#( IM UGLY LAUGHING OMG )

[4giorno]

wait so the whole 100th episode is named after bucks intense jealousy bc of someone else getting close to eddie

[staraxiaa]

+ extra lines bc i ran out of tag space .

If you cross the river (will the fighting end?)

Contrary to what granny once said, Kita thinks he won't ever truly know who you are. You are the one who waits by the river, watching as he scrubs dirt from fresh carrots and dirty shovels. You are the one whose presence lingers like mist over his skin when you part. You are the one whose eyes he always feels, at every moment—the eyes granny reminds him of when they wipe the floor or prepare a meal together.

You are the one who knows that it does not matter, that he would still perform his rituals and hold unwavering conviction even if you were not there. Because he is Kita; he is Shin-chan—repetition, perseverance, and diligence is how he lives...because it simply feels good.

You are the same, committed to your duty to watch him from the moment you were pulled from the glory of a summit. And he is committed to being watched by you.

shinsuke kita x GN reader character study for shin, reader is a river/rain spirit, themes of disaster, mentions of dying/minor character death, fluff and angst, slow burn (i think), slight spoilers for haikyuu!! timeskip 20.4k words | oneshot, complete

notes: This fic is set around the premise that Kita's gran lives in the mountains of eastern Hyogo, just above Osaka. I have his parents living in the city while Kita is cared for by granny until it's time for him to start school, around 6 years old. He goes to Osaka during the school year and no longer spends time in the mtns. Since canon doesn't offer a whole lot of information, I took liberties with the setting and backstory to fit the plot of my fic. I hope this can help negate any potential confusion! + (It's another fic spanning childhood to adulthood. With a magical reader. I am unfortunately not able to escape my own tropes.) + shoutout to this fic for inspiration

ao3 option

One moment you are a carefree being, gleefully running along a series of falls wedged along the mountain summit. The sun is setting and you are soaking in the glory of the day: with swaying leaves and shimmering droplets, and the last bit of light streaming through pockets of trees.

The next you are falling, rolling, bumping your way through the water. A current sweeps you away without warning, your vision goes dark, and you have left your place above the sun to land in the depths of a looming valley. You have to carry onwards, knowing there is no going back, so you search for the one who brought you here.

There is a dim light beyond the bank. It seeps from the open screen of a traditional-style house, illuminating the wooden beams and eaves from behind. It's a bedroom, with a small boy dutifully putting his futon down for the night, smoothing out the bumps and lining the base to be in its exact spot. He has salt and pepper hair and you think he is the youngest old person you will ever see. He never looks your way, but you sense that he knows you are watching.

So you watch, now that you're here.

"Granny, who's that?"

He is a toddler, carried along the path next to the river by his grandmother, a thin arm clutching him tightly against her hip. Her eyes slowly move from his face to his finger pointing towards the water. She can't see what he sees: another child, waist deep in the gentle rapids, mysteriously faded—like a mist lingering instead of wafting to the sky. She smiles gently when she understands, bringing a hand to pat his hair softly.

"You'll learn when the time is right, Shin-chan."

She knows how this story will go.

Someone is always watching, Shin-chan.

Kita's life is built upon the small things he does everyday, and the end results are no more than a byproduct of that.

Someone is watching over you.

Rain streams down the mountain gullies and pools in the river at the center of the valley.

The sun rises. Over and over and over again.

Childhood

The morning light streams through open screens, crawling up the veranda and into the adjacent interior. It’s the beginning of June—cleaning day, the tatami mats moved aside for inspection and rotation while Kita and granny scrub the wooden floors together. Foam bubbles from the rag when he wrings it out, excess water trickling into the bucket. He wipes it across the floor of their living room, watching carefully as the wood darkens slightly, but not too much, leaving shiny streaks and stray bubbles behind. He smiles to himself gently.

A grin tugs at granny as she watches from the opposite side of the room. It was Shin-chan’s own decision to clean with her today. He gave her no reason as he simply said, “I’ll help,” when she grabbed her bucket and rags. He already started pulling the mats aside, then struggled to move the table in the center by himself. Granny chuckles to herself at the recollection before returning her attention to the floor, her section a little lighter than Kita's.

He looks to her side and the faintest crease appears between his brows, a slight purse of his lips. When he wrings out his towel again, he pulls the ends a little tighter before bringing it back to the floor with a new gentleness. The result brings the twitch of a smile to his mouth. It makes him feel good.

From outside, he hears the rustling of leaves, creaking as bamboo sways in a light breeze, and the scrapes of shrubs against the house. The morning is cool, bringing in air that will hopefully linger as the day drags on. The only chatter comes from the birds, quick raps of storks in the river and singing sparrows in the trees. Kita feels a warmth, one from inside, as he listens. Focuses.

He thinks it could be praise, from the spirits that are watching.

It’s still morning when they finish, the mats brushed and switched with the ones in the closet. After they return the table to the center of the room, granny quietly thanks Kita for his help. He only nods in return. Quiet Shin-chan. He thinks he’ll read until lunch, or maybe help some more if granny plans to work in the garden.

She interrupts his thoughts. “Let’s go for a walk, to Fujiwara-san’s.”

Kita's brow furrows ever so slightly, but he nods. Granny sometimes likes to visit the neighbors, though without any clear pattern or schedule. He thinks she might be doing it for him, so he can talk with other kids his age, especially with his sister always gone to a friend’s and his baby brother in the city. He would rather read, but agrees regardless since it’s granny asking.

They slip their feet into sandals and start down the path along the river, towards the right. Kita reaches for granny’s hand and she smiles down at the top of his hair. They walk slowly along pebbles and dirt, accompanied by the sound of water rushing next to them. Eventually they approach a bridge, granny having to grasp the railing as she walks up the steps. When she reaches the center of the river she pauses, a ritual, to watch the water run by.

“Fujiwara-san said he has exciting news,” granny offers in a delayed explanation. Kita doesn’t respond. 

Granny takes another minute to step down on the other end of the bridge and continue walking. They go left, towards the house that sits opposite of theirs. It takes slightly longer with the incline, but it’s quaint and Kita feels no hurry.

The house is open when they arrive, doors aside to let the last cool minutes waft through. There’s nobody home, however, and Kita looks up to granny curiously after they step onto the exterior veranda.

She only offers a smile as they wait a few moments. His attention is diverted when he hears the thumping of footsteps, small and quick, getting closer. They’re followed by Fujiwara’s muffled voice, worried. Kita's hand tightens in granny’s as he watches closely.

Out runs a child, his age, tracking dark footprints along the tatami mats from the back entrance. Not just with dirt, but smudges of mud, smearing on the woven grass. His chest tightens at the sight and he has the urge to scold, to clean the mess, but then he feels eyes on him and—

That watchful gaze he remembers clearly, despite only seeing it once, years ago. A gaze he still feels everyday, most intently at night. You are grown, but only as much as he is. And you’re…real. With a weight and embodiment, a person instead of a misty image on the river’s surface. You’re also brighter, both in appearance and spirit, as you put a small handful of grapes (fat and crisp and green) into your mouth (skin and seeds included) and chew quickly before swallowing and smiling widely at him. 

Again, Kita wants to protest the sight, tell you the skin is dirty and you can’t eat seeds, but the words are trapped. Something is tugging at his chest—something other than his apprehension, something that makes him want to physically step forward.

But then Fujiwara-san is rushing in, though not very quickly. He’s another old-timer in the village, with crinkly eyes and little hair remaining on his head, paired with a thin physique and hunch in his back. In one hand he carries a woven basket, filled with more bunches of grapes, shiny and wet. In the other is a wooden cane, pale with a reddish tint—Kita thinks maple. The old man never needed one before, and Kita wonders what’s changed.

He looks back to you, the one change he’s aware of.

“Shinsuke-kun,” his thoughts are interrupted by the call of his name. He hasn’t been listening, he realizes, and he turns his attention to the grandpa. “This is one of my grandchildren. My daughter has been busier with work lately.”

Kita, for a third time, wants to protest. He’s met all of Fujiwara-san’s grandchildren before, and if he hadn’t, granny would have certainly told him about another five year old. He doesn’t know how to respond, can’t, and so he watches blankly. You are smiling at him the entire time, with a joy he doesn’t understand—at least, not entirely.

(There is a tightness in his chest at the sight of you, like it wants to expand beyond its capability. He’s not sure what that means.)

“Have some grapes!” you exclaim in a soft voice, thrusting the bunch towards him. Two fall from the force of your sharp movements, and he watches as they roll on the ground, leaving another stain. He doesn’t accept them, just continues to stare at the mess.

Granny fights a smile as she encourages him. “Let’s try some Shin-chan.”

He wants to say that he’s already had them before. He knows they will be delicious and crunchy and refreshing, especially now that the heat is rising with the sun. He knows that Fujiwara’s grapes are the best, and now two have been wasted and splattered on the tatami. Instead of reprimanding you, he reaches his arm out to take the bundle. Since granny asked.

His eyes widen when you then crouch to pick up the fallen fruit from the floor and eat them (skin and seeds included) without so much as wiping them off.

Who are you?

The faintest tug on his hand makes him turn to granny, who’s pulling one off the bundle he’s holding to give it a taste. “They’re delicious as always,” she says. “I’m surprised it’s such an early harvest.”

Fujiwara smiles, eyes crinkling further. “Snow came early this winter,” he reminds her.

She hums thoughtfully. “Ah, yes. The weather has been quite unusual this year.”

Unusual, Kita wonders to himself. Because of you.

You smile at him again and that inexplicable tightness arises in his chest once more. He frowns, the first genuine frown of displeasure today. His mind tells him to ask granny if he can go home, but he doesn’t want to. He doesn’t understand how that could be possible, to want and not want something at the same time. His frown deepens.

Kita thinks his time at Fujiwara-san’s is excruciating. Kita is also hesitant to leave when granny says it’s time to go. He misses a knowing smile that rests on her face as she tugs him gently, watching as he glances back during their walk home.

You are nosy. Kita was already aware, given he could feel you watching him at every moment, even when he can’t see you. But you are nosy when you are physically near him. And you are around him often now, nearly every day for the past week. Whether you simply show up at random or granny is pulling him along to Fujiwara’s, Kita learns that being around you is inescapable, inevitable. 

At the very least you aren’t noisy, just curious. At granny’s you quietly hover whenever Kita switches tasks or activities, a ghost floating over his shoulder. Once you’ve fulfilled whatever interest you have, you keep to yourself in your own part of the room. You’re helpful in the garden, for some reason, but you make him grimace when you pull a carrot directly from the ground and take a bite, dirt and all. You don’t help him wash the harvest, just crouch next to him by the river water and watch his hands diligently scrub.

You are, however, incredibly messy. It’s as if you don’t even register what a mess is, mud and leaves and water following you everywhere. Always. Trekking through the door with bare feet, smudges of grime trailing behind, sometimes with dripping hair—undried hair—that leaves dark circles and puddles on the mats and wood.

Every time it happens his chest flares with irritation, that urge to scold you. But granny is near, so he says nothing and instead looks at her intently. Granny only ever smiles back, sometimes handing him a towel and reminding him that he can help, if he wants. He doesn’t want to. He’s not sure why the adults haven’t explained it to you, surely Fujiwara-san can’t keep up with the cleaning he must have to do to house you. If Kita and granny always have to scrub your mess after you visit, Fujiwara must be mopping every hour. Sometimes they clean when you’re here, while you just sit and watch, only to dirty the floor again the following day.

After a week of this passes and you show up again, uninvited and with your bare feet leaving mud on the veranda, he caves.

“Don’ come around here if yer jus’ gonna make a mess,” he says firmly—but also quietly, wary of granny’s proximity. Why do you always enter through the veranda anyways—not the genkan, where the mess would be easier to contain?

You don’t appear deterred, smiling as you hold up a basket. “I brought you grapes, Shin-chan.”

He blinks. “That’s kind,” he admits, “but I don’ want ‘em.”

“Well I do,” Granny’s sweet voice says from behind him. Kita tenses when he hears it, turns to look at her guiltily. Her calm, smiling face makes him uneasy.

He starts to protest, those disagreements he felt a week ago, since the moment she wanted to go to Fujiwara’s, bubble up together. “But gran—”

“Shin-chan,” she cuts him off. Her voice is gentle and soft, but holds a different kind of firmness that Kita can’t deliver. One that makes him listen, because he has to.

“It’s okay,” you say, interrupting the conversation that would have followed. You’re still smiling, unfazed. It flames Kita's annoyance, while calming his nerves. Again, he doesn’t understand these feelings. “I’ll go home if Shin-chan wants me to.”

The boy’s eyes widen at that, heart plummeting as if he’s done something wrong. Why do I care? he immediately wonders. Maybe because granny is watching over his shoulder, or because Fujiwara-san seemed so happy to have his not-actually-grandkid (Kita is still certain) around his house. He doesn’t know what home you’re referring to, Fujiwara’s or the city or…somewhere else. Regardless, it would be easier if you went back and let them rest, granny especially, since she must be tired from the extra chores. He still hasn’t answered, caught between wanting to agree, waiting to disagree. He’s not sure which part of him wants what.

Instead of caving to his irritation for a second time today, he sighs and says, “It’s fine…jus’ wash yer feet.” He realizes he’s resolved to clean up after you so granny doesn’t have to. What is he doing?

“Okay,” you say easily, smiling. That relief fills him once again, and he can only stare at you, as if explanations for that feeling in his chest will surface if he looks hard enough. They don’t.

“Here are the grapes,” you assert, raising them in front of you. He hesitates, staring at them in accusation after he finally grasps the handle of the basket. Then you say: “Okay, bye now!” and run off the veranda, your bare feet landing in the dirt and carrying you along the trail and across the bridge.

Kita watches you with a pained face, and he realizes his free hand lifted slightly, as if reaching for you. He scowls and forces it down. Then he turns to granny. She’s smiling at him, he can sense it’s with amusement. He wants to ask why you left, if you really are going home, wherever that is. But he can’t, not when granny is giving him such a look.

“Stop cleanin’ up after others,” he tells her instead. Granny blinks, wondering why she’s being scolded now, too. “I’ll do it. Jus’…jus’ rest.”

She smiles warmly. “You’re a good kid, Shin-chan.”

Kita doesn’t think so. Not right now, with the way you ran away.

“Some people need time to learn the ways we live,” she continues vaguely. “Not everyone comes from the same place.”

He wonders why someone from the city would run around without shoes, through mud.

That inexplicable relief returns when you stand in the outdoor veranda the next day. He still doesn’t understand why he would want to see you, maybe for the confirmation that his words did not actually send you away—that granny and Fujiwara-san can continue to enjoy your presence. Regardless, he stares pointedly at your feet, the dirt clinging to them.

“Sorry,” you say, with the tact to at least look sheepish this time. “I washed them at Jii-chan’s, but they got dirty again.”

Kita is too stunned to react. Do people from the city not understand how shoes work? Or water? Dirt? He sighs, attempting to find his patience, as he tells you to stay put while he leaves. He grabs two pairs of sandals from the genkan and re-enters the veranda. He slips on one pair, then ushers you to follow him down the steps to the spigot.

“Rinse your feet,” he instructs. You do, poorly, but he supposes he can only ask for so much. He puts the second pair of sandals on the ground and tells you to step your feet in after you rinse. It’s an arduous process, but finally you are mostly clean and in the sandals. He then walks you to the entrance of the genkan and tells you, “Enter here. Wear those shoes when ya visit and put ‘em—” he points to a cubby, “there when ya come in.”

You are smiling, always smiling, when you reply. “Thanks Shin-chan!” Then you kick off your sandals and toss them into the cubby. Kita's chest flares again with displeasure at your haphazard treatment of his things. Suddenly you grab his hand and pull him inside, and all he can think is that your skin is cold. He can’t find it in himself to comment, heart racing as he stumbles and tries to slip off his slides before you tug him to the main room. He watches as your undried feet leave dark prints in the tatami in front of him—he thinks of the mold that has probably started growing under them since your first visit.

He passes granny as you pull him through the rooms. He gives her a wide-eyed look, one that tries to ask for help. She only smiles.

Kita feels a little bad for his outburst, once a few days pass and he understands that you aren’t intentionally helpless. You enter through the genkan, with relatively clean feet. You’re careful when you eat after he points out that you tend to make a mess. You help clean, when he asks you to. You still leave crumbs around and wet patches, you scrub too hard sometimes and other times not enough, but you try. And Kita finds that he doesn’t mind so much anymore.

You just don’t know things.

The more he ruminates on your…unfamiliarity with the world, the less sense your story makes—the city story that Fujiwara-san told him and granny. It’s obviously not true, but it also has to be, if everyone believes it. Someone from the city wouldn’t look so surprised that their feet collect dirt. He recalls that evening a few years ago when he was only two, when he could see you in the river. He thinks about the never-ending feeling of being watched. You’re from here, from him.

It becomes apparent why you’re here, why you hang around him at home and linger in his presence. One night he wakes up hours before sunrise. He struggles to re-enter his slumber and curiously opens the screen facing the river, to gauge the time. The mountains loom behind the image of a small figure on Fujiwara’s veranda. You, offering a little wave.

He doesn’t react, just watches as you swing your feet. The moon sits high between you, illuminating the river below, the mist that lingers on its surface. He wonders if you’ve always been there, why he never saw you until a couple weeks ago.

The spirits are all around us, in every living thing. Granny’s voice calls from his memory.

As he watches you, the river, he wonders what defines a “living thing”— if it’s breath or blood or growth. Something else entirely. He thinks the river breathes; it absorbs the air when it bubbles over rocks. Its blood is the water itself. It grows in its own way, banks expanding and collapsing, body winding and pooling, collecting life, collecting stories and history. He’s curious about your story, why it’s part of his.

He closes the screen and goes back to bed.

Shinsuke is not the kind of person to ask unnecessary questions. Even as a child, he keeps those curiosities within, assuming they’ll be answered eventually. Like granny said, You’ll learn when the time is right.

So he doesn’t ask, instead infers. Analyzes and assumes. You aren’t the same. Throughout the summer, as you spend time together, you are always asking. Asking and smiling. Sometimes they’re necessary questions: how to properly wash a dish, or where to set a gift of vegetables. Most of the time they’re unnecessary, asking how Kita is feeling, what he thinks of the weather. Sometimes they’re downright invasive.

“Where are your parents?” you ask him one hot July day, laying in the main room. Kita is fanning himself and wondering why you aren’t sweating.

“Osaka,” he says curtly. He hasn’t seen them in a while, hasn’t thought about them either.

“Do you miss them?” You ask, nosiness unsatisfied.

He shakes his head, no unnecessary response. He likes it with granny, always misses her the few times he’s gone to the city.

You hum, like you heard his unspoken answer. He thinks that’ll be the end of it. It isn’t.

“Your hair must be a mix of theirs,” you say plainly. “Whose is grey?”

He shakes his head, “Neither.” They both have black hair, the same with his sister who’s never home and his baby brother in the city with a nanny.

You’re surprised. “Oh. Do you know whose it is?”

He shrugs, uncaring.

But you smile for some reason, with genuinely joyful eyes. “Maybe it’s your gran’s,” you say happily. It makes him blink in surprise, mystified. He inhales, chest lighter. “It’s cool how that sort of stuff happens.”

He can’t look away from you, your smile that pierces right through him.

That night after his bath, he looks at himself in the mirror, intense, searching in a way he’s never done before. He sees the traces of his mom in his eyes and his lips, his dad in his nose. Both of them at the tips of his hair, that lower section by his neck. He continues to stare, looking for granny. He sees the way she influenced the nose he got from dad. He sees the way she claimed his hair, cradling his head and framing his eyes and cheeks. He wonders what it means, to be chosen by the traits from a generation before.

When granny says goodnight, Kita puts his arms up for a hug. She’s warm, always is. His head nestles into her neck, his threads of grey and black hair tangling with her sea of silver. He doesn’t know what it means; he is a five year old without the vocabulary to articulate the tightness in his chest, something akin to longing and fear. He is a five year old incapable of grasping what it means to be alive.

Only a couple days later, Kita catches a new perspective of you. 

You are barefoot in the genkan and Kita is ready to scold you, this one he knows is deserved after all he’s taught you. Before he can, you speak.

“Come with me today.”

Your hand is outstretched and inviting, but Kita is apprehensive, not sure what you mean. Before he can ask, granny speaks from behind him. “Go on, Shin-chan.”

He frowns and looks at her. Neither of them know what you’re talking about, where you even want to go. But granny looks calm and assured, without a worry in the world.

You don’t wait for an answer, grasping his hand when he’s still turned away and giving it a tug. He feels that same chilliness on your skin, one that makes him think you might be sick. He manages to protest long enough to step into his slides before you pull him out the door. 

It’s a beautiful day. The sun still hangs to the side, the heat of July not yet settled in the valley. The sky is a bright blue, populated with innocent fluffy clouds, white and rolling in the breeze. A group of sparrows sing in a shrub you two pass, and a toad leaps off the path to get out of your way. Kita inhales deeply, the air humid but clean.

“Where’r we goin’?” he manages to ask, quickening his pace to match yours. Your hand has loosened its grip, but he doesn’t let go.

“The forest!” you cheer easily.

His eyes widen. The forest? He’s been to the forest before, to pick bamboo shoots and tea leaves with granny, but he’s not supposed to go without an adult. Does granny know? Why would she let them go by themselves? These are necessary questions, he thinks, and yet he swallows them down and lets you take him without protest.

You are fast despite being barefoot, rocks and sticks seemingly unnoticed as you dart along the path. Kita follows along diligently, stumbling only a few times. He wishes he wore his athletic shoes instead of the sandals. He glances back to the house, studies the way it shrinks from the distance. The two of you are still on the southern side of the river, not yet crossed to the northern mountains, where granny takes him.

Kita decides that he likes running like this, despite the heat and his shoes. It’s a gentle jog, with a destination in mind, his hand in yours as you lead the way.

He doesn’t know how much time passes, just follows you up and along the path until the two of you reach its end. It’s the first time Kita has seen it, the way it stops before a rock face that climbs up a mountain west from his house. He looks down the path, into the valley from the incline.

He looks back at you, waiting for an explanation for what to do next. You don’t offer one, walking to the bank of the river. To get in the river, he realizes, and for the first time since leaving granny’s he tries to pull away.

You turn back to him, smiling softly. “Trust me, Shin-chan,” you say.

He’s not sure why he should, why he did, to let you take him all the way out here in the first place. Because of granny’s encouragement, he thinks. Go on, she said. Did that mean all the way? To the ends of wherever you wanted him?

You have turned and continued down the bank. Kita does not try to escape your grasp, letting you pull him along.

The water of the river rushes over his feet, cool and surprising. It runs up his ankles, his shins, his knees, and finally his thighs. You are leading him forwards, upstream and past the rock face that marks the end of the trail. His toes bump rocks covered in algae, slipping and wavering as he wades slowly. You, however, are sturdy, never faltering with your sure steps.

You approach a pile of rocks, scrambling over them to bring yourself back onto land. You help hoist Kita after you. He pauses when he steps onto the forest floor, the softness catching him off guard. He looks down to see reddish-brown piles of pine needles coating the ground, dotted with lush bundles of ferns and patches of vibrant moss. The land rolls gently, small and soft hills of fallen pine covering rocks and dirt and life. A mist lingers from the proximity of the water, the sun pulling the moisture into the air. The scenery is dark, quiet from the hazy canopy above. Kita inhales deeply in attempt to regulate his exhausted panting, the essence of wood and mint taking over him. He is in awe, not used to being swaddled in pine. The forests here are mostly a mix of leafy trees, oaks and maples and chestnuts, with pockets of bamboo. Not secret havens of sweetness and tang.

You tug him along, bouncing through the fluff of the soft ground. He follows, eyes wide and soaking in the scenery, wanting to memorize every moment. You show him your enchanted forest, its mysterious darkness splattered with occasional sun that manages to seep through. He spots a white hare leaping away, watches birds flutter from the trees. At one point you guide him to cross the river on a fallen tree, green with moss and bundles of young sedge. Behind your skipping form he walks carefully, arms outstretched for balance.

His heart freezes when he steps down onto the other side, catching sight of a grey wolf waiting its turn. He clutches your hand as the creature steps forwards, two smaller ones following. They look at him blankly before leaping onto the natural bridge, continuing their own journey without looking back.

When he turns to you, you are smiling, and tug him forwards once more. The sun starts to stream in, brightening as pines transition to those oak and maple and chestnut trees. The ground is no longer soft, but firm dirt and clumps of rocks, leading to one larger slab of jagged earth that juts out from the mountain entirely.

You step out into the sun and he follows, taking in the view in front of him.

He is not at the peak of the mountain, maybe halfway there, but the outlook forces him to understand the vastness of the valley. He can see the large span of the mountains as they roll and crawl in the distance, his house a small square along others. The river is more apparent, winding intensely down the mountain and softening into a gentle curve next to the village. He can see crop fields and the road that has taken him to Osaka before.

You speak, the first time since bringing him into the water, “Some people climb mountains to look from above. I like when I still feel inside of it, can still see what’s happening.”

Kita thinks he understands, remembers the way the mountains from his house are like a promising wall, a guardian. How the depth of the valley cradles him. He thinks of the hare and the birds, the wolves, the journey here striking wonder and awe into his heart. He recalls that feeling of being watched, your gaze always near.

The sun approaches its peak in the sky, nearly noon. It illuminates the valley, brings light into the forest behind them. Kita watches it light up your face, already bright from your joyful expressions.

“Happy birthday, Shin-chan,” you tell him, taking him by surprise. He forgot, in the excitement of the past hours with you. Granny gave him some books this morning as a gift. You’re giving him the forest. His smile is small and reserved, but it’s the first time he offers one back to you.

He thinks he understands now: what you meant when you said home.

The sight of your back with a hand pulling him along defines the next year. After you show Kita the forest, he trusts you wholly, no doubt that you will look after him. He is happily tugged again and again into that realm of magic. He encounters more animals—badgers and pigs, bears and herons. In the winter he sees foxes and macaques. The river freezes and snow becomes the new carpet of the forest. You don’t shiver either, he learns.

You take him to the summit once, so he can see the view. The pine transitions to a highland, bald of trees and instead coated in grass and shrubs. It’s beautiful, a clear day when the entirety of the valley is visible and he can spot granny’s home, how it sits across from Fujiwara-san’s. When he looks up, there is only the blue of the sky, not a single speck of cloud coverage. They stay until dark and watch the Milky Way span across the blackness of night, its subtle hues of pinks and blues, the way meteors shower down in flashes.

He watches life rise from the ground when the weather warms once again, as seedlings sprout and newborn animals wander through the land. Flowers bloom, coating pockets of earth in the full spectrum of light. He is witness to deer learning to walk, stumbling awkwardly over roots and rocks. He sees the other clumsy ways animals go about the world, how a sparrow drops its worm, how a duck trips and rolls into the river behind its mother. He collects these moments in his memory, happy to observe, solely to understand.

And you observe him, because Kita knows that is what you are meant to do. He still doesn’t know who you are, or why him, but he feels your eyes constantly. He doesn’t admit it, but they are comforting.

On the days you two are not parading in the mountain, you are still usually in each other’s presence. Kita no longer reads while you look over his shoulder or sit on the other side of the room. He reads to you, the books granny rents him from the library. You like to lay on the veranda while he sits and swings his feet, paying close attention to pronouncing the words. He still cleans up after you, since you never fully get the hang of doing things yourself. It’s only crumbs and small puddles, untidy blankets or cushions, an untucked chair at the table after dinner. He finds himself volunteering to take granny’s extra harvest of leeks to Fujiwara-san’s, under the pretense that he wants her to rest.

He walks there briskly, and stays for an additional hour. You have a lot to say, your nosiness still strong even after nearly a year.

“Jii-chan told me you’re starting school soon,” you say, eating one of the leeks. He watches you chew the entirety of it, uncooked. Some water squeezes out and dribbles onto the floor.

“In April,” he replies. April is two weeks away. It’s when he’ll go to Osaka. He’s supposed to stay there for the week leading up to school to prepare. He gets the sense that you’re leaving too.

You don’t look sad, and his shoulders feel tense when he notices. He’s not sure why.

Kita doesn’t ever ask unnecessary questions, but right now he is compelled to ask you many things. Sometimes it seems like you understand what he’s thinking, but you never respond unless he says it outright. As a result, he never gets to know.

He surprises both himself and you when he asks, “Are ya goin’ to school, too?” He already knows you aren’t.

You shake your head. He wants to ask why, wants to ask if you’re going somewhere else. He wants to know if you’ll be here when he comes back during break. He wants to figure out why you came in the first place.

Another question: “Are ya goin’ home?”

You nod your head this time. He watches you, thinking you’ll return to the pine forest. You shake your head when he thinks it, and give him the reprieve of elaborating. “The river.”

He frowns, confused. The river? You were always in the forest, guiding him along its greenery. He thinks about how he has to wade upstream to enter the forest in the west. He recalls the memory from years ago, a child in the water watching him. 

“I came from the forest,” you try to explain, “but the water’s my home now.”

Kita is reminded that he was born in Osaka, but would always rather be at granny’s house in the northern mountains.

It’s hard for him to leave granny’s, more than any time before. When the driver comes to get him and he squeezes in the back with granny, he looks out the window towards Fujiwara’s house. You sit on the veranda, waving while your legs swing. This time the sun is high in the sky and the river releases a blinding reflection. When the car drives away and he can no longer see you, his chest hurts.

Osaka does not make it easier. His mother coos at how big he’s grown while his father watches disinterested. Kita is shown his baby brother, now a toddler awkwardly walking around and speaking. Kita doesn’t know how to talk to him, but he tries. He says hello to his sister—who he hasn’t seen since she decided to stay in the city—when she finally makes an appearance at dinner. Granny stays for the meal and the night, and then leaves in the morning.

That night, the second one in Osaka, he cries while laying in bed. He isn’t sure why, the feelings simply overwhelming and in need of release. The squishy mattress in a raised bed frame doesn’t comfort him. He thinks about you, about granny. The mountains and the forest. The river. When he looks outside his window—a square of glass punched through plaster walls—he only sees pavement and blocks of concrete. Other homes, maybe with other children crying for reasons they can’t explain. There is no mountain in the distance or river running along the ground. The sky is hazy, no stars in sight. The only twinkling comes from his own eyes, his teary squinting blurring streetlights and windows with every blink. Each time his eyes close, for a moment he thinks he can see you.

If Shinsuke is one thing, he is malleable. He can fit himself into environments, his adherence to routine giving him a means of finding comfort no matter where he is placed. Responsibility grounds him, distracts him. He can redirect his energy to doing well in school, looking after his brother. These things feel good to him, to simply do them well.

Even though you are not with him, he can feel your eyes at all times. He is reminded of being at granny’s, her washing the floor as she tells him that the spirits are everywhere, always watching. He finds himself cleaning up after his brother, thinking of you. He wonders what you think, if you’re reminded of the same.

School is as alien as Osaka, with its concrete exterior and plastered walls. They are painted white and lined with large sheets of glass. They slide open, but only for students to shout at their friends outside, not to let the morning air in. 

In class, he sits quietly at his desk and listens to the teacher. He doesn't talk with other students or pass notes under the desk. He doesn’t even wonder about you, the feeling of your eyes always on him. He watches the teacher closely, diligently records the lessons. He watches other students, gathering first impressions and additional observations. He notices the way some of them doze off or scribble in their books. He sees the meaningful glances some make to each other, usually girls as they eye each other and specific boys in the class.

When he studies for his first exam, he thinks that he can feel you in the room with him. First looking over his shoulder—a cool breeze wafting from behind him, and then laying on his bed—the sheets oddly chilly when he goes to sleep. He remembers how you sat by him while he read aloud just a few weeks ago. He murmurs to himself as he reviews information, wondering if you can hear him.

Kita scores at the top of his class. He doesn’t feel anything when teachers congratulate him and other students whine. There is no pride in his chest or sense of satisfaction at the results. He thinks back to his nights studying, your presence lingering over him. It just feels good, he thinks, to do things well. The process of trying and dedicating himself to something.

He makes a routine out of it, delegating time after school to review material. It falls easily into his schedule, after dinner and before he readies for bed. He still has time to play with his brother, usually reading or offering him toys. His sister is always gone, either busy with club activities or friends. His parents get home late too, but they usually manage to have a full family dinner.

They’re eating quietly, having debriefed their days as they reach the end of their meal. Kita glances at his family, realizing that they’re different from the people at school. He’s known them for his whole life, people without first impressions and instead ingrained understandings. He looks at them intently, notices the way they eat, listens to the way they speak. He knows them intuitively, no running list in his mind to keep track of information. He is reminded of the time you asked about his hair, and he stares at his mom, then his dad. His mom’s hair is long and brown, artificially lightened from its original dark color. His dad’s is black with a sprinkling of silver from age. Kita wonders if his will do the opposite when he grows old.

There’s another exam the following week, this one for his science class. Kita is the first one in the classroom, watching students filter in. The boy who sits next to him—Daiki, tall and skinny—plops down with a sigh just a few minutes before the teacher is supposed to arrive.

“Gahh, I’m so nervous,” he says to Kita, laying his head on the desk. When Kita doesn’t respond, he asks, “Are you?”

Kita shakes his head at that, not sure why he would be. He studied. 

When the results come back after a few days Daiki whines that Kita is a goody-goody, trying his hardest to get the teacher’s attention. Kita looks at his full marks and once again feels nothing. He thinks it is the natural result of his efforts. He wonders what you would say, if he could talk to you. He thinks you would ask nosey questions about his siblings. It makes his chest feel hollow.

Some kids try to be his friend, or at least try to talk to him. But he’s quiet, not very eloquent or forgiving with his words, and so they eventually leave him alone. He thinks about how you diligently stood by him, how you smiled when he scolded you.

When he gets home and returns to his room, it is exactly as he left it. There are no crumbs to sweep or puddles to wipe. His brother is out with the nanny, but he feels restless, the need to do something. He thinks he can get started on his homework early, pulling out his notebooks and folders. He can’t focus on the words, eyes skimming the pages without understanding. He knows that studying now is futile, and decides to continue later. He settles on bathing early instead.

His bath draws on, longer than usual. He finds himself pausing, getting lost in thought—though more lost in feeling, since his mind drifts blankly. He’s still restless by the time he finishes, but slightly relaxed. He stands to wrap himself with the towel and steps carefully onto the bath rug. Once he’s dried and his towel is secure around his waist, he leans over to pull the plug and let the water drain. Just as he grasps it, there’s a lurch of water that spills out and onto the floor. His eyes widen in disbelief and his chest flares with annoyance knowing he will have to clean the mess. He looks at the floor incredulously before turning back to the bath and—

His eyes widen further, mouth opening slightly at the sight of you—a misty figure over the water. You’re wearing a sheepish expression as you lean over the edge to assess the mess.

“Sorry,” you say quietly. Kita's disbelief increases at the sound of your voice. “I’m still getting the hang of it.”

Kita slams the plug back down and stands to face you clearly. He feels the water pooled at his feet, but all irritation has fled his body. Instead he is filled with a warmth, a contrast to the coolness wafting from you.

“You made a mess,” he tells you, unnecessarily. You know that already.

“Yeah,” you say. You apologize again.

“Don’ do it again,” he tries to scold. His body wants to step forward, to reach you. He’s not sure why, and he frowns with skepticism.

You nod, then lift your leg experimentally. When it’s pulled above the water, there are no droplets falling. Instead, you appear airy, like the water sits around your body. You step out and onto the bathroom floor, successfully avoiding increasing the mess. You smile brightly at your success. Kita continues to watch, wondering if you’ll disappear, evaporate at any moment. You look at the water on the floor and then meet his eyes, smile turning sheepish again.

“I should mop,” you tell him, breaking him from his quiet spell.

“I’ll do it,” he says immediately. “Jus’...jus’ don’ go anywhere.”

You nod.

Mopping helps him calm down, perhaps needing a task to manage his agitation. You watch, and then follow him to his room once he’s finished. He dresses while you distractedly rummage through his things, then walks over to you at his desk. He feels a wetness under his foot and looks down, seeing footprints scattered along the floor. They’re light and clearly yours, and he ignores them, continuing over to you.

“You can go back to studying,” you tell him.

He can’t bring himself to look away. He’s not sure why, chest tight with anticipation.

There’s a knock at the door, mom’s sign that dinner is ready. The noise startles you and there is a poof, the sound of you evaporating into mist, wafting up to the ceiling. Gone. The only traces of you are those faint, damp footprints and few misplaced items on his desk.

For the first time in a long time, Kita feels a sinking disappointment.

Adolescence

Contrary to what he expected, Kita doesn’t leave Osaka during break. His parents think it would be good for him to have a consistent lifestyle. Kita doesn’t protest, but he can feel a heaviness in his stomach. He asks about granny, if he’ll see her soon. They tell him she will visit some time, and she does, though rarely. He thinks about the forest and the mountains, when he’ll see them again.

On the first day of fourth grade, Kita wakes up on time. He uses the toilet, washes his face, brushes his teeth, and changes his clothes at his usual pace. As he splashes cool water along his forehead and cheeks, he is reminded of your touch and wonders if he will see you this morning. He often finds himself waiting, without realizing until a significant amount of time has already passed. You are irregular and unpredictable. It puts him on edge, that you might disrupt his perfectly crafted routine.

He is the first to sit down for breakfast and the first one to finish, everyone else but his mother just having started. He stands to put his dishes away and gather his school things when she rushes into the room. She’s fumbling with her shoe, trying to get it in place while collecting her things to fill her purse. Her face brightens when she sees him and asks about his first day, if he’s excited or nervous.

Kita shakes his head, neither. He’s been going to school nearly everyday for years now, what reason would he have to be nervous? What’s to be excited for?

He turns to leave, but she calls for him. She asks if he’s planning to join a club.

He shakes his head again, not sure why he should.

But his mother protests, “I think it’d be good for you to do a sport. You don’t exercise much, with all the studying.”

His father hums in agreement from the table and his sister stands to excuse herself. His brother knocks his bowl over, spoon clattering to the ground. Without hesitation, Kita walks over to return it.

“Just try one, okay?” his mom asks. Kita nods in response before finally leaving. 

In his room, he gathers his books and school supplies into his backpack, double checking that everything is there. He slips it over his shoulders and then turns to the window. It’s translucent with a sheen of moisture from inside. He wipes it away and glances at the sky. It’ll probably rain, he gauges. As he steps away from the window to leave, he catches a glimpse of you in the reflection.

His first day of school is like any other, spent seated at his desk near the center of the room, watching the teacher, observing his classmates. He diligently helps clean at the end of the day: sweeping duty, not missing a single spot. Once finished, he changes his shoes and makes for the exit. Some students say goodbye, and he nods in return. He can hear the soft pattering of rain as he approaches the door, and pops open his umbrella before stepping outside.

The walk home is quiet, with occasional groups of students chattering by. Kita walks at his typical pace, unrushed. He hears his shoes tap against the pavement with each step, the plopping of raindrops above his head. The occasional car rushes by, veering aside to avoid splashing him. He runs through a mental list of what he needs to do for school, but it’s short given it being the first day.

When he’s only a few minutes from home, he hears splashing behind him, as if someone is running through a puddle. You, calling his name.

He doesn’t turn to look, but his steps slow while his heart speeds, giving you time to catch up. Within a few seconds you are by his side, your now-usual misty and translucent figure at his side. You smile when he glances at you, but he appears unfazed. You’re unbothered as you walk with him, light on your feet.

When he reaches the door of his home and unlocks it, you let yourself in first. He closes his umbrella and gives it a shake before setting it on the rack. While he removes his shoes in the genkan, he eyes the light trail of footprints you left on your way to his room. He leaves them, knowing they’ll evaporate before anyone else comes home. He stops by the kitchen, dumping a bag of carrots onto a small plate, and then he briskly enters his room and closes the door behind him.

He sees you laying on his bed and he feels an itch of annoyance, knowing the sheets will be damp. But he doesn’t say anything, instead setting the plate on his desk and sliding his bag onto the floor. You smile and ask how his day was.

This has become part of Kita's routine, your irregular visits. He walks through life with an anxious anticipation, waiting for you to come. He is relieved when you appear, but he is never entirely pleased. There’s a warmth in his chest regardless, one that reminds him of granny.

He wonders if maybe that’s why he accepts the interruption so easily, because it momentarily brings him home, his life in the mountains, granny’s voice telling him that someone is watching over him. He knows that someone is you. He wonders if granny knows about your visits, if you ever tell her about him.

His answers are short, per usual. But he talks about his classes, his classmates, how mom wants him to join a club. He knows that you know all this, but he says it anyways, gives into you.

“Do you know what club you’ll join?” you ask.

He shrugs. “A sport, since I should exercise.”

You nod at that, “It’s too bad the forest is so far away. Exploring is good exercise.”

Kita thinks about the forest often, seeping into his spare time when he’s not caught up in classes or the growing responsibilities of life. He’s heard from mom about wildfires in Hyogo, ones that spring at random in the dryness of summertime. Luckily nothing near home, but still within the province. He recounts those memories of rabbits and monkeys, remembers the flowers that are blooming right about now. He's curious if it’s raining, how visible the stars are tonight. These questions bring a pain to his chest, one he can’t explain, one that doesn’t make sense. Sometimes he calls granny and the pain goes away. Sometimes it gets worse.

When you’re in his room with him like this, he thinks it’s a different pain entirely.

Eventually your questions lull and Kita knows that this is his queue to start his schoolwork. He doesn’t have much to do, though. Instead he wants to ask a question of his own. You can tell, and you wait.

He doesn’t know how to phrase it, so he never asks. As a result, you never answer.

A week later the school allows them to pick clubs. Kita looks at the other hopeful kids as they play rock-paper-scissors for a spot for the popular sports: basketball, football, baseball. He eyes the groups that are smaller, have less interest. The running club looks crowded, so he makes his way over. He still has to do a round of rock-paper-scissors, and he’s one of the three who have to find another option. To his right is another small group, and he asks to join without knowing what they are. Volleyball, apparently. He’s not sure if he’ll be any good, but he figures it’s only for the year and he can try something different in fifth grade.

Volleyball, it turns out, is difficult. He learns how to receive a ball, but it flies in the opposite direction of where he wants it to go. He watches the other players, trying to understand how to improve himself.

Volleyball, it turns out, is technical and requires a lot of practice to sharpen his skills. He diligently attends practice, two days a week for fourth-graders. The coaches appreciate his efforts, how he runs his full laps and takes every suggestion seriously. Kita finds that he just enjoys the process of training, improving his abilities and caring for his body. His legs feel tired at the end of the day and it reminds him of running through the forest. It reminds him of his efforts, makes him feel good.

Volleyball, it turns out, is the perfect distraction. From you.

It becomes part of his routine, filling in the gaps of time that he normally finds himself waffling in, waiting for you. He learns to walk through everyday as if it’s the same, just himself, but allows it to shuffle when you make an appearance. 

Volleyball helps as he enters middle school and your visits lose frequency. Your lack of presence, however, makes the feeling of your gaze on him even stronger. He feels it every time he’s on the court—though he only ever plays games in practice. He in turn watches his teammates, their ticks and habits. He watches his opponents, offers notes to his team about patterns and flaws in their styles. He’s not a powerhouse like the standout players, doesn’t have any exceptional talent, and so despite his hard work and consistent practice, he doesn’t play a single game, doesn’t even receive a jersey.

You ask him about it one evening, on break before high school starts.

“Are you going to join the volleyball club?” you ask, to which he nods. It makes you hum as you sit on his bed. He can see the wall behind you, how it darkens slightly from the moisture of your form leaning against it. 

“I hope you get the chance to play more,” you tell him honestly. “I don’t know why they don’t let you.”

But it means nothing to him, that sort of attention and recognition. He just plays to play the game, do the drills, learn the mechanics—to take care of himself. You know this, but you like watching him, the way he watches the game, moves with it, into it.

He doesn’t say anything in response, knowing that you know what he thinks.

Instead of pushing further, you change the subject. “I’m not going to be able to visit very often,” you tell him. You sound regretful, and his chest is agitated. He thinks of the fires, happening at random across the country.

“I know,” he tells you. He could sense it, recognized the increasing infrequency of your presence. He wants to ask why, but he can’t get the words out, for whatever reason.

You look at him closely and say, “I’ll be around though.”

He nods at that. He knows.

Inarizaki is a prestigious school, known for academics and athletics alike. Kita makes it in easily with his grades, and joins the volleyball club despite knowing he will likely never play in a match. The coaches note that Kita is inexperienced in competition, but they know an asset when they see one. His skills are too sturdy, too well-practiced for Inarizaki to not take advantage of him.

During his first year, he hardly plays. Even so, he is the first at practice, one of the last ones to leave, and the most diligent athlete on the team. He runs the entire length of the track, finishes every rep during weight training, and completes every drill and penalty without complaint. The coaches find that he does not have star power—he is unassuming and ordinary—but he is exceptional in his efforts, and his efforts meet returns when it counts, when they need him on the court as his usual Kita-san.

Some of the older players tease him for his diligence, others admire him because of it. Everyone realizes that he pays no mind to what they think, only ever doing what he wants, what fits his values. He respects his elders even when he disagrees with them, but he is blunt with his fellow first years, unafraid to call out their behavior, especially if it contradicts something they’ve said before. Some say it’s rich coming from him, someone who only warms the bench.

Aran is the one who talks to him, one day in the locker room. A tense conversation between Michinari and Shinsuke unraveled earlier when Kita commented on how the libero attempted too many unpracticed receives in-game, that he should have stuck to underhand until he perfected his overhand off the court. Michi has a temper, and his frustration was pushed by the spiker’s comment. He shouted that Kita wouldn’t understand, that he hasn’t been put in a game, hasn’t had the opportunity to feel the pressures of expectation.

Aran lingered when the others filed out of the locker room—partially to make sure Kita was okay, and partially to suggest he cool it with the critique.

“Don’t take it to heart,” he offers. “Akagi-san gets bad nerves. He knows what he needs to do.”

“I don’t understand the point of being nervous,” Kita responds.

A machine, Aran thinks. This guy is a machine. He says as much, and thinks there’s truth to Michi’s comments, that Kita must not understand because he’s never played in a match that counted.

But Kita explains—that it doesn’t make sense if you’ve practiced the skills and know your capabilities. That it’s the same with eating, shitting even. He thinks Michi’s underhand receives are enough, that they have saved the ball from Inarizaki’s own powerhouses in practice. Why would he need to try anything else?

Aran’s eyes widen as Kita speaks, starting to understand his perspective. It becomes apparent that his criticism towards Michi was more of a poorly delivered compliment: that their first-year libero is enough as he is, that he could save them with the tools he knows—he doesn’t need miracles. This glimpse into Kita puts Aran’s teammate in a new light, recontextualizes his diligent attitude towards their training and the criticism he gives his peers. He trusts the process, knows that the results will follow suit.

Aran begins to notice how Kita fades to the back, his presence unassuming on its own. Kita does not play for recognition or adulation, he simply does what needs to be done. His diligence to get every ball in the air goes unnoticed when the flashy ace pulls an impressive cross against three blockers—a move that would not have been possible without Kita, committed behind him. But Kita doesn’t care, doesn’t ask for attention. 

Aran already held immense respect for his teammate, for his repetition, diligence, and perseverance. But now he feels a special type of awe when he watches him more closely.

Kita does not make a fuss of convincing others of his praiseworthy traits, but Aran takes it upon himself to point them out to his team, to give new context to Kita's seemingly harsh words. Slowly but surely, they will understand, too.

What Aran doesn’t know is that Kita feels like he has already been noticed and recognized, always has been and always will be, at every moment—by you.

(Your eyes continue to bore into him no matter where he is. They feel stronger the longer he goes without seeing you. Your visits are few and far between, but he has his routine, knows to follow it independently and let it shape around your irregularity.)

The following season, a handful of talented first years join, including a freakishly synchronized twin duo and a sly middle blocker. They fight with each other. Some of them cut corners. One particularly troublesome one likes to work himself through illness, inspiring misguided awe in other first years. Kita as a second year has no qualms scolding his teammates, now sometimes including his upperclassmen. The underclassmen pout and grumble while the elders know the intent resting behind his abrasion. 

You only visit him twice during the school year, both times at the hotel for nationals. The first is during the Interhigh National Tournament; he is sitting in the tub at the end of the day, running through his observations of other teams he saw, considering what would be useful to share with the others, to exploit. His head is resting on the ledge of the tub, staring at the blank ceiling as a canvas for him to visualize what he saw: bad crosses, a fragile ego, delayed timing for a back attack. He thinks about the team they’re playing tomorrow, the most imperative information to note. He thinks he should finish bathing so he can write it down.

When he straightens his head to look forward, he jolts in surprise, water splashing out and onto the bathroom floor.

You’re there, sitting on the other end of the bath in your misty form. Your eyes are wide, head turning to look at the puddles on the tile. Kita can’t even consider the mess, body tense at your proximity. He’s never been flustered around you before, never felt strange about his nakedness if you appeared after a bath. It’s been a long time since you’ve come from a bath. And this—this is a closeness and intimacy he has never imagined. You, sharing the water, right beside him. He is frozen when your eyes move back to his face.

“I’m sorry I scared you,” you whisper, and he recalls another variable to add to the situation: Aran, likely still in their shared room.

Kita shakes his head, not knowing what to say. “You—” he stutters, unlike him. “What’re ya doin’.” Ever since middle school you only appeared in the rain. He didn’t know bathtubs were even still a…vessel of transportation.

You smile. “Good luck tomorrow.”

Kita blinks, torn between the urge to scold you, the urge to reach for you, and the urge to make you leave before Aran learns of your presence. He finds it exhausting, the way you pit these conflicting pieces of him against each other.

Instead he tells you, “I probably won’ play.”

You shake your head, still smiling. “You’re doing it right now.” The analysis of his opponents, you mean.

A sound at the door makes you jolt, the water softly rippling around you. It’s Aran, asking if things are okay. He doesn’t comment further, but he swears he hears the murmuring of voices.

Kita calls back that he’s fine, just about to get out and be done for the night. He gives you a look afterwards, a sign that you can’t stay. He wishes you could.

You surprise him by leaning forwards, reaching for him. He is suddenly swept into your chilly embrace, arms wrapping around his shoulders. His body is tense, on edge from the intimacy, but he only feels your body above the water, arms and chest and head as it settles into his neck. Despite your cold temperature, Kita's body heats at the contact.

“I’ll see you,” you say, and then you are mist, dispersing into the air.

When Kita exits the bathroom, Aran thinks for the first time that he looks amused—a mirth settled in his eyes and his lips slightly quirked.

A few months later during the Spring High Nationals, you appear in his room, again shared with Aran. Luckily the spiker is out for the moment, allowing Kita the freedom to speak with you. He’s getting dressed from the bath while you flop onto his bed. When he finishes he stands over you, inquiring why you came.

“To wish you luck again.”

Where you’re laying on the bed, his hand hangs by his hip only inches from your face. He is called to reach for it, hold it gently. He’s not sure why but this visit makes him uneasy, like it could be the last. He wonders if these are nerves.

The sound of the key opening the door interrupts his thinking. You have already faded into the air by the time Aran enters, followed by the twins barreling their way past him.

Atsumu (the obnoxious) immediately makes for Kita's bed. He flops down onto it, not unlike how you did minutes before, but immediately tenses and shrieks. He rolls himself off, pushing Kita back from where he was standing, all while shouting, “Kitaaa! Why’s it wet—”

Kita thinks he should thank you, next time you visit.

You don’t visit again.

Rather, Kita goes home to you. He decides to leave for break instead of sticking around for club practice, a choice he’s never made since he started volleyball. Something in him calls to visit granny. So at the end of March he boards the train headed towards the north station, and then hails a ride to the village. Granny is home when he arrives, and she marvels at how tall he is, not having seen him since she visited in middle school.

He towers over her small figure, awkwardly hunching in a hug. Granny says that he’ll be a big help with his height, and over the next day she sets him to dust the high shelves and put away dishes. She comments that he can move the table in the main room all on his own, no longer small, five year old Shin-chan.

The ease Kita feels in himself when he is here, with granny in the mountains, is undeniably because this is his home. He is malleable, shapeable to the life he’s lived in Osaka, but this is where he should be. He knows that when he enters this final year of high school, he will be given a sheet that asks for his three career plans. With his grades and diligent work ethic, he knows that he can put himself on any path and make it work. But in this moment, in granny’s embrace, the warmth of a home lined with screens and tatami, Kita knows that he wants to be here, no matter what.

That night he lays out his futon, smoothing out the creases and carefully lining it to be perpendicular with the wall. He smiles, this routine of preparing his bed one of many things he missed in the city. Before he lays down, he is overcome by the feeling of being watched. He turns to the screens that lead outside, towards the river. He walks over and opens them, looking into the darkness of the night.

The moon hangs low in the sky—a crescent, a smile. It shines softly on the water, Fujiwara-san’s house behind it, and the form of the mountains beyond. You aren’t there, but the river is misty, a bluish haze settling thickly on its surface.

In the morning he decides to go for a run, an attempt to maintain conditioning while he’s gone from practice. He goes left—west—towards your mountain.

The jog is peaceful, with March air cool and crisp against his skin. He is calmed by the sound of the water rushing next to him, running the opposite way. There are birds singing when he passes and a small hare jets by his feet. Running feels like a trip through his memory, recounting the times he tried to keep up with your pace, the adventures you went on together. He is running through the blue of wanderlust, along the breathing water and between the distant mountains, under the bright sky above him. He is running through the green of nostalgia, the lush vegetation, stalks of bamboo and solid trees, mostly oak and maple and chestnut, but occasionally the mysterious pine.

He is running to you.

It isn’t apparent until he reaches the end of the path, to that rock face at the foot of the mountain, and you are there—in the flesh—waiting in the river. The water is cold during spring, and yet you smile warmly, unfazed by the temperature. When he takes your hand to let you guide him through the water, through soft pine and hazy light, your touch is cool and refreshing against his—hot from exertion.His heart lurches at the contact, an inexplicable mix of tightness and lightness blooming in his chest. He can’t tell if it’s hollowing him out or overfilling him. It feels like hello and farewell all at once. There is a knot in his stomach, one that feels like nerves. It is exhilarating, magnetizing, like falling into you completely. He lets himself. He has no other option.

You come back with him to granny’s and have breakfast together. She doesn’t say anything, only calls you “dear” and thanks you for your help cleaning up. She does not mention Fujiwara and neither do you. Kita feels whole, sitting on the floor at this table.

At night you sit and watch as he prepares his futon. He looks at you and asks, “D’ya need one?”

You shake your head, smiling. “Don’t sleep.”

He nods before getting up to turn off the light. He opens the soft blanket and lays down. He turns to you, hesitating. He wants to know if you’re staying, if you’ll be here all night. Part of him wants to invite you to lay next to him.

He doesn’t say anything, just looks at you curiously.

You are smiling over him, as always. One of your hands reaches to smooth back his hair and he softens. Even with your skin always cold, his body will forever warm at your touch.

These days continue and Kita feels light, enjoying time with you, as a person. His questions fade after he succumbs to focusing on soaking in your presence. It feels good, not unlike the satisfaction of completing his daily rituals.

He looks at you closely, the way you’ve grown with him. You are still smiling, still diligent in ways that he initially failed to see as a five year old. Watchful, joyful. He doesn’t feel the smile on his face, a small one that granny notices. You are smiling too, as you take dishes he’s finished washing and run a rag across their surface. You miss some spots, little droplets sticking to the ceramic. Some fly off and land on the floor and counter.

Kita is entirely at ease. It is quaint, quiet, content.

After a few moments, you suddenly pause your drying and turn thoughtfully, towards the river. Kita watches as the faintest furrow appears between your brows, your face both pensive and concerned. You drop the rag on the counter and step away. He stares curiously, still scrubbing a plate.

“I’ll be back in a second,” you say. Nothing else, no unnecessary information. 

Fear germinates in his chest, his heartbeat picking up speed. Granny smiles at him, reassured. He wonders how she retains her calm demeanor.

When nearly ten minutes pass and you don't return, Kita tells granny he’s going to check on you. She nods in understanding as he slips on his sandals and exits through the genkan. He spots you immediately, standing between the house and the river. You’re facing the northern mountains with a frown on your face. Kita realizes this is the first time he’s seen you anything but joyful.

You answer his silent question when he stands beside you, “There’s something wrong.”

“In the forest?” he clarifies. You nod, looking onwards. He watches you for a silent minute, the way you study the sky over the ridge. 

“I think…” you start. Pause. “You should leave, with your gran. And everyone else.”

Kita's brow furrows as he looks at you skeptically. You turn to him, eyes unwavering. You never look this serious. Always nosy, unnecessary questions. Lighthearted. Messes on the floor.

“Shinsuke,” you say firmly. He startles at the sound of his full name. “Tell everyone there’s a fire—in the northern mountains. I’ll try to keep it at bay, but it’s spreading. By the time they see it, it’ll be too late. If you can evacuate the houses on the other side of the river before it’s visible, things should be okay.”

He feels a strike in his lungs, like he’s gasping for breath. He wants to ask for details, but you’ve made it clear there’s no time. You are grabbing him, your cool hand holding his wrist, as you start towards the bridge in a run. He is momentarily brought back to his sixth birthday, running behind you as you guide him along the path to the base of a mountain—your mountain. He remembers thinking that running behind you was fun.

This time you are serious, almost panicked, bringing him across the river and pointing at the houses, which ones he should evacuate first. The ones with the oldest people. Fujiwara-san is one of them. You let go of his hand and run, sprint towards the base of the mountain. He feels panicked, wondering how long it’ll take for you to come back. What it means for you to keep the fire at bay. You fade away, the blue of distance settling between you two, mistiness.

The next moments are a blur. He knocks on doors and is greeted by elders he hasn’t seen in years, ready to exclaim at how he’s grown. Their coos are interrupted by his apologies, an explanation that he got news of a wildfire and wants to make sure people have time to evacuate. He suggests that they get into their cars and head east near the highway, and to wait for official advice for next steps. He says the words, but they don’t fully register when his mind is still occupied with the memory of you sprinting to the danger. The families look at him skeptically, but they get a move on when they remember this is Shin-chan, the quiet and good-natured village boy.

He makes his way down the homes to relay the news. He asks neighbors to tell the others, and to call emergency services. There are 26 homes on this side of the river, and by the time he knocks on half the doors, smoke hangs over the mountains. No fire is in sight, but the signs are there. It makes the next conversations much quicker, and he is relieved as he watches cars pile out towards the highway.

Suddenly an alarm starts blaring. The emergency intercoms spaced along the neighborhood release a sharp and repeating warning sound. A deep voice calls out between the noise, commanding evacuation. Kita's breath is labored from the exertion of running between houses, but his chest feels lighter knowing that his responsibility has been lifted.

By the time he crosses the bridge back to granny’s home, the sky has darkened significantly, black smog blowing along and spewing upwards. There’s the slight lick of a flame creeping over the ridge and he feels his heart begin to gallop. His stomach clenches roughly when his mind flashes with images of the western mountain forest, deer and wolves and rabbits and birds. Flowers and pine and ferns. He glances that way and sees that it’s still untouched, for now.

He runs inside granny’s, calling for her to get in a neighbor’s car, since she doesn’t own one herself. She stands slowly, at her elderly pace, and Kita is restless as he helps her exit the house as quickly as she can. He takes another glance at the mountains and his heart plummets at the sight. The fire has crept over the ridge, and he can hear the distant crackling as it runs forward. Kita's eyes trail down to a figure by the bank on the opposite end of the river and recognizes you. His chest constricts with relief and concern at the sight. He tells granny to walk down to the next door neighbor, to see if she can evacuate with them. He has to lower his head to her ear so he can be heard over the sounds of the sirens and the voice on the intercom.

He starts jogging towards the bridge, to cross it, but you yell his name. It’s loud and fierce, a demand to stay put. It has a firmness that forces him to listen.

His feet stop, now directly across from you. He can see your face, the intensity in your glare. You’ve never looked at him this way.

“Don’t come!” you yell, voice almost lost over the commotion.

Kita is frowning, brow furrowed and mouth open in disbelief. He doesn’t have time to yell back before you continue.

“You have to go, Shin!” You shout. Kitas chest is heavy, and his shoulders are rigid. The flames are growing closer, rolling down the mountain. There’s a gust of wind and it blows the smoke towards the village. He can feel the heat of the burning forest.

Suddenly there are popping sounds, loud like fireworks squealing and shooting through the air. He doesn’t understand where they’re coming from, what they mean. They don’t stop, ringing through the valley and compounding with the blaring alarms, the warning voice on the speakers.

Kita doesn’t want to leave. When he looks at you, the despaired expression on your face and the many layers of hurt—layers he doesn’t understand, has never understood because he never asked—he knows that he can’t leave you. He has to do something, he is restless, like a child waiting for something that has no regular pattern, no rhyme or reason to be there in the first place. You, visiting him in Osaka.

But you won’t have any of it. “GO, SHIN!” you yell, voice booming—akin to a clap of thunder. The popping and splintering noises grow louder, and it strikes him that they are from the bamboo at the base of the mountain, the moisture in their chambers expanding enough to turn into deadly explosives. He sees a flock of birds lift from the forest behind you and fly east.

He tastes salt—tears, rolling down his cheeks and through his open lips. His voice is choked as he yells back in a desperate attempt for you to leave with him.

“I’m yer burden,” he reminds you, face scrunched in pain. His voice isn’t as loud as it should be, for you to hear him across the river. But he knows you can anyways, knows that you know he means don’t leave me, I’m the one you’re supposed to look after.

You smile sadly. He can’t tell if you’re crying too, but he can feel the same pain on your end. Your voice is equally too quiet to be heard when you respond, but it rings clearly in his mind.

“But I’m not yours.”

Your gaze is looking behind him, beyond him. He turns and his eyes widen, spotting granny slowly making her way down the path. His stomach churns—she didn’t catch the neighbor driving away. She’s coughing, unable to walk at the same time. With the smoke blowing over and granny’s old lungs, she can’t carry onwards alone. Kita hears himself curse and he rushes to her side, no hesitation as he lifts her frail body against his chest. Her head lands against his neck—her hair soft against his—and she coughs another long fit. He knows he has to leave. 

He takes one last glance at you, then at the fire crawling towards the now-emptied homes on your side of the river. The heat is increasing, blowing towards him with more smoke and ash. Five deer appear from the woods behind you and run across the bridge. You are staring at him, urging him to follow their example. He knows that he has to take care of granny, but he thinks this is the most pain he’s ever felt, buried deep in his chest. It’s the kind of pain that comes from hollowness, recognition that something vital is missing and yet somehow life is forcing him onwards regardless. He doesn’t know why this tension is there, when there’s a clear job for him to do, to do well. His face pinches, another round of tears welling before he blinks and turns to run down the path.

In this moment, he summons that unwavering confidence he has in himself. Not one of arrogance, but from the knowledge of what he is capable of, what he does everyday without failure. He runs east along the river, clutching his grandmother close. He tells himself this is any normal day of training, running to improve his endurance for volleyball. He is running besides Suna-san, who’s looking for a shortcut. He is running behind you, on your way to explore the enchanted section of pine in the mountain.

He is a toddler, carried along the path next to the river by his grandmother, seeing a mysterious child his age standing in the water. He asks who it is, pointing to a figure that granny can’t see. She tells him that he’ll learn one day, when the time is right.

He is sprinting down the same path, through smoke billowing over the valley erupting from a fire to his left, separated only by a river. Separated by you.

The honk of a car sounds behind him, a noise he barely catches with the sirens and the voices and the explosions pounding around him. He turns and sees the car of another neighbor, ushering him to get in. He veers to his left, letting the vehicle pull up beside him, and he yanks the door open, climbing inside with granny still against his chest. They lurch forwards as the driver steps on the gas and Kita guides granny to the seat beside him, reaching over to buckle her in. The interior blasts cool air and Kita is handed a water bottle.

“The fire department’s tellin’ people to evacuate to the next city,” the neighbor says. Kita nods numbly in response, unscrewing the bottle and helping granny take a few sips. She still coughs, but they’re smaller, less frequent.

With granny somewhat stable, Kita looks out the window to his left, facing the burning mountains. The car nears the ramp to the highway, starting up a mountain east of the fire. It gives him a clear view of homes being swallowed, Fujiwara-san’s one of the first.

Kita is breathless at the sight, reminded of everything these people will lose. He recalls what is already lost: the forest, the animals, the delicate combination of life that dwells in this valley. He thinks your mountain will be lost too, watching as the fire creeps west.

The popping sounds are dwindling, with the fire moving past the burnt bamboo sections and the car speeding away from the scene of destruction. But it is not quiet. There is a sudden clap of thunder that rumbles, long and gritty and deep. Kita watches as winds blow ferociously. Untouched trees sway while burning ones topple from the force. The sky is dark, a mix of smoke and storm clouds, though Kita isn’t sure when the storm began to form. He can see the water falling from the sky, blown at a sharp angle from the strength of the wind. It pelts over the mess of heat, releasing bouts of swirling steam into the air, to condense back into rain clouds.

As the car climbs higher up the mountain and the road, Kita watches the battle unfold before him. The power of rain as it fights the flames of red and gold eating the landscape. He watches the mist rising at the contact between elements, the water evaporating on impact.

He sees you in his room, that first time in Osaka when you were startled by a knock on the door. The way you went poof and disappeared.

They house granny in Osaka, taking over Kita's sister's room since she's at university in Tokyo. Kita is the one who looks after granny most carefully. It reminds him of caring for his brother when he first came to the city. He learns that granny’s house wasn’t caught in the fire. The river was an effective barrier and the rain came in time to manage any embers that had gotten blown over. The reports on the event stated that it was a miraculous storm, one that came from nowhere, completely unpredicted. It was an eventual downpour, enough to contain the fire within minutes and smother it completely in less than a half-hour. Footage from a helicopter shows the water rushing down the gullies and pouring into the river. With it carried embers, soot, ash, all piling together and flowing downstream. The next town down the river reported black water filled with sediment. A truck came in to deliver hundreds of cases of bottled water.

Aerial images reveal that nearly every house on the northern bank was claimed, only a few saved towards the east. He sees photos of the destruction. Your forest didn’t manage to escape in time, the fire stealing your enchanted pine. He wonders if you could have saved it if you didn’t prioritize his home.

There was one death: a backpacker, the person everyone believes is responsible for the disaster. Her body was completely charred, things almost entirely unidentifiable. Emergency services only picked out the metal of a stove—the decided perpetrator.

Kita has no time to grieve, with only a week before school starts again. After he helping granny get situated in the house, he immediately went to practice as a distraction. His teammates are appalled at the news, offering pats on the back and words of condolences, sighs of relief that he was lucky to leave in time.

But they don’t know what he lost. Not just the forest and the mountains, or the ability to visit his real home for months at the earliest. Even with the fire out there may be coals smoldering underground, or dangerous air wafting in the sky. The mountains won’t be green for at least a year, needing time for seeds to take root and sprout, needing seasons to accumulate rich dirt again. There’s no telling how long it will take for animals to return, birds to nestle back into shrubs or rodents to burrow again. The wolves and the deer are surely gone, evacuated to the next viable plot of land.

These aren’t the worst of his losses. What grasps his heart tightly, enough that sometimes he struggles to breathe, is the sight of you running into that smothering roll of flames. The loss of your eyes watching over him.

He dreams of fire, of heat and searing pain. His mind flashes with streaks of red and orange, billowing greys behind it. He hears the crackling of a burning forest and the popping of erupting bamboo. He wakes up panicked some nights, coated in sweat from the searing sensations he conjures in his sleep. In these moments he thinks it would help if he could be with you, your body always cool and damp, the sort of comfort that eases him, that could put out the fires of fear that grasp him.

A week later during practice, coach hands out jerseys. Kita is called first, given the number 1—captain. He blinks in surprise, having expected it to go to Aran. Nonetheless he takes the jersey and the title, and sits on the gym floor. He doesn’t register that he’s crying until he sees the teardrops fall onto the fabric, little spots of grey appearing where it was originally white.

He can hear Suna’s comment about the unfeeling robot showing emotion. He doesn’t care. He sniffles. There is a warmth in his heart that he hasn’t felt the past two weeks. He doesn’t understand where it comes from, why this of all things brings him comfort.

He tries to explain while walking home with Aran.

“I tend to agree with the adults…that the journey is more important than the destination.” His words remind him of granny at home, the way her hair skipped over his dad and went straight to him. The ace turns to him curiously, not sure what he’s getting at.

“I am built upon the small things I do everyday, and the end results are no more than a byproduct of that.”

He’s not good enough to go pro or make a living off volleyball. He just does what needs to be done, what fits into his routine—taking care of his body, cleaning up after himself, being courteous, and…volleyball. He holds up this jersey, looks at how it’s branded with 1, the captain’s number.

“Maybe this is just another result of the things I do.”

Aran blinks, stutters for a moment when he realizes what Kita is implying. “Don’t just—don’t sweat the small stuff! You don’t have to have some sort of logic behind your feelings!! If you’re happy, then you’re happy…that’s it!”

They hold eye contact after Aran’s outburst, and then Kita erupts into laughter. The ace watches his captain skeptically, not intending for his heartfelt advice to be amusing. His shoulders slump when he realizes this is the hardest he’s seen Kita laugh, ever.

Kita is reminded of all those times he couldn’t understand what he was feeling, why he was being drawn to do something he knew he logically didn’t want. All the moments he saw you and felt skeptical of the questions he wanted to ask, the embrace he wanted to pull you in, the warmth he felt in your presence—the way his brain and his logic denied him something he wanted, because there was no explicable reason for it. He thinks of the way you left, the way it hurt like no injury he’s ever lived through. He thinks of the lack of your gaze following him since just two weeks ago, the way he misses it but refuses to admit to it.

“You’re right,” he tells Aran.

By the time school is ending and he plays his final match, you are still not watching him. He feels the eyes of his granny and the eyes of his school on his back. The brooding eyes of Karasuno are on him when he is subbed for Aran in the second set. But yours are still missing.

He, however, has his eyes on his team the entire game, picking out their mistakes and what he knows is the misguided thinking behind them: Gin’s impatience, Atsumu and Osamu’s carelessness, Suna’s laziness. He stands behind them, the defense specialist who will receive the ball, and the one who’s eyes linger on their backs. He is watching them. He is like the lingering mist that wafts behind them, telling them that someone will see, whether they work hard until the very end, or let themselves succumb to their impulses. 

Kita has lived his entire life under your careful gaze. To cope with its absence, he has learned to become the omnipresent eyes backing up his team.

Adulthood

Granny always told him that someone was watching, and your gaze was proof. But at some point he realized that he wasn’t doing it for the spirits, that it didn’t matter either way. His work ethic would be the same even if you never saw him. This realization holds more weight when it is carried out in practice, Kita living his life with the same repetition, perseverance, and diligence in your absence. It makes him feel good, eases the emptiness. So he does it well, and he does it everyday.

He graduates at the top of his class, with grades that could get him into any university, launch him into any career he could imagine. And yet when the year passes and granny says she wants to return to the valley, Kita knows where he will go.

When he pulls into the neighborhood, his eyes are glued to the mountain. There are still trees and bamboo standing, though they are charred corpses. Debris of coals and fallen leaves litter the ground, coating the forest in brown and black. A light layer of green sits atop the earthy tones, sprigs of saplings and shrubs breaking the surface. Kita’s chest expands at the sight, a glimmer of hope.

There are only a few other neighbors who have returned, most still with family in the city. Kita speaks with some of them and gathers that they figure it’s a sign to leave the countryside—to better opportunities and a more convenient life. He wonders what will happen to this village if everyone decides to flee, who will take the land. Maybe the government will turn it into a Hyogo heritage site, a place people will flock to as a sort of pilgrimage. To see the brittle remains of homes and the earth’s attempt at recovery.

Kita knows that he wants to stay here, that granny does too. He’s not sure how it’ll work, but he can’t imagine himself anywhere else. His parents are skeptical, figuring that he’ll make an attempt only to eventually fold for a city job, but they forget that one of Kita’s life pillars is perseverance. He will find a way.

The way opens itself to him the following day. The April air is cool when he goes for a midday walk, crossing the bridge to the burned edge of the river. He trails along the slight incline towards the skeleton of Fujiwara’s home. There is only the charred foundation and a couple ragged beams standing upright, the rest collapsed into rubble. For a moment he can imagine you, running from the back door and into the front room with a bundle of grapes. He hears the distant whispers of Fujiwara’s protests as he follows slowly.

Kita walks to the once-veranda, experimentally standing on the elevated foundation. The charred wood creaks beneath him, but feels sturdy enough to hold. He carefully ambles along the collapsed room, scanning the damage. He manages to cross the house and reach the back exit, and he pauses at the sight.

The ground outside is similarly littered with earthy debris, patchy with occasional new grasses and saplings. Fujiwara’s garden is gone, no more grape trellises or rows of starches. But there is a small square, less than a tsubo, dug into the dirt. Kita knows what this sort of sunken patch means, has seen them in some of the neighbors’ backyards growing up, flooded and filled with lines of grassy crop. He steps carefully from the foundation of the house and curiously stands over the square, imagining the rice that would be planted at the end of the month.

He hears footsteps from near the house and turns to see Mayumi-san, the one who drove Kita and granny out of the valley during the fire. She looks healthy despite being in her seventies, carrying a shovel and a hoe as she makes her way over.

“Ah, Shin-chan,” she greets him. “S’been a while, good to see ya again. What’re ya doin’ out here?”

He bows slightly as he greets her and explains that he was exploring the neighborhood, since he only just returned. He asks about the rice garden.

“I was testin’ to see how it’d grow, since the ash can help sometimes,” she explains. “I came back early after the fire, n’Fujiwara said I could use his yard since he’s probably stayin’ in the city with his daughter.”

An excitement sparks in Kita’s chest, like something clicked into place. He’s not sure what it is exactly, but he presses her. “How’d it do?”

Mayumi smiles, one that looks devilish and would be frightening if he wasn’t accustomed to seeing it. “Shit’s the best yield I’ve ever had. M’gonna try to dig a few more plots, maybe sell ‘em at the city markets.”

This is his way, he realizes. He sees the shovel in her right hand and hoe in the left and speaks before he can register the words. “Y’want any help?”

The rest of April is spent preparing the land with Mayumi and pouring over books on agriculture. He soaks in his elder’s expertise on the subject, in the abstract and the field. When the end of the month rolls around and the two of them begin sowing seeds, Kita thinks that for the first time since your absence that he feels whole. He is here in the valley, between your two homes, dedicating himself to the land that you led him through as a child. He thinks he can feel your presence while working, your hands misting over his, transplanting seedlings with him. The rains that come in are well timed, bringing rushing water down the mountain to flood the few squares of crops.

The days pass with granny, some quick and others slow. She does well in the village, with other people her age, though the company is sparse. Kita can sense that it’s hard for her sometimes, but like himself she is malleable to her environment, can make do as long as she has her routines. Her lungs aren’t as strong as they used to be, but she enjoys her walks and can maintain the chores—the ones Kita lets her.

When September comes in, Kita and Mayumi spend one sunny day harvesting. Kita wields his scythe carefully, the movement unpracticed. He grasps the dry stalks and runs the blade across the taut stems, bundling them on the ground to be collected. They gather the clumps and carry them to the house next to Mayumi’s—another neighbor who hasn’t returned since evacuation. 

Mayumi prepares a sheet across the main room for them to work on. Then they thresh the harvest, grabbing the bundles and smacking them against the floor, pelts of rice springing off the stems. Kita is reminded of water, of rain splashing against the surface of the river. When all the stalks have been emptied, they spread the seeds of gold with their hands, like smoothing the creases of a futon. The day’s work is over, now waiting for the crop to dry. They exit, leaving a few of the screens open to let new waves of dry air flow through.

Kita finds these processes fulfilling, like his own daily routine. It’s another series of tasks that can be learned and done well. The result is his own sustenance, something he can live off of and share with others. It tastes better, he thinks, once he’s experienced the entire journey.

He tells his old teammates that he’ll be in Osaka next month for the markets. They only have a few dozen bags to sell, but he wants to get his friends’ opinions.

The markets are energetic and amiable. Kita shares with curious shoppers the story of the valley, how the burned houses and their backyards left ash that the rice took to. People find the narrative compelling, and they buy the rice despite the hefty price tag. Other vendors are interested, some make purchases to try in their food. Kita enjoys the atmosphere, the way these people and their businesses are connected. He and Mayumi manage to sell all the rice they brought. It’s hardly a profit, but it’s promising.

The next day Kita is in the Miya’s home with the additional company of Suna and Gin. They talk about life, preparation for nationals, what they’re thinking of doing when school ends. Atsumu is going pro, taking volleyball as far as he can. Osamu is ending it here, contemplating career options. He says he’s looking for restaurant jobs; he wants to be a chef.

“Yer gonna be a farmer, huh?” Atsumu asks, laying back on the couch. “It suits ya, that simple life.”

Kita nods. “Knew I needed to take care of granny, that I was gonna be in the valley anyways. One of the neighbors was growing some an’ I asked to help—wanted to see what it was like. S’gonna take time, but we’re gonna try to get the land from the neighbors, see if we can apply for subsidies ‘cause of the fire. Then we’ll try t’upscale. The market yesterday was good.”

Gin sighs, “Ever the considerate and diligent Shin-chan.”

“The rice is good,” Osamu interjects. “It’d be good for onigiri.”

It is, it turns out. After three years, Osamu decides to leave the restaurant he started working for out of highschool and open his own onigiri store. Kita is their main rice supplier, and a customer who never has to pay. They have classic flavors in the beginning: tuna mayo, pickled plum, ikura. When Kita comes with his next delivery, Osamu sits him in the dining room and has him try new options. The former captain takes his job as taste-tester seriously, his diligence appreciated by the former setter. They decide that the shrimp and beef flavors are ready to be sold, but the chicken needs reworking.

Kita gets into his truck that evening and drives home. The sun sets by the time he enters the valley, winding through roads in the black darkness. When he arrives at granny’s and exits the car, he sees that the sky is beautifully clear. The Milky Way spreads itself over the northern mountains, where life is still recovering, slowly but surely. He takes in the view for a few minutes, enjoying the quiet noise of the night—soft rushing water from the river, chirping insects, occasional wind.

He notices the blinking lights that cross the expanse of stars: planes and satellites. He sighs, remembering a time when he could sit on the top of the mountain and witness an unobscured view of the sky, taking up the entirety of his visual landscape.

Suddenly there is a shooting star, the most intense he’s ever seen. It’s a bright flash of light, he thinks for a moment white and orange and pink, that darts from the east and disappears as it curves west. Its trajectory gives the illusion that if it touched the ground, it would land on your mountain, that special enchanted forest.

After a few more minutes of watching, of relishing the awe, he makes his way inside. Granny is asleep, so he heads straight to bed.

When he wakes the next morning, for the first time in years—since that fire crawled along an entire mountain and you left to put an end to it—he feels the prickly sensation that he’s being watched.

Life doesn’t change with you watching him. Life didn’t change when you stopped. It’s something he knew, something you knew. He carries onwards, his routine of life, one that he does well and does everyday. He and Mayumi expand the fields again, creeping their business along the length of the river. Kita slowly takes on more farm responsibility, knowing enough to work independently when Mayumi needs to rest with increasing frequency. Granny is similar—she likes to help sometimes, with the easier work, but her lungs still struggle, never fully recovered.

It’s a beautiful morning, with cool air entering the house and light diffusing through the shoji. He can hear the birds and the rustling of leaves outside when he wakes, blinking away the lingering visions of orange and red from his dreamscape. He opens the screen towards the river while he puts away his futon and prepares for the day.

Granny isn’t in the main room as per usual. Kita pays it no mind, assuming she’ll be in soon. He makes breakfast and waits for her. She doesn’t come in on time. Kita stands to search, thinking she may have missed the time.

He enters her room and sees she’s still sleeping. He crouches over her to gently rock her awake, but there is no response. At that moment he realizes she is not breathing, not making a sound. He freezes, feels his heart plummet. He carefully lifts her hand from under the blankets—still warm—and checks to see if there’s a pulse. It’s quiet, flat.

He moves slowly, processing, sitting back on his heels next to her. His throat is tight and his chest—it’s hard to breathe. He shakily inhales through his nose and holds her hand in both of his. There’s a stinging behind his eyes and suddenly he is crying, weeping openly as he holds onto her. Death is the logical consequence of living, one of the only certainties of life; knowing this does not make Kita’s loss any less painful. While the hurt sits heavily in his chest, there is a growing spark of gratitude for her, that they were able to spend the beginning of his life and the end of her’s together.

Granny’s passing brings her closer to Kita, in a way. He feels that there are now two pairs of eyes on him, watching over him. When he looks in the mirror and sees his grey hair, granny’s hair, he thinks that he will always be a piece of her living on, that it’s his duty to live earnestly for her. He makes a shrine for her in one of the rooms of the house, placing her urn in the center. It is a beautiful grey clay, narrow and unglazed. A black thread ties the lid to the body.

She becomes another part of his routine, sitting before her remains and her images with his hands clasped and eyes closed.

Life goes on.

A month later he is in the field, tending to his crop. It’s late in the day, when the sun is near setting. The pink of the sky reflects onto the flooded beds, interrupted by sprigs of green. He inhales, appreciating the scenery, before exhaling and continuing his work. When he looks up a moment later, he is frozen by the sight.

There’s a wolf, large and grey, like the first one he saw as a child in the pine forest. He is not afraid, but in awe. A wolf returning means there’s prey: rabbits and deer. It means the forest is recovering, that creatures are finding their way back. He takes in the strong figure of the predator in front of him, sturdy and confident. A movement flashes in his peripheral, three pups catching up. Shin notices that one is nearly white, standing out from the others. He thinks of himself in Osaka, with his relatives.

When the pups catch up, the mother turns away and carries on.

Kita finishes his work before the sun fully sets. A light rain begins, clouds absorbing the vivid hues of sunfall, and he hurries to collect his tools before crossing the bridge home. The drizzling turns into solid pelting by the time he makes it to the empty house. He turns back briefly, squinting through the water collecting in his eyelashes, to see how long the downpour will last.

There’s a figure, at the other side, and his eyes widen in shock. He drops his tools and takes a few hurried steps closer, searching for confirmation.

Through the rain he can see you, standing at the other bank. You are smiling, he can tell, with your shoulders pulled upwards as if embarrassed. He thinks he is dreaming, that this is impossible. You, in flesh and bones, standing in front of the remnants of Fujiwara’s once home. He does not realize that he is smiling back, eyes crinkling and collecting water—his own tears as they spill—and grin spanning impossibly wide. His chest feels like it’s lifting, floating him in the air, to you on the other side.

Suddenly you are running forwards, not towards the bridge, but down the bank, to cross the water. Kita’s face flashes with concern and he starts down his own side, slipping through the mud. By the time he reaches the shore you have swum halfway across, long confident strokes despite the speed of the current. Kita marches forward, water touching his waist when he finally reaches you. He grabs your outstretched hand and tugs you into him, engulfing you in his chest and arms. You are as cold as the water surrounding him, but his body explodes with warmth at the contact, at finally being with you.

His heart races as he clutches you close, in an iron grip that refuses to relent. He thinks he hears you laugh against him, and he chokes out some strangled mixture of a laugh and sob. The water makes it hard for him to stand steady, so he brings one arm beneath you to lift you from the sediment and carry you to the bank. There he sets you down and grabs your waist firmly, staring at you with disbelief. You are smiling with all the glee in the world, eyes nearly closed by the force of it.

“I made it, Shin-chan.”

He doesn’t know what that means, but he thinks of the shooting star and the wolf, the rice fields filling easily without additional irrigation.

You lean forwards and wrap your arms over his shoulders, clutching him close. His arms come around your waist and he thinks he can recognize his feelings: relief and homecoming. There is a fullness, one that is close to painful, a pain he had been living with for years in your absence. He pulls you up the bank, to bring you into the house. He leaves his tools out, to be dealt with tomorrow, and goes straight for the genkan. 

You try to protest when he passes the spigot, “Shin, the mud—”

But he doesn’t care, kicking off his boots to be cleaned later. The mixture of river water and mud splatter on the tile of the genkan, leaving brown puddles and smears. Kita removes his socks and drops them behind him, letting his clean feet be the barrier between himself and the floor. He carries you to the bathroom, to deal with the mess together.

At night you are in his room, watching him set up the futon. He looks at you to ask, “D’ya need one?”

You shake your head, smiling. “Let’s share.”

His heart pounds loudly in his ears. He nods quickly and pushes the blanket aside for the two of you. He clutches you close under the soft comforter, your head slotting snugly in the space of his neck. It sends a shiver down his spine, the chilliness, but it coats him in warmth. He can feel his heart still racing, never fully calmed since seeing you. He feels those questions and thoughts bubbling up, words he always found unnecessary to say. Something about this moment lets him release them, lets him be curious about you.

“Didn’t know if I’d ever see ya again,” he says quietly, into your hair.

You nestle your head further into his neck. He can feel your lips against his throat as you speak. “It took a lot from me, the fire. Always need time to recover.”

His hand comes up to cradle your head, smoothing through your hair.  The image of the rainstorm flashes before him, the way the clouds swarmed from a previously blue sky to pour everything it had—everything you had—to put out the fire. He remembers the awe he felt, the sublimity of the view from a car fleeing the scene.

He doesn’t dream that night, his mind like an empty gulley, letting the soothing rainwater rush through him.

He cleans up after himself in the morning, retrieving his tools and mopping the genkan. It takes a while, though, interrupting his work several times to check that you are still in his room. You haven’t risen by the time he finishes making breakfast. A panic sits in his chest as he enters to wake you. You are still asleep, and he relaxes when he sees the steady rise and fall of your chest beneath the covers.

He sits on his knees beside you and gives your body a gentle rock. Your eyes peel open after a moment of stirring, and you are already smiling. Kita thinks it brightens the room more than the sun streaming in, that life is breathed into him from you.

You notice the granny’s shrine at breakfast. After assisting with cleanup, you ask if the small urn is all the ashes he has of her. He shakes his head and shows you the drawer in the display, where a box lays with the majority of her cremated remains.

“I wasn’ sure where t’put her,” he tells you.

You have an idea.

Only a few minutes later the two of you are exiting through the genkan, dressed for a day in the woods. Kita has a backpack on, the box from the shrine tucked safely inside. He lets you take the lead, turning left down the path and towards the western mountain. He is reminded of his sixth birthday, running to the end of the dirt road for the first time, panting to keep up with you. This time you are calmly walking hand in hand, in no hurry. Kita squeezes yours tightly, a necessary action to express the feeling in his heart.

You smile at him, and bring his hand to your mouth, kissing the back of it. Kita inhales in surprise and you watch his ears turn red, giggling at the sight.

When you two reach the end of the road, the rock face is still standing sturdy. He can see burned trees standing at the base, your mountain not untouched by the disaster. However, like the other forests, it is recovering, hope sprouting in the form of ferns and saplings. He sees a rabbit scurry away and a soft smile crosses his face.

You head first down the bank and into the water as usual, him following with his hand in yours. The cool water creeps up, only up to his knees now that he is grown. The water is easier to navigate in his adult body, and he effortlessly steps up the rocks to the forest floor, ones he used to scramble over on his hands and feet. The ground crunches beneath him. There is a patchy layer of pine needles—short ones—spreading along. The ground is not fluffy from decades of accumulation, but it’s a start. Small saplings bring bursts of fresh green, prickly when he brushes against them. The ferns hide beneath them, avoiding the scorching sun.

History repeats itself as you pull him forwards, along the river and through the early rebirth of the enchanted pine forest. The fallen tree that once served as a bridge is miraculously intact, though the top is scorched and he feels unsteady walking to the other side.

Wandering through the forest is another type of home. He hadn’t taken it upon himself to explore since returning, not wanting to disrupt the delicate healing of the ecosystem. He trusts you, though, and the path you’ll lead him to experience the land without damaging it further.

He notices that you are taking him to a section that he hasn’t been often, not a regular spot during your times together as kids. But it makes sense when you arrive at the small clearing and he sees the massive pine from his memory. It is thick with twisting branches, sturdy. Some of them are blackened from the fire, but others are coated in fresh needles, long and green, waving gently in the wind. He is surprised he hasn’t seen this miracle before, from the house. Maybe the distance obscured the view.

Kita walks slowly to the base of the tree and looks up towards its canopy. He can see the contrast of the charred and ashy sections of trunk against the rich brown of its healthy, resilient branches. The green shines brightly against the black and grey, proud of its revival.

He shrugs his backpack from his shoulders, understanding that this is where granny should be. He lowers to his knees before he unzips the bag and carefully removes the box. It’s a light wood, with tan streaks running along the grain. Pine, he thinks to himself in disbelief.

He slowly unlatches the box and sets it on the bed of brown needles near the trunk. There’s a plastic bag inside, tied with a simple overhand knot. He undoes it gently, slowly unfurling it to roll open and over the edge of the box. It’s the first time he’s looking at her remains, he realizes, and he notices that they are grey, grey ash with clumps of small black coals.

You watch as he moves slowly, cupping soft remains in his calloused hands.

“It’s like your hair,” you say.

He cries, letting out soft, ragged breaths between quick inhales. His weeping lasts the entirety of the time it takes him to spread the ashes at the base of the tree, where it meets the ground. When he finishes you crouch behind him and wrap your arms around his torso. He continues to cry. You feel it, his chest heaving with grief and mourn, love and gratitude. He brings his palms to his eyes to wipe the tears, but they continue to fall, splatter the earth beneath him with feeling.

You listen quietly as his sobs fill the space between rustling leaves and distant cooing birds. Eventually you take one hand from his torso to rub his back slowly, soothingly. 

His noises eventually lull, quieting to the occasional sniffle. He gently pushes the bag into the pine box and then slowly closes the lid and does the clasp. He returns it to the backpack with careful, practiced motions. Your arms release him when you sense he wants to stand. He turns around to face you, you and the valley below.

He watches you closely, runs his eyes over your face, eyes and nose and lips. He wants to memorize your soft smile, the way it warms him like the sun.

You bring your hands to his cheeks, their coolness refreshing after crying so heavily. He leans into your touch and closes his eyes, soaking in the contradicting ways you make him feel—this tug between heat and cold. He feels you press a kiss on his temple, then the other. They’re smeared with the grey ash and black coals, transferring the dust onto your lips. He sighs, in peace, and brings his hands to cover yours. 

When he opens his eyes once more, he looks behind you through the space between the trees, to the valley below him, spanning wide. He is reminded of the thousands of years it took these mountains to form, the thousands of years it took for the forest to grow on top of it. He knows that the fire he witnessed was not the first to rage across the land, and it certainly won’t be the last. He takes in the growth and change that has developed in the past few years, sparkles of hope in a collapse of despair. He recognizes that the destruction is an opportunity for something new, for him to be part of building the next beautiful forest that will rise.

He has lived for what feels like forever, and yet an entire life lays ahead of him. A life with the forest and the mountains and the river. A life with granny’s spirit watching over him, her hair and remains guiding him forwards. A life of working the land and growing something for himself, for others.

A life of unnecessary questions, ones he struggles to ask. A life of inexplicable feelings, ones he’s learning to let in.

A life with you. Here.

i know i said minor character death and then killed granny,, she's a minor character in haikyuu!! but she is a main character in my heart

anyways here's the afterword

[ellieslob]

★ streamer ellie!

ways to help palestine!!!

S★ she started with fornite and minecraft gameplays but went viral for playing girly video games and screaming with pure rage and desperation if she loses or if her chat tells her the outfit she made was ugly asf😭

S★ she deadass will say “u guys clearly don’t know about fashion like i do” n then pull outfits like this:

S★ she used to be so fucking afraid that her face reveal went like dream’s that she posponed that shit for like a year. when she finally did it she ended the stream, turned off her phone and went to bed covering her body completely, while sniffing and crying “my career is over ”

S★ after her face revealed her account went even more viral, people started to make thirst traps of her and edits, videos, even fanfics, she got a little more comfortable with showing her face. her favorite edits were to songs like ride, baby by me, hey daddy (daddy’s home) and a song in spanish called vaquero, they were just so funny to her😭

iloveellie: she’s daddying so hard‼️

ewisinthechat: aw you guys really see me as a father figure?😺🫶

brondon444: 😭

kvcjjsaj: 😭

loverboydsa: 😭😭😭

“hey why is everyone crying in the chat, is everyone okay?”

S★ she really loves the cat emojis, specially this one 😻

S★ out of all her platforms (aside from twitch) she uses twitter the most, she tweets without a second thought in that head, without filter, like zero hesitation and then apologizes if she said something way too controversial.

ewisinthechat2: have you had that feeling when someone is so stupid you want to stab your eye with a fork? #kys

ewisinthechat2: k, i guess u have not😅…

S★ she was practically new to tiktok, so the first moths she had her likes public, she didn’t even know that was possible on the app. but if you click on it all you could see were shit post and memes that a dad would like, all except for a big section of aprox thirteen videos, one after the other, all with the same girl.

sckerforellie18: did u guys saw ellie’s likes? i think she’s stalking that poor girl😭

slaybabesew: HAHAH WAIT IS REAL, IS SHE HER GILFRIEND???

elliesaheymamasg: she’s so hot wait😩

heyemogirlbb: it’s her @girlypop66

S★ the chat started to tag you to every single one of her videos on tiktok, her photos on instagram, tagging you on things like “hi, could you please date my mom?🤗” or “my new mommie😻” EVEN in her questionable tweets telling you “we know she’s crazy but give her a chance😭”

S★ one day you waked up to your phone being practically broken from all the notifications, you still had your little pink iphone 6 and you had to buy another one because of it.

Instagram

girlypop: hi um i don’t think we really know each other but people are tagging me on your videos😭 love them though

S★ ellie was in a stream, the chat had to make her laugh and spit the water so she was reacting to videos that her chat had send her. when that notification appear on the screen, she read it, gulped the water, looked dead ass serious at the camera and turned off the stream.

elliewilliasm: omg hi, im so sorry i didn’t know, I’ll tell them to spot

elliewilliasm: spot*

elliewilliasm: STOP**😭

you laughed in your new phone, she was funny, and for what you had seen in all the posts that you were tagged on, very pretty too.

girlypop: hey would you like to grab coffee sometime?

ewisinthechat: TO EVERYBODY IN THE CHAT, THANK YOU, YOU GUYS ARE THE FUCKIN BEST, LOVE YALL, IM SO LUCKY TO HAVE YOU, XOXO😻😻😻😻

GIVEAWAY COMIN FUCKIN SOON💯💯‼️

S★ she was exhausted when she jumped to her bed, after all the crying, screaming, jumping and the extreme tweeting that just said “YESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYES”, she unlocked her phone again.

elliewiliasm: yeah sure :)

REBLOG AND COMENT

IF YOU WANT TO BE IN THE TAG LIST

[maplesyrupsainz]

˖⁺｡˚⋆˙days like these | DR3˖⁺｡˚⋆˙

pairing: daniel ricciardo x y/n reader (she/her)

genre: social media au, established relationship

warnings: random fluffy shite

summary: in which you're so active on social media and your fans eat it up

a/n: kind of the daniel version of This Fic i made from a lando request !!!

fc: various brunette girls from pinterest

my masterlist

twitter ->

instagram ->

yourusername

liked by danielricciardo, maxverstappen1, and 332,782 others

yourusername your favs

tagged: danielricciardo

view all 3,193 comments

maxverstappen1 neither of you are my favourites

yourusername you stink + no one asked + ratio + my bf is hotter than urs

maxverstappen1 what are you saying to me right now

yourusername you heard me

danielricciardo hahahahah

maxverstappen1 daniel tell your girlfriend to leave me alone please

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user3 y/n is the funniest & best wag tbh she's literally right she is our fav

user4 im in love with u

danielricciardo wow you are gorgeous and amazing

yourusername i know right

user5 i love them so bad

twitter ->

instagram ->

danielricciardo

liked by maxverstappen1, landonorris, and 881,034 others

danielricciardo girl is always eating

tagged: yourusername

view all 12,729 comments

yourusername what is wrong with you

danielricciardo huh??

yourusername WHY WOULD YOU POST THESE UGLY ASS PICS OF ME

danielricciardo wtf you literally look hot as hell

maxverstappen1 😂😂😂

yourusername i know you aint laughing at me sloth verstappen

maxverstappen1 🤐🤐🤐

user9 how can someone still look this hot whilst eating

user10 omg i love her

user11 now this is why she's everyone's fav wag

user12 reason 10292 more like

francisca.cgomes how did you bag such a hottie

danielricciardo ask myself this everyday

yourusername OMG KIKA im blushing

danielricciardo wow she doesnt care when i compliment her

francisca.cgomes what can i say 🤷‍♀️

twitter ->

instagram ->

yourusername

liked by pierregasly, danielricciardo, and 289,061 others

yourusername beach day with my gf

tagged: francisca.cgomes

view all 6,293 comments

pierregasly ???

yourusername and what do u want

pierregasly my girlfriend back?

yourusername not right now, sorry

francisca.cgomes the girls are fighting over mee

user16 I LOVE THEMMM OMG

user17 wag besties 🥹

francisca.cgomes i love u

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danielricciardo so this is why u didnt text me back today

yourusername I DROPPED MY PHONE IN THE SEA OK

maxverstappen1 😂😂😂

yourusername next time i see u it's on site

maxverstappen1 😰

user18 hahaha max never says a word and still gets roasted

maxverstappen1

liked by landonorris, kellypiquet, and 917,892 others

maxverstappen1 Cool 😎

view all 11,013 comments

user19 IS THAT DANIEL & Y/N IN THE LAST SLIDE

user20 LOL more comments about y/n than max himself

kellypiquet ❤️❤️

liked by maxverstappen1

user29 Y/N Y/N Y/N Y/N ‼️

yourusername obsessed with my man much

maxverstappen1 i'll block you

yourusername booooooo max verstappen booooooooo tomatoes tomatoes

danielricciardo be nice y/n

yourusername no

maxverstappen1 what is wrong with her

user30 i cant tell if y/n actually has real beef with max or not 😭😭

user31 surely not hahah she's literally in his photo dump

twitter ->

instagram ->

danielricciardo

liked by yourusername, francisca.cgomes, and 771,829 others

danielricciardo my woman

tagged: yourusername

view all 8,183 comments

user35 bet he's sucking up to her

user36 awww the flower in the plastic cup

user37 the bows on the uggs she's just a girl fr

yourusername i havent forgotten what you said daniel

danielricciardo im sorry for calling you unemployed even though you are

yourusername right.

maxverstappen1 a taste of your own medicine for once

*comment deleted by maxverstappen1*

yourusername i saw that maxverstappen1

maxverstappen1 saw what

user37 boooo we want y/n & daniel fluff

danielricciardo she wont love me anymore

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yourusername 🤔

danielricciardo give the people what they want

yourusername fine i forgive u. and i love u

danielricciardo ! i love you so much

user40 and the crowd goes wild!!!

THE END ❤️

[cindyss]

• — MY SHORTS DONT HAVE LACES — •

PAIRING(S): theodore nott x fem. reader !!

WARNING(S): smut

SUMMARY: Hermoine is aware of y/n’s feelings toward theo, therefore when she gets the chance, hermoine makes it her job to get them close to eachother

A/N: i hope you enjoy this and check my most recent post with tom riddle please show it some support 😭🙏 (this is edited)

——————————————————

You and Hermione were in your shared dorm, getting ready together for the pool party thrown.

You put your matching black swimsuits on and put your hair up so that it doesnt get wet from the water.

“Hermoineeeee” you sigh. “Is- is uhh is, is theo gonna be there?” You ask hesitantly.

Hermoine had always been aware of your feelings toward theo and she made no effort to stop teasing you about it.

“Ugh, y/n, yes he is” she spoke as she rolled her eyes.

“Do i look good, should i tie my hair or keep it in a claw-clip like this? Omg idk what to do i feel so ugly. Should i change this swimsuit?” you complain

“Y/l/n, one more word i swear. You look gorgeous, ur perfect. How many times do i need to tell you that?” She said.

You jump into her arms before she could finish, “god hermoine i love you” you say.

“Yeah i know bla bla bla bla, now we have a party to get to and boys to impress” she winked before dragging you out of the room.

You get to the party and ur eyes immediately begin scanning the room, in search of theo. In no time you spot him, sat in the hot tub with cormac, harry, ron, ginny, and luna.

Hermoine notices your intentions and grabs your hand leading you to the hot tub, “hermoine, no, im not ready yet!!” you sigh.

“too bad” she says before jumping in the hot tub. “shoot, y/n, there’s no more place for you, but im sure theo would be more than pleasured to keep you on his lap” she giggled.

You and theo didn’t hate eachother, you weren’t friends either. However, there was always tension between the two of you, even Neville could catch it.

He patted on his lap, gesturing for you to come over “c’mere” he said. You drag ur feet in the water and adjust ur sitting on his lap.

Looks and smiles exchange between everyone in the tub and you begin to feel the tension form. Cormac, next to you, starts talking about his previous experience with the ladies and other stuff.

And while ur listening, trying to act interested in whatever he’s talking about, you feel something poke from under you.

You also feel theo’s hands wrap around ur waist from under water which makes you let out a loud gasp, loud enough for the people in the hot tub to hear at least.

Everyones heads turn around to you, “sorry guys, thought i saw a bug” you laugh it off and all ur friends go back to their conversations.

The poking from under you only got more annoying, so you turn ur head, “theo, the laces of ur swimsuit are poking me, can u do something about it?” You speak.

“Cara mia, my shorts don’t have laces” he whispers to you, you could feel his breath on ur ear. “Fuck theo” you say.

He looks at you and then says something again “i say we get out of here darling before i can’t control myself anymore”.

You immediately jump up, and theo follows you. “If you’ll excuse us, we have some business to manage” he jokes pointing at the both of you.

“Get out of here man” Ron laughs.

“God please no” this, from Luna.

“Off you go” hermoine says smiling.

Theo then grabs your hand, two towels, and starts leading you back to his dorm. On ur way there, he wraps one of the towels around you, making sure you’re not cold.

When you get there, the Slytherin boy wastes no time locking the door and smashing his lips onto yours, immediately also allowing his tongue to slip in.

The kiss was not sweet, it was slow yet passionate and hungry. The boy was practically eating your face off while he has you pinned on the wall.

In a sudden movement, theo slips his hands under your thighs and carries you up into his arms. He carries you to his bed, the kiss ongoing, and makes you lay there.

He wastes no time unclasping your bikini and sucking on your tits. Your fingers meet his hair and you start tugging at it as he sucks on your nipples.

He leaves kisses on your boobs and cups them while he moves back up to your lips, also removing your underwear. They meet again and this time the kiss is faster, deeper, and hungrier.

“I- i.. fuck” he says in between kisses.

“Mhm?” you wonder.

“My friend down there, fucking hell, he needs attention.” the boy explains.

You laugh and start working your way, trying to remove his shorts. He turns over making sure to provide you with enough space to take control.

You make your way down, leaving kisses down his ab lines. You slowly lower his shorts and begin trailing his v line with your fingers.

You then remove his shorts completely and for a second, you are taken back by his large size.

His wet, throbbing cock was now inches away from your face. You begin by licking his tip, slowly and carefully before taking him in all in one go.

To that, he gasps, his hands then move to your head guiding you, he grabs onto your hair and leads you.

He even makes you gag a few times when he hits your throat, which you pinch his thigh for that.

You speed up your movements as you wanted to be the one to make him cum first, and you wanted to be the one that makes it happen faster.

“Cara mia” he spoke. “Im gonna.. soon. Im gonna.. fuck”.

You mumble a quick mhm as you speed your movements.

“Fuck you’re so good at this”. he praised

You smiled to yourself before he finally came on your mouth, he squeezed your hair as he released.

You move back up to him and stick your tongue out to show him you swallowed it. You then start kissing him again, slipping your tongue inside, his hands wrapping around your waist.

“You know ur actually gorgeous, youre so perfect. A goddess i swear” he said as you were sat on his lap, staring deep into his eyes.

“Tell me something in italian” you ask.

“Hmm? Something like what ehh?” he smirks.

“Anything” you smile.

“Well.. ti scoperò finché non potrai più camminare.” he said in a whisper.

“And that means?” you wonder.

“I’ll fuck you till you cant walk” he spills.

“Oh is that so?” you giggle.

he nods and then you give him the look of affirmation before he slams into you, which makes you let out a gasp before adjusting yourself to his size.

You then start working ur hips in sync with his, riding him while his hands roam ur body, touching every bit of skin he could get his hands on.

“Fff.. fuckkk, you look too good like this” he praised. “dannatamente perfetto”. (fucking perfect)

you smile and in a sudden movement, he flips you over so hes in control, he starts speeding and you grab onto the sheets for dear life.

He leans in and kisses you, you moan into his mouth and his swollen tip hits your spot, the one that sends you to the moon and back.

“FUCKING HELL!!” you scream, “THEODORE IM GONNA CUM”. He speeds up his movements and guides you as you release.

“è stato fantastico, bellissimo” (that felt amazing, beautiful) he spoke slumping on the bed next to you.

“You really gotta start teaching me italian so i can understand what ur saying” you chuckle.

“Oh yeah? What if i dont want you to understand what im saying” he teased.

“Uhh oh, we might have a problem then” you both laugh as he hugs u tightly, kissing ur temple.

[divinesolas]

Worth it

Summary: your little sister has a big crush on cregan stark, you attempt to help her score him but his eyes seem to be stuck somewhere else.

c.w: reader is older than cregan, reader is 24, cregan, jace and readers sister are 21, tension, fingering (fem), sister is referred to as kit, cregan is taller (not specified how much) not proofread

w.c: 2k

a.n: was asked if i could do modern cregan and im like OFC !! once i open up my requests again i will definitely add cregan to my list !!

You just watch as your sister paces around your room with a bored face.

“kit-”

“What am i gonna wear? omg my nails look so bad i knew i should have gotten my nails done yesterday fuck!”

Your sister had gotten an invite to a party tonight but it wasn’t just any party. It was cregan starks party. your sister has had a big crush on cregan since the beginning of this school year. You have seen him around before, living in a college town leads to you seeing most of the college students around. You hated to say it but he was hot.

But you can’t tell that to her, when she showed you his picture you acted like you thought he was ugly to make her happy, knowing she would have lost it if you told her you thought he was hot. He was just your type, a bigger guy that clearly worked out, he was kind from what you had heard about him. But none of that mattered what you did know is your sister was completely delusionally in love with him and wanted to sleep with him tonight.

“Kit it’ll be fine, you’re cute, if he doesn’t like you then he can go fuck him.”

“ugh but i want him to fuck me!” she flops face first onto your bed with a groan and you just roll your eyes. “You’re acting like this over a guy….” “I know i know but you must get it, wanting a guy so badly.” You stop and think to yourself. You’ve been with a couple guys in the past but when you try to think about anyone the only guy that pops up in your head is cregan. No. It must be because your sister was just talking about him.

“I guess? but i promise you will never catch me rolling around like a baby and whining over one.” She lifts her head and pouts at you, “I am not.” “I didn’t even say it was you but if the shoe fits.” She stands mumbling to herself about how much she hates you but you just laugh and fall back.

“Well what are you gonna wear tonight?” “What are you talking about?” “They said i can only come if you come with me.” You sit up and look at her confused, “What?” “That's what Jace said, oh and he asked if we can pick up some booze.” That must be it, but you have no clue why you have to come. and how close was she to these people they know who you are?

“im not a college student kit it would be fucking weird if i showed up.” “Y/n please i really wanna go,” she pouts and you and laces her hands together to beg you. You can’t say no to your sister. Your face must admit defeat because all attempts of arguing with you sister go down the drain as she throws and dress at you and demands you get changed so she can go see if she can try to chat with cregan. Fuck it, you’ll stay for like twenty minutes or atleast until you see cregan and your sister chatting then you’ll leave.

You feel awkward as soon as you walk in, especially since your sister runs away from you basically as soon as you step through the door because she spotted some of her friends. You grip the boxes of beer you have tightly in your hand as you try to glance around to find a kitchen. You walk around a bit and manage to find it, letting out a sigh of relief as you place down the boxes.

“Thanks gorgeous.” You jump and turn around being faced with the man himself. “Cregan.” He had a wide grin on his face, “My reputation proceeds me.” You open and close your mouth trying to come up with something to say. God he was hot. fuck you can think like that. Your eyes drift down and you can see a little bit of his chest due to his unbuttoned shirt and hear him laugh and look back up and you see him just watching you. You take a major step back as you flush.

”I'm sorry-” “Don’t apologize i like you looking at me.” He moves closer to you and you move back until you hit the table and he’s standing right in front of you. “You’re beautiful.” “Thank you..” You look away from him and from where you are you can see you sister chatting with her friends. Your eyes widen and you push his chest making him stumble back from you out of view.

“I can’t talk to you.” He raises one of his eyebrows, the look on his face never dropping. “And why can’t i?” you shake your head trying to move around him so you can leave, “I'm not a student.” “I know.” He keeps on standing in front of you, “ Your kits sister, wanted you here.” You tilt your head, What?

“Huh?” He steps closer and you can feel his breath on your face, “I like you. Wanted you here tonight so i can finally get the chance to talk to you.”

what?

“I can’t.” You can’t do this to your sister could you? She seemingly really likes this guy. No matter how hot you think he is. “Why not?” “My sister likes you.” You blurt out. He doesn’t seem shocked by your reply. as if he already knew this info already. he just looks up to the living room with a shrug, “Doesn’t seem like she likes me much.” You turn your head and see her sitting on some guys lap making out with him. You’re gonna fucking kill her. She was so determined early what happened to that?

“oh..” “come with me.” he offers you his hand, no pressure for you to take it. You shake your head, “im older than you..” “And? that's even better.” you raise your eyebrows at him, finally feeling relaxed for the first time since you stepped through the door. “You into older women?” He shrugs with a smirk on his face, “could be, never been with one. never been with anyone like you.” you flush but try to keep up your attitude. “You couldn’t handle me.”

He leans down and whispers in your ear, “I would love to try,” He presses a kiss on your ear before pulling back and once again offering you his hand. “You don’t have to say yes.” With one more glance at your sister who seems to be eagerly shoving her tongue down that poor guys throat you grab his hand. “fine, but you better make this worth it.” “Believe me, i will.”

You don’t make another sound as he’s leading you up the stairs. you try to keep your face hidden in case you sister just so happened to look in your direction. you don’t look up until you enter a bedroom, standing in the middle of it. You hear a click behind you and you turn around. He grips your face and pulls you into a kiss.

You can feel his facial hair scratching against your skin in a delicious burn. He’s a good kisser, a really good kisser, but you won’t tell him that, it seems like his ego is already high enough. you two walk back until your falling back onto the bed. You watch as he rips the buttons off his shirt and throws it aimlessly on the floor. “You couldn't just unbutton it?” he laughs, “You should take it as a complement i want you so bad.”

That certainly has you pressing your thighs together and he grins before getting on top of you and kissing you once more. One of his hands slide up to your titties and play with them over the fabric of your dress while the other slides down to your core, rubbing you over your underwear. “Fuck you're so wet, all this for me?” “yes, just for you.” He laughs, “your tune as changed from the kitchen.”

He rubs over your clit and you throw your head back, “Shut up and touch me please.” he lets out another chuckle before taking his hand off your titties and bring it to move your underwear aside, “Anything for you.” He suddenly shoves two fingers into you and your hands grip his shoulders. “Fuck you’re so tight.” You can feel him wiggle and press his fingers against your walls. “cregan…” “I know i got you.” His pace is fast enough you are not whining but slow enough to where you are left aching all over. Your dress is far too tight. you are so hot you feel like you can’t breath. you arch your back and try to pull down the zipper on your back to take it off. You hear some mumbled curses from cregan before he reaches his free hand to your back and pulling it down. You let out a sigh of relief that is quickly followed by a loud moan as he plays with your clit with his thumb.

He pulls your dress down far enough with his free hand to free your breasts and lets out some more mumbled curses, admiring you with a shine in his eyes. “You are so gorgeous.” You don't respond. not that you could in your state. He leans down and takes one of your nipples in his mouth and rubs the other one with his hand.

The stimulation is too much for you to bear, your legs begin to shake which causes cregan to lift his mouth off you and look at you, “You gonna cum?” You nod your head, your eyes closed tight. “cum, fuck i wanna feel it cum.” He does not still even as his hand becomes drenched in your juices. He stops after awhile, letting you ride out your orgasm before he slowly pulls out his fingers, bringing them to his mouth and sucking on them.

He goes down to unbutton his jeans before there's a knock on his door. “cregan!”

an annoyed look dawns his face as he glares at the door, “What the fuck do you want jace?”

“Kit’s looking for her sister. want’s to tell her shes leaving. you know where she is.” You look at him alarmed and try to sit up but he just pushes you back down. “If i see her ill let her know.” there's some talking outside the door you can’t hear, its your sister and Jace. you hear footsteps fading before a key gets inserted in the lock and his head pops in. cregan lays the blanket over you to cover you.

“Jace i though i told you to fucking cover for me.” Jace just rolls his eyes, “I've been fucking doing it you dipshit, she got worried about her sister when i tried to take her back to mine.” you finally get a good look at him and you realize he's the guy that your sister was making out with on the couch. Cregan just shakes his head and rolls his eyes, “fine fine you leaving?” Jace nods and sends you a smile before you turn your head away embarrassed. “have fun.”

The door clicks with a lock and cregan tosses the blanket off you, “sorry about that.” “did you ask jace to hook up with my sister?” “don’t say it like that he actually likes her.”

he goes back to unbuttoning his jeans, “you still wanna continue?” You nod, reaching your hands over to pull him out of his pants. “You still need to make this worth it you know.”

[megumishotgf]

fic recommendations ˖ ࣪࿐ྂ

here are some of my favourite fics currently!! yes most of them are smutty because i am a whore!! ♡

featuring: megumi, satoru, suguru, katsuki (+ a little yuuta + mikasa) credits to all these beautiful writers - pls check them out!! masterlist fic recs pt. ii pt. iii

: ̗̀➛ megumi fushiguro x reader

possessive megumi is tired of other men thirsting over you, including toji and satoru (fic: incredible... i come back to this all the time.)

first kiss with gumi leads to another first (fic: smutty but also so intimate i love it)

you ask megumi to rail you after ur ex cheats (he fucks you so good omg. part two of the fic this is the smutty part)

y/n is pregnant and craving donuts (manga spoilers, a little angsty but mostly cute fluff!!)

you worry megumi doesn't love you. he does (don't worry not angsty so cute and fluffy makes my heart swell!!)

late night call w/ gumi who is so crazy in love with you (im crying i love him)

clueless inspired stepcest with gumi (adding this with no shame it's so so good. soft dom gumi my favourite)

"pretend i'm a random girl at a bar coming onto you" (established relationship. so fucking funny and witty. thank u so much author)

finger fucking you until you squirt omfg (i'm going insane)

weed dealer megumi headcanons (smutty towards the end i love this so much)

megumi protects you from an ass then fucks you in his car (i love protective men)

ditching school to blow your nerdy skater boy gumi (school a.u omg!!)

: ̗̀➛ satoru gojo x reader

satoru finds footage of his teen years with suguru, y/n and shoko (angsty fic: this is so beautiful and could make me sob)

mating press with satoru (holy shit... he loses control of his technique cumming inside... i'm in awe)

y/n is suguru's sister and hates toru but eventually they fuck (i was hollering reading this it's so good)

satoru needs help cutting his hair. almost goes bald (this is so funny and heartwarming. a blessing from tumblr)

drunk satoru cries about your pussy being so good then comes home to fuck you good (deleted ya’ll someone PLEASE send me this fic if it is elsewhere!!)

your clingy situationship w/ satoru (he's so soft and in love...)

: ̗̀➛ suguru geto x reader

suguru lets virgin! satoru fuck his gf (fic: so good holy shit. one of my favourite fics ever. suguru is so soft for his girl)

you're fucking your best friends' father (college a.u!! suguru gets jealous and fucks the brattiness out of you. so so good)

social media au w/ your bf geto!! (so cute and funny!! there is a gojo version too!!)

suguru finds you during your 'sad girl bathtub hours' (comfort!!)

squirting shamelessly in his face (dream)

weed dealer! suguru corrupts you (dumbification kink go crazy)

: ̗̀➛ katsuki bakugo x reader

katsuki doesn't understand how attractive he is (drabble: katsuki is so fine but he only has eyes for you)

you blow katsuki while getting his car washed (taylor swift playing omg? so hot)

your kid shows you a beautiful (ugly) drawing, katuski dies laughing (so fucking funny have you seen the similar tiktok!!)

: ̗̀➛ yuuta okkotsu x reader

vampire! yuuta soothes your period cramps... (u know what this means. incredibly written)

: ̗̀➛ BONUS: mikasa ackerman x reader

drug dealer! mikasa (headcanons: a little smutty, gunplay and robbing men)

: ̗̀➛ multiple characters (drabbles)

jjk men as chubby chasers !! (toji, yuuta, gumi + satoru) (fellow chubby girlies you will go crazy for this)

jjk men + halloween costumes (toji, satoru, nanami + suguru) (so funny and accurate!!)

[hotgirlssupportlando]

one day x lando norris

pairing: lando norris x fem!reader summary of series: a series following one day of every summer from 2016 onwards in y/n’s and landos lives, exploring their friendship and love for one another. of course some angst and fights along the way in this rollercoaster of emotions. a friends to lovers, growing up together kind of thing. summary of this part: the start of y/n and landos friendship/crush. y/n is bored at the eurocup where a stranger (lando) is suggesting a betting game to make her interested in the sport (and him). wc: 1,2k notes: im too obsessed with one day atm so just had to write a story inspired by it!! it’s very modified tho, and i haven’t decided yet if it will have the same ending, don’t know if i can handle that haha! also pls ignore the charles pic, couldn't find a better atm. hmu if you have any requests for any of the years x part two here

summer of 2016

Red Bull Ring, Austria

”please y/n, you’re 16 years old, can’t you go elsewhere and entertain yourself, you’re getting a bit annoying now” y/n’s dad told her whilst he was trying to fix the broken car.

”ugh, sure i’ll go for a walk then” y/n sighed and went to go for a walk around the paddock hoping to see something more interesting than broken cars. her friends were jealous that y/n could tag along her father around europe all summer watching the eurocup formula renault 2.0, but she wasn’t very impressed. despite having a father working as a mechanic and utterly interested in motorsport she hadn’t inherited any interested in the sport what so ever. but at least she could escape england and the rain for some time so it felt like a win although she sometimes felt like dying from boredom. 

y/n walked around the paddock and decided to facetime her friend y/f/n.

”please come and save me, austria is so fucking boring and where the hell are all the cute guys i was waiting for??” y/n proclaimed. 

”omg y/n stop it, you’re always nagging about everything, you should be happy!! nothing happens here either so might as well be in another country doing the same” y/f/n said as y/n entered a tent where they served drinks and snacks. while she was ordering she noticed a curly haired boy shaking his head whilst smiling her way but she just continued her conversation with y/f/n. after enough discussion about the lack of interest y/n had for the sport and talking about y/f/n new crush y/n ended the call, sat down and opened her pepsi in front of her. it took about five milliseconds before the curly haired boy reappeared, this time in the seat in front of her. 

”hi” the boy squealed. 

”…hi?” y/n said questioning what he wanted, she weren’t exactly in the bestest of moods so to say. 

”i heard you hated the eurocup and that you think every guy is ugly here, so here i am to prove you otherwise” he said grinning. y/n chuckled at the way the boy seemed to have no time to waste in proving her wrong. 

”and how are you supposed to do that? do you have a masterplan?” y/n asked looking amused.

”glad you asked! well first of all here i am so now you’ve at least seen one cute boy around the paddock so there’s one problem solved an-” the boy was interrupted with y/n’s laugh. she couldn’t help herself from laughing but tried to gesticulate with her hand that he could continue. 

with a smile he proceeded to tell the girl about a betting game that could make her interested in watching the races. y/n was immediately down for the idea because honestly she could’ve done anything at this moment to have some fun. they had to come up with one condition each for the bet and agreed on saying them at the same time so no-one could back out. the curly haired boy betted that he would stand on the podium on today’s race and y/n betted that he wouldn’t, easy as that. now to the conditions. the boy apparently had his condition already planned out so y/n panicked trying to come up with one quickly too. she looked around her and went with the first random idea she got. 

”okay so we’ll say them on three?” y/n asked getting a nod for an answer.

”one.. two.. three” 

”you’ll buy me-” y/n started before getting interrupted.

”you’ll give me a kiss” the boy said with a cheeky smile. 

”…a pepsi. WHOA! you’re wasting no time mister” y/n laughed out after finding out the big differences in the conditions given. she was followed by a laughter from the boy too who was unsurprisingly very pleased with the bet. y/n wasn’t disappointed either, the boy was indeed quite cute for being a driver but she couldn’t let him know that. imagine the hubris he would get then, in comparison what he already had. 

the pair shook hands and locked in the bet. they decided to meet up after the race either at the podium or at his team, depending on how the race went. y/n was excited and almost felt a little butterfly in her stomach getting loose. 

”see you later then…” the boy hesitated realizing he hadn’t asked her name.

”y/n l/n, and yours was?” she asked.

”lando norris, but there’s no need to remember that, you will see the name on the top of the podium later” he chuckled walking away to his team. 

y/n could only smile and shake her head while walking away too. 

—

”and lando norris takes his fourth victory in this seasons eurocup!!” the presenter shouts excitingly. 

y/n was smiling so big her dad had to check up on her, how she immediately had watched a whole race after watching exactly zero of them up until now this summer. y/n had no time to explain to him what was going on and started to run along the paddock until she reached the podium. she was so excited and nervous that she was about to burst, it was hard to believe that she was developing some kind of a crush to this random driver. 

because she had little to none sense of direction the celebration at the podium was already done and dusted when she reached it. a bit disappointed and confused she looked around to see if she could see lando somewhere. there was surprisingly many people running around here.

”looking for someone?” a familiar voice said and y/n turned around. there he was, a happy lando holding a trophy in one hand and a bouquet of flowers in the other. she smiled and congratulated him partly for the victory and partly because he somehow got her interest in the sport for once. 

”i know it’s not nearly as good as a pepsi but you can have my flowers as a consolation prize” he said handing them to her. she took the flowers and admired them with a smile feeling her butterflies about to let loose. she collected some courage and looked up at his eyes before quickly looking at his lips and crashing onto them. the kiss took lando a bit with surprise but he was quick to answer it. with the hand not holding the trophy lando gently grabbed the back of y/n’s head, slowly deepening the kiss. the butterflies were officially out and about in y/n’s stomach. she tried so hard to hide the excitement but at the end she couldn’t resist smiling and therefore accidentally ending the kiss. slowly they pulled away from each other, leaving them both with blushing smiles on their lips. they looked at each other in silence for a moment before abruptly getting interrupted.

”lando! we’re taking pictures! come here now!” a member of his team shouted.

”well i guess i have to go then.. hope i’ll see you around” lando shyly told the girl.

”i hope so too” y/n stated not knowing the rollercoaster of joys and troubles they’d share in the future as friends and lovers. 

—

notes: feel free to give feedback and requests for future parts! x

[kenlvry]

LISTEN TO ME RN HEAT ME TF OUT STANS GANG + CRAIG DOIGN THE LIPSTICK TREND FROM TICTOK WITH READER

the lipstick trend with stan and craigs team

an, I AM LISTENLING ANON DONT WORRY. no idea what you mean by heat out though 🤨 , 17-18 and gn reader but use of her in tolkiens

kenny

he was the one who suggested it, it came across his fyp one day and he sent it to you "lets do this come over rn." "you asked, why dont you come to my house? 🤨" "why don't i cum in your mom" "HUH 😧" "im here."

you both definitely argue on what lipstick you should wear "okay but i don't even use pink lipstick" "well you should" "its light colour its not gonna appear" "well fuck 😒"

the process of kissing his face is wild, he would suggest to do his lips as the first place "KENNY HOW ARE WE GONNA DO THIS TREND IF YOU KEEP TRYING TO MAKE OUT WITH ME" "ITS NOT MY FAULT"

after like2 hours you finally get the lipstick on his face. now the tiktok was even harder he wouldn't stop laughing. you'd give up and he apologises while laughing

thank god you guys were able to finish it under 1 hour it turned out really good, at the end of the video he kissed you and you wanted to cut that part but he said keep it for like and its true the comments were all about the kiss on the last clip

kyle

okay he too wanted to ask you first but he was kinda shy and waited for you to ask and you did!! woohoo for kyle

"kyle wanna do this" "OKAY" he insists on picking your lipstick and picks the ugliest colour like what 😐

to him there was no such thing as an ugly colour buy it didn't suit your face so no way.

the process of it was calm, he at first wanted to put on the lipstick for you but you looked like a clown has mans never put on lipstick??

he watches you as you kiss him and reapply lipstick and then kiss him again, he feels like a princess fr 🤭🤭

he hasn't seen his face yet so when you record and he saw his face he laughs out loud, "LMAO WHY DO I LIKE THAT??" "WDYM"

you would tell him to take off his hat which he refuses but you looked too cute, when it posted cartman was first to comment and you can already tell what he commented "ew gay" your followers defended you two though 🤭

stan

stan blushes internally when you ask him. "sure im down" DEEP DOWN HE WANTS KIDNAP YOY AND KEEP YOU TO HIMSELF

"what lipstick do you think matches me best, pink or red?" "id say my tip colour" "WHAT 😧"

he has to hold in the very urge to puke every time you kiss him because like you look so cute omg.

he looks in the mirror and is js like "damn, i did it". HE LOVES IT SOOOO MUCH YOU CAN TELL HE'S BLUSHING ONGG ‼️

he even directs you like "do here next, okay now here" its so cute 🤭🤭

when you record and the camera pans to him, he smiles and covers his face blushing bc he can't contain it. it was such a cute video and got iver 2 mil likes. cartman definitely commented "i bet you had to change your clothes 10 times"

cartman

"cartman lets do this" "what." "wdym? cmon its cute" "y/n no offense but that is the most gayest shit i've ever seen" " NO ITS NOT UTS CUTE" "my reputation is at stake if i do that be so for real" "okay I'm asking kyle then" "lets do it."

he actually been wanting to ask you for weeks now but doesn't know how so winwin. you take your absolute time picking your lipstick and he couldn't be more done with "hurry up this doesn't even effect anything" "shut up cartman if i use the right one people will ask what lipstick it is and i get views"

picking a lipstick was already a big deal just imagine the process "ew gay not on my lips" "cartman 😐" tbh he wish he could just make out with you rn but yk how mans is

now recording is even more a hassle "JUST SMILE IS IT SO HARD TO CRACK A SMILE" "NOT WHILE IM LOOKING LIKE THIS" the most he does is wipes your lipstick off and then he just gives a 🙄 look until the end of the video

the comments are just him getting teased at clydes commenting "NAHHH CAN'T BELIEVE HE AGREED TO THIS" kyles is "i can tell that this took a long time" and then wendys is "is that cartman or a clone of him". cartman is pissed af at the comment, he told you his reputation is at stake 😒.

he actually has it saved downloaded and also is his live wallpaper sooo.

butters

butters is the one who asked you this " um y/n can we do this? 😣" while twiddling his fingers, "OKAY"

he's all giddy and smily during the process, after every kiss his blushes intensifies and by the end of it he is just.. 🔴

even though it is the most simplest video ever he has to have a tutorial, he is asking questions for everything man, how do i wipe the lipstick, what do i do, do i smile when its on me , do i laugh??

you tell him what he thinks he should he and he starts kissing you bc rn the sexual tension between you two is intense (to him atleast, he thinks thinks hand holding is already intense)

everyone comments on how cute he is and yk how tiktok is so people comment "does he whimper" "submissive who?" and hes likw WHATTTTT 🧍

clyde

when you suggested this he nodded so hard his head probably was about to fall off. "clyde you wanna do this" "DO I???" ..... "well.. do you?" "i mean yeah it's like a way of- yes i wanna do it"

he loves any lipstick you wear so he lets you pick. after every kiss he looks in the mirror and kicks his feet giggling and you just stand there 🤨

he also tries to make it a makeout session like kenny, when you kissed on his lips he holds your neck and literally makes out with like cnon we have 9 more

when you first hit record and yk how the guy has to wipe your lipstick off, nah he grabbed you by the chin and slams his lips with yours "WHY DIS YOU DO THAT??" "its called content,you wouldn't know with your 9 likes and 70 views"

well you kept the clip and everyone in the comments were talking about it "need a boyfriend like you y/n" "why can't my boyfriend be like this" clyde is obviously gloating bc he had the idea.

tolkien

most romantic man you know, is the first to ask you. "y/n can we do this?" "OKAY BOO 😝"

"hmm which lipstick do you think babe?" "i think every lipstick makes you pretty, it doesn't matter if it doesn't suit you because in my eyes you look beautiful in anything ☺️" "what if i wore kim kardashians 2013 met gala dress" "might have to rethink what i said"

he smiles while you kiss him here and there, every once a while he kisses you back, it was such a cute moment for you two😝🤞🤞

when recording he looks at you while smiling during the whole video and it blew up fast because of that

"the way he looks at her" "wishing he was like this" "you got the bag that man is inlove", it blew in seconds fr

craig

"craig lets do-" "okay" "i didnt even ask you yet" "I'll do anything if its with you" "what if i asked you to have a threesome" ".....if its makes you happy idk.."

idk about you but i think he acts like he doesn't care but inside he is so happy you asked he's been wanting to ask you this but doesn't know how to start up the convo

he doesn't care what lipstick or where you kiss him, its just the way you press your lips on him and look at it then quickly reapply to do it again because it wasn't pigmented enough.

when recorded, he doesn't just wipe he makes you turn to face him by grabbing your chin, and he doesn't let go and just looks at you with those yk siren eyes.

people are simping over him ong "damn girlie share for us" "you mean OUR boyfriend" "tryna find someone as hot as him" and you are pissed fr he laughs at you cursing out the people, like bae dw my eyes only fo you 😝🤞

tweek

"tweek, wanna do this?" "but what if I can't remove the lipstick stain" "tweek what dw i have makeup remover" "WHAT IF THAT DOESN'T WORK 🤯🤯" "TWEEK"

okay so the lipstick may turn out ugly bc of how shaky he is but ITS OKAY BC ITS TWEEK DUH, "a-are you sure you dont want to redo this?" "tweek its fine"

he insists on redoing it the 2nd try turns our worse because he's even more twitchy because of how close you are☺️☺️☺️

his face is just red because he keeps wiping it off with his hands so you can redo it and its obvious too

recording it was so funny because you can't stop laughing at the smudge lipsticks

when posted the comments were so cute but... uh questionable some were "the way the smudges are so obvious 😭😭❤️" or "wishing my future relationship will be like this 🤭" and some were just "tip colour when?? 😜"

[chrissv4mp]

- I COULD CHANGE YOUR LIFE —

chap 3 , come visit me in jail — | — ...back — | — next...

summary: the morning after you and chris bond, he just seems to fall deeper in love with you and your amazing personality. he falls so deep that when he sees a negative comment on your recent instagram post, he feels he has no choice but to do something about it.

pairing: stalker!chris × singer!reader

warnings + topics: cursing, stalking, weapons, murder, blood, obsessive behavior, breaking & entering, crying, chris is crazy, choking, drowning, etc. DO NOT READ IF YOU ARE SENSITIVE TO THESE TOPICS.

author's note: here's where it starts to get intense.....👀

author's note 2: series title mention in this one has me floating🗣🗣

word count: 6.6k

"bet i could change your life."

y/nwhosthat

liked by nicolassturniolo, oliviarodrigo and others

y/nwhosthat you're never gonna believe it

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mysteriousman no tag in the first photo i see....

-> y/nwhosthat didn't even know there were tags on this app??

-> y/nsonlylove says the girl who uses them in every single one of her posts🙁 u got them searching for answers now

hearts4chrissy i know my man's hands when i see them chris honey come home💔

latinosfory/n they are reaching omg😭

matthew.sturniolo all these rumors and im still focused on the frank ocean lyrics🤷‍♂️

-> y/nwhosthat everyone should be focused on his inspiring lyrics

-> wishingherwell MATT???

theyenvy.michael ugly ass girl tf get off this app👎

chris feels a sudden anger wash over him as he reads the most recent comment on y/n's post, and his hand wraps even tighter around his phone before he clicks on the guy's profile.

he's 20, and he's also in boston. chris scrolls down, cringing at his weird objectifying comment in his bio, "ho's are only useful in the kitchen, i stand by my statement🤷‍♂️"

fucking douchebag, chris thinks as he scrolls down on his page. he clicks on michael's recent post and is met with a mirror picture of the boy in his messy bedroom. there's posters of half-naked girls and polaroids of him and his friends on the white walls behind him.

he scrolls left, and there's a video. chris doesn't even need to watch it because when he sees the first frame, he already knows he might lose it. the first frame shows off michaels blurry foot only inches away from a small puppy on the side of the road. the brunette feels sick already. how many red flags did this guy have?

another scroll and chris finds himself looking at a blurred picture of michael and his friend hugging. only one normal photo in this entire dump. chris doesn't even want to scroll down further on his page.

as he turns off his phone and throws it to the side, his free hand clenches into a fist. chris has never felt this angry before, and just the thought of michaels comment makes him even angrier.

before getting up, he grabs his phone. he runs up the stairs, heading straight for nicks room as he barges in. he stands at the doorway and watches as his brother jumps in shock.

his hair is still messy, not having time to do it before chris came in, "chris, what the fuck!"

"oh my god, you almost gave me a heart attack. fuck you," the older boy grumbles before walking over to his bed and sitting at the edge, "what'd you need?"

nick's tone is softer now, and he pats the side of his bed in a motion for chris to come over and sit. chris does just that, taking a few deep breaths before he throws himself back against his brothers bed.

"i don't know. i wanted to ask if you've ever felt so angry that you just wanna destroy everything around you." chris sighs, propping himself up on his elbows to look at the dark-haired boy beside him.

he just laughs softly, nodding, "yeah, almost always. why, what's going on?" there's a subtle look of concern on his face, and chris frowns.

chris shrugs, eyes trailing off to look at the wall across from him, "i was... reading comments, and i saw one that infuriated me like nothing did before. and, nick, i know you've told me not to let 'em get to me, but..." he takes his lower lip between his teeth, "this time it was on a loved-ones post, and i can't control it anymore."

nick frowns, his concern rising as his eyes meet his brothers, "okay. just talk to me, i don't want you doing anything... bad this time. remember what matt and i have told you to do when you feel that way. take deep breaths, yeah?"

chris' eyes widen at his brother's first words, his chest feeling tighter as he suddenly finds it harder to breathe. his mind wanders back to that night.

"hey!" a man's voice is heard from behind chris and his brothers, and the younger boy is the first to turn. he recognizes that voice, and it only ticks him off further.

chris waves his hand, a small gesture that even makes him cringe. why was he wasting his energy on this dick? the guy doesn't wave back, only scoffing as he stomps in chris' direction.

"what's up?" there's a faux look of happiness on the brunettes face as he steps forward, now right in front of the much taller guy, "c'mon, talk that shit you were spitting all over madi's posts, you weren't scared when you posted it."

the brown-eyed man laughs, tilting his head as he squints his eyes at chris, "i'm not scared now, either. the fuck? i said she was a dumb bitch who can't even—"

chris doesn't even let him finish, his head filling with so many thoughts he couldn't even comprehend. his entire body felt hot, like he was on fire. the one thought that was screaming out to him finally pushed it's way in front, kill him.

he lands the first hit on the guys cheek, and it's not soft. he doesn't stop either, his free hand coming up to punch the man in the stomach. his motions are quick, and he doesn't give the man time to think before punching him right in the nose.

the blond stumbles back, coughing as his nose leaks red down to his lip. his head turns back up, looking right as chris before he stomps up to him and swings right at his face.

nick gasps as he watches chris fall to the ground, his lip and nose already bleeding red. matt comes up to the guy, standing between his brother and the infuriated man in front of him, "hey, hey, let's calm down, yeah? this was a misunderstanding."

"misunderstanding? no, i don't think it is. i know what i said, and i'm not gonna take it back. who even are you, you look like a fuckin' mamas boy."

matt inhales sharply, looking back up at the man before he begins to speak again, "listen, we don't want this to get any more violent than it's already become. let's just talk about it?"

the taller man laughs, wiping his bloodied nose with the back of his hand as he looks down at matt, "nah, you're little boyfriend over there can speak for himself. wait, he can't, can he? pussy ass bitch."

chris groans as he stands to his feet, nick hurrying to grab him before he does anything worse and possibly get sent to the hospital.

matt only sighs, his skin starting to crawl slightly at the man's words, "we're not doing this, sir. my brother didn't mean anything, and we're sorry, okay? let's just leave it at that."

he feels himself get pushed back, and only then does he look up at the brown-eyed boy.

"matt, let's go." nick calls from behind him, eyes moving to the beaten-up guy in front of his two brothers, "we're leaving, it's over now!" he yells to the guy, dragging chris by his shoulders in the opposite direction.

chris struggles against his older brothers grip, and when he digs his nails into nicks skin, he finally lets go. matt is pushed out of the way as chris lunges toward the man.

his hands go for his neck, squeezing tightly as they both stumble to the ground. chris' fall is shielded by the body under him, but the older man's fall isn't. chris doesn't hear the crack as they fall to the floor, his head pounding so loudly he can barely even hear his brothers screaming at him to stop.

but he doesn't, tears brimming in his eyes as he remembers the look on his best friends face as she showed him. chris never wanted madi to feel that way ever again, and he was gonna make sure she never did.

"chris, get the fuck off of him!" matt almost screams, his voice low as to not alert anybody around the area.

nick stands there in shock, the empty parking lot now feeling much bigger than it was. he felt like if he ran he would never be able to escape.

chris sobs as matt drags his weak body off the unconscious guy, holding his brother in his arms as they fall to the floor softly. matts grip is tight on his younger brothers waist as he holds him close, his eyes wide in fear as he watches blood pool around the blonds head.

"fuck. i'm sorry, matt," chris doesn't know what else to say, he doesn't even know why he's apologizing to his brother, "'m sorry, i—i didn't mean to.."

matt drowns out the sound of nick gagging behind him as he tries to reassure the brunette in his arms, shushing his softly as he looks around for any passerby who maybe saw what happened.

nick is hunched over, his back facing both of his brothers as he throws up. this wasn't the type of night he was expecting, and it sure as hell was the one he's experienced, "oh my god, chris."

"did you fucking kill him..?" nick gags again at the thought, not even being able to turn around to look at the body.

"chris." the brunette jumps at the sudden voice, his eyes snapping towards his brother as he finally comes back to reality, "were you listening? i said that—"

"yeah, yeah. i was... listening." chris smiles sweetly before jumping off the bed and going to leave, "thanks, nick. seriously."

the taller boy smiles, and chris gives him an awkward wave before closing the door and making his way down the stairs.

his fingers run across the handrail as he descends down the stairs, the smooth texture soothing him in the slightest but then being taken away as he turns the corner to the kitchen.

eating would get his mind off things. plus, he hasn't eaten since lunch yesterday, going straight to bed after he got home from y/ns house. he felt like he had the world in his hands and he didn't want anybody to ruin that, so he just slept.

sleeping always made him feel better, more energized, and somehow even happier. but when he woke up and had to face the real world, he just felt weaker, smaller. he felt like all eyes were on him and everybody around him was judging him.

as chris reaches for a cabinet, his phone buzzes in his back pocket. great, just what he needed. grabbing it, he unlocks it with his face and then swipes down for his notifications. his face lights up, and his lips curve into a smile as he sees y/ns username at the top.

he quickly taps on the text, holding the device with both hands as he leans against the corner of the counter, now too focused on his phone to even remember what he came in here to do.

chris' demeanor changes quickly at the new information that michael is y/ns ex-boyfriend. he hasn't let her go, and that was gonna be a huge obstacle in his plan.

he'd need to get rid of him, and he'd need to do it quickly. they always sooner than later, right? it's better to get the job done first than to set it aside and maybe even forget about the task.

chris also wasn't interested in seeing michaels comments on y/ns posts any longer. sure, this was the first time he's seen them, but the boy definitely wasn't gonna stop and chris never wanted to see that fucking profile picture again.

so, that's how he found himself running down the second flight of stairs and down the hallway to his room. he knew what he needed, he thought about this entire thing before he'd even met michael. he was planning on using this for jamie, but then he wouldn't be able to hear your beautiful voice for way longer.

michael was the perfect victim as well. he wasn't well known, and he sure as hell wasn't a likable person, so who would miss him or even notice his sudden disappearance? fuck, even chris wouldn't and he was gonna be the one doing the job.

the door to his room swung open, and chris immediately headed for his walk-in closet, shutting the door as to make sure no one would see him. he couldn't have his brothers knowing, they'd probably put him in a mental institution this time.

chris turned around, back facing the door as he moved his shirts, spreading them apart to reveal the small shelf behind the clothing articles. there was another black box, but this time it was wooden and a little bigger than the one he kept for y/n.

he wasn't careful when opening the box, throwing the lid behind him and hearing the small thud as it landed on the carpet. he reached into the box, pulling out a safety pin to unlock the doors. the last thing he pulled out was a lengthy knife, the handle fitting perfectly in his grip.

chris didn't know anything about actual murderers, but he definitely got a good knife to do the job. maybe he wouldn't even have to use it, he didn't really want to, either. he wanted his hands around that boys neck while he begged for chris to take mercy on him.

he wanted to see tears brimming in his eyes as the life was being squeezed out of him, slowly. chris knew that he wanted michael to have a slow death, a painful one, and suffocating was definitely up on his list.

before rearranging his closet again, chris placed the lid back on and grabbed his items. he took his backpack as well, storing the 2 small items in there along with some binders to cover them up. he was sure someone would recognize him out here, and he wasn't gonna risk anything.

he slipped on a dark grey hoodie along with a black jacket, finishing off the outfit with some black jeans and a pair of black air forces. it was a sketchy outfit, but who cared? chris was breaking into someone's house. he didn't need to be stylish right now.

all that was on his mind was michael and the many options of how he could do this. chris paced back and forth in the empty space of his room, rubbing his temples in an effort to soothe the growing headache that he was facing. his mind was screaming with every possible thought imaginable, some of them telling him to back out and others telling him to man up and stop being a pussy.

chris would hold off a little longer, though. it was still bright out and he wasn't gonna do this in the daylight, he wasn't that uneducated in things like this. he'd watched some serial killer documentaries, so he'd say he knew... stuff.

it was 2:55 when he stopped thinking about the entire thing, his head going elsewhere as hunger overcame him. now he remembered what he was in the kitchen for earlier, a snack.

as chris walks up the stairs, he sees matt leaning against the kitchen counter on his phone. there's a smirk on his face as he chuckles softly at whatever he was watching.

the microwave is on, the buzz being the only sound other than matts quiet breathing and chris' footsteps entering the kitchen. he's still dressed in his black outfit, and matt puts his phone to the side just to look his brother up and down.

"are you on your way to a funeral or..?" matt questioned with a smile on his face, cocking an eyebrow at chris as he finally stepped foot into the kitchen. the first thing he did was grab a pepsi, setting it on the dining table before leaning down to open the freezer.

"no, just decided to wear whatever i first saw. i'm going out with sam tonight, so i probably won't be back until late." chris hums as he pulls out a mini pizza before walking over to where matt is standing.

matt moves over slightly, looking up to check the timer on the microwave only to see it's been just a few seconds. he groans as his head turns back to chris, watching as he takes the frozen pizza out of the box and sets it on a metal pan.

he preheats the oven and then lets the pizza sit on the stove as he goes over to sit at the table. matt joins him soon after, deciding to chat with his brother to pass the time.

"where are you goin'?" the older brunette asks, picking at the hang nails that stood out on his fingers. he winced as he pulled one off, shaking his hand by his side in an effort to stop the pain.

chris looks over at his brother, emotion unreadable as he stares at his brother with nothing behind his eyes, "oh. we're gonna.. meet up with this guy. he says he's got somethin' to show us."

matt nods, confusion washing over him as he sees chris' dilated pupils. it couldn't be the lighting, they just replaced the bulbs and it wasn't even dark yet. what was he thinking about?

"cool...? just be safe, i don't want anything bad happening to you." matt huffs, patting his brothers shoulder before getting up to check on his food.

chris turns in his seat, watching as matt stops the microwave and takes out his bowl of ramen, "i'm always safe, don't worry about me, matt. we're the same age, and you treat me like a baby."

matt raises both of his eyebrows in an exasperated manner, grabbing a fork out of a cabinet as he blows on the steaming bowl, "yeah, i wonder why."

chris laughs, "fuck off, matt." his brother chuckles as he walks past chris and back up the stairs to his room, leaving chris alone with his thoughts. again.

the brunette made a quiet beat on the table, tapping it and nodding his head as he recreated the beat to one of his favorite songs. once the oven beeped, chris got up and placed the metal tray into the oven and set a timer.

chris went to sit back down, stopping when he felt his phone buzz in his pocket again. this time, it wasn't a text from y/n, but a dm from her ex. michael.

theyenvy.michael — the fuck is you trying to steal my girl for?

you — im not? y/n is just my friend, kid. also aren't u her ex? ong ur trying too hard

theyenvy.michael — nah, she's my bitch fr. stay tf away from her, aight?

you — right. bcuz she's totally okay with u calling her a bitch. get tf off my dick....

you — she fr dodged a bullet when breaking up w you. ur profile is not it.

theyenvy.michael — ur not bouta dodge my bullet👎 watch out bro

chris scoffed, cracking open the lid of his pepsi as he took a sip. who did this kid think he was? chris wasn't scared of him. if anything, michael should be afraid. he should be terrified of what's about to happen tonight.

but he's not gonna be because he's not gonna know. chris loved taking people by surprise, jumping out at the perfect moment, and having a good laugh about it. only tonight, chris would be the only one laughing. chris would be the only one still alive to laugh.

the brunette glanced at the time again, 3:20. he didn't want to wait but he had to, nobody could see him. if anybody did, he would be the main suspect in the murder. chris couldn't even have a single thing that would point at him. chris couldn't even have y/—

"chris!" nick's voice breaks chris out of his trance, his head snapping towards the staircase that nick basically flies down, "oh my gosh, you're never gonna believe me!"

the brunettes eyes widen in terror, his mind racing with endless ideas as he looks to his brother for answers, the same expression on his face, "what? nick, what happened?!"

nick squealed, gripping onto chris' shoulders as he shook him violently, "there's a track on y/ns new album featuring melanie!"

chris' face drops, and he almost shoves his brother to the floor as he stands to his feet, "you are by far the worst person to announce news ever." he scowls, turning around to check on his mini pizza.

"come on, it's huge news! i seriously didn't know that y/n and melanie knew each other and oh my gosh! the song title just makes me even more excited—" nick trails off as he stares at chris, who is taking the metal tray out of the oven and placing it on the stove.

"and you're not listening." nick frowns, and chris parts his lips to speak.

"oh, no, i am. i just don't find this topic interesting, seeing as you're the only person in this house who cares about melanie martinez." chris shrugs, and nick raises an eyebrow at the boy as he leans against the dining table.

"what's up your your ass? you were just all happy-go-lucky, and now you're acting like a dick. did someone say something or...?" nick asks, head tilting in confusion as he watches chris transfer his pizza to a paper plate.

the younger brunette sighs, letting his shoulders relax as he shuts his eyes softly, "sorry. i'm just stressed, there's a bunch of things on my mind right now."

"like what?" nick pushes quietly, taking chris' previous seat the table.

chris stays silent, eyes opening again as he holds his breath. once his face begins to turn red, he speaks, "uh, work. social media, stuff like that."

nick sighs, nodding, "we can always take a break, you know?"

a break, seriously? chris thinks to himself. how could chris ever catch a break and let himself relax while all this was happening around him? he had to keep y/n safe, he had to get rid of anything and anyone who bothered her, and he had to film videos with his brothers. he just couldn't find time to let himself rest.

"i can't." he finally mutters, staring down at the marble counter as his fingers tap against it. he hears nick get up behind him.

then, he feels a hand on his shoulder, "you can, chris. just take things slow, focus on yourself for a little while. i promise you'll feel better." his voice is soft, calming, reassuring.

but chris doesn't know if he can trust that little change of tone. it wasn't that easy to just let everything go, not for him at least.

he couldn't even let a simple comment go past him. chris just always needed to do something about it and he hated it. he hated that he was like this. why was he like this?

chris didn't even know he crying until nick started to pat his back, muttering, "it's okay, i got you. let it out."

what was happening to him?

christophersturniolo

liked by ysbtril, matthew.sturniolo and others

christophersturniolo impulse

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matthew.sturniolo kids off his meds

-> christophersturniolo kid is alive

y/nwhosthat u said u were going to sleep, ur really breaking my heart christopher💔

*liked by creator*

-> trevssturn these secret relationship rumors are starting to become a lil believable...

-> matthewslovee babe the rumors are based off one post😭 let's settle down

nicolassturniolo oh brother what's he on about now

-> christophersturniolo shhh im plotting👀

xx4mygf notice how the only comment he hasn't replied to is y/ns

theyenvy.michael im ong coming for you lil boy

-> christophersturniolo stop meat riding bru

8:45, chris stood on the sidewalk across from michaels house. he turned his head down, looking at the picture he had screenshotted of a car, michaels car in his driveway.

he found it when scrolling deeper, almost throwing up at all the horrific things he found on the page. he was surprised nobody had reported him yet, he was sick. michael had also been stupid enough to take a picture of himself right in front of the 4 numbers on his house.

as for the street, well chris didn't need to search much for that either. again, michael led him right to it, posting a video of himself walking down the sidewalk with his friends as they laughed about something stupid.

chris was waiting here for a few minutes, pacing up and down the sidewalk so as not to seem suspicious and get caught by michaels neighbors. he didn't want to get asked any questions today, especially not when he was right in front of his first victims house.

as he started to get impatient, chris looked around before running across the street and quickly jumping the fence. he landed on his feet perfectly and quietly snuck to the back door of the house, looking around the house through the sliding glass door.

sliding his backpack off his shoulders, he kneeled in front of the lock, grabbing the safety pin before sticking it into the key-hole and twisting it around. he took his bottom lip between his teeth in concentration as he continued to try and pick at the lock, smiling when he heard the click.

as he stood up, throwing the safety pin somewhere behind him in the grass and throwing his backpack on his shoulders again, he slid the door open carefully. he listened to the soft sounds of the neighborhood, trying to pick up any sound of talking or footsteps coming closer.

when he didn't, he threw the door open and stepped in before shutting the door again. his fingertips slid across the dusty frame of the door carelessly before he shut it again and traveled deeper into the house.

his eyes landed on the freezer first before roaming all around the kitchen. it was trashed, like nobody had lived here in ages and rats had taken over, but there were none, only open chip bags and splatters of unknown sauce. crumbs adorned the floor, crunching under chris' feet as he took steps toward the fridge.

what's the harm in getting a little snack? he was hungry due to walking here all the way from his house, and michael wouldn't mind. he would he gone, so who would care?

chris grabbed an orange popsicle from the freezer before closing it and making his way to the living room. he took a seat at the couch, putting his feet up on the coffee table as he licked at the frozen treat.

when the brunette had finished it, he threw the damp stick into the garbage by the entertainment center before walking to the window at the front of the house. he kneeled in front of his, elbows resting on the windowsill as he waited for michael.

as he waited, his backpack suddenly felt heavier on his shoulders, the feeling of guilt and regret starting to wear on him. was he seriously gonna do this? it wasn't like he didn't want to. it was just that... he didn't even know, honestly.

he knew he was doing it for him and y/ns relationship, so they could live happily with no distractions or obstacles. but, then again, they would still have to face arguments, the publics opinion, and the many rumors that would start to spread. that's why, when chris finally gets you, you'll both flee the city and live somewhere together. alone where nobody could find you guys.

sure, chris would have to explain why, but it didn't matter. if you really loved him, you wouldn't care the things he's done to get there. or maybe you will. maybe you'll hate him and turn him into the cops. if that's the case, then chris might just have to get rid of—

"hey!" chris jumped at the muffled sound of a mans voice, and he turned his head to look in the direction of it, "come on, oscar."

it was michael, tugging roughly on the leash of his dog so as to get him to follow michael. the dog did follow him, his head hung low as his paws patted the concrete below them with quiet thuds.

chris just wanted to rush him right now, but he couldn't. he had to wait until he was inside, catch him off guard in the safety of his own home where he thought everything was normal. he would take care of the dog later in a... better way than what he'd do with his owner.

he jumped back as he heard the brown-eyed boys' footsteps, leaving the windowsill as he made his way further into the house. he hid in a closet down the hallway, shutting the door with a quiet thud as he stayed as still as he possibly could.

the door opened, and chris heard the click of the leash being undone, followed by the footsteps of both michael and oscar. chris watched through the blinds of the closet as michael put his dog into the metal kennel before shrugging his own backpack off and placing it on top of the kennel.

he walked down the hallway, and chris swore he felt michaels eyes staring right into his. he shuddered at the feeling, tensing up when michael neared and round the corner to his room.

chris heard a door open, and then rummaging. the brunette quickly jumped out of the closet and turned the corner, walking into michaels room and seeing his back turned as he faced his own closet. chris' eyes flickered between his bathroom and michael before he stepped closer.

when michael began to turn, chris threw his backpack off and grabbed the black-haired boy by the hood of his jacket, tugging him backward and hearing him gag.

"what the f—" chris quickly shut him up by throwing him against his wall harshly, hearing michael gasp as the wind was knocked out of him.

his eyes widened as chris stomped toward him, his hands going straight for the neck as he began to squeeze. the brunette felt another cold pair of hands on his as he stared michael in the eyes, his brown ones wide and filled with terror as he recognized chris.

chris' just stared, a smile creeping onto his face as he pressed michael harder against the wall. the shorter boy strained against him, choked noises falling from his lips with the little air he had.

"help—" a strangled cry left him, eyes brimming with tears as his vision became blurry. chris noticed, and he almost felt guilty. almost, "plea—sorry! i.."

this wasn't enough for chris. sure, michael would die in his hands, slowly and painfully, but chris wanted him to really feel it. when michaels eyes started to flutter shut, chris let go of him, letting the boy stumble to the ground.

the brown-eyed boy gasped for air, grasping his neck softly and rubbing the area where chris had squeezed. there was anger slowly creeping into him, the fear now long gone as his eyes darted around the messy room.

michael began to crawl, and chris let him. the brunette didn't let the boy go far, grabbing him by the hair and dragging him toward the hallway. michael kicked his feet, grunting but not even trying to yell. he was still confident he could win the fight, and chris gave him credit for that.

"let me go you fuckin' freak!" he struggled, and chris just ignored him as he continued to drag him down the hallway and to the bathroom, "bark, you useless piece of shit!" michael yelled at his dog, and oscar only looked at him sadly.

chris kicked the boy in the back, making him cry out before throwing him further into the small bathroom. the brunette shut the door, locking it before turning around to grab michael again.

he grabbed him by his hair again before throwing him against the wall just for the fun of it, smiling as he saw the hurt look on the shorter boys face. chris stepped further into the bathroom, leaning over the tub as he went to turn the water on. he reached his hand in, plugging the drain and watching as the water began to fill up.

michaels eyes widened in terror, his hopes going down as he watched chris turn back to him. more tears fell from his eyes as his body began to tremble. he felt pain everywhere, and he couldn't even move an inch without feeling a sharp sting. chris squatted in front of the boy, tilting his head as his hoodie fell off his head.

"where did that tough boy on the internet go, huh? or are you seriously just a poser." chris scoffed, taunting the boy with a sadistic smile on his face. when michael didn't answer, chris began to yell, "answer me!"

michael winced, sniffling as he listened to the water in the tub, "i don't have to answer to you, asshole. you're not gonna fuckin' do anything. you're scared."

chris raised an eyebrow, chuckling softly as he moved closer. he watched as michael flinched, and only then did a pang of guilt hit him. his smile dropped, and he just stared michael in the eyes. his gaze was dark, full of anger, guilt, sadness, and so many more emotions he couldn't even comprehend.

"i'm not scared, michael. you're shaking, look at you. you should be absolutely terrified of what's to come. nobody will notice you're gone because you're a fucking maniac that nobody loves. not even y/n still loves you, kid, you're trying too hard." chris masks his feelings with a smile, patting michaels cheek in a teasing manner before standing up to check on the tub again.

he turns the handle, stopping the water from flowing out before his turns back to the brown-eyed boy on the floor, "never said i was a nice guy, did i?" chris laughs at the scared expression on his face, walking over to him and watching as he tries to crawl away.

chris only grabs him by the hair again, dragging him harshly toward the tub as he hears michael scream and cry for mercy, begging chris to let him go. chris ignores him, resting his free hand on the edge of the tub as he drags michael toward him.

his knees are on the tiled floors, and chris gives him a soft wave before dunking his head into the cold water and watching as bubbles erupt from the boys nose and up to the surface. chris only watches with a blank expression, his stomach twisting as he feels the shorter boys hands trying to push him away but slipping and falling to his sides.

chris holds his ground, his grip on michaels hair tight as he pushes him deeper. his entire upper half is almost over the edge now, and chris doesn't realize until he feels water splash onto his cheek. his eyes move to michaels arms, flailing in the water and making a mess of the bathroom. his head turns to look at the bathroom door, taking deep breaths as he feels tears prick in his eyes.

he chokes on his spit, eyes closing as he tries to drown out the noises of splashing water and endless gurgling. chris' knuckles turn white as he grips tighter on both the tub and michaels black hair, finally starting to sniffle as tears begin to run down his face. he didn't know what he was doing, but there was no going back now. chris couldn't let michael go because if he did, the boy would only go to the cops and snitch on him. chris was past the point of no return, so he just let the whole thing happen.

the brunette begins to sob as the sounds of splashing die down, his grip on michaels hair finally loosening as he lets his entire body fall into the tub full of water. chris holds his face in his hands as he stays in a squat, his left hand soaking half of his face.

"shit, shit, shit. god, you're such an idiot, chris!" he scolds himself quietly, wiping his tears before he gets to his feet and takes even deeper breaths.

he's still not put together fully, but he pushes through it, looking back to michaels lifeless body before he leans over and grabs his hand. his fingers are still adorned with rings, and chris just takes the first one he sees and stuffs it into the back pocket of his jeans. chris quickly unlocks the door before walking back to the bedroom, taking careful steps as he looks around for his backpack.

when he spots it, he throws it over his shoulder, slipping into the straps hurriedly before leaving the room and walking down the hallway towards the kitchen. he takes the leash off the top of oscars kennel before he unlocks the metal crate, letting the dog out.

"hey, buddy," chris coos, petting his head softly as he sniffles once again, "i'm gonna find a better home for you, i promise. i'm so sorry."

oscar only whines, and chris just latches the leash onto his collar before guiding him through the living room. he takes another long look around, a millions feelings eating him up inside all at once. he doesn't feel regret... he doesn't even know what he feels.

chris freezes when he finally hears it. sirens. sirens coming closer and closer to the house that he stood in, "fuck. fuck, fuck, what—"

the brunette looks around, turning back quickly before sprinting through the kitchen and darting towards the backdoor. chris throws the door open, not even caring about the loud banging sound as he runs out of the house, the leash tightly wrapped around his hand.

"come on, boy!" chris yells as quietly as he can, and oscar continues to gallop behind him. he continues to make his way through the backyard, trying not to focus on the sirens that grow increasingly louder. how hasn't he realized the silent alarm? he was too caught up in his plan to see the red alarm above the backdoor.

chris opens the metal gate, running down the back alleyway and deeper into the neighborhood, not stopping even when he crosses the road. he loosens his grip on the leash as he makes it far enough from the house, hunching over as he tries to catch his breath.

he turns to check on oscar, giving him a few gentle pets before he reaches into the back pocket of his jeans. his hands find the small ring, and he pulls it out with a smile.

this ring would be on your finger someday, and chris wouldn't feel even a small amount of guilt for what he had done. he hoped you wouldn't resent him for it, either. that would just mess the entire thing up, and he didn't want to hurt you.

but for now, he'd just have to live with the memory.

"you could be my wife."

comment to be on this taglist!

@livialifesblog @zayyluvz @1800-love-me @snowysosturn @mirioosos

@ladyy-whistle-d0wn @ginswife @spideylovin @dej4vhs @strnlxlqve

@joemamaaa42069 @fratbrochrisgf @slut4chriss @h3arts4harry @str4wberryk1ss3s

@riasturns @yurpppppy @nwlluvsturnsstars17 @asimp4chris @byneptunee

@ilove2021chris @freshloveforthefit @sturniologals @ifwdominicfike @sturnsdoll

@3lizaluvs @matt444nixi @nikki-starx @notmylaa11 @jetaimevous

@fionaheartswomen @sturni0l0 @sturniolofannn @sturniolofannnlmao @demzzz

@n3-vaeh @melanch0lybby @viiiwwwee @johnniesverr @kaisturni

@chrissfawn

[floshav]

more rodrick PLSSSSS it can be anything

omg this is my first req ever and im so excited thank you!!

you wanted more Rodrick well here's more Rodrick.

part 2 out now!!

summary: Rodricks your best friend but thats not enough for you. As much as you hate to admit, you like the boy. That's why you show up drunk and high at one of his infamous house parties after he'd ranted to you about how he was so so in love with Heather Hills.

warnings: angst, heartache, kissing, Heather Hills, pining, weed, alcohol, crying, one sided love kinda, self hate

wc: 1k+

"She was so pretty."

"Oh yea?"

"No. I dont think you understand, like the way her hair smelled when she strut past me, the smell of..... smell of something light. Fresh! Pink even."

Rodrick practically had stars in his eyes when he described how his crush was at school. You'd be ecstatic if the crush was you, but the world is cruel so here you were talking about Heather Hills for the last hour or so.

"Y'know... I heard she spat on Louise last week. Poor kid, was dosed in her icky saliva for the whole day." Y/n was selfish but she tried to paint Heather in a bad light.

"Shit i'd pay good money for her to spit on me."

Well that backfired she thought.

"Freak" Y/n lightly laughed as she fell back onto Rodricks soft bed. Chest heaving up and down whilst her mind felt clouded.

"What can I say, love makes anyone a freak."

There was that word again. Love. How could he be bloody in love with little miss Heather Hills. The queen of highschool. The perfect girl. Pretty blondie. Pretty face. Y/n quickly began to realise there were plenty of reasons for Rodrick to crush on her. Y/n was a nobody. She thought her face ugly, her style wack, her eyes too uneven. She hated, hated, hated herself and wished she looked like Heather.

"Oh. My. God. I just had the best fucking idea" Rodrick exclaimed with the dorkiest smile he could produce, each fine line below the thickness of his eyebrows seen under the dim lighting of his room.

"Hmm?" Y/n buzzed as she basked in the coolness of his sheets

"M'gonna throw a party" "Heather would definitely come, i mean its one of my parties we're talking about."

Flashbacks to Rodrick's last party hit y/n's head like a train when she remembered how chaotic and horrible the experience was. Drunk teens shouting and chugging unknown beverages, shoulders brushing against shoulders constantly as she tried to find a room she could breath in without having to see another damn couple absolutely devouring eachother. Each and every minuscule second she'd spent in that house made her want to puke. The sight that made her want to puke the most was Rodrick's clearly drunk self throwing himself onto Heather, eyes sparkly with hope whilst she just sat there smiling so sweetly it was sickening.

Quickly she was sent back to reality.

"D'you think that's a good idea?" she questioned, tired.

"Course it is! she always comes to my things"

"Kay' whatever you think is gonna earn you your little dream girl specimen."

"Trust me, this times different." That's what he always said.

--------------------------------------

It's ok. It's ok. I-It's.... it's gonna be fine. she told herself as she admired the makeup she'd put on for tonight's occasion, she'd tried to copy one of Heathers famous looks, but quickly realised it didn't suit her skin so she stuck to her usual and hated herself for it. It was dreadfully the day of his party. The day that she'd have to witness him openly flirt with Heather just because he had an excuse to down a dozen bottles of cheap booze. She swiped a smear of lipstick that somehow ended up below her lip and sighed as she adjusted her shirt. Why do you always give in? Just confess you idiot. No! what the fuck am i thinking. she scrunched her nose and took a deep breath in, abusing her vanity with the pressure from the pads of her fingers.

She really really didn't want to go. She couldn't bare seeing Heather show up with her annoyingly perfect face, her perfect nose, her perfect hair, her stupidly sweet personality that everyone gaped over. Fuck it. She hated herself and wanted to forget that Rodrick even existed.

She found her not so hidden stash of weed she'd carelessly left under a pile of worksheets from her chemistry class, something ionic bonding. She didn't know how long it'd sat there for but it stained the ziplock bag a dull yellow. The bag was crinkled and smelled like the thought of Rodrick. Whenever she was upset or mad at Rodrick she'd smoke weed to drown the thoughts out but she slowly realised it was ruining the drug as a whole for her.

She rolled a joint in a random piece of paper she'd found thrown on her floor and lit up the end, taking a deep whiff of it, smile playing on her lips.

-----------------------------

"Animals.....Elephants....Tiguurrrsssss!" She slurred as she laid flat on her disheveled bed scrunching the sheets as her eyes formed stars around her ceiling. She got up abruptly, hair a mess and rubbed her eyes deepening the pressure with every second. "Rrrr... What time? Uggggh" She sighed as she reached for her phone. Her room was cloudy and smelled of green. Beside her were a few empty glasses so she took a sniff, curious. Happy juice? No, Vodka she thought. She saw the emptied out bottle of cheap convenience store alcohol by the side of her feet a long with the yellowed bag of weed which was empty. it'd been around 2 hours since she blacked out on her bed somehow thinking about how her fan looked like the shape of animals. Shit, fuck, ass, asshole! she muttered under her breath as she plopped back down.

"Why not? What's thurrr worst that could happennn?" she mumbled eyes fluttering as she picked up her bag and stumbled out her window, careful not to wake anyone. She took the route down the tree that always worked for her but in a clumsy fashion as she fumbled down the hard branches of her overgrown escape buddy. Craaack, Creeeeak. The continuous sounds made her annoyed. "Uggggfh can't everyone just shut up!!"

--------------------------------------

There she was. Standing dumb, drunk and high in front of the booming house lit up by warm yellow light. She could already smell the familiar smell of cheap alcohol, body odour and weed. My kind of night she thought as she barely made her way to the entrance. There were already people outside partying like no tomorrow as some flipped their hair to some overplayed hip hop song that everyone knew. While some were more restricted, sipping on booze as they giggled with their friends. The true highschool experience y/n thought.

Bump.

"Hey! Watch it-"

"Y/n?"

It was someone with beautiful waves of blonde still visible from her clouded vision, pretty makeup and a perfect body. Heather.

"O-Oh hey Heather! Pretty little Heather Hills." Y/n slurred as her vision was still blurred

"Uhm... Y'alright?" She questioned looking back at her friends as if y/n was cuckoo.

"No. No. No. No! Y-you. You. You and your stupidly perfect self can go to hell!" y/n lashed out

"W-what? Y/n what the fuck is wrong with you?" Heather said clearly freaked out by the sudden aggression.

Tears started to cloud y/n's vision so she took in a deeeeep breath trying to suck in as much oxygen as she could.

"Fuck you. Fuck you, fuck you, fuck you! You- You're all he wants. Heather, heather, heather! My perfect little heather with her pretty little face!" Y/n cried out as her knees began to weaken. She had no sense of shame, embarrassment or anxiety. She was too blacked out for this. So blacked out she just blurted her deepest darkest thoughts.

A crowd began to form around them, some curious at the sudden shouting girl who was crumbling a part, vulnerable in front of some people she didn't even know the names of.

"W-what? What are you even saying y/n." Heather said confused and disturbed as she began to back away.

Warmth began to spread at the small of y/n's back. Rodricks hand.

"Y/n? Why the fuck are you screaming?- Y/n s-shit you're not alright." Rodrick hastily slung y/n's arm around his shoulder careful with her as if she was a piece of fine china.

"S-sorry bout' that Heaths, trust me she doesn't mean anything she's saying" Rodrick stutters clearly not drunk enough, nervous as he realises that Heather is clearly agitated.

"Y-yea. It's okay Rodrick. It's not your fault, just get her far from here kay?" Heather said with sympathy and those stupid doe eyes whilst placing a hand on his shoulder. This should've made him tremble with pleasure, but the fact that she'd talked about y/n as if she was a monster made him angry.

"Yea. Yea alright." Rodrick scoffed, lightly rolling his eyes before dragging y/n's blacked out figure up his carpeted staircase, the carpet grazing her knees creating a friction which burned satisfyingly on her kneecaps.

"Fuuuck. Fuck..." Y/n softly mumbled, head tilting to the side of his shoulder as he firmed his grip on the side of her shoulder. Shoulders.... shoulders are for friends, real girls get hands put on their waist. Not shoulders. She managed to conjure the thought in her hazed mind.

He struggled to open his door as y/n's body weight pressed into the side of him as he suddenly heard silent weeps of sorrow erupt from her lips.

He set her on the foot of his bed, careful not to drop her anywhere harsh.

"Y/n? Y/n what's wrong, you're like black out drunk." He asked now bending down with both hands on his knees.

He slowly caresses his hand over the hill of her cheekbone and shoves a fly of hair away from her puffy eyes.

"You....i... Im sick of you and- and her." She sighs as a hysterical tear falls from her eye. Her face was the saddest Rodrick had ever seen and this broke his heart.

"Me and... me and who y/n?" He said so softly as he began to crouch so so close to her, his eyes looking up into hers with genuine curiosity and care. The mention of her name fluttered her heart.

"Heather" She breathed out involuntarily sniffling.

"You don't like me talking about her?" He slowly asked as if all the dots were finally clicking together.

"That's a stupid question." He lowly chuckled as he swiped his thumb under the pad of her eyes.

"I.. I really- I really"

"You really what?" He said again so so softly

"I really like you." She blurted before she felt that familiar rush of heat rapture her face.

Rodrick's eyes glance down to her swollen lips and he feels a strong ache pill at his heart. His best friend just confessed about her underlaying fondness of him and he'd been an ass talking about Heather all the time. He imagined how bad it must've sucked all the damn time.

"I-I'm so sorry I- I always talked about her."

"No! don't fucking be sorry you idiotttt." She slurred

"You- You don't owe me anything." She smiled softly as she fluffed up his hair.

"Maybe..." This is wrong he thought

"Maybe i do owe you an apology." He said slow and steady as he glanced down to her lips and locked with it for the final time.

He slowly moved in to plant a soft kiss on her puffy lips and her eyes widened in surprise.

The kiss felt like heaven and she tasted like everything he was used to. A hint of cherry chapstick, a lot of weed and something coconut. His lips felt so soft against hers and she breathed in every second of the experience. She almost wanted to whine when he pulled away.

"I- Fuck."

Y/n's euphoric high was quickly ruined at the notice of him clearly regretting his decision.

"No- It's fine Rodrick. I get it, it was just a in the moment thing." She sighed as she put both her hands to her face rubbing her cheeks and eyes as if she was trying to rid off the pain in her heart.

"No, no, no! it's not that."

"I just..."

"Fuck it." He went in for another kiss.

--------------------------(end)

thank u for the request!! i hope this was enough to satisfy ur rodrick need lol, if u ever want a smutty end to this lmk but yarrrrr

[sexydoffyman]

OMG HIHI OK SORRY FOR MY LIKE REALLY HYPER BEHAVIOR HUT IM WHIPPED FOR THIS SERIES 2 OMGG PLSS MAKE MOREE

😍

FOR PART 3 LIKE UH I DONT HAVE ANYTHING SPECIFIC IN MIND BUT U COULD MAKE IT LIKE A COURTING HC BUT ITS UP TO U BECAUSE WE EATING THIS SHIT UP FR

FIGHTING OVER YOU P3

navigation

p1 p2 p3

genre: romance?

characters: Ghost, Soap, König

A/N: I'm so sorry. I tried to research what courting means and, yes, I know you told me. English is not my first language.🦀 I'm falling asleep as I'm writing this lmao.

artist @ave661 check their stuff out, my fellow humans!

When you catch on that they are following you around constantly, you decide to talk a little with them.

You met Soap the other day and immediately went to strike up a conversation.

"Sup Soap!"

Soap will turn around to face you so fast.

He looks like a puppy waiting for its owner to play with it.

It's adorable.

His eyes just light up. You finally recognised his existence.

He wouldn't even respond right away. He'd just look at you. Love overfilling his eyes.

He just looks so comfortable.

Now Ghost is always near Soap, so when he hears your voice, he's there in a matter of seconds.

You know the meme "He's pretty" "And you're ugly. Now let's get to work."

Yeah, that is basically what happens.

They don't even notice König lurking behind the corner.

He was waiting for Ghost to get Soap away from you. Now he has you all to himself.

You turn around to go to wherever when you meet yourself with Königs chest.

You really have to look up at him.

He smiles. You can't see it, but he smiles.

He just waves at you like he isn't a threat to society.

You also smile at him.

Now König is a little older, so he knows how to keep his shit together.

Now switching back to your POV.

Soap just got taken away from you. And you have another opportunity to talk to one of them.

"Hey König!"

"Hallo M/N (male name)"

"You really fucked them up last mission." You told him, trying to make small talk.

He appreciates that you pronounced his name correctly. A thing that happens very rarely to him.

He turned around and looked back at you "You wanna-"

BANG

Before he could even finish a heavy shoe smacked into his face.

You quickly realised that Ghost took care of another simp. Who was going to get rid of him tho?

Price.

Our g'ol captain Price is ready to put all of them to their senses.

Slapping Soap on the back of his head and pulling Ghost off of Soap.

It was hard for him to get Soap out of Ghost's chokehold. But he managed to do it.

It's Price, after all.

He scolded all of them while you couldn't stop chucking in the corner.

"Leave them to me Price. You've tortured them enough."

All three of them look up at you, to which Price can only laugh.

"That might work just the best. Don't let them tear you apart!" He said as he left the room.

p4 a little date with the trio?

[writingstoraes]

out to the world 🌎

pairing: charles leclerc/fem!reader

type: instagram imagine/social media au

notes: not proofread and not revised so please expect errors hehehe please lmk what u think by replying or messaging and if u wanna be part of my taglist! <3

about: fans and people in the paddock have been trying to figure out whether charles is in a relationship or not. amongst the rumors, charles has had enough after seeing a series of mean comments about you.

paddocksays

liked by pierregasly, charloslove, leclercs, and 20,078 others

paddocksays F1 Ferrari driver Charles Leclerc spotted with a mystery woman having a splendid time on a yacht in Maranello. The same race weekend, Charles was accompanied by the same woman outside of Ferrari's HQ and he was seemingly very protective of her and apparently came out of the doors holding hands.

Is the Monegasquè finally off the market?

leclercs WHAT THE FUCK PIERRE LIKED?????

dr3stappen when will he make a dummy acc so hes not slipping on stuff like this 💀

ferrarifan Ok but Pierre liking doesn't confirm it,,, man probably thought this was pure bs and had a laugh

leclercs they were holding hands...

ferrarifans Dont you hold hands with your friends? Are you friendless?

charleswdc OMG go king so deserved

ferraritifosi Does it matter? She is probably a gold digger anyways.

ferrari1 Yeahhh lol riding off on that ferrari paycheck Charles has

16lecs55 Lol his ex was prettier

paddocksays

liked by charleswdc, dr3stappen, maxyracey, and 76,095 others

paddocksays Ferrari's very own lover boy? Charles Leclerc spotted out and about today on the streets of Monte Carlo with the same woman he was with in Italy. The "couple" is definitely not trying to be subtle.

Fans suspect that the woman is Y/N Y/L/N, a friend of Alex Albon's girlfriend, Lily.

tifosi1 Not even trying to hide the PDA, she is definitely using him

ferrarilover Clearly she wants some clout and some 💸💸💸

charleswdc they are trying to be subtle yall just dont know how to give them privacy ffs

ferrari1655 Not good enough for him lol he can do a lot better

sainzchamp ohhhh she ugly why is he even w her 💀💀💀

charles_leclerc

liked by carlossainz55, danielricciardo, lilymhe, and 2,450,334 others

charles_leclerc Up until now I never thought I could meet someone so loving, kind, and mesmerizing in all ways possible. To the only person I want to dance all my dances with, tell my ridiculously unfunny jokes to, and parade the streets with at midnight because we were craving pizza, you have my whole heart.

I am in a very loving relationship and I have never been happier. I ask everyone who's been making awful, unwarranted comments about Y/N to stop. All rumours and hearsays about her that paint her i negative light are not true. She does not deserve any of it and is the best person I know.

carlossainz55 I'm not the best person you know???

pierregasly Hurts, right?

charles_leclerc Please get out of my mentions 🙏

yourusername me? after your money? you havent even paid me when i put gas in all of your cars

charleswdc LMAOOOO SHES SO

charles_leclerc Will wire it to you now, chèrie 😘

yourusername no need, just bought u a new car

lilymhe MY LOVESSS ❤️❤️❤️ where are the mean comments im ready to fight

danielricciardo My man finally hard launched 🎉

yukitsunoda0511 MY PARENTS!!!!

yourusername kidding asside, je taime my love 🤍 my always in all ways!

pierregasly I feel like I had something to do with this

landonorris Please make a dump account dude

----------

tagging: @slytherheign <333

notes: this took me almost two hours lmaooo lmk what u think!!! ill be making a directory soon with all of my works i just need to figure out how to do masterlists 🥹 tysm for reading 🤍

[hwasoup]

Tale As Old As Time

Playlist !!

art credit: Marbipa

OMG GUYS IM SOSOSO SORRY FOR SUCH A DELAY, COLLEGE REALLY DEVOURED ME IN THE MOMENT. AND TUMBLR REMOVED THE OPTION TO MAKE THE TEXT YELLOW...SO THE COLOR WILL NOW BE ORANGE. However, this is a double update week bc I owe you guys bc of your amazing patience with me!! I hope you guys enjoyed this chapter

like always don't hesitate to lmk if you would like to be tagged:')

prev | next

warnings: talking objects, borderline assault, Canis Lupus

word count: 3.3k

Chapter 4: Dinner is served

However, in the village’s small tavern….

“UGH, WHO DOES SHE THINK SHE IS ?!” 

“Uhh Ben, chill out here you’re drunk.” Eddie says, while trying to take away his beer. Ben looks at Eddie extremely furious and annoyed “So? don’t you see that- that woman has messed with the wrong MAN ?!!” Eddie winces at his words a little and says “erm…. sure…let's say that she did.” Ben, who was moping in front of the tavern’s fireplace, takes another swig of his beer. “Dismissed, publicly humiliated, How DARE she! Nobody says NO to ME!” he says in a growl. Eddie sighs and rolls his eyes a bit and cracks his knuckles. “Well, you’re not a bad person... And besides forget her, you have tons of admirers in this tavern anyways” he says with a remark. Ben groans “Ugh, EDDIE LISTEN... My rustic cabin, my latest kill roasting itself on the fire, the children playing with the dogs ...and a pretty wife rubbing my feet…And what does Y/N say?? she says NO” he says throwing his beer into the fire.

The flame bursts a bit startling Eddie, but he proceeds to maintain his composure. “Listen to me ben…listen to the tavern…they’re all here because they’re admirers of you...” One man yells “NOBODY BITES LIKE BEN OR CAN WIN AT CHESS LIKE HIM” 

Another man yells “HE CAN EASILY WIN SPIT CHALLENGES” The tavern eventually comes together as they spew out all of their favorite qualities of ben. Especially the women, all of them gushed over his blonde hair, his brawn, his charm, and even his chest hair. (for some reason) Ben’s mood lifts and he smiles as he cheers along with the tavern of the glorification of his achievements and assets. People get together and eventually dance and drink as a small trio plays some music to add more to the cheerful atmosphere. Ben sits beside some ladies and brags about the number of eggs he eats in the morning. “TEN CHEERS FOR BEN RILEY !!” the tavern yells After a while of just fooling around, with a brightened mood Ben sits back in his lavish chair and looks at Eddie “that was very fun, thank you… but how come not a single woman has approached you?” Eddie chuckles and simply scratches his hair “well…I’ve been told I'm either too bored or too clingy .... I have no idea why though...” Ben just stares at him and clears his throat, looking back at the crackling fire.

Suddenly, the joy got sucked out of the room when Mauricio came waddling in tattered clothes, unruly hair, and barefoot. “SOMEONE, PORFAVOR QUE ME AYUDEN!!” The people in the tavern whispered to each other as they stared at him. Mauricio runs towards Ben and other customers in the tavern as he yells “SHE’S LOCKED IN A DUNGEON, EL LO TIENE CAPTIVA !!” 

A man asked, “but who?” Mauricio looks at this man with his eyes filled with fear “...who?... WHO?? MY DAUGHTER Y/N< WE HAVE TO GO SAVE HER NOW !!” Ben raises an eyebrow and looks at Eddie as he tries to stifle a laugh, not believing his words. He gets up and approaches Mauricio and pats his back “calm down Mauricio, now tell me… who is it that has Y/N locked in a dungeon?” 

“UN MONSTRUO! A BEAST !!” 

Crickets could be heard in the entire tavern as it went silent… 

The entire tavern bursted into laughter at the idiocy of his words. 

“Lemme guess! He’s a huuuggee BEAST.” 

“HE’s got an UGLY MOUTH WITH TEETH” Mauricio in his fears nods his head vigorously as he confirms each person’s questions about his so-called ‘beast’. He looks around and trips and falls on the wooden floor “Will you help me?” he asks with tears in his eyes.  Ben rubs his chin as he rolls his eyes as he decides to say something sympathetic to him “alright, alright, Mauricio relax, we’ll help” Poor Mauricio looked up with hope in his eyes as he thanked Ben for his courage to step up and help him. It didn’t last too long since he shortly got thrown out of the tavern by the owner due to his “madness.” 

Little did he know that Ben was already devising a plan with Mauricio’s plea for help…that may or may not have to do with marrying his daughter.

—----------------------------------------------------------------------------

On the other hand in the Castle..

After what seemed to be a few hours after that nasty confrontation with Miguel, A starving Y/N emerges from her room. She looks around as to see if she would see Miguel, but she ultimately decides that he has very much retired to his room. Wherever it may be. As she walked down the halls, she didn't notice the sound of giggling coming from behind a curtain.

“Miles nooo, stay away” 

“Ok but I just wanna hug, Gwen” “Miles, the last time you hugged me, you literally burned my feathers” she says with a sigh. Miles sighs and just pouts “It’s not my fault you got turned into a feather duster, ok?” Gwen rolls her eyes and chuckles at his antics. Miles then looked up as he heard the sound of footsteps and his flame burst a bit more “Hey look !!” he says pointing at Y/N “she emerged !!” He left Gwen in a hurry as he quickly hopped his way to Y/N as he followed her to the kitchen. In the kitchen, Peter was putting Mayday to sleep in the cupboard. Once she fell asleep, Peter closed the cupboard only to spot the cook, who was angrily huffing his stove top with fire as he whined over his cooking going to waste. Peter sighed “shh, come on I just put the little one to sleep, it’s been a long day.” Lyla however hops in and sighs “Honestly, I think she was just being headstrong, I mean...Miguel did say PLEASE” Peter sighs and says, “Really Lyla? you know that Miguel has a temper…and if he doesn’t control it, things won’t work out for him.” 

They were interrupted when Y/N walked in. “Hey, you showed up, a little late but that counts!” Peter says. Lyla turns around and greets her “Hello, I don’t think we properly introduced ourselves, I'm Lyla, you already know Peter of course, and in the back over there trying to get everyone in check is Jess and-” Miles butted in the conversation as he smiled at Y/N “and I’m Miles, nice to meet you senorita” he says wiggling his eyebrows. Jess waddled over smiled at Y/N “If you need anything to make your stay more comfortable just tell us honey” “Well ....I am hungry,” Y/N says with a sheepish smile. Peter grins and starts directing the kitchen to quickly cook something up for her. Lyla escorts her to the dining room, while Jess sighs “ok, but we have to be as quiet as possible, or else Miguel will flip. Miles just hops around happily as he says “aw come on, we gotta get Pav here! Actually, Imma go get him” he says as he hops off out the kitchen. 

A little while later, Miles came back with a large piano, “come on Pav, you haven’t played for someone in forever!” Pav smiles as he warms up quickly playing his keys “yep i’m all good” Jess walks in and spots him “Please…play quietly” Pav looks at Jess with the biggest stank face he has gave her “oh no yea..sure..softly… are there ANY more tasteless remarks to my artistry?” Jess says no and walks off back into the kitchen. In the dining room, Y/N was quietly sitting until she saw Miles come up to the table with a smile. He signals to Gwen who’s hovering over the window with a mirror to create a form of stage lights. Pavitir is playing his tunes, and Miles looks at her and smiles happily “It is our pride and pleasure that we all welcome you here tonight. Stay seated in your chair as you relax, enjoy what you see, as the dining room proudly presents…. your dinner!” Y/N smiles in amazement at all of the food that has been placed on the table, she had never seen so many foods from different regions in such a long time. If she had to be honest, it was better than the cooking she had seen from the local restaurant back at the village. She was handed a napkin by Miles, and she took it and placed it onto her lap to catch any food that would hypothetically stain her dress and fall to the floor. Each dish was kind enough to explain to her what each dish was. She had some gray stuff, Beef ragout, Chilaquiles, Asopao de Pollo, Arepas, Mofongo, Congri, Tequenos, Tostones, Pupusas, Camarones al ajillo, Quesadillas, and even Enchiladas. She had never tasted such a culinary cabaret in her life before. As Y/N ate, she chatted with Miles for a bit as he told her how it has been 10 years since they had a guest like her. She chatted with Gwen a bit and found out she’s the feather duster that snuck into her suite while she was busy crying to collect the dust that was piling up. She learned that Lyla is actually a relative of Miguel and learned about all the staff as well. Y/N found herself creating a friendly bond amongst the staff as she happily ate to her heart’s delight. Peter came in after a while on his serving cart with some tea for her to drink “one lump or two?” he asked. Y/N giggled “Just one please” She takes a cup and sips it as she sighed in content as the soothing flavor of the tea. 

After Y/N ate her fill she clapped in awe “this was wonderful, please give my compliments to the chef!” Jess smiled at her from a distance and looked at her minute and hour hand. “Oh dear, look at the time…it seems to me we should all get some sleep” She approaches Y/N and tries to escort her back. “Oh, but Jess…after such a meal, I can’t just go to sleep, besides it is my first time in such an enchanted castle...” Jess nervously laughed and looked around trying to divert her attention, “oh why who would say such a thing..I mean-” Lyla hopped in and heard what they said “Yyyyyeeeaaa…. totally not enchantteeeddd” she says to Y/N. Jess turns around to look at l

Lyla and muttered “it better not have been you” Lyla looked at her in shock at her accusations and was definitely going to retaliate until Y/N diffused the situation. “Oh guys please…I figured it out myself...” she says with a smile. She then gets up from the chair and approaches the door “I hope you both don’t mind If I look around, if that’s okay” Lyla perked up and hopped to her “wanna tour girlie ?” “AH AH AH…. we can’t let her... She might you know... go someplace else?” Jess says sternly. Y/N giggles as she looks down at Jess’s frown “aww come on, I bet you know a lot about the castle…how about if you tell me all about it?” Jess sighs as she gives in “alright then...”  —----------------------------------------------------------------------------

An hour later…

Jess was happily giving her knowledge of the castle, adding her expertise and explaining how old the castle truly was. She gave some stories on how she lived in the castle, as well as her years of service. Y/N looked around in awe as she marveled at each painting and each intricate design of the castle. It might have looked scary at first, but now that she’s taking a closer look. The castle itself is truly beautiful.  They passed by a hall of empty armor, each head turning around to take a peek at Y/N, finding her curiosity quite charming. Jess heard the squeaks of the rusty armor and turned around and with a silent hiss “Turn Around”

She looked back to her direction and noticed that Y/N was nowhere to be seen. Jess wanders around until she spots her trying to go up the west wing. “Lyla damnit go stop her !” Lyla notices and hops as quickly as she could to stop Y/N from going any further, Jess running along behind her. The two eventually reach Y/N and stand in front of her making halt gestures. “What’s up there?” she asked. Sheepish smiles were both seen on both women’s faces as they try to make up some excuses.

 “Oh nothing there just storage, Rubbish, Dusty, Boring, absolutely nothing in the west wing” Lyla says Y/N chuckles as she was able to trick them and says in a coy voice “Oh so THAT'S, the west wing” Jess groans in frustration and looks at Lyla “nice going idiot...” Y/N keeps on staring up the stairs as she wonders what Miguel is truly hiding in the west wing.  The two women then started blabbering as they started to try and convince her to go and see the library. She nods and slowly follows them until she notices that they sped so quickly that they were almost down the hall. She took this opportunity and quickly tiptoed up the stairs and into the West Wing.

The more she went up the stairs, the more she noticed how the hallway had cracks, claw marks, shattered mirror pieces, and broken gargoyle statues. Y/N looked around a little concerned and debated if she should stop. However, her curiosity got the best of her nature, and she kept on going. She eventually made it to the top and walked down a hall to two double doors. “This must be Miguel’s room” she whispered to herself. Y/N looks back behind her just in case Jess followed her but didn’t see anyone. With a deep breath she slowly opened the doors and walked in to see an almost dilapidated room. Everything was broken or at least about to shatter. “Probably from his anger issues” she says softly to herself. After walking inside and looking around she spots a portrait, she slowly approaches it to see claw marks on it. She couldn’t make out who the man painted in the portrait is, but she could tell that he was handsome, but what struck her the most was his piercing crimson eyes. 

She then turned around to notice the window completely open and a table with a mirror and a beautiful glowing rose. Amazed at its beauty she took the glass encasing off of the rose and watched how it sparkled, it was mesmerizing. Y/N then reaches a hand to touch the rose but stops as she feels a shadow loom over her. She looked up and gasped in shock to see Miguel.  He angrily huffed at her and snarled as he quickly made his way to reach for the rose’s glass encasing and protectively covered it. Miguel then slowly looked at Y/N with such rage in his eyes and blocks her from the rose “Porque Viniste” Y/N slowly stepped back as she raised her arms to protect herself from harm without realizing. “I’m..I’m Sorry” she says softly. Miguel growled and rolled his eyes “Sorry? I warned you to NEVER COME HERE” Y/N flinched and moved back even more “I didn’t mean any harm; I Apologize if I offended you” Miguel enraged clenched his paw into a fist “DO YOU REALIZE WHAT YOU COULD HAVE DONE?” He takes his anger on a broken chair and punches it. “I- No, Please, stop” she said worriedly. 

“LARGATE DE AQUI” 

Y/N didn’t hesitate and ran out as quickly as she could. Miguel raged and punched anything in his sight that was breakable in his room. His eyes widened as he realized he scared her off again. His heart ached at his own actions, and he lowered his head in shame feeling just awful about himself and worried for her...

Y/N on the other hand has made a run for it and somehow found her coat as she was running down the stairs. Miles was playing chess with Pav and spotted Y/N running “HEY, Y/N!! Where are you going ?!” Y/N looked back at them and fearfully said “Promise or not, I can’t stay here for another minute!” She left the castle and, in a hurry, looked around for the stables and found her dear old Felipe, despite the heavy blizzard that was occurring outside she managed to saddle him up and rode him away and out of the castle grounds into the black forest. 

After a while of horseback, she realized that she had no idea where to go, everything was covered in snow. Felipe whinnied and panicked as he fidgeted left and right where to go. Y/N tried to calm the horse down but gasped in terror when realizing there was a pack of hungry and vicious wolves ready to hunt them for their next meal. Felipe regained his control and immediately turned back to the castle’s direction to run away from the wolves. Y/N grasped tightly onto the reins and tried maneuvering Felipe through the woods. The wolves nipped at Felipe’s legs, and he would only run faster. Y/N was hyper focused in getting away that she didn’t completely register the frozen lake in front of her. The two fell in with a splash in the icy water, Y/N kept on holding onto the reins and Felipe quickly swam to the other side, the wolves still following behind. Eventually the other half of the pack caught up to both Y/N and Felipe in the front and spooked them, Y/N fell off the horse’s back and Felipe’s reins got stuck onto a tree branch. 

Y/N quickly got up from the snowy ground and found the nearest thick stick that she could find and stood in front of Felipe to help protect him. She swung the stick left and right, battling the canines on her own, but the stick was split in half when one of the wolves' sharp teeth gnawed into it. Y/N stood there in shock not knowing what to do..she was about to get eaten along with her beloved horse. A wolf leaped out of nowhere and took a bite of her coat, throwing her off her balance and making her fall to the ground. She screamed in terror, as another wolf leaped at her ready to bite. Until she heard a loud thud from the wolf’s body and a loud roar. She looked up and saw Miguel who stood beside her and protected her with his large body on top of her. He then jumped away from her leading the wolves far from her reach and fought them on his own, he scratched, bit, he harmed, and almost killed. 

The wolves, intimidated by his dominant presence, whimpered and scurried away from him.  Miguel let out one final growl until he looked directly at Y/N, his eyes showed relief that she was fine, but quickly rolled behind his head as he weakly fell down onto the cold icy ground. He was bleeding with many bites and scratches from the wolves. He panted heavily as the pain from his wounds slowly enveloped him. Y/N was going to take advantage to run away but stopped…she would be no better than a crude human to leave him out there. He saved her life…and she owed him. She slowly walked away from Felipe and kneeled down to Miguel and whispered. “Hey, I know it hurts…but you have to help me...” 

She was able to somehow get Miguel to stand up and mount the horse. His body however limped on it as he was too weak to sit properly on the horse. Y/N bit her lip in worry as she took off her coat and wrapped it over Miguel’s wound. 

Y/N slowly united Felipe’s reins from the tree branch and slowly led him back to the castle.

With the beast on his back.

taglist: @cupcakeinat0r , @miguelhugger2099, @mcmiracles, @xxsugarbonesxx,@codenameredkrystalmatrix,@deputy-videogamer,@lxverrings,@miguelzslvtz,@itsameclinicaldepression,,@ricekrisbris,@loser-alert , @thedevax, @uncle-eggy, @m4dyy, @freehentai, @synamonthy, @razertail18, @s0lm1n, @badbishsblog, @faimmm, @keendreamknight, @texanadmirer, @stargirrls, @itzsab

[ofc-vi-writes-too]

Batfam members and what they’d get cancelled for/their apology

Just watched ItalianBach’s youtuber apology tier list video and inspiration STRUCK.

𖦹𖦹𖦹𖦹𖦹𖦹𖦹𖦹𖦹𖦹𖦹𖦹𖦹𖦹𖦹𖦹𖦹𖦹𖦹𖦹𖦹𖦹𖦹𖦹𖦹𖦹𖦹𖦹𖦹𖦹𖦹𖦹𖦹

Bruce: there are SOOOOOO many things. So so so many things. He has been cancelled so many times that there is a blog dedicated to keeping track of BW apologies. the user is probs something like bruceissosorryagain. Personal favorite was when he ruined a pretty popular and well liked socialite by knocking over a champagne tower directly onto her great grandmother’s wedding gown. For some god foresaken reason the champagne had been dyed red to match the victorian vampire aesthetic of the wedding?? The hashtag “BWmeetscarrie” will forever haunt wayne manor.

Dick: He was literally a cop in 2020. his goose was GOT. He was trying to prove that not all cops are bad by posting to that macklemore song with the little black fist painted on his cheek and BLM on the other. u know the one. It didn’t go over very well. Even macklemore commented “c’mon bro..” This was followed by a 45 minute long apology video explaining how he now understands the harm it can cause to lump all marginalized groups into one category and how he regrets his action severely and yada yada yada hes so sorry, at the end there was a 2 minute long acrobatic performance to the song Nina Cried Power by Hozier. He also donated to several black charities following the whole ordeal. Didn’t leave his house for a week.

Jason: Ran a rage bait account on tiktok when he was like 13-15 where he posted cringe alpha sigma male mogging content, and someone somehow found out it was him, and his apology wasn’t so much an apology as much as it was “I’m sorry you were stupid enough to believe the bs I was posting, and I’m sorry i got caught. Fuck you guys btw now I have to find a new hobby 👎🏽.” The videos are still saved to his phone when he needs a good chuckle.

Tim: Said BTS was ass and BP was even worse (he tweeted it out of boredom, knowing it was gonna be bad, but not knowing exactly how bad). Armies and blinks tried to dox him MUTIPLE times but tim keeps it on lock so his info was safe. There was a boycott for WE so Bruce made him post and official apology. It was half assed and there are kpop accounts to this day that say “Fuck tim drake” in their bio. Either that or he got “cancelled” on some Jynxzi stuff. Like the whole situation to a T. Maybe both are true. He also had a ukelele in his apology vid.

Damian: called an old lady a “stupid ugly stinky bitch” on national television because she “asked father too many questions.” (it was an interview) Jaws were dropped. Nay, jaws were dislocated. Damian was too young at the time to have social media, let alone post his own apology, so bruce did it for him and sent that poor old lady a lot of cash.

Duke: Unironically said “if it’s snowing I’m not going.” the dudebros thought that shit was hilarious. No one else laughed. Duke was serious, but he felt so bad about offending people that there were tears in the apology. At least thats the story he’s currently running with.

Cass: A video of her saying the F slur surfaced. Her apology was her coming out.

Steph: Said something offensive without realizing it and didnt know what she did until she tweeted saying “why is everyone being so wierd around me?? did I do something wrong??” everyones response is either “girl please bffr” or genuine actually helpful input. She apologized less than a day later in a quick and concise apology vid.

Barbara: compared herself to marsha P johnson in an interview and when she was asked to elaborate she simply could not. The truth is, she had no idea who that woman was other than the fact that she was a good, cool woman so she was like yea omg im so her. Her apology was also a mini documentary about Marsha P Johnsons life.

[cupoftaae]

Hello! your writing is such a comfort to me, and Im a sucker for domestic, fluffy type shit to be honest. could you do something cute like reader is pregnant and tae like journals and vlogs all the time because hes so excited? Was gonna write something like this but I dont think I could do it justice.

uhg this is so cute omg. Thank you for reading my work and im so glad it can offer some comfort, thats such a sweet thing to say :(

I hope you enjoy! <3

warnings- swearing, mentions of pregnancy

ladybug - KTH (drabble)

Saturday, june 11th, 2022

Taehyung set his phone down on the desk as it recorded him, he smiled and jokingly waved. "hello, today is.." he leans to check the date, "June 11th, its Saturday and the time is 4:54pm. Y/N is in the bathroom taking another pregnancy test because she is now a week late" he laughed and spun side to side in his chair. "I dont know why, but...I have a really weird feeling about this one, a weird but good feeling" he smiled and looked down. The past year has been very exhausting mentally for the both of you. After getting married, you both knew you wanted to have children right away, but your body didn't get the memo.

It was purely negative after negative, to the point where you refused to even take any tests for 3 months...up until now. Taehyung knew he wanted to journal your journey so that years from now you both could look back on the firsts of parenthood. He wrote down everything, from the good days to even the ugly ones, every appointment, every test, everything was in his notebook, and he was hoping that today would be *the* entry, he had a feeling it would be, so he decided on filming it just in case.

"ok, we have to wait 5 minuets" your voice is heard off camera as Taehyung looks up and across the room at you, "Ok" he smiles, waving you over. "cmere"

you nervously walk over as he places you onto his lap, long arms draping around your waist as you exhale. "filming?" you asked, watching him nod. "Do you want me not to?" he asked, "no, its fine, but what if its negative again?" you sigh and turn your body so your back is to the phone.

"then i can just delete it like the other ones" he ran his hand up and down your back, attempting to soothe you best he could. He was in his whole little nervous energy world right now and couldn't imagine how you were feeling, it had been months since the last test, and you werent sure you could take another hit with the reminder that your body isnt working.

It seemed like you had been waiting forever, tae had paused the camera 3 minuets after you came out, playing with your hair as you remained silent, hand in his. Your phone alarm could be heard from the bathroom once the long wait had ended. You, in that moment, wish you had another 5 minuets, because the second the alarm filled the air, your heart has stopped. "Im nervous" you whisper, standing up slowly as taehyung followed. "I know sweetheart, but we won't know unless we look, yeah?" he cupped your face gently, thumbs caressing your cheeks as he pressed a soft kiss to your lips.

You led him into the bathroom with you, "Wait dont turn it yet" he giggled and ran back to his phone he had left in the bedroom. You stared down at the upside-down test which sat on the edge of the sink, feeling your pulse in your ears. Once your husband returned, he closed the door and set up the filming, setting it a bit against the mirror as it faced you both. "dont be nervous, whatever it is, we will get through it ok?" he soothed, hugging you tightly and swaying a bit. It had been a few moments of preparation and deep breathing before finally feeling confident. "Ok ...im ready" you nodded, making him smile, "yeah?", he lifted the test, not flipping it yet. "yeah, but....you need to read it because I think I'll throw up if I do" you laughed, hiding your face in his chest as he breathed out, counting down in his head before finally flipping it.

"what does it say?" you whispered, fingers lightly gripping his t-shirt. Taehyung giggled nervously, "angel, Im not too good at reading these types of test....I-..I dont know if you are pregnant or not"

You let yourself smile at your husbands antics, pulling away to face the test, eyes widening. "baby..."

"what? is it negative?"

"Baby...two lines means pregnant, im pregnant." you turned to him, "Im pregnant" you whisper, taehyung not fully registering it until a few seconds after, head looking back down at the test.

"youre pregnant....." he looked back to you before a smile creeped onto his face, pulling you over and gently lifting you into his arms as tears escaped both of your eyes. there was no talking, just quiet (happy) crying, and touches and squeezes of love and emotion.

He finally set you back down and held your face. "Finally, damnit" you joke, making him laugh as he leans down to kiss you. "we are gonna be parents, baby. It is happening" he cooed sincerely, your hand wiping at his tears. you nodded, "its happening"

He kneeled down and lifted your shirt, his cold hands against your still flat stomach. "hi there" he whispered, making you cry even more as your hand ran through his hair. "we just found out about you, but mommy and daddy already love you so much" he kissed above your navel and held you close.

"Im so glad we got that on camera, fuck" you laughed as he stood up, wiping a tissue under your eyes. "I know!!" he sniffled and kissed you again. "god, I fucking love you"

"I love you too"

Tae picked the camera up and held it to both of your faces, making you giggle a bit. "welcome to the adventures of two 20 something year olds figuring out how to be parents, tune in next week for 'realizing we are too poor for this'" tae finished, shutting the camera off as you laughed and gently slapped his chest.

You sighed contently as he walked back into the bedroom with you, already becoming clingy with just the way he holds you. "this explains so much" you sit in thought, "I thought my period was coming because I was crying so much last week over everything but I guess not"

Taehyung smiled and crawled onto the bed next to you, hand rubbing your stomach. "oh my god, Taehyung, I had wine 2 days ago" you frown, grasping his hand. "im sure its okay, my mom used to have some wine when she was pregnant with me, and I think im okay" he smiled at you, his eyes scanning over your features lovingly. "dont stress, sweet girl, you are gonna be a mommy. We will plan an appointment this week and Ill be there for you ok? I promise" he kissed your hand as you looked up. "I love you so much"

"I love you more"

--

Thursday, November 20th, 2022

You had taken back everything you said about first trimester being the worst. Second trimester had absolutely everything to despise, and you realized it more each time you began to outgrow an article of clothing.

"theres mama" taehyung smiled brightly as he walked out of his office and into the living room with his camera, filming you on the couch. "shes wearing my sweatpants" he whispered and sat down, flipping the camera to the both of you. You pouted and looked at him, "baby I dont wanna be filmed, i look really gross" you sigh, "No you dont, you look sexy" he teased before shutting the phone off.

"are you still dizzy?" he asked, hand gently rubbing your thigh. "a little...but not as much"

the dizziness you've experienced since the second trimester has been the cause of worry for the past few weeks, despite your doctor telling you its normal.

"Just stay here, chill out and drink water" he smiled and got up to refill your water.

"I hate sitting down all day, its annoying" you huff, laying against the pillow. "I know baby, I know, but its not like your being lazy, you are creating a whole human, its a lot of work mama." he spoke, shutting the fridge to see the ultrasound photo hanging on the door.

You smile at him as he walks over, thanking him for the water. "Do you need anything else?" he asks, hand rubbing your slightly bigger stomach. You wouldn't have guessed you were almost 6 months pregnant, your bump has remained relatively small throughout the entire pregnancy, which you were thankful for, however it seemed like the weight just travelled to other parts of your body, like your feet.

"can you just lay with me?"

"of course baby" he moved to lay behind you, pulling you against him as you both watched tv, his hand finding its familiar place against your stomach, feeling soft flutters, something thats been occurring more recently.

"little ladybug is awake" he whispered and kissed your shoulder. You laugh and place your hand atop of his. You two had never figured out the gender, wanting to be surprised until they made their arrival, but Taehyung had a habit of calling the baby by "ladybug" ever since last month when you two laid outside and a small ladybug found its way to rest on top of your bump. He, of course, wrote the whole thing down in his journal as it happened.

Taehyung deep down didnt care the gender of his child, but he really wanted a little girl. A mini you. He wanted to take care of and protect his princesses all the time, and he so desperately wanted to make you both happy.

--

2 months later

You had woken tae up around 4am with severe cramping and back pain, he joined you on the floor in the bathroom as he placed a cold cloth on your neck. "just breathe, sweetheart." he sighed, trying to calm you down.

"What if they are coming early? Its too soon tae, and I-"

"shh, everything will be ok. You and ladybug are ok" he kissed your head. "Do you want to go to the ER?" he whispers, watching you nod as he helps you up carefully.

he helped you slip on your sneakers before getting into the car as he began driving to the hospital. "It doesnt feel like, I dont know how to explain.." you mumble, taking deep breathes

"What do you mean, love?"

"It doesnt feel normal and Im afraid something is wrong. Ive never felt this befor- ah!" you whine and hunch in pain as tae holds onto your hand and whispers soft words, promising he is driving as quick as he can.

Once he had helped you into the hospital, the doctor made him wait in the waiting room until they figured out what was the issue. Half an hour of leg bouncing, lip picking, and deep breathing later, a nurse finally stepped into the room to alert him of the situation. "Mr.Kim?" she asks, walking over as he sat up and nodded.

"ah, ok, So y/n is perfectly healthy and ok" she smiles and sits, "what she was feeling, is what the medical industry call 'braxton hicks', they are completely normal, its basically the body preparing itself for when the labor does in fact come." she adds, watching tae instantly relax upon hearing this. "I know its scary for a lot of first time parents but she and baby are in good health"

"thank god" he exhales and follows her back into the hall as he meets up with you again.

"Baby already causing problems for mommy huh?" he jokes and kisses your head, making you giggle and reach for his hand. "Did she tell you?" you ask

"mhm, nothing to worry about."

"kinda scary, if pre-labor feels that bad....then how is real labor gonna feel" you sigh, trying to avoid the thought despite the fact the baby needs to get out one way or another in just a few months.

"hey, look at me" he smiled, "everything will be ok, im right here" he squeezed your hand and leaned to kiss you softly, making you feel better already.

"I know, thank you"

Once you had fallen asleep, taehyung sat at the tiny desk across the room and began to film himself. "Hi ladybug, we are at the hospital because we thought you were making your grand entrance a month and a half early" he laughs quietly "but no, thank god. just stay in there and keep growing, you will meet us eventually" he smiled, "we love you"

--

march 3rd, 2022.

2:23 pm

You and taehyung had been adding the finishing touches onto the nursery, placing soft little blankets and bedding into the crib taehyung put together. "I like the colors, I think baby will like it" he spoke, adjusting the drawer and adding some more things into the hospital bag.

You were 9 months pregnant at this point, and there was nothing you hated more than moving. you sat in the rocking chair and nodded, watching your husband clean and organize. "hm what about this?" he asks, holding up a onesie that had pink ruffles. "are we bringing this"

"yeah" you smiled and ran your hand over your stomach

"ok" he put it into the bag and zipped it up, placing it by the door.

"Ok, I say we go get some lunch now. Let me help you get downstairs" taehyung smiled and reached out to hold your hands. You groaned and stood to your feet, wanting to just put all your weight against him. "you ok my love?" he coos

"mhm"

He began bringing you down the stairs and into the kitchen when you suddenly gasped, leaning against the back of the couch. "what??" he turned, watching your face turn to horror as you looked down. "I think....my water broke" you yelp in pain as a sudden sharp cramp covers your abdomen. "fuck, ok it hurts" you grasp onto his arms.

"ok, ok, uhm, well, well we need to go to the hospital now" Tae rambled, looking down at the small puddle, unsure where to go as he didnt want to leave you. "Go get the bags please, hurry up" you whisper as you rely on the support of the couch to keep you up.

Taehyung had ran quickly upstairs, nerves fueling his body but yet a smile creeped onto his face. His baby was finally coming, after all of these months, all of these moments, from when you told both of your families, to your baby shower, ultrasounds, shopping...its all coming together right now.

On his way back to you, he grabbed his phone and mindlessly began to film. "no time to talk, apparently you chose lunchtime to come greet us" he laughed and held the phone into his pocket as he came into the living room.

"tae it really fucking hurts" you cry, reaching for him again as he puts a coat over you. "I know sweetheart, its gonna be okay. We are gonna meet our little ladybug soon" he whispers, helping you stand on your own. "we are, huh" you breathe out, sudden excitement filling you.

"we are, time to officially be parents" he smiled and brought the bags into the car before helping you into the passenger seat. "I called Jin, hes coming to watch yeontan" he mumbled as he tried not to speed down the street as your groans became louder.

"hmmph, shit" you gripped the headrest of your seat as you tried not to cry, squeezing taes hand. "sorry if im hurting you"

Taehyung laughed, "its okay sweetheart, just breathe and focus on baby." he assured.

And thats what you did for the next 7 hours

-

"Hello my little ladybug" taehyung held his camera up to his newborn daughter as she laid against your bare chest. You were sweaty, tired, sore and ready to sleep for months, but you couldn't help but want to capture every moment with your new little family. "We waited so long for you, our sweet girl" he spoke, voice cracking as his hand reached out to hold hers, tiny fingers wrapping around just his one. Your eyes grew wet as you looked at him. "We are parents" you whispered, kissing your daughters head.

"you did such a good job, you are so fucking strong" he kissed you softly before turning his camera off, focusing all on you both.

"I cant wait to show her off to everyone, and spoil her" he added, watching her wide eyes look over at him.

"shes gonna be a very happy little girl" you smiled, watching the sweet interaction. between the two of them. "here, hold her again" you insisted as tae helped you sit up, taking the small newborn out of your arms gently.

"hi" he whispered, listening to her little coo's. He looked at her like she was his whole world. He never knew he needed anything more in his life after he married you, but now he can say with honesty and pride, he feels even more complete.

His wife, daughter, tannie and him.

His little place in the universe.