left midway through Die Hard because he gets scared of sleeping in other people’s houses, which leaves Toga, the girl she invited, Spinner, Dabi, Tomura, and you. Of everybody who’s left, only you and Tomura can be said to actually be awake. Spinner’s yawning on every other breath, Toga and the girl are cuddled up in the same beanbag, snoring, and Dabi drank too much eggnog and was out like a light before they’d even finished Krampus. You and Tomura are definitely outnumbered.

It’s not like Tomura isn’t tired. Tomura’s really tired. He feels the heaviness in his limbs and the yawns tightening his jaw, but his mind is wide awake, and he’s going to pay attention to every second of the movie you picked. Since he gave up forcing everybody to watch Gremlins in favor of your movie, he wants to make sure it was worth it, and he wants to know exactly what happened in case you want to talk about it afterwards. He’s hoping you do. He’s not ready for you to leave yet.

Tomura wasn’t sure about seeing you outside of work, but then he decided it would help him figure things out. Seeing you around the office is one thing. For him to know if he likes you, he has to know what you’re like outside of work, so he can decide if he’d want to hang out with you then, too. Tomura’s not good at this whole liking-people bullshit. If there was some kind of life skills class where everybody learned it, he probably missed it while he was being homeschooled or in juvie. By the time he got out, halfway through high school, everybody already knew what they were doing. Tomura just has to fumble through somehow.

You make it feel less like fumbling. It makes more sense to Tomura when you’re sitting next to him, roasting Love Actually just like he is, actually paying attention during the horror movie he picked instead of drinking straight through it. You pay attention to things, notice them, just like Tomura’s Secret Santa notices stuff about him. Tomura feels less weird about being noticed than he used to.

But he doesn’t want to just sit here noticing and getting noticed all night long. He wants to talk to you about something that’s not work or whatever dumb Christmas thing is happening, and he can only manage half. “Is this really the first movie you thought of when I said you could pick one?”

“I was trying to pick one you all would like,” you say. Something about that reminds Tomura of the way you wrote your wish list. “I do like this one, though. Some people think it’s stretching it to call it a Christmas movie, but it’s all leading up to Christmas, so I count it.”

Movies that can only be called Christmas movies if Tomura’s stretching it are his favorite kind of Christmas movies. “Why do you like it when it’s going to be sad?”

You glance sideways at him. “What makes you think it’s going to be sad?”

“The grandma telling the story is the main girl when she’s old, and she’s telling it past tense,” Tomura says. You nod. “Besides, he’s – like that. No way is that working out well for anybody.”

“But it could,” you counter. “You might be right about how the story goes, but there’s nothing in the story that says it has to be that way.”

Tomura thought you were awake, but maybe you’re sleepier than he thought. “You mean, other than the whole story so far?”

“I mean –” You trail off. “In some stories, there’s obstacles that can’t be overcome. Like somebody being dead, or something being too wrong to work. And in some stories the obstacles are a choice, kind of. Those are the ones I like.”

Tomura’s played games where choices matter. Somehow he always stumbles into the bad ending, and knowing that there’s a good ending out there that he was too stupid to get makes it even worse. If you like those stories, you’re probably better at making choices than he is. Still – “If the end’s the same, why does it matter?”

“Well –”

“Hey, can you save the philosophy until after the movie?” Spinner yawns. “I’m still trying to watch.”

Tomura gives it five minutes until Spinner passes out, and he’s only off by about thirty seconds or so. Now it’s just the two of you awake, watching the weird movie you picked. Tomura’s trying hard to watch the movie, but just like he keeps getting the song you sang stuck in his head, he keeps getting stuck looking at you.

The movie ends like Tomura thought it would – sadly, but not surprisingly – and he glances at you. “You’re going to say she could have chosen to stay with him,” Tomura says, and you nod. “Why would she do that? When he’s – like that –”

Tomura doesn’t get why he’s being squeamish about calling it like it is. The main character’s ugly. Scary. Nothing anybody wants to touch. “Maybe she likes him how he is,” you say. You’re not looking at the screen anymore. You’re looking at Tomura. “There’s nothing about the story that says she couldn’t have picked him. There’d have been consequences, but there are always consequences. And I guess that’s why it’s sad. Knowing it could have been the other way just as easily.”

You look away from Tomura, and even though he usually hates being looked at, he sort of misses it. “I guess it’s good that everybody fell asleep,” you say. “This doesn’t really seem like a sad-Christmas crowd.”

“Sad Christmas makes more sense than happy Christmas,” Tomura says before he can really think about it. “It never made sense to me, except –”

Making friends. Spending the holidays with them instead of wondering why everybody but him got to celebrate with people they mattered to. And he’ll never admit it to Toga, or anyone, but the Secret Santa thing is kind of fun. He likes leaving stuff for you and seeing how you react. Almost as much as he likes getting things from whoever his Secret Santa is.

“Yeah,” you say, like he’s explained it all out loud. Maybe he’s tired enough that he has and just didn’t realize. “I can see that.”

You’re doing that noticing thing again. Tomura keeps looking at you, trying to notice you back, but the longer the two of you look at each other, the weirder it starts to feel between you. Like there’s something more that needs to happen. Tomura steels himself, braced for whatever you do or to act as soon as he has an idea of what to do.

And then you look away. “It’s late. I should go.”

“You could stay,” Tomura says. “None of us except Toga live here, and we’re all sleeping over.”

You look like you’re thinking about it. Tomura can think of a lot of reasons why you should – it’s late, it’s cold, it’s probably a long way to your apartment, you’d basically have to wake up again by the time you got home – but before he can say any of them, you nod. “Okay. Where should we sleep?”

You end up with your heads at opposite ends of the couch, under the same blanket. Both of you rustle around, knees knocking together as you try to settle in. You fall asleep faster than Tomura does. There’s no way he can imagine you tangling your legs up with his if you were awake, and Tomura’s so focused on trying to live with being this close to someone that the question of whether he likes you is answered definitively offscreen. It’s something he wakes up with. Just like he wakes up still sharing the couch with you.

<- part vi

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queer-obsession · 2 days ago

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Relationship: Vampire!Miyuki Kazuya x Human!Reader Rating: Mature Content Tags: Monsters (ergo, monstrous things), Blood, Profanity, Vampire Magic, Hints of Ancient Monster Magic, Stalking (we're talking vampires here), Attempted Abduction (not by Miyuki), Attempted Vampire Attack (not by Miyuki), Possessive Language, Hints of Miscommunication (in that he's a monster and reader isn't), Miyuki Kazuya Calls Reader "Little Human," Accidentally Accepting Monster Courtship Word Count: 3,120 A/N: I might turn this into a series or smth. There's a lot more than what's written but I'm still getting used to publishing unfinished and unpolished works.

You’re lucky in your location. You’re lucky that the city you grew up in, the city you still work and live in, is deemed neutral grounds by the local vampires, setting precedence for all other monsters in the vicinity.

Just outside city boundaries lie three separate nests, all openly at war with the next. Historically, fights have broken out as they’ve tried to claim separate parts of the city, confusion arising from where the city has evolved in its growth. It’s since been deemed “untouchable” for the sake of survival. Whose survival, you’re not entirely sure, as hunting isn't banned outright within the city, but things remain otherwise peaceful for the monsters.

The ceasefire attracts all kinds of nomadic vampires—vampires who will not or cannot join nests—but the city remains large enough that it’s still not a problem. If anything, it’s enriched by their presence, especially as most fall in line quickly.

You’re more than familiar with vampire lore and laws for the city, what with your best friend and neighbor being a vampire belonging to the southern nest. It’s thanks to him that you’ve gotten pretty good at identifying vampires even when they wish to remain anonymous and blend in.

You know which vampires to avoid and which ones want privacy, which ones will entertain a curious mind, and which ones will try to bend the rules for one motive or another. You can spot a friendly vampire (friendly within reason) and you can spot a remarkably dangerous one, picking them out easily in a crowd.

It’s funny, then, the way he seems to fit into most of the categories at once. A vampire who wants to talk, watching with eyes bright and full of interest and mischief, exuding an air of elusiveness to contrast the welcoming quality of his presence. It’s a little funny how he makes every single cell in your body scream RUN. It’s a little funny how you don’t.

The shadows move with him and you know he’s likely one of the oldest vampires you’ve come across, and the way he watches you makes you think it’s been some time since he’s been around humans, much less other people. Maybe that’s what does you in, what makes you stay and talk to him when you should call your manager and leave. Maybe it’s the way his eyes pull you in while his words, so carefully chosen, half-heartedly try to push you away.

And he doesn’t use charms on you.

No, Kuramochi thoroughly checks each time you come home, growing increasingly wary of this newcomer, increasingly distressed in the way that you’re becoming obviously drawn to him. You’re curious, wanting to know more, always left learning more about history while discovering almost nothing about him. The more he talks, the less you think you know of him, though you’re certain he likes that.

As certain as you are that he likes you.

The voice in the back of your mind, the same one that sounds alarms whenever he’s near, the one that’s so aware of him you can feel him when you’re blocks away, doesn’t let up, only growing stronger. Kuramochi becomes so on edge that he rarely returns to his nest anymore, borderline threatening to escort you to and from work (and you’ve a feeling it wouldn’t stop there). It’s enough that you can no longer in good conscience ignore them both, as much as you may feel dismayed.

(It surprises you how disappointed your heart is by that decision. How terrifying, truly.)

You’re not cruel; you’ll be honest with him and let him down gently. There’s no need to fear violation of the ceasefire (or an inciting incident to prompt a violation). Similarly, you’re certain that whatever danger he does present to you isn’t that of an out-and-out murderer.

Almost as if he knows, you find him waiting for you outside of the bar—while he’s always loved visiting, even if never properly ordering a drink, you’ve seen him outside only twice. Again, the shadows follow him, much thicker than before, providing an almost film noir filter to everything. Despite this, you can see his eyes clearly—the golden amber a favorite of yours ever since he first slithered into your life.

Perhaps telling him now will be easier. He’s still a man, after all, and more than once you’ve rejected men at the end of the evening only for them to curse you for wasting the time that came before. So you do.

“Good evening, Miyuki.”

“Good evening, Little Human. You look like you have something on your mind.”

“I do.”

“Care to share with the class?”

“Wow, this feels so silly.” It feels like a high school breakup, in all honesty. Which is stupid because you aren’t even together. “Miyuki, I must ask that you leave me alone.”

“Leave you alone?” Your alarms sound, but you otherwise can’t spot a difference in his demeanor. He seems as unbothered as ever. “May I know why?”

“My… friend is concerned and I trust his judgment.”

“Your… friend?” he imitates, watching you carefully as he does. “Have I met this friend? There aren’t many humans I bother talking to; only the ones at the bar.”

You didn’t know that. It’s stupid, but for a moment your heart stutters and you feel special. And it’s annoying when you see the uptick of his lips, the acknowledgment that he heard a reaction you cannot control.

“No, he doesn’t come out this way.” For some reason, you know better than to mention that Kuramochi’s a vampire.

“Are our talks no longer interesting? I find them to be rather enjoyable.”

“No, I enjoy our conversations.”

“Is it something I said? I know I can come across callous at times.”

“You can be an ass at times,” you correct, suddenly feeling breathless at the toothy smile he gives, “but no, you’ve never said anything to offend me.”

“Is there any concrete reason why you would want me to leave you alone, aside from your… friend?”

You feel like it’s a trap, like he knows it’s something intangible like your survival instinct, but that’s not necessarily concrete. And still, like an idiot, you answer honestly. “No. You’re fun to shoot the shit with. I have fun with you.”

He smiles again, eyes brightening when he hears what that does to you. “I figured as much, considering you’ve told your friend about me in the first place and haven’t asked for this a year ago.”

“Shut up. You’re not making this any easier.”

“Why would I?” He doesn’t sound angry or like he feels any emotion close to the negative end of the spectrum. If anything, he sounds like he’s having fun while you’re trying to end this friendship.

“God, this feels like a high school breakup.”

“Oh? Oh? Are you interested in me? Is that why your friend is concerned? Is it a case of jealousy?”

“No!” Despite the honesty of your answer, you can’t deny the increasing warmth and the feeling that you’ve been caught. “No, I am not romantically interested in you. That is not what this is, even though the more you say makes this feel all the more juvenile.”

“The lady doth protest too much.” He laughs, laughs while you fluster at the notion he bothered to remember that passing remark about enjoying Hamlet sometime after you two had met. “Well, it wouldn’t do to have my favorite human upset with me. If that’s truly what you want—”

“It is.”

His eyes gleam in the night and you know he hears the “not” that waits at the back of your throat. His smile never wavers, nor does it change flavor, never indicating anything other than mirth. “I wouldn’t want to upset you.”

Your heart drops a bit and cold washes over your chest, though you’re the one to do this. He knows this. You know that he knows this. Maybe that’s why he steps closer, bringing the distance between you to arm’s reach. Despite this being over—and God, what a dramatic way to feel about the ending of something you could barely call a friendship—you know he’s not yet done with you.

In a fluid motion, he takes your hand and brings it to his lips, never breaking eye contact, simply telling you, “If ever you change your mind, you need merely call my name.” He presses his lips to your knuckles and you can nearly feel his fangs.

Before you can think about it, before you can comment on it, he’s gone, taking the shadows with him.

Kuramochi is visibly relieved when you tell him, though you don’t tell him of the kiss or the joke about your interest or the way your heart’s been flipping in your chest each time you’ve thought of it since (and you’re quick to change the subject when he tries to bring up your apparent arrhythmia). He still doesn’t go home, but you don’t mind seeing as much of him as you do now.

It annoys you how you miss him. Miyuki Kazuya. An unsolvable enigma, though you didn’t mind it at the time. Now it just pisses you off. How much did you tell him of your life only for him to give you nothing of his? How much of what you know about him is the result of observations and deductions rather than answers? How often did you reward his questions with truths while he shut yours down? You know next to nothing about him, and yet your heart has the audacity to miss him?

But you do.

Something else you don’t tell Kuramochi about is the dreams. About how they started the night you said goodbye, how they’re all vivid and feature Miyuki. You don’t mention how, when you’re out in the city, you swear you can spot him in the shadows—in the alleyway near the library or perched atop the bank or across the street from your bar when winter draws near and the days grow short. You don’t tell Kuramochi about how your idle thoughts often turn to him, how clearly you can still hear his laugh.

All of it makes your traitorous heart race a bit. It makes your lips curl into a smile. It gives you the physical sensations of a crush and again you feel like you’re in some kind of high school romance.

And the alarm bells that ring whenever danger’s around (and whenever he’s around) are nearly constant, though it coincides with the influx of monsters in search of either a home in the city or the protection of one of the vampyric nests. Sometimes you’re reminded of him, as if he grows near, though you push it aside as annoyingly hopeful thinking, the vague acceptance that this has become his city, too.

It takes you a bit too long to notice that your walks home, the ones that were once quiet and devoid of any cause for panic, now also bring the alarms.

All it takes is one night.

Kuramochi has returned to his nest, satisfied that Miyuki is no longer around, letting you know that he’ll likely be gone for a couple of weeks due to his prolonged absence. You don’t mind; your street has always been safe, your apartment more so, thanks to the resident vampire that lives at the corner townhouse next door.

You aren’t paying attention when you reach the door to the building and by the time you’re aware that you’re in danger, it’s too late, one hand already circling around your wrist while the other grabs the back of your neck. They drag you into the alley across the way, nice and dark and out of view and you know this isn’t some ordinary robber. This has to be a feral or starving vampire, given their speed and the particular bite of their nails in your skin.

To attack you like this, in the open of the city even if at night, they’re probably both.

You’ve heard the stories, had them confirmed by the vampires you know—feral vampire attacks always end with a trail of human bodies before they regain control of themselves. Assuming they aren’t in control of themselves and that they truly are feral.

Kuramochi’s name is halfway through your mouth before you remember—he’s miles away and can’t hear you. He’s fast, but not fast enough to get here before you’ll be dead. And then you hear his voice in the back of your mind.

If you ever change your mind, you need merely call my name.

It’s a long shot. He meant it as an extension of friendship, not as a “call me if ever you’re in trouble.” Who knows if it’ll work or if he’d even get here in time? But his name comes out anyway.

Your heart’s pounding and your adrenaline’s pumping, only making you smell sweeter to this wild vampire and you aren’t sure whether your voice actually came out, so you call him again, sounding like half a plea and half a prayer and you’re growing more and more sure that this is how you’ll die when you hear the voice that’s been haunting you.

“I didn’t expect you to call so soon. To what—”

You don’t see him, but you feel him. For the first time since you met him, you feel safe. Terrifying, on top of the way you feel claws dig into you, sure to draw blood. The more you feel Miyuki’s cold fury as it rolls off him in waves, the more secure you feel. The shadows grow into something absolutely menacing, but you feel protected. Invulnerable despite your vulnerability dripping from your wrist as your assailant is torn from you and flung in the opposite direction.

While you’re trying to catch your breath, trying to regain your footing, you try to spot him, though you’re given but a glimpse.

What a terrifying monster you’ve summoned. Never have you heard of making a feral vampire cease their attack before their end, but here you are staring at a look of pure terror from he who would spell your doom. You almost feel… sorry for him. Darkness engulfs the alleyway until you can’t see anything but the horrifying, empty void before it recedes, leaving you against the building you always thought hideous with Miyuki at the end, furthest the street, standing in a growing pool of blood. There is no body, seemingly no source for the blood. Only him with his back turned to you.

As you step back out of reflex more than a conscious desire to run, you stumble, falling backward as your legs give out from under you.

“Are you okay?”

His voice sounds so far away, so foreign without the weight of the impending laugh on his tongue, and you aren’t sure that it isn’t imagined. For all you know, this is all in your mind, some kind of comforting fantasy as it all goes tits up.

When you don’t answer, he turns, slowly, revealing the front of him covered in blood. His eyes are positively shining despite the mask of calm that he’s wearing. For the first time since you’ve met him, his fangs are drawn, completely visible. At one point you believed seeing him with his fangs would change your perception of him entirely, that it would make him look completely different.

Instead, you find him the same Miyuki as you have ever known him.

He removes his gloves, shaking them once, twice, before placing them in his back pocket, and starts making his way over to you.

“Are you okay, Little Human?” he asks again and you can’t manage anything past a simple, dumbfounded nod. “I’m going to help you up now, alright?”

It’s not even a thought when he offers you his hand, the same one that undoubtedly tore someone to shreds not moments ago. You take it without hesitation, body moving of its own volition, and the relief you feel is instantaneous.

He convinces you to invite him inside, to guarantee that you’re safe and to avoid any misunderstandings given his appearance right now. As you come out of your stupor, you find it only mildly annoying how easily he fits in your space, but it’s nothing you’ll complain about, not when he came so quickly after you called.

Perhaps the entire event has made you a little careless, but you’ve yet to process the possibility of how he was able to come so quickly—mere seconds after the last syllable fell from your lips the first time you spoke it. And there’s something that you remember, the more your mind forces you to think back to it. A single utterance before everything went black. Maybe you just don’t want to think about the way he called you “his human.”

You don’t ask him about either as he coaxes words from you. You don’t mention it when you offer him a pair of pajamas that your ex had left years ago. You don’t think about it as you help him try to wash the blood from his clothes, used to this problem thanks to Kuramochi.

The only thing you can focus on—such a silly little thing, too—is the way he looked the same, even with his fangs drawn. The only thing you can focus on is the way your heart beats out, “That was my Miyuki.”

How… annoyingly out of character. How out of left field. How—

Shit. Kuramochi once mentioned this, years ago, but Miyuki doesn’t let you dwell on that thought (or maybe he knows what’s coming, where your logic is taking you. You wouldn’t put it past him).

“You seem to be particularly popular with vampires,” he teases lightly, obvious in his attempt to gauge your mood. “If I had known more would come for you, I would have started things sooner.”

“What do you mean?”

“He’s not the first who’s thirsted for you and followed you, though I’m surprised I caught him so late, and the stench of your friend sticks to everything here except your bedroom.”

“No, what do you mean, ‘started things sooner?’”

He comes closer and it feels like his golden irises are burning into your soul. His smile is wide and gentle, very unlike the excitement in his eyes.

“I would have started courting you sooner.”

Your mind blanks but you think you feel the barest edges of an invisible tether, the ghost of a link between your soul and his. Something almost fitting into place, but not quite. An unremarkable voice in the back of your mind telling you something horrifyingly remarkable—the inevitability of what's to come, wrapped up in the not-so-tender reminder that words have power.

tagging @tyga-lily because I can't believe I'm stuck on Vampire!Kazuya again. Pls send help

Daiya no Ace Masterlist

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