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neowinestainedress · 4 months ago

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wave | lee donghyuck (part two)

part 1 | masterpost | full fic not split in two

pairing: lee donghyuck x fem reader genre: college au, academics rivals to lovers, kinda fake dating, forced to work together on a project, smut, fluff, humor (idk), music major!haechan, music major!mc | not really requested but thank you 💌 anon for the inspo summary: your indifference toward Lee Donghyuck, also known as Haechan, becomes rivalry when he decides to sabotage you. The battle turns into a war, the war turns into a plan, and the plan, well, the plan fails miserably... or succeeds wonderfully. After all, it’s all about points of view. Or, Haechan thinks he found a way to distract you and be better than you, but doesn’t think it thoroughly and screws it up. warnings: smut, weed/alcool consumption, thigh riding, oral (receiving, giving), unprotected sex, teasing, etc | inclusivity notes: reader wears different hairstyles (no mention of texture, type and color), no mention of body type (but haechan lifts her a few times), no mention of skin color, no use of y/n wc: 20.3k (out of 42k)

a/n: here’s the second part. please if you liked it leave feedback (comments, reblogs, asks), i love knowing your opinions and it keeps me motivated to keep posting my writing. enjoy!

After too many dates, too many studying sessions together, and in general too much time spent together —even with his group of friends— you feel like this is a relationship that simply hasn’t been named, yet. Something about everything doesn’t feel like just sex and hate.

You’re fine like this, for once believing you can let loose a little and still do well in your studies.

Haechan, instead, thinks his plan is going amazingly. He knows he has you distracted, he knows he takes away your time, and he knows everything is technically perfect. But the plan is not the best made of his life, and the more time passes, the more he forgets about it, and the more he thinks about you.

He never planned to use you, that had to be clear. He just wanted to distract you with sex —something you both wanted to have— and give you a boyfriend experience so you could write the song in the best way possible. But in doing all that, he is more caught up in you —and not only because of the plan, he is just caught up in you— than in his studies.

It’s nine pm on Sunday after he dropped you home around four pm this afternoon. He made you meet his girl friends too for lunch and then you went back to his place to stay together for a while. But even if you spent almost the entire day together, he still misses you.

He rolls on his back as he goes into his contacts to text you again, he doesn’t have to scroll down, you’re second on the list since he last annoyed you forty minutes ago but you still haven’t replied.

haechan: can you answer me?

haechan: i miss you : (

haechan: you didn’t even let me eat you out

haechan: you looked so pretty in that skirt i think it looks better with my head underneath it

haechan: fuck and now i’m hard thinking about you

mortal enemy: the only hard thing should be the books you should be studying on, remember we have a test tomorrow?

“Fuck,” he screams, sitting up. “What?”

He never forgets these things. He always writes them down in his agenda that he maniacally reads every day to make sure he’s always on time with his studying schedule. He can’t have forgotten about it. But, apparently, he did.

His thumb quickly wipes to call you and your answer doesn’t let him wait.

“I’m studying,” you huff annoyed as you pick up his phone call right away.

“Why would you go out with me if tomorrow we have a test?”

Your chuckle reaches his ear through the phone before he gets to hear your voice again. “Why not?”

“Don’t you want to be the top one? What about your grades? This adds up for the finals.” Panic fills his voice, he’s hoping you remembered just now and haven’t been studying since you went back, but you’re too relaxed for that to be true.

“Yeah, I know,” you reply, too calmly for his liking. Was his plan working? No, because you knew about it. And he completely erased the test, too busy thinking about you.

“And you go out?” He asks again as anxiety starts to take over him.

“Why would I lock myself up before a test? It’s not even that serious. There’s the topic you pick, and then like four questions that will surely be the main things we discussed in class, Professor Kim only knows one way of making tests.”

He groans, he can’t believe you’re always so ahead of him. “How do you know these things?”

“I use my brain,” you reply nonchalantly.

“So you started studying… when you got home?”

“Last week.”

“Last week? Are you kidding me?” He screams so loud that he’s sure you have to move the phone from your ear.

You sigh, rubbing your temples, Haechan knows it, you always do that when he pisses you off somehow. “You didn’t open the book at least once until now?”

“I…” I would usually read through the notes at least once a week, but I’ve been too busy. “I’ve… I read the notes, until some weeks ago. I got busy, okay?”

“Were you perhaps distracted by something Hyuck?” You ask teasingly, and he can see you twirl the end of your hair in your fingers while your tongue pokes at your cheek.

“Nothing distracts me,” he mutters, frowning even if you can’t see him.

“Then hang the call and try to read the notes at least, I’ll send you the recordings of the lessons, play them all night maybe something will stick to your brain.”

“Okay, bye. Wish me good luck, please,” he says, and you chuckle. “No seriously, don’t manifest against me, I need all your good energy.”

“I will, Hyuck. Just give it a quick read and then try to get as much sleep as possible. You have a brain and you’re smart with it, it’s better for you to be active tomorrow than force information that just won’t get in, alright?”

He hums, weirdly feeling a bit calmer at your words. “’kay, goodnight, babe.”

“Goodnight.”

Haechan sighs, slumping on the bed, boner long gone and anxiety on his chest, until the screen lights up again and a few messages from you show up.

mortal enemy: 10 audios + 10 files ‘music theory notes’ sent the audios anyway but my *perfect* notes should be enough to not make you pull up an all-nighter also don’t stress too much, I appreciate the act of chivalry to make me top this class grades again :;

He forgot about an exam, he didn’t study for it, yet he’s smiling like an idiot because of you.

Haechan’s screwed.

“So, how did it go?” You ask, blocking Haechan as soon as the bell rings and Professor Kim dismisses the class, letting you know the results will be in next week.

Haechan glares at you, and you suck your teeth. “Come on, it wasn’t that difficult,” you say, sitting on his desk, as he looks for something in his bag.

“I did great, I just don’t want to admit your notes are perfect and were enough to save my ass,” he says, and you can’t hold back the smile.

“You’re welcome,” you say, standing up and kicking him playfully with a swing of your hips.

“Hey! You could’ve made me fall,” he jokes, grabbing his bag before taking a step back so you can lead the way out of there. “And thank you.”

You chuckle, lowering your head to hide that dumb grin on your face. “You know, I wanted to ask you why we never revisited music theory but I thought you wanted to do it on your own, maybe you were scheming something against me.”

“What? I would never scheme against you,” he says as you start walking to lunch.

You stare at him with a raised brow, and he huffs. “It was in the past and you did it too. Also, what would I scheme?”

“I don’t know, maybe you sneaked into his office and stole the test to already know the answers?”

“That would be cheating, not beating you. There’s no fun in that,” he says, holding the door of the cafeteria open for you.

“You’re such a fair rival,” you joke as you head to the buffet to grab something to eat.

“Wait,” he stops you when your plates are full. “Why don’t you sit at our table? I hate seeing you eat alone.”

“Have you ever considered I can’t stand how loud your friends are?”

“Oh come on, you already deal with them when you come to my place.”

“Exactly.”

Haechan huffs, standing in front of you to stop you from going toward your table. “We can go to yours today.”

You furrow, lightly tilting your head to the side. “We don’t have anything to study.” You try to decipher his expression and think if you could get so distracted to forget something you had to work on or revisit. “The song?”

He shakes his head. “I might…” he pauses, trying to find a way to say what he wants to say that’s not so humiliating, but then he gives up with a heavy sigh that rolls from his lips. “Okay, I need help.”

“You?” You scream, attracting some attention on you, and Haechan glares at you, pulling you to the sides so that the curious gazes can linger away from you.

“Yes, me,” he replies through gritted teeth. “It’s just a small thing, but I don’t get it.”

You smirk smugly and he rolls his eyes. “Fine, I can’t wait to tutor you,” you reply, starting to walk to his group of friends’ table.

“Why can’t I ever win with you?” He whispers, shaking his head and following you.

You’re not sure Haechan told you the truth. He is smart but he isn’t the best actor ever, and when he came to your place to try to understand that small thing he didn’t understand in sociology, you were pretty sure it was just an excuse. You explained it in less than five minutes, he got it too quickly and immediately started messing around.

You don’t mind it, though. You enjoy spending some time with him. He’s a good distraction. Surely you would’ve fixed some notes or listened to some lessons instead of… well, instead of being on his lap with your fingers in his hair and his hands on your ass, grinding on him.

You hold in a moan when he concentrates on your neck, kissing, biting, and sucking the spot that makes you shiver. And you’d like to go on like this, but you need more. So you shift on top of his thigh, while yours presses against his hardening dick and makes him growl.

“What are you do—”

“Shh,” you shush him quickly, pressing your thumb on his lips before replacing it with your lips. “Ouch,” you gasp when he bites on your lower lip. “Why did you do that?”

Haechan chuckles, shrugging before leaning close to you again. “Why not?”

You frown but have no intention of carrying it any further. You can feel your panties stick to your skin and you just want to come, not really caring if it’s just like this.

But the moment of intimacy, if you could call it that, gets interrupted by the buzzing of his phone in his pocket.

“God, just answer,” you yell when Haechan ignores the third call but whoever is on the other line has no intention to stop trying.

Haechan rolls his eyes as his right hand leaves your ass to search through his pocket and huffs annoyed when he sees the name on the screen.

“Jaemin, what?” Haechan groans as you keep moving on his thighs, ignoring his deadly glare. “No, I’m busy.”

You faintly make out an angry reply from the other side, but you don’t care enough to understand what Jaemin’s saying.

“No, I can’t go out with you.”

“We can,” you reply loudly enough so that Jaemin can hear while Haechan scowls at you again, muttering a scold under his breath, but his anger is quickly addressed to his friend on the other side.

“Yes, I’m with her,” he huffs, rolling his head back, trying to stop your movements but failing. “Don’t ask questions. And yes, fine, fine.”

When he hangs the call after mumbling a quick, annoyed goodbye, you chuckle. “Thought you didn’t want to hear my annoying friends?” It’s all he asks, leaving a small, teasing slap on your asscheek.

“What were we supposed to do? Stay inside all day?”

“Yes, we have everything here,” he says, spreading his arms to point around. “And you’re still grinding on me.” He looks down, eyes narrowing as he stares at your hips.

“I’ll finish and then we’ll get out,” you wink, starting to move faster but he has no intention to get back into the mood, not yet, at least.

“You’ll stain my pants and where do I come?” He huffs, and you’re sure he’s trying to find an excuse to don’t go outside rather than one to don’t fuck with you. He would never say no to that, especially when you two are already in the middle of it.

“Take them off,” you urge, jumping off him, waiting for him to get undressed as you do the same, your panties the only thing staying on. “Come on. You don’t want to be late.”

Haechan groans, “you’re so… so greedy. You just want everything.”

“Yeah, am I allowed to have one flaw?” You bat your lashes at him, grinning when his eyes roll in the back of his head. “Oh, will I stain the underwear, too?” You ask when his lower half is completely bare to your eyes.

“Honey, I’m not coming inside my boxers, can’t wear your panties to hang out with the boys,” he says annoyed.

You chuckle, climbing on his thigh again, watching him whimper when your bare leg brushes against his dick and you press on him to be as close as you were before.

He doesn’t know why you didn’t take the panties off, but he knows he doesn’t want them there. He wants to feel you on his skin. As hot as this is, he wants to feel your pussy drip down his thigh, and your panties are stopping the full experience.

“Oh, for fuck’s sake, Donghyuck!” You scream when the sound of the fabric ripping hits your ears and the chill air of the room hits your warm core.

He groans. “It’s so hot when you say my real name with an angry tone, makes it hard to hold back fucking you.”

“You need to stop ripping my stuff,” you complain, trying to hide how hot you found that, the ripping of the panties and that fucking smirk on his face now that he lays back against the headboard of your bed, so proud and snotty that is hard for you to hold back fucking him.

“Shut up, you love it,” he says, pulling you into a rough kiss, pushing your body closer while his hand rests on your hips to guide you in the movements. “Also they weren’t a good pair, if you were in lingerie I would’ve asked you politely to take them off.”

“You will never see me in lingerie,” you retort, pulling away as your hand sneaks down and starts moving up and down on his throbbing cock.

“Fuck,” he groans, “at least warn me?”

“I’m half naked, grinding on top of you and I have to warn you when I grab your dick?” You ask. “If you don’t want, I won’t make you come.”

“No, just —fuck,” he glares at you when you concentrate on the tip, “don’t be a bitch.”

“Sorry, sorry,” you chuckle but still move your hand quickly, following the steady rhythm of your thighs. Your head rolls back when one of his hands creeps under your shirt and cups your boob, his thumb brushing against your hard, sensitive nipple.

Haechan sucks in a deep breath when your thighs start shaking around his and your cum drips down his thigh. “Fuck,” he moans, eyelids fluttering as he looks at you, head reclined back as you hold onto him with only one hand, the other still busy taking care of him. “This is so hot, you are so hot.”

The compliment pushes you closer to reaching your high and when he lifts your shirt to wrap his lips around your sensitive nipple, you lose it.

You whimper and quiver, hips moving messily as you keep riding your high, breath getting stuck in your throat when he accidentally bites you as his orgasm washes over him unexpectedly.

“Fuck, sorry,” he mumbles, and if you weren’t still so lost in your pleasure you would let him know you liked it.

When your hips still, and the dizzying sensation calms down, you lay your head against his shoulder for a while as his arms wrap around your waist.

“Can we stay in?” Haechan pouts when you try to get away from him, reaching for your hand to keep you next to him before he rolls over when you shake your head and jump off the bed. “Please.”

“We can’t always fuck and study and study and fuck,” you reply, cleaning yourself up, holding in a sigh when you realize he stained the cover of your bed with his cum.

“Who said I want to do either of those things?” He says, looking up at you with puppy eyes, pushing his lower lip out to pity you.

“I know you,” you reply, glaring at him before pulling your pants back on, not even caring about putting on another pair of underwear, you would’ve had to wash all those clothes anyway after taking a well-deserved shower, but for now you only had to pick some clothes to go out with the boys.

“No, let’s stay in and, I don’t know. Should we sing?” He proposes, jumping on his feet and putting his discarded underwear on.

You laugh, staring at him in shock. “You want to sing?”

“Yeah, you have a guitar, right?”

You nod, turning around the corner where your guitar is.

“Don’t you want to hear my angelic voice?”

You take a deep breath at his brag and then exhale loudly. “But Jaemin?”

“Fuck him, I don’t care,” he says while a small victory grin already starts widening on his face. He knows you’re about to give in.

You huff, rubbing your temples and giving up fighting him when his fingers are already typing on the phone to tell his friend you two can’t come anymore.

When he puts the phone away and smiles at you in anticipation, you sigh. You really are stuck with him, aren’t you?

“Why don’t we prepare biscuits?” You suggest. You wanted to bake something for a while now, but you never really find time to dedicate to the kitchen.

“Biscuits?”

You nod, stealing his sweatshirt to wear on top of your shirt before walking to the kitchen —that space you consider the kitchen.

“I’m a mess when it comes to cooking, you know, right?” He confesses as he leans against the countertop, watching you move around to grab all the ingredients and tools you need.

“You? Admitting you’re bad at something? To me?” You ask with a teasing tone, but you’re genuinely surprised he let you know without turning even this into a competition.

He fakes a laugh. “Very funny,” he says. “I just don’t want to hear you complain if I make some mistakes and ruin your perfect biscuits.”

You chuckle. “Can you weigh the ingredients and then put them all in a bowl?”

“All at the same time?”

You nod, handing him what he needs and showing him where the scale is. “Is not that hard, even you can do it. Plus, it will be another thing I teach you today,” you wink.

“Careful, baby. Don’t start thinking you’re so much better than me,” he says, starting to weigh the ingredients and putting them in each separate bowl.

You scoff. “Honey, I won’t start thinking that,” you say, resting your head on his shoulder, “I already think that.” You leave a teasing kiss on his cheek before he hits you with the flour and you gasp.

“Oh, no, we’re not doing that,” you warn, taking a step back, seeing how he’s ready with another handful of it.

“Then take it back,” he says nonchalantly.

“I never take back the truth —oh, Jesus Christ, Donghyuck!”

He laughs loudly, bending forward as he glances at you, flour on your face and well, his sweater. “Don’t call my name like that again, though. I won’t resist this time,” he says when he finally stands up and stands right in front of your face. “Now, will you take it back?”

“Never —Ah!” You scream when he lifts you up without a warning and sits you on the table before he starts tickling you. “No, no, please,” you babble, shaking your head and trying to stop his hands on you but he’s faster. “Okay, fine, I’m not better than you — I’m not better than you!”

“Good,” he says, stopping his torture and smiling proudly. “I love it when you listen,” he jokes, kissing you again.

You should hate it —or at least don’t like it so much— when he kisses you like this, out of nowhere, for no reason at all other than wanting to shut you up, or maybe to feel you. But you truly don’t mind. Actually, you lean in for another one, and another one and another… until you feel this is once again going in another direction and, as much as you’d love to indulge in the moment, you want to prepare those biscuits.

“Enough,” you say, pushing him away and jumping off the table. “No more food waste and we’re doing this together.”

You discover you and Haechan work better in the kitchen than in other fields, maybe because there’s no tension pushing you to do better but you are listening to each other, teaching tricks, and simply having fun. And this atmosphere stays with you even when he grabs the guitar and starts playing the tune of your song, you sing some bits of the lyrics and then jokily propose to add some about baking cookies on a cloudy spring afternoon, expecting him to laugh at it but he just smiles and tells you to go on. And you do, mumbling something about being in the kitchen, humming, baking, and laughing. You think it’s too cliché, and you will surely go back to it obsessively until it comes at you like you want it, but he loves it.

Then the oven rings, signalling the biscuits are ready and none of you can believe they came out good, nothing burned, and they’re tasty. Somehow, those cookies, feel like the biggest achievement you two ever made together.

“Maybe we should stop fighting each other,” he mumbles, after chewing his last bite. “We make a pretty great team.”

You smile, cleaning your lips with a napkin, crumbs falling on the table. “Hate to agree, but we do,” you say. “I mean… we kinda teamed up months ago, don’t you think so?”

“We want to kill each other, and you call that teaming up?”

“It’s our way of teaming up,” you reply, handing him a clean napkin so he can clean himself, and he takes it. “We just like to keep the flame alive, if we stopped bickering at all, it wouldn’t be so funny.”

Haechan shrugs, he guesses so. “Not like anybody else ever stood a chance with us on top.”

You chuckle. “Imagine if someone is using our rivalry to get to the top and we never noticed them.”

“Honey, trust me, I would’ve noticed.”

Once you’re done eating, you push him into the shower. There’s flour, and dough on all your clothes, and you still need to wash off the sex of before. You’d opt to shower separately but you’re tight on water and you have to make the best out of the confined space, reason why his plan to fuck another time fails.

“Why are you wearing my pink robe?” You turn around two seconds to grab the towel you prepared for him, and he betrays you. “This was for you,” you say, holding up the white towel as you stand there naked.

“I already put it on, it’s wet,” he says. “Come on, it’s pretty.”

“Yeah, that’s why is my favourite robe,” you pout, but still wrap the towel around you because you don’t want to freeze.

“I’ll make it up to you,” he says, and, before you can even think how, you don’t feel the ground under your feet anymore. Your arms immediately wrap around his shoulders for more safety as you let him carry you outside. You have no idea what is going on today, but you like this, how he’s taking care of you —in his way, of course— and how this feels good.

“You have to change it anyway,” he says when he drops you on the bed and, as soon as you open your mouth, he knows you’re about to complain about the wet towel on the dry covers. “I’ll help you change it later.”

While you change into your new clothes, your pink pyjamas with small black hearts as a pattern, you watch him walk around as if he’s so familiar with the place —not that it would take much for anyone to know where everything is, considering how small it is— but something about it makes a feeling of comfort and warmth spread in your heart. Nobody else had ever been inside that place.

But then you snap out of it and realize he’s naked, and his clothes are dirty, so you rush to the closet to find something to give him.

“So, mhh,” you say, making the things you grabbed fall in front of him, who’s sitting at the table. “I have those sweatpants and a sweater, or these pyjamas if you want it, it’s pink, but it doesn’t look like you care much,” you note, looking at how much he’s rocking your robe.

“Pink pjs! We’ll match,” he says, eyes lighting up as he wastes no moment getting out of the bathrobe.

“Out of the kitchen!”

“There’s not even a wall?”

“Still, get out,” you say, pushing him with force away from there. “Better.”

He rolls his eyes but still grabs the shirt and pulls it on him, blinking when he sees a pair of clean boxers. “Why do you have these?” He still studies them, thinking he has seen them before.

“Because they’re yours,” you say nonchalantly while fixing your hair in a braid.

“They’re mine? I left them here?”

“I might’ve accidentally dragged them with me once,” you confess, looking at him with a big, awkward smile.

“When?”

“When Jaemin almost pushed the door down and we had to rush to get dressed. I just stuffed everything in my bag and your underwear was next to mine so, ta-da,” you say, stretching your arms and shaking your hands to complete the sound effect.

Haechan sighs, nodding. “Of course, it must have been because of Jaemin, somehow.”

“Well, it turned out useful, just put them on. I don’t want to see your dick more than necessary.”

Haechan scoffs and bites back a comment as he finishes getting dressed. “You have to admit I look really good in pink.”

You look at him up and down while he twirls, and you smile. “You would be my favourite Barbie at the mall if they sold you in boxes.”

“God, you’re so annoying, can’t ever make normal compliments,” he complains. “Come on, help me with the bed. It won’t clean itself.”

Making the bed with him is tiresome. His weird way and theories about making it lead you two to bicker more than you should and remake it twice to see who is right —you, obviously. So, once you’re done with it, laying on it with him by your side, you know not even God himself will make you stand up to cook dinner. You don’t need to say a word, Haechan already has his phone out ready to order, and you couldn’t be happier.

You spend ten minutes deciding what movie to watch and another five bickering because you don’t want to eat on the bed, but he insists you won’t make a mess, and if you do, he will help you clean up. It ends with you giving up and the bell ringing with your order ready.

You never have nights like this. You always try to cook on your own and don’t waste money on eating out, and you also never finish the movie or the series you start, either too tired halfway or with something more important to care about, for example, some notes to copy, or lessons to listen.

But this is nice.

You two joke, laugh, eat, and then you start to feel the sleep take over you, and you don’t think about sending him home or falling asleep on the pillow.

And as you rest your head on his shoulder, Haechan’s more and more sure that his plan failed.

“You’re playing with me, right?” You ask when Haechan messes up for the nth time. The end of the year is approaching, and you two are getting ready for yet another test, the last before the finals, but right now he’s testing your patience not getting a single answer right. You’ve been stuck in his room for hours now.

“I wish I was, my brain is fried,” he huffs, throwing his head back on his chair.

You’re speechless and you shake your head. “It’s super easy, you were better than me in this class, what the fuck is wrong with you?” You snap.

“Hey! Why are you so pissed? Shouldn’t you be happy you’ll beat me even in this?”

“Be serious,” you say, sending him a deadly glare. “What are you thinking about?”

“I’m…” he huffs, shaking his head, and turning around in his chair to avoid you. “I’m just stressed for a lot of things. I’m tired, I didn’t sleep tonight.”

“You struggled even last week. And when the Professor asked you something in class you gave an answer that is just not you,” you say, cutting off his bullshit, grabbing the armrest of the chair, and forcing him to face you with a rough tug on the chair.

“There are too many things to remember,” he says, after frowning at how harsh you have been. “It’s not that I don’t know, it’s that I mess it all up.”

You sigh, rubbing your temples. “Do I have to motivate you?”

He lifts his head, staring at you with a furrow. “What do you mean?”

“Let’s play a game,” you say, sitting better on the chair, and Haechan gulps when doing so your skirt —short skirt, incredibly short skirt— rises. He will never tell you, but the way you show up on your dates is another reason why he can’t concentrate. It’s May, it’s so hot. It’s your excuse, but he would bet you’re also doing it to mess up with him.

“No,” he replies, already fearing your proposal.

“Why not? You didn’t hear it, yet.”

He sighs but signals you to go on with a quick movement of his fingers.

“So, we’ll revisit once again, I’ll try to explain all your doubts. Then, I’ll ask you a question, if you get it right, I’ll take off one piece of clothes, if you get it wrong, you’ll take off one, and vice versa.”

“How studying with you butt-naked would make me learn more things?” He almost screams in a high-pitched voice.

“See!” You say. “You’re already starting with the idea you’ll lose.”

“Because I can’t get anything in my brain, and if I get it right then you’ll have to take something off and all I’ll think about will be… you.” I already only think about you, he’d like to add, but that’s too humiliating. Just like the grin on your face. He hates how weak he is. He hates how easy it is for you to win battle after battle. And he hates even more that his plan is showing flaws with each passing day. He doesn’t want you to be his Waterloo, but he’s not sure he can come up with another strategy soon enough to beat you.

“Fine, then no study-strip-poker,” you give up, but the smug smirk on your face doesn’t drop when you start to think of something else that could motivate him, it only grows bigger when you finally get it. “If you answer right to at least ten of the fifteen questions, I’ll suck your dick.”

Haechan gulps. His eyes immediately fall on your lips as his brain starts to wander on lands he shouldn’t think about, not now at least, not when he has a bigger obstacle to face if he wants to get there.

“Hey,” you call his attention, snapping your fingers and waving them in front of his face. “It has to be motivation, not distraction. Do you want me?”

He huffs, throwing his head back. “Can’t we just fuck and then we’ll start again?” He pouts like he does every time he wants something from you.

“No,” you reply sternly, stealing his sweatshirt from his chair and putting it on you. “You don’t get the prize if you don’t win.”

“That’s not fair. And why are you covering up?”

“So you can’t distract yourself,” you say. You might like to tease him with more revealing clothes, but your intent is never to get him to be this distracted. You don’t want to be the reason he will fail this last test.

“You’re not my distraction,” he scoffs, diverting his gaze, and moving closer to his desk.

You decide to ignore him, you know the truth, and as much as the idea of him starting to lose because he’s too busy thinking of you, sends you on cloud nine, you also don’t want him to do terribly, especially in a class you know he loves and is good at.

“I know the theory,” he says, stopping you from going back to the start. “I wouldn’t be able to produce songs if I didn’t.”

“Yeah, but you just failed to explain how you create and add effects, and you forgot the basic difference between the dry sound and the wet sound, so revisiting some theory won’t hurt.”

Haechan sighs but soon gives up as you hand him your notes. He always thought you were crazy for also having printed pictures of how the software works but now that he needs it, he couldn’t be more grateful that you’re so precise with everything.

You start explaining things once again, cutting short about the most basic notions and diving deeper into the last lessons, as you try to stop as much as you can to make sure he’s still following you. And, after almost an hour, you’re done.

“What are you doing?” He asks when you take off his sweater again. “What about my concentration?”

“I needed your focus while I was explaining, now you have to answer even if you have distractions.”

He huffs loudly, throwing his head back. “But don’t play dirty, you can’t touch yourself or anything like that.”

“I’m not that cruel, I just want you to answer me,” you say. “So, let’s start with an easy one, should we?”

Haechan answers the first questions with ease, not like he usually would, but it’s still better than the mess of before. And he would be so close to getting the last one that keeps him on thin ice, he only got five wrong...

“No, no, no, please,” he begs, trying to stop you in place. “Please, give me one last chance. Ask me just one last question.”

“You got six wrong, babe,” you reply, loving how he’s almost on the verge of tears as his big brown eyes look up at you.

“But it was hard, I will never remember all the types of old reverbs unit,” he whines, coming closer to you.

“Then why do I?”

“Don’t lie, you don’t remember them either, I can’t even pronounce some of those names.”

You chuckle. “Oh, it’s really funny when the lack of a good fuck gets in your brain.” It’s not about sound design anymore. It’s about the desperation behind his eyes; knowing he wants you so much even if you’re the biggest reason for his despair gets your body hot and your pussy wet.

He groans, slumping back on his chair as he gives up on you. Or so he thinks because when he doesn’t pity you enough and you’re still packing your things to leave, he’s back again with his complaint.

“Please, one last chance? I didn’t mess the others up, I just made some tiny mistakes.”

“And you didn’t answer to two,” you say, ignoring him, trying to keep a serious face to not show your true emotions.

“Do I have to get on my knees?”

You snicker. “You look good on your knees,” you taunt but you don’t expect him to do that. “Get up!”

“Not until you give me another chance,” he retorts. “Please.”

You huff, rolling your eyes. “Fine, but just one.”

He nods enthusiastically, almost looking like a puppy being teased with a treat before he sits up in front of you.

“The differences, all the differences, between the shelving equalizer and the peaking equalizer.”

“Okay, I know this one, I know it,” he says before he starts explaining without missing a single detail. “So?” He asks with eyes full of hope as if he doesn’t know he just gave you a perfect answer.

“It was… great,” you tease him but you can’t keep a straight face when you see the pout on his face. “Kidding, kidding, you answered perfectly. So, I guess you deserve your prize.”

“Yes,” he screams, and in a second he throws himself on you but you shake your head and push him back on his chair. “What?”

“You sit there and let me handle this,” you say, placing your hands on his thighs. “Take them off,” you order, tilting your head to point at his grey pants. You see he’s confused about where you want this to go, but he obeys you anyway. “Everything,” you add when he’s still in his boxers. “Good boy, come here,” you say, patting your lap.

Haechan frowns. “You said you were going to suck me off.”

“I know, and have I ever break my promises?”

“I don’t know.”

“Just trust me and come here,” you order, waiting for him to follow. “Can’t believe you’ve been this hard all this time,” you say, wrapping your hand around his hard cock, starting to pump the pre-cum that leaked.

“You teased me,” he huffs, trying to keep his composure as he watches your hand moving on him delicately.

“I know, babe. I’m sorry,” you pout, one hand sneaking under his big white shirt to tease his nipples.

“Don’t,” he mutters, but you only laugh.

“Don’t, what? Let me take care of you, you’re stressed.”

He doesn’t reply, his head falls back as your movements on his dick quicken. He feels so small in your hold and he should find this more embarrassing but he doesn’t care. He loves the way your hand wanders delicately on his body and your lips leave pecks on his neck while the movements on his dick are fast enough to give him what he wants but not too fast to ruin this moment.

Your hands keep moving while your lips kiss his neck and jaw.

“Feels so good,” Donghyuck hums, shifting in your lap.

“I told you,” you chuckle, watching him roll his head back on your shoulder as his eyes close. “The others will hear you,” you say when his whimpers get louder.

“Don’t care,” he moans. “Feels too good.”

You smile and shrug. If he doesn't care, who are you to worry about it? It’s not like they don’t know what happens between you two.

So you quicken your hand, sliding up and down his sensitive dick so fast you make him tremble in your hold.

“You’re so cute like this, you know?” You say. “You look so small and delicate.” You expect him to get mad but instead, he moans and nods swiftly. And you know that stress got him good. Donghyuck, admitting to be vulnerable in your hands? You can only thank the weight the University is putting on his shoulders. But if that’s a way to make it go away, you can’t complain.

“I’m gonna — gonna come,” he whimpers when you start rubbing your thumb on his tip. “Fuck.”

You trap his scream with your other hand, staring at him as he slumps against you as his orgasm washes over him, squirting white strings of cum on your hand and his crumpled shirt.

“Get on the bed,” you urge while lifting the shirt off his body, leaving him naked. He barely has time to put himself together, but you don’t care and you know he needs more too.

“Don’t you think it’s a bit unfair that you’re still all dressed up?” He asks, still sitting on top of you.

“Do you want me to suck your dick, or do you want me to leave?” Is the only thing you have to say to make him obey with no more complaints. “Good. You should be thankful I gave you another chance. Right now you would be masturbating all alone and have no knowledge of sound design, so… what do we say?”

“What do you want me to say? You didn’t—”

“What do we say?” You shut him up, pulling his hair back harshly as your body weights on his lap, eliciting a broken groan.

“Tha — thank you,” he mumbles, cock throbbing right against your thigh. “Thank you but, please, do something, I’m… I need you.”

You snicker, letting go of his head and crawling back on the bed. “You’re so pathetic,” you mock, grabbing his dick again. “Begging on your knees just because you wanted my mouth.”

Haechan groans, throwing his head back but the harsh slap on his thigh makes him snap his eyes open.

“Why?” He squeaks.

“Eyes on me when I’m talking to you,” you order before lowering down so you can tease his tip with your tongue, making him bite back a loud moan.

“Please,” he pleads, and you finally give in. When you take him in your mouth, the broken breath that rolls from his lips makes your pussy clench around nothing.

“Shit,” he moans, fists clenching in the sheets as you suck harder, moving your head up and down in quick movements. He wants to look at you, knowing it will be even harder to not come on the spot, but he’s fighting with so many parts of him, he doesn’t know what to do.

When you pull away to look at him, he whines, hips bucking up in search of physical contact. You snicker, “and then I am the greedy one?”

“You’ve been teasing since you stepped inside the house,” he whines, trying to grab your hand but you don’t let him. “Come on, I’ve been good.”

It’s true, he has been good, but you don’t want him to come yet. “You can’t come, not yet.”

“Fine, just — just don’t tease me. Please,” he cries, begging you with his eyes.

You start taking care of him seriously; bobbing your head up and down while your hand wraps at his base to touch him where you can’t reach. Your movements are quick, but not too messy, since you’re trying to avoid creating a pool of spit and pre-cum all over his lap.

“Your mouth, fuck,” he groans, involuntarily fucking into your throat and uttering a slurred apology. “You’re just so good. God,” he curses, and you catch him rolling his eyes. “Even at — even at this you’re good.”

You snicker to yourself and keep focusing on his dick, heavy on your tongue as you suck with force.

You might be too good, cause it doesn’t take a lot for him to explode in your mouth; a brief warning for you to choose if you want to pull away and then the pleasure runs through his body for the second time.

You barely have time to clean your chin from the cum that dripped down that Haechan pulls you close to him, kissing you intensely while his hands are all over your body. “Want you, please, please fuck me,” he begs against your lips.

You slip out of your panties, quickly grabbing the base of his cock to line it with your soaked entrance because you can’t wait anymore.

“Oh, fuck, you’re so wet,” he hums when you sink, wrapping your hands around his shoulders.

“Want to take merits for this, too?”

“Well, yes,” he retorts. “Shit, don’t move, it’s not fair.”

“Everything is fair between us,” you say, starting to pick up a rhythm that makes him struggle to come up with a snarky reply. “Loss of words?”

He groans, throwing his head back and tightening the hold around your waist. “You can —mmph— you can talk all you want but —ugh— I am the reason why you’re soaked.” Somehow the way you’re bouncing on his dick it’s not enough to wipe away that smug smirk off his face, and you can’t stand it.

“Just shut the fuck up and enjoy this, will you?” You snap before kissing him roughly, cupping his chin with force before nibbling his lower lip, making him hiss. “I like it when you moan, so please, just fucking moan. The only words I want to hear are my name and begs.”

Your “threat” is effective because he doesn’t dare to open his mouth again.

“Good boy,” you praise without ever stopping to kiss him and moving your hips at a quick but regular speed.

You quickly realize that stress has gotten to you, too. You love to pretend it doesn’t affect you, and that you don’t need to let off steam, but you do. You are desperate to feel carefree for a few moments, put all the books and papers behind and have fun. And worst, you need him.

Donghyuck is what makes you feel good. It doesn’t matter if it’s mostly physical, he takes you to another world every time. He makes you feel wanted, he puts you through the test, but he makes everything worth it.

You’re so sure of it as you let your body crush against his, your fleshes meeting in a messed-up tangle of flaws. The kinds of flaws you both grew close enough to show each other.

In a few minutes, waves of pleasure hit you both and your bodies collapse into each other as you keep lazily riding that sensation; muscles on fire, lips meeting in messy kisses, moans panting the room, and your hands looking for each other.

When you lay on the bed side by side, you feel disconnected, and, truly, the only thing you’d like to do is to close your eyes and fall asleep, but your eyes fall on the clock against the wall and remind you why you went to his place.

“Five minutes and then we’re revisiting again,” you say, knowing the only way to get up is to say that thought out loud.

Donghyuck groans, pressing his face against you and mumbling, “can I eat you out if I make no mistakes this time?”

“We’ll see.”

You’re woken up in the middle of the night by the sound of the piano playing from the living room. The other side of the bed is empty, and the sheets are crumpled up, signalling you Haechan got up somewhere during the night.

You two went on a trip the whole weekend. Not like you had a choice when he passed by your place and told you to get in the car without giving you any information. You got mad at him when he told you it wasn’t a one-day thing, but you were too far from town to even think of going back. And even if initially you were angry because your plans for the weekend were different —studying all day for three days— your anger disappeared quickly.

This is the second night out; you spent the entire day wandering around a town you didn’t even know before and got closer to each other. You love the thrill with him, but you soon realize you also love it when there’s peace between you. It’s impossible for you to don’t bicker, but you learned how to balance everything. And the more you get to know him, the more you like him.

“Can’t sleep?” You ask, watching his features being lit up by the faint moonlight and a small lamp at the side of the piano. It’s an old one, almost left abandoned in the living room of the small, cheap house you’re staying in for the night.

Donghyuck shakes his head. “Got a tune I couldn’t get off my mind so… here we are.”

You smile, tucking a strand of hair behind your ear as you sit next to him. You don’t talk, you only watch his fingers move on the notes looking like ballet dancers. You’ve never seen him play the piano before, you weren’t even sure he could. But you’re amazed at how many things he’s talented at, the guitar, the piano, production, singing, dancing —and making your days less grey.

You don’t tell him, you only lean in, resting your head on his shoulder as he keeps playing the sweet melody.

“It’s…” he huffs, stopping for a second. “Doesn’t it sound messy?”

“Not at all,” you reply. “It sounds upbeat. Happy.”

“Out of all the ways you can describe music,” he chuckles, looking at you.

You look up, shrugging. “I’m describing how it’s making me feel.”

“Yeah? And what does it feel like?”

“Play it again,” you say, closing your eyes and letting the tune lull you. “It feels like spring. Like a field full of sunflowers, the ones you see at the side of the highway, passing by so fast before you can even get lost in their beauty.”

Haechan chuckles, holding back the big smile on his face. “It reminds me of those late summer evenings, when the heat dims a bit and the sky is pale pink and purple and blue, and time is frozen.”

“Yeah, when you’re ten and you don’t want summer to end because it means you have to go back to school,” you smile. “When you would stay out all day and come home with the smell of your favourite cake that your mom just baked.”

“Really? Your mom would bake that too?”

You nod. “Chocolate cake, basic and too messy for the heat of summer. But my mom loves me too much to don’t bake it for me, even if it’s 30° outside.”

Haechan chuckles, and his fingers start moving faster, starting the melody of what could be the chorus of the tune.

“In this part, it feels like a wave. I’m picturing running on the beach as the waves crash at your feet and the wind blows against your face.”

“Why are you smiling?” He asks.

You shake your head. “I — I can… it feels oddly romantic, a bit tormented, maybe confused, but in love,” you whisper. He gives you a weird look, and you’re not sure if it’s because you’re not using technical words to describe it or because you’re just weird. But there’s a reason you’re not being technical, you’re saying what it makes you feel, the vivid pictures in your mind. And, somehow, there’s you and him.

You two on the beach, walking on the sand before he starts running, teasing you to follow him. There’s the scent of the sea filling your nostrils and your lungs burning up as you reach him and then fall in his arms and feel your heart explode.

“It’s an unexpected feeling, something that wasn’t supposed to happen and then… changed everything. It’s thrilling. Scary, but satisfying.” You avoid his gaze but hear him hum in agreement, and wonder if he’s thinking the same, if he can feel this tension.

“So, something that sweeps everything like a wave,” he asks, and you nod. “Sunset,” he adds, smiling at you, slowing down the rhythm of his fingers. “I can also see the sunset colouring the scene. The kind that makes you look up and stare in awe like a child.”

“The one we saw yesterday,” you reply shyly. “It made your eyes look even more brown,” you confess, watching his cheeks tint up of rose.

“The kind that leaves you breathless,” he whispers. His fingers are still moving but they’re playing the same notes, he’s too busy staring into your eyes, leaning closer to you.

“And speechless.”

And a bit closer.

“And grateful you’re on earth.”

And closer.

You move back, coughing and lowering your head because you feel on fire. Is he making fun of you? Does he feel this? Why is he so confusing?

“It feels like a road trip with nowhere to go,” you say to fill the silence, and your words make him play again. “The calm while everything outside is falling apart.”

“Like running to your safe place?”

You nod. “It feels like… home.”

He smiles, looking in your direction while his fingers still play that sweet melody. “I always believed home is a person, even people, but not a place.”

You swallow, staring at his lips before your eyes meet his. “I’ve forgotten that feeling quite some time ago,” you whisper, feeling your head spin. You left home and never looked back, eager to chase your dreams, the ones you’ve been fighting hard to achieve since you were a child, but in that marathon to success, you’re starting to realize you lost something.

“You just need to find the right people, and then never let go.” He leans closer to you, hands falling from the piano as he leans in completely to trap your lips in a kiss. His hand cups your face while the other moves to the back of your neck, pulling you closer and moving his thumb in small circles. You feel like your lungs are on fire, and your legs are weak, but your heart never pumped harder than this. And when he slowly pulls away, you’re staring into each other’s eyes.

You know all the words to your song.

It’s true you’ve tried to avoid Donghyuck’s group of friends as much as you can —mostly to preserve your brain from early injuries— but it’s also true that the end of the second academic year is tearing you apart and you need to do something to don’t go insane.

So here you are, it’s Friday night, at their place, and you’re surrounded. Haechan has left you alone for a moment, busy talking with Mark. Jeno is trying to set up the table in the living room, while Renjun runs after him because ‘things are not perfect enough.’ Yangyang —no, he doesn’t live with them, but for some reason, he is always around— is in the kitchen doing only God knows what.

For your luck, you have Jaemin and the girls by your side. Ningning, who apparently has something going on with Mr Loverboy at your side. Yeri, who is there just to bully Haechan, Mark and Yangyang —an old tradition that goes on since high school, and you love her for that. And Minjeong, who’s the nicest and yet smartest person you know, you are relieved she is in creative writing with Jaemin. You met them all before, one of the thousand times Donghyuck dragged you around with him, and the four of you got along right away, quickly becoming friends.

“They’re so loud, I would have a constant headache living here,” Yeri huffs loudly, rolling her eyes and falling backwards in Ningning’s arms.

You raise a brow as a ‘told you’ moment.

“They’re not that bad usually,” Jaemin defends, looking at his friends, now all too interested in something that regards what they are supposed to eat.

“Pfft, please, Jaem,” you say, glaring at him.

“How would you know?” He says. “Oh, no, yes, actually you would, you’re always here.”

“See, so stop defending them,” you say before becoming aware of the three sets of eyes boring holes into you. You turn around meeting your three friends and lift a brow in a questing look.

“Why would you always be here?” Ningning teases, nudging you.

You roll your eyes. “Don’t wander too far with your brains. I’ve got a project with Hyuck.”

“Hyuck? You used to go around calling him by his stage name just a few months ago and now it’s Hyuck?” Yeri points out, smirking smugly.

You throw a pillow at her. “He’s always attached to my hip, of course, we got closer,” you explain, frowning.

“Sure, sure,” she laughs. “Not even the boys call him Hyuck.”

“They do,” you retort.

“Of course you know, you’re always here,” Minjeong giggles and you gasp.

“You traitor!” You say, grabbing her shoulders and shaking her as you both laugh.

“Move your asses over here, motherfuc—” Yangyang screams before Renjun slaps a hand on his face.

“I will kill you all one day,” Renjun says, storming into the kitchen to bring more drinks as you sit down around the table.

“Please leave us out of it,” Yeri screams loud enough so he can hear.

“Sure, you can even help me get it done if you want to,” he says, sitting between Jeno and Yangyang, handing the bottles around.

“I’m in,” the four of you say simultaneously, raising your hands and they all gasp as they glare at you.

“Guess we better sleep with our eyes open tonight,” Yangyang mutters.

“You should always sleep with one eye open,” Yeri threatens, smiling creepily.

You chuckle at their antics, but your attention is caught by Donghyuck who sits by your side. “Would you kill me?”

You smile, caressing his hand on his thigh. “Honey, what are you saying? You would be the first that has to go.”

The smile on his face drops and you laugh, turning to the table to grab something to eat.

“You know,” he whispers, leaning in so only you can hear, “no dick tonight.”

You lower your head, trying to hide the embarrassment, but then lift it up and shake it, fixing your hair behind your ear, and turning to him. “Not like something could’ve happened tonight anyway.”

“Period?”

“People,” you say and he chuckles, opening a can of beer before taking a sip.

“As if that ever stopped you.”

You roll your eyes, stealing the beer from his hand, “as if that ever stopped you.”

He smiles, resting his head on his palm as he looks at you. “You never said no, though.”

You wave him off, returning your attention to the table, but it doesn’t last much, they’re deep in a heated conversation and you’re missing something. “Why are they bickering… again?”

Haechan chuckles, shaking his head, grabbing a spring roll, dipping it in the soy sauce before taking a bite. You roll your eyes because you need to be updated right away but when you look at him munching happily you can’t hold back a smile.

“So,” he says, cleaning his lips after he swallowed, “Jeno wants Renjun for a project, but Renjun has war traumas of the last time they did a shooting together and doesn’t want to.”

You giggle, grabbing a spring roll too, and dipping it in the same small cup of Donghyuck, while you both pay attention to the conversation.

“But you’re perfect for it,” Jeno insists, shaking Renjun from his shoulders, not caring about the pissed-off expression of the older.

“I’m literally not, ask anybody else but me,” Renjun repeats, a deep crease visible on his forehead.

“But you look like an angel,” Jeno pouts, finally stopping his movements and batting his lashes to gain some pity.

“I might look like an angel, but I feel Satan rising in me every time you talk,” he says, making everybody laugh before he glances, and the room goes quiet.

“Come on, how bad can it be?” Minjeong says, and you see her shift closer to Mark, but you don’t say anything.

Renjun groans, throwing his head back. He can’t believe he might be convinced into this by the end of the night. “He’s too much of a perfectionist, and I’m not comfortable in front of the camera. Also, he’s not rich enough to have a studio and he always takes ages to put the light boxes in their place once he’s done.”

“Oh, I won’t annoy you, I promise,” Jeno begs again.

“We can rent a studio,” you say, all eyes on you. “I mean,” you cough, placing the small bite of the roll left on the plate in front of you, “me and Hyu— Donghyuck have to shoot the cover for the songwriting project, I don’t think we can wait any longer since we also have to record the song and then come up with an advertising strategy.”

“Then rent a studio?” Renjun says, coming out colder than he intends to. “No, wait, I just don’t get why you have to drag me in this.”

“Jeno proposed to be our photographer, but I doubt we can do it at home. And since we wouldn’t be paying for his job. Sorry,” you mouth quickly glancing at Jeno who shrugs and smiles at you. “We can at least put the money for the studio.”

“And where do I fit in this,” he cries, shoulders slumping as he knows there’s no way out of this, no matter what you say next.

“Well, since you pay the studio per hour, I don’t think Jeno will torture you much. He takes two hours with you and two hours with us and in a day, we are done. Also, if there are four of us, we can be quicker,” you finish explaining, hearing some hums of agreement from your other friends.

Jeno doesn’t say a word, he’s only smiling widely with his face close to Renjun’s as the latter regrets all the life choices that brought him here. “Fine, I’ll do it,” he exhales, groaning when Jeno hugs him and screams a cheer in his ear. “Step away before I change my mind,” he warns, slapping Jeno’s arm and glaring at him when he does as told.

Yeri sighs deeply at your side, rolling her eyes and muttering, “children.”

You chuckle, finishing your roll, and stealing Donghyuck’s beer again before talking to him. “So, I guess we’re almost done.”

“Almost done? You still didn’t show me the lyrics, have you even written them?”

“Hey,” you scold. “Are you doubting me?”

“I don’t know, last time I checked, you were the one struggling. I offered you four bases, and all the words I’ve read from you ended up crumpled in the bin.”

You sigh. “I’ve got the song,” you reassure him.

“Really?”

“Yeah, and I also picked the production. I mean, I… I wrote it because of that production.”

Haechan’s smirk widens when you start stuttering and looking away, trying to look unsuspicious in your friends’ eyes. “Really? And why are you shying away?”

You almost jump when you feel his hand on your thigh, resting on your bare skin under the skirt. “I’m not,” you whisper, trying to keep cool.

He snickers. “You know I’ll have to see it and you can’t keep it a secret from me, right?”

“I know, I don’t want it to be a secret. You’ll read it.”

He squeezes your thigh, and you glare at him. “Not now.”

“Right, later, under the cover when we’ll watch a movie,” he jokes.

Yeri coughs beside you and you see your entire life pass in front of your eyes, but you fake nonchalance and turn to her. “Need something? Some water?”

“Some tea, honey, some tea,” she says, raising a brow and pointing at the man at your side, now busy talking with Yangyang.

“I can make some.”

“Stop playing me,” she whispers, sending you a deadly glare. She can be scary at times, you’re not surprised the boys listen to her in the blink of an eye.

“He’s just being stupid, he flirts even with walls,” you say.

“Does he touch their thighs?”

“No, he’s not,” you say, only to gasp when she looks down and his hand is still on you. You push it away but he puts it right where it was and you can only sigh.

Yeri snickers. “Ah, l’amour.”

Your head rolls back as you let out an annoyed sigh. “Love my ass.”

Yeri shrugs, sipping from her small bottle of soju. “Don’t care, there’s still something going on, and I’m interested.”

“I’d love to mock you with somebody but you’re more closed than an unopened can of beans.”

“You are so bad with words. How do you write songs?”

“I don’t write about beans, clearly,” you say seriously before you both laugh.

“You two, mind to share what’s funny with the class?” Ningning calls you out.

“Sorry Professor Ning, we’ll be even more annoying next time,” Yeri retorts.

“Why do I feel you’re quoting something we can’t understand?” Renjun says.

“Because you’re right,” Yeri replies.

“Yesterday Yeri almost got us expelled,” Ningning says with a forced smile on her face, making you all gasp.

“What happened to sharing information?” Mark screams, leaning in with interest.

“Why do you care so much?” Yeri shrugs, grabbing a bowl of tteokbokki to eat.

“Mh, hello? You got your asses out of Uni,” Minjeong says.

Yeri only rolls her eyes, resting her head on Ningning. “If a tteokbokki falls on my clothes you’re dead,” the blonde-haired warns before bringing her gaze to all of you. “In her defense, it wasn’t her fault. Not at the start, at least.”

“No,” Yeri retorts, sitting up straight again, and placing the bowl on the table, “it wasn’t my fault, period.”

“Here she goes again,” Ningning sighs, puffing and shaking her head, making you chuckle. But Yeri is not paying her attention, too busy telling the facts right.

“Professor Choi hates us and treats us like kids. Not only his lessons are boring, and I would like to add, useless, but he also thinks we’re in kindergarten.”

“Did you fight with him?” Jeno questions, frowning, already fearing a positive answer.

Yeri gulps, looking around to take time to answer.

“Oh, God, tell me you didn’t,” you say, staring at her with a worried expression.

“He asked for blood,” she says, getting fired up.

“You fought a Professor?” Jaemin gasps loudly.

“She didn’t,” Ningning intervenes when Yeri is about to open her mouth again. “Just because I was there to babysit her, but she didn’t.”

“I didn’t come here to be treated like a child,” she says, crossing her arms on her chest. “We weren’t even being loud. We were sitting in the back of the class, minding our business and he called us out. There was a group of boys in the middle row watching fucking porn and he called us out.”

“Ew,” it comes out collectively.

“But unless the headphones weren’t connected how would he know?” Yangyang asks.

“I don’t care! He hates us,” she groans.

“So you decided to make him hate you even more? Smart move, Yerim, smart move,” Renjun says sarcastically, and she glares at him.

“I just decided to drag her out when things got a bit heated,” Ningning says.

“Not in a Beyonce way I guess,” Haechan jokes, and Yeri slaps him as you move back to give her space to hit him.

“Hey! Why are you helping her bully me?” He asks offended.

“Cause you deserve it?” You shrug.

Donghyuck looks around in disbelief, groaning when everybody agrees. “Fake ass friends, can’t even trust your own shadow in this group.”

“Back to what matters, safe to say you won’t pass the class,” Renjun says.

“We will, there’s only one lesson left, and we’ll pay attention,” Ningning says and Yeri raises her brows. “We will pay attention. He might hate us, but, you know, a bit of boot-licking and we’ll be fine.”

“Fine,” Yeri gives up. “But only because I don’t want to see him ever again.”

“We once fought so hard we got kicked out,” Haechan confesses, bringing the attention to him.

“You and?” Jeno asks.

“Dumbass, Miss Better than him, thought you heard them bicker every two seconds,” Renjun replies instead, pointing at you with his index finger.

“Hey!” You say. “I mean, thank you for acknowledging I’m better than him but it wasn’t so bad.”

“Oh, trust me, it was,” Mark comments before drinking his beer.

“And you were teaching us a lesson, uh?” Yeri teases, eyebrow raised at you two.

“We didn’t insult the Professor,” you explain. “We were just at each other’s throat.”

“Why?” Minjeong asks.

“Honestly? Can’t remember, we fight about everything,” Donghyuck replies.

“We don’t fight,” you clarify. “We discuss. And sometimes things take a bad turn. Not anymore, we learned how to survive with each other.”

“Oh, I’m sure,” giggles Yeri and you kick her knee with yours, making her groan.

Haechan sends you a look you ignore, and you go on explaining. “We were just stating our thoughts, but we weren’t exactly agreeing, and we couldn’t stop, so the Professor told us to take it somewhere else.”

“And you did? You simply could’ve stopped,” Renjun asks in disbelief. He can’t believe he thought you were normal.

“We had business to settle, okay?” You explain.

“Oh, and we sure did,” Haechan chuckles under his breath or so he thinks because the room goes quiet, and you think you want to strangle him.

You have to come up with something.

“You only won because I gave up,” you say, looking into his eyes, seeing the devilish glint behind, warning him to not say a word more.

“You always give up if there’s a prize you can take,” he clicks his tongue and you gulp.

“Oookay, weird tension in the room, it’s clear the only one not getting laid is me,” Yangyang cheers, bringing you two out of your competitive stare. You’d like to complain, saying it’s not what he thinks about, but you’re still stuck, brain busy thinking about something else.

“This night it’s boring, if we don’t do something funny, I’ll act out my plan of killing you all,” Renjun says, standing up.

“I still don’t know whether you’re joking or not,” Mark says.

“Because I’m not.”

“Caught you!”

“Hyuck!” You scream, turning around, holding a hand over your chest as his arms wrap around your waist and his chin rests on your shoulders. “You could’ve killed me.”

“You’re eating cake without me, that’s the crime,” he says, pulling your hand to his face to take a bite.

You roll your eyes. “Jaemin told me he had to store it away because Jeno and Minjeong were eating it all.”

“So, you were hiding, uhm?”

You hum, cutting another piece and diving it in two to give it to him. “He said I could eat it. Also, I think I had too much alcohol and I need to put something in my stomach.” You sit on the countertop and he takes his place between your legs.

“Am I allowed to eat it?”

“I guess so, I’ll take the blame if he says something,” you giggle.

“Don’t think he will notice, too busy dancing with somebody,” he says, hinting at Ningning.

“They look cute together,” you say, smiling fondly.

“Oh, they do. If only he could grow some balls and confess,” he says.

“Do you confess, Casanova?” You tease.

Donghyuck smirks. “How does it look like?”

You shrug. “Don’t know, you tell me.”

He rolls his eyes before he realizes you two are not together. “Wait, are we… no, never mind,” he says, pulling away, and turning to the door.

You grab his hand, stopping him. “What?”

“Jeno called,” he lies, trying to escape your hold.

“No, he didn’t. He’s sitting with Yangyang passing the blunt around,” you jump off the top and face him. “Are we?” You’re not sure what you expect him to say.

Donghyuck gulps, struggling to keep his eyes on you. “Are you fucking somebody else?”

Whatever you were expecting, that wasn’t it. “Are you?”

“I asked you first,” he retorts.

You blink. “Oh, really?

“Yeah, really.”

“Do I look like I know somebody else besides us?”

“Jeno likes you, and he told me you two are texting.”

“As friends, Hyuck. I already told him I’m taken — I’m not, I’m… I’m taken by other things in my mind. Uni, fighting you, especially fighting you.”

Donghyuck snickers, not really what he expected from you, but deep down —not even so deep, truly— what he wanted to hear. “Yeah, I agree, you’re taken, mostly by me.”

You’re about to retort but he slips from your hands too soon, leaving the small kitchen to reach the others. But you’re smiling. It’s a dumb, small smile that lights up your face in the dark of the night, and your heart pumps. You two didn’t name any of this, but —bickering aside— you objectively know you acted like a couple. It’s not about the sex, it’s about everything else. He started to pick you up before lessons so you could go to class together and sit next to each other —while he did everything he could to distract you. You ate at your friends’ table at lunch, went out for dates, and occasionally even slept over. You are taken and probably for longer than you even realise. Donghyuck started filling your days months ago, and even your life.

You’re still caught up in your thoughts that you don’t hear Ningning enter the kitchen.

“I spy with my little eyes something suspicious,” she sings while pouring herself a glass of water, leaning against the countertop where you were before.

“First Yeri, and now you?” You ask, a small smile curling your lips while you walk to lean next to her.

Ningning gasps offended. “She knew before me? Is this how you betray me? After I helped you style your hair?”

You laugh, resting your head on her shoulder, and inhaling deeply; she always smells nice. “I didn’t tell her,” you confess. “Honestly, I don’t even know myself.”

You can’t see her, but you know she’s smiling when her arms wrap around your body.

“So, what is that, love?”

You hum. “I don’t know what it is, but I know I like it.”

“I knew you were a romantic at heart,” she jokes, pulling away to squeeze your cheeks.

“I’m just happy. I don’t think I need to put a name on this… on this happiness.”

A big smile spreads on her face and her eyes crinkle, her hand softly caresses your cheeks. “It’s not only Donghyuck, is it?”

You nod, pressing your lips in a flat line because something about this feels too emotional for you. It’s 11 pm and there’s faint music playing in the living room while people laugh, and joke, sharing a blunt or bottles of alcohol. And you’re in the kitchen talking about a boy you want to kiss and strangle with who, you’re sure, can now consider your best friend. It’s the stupid fun of the early 20s. It’s the sense of something you’ve been missing for too long since you only let yourself be absorbed by your studies, leaving friendship behind.

And when a lonely tear rolls down your eyes, Ningning coos, gently wiping it away. “I’m happy,” you say, nodding.

“I know,” she replies, cupping your face.

“I’ve been on my own since I came here and I never regretted believing in my dreams even if it meant leaving the ones I loved the most behind, but now I realize what I’ve been missing,” you confess. “I love that they’re so loud they give me a headache.” You both chuckle and your hands intertwine. “And I love that we all sit together at lunch even if most of you have to run from the other side of the building. I love how none of you hesitated one moment to consider me part of your group.”

“I’m so happy you’re with us,” she says, smiling. “I guess Donghyuck does something right sometimes.”

You both laugh.

“Yeah, he definitely made my second year less boring than the first one,” you admit.

“Come here, I guess we both could use a hug,” she says, not giving you time to reply before you’re into her arms. You stay like this for a while, and you know more than before that this is what you missed the most. This is what college means. It isn’t in the loud parties, the sex, and the drugs, it’s in the people you do things with. Nine young people like you, trying to survive this craziness by being each other’s strength. You can still look at your goal right in the eye even if you have fun, even if you date, even if you have someone to walk down this road with.

“You know, I knew you were a good one when you slammed your fist on the table at lunch when he made you fuck up the essay,” Ningning confesses when you pull away.

You laugh, wiping away another tear. “I’m glad he did, I wouldn’t be here today if he didn’t.”

“You and Ning disappeared in the kitchen before,” Donghyuck says, searching in his closet to find something to make you wear for the night.

“Yeah, we talked about us. I know I might not show it, but I’m glad I found this,” you sigh. “I like them.”

Donghyuck smiles, sitting next to you. “They all like you just as much.”

“It’s like I finally have a place where I belong. I have people to rely on, so maybe I’ll learn to stop wanting to deal with everything by myself.”

“I told you life doesn’t have to be lonely,” he says. “I know that coming from me sounded like sabotage but I meant it. Having someone by your side makes everything easier.”

You smile and nod, grabbing the shirt he’s handing you. “I hate to say it, but you were right,” you chuckle. He doesn’t reply and you don’t drag the conversation, simply enjoying the thousands of words you two should be telling each other, but are not ready to face, yet.

“Can I use the bathroom? I need to freshen up a bit,” you say, breaking the comfortable silence. Most of the others are crushed in the living room, you think you saw Ningning sneak into Jaemin’s room but you were too caught up in Donghyuck to be sure of that, Renjun and Jeno might still be awake but you’re sure that all the weed they smoked won’t make them pay attention to you.

“Sure, if you need towels they’re in the cabinet under the sink,” he tells you, and soon you’re out of the room.

It doesn’t take you long to clean yourself up; you wash your face and steal someone’s products to get rid of your make-up, quickly get rid of your dress, put on some perfume —you’re pretty sure it’s Donghyuck’s cause you smell like him— and then wear the shirt he borrowed.

Once you’re done, you quickly make your way to the kitchen, and, passing in the living room, you see your assumptions are right; there’s no sight of the two love birds, and the only ones awake are Renjun, Jeno and Yeri, while the others are crushed on the sofa. You expect a remark from the girl, but she barely notices you, too busy playing —trying to— something with the other two.

After a few minutes, you’re back in Donghyuck’s room, and you notice he’s changed into something comfortable, too. He’s lost folding his clothes, and you let yourself get lost in his beauty. Too busy fighting him and trying to prove something, you realize you never noticed the smallest details that make him so handsome. The bridge of his nose, his soft lips, the moles on his cheek, his soft brown hair falling around his face.

“You alright?” His voice brings you out of your daydreams and you nod shyly, feeling embarrassed for being caught staring.

“Yeah, everything fine,” you reply, quickly walking to the bed. You see him staring at you with a confused expression, but avoid any awkward moment by reaching for your phone and pretending to be busy. But you’re not busy, you’re confused. You’re not used to this, any of this. Your nights have always been filled with yourself and books (whether for school or your entertainment), and if you felt wilder a movie, rare were the occasions when you would go out with your friends. And regret is creeping on your back. You feel like you lost a lot, you feel like you’ve punished yourself to get where you are now. And you think about love, how you treated your relationships, how little weight you gave them. And when you think about what you felt in these past months you wonder if you have ever even been in love.

“Remind me to never make you drink again if you get this sulky.” Once again, Donghyuck’s voice brings you back to earth, and when you turn toward that sound, you see he’s sitting next to you.

“I’m not sulky,” you chuckle. “I was just thinking about what I said before.”

He hums. “And?”

You shrug. “Nothing. You can’t change the past, I was just… having some bittersweet emotions.” It’s the truth, but you know that deep down your brain is trying to make you focus on the friendships because you don’t want to think about your biggest problem: the man you have by your side. This wasn’t supposed to be whatever it is. It wasn’t supposed to happen. And you don’t hate that it did, but you don’t know how to feel and act about it, cause you didn’t plan it. You couldn’t study this, you couldn’t put this on a PowerPoint and have it all laid out for you to understand it, it’s not logical, it’s not a theory, a study, a thesis, it’s emotion.

“You seemed happy before,” he whispers after a few minutes of silence passed. His hand gently rests on your stomach and you feel your heart race.

“I was,” you reply. “I am. I just wish I found this sooner, I always focused on my studies and career, and looking back at it now, it was lonely. And…” you sigh, rubbing the bridge of your nose, “I’m jealous of you, ‘cause you managed to be at the top with all of this.”

He chuckles, but it’s a tender sound, and then smiles at you. “Well… I managed until you came around. You…” he coughs, struggling to confess, “you distracted me a bit, so I think you’re better than me at this socializing and rocking your career at the same time thing.”

You laugh. “I distracted you?”

“Just a bit, don’t get too excited,” he warns, falling deeper into the mattress and laying in silence. You have your thoughts tormenting you, but for him, it’s no different. He knows his plan failed. You’ve been filling his thoughts, days and seconds for a few months now. Even when he was studying or recording, somehow, you were always there. At first, for spite, surely, but then, it turned into something else. Hate turned into teasing, teasing turned into lust, and lust turned into something more. He knows he doesn’t just simply want you or need you. He craves you and your company, your study sessions together, your smart talks, your witty words, your annoyed eye-roll when he’s right, and the soft eyes when you listen to him. He craves you and your laugh, the suppressed one during lessons and the loud one when you are alone, or your hidden smirk when he makes you smile even if you don’t want to.

He constantly comes back to you.

“Are you listening or are you avoiding me?” You ask when he doesn’t reply to your question and he shakes his head, mumbling an apology.

“Sorry, I was thinking.”

You chuckle. “It’s alright, it was a bitter question anyway.”

“No come on, ask me again.”

“It was just for fun. I wanted to know if I was the reason why you’ve been doing a bit worst than me lately,” you say. There’s no mockery in your tone, instead it’s light and hides a timid blush as the words roll down your tongue.

Donghyuck’s body shuffles next to yours and only then you realize how intimately close you are, with your legs almost intertwined, his hand still on your stomach and his face resting on your chest. “Well, yes, you were an unexpected presence in my life, so…”

“So…?” You laugh. “Am I so hot I got you horny all the time?” You joke but he doesn’t crack a smile, instead he furrows and stands up to sit on the bed with his arms crossed.

“I’m not that horny,” he murmurs.

Your body mirrors his, and then your hands lift his chin up. “Sorry, I was kidding. I didn’t mean to offend you. I just didn’t think you thought about me that much. I wanted to be on top but not like this.”

“Technically, you’re not on top of everything, but anyway, we just spent a lot of time together, you know? So different studying methods and so on, shocked me a bit.”

You raise a brow, not because you’re so pretentious to think you distracted him that much, but because you think you learned to read him a bit and he’s not being honest at all. “Sure, and you weren’t busy thinking of me after our… dates? Coming home and texting me, and telling me how you should’ve been between my thighs instead?”

He blushes, and you can’t believe your eyes. “It only happened once, and either way I never study at night, my pretty brain can’t handle it.”

You laugh. “Your brain is pretty, now?”

“Yeah, of course, everything about me is pretty.” He shrugs.

“You’re a bit of a liar, you know? First telling me I distracted you and then taking it back, but it’s alright, I think we settled this war. We’re equal now, right?”

“I guess you could say that.”

You huff rolling your eyes. “You’re so competitive, God.” You fall on the mattress again. “But maybe it’s good, we can keep this healthy and competitive.”

He hums, thinking about it and then nods. But you don’t expect him to cage you with his body as he sits on top of you and reduces the distance between you. “Doesn’t sound bad, we could try.”

You smile, trying to act nonchalantly, but it’s hard when he’s so close; hair a mess, face tired but still so fucking handsome, and plump lips so temptingly close to yours.

“I want you,” you whisper, looking straight into his eyes even if they make your knees buckle.

“I want you, too,” he replies before diving in and kissing you.

The last weeks before finals are hectic. You and Donghyuck spend all the time studying together. When you’re not locked in the library you’re either at your or his place, and most of the time you end up sleeping over with the excuse of “spending just a few minutes together without thinking about exams.”

Yet, none of you confess anything. Your relationship lingers in that limbo.

In all that chaos, what takes you more time is the songwriting project. You spend days in the studio to record and mix it. Then when you are done, you move to the studio with Jeno to shoot the concept photos. And it would been enough for the exam, but you and Donghyuck just have to go an extra mile, making an entire booklet with the photos and the lyrics inside, the physical CD with the track, the instrumental, and an acapella version.

Even if the shooting is long and tiring, since you have to style and do each other’s make-up, and the only help is from Renjun, you have a lot of fun.

If at the start you feel a bit insecure with the poses, Donghyuck is the perfect partner to have to feel at ease. And Jeno knows how to do his job, making you feel like a queen after the first awkward shots.

“I love how the photos turned out,” Jeno cheers happily on your way to their place. “The three of you are the perfect models. I will annoy you again to build my portfolio.”

Renjun rolls his eyes as his head slams against the bus window.

You chuckle. “Come on, Jun,” you say, pinching his cheek. “You had fun too, you can’t deny that. Also, you got so many beautiful photos for free, I wouldn’t complain.”

“Free? I’d like to remind you I helped you pay for the rent,” he retorts, sitting straight again. “But yeah, I had fun,” he admits, making Jeno clap happily. “But, I will do this again only if she comes with us.”

Jeno bats his eyes at you and you snicker. “Yes, if I am what he needs to be dragged into the studio, I will come with you.”

“I love you,” Jeno screams, hugging you tight. When you hug him back, you make eye contact with Donghyuck, but he swiftly turns his head. Not quick enough to hide he’s not enjoying this so much; jaw tense, fingers closing in a fist.

You find his jealousy of Jeno quite interesting. Even if it’s true you got very close to him, it’s hilarious how Donghyuck thinks anything would happen between you two when Jeno is clearly taken by someone else; someone too busy plotting his murder to realize his feelings, but that’s another matter.

And Donghyuck shows his jealousy even more when, once at home, you sit around the table to watch Jeno post-produce the photos and create the mock-up for the entire project with your supervision.

His arm wraps around your shoulder as he keeps his leg pressed against yours, and you have to hold back a chuckle. Yes, it’s obvious there’s nothing between you and Jeno, but this makes you feel wanted, and you let him show it.

You know you’ll have to deal with other menaces tomorrow; a hangout is already scheduled in the group chat with the girls after a quick text sent right away by Yeri. You love her, you do, but without that, maybe, just maybe, you wouldn’t have four other pairs of eyes set on you — Jaemin and Yangyang are very curious when they want to.

“Are you listening?” Jeno’s voice brings you out of your thoughts.

You blink twice and then mumble, “what?”

He shakes his head. “Do you like the font?”

“Oh,” you whisper. Your eyes adjust again on the screen that you were mindlessly staring at and focus on the project. “Yeah, I love it.”

“We were thinking of not putting our name on it since it’s more trendy lately,” Donghyuck says.

You nod. “Yeah, I think it’s better like this. I also love the picture, I think it would be more powerful without the name on it but we’re not that famous, yet,” you joke making them laugh.

“That’s why I didn’t make it too big, so the focus would be on you two.”

“Love it, that's perfect,” you praise. “Honestly, seeing it all almost done, I feel guilty for not giving you anything.”

Jeno shrugs. “It’s alright. I’m having fun doing this and can put it in my portfolio anyway. I did much worse and less fun for some courses.”

“We will offer you a dinner,” Donghyuck says. “Somewhere cheap, though.”

After a few hours, everything is almost done. Jeno still wants to double-check everything tomorrow before sending it to be printed but the final results won’t differ much.

“So, I think we should celebrate the project that brought you two so close,” Ningning says, winking at the last words, before raising an empty cup.

You chuckle, trying to escape Donghyuck’s hold, but it’s still firm on you. “It’s just a Uni project, there's nothing to celebrate.”

“Well, mine and Mark’s is not that good,” Yangyang snorts. “I don’t understand why you two always want to do so much extra work but whatever makes you happy.”

“We love the song,” Donghyuck replies. “And we’re proud of it so we might as well fool ourselves it might get more than 30 listens on SoundCloud.”

“For me,” Ningning says, “this is huge. One day you’ll be famous and we will get to say we were here from the start, so we need to treat ourselves and party.”

“Yes, let’s treat ourselves to the cheapest pizza on the block. Oh, how I love being an adult,” Yeri huffs, slumping on the couch. “No, but really, this is something to celebrate.” She then moves closer to you so that only you can hear. “And maybe if we get you drunk enough we’ll get juicy info before tomorrow.”

You roll your eyes and shake your head. “Fine, order these pizzas and let’s celebrate.”

The girls don’t get you drunk enough to spill anything but get themselves drunk enough that Jaemin has to drive them back to their place. Truthfully there’s nothing to say anyway. You and Donghyuck still didn’t talk, you didn’t even have sex lately. Too busy with everything, that was the last of your thoughts. But you did sleep together and basically lived in symbiosis. So?

You should feel happy about this project. Academically it will be another success, and honestly, one of your best works so far. So why do you feel this emptiness in your chest now that you’re sitting on a chair in Donghyuck’s bedroom?

This is the end. Now nothing holds you two together, and you fear that what you built over these months might not be strong enough for you to still hang out with you. You wonder if this meant anything to him. Sure, he likes you, but how much? Sex means nothing, and even if said between the lines, he got you to try out romantic things to make you come up with the song. And he succeeded. You have the song, the lyrics you tried so hard to put down. Fake dates, fake flirts, fake everything, but everything you put down is real. And it’s terrifying.

So absorbed by your torments, you don’t see Donghyuck stare at you, standing in front of you changed into fresh clothes.

“Hey.” His voice makes you flinch in surprise and quickly look up at him. There’s a frown on his face. “What’s with that face?”

You shrug, diverting the eye contact.

“Are you not happy with the result?” Donghyuck asks, grabbing the closest chair so he can sit right in front of you.

“No, I love it. I loved everything so much and that’s why I’m sad.” There are many reasons why, and you’re not a master at dealing with too many emotions at once. Subjects? Books? Essays? Projects? They can fall and pile up on you and you won’t feel the weight of it. But real life? Feelings? Not where you excel.

“Cause you won’t have any excuses to spend time with me and see me?” He teases, chuckling. He’s still the same person you met one year ago but behind his playful voice and acts there’s something tender, at least you like to see it this way.

“Uhm, I hope we will keep seeing each other,” you confess shyly, doing everything in your power to not meet his warm gaze. His hands on his lap are a beautiful view now. “But no…”

His teasing smirk turns apprehensive. “Hey, what’s wrong?”

You shrug. This should be the easy thing to confess. A bit humiliating considering showing some weakness to him still feels like letting your mortal enemy pour salt in your open wounds, but you’re hiding more vulnerable things from him.

“Nothing but… I was so sure I didn’t want to be a singer, and I was more and more sure of working in Pr, and now… I don’t know. I loved writing the song, like I always do, but this time felt different, as if… that’s what I’m supposed to do in my life, you know?” You look up because even if you can’t take a mocking look you have to see his reaction.

He smiles, caressing your cheek. “I think you’re good at it so yeah, you should.”

You’re taken aback by that reply. Deep down you wanted him to shred your dreams cause you feel like all of this is insane, and if you have nobody supporting you maybe you won’t indulge in it. But it’s clear that Donghyuck is not an enemy anymore and has your back now.

“Yeah but… I loved singing and doing it with you. Being in the studio, recording, but even before when we were working on the melody and everything. And working on the concept? We did all that with just one song, can you imagine what working on an album feels like?”

He smiles and nods. “Well, yeah, I fantasized about it a lot, so yes. But why is it a problem? Why can’t you pick this as a career?”

You can see in his eyes that he’s confused. Not by your change of path, but by your sudden insecurity. Deep down you’re shocked by that too. You have changed goals a few times in your academic career but somehow this feels so different.

“Cause it’s rare to make it,” you mutter, nervously playing with your hands. Truth is, the chances of failure are so big, and you’re not sure you could take it. You and your perfectionism and your need to succeed on the first try.

“Can’t say you’re wrong, it’s hell out there, but… you’re good, and beautiful, and I’m sure that with your songwriting skills and your voice, someone will notice you.”

He had tried to make a name for himself longer than you, he knows it. During some vulnerable night conversation where you showed him your songs, he told you how many demos he had sent, and how hard he tried to build something at least on the socials. So you don’t care if his words are driven by sympathy, he could discourage you, but instead, he’s supportive, and that’s all you need.

“And what am I without your production? Will you be my Jack Antonoff?”

Donghyuck laughs. “I’d prefer to be your Aaron Dessner.”

“Yeah, fine. I like that Haechan,” you say, highlighting that name that now sounds foreign.

“I don’t want to hear that name roll from your lips anymore,” he chuckles and you hum laughing.

“Talking about lyrics,” he says after a few seconds, the phrase lingers in the air… “this song was interesting.”

“Interesting? What do you mean? Is it bad?” Your eyes widen and the anxiety that left you jumps at you again.

He shakes his head. “I said interesting, not bad. You should know the difference.”

“It’s not funny, interesting means nothing.”

He chuckles. “Some phrases are interesting… that’s it. They look familiar.”

You feel your body burn up in flames and you have to shift your gaze from him. You should’ve scrapped that, he isn’t dumb. (You believed he was up until two seconds ago, but apparently, he was just waiting for the right moment to trap you.)

“I wonder if something, or someone,” he winks, “inspired you.”

“The sea. When we went there together. The sea inspired me,” you whisper swiftly, nervously biting the inside of your cheek. “That’s why I called it wave.”

Donghyuck laughs. “I’m not talking about the title, and you know it,” he says, resting his hand on your knee. “Flow that I’ve never felt before? Meeting you through distinctive distraction is a miracle?”

“You told me you liked it,” you say, playing innocent.

He rolls his eyes. “I do. I love it, actually. I just wanted to analyse it with you.”

You gulp when his fingers start rubbing on your skin. “We should’ve done it before recording it, don’t you think?”

He clicks his tongue. “Nah, I want to do it now. I think I already know who inspired you.”

“The sea —”

“Drop it,” he retorts sternly, squeezing your knee. “I think our plan worked. Well, unless you found someone else who inspired you to write a love song.”

“It’s barely a love song,” you stutter, body heating up.

“Right, some lyrics felt sexy,” he giggles. “You’re such a master in holding me here and there and going up and up down and down again.”

You try to scoot away, but he blocks you by putting his feet under the leg of the chair. “So what? Also, you’re dirty-minded, that’s not what it means…”

He snickers, rubbing his thumb on your cheek. “Why are you so flustered then?”

“Cause you’re too close to me, I can barely breathe.”

“Mhh… it reminds me of something.”

You roll your head back and mutter a curse under your breath. “Isn’t it what you wanted? To inspire me? I did it. I romanticized everything and we got the song.”

“Romantized everything,” he hums. “In this wave called you that’s pushing in, I fall in love. You are the center of my heart. Feeling new, feel now. The wave that started because of you, babe. Dive into the world called you. Damn, your creativity is so good, you are talented.”

“Are you mocking me?”

“No, I…” he sighs annoyed. “If you wrote it down in a song, why can’t you say it to my face?”

You gulp. “I have nothing to tell you.”

He raises a brow. “So you’re still confused. Should I satisfy you to hear you say it?”

You hide your face in your hands and groan. “Fine,” you snap. “I — I wrote that about you. And I, God, this is humiliating. You heard the song, you sang it. Do you want me to say it out loud? Was that not enough?”

Donghyuck smiles, and, for a moment, you fear he will break into a mocking laugh, but instead, his smile gets bigger. “Yes, I knew it,” he screams.

“Oh… of course it’s funny to you, maybe this is what you wanted all along, make me fall in love and then make fun of me.”

“Fall in love?” He whispers, stopping in his tracks to look at you, and only then you realise you said it loud and clear. And it’s worse than saying it in a song. “You love me seriously? Like it’s not just attraction and maybe liking me?”

You feel like choking up on tears but try not to show it. “So you can laugh at me more?”

“Why would I laugh at you? I just want to know if what you feel is real,” he replies, and somehow he sounds even more annoyed than before.

You hum and nod, no words can leave your mouth.

“Did you really think I would use this against you? Don’t you trust me?”

“I — I… I don’t know, okay? I do, but also, this was… this was all fake, just to write that song and now it’s real. And it was never supposed to be real, and maybe you never wanted me, cause I’m not your type and you hated me and we both wanted this to be over and now I feel like I can barely breathe without you, and I know that in the song I said I would’ve left the decision in your hands but the idea of you not wanting me back makes me sick and I —”

Your words fall into a void as he kisses you with no hesitation. Hands cupping your wet face and holding the back of your neck to keep you close.

“You’re so fucking stupid. So, so smart and yet such an idiot when it comes to feelings,” he chuckles when he pulls away. ��You said I was an unexpected thing that completely changed your flow but do you have any idea of what you were to me? You ruined my second year,” he confesses, and your face quickly shifts into a worried expression, but he clears your doubts right away.

“I thought I could beat you, I thought I could have the upper hand and… you messed up my days and nights. I thought you couldn’t fill up so much of my time when I already had so many friends but, fuck, I was wrong. And instead of distracting you, I let you distract me.”

“But I — I didn’t plan it, I didn’t want to —”

His thumb shushes you as his eyes crease in a smile. “You didn’t do anything, I just miscalculated. I didn’t know the amazing person you are, and let jealousy consume me before love took its place without me even noticing.”

You almost gasp. “Love? So, you do love me back?”

He nods. “Strong word, I know. But goddam, you were ten times cheesier in the song.”

You laugh and he does the same.

“But I am hurt, though. I can’t believe you thought I was playing you.”

“What were the chances you were going to fall for me, too? Nobody ever falls for me.”

“Good thing you only needed me to fall for you,” he says, kissing you. “So… did you fall for me at the beach?”

“I was confused back then. I knew I felt something but I didn’t know what it was. I thought it was only attraction, but at the same time, I felt like I needed you, you know?”

“And to think I wasn’t even sure of taking you there,” he giggles.

“Really?”

He nods. “I wanted to study, I already felt like I was falling behind and I thought I could use those three days to catch up, but then you crossed my mind and I forgot about the rest.”

You look down to hide the big smile on your face. No, you’re not happy you almost made him fail his second year in this war, but you love knowing how much he cares about you. The old Donghyuck would’ve never confessed this, he would’ve never shown how weak you make him. But now he’s proudly telling you how you genuinely occupied his thoughts.

“I know I didn’t show signs of failure, but you did succeed in your plan just a bit.”

He snorts. “Don’t need fools gold.”

“No, I’m serious. I mean, maybe you’re right, you didn’t, but I think you succeeded in something better. You showed me I can achieve my academic goals and still live life. You showed me so much. I had fun on my own, and I loved it, but I also only had myself and nobody to count on, and that sucks.”

“I didn’t do it.”

“Yes you did, you pushed me out of my comfort zone and trust me, I did panic sometimes. I just hide it better. But you gave me the chance to meet seven amazing people allowing me in your friend’s group. Some of you have known each other for so long, that’s probably when I should’ve put my heart at ease and realised you truly cared about me.”

“You fail to understand how likeable you are. Everybody loves you, you just don’t pay them attention.”

You shrug. He’s probably right. You never cared about that, but you won’t start caring about it now. You found your people, you found your place.

Staying at his place for the night is tempting, but, truth be told, you two want to be on your own on your first night as lovers. So, with the excuse of wanting to eat an ice cream (not an excuse, you will eat ice cream), you slip out of the place.

The others don’t care. Honestly, it’s clear that everyone except you two was expecting this ending, but you will deal with this tomorrow at lunch with the girls. For now, you chuckle at Jeno’s wink before he rests his head on Renjun’s shoulder again, who barely waves goodbye before going back to the movie they’re watching. Mark seems to be the only one confused at the way your arms are linked when you walk through the living room, but you’re sure that Yangyang, who has a teasing smirk on his face, will fill him in as soon as you’re out of the door. Jaemin will sneak at the girls’ hang-out tomorrow, his face lets it all known.

“I love this place,” Donghyuck says when you enter your apartment.

“Really? This hole?” You chuckle, leaving your bag at the door and getting rid of your shoes.

He nods. “It’s cosy and quiet, and I get to have you all to myself.” Before he finishes the phrases he pulls you in his hold, almost making you lose your balance and you scold him.

“Can you be less clumsy?”

“Mhh... no.”

“Also, it’s not like not being alone ever stopped you from being the clingiest man on earth.”

He huffs, throwing his head back as he slowly starts walking backwards to reach the bed. “As if you don’t like it.”

“You got us many suspicious looks,” you complain.

“Girl, everybody knew about us,” he says, falling on the bed with you. “I fear they were betting on a situationship but well, we didn’t do anything to keep this on the low.”

You shrug. “Whatever,” you say, caressing his face to move the hair on his eyes. “I don’t care. Tonight I just want to think about us.”

“Now you’re talking,” he hums happily. “Can I get a chocolate-less kiss?”

You laugh. “You can get all the kisses you want.”

Your lips connect to his to start a sweet kiss that lasts for a while. You never truly pull away as your hands start moving on each other to get rid of the clothes and leave you half-naked on the bed.

“Wanna taste you,” he murmurs, rolling around so your back is on the mattress before he starts going down. His fingers hook with the band of your panties and pull them down. “A bush?”

You huff. “I was just a bit busy, and didn’t have time to shave.”

“Good. I hope you don’t find time to do it ever again,” he says making you laugh.

“You like it?” You ask.

“I love it,” he replies.

You don’t have time to react because his lips are on you as soon as he's done talking. Your hips buck up and you fail to hold back the moans.

Donghyuck takes his sweet time, licking up stripes to get you wet before he starts sucking on your hardening clit.

Your head rolls back against the pillow and your hands can’t help but tangle in his hair to pull him closer. The groan of pleasure that comes out of his mouth at your gesture makes you tremble.

“So fucking sweet for me,” he mumbles against you. “My sweet girl.”

A dumb grin curls your lips and your eyes try to open to get a glimpse of him. You regret that action cause his pretty face smashed against you as he eats you out as if you're his last meal sends shivers straight to your core.

“Please,” you whimper, making him open his eyes to stare at you. Your throat tightens and you feel like you might pass out from that, but still force yourself to finish the phrase. “Don’t stop, you’re so good. I — I never felt like this.”

He grins, pulling away only to reply. “Yeah? Am I that good?”

You groan. He’s still so competitive and always has to prove a point. But you don’t care. That’s fun. That’s what you love about him. “Yes, you’re that good. Just please, keep doing it.”

“Never planned of stopping.”

When his mouth starts moving on you again you see stars. Your neck falls behind, enjoy the softness of the pillow, and you stop trying to keep it together, moaning loudly and chanting his name.

His hands wrap around your thighs, keeping you close to his mouth. And each flick of his tongue pushes the climax closer, making you see stars.

Your breath gets messier as you hit your peak and pleasure takes over your body as you let go to that blissful sensation running inside you.

You’re still gasping for air when you feel his fingers prodding at your entrance, slowly entering you.

“Hyuck, what are you—?”

“I want you to be ready for me,” he says. “I won't make you come another time, I promise. Just getting you wetter.”

You mumble a sound that makes no sense before you decide to relax and enjoy the sensation. It’s not like you would ever complain about his fingers, you simply don’t want to be too sensitive already. But he’s true to his words, his two fingers fuck into you, curling up right on your sweet spot, turning you on more and coating them white.

“Always so good for me,” he praises when he pulls out, sucking them harshly before he leans in to kiss you. Your hands wrap in his hair as you pull him closer, letting your legs wrap around his waist to pull him down. “Damn, calm down,” he chuckles close to your lips. “I’m not going anywhere.”

“I know, but I want you close.”

Donghyuck smiles. “Unhook your legs for a moment and I’ll be as close as possible.”

Reluctantly, you do as ordered, knowing that as soon as he’ll slip in, your legs will be exactly in the same place.

You barely pay attention when he does, too focused on the gentle kisses he's leaving on the crown of your head, cheeks and neck. Your eyes only open when he bottoms in and brings your legs around himself.

“Happy now?” He asks, brushing behind a few strands of hair that fell on your face.

“More than happy,” you reply smiling. Your body moves on its own when your hips buck up against him, eliciting a deep moan to slip past his lips.

That’s the sign he needs to know he can start moving. One hand places on your waist to keep you in place and the other supports his body as he starts dragging his hips out.

You can feel your heart skip a beat when he leans down and hides in the crook of your neck, inhaling deeply. “You always smell so good, that’s what tricked me to always be close to you,” he mumbles, nibbling your skin.

You chuckle, shaking your head. Even now he has something to say. Still, his words don’t distract him from his actions. With each stroke, he hits deep inside of you, hitting sensitive spots that make your toes curl and your fingers close into fists on the sheets.

After finding the perfect angle, Donghyuck starts speeding up, his thrusts not harsh but fast enough to build up a steady rhythm. And, with each one, you feel a wave of pleasure invading you.

“Come here,” you whisper, cupping his face to pull him close. “Wanna kiss you.” Your lips are on his right away and you both let go to a long passionate kiss as the hold of your legs around his waist tightens. One hand leaves his face to run on his back, feeling his muscles flex.

Your moans get louder with every passing second but they end up muffled in the messy kiss you’re still sharing.

When his hand sneaks between your bodies, so he can touch your clit in quick circular motions, you know you won’t last much longer. Your walls clench hard around him, and more wetness coats him as your hips buck up for more friction. And the last drop comes from his lips, leaving yours to wrap around your sensitive nipples.

“Hyuck,” your voice trembles as you call for him. Pleading eyes looking up at him. You should say something sex-related, maybe praise how good he’s making you feel, or how close you are, but even if those are the thoughts on the tip of your tongue, the words that come out are completely different. “I love you,” you whisper in a hush, feeling the weight disappear from your chest. Saying it clearly is like finally coming to the real realization.

Donghyuck smiles, kissing you repeatedly on the lips. “I love you, too.”

And soon after, you both reach your peak. The pleasure shoots through your bodies like fireworks in the sky.

You stay like that for a few minutes, kissing each other as you wait for your bodies to calm down.

When he slips out of you gently, putting his shirt under your body to avoid a mess, you still have a dumb, but content, smile on your face.

You don’t have the energy to move, so you lay there as you watch him move around to grab new clothes and two glasses of water. Just the time to pull yourself together, and you’re once again under the bedsheets, cuddled up against each other. You relax at the feeling of his fingers rubbing circles on the back of your neck and let his heartbeat be a sweet melody.

Mamma Mia is playing on the TV, but none of you has much energy to sing along to ABBA’s songs —he has a bit more than you as he hums the words.

When he chuckles, you look up at him.

“What’s so funny?” You ask, staring at the tv with a frown on your face. The SOS scene not being exactly one of the funniest one.

“I was thinking about us,” he says.

“I do hope we won’t end up like this.”

“Yeah, no, but you ended up being my Waterloo, I guess,” he whispers, looking at you. And then you get it, remembering when he sang it to you.

“I told you,” you reply, making him gasp offended. “What? You expected me to say something nice? You mocked me, you bragged and I cursed you with eternal love for me.”

Donghyuck laughs and then wraps his arms around you to pull you flatter against him, resting his chin on your head.

“You know this doesn’t mean I’ll stop trying to beat you, right?” He chuckles, but when you lift your gaze, getting a glimpse of him, you see his serious expression. And you hope he's true to his intention and that that spark set by your ambition will never die.

You smile smugly before relaxing against his warm embrace. “Yeah, but we’ll see if I’ll let you.”

YEARS LATER

“Is everything alright? Why are you looking at us like this?” You ask, shifting on your seat on the couch, looking at the girl in front of you.

“Is it true?”

“What?” Donghyuck says.

“Is it true that you two couldn’t stand each other?” She says, big brown eyes staring at you with curiosity.

You quirk a brow, giving your full attention to your daughter. “Why this sudden question?”

“Cause it’s embarrassing to see tweets of people going insane over you two, but also I think it’s unfair how these strangers seem to know more about my parents than me.”

You and Donghyuck laugh. “And what do they say?"

She rolls her eyes. “That they can’t believe you hated each other and that you started dating her to distract her but ended up falling for her?”

You look at each other smirking before a tender, nostalgic smile takes its place.

“Would it be so terrible?” He asks, tilting his head.

She thinks about it for a moment and then replies. “It would be a bit embarrassing for you, Dad. But also... cute. So?”

“I’d say it’s true,” he replies, shrugging.

“Wait, so you really started dating because you hated each other?” She screams, sitting straight on the loveseat, leaning toward you with her body.

You chuckle. “We didn’t hate each other. We believed we could outdo the other. And your father did too much, as always.”

“You were miserable before me,” Donghyuck replies, tightening his hold around your waist. “I had a plan, and it would’ve worked.”

You roll your eyes. “Imagine thinking you could make me fall in love and not fall in love with me,” you say to your daughter. “I was a real heartbreaker back then.”

“You still are,” she replies, smiling. “My friends go insane every time they realize who my parents are.”

Your daughter never brags about being your child. The famous singer, producer, and dancer Haechan, and you, who had a good launch as a singer before you realized that wasn’t your world and decided to stick to be a choreographer and PR manager (well, mostly Donghyuck’s choreographer and his manager). But everyone close to her knows who she is, and it’s not easy to act nonchalantly about it.

She has heard many stories about you two. The gossip about your story running wild since you broke into the industry. But you never sat down and explained it to her, not until now.

“We still have our charm,” Donghyuck laughs.

“I think the most important thing is your love and that you might be the best parents in the world. But I’m saying it officially only if you don’t turn it into a race.”

“Us? Turning something into a competition? We would never,” Donghyuck jokes.

She rolls her eyes, huffing loudly. And you can’t help but smile thinking how similar to your husband she looks right now.

“Honey, forgive us. How do you think we’re still having so much fun after all these years? That’s how we thrive, we learned how to push each other healthily.”

“Yeah, fine, I’m glad your love story is still perfect, but seriously, no competition when it comes to me. I love you both so much.”

“Come here,” you say, patting the space in front of you on the couch. Hugging her when she sits down between you two. “You are the only thing we won’t turn into a competition.”

Donghyuck hums in agreement, wrapping his arm around you two. “We both won with you.”

general taglist: @froggyforhyuck, @wingsss45, @tddyhyck, @technologyculturedneo

fic taglist: @hcluvie, @gusgus0517, @multifandomania, @413cl, @odgsuji,

@hey-hey-heybitch, @nctrawberries, @n0hyuck, @haechoshi,

@girlwholoveslpreppyattire, @viciousdarlings, @hyuckmoon,

@jaeymark, @hqech, @xntlax, @milkyway-vxm, @fullsunahceah,

@beomgyusonlywife, @toroufriteh, @yesohhsehun, @shxnz

@haecastor, @hyucksaint, @sk8ermark, @midnightrained

@maiteeeeesstuff, @smwhrinthehaze, @yoursyuno

#nct fanfiction #haechan smut #lee haechan smut #donghyuck smut #lee donghyuck smut #haechan fluff #lee haechan fluff #donghyuck fluff #nct smut #nct 127 smut #nct dream smut #haechan scenarios

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greenplumbboblover · 3 months ago

Text

WIP #1 - Stories Be Told

A mod that has arisen from playing TS2 and loving Stardew Valley! (and always wanting to get to know the townies a bit better :))

I know I haven't really replied too much on the post about the mod idea, but I had to figure out personally what to pick and how to even attempt this from a technical perspective.

I went through 5 adaptations, to eventually get to this result! :) So while most of it is definite, I'm still fine-tuning a lot (and writing the stories).

How does it work?

The mod comes with two ways to get to know your fellow townie! With townie, you have to understand that EA townies will have them. Newly generated townies will NOT have any stories.

🕵️‍♀️Secrets (aka, facts!)

Depending on your sim's Lifetime points (that red/green bar), and relationship status (friends, enemies, etc), you'll get to know more about them! Of course, if you're in the red, you might get some nasty comments!

The idea is that the better you get to know them, the more they open up. Just like real people! They all have their unique dialogue as well!

❤️ Heart Events ❤️

Inspired heavily by Stardew Valley's approach, as using the TS2's scripted events wasn't working technically speaking,

A heart event will trigger by itself with a Text message, just like getting an invitation for a party.

Let's have a look at one with Morgana's Heart events!

Morgana has sent a text message asking Christopher to come along to have dinner at her house. We could ignore it without any consequences... or go ahead and go anyway!

Your sim will automatically make their way to the place they are invited to go to! And Christopher just made it as well :)

(Not getting too much into spoilers here hehe) but eventually Thornton and Morgana end up in a fight.

What's cool is that certain heart events will want your input! Such as this one:

I'm still working on fixing the dialogue btw :p

Some of these will have pretty unpredictable outcomes, so be aware of that if you want your town to stay the same without any progression into a family's dilemma!

... and what's even better is that this all happened automatically!

Just like a scripted event, they ended up arguing where it made sense in the dialogue, moved to the kitchen to excuse themselves, and eventually asked the player to leave (of which the player did automatically!)

🛠 Info for World builders and Developers

What's even better is that you can make your stories yourself! While heart events will require you C#, the secrets will only require you the existing sim's Sim Id and some XML knowledge! :)

I'll make tutorials of course on how to make each, but I figured it would be good to add that this is all super flexible on making your own stories.

That's it! The mod is technically done from a technical perspective, but I still have loads of stories to write (I only finished Morgana's so far 😬), So any feedback at this point would be really appreciated so I can implement it before release! :)

I'll release it first with Stories for Sunset Valley first, then move on to twin brook, Bridgeport, etc.

#the sims 3 #sims 3 #the sims #ts3 #sims #ts3 simblr #sims 3 story #sims 3 gameplay #sims 3 simblr #sims 3 screenshots #wip #sims 3 wip

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lilahisntsadanymore · 11 months ago

Text

Blood status seems to become less important when you acknowledge the actual feeling of love. What will Theo do when Y/n comes to the terms with the differences between them being impossible to ignore?

Pairing: Theo Nott x granger!reader

Words count: 1.9k

Author's note: My apologies for keeping you waiting so long, but I finally got some time off at uni!! Wishing you all a good year!!

Kind of a 2nd part of this fic, but you can read it without the previous one

≫ ──── ««•◦ ✪ ◦•»» ──── ≪

Keep you safe

One evening, Theo was waiting in the library. Waiting for a person he never expected to talk to. Y/n Granger. He found himself feeling a bit nervous, even though there was no reason.

Thinking about Y/n made him feel something. A feeling he never felt before. Slughorn said it's love, the muggle kind of love, the purest form, not induced by anything supernatural.

Theo decided to read about it. Hoping to find some book about it, he asked the librarian. She gave him a book specifically about love potions and spells. One of the first chapters was just what Theo was looking for.

"How to tell the difference between love and infatuation caused by magic." He whispered the first sentence to himself.

He started reading, his mind realizing what he got himself into as his gaze brushed over the text. Well, technically it wasn't his own fault and apparently also not the girl's fault.

But there must've been a reason. If love was a part of biology, brain chemistry, there had to be some logical factor.

"What are you reading?"

When Theo heard Y/n's voice right next to him, he immediately closed the book, causing it to make a loud sound.

"You took such a long time I got bored." He replied.

"Don't be so shy," the girl shifted her eyes to the title of the book, "oh, love potions and spells? But we're doing something completely different."

"Really? I couldn't care less, forgot what we were supposed to do." Surely one thing he'd love to do was making out with her on that table.

Y/n put her homework on the table.

"Read it and tell me what's wrong."

"Nothing is wrong, I just-"

"What's wrong with my text, Nott. I didn't ask how you were doing."

"Right."

Theo took the papers and started reading. The text was written with the most beautiful handwriting he's ever seen. So elegant, so precise.

"How long did it take you to write?" He asked.

"One evening. It was easier than you'd think."

"I think it's extremely easy." He bragged. "Anyway, is that all? Or do you wanna add something?"

"Well, Slughorn thought it's necessary for you to help me. Is there anything you think should be added?"

"Uh, no, it looks fine," he mumbled, avoiding eye contact.

"Fine? Theodore Nott, the perfectionist Slytherin, settles for 'fine'? I expected more from you."

"Look, it's not my homework, it's yours. I don't know why I agreed to help you, but it was pointless."

"You got yourself into this, could've said no."

"What the fuck am I even doing?" Theo asked rather himself than the girl. "I don't need to be helping a mudblood, who cares what grade you'll get." With these words, he stood up.

"Because-" Y/n stuttered. "Because... I've heard your conversation with Slughorn. And you said... that you liked me."

"Me? Liking you?" He snorted with laughter. "What the hell, Granger?"

Tears formed in Y/n's eyes as she watched Theo walk away. Sure, he was mean to her before, this wasn't the first time. But this time was somehow different.

Y/n could swear she heard Theo confessing to Slughorn that he's actually in love with her. It's not possible her brain played tricks on her. Plus Hermione said Theo told her about his feelings for Y/n.

≫ ──── ««•◦ ✪ ◦•»» ──── ≪

Harry walked onto the astronomy tower. Y/n was supposed to be back a long time ago. Ron and Hermione also wanted to go there, but Harry asked to let him go alone.

Harry knew where Y/n was thanks to the Map. He felt such relief not seeing Nott's name next to hers. She was standing alone, leaning on the banister. There was something in her hand, Harry couldn't see well in the dark, but from the smell he realized it was a cigarette.

"I didn't know you smoke." He spoke.

Y/n expected this to happen, she was aware of Harry's feelings towards her. She took one last drag from her cigarette then dropped it on the ground, put it out with her shoe and kicked off the tower.

"Why do you keep doing this?" Y/n asked, smoke leaving through her mouth. "I knew you're gonna look at your silly little map to see where I am."

"We were starting to get worried. Theo is... you know, dangerous. We got scared he would hurt you."

And he did. Theo did hurt Y/n, just not physically.

"Hermione should be here instead. But, let me guess, you told her you'll check up on me."

"Maybe," Harry admitted finally, "do you know why? Because I actually care about you. I've had feelings for you for years. I deserve you, not Nott. I deserve you, because-"

"Because you're the chosen one?" She mocked and paused. "Look, Harry, I like you as a friend. I've never felt anything more than this. I can't change how I see you and I won't pretend otherwise."

He nodded, acceptance settling in. "I get it. I just... I thought if I cared enough, it would make a difference."

"Caring is important, Harry, but it doesn't always lead to the feelings we hope for."

"Whoever you date, just don't date Nott, please."

"I promise I won't. Not after today, I'm over him."

"Care to share what happened?"

"I'll tell you, Hermione and Ron in the common room. Let's go, I've been here too long."

≫ ──── ««•◦ ✪ ◦•»» ──── ≪

Y/n didn't even know how wrong she was that night on the astronomy tower, but she forgot about it. Weeks went by, Christmas had passed, everyone were back from the break. Classes started again and Y/n found herself hoping to catch a glimpse of Theo.

They kept exchanging glances on the corridors, accidentally bumping into each other in the crowds. Y/n wanted to believe Theo liked her, but even if he did, they could never work.

"Y/n, listen to me," he said, catching her when she was alone in the library one time. "I know how things have been between us, but during the break I... I realized I don't wanna keep being enemies."

"Theo, you know it could never work. You said what you said and maybe it's better to leave it this way."

"I contemplated a lot," it was true, he spent the break mostly in his room, drowning in thoughts. About her, about them, coming to terms with what he was feeling. "I decided to accept my feelings."

"That's great for you, but we could never work. I've always 'fancied' you, I guess, despite what you were doing, ironically, but the time we worked on my project together, I accepted we could never work."

"And why's that?"

Y/n took a deep breath, wondering if he was stupid or just pretending. Maybe it was a bet he had with someone. Maybe Draco dared him to do this.

"You don't see how different we are? What do you expect is gonna happen? Would you introduce me to your father? Wouldn't you care that I'd get you disowned?"

Theo looked at her, Y/n could see sadness in his eyes. She realized her words made him realize the differences between them, because he walked away. Theo walked away without a word.

Y/n pierced her own heart with an invisible knife. She was really hoping they could work, but it just wasn't possible in this universe. Maybe there was a universe where none of this purity bullshit didn't exist. Y/n wished she would've been born there.

Y/n couldn't predict what Theo was going to do. She thought her words made him give up on her. It was for the best, of course, she should've focused on her studies firstly, and then on a realistic relationship.

It was a Friday. Y/n was sitting next to Ginny by the Gryffindor table. It was dinner time, all the students gathered in the Great Hall. All the students besides one Slytherin, the one that Y/n hoped to see. Maybe it was weird, but she enjoyed the sad looks they'd pass to each other.

"Hey, Y/n, are you listening?" Hermione asked from across the table.

"Sure," Y/n quickly shifted her eyes to her sister. "You were talking about Defence Against the Dark Arts."

"You've got divided attention. Stop looking at the Slytherin table."

"Ugh," Ginny groaned, "were you doing this again? Merlin, you stare at this Slytherin git 90% of the time."

"Well, he isn't here today. I wonder where he could be. Everyone else is here."

"There he is," Ron pointed out, rolling his eyes.

The golden trio and two younger Gryffindors looked at the doors' direction. Theo had just walked into the Great Hall, but surprisingly he didn't walk towards his table. He walked towards Y/n.

"Y/n," he spoke, catching everyone's attention. People were reading to witness another argument. "I can't help this, I love you."

Shocked noises came from all the tables, but Slytherins kept whispering between each other also when Theo continued talking.

"I don't care what anyone says, anyone thinks. Love is not meant to be controlled, it kills me to fight it."

Y/n stood up from the table, ready to leave the room.

"Theo, stop," she begged, "you're embarrassing us both. Your friends will-"

"I don't care what they do. If they don't accept it, they're not my friends. If anyone wants to fight me for having feelings for a muggleborn, I can fight, I've never lost a duel."

The whole Great Hall fell silent, even the teachers didn't try to intervene, when they saw Theo pulling out a small, black velvet box.

"I want you to wear this ring," he opened the box, "as my promise to always protect you from whoever tries to harm you or our relationship."

"It's beautiful, but..." Y/n was speechless by the sight of the ring. It was silver with two gemstones forming a subtle heart - half emerald and half ruby.

"It was custom made and if you accept it, I'll once get you a matching engagement ring. Also, there are thorns which will hurt you when you try taking it off. I want you forever, Y/n Granger."

The ring in the black velvet box sparkled under the enchanted ceiling. The Great Hall remained in silence as Theo poured his heart out, confessing his love. The unexpected turn of events had everyone on edge.

Slytherins exchanged intrigued glances, Gryffindors shared confused looks and even the teachers seemed to not know how to react. Y/n could feel the weight of everyone's eyes on her, and for a moment, she considered the potential consequences of accepting Theo's proposal.

"Theo," she began, her voice breaking, "it's not that simple."

"I know it is. But I can't keep hiding my feelings, Y/n. I've tried, and it's tearing me apart. I'll protect you from whatever comes our way."

Y/n looked at the ring, then back at him. "I believe in second chances. And I appreciate your sincerity. I accept the ring, Theo."

Theo carefully took the ring from the box and gently slid it onto Y/n's finger. The Great Hall burst with cheering and applause, only the Slytherin table didn't seem so enthusiastic about this.

Theo placed his hands on Y/n's waist, pulling her in for a kiss. She didn't hesitate to kiss him back, her hands sinking in his dense her yet the ring on her finger still visible, reflecting the light from the ceiling.

#Theo Nott #theodore nott #slytherin boys #theodore nott x reader #theo nott x reader #harry potter x reader #harry potter fanfic #theo nott fanfic #Lorenzo Zurzolo

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the-real-couchrat · 1 month ago

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Post ending / rescue AU / recovering Curly is everything to me, so I’m making a list of other people’s posts that feature him. (The links will connect to a reblog of them in case anything ever happens to the original post)

If anyone ever see’s posts like these ones, PLEASE tag me in a reblog!! All posts are welcome, not just art!

Please note that I don’t decide what to add to this list based on shipping, opinions on the metaphors in the game, the accuracy of burn scars, the morality of Curly, or anything else that causes discourse in the fandom. I just add any posts that I come across that include Curly recovering from his injuries in any way. Prosthetics, wheelchair, wig, crutches, It just needs to have him in better shape than when he first got injured.

No NSFW

(Also this post is edited to add new ones when I find them)

Rehabilitated Curly

Party with no Jimmy

Stand around in medbay party (Idk if this counts, but he has prosthetics so I'm saying it does)

Happy abortion!

Post-ending speculation (text)

20 years later (I AM NOT WORTHY TO LOOK UPON THIS WITH MY MERE MORTAL EYES)

ANYA’S GRADUATION DAY

Post ending

Rescue/Recovery AU

My own post! (text)

Aftermath Curly

Good ending

Best way to approach captain’s disability?

A little sketch

They care

“I wouldn’t want to frighten her”

Anya doesn’t quite overdose

They’re safe

Guys rate my fanart

WWI face prosthetics

Less fucked up Curly AU

Fix-it type AU

Silly recovering time

Curly got some gifts for his b-day

Imagine Curly survived (twitter)

Curly with a service dog

I’m not a dog and you’re not a mare

Drawing the dentalcare crew (does this count?)

The quality will not be questioned

Fix-it AU

Want to make Curly some cool new mechanical hands so he can strangle Jimmy

One can dream

He’s got a wig now

Happy ending where they all survive (devianart)

It hurt my heart (twitter)

God forbid I get sick (translated?)

This might be controversial but… (text)

Let’s get you out of the house!

Cyberpunk AU

Cartoons with breakfast

Old-school surgeries (text)

Post-ending fic prompt (text)

Post-rescue AU curlyana

Post-rescue curlyana part two

Why is this goddamn white boy so hard to draw?

Captain stop infodumping the baby

Maybe never forgive

Draw Captain Curly having a prosthetic limb

Curly from Mouthwashing (good ending)

This is how I imagine Curly post OP

whats the worse fate, whatd be better for the tulpar crew

Wip

🐈

Mouthwashing AU (Reddit)

Curly if he survives (Reddit)

My own art

I’ll give him smoochies, prosthetics, and skin grafts

Art dump time✨

Hoppin on da trendin train

The crew built curly a mechanical hand

How to give Captain Curly a voice (idk if this technically counts, but it’s a disability aid so I will)

Doodle of the Tulpar crew post-rescue!

New hyperfixation just dropped

Hi Tumblr. Funny seeing you here

Another rehabilitated Curly

Who up washing they mouth rn

Don’t use the dog buttons (text)

Haunted part one and two

Prosthetics

AU were someone saves them

Mouthwashing doodles

A New Ladder-Reader x Curly (I’ll add the original art videos when I can) (also I didnt read it. if someone did read it, please let me know if it’s SFW)

I know he always have his headphones on

More rehabilitated Curly✨

You guys like this right

Anya, what’s it like working as a medic on a spaceship?

This is how we can still get the good ending

“I’m sorry Anya”

More cringe mouthwashing art be upon thee

Curly’s happy (and recovering) ending

Writing an AU of mouthwashing where the crew survives

Most people seem to be giving him prosthetics…

Doing a bit of study

#mouthwashing #mouthwashing AU #Captain Curly #recovered Curly #healing curly #healing curly mouthwashing #mouthwashing curly #curly mouthwashing #recovering curly #recovering curly mouthwashing

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wttcsms · 2 months ago

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if you feel like falling (catch me on the way down) | TWO

ᝰ.ᐟ after getting your heart broken by professional soccer player, rin itoshi, all because he loved the game more than you, you officially swear off all men — especially athletes. your publicist doesn’t get that memo, though, and you find yourself roped into a fake relationship with yoichi isagi, who isn’t just a pro soccer player, but also your ex’s rival. things could get messy. ( fem!reader )

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pairing yoichi isagi x reader (endgame), past! rin itoshi x reader word count 5.9k chapter synopsis the busier your schedule, the less time you can spend thinking about rin. the only problem is, you see something you can't unsee. nothing a bottle of tequila can't fix, right? (spoiler: tequila isn't fixing a broken heart) chapter contains partying and drinking to cope, diet culture author’s notes i have nothing to insightful to add rn, but send me any asks discussing this fic and i will have a lot to say LOL

From: [email protected] To: [USER EMAIL HIDDEN] Cc: [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected] + 3 others Subject: 6/19 — [NAME] [SURNAME] AGENDA Attachments: 📎 [6.19 AGENDA.pdf]

All —

Attached is the PDF copy of [Name]’s itinerary for today. Reminder that these times are STRICT. Stay on schedule.

Fumiko Gima

Get Outlook for IOS

Your first alarm goes off at 4:50 AM to what you assume is the noise they play on repeat in hell (By the Seaside, an Apple classic). After waking up, you roll over in your king size bed (the problem with always choosing to go big instead of just going home is the fact that when you’re all alone, the luxury of extra space just becomes empty space) to promptly hit the snooze button. You’ll allow yourself five more minutes of sleep (as a treat). When the second alarm you set up goes off at 4:53 AM (By the Seaside, once again), you scream into your pillow, and shut it off for real this time. You knew you weren’t going to give yourself the full five minutes, but it felt really good to trick yourself into believing that you would. You always start the day with this tiny disappointment; that way, no one has the privilege of being the first person to piss you off.

At 4:54 AM, you slide your feet into your Ugg slippers, readjust the loose straps of your silk camisole, and shuffle into your marble-floored bathroom. You rub the sleep from your eyes, brush your teeth with your pink electric toothbrush, and wash your face. By the time you’re done with your morning skincare, it’s 5:06 AM. You honestly can’t remember the last time you did your own makeup, but you bring your makeup bag with you anyway. If there’s downtime between shoots, you’ll post a faux-GRWM TikTok where you apply three miniscule dots of concealer on your seemingly already flawless skin and add a fresh layer of the brand new, limited edition Rhode peptide lip treatment that Hailey Bieber’s team gifted you. They also gave you twenty grand to do so, with a personal “hey girlie, would love to catch up with you one of these days!! life has been so hectic, sorry for not keeping in touch x btw, i just came out with a new shade of my…” text from Hailey herself. (You replied back with a “yessss, we need to meet up soon!! Also, LOVE LOVE LOVE the new shade omg 😍” — neither of you have any intention for planning a meet-up, and you don’t “LOVE LOVE LOVE” the new shade as much as you “LOVE LOVE LOVE” to deposit a fat check.)

You’re sliding into the backseat of the glossy black SUV parked in front of your driveway at 5:14 AM. Your chauffeur, Benji, holds open the door for you.

“Good morning, Ms. [Surname],” Benji never drops the formalities with you, except for when he’s lecturing you. Thank God he doesn’t own a smartphone; if he saw half the things Daily Mail wrote about you, his voice would be gone from scolding you so much. Even if he’s technically on your parents’ payroll and is paid to make sure you get to and from places safely, it still feels nice to have someone who cares about you enough to call you out on your shit.

The first stop is an exclusive, members-only pilates studio. If you’re home, you have to work out in the morning, no matter what. You like your routine. Out of all the things online magazines put out about you, it’s kind of embarrassing how the most accurate one is revealing how you stay “fit ‘n flawless even after going out every night.” Most people didn’t believe it. Rin got it, though. Rin would actually work out with you, when the two of your schedules aligned, and— Time to start your workout early! Nothing takes your mind off of matters more than focusing on the burn of your core and arms.

By the time you finish your private session, you’re walking out the studio with your puffy tote bag slung over your shoulders. Your body is still a bit damp from taking a quick shower but not drying off properly, and Benji drops you off at your first business stop of the day — ELLE Japan.

You smile brightly as the team of makeup artists surrounding you shower you with compliments. One of the girls brushing on your foundation tells you that you have really nice skin. When she goes in for a second layer, you almost consider rescinding the thanks you gave her.

The set is hectic, as expected. No matter how long these people have been in the industry, no matter how big the host is, something always seems to be going wrong. Apparently, there’s been a mishap over in wardrobe, and ELLE’s people are not very happy with how this is going to delay everything. With your hair and makeup done, there’s nothing for you to do besides sit down, be quiet, and look pretty.

Downtime is the last thing you want. You’re used to a busy schedule, but you convinced Fumiko to accept as many projects as possible. If you have to rank at the top of the list for celebrities who emit the most CO2, then so be it. You’ll pollute the whole damn planet if it means you won’t have a single second to be alone with your thoughts.

At 9:00 AM sharp, you go on your phone to inform your manager that the agenda is fucked. ELLE Japan is definitely going to push back this session with you for at least a good hour, which means Fumiko is going to have to explain to Your Style (the YouTube channel name for a famous fashion commentator who’s amassed nearly twenty million subscribers) why you’re going to be late for the Zoom debrief on what you two are going to talk about in an upcoming video. At 9:02 AM, you receive a text.

juli ᡣ𐭩: u know i love u

It’s two in the morning in Paris. When Juliette said she was going to visit her father, she said it was going to be a much-needed vacation — just something chill and lowkey, like going to all the designer stores and eating croissants on a balcony. Those were her exact words.

juli ᡣ𐭩: [photo attachment]

Somehow, from the neon strobe lights, bodies pressed against one another’s, and the way the image is blurry because she couldn’t get her phone to focus, it feels like Juliette’s “something chill and lowkey” morphed into club-hopping all over France. You roll your eyes with affection. You should’ve known her vacation was going to turn into this; as if Juliette would eat bread for pleasure — she’s been quoted for claiming that carbs are a necessary evil. She probably hasn’t even touched a croissant for the past week she’s been there.

juli ᡣ𐭩: showing u before TMZ posts it juli ᡣ𐭩: [video attachment] juli ᡣ𐭩: do not freak out. not worth it. juli ᡣ𐭩: ugh i knew this club sucked ass for a reason

You wait for the video to load. It’s almost as blurry and unfocused as the original image she sent, but you can tell she had to zoom in pretty hard to capture what she wanted. It’s two figures with a minimal amount of space between them. One of them is definitely a girl; she has the build of the usual French models. A thin, leggy brunette who has mastered the intricate art of Just Had Sex hair. Perfectly messy, but could never be considered sloppy. She’s wearing a sparkly, tight minidress. The fabric shimmers when the strobe lights pass by her body. The person she’s practically pressed up against is a man. Tall, lean. He’s leaning down, presumably so he can hear her better. When the video clip ends abruptly (someone bumped into Juliette, and the video ends with shaky footage and a loud “putain!”), you replay it. And replay it. And then you play it again, just for good measure.

Each time you watch the stupid video, you find something new to notice. Her red lips brushing against his ear. The way his hand hovers near her hip. The way you’re certain she’s smiling when she speaks, like the smirk of a victor. The exact same self-satisfied, smug grin you sport whenever you get a guy right where you want him. Upon every rewatch, though, one thing remains the same: you’re constantly fixated on him.

Right now, it’s two in the morning in Paris. You know that when you weren’t in this fucked up headspace you’re in right now, you’d be in bed, snuggled underneath your blankets, by 11:30 PM. You know that when you felt your best, you could be in bed, whispering in the dark to the person you felt safest with, at 10:00 PM (at the latest, because you both would have a busy day ahead and needed the rest). He likes sleeping early because he likes being well-rested.

So why the hell is Rin Itoshi at a club right now?

At 9:39 AM, ELLE Japan gets right back on track. Before your editorial shoot for a special anniversary edition of the magazine, they get you to sit down to do a video interview that they plan on posting all over their social media.

“This is a very special edition that will be coming out, and you are not only having the biggest spread dedicated to you, but you’re also going to be on the cover. Knowing this, how are you feeling right now, [Name]? This might be the most high-profile photoshoot you’ve done so far in your career, and that’s saying something. You have quite the impressive resume.”

The ring lights are shining directly in your eye. The stool they have you sitting on for this interview is uncomfortable, and you have to focus on remaining balanced. Your back is perfectly straight, and your hands are folded in your lap. You blink, and you see the video playing in your mind. You have God knows how much makeup caked on right now, and you still have a long day ahead of you. Rin is at a club right now. Rin is at a club right now, with a girl. Rin is at a club right now, with a girl, and they’re basically grinding against each other, and he might just have forgotten all about you.

You smile brightly. At 9:40 AM in Japan, you let everyone know,

“I honestly think I’m the happiest I’ve ever been before in my life! This is a great way to establish a sort of, I guess, new era of my life and my career.”

You turn to face the camera directly, giving them a dazzling view of your pearly whites. “Not trying to rush the process or anything, but I am definitely looking forward to seeing how this will all play out in the future.”

You’re operating on autopilot for the rest of the day. The ELLE shoot wraps up close to noon. You forgo lunch, but knowing you and your tendency to skip meals, Benji refuses to start the car until you eat the lunch his wife packed for you. It’s light and refreshing — they want you to eat well, but they’re not cruel. Even if they want to bring you a feast of a nice, hot, home cooked meal, you’ll eat it out of obligation and then suffer the consequences on set when everyone asks why you’re so bloated. You don’t even taste what you’re consuming.

At 12:30 PM, you hop on the Zoom call and pretend to care about discussing matters such as the lack of personal style affecting the younger generations. Every topic is a trivial topic to you. The only thing worth dissecting is that damn video. You should’ve asked those twenty million subscribers to help you analyze that, instead of nodding along when the YouTuber starts going on a rant about how Shein and other fast fashion brands are ruining everything.

Late in the afternoon, you get another text.

kenyu: So the team wants to host a belated birthday party for me lmao. Team’s planning on having it at 10 tonight kenyu: Sending you the address right now

A party is exactly what you need right now. Endless drinks, no need for rational thinking, and you’ll be (mostly) surrounded by people who think models are all vain and vapid. No one there is going to expect a decent conversation from you, and with the state you’re in, it’s a wonder how all your sentences are even making sense.

You give Kenyu’s next message a like in response. You were expecting a club, but when you click on the address, Maps reveals that it’s residential. Rin is gallivanting around European nightclubs, and meanwhile, the best you can do are house parties. This is how the future is playing out?

At least even at your worst, people still think you’re on top of the world.

Maybe life without a man dragging you down and invading your space is for the best. After all, once you got done with all your professional obligations, it’s only eight at night. You’re used to going out with whatever makeup they did for you on set at your last shoot of the day, which is a shame. You have shelves full of makeup that’s been sent to you by different brands, and one of these nights, you plan on just messing around at your vanity.

You like living alone, you decide. You can leave all the lights on if you want, and no one complains about it hurting their eyes. You have full control of the thermostat. You don’t have to fight for counter space in the bathroom. Plus, no one can see how you’re living.

At 9:13 PM, you’re sprawled on the cool marble floor of your bathroom (squeaky clean thanks to the housekeeper you have come once a week), and instead of rewatching that dreadful video and subsequently crying, you had a quick retail therapy session. Your new Prada heels should be coming within the next two days.

You don’t get Benji to drive you. Nobody bats an eye at a rich girl having a driver, but it does seem kind of weird to have him drop you off at a party as if you're a tween girl getting taken to the mall. If the house is owned by one of Yukimiya’s teammates, surely it won’t be too awkward if you had to leave it there because you got too drunk to drive yourself back home?

Because — no offense to Yuki, you’re happy he’s getting another birthday celebration — the whole point of even going to this party is to get fucked up. You already know that Juliette had a point — if not TMZ, then at least Daily Mail will be all over Rin and that girl in the club. If that gets leaked, then you might as well have your own headline to combat his. Sure, lately you’ve been out partying, but that was with other models so it doesn’t raise too many eyebrows. Rin being caught at a club is basically him hard launching the breakup. You need to raise some speculation on your side of things, too.

you: can you get someone to pick up my car from this address tomorrow morning? you: please :)

When you see three dots appear, you smile for real. You can practically hear her sigh and see the shake of her head.

Fumiko Gima: Yes. Fumiko Gima: Be safe.

Aw, maybe your manager does have a heart. Right before you can send her a heart, she adds:

Fumiko Gima: Don’t stay out too late. You have your first shoot at 8 AM.

This is the message you give a heart reaction to. Maybe everything really is just business with her.

You suppose you can’t fault Fumiko for always seeming cold. She’s your manager, not your best friend.

In this industry, her honesty is refreshing. You normally find this to be the case, but you really feel it now when you step into the mansion and hear a cacophony of laughter swarming you from all sides. At every turn, there’s a celebrity with a drink in hand. Everyone’s leaning towards each other, as if they’re so captivated with the other’s words.

You see an actor leading a stumbling model up the spiral staircase. To your side, you see a baseball player chatting up the daughter of one of the baseball league’s board members. Upstairs, someone’s probably snorting a line off Yukimiya’s teammate’s bathroom counter. There are only three reasons why people in your social circle attend these parties: to get fucked, to get fucked up, or to make business deals. Considering the fact that you’ve been here for nearly five minutes and have yet to see a birthday cake — or the belated birthday boy himself — you’re pretty sure everyone here has lot the damn plot for the original celebration.

When you venture some more, you end up in the massive backyard. Some people are drunkenly making out in the pool, some people are watching them, and in a table in the corner, you spot a group of girls giggling and cheering as they all do shots. Perfect. This is exactly where you need to be.

One’s a model; you’ve seen her on a couple pages you flipped through in Harper’s Bazaar. You go up to the table and give her a bright smile.

“Hey, girl! Or should I say Miss Bazaar?” You greet her like how you think people would tease a friend. She’s not your friend; you don’t even know her name. You know she knows your name — everyone here does. And it’s because of the fact that everyone knows you that she lights up when she realizes you’re speaking to her.

A photo op with you guarantees that even if the headline coming out tomorrow is centered on you, she’ll still be in the frame. Daily Mail will add a caption naming everybody from left to right, and she’s planning on being the one captured right next to you.

“[Name]!” She squeals, giving you a quick side hug. “How have you been?”

All your friends, the grand total of exactly two people, know how you’ve been. You grin, pointing to the bottle of tequila they have on their table.

“After how this day has been, I honestly just need a shot.” You play it off like a joke, and as someone pours you one, you add, “Or maybe like five.” They all giggle before throwing back the tequila straight. They might think you’re joking, but this table full of strangers are the first people you’ve been honest with all day.

At 12:15 AM, they aren’t strangers anymore. In fact, you think they might be your best friends in the whole world. You don’t know the lyrics to the rap song blaring through the bass boosted speakers, but you’re laughing as you take another shot. The Harper’s Bazaar girl is doing another shot with you, but she has her phone in her other hand. She makes sure that the both of you are in the frame together, and a second later, she’s tagging you in an Instagram story you don’t bother to view. You’re not even following her.

“Okay, so out of all the guys here, who looks the most fuckable?” One of the girls leans on the table for support as she asks this question. You can’t help but notice how glittery her lipgloss is. Wow, even after all the shots she’s taken, there’s no transfer. Impressive. “I say Theo Sachs.”

“Who the fuck is Theo Sachs?” Harper’s Bazaar asks, and the whole entire table giggles. Honestly, at parties like these, laughing comes easy. In fact, you’re giggling right with them, even though you also have no fucking clue who Theo is. There’s just something so freeing in tequila-induced joy.

“Um, the host of this party?” Glittery Lipgloss says. “Oh my God, girl, he’s like, one of the players for Bastard.”

“The fuck is Bastard?” Another girl asks, adjusting her blue minidress.

“The soccer team!” Glittery Lipgloss is too drunk to be fed up, but you’re sure she would be rolling her eyes if she could.

“I didn’t know we had soccer players here. I only saw baseball players.” Blue Minidress frowns, before adding, “I would totally fuck one of the baseball boys, though. No preference whatsoever. Matter of fact, I could take the whole team.”

Harper’s Bazaar laughs. “What about you, [Name]? Who are you taking home tonight?”

Before you can think of something to say, Glittery Lipgloss groans. “Oh my God, she has a boyfriend.” She looks at you for confirmation. You don’t give her any, but thankfully Blue Minidress has her own insight to add to this conversation.

“So what the fuck does that have to do with her question? [Name], who are you taking home tonight?”

Nobody. Out of every party you’ve gone to this past month, you went back home, completely and utterly alone each and every time. It’s not even because nobody offered — they have — but because no matter how lonely you may get or feel, you don’t like strangers in your space. It took you three months of dating Rin to let him into the penthouse you were originally staying in, and that was with you being in love with him.

Once again, you’re saved from answering when someone behind you goes, “[Name]?”

You turn around, only to come face to face with Yoichi Isagi. On second thought, maybe this isn’t the rescue you thought it was. Drunk You can’t hold back your frown when you see him. He’s wearing a dark blue polo shirt and chinos. He looks perfectly business casual and could pass off as an off-the-clock investment banker instead of the world class athlete you’ve heard he is. Then you let out a little snort of laughter, which only makes him look more confused. You don’t want to tell him that it’s kind of funny how normal he looks.

Not in a bad way. You’re surrounded by models for practically the whole day. Looking unattainably hot or having ethereal beauty is the one non-negotiable job requirement. Even Rin, with his stupidly long lower lashes and impossibly high cheekbones and his pretty boy resting sulking face, is serving standards some male models can’t achieve. Isagi looks like the type of guy you would have a crush on if the two of you were completely normal and attended regular high school together.

But that’s not the reality you’re living in. Right now, you’re getting drunk with girls you don’t know, and every night, you’re making headlines. He’s a professional athlete that everyone at this table would gladly fuck just for a chance to be declared social media’s favorite WAG of the Week. The both of you could have your pick of anyone at this party, but you refuse to let anyone in, and you think Isagi might be one of those intense athletes who only care about their sport.

If that’s the case, he’s doing every girl a favor by not pretending he can commit to anything but soccer. You know someone who could use a few pointers.

“Hi,” you mumble, and then you want to slap yourself because why the fuck are you acting like you’re nervous? But for some reason, you feel like you're a kid caught with their grimy hand in the cookie jar, like you’re doing something wrong.

“I didn’t know you’d be here.”

“Well, it’s Kenny’s birthday party. Of course, I’d be here.” You cross your arms against your chest, feeling like you have something to prove. Before Yukimiya became his teammate, Kenyu was your friend first. Like, real friend, not just someone you leave supportive comments on their Instagram post type of friend.

Isagi actually smiles when he hears that. “Funny. I think everyone but Yukimiya actually wants to be here.”

You sober up a bit when you hear that. “Yeah, I couldn’t find him anywhere.” Not that you looked very hard. The minute you found this table of girls, you didn’t bother exploring the rest of the mansion.

“He was upstairs with some of the guys. You know that he, uh, doesn’t really like these types of parties.” He rubs the back of his neck awkwardly.

“You don’t seem like the type to like these parties either.” If he was anyone else, you’d be saying this to flirt. You’re honestly not sure what your intention behind this comment was, either. You’re too drunk to decide if you wanted it to be an insult (some way to defend Yukimiya’s behavior?) or just you trying to make conversation for once (you’re not normally one for small talk).

“Caught me.” Isagi smiles easily. From now and thinking back to Yukimiya’s birthday lunch, Isagi is rarely not smiling. You wonder if he means it. Surrounded by people who only let you drink with them because being seen with you elevates their own status, you decide that the answer to that is a probably not. “I was about to head out before I thought I saw you, and I wanted to come by and…” For a second, he pauses to choose the right words to say. “Just wanted to see if it really was you.”

“Well, you saw me. Guess your business is done here.” Then you swiftly turn your back to him, as if to abruptly end the conversation. Instead, you’re drunker than you realize, and your heel ends up being wedged deeper into the grass than you expected, and you lose your balance. You think you might fall, which would be so embarrassing, but maybe not as embarrassing as what actually ends up happening.

What actually ends up happening is that Isagi is quick to wrap his arm around your abdomen, pulling you close to him as he attempts to keep you steady and upright. The girls looked shocked, but then they burst into another round of giggles, and since you’re not joining in the laughter, all you can think about is how annoying they are. You squirm around in his grasp, ignoring the whiff of fresh laundry you get from being all up in his personal space (not by choice!!!; he’s the one that pulled you in, after all!), and he releases you.

“Are you feeling okay?” He asks you. It’s hard to glare at him when he looks so genuinely concerned.

“Never better.”

“Do you have a ride home?”

What does it matter to you? Is what you want to say.

“I’ll call an Uber.” You lie, hoping that this will end the conversation once and for all. Seriously, Isagi just killed the whole vibe of the party for you. You want to go back to drinking.

“But I thought you didn’t do Ubers.” When Isagi calls you out on your bullshit, you soften momentarily. You almost forgot that he heard about your weird thing of having strangers know your home address. Then, you go back to giving him the cold shoulder. Sometimes, it’s a warm and gooey feeling to be known. Right now, you want to drown your sorrows in tequila and be showered with fake affection by girls who probably don’t even like you sober. You didn’t come to this party to be known. You came here for revenge.

(You’re not going to acknowledge how drinking your sadness away isn’t necessarily showing up Rin, but for nearly an hour straight, you hadn’t thought about him, and that’s good enough.)

When you have no response to that (wit doesn’t come easy when you’re in the condition you’re in right now), Isagi looks at you imploringly.

“Let me take you home.”

You shake your head childishly, almost saying nuh-uh. “Just because you don’t like this party doesn’t mean I don’t like it. I’m staying right here.”

He finally frowns. “Fine. I’ll wait for you to finish up here, then I’ll take you home.”

“I’m with my friends right now. Leave me alone.”

He raises an eyebrow. “Really? Which friend is going to make sure you get home safely? Yukimiya already left early.” Despite the two of you not knowing what the other is thinking, you both give wry smiles about that statement for the same reason. The party is still going on strong, despite the guest of honor not wanting to show his face and leaving early.

“These are my best friends.” You gesture to the trio of girls you know nothing about, besides the fact that they can keep up with your drinking habits. They all smile at Isagi, who waves back before turning his attention back to you.

“Really?” He asks. “What’re their names again?”

No one has anything to say to that, especially you. When the silence gets too awkward, Isagi clears his throat and also puts his foot down.

“I’m taking you home, [Name].”

You look at the trio of strangers you just spent hours with. Harper’s Bazaar shrugs, and the other two look away. The sting of not knowing who they are, despite them obviously having enough notoriety to be invited, makes your “best friends” not your friends anymore. Whatever.

“Fine.” You grumble, following Isagi to his car.

“Did you have fun tonight?” Is what he asks you as he signals to make a turn. The clicking of the turn signal is the only thing that fills the silence in the car.

No.

Sometimes, it’s fun in the moment, but that’s only when you’re drunk enough to trick yourself into thinking you’re having a good time. You’re more like Yukimiya (and — gross — Isagi) than they know; the whole “It Girl dominates the party scene” vibe you’ve got going on… It’s just bullshit that your PR team mixes together to get people talking. The high of being adored by everyone in a room vanishes almost immediately the minute you go home and wash off your makeup. In the bright lights of your bathroom, you stare at the sad, lonely girl in the mirror. It’s too dark outside for you to see anything out the window, but you lean your head against the cool glass, and before you know it, you’re waking up…

To Isagi groping you?

You’re groggy and confused and trying to blink the sleepiness out of your eyes, but Yoichi Isagi is definitely all up on you. You’re shocked, honestly. He looks like such a sweet guy! No wonder he was so pushy in getting you home.

He’s holding you in some awkward side hug, and he’s patting down your waist, trying to slip his fingers through the fabric of your dress, and finally, because he must be a novice-level pervert who doesn’t know the first thing about female anatomy, you speak up.

“Gross! You can’t even feel up a girl properly! No wonder you take advantage of drunk, vulnerable girls!”

“Ah!” He jerks back, shocked that you’re awake. Serves the pervert right. He should be backing up. You took a month of kickboxing classes (your modeling agency thought it would be the next big thing, since all the Victoria Secret models kickbox — they were wrong). “I-I wasn’t feeling you up!”

“Then why were your hands all over me?”

“I was looking for your key! You were asleep, and you looked like you needed it, so I just carried you to your door, but it’s locked.”

Oh. Likely story. You’re not letting him off the hook just yet.

“Obviously my front door would be locked, dumbass. Who doesn’t lock their house?” You point to the perfectly trimmed hedges by your door. “Key’s in the bushes.”

Since you’re making no moves to get down on your knees and rifle through the bushes, Isagi sighs and does it himself. When he holds up the key, you nod in thanks, take it, and then proceed to unlock the door using your fingerprint.

He blinks. “What?”

“What?” You repeat back, innocently.

“You didn’t even need the key to unlock the door!”

“Yes, Isagi. Modern technology is something, isn’t it?” And because you feel kind of bad, you offer him the chance to wash up before driving back.

“You’re really something, you know that?” Isagi says from the kitchen sink. You’re sitting on a stool by the counter.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It’s nothing bad.” He clarifies. “It’s just… Rin’s a pretty private person. We always wondered what his girlfriend must be like. Sorry.” He shuts off the faucet, dries his hands. “Ex-girlfriend, I guess.”

“How do you know that?” You’ve been racking your brain, wondering if Yuki spilled your secret accidentally. Or — even worse — Rin himself confirmed it. Rin never even told anyone explicitly that the two of you were dating, so it’s not plausible that he would go blab about the breakup.

“Well, I didn’t really know for sure until I drove you home that first time.” He admits. “I just thought you made a weird face when I mentioned Rin during lunch, and then you started acting funny afterwards. Just had a hunch, that’s all.”

Great. So, Isagi, who’s basically a stranger to you, could read you to filth. Is there anyone else that you haven’t been fooling? How embarrassing. Being perceived sucks.

You don’t say anything else. You can hear Isagi mumbling about something, and you make a half-hearted noise in reply, but you’re sleepy and drunk and coming to the realization that you can’t keep fooling everyone around for long. There’s no point in dancing around the topic of your breakup. It’s getting tiring, anyway.

It is pretty exhausting to be pining after someone who’s not coming back.

Because that’s why you’re trying so hard to keep the breakup a secret. Partly for pride, but mostly because… You’re hoping that after learning everything there is to know about you, Rin Itoshi wouldn’t go so far to cut you so deeply by leaving you. Right? He understood your level of loneliness like no one else, and he related to it. For the first time in both of your lives, the two of you suddenly found the right person to fill in all the empty spaces.

And then he left, and the emptiness just continues to grow in infinite amounts.

You groan as you move around, only to find that you’re moving on top of your bed. You’re tucked into your sheets, and your hair is splayed across your pillow. You turn your head and see a shadowy figure exiting out your bedroom door.

“You’re leaving, too?”

Your throat is dry, and the words come out small. You hate this feeling of hopelessness and vulnerability, and the figure pauses in his steps.

He hushes you gently. “You should go to sleep. You’ve had a long night.”

“Fine. Don’t stay. I don’t care.” You burrow yourself further into your blankets.

“Do you really want me to stay?”

At one in the morning, covered in the darkness of your bedroom, you turn every shadow into Rin Itoshi. You don’t know what you mumble in response, but you know that whatever you said, it’s directed towards him.

#yoichi isagi x reader #yoichi isagi x you #isagi x reader #one shot #fluff #blue lock x reader #bllk x reader #rin itoshi x reader #smau #series: if you feel like falling

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beenbaanbuun · 9 months ago

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nudes w/ yunho

words - an amount

genre - smut

warnings - nudes, dom!yunho, degredation, finger sucking, masturbation

——————————————————————————

A smirk grew on your face as you read over the text you’d just received from your boyfriend.

‘Can you stop sending me nudes?’

You sat there in your lace underwear set, a wet puddle forming between your thighs as you thought about all the things he’d do to you once he was home. He was very big on punishments, much to your enjoyment. Sometimes, you went out of your way to annoy him, just so you could spend the night under him as he played with your body as if it was his own personal toy.

‘Why?’ You shot back, fingers slowly making their way down to your core. Technically you weren’t supposed to play with yourself without Yunho’s permission, but what he didn't know wouldn’t hurt him. And if he did know? Well, it's not like the consequences would be anything you wouldn’t be more than happy to deal with.

‘I’m at work, Sweetheart.’ Despite his kind words, you knew that he was seething. You could see him when you shut your eyes. Jaw clenched and eyebrow raised as he breathed heavily through flared nostrils. Just thinking about his anger made another wave of desire surge through you. As you trailed your fingers around the edge of your panties, you couldn’t help but notice another gush of slick coming from your twitching hole. God, you couldn't wait for Yunho to get home.

‘I just wanted to show you my new panties.’

Your fingers made their way beneath the soft material and your breath hitched as your fingers caught on your clit. A breathy moan made its way up your throat as you toyed with the little nub for a moment or two, gently rubbing circles before pinching it lightly. You imagined it was Yunho, but your hand felt completely different to his. It was smaller for a start, and you could never play with yourself in the same way he did. He could make you squirm in a way you didnt even think was possible.

If making you cum was an art, your boyfriend had mastered it. You, on the other hand, were still learning, and bringing yourself to the edge was much harder than he made it seem. Even on those nights that he simply refused to touch you, inspecting you carefully from across the room with a smug smirk, it was so much easier for you to cum. At least then there was a firm voice instructing you where to move your fingers, whether to add more or less pressure, and exactly when to do so. Now, you felt lost. Without the presence of Yunho, there was no hope for you.

The initial pleasure soon dissipated and in its place came disappointment. You were just aimlessly touching your clit now, a frown present on your face as you pleaded with whoever was up there that Yunho would come home from work early. You were certain that all you needed to cum was a firm hand and a deep voice to push you to your limits.

Yet even with your lack of ability to push yourself to the edge, it wasn't until your phone chimed that you actually removed your fingers from your panties. You brought them up to your face, carefully studying the way they shimmered with your slick. You spread your middle and your index fingers, watching as your arousal stretched between them like a spider's web on a dewy summer’s morning. It was pretty, in some sort of weird, erotic way, and you couldn’t help but admire it. Not for long though, a thought suddenly striking you and pulling you from your trance; Yunho would make you lick them clean.

That’s all it took for you to guide them to your awaiting mouth. You pushed them to the back of your throat, almost gagging on them before you closed your lips around them. It didn't taste particularly exciting - you were all too familiar with the taste of yourself by now- but it reminded you of your boyfriend nonetheless. Of all the times he’d choked you with his long fingers after pulling them from your creamy hole. So with a smile on your face, you circled your tongue around your fingers, sucking all of your slick off of them.

As you did so, you lifted your phone up to your face, and read the latest message from Yunho.

‘You don’t know what you’ve got yourself into, Sweetheart.’ You had to grin because yes, you did. In fact, it was the knowledge of what he may do to you that led you to orchestrate this whole situation. You wanted Yunho to dominate you, and you wanted it bad. The lack of power as he controlled your mind, body and soul tempted you like nothing else. The way he can so easily seize control of you, reducing you down to nothing but his puppet was something you desired to no end. It was as peaceful as it was exciting, hushing your mind until there was nothing left but him.

So yes, you knew exactly what you got yourself into.

‘Hurry back before I cause any more trouble.’ It took you a while to type it out with only your non-dominant hand, but Yunho waited for your reply anyway. The moment it sent, you spotted the three little dots that let you know he was typing. It felt good to know that you had him wrapped around your little finger, just like he had you.

‘Already on my way.’

The words popped up onto your screen and you grinned, knowing that he’d soon be there to take care of you. You turned your phone face down on the bed and closed your eyes, simply letting yourself relax into the buzz of excitement that flowed through your body.

———

It took Yunho a little over 30 minutes to get home, by which time, you'd fallen asleep. It was no secret that over the years you spent with your boyfriend, you'd developed a little bit of an oral fixation, specifically when it came to his hands. Having his fingers pressed to your tongue always seemed to put you even deeper into a submissive headspace; despite your fingers not comparing to the length, girth or warmth of his own, they still helped you relax deep enough for you to fall into a quiet slumber.

“Jesus, Sweetheart,” were the words that woke you. Deep and smooth as always, coming from the man you loved most in the world. He sounded like chocolate, making you all warm and fuzzy on the inside. “After all that, you’ve passed out on me. Couldn’t even wait a few minutes for me to come home, hm?”

You mumbled something. Nothing of any particular meaning, but it made your boyfriend coo anyway. He always found you cute when you first woke up.

“If you’d behaved earlier, I might have let you sleep,” He said, and through your sleepy haze, you recognised the familiar condescending tone he usually used when the two of you were in bed together. Despite the fact that your brain was still coming to terms with being awake, you could still feel the ache in your pussy kick in again. “Unfortunately, my sweet girl isn't so sweet after all. Nasty little whore needs teaching a lesson.”

You subconsciously spread your legs, giving him access to the place that you so desperately wanted him. The display made him let out a low chuckle, which in turn made your hips buck slightly. Just the sound of his voice was enough to drive you crazy with need.

“Yun,” you whined, the words coming out jumbled, your fingers still pressed firmly down on your tongue. Only now did you crack your eyes open wide enough to get a good look at him. He was all dressed up in his dress shirt and slacks, sleeve rolled up to his elbows and hands in his pockets. He looked just as handsome as he did ‘in-charge’ and you loved every second of it.

“She speaks,” He squatted down so that his face lined up with yours. You couldn't help but notice how pretty he looked with those long black bangs sitting on his brow bone and that cruel glint in his eye that warned you of just how much trouble you were in. “Shame you can’t use that brain to follow instructions, huh?” The question was rhetorical, but you nodded anyway.

You felt a warm hand wrap around your dominant hand’s wrist and pull. With a pop, your fingers were finally free from your wet cavern, but not for long. You watched with the utmost interest as Yunho opened his own mouth and encapsulated your fingers inside. He hummed deeply, letting his eyes flutter closed as he tasted your spit on your fingers. His tongue moved on its own, lapping at the appendages as if your saliva was going to be his last drink. It felt so dirty, but he didn't even blink an eye. It's as if it was the most natural thing in the world.

You never knew that your fingertips were an erogenous zone, but the feeling of his tongue trailing along them only served to make you wetter. You squeezed your thighs together, ignoring the painfully loud squelch as you did so. Your panties were embarrassingly soaked, but you couldn't help it. Not when Yunho was acting like the embodiment of temptation itself.

“You taste so sweet,” he mumbled as he pulled his mouth off of you. When he opened his eyes again, you couldn't help but notice that his pupils were blown out, lust taking over his face entirely. You couldn't see yourself, but you were almost positive that you were faring no better. “And that's why you’re my sweetheart, sweetheart.”

You gave him a sleepy giggle as he went back to lapping at your fingertips with the tiniest of kitten-licks. His tongue danced along them, dipping in between and swirling around the tips.

“I love you, Yun,” the words slipped from your lips before you could stop them. He smiled. A proper smile full of joy and love. It made your heart pitter-patter giddily.

“I love you too, Sweetheart,” He leaned forwards to offer you a sweet kiss to the lips. It was short lived, but it made your heart flutter like you were a schoolgirl receiving a letter from her crush. When he pulled away, his eyes were much darker, and that fuzzy, gentle feeling was replaced with hard, powerful lust. You swallowed hard as Yunho let a twisted little grin paint his face, “but I’m about to fuck you like I don’t.”

#yunho hard thoughts #yunho smut #ateez x reader #ateez fanfic #ateez oneshot #ateez fic #ateez smut #yunho x reader

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morningmask27 · 2 months ago

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acrylic on canvas 30x40 cm

it is very evil of Belladonna to not bite women when she probably has the entire lesbian community on their knees now

anyways, Dracula's Ex-Girlfriend was so fucking good and despite my hatred of drawing (let alone painting) humans it compelled me to create something.

I'm just going to leave a wall of commentary on the process under the cut because I need to chatter about all of this real quick

I chose this scene at the end because 1. it was super hard to find one still where Bella and Fay are both properly visible (yet somehow Fay's still facing the other direction) and 2. this scene just hits a bit different to me.

the discussion of smoking, a thing that's bad, but it being life, right as Bella drank that bartender dry made me think of a few things I experienced and while I personally will still keep on going against what Fay said here, I still got to see things in a somewhat different light I guess.

Fay's care is also so present here. Bella is self-destructing massively, but Fay still comforts her, even after she "fell back" on her bad habits (she never quit) and this hug just hit me personally quite a lot. the silent care, the "you're warm". I can't fully describe everything it makes me feel, but this scene was good.

on a more technical level. I had to take some creative liberties with the lighting and such because it was DARK and my painting skills aren't ready to make such minute details with extremely dark colors. It would get ugly and muddied, so I had to adapt. the harsh shading on Bella's face is less striking, but I don't know if I could make it better with my current skills.

This was also one of the first times I've really rendered a human face; Last time I "tried" it was 1. without a ref (unwise) and 2. when I was even worse at drawing humans and I ended up so mad at this painting that I Could Not Go Paint Again for a while because of how mad I was lol, so I'm honestly really impressed with how I managed to do this without making a huge mess.

At least until I got to add the blood. It still looks good now, but I had to fiddle a lot with the reds I used and the skintones to mitigate the damage of a few first strokes that got too grandiose.

I also decided that Fangs. I am a bit of a vampire researcher and seeing the different traits they get in different media is always fun and here the fangs seem a bit retractable, but Bella's a vampire and I am a sucker for fangs, so I had to include them.

my handwriting also didn't fail me too horribly, even if I had a few accidents and had to clean them up before I got this "clean" little text. I really don't have good brushes for very thin and precise strokes (nor the capacity to not tremble the entire time honestly)

This was honestly quite fun too. Four hours of listening to some music, having a weird moment with my mother on the phone and just painting. I did really not want to draw Bella's face at first and drew nearly everything else before I began, but once I did I got into the groove and it went fine, so I'm pleased with this.

#morningtalks #morningdraws #dracula's ex girlfriend #also. Abigail if you're for some reason reading this I am fully willing to send this painting to you if you'd like #It's quite large and I have way too many in my room already lmao #so dm me or something I'll arrange the shipping

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linearao3 · 6 months ago

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So, a little while back, @pyrrhlc very graciously offered to send me a copy of Child Ballad he had bound, and naturally I was very hyped to accept this offer but (a) I live on the other side of the Atlantic, and (b) any packages I receive at my home address must go through my super, who is both daffy and an asshole, and has kept packages from me for time spans ranging from a week to three months to “denying he ever saw it,” so I was hesitant. But I worked out with my friend who lives in a nicer building that it could be delivered c/o her, so I was very excited about that.

Then there was some trivial misadventuring with the USPS, so I had to ask my friend to go fetch it from the post office for me. “It’s very pleasing to the eye!” she texted me, and I ran uptown to behold the wonder.

Now, the box was slightly bigger than I had anticipated, but I was initially just thinking I didn’t think Child Ballad was that long but I too would be worried about sending intricately-made art over the ocean so extra packing makes sense and joining my friend in admiring the box.

Please note the pattern of the paper. (I actually recognized it from a tumblr post of pyrrhlc’s.)

My friend and I carefully unwrapped it, at which point, she said, “you should make an unboxing video!” and I was not about to wait long enough to do anything that fancy but I did take pictures and look:

WHAT

Friends. Comrades. Seen here now at home on my desk:

FOUR BOOKS.

Four extremely beautiful books! Plus an enclosed note with a handsome crow (the books are from the Black Crow Bindery!) which contains kind words about my fics and also edifying facts about the patterns on the covers! The Service Work ones are based on wallpaper from the 1880s! They all have pretty ribbons and handsome Baskerville typeface!

The two Service Work books also have these pretty metal corner guards which probably have a technical name I am unaware of! Tumblr won’t let me add more pictures! You can kind of see them in the others, though!

They are all very beautiful! I am very grateful! Please admire @pyrrhlc’s artistry in this as well as in his writing! I am admiring them on my bookshelf as I speak!

#book binding #gorgeous oh my goodness #murder ballad #child ballad #serves you right #served me well

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gothamite-rambler · 6 days ago

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It's been 8 years since the headphone jack was removed from the iphone

Damian texted quickly to Carrie on his iPhone 16 and then opened Apple Music to look for a song to play she told him to listen to, but when he couldn't find his airpods he sighed.

Damian (bothered): God damn, I lost my dongle and now I have no earbuds.

Tim chuckled, wiping his nose.

Tim: Why do you insist on calling it a dongle?

Damian: It's one of the names, and it's a funny word. I get tired of the wireless earbuds sometimes, though. I hope someday the new iPhone re-adds that hole at the bottom.

Tim: Hole?

Damian (sincere): Yeah, the place to plug in the jack for old-school headphones. I’d rather have that than charge my wireless ones.

Barbara (looking up from her laptop): I'm sorry… old-school headphones?

Dick: And do you mean the headphone jack? There are phones that still have that.

Damian (intrigued): Are they Apple phones? The older models have them, but they're basically obsolete. They removed it ages ago.

Barbara (frustration in her voice): They removed the headphone jack from the iPhone in 2016.

Damian: Oh wow, that's almost a decade, like eight years ago—

Dick spit out his drink, shocked, and covered his mouth as he coughed. Barbara could only muster a whimper at how much time had passed since the last iPhone had a headphone jack.

Tim (amused): Damian, I agree with you. I use Android myself, but they decided to remove the jack from those phones too. Samsung took it out six years ago.

Dick (shocked): SIX!

Damian: I know, right? Time flies. I'm more of an Apple user, but those folding phones are quite an impressive technical feat. Did they have those back in the day?

Damian and Tim jolted as Dick fell to the ground, covering his face in shock.

Dick: Back in the day?!

Tim (chuckling): Dick, the first flip phone came out in the late '90s.

Barbara (weakly): 19—1996… Okay, but we were born in the '90s! We're not that old!

Dick: Damn right!

Tim (messing with them): That means you didn't have a phone for most of that time! When the first phones came out, you guys had to be in your teens, right?

Damian (surprised then apologetic): Damn! Oh, I'm sorry! Just my teacher was born in the 1900s.

Dick (meekly, still on the floor for comfort): Please stop talking. That doesn’t mean we're old!

Tim (crossing his arms, mischievous): You know, Damian, they didn't have phones when you or I were teenagers. A lot of the stuff we have now didn’t exist back then. No streaming, no fancy laptops, they even had typewriters in schools.

Damian chuckled, bemused by this information.

Damian: I heard they lacked a lot of technology, but what did they do for fun then? I feel like those old black-and-white shows can only entertain you for a short time.

Barbara whimpered, covering her mouth because she did watch a lot of black-and-white shows.

Dick: Okay, we watched color shows back then! I said color shows… oh my God.

Damian (curious): What about music? Could they download it on an… MP3 player?

Tim (enjoying this, shaking his head): Nope! Didn’t exist yet. All they had were CDs and cassette tapes.

Damian: Oh my God, they're that old!

Tim (laughing and covering his mouth): Damn!

Barbara crushed her paper coffee cup in her hand, her left eye twitching as Dick stood to his feet, embarrassed. He rested his hands on the countertop, trying to regain his composure.

Dick (angry, raised voice): I am… not saying my age to you children! I had a phone eventually!

Tim: Not the one he had. You guys grew up Amish, didn't you?

Barbara: I can still punch you in the throat, Tim. Tread lightly.

Dick: I'm not sure about her, but I watched SpongeBob and Rocko's Modern Life.

Damian: Didn't SpongeBob first premiere in 1999? And what's Rocko's Modern Life? An oldies show?

Barbara sighed, pinching the bridge of her nose and shaking her head.

Barbara: Nice save, dumbass.

Damian (joining in on the mockery): How did you guys not go insane from boredom? Did you churn butter, go to church, watch the news?

Barbara (slamming her fist on the table): Look, my dad's a cop; I enjoy the news in general!

Damian: I was just curious about the headphone jack, which seems terribly archaic, but this is fascinating I have relics of the past in front of me.

Tim nodded, enjoying picking on their older sibling and friend.

Damian: I have a few more questions for you AARP members. Do you guys reserve early bird seating at restaurants? Do you use anti-aging skincare products, and did you ever use those papers that help with saving money?

Dick: You mean coupons? Oh no, I'm did it again! No, I can't be that old!

Dick sobbed softly.

Barbara (defensively): Sometimes I like an early dinner! Jesus! And if you want the headphone jack back, you can just ask us for one! I carry a lot because I'm cultured!

Barbara pulled out an iPhone Apple Lightning to Headphone Jack Adapter. Damian was thankful at first, but when he saw the Lightning part, he frowned.

Damian: This is for the older iPhones. They use USB-C now.

Barbara: Dick, hold me back.

Dick grabbed Barbara's arm while sitting on the floor again, and she tried to swipe at Damian with her other arm, offended. Tim grabbed Damian's arm and pulled him away while trying not to laugh. Barbara covered her face, groaning.

Barbara: Fuck, we’re old like Bruce now.

Dick (raised voice, defeated): Stop reminding me!

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hoodedjelly · 5 months ago

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Nicktoons unite main 4 in their respected styles ( minus jimmy neutron i'll explain more below)

i feel very mixed about these but it was still fun either way studying all of these cartoons respected styles. the final does make me happy, seeing all of them together ^__^ 💞

below i will explain my thought process working with each style so get ready for a wall of text:

first before anything you may be asking: why no jimmy neutron style!? it's because i tried and gave up! i was starting the rendering process for timmy and i hated it so i just didn't continue! no point of making myself miserable for something thats harmless fun style studies. but have these as a little treat:

Fairly Oddparents style: the easiest style to work on and research for, fop style is not that complex. i should also add i didn't draw each style in one sitting i drew each character together and then edited them all, so that might be the reason why some look better then others, i just got good. but i'm saying that because the character i started with was spongebob! specifically because i was tired of ppl thinking dp style and fop style are the same and how spongebob would look the same in both styles, just a flat square. which is wrong! fop style is very different! i would prob describe it as a flat paper style. has sharp and rounded thick lines. the main source of research i used for it was the designer for fop was Ernie Gilbert. he has designed a lot of iconic characters for the show and i highly would check out his work, this is his website

Danny phantom style: now this one was tricky, prob the hardest one to figure out and i honestly don't think i really DID figure it out. the possible reason is i am still trying to go through the show atm myself, but i'd doubt it. they all just look off to me, just a little. which no need for me to work myself in a circle trying to make it "perfect". im no professional character designer! especially not Stephen Silver.

Spongebob Squarepants style: this one was tricky but in the opposite way to dp style, where i didn't know what to reference! to start off the show is mainly nonhuman characters, so finding character refs were hard. the refs i did use were the mermaids and the superheros, so i used that for timmy. but in the middle of working on jimmys i was watching a video of someone ranking every single spongebob ep and TURNS OUT in the later seasons, i think season 13, there were human designs! (technically elfs but whatever).

and weirder thing is how they draw patchy but im not going to get into that. i am assuming that style is for characters that are supposed to be real life humans up on land in that universe (but why not just use real life humans? idk, maybe tom kenny is getting to old for the role). BUT ANYWAY, i used the elfs for a main source for jimmy and danny, they turned out a lot better then the timmy in my eyes. i wanted at least one of them to have the black eyes but they all have bright blue eyes and the show usually always colors blue eyes. i get ahead of myself cause there was a lot more factors i still had to figure out. like the line art. the show doesn't have a clear line style like dp or fop, its just relatively consistent medium lines. so i just went with more recent show stuff then older stuff since it's HD.

ok but thats basically it, i can prob go on more but i'd feel no one gaf. i made these for fun and it was fun making them! i love all of these shows a ton so it was nice looking up the designers and artist for these shows. support the artists!!! fuck bitch fartman!!!!!

#nicktoons unite #nicktoons #nickalodeon #spongebob #spongebob squarepants #danny phantom #danny fenton #jimmy neutron #jimmy neutron boy genius #timmy turner #fairly oddparents

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trippinsorrows · 5 months ago

Text

with me + part nineteen

authors note: the infamous chapter is finally here! a lot of questions you all have asked me are finally answered. i hope it's enjoyable and worth the wait!

status: in progress // masterlist

warnings: angst (discussion of child loss), language, suggestive themes

song inspo: with me by destiny’s child

faceclaims

words: 10k

taglist: @pixiedust4000 @yolobloggers @msbigredmachine @southerngirl41 @wanderingreigns @romanreignsbae

To say your 2024 Bingo card has been filled with nothing but surprises would be the understatement of the century.

The past six months, really, have been mostly wonderful but also chaotic as hell.

And if someone had told you, way back when it was just you and Joe in your own little fantasy world, that his wife would one day text you in the middle of the night, wanting to meet and join forces to combat your apparently psycho-ex best friend, you’d laugh your ass off. Laugh your ass off harder than a guest at a Katt Williams special.

But, life is funny, and God clearly has a sense of humor, because that’s exactly what happened.

It’s also why you’re sitting on Joe’s bathroom counter at 4am as he finishes up in the shower, readying for his early flight.

“I’m sorry, it completely slipped my mind to tell you I gave her your number.” Joe shuts the water off, and you immediately redirect your attention to anywhere but him as he walks out. It’s bad enough you two didn’t have enough time to get in another session before his departure, but it’s another thing to be so cruelly taunted by your sexy ass man in all his buff, your favorite pastime on fully display but unable to be touched.

Sucked.

Rode.

All of the above.

Joe continues, and your eyes land on him just as he’s knotting the towel around his waist.

“I should have asked you before I did so, but with everything going on—”

“You don’t have to apologize, Joe.” Cutting off his unnecessary apology feels like a good move, the right move. You’re not mad at him about that at all. “I know you would have never done so if you believed she had any ill intent.” And it’s the truth, especially on the eve of this Mariah mess. “Sure, I would have liked a heads up that my boyfriend’s ex-wife would be texting me asking to meet and essentially do an interview together, but it wasn’t a necessity.”

He chuckles, looking over and asking, “what are your thoughts there?”

A heavy sigh leaves your mouth at his equally heavy question. “I don’t know. I feel torn. On one hand, it’s kinda weird, ya know? Truth be told, I always figured if by some miracle I ever spoke to her, she’d try to kick my ass sooner than she’d want to grab dinner.” You quickly add, “emphasis on try because ain’t no bitch beating my ass.”

He chuckles, reaching for his deodorant. “Well, you better not be fighting nobody with my baby in you.”

Rolling your eyes, your hand naturally rests on your stomach. “I know, I just….what do you think?”

“I think you should do whatever makes you most comfortable.”

“None of this is comfortable,” you murmur, and it’s the truth. This whole thing sucks all around. “And that’s not an answer.”

He shrugs. “I can’t tell you what to do, babe.”

“Technically, you can, but you’re choosing not to. There’s a difference.”

Joe moves over and caresses your temple, sharing quietly, “I want you and Callie to come down to Philly a few days before WrestleMania. They’ll put me up in an Airbnb. I’ll make sure it’s big enough for all of us.”

The abrupt change of topic confuses you, yes, but there’s more excitement at the thought of being reunited with him than bewilderment. It brings a small smile to your face. “Are you sure?” Any chance to see Joe will always be taken advantage of, you just don’t want your and Callie’s visiting him at such a time to cause any sort of distraction. “I don’t want us to get in the way. You need to focus.”

“You two could never get in the way, and my focus is exactly where it should be.” His hand snakes under your shirt, feeling your soft belly. “I also want you to come to the Hall of Fame Awards with me.”

That definitely takes you by surprise. You’ve never attended any sort of formal, public event with him before, and the WWE Hall of Fame awards is like the event. “Are—are you sure that’s a good idea?” Being careful with your words and honest with yourself, you confess, “I’m not sure if it’s a good look for you to be seen so publicly and openly with me right now. Your fans already kinda hate me.”

Limiting your media consumption has been a saving grace in all this. Not that you were big on it to begin with. However, you have read a couple articles and made the even bigger mistake of reading the comments. To say some, if not most, of the internet wrestling community have nothing nice to say about you would be putting it lightly.

There’s people cussing you out, people saying you should burn in hell for what you did, even some saying if Joe (Roman) loses at WrestleMania, it’ll be your fault.

That last one is at least a little funny to you, because for such big fans, they sure don’t know how WWE works.

Roman’s gonna retain the same way he has for almost three years.

Ain’t shit stopping that.

“I told you before, and I’ll keep saying it until I’m blue in the face—I don’t give a fuck what they have to say about us. I love you, and I’m going to be with you, regardless of what anyone thinks. The Hall of Fame, Wrestlemania, hell, I’ll take you in the fucking ring with me if I want to.” His defense is so strong in its delivery and conviction that it almost instantly takes away any and all reservations on your end. “And they’re not fans if they have some negative shit to say about the woman I love.”

“Well, in their defense, Mariah did a damn good job making me out to be some Jezebel.”

“That’s partially why I think you should do the Live with Jadah.” His tone and expression soften, thumb rubbing against your stomach. “They don’t know you like I do, and they don’t need to per se, but they can at least see you’re not what she’s made you out to be.” He brings his mouth to your temple, lips lingering. “They can see why I love you so much.”

“Knew you had an opinion on what you think I should do.” But, regardless, you’re thankful for him truly allowing you to decide what is best for you. And you think you have. With a big breath, you settle on your final answer. “I’m gonna do it, but not even to let people see I’m not this horrible person. I just….I haven’t really had a chance to use my voice in any of this. Like…..” You work hard to help him understand where you’re coming from. “I didn’t have a voice in the DCFS situation outside of defending my parenting, but in this….there’s a chance for me to speak my side, to be able to defend myself. And I feel like I need to do it.”

“I agree.” You’re not surprised. Joe is anything and everything, including forever supportive. “Ya’ll are gonna use my Instagram to do it too.”

“Wait, what?”

“Baby, Jadah doesn’t have any social media, and you don’t need all them damn people on your page, nor do you want that.” He’s right. You hadn’t thought of it that way. “Mariah had an audience. You get one too.”

Fair. Very fair. “Okay.”

He taps your hip, informing. “I’ll leave you the login info." It sometimes still amazes you how much he trusts you, how easy it is for share so many things with you that are objectively personal. His banking information, his fucking social medias that are literally tied to his career.

It means the world for him to have so much trust in you.

“We’re going to Disney after Mania.”

Joe is just full of surprises, jumping from subject to subject. “What? I thought we were going for Callie’s birthday.”

“We are, for a second time, but the first time is gonna be that Tuesday after Mania. A day for you and Callie to rest.”

You’re still trying to settle on the fact that this man is proposing two Disney visits literally back to back when something else hits you. “Wait, the week after WrestleMania? Don’t you have to work?”

“I’ve got it handled,” is all he says, all he offers, all he provides.

“Joe, what does that even mean? How does that work? How do you just win WrestleMania and disappear right after?” Something’s not adding up. There’s something he’s not telling you, and it pisses you off for a lot of reasons, but mostly because you just hate being kept in the dark. “Is it being written into the storyline or—”

“I’ve got it handled, okay?” His tone is exasperated, which you find ironic considering you’re the one on the receiving end of his vague ass answers. “Just….trust me.”

That’s a hard one. Not trusting him. That comes second nature at this point, but trusting him and not knowing if whatever he’s handled causes any sort of problems for him. You worry about any hits he might take sometimes because of his decisions that are usually for the sake of you and Callie.

It shouldn’t bother you, but it does, especially because you know how important his career is to him.

“What about you?” That’s your biggest concern. This man has been ripping and running for what feels like months. He deserves a vacation. He needs a vacation. If he’s gonna be off for a couple days at least, why not use them to recharge? “You need to rest too, Joe. I can tell you’re exhausted, baby. There’s no need for us to go twice. We can just stick with May for her birthday.”

He shakes his head, preparing a guaranteed disagreement. “You’re gonna be five months pregnant by then. You don’t need to be walking around a damn amusement park while that far along. I don’t know if you’ll even want to.”

“Baby, trust me when I tell you, I could be nine months pregnant, and I’m still going to waddle my big ass around that park. I’m fighting any kid that tries to get in my or Callie’s way.”

He shakes his head, muttering, “the May visit might not happen if your ass gets us banned.”

“I can behave,” you murmur, recognizing you’re being a bit dramatic. Just a smidge. Disney has been a dream visit since you were a kid, so there's an immense amount of excitement at going.

“And why are we going twice anyway?” Eyes narrowing in suspicion, you realize and point out, “you’re up to something, aren’t you?” He rolls his eyes but says nothing. “You are. Oh my God, Joe, you’ve already done so much for us, we don’t need anything else. I don’t need anything else.”

It’s the truth, too. Going to Disney twice in one year when some people never get to go at all is absolutely not a necessity. No matter whatever he clearly has planned that requires two trips.

Joe looks like he wants to say something but decides against it. Annoying ass. “It better not have anything to do with a damn dog.” He laughs. “Especially with me pregnant now. Two kids under the age of 5 is gonna be a lot in and of itself.” Since you’re already on the subject, you add, “I’ve been thinking maybe my mom can come stay with us a little after the baby is born? So, I can have some help when you can’t be there.”

There’s something in Joe's expression that gives you pause, like he wants to say something but decides against it. “And I mean, I’d be fine with your mom coming too, I just—another adult will be great.” You throw that out, an honest thing, thinking maybe he’s wondering why it always has to be your mom and not more of his side of the family.

Although deep down, you know that’s not it.

“Of course, whatever you want.” He kisses your forehead and moves away to finish getting ready to go.

As much as you don’t want to feel annoyed, you do. This is at least the second or third time you’ve tried to broach the subject of post-baby, and he’s been elusive, borderline dismissive.

It’s hard to tell if it’s because he’s maybe nervous about something, if he truly doesn’t understand why you’re wanting to discuss this now, or something else, but regardless, it’s annoying.

And you don’t like it.

You don’t like it at all.

———-

Things happen fast in Florida, or maybe it’s just you and the reality show that your life has been the past week or so.

Because one minute you’re celebrating an unexpected but welcomed pregnancy, and the next you’re the subject of major media articles, publications, and news segments. Followed up with being hit up by your boyfriend’s ex-wife, the same wife he had when you first started sleeping with him.

The same woman who you’re anxiously awaiting to ring your doorbell at any minute now.

The silence of the large house doesn’t help either. You're greatly wishing you could be distracted by Callie’s loud singing, running around, laughter, something. But, you asked Alexis to take her out for a few hours for you, not wanting her to be around in the event that things turn ugly.

And that’s a bit of an irrational belief on your part.

You would have never invited her over, accepted her invitation, agreed to even meet with her if there was any thought in the back of your mind that she has any ulterior motives. In a weird twist of fate, you’re both kind of in the same position, the subject of all kinds of public scrutiny. Granted, from what you have seen on social media, majority of the people are on her “side.” Some going even as far as starting and using the hashtag #TeamJadah.

And you can understand that, understand why the public would “side” with the wife versus the mistress, but it’s also based upon a shit ton of Mariah’s lies and smear campaigns that have painted you in such an ugly light.

That’s ultimately why you’ve agreed to this, agreed to this highly uncomfortable team up, because it’s the only and best way to reclaim your voice.

To reclaim your narrative.

The sound of the doorbell ringing literally makes you jump from where you sit criss-crossed on the new expensive ass sofa Joe picked out for the house. It is comfortable though, and for a second, you almost choose to stay in the comfort of the sofa versus answering the door.

But, you know that’s not an option, for Jadah to fly out on such short notice only to be stood up by the other woman.

It’s not a good look.

Clearly.

So with a deep breath and quick mental pep talk, your feet carry you to the door that you unlock and hesitate only a second before opening.

Instantly, you’re hit with two things: the sweet smell of Jadah’s perfume and Jadah herself. Right off the bat, you can’t get over how gorgeous she is. Her deep complexion is absolutely flawless and moisturized as hell, thick eyebrows that frame her almost slender facial shape perfectly. Full lips pulled back into a sly smile. She’s wearing a pair of jeans and thin sleeved top that show off her shape, both slim and thick where it counts.

She’s as drop dead gorgeous as you imagined her to be. You can’t be attractive as Joe is without someone to match your aura.

“Well, let no one say Joe doesn’t have good taste. You’re even prettier in person.”

Receiving compliments from your boyfriend’s ex-wife was also nowhere on your 2024 bingo card, but clearly all projections need to be discarded at this point with how many stunners have happened.

“Thank you.” It’s strange. You’ve always been super good with compliments, taking them at face value, because you know that you’re pretty, always having the high self-esteem to recognize as such. But, hearing it come from her of all people feels a little…..off. Like, she shouldn’t be complimenting you. “Umm, come in, please.”

She does so, walking and looking around, almost inspecting. “This place is beautiful.”

All of the compliments are throwing you. It’s not what you were expecting. Then again, you’re not sure just what you were expecting.

“Thanks. Do you…want some water or something?”

She shakes her head, “I’m good, thank you.” Jadah gestures with a manicured finger between the kitchen and the living room. “Preference?”

Shaking your head, you leave that up to her. “Whatever you like.”

She nods and heads into the living room, sitting down on the sofa where you just sat, anxiously awaiting her arrival. Wordlessly, you follow suit, sitting on the sofa opposite of her.

“Thank you for agreeing to this,” she says, placing her purse on the coffee table. “I know me reaching out must have taken you for a loop.”

“A little.” A lot. But, she doesn’t need to know that. “I—I can understand why. I’m so sorry you got caught up in all of this.”

“One thing you don’t have to do is apologize. For any of this. For anything. From what Joe told me, this girl is just psycho and has some weird obsession with trying to ruin your life.”

Scoffing bitterly, you can’t find a point to disagree with. “That sounds about right….”

No one says anything for a good, solid minute. Or two.

“Okay, why don’t we get the awkward part over.” Her voice takes on a new tone, one similar to boredom and insouciance. “We both dated and slept with the same man. I happened to be married to said man when you started sleeping with him, but that shit doesn’t even matter, cause you already know what our deal was.”

The deal…..

No, you have no idea what the deal was. That’s part of why you’re happy to finally be talking to her, because you have so many questions. Granted, that’s not the reason she’s here in the first place but still.

Your facial expression must give away the confusion because Jadah’s indifferent tone shifts to something else, something more serious. “Y/N…..how much do you know about my marriage to Joe?”

It’s a bit difficult for you to navigate how honest you should or shouldn’t be with her. She’s a stranger for all intents and purposes, but given why you two are now even sitting across from each other, maybe honesty is the best option. “He’s never really said anything about you or his marriage, and I won’t lie to you, it’s not like I’ve made a lot of effort to find out.”

There’s a part of you that still struggles with a level of guilt for the intentionality you had at the beginning of dating Joe to not ask about his wife, to pretend that you didn't see the wedding band on his finger.

Avoidance makes justification a hell of a lot easier.

She chuckles, gaze settling on her lap. “I shouldn’t be surprised. Joe’s always been a good man. He was probably trying to protect me, protect my privacy.” Jadah shakes her head. “The irony, huh?” She leans forward, hands on her knees. “Alright, we’re doing this.” She seems to be speaking more to herself than anything, and you get it fully. You’re still giving yourself mental pep-talks just sitting across from her. “I’m gonna tell you the truth about us, but I’m telling you now, certain things Joe, even with how much he clearly loves you, may never talk about. Really, it’s years of therapy that’s why I can talk about it now.” On one hand, the warning is appreciated. On the other hand, it only increases your anxiety at whatever you’re about to hear. “I also have this thing where I use dark humor to cope with heavy shit, so just pretend like you don’t notice.”

The conversation with Kaylah in Vegas returns to the forefront of your mind, and you start to feel bad for opening the door for Jadah to have to revisit a clearly painful past. But before you can protest, she starts sharing.

“Joe and I met in college. I was 20, going on 21, and he was 22. He was playing football, I played soccer. I thought he was attractive and vice versa. We had a class together, and I approached him first. Next thing I know, we’re fuck buddies. It wasn’t romantic. We didn’t go on dates. He didn’t want that, and neither did I. It was just sex.” She says it so simply, so casually, and for a second, your mind goes towards comparisons. That’s kind of similar to how it was with you and Joe at the beginning. Just all about sex.

“Well, like two dumb college kids, we were having unprotected sex, and we both know what can happen there. I ended up getting pregnant. And this….this is where shit gets bad, because both his family and my family were of the belief that because we were having a child together that we should get married, so guess what we did?” She rolls her eyes, leaning back into the sofa. “I think that might have been our first mistake.”

A mistake….

Joe has also made a comment at least once or twice insinuating he viewed the marriage as a mistake. Had stated they initially married for the wrong reasons, and hearing the full story, you sort of agree.

It’s such an outdated belief that two people need to be married in order to have a child.

“We did it, we got married. My family is in real estate, so we moved into an apartment they owned off campus and prepared for the baby. That was really the only time we talked and interacted. When it had something to do with the baby. And looking back on that, I can see now that even if we wanted it to work, it wouldn’t have. I felt nothing for him outside of the fact that we were having a baby together, and I know he would say the same because we discussed as such when we finally decided to get divorced. But, I’m jumping ahead of myself.”

Slowing down would be wonderful, because this is a lot for you to take in and digest. Jadah sounds like she’s essentially stating she never loved Joe, never had feelings for him. And it seems like he felt the same way, like they were only trying to make it work for the sake of the baby and their families.

She’s quiet for a second, and you already know the next thing that’s about to come out of her mouth. “There’s—there’s no easy way to say this, so I’ll just say it.” Another pause. “We lost the baby. I–I had a stillbirth. I was just about 8 months along. I—grief is so damn weird, because some days I’m okay, and then others, I feel like it just happened.”

Shaking your head, you advise gently, “Jadah, you don’t—”

She lifts her hand, stopping you as she explains, “today….today is an okay day. I’m….I’m good.” And you hope, for her sake, that she’s being honest with both you and herself. The last thing you want is to unintentionally trigger her. “We coped the only way we knew how at the time: avoiding each other and having sex when we weren’t avoiding each other. Both of which were unhealthy, one of which resulted in me getting pregnant again. But, I—I ended up miscarrying.”

That….that you especially weren’t expecting to hear. The loss of one child seems unfathomable, but the loss of two children is just so wrong. Like, it shouldn’t be allowed to happen. No one deserves to experience that kind of grief, and while your heart aches for Jadah, it’s hard not to think mostly about Joe.

To think about how that kind of experience had to have torn him up. How could it have not?

“After that miscarriage is when we tried to make things work, tried to actually be a real couple. It was mostly on my end but also that loss was the first time we actually tried to heal together instead of separate. I did most of the initiating, and I can be honest with myself now in admitting it was mostly because I wanted to try again. I wanted to try to have another child.” Her attention is mostly focused on her lap as she recalls what had to have been one of the most difficult times in her life. “Through therapy, I learned that I thought if I could finally just have a child, my grief would go away. Obviously, that’s not how that works, and I learned the hard way because I did get pregnant again, but I….I also ended up miscarrying again.”

Words. There are none to properly describe what’s going through your head right now, the emotions all circulating throughout your entire body. Tears brim your eyes listening to this heartbreak. You have such a tremendous amount of compassion and sympathy for the woman sitting across from you.

For the man not before you currently but you’d give anything to be able to hold and hug right now. You had no idea he’s been through so much, lost so much, and yet he still stands tall, forever being your backbone.

Being your saving grace.

“That was the last time Joe and I were ever intimate,” she continues, dabbing at her eyes. “He refused to touch me unless I got on birth control. Said he didn’t want to see me go through that anymore, and I believe him. But, I also don’t think he could handle another loss either.”

You’re not sure anyone could handle that kind of loss a fourth time.

“I was the one who cheated first, but it’s hard to call it that when I nor Joe ever really saw our marriage as real. It was legal, yes, but he never loved me, and I never loved him. We had love for each other, but we weren’t in love with each other. And I think the little we did feel was because of our shared losses.”

This almost feels like a discussion that needed to happen in separate sessions, because it’s so much to take in. You’d always wondered about this marriage, wondered what the real story was, but hearing that real story almost has you wishing you would have never asked. It’s just all so heavy.

“And then he started becoming more famous and up there in the WWE. I don’t need to tell you how crazy his schedule can be. I barely ever saw him. We essentially became roommates. He did his thing and who he wanted, while I did my thing and who I wanted.”

It’s hard on you hearing all this, for obvious reasons, but there’s also a part of you that is grieving for different reasons. Grieving what maybe you and Joe could have been if you knew all of this. Knew his wife wasn’t the high school sweetheart turned wife, knew he wasn’t going home and playing house when he wasn’t in your bed. You always just assumed this was the case, the few times you even allowed yourself to think about him being married. It was more toward the end of your relationship as you realized you needed to start being honest with yourself about your relationship with him.

“I know for a fact Joe never initiated a divorce because he felt like it was wrong. Like it was wrong for him to leave me because I couldn’t give him what he wanted, a family. I can’t speak for him, but I’d bet that’s why he didn’t divorce me even when he met you. Because he’s a good man who still felt a sense of loyalty to me because I had tried to give him a child. I just….I couldn’t.”

Your chest tightens at her words. Did she just….. “Joe wanted kids?”

Jadah is quick with the response, reiterating. “He always wanted to be a dad. Even with our first pregnancy, we were both nervous and young, but he told me that he wanted a big family because he came from one.”

It’s getting harder and harder to keep the tears at bay. You hadn’t the slightest clue fatherhood was something Joe always envisioned for himself, something he always wanted. It makes sense, it makes all the sense now why he reacted so strongly as he did when he found out about Callie. The way he looked at you with such love and appreciation on Christmas when you apologized for not getting him anything, the way his eyes fell on Callie is he calmly told you that you already did.

A child.

You’d given him a child, something he always wanted but could never have.

Shaking your head, you admit aloud but gently, “I didn’t—I didn’t know that.”

“Do you know what Joe told me when we finally realized we needed to just file?” She doesn’t wait for a response, most likely already knowing what your answer will be. “He said he was never supposed to be with me, because he was always supposed to be with you.” A tiny gasp leaves your mouth. “And he’s right. Joe never spoke about me the way he speaks about you, the way his eyes light up, the smile on his face…... He was never in love with me, because his heart was always supposed to be with you.” Any effort to refrain from crying is null and void. “And I’m happy for him. I truly am. I couldn’t give him what he wanted, and that’s okay, because you have.”

Her comforting you is the last thing that should be happening, but it’s exactly what occurs. She reaches over, placing her hand on top of yours.

“Y/N. I don’t hate you. I don’t think you’re a whore who ruined my marriage. That marriage was a sham from the beginning. If anything, I was more upset at you when Joe told me about Calista. I was upset because I wish you had told him from the beginning that you were pregnant. We could have gotten divorced sooner, and he could have finally experienced fatherhood. I could have finally figured out what I want in life.”

Sniffling, wiping at your eyes, “All this time…..I thought that I had been that woman, that I took him from you. That’s why I didn’t tell him about Callie, I thought—I felt like it was wrong, wrong because he was married.” It’s that along with your unaddressed daddy issues, that whole trauma, but while Jadah is relatively open with you about her struggles. You’re just not there yet.

“You can’t take what never belonged to me. I’m able to admit now that I never had Joe, and to be honest with you, I never really wanted him.” She frowns almost, continuing to share more with you than you ever expected her to share. “I wanted to do humanitarian work after college, and I didn’t do that because I was too busy living my life the way everyone said I should. I don’t blame Joe either. I guess I just wish all three of us didn’t have to wait so long to finally have what we wanted.”

In a strange sort of sense, all three of you are victims of some type of circumstances, different in various ways but still victims.

“Are you….are you happy, Jadah?”

In all that you’ve heard her divulge, a no wouldn’t surprise you. She’s such a strong woman, but in the midst of all this, you getting Joe, Joe having you, where’s her happy ending?

“I’m bisexual.” It’s such a strange first initial response, one that you’re not sure how to reply to or take. Not that you’re judging at all. Good for fucking her. But, where is the relevance? “It’s not a secret, either. I’ve been out since I was in middle school, but I’ve been in a relationship with this amazing woman for almost a year now, and it’s with her I’ve realized I just tend to form deeper connections with women than men. Especially emotionally. It’s gotta be why I never felt anything for Joe, because we both know that man is objectively gorgeous, insanely sweet, and the D is fire.”

That makes you laugh, the first in the midst of this heartfelt conversation. “You’re not wrong about that.”

“But, she’s amazing, and we’re so happy, so yes, I am more than happy.” Her eyes light up the same way you’re certain she’s seen with Joe when he talks about you. “But, you know what will make me happier?” She announces with attitude and determination. “Getting on Live together and blowing up this bitch whole spot.”

Another laugh that’s followed up with. “I’d rather beat her ass, but this is second best.”

“I mean, we can do that too. I don’t really know how to fight, but I’ll cheer for you on the side.”

There’s more laughter as you realize Jadah has that dry sense of humor that can have you dubbed over in tears from the humor, meanwhile she’s got a straight face the whole time.

“I wish, but I can’t be fighting in my condition.”

It leaves your mouth before you even realize what you’re basically confirming, and before you can freak out, scolding yourself for being so insensitive, Jadah is already two steps ahead.

“Seriously? Congratulations!” Her smile is just as genuine and happy as all the outdoors, as she explains. “Y/N, just because I can’t have kids doesn’t mean I can’t be happy for people who can. I know Joe must be over the moon happy.”

“He is,” you answer with a matching smile, hand going to your stomach. “I’m really happy I got to meet you, Jadah. I think….I think we both needed this.”

There was something so healing about all of this, some sense of solace and closure that feels like it’s been provided for the both of you. Her being able to talk this out and be honest about her feelings, and you learning that maybe, just maybe, your relationship with Joe was never wrong in the first place.

Because it was always supposed to be.

“I agree.” She squeezes her hand. “Now, let’s get started on our strategy for this Live, cause I’m ready to shut that ex best friend of yours fifteen minutes of fame down.”

———-

In another life, you and Jadah could have been the best of friends.

There’s such an ease that comes with talking to her. Not only is she just as laid back as Joe promised, but the bitch is funny as hell. The strategizing your game plan for the Live is filled with her dry humor that almost has you in tears at one point. And it amazes you how someone who’s been through so much can still find it in her to laugh, to still be filled with so much joy.

It’s admirable.

And maybe there’s a way where you can be friends of some sort, because there’s truly no ill feelings towards her on your end. You’re also almost certain it’s the same for her as well, but right now, the focus is on this Live.

Well, sort of.

“I definitely think the cool tones will really compliment the white theme of the house. You guys don’t plan to paint, right?”

Joe never mentioned that Jadah is an interior designer, not that he needed or even had a reason to, but it definitely comes in handy considering you have this big ass house to decorate without a lick of knowledge about decorating.

It didn’t take long to figure out how you’re going to tackle the Live, and you two even got your iPad set up in the kitchen, deciding that’s where you would hold it. She even set up the practice live so you two could familiarize yourself with the layout before actually going live.

So with that out the way, it only took one question from Jadah about designing for her to be assisting you with some options for different rooms in the house.

“No. Joe hasn’t mentioned anything about it.” You then remember. “We are getting a mural painted in Callie’s room. I guess Joe knows someone.”

“Oh, that’s awesome.” She beams, asking, “what’s the mural gonna be?”

Smiling, you answer, “disney. She loves Disney.”

“Y/N…..do you….do you think I could meet her?” She quickly adds, almost as if she’s nervous about even asking in the first place. “I know you probably need to talk to Joe first, but—”

“Of course, you can meet her.” There’s no need to think about it, no need to talk with Joe about it. “I was actually going to ask you if you wanted to meet her. She’s out with my best friend right now, because I didn’t want her overhearing our Live, but I’d love for you to meet her.”

She seems so moved and appreciative of this. “Thank you.” She motions down the hall, “you don’t happen to have any food, do you?”

Laughing, you answer. “Girl, I was just thinking we need to get this Live done, cause I’m hungry.”

It’s not too surprising on your end. In the past few days, you’ve noticed your appetite increasing, a strange symptom to have so early on in your pregnancy. Annoying, too.

“Well, let’s pig out on snacks, and maybe we can get actual food later,” she suggests. You’re down for that, thinking about asking Alexis to stop and pick something up on her way back to the house with Callie.

“Sounds good to me.” She then looks around, noticing the speakers located throughout the house. “Do those work?”

Already knowing where she’s headed, you pull out your phone, opening up Spotify and reaching it to her. “What’s the vibe?”

Jadah sucks her teeth, taking the phone. “Girl, you already know.”

She moves her fingers around the screen before music starts to play.

Knuck if you buck boy

“Oh my god, you taking it way back.” And it’s so appreciated, cause this always has been and always will be your song. It’s aptly appropriate as well.

“We gotta be in the zone.” She’s dancing along the way to the kitchen, tossing you your phone as she walks backwards. “You still remember Princess verse?”

Is water wet? “Don’t play with me.” Making it to the kitchen, you’re barely able to open the cabinet where the snacks are before the verse starts.

Yeah we knuckin' and buckin' and ready to fight

I betcha I'm'a throw dem thangs

So haters best to think twice

Word for word, you don’t miss a beat, and Jadah is right there with you, dancing and playfully twerking to the soundtrack of every middle school fight back in the Y2K era.

The two of you share a laugh at your silliness as she forages through the cabinet for her preferred snack while you open the goldfish and glance at the iPad. Frowning, you move closer, asking, “why is the screen still on? It’s supposed to be on auto—Jadah?”

She’s distracted, caught between Cheez-Its and Pretzels, answering distractedly. “Yeah?”

“Why does this say we’re live?”

At your question, she answers half-heartedly, “it’s in that practice mode thing, isn’t it?”

That would provide a heavy layer of relief if your eyes didn’t land on the number of the corner of the screen.

The number that reads over 100,000k people are currently watching this live.

“Jadah! It’s fucking live!” She spins around, confused. “Like, we’re on Live!”

“Oh, shit,” she curses, running over and also looking at the screen. “Damn, we are.”

Panicked, you back up to the opposite counter, lecturing, “I thought you said it was in practice mode!”

“I thought it was!” She defends, shrugging and reminding you of her naivety with technology. “You should have never left me in charge in the first place! I haven’t used social media since Tom and I were besties on MySpace!”

“Oh my god.” your hand remains over your mouth as you take in the fact that this thing has just been sitting here, live for the whole wide world to sit and watch.

“I don’t know why there’s so many people here. Were ya’ll just sitting here staring at her fridge?”

“Jadah.”

“It’s a valid question!” She sucks her teeth, pulling out the bar stool and plopping down. “Well, since everyone’s here, we might as well get started.” She reaches for your phone, simply saying “music.”

Believing she’s going to turn off Crime Mob, you hand it to her, but that’s too good to be true. Because instead of silence, you’re hit with Megan Thee Stallion.

I just want to kick this shit off by saying, "Fuck y'all!"

I ain't gotta clear my name on a motherfuckin' thang

“Jadah!”

“I said we were getting started. We need to set the tone.”

“We can’t be playing this kind of music on Joe’s account though.” At least, you think so. You’re not entirely certain what exactly his public image is supposed to exemplify. But, songs about fighting and cussing people out don't seem to align.

However, she waves you off, focusing on the screen. “Hello, everyone, and welcome to this special edition Live. I’m sure most, if not all of you, recognize Y/N, thanks to a basic bitch we’re about to roast alive in this here video.” She gestures to you, and unsure of how exactly to respond or act, you simply offer a sarcastic wave. “But most of you may not know I am because I’m pretty sure there’s only a couple of photos of me online, which is the way I prefer it.” She places one hand on her chest. “I’m Jadah, the infamous ex-wife who apparently hates Y/N and pulled up ready to knuck if you buck, but we’ll get into that later.”

Feeling more comfortable after making active efforts to push away your nerves, you tease, “bet ya’ll didn’t see this one coming.”

Jadah’s face lights up with a mischievous smile. “We figured there’s so much being said about us by this delusional bitch, that it’s time we speak our truth. And I’m just gonna say right now that while we’re doing this to clear up the lies, there are some things we’re not going to touch on because it’s nobody’s business.”

“None of this is really anyone’s business,” you add, the confidence growing by the second. “It’s all really fucked up how we even have to come up here and defend our characters and talk about personal, real life situations. I never wanted any of this, never wanted to have my face be out there, to have my daughter’s face be out there.”

“And that’s the thing, too,” Jadah seems to be feeding off your energy just as much as you’re feeding off hers. “I don’t have any social media at all. I hate it. After today, I don’t plan to ever do anything like this ever again. But, it’s also the fact that people are saying such cruel things about an innocent child that absolutely disgusts me. Like, people are attacking an innocent little girl and saying that it’s in defense of me, which is so insane because none of you know the truth.” She looks over at you, asking, “mind if I start off?”

“No, go ahead, please.”

“Bet.” She claps and announces. “I’m gonna keep this super easy for all of ya’ll. First things first, I have never spoken to that Mariah person a day in my life. Have zero clue who she is. The texts? Never happened. Phone calls? Never happened. Screenshots of said messages? Never fucking happend. Why?” Jadah makes a triangle over her mouth so her voice projects. “Because I don’t fucking know her!”

“More facts: Joe and I were married, yes. We got married when we were like 21 and 22 because I was pregnant, and that’s when people still believed children could only be raised by married couples. That’s the only reason I married that man. We were never in love. Never even dated. We were just horny college kids who didn’t use protection.”

As strange as it may be, you can tell there’s a bit of hesitation on Jadah’s end before she goes into the next part. “We, unfortunately, lost that child. And experienced some other forms of loss that I won’t get into because it’s very personal, but to make a long story short, we ended up having an arrangement. Essentially, he did what and who he wanted, and I did the same.”

She pushes some of her hair back, continuing to explain bits and pieces that are still true but protect her from having to lay out her darkest experiences. “I don’t even consider it an open marriage, because outside of us legally being married, we never had an actual marriage. As most of you already know, professional wrestlers have insane schedules, so when I tell you he was at the crib maybe a month out of the year? I’m not even exaggerating. That man was my platonic roommate.”

There’s a small smile on your face as her humor and sass melt into her delivery after carefully maneuvering around the specifics of her personal loss. “Ya’ll are all up in arms, coming after this girl talking about she broke up my marriage, blah blah blah. But, she couldn’t break up what didn’t exist. I never loved that man. Joe is a great guy, but we never loved each other.” She gestures to you with her thumb. “This is who he loves. This is who he has a family with. And the fact that ya’ll can sit there and claim to support him and be a fan while attacking the people he loves blows my mind.”

“So, it goes without saying, Mariah lied her ass off about all of that for clicks and views. She’s a liar. And you can print that in your tabloids.”

“I also wanna clear up some things about her if that’s cool with you?” Jadah nods, and motions for you to have the figurative floor. “I need people to understand that this is somebody who I thought was my best friend, who I’ve called a best friend since I was in kindergarten. Matter of fact, we met because some boy was picking on her, and I went up and pushed him, standing up for her. I’ve always prided myself on being a loyal friend, especially to her. So for her to do all that she’s done to me has been so fucking hurtful and confusing.”

“I found out that she’s been sleeping with my very first boyfriend, the boy I lost my virginity to and dated on and off up until I was in my mid-twenties behind my back since we were teenagers.” You have no intention of stooping to Mariah’s level, but if she wants to lay out your information for public scrutiny, then you damn sure can make sure they know just who they’re believing. Know her character, or lack thereof. “Mind you, he ain’t shit either and he can go fuck himself just as much as she can. Like, it takes two, but here I am calling this girl my best friend, crying and confiding in her about all he’s putting me through, and the whole time she’s fucking him behind my back.”

“That’s so foul.” Jadah looks just as disgusted as you feel just thinking and talking about it.

“But you know what? As fucked up as that is, that part is well with my soul because I have a man who treats me so damn good, a beautiful daughter, and a loving, supportive family. So, that’s fine. What really fucks with me though, still—” There’s an unplanned pause as emotions get the best of you, just revisiting this subject. “Fuck, I said I wasn’t gonna cry.” Taking a deep breath, you do your best to continue without breaking down in front of the whole damn internet. “What gets me is that this girl who I considered a sister, who I literally made the legal godmother of my child, called DCFS on me, made up horrific lies and stated my child was in immediate danger—”

“Oh my god—”

“They took my baby away from me and placed her with my mother, so I legally could not have any contact with my child or my mom for three days. And that may not seem like a lot of time to ya’ll, but I love my child. She’s very attached to me, and I’m kinda the same. So those three days were torture. I couldn’t sleep, I couldn’t keep anything down, my chest hurt. I had to hire a lawyer, be interrogated like I’m some criminal. It was awful.” Your attempts to hold back the tears failed epically, and Jadah’s hand is on the small of your back, rubbing in a comforting motion. “And now she’s sold all these personal photos and videos of my daughter to the highest bidder, so now I worry about what kind of fucking disgusting perverts now have access to them. It’s been fucking hell dealing with girl. You all have no idea.”

Up until this point, you’ve made an active, concerted effort to keep your eyes away from the comments, not wanting to lash out or be unintentionally triggered. But, an accidental glance reveals a slew of incoming comments including hearts of all colors.

It’s then you can’t help but to read a few, also needing to get your shit together. Crying on the internet is something you used to make fun of people for. Now, you’re in the same position.

The comments are a complete 180 from the last time you decided to torture yourself by viewing the public’s general opinion on you.

There’s a tremendous amount of sympathy, support, and newfound understanding. For both you and Jadah, though, the majority of them seem to be aimed towards you.

A lot of apologies as well.

“And this is the kind of person you all have been deceived by. The only thing she was truthful about is that yes, I met Joe because of her. She won a contest years ago that gave her tickets and backstage passes to a Smackdown show, so she invited me, and I met him that night.” That’s probably the only thing you could ever be grateful to Mariah about, the fact that her letting you be her plus one resulted in you meeting the love of your life. “But, I’m not a whore. Not a golddigger. I’m very intelligent. I got nearly a perfect score on my ACT and my SAT back in high school. I was student body president, homecoming queen, prom queen. You look up Ms. Popularity, and you’ll see my fucking face. I have a bachelor's degree in education, I’m a licensed teacher in my state. Like, I don’t need attention from strangers nor do I want it.”

“And here’s the thing, my daughter is almost five, so I’ve been in the picture. If I was this big attention whore like she says I am, why have I not gone public or made my presence known? The only reason ya’ll even know who I am now is because I was essentially outed, but I don’t want this shit. Joe is famous. Not me. I don’t want that. I just want to live in peace and privacy with my family. That’s all.”

It’s a bit of playing with the truth, insinuating that you’ve been in Joe’s life consistently the past five years, but that’s one of the parts of this that doesn’t need to be shared on the world wide web.

“We black and educated excellence over here. We don’t need validation from strangers.” Jadah says it better than you can as you continue to blot at your eyes, grateful the tears are drying up. “We need some church in here to lift the spirits.”

“Oh, Lord, what are you going to play now? We are about to get Joe’s account banned.”

She clicks around on your phone before the song starts playing.

We lift our hands in the sanctuary.

We lift our hands to give You the glory.

“You’re so stupid.” This laughter is so good for your soul, it’s the most you’ve done in such a short span in a while. And it feels good. “But why would you pick this damn song, knowing good and well it never ends.” Reaching for the goldfish bag on the island, you open and grab a few.

“Y/N! Why are you eating? We are in church.”

You give her that ‘girl, please’ look, justifying. “Girl, I’m hungry. It’s snack time, shit.” You’re craving more than a snack, more like a full course meal, but Callie’s snacks will have to do for now.

“Now you’re cussing in church. Don’t drag me to hell with you, whore.” She leans closer into the phone, taunting, “you liked that one, didn’t you, Mariah?”

You almost spit out your food. “Jadah!”

“What? You are a whore. That’s why I pulled up at your house blasting Sideline Hoe by Monica in my 2007 Toyota Camry, wearing my Baby Phat bomber jacket to fight you that one day.” At this point, you’re about to piss on yourself. Jadah’s sense of humor is golden, because she’s saying all this with such a straight face. Never once breaking scene.

You decide to play along, correcting. “No, it was The Boy Is Mine, remember?”

She snaps her finger. “That’s right. My bad. And then the second fight, it was Jolene. I played that when I snuck in your hospital room at Grey Sloan and caught you flirting with Dr. McDreamy.”

Turning your head, you try your best to hold in your laughter, but it’s impossible.

And Jadah also breaks a bit, speaking to the phone and viewers. “You see how ridiculous and stupid this all sounds? That’s exactly how stupid majority of the shit that came out of Mariah’s mouth is. I literally just met Y/N for the first time today, this morning. And as ya’ll can clearly see, we good over here. She got her man. I have a wonderful, beautiful girlfriend. Stop being so invested in lives you don’t live.”

You start to add something else when Jadah interjects, “and let me just say this, cause I saw some people having the audacity to say this girl is ugly. Ugly where? The bitch is gorgeous. Look at her!” She gestures to you, adding, “she’s stacked in the front, and it’s sitting in the back. Shit, I would hit that too.”

“Girl, you better stop before they start making up rumors and shit about us all being poly.” Snickering at just the thought alone of that being the latest on the rumor mill, you jokingly coin it prematurely. “Roman’s Harem.”

“Roman’s Hoe House,” she suggests, and you’re nearly in tears from laughter. This bitch is hilarious. “Plot twist, everyone. This was all a publicity stunt for a new season of Flavor of Love featuring Roman Reigns.”

“Jadah, oh my god, stop.”

She lifts her hands to silence you as you lay your head on her shoulder, laughing your ass off. “We will be taking applications following this Live. If you are a woman of color with ass and boobs, please apply. Slim thick girls, ya’ll can apply too with the understanding your chances are a bit slimmer. No pun intended. Skinny girls….maybe try the Bachelor or something.”

“Jadah, you are a menace.” You are dying for her to meet Alexis. They seem very similar in a lot of ways, and it seems like they’d vibe well. Hopefully.

“Y/N, please, I am trying to build recruits for the harem.” She finally cracks, shaking her head and leaning forward to read some of the comments. She then asks you, “should we answer questions?”

That’s an easy pass, though you also know this is your one chance to really show who you actually are versus who you’ve been painted out to be. “Sure. A couple.”

Jadah gets to reading, “uhhhh, okay this one is tame. What’s the sexiest thing about Roman?”

“Jadah, how is that tame?”

“You should have seen the other one,” she mutters. Something tells you that it’s better you didn’t.

“All of him. That’s such a generic, basic answer, but it’s the truth. He’s the full package. Tall, handsome, amazing body. Insanely kind.” Big dick, not that that needs to be shared with the whole world. “I will say though, like, seeing him parent our daughter, how good and patient he is with her. That is immensely attractive. Him being such an amazing dad and partner. That shit is sexy. If you’re grown, you agree with me.”

“You better be grown if you’re watching this Live.” She’s not entirely wrong. Jadah then reads the next one. “What’s something most people don’t know about Roman?”

Looking over at Jadah, you ask, “do you wanna….”

Immediately, she’s shaking her head, admitting, “I don’t know him well enough to really speak on that. Like, we knew each other better in college, but obviously who we were in college is vastly different than who we are now.”

It really does stump you to hear her say that aloud, not that it upsets you, but just the mere fact that you spent so long viewing her relationship with Joe in one way, but in actuality, they were more strangers than anything.

Strangers only bonded by loss.

“Ummm, a lot, actually.” You finally answer, trying to figure out how or even what to share. “He’s actually very quiet, like, borderline shy. At least when you first meet him. Once he warms up, you see more of his personality. But yeah, it’s fascinating how well Joe encapsulates Roman cause they’re totally different people.” You glance at Jadah, murmuring, “maybe one more.”

This Live has gone on long enough, and you feel that you and Jadah touched on all the points you wanted and needed to address.

She nods, clearly searching for a good final one. A couple seconds later, she reads aloud. “What’s one thing you’d like to say to Roman’s fans?”

Damn.

What a final question.

There’s a couple seconds you utilize to gather your words, wanting to articulate effectively and clearly. “That regardless of how you feel about me, please don’t let that change how you viewed him before you even found out I existed. Joe—sorry—Roman, no, fuck that. Joe is so damn passionate about what he does, his work is everything to him, and he does it like he does everything else in his life—with full passion and dedication.” Your eyes are starting to water again from unexpected emotionality. “I’m so proud of him and all he’s done and accomplished, and I know it’s just the beginning, so I’d love for you to continue to support him on his journey.”

“Damn.” Jadah mumbles after a minute of silence. “That was deep. We need another song—”

“Jadah, I swear to God, if you play one more song—”

“You’re going to like this one!”

“I think we’re just about finished anyway.” It’s not a think. It’s a know. Callie’s been gone long enough. You miss your baby. “What—”

Roman’s theme song plays louder than the previous songs Jadah played, and a smile is instantly on your face. “Okay, you were right.” The two of you vibe for a minute, because your man’s song really is an actual vibe.

“Alright,” Jadah laughs. “You all have been a wonderful crowd now, but we’re hungry, so we’re gonna go eat—what are you thinking?”

“Hmmm, maybe Chinese?”

“Good call.” She then focuses on the screen again. “We’re gonna go pig out, listen to some more amazing music and….yeah.” Jadah grabs you and pulls you right next to her, so you can say something too.

“Thank you for listening to our side, the truth, and please be kind. To everyone. Not just the people you know.”

“And don’t forget to send in your applications for—”

“Jadah!”

#roman reigns x black!reader #roman reigns fic #roman reigns #roman reigns x black!oc #arisnotebook

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