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drakenology · 4 years ago

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Arguments - feat Bakugo, Todoroki, Kirishima and Tamaki Amajiki

author’s note: i’m feeling angsty today. so this is gonna be about arguing with some of the bnha characters. anyone else feel off today? just me?

warnings: swearing, angst, fluff 🥺, and suggestive themes not full on smut. characters aged up! some of these are long.. i was feeling dramatic

headers from @annicon

Bakugo

as much as i love this man i can admit he would be SOO stubborn

would get frustrated easily

yells 🥺

he knows when to walk away when the conversation isn’t getting anywhere which is good

would NEVER hurt you (i’ve seen ppl write that this mf hits you... girl...domestic violence is not an aesthetic.)

he isn’t the best with words so it’ll take him a little while to admit he’s wrong because he can’t verbalize how sorry he is sometimes

when he does he’ll hug and kiss you and apologize like a million times after he’s done being a stubborn little prick.

gives you the best “i’m sorry “ dick imaginable holy shit

Bakugo done did it. He pissed you off. You were already having a terrible day and then you come home to this motherfucker with a bunch of people over after you told him that you weren’t in the mood for company. So for the rest of the night when everyone left, you gave him the silent treatment knowing that he HATES when you ignore him on purpose.

“Y/N?”

You say nothing, continuing scrolling through your phone to look like you were preoccupied.

“Y/N, what’s your problem? I know you hear me.” Bakugo persists.

You ignore him, turning your back to face him. He grunts and grabs your shoulder, turning you back around to face him.

“Y/N if you’re pissed at me just say that. But ignoring me is fucking immature and it’s pissing me off!” He yells. Translation: “What did I do? 🥺”

“I’M pissing YOU off!? That’s funny. Because it’s not like you didn’t completely ignore my fucking feelings tonight. Why did you invite Kirishima and Denki over after I specifically said I didn’t feel like playing fucking HOSTESS!” You shout back, throwing your phone somewhere.

“Are you serious!? I never told them to come here they just showed up. What was I supposed to do tell them to piss off!?” Katsuki asked.

“YES!” You scream, annoyed that he’s not getting the reason why you’re upset. You never minded having Bakugo’s friends over but you just wanted to have a calm night with just the two of you. You were exhausted and fixing dinner for you and 3 other people and listening to loud chatter about sports and video games was not on your to-do list.

“This is so fucking petty! I don’t get why you’re so mad that they came over.” Katsuki said shrugging his shoulders.

“That’s the problem, idiot! You don’t fucking get it! I worked all day today. I just wanted us to relax but no, you wanted to have a fucking guys night in my living room! It’s the complete disregard for my feelings that’s pissing me off not the fact that they came. I told you I was tired and you having them come over anyways was like a big fuck you to me!” You explain, your face pulled into a face Katsuki knows is your angry face. Bakugo sighs, not ready to admit that he was wrong.

“Tch. Whatever. I’m gonna go sleep on the fucking couch. Let me know when you’re done being fucking frigid.” He shouts, clearly out of anger.

“Fine.”

“Fine!”

Katsuki leaves your shared room and slammed the door, you throwing yourself onto the bed. You feel tears sting your eyes as you sob into your pillow. You hated fighting with Bakugo, and you knew he hated it too. He has a hard time expressing himself without getting defensive sometimes. But you knew he felt bad. You sigh and close your eyes and go to sleep.

The next morning you get up from bed and get ready to start your day. You shower and brush your teeth, you and Bakugo strategically avoiding each other all morning to go and do your daily routines. You didn’t utter a word to each other. Just questions and short answers.

“Got work?”

“Yup.”

“When?”

“7:30.”

The silence killed you both as you sat at the table and ate breakfast, Bakugo’s face pulled into a frown as he ate. You roll your eyes and go to put your dishes in the sink and grab his once he’s done. You can hear him get up from his chair as you wash both your plates and dry them. You had assumed he was leaving so you just wash all the rest of the dishes without turning your back. Suddenly you felt familiar arms wrap around your waist.

“Let me go.” You say, tearing up at the sudden touch. He was trying to make up with you and you were so ready to forgive him. The tension was almost too much to bear. This fight was small and it turned into something way bigger than need be.

“Not until you listen to me. I’m sorry, ok? I should have never yelled at you the way I did. And calling you frigid wasn’t ok either. I shoulda just told everyone to go home. We have those dumbasses over all the time. One night wouldn’t have killed me. I’m sorry. Can we just forget this shit ever happened? I hate it when you’re mad at me.” He pleaded, burrowing his face into the crook of your neck. You smile and turn around to look at his face, cupping his cheeks in both your hands as you stand on you tip toes to kiss him. He kisses you back eagerly, happy that you and him are back on good terms. He pulled away from the heated kiss and looks at the clock on the microwave.

“6:30...we still have an hour to kill. If you’re late I’ll drop you off.” Katsuki says, his eyes turning dark with feral lust.

“Late? What are yo-“ you’re interrupted by Bakugo pulling you into your bedroom with determination to make things right.. his way.

Tamaki (🥺 my new found love)

Tamaki is NOT a confrontational person so arguing with you is really hard. He hates raising his voice or even getting to a point to where he’s angry because he doesn’t want to think about hurting you in anyway.

He’ll shut down and turn cold or try and act nonchalant.

he might even avoid conflict by changing the subject

if he’s riled up enough though he’ll cuss you out.. to his dismay

doesn’t like being mad at you and vice versa

hates arguments.. like honestly can you just get over it so he can eat you out now?

speaking of eating you out, he gives apology head and he won’t stop until you say you forgive him.

Tamaki didn’t like to admit it but he was really jealous. Like really really jealous like YANDERE type jealous. You and him were out to dinner with Mirio so you were all chatting about mindless nothing, catching up like you always do. Nothing seemed to be out of the ordinary for you but to Tamaki it appeared that Mirio was a little too playful at dinner with you. He was cracking jokes and poking fun and Tamaki took it as him flirting with you; which Mirio would never disrespect your relationship like that. Rage sat in the pit of Tamaki’s chest as you laugh at all his jokes. He was furious but hid it pretty well for the night.

“And then Tamaki wet himself in front of the whole class when I scared him with my quirk in middle school. Can you believe it?” Mirio laughs, causing you to laugh at the thought.

“Oh leave him alone, Togata.” You giggle, waving your hand in front of your face to stop the tears from laughter. He had been making you laugh all night all to Tamaki’s disliking. He was quiet all dinner, which you noticed immediately after Togata’s last joke.

“Hey Tamaki, is everything ok?” You ask, concerned that he might not want to be out anymore.

“Yeah.” He said coldly. “Actually I’m just gonna go to the car. I feel kinda sick.” He stands from his seat and walks to the exit, absolutely fucking furious that you were “flirting” with his childhood friend right in front of him.

“Awkward. What’s up with him?” Mirio asks, completely dumb founded by Tamaki’s sudden disappearance.

“I dunno. I’m gonna go to the car and see what’s wrong. Do you mind?” You ask, standing from your seat.

“Nah that’s cool. I’m actually gonna head out. You go on ahead, Y/N. I’ll take care of the tab.. this time.” Mirio jokes. You giggle and thank him, walking towards the exit. You walk through the parking lot and find the car, seeing Tamaki sitting in the passenger side with his arms crossed across his chest. What was his deal? You open the car door and sit in the driver’s side to meet a thick tension.

“What’s wrong Tamaki? Do you really feel sick or are you upset with me?” You ask.

“Why don’t you ask Mirio? I’m sure he’ll be able to answer since he’s the only guy you talked to all night. It was like I wasn’t even there.” Tamaki says, calm but obviously pestered.

“Is that was this is about? Tama you know it wasn’t like that. Mirio has always been a jokester what’s the difference now?” You ask, getting a little upset at his accusation.

“The difference is that he was trying to make a pass at you. He was so obviously flirting with you.” He says, his tone becoming stern. You’re shocked at how he was getting, frowning at how unreasonable he was being.

“No he wasn’t, Tamaki.” You say, looking him dead in his eyes.

“Yes he was. I’m not about to fight with you about this he was clearly fucking flirting with you. He joked with you all night and you laughed at every single thing he said. You must want to fuck him, don’t you?” He asked, looking at you with some sort of betrayal in his eyes. This infuriates you.

“What are you talking about!? You know I would never cheat on you Tamaki. Especially not with your best friend. What’s with you!?” You ask sternly, not amused or pleased in the slightest.

“Whatever, Y/N.” Tamaki says, looking out the car window while turning the other way so he’s not facing your side of the car. He knew this was stupid and he knew your loyalty was never to be questioned but he couldn’t shake this feeling of jealousy.

“No. You don’t get to start a fight and then blow me off when you’re through arguing! Talk to me!” You yell, furious at this point. Tamaki shrugs, avoiding the situation entirely now.

“Just drive. I wanna go home.” He says, not taking his eyes off the view from his window. You roll your eyes and start the car, pulling out of the parking lot to start your way home. The drive home was so quiet you could hear a pin drop. You were so angry that you didn’t talk to Tamaki the whole way home, knowing you’d probably cuss him out if he said the wrong thing. Tamaki immediately felt bad after picking that fight. He didn’t know what came over him, he knew he had to make it up to you before you two go to bed angry with each other. You approach your shared apartment and park the car, silence still riddling the car. The tension between you both was intense and it scared you. You’ve never seen Tamaki this upset. Jealousy was always an issue for him but he’s never reacted this strongly.

“Y/N?” Tamaki says breaking the silence. You look at him, a little relieved that he’s talking to you again.

“I-I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that to you. I know you’d never cheat on me, of course. But I was just so jealous. It felt like you and Mirio were on a date and I was just the third wheel. The thought of him taking you from me drove me crazy. I wasn’t thinking. Can you forgive me?” He says, placing his hand on top of yours on the steering wheel. You sniffle, tearing up at his apology.

“Tamaki, I’m sorry I made you feel like that. I love you so much. No one could ever take your place, not even Mirio. I’d never betray you like that, ever.” You sob, tears flowing down your face. Tamaki questioning your loyalty really hurt your feelings and he hated seeing you cry.

“I know that. Please don’t cry. I’m so sorry, Y/N. It was so stupid of me to even assume.” He says, taking his hand and wiping your tears away. He took your hand and gave it a sweet kiss to soothe you, rubbing circles with his thumb on it as he consoled you. You giggle and wipe your tears, happy that you guys made up after that silly fight.

“Let’s go inside.”

Todoroki

arguments between you two get heated. It gets to a point where sometimes you don’t speak to each other for days. he’ll definitely give small reminders that he still loves you to butter you up to alleviate some of the tension.

raises his voice

just as stubborn as bakugo

to a fault of his upbringing facing his emotions was hard for him sometimes, causing him to be cold when you fight

when it’s time to get over it and make up he’ll make it a huge event; flowers, chocolates and lots of freaky apology sex

cant stand arguing with you just like tamaki but wont back down in the slightest

is sure he doesn’t say anything harsh to make the situation worse.

“Why are you being so stubborn?!” You shout at your bi-colored haired boyfriend. The two of you have been fighting all day to your surprise. Shoto was usually easy going and you two hardly fought. But today, a bug seemed to have crawled up Todoroki’s ass and he’s been picking fights all day. You’ve been arguing about small things like who left the bathroom light on or who ate the last hot pocket. Right now it was an argument about when you’re going to meet his father Endeavor. It’s been almost a year since you two have been together and you don’t even think his father knows you exist.

“For the last time Y/N we’re not going to my dad’s house. That’s final! You can argue with yourself about this. End of discussion.” Shoto says, very annoyed at the thought of being near his father. He still couldn’t stand him, even as an adult. He can’t bring himself to bring you around him because he knows how he can be. If he even says something slightly rude to you he’ll flip the fuck out. You groan in frustration, wishing he’d at least consider.

“He doesn’t know we’re together does he!? What am I to you some secret? Why did you stay with me all this time if your family doesn’t even know I exist !?” You shout, tearing up with seering anger.

“It’s not that. Of course he knows we’re together; my whole family knows! Why do you want to involve him so badly?!” Shoto yells.

“Why wouldn’t I want to meet my fucking boyfriend’s father!? You’re not making any sense.” You say, getting more and more frustrated as Shoto makes excuses.

“You know what? Fine. We’ll go meet him tomorrow. But as soon as he treats you like you’re not good enough for me don’t be surprised when I tell you I fucking told you so. God you can be so stubborn sometimes.” Shoto shouts, rolling his eyes at you.

“Oh I’M stubborn!? That’s rich coming from you. You’re being so unreasonable right now. I know you and your father-“

“YOU DONT KNOW SHIT ABOUT MY FATHER. Stop speaking on things you haven’t the first idea about!” Shoto yells, punching a nearby wall. (Oop.) You flinch, shocked at how angry he got so quickly. You tear up and run off to your bedroom, Todoroki immediately regretting getting so upset with you. He scared you and that’s something he never wanted to do to you under any circumstances. You cried yourself to sleep that night, angry that things got so heated. Why did he react like that? And why was he treating you as if you knew nothing about him and his father. He would vent to you about him all the time and you gave him advice when you could. But tonight you felt like you were nothing but an outsider. Shoto didn’t even bother coming into the room. He couldn’t face you after making you cry. Right now, he hated himself for treating you like that. He was just so afraid of his father’s judgement he didn’t want him to hurt your feelings with how crass he was. If Endeavor found the slightest thing wrong with you he’d never let you or him forget it. He could hear him now calling you unworthy of the Todoroki name. The thought alone enraged him. In his own cryptic way, he was trying to protect you from him but this was no way to do it nor did he have the right. Todoroki slept on the couch, missing your warmth against him in your bed.

The next morning the two of you drove to the Todoroki estates in silence. You were still pissed at him and Shoto didn’t want to say anything to further upset you. He was annoyed he was making this trip in the first place but he knew he had to man up for your sake. It was unfair of him to try and keep you away from his family especially since you would one day take on his name and be a part of the family when he married you. He knew he couldn’t keep you away forever, but god couldn’t he have had a little more time? He dreaded this day.

“Ready?” Shoto asks coldly, trying to hide his remorse from his tone. You nod, getting out of the car before he could walk over and open the door for you. Shoto is surprised and gets out with you, guiding you to his old home. He can’t lie, he’s so fucking nervous. What if he hates you? Not that he cares what he thinks, he’ll marry you anyway but still. He at least wants his blessing. You walk with Shoto to the main room of the home and wait for Endeavor to come downstairs. Suddenly you hear footsteps from across the room. It was him. He was tall and his aura was so dark and intimidating.

“You must be Y/N.” Endeavor says, looking down at your small frame. You nod, a wave of nervousness shooting through your body.

“N-Nice to meet you sir.” You bow respectfully.

“No need for that. Please, have a seat.” Endeavor says gesturing to the couch. You and Shoto sit down next to each other, Endeavor following suit by sitting across from you two.

“So.. how long have you two been together?” Endeavor asks, his booming voice almost sending an echo throughout the empty room. You gulp and look towards Shoto.

“10 months.” He answers for you, taking your hand to calm you. You’re still mad at him but god you’re glad he’s doing his best to ease your anxiety.

“And you just now arrange a meeting? Hm.” Endeavor questions, looking at you as if he was scanning you to find something irredeemable about you. You look down at your lap, unable to keep eye contact with the intimidating man.

“I-I wanted to meet with you sooner. Me and Shoto fought about coming here last night but I convinced him.” You say nervously.

“I see. You seem like an ok girl. Shoto has had his fair share of.. inadequate women in his life so, you’re a step up from the rest.” Endeavor says, motioning for a maid to make you all some tea. You laugh nervously, Shoto squeezing your hand in annoyance. Was that a compliment?

“You two seem like you’ve been fighting.” Endeavor says suddenly, observing both your body language. You’re both shocked as you turn to look at each other. How’d he know that?

“What’s it to you?” Shoto asks, glaring at his father.

“Oh nothing. But if you’re planning on marrying this girl it’s probably best to not argue too much with her. Hell, she might up and leave.”

Shoto looks at you, pain in his eyes. The look on his face alone said “I’m sorry.” Shoto hated to admit it but his father was right. Fighting as much as you have been, especially the fight you had last night was toxic and could take a toll on your relationship.

You smile at him and turn to Endeavor

“I’d never leave him.” You say, snuggling closer to Shoto as he blushed. He was embarrassed that he was being so vulnerable around his father but he knew that only you could make this happen.

After a long conversation with Endeavor and Shoto, you leave with a feeling that you might have won him over. You think? He was hard to read, just like Shoto. He was more like his father than he likes to admit. Shoto opens the car door for you to get inside and then walks to the drivers side to come in. You sit in the car for a while, silent until Shoto grabs you and leans over to kiss you. You kiss him back, tearing up into the kiss.

“I’m sorry, snowflake. I can’t believe I raised my voice at you like that. I was just so scared that he was gonna hate you and say something disrespectful. I should have just told you that instead of being defensive. I’m so so sorry I scared you. Please forgive me. ” He pleaded, peppering kissing on your face.

“I know. And I forgive you.” You giggle, pulling Todoroki closer to you to kiss him again.

Kirishima

Out of all the boys he’s the least stubborn when it comes to fighting. But don’t be fooled, he’ll argue you down. he’s very good at managing his temper when it comes to you.

Regrets starting a fight in the first place

Just wants to cuddle and go back to normal

But when he’s angry hooo boy

doesn’t even yell, he’s like a calm angry which is terrifying

tries talking over you, trying to plead his case

will not rest until the situation is resolved and over with so you guys can move on

like all the others... apology sex

will try not to lose his patience

You and Kirishima had been together for a while now so it was only inevitable that you two have your first fight. You were always a vigilant person and wanted to help others even though you were quirkless like Deku was at one point. Kirishima is protective of you to a fault and the thought of you getting hurt or worse didn’t sit well with him at all. You assured him that you were capable of taking care of yourself and protecting yourself but he wasn’t having any of it. You spent years perfecting your martial arts skills, training your ass off for countless hours everyday and he knew that. But he didn’t want you to one day meet your match without him there to protect you.

“Y/N, drop it. You’re not going on missions with me and that’s final. It’s too dangerous.” Eijiro said, his brows furrowed. He was trying not to lose his patience with you but you kept insisting. He just wished you’d forget about this whole thing; for your safety.

“You don’t have the right to tell me what I can and can’t do! I’m fully capable for taking care of myself and you know that.” You yell, irritated at your boyfriend underestimating your abilities. Eijiro sighs and stands up from the couch to stand in front of you, inching so close you could almost kiss.

“I’ll die before I let you go out there. Do you know what would happen to me; to your friends and family if something happened to you!? We’d be crushed. Please just drop this.” Kirishima says, wanting to avoid this conversation all together. But alas, nothing was changing your mind. You were very head strong and stubborn to no avail so you weren’t going down without a fight.

“You can’t stop me!” You yell

“Oh I can’t?” Eijiro challenged.

“No. You can’t. You can’t treat me like a child, Eijiro.” You say. “How can you say I’m not ready if you don’t give me a chance to prove I am!?”

“Because you just aren’t! Okay!? You say you’re not a child but you’re acting like one and a petulant one at that. Just drop it! God, you can be so stubborn sometimes. Don’t you see I’m just trying to keep you safe!?” Kirishima yells, instantly regretting raising his voice at you and losing his cool. You tear up, furious that he’s treating you like some kid. You grab your stuff and prepare to leave his apartment.

“Where are you going?” Kirishima sighs

“Fuck you, Eijiro.” You say, walking away from him and going outside to cool off. Kirishima tries to grab you before you leave but you snatch your arm away from him and walk outside with a huff and a slam of the door. You wipe your hot tears away and start aimlessly walking down the street to go home. Hell, you don’t even know your way home from Eijiro’s place but you’ll be damned if you go back there. As you walk you see Kirishima’s car pull up to the side of you, driving slowly to keep up with your walking pace.

“Y/N please get in the car.” He says out the car window

“No! I don’t wanna talk to you so just go away!” You yell, continuing to walk as the brisk wind assaults your bare skin. Dammit you forgot your coat.

“Y/N! You’re being ridiculous just please get in the car. You left your jacket; it’s freezing out here!” Eijiro shouts, getting out of the car and grabbing you to pull you inside. You groan, obviously being overpowered by your strong boyfriend. Kirishima slams the door and gets back inside, drives back to his apartment and parks in the driveway. He sighs and leans his head on the steering wheel.

“I’m sorry I got so heated with you. But can you blame me? I’m worried about you. Sure we’ll be on these missions together but what if something happens? What if I’m not there to protect you when something goes wrong? These missions are unpredictable; anything could happen and I’d literally die if even a scratch is put on you.” Eijiro pleads. You start crying, sniffling at his words. He was right to be worried.

“I love you, Eijiro and I appreciate you being so concerned about me. But that doesn’t give you the right to shelter me. You can’t just force me to not follow my dream.” You sob, wiping your tears away. Eijiro grabs your hand and kisses it.

“I know. I just can’t bear the thought of you being hurt. But if this is what you really want, I have no choice but to at least see this through.” Kirishima says, holding your small hand in his two massive ones. You smile, putting your other hand on top of his.

“Thank you. Also, I’m sorry for saying fuck you to you. That was mean.” You say pouting.

“It was. Hurt my feelings.” Eijiro said faking sadness, immediately laughing as he watched your face frown up again at the thought of hurting his feelings.

“Oh shut up.”

#bnha fanfiction #bnha x reader #bnha smut #bnha bakugo x reader #bnha midoriya x reader #bnha imagines #bnha #bnha todoroki x reader #bnha bakugou #bnha bakugo katsuki #bnha headcanons #bnha kirishima #bnha denki #bnha tamaki #bnha amajiki #bnha angst #bnha fluff

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queenshelby · 4 years ago

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The New Assistant (One Shot)

Pairing: Cillian Murphy x Reader

Warning: Smut

Words: 3985

Summary: You are Cillian Murphy’s new assistant for Season 6 of Peaky Blinders.

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Your First Day at the Peaky Blinders Set

‘Mr Murphy, I am Y/N, your new assistant’ you said as you stood 1.5 feet across from him, complying with the social distance requirements.

‘Please, just call me Cillian’ Cillian said with a smile before telling you that it is nice to meet you.

‘Sorry Mr Murphy, uhm Cillian’ you said, causing him to laugh.

‘So, here are the scripts for today and a coffee’ you said. ‘Rose told me that this is how you drink your coffee, but if you like something else just let me know’ you added.

‘Thanks Y/N, it’s perfect’ Cillian said as he took a sip and getting on with his work.

You only recently began watching Peaky Blinders as you applied for the job and you couldn’t believe that, when you met Cillian, he had as much charisma as he displayed on camera.

His piercing blue eyes and smile were almost hypnotising, yet he seemed kind and down to earth.

You noticed that he was lost in his own little world as you observed him work for the morning. It was like he transformed into Thomas Shelby and, every time he spoke to you, it took him a little while to lose his Birmingham accent.

After you accompanied him on set for five hours, he asked you whether you could prepare the scenes for the next day for him.

You drew up a schedule for him, putting together transcript for each scene. You made two copies and placed them in small folders.

You were very organised and he appreciated it.

‘Two folders? Please tell me that they are not both for me’ he said with a slight worry as he stepped back into his trailer after finishing off for the day.

‘No, just one is for you. The other one is for me. Rose said that you like to rehearse your scenes in advance’ you said before offering him to rehearse the scenes with him.

‘Yes, but I usually do this alone’ Cillian said with a smile.

‘You sure? I mean, I am not a good actor but I did take some drama classes back in high school many years ago and I could point out any mistakes with the lines as I read along’ you said with some slight laughter as you pointed at the script.

‘Well, I suppose why not. This could be fun’ Cillian said, gladly accepting your offer. After all, it was better to have some company than talking to himself in the mirror.

‘Alright let’s do it then’ you said as you sat down on the small lounge in his trailer, giving him little time to prepare.

After Cillian took 15 minutes to read the scripts, he put the folder down on the table. You couldn’t believe that he remembered the lines already.

‘Alright Y/N, Scene 7, let’s go’ he said with a cheeky smile, waiting for your acting skills to surface.

‘Thomas, you cannot be serious’ you said putting in a terribly bad Birmingham accent, causing Cillian to a have a slight chuckle. You tried very hard to stay serious.

‘You should know that I am serious Lizzie’ Cillian responded, having memorised his script, Tommy’s thick accent surfacing.

‘You are going to get us killed Thomas. But you don’t care, do you? You never cared’ you said, improving slightly in your tone.

‘When have I not cared for you Lizzie, ey?’ Cillian said before continuing on with his lines.

The script was slowly moving towards the intimate scene between Tommy and Lizzie but you were only rehearsing the words, not the actions. A shame you thought, but you knew you had to remain professional.

‘Lizzie, you need to understand that this is what I need’ Cillian said as he went on. In the script this would be where Tommy steps closer towards Lizzie, wearing nothing but his black suit pants.

‘Oh trust me Tommy, I know what you need. Just fucking kiss me already’ you said, biting your lips and feeling slightly awkward as you spoke the line with such passion. Your thoughts wandered to the scene, playing it out in your head.

‘You should consider a career in acting Y/N’ Cillian smirked as he didn’t continue with the script. He became to notice that you were feeling slightly awkward.

‘I don’t think so’ you said shyly as you starred into his deep blue eyes. There was an awkward silence between you until Cillian finally spoke again.

‘Can we do this again?’ Cillian asked as he noticed that he missed a couple of words within his lines. You didn’t want to point the mistakes out to him as, in your mind, he was perfect.

You agreed to another round of rehearsals and all went smoothly the second time around until you reached the final line.

‘Oh trust me Tommy, I know what you need. Just fucking kiss me already’ you said, inhaling deeply before taking a break.

‘You sure do Lizzie’ Cillian said as he finished off the script for Scene 7, causing you to simply stare at Cillian.

‘And then Tommy gets to romp Lizzie’ Cillian said laughing before he suggested that you rehearse the next scene with him.

‘Lucky Lizzie’ you giggled just before you realised what you had just said.

‘I am not so sure, it looks pretty rough’ Cillian said as he flicked through the script.

‘Well, some women like it like this’ you said.

‘So I’ve heard’ Cillian said, not sure where this conversation was going.

‘How do you do it, acting scenes like this?’ you asked curiously, causing Cillian to laugh.

‘Well, you just switch off and do it, I suppose’ Cillian chuckled.

‘You know you still missed a word here’ you said shyly. ‘Do you want to try again?’ you said, causing Cillian to nod.

Without missing a single word, Cillian acted his entire script for the scene until your line came up once again.

‘Oh trust me Tommy, I know what you need. Just fucking kiss me already’ you said.

‘You sure do Lizzie’ Cillian responded, but you weren’t finished with your script this time.

Having read on from the last time, you knew what was happening in the script. Tommy and Lizzie were getting it on but not before Tommy grabs hold of Lizzie’s throat, looking into her eyes without speaking a word. His eyes were doing the talking in the end of the scene. So, you went on, finishing Lizzie’s final line before the cut.

‘Don’t you want to fuck me?’ you asked with your eyes full of fire.

‘What?’ Cillian asked surprised.

‘That’s Lizzie’s last line and the final line in the script for Scene 7’ you answered.

‘Right, yes’ Cillian said, blushing slightly before an awkward silence erupted once again.

‘Shall we go the next scene now?’ you asked, causing Cillian to nod.

Acting it Out

The next day, you got to watch the scene you had rehearsed with Cillian the evening before and you couldn’t help it but be amazed by his acting skills.

At the same time, you were somewhat turned on by watching him with Lizzie, roughly throwing her onto the bed before taking her from behind.

You would have loved being in her shoes for a moment, but for real.

‘I watched your scene with the script in my hand, it was perfect’ you smiled as you gave Cillian some clothes to cover his half naked body.

You couldn’t help it but gaze over his freckled chest as he stepped closer and he was sure to notice.

‘Well, I had some good practice’ he smiled, not bothered by the fact that he was half naked and that you were clearly staring at him.

‘I am always here to help Cillian’ you said as you handed him the script for the next scene.

‘Thanks Y/N’ Cillian said before getting ready for the next scene.

The day went fast and Cillian pretty much disappeared to his apartment right after the day was finished.

As you went into his trailer to get your handbag, you noticed that he left his notes.

You knew that he was going to look for them to rehearse before tomorrow and decided to drop them off to him.

You were staying at the same hotel building so it wasn’t an inconvenience.

As you arrived at the hotel, you knocked on his door and he was quick to open.

‘You left this on set’ you said as you handed Cillian his notes.

‘Thank you Y/N’ he said before taking a pause.

He noticed that you were gazing into his apartment through the open door and raised his eyebrows slightly, smiling at you. It was like his eyes were asking you what you were doing without his mouth actually moving.

‘Oh sorry, I was just trying to see what the score was. I don’t have pay tv in my room’ you said with embarrassment, pointing at the TV.

‘Uhm, right. Would you like to come in and watch the game with me? I’ll even put on a shirt’ Cillian asked with smirk.

‘You know we aren’t allowed, with social distancing and so forth’ you said.

‘I won’t tell if you don’t’ Cillian said with a chuckle. He knew it wouldn’t have mattered as you spent a lot of time together already.

‘Alright then, it can stay our little secret’ you said as you walked inside his studio apartment.

Cillian was quick to put on a t-shirt, although you would have preferred if he didn’t.

‘You never mentioned that you liked soccer’ he said.

‘It never came up’ you responded, still somewhat nervous by his presence, being in his apartment.

But, you soon relaxed and sat down on the lounge with him.

Cillian offered you some wine as you were watching the second half of the game.

It was a tight finish with a score of 1-0. The last goal was scored in the final 10 minutes and it was nerve wrecking.

Cillian’s team won and you couldn’t help it but be a little disappointed as you were cheering for the opposite team.

‘Tomorrow is going to be a busy day’ you said as the game had finished, not knowing what else to say.

‘Yes, I am not looking forward to it’ Cillian said leaning forward to pour some more wine, cringing a bit as he moved.

‘Are you alright?’ you asked as you noticed that he seemed uncomfortable as he leaned forward.

‘Yes, I just hurt my back earlier during one of the scenes’ Cillian said.

‘Where does it hurt?’ you asked as you began tapping over his back, causing Cillian to look at you with surprise.

‘Oh god sorry’ you said, removing your hands quickly. ‘Bad habit’ you were quick to say.

‘Bad habit ey?’ Cillian asked with a smile.

‘Before COVID I was a physiotherapy student’ you explained. ‘I like to fix people’ you added with a laugh.

‘Right’ Cillian responded with a warm smile.

‘Would you like me to take a look and see if I can fix the pain?’ you asked.

‘Now that would defiantly break social distancing requirements’ Cillian chuckled.

‘I won’t tell if you don’t’ you said with grin on your face, causing Cillian to laugh.

‘Alright then, give it a crack’ he said.

‘Take off your shirt’ you said, causing Cillian to raise his eyebrows again before obliging with your request. It wasn’t like you hadn’t already seen him half naked.

You climbed behind him and couldn’t help but stare at his freckled skin again as you began to run your hands over his back, pressing hard on several trigger points until he eventually cringed.

‘Is that where it hurts?’ you asked.

‘Yes, fuck’ he said after you pressed down on the area harshly.

‘Sorry, but this might hurt a little’ you said while beginning to massage the area.

After about two minutes, the pain subsided but Cillian didn’t think to tell you. Instead, he let you continue with the movements. He began to enjoy the massage you were giving him.

‘That feels better’ you said, noticing the tension in his back disappearing slowly.

‘It does, but I don’t think I want you to stop now’ Cillian said jokingly.

‘I can keep going, if you like’ you said, moving your hands to other regions of his back while breathing in the sweet scent of his aftershave.

As your hands moved to his shoulders and over, slightly towards his chest, Cillian could feel a tingling sensation emerging in between his legs.

Hoping that you wouldn’t notice what was building up in between his legs, he placed his t-shirt across them, hiding his emerging erection.

As you continued the massage for a few more minutes and he noticed that his erection would not go back down, he felt the need to tell you to stop, but he couldn’t bring it across his lips. It felt too nice and pleasurable.

Your hands were roaming across his back, up and down and you began to notice his breathing getting heavier.

As your hands suddenly stopped on his lower back he looked back over his shoulder, not realising that this was exactly where your face was at this moment.

His blue eyes gazed into yours for a moment as there was an awkward silence between you.

As you starred at him, your hands moved up again, causing him to breath in heavily once more.

In that moment, with your hands still wandering up his back, you leaned forward in sixty-degree angle, pressing your chest against his back and brushing his lips with yours.

Cillian gave into the kiss, turning around slightly to caress your face and pull you closer towards him. The kiss was intensifying and became more urgent with every moment.

‘I think all of the social distancing is out of the window now’ Cillian chuckled as your lips drifted apart and you climbed away from behind him.

Within just seconds, you pulled your t-shirt over your head and climbed onto his lap with one leg placed on each side of him before leaning in for another kiss.

Cillian ran his hands over your back as you exchanged a passionate kiss and you could feel his erection beneath you.

‘Let’s take our rehearsals a bit further, shall we?’ you said in between kisses as you grinded yourself against him.

‘We shouldn’t, you are my assistant’ Cillian responded while running his hands over your breasts, without any intention of stopping.

‘I won’t tell if you don’t’ you giggled as you stood up, taking off your jeans as well and letting them drop to the floor.

Cillian gazed over your body, taking in everything and admiring your curves.

‘I suppose it can stay our little secret, although I think it’s a bad idea Y/N’ Cillian said as he stood up in front of you, pressing his lips against yours while you reached for the zipper of his jeans.

‘I think it’s a great idea. We both want this and need to get it out of our systems so that we can work well together. Despite, you are stressed, let me be a good assistant and relief that stress of yours’ you smirked as your hand ran beneath his briefs, taking hold of his erect cock.

Without responding to your comment, he pressed his lips onto yours again before guiding you backwards towards his bed.

‘If I'd have known we'd be doing this I wouldn't have worn this’ you added, looking down at the underwear.

Cillian grabbed your chin lightly and pressed his lips to yours for a short moment.

‘It’s coming off anyway’ he winked at you before reaching behind you to unclip your bra. His gaze dropping to your small but perky breasts.

He took them in his hands grabbing onto them gently before pushing you onto the bed.

Next his hands went to your panties and pulled them down your legs and before you knew it you were laying on his bed completely naked and Cillian’s deep blue eyes devoured you.

You didn't feel self-conscious like you usually would because you could tell from that look in his eyes and his facial expression that he clearly liked what he saw.

Cillian’s eyes locked on yours as you sat up against the pillows and his fingers went into his waist band pulling down his briefs.

His erection stood proudly pointing at you and you weren’t disappointed with that either, he sure was packing down there!

He climbed onto the bed and pulled your legs apart, kneeling in between.

‘Is it bad that I’ve been fantasising about this?’ Cillian asked, still gazing over your naked body.

‘No. I've wanted this too’ you admitted, your eyes fixated on his hand moving up and down that cock of his.

‘I always had to touch myself whenever I went to bed because I wanted you so much’ you said.

‘Show me’ he breathed out, your eyes closing at his words and then opening as your hand slid down your body and stroked through your already damp folds.

He groaned as you pushed two fingers into your wetness.

With a quickness you had never witnessed before he grabbed a hold of your wrist and raised your fingers to his mouth, his eyes closing as his full lips wrap around your fingers sucking off your juices.

He then grabbed onto your other wrist and pinned them both above your head as he leaned down and ran kisses over your breasts and trailing them all the way down to your wet folds.

His hand went in between your legs, instantly finding your clit. He began to rub it, in small slow circles while his tongue ran through your wetness.

‘Fuck, Cillian’ you moaned as your hands reached down and grabbed onto his shoulders.

His movements became quicker and he increased the pressure, pressing down harder and harder. He then replaced his finger with his tongue on your clit as he shoved two fingers inside you, pumping them slowly in and out.

‘You're so fucking wet Y/N’ Cillian groaned, his eyes never leaving yours.

His fingers soon curled upwards against your g-spot as he continued to pump them in and out of you.

You gasped out at the sensation and could feel yourself racing towards your first orgasm of the night and you had a sneaky feeling that it most definitely wouldn't be the last.

As his force and speed increased so did your moans and you reached down and gripped his hair, pulling on it.

‘That’s it, oh god’ you moaned loudly as your walls began clenching around your fingers while your orgasm washed over you.

Cillian slowed down the finger action and let go of your clit then wickedly flicked his tongue against it once more making you flinch.

He grinned at you as he moved up your body and then took your mouth in a deep kiss.

You shoved your tongue into his mouth, tasting your own arousal and then somehow flipped him over so you were straddling his hips.

You tasted the skin of his neck. Then you made your way down that freckled chest, gently biting his left nipple on the way down.

You licked at his toned abs and then reached that hard as steel erection that was already oozing precum. His breathing was becoming deeper as you encircled your hand around him and pumped a couple times before flicking your tongue against the head.

‘Fuck’ Cillian moaned as his hand reached for your hair while you began bopping up and down his shaft.

You enjoyed the taste of his precum as you continued your movements for several moments while using your fingers to play with his balls.

He loved every moment of it but, after a while, had to ask you to stop for obvious reasons.

You obliged. You wanted him inside of you badly.

Cillian then reached for the bedside table, grabbing a condom from the draw and putting into his hard cock.

Before he could change position you climbed on top of him.

‘No need to be gentle, I like it just like Lizzie does’ you smirked, causing his eyes to roll into the back of his head as your pussy slid over his hard cock and you guided it inside of you.

You were unbelievably tight causing Cillian to moan out load on that first stroke.

Your hands were resting on his chest as you slowly raised yourself up and then dropped back down over and over teasing him to the point where his hands were digging into your thighs.

You began to quicken your pace, riding him faster and faster.

Cillian held onto your hips as he thrust his up to your stroke by stroke unknowingly getting faster until he was holding you up and thrusting into you so hard and fast that you were crying out his name.

It was obvious to you that he also liked it rough and, as soon as your walls began to contract around him, he flipped you over onto your back.

He wanted to take control and you were absolutely fine with that.

Your legs wrapped around his waist as he continued to thrust into your tight hole for several more minutes.

Unhooking your legs from around him, Cillian leaned up and rested them over his shoulders before increasing his pace.

His hand reached down and began rubbing your swollen clit, making you cry out once again continuously.

‘Oh god yes’ you moaned as you were so close again.

Just as your walls began tightening around his hard cock, he pulled out of you.

‘Not yet’ he smirked before he told you to get on your hands and knees.

‘Please Cillian, just fuck me’ you pleaded as he was tasing your entrance with his hard cock from behind you.

‘As you wish’ he said as, all of a sudden, with one deep thrust, he buried himself inside of you again.

You cried out as he entered you and his thrusting was slowing down for a moment as he pushed his hips into you as deep as humanly possible.

The thrust was hard and deep, but he soon picked up pace again.

‘Oh god yes. Fuck me hard’ you groaned out into the pillow beneath you.

That was all he needed to hear, his hips slamming into you harshly as you pushed your back.

Second later, remembering the scene between Tommy and Lizzie, he grabbed a handful of your silky hair and pulled on it, making you arch your back as he fucked you from behind.

‘Yes, don’t stop’ you moaned as his speed picked up more and more with each thrust.

‘Fuck Y/N’ Cillian groaned, his hands regaining their grip on your waist.

‘Oh my god Cillian’ you moaned, your voice muffled by the pillow and your walls tightening around his cock.

Your orgasm came running over you like a speed train as you screamed loudly, sending Cillian over the edge also.

Within seconds of your own orgasm, Cillian found his release, his thrusts slowing down as he rode out his orgasm.

‘Fuck’ was all he managed to say as he pulled out of you and disposed the condom filled with his sweet cum.

You were still huffing, your body limb just as he collapsed next to you.

‘Feeling better now?’ you grinned.

‘Yes actually’ he smiled before giving you a quick kiss.

After you spent about ten minutes curled up with each other it was time for you to leave. After all, you both had a busy day ahead.

‘So, just let me know if you ever need some more stress relief’ you smirked as you said goodnight.

#cillian murphy #cillian murphy smut #Cillian Murphy x Reader #cillian murphy imagine #Tommy Shelby #tommy shelby smut #tommy shelby x reader #tommy shelby imagine #thomas shelby #thomas shelby smut #thomas shelby x reader #thomas shelby imagine #peaky blinder imagine #Peaky Blinders #peaky blinders fanfic

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youaremysunshiness · 1 year ago

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entry #6

this post was so mean. l feel bad. I still stand by what I said but I shouldn’t be calling him all those names. i really let out my rage on here lol but it was necessary for me to sleep in peace. anyway, i told him i was going to choose my other friend as my cinematographer and he seemed okay with it. he told me he was okay with it, but he typically does this thing where he seems very genuine and accommodating but then he turns around and starts drama.

about a month ago, i journaled about this issue i was having with two of my girlfriends (we’re good now) and when i was going through it, i confided in him and he seemed so understanding and compassionate. he told me how valid my feelings were and told me that he wouldn’t tell anyone. then he ran to our friends who were at dunkin and he just blew the whole thing out of proportion. i found this out because one of these girls is my roommate and she pretty much tells me everything (words she said herself). basically, he said that i was being childish and made me out to be a bitch, which made the whole situation worse.

at the time, i was very hurt that they went to Lucifer’s party and i only spoke about it with them briefly. they both apologized to me before about it but i was still carrying some hurt from it. so when my closest friends started to like each other and i started feeling left out, i started to build things up in my head and i really believed that they didn’t care about me as much as i cared about them.

also, there really wasn’t any drama at all because i was just not speaking to them and was taking my time away from them to have some space. i confided in other friends but it was never like, “oh fuck you,” or anything. i took some space to prevent an argument and to process my hurt and anger because i was too emotional to talk about it because i hadn’t fully processed it yet and my anxiety was getting to me. i should’ve told them that i needed space because i just went silent on them for a few days without telling them what was going on and that made them worry. it also allowed this guy to exaggerate and spread misinformation.

but conflict always proves who your real friends are. if you can have a conflict/fight with someone and eventually talk about it with honesty, compassion, and understanding and be mature enough to admit your faults on both sides, then your relationship is stronger than any obstacle. when i opened up to them, we were able to work it out because they were both very understanding, compassionate, and forgiving of me and i was with them, too. if anything, conflict brought me closer to them instead of driving me apart from them because they care about my feelings and i care about theirs. we care about each other. we love each other and that’s the most important thing.

i now have better trust with them because we had a little rift and overcame it. we all learned our lessons about how to treat each other and gained a better understanding of each other’s feelings and history. i especially feel so much closer to my roomie because this issue led us to have so many deep conversations about being women, growing up, and childhood trauma. we’ll literally talk for hours about that shit and it’s so nice to have that friendship.

unfortunately, i feel myself drifting apart from my other roommate because of the issues he causes and how selfish he can be sometimes. it makes me lose respect for him and want to distance myself from him because he’s very self-absorbed to the point where it’s disrespectful to everyone and i don’t like that. maybe one day, he’ll mature. once he gets a job. in retail. it should humble him lol.

anyway, some good news: tomorrow is my birthday and i’m excited to go on a little picnic with my friends if i can get off work. i feel bad asking off.

march 11, 2024

i am anxious and stressed because a film i’m working on for school is shooting a short scene tomorrow and my cinematographer is flaking on me. when i said that i would ask another friend to do it because he already agreed to do so many other projects, he insisted to do my film. i’m producing and directing and editing this film and it’s stressing me out so much because everyone’s films are filming at the same time and it’s hard to get a solid crew or cast because my school doesn’t give us a schedule for Intermediate Directing and just shoves us into filming like “good luck! figure it out!” when we all have to rely on each other.

anyway, i set the call time tomorrow (for crew) at 12:30 pm and my cinematographer tells me that he’s going to be late because he’s going to the gym with another friend. that’s it. that’s the reason. he can’t bother to cancel his plans to be responsible and follow through with what he signed up for. i’m so upset. i’m so pissed at him. like, are you that self-centered that you can’t cancel plans to go to the gym for a school obligation? are you serious right now?

he also lives with me and i can’t stand him anymore. he is the most self-centered, spoiled, inconsiderate man i’ve ever met in my life. like, i’m sorry your parents cater to everything that you do, pay for your expensive splurges on taylor swift merch and your whole life. get a job. i don’t trust people who don’t have jobs. they are always so spoiled and inconsiderate and irresponsible. you’re 20 years old and you’ve never had a job? you’re a privileged little dickhead.

ugh why did i agree to let him be my cinematographer? i knew he would do this. i knew he would be selfish and flake on me. his dad also owns a gymnasium at this church and i asked to use it this sunday and his dad said that his son (my cinematographer) needed to be there the entire time. then he has the nerve to say, “i can’t guarantee i will be there.” why? because you have something better to do? he always ditches me and my other friends because he’s obsessed with a guy friend of his, D, and follows him around like a dog. he 100% would flake on me to hang out with D because he’s a little shit. i’m so mad. i can’t believe some people. they literally think the world revolves around them.

i’m going to fire this man. i want to tell him off so bad because of how selfish he is and how much he doesn’t deserve to work with me or any other female director he praises and know will make him look good because they are talented. it’s not all about you. also, i saw how he treated a female director and he was so awful. he kept overstepping and tried to direct for her to the point when he was confusing the actress because the director was telling her to do one thing (allowing her to actually act) and he kept giving her conflicting directions. you’re not the director. stay in your place. ugh, men in the cinema department always do that shit with female directors and there are so many talented women in my class that want to be directors and so many men in the department overstep and take away opportunities from women because they’re so used to the world revolving around them.

i’m just gonna ask my female friend to be my cinematographer because she wouldn’t fuck me over like that and women are easier to work with (just saying as someone who wants to be a director and happens to be a woman). women can be a breeze to work with because they listen and don’t look down on you. don’t get me wrong, i’ve also worked with some good men who aren’t misogynistic and really helped me bring my vision to life without overstepping or mansplaining. my guy friend who was my cinematographer for my last film was awesome and i’m forever grateful to him for putting so much effort into each and every shot.

anyway, i feel better after ranting and thinking about good male friends who were awesome to work with. some men really do suck though, and they never realize it because they’re too self-centered. hopefully i figure something out for tomorrow.

#journal

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kohanayaki · 4 years ago

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.:Time and Time Again:. (Marauders Era x Reader) Ch 5

Harry confronts you with a familiar piece of suspiciously folded parchment, and you tell him the story of how you helped create it (mostly told through flashbacks taking place in the Marauders era).

LINKS: CH 1 CH 2 CH 3 CH 4 CH 5 CH 6 CH 7 CH 8

___________________________________________________________

Ch 5 .:Narrow Spaces and New Alliances:.

Your eyes drifted open slowly, the bright streams of sunlight coming in through your window strangely unbecoming of 12 Grimmauld Place. It took you a moment to get your bearings as you rubbed the sleep out of your eyes and remembered where you were. As you sat there, looking around Sirius' guest bedroom, last night's events all seemed to flood back to you at once. You groaned into the comforter, feeling your face burn as you recalled blatantly staring at his lips just minutes after crying into his shirt for at least half an hour.

Come on, get it together, you thought to yourself, you're here because Dumbledore summoned you, stay on task.

However, as soon as that memory left your head another replaced it, this one weighing heavier on your chest. You found yourself thinking back to your encounter with Severus. Well, as much as you could call it an 'encounter.' Even when you couldn't see him, you could feel him when you reached out to him with your mind. Severus was good at blocking legillemency— too good, in fact, because you would know the familiar force of his mental shield anywhere. You'd never felt it as powerful coming from anyone else. You almost laughed at the irony of it; the very thing he was trying to use to keep hidden was exactly what had given him away. That, and the smell of him, which took you back to the moment you'd first smelled that damn amortentia potion. . .

You tried to shake off the thought as you properly got out of bed and changed into some casual clothes. The next Order meeting wasn't until tomorrow afternoon, so you had the day mostly to yourself, but you knew the next time you were all in a room together you would have to address some things privately if you had any hope of working together efficiently. You gently padded down the wooden stairs, the door to Sirius' room still closed. He never was an early riser.

As you reached the kitchen you began to put a pot of coffee on when you heard someone approach the room, stalling in the kitchen entrance. You turned around to see Harry in the doorway.

“Morning,” you grinned, turning back to the counter and using your wand to bring some water to a boil, “Coffee? Tea?”

“Oh,” Harry said, a bit embarrassed you'd caught him in mid-thought, “no, I'm okay.”

“What's on your mind?” you asked.

“Um, I was wondering if you could tell me, I mean, if you have the time. . .” he trailed off, reaching for his back pocket, “well, the thing is, a few years ago I found—”

“Kreacher heard sounds coming from the kitchen and did not expect (Y/n)'s return,” Harry jumped at the house elf's sudden arrival, but you seemed unphased.

“Though master's half mudblood godson remains here,” the elf muttered to himself, “How many more days must it be?”

“Hello, Kreacher,” you greeted him, “nothing nasty about Harry, now, alright? Don't forget he's my godson too.”

“Of course,” Kreacher said, thickly sarcastic but with respect for you in his tone nonetheless. His permanent frown seemed to deepen, however, when he saw you next to the coffee maker. “(Y/n) of house (L/n) should not have to be using the kitchen. Mistress Black would have wept to see a pureblood use muggle equipment. If (Y/n) requires refreshment Kreacher will have it ready.”

“There's no need for that,” you said, “Besides, it's done already, see? You can go on now.”

Kreacher squinted at the cup you poured for yourself. “Always peculiar,” he grumbled, stalking away at your request and muttering to himself all the while.

“He's oddly. . . nice to you,” Harry said, green eyes quizzical behind his round-framed glasses.

“He is,” you chuckled.

“But, well, you're—”

“A blood traitor?” you gave him an easy smile when you saw his expression, easing his fears that he'd actually offended you. “I know,” you said, “he's been through a lot, it's complicated. Trust me, he wasn't always like this to me. It takes time. And it doesn't hurt to be nice to him either.”

Harry decided against bringing up that the nicest person that he knew to the house elf was Hermione, who Kreacher regularly called a 'mudblood wench,' but decided to focus on the 'taking time' part of your statement, wondering just how long this kind of progress took with the spiteful elf. Besides, you seemed to have some sort of history with him.

“Anyways, what was it you were saying?” you asked Harry.

“Oh, right,” he said, reaching back around him, “um, my friends Fred and George, you've met them?”

“Molly and Arthur's twins, of course,” you smiled, “little imps, they are. Those two could give your father and Sirius a run for their money.”

“Right!” Harry said, “well, that's sort of the point. They're the ones who gave me this.”

As you turned around to face him you stalled mid-stir, nearly dropping your mug as you did. Even as a piece of blank parchment you knew what it was, the distinctive accordion folds that met in the center giving it away.

“How in the world. . .” you trailed off as Harry handed it to you, “but Filch—”

“Didn't do a very good job of hiding it, apparently,” Harry finished, “I thought you might want to do the honors?”

You nodded wordlessly, a pang of unexpected emotion hitting you as you pressed your wand to the map's center.

“I solemnly swear that I am up to no good.”

The faded, brown ink showed itself as its protection charm was washed away, revealing the nostalgia-inducing inscription scrawled in your respective handwritings:

Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot, Prongs, and Fangs are proud to present: The Marauders Map

“Do Remus and Sirius know you have this?” you asked Harry, who nodded.

“Professor Lupin gave it back to me third year before he left Hogwarts,” he said, “but he never told me anything about it after that.” he seemed deep in thought for a moment before looking up at you. “If everyone else is who I think it is, you're Fangs, right?”

It was your turn to nod now.

“I always wondered, how did you do it?” Harry said, hardly containing his curiosity, and you couldn't help but think how much he looked like James in that moment. “How does it work? What sort of magic did you use? All the secret passageways, how did you find them?”

“Alright, slow down,” you laughed lightly, giving in, “I suppose there's no harm in telling you.”

Harry brightened at that, bounding into the living room and taking a seat on the couch as if to say 'we've got all day,' which you did. It warmed your heart to see him so excited, this was one of the only ways he could get to know his parents— through the stories that remained from the people who loved them. If you could help the picture of his family in his mind become a bit clearer, you would tell him any story he wanted to know. He deserved that much after everything he'd been through.

You took a seat opposite him, still nursing your cup of coffee.

“Well,” you said, “it's a long story, starting with how bad those lot were at keeping secrets. . .”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 1974 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“Run!” James half shouted half laughed as Filch hobbled after the four of them. Sirius nearly bit his tongue trying to keep in his laughter as the Caretaker slung insults and promises of punishment their way, cat ears and a tail freshly sprouted from his body.

“I can't believe we actually did that,” Sirius cackled, keeping easy pace with James.

“I can't believe you dragged me into this,” Remus panted, his current body not lending itself well to physical activity. For once he actually wished he was a werewolf right about now.

“I don't know if I can keep up,” Peter wheezed, falling behind.

“Oh come on,” James said, grabbing his sleeve and helping him run, “we can out run a gummy-legged old prat like him.”

“I don't know, he's faster than he looks,” Remus pointed out as Filch rounded the corner behind them.

“Damn,” James cursed under his breath, “we'll lose him if we can make it to the one-eyed-witch passageway.”

“We'll never activate it in time,” Remus countered.

“The hallway behind the third floor tapestry?” Peter suggested.

“No, Filch knows about that one now,” Sirius said.

“Why the hell didn't you bring your cloak?” Remus huffed.

“Well getting caught wasn't supposed to be part of the plan, but someone had to let out a laugh before we could get out!”

“Just save your air and sprint!” Sirius hissed.

The extended run time was starting to catch up to all of them now, and when they'd made a wrong turn to a blocked off corridor they thought they were done for.

“Hey, morons, over here!”

Four heads snapped towards the sound of your whisper, but you were nowhere to be found. Suddenly, one of the light pillars began to shift, revealing a large crack in the wall just big enough for them to fit sideways.

No questions were asked with no time to waste, and the four boys clamored after one another so they could fit inside. Your magic moved the pillar back in place just in time, and you watched from your hiding spot as Filch reached the walled-off passage in surprise, grumbling as he looked around for the culprits behind you. You had to stifle a snicker as his cat ears lowered; was that growling coming from the back of this throat or did you imagine that? Eventually he stumbled off in frustration and you sighed.

“Alright, the coast is clear,” you said.

“Why did you help us?” James rose a brow, that signature shit-eating grin back on his face like it never left, “you haven't fallen in love with me since our truce, have you?”

“Dream on, Potter,” you rolled your eyes, pushing him out of the crevice and smirking as he tumbled to the floor.

“It seems like I'm always saving you nowadays,” you said, stepping out of the wall yourself with the rest of the boys following.

Remus was thoroughly confused, looking pointedly between you and Sirius. He knew you and James were pretty much friends now, but he also noticed that the hostile air that always seemed to be present with you and the elder Black had diminished. He'd even seen you two talking in the halls lately. Sirius gave him a look; he would explain what happened in the forest with Lucius to Remus later. Mostly he didn't want to admit that Remus was right about you not being so bad if he gave you a chance; you had actually been getting on pretty well since that night.

“You do realize it's no fun winning the house cup when you four practically make Gryffindor ineligible every year with all the shit you get up to, right?” you chuckled, “some competition would be nice for a change.”

“We'll see if you're singing the same tune when Quidditch season rolls around,” James said smugly.

“You're right,” you said, squaring up against him, “guess that's a new competition we've got going for us.”

It had recently been announced that you and James had both been selected to play Seeker for your respective houses next year. It was an arrangement that had the whole school talking, your rivalry turned (mostly) friendship now infamous, even if it was a recent occurrence.

“Hold on, how did you know that was there?” Peter asked you, pointing to the moving column, “even we didn't know about it.”

“Oh?” you crossed your arms, “and are you four supposedly some kind of all-knowing secret masters? Because clearly there's things you don't know about yet.”

Sirius slapped a hand over Peter's mouth before he could retaliate and give away what they've been working on.

“Yes, well, apparently,” he said, ignoring Peter's muffled protests.

You looked at them curiously, all four boys looking suspiciously nervous.

The next day at breakfast, James had brought up the idea of 'hiring' you to help them finish the map.

“I'm telling you, I think we can really make progress with their help,” he pitched, “they clearly know what they're talking about, and we know they can pull a hell of a prank from all the times they've gotten me.”

“How do we know they won't tell anyone?” Peter countered, “I don't know what's up with you, but you're trusting them too fast, James.”

“They're not the type that would tell,” Remus admitted.

“Oh, not you too!” Peter whined.

“I'm just saying, they'll likely appreciate what we've gathered so far and have a fair bit to add,” Lupin insisted, “it could be worth a try if you really want to finish it before we graduate—”

“Finish what?”

The four boys jolted upright, turning to see you and Lily.

“Are you guys okay?” Lily asked, concern written across her features.

“Of course!”

“Never better!”

“Why wouldn't we be?”

Remus just groaned at his friends' panicked answers. This was hopeless.

You and Lily shared a knowing look off the the side.

“Alright, whatever you say. . .”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Harry laughed heartily,

“Wow, I mean, I know you said they were bad, but that bad?”

“For being expert pranksters who hardly ever managed to get caught, they were remarkably terrible at hiding things,” you said, chuckling along with him, “It didn't take us long to figure out they were up to something, although they seemed to think they were brilliant at covering it up, Remus had to burst their bubble eventually.”

Harry shook his head, smiling fondly and imagining all the scenes in his head as you continued your tale.

“So that was when they were first starting to put the map together,” you continued, “but that wasn't even the biggest secret they were hiding. Of course, I wouldn't find out about that for another year, but we'll get to that part of the story later. . .”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 1975 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“This tastes awful,” Sirius complained, trying to ignore the plant prodding the under-side of his tongue.

“Well if you were expecting treacle toffee I'm sorry to disappoint,” James rolled his eyes, equally nauseated by the bitter tinge of the Mandrake leaf in his mouth.

“There's no way someone can do this for an entire month,” Peter said, “How do you brush your teeth? What if you accidentally swallow it when you're eating?”

“You three have fun with that,” Remus chuckled, flipping through an old library book and his mouth gratefully leafless.

“How about some gratitude, Moony?” James said, “We're doing this for you.”

“Please, you just want to see if you can turn into a dragon or something,” Lupin chortled, “and you don't actually have to go through with all this. Who knows if this animagus stuff will actually work.”

“Well, a dragon would suit me,” James mused, “but of course we're going to see this through, mate. You know we'd do anything for you.”

Remus smiled to himself, not responding and not needing to. He knew.

“Hey guys,” you grinned, walking up to the Gryffindor table.

Peter gulped suddenly in surprise as you came up behind him, and his eyes widened in horror.

“Shit!” he coughed out, “I-I swallowed it!”

“Your. . . food?” you questioned, glancing over at the boys who all had that same, vaguely panicked look about them.

“Okay, it was funny at first, but you guys have been acting weird since last year and now it's worrying,” you admitted.

The four looked between themselves and came to a sort of silent conclusion. Maybe in this scenario it was better to tell one secret to keep the other. And so, later that night, they told you to meet them after lights out so they could tell you what was really going on. You snuck out of your dorm room and made your way through the secret tunnel to the Gryffindor common room, a route you'd taken plenty of times to mess with James.

You pushed a loose panel of wood open, coming into the warmly lit space through one of the cabinets. You pushed an armchair that was half blocking your path out of the way as you crawled through the space.

“Blimey!” Sirius jumped, “give us a heads up, would you?”

“Sush,” Remus scolded him, “you really don't understand the concept of an inside voice, do you?”

“Alright, well I'm here,” you said, brushing off your robes, “now what's this big secret? This better not be a trick because I've been working on a new hex.”

“Nothing like that,” James assured you, “we've been working on something we think you might be interested in, if you're willing to contribute.”

He stepped to the side so you could see the floor where they'd been huddled around and your eyes widened.

“Merlin,” you said. The red and gold carpet was covered in at least forty different pieces of parchment. Pages upon pages overlapped with each other, each messily detailing a different part and level of the castle in scribbles of smudged ink. “This is. . .”

“The entirety of the Hogwarts castle and surrounding land,” Sirius said proudly, “complete with secret passageways.”

“This is our lives' work, (Y/n),” James said, “be impressed!”

“What impresses me most is how none of you have any sense of scale,” you said, sifting through the papers, “you should really condense this. Kind of hard to make any use of a map if you have to flip to page thirty-three to find the kitchens.”

“Point taken,” Remus said, “it could do with some reorganization.”

“And probably a bigger piece of paper,” you mentioned.

“Right, that. . .”

“That's not all there is to it, though,” Peter said, “Sirius?”

The curly haired boy stepped forward, pressing his wand to the center of the floor.

“Revelare Popularis,”

You watched in wonder as hundreds of names suddenly appeared across the pieces of paper, all students and faculty you recognized. They were scrawled in Sirius' handwriting, as if he'd written them himself.

“This spell shows where everyone in any location on this map is at this very moment,” he said, “It's not exact, and we've been working on variations.”

“So you can plan ahead without getting caught,” you mused, “how'd you learn something as advanced as this, Black?”

“I get around,” Sirius shrugged, unabashedly showing off. Peter rolled his eyes.

“So, the only drawback, of course, is that the spell doesn't work in real time,” Remus said, “so by the time you get where you need to go. . .”

“People will have moved,” James finished, “we're willing to share this little trove of knowledge with you if you're willing to give up all the secret rooms, passages, and hiding places you know.”

“And we thought you may have a solution to our timing problem,” Remus said, “I could tell from our study sessions you quite enjoy learning ahead of your year.”

Your eyes scanned the pages, and you were admittedly impressed. There was ton of stuff on here you had no idea about, but you knew a fair amount was missing as well. It seemed like a fair trade.

“I'm in,” you said.

“What?” Peter blinked, “it was that easy?”

“This is a useful tool you've got,” you said, “I think we can all benefit from it being improved. And now that you mention it, I actually do think I've read about a similar spell to that paper charm. It was in some Gaelic tome in the restricted section on ancient magic. I'm not even sure it used a wand. It was called the Homunculus charm. From what I read it sounded like it acted as a live feed for people in any given location, clan leaders used it to plan ambushes and keep track of citizens. If we could link it to the entire castle. . .”

“We'd be able to see where everyone is—”

“And what they're doing—”

“—At every hour of every day!”

“True, albeit a bit stalkerish,” you quipped, “you let me in on this if I add in what I know, and you got yourself a deal.”

James put out his hand, and as tempted as you were to turn it green or make all the bones in it disappear, you reached out and shook it.

“I do believe this puts us in a formal alliance, Potter,” you said cheekily.

“I believe so,” James smirked.

“Terrifying,” Remus chuckled, “This school won't even know what hit it.”

“Well, what are we waiting for?” James said with a cheshire grin, “let's steal ourselves a book, shall we?”

Read chapter 6 here!

Taglist: @sleep-i-ness, @blackpinkdolan, @parker-natasha, @ornella0910 @undertaker1827 @thatwierdo-koemi @nxstalgicnxbxdy @calaryssia @aleksanderwh0r3 @mialupin1

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lavynrose · 4 years ago

Text

Artem and his S/O confessing at the same time pt. 2

Title: Dedicated

Pairing/s: Artem Wing X Reader

Pronouns: Gender Neutral

Genre: FLUFF FLUFF FLUFF TOOTH ROTTING FLUFF

Warning/s: grammatical errors

Notes: ok so!!! thank you so much for waiting <3 one thing i'd like to say is that i recommend reading part 1 before this bc it creates a build-up for the story's conclusion. There are some parts here that needed context from part 1. Enjoy!

part 1 here

He couldn't ask for more.

The sunset spilled all around the theme park, the golden intricates of the the railings sparkled than ever before. The orange radiance of the solemn sun gives the park an even more golden glow.

Artem looked around, taking in the seemingly perfect view of what can be only described as serene. The laughter of groups of friends, families walking hand-in-hand, couples giving their significant other loving looks, people enjoying themselves left and right, the quaint smell of hotdogs and popcorn.

You spending your time with him.

The sunset made this picturesque scenery even more breathtaking, and he could come here everyday if only allowed.

Right now, right in this very moment, everything is glowing.

Especially you.

"That was really fun!" the enthusiasm in your voice never fails to make him feel the same. He loves seeing you have fun, without a care in the world. He admits, he also enjoyed getting splashed by water on the raft ride.

He unconsciously offered his arm to link with yours and when you took it as you gazed at him, he's more than satisfied.

You fit so perfectly in his arms, it feels as if you're the missing puzzle piece he never knew his being had. Even having dried after getting soaked from the raft, the warmth that your touch radiated fills his senses with comfort.

This moment of getting to spend time with the person he profoundly longed for was enough for him. Enough for now. You don't need to know his affections for now.

Does he really need to let you know?

His feelings?

It'll probably make your relationship awkward. He's not ready to risk the sweet smiles and playful looks you direct towards him just for his own selfishness.

It doesn't matter. He'll love you even if you won't, anyway.

He then stopped in his tracks, you followed suit. Not caring about the people around you. Lost in the little world the two of you shared. He looked down at your form, "Yes it was. I enjoyed it very much." because you're with me, he wanted to add but instead of saying those words, an amiable look in his cerulean eyes twinkled, and an adoring smile latched upon his features instead.

Almost as if he's telling you an unspoken confession.

His expression however, turned into mild surprise when he noticed how your gaze was filled with enchantment. With a soft glint in your lidded eyes, your brows are knitted together. You were silent.

It baffled him.

Why.

'Why are you looking at me like that?' Artem wanted to blurt out. His mouth opened to say something.

It was unclear to him as to why you looked like you were staring at his very soul.

'Why are you looking at me like,' he can't help but ask himself as he continued to scrutinize your tranced gaze, 'like you want to say the same words I desperately wanted to tell you?'

Are his feelings reciprocated?

You blinked and suddenly looked away, "Uhh, Artem, I-"

"Everyone! One more hour to go for the fireworks! Please look forward to it!" The both of you landed your eyes on the speaker, then on each other.

Artem cleared his throat, pulling the collar of his turtleneck, "You were saying?" he inquired, voice and features laced with curiosity.

You cleared your throat and pulled on your collar, mirroring him, "I..." you started as your eyes darted as if you were looking for excuses, then your orbs glinted with realization and faced Artem, "I just wanted to say that we should take pictures! This is a memorable night after all."

His eyes begin to scan the theme park and his gaze found a small photobooth just beside the merry-go-round.

"Good idea. We haven't had anything to commemorate today's fun." He brushed off your weird behavior earlier as you dragged him towards your destination.

There weren't too many people in the waiting line, there were multiple photobooths, plenty enough to not create a line of more than five costumers per booth.

As soon as it was your turn, you excitedly rummaged through the cute costumes the guests can wear in the photos.

"Look Artem," you snapped your fingers to get his attention, "This would look cute on you!" You squealed as you waved the headband with cat ears in front of his face.

This kind of trend has been circling around lately. No matter how much of a busy man Artem is, he still has seen some posts about this on the internet...

Catboy culture, wasn't it? He wondered.

"You should wear one, too." He suggested. He gingerly took the headband from you and after a few moments of hesitation, he finally gave in to the anticipation in your eyes.

Your eyes were practically sparkling taking in the sight of catboy Artem in the flesh.

"Oh my gosh." You breathed, gaping at him.

Artem blinked. "Is there something on my face?" He then turned to the mirror to check what's wrong, nothing seems to be out of the ordinary though.

"It's nothing!" You frantically waved your hand and gestured towards the camera, "Let's take a photo!" you grinned, wearing cat ears identical to Artem's.

You guys started the photoshoot with your hands making peace signs.

Ah, the classic.

The few shots after just consisted of you putting on different faces while Artem just wore different headbands each shot, with the same pose.

"You guys, please act cuter for the camera! " The photographer suddenly commented.

Isn't Y/N cute enough? Artem internally recoiled.

"Young man, put your arms around your date or something, or do a heart pose together! " Mr. Photographer added.

Artem looked back at you, his eyes meeting yours, both were wide with surprise.

He cleared his throat for what seemed like the nth time today and looked at you for approval, "Do you want to?" he asked as his hands formed half a heart.

Your cheeks lighted aflame as you raised your hand, forming half a heart to connect it with his, "I don't mind."

As your fingers touched, Artem cannot control the pink flushing his cheeks as he smiled at the camera.

The photographer continued to instruct the both of you with how you should pose. He deserves a raise for doing his job really well, Artem thinks.

After of what it seemed like endless snaps of sappy pictures, the two of you decided to print all of them.

"Now we have lots of souvenirs!" you scanned each one of the photos and Artem can't help but think how good you two look together.

He thanked the photographer for putting his all into the shoot, then you both headed for the exit.

"How was it, Artem?" You turned towards him with a profound smile.

You have lots of photos together now. He can already see himself wide awake at night, staring at your couple-like pictures.

It was more than okay.

"It was a fun experience. The cat ears aren't bad." He said as he recalled how astonished you looked when he wore the headband.

"We spent almost 20 minutes there..." You sighed as you looked at your watch.

Artem unconsciously checked his wrist watch as well, "There are 40 minutes left before the fireworks. Do you want to check out more rides before then?"

You surveyed the theme park to look for more booths, "Look at that, Artem." you pointed toward the large and loud crowd at the park's quadrangle.

"Perharps it's someone performing." Artem guessed, hearing the strums of a guitar from the speakers.

"Let's check it out!" Curious, you and Artem shuffled yourselves into the crowd. The faint singing voice grew more and more audible as you got closer to the center of the attraction.

You headed to the front for the best audience experience and the singer came into view, "Isn't that?" Artem's eyes were as wide as saucers when he recognized the person singing.

Funny how you weren't surprised, and he wondered why.

There at the center, sitting at a stool with a guitar in hand, singing with a gold microphone in front of him, was the new employee at the firm, William.

Artem frowned.

That's the guy. The guy who was getting too cozy with you, the guy causing the unpleasant pangs inside his chest.

The guy who was one of the reasons why he got the courage to ask you out on this date in the first place.

The feeling of delight earlier was now replaced by uneasiness.

"I didn't know he was a performer." Artem murmured, and he kept glancing at you.

When he saw that you were clapping your hands and a proud smile has decorated your lips - one that's not aimed him, a sudden bitter feeling overwhelmed his whole being.

You looked very happy, and he hung his head low.

He vividly remembered your smiling faces in the office yesterday, and how William seem to always hang around you.

Artem realized he wasn't special. The warm look that he witnessed from you earlier in the sunset, the look that made him think that you reciprocated his feelings, you probably do that to everyone.

He felt so stupid.

While everyone was watching William hit the notes and strum the strings, Artem was watching your every reactions, only for him to get hurt on the inside.

His heart hurts, the clenching feeling in his chest tightening with every cheer that you voiced.

He's glad it was you who were causing this pain, though.

The crowd boomed with claps and shouts as the last note finished the song, and Artem wasn't in the mood to join them.

6:30pm

"Aren't you going to greet him?" Artem's voice made you look up to him, his brows furrowed and he wasn't making eye contact.

You just brushed his behaviour off and said, "Nope. I wouldn't want to disturb him on this special day!" you felt giddy, knowing that you helped William to set this all up.

As soon as his first day in the office, which was around a month ago, he had overheard you and Kiki talking about the big opening of PAX's amusement park, and kept asking questions about the event. He then learned you were friends with the heir, Marius.

You've never seen a face as shocked as William's when he learned that.

He even made Kiki contact her insiders about the soon to be opened theme park.

Kiki asked why he was so curious, and he said he performs on gigs as a hobby, balancing it with his law career, and that he loves performing ever since he was a kid.

"Performing on the theme park's opening would definitely give me more opportunities!" He sounded so passionate that you can't help but support him.

He became bashful though, as he said, "Besides, I've been looking for an opportunity to surprise my girlfriend next month," you and Kiki beamed at him, "This would make her happy, as I made a new song that I specifically made as a gift for her birthday. I'll sing it on the opening if I'm allowed."

That's why ever since, you became close with William. Whenever you talk though, he almost always talk about her girlfriend.

"30 minutes remaining for the fireworks display!!!" The speakers announced.

You were excited for the fireworks, and an idea popped out of your mind.

"Artem," you called him out "Let's ride on the ferries wheel, that way we're up in the sky as the fireworks erupt," you dragged him to the ferris wheel's ticketing booth, "I heard that it takes 20-30 minutes for a capsule to be on top of the wheel, the time is perfect for us!"

"Can we be alone in the capsule?" Artem suddenly requested, his eyes filled with a look you can't fathom. He looked so vulnerable.

"Yes, that's actually normal. We can request that for the youngest senior attorney with 99% win rate!" You grinned and you expected him to send you one of his gentle smiles, but he just turned his head away, and looked at the distance.

You take a good look at him again once you got the tickets, he's still looking away, a solemn demeanor in his face.

You can't help but wonder what he's thinking. He's been acting a little weird, you thought.

Does he not want to hang out with you anymore?

"Artem, if you don't want to, you can tell me. I won't be mad." You eyed him with concern, "We can just sit on the bench or something." you suggested.

Just like that, his expression changed quickly, regret clouding his face, "Y/N," he sighed, "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to imply that with my actions," he stared at you for a few seconds, then you noticed that light was back in his eyes, the fond smile you liksd seeing is back again, "The ferris wheel is perfect." He then grabbed yoir waist and guided you both to the capsule.

You grinned, "I requested a capsule for only the two of us!" you waved the tickets at him, he chuckled and grabbed it from you to give to the person managing the capsules.

The capsule was air-condition inside, with big windows to get a good view of the outside. You expected nothing from a device created by PAX.

Across from you, Artem sits, his mood is a little better now, but you can't help but notice the silent sadness his cerulean eyes hold still.

You don't like seeing him like this.

"Hey, Artem?" you half-whispered, not wanting to surprise him from his reverie.

His eyes met yours, "Yes?" he responded gently.

"You know you can trust me with your problems, right?" You started, you don't let his surprised expression distract you from what you want to say, "I will listen intently to your troubles, and we'll find a way to solve them together! " You declared with the brightest smile you could ever muster, "So please, share your burdens with me. I'll carry them with you." You finished with a toothy grin.

He blinked a few times before finally shaking his head with fondness, "Thank you, Y/N. I want you to know that you are special to me." His face is suddenly filled with so much endearment you quickly looked away, "Uhh, Of course!" your face flushed red and you raised your hide in an attempt to hide it.

Artem chuckled, the sound giving you a sense of comfort and security. You looked up to him again and saw his features get illuminated by the lights flickering in the theme park, his adoring eyes lingering on you.

Like yours was lingering on him.

You smiled at each other, letting the other feel that they're not alone in the battles they're facing.

What are you to each other, anyway? You pondered when you decided to avert your eyes away from him first.

As far as you can recall, friends don't do this kind of thing with each other. The staring, the blushing. Oh, especially the blushing.

You can't help but long for the possibility of having your feelings reciprocated, but oh boy were you afraid.

"Can I sit beside you?" His question brought you to your senses, and you happily obliged, "Of course! This capsule isn't shaky, we'll be okay being on the same side." You made space for him as you patted the empty space. There he sat, his scent enveloping your senses.

It was silent for the whole ride up, but you were comfortable with it. You were with the person you love, being with them is enough.

7:00pm

Your capsule was right on top when suddenly, a boom was heard and splashes of color was seen through the window.

"Artem!" you pointed at the big, colorful patch of explosion that's a little bit below the capsule you were in.

The ferries wheel was so high that you were higher than the fireworks!

The fireworks was on your side of the window, you can see the view to it's fullest glory.

"Whoa!" you exclaimed, your eyes astonished by the scene before you. Your hands flat against the window, when you suddenly felt a body pressed against your back, and a hot breath against your ear, "It's amazing" you heard Artem mutter, as his breaths fanned the hairs on your neck, before resting his chin on your shoulder.

You yelped, you forgot Artem was just beside you!

Your heart pounded against your ribcage when you realized that in order for Artem to see the fireworks, he needs to look at your side of the window.

Heck, your thighs were touching, and you can feel every ounce of heat that his muscular body radiated. He's practically caging you and this small, suffocating space of a capsule isn't helping!

Despite the unbelievable heat that your whole body is feeling right now, you badly wanted him to wrap his arms around you.

Something was pooling in your stomach, something weird. All you can think about right now is Artem kissing you against the window while you sit on his lap.

Warmth filled your already heated cheeks upon realization of what you just imagined, and you mentally slapped yourself. What were you thinking?

The smell of his vanilla cologne isn't helping!

Nobody has ever made you feel this way before. No other person has affected you like this. You think about the things that this man had done for you, he was selfless, hardworking, and most of all, kind.

Especially the smiles he had always shown you. Those smiles filled with comfort and fondness that makes you weak in the knees. Whenever you see that smile, you find yourself looking forward in seeing it again.

To you, Artem Wing was unobtainable.

Yet you wanted to make him yours.

7:01pm

"Artem!" you pointed below with an enthusiastic grin as the fireworks boomed and splashed the sky above the theme park.

His body scooted over to you without realizing, eyes widening with glee and he muttered, "It's amazing" Artem leaned towards you, placing his chin on your shoulder for him to get better view of the fireworks display below.

It's taking every ounce of his control to not face you towards him and claim your lips then and there.

What you said earlier only fueled his raging feelings for you. You were willing to carry his burdens with him? He never had someone say that to him before, and he was happy it's from you.

The evening is flawless. The two of you were alone, having you near him like this, your decleration of support earlier, and a beautiful scenery before him that he won't get to see everyday...

A perfect evening to pour his heart out to you.

He decided that if there was a best time to confess his love for you, that time would be now. He didn't care about your answer right now, he just wanted to let it all out before this passionate feelings can drive him to insanity.

These feelings were driving him crazy, he wanted to let you know how you make him happy, that he thinks about you eveey second of every day, that you ground him and his lonely heart.

He noticed you were silent and unmoving, so he decided to take the chance. He took a deep breath.

"I'm in l-" "Can I ki-"

You turned your body to face him, surprised. Your face only a few centimeters away from his. One wrong move and you'll kiss.

The both of you blinked.

"You... go first." you said, biting your lip.

He stared deep into your eyes, none of you dared to move from this intimate position, your breaths fanning each other's faces.

"Y/N, I," he rested his forehead against yours and breathed with the most vulnerable voice you've ever heard from him, "I'm in love with you..."

You gaped, but he didn't mind.

He closed his eyes for a few seconds, "It's okay if you don't feel the same. I..." he opened his eyes to give you a loving gaze "I will keep loving you anyway."

He looked so vulnerable right now, but it didn't scare him. If anything, he feels relief in finally voicing out the feelings he's hidden for so long.

"I was in a bad mood today because I think you were interested in William," you just blinked and he continued, "I mean, you always look happy when you're with him. It crushed my heart." He finished as he waited for your response.

He waited, and waited.

The silence that you were giving him didn't give him any clue to what you were thinking, it's unnerving.

After of what seemed like an eternity you finally let out, "He has a girlfriend, silly." you see Artem's eyes widened and you continued, "It's a long story, but I'm not interested in him. We're just friends."

You felt the heat creep up his face.

"So... what were you going to tell me?" He said hesitantly as he gulped, the embarrasment from earlier evident in his voice.

Your cheeks flushed pink as you darted your eyes, it was now your turn to get really embarassed, "Can I..." your face looks conflicted. That if you say whatever you wanted to say, It'd be the death of you.

You took a deep breath, Artem told you his feelings, so it's only fair you tell him yours, you told yourself and mustered the courage to look up to his ocean eyes, a vast ocean so blue, you could drown in them, "Can I kiss you, Artem?"

It took a moment before he could fully process your words. His brain short-circuit.

"What?" He blurted out as he scanned your face for any signs that maybe, you have made a mistake.

but you replied, "I want to kiss you Artem," you put your hands on his shoulder to steady yourself, "I'm in love with you too."

His body tingled with so much joy, you being in love with him was just a distant dream before.

Not willing to wait anymore, he licked his lips as he slowly dipped his head to meet your already parted mouth, welcoming him.

You may or may not have kissed the entire way down the ride.

Artem Wing is a dedicated man.

Now, he's willing to dedicate himself to you for the rest of his life.

do not repost © lavynrose 08/16/21.

#tears of themis #tears of themis x reader #artem wing #artem wing x reader #artem x reader #tears of themis imagines #tot x reader #zuo ran x reader

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quicksilverownsmysoul · 4 years ago

Text

Coffee of the Week pt.2

Icon credit: @thatspookyagent

Summary: This is the second part to Coffee of the Week, where Colin takes the reader out for their date. You can read Part 1 Here

Warnings: None this is pure fluff

Word Count: 2245

"So," Mare said in a bored voice. "Have you decided where you're taking her for your date tonight?" Colin paused for a moment before answering, which confirmed Mare’s suspicions

"No I have not." Colin said, doing his best to avoid Mare's judgmental eyes.

"Really man, you had all week to think of a place."

"I know." He signed leaning back in his chair, he swiveled it to the side to face Mare. "But like where would I even take her? There's only like three restaurants in Eastown."

"Hey!” Mare said defensively. "We have four restaurants you're forgetting the KFC that's attached to the Taco Bell." Mare joked as she began to put away her papers.

'My bad." Colin smiled to himself at Mare's little joke. It seems that lately she was warming up to him, it was nice to be able to joke and talk to her like this. He watched as she cleaned up the rest of her desk.

"But seriously where are you taking her." Mare glanced at the clock on her computer screen before shutting it down. "It's already 6:30 you should be getting ready by now."

Colin glanced down at himself. "What's wrong with what I'm wearing now?"

Mare pursed her lips. "Nothing. Just forget I said anything."

"See there's another thing I have to worry about now." Colin ran a hand down his face. "I haven't even been here that long so I don't really know where is a good place to eat at.” Colin sat with his head in his hands for a moment before lifting it up, eyes glancing towards Mare. He turned slowly towards Mare, a hopeful smile on his face. "Unless you-"

"No."

"Mare-"

"No."

"If you could recommend-"

"No."

"Mare please!” He had stood up at this point and moved towards Mare’s desk, she had scooted her chair away from his approaching form, her face scrunched up at his persistent pleading. “Please tell me where to take her! I really like her and I don’t wanna mess up." Mare finally glanced over at him through the corner of her eye. He looked like a kicked puppy, he was so desperate it physically hurt her.

She sighed. "Fine." Colin's face split open in a wide smile. "Stop that." She snapped, he immediately tried to change his facial expression back to neutral but Mare could see he was trying to fight back his smile. "You should take her to the Italian restaurant that's near the center of town, one of my friends works there." She tore a piece of paper off one of her reports. "Tell her that Mare sent you and she'll make sure to give you a good table and treat you and (y/n) well." She handed the paper over to Colin.

His eagerly grabbed it and smiled widely at Mare, "Thank you so much Mare you-"

She held her hand up to silence him, pointing an accusing finger. "Don't make this into a big deal detective." Mare shrugged on her coat and made her way towards the door. "And if you tell her it's a date she'll throw in a free dessert.

"Thank y-"

"Not. A. Big. Deal." Mare slammed the door shut. Colin smiled at her fading figure, she was definitely warming up to him.

Colin’s heart was beating out of his chest as he pulled up to your house, a million thoughts running through his head. Things like was he too early? It was only 7:30 he wasn't supposed to pick you up till 8:00. What if you weren't ready, was he dressed up enough, was he over dressed?? He shook his head trying to clear all the thoughts that plagued him.

He made his way to your front door and after a few seconds of hesitation rang your doorbell. The sound of loud barking made him jump up in surprise. “I’m coming.” He heard your voice yell and the sounds of your footsteps approaching the door. You opened the door with a smile, you were holding a big fluffy dog by its collar as it strained against your hold. “Hey Colin! Sorry about him, he always barks when someone is at the door.” He glanced down at the dog, it was eagerly trying to pull its way towards him, tail wagging intensely. “Let me go put him outside. I don’t want him jumping all over you.”

With zero hesitation Colin said. “Let him go.”

“What?” You asked in surprise.

“Let him go, I wanna meet him.”

You let out a little laugh.“ Are you sure? He’s a jumper.”

“Of course!” You let go of your dog’s collar and he went barreling towards Colin, who was squatting down with his arms wide open. Your dog ran into his arms and knocked him flat on his back. You rushed forward to pull your dog back until you saw Colin laughing. Your dog was licking him all over while Colin nestled his face into your dog’s fur. “You’re such a good boy aren't you?” Colin asked as he petted your dog, your dog just wagged his tail even faster and tried to lick Colin’s face even more, you smiled at the sight

“It seems he likes you.” You giggled out.

“What’s his name?”

“His name is Tino.”

“Hello Tino, I’m Colin.” Colin shook your dogs paw introducing himself. You smiled at his antics and squatted down next to him, rubbing Tino’s soft ears in your hand. “What kinda dog is he?”

“I’m not sure, I adopted him from the center in town and no one seemed to know what kind he was.” Colin nodded at your answer and tried his best to stand back up, it was a task in itself since Tino kept trying to knock him back down. You stood up as well and let out a small laugh at Colin’s appearance. “What?” He asked. His once crisp shirt was wrinkled, and his perfectly combed hair was all tousled. He was covered head to toe in dog fur.

“I think Tino may have gotten a little bit of fur on you.” He glanced down and saw all the dog's hair sticking to him. He laughed with you and did his best to try and pick the dog hair off. ‘Wait here.” You went inside and came back with a lint roller in hand. He took it and began to roll it up and down his clothes. You moved closer to him and brushed his hair out of his face, smoothing it back into place. He blushed at the action.

“Are you ready to go?”

“Yea! Where are we going?”

“It’s a surprise!” You laughed, it really wasn't he only really had three options on where to take you in Easttown. And you figured it wasn't going to be the Taco Bell or KFC.

The ride to the restaurant didn't take too long and in no time you two had pulled up to the place. He parked and rushed out of the car to your side. He opened your door for you and you swooned at the old fashioned action. You looped your arm through his and he led you to the door, he whispered something to the hostess and she smiled widely and quickly led you two to a table. It was almost sectioned off from the other ones, it had an aura of privacy to it. She rushed over and placed a rose in the vase at the center of the table and lit up the candles. Colin pulled the chair out for you before sitting down on his own.

He picked at the table cloth, not meeting your eyes. “‘So, did I pick a good place?’ He asked with a nervous smile.

“Mhmm, this is my favorite out of all of Easttown’s numerous restaurants.” You smiled at him coyly, he let out a little laugh.

The rest of the night seemed to speed by, you and Colin just clicked, there wasn’t a moment that wasn't filled with conversation. Either about his work or about your own, him telling stories about his current cases or you telling him about the rude customers you had gotten that day. Then it shifted towards talking about your favorite tv shows or movies. He admitted that his job didn't leave him much time to watch tv and you vowed that one of your date nights had to be a tv or movie marathon. He blushed at the insulation that there was going to be a second date.

You two had just finished off your meals when the hostess came by holding a piece of Tiramisu, you let yourself think about the irony of it. You guys had met at your coffee shop and here you were on your first date beings served a coffee flavored dessert. She set it down in front of you two. The plate was decorated with chocolate powder in the shape of a heart. You glanced down at the table and noticed Colin’s hand resting on the table, inching its way closer to yours. You closed the distance and placed your hand over his, squeezing it lightly. He smiled up at you and you returned it. He let you take the first bite of the desert, and he even let you have the last bite. He was a true gentleman through and through.

The drive home was filled with constant loving stares back and forth, your hands resting intertwined on your thigh. When you guys got back to your place you didn't want to leave the car, it had been a while since you had a date like that. One filled with so much comfort and romance, one you never wanted to end. More often that you went on dates with sleazy men that picked you up two hours late and flirted with your hostess. Which resulted in you sneaking out the bathroom window and drinking your sorrows away at the bar. But you had a feeling you wouldn't be ditching any of your upcoming dates.

Colin, being the gentleman he was, got out and went to open your door for you, much to his and your own dismay. You slid out of the seat and walked as slowly as possible to your front door. He held both your hands in his own. “This was fun.” He looked down at his shoes, not meeting your eyes, fearing you wouldn’t agree with him.

“It really was, we should do it again.” His head whipped up at your response, a smile taking hold of his features.

“How does next Friday sound?”

“LIke it’s too far away.” He blushed at your words. “But I think I can wait till then if you continue to come by every morning.”

“Well I couldn't very well start each day without the best cup of coffee in the world now could I?”

“Oh shut up.” You giggled, his heart fluttered at being able to make you laugh. What he wouldn't give to spend the rest of his life trying to make you laugh. A little warning light went off in him at that thought, was he seriously already thinking of spending his life with you. You guys had only met this week and it was only your first date. What if you thought he was moving too fast? What if you didn't want to even go out again? Wait, you had just said you wanted to go out again. He was spiraling, lost in his own thoughts. You saw his brow furrow and reached your hand out to smooth out his worry lines.

“What’s bugging’ ya detective?” His eyes widened at hearing your sweet voice address him by detective.

“Nothing, just lost in my thoughts.” His ears turned red at the realization he had just zoned out in front of you. You just giggled, moving your hand down to cup his face. He leaned into your soft touch and slowly moved his hands up to rest on your waist. He pulled you closer and you began to slowly move forward. Your lips connected, it was very soft and hesitant. You moved your other hand up to cup the back of his neck, running your fingers near the edges of his hair. The wind blew softly around you two, making your hair and his coat flutter. You pulled away and rested your foreheads together. You looked up at him through your lashes, reluctantly beginning to pull away. “Goodnight detective.”

He pulled away as well, letting his hand linger in your own, holding on to your fingertips until he couldn't anymore. “Goodnight (y/n), I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“I can’t wait.” You closed the door and he stayed outside your door until he heard the locks click shut. Once he knew you were safe he made his way back to the car, pumping his arms in the air, in joy.

Unknown to him you were watching his little display of happiness from your window. You did your best to suppress a fit of giggles as you sat down at the little window seat, unfastening your heels and tossing them to the floor. You tucked your feet underneath yourself and watched him get back into his car, a smile never leaving his face, and never leaving yours. You gently touch your fingertips to your lips, the lingering taste of his lips on your own. You sighed at the memory, he was going to be the death of you.

206 notes · View notes

theskywaslookingback · 4 years ago

Note

tma fic recs please ? 🤲🏽

Oooooo yes! I never get asks like this, thank you!

[my tumblr fic recs tag is here for browsing]

I had to put it under a cut because it got...entirely too long barely half an hour into making it, sorry.

Under 5k

means of cartharsis by orphan_account [G] [965]

“You’d think – you’d that at this point nightmares would be second nature for me, hm?” Martin says, forcing a smile even as he tugs the blanket tighter around his trembling shoulders.

It’s meant to be a bit funny. Instead of laughing, though, Jon frowns.

“No,” he says simply, and matter-of-factly wipes the moisture from Martin’s cheeks with a tissue like he’s a crying child.

A Proper Sleepover by Goodluckdetective (scorpiantales) [T] [1.4k]

In a different world, one where Elias is not waiting for them outside the Lonely, everyone has a chance to savor a moment of respite. As much as they can get these days. If only to talk about things that long need to be spoken.

“Basira says we should all sleep in the same room tonight,” Jon says without looking up. “Safer. So we can keep an eye out for intruders and also each other.”

“So we’re having a proper sleepover then?”

Jon scoffs. “Technically we’ve been having a proper one for months.”

where i go, when i go there by rainny_days [T] [1.7k]

Martin wants Jon to hold his hand. Martin doesn't want Jon to hold his hand.

It's complicated.

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Jon loses his first soul mark when he is eight years old.

a palace from ruin by bibliocratic [G] [2.2k]

"What're you sorry for?” Martin asks.

“I should have asked,” Jon says finally. “I'd never.... you were always so private about him, so I mean, at first I wasn't sure he was even yours, but then – when you, when you went with Peter, and I – he was so small, and I thought he was h-half-dead. S-so I picked him up and I carried him. And I'm sorry.”

interiors by doomcountry [T] [2.7k]

In the doorway, he fumbles with his keys. Their sound is loud in the silent stairwell. You don’t remember getting here.

searching for a light (for a right) by Kalgalen [T] [2.7k]

Some people make the mistake of assuming he's naive about sex, for the simple reason he hasn't dated in a while. Tim has called him a prude, at one point, and implied that he was somehow afraid of the intimacy required by the act; he wasn’t entirely wrong, but this definitely isn’t the reason for Jon's disinterest and general bafflement toward what most people seemed to consider as "what makes them human".

Jon simply hasn't found the right person. That is all it is: high standards, and a reticence to let people in.

(In which Jon finds out society is wrong about what a romantic relationship should be.)

how to plant a garden in rocky soil by treeprince [T] [2.9k]

Sometimes you just need a good pair of hands to work out all the kinks in your life.

Good thing Martin has two.

A Weather In The Flesh by cuttooth [G] [3k]

"There is a span of years where Jon doesn’t touch anyone other than the occasional hand shake. It’s not so bad. He’s never been someone who’s needed physical affection."

Jon has never been any good at making people want to stick around.

I'll bring the motion by callmearctus [T] [3.1k]

A long series of kidnappings and international flights leaves its own special mark on someone. Before the Unknowing, Jon is a mess.

Martin helps.

A Bread Made In Heaven by Againstme [G] [3.3k]

Martin moves over and watches how his boyfriend handles the dough. He's awkward with it, tentative and gentle, as if he's scared of hurting it somehow.

"Is this, uh, am I doing this right?" Jon asks, still slowly stretching out the dough and folding it onto itself.

"Well," he says shifting closer to Jon again, "you could be applying more pressure. Here, let me help you out, dear."

Martin moves fully behind Jon, and reaches around him, putting his hands on top of his boyfriend's. Jon inhales sharply, but doesn't say anything else, just lets Martin's hand rest on top of his.

Martin's hands are bigger, but not big enough to entirely envelop the other's hands, and Jon's hands are much, much warmer than his own are. To see what they're doing, Martin moves his head to look over Jon's shoulder. Though he can't see his boyfriend's face from this angle, he can see how it is slowly growing red at the edge of his vision. He decides not to tease him on it, instead content with letting a smile spread across his face and slowly guiding their joined hands in the proper motion.

Or, Martin teaches Jon how to make bread.

stumbling and spinning by lady_mab [G] [3.3k]

“Things happened,” Jon says demurely, trying to untangle Gerry’s fingers, but it only results in him getting pulled in so Gerry can kiss him properly. “It’s not all that bad.”

“I suppose not,” Gerry says with a sigh, sitting back upright. “You somehow managed to snag an incredible boyfriend out of it.”

It takes a solid few seconds before realization clicks in Martin’s brain. “You mean me?” [...]

“You have to admit, Jon has great tastes,” Gerry teases.

nothing sweeter than local honey by beeclaws [T] [3.4k]

So Tim is content, one arm leaned into the spray, waiting for the water to warm, enjoying the feeling of homecoming underneath the gentle fuzz of jetlag, when he hears gasping, panicked breaths coming from the other room.

Tim and Jon, in the aftermath, relearning how to be okay.

When Words are Inadequate by Mugatu [T] [3.8k]

Meals and the preparation of are, for want of a better word, informative. Fact gathering. A place where they can fill in the gaps of their knowledge of the other.

Jon cooks for Martin, and they learn more about each other.

go softly by doomcountry [T] [4k]

And there is nothing else besides this.

Imago by cuttooth [T] [4k]

“Jon?” he asks tentatively, tightening his grip around the poker as it slips against his sweaty palm. The antennae twitch, and suddenly Martin knows that it’s Jon, the knowledge sliding into his mind in a surge of desperate affection, the same profound love he felt that first time he truly saw Jon in the fog of the Lonely.

“Oh,” he whispers. “It really is you.”

Jon changes, but he’s still the same to Martin.

shoreline by bibliocratic [G] [4.1k]

“Martin," Tim says kindly, tipsily, only mildly slurring. "Dearest, dearest Martin. You're wankered, babe. Last train to Stockwell fucked off hours ago because it is now piss off o'clock in the morning, and there's a sofa with your exact name on it at my place. Thought you said you wanted some handsome fellow to take you back to his tonight?”

Or: The OG Archive crew go drinking, Martin comes out, and gets some well deserved TLC. In that order.

get your epitaph right by bibliocratic [G] [4.2k]

Martin's daemon has tried on the shape of dogs and lizards and snakes and horses, and even – once, when he was younger and Mum took him to the seaside, a fish.

Martin's never seen his soul in the dressing of a spider before.

i've known the warmth of your doorways by beeclaws [T] [4.2k]

'I’m always in pain, Jon wants to say, even as he dismisses the thought as melodramatic. Between his growing collection of old wounds and scar tissue, the supernatural hunger for statements that hasn’t been truly satiated in months, and the unpredictable aches and strains his body threw off day by day long before he ever set foot in the Institute, some level of pain and discomfort follows Jon wherever he goes now. He is used to being in pain. He’s not used to someone holding his hand as he suffers through it.'

Jon catalogs the comforts he receives, and wonders how long he will be allowed to keep them.

lay down your weary head by Zykaben [T] [4.6k]

Jon has been running himself ragged, searching for every scrap of information he can possibly find about the Unknowing. He's exhausted and sleep-deprived but he can't bring himself to take a break, not now.

Luckily, Tim and Martin are there to make sure that their boyfriend gets the care and rest he needs.

only the sweetest words remain by bluejayblueskies [T] [4.6k]

This isn't how things are supposed to go, right? Jon remembers those ratty paperbacks from the charity shops, dime-a-dozen romance novels with broken bindings and yellowing pages and words that spoke of love and passion and sexuality in prose that was more than a bit too mature for someone whose age hadn’t yet reached double digits. Stolen glances turn into dinner dates turn into passionate kisses turn into…

Well, he’d never actually read those parts of the books, because it had all seemed so deeply uncomfortable and gross. But he got the picture.

Or, Jonathan Sims, on being loved

5k-20k

and they keep not letting go by Marianne_Dashwood [G] [5k]

It’s an electric feeling, something strange and new and familiar all at once, even though he has been holding Martin’s hand for most of the day. His stomach swoops, like he is standing on the edge of the precipice of realisation and staring into the void of unknowing. But at the same time, he does know. In this instant of contact between them, the last few years of cups of tea and small smiles and momentary glances, of panic and fear and only feeling safe with Martin’s solid presence in the room, despite his paranoia, rush into him, and oh, oh oh.

ready to call this love by yewgrove [G] [5.6k]

How is Martin supposed to tell Jon that he panicked, stupidly, when the lovely old lady down the village asked him what they were doing in this part of the world? Got the shopping! Oh, by the way, we're married now! Whole village thinks we're on our honeymoon, hope you don't mind!

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They still haven't talked about it, any of it, not even to pass the time on the long train ride to Scotland. Instead, Martin fell asleep in the seat next to him, pressed into his side from shoulder to knee, and Jon thought about love confessions and verb tense and how the two fit together when you think you're dying.

or: Good cows, mediocre poetry, and other crucial topics of discussion.

This Must Be The Place by cuttooth [T] [6k]

“You said – you said we were going home,” Martin says softly.

“I did,” says Jon, and is grateful that Martin doesn’t comment on him calling the Archives home. “I – I don’t really know where to go. I, uh, I don’t have a flat anymore, I don’t think. We could find a hotel?”

“Let’s go to my place,” says Martin. His hand squeezes Jon’s, more gently than before. Most importantly, Jon notes, he doesn’t let go.

Jon and Martin go home for a little while.

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Even after leaving London, Jon and Martin are not free, not really. Maybe they never will be.

But for now they can be themselves, and maybe in the end, that's enough.

house by tomatoes [G] [9k]

Martin can take care of himself.

roses, roses, roses by acetheticallyy (judesstfrancis) [T] [9.3k]

Rose scented laundry detergent. Running into Jon in the breakroom. Running into Jon on his way back to his desk. Rose scented detergent. Running into Jon. Roses. Jon. Roses, roses, roses.

a deeply annoying child by ajkal2 [G] [9.6k]

Jon is hiding under the desk.

----

There's a child in the Archives, who shouldn't be there.

Inseparable by voiceless_terror [T] [10.3k]

“You can stay.” The voice interrupts his internal panic, and he looks over to find Jon studiously avoiding his gaze, staring hard at a neighboring bush. Martin wonders what caused his sudden change of heart. “But you have to sit on the other side. And don’t talk to me.”

Jonathan Sims and Martin Blackwood meet as children. Some things change, others do not.

i'm almost me again, you're almost you by gruhukens [G] [12k]

After a second Jon steps in towards him, close enough that Martin flinches, but all Jon does is put two fingers under his chin with his free hand and raise it until Martin can’t duck away. Jon has never touched him so casually before – at least, not until today, and it raises a lot of thoughts and feelings that Martin is trying very hard not to process.

Much like a lot of other things that have happened, he thinks. Not that it’s horrible or terrifying or numbing like everything else has been: it’s just another thing on the list of things he doesn’t have the capacity to deal with.

---

In the wake of the Lonely, there's a lot that Martin doesn't really want to think about.

hello my old heart by firebirdsuite [T] [15.8k]

Peter’s wrong, of course. When it’s all over, Martin does still want to tell Jon everything. It’s just—well, there’s a few things they need to work through first before they can get there.

Martin and Jon find each other again in Scotland.

Over 20k

The Kindness of Strangers by TheOestofOCs [M] [23k]

It was easier to treat Jon like a monster when he wasn’t shivering against his back, brokenly humming—wait, was that…

“Are you trying to do ‘Hey, Jude’?” Tim demanded.

Jon stopped, stiffening. “Mm hrmh mm mmh hm,” he said defensively.

“You really can’t hold a tune, can you, boss?”

It was just an ordinary walk to a restaurant. Tim had insisted that if they were going to talk, there would be no tape recorders or weird Archives ghosts listening in. A bit of fresh air wouldn’t kill him, Tim had said. What could go wrong?

By the time Jon spots the white delivery van, it’s much too late.

The Stranger kidnaps Jon. Tim comes along for the ride.

Misjudged by ShastaFirecracker [T] [36.5k]

Martin's been a longtime listener of What the Ghost, so when Georgie gives a shoutout to her flatmate's Twitch channel during a Q&A, he checks it out - only to discover that her flatmate is also his most terrifying coworker at his new job. The first time they crossed paths, Jon yelled at him for incompetence. But on the streams, Martin sees an entirely different person - someone fun and relaxed, engaging and unfairly attractive. Over time, Martin begins to find that Jon buried inside his dour, awkward coworker. He also learns to live with the fact that his crush is painfully one-sided... or is it?

if we make it through the night everyone is gonna hear us (Series) by skvadern [Ratings Vary] [42.4k]

In which Sasha survives the NotThem (with a little help from a certain Distortion) and she and Jon spend s2 working together to try and make sense of everything that's happening to them. It goes...interestingly

the garden of forking paths by bibliocratic [T] [49.7k]

Whatever he had predicted might happen, Jon wasn't expecting to survive upon demolishing the Panopticon. He certainly wasn't expecting to be rescued.

Instead, he wakes up in an alternative universe where he's never been the Archivist, and Martin Blackwood doesn't exist.

Martin Blackwood wakes up somewhere else entirely.

it's only forever by lady_mab [T] [50.9k]

“The castle at the center of the labyrinth,” Jon breathes, recalling again the words from one of the past conversations with Martin. “He’s there.”

“Turn back, Jonathan,” the Goblin King says, and Jon is surprised to hear a slight edge of desperation in the tone. “Turn back before it’s too late.”

“I can’t,” Jon answers with the same tone. “You know that I can’t.”

The Goblin King’s grin is gone completely, and he regards Jon with a degree of pity before that melts into resignation.

Yesterday is Here by CirrusGrey [T] [53.3k]

"Who the hell are you?" Jon could feel his hands shaking. The man laughed, taking a step forward and raising a hand to point at him. "I'm you, from the future!" he said, then swayed, eyes going unfocused, and collapsed to the floor in a dead faint. -------- Post-season-four Jon and Martin time travel back to the season one Archives.

A Home For What Loves You by TheWrongShop [T] [151k]

It was completely fine that Jon was following up on this very normal, non-supernatural statement at midnight on a Friday. He was going to find nothing at all, and then he was going to go home and sleep for fourteen straight hours and feel absolutely no qualms about moving case #0150409 directly into the filing cabinet marked "discredited".

Or; Jon and Martin end up investigating Carlos Vittery's basement and finding the entity formerly known as Jane Prentiss together.

RATED E *MINORS DNI*

A Look And A Voice by cuttooth [E] [6.9k]

“Do you want to have sex with me?” Jon asks bluntly, and for a second Martin can’t breathe.

“It - it doesn’t matter what I - ” he begins valiantly, before Jon interrupts him.

“Because I want to have sex with you, and frankly it doesn’t matter if you think it’s for the wrong reasons. I’m an adult. I can make my own decisions. The only thing that matters is if you want to as well.”

Martin meets a guy in a bar and takes him home.

Warms The Coldest Night by cuttooth [E] [11k]

"Flame that warms the coldest night Bring to us the waxing Light, Be with us on Solstice Night." Gypsy - Bring Back The Light

There is mistletoe hanging in the doorway to the Archives when Jon gets in.

Curiosity by ShastaFirecracker [E] [11.6k]

“You know that conversation we had the other day about how one of the most important things for queer youth to learn is that it's okay to change their minds, because identity and self-discovery are always fluid?”

Behind him, Martin slipped oven mitts over his hands and pulled open the oven door. The scent of garlic and rosemary flooded the kitchen. “Yeah?” he said.

“I, um... I'd like to revisit the topic of sex.”

At the Interim (Series) by Rend_Herring [E] [41k]

A Measure Outside the Lines and The Residuum

triptych (Series) by Stacicity [E] [44.9k]

A collection of Jon/Tim/Martin fics

a steady hand, a delicate man by callmearctus [E] [52.8k]

Martin is the proprietor and manager of a very discrete and fairly exclusive brothel situated between Belgravia and Chelsea. Blackwood House excels at special requests and pleasing any client.

Except for Jon, who probably has never been pleased a day in his entire life.

Despite that, he still comes back. It eventually begs the question: how do you solve a problem like Jon Sims?

#statement ends #anonymous #fic recs #save #((this took me like two hours lmaooooo))

113 notes · View notes

fruitcoops · 4 years ago

Note

if you are still taking request I think that it would be so cute if lily convinced remus to go to the nail salon with her, and he was going to just get like a manicure and clear coat, and he changes his mind and comes home with his nails done sirius' favorite color as a surprise and sirius is just like dumbstruck by how much the little things remus does makes him fall even more in love with him and fluffy cuteness ensues

This is adorable! Enjoy some Loops and Lily, ft. fluffy Coops on this lovely Monday. SW credit goes to @lumosinlove!

“Remind me why I’m coming with you again?” Remus sighed as they turned the corner. “It’s just going to chip off in two days anyway.”

“Because you had a shitty weekend and deserve a hand massage,” Lily said briskly. She looped her arm through his and tucked her hand into her pocket, tilting her face up toward the sun and trusting him to guide her along the sidewalk. “You don’t have to choose colors if you don’t want to.”

“If I have to go, I’m not going to half-ass it.”

She grinned and cracked one eye open. “There’s my Remus.”

A gentle bell jingled above his head as they ducked into the shop—Lily called it a ‘salon’, which he didn’t really understand, but it sounded fancy. One woman looked up from a client’s nails and waved, then pointed to the far wall. “Pick whatever colors you’d like! I’ll be with you in a few.”

Remus stopped in his tracks. “That’s…a lot.”

Lily rolled her eyes and dragged him closer. “You’re not chickening out on me over some colors, Lupin. Which one do you like?”

“I don’t know! There’s too many!”

“There’s green,” Lily huffed, planting him in front of about three dozen different shades. “Go nuts.”

“I’m not putting green on my nails. It’ll look weird.”

“Then do red and gold!”

“That’s lame. Can’t I just watch you get yours done?”

“No,” Lily groaned. It wasn’t the first time he had asked, and likely wouldn’t be the last. “It’s about the experience, Re. If you want just a clear coat, that’s fine, but you said you—”

“—didn’t want to half-ass it, I know,” he finished with a grumble. Colors. Colors aren’t that difficult. Green would be odd, orange would be worse…

His eyes caught on a little bottle near the base of the racks. It was a plain, pretty blue; nothing special, yet calming. Sea You Later! the base read when he picked it up. Lily made an approving noise over his shoulder. “That’s cute.”

“It’s not bad.”

“Looks like Sirius’ shirt, actually. The one with the dogs on it?”

Remus rolled the bottle around for a moment. “It really does, now that you mention it. Huh.”

She patted his hip and went back to the shiny, shimmery ones on the right. “You should give it a shot.”

---------------------------------------

Painting nails took a really, really long time. Much longer than Remus was anticipating when he hesitantly rested his hands on the towel and tried not to think about how much bigger they were than Lily’s. He felt awkward in a place like this, where everyone seemed so put-together and comfortable.

His worries were quickly dispelled when the nail artist began rubbing the tension from his joints with peony-scented lotion; he immediately relaxed into her touch, letting the calluses from sticks and weights be soothed. Judging from her pleased hum when she inspected his nails, he hadn’t accidentally been butchering them his whole life—the scrape of the nail file made him grimace, but she didn’t have to do much before a coat of clear polish went on.

“It’s a protector,” Lily said at his confused look. “So your nails stay healthy and don’t turn yellow.”

“This is a lot more complicated than I thought it would be,” Remus muttered as he stuck his hands underneath the miniature fan.

The nail artist laughed as she rolled her chair to Lily’s station. “First time?”

“Yeah. I can’t imagine you get a lot of guys in here.”

She shrugged. “More than you’d think, I bet. There’s nothing wrong with wanting your hands to look nice, and a pop of color never hurt anybody.”

“Good point.”

The clear polish—base coat, Lily said with a teasing smile—dried quickly, and soon two perfect layers of blue shone under the bright lamp. Lily’s design was much more complex than his own, with shimmery bits and spiraled paint, but he liked the simplicity. It even matched his socks.

Lily and the nail artist chatted the whole time, swapping stories about summer activities and everything that had happened since she last visited; Remus waited patiently with his fingertips under the fan and people-watched as the sun grew higher in the sky.

After an hour, they were finally done, and Remus couldn’t stop rubbing his hands together as they headed back outside until Lily smacked his arm. “Stop it, you look like a Disney villain.”

“I’m sorry, they’re just so soft!” He brought his hands to his face and breathed in the soft floral scent. “Here, feel.”

“I’m not going to feel your hands.”

“Feel them.” When she shook her head and kept walking, he jogged ahead and held them out, palms-up. “Lily! Feel my hands!”

“Alright, fine!” she laughed, grabbing them both. Her eyebrows rose. “Damn, they are soft.”

“Told you so.”

“That color looks really good on you, too.”

“Yeah?” Remus looked down at the polish again, smiling to himself. There was just something about them that made him happy. “They match my socks.”

“You’re kidding.”

“Nope.” He reached down and pulled his pantleg up, startling a snort out of Lily.

“You’re ridiculous,” she said as she linked their arms again. “Did you have fun?”

“It was nice,” Remus said with a shrug. “I don’t know if I’ll go back a lot, but I had a good time listening to you two talk.”

Lily nodded, looking quite self-satisfied. “Good. I bet Sirius will get a kick out of them.”

“You think so?”

“For sure. He always likes mine.”

Remus thought back to the many, many times Lily had displayed her freshly-done nails to them with great pride; Sirius did have a penchant for colorful and sparkly things, after all. Why should his ordinary blue nails be any different?

Lily made sure to take an obligatory Instagram photo of their hands before they entered the house, then immediately laid out in front of the fan by the back door while she uploaded it. “Hey, Lily, it’s good to see you, too,” Sirius said drily as he came in from the backyard. “I’m good, thanks for asking. It’s pretty hot out there, but—”

“Shut up,” she laughed, grabbing the back of his ankle when he stepped over her. “Where’s my lover?”

“Your husband is tormenting my dog,” he called over his shoulder before winding his arms around Remus’ waist for a kiss. “Bonjour, mon amour.”

“Hey, you.” Remus bumped their noses together with a grin he could never even try to hold down. “You know how I never half-ass things?”

“Mhmm.”

He held his fingers up. “Ta-da!”

“Oh, pretty.” Sirius’ eyes went wide as he took one of Remus’ hands. “Your hands are so soft!”

“I know, right?”

“He made me feel them!” Lily groaned from the floor. “It was so weird.”

“You love it!” Remus shot back before leaning onto his tiptoes to kiss Sirius’ forehead. “I figured you’d like the blue.”

“I’m surprised you didn’t do green.”

Heat rose to his cheeks, and it had nothing to do with the sunshine. “It’s your favorite color, right? Not too green, not too purple. Reminded me of you.”

Sirius’ eyes grew impossibly soft and he cupped Remus’ jaw, pulling him in for an unhurried kiss that melted his brain into his toes. “Je t’aime.”

“Love you, too,” he breathed. His face was definitely redder than a fire engine by that point, but he hardly cared.

There was a light squeeze around his hand. “These look really nice.”

A spark of joy lit in Remus’ chest. “I’m glad you like it.”

“Ugh, love,” Lily scoffed, despite the fact that James was pressing a million and one kisses to her neck as he hugged her from behind. 6

Sirius thumped his forehead on Remus’ collarbone. “You are the worst sister-in-law of all time.”

“I know,” she said with a smug smile, tilting her head to kiss James’ cheek. “Hi, lover.”

“Hi. Your nails are so beautiful.”

“I didn’t get them in your favorite color. Sorry.”

“I’ll never recover,” James sighed. “Well, at least we’re not a terrible rom-com cliché.”

Remus flipped him off over Sirius’ shoulder; the nail polish gave the gesture a little extra oomph that certainly canceled out the grin that made his whole face ache.

210 notes · View notes

krappykawa · 5 years ago

Text

ಌ i mildly like you more than like (p.1)

— in which an incessant fan girl, a kiss, and a little bit of denial makes oikawa tooru realize he might mildly like you more than like

description. you’ve been in love with oikawa tooru for longer than you can remember. having known him for the better part of nearly 11 years, you’ve come to accept that you’ll never be more than a best friend to him. but with the help of a few irritatingly persistent fangirls and a kiss that was only meant to drive them away, a tale of unrequited love might just prove to be something more.

warnings. language

word count. 4.2k

oikawa tooru x f!reader, childhood best friends to lovers, fluff, some angst

parts. 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6

author’s note. i started writing this a few weeks ago and it was originally just going to be a one-shot but it got almost up to 10k words so i just decided to split it up HHSKFJ

Oikawa Tooru has perhaps one of the strongest drives when it comes to hard work.

His tenacity is a thing of nature, something that awes you time and time again, no matter how many times you’ve seen him pick himself up before. It might be one of the reasons you fell in love with him in the first place.

But despite how in-tune he is with his senses on a mental standpoint, his Achilles’ heel lies with his inability to pick up on the signs his body gives him when it's had enough. Well, he can, but he just chooses not to listen.

His first encounter with a crack in that heel came in his first-year, where you had to stand on the sidelines and watch as he fell to the ground during a game with a resounded sweep of gasps around the gym. That injury benched him for more than half the season.

It was from that point on that you and Iwaizumi decided that if Oikawa wasn’t going to take care of his own body, then it would be up to you two to make sure his head is still above water.

So it doesn’t surprise you when your phone flashes with a text message from Iwaizumi during one of your shifts at the bakery.

1 new message: iwa (´,,•ω•,,)♡

Received: can you come pick up shittykawa

“Tooru?”

A figure sits slumped against the benches in front of Aoba Johsai high, his eyes closed as he lays back. There’s something beautiful about the way that he looks almost ethereal in this relaxed state, the most relaxed you’d seen him in months. When he hears his name from your lips, he slowly blinks and sits up, the aura of relaxation falling from him.

You almost regret having said anything in the first place when he puts up his guard the moment he sees you.

“Y/N-chan!” An easy smile falls between his lips, one that could’ve easily fooled anyone else. He always was very good at portraying happiness and contentment, especially when he’d been followed everywhere by people that only really want to see Oikawa Tooru, popular ladies’ man with charm that could make your mother swoon.

But you’re one of the select few that knew him before he learned that his charm was a crucial asset in his arsenal. You knew him at his highs and his lows, so the convincing smile on his lips doesn’t convince you in the slightest. That’s because you notice the way his arms seem to sit limply in his lap and the way his eyes convey fatigue rather than joy. You also know that Iwaizumi called you here for one thing.

“Don’t Y/N-chan me. Iwa texted me.”

Oikawa’s facade seems to fall at that, replaced with a troubled expression. He brings his right hand up to wipe at his face in frustration. “Listen, I don’t know what he may have said, but he’s exaggerating. I’m fine.”

You raise an eyebrow at him. He can’t seem to meet your eyes. “Well, that’s a lie considering that you’re out here right now and not in that gym,” you say matter-of-factly.

“He physically dragged me out here!” Oikawa whines, throwing his hands in the direction of your school’s gym.

A bemused chuckle leaves your lips as you move to sit beside him on the bench. Oikawa moves his bag to give you more room to sit, but you don’t move any closer. “And when has that ever stopped you?”

Oikawa getting kicked out of practice by Iwaizumi and even on select days, by their coach, is not an unusual occurrence. Iwaizumi has forcefully dragged Oikawa out of the gym before. Each and every time, Oikawa just marched right back in, despite Iwaizumi’s rage and his coach’s warnings. Even when his extra practice hours cause detrimental effects to his knee, Oikawa never seems to back down.

It was something both you and Iwaizumi had grown used to in your years of friendship with Oikawa -- his incredibly stubborn determination to somehow work himself to the point of bad health.

That’s how you know something different has happened today, because Oikawa is sitting out here on a bench rather than arguing with Iwa about how “a few more serves won’t hurt him!” (though they most definitely do, and Oikawa never seems to learn).

You turn your head to look at him. He’s quiet now, though he still doesn’t meet your eyes. His gaze is instead focused on a dog that’s running in the park opposite the school. You know that he’s avoiding confirming your accusation.

When it doesn’t seem like he’s going to talk anytime soon, you sigh. “All I’m saying is that if you really believed that you were fine, you would be using all your blood, sweat, tears in order to find a way back into the gym. Especially since the qualifiers are coming up.” You lean back against the bench as well, letting your eyes watch the dog happily run with its tongue lolling out of its mouth. “But instead you’re here, sitting on a bench in the afternoon. And from the looks of it, you had no intention of heading home.”

He still doesn’t turn to look at you, the only indication that he even heard you is the mild tick in his jaw. You try not to think about how perfectly sculpted his side profile is.

When he finally does speak, he still avoids your accusation of his fatigue and instead asks, “Why did Iwa-chan call you here anyway? Aren’t you supposed to be working at the bakery?”

You shrug. “Business was slow. Besides, my boss likes me enough to let me go early today. He said I’d have to work overtime this weekend though.”

At that, he finally turns to look at you. In the split second that you glance at him, you catch the guilt in his gaze before he looks away again. “You shouldn’t have come. You already overwork yourself being the only decent baker besides your boss that works there.”

A smile spreads on your face, your tone teasing. “Oikawa Tooru wants to talk to me about overworking myself?”

“I’m serious. You work too hard at that bakery for the measly amount that they pay you. Don’t think I don’t notice the way you try to cover your under eye circles with makeup.”

You feel your stomach jump, the familiar feeling causing your lips to tug upwards lightly. Tooru has been one of your best friends ever since you moved into the house across from his when you were seven years old. You hadn’t known when it happened, but you had come to school one day last year and just suddenly knew that your feelings were no longer limited to platonic when it came to the brown-haired volleyball captain. It’s in moments like these where you wonder how he hasn’t managed to figure your feelings out, considering how observant he is of everything else about you.

“Yes, well I’m sorry that we can’t all look like we spawn from a god like you do. It’s seriously unfair how you can still look like that when you get even less sleep than I do.”

There’s only a hint of teasing in his voice when he says, “You think I look that handsome?” He turns to face you again, and this time there’s a blink of surprise lurking in his chestnut eyes. Especially now, with the sun casting golden glows on his hair and skin, he looks beautiful to you.

Painfully, it reminds you about how unrequited your feelings are. Not that Oikawa has ever outright rejected you or even acknowledged knowing anything of your feelings, but him reciprocating your feelings didn’t even cross your mind as a possibility most days. Not with the group of girls that are always vying for his attention; not when his ex-girlfriend was what everyone thought was his perfect match; not when he hadn’t even attempted a committed relationship since Yua-san broke up with him all those months ago.

“Y/N?” His voice drags you out of your train of thought. You realize that you had been staring at him this entire time.

You play off your thoughts with a roll of your eyes and turn your head back towards the park. “No,” you lie. “I just hear comments like that from your fan club all the time.”

He nods lightly, his eyebrows creasing. “Right. Right, of course.” You’re about to ask about the odd tone in his voice when he speaks again. “You never did answer my question. Why did Iwa-chan send you here?”

“He wanted me to make sure that you actually went home instead of finding somewhere else to practice,” you say. A chuckle escapes your lips. You’re happy for the change in topic.

“I am not that hard-headed!” You raise a brow at him. He pouts. “Fine. Maybe a little.”

“A little?”

“Oh come on, Y/N. Now you’re just being mean!”

“Yeah well, it’s payback. You’re a real pain in the ass.”

“In your ass, I hope.”

You try to keep the blush from your cheeks as your mind takes you in a completely different direction. Suddenly, the space between you two seems too small. “You might want to rethink what you just said.” You try not to stare at his mouth as it falls open, your mind still invading your thoughts with images that you should not be fantasizing about when he’s sitting right beside you.

“Wait.” Oikawa’s eyes go so comically wide that you almost forget your own embarrassment. “Jeez, that did not come out in the right way. Not right at all.” For what seems like the millionth time, he looks away from you, though this time it seems to be out of his own mortification over what he just said. There seems to be a blush to his cheeks, but you very well might have just imagined it.

You let out a laugh, your arms coming up to clutch at your side. “I cannot believe that you’re supposed to be the big hotshot volleyball player that every girl has a crush on. There is not a charming bone in your body. I refuse to believe it.”

Oikawa lets out a small chuckle. “I don’t have to charm you when you already love even the uncharming parts of me. But if anyone asks, I am completely perfect. There are no uncharming parts to Oikawa Tooru. Don’t you dare spread false rumors, Y/N-chan!”

An amused snort leaves you at his last three sentences, but you decide to respond on the first part of his words. “Me? Loving you? Very unlikely.” You tease, trying your hardest to keep a straight face when Oikawa begins to pout.

“If you don’t love me after all these years I will actually start crying right now and then those girls that follow me everywhere will come for your blood for making me cry.”

You chuckle again, catching yourself before you roll your eyes again. Next to you, Oikawa has his arms crossed with a convincing pout sitting on his lips that makes him look like a child. You smile despite yourself. “Okay, okay keep the dramatics to a minimum.”

“Then say it.”

“Say what?

“Say that you love me.”

You feel a small pang as you plaster a smile on your face. “I mildly like you more than like,” you say, not really sure if you’d be able to say those three words to him at this point in time. Not when you know that they’re true.

Oikawa’s pout deepens, but you’re adamant on not saying more.

“That’s all you’re getting from me, Crappykawa.” Suddenly you find yourself amused at the way you managed to sound exactly like Iwaizumi. It hadn’t occurred to you that you’d spent so much time with him.

“Call me pretty and I’ll drop it.”

“You’re so needy sometimes, you know that?”

“Very much aware, Y/N-chan. As if you and Iwa-chan would ever let me forget.”

An eye roll comes easy to you and this time you don’t try to stop it. At this point, an eye roll is almost like a natural reaction to anything Oikawa says. “Fine. I’ll admit you’re not bad too look at.”

“Not great, but I’ll take it,” he concludes. “I can slowly feel the crack in my ego being restored.”

“If you want to be complimented please go seek out the never-ending stream of girls and guys that come your way hoping for even an ounce of your attention.” You hope that he doesn’t notice the mild bitterness in your voice. “I’m almost positive that they’ll be willing to tell you just how pretty you are and how everyone in the world should be in love with you.”

“They should be, shouldn’t they?” Oikawa bemuses.

A laugh leaves your lips despite your efforts. “You are insufferable sometimes. I don’t understand why I’ve kept you around for so long.”

“There you go with the insults again,” he tskes. “Have you and Iwa-chan been spending time together without me?”

“Iwa and I are friends you know?”

“Yeah but you’re supposed to be my best friend,” he pouts.

“You already said that line to Iwaizumi yesterday when he opted to carry me instead of you.”

“Yeah, well … I met you before he did!”

“Because you threw a volleyball at my head!”

“It was an accident!”

Laugher spills from both of your lips at the memory. It isn’t until Oikawa’s hair brushes upon your shoulder during his laughter that you realize that the space between you and Oikawa had increasingly gotten smaller. He’s so close that your thighs are only centimeters apart.

As your laughter dies down, Oikawa’s bubbly personality begins to slip once more and the fatigue on his face becomes more evident. Eventually, he rests his head on your shoulder. You feel your stomach flutter pleasantly at his proximity. Even now, you can smell the cologne he regularly wears, the one you helped pick out back in first-year that he’s worn ever since.

Once the silence lasts for a few moments, you finally attempt to ask him about practice once more. “Are you finally going to tell me why you didn’t fight back when Iwa threw you out of practice?”

He sighs. “I guess you can say that I’m a little bit tired. Plus my knee hurts like all hell has reigned down.” His voice is so much different from just moments before that it’s hard to believe that they come from the same person.

“You’re exhausted,” you say. It’s not a question, but more of a definite statement.

“More or less,” he responds quietly.

This time, it’s you that sighs. “Just … be careful. I get that you want to beat everyone and go to Nationals, but you’re no good to your team if you fuck your knee up so badly that you can’t play.”

“This year is our last chance,” he mumbles. “I just don’t want to look back later and wish that maybe I’d practiced just a little more.”

“You can’t beat anyone if you’re sitting on the bench from an injury that you got from overworking yourself.”

Oikawa winces at the tone in your voice. You almost feel guilty. Almost.

“You’re going to work yourself to death. Iwaizumi and I aren’t just going to stand by and watch you dig your own grave,” you say softly. “For his sake, at least. Don’t push yourself too hard.”

“I’ll try,” he says. For some reason, you believe him.

The two of you sit there in silence once more, the wind blowing lightly on your hair and the sounds of a busy town echoing around you. You wish that you could bottle this moment up and keep it with you forever, even if it’s only a testament to how much Oikawa values you as a best friend and nothing more.

The thought makes your stomach drop in the slightest bit. It’s usually easy to contain your depth of feelings for Oikawa when the air around you two is lively and joking, but you’ve found over the years that quiet moments like these are the ones that really tear at your heart.

He’ll never know the extent of your feelings for him, and you’re too afraid to wonder what would happen if he did know.

Oikawa turns his head only slightly to look up at you while still continuing to lean on your shoulder. “You okay?”

You give an almost imperceptible nod. “We should head home. I don’t know what Iwaizumi might do to you if he finds you out here after practice ends,” you say.

Oikawa nods and detaches his head from your shoulder.

The two of you have only walked a couple of meters when you hear a group of girls squeal from not too far away. Oikawa tenses from beside you.

“Your fanclub found you,” you say.

“I’m aware.”

He doesn’t make any move to look back at them or stop. Instead, his pace seems to speed up.

You furrow a brow. “You don’t want to talk to them? Thought you loved their attention?”

“Ouch. You really know how to wound a man, Y/N-chan,” he says with a small smile on his lips. You take notice of the weariness in his features. “But while I do enjoy them feeding my very justified ego, I am far too fatigued to deal with them.”

You nod and continue to walk beside him. The less interactions he has with his fan club, the better your mood will be. Besides, you weren’t going to fail Iwaizumi by not doing the one thing he asked you to do and not take Oikawa home.

A giggle reaches your ears once more, and you sneak a glance behind you. The girls are talking amongst themselves, but still obviously walking in the direction you’re headed in.

“Well, what do you wanna do? Cause they’re coming.”

Oikawa sighs and you notice a tick of irritation in his clenched jaw. You can see a million thoughts going through his mind, but before you can ask him about them, he reaches out to grab your hand.

“Is this okay? I’m just hoping that they’ll leave me alone if they think that you and I … uhm.”

Oikawa’s hands are long and calloused, but they feel nice as his fingers intertwine with your smaller ones. You try hard not to let the little gesture get to you. “Yeah … yeah of course.”

The two of you fall into silence again, mostly due to his fatigue and your inability to form coherent words that don’t have to do with his hand in yours. You’ve held hands with Oikawa before, but it was never with the intent to make you two look like a couple. You wish more than anything that he would break the silence before you blurt out something that you don’t want to.

Your wishes are answered when Oikawa asks, “They’re still following us, aren’t they?” Oikawa still doesn’t look back as he says it.

In your short reverie you had forgotten about the girls behind you. You sneak another glance at them and find that Oikawa’s assumption is correct.

“Yeah, they are.”

Oikawa makes an incoherent noise. “Y/N-chan, could you be a dear and describe what they look like? I have a feeling I know who exactly they are.”

You turn back again, and really take a good look at them. They’re pretty. Really pretty, you think. You wonder for a second what they could’ve done to make Oikawa so adamant on not speaking with them.

“There’s three girls. One with cropped red hair, one with long blonde hair, and one with brown hair in a high ponytail.”

“Oh, it’s them again. I don’t know what to do to get them to leave me alone at this point,” he sighs.

“Who are they? What’s going on?”

His grip on your hand tightens. “Ichika-san and her friends. She sent me a love letter about a month ago. I tried to let her down easily, but it seems that she has yet to give up.”

“This girl is your stalker?”

“Not quite. At least, I hope not.”

The noise from behind you two gets increasingly louder. A giggle echoes on the mildly empty street and you catch Oikawa’s name being whispered between their conversations. Now that you’ve found out about what they’ve been putting him through, your annoyance spikes.

“Not to sound paranoid or anything, but I’m not keen on these girls finding out where you live.”

Oikawa is quiet for a moment, his brows furrowed in indecision. It seems that he makes up his mind when he turns his head to look at you. “Kiss me.”

Your step momentarily falters.

“What?”

He shakes your intertwined hands. “We’re already holding hands. They might get the memo if we …”

“Oh.”

“I .. I mean only if you want to. You don’t have to. I just figured that .. nevermind. It’s a spotty plan. They might still not leave us alone and --”

“No, it’s fine. I’ll do it.” You weren’t going to pass up a chance at kissing him, even if it’s only for a diversion. This doesn’t seem like such a bad idea anyways — you’d long since given up on him reciprocating your feelings, and this way you can kiss him while saving yourself from the possible embarrassment of rejection.

“You will?”

“Where’s the harm? It’s just a kiss right?” You can barely hear yourself talking over the beating of your heart. “Besides, it could work.”

Oikawa shoots you a grateful smile. “Okay. Whenever you’re ready then.”

You try to shake out your nerves and instead focus your time in looking at your surroundings. The sound of giggling is still in close range when you spot a tree nearby. It’s still pretty out in the open, but not so much that you and Oikawa might draw stares, at least not from anyone that isn’t a part of the group of girls behind you.

Gathering enough courage to not insanely mess this up, you tug on Oikawa’s hand to drag him with you in the direction of the tree. You make sure that you’re still in the line of sight of the three girls when you snake your arms around Oikawa’s neck and pull him down.

His lips are softer than you imagined, and you’ve imagined kissing them more times than you’re willing to admit. Pleasantly, he tastes like oranges, which you don’t quite understand, considering that you can’t seem to remember him ever being fond of oranges. But then again, you can’t quite think of anything besides the feeling of his lips on yours.

Your lips move fluidly against his, soft but not entirely without passion. It takes everything in you to not kiss him with the force that you want to be kissing him with.

Hands come down to grip your waist as he pulls you closer to him, gently placing a hand on the small of your back. You run your hands through his hair and wonder to yourself why you hadn’t ever played with his hair before. If you ever make it out of this with your senses still intact, you’d make playing with his hair a part of your regular routine.

He makes a small noise against your lips when you make the mistake of pulling a little too hard on his hair. His grip on you tightens.

You don’t know how long you two stand there, lips locked with each other, but Oikawa doesn’t make any move to pull away. Instead he deepens the kiss by running his tongue against your bottom lip and pulling you even closer. You stifle a noise that threatens to come from deep in your throat. One of his hands comes up to cup your cheek and tips your head so that he can slip his tongue into your mouth. He has fantastic lips, you think.

It’s only until you feel the air in your lungs begin to dwindle that you force yourself to pull away. The kiss lasted for longer than you expected, and by the way you pant with every breath, it feels like a kiss that the rest of the world should not have been privy to.

You keep your eyes closed for a moment more, wanting to savor the moment for just a little longer. The moment you open your eyes, you’ll have to come back to the reality that this was just a one-time thing. You’ll have to come back to reality and remember that this kiss likely doesn’t mean anything to him.

Slowly you open your eyes, and find that Oikawa’s already staring at you intently. His breathing comes out staggered, and his eyes have turned a few shades darker. What used to be a soft chestnut brown looks almost close to black. In them, you notice a flicker of an odd emotion that looks too familiar, but you don’t want to hope for anything.

You slide your hands down to his chest. His hands are still planted on your back and face, touching you both gently and carefully. “Did it work?” Your voice comes out small.

He seems to wake up from his trance then, and turns to look in the direction that the girls were before. You look behind you to see one of the girls running away with her head in her hands. Her two friends follow after her in an attempt to console her.

“I think it did,” he says. And what he says after is so quiet you almost believe that you imagine hearing it. “In more ways than one.”

part two will most likely be up on thursday next week :)

#oikawa x reader #oikawa headcanons #oikawa x y/n #oikawa fluff #oikawa #oikawa tooru #oikawa tooru x reader #reader insert #haikyuu #haikyuu!!#haikyuu x reader

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imagine-that-100 · 4 years ago

Text

The Martini Police

Description: You’re leading yourself down a slippery slope, but thankfully the person that matters most in your life notices and helps you.

Word Count: 1.6k

Warnings: Angst, and drinking issues

A/N: This was requested by an Anon. I hope I did it justice. Angst isn’t really my forte but I gave it a go. Likes and reblogs are always appreciated. Thank you for reading x

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

“What happened?” Alex asks, rushing into the kitchen.

You were sitting at the table, head in hands, heels just being kicked off. But that wasn’t what shocked Alex, it was the fact that your tights were all ripped, covered in dried blood, and you had it still trickling down your leg, from your knee which was cut open.

You shake your head and in a pathetic voice, you whisper, “I don’t know.”

Alex rushes to the sink and immediately wets a cloth so he can help clean you up. He was still in his pyjamas, only coming down the stairs because he heard the front door closing a few minutes ago and it worried him when you weren’t in bed beside him.

He knew you’d been on another night out, but he hoped you’d be in bed beside him when he opened his eyes this morning.

As water collects in the material he worriedly asks, “What do you mean ‘you don't know’?”

“I can’t remember.” You say in an exhausted voice, looking up at Alex for a second but you cast your eyes to the ground once more.

You take a few deep breaths before you realise that your mouth has gone dry again. So as Alex comes back over with the wet cloth to try and clean up, you reach for the drink you poured when you came in.

Alex makes his way back over and kneels down in front of you to tend to your injury, but he notices that you half wince at what he thought was the water in your glass. His face falls immediately, and he reaches for the glass you were about to put down, as he asked, “What’s that?”

Your eyes go wide as he takes it from you. “Alex, please don-” You start but it’s too late.

He already brought the glass up to his nose and the stench of vodka filled his senses immediately.

“Is that vodka? At seven in the morning?” Alex asks you with wide eyes, despite knowing it’s a fact.

You watch as he gets up and pours it away, and you just try and defend yourself, “It’s helping take the pain away.”

“You know what else would do that? A paracetamol. Or an ibuprofen.” Alex said distastefully, but it was the shock filtering through his system. “You should not be drinking at this time in the morning.”

You murmured a little, “I know, I know.” as Alex comes back and starts cleaning up your knee. He ended up just ripping the tights open and pulling that leg off, as you didn’t look like you were in a fit state to stand up and take them off yourself.

You don’t protest, feeling bad enough that you’ve obviously upset him by drinking and stumbling home at this time. You’d gone out last night with a few of your older friends that you met when you first moved to London.

You’d been going out with them a lot recently after one of them got back in contact. And most of the time you’d been stumbling back into your home at similar times.

And that wasn’t like you at all.

It worried Alex to no extent. Because he’d seen you around these people. You were different around them compared to how you were with your usual group of friends and both of your friends.

And Alex couldn’t pretend he didn’t see it anymore.

“Y/N…” Alex says softly, drawing your attention to him, as he carries on cleaning up your knee. He says almost hesitantly, “I don't think you should go out with that lot anymore.”

You frown at him, questioning what he meant by that, “What?”

“I don’t trust them.” He tells you honestly, still trying to keep his voice calm. “And I don't think they are good for you.”

Despite his calm tone, you get defensive about what he just said. And it didn’t help that you were still drunk when he was just trying to express his concern for you.

“Do you think this is high school where you can make me feel guilty about who I spend time with?” You ask not comprehending where this was coming from at all.

You saw Alex sigh at that as he got up with the now blood-stained cloth in his hand. When Alex gets a large plaster out of a box, he also gets some painkillers as he hears you scoff, “I didn’t realise we were teenagers getting jealous over friendship groups.”

“I’m not jealous Y/N/N…” Alex shakes his head, and once he’s got your glass of water, he says, “I’m scared for you.” as he kneels back down in front of you.

Your emotions seem to change immediately hearing him say that. You ask with shock clearly on your features, “Why?”

Alex makes you take the painkillers before he tells you what he’s thinking.

“Because this is the sixth time you have stumbled home when the sun’s already coming up and you’ve been hurt. You’ve had bruises on you before and now you’ve cut your knee open.” Alex points out in a pained voice before continuing to tend to your injury.

“That's just me being clumsy.” You sigh, knowing you weren’t the most balanced person when you were like this.

Alex isn’t so convinced, “But is it though?”

“Because I know you know London’s not always a nice place. Someone could have hurt you whilst you’re like this.” Alex says, as he puts the large white plaster over your knee and presses down the sides of it, so it doesn’t come away from your skin.

You shake your head, “Don’t be dramatic.”

“I’m not Y/N/N, I'm scared.” Alex reiterates, emphasising that he was in fact he was worried about you.

Not seeming to get it, you ask, “Why are you scared?”

“I’m scared for you because you can't remember how these things have happened.” Alex tells you; worry is all over his features as he says, “I’m scared that someone is hurting you on purpose or your so called ‘friends’ are putting you in harm's way by letting you get blackout drunk.”

You’re just looking into his brown eyes at this point as he’s looking up at your heavy and tired Y/E/C ones. Your makeup had smudged a little, but that wasn’t a surprise considering you’d been out of the house for over 12 hours.

Alex presses on calmly, trying to make you understand that this wasn’t good for you. “You surely can’t like having no memory of where you’ve been? Or what you’ve done?”

You think about it for a moment and you feel your eyes filling up because even when you thought really hard back to just a few hours ago, you were drawing a blank. And that was starting to scare you.

Especially when you realised you barely had any memory of being around your old friends on the previous nights out, you’d been on too.

So, you look into those gorgeous brown eyes, and shake your head a little as you answer, “No.”

“Then please stop with this Y/N.” Alex begs you in a strained voice. Seeing you get even a little upset hurt him and it felt bad that it was his words causing it. “I worry about you all the time when I’m away now because I don’t trust that those people have your best interests at heart.”

Alex hints at his worries for the future too. Because he’d found an empty glass in the kitchen last week after you’d returned home early from a night out and it stank of stale alcohol.

So Alex has to say, whilst you’re both having this conversation, “I don't want this to get worse for you Y/N. Because we all know what slippery slopes alcohol leads you to.”

“And I love you, so I’m not letting you get to that. Because I need you, and I can't lose you.” Alex continues in a pained voice, trying not to cry.

“I need you too... I don't wanna get to that Al.” You admit as the tears start gathering more.

“It’s not going to get to that.” Alex cups your face, and he smiles when you lean into his touch. He reminds you, “You’ve got me, yeah?”

Your eyes fill to the brim with unshed tears and when you nod, saying a faint, “Yeah.”

When your tears start spilling Alex gets the first few before he pulls you into a hug. His chest was hurting seeing you like this and yours was just as heavy.

You clutched him like he was your last lifeline and Alex held you tightly as he felt you start crying in his arms. Yours were around him and you were holding onto his pyjama top like it was

“I'm sorry.” You sob into him, needing him to understand just how sorry you were.

You never meant for it to get like this, but everything he said just clicked together and you could see that you were on a dangerous path. These people that you thought were your friends were just leading you down a dark path of needing a drink almost every night and you didn’t want that.

And you didn’t want that. Before they got back in contact 6 months ago, you were fine living your life with Alex barely wanting anything to drink, even when you both did end up going out.

And you wanted that back.

“No, don't be sorry.” Alex shakes his head, as he cradles yours, feeling shaky breaths rattling though you. He admits, “I just need you to be okay.”

After a few minutes, he hears you say when you’ve calmed down, “I love you Alex.”

“I love you too.” He says before proceeding to kiss your head.

And he does help you through it. Because that's what you both signed up for.

For better, for worse, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish.

Always.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

You can add yourself to my Taglists in my Masterlist x

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myelocin · 4 years ago

Text

木漏れ日 | tsukishima kei, oikawa tooru

Synopsis: Tsukishima Kei's always felt like he's meant to save a seat for someone, and while you felt the same, neither of you seem to want to break the silence and say that "perhaps this could be more," first. And the realization that sometimes, keeping love in the silence only does more harm than good.

Characters: Tsukishima Kei, Oikawa Tooru

Genre: Slice of Life, Hurt/Comfort, Office!AU, Slowburn, Love Triangles (But not really), Happy Ending, (2nd person POV writing)

WordCount: 20,500+

A/N: This is a commissioned piece from @tsu-kiss ! Thanks for letting me write about you & your day 1 <3 heart heart | Playlist

commissions | ko-fi

There’s many things about Tsukishima Kei that you always found best described as odd.

To start, he’d wear a god awful blue button up, that was never quite ironed properly, under a coat that you always thought suited him. You heard he’d gotten that coat as a gift, from his mother, so you suppose that perhaps fashion just wasn’t his thing.

But you never minded him much.

He wore matching socks, and brushed his hair often enough to never spot any weird clumps no matter how much you’d squint towards the back of his head—of course just on the days when you find that you didn’t have much to do in your office other than hyper fixate on just about everything you can see.

(Unfortunately for him, he’s the cubicle right in front of you.)

(While fortunately, for you, he seemed to be interesting enough to fit the bill for most parts.)

He had a dinosaur charm hanging off of his car keys, purple. There’s a couple of rocks—fucking rocks—sat in the corner of his desk, right beside his mug with the weird illustration of a frog on it, and more pencils instead of pens inside it.

Pencils, you would remind yourself. At first, you thought that maybe he sketched on his downtime, but eventually, that self-imposed theory was quickly debunked. During a company outing, a few months ago, your team had went against his for a nice game of skribbl.io, and while your side emerged victorious, you couldn’t help but feel pity for the team that had to scratch their head at the scribbles the man could only come up with.

Tsukishima Kei was peculiar, but then again, at the core of it all, you suppose that he was interesting too.

Interesting enough to squint your eyes at when work was slow, and your boss wasn’t around. The papers in your desk would still be in piles, but the deadlines were too far for them to be scattered around your workspace.

You couldn’t see the view past him, considering his height, but you suppose having no other option than staring at a wall would be a worse situation, so with this, you settled.

Purple dinosaur, rocks, pencils in a mug with a weird frog on it coworker.

He was a sight, but he wasn’t unpleasant—so this would have to make do.

Your friend always told you that people often hung the most intimate parts of their stories around them like charms off a corner of a bag, so perhaps there was more to him than just the odd bits and pieces that never quite fit together.

Stories, you think.

You’ve always loved them.

All the while, in front of you, Kei thinks the same.

There’s a drawl that comes with the slower days during office hours. Time moves at an incredibly slow pace, to the point of feeling like he’s merely dragging his body to move through the motions with every minute that passes.

Recently, it’s been feeling like life just moves through the cycles, but because the drawl doesn’t exactly feel too bad, he supposes that he can’t mind it too much.

He can stare at the clock from seven until one, and type the same sentence on a file again and again when his superior walks past his desk. The dinosaur charm on his set of keys was cute, along with the array of rocks on the table.

And while things for each of you worked like that, when moments were molded together, it worked like this.

(A little awkwardly, if anything.)

Relationships between coworkers had never been much of a taboo thing, but it was the kind of topic you tend to avoid. Schedules for the both of you worked around a clock, and compromise was a word you didn’t even bother trying to skirt around.

He was Tsukishima Kei, as the man who stapled his papers a little too loudly and had more pencils than pens in his cup, while for him, you were just Nina.

The girl who sat behind him who dressed like the tones of earth and smelled like caramel coffee every 9am.

You know each other by name, and maybe by coffee order, but there were still more than just a couple questions of “who are you, exactly?” that still were left unanswered. Though then again, you were never really certain if those kinds of questions were the ones that even needed answers in the first place.

You could ask yourself what you should wear today, and you’ll shuffle through your closet before eventually deciding on that beige cardigan instead of that yellow turtleneck. Before the barista would ask you what you wanted to order, you’d already be in line, asking yourself the same question and answering with your usual order ready to be spoken out loud.

There were questions where the answers for them were necessary while some, could be satiated with just the fact that they were even asked in the first place.

Why did you pick a dinosaur for your keychain instead of something more…age appropriate?

Why pencils over pen?

Why do you scrunch your nose right before you sneeze?

Why that blue striped undershirt when you look more fashionable than just that?

You don’t know, but it’s not like you’re curious enough to care. Looking at him, or rather, squinting through the frames of your glasses, it dawns on you that Tsukishima Kei will just be one of those sentences with a question mark, because even if the tone which you read it as would sound as a question, there was never a need for an extension.

An answer.

To wonder freely, but never dwell in curiosity. Fleeting.

He’s just a fleeting thought; just the coworker who just happened to occupy the desk in front of you and was interesting enough to look at from 8-6.

And while those were always your thoughts, he thought the same too.

Truth be told there was a lot about the both of you that mirrored each other. While he didn’t have to jump off his car when he’d make his way out, he always was the type to have sporadic bouts of road rage. He’d sigh when your boss came over your area of the office, and tap away on his keyboard as if he was trying to finish a report, even though he’d already had all of his files ready to be sent, finished and stacked in a folder two hours ago.

Much like you, he had a bit of a sweet tooth and was never really the type to turn down a slice of cake if he was offered a piece.

Questions, Kei often thought. There had always been an abundance of questions in his life.

Though, admittedly, a majority of them nowadays are just admittedly centered on you.

What’s your name? being the first, and he remembers that it was spoken out loud almost two springs ago. How are you? as the stereotypical question number two; though admittedly, it was only asked under the clauses of what social etiquette dictates for people who are at least acquaintances.

When he thinks about it, you are an acquaintance. You’re Nina; the girl who smells like caramel anything coffee every 8:30 am, and the desk behind his with the keyboard with the keys that never clicked too loudly.

Who are you? as the question he thinks, often, when his thoughts drift.

And most of the time he can answer it. Objectively speaking, he can just look at things from a wider perspective and say that you’re you, all the while he’s always just been him.

But truly, it’s undeniable that when some days when nine am would hit and he’d turn to ask for a stapler from either you or the desk beside yours, there would just be something about your little corner of the room that would just make him think.

All the words in every language he knows, only the word beautiful remains. It’s an observation, and he can admit that much. A passing thought, perhaps, thought of in the midst of what is this or that, but it’s one of those thoughts where he just won’t bother to deny it nor even begin of trying to write it off with a different explanation.

Nine am was yours, and as was the morning light.

A murmured question, the smell of coffee, and a thank you that blends with the harmony of morning. A soft click, the shuffle of the chair, and the sound of your soft keys tap, tap, tapping away from behind him.

Who are you? he asks; a question he never bothered to try to find the forever answer to.

(Because nothing is a constant, Tadashi used to say.)

(Because everything flows, he remembers some more.)

But Kei keeps it as a passing thought none the less. He’s always supposed that questions like these are reserved for the hours within the day where the clock would tick slow, and time would feel like a routine like drawl.

Blank thoughts and typing out the same sentence again and again to seem busy did probably lead to questions about the unprecedented and the constant in his head.

Whereas the constant was you; his nine am touch of caramel and soft tapping noises. While the unprecedented was this:

The word beautiful, as the only thought that explains a majority of what he sees. Turning around to give back the stapler he really should stop borrowing, and catching a glimpse of your profile under the sort of light that he can only really see during spring mornings.

It’s like finally realizing that this is where the good in good morning comes from.

Who are you? he thinks again, and it’s at every 9:07 where he’d think to himself that perhaps he wants to know you more than just your name.

The four letters that spell out Nina suddenly seem insufficient, and he wants to ask why it’s caramel you order instead of mocha. When he’s in the breakroom and looking in the fridge to grab the Tupperware of fruit he keeps as a snack throughout the day, even though it’d only been a fleeting observation to him then, it’s now where he wants to ask why it’s crème brulee instead of the strawberry shortcake he always hears you comment about.

Who are you? as the translation to I want to get to know you, but he’s always quick to remind himself that these are just the kinds of questions best left unanswered. It wasn’t the fact that there was a lot at stake, because truth be told—nothing much would change at all should they be answered, but at the same time, he liked the drawl the routine brought.

Curiosities were best kept as curiosities, and some questions would remain read out loud as questions, but ultimately just filed as passing thoughts at the end of the day.

Eight AM to six, Tsukishima Kei would move through his routine by willing his body through the motions, even if his thoughts did admittedly drift off to you. Just curiosity, he’d reason.

When he’s driving to work before eight and he sees you hop off your car and adjust your bag, he wants to ask if traffic was bad on the drive here. (Just curiosity.)

When the time of the morning rolls around and he smells your signature caramel and hears you murmur a quiet good morning to the entire office, he wonders what it would sound like if you just said good morning to him. (Just curiosity.)

When he’s catching peeks at you from the corner of his eye just to see your profile turned to the side, and facing up to feel the filtered sunshine through the window, he wants to know if you’re the type who prefers spring over the winter, and why. (Just curiosity.)

So even with that, Tsukishima Kei supposes it’s just because of curiosity that leads him to approach you when he sees you on a Sunday, sat by the window in Starbucks, with a drink that doesn’t look like caramel in your hand, right as he asks—

“Is this seat taken?”

It’s not as if you mean to say that it feels like fate is telling you that you’re still waiting for something, but some days has you feeling like you’re meant to wait for someone.

Moments like this—like now.

You’re staring out the window of the nearest café by your place, with nothing really written for the agenda of your day. Times like these are where you usually tell yourself that it’s okay, and that day offs existed for a reason—but the mind always did have a way with never staying still.

And while for some, thoughts just rolled by—yours on the other hand, always had a habit of running.

You’re waiting for something, it says, but as soon as you take a peek at what’s beneath the underneath, you know that something is just a loose replacement for the word, “someone.”

But as of now, someone is just a figment in your head.

Someone is the reassurance that there’s something to be met after this, or in the midst of this. This, as your twenties—as your maze.

More than ever, you know that this is the part of your life where you’ll carry the burden of trials rather than wear the crowns of victory, but you suppose that there’s a couple hidden gems you can only find throughout the journey. Or at least, that’s what you have to remind yourself. Then again, epiphanies like this didn’t exactly happen like they were just thoughts that would come easy, without much thought. Sometimes, you think, the most profound epiphanies were uncovered within moments wherein they would just come to you.

The blank period between just beginning to build your foundation and laying out the perimeters for the solid home above that was this exact point of your life. Weekends and day offs where you could try to catch your breath right before you dived back in the trenches again.

(You hate Mondays.)

(But not as much as you hated Sundays.)

Though the silver lining found within the two was always your coffee. Your kick of caramel within that bitter shot of espresso. Your weekends between life was comparable to the silver lining most people usually talk about. A pit stop, and a taste of sugar. Caramel within espresso, where the difference between something being underneath and blended with was made clear.

You suppose that life was never really layered in the end.

As much as people try to separate the specifics within it, at the end of the day it all would just blend together.

Like trying to pick apart salt and pepper, when you sit by your 9am light beside the window on your moments of rest during Sundays off—you admit to yourself that you can’t really tell apart the intricacies of life.

(Timelines, you mean.)

Sometimes you remember that the reality of the matter is that you’re twenty three years old and a little more lost in the world, when at sixteen you thought that by now you’d be found—or at least three steps away. The poems in the letters that bring you comfort tell you, in the timeless words meant to ground the lost in the moment, that what even is the definition of being found?

There was no universal timeline that everyone had to follow, and even if that was true, what you feel regarding the matter still felt like it was beyond your control. (Beyond your reasoning.)

Nine AMs and their light was a comfort. They come to you, metaphors delivered in silent whispers and ghost like touches: on your shoulders, your cheeks, and your eyelids, and for that short while they’re there you feel okay. (Safe.)

Mornings bring about the kind of comfort that feels more everlasting than even the idea of a ring on your finger. The sunbeams tell you they’re there—still there—because they’re what’s timeless. Diamonds on your ring, and a finite love to call yours be damned.

(The light’s what’s stayed, and what will stay.)

—Or at least that’s how you feel for a sliver of the time.

Because truth be told, you feel like you’re still supposed to be waiting for something.

Perhaps it’s a sort of love, or perhaps it’s the love.

(You don’t know, because for now love doesn’t have a face.) Love resonates to an unfulfilled yearning you have within; the kind that can momentarily be satiated by your nine ams and kicks of caramel every weekday morning and iced shaken passion lemon tea every Sundays as a treat for yourself.

For now, saving the seat in front of you and taking up a table meant to seat two by the window during your weekends will have to make do.

Asking yourself questions throughout the day that most of the time don’t really need answers will make do.

Blinking at the nine am light while sipping your daily dose of sweet is enough to keep the thoughts that where you are won’t be enough after this, away.

And because there’s a lot of for nows, that you decide to cling on to for the sake of keeping what’s here feeling like it’s enough, you move through your day with the idea that even if the seat in front of you will always be saved for the eventual kind of love you know will manifest one day—having company can’t be so bad. (To at least satiate your for now.)

Like Tsukishima Kei, and his god awful stripped blue button up you just know he can do better than. His presence during weekdays from eight to six was expected, and blended well with the routine unconsciously established during your work hours.

It wasn’t like you meant to move closer towards him, but it was an undeniable fact that a person will somehow gravitate towards those that mirror them in a sense.

Maybe it’s the pencils on his desk, or the purple dinosaur you admit is cute hanging off his keys.

He isn’t love, because he’s just a name, and a presence that’s become a sort of permanent fixture in the routine you know is only a temporary flow. But what he is is the curious head that towers above Sunday’s afternoon crowd that squints at all the occupied tables in the room.

He’s the light brown sweater, golden hair, amber eyes, and purple dinosaur keychain that hangs right beside his set of keys looped on his right hand. But most importantly—and most recently, he’s the question, “is this seat taken?” when his eyes widen at the sight of you after a quick scan of the crowd in the room.

And he’s the face, that breaks out into a smile, come sunshine, as you think of all that is golden and illuminated, that says “Thank you,” right after you say your yes.

(It dawns on you just then how good it felt to even say no.)

If wouldn’t take a genius to figure out the unspoken connection brewing between you and the constantly brooding blonde.

Then again, the view from the bubble was different than the view from a different angle. While the whole office, and frankly any stranger who could differentiate the color blue from red saw the both of you as a pair, you both still looked at each other as just the temporary company who warmed the seat you’re still saving for someone.

“So what’s the deal,” Tadashi says, rounding the corner and dropping a pile of unsorted files on Kei’s desk. “—With you and,” he continues, then pauses, flicking his eyes to the side to ensure that your desk was empty before continuing with, “you know.”

Kei blanks, momentarily forgetting how the pile seemed to make a slight thud that already pokes at the incoming migraine of today’s workload manifesting behind his head. “I what?”

Tadashi smirks, an expression that Kei still can’t seem to wrap his head around. “Nina.”

“Nina,” Kei deadpans. “Our coworker Nina.”

A few beats of silence pass, and Tadashi chuckles at the sight of his point completely flying right over his friend’s area of awareness and presence. “Lena saw you at Starbucks last Sunday with her.”

Grabbing the first chunk of the pile, he begins to sort, his attention already shifted. “It’s social etiquette to talk to people you’re acquainted with.”

“Acquainted,” Tadashi parrots, laughing. “So last week and the week before that was just because you’re acquainted.”

Kei sighs, looking up and dropping the three pieces of paper previously clasped in between his pointer finger and thumb, its contents already long forgotten at this point.

“Just a coincidence,” he reasons, knowing that his words will more so fall on ears that aren’t exactly keen on accepting the rather objective truth.

Tadashi’s always been the type to try to read in between the lines, but unfortunately for him, Kei thinks, there wasn’t much of a metaphor in this situation. He goes to the café every Sunday because his brother would usually crash by his place in the weekends, and Kei found that even if he did love him, he still wanted a slice of his day off dedicated to himself.

He never mentions that to Tadashi though, already knowing that the man would just counter back just as quick, with the question of why is he spending time with you then? Asking you if the seat is taken despite the empty tables that had always been abundant ever since after the first meeting.

“Okay,” Tadashi shrugs, hands raised up and smirk in place—a weird look on him, Kei comments to himself inwardly again—as he turns back around to make his way back to his department.

“Still rooting for you though,” he calls out, turning around to launch a last ditch comment towards the steadily irritated man who can only do nothing but stare at him blankly in response.

“What do you think about Tadashi?” he asks you, four weekends later when you’re sat in the same table, at that same coffee shop again.

Writing his question off as a passing comment, you shrug. “From accounting?”

Kei nods. “From accounting.”

You give his question a couple moments to let it soak in, before you eventually just shrug, again, not really definitive with the answer you come to a conclusion to. “I don’t know him that well. What’s this about?”

“Nothing, really,” he answers. “I just thought you both would be good together.”

“Like for a project?” you ask, as you absent mindedly continue to scroll through the contents on your phone. There was a sale at Muji, the ad on Instagram reads, so you make a mental note to maybe stop by on the way home after you finish your grocery run.

“Like together,” he responds, and it had you been looking at him instead of the screen on your phone, you would have seen the sly way he sips his coffee and watches for your expression from the corner of his eye.

And because you’re a lot more aware than you give yourself credit for, even though you don’t see it, you feel him basically boring his eyes onto your profile. You realize you lack an opinion regarding what to think of the situation, so you let him stare.

Truth be told, you don’t know what his staring could exactly pertain to, so in response, to try to satiate both the curiosity in your head along with his question, you shrug, answering, “I don’t think about it. Why?”

He’s quick to turn to the side, to his left facing the window where the child across the street suddenly looked more entertaining than trying to wrack his thoughts for more words to fill in the conversation.

“Cute,” he hears you hum, right before he turns his head to catch a glance of you wearing the smile he tells himself doesn’t catch him off guard every time, peek through the rim of your cup.

There’s a lot about the details founded within tidbits of moments he thinks is worth the most. As if trying to immortalize the bits and pieces that don’t matter universally, he knows when coming across the specific kind of people he’d probably get chided for it.

Kei remembers his mother scrunching her nose at the way he’d eat the bready part of the cupcake right after scraping off the icing, and how he’d give the skin on his fried chicken to his older brother when kids his age usually liked the crispy parts the most.

It’s a funny thing, he thinks—about just how false the universal standards really are.

What “matters” really is relative in the end, because the joy you come across to is what remains the same. Like yesterday, finishing his work early was joy. Finding that his superior had skipped a day of work to attend to family matters hence the lighter workload on his desk—that too was joy.

And strangely enough, spending another of his Sundays yet again sat in the café he tells himself he really should stop coming to for the fourth time in a row, sat across you, is joy.

(Joy, like the way your face lights up at the sight of the boy holding his mother’s hand as he crosses the street.)

(Joy, like the emotion that blooms on your face, radiance comparable to your nine am shower of sun.)

(Joy, like the word best used to tie to what’s swirling with him in the now, because even if a lot of things were hanging and left as questions to dangle in the space between what can be answered and what could just remain as what ifs—this little moment makes something in him bloom.)

“Yeah,” you hear, and you will yourself to not think about the way his voice seems to deliver more than just a passing comment. “Cute.”

Like drifting away from the current, this is the part where you break from the waves and try to make sense of all the ocean that’s in front of you. The water’s clear, and the waves aren’t knocking your air out of your lungs, but the shore’s still far, you think.

There’s the presence of birds circling you from above, so you know land isn’t too far. There’s a safety net, that’s there, but you’re still in the water. There’s the feel of sand beneath your feet, along with water against the palms of your hand. You’re not swimming, but you haven’t waded too far in to be drowning either.

Just testing the waters deep enough for you to know what the waves feel like—just to get a taste of the thrill must be like—but never too much to the point of being overwhelmed.

A dance between two strangers, or a conversation shared between two souls too familiar to just be acquaintances. It doesn’t take long for Kei to settle into the rhythm you’d composed for yourself.

Work still moves through the schedule from eight to six, and your boss is still the cause for most of your headaches with every additional file set on your desk every Monday. Nine AMs was still your favorite hour of the day, along with the kind of sun it brought and offered you, day in and day out. Tsukishima Kei was still the boy with the god awful striped blue dress shirt that sat in front of you every day.

But then again, there were changes, but most of which were welcome, none the less.

When he turns to ask for a stapler, he’d lean by your desk and strike up a conversation instead of promptly end it with a solid thank you. Breakroom conversations during lunch were often shared together; in the beginning just coincidences, but eventually, slowly, planned. Some mornings you’d find a cup of coffee on your desk when you’d be running late, and for the first few times, you’d spend a hefty twenty minutes or so pondering about it, before eventually remembering that this was the exact coffee order that you told Kei you wanted to try just the day before.

A friendly hello, turning into a knowing glance, and the thank you said out of courtesy turning into light conversation exchanged in hushed voices.

There was a story now, behind the purple dinosaur, because when he’d seen you look at it a little too long, that same afternoon you found an identical one on your desk, beside your pastel highlighters you let him borrow with no problem, when you had always known yourself to be quite specific about it.

Conversations in the break room that used to hold just passing thoughts, and a couple nods to the head just to acknowledge the other, now turned into actual conversations. It wasn’t the comment that ended with a period, anymore, because every day there would always be somewhere where they had left off of.

Kei smiles, often, because with the light, comes you.

He can’t call you his, because there would always be a whole lot more to it than just calling you something that you clearly aren’t,

“—yet,” as Tadashi would often tease him with.

But he finds it undeniable to say that what you are is something.

Like having conversation plus the company.

The seat he tells himself he’s saving for someone, or something, occupied with a stranger. And even if neither of you can exactly call the other yours, the both of you could always call the little purple dinosaur and the box of nescafe caramel instant coffee—

“—Ours,” he hears you say.

He looks up, from his mug and his stack of papers that all need his signature on his desk. You’re in a similar position as him, with your own mug in hand and stack of papers in front of you. He’s watching you smile, first at what he presumes to be your first sip of coffee, then at the recruit who peeked in the break room to ask you a question.

Then it’s your next smile, for him, and he’s struck in between a thought and action: a little breathless if he were being honest with himself—but because for now you’re just the conversation that comes with company and nothing more, he keeps the thought as just a thought.

It doesn’t pass, but it stays, and he knows this is the kind that’s most likely going to linger a little longer than the rest.

“Ours,” he hears you say, again.

You’re motioning to the stack of caramel sachets in a box that he had bought for the both of you to share, nodding your head. “Oh,” you say. “It’s ours,” you continue, motioning towards him.

“Yeah,” he parrots, not so much as being high in love, but struck and rooted was a good word to describe the situation.

To describe what he means for you.

Ours, he echoes. It’s a good word.

Yours or his was too daring of a word to dub for any of you, but ours fit the boundary he found the both of you to be situated within.

He could call the purple dinosaur and the story with it ours, and the taste of caramel just the same.

Ours, he thinks.

It makes sense.

“It’s just,” Tadashi explains. “Nina makes a lot of sense.”

Kei nods, agreeing. “She’s a smart girl.”

“No she makes sense for you,” he counters, leaning half his body across the desk. Tadashi eyes the keychain, and at the stack of caramel sachets by his mug, giving Kei a smug look afterwards.

“For you, Tsukki,” he says, a knowing tone in his voice. “I mean that she makes a lot of sense for you.”

As always, Kei keeps his eyes on his screen, as he taps away, continuing his work and keeping his focus trained towards it instead of humoring Tadashi. He knows he means well, as always, because as observant as his friend is, he always means well with his intentions.

Knowing that his friend isn’t the type to give in, Kei relents. “Why do you say that?”

Tadashi beams, leaning forward even further, squinting his eyes up at his friend who looks at him with bored eyes. They’re golden, he thinks. Kei had always had a certain hue of gold he could never match to what’s around, but it’s under the glow of the kind of gold nine AM gives where the puzzle piece finally clicks.

“I say it because it’s obvious,” Kei hears Tadashi answer.

It’s simple, really.

Not just because of a keychain and a cup of coffee, but because of the puzzle pieces he didn’t know would even fit together are now here, suddenly being nudged into place.

Kei pauses; leans back in his seat, arms crossed over his chest, just as he looks at Tadashi.

His friend wears the smile he already knows the meaning behind, so he sighs, the thoughts he knows he should think through being pushed away by the third party wall called objectivity and false rationality.

“She’s just a friend,” Kei reasons, blunt. Underneath his thoughts, he knows it’s not much of a reasoning, but more like an on-the-surface answer, but he tries to push it as his truth anyway.

Tries.

There’s a bandage on his hand from yesterday, because of a burn.

“I’m nice to you, because I’m your friend,” he hears your voice from yesterday echo in his head. It baffles him still, to think that you’d have a supply of unopened bandages and burn ointment in your drawer, when he knows you’ve never been the clumsy type.

Kei looks past Tadashi, to the empty space of your desk, and tries to tell himself that it’s just a desk. He tells himself that your seat is just a seat, and the pillow there is just a pillow.

He pushes away the memory that’s on the edge of resurfacing: of you, three days ago, saying that the leather on your chair is a little too uncomfortable for you to comfortably sit on. All the while it was he, in return, taking it upon himself to deny the fact that on the way home that afternoon, his reason for taking a U-turn three streets away from home to drive to IKEA was because he needed a new trashcan.

And the pillow, with the serenity blue fabric was just conveniently right by the trash bin section of the store.

It’s because he’s doing a favor for a friend, he told himself.

Sometimes you take a U-turn, even if you see the roof of your apartment building, to do a favor for a friend.

You were a friend who happened to just share a little more stories with him than the rest, and that was okay.

Friends can have conversations in between work and share a few stories together. And favors, Kei reasons. Friends do favors.

You rubbed ointment on his hand and bandaged it from a burn, because you’re doing him a favor. So in return, he bought you a pillow to sit on, because he just so happened to remember your passing comment regarding the fact that leather is uncomfortable for you.

There’s a spare trash bin in his room that doesn’t even get filled up.

Really, he prefers mocha over caramel, but caramel isn’t so bad.

The glare from the sun bothers him a bit, but he tells himself that perhaps a little sun is nice only when it’s 9AM.

Tadashi smiles.

“Tsukki,” he recites, just stating what he sees. “She’s the one you’ve been saving your seat for.”

And you think the same.

Conversation that ends with a comma means that there’s more to come. Tsukishima Kei turned into the “hello” that would branch off to ”how are you?” in the hallways, and “coffee again? This Sunday?” if you caught the same elevator as him when you were leaving work for the day.

Caramel in your coffee, with the perfect kind of sweetness you now know that he only sometimes likes.

Never to be one for sweets, but the slices of strawberry shortcake from that one bakery down two blocks away from his building was always something he couldn’t say no to. You know that now, you realize. You’ve known it for a while, because three weeks ago he had brought two slices to work after you told him you always were the kind of person with a sweet tooth.

You know why he has more pencils than pens, and laugh because you think it’s fitting. He’s always liked to doodle in the corner of his files, so for as long as he drew with a fairly light hand, he could always go back in and erase things if need be.

He told you that, over coffee one weekend, again. With a telltale shade of pink dusted across his cheeks and a slight pout to the lips, you found that Tsukishima Kei did look pretty.

At least you think.

Often, you’d overhear the ladies in the breakroom exclaim that he looked a little more scary than necessary, but you think it’s because they haven’t seen him laugh. Contrary to their belief, Kei often wore more than one expression, but only when it counted the most.

He laughed; expression lit when he’d scroll on his phone and watch a video that satiated his kind of humor that you’ve now also grown familiar to, and you’d think to yourself that him looking bright is fitting. When he’d come across a pack of the cottage cheese one of your coworkers always left open in the refrigerator, he’d crinkle his nose and pout, instead of look angry.

Kindness is a good look on him.

“I really enjoy your company,” you remember him say, just last Sunday when you were at that coffee shop right by the window again.

He smiled at you, in the way that delivers his truth far better than words ever could.

You don’t think there was ever a reason to doubt him. He was blunt, when needed be. He reached for a tissue when you had a bit of whipped cream on your lips, and told you that your files could be organized better when you were passing off folders for him to sign and pass forward.

Errors concluded through an objective point of view, where seldom did he try to peer at what was asked to be critiqued with a biased eye.

You conclude that Kei’s just the type to mean well, so you suppose there could be no harm in wading in a little deeper than you usually would.

The universe gave, so you took.

(And clutched on a little too tight.)

Clutching onto it, like your hand on the new tube of ointment you purposely drove to the pharmacy for before picking up your coffee and his as you made your way to work. You held on tight to the steering wheel, smiling at the thought of sharing your nine AMs with someone again, even if you told yourself you’re saving that spot—like he saves his seat—for the someone, or something that’s inevitable to come.

Perhaps love could look like a purple dinosaur charm and taste like caramel. Perhaps you’ll warm up to the sight of a blue striped long sleeve and think that it’s fitting with beige.

Serenity blue had always been a pretty color, you think.

Pretty.

Pretty like Kei—a thought you tried to pass off as just a fleeting kind of epiphany when you were drumming your fingers against the steering wheel of your car while stopped at a red light. Pretty like Kei—as the thought that stayed, and bloomed into a truth that comes wrapped with his name.

Pretty, like his thank you, when he murmured his gratitude to you like a secret. His face just a few inches above yours, as he looked down, watching you rub ointment on the burn on his hand and bandage it with the daisy patterned stickers, patient.

Patience was pretty.

It’s not like he’s love, because that’s a word that needs more justification than just a couple conversations and some one-sided epiphanies conjured up in a haste.

You weren’t in a rush, personally, at least you try to tell yourself that. You drove slowly around the block when the sunset was pretty, and took your time in picking out that tumbler you bought at starbucks. You could wait for a lot of things, because time was the constant where despite the ticking, still felt limitless.

So it’s a mystery to you, that you’re rushing right here, right now, at nine in the morning when the windows by the hallway you had to walk through to get here often showed you the best view. A tube of ointment in hand and the hope to have your first sip of coffee taste like nescafe’s caramel instead of the blend you like from Gigi Coffee down the block from where you live.

Pretty like nine AM streams of gold, and pretty like Tsukishima Kei and the overgrown bangs that suit him quite well.

So when you’re in the elevator and staring at the reflection of you in the mirror to your left, you don’t exactly have it in you to admit that it is a little out of character for you to reach up and fix your hair more than just a couple of times.

The left seems a little too off, while the right was too unnatural. You part your hair in the middle, like usual, and brush the little fringe you have to make it look pretty, and smile.

You remember that time, just one Friday ago when Kei was riding this same elevator with you to the parking lot in the basement, as he looked at you for a briefly, before glancing up

He could be it, until he ends his story with just the role of an almost.

So it’s almost, you repeat in your head. A new tube of ointment clutched in your hand and the three more steps until you round the hall and make it to your desk. Almost there, as the thought that excites you more than it terrifies you this time.

Here, the sun is yours, as is the light. When nine AM ticks on the clock, the sunbeams falling everyday almost as if all it’s done is defy every call the clouds the rainy season brings about.

Perhaps that seat that’s been both empty and filled is almost actually occupied. Almost like one more step, that you take without hesitation as you tuck one strand of your hair back and brace yourself for light.

For the wounds on his hand you wish to mend and for the word “almost,” you think would be rewarded with a happy ending, you allow your heart to speak its truth and blend with the moment, unfiltered, as you smile.

You think of rehearsing a small hi, but decide against it at the very last second, because you want to say his name instead.

Kei, the name he’d insisted you call him with red on his cheeks while his gaze was set to the side. His Strawberries and cream on his glass instead of the espresso people would think is his style, and you smile, because it’s nice to know him as more than just Tsukishima Kei at the office.

Like knowing how his face looks when he scrunches up at the sting from the ointment, you know better now to get the one that he said doesn’t sting as much. You know he’ll appreciate the plain bandaids you have in your bag, instead of the daisy covered ones he had to make do from the stack you had laying on your drawer.

You ready yourself for the friendly hey, instead of the practiced hi, with the smooth good morning everyone that’s just a coworker in this room gets instead of the smile you think you’re set to give to him today.

You look forward to the taste of instant caramel, plus the sight of the sun.

One step, then you turn. You’re not blinded, but the scene in front of you is illuminated. Tsukishima Kei, his back against the chair, bandaged arm on the desk, and an expression of what looks like apathy scribbled across his face.

You pause, not so much as if you’re a deer caught in the headlights, but more like something within roots you to watch.

A stage is set, and the story looks to be continuing, instead of just beginning.

Tadashi smiles, patient. There’s a story behind the peace he wears, and you catch yourself thinking that you wish you knew the context behind it. In a way, you feel as if you do, but your thoughts blank when you try to dig for more connections, so you watch.

“Tsukki,” you hear him recite, just stating what he sees. “She’s the one you’ve been saving your seat for.”

“Nina,” Kei deadpans.

Nina, your thoughts echo. That’s my name.

You listen.

“I barely know her.”

Tadashi sighs, in dramatics. “The point is to get to know her.”

In response, Kei sighs too. “That’s already a lot of unnecessary work,” he mumbles, offhandedly.

You stay still, starting to think that maybe you don’t want to listen.

“C’mon Tsukki,” Tadashi pushes. “You meet up every weekend and the whole pantry in the breakroom has pretty much become you and her’s snack station.”

You watch, still rooted as Kei heaves a sigh in response, like the context of the conversation is the kind of weight that’s thought more like a nuisance instead of just a little heavy. “She’s convenient,” you hear.

Convenient, the word echoes.

Convenient, as the word that you let ring.

It’s funny how you almost slipped and clicked your shoes against the tile too loudly as to alert them that you’ve been there.

Just like how you almost turned around, when you made it to your seat a little later that morning, and he was already tapping on the edge of your desk, undoubtedly asking for the stapler.

There was a sense of hesitation in his voice, that didn’t fly past you. On the other hand, you didn’t turn around, like you usually would do, to at least strike up conversation. It was more convenient, like this you think. You’d place the stapler and your mug with the highlighters in the end that’s closest to him, and you’d turn your monitor a little to the side, so that you can avoid the glare from the window that always bothered you.

Right, you think. The glare.

Typing without that damned glare made work a lot more convenient. Humming out a quick response instead of trying to piece together what to say worked the same, and staying in your desk and ordering in your coffee instead of going to the break room to get your usual cup of caramel was also like that.

“Just for convenience,” you say as your reason to Kei, when he asks you if you wanted to get lunch with him that day, and you told him no, because you wanted to stay in the office instead.

It’s convenient too, when you look away and continue to type, willing yourself to focus on the text in front of you instead of his retreating figure your peripherals still catch a glimpse of.

Just like how the Sunday after that, the reason why you chose to still sit in that same table by the window is because it’s convenient. Two chairs with only one occupied, you cross one leg over the other under the table.

There’s a file open on your laptop, with the material you need to go over still stuck on the first page even if you’ve already been sat in the same spot for 3 hours now. You wore a cardigan over your top on the drive here, and took it off to hang it over the chair across yours because it’s more convenient to just do that than drape it over your bag on the floor.

When Tsukishima Kei walks in, you ignore the fact that this seems like it’s just clockwork.

You click your tongue, a gesture more towards yourself than towards him, as you try to remember at least the last three things that’s ben staring at you on your file today.

Blank.

He spots you, so you clear your throat, reach forward to take another sip—too sweet—and squint at your screen.

The words are in complete jargon, as are the thoughts in your head. You tell yourself that the thoughts that come are just meant to be fleeting little nothings, but the truth is that they aren’t.

Convenience, it echoes, and you come to realize that you aren’t exactly in the place to be angry. Company was because of convenience, and it did start like that.

You suppose that it was just on you that you started considering Tsukishima Kei as the conscious choice you eventually chose over the usual—every day.

There’s a lot to be defined and sorted through when you think of the word almost.

Objectively speaking, almost wasn’t that much of a heartbreaking word to ponder about. You almost made it past the light, but orange tells you to slow down. You almost sent in your order before the restaurant closed, but ended up not doing it anyway.

To you, almost was a reminder that if something didn’t happen, there was just a greater someone above and perhaps beyond, setting down the foundations to say that this would only end up as a bad scenario.

Just like how you almost looked at him.

“Nina,” he smiles.

“Tsukishima-san,” you respond, keeping your poise.

Quite audibly, he shuffles. You clear your throat again, trying your hand at dissipating the awkwardness that sort of settles. “Is this seat taken?” he asks.

With hands that just barely pause above the keys, the best you offer him is a friendly smile.

“Ah,” you respond, then blink. When you look up and over towards him, he’s holding his bag in one hand with a cup of coffee in the other. There’s a lot of almosts that run through your head.

To be fair, you could say yes. But that was being fair to the rationality of the situation and not exactly to yourself. You hate the word convenience, because that meant that it was just another one of those for nows.

(You hate how temporary presence can be. More so within instances where the world makes you feel as if you’re the temporary.)

Like the seat you’ve occupied across him this whole time, you think to yourself that perhaps you were just the conversation that was convenient enough for him to sit with until what was to come arrived.

So you stare.

The absence of caramel is a little new, but it hasn’t settled enough for you to decide if whether you’re welcoming it or not.

Kei shifts his weight from one foot to the other, and waits.

He waits.

Waiting.

It’s annoying, you think.

You tell yourself that waiting shouldn’t always make you feel like you’re on the edge of something that won’t play out well, but in the moment, there’s not a lot of comfort you can cling towards.

So you grasp at what you have. Right now, you hold your cup of coffee and own company. The reminder that what you must be waiting for probably wasn’t him—the almost, you call it—present in your head, repeating like a mantra. The kind of mantra that’s meant to deliver you to safety, you hope.

He motions towards the seat again, when you don’t answer, so you straighten your back, bearing your thoughts together to try to atleast string some words as a response.

To be fair, you do ponder about what to say. You realize that not a lot can be weighed because if Kei had already made his intentions clear yesterday, you suppose you can give yourself your own clarity too. Transparency meant you were granted your own peace of mind, and you’ve always hated how foggy the word almost looked.

You don’t think about the two more sachets of caramel in the breakroom—almost finished.

You stare past him, focusing on the menu you can’t even read from this distance behind him, and try not to sigh.

He stares, and you hate how you know what kind of coffee he bought.

You despise how you know the exact files he’s probably carrying with him in his bag right now because you know him that well at this point. Too well, the voice in the back of your head nags.

But you hate how fleeting the word “convenience” feels. You’ve always thought to yourself that even if the seat in front of you had always been empty, the fact that you were seated in yours was the constant you’d forever abide by.

“Seat’s taken,” you hear yourself say, before you almost caught yourself saying no, it’s free.

It’s yours to take, you would have told him, because you felt like you still had enough in you to give him a couple more pieces you thought you wouldn’t need.

But the truth is, you realize, is that at the end of the day, you’d need every piece of yourself to be whole. Whether that seat across yours would be occupied right now, tomorrow—or even ten years into the future, it felt wrong to just have another almost keep it warm.

“Sorry,” you repeat, hoping to deliver your truth to him. “It’s taken. Just waiting for someone.”

“Ah,” he nods, though he doesn’t turn away. You feel him stare right through you, and you feel naked. Perhaps there’s a part of you that craves for him to know your actual truth and confront it, but the part that was all rationality said that that wouldn’t be a convenient thing to do, so you relent, and let go.

“Someone,” he echoes. “You’re saving that seat for someone.”

You nod, absent. “Yeah,” he hears you say, and he wishes you’d give him a little more than just the tendrils of a lie lying on the surface. “Someone.”

Just like how you almost missed a stop and rescheduled that trip to your friend’s flower shop next week again.

You almost missed him.

(But you didn’t.)

So you think that maybe this was the other road you’ve been meaning to take. It’s not a seat, but it’s a space. In between the bookshelves and the counter, there’s a space for you to fit in so you could reach past the bloom of hydrangeas to call your friend’s attention.

Except it’s another that catches yours first.

With your feet planted on the ground, you remind yourself that there’s no chair beside you to hang your jacket over as if you’re meaning for someone to come. Somebody already is here, you realize. He doesn’t glow like how komorebi reflects on your earth, but at the hues of his eyes you do see a semblance of the roots of earth.

Like two pools of hazel, you see the deeper shades of the sunset.

“Hi,” he grins.

“Ah! Nina!” your friend calls, so you turn to her.

She hesitates a little, setting down the vase she carries right before she picks up the conversation again—first motioning to you, then next to the man.

“Oikawa Tooru,” you introduce. “Makki’s friend from highschool,” you hear her continue. “He’s back in the country for a couple family stuff but his work is in Argentina now.”

You smile, appreciative of the conversation. “Business?”

Oikawa laughs in response, boyish. “Something like that.”

“He’s being humble,” you hear Takahiro chime from across the shop. “That’s the shit he does when he wants to be smooth around a girl,” he adds, laughing.

The man beside you rolls his eyes, albeit evidently enjoying the light atmosphere in the room. In a sense, you do too, so when your friend joins the other two in their laughter, you contribute to the happiness with your own chuckle.

The context of what was going on didn’t exactly sink in quite yet, but you found yourself still in place.

“I play volleyball,” he tells you, a little after when the laughter dies down. He’s still smiling, you note, just like you are, so you suppose that it’s nice that happiness can linger.

“Professionally!” your friend adds, her voice muffled from the distance in between you and her across the room.

“You relocating?” you ask, curious.

Oikawa leans forward, head propped up on his palms, as he shakes his head in the way you assume to be a no. “Just visiting home for a bit.”

“Ah,” you nod. “Homesick?”

He chuckles, airy. “I guess you could say that.”

Oikawa’s pretty, you think. It’s not like Kei’s kind of pretty that’s comparable to the light, but Oikawa’s is more leaning towards the same kind of pretty that’s to be associated with flowers. Like petals on roses, his pretty was classic.

(It’s just a shame that you like the tiny white petals on daises just a little more than the classic red.)

When Oikawa looks at you, and offers a smile that has you feeling like you’re meant to know him as more than just the stranger you bump into coincidentally at the coffee shop, you’re reminded, once again, about how this was another encounter that you almost missed.

“It’s nice to meet you, by the way,” you tell him afterwards, when you’re both outside of the shop, the expected goodbye lingering in the air.

It’s you who initiates it. On the other hand, it’s him who tries to prolong it.

Oikawa ponders about what he’s ought to say, pausing just for a few moments before he turns fully to face you, smiling again. “You too,” he chose to say.

(Chose.)

“Almost missed you,” you say. “Glad I stopped by the shop today.”

“Almost,” he laughs. “I almost didn’t come too,” Oikawa admits, eyes to you, present in the moment instead of being somewhere far away.

“But you came,” you laugh.

“And you made it,” he replies.

It’s interesting, he thinks.

You, he means.

It doesn’t go as far as saying that he’s only admitting to this because of all the time he has on his hands—as if you’re just the constant that’s there and convenient to think about, but he means it in the sense that he’s aware about you.

Your dynamic with Oikawa Tooru worked well in an odd sort of way. He was polite, much like Kei, and didn’t overstep his boundaries. Looking at him from a wider point of view, it’s safe to admit to yourself that he does check off most of the things written on what you think is your “someday.”

Almost as if you’re satiating a part of yourself and writing a closing chapter for the child within that hoped for a prince charming that would pull out your chair before you sat on it, Oikawa fit the bill to the T.

In contrast to what you had with Kei, Oikawa shared the same boundaries as you did. He never was the type to pry too much, only going as far as asking you a little about your job, but nothing much afterwards.

There was a sort of certainty that you found intertwined with having conversation with strangers. Like knowing names, then seeing boundaries before anything more was breached. A comfort, as you would call it, was given through the fact that the both of you knew the ending to this far in advance.

He was meant to stay in the city—thus your life—for just ninety days at most, given his visa, so you started speaking to him with that in mind. On the other hand, you assumed that he did the same for you.

When you move about with the thought that this was one of the things that was certain to remain as just a for now, you find that it’s easier.

You know his name, but this time you know better than to ask for more. There were some answers from yourself you weren’t sure you’d be able to give, so you never bothered to try to ask for the same.

Almost became a word that was bitter at the taste, and you didn’t want to taste more. Perhaps this time around you’d try to wait for what’s actually meant to come and leave that seat empty.

But it’s undeniable, that when Oikawa Tooru smiled, he was pretty.

He always sat in the seat beside the one with the jacket over the back—an unnecessary gesture, really, but it was appreciated.

“So what’s your story?” he asked you one day—today—and you think that he’s hovering just a little over the boundary that had been set. Comparable to a child standing over their parent’s bedroom door, trying to ask for one more snack before they’re sent to bed, Oikawa looks to be doing the same.

He swooshes his drink around with his straw, and asks away, though his eyes are not on yours.

Hesitation is the first emotion you sense—where despite the stillness of his voice—you could still pluck out the shaky foundation it seems to be just thrown on.

Still, you humor him, finding that his curiosity wasn’t exactly threatening. “Story?” you ask, though it was already clarified.

Oikawa hums out his affirmation, still not looking at you. He peeks, though, and at the very last second you catch him staring at you rather intently from your peripherals when you swirl your own drink around and look down.

“You don’t have to say anything,” he laughs. “I’m just wondering why you’re always putting your jacket over the seat in front of you.”

A few moments pass, and he lets it stay, before he eventually clears his throat, breaking the silence before it settles and overtakes the flow of the conversation. His curiosity was something he’s had for the short while he knew you by now, and he didn’t want to let go of the chance of getting answers to it now that you seem to be willing to drop at least a few crumbs of your truth.

There’s not much that’s intentionally hidden, he thinks. The earth around you didn’t look scarred, or too broken in for something to be buried underneath, so he realizes that every bit of your truth was already out in the open. Perhaps it’s masked, or perhaps it’s too intertwined with the vines that it looks natural already, but none the less, he wants to be able to see and read what’s there.

In between the lines, or through the foliage and its vines, Oikawa Tooru can say that he wants to understand and know the contours of your earth.

May it be as vague as the hue of your sky, and feel of the grass, or may it be as specific as to know the feel of every petal of the flowers planted on your soil, he wants to know something.

But what you give him, in return, is a question of your own.

“What does your someday look like to you?”

Oikawa pauses, his eyes on yours. “My what?” he reiterates, with a chuckle.

In response, you let out a laugh of your own, amused at the blank look on his face. Oikawa looked like someone who was always two steps ahead of whatever was there, in front of even himself, so to see him in this state—a little caught off guard and baffled—it was more or less interesting to say at the very least.

“Your someday,” you laugh, straw pinched in between your thumb and pointer finger.

You watch as he chuckles, one hand behind his head as he exhales a lighthearted sigh, responding, “You’re gonna need to give me a little more information than just that.”

He smiles, blinding. You see that you kind of want to look away. “I’m not someone who’s too smart when it comes to reading poems.”

“So you don’t like reading underneath the underneath?” you ask.

“Nah,” he shrugs. “I’ve always been upfront with stuff in a way.”

“Funny,” you retort, leaning forward to rest your chin on your palms. “I was told the opposite about you.”

He raises a brow, still smiling. You’re still blinded, and you still want to look away, but a little later on you find that the light doesn’t exactly burn. So with that, you stand your ground and look. The light at 4PM isn’t anything like 9AM, you think. It’s blue skies and shining skies; white clouds, and a cool breeze. The day feels like it’s been lived—like things are established and there for yours to take—and you find that you don’t know what to think about it.

“So you have dirt on me,” is what he says, and he leans forward, intrigued.

“I’m a lawyer,” you retort. “It’s in my nature to be inquisitive.”

“So what you’re saying,” Oikawa says, slowly, “—is that you look at me like you would look at a client?”

“A client,” you parrot, huffing in exaggeration. “I’m just curious about a lot of things,” you admit. “I like clarity and certainty over standing on stuff that’s vague at most.”

“Plus,” you add, “in what way am I supposed to think about you?”

“As a friend?” you challenge, leaning forward to take a sip. Oikawa tries to steady his gaze with yours, but he swallows, frankly a little nervous.

There’s no answer why he’s nervous, but the feeling settles, so he decides he can’t do much other than simply just let it be.

“Is that what’s open on the table for me to take?” he asks you in return, and when you open your mouth thinking you have the answer, the silence tells you that you don’t.

“I don’t know,” you answer. “That’s something I can’t answer right now.”

“You mean that’s a part of the someday you have yet to answer?” he counters, smirking. The tides of the conversation have turned to favor him, Oikawa thinks, so with that in mind, he treads around his words, hoping not to slip and dive.

But even though he knows how to swim, he was always cautious enough so that he wouldn’t drown.

“My someday looks like that seat in front of me finally being occupied by someone who won’t leave.”

“So your someday,” Oikawa notes, “is someone that’s permanent?”

Shrugging, you explain your thoughts, “It doesn’t have to be someone, my someday can be just something.”

“But a chair’s built with the intention to be sat on, right?” Oikawa prompts, looking at you like the very essence of your truth is dancing right on the palms of his hands. “You can drape a jacket over the seat as much as you’d like but it’s okay to want to save it for someone and not just think that all it will end up being is a something.”

His words reach you, but you stay behind the line.

The wish to jump and dive doesn’t fill you, but the curiosity of what could happen should you take the leap is present enough for you to push for more of the conversation. Then like holding your palms out into the sky, you keep your distance from the waters and try to imagine what the waves could feel like under your skin.

Whether the seas may storm or not, you pull back because you realize that it’s the solidarity of the depth that terrifies you.

“Who are you to tell me what my someday is?” you ask, unafraid. Behind the boundary, you’re safe, and your feet are planted within the soil of a steady earth.

Across you, Oikawa gives you the sight of the skies, but also give you a glimpse of the seas.

It holds a promise, you see. A pandora’s box—but that’s the thing. A box like that was never meant to be opened.

You pull back before you can give yourself the chance of even opening your palm.

But Oikawa insists—in the way that doesn’t terrify you, but you find that it doesn’t exactly convince you well enough either. “I’m just showing you a different angle,” he explains. “You miss a lot when you just look at things from a first person point of view you know.”

“What if my reasoning already feels complete to me though?” you retort, out of curiosity, not necessarily aggression.

“Then that’s for you to live out,” he smiles. “I’m not gonna dig in places I’m not welcome in, but I can just tell you things you either could choose to believe or not.”

“So someday,” he sighs, as if he’s been holding his breath for this long while. Perhaps he has, but you don’t ponder too long in regards to it. “Your someday at least, is just whatever lands in that seat.”

You shrug. “I guess, but I hope it’s something good.”

“Or someone great,” he smiles, still offering his little variation of a truth.

“You’re really pushing that agenda huh,” you laugh.

“I can stop if you’re uncomfortable,” he replies, joining you in your laughter.

You smile, then make known your honesty, saying, “Who says I would even listen to you?”

“Ah,” Oikawa nods. He looks at you, then at the seat that’s empty beside him. “So would the someone that’s bound to take this seat be someone you’d listen to?”

You laugh, choosing to glaze over the metaphor he lays for you to uncover and instead just keep yourself safe at the distance. “Hopefully,” you shrug.

“I got a lot of hopes for my someday,” you smile. “I just hope it looks like happiness.”

“Why?” Oikawa prods. “Aren’t you happy now?”

Smiling, you poke a little bit of the more vulnerable end of your truth. “I am,” you confess. “My happiness is my nine am sunshine and pastel highlighters. So I can say that I really am happy.”

“But more happiness is always welcome,” you add, wistful.

Oikawa recognizes the look of yearning quick, but he doesn’t dig. Neither does he ask, nor prod—instead, he just lets you be.

He lets the empty seat stay empty, and doesn’t question it when you stare at the spot a little bit longer every time you turn your head towards it again.

“Something or someone good is something constant right?” he smiles.

You do the same, the truth in his words resonating with you.

All you do is smile, and Oikawa already hears what you mean to say.

(He hears a yes that holds all the longing your heart tries to rewrite as strength.)

What Kei does, on the other hand, is do a complete 180.

From an outsider’s perspective, it looks more like an odd dynamic if anything. There’s the awkward glance, when you catch each other at the breakroom at the same time, while the box with the remaining two sachets of caramel instant coffee remained on the shelf untouched. Some days you wished for someone who was a little more unaware would just grab at least one or maybe even both sachets, taking it for themselves, so you at least would have a reason to throw away the box.

But it doesn’t work that way.

The thing about almosts, you realize, is that when it leaves, what you’re left to deal with are the tendrils of it.

The things that’s there—that lingers—but in this case, while it’s there, in a sense it just looks like a stain.

Like the ink from your pen bleeding into the paper because you paused too long, and pressed too deep, the things that was yours and his looks like a stain.

It’s not like you take off the keychain or turn from him whenever he said hello if he came across you in the hallways, but most of your exchanges have felt more like the standard greeting the two of you started on.

Square one.

You think to yourself that perhaps he’s become the co-worker who just shares an office with you again, but the more you allow your thoughts to simmer, you realize that at the core of it that’s all he really has been this entire time.

Through the eyes of a poet who chooses to write the things they see through the rose colored lenses, perhaps Tsukishima Kei could have been an almost. The physical manifestation of the someday you’ve been saving the seat across you for, where he answered every metaphor you tell yourself you didn’t even think was there.

(At the truth that had been wrapped with your layers of optimism and false leads of poetry, you think that maybe you had waded in far too deep and held your breath too long, that your lungs just simply gave out.)

You blink.

This wasn’t heartache, but your chest felt dull.

Tsukishima Kei wasn’t love, but he occupied the seat intended for your someday for that short while a little longer than he should have, so like vines wrapping around old stone, you tried to hold onto something.

(Anything.)

Caramel and dinosaur charms; the band aid on his finger, and a quiet look that felt like nine am.

It’s just the difference between nine am and Tsukishima Kei—was that while it was a choice for you to turn your head and bask in the light—at the constant that was the light in the first place, all Kei had been was the temporary caught in the mix.

And by his words, you concluded that he means the same.

Convenience, he said.

A fickle, fleeting thing, when from your point of view, you began to see what could have looked like something that lasted a little longer than that.

You tell yourself that it’s just more convenient that way. Workdays that start from eight, will move through the hours so that it can end at six. You’ll type your files, call your clients, and highlight what matters with the pastel highlighters in the cup that’s been moved from the corner of your desk to the spot right beside your computer screen now.

Kei begins to bring his own, as well as his own stapler, so you think it’s safe to say that that’s all there is to it.

Working around what’s convenient, you mean.

An air of something incomplete hangs around for a while, often coming in passing. Awkwardly clearing your throat when you catch him in the same elevator, or when you hop off your car and he’s just getting out of his. He’s still polite, none the less.

When he sees you by the stock room carrying two boxes of refills for the printer, he takes them from you, even though you had always been the type to refuse with your redundant “no.” In the breakroom when you’d have to stand on the tips of your toes to reach the biscuits at the top of the shelf, he’d still grab them for you.

The obvious change in dynamic was just made known through the drop in conversation.

There was a stop, after the usual hello, and a goodbye, after you’d say thank you because of a favor. Like the both of you finally adhering to just what’s socially acceptable for acquaintances, even though you knew Tsukishima Kei would never be a stranger—these days it’s felt like he’s everything that’s got to do with that.

But the seat’s saved, you think.

Maybe his is too.

Perhaps the difference between the both of you was just that while you wanted to keep it open and waiting for what or who’s eventually meant to take it, Kei seemed to not have much of a problem at letting what’s convenient keep the spot warm.

Too many moments of for-nows, that’s okay at the start, but it eventually turns draining in the end.

Though still, you can’t help but admit that the taste of instant caramel seems a little sweeter than your usual brew that you’ve had for years now.

Oikawa Tooru comes into mind when you think of the word that could possibly mend the broken that is almost.

In a way, you tell yourself that there’s a lot that you should leave up to the voice of fate. The final say that it dictates, and the path that looks lit, and well swept, evident for you to walk on instead of the one that’s still covered with vines.

(You’ve always argued with the word fate.)

Though there was a balance of what was given and taken with the universe, you liked to think that at te very core of this all—was a choice.

Convenience was like fate, and with fate, came a multitude of only almosts that exist just to end as is—doomed to never make it.

Left as a comma in a sentence, within a work in progress, abandoned.

Hanging.

But you think to yourself that Tsukishima Kei had a definitive end.

Not as a person, or a connection, because those are just some of the things that’s meant to stay. To evolve. To change.

(Change.)

You think that it’s a little unfortunate how his identity seemed to change when you felt like you were on the cusp of moving towards somewhere greater. But the consolation, after the discovery of what he had made known as his truth, was that perhaps the silver lining in fate was how it often blessed a person with serendipity when they least expected it.

Maybe yours wasn’t the light, after all.

Maybe nine am and caramel was meant to be just a bridge, or a nudge in the direction to have you standing where you are right now, led to this exact moment, and what was meant to be yours—sat in the seat that you had been saving—were the petals in the shade of almonds and turquoise.

A few words spoken in Spanish, where the r rolls quite nicely, and a laugh that feels like he knows your story even without him digging too far down.

There’s bedrock beneath the soil, impenetrable. But Oikawa Tooru digs his feet into your earth anyway, content with what you lay for him in this surface.

(An in between of whether you particularly prefer that or not is caught in between in your head.)

“So what was your almost?” he asks, and ripped from your thoughts, you feel yourself land back into the surface.

At the haze that triumphs over your head, you have to remind yourself that the surface is nice. The surface is where the flowers grow, and face the sun. The surface, is the final product—the defining face—of what you are and what you have.

“What makes you think I have an almost?” you respond, curious.

Oikawa chuckles, evidently amused. “I think we all have an almost.”

With that, you relent; shoulders sagging, though your guards are still somewhat up. They stand guard beside you, this time, instead of cover you directly.

“He was meant to just be that I think,” you say. “An almost,” you clarify, then smile, as you add an afterthought. “I don’t hate him though.”

“Ah,” Oikawa nods, smiling like he just solved another piece of the puzzle. “So it was a someone this whole time.”

At his words, you roll your eyes, but chuckle afterwards anyway. “Was is a pretty good indication that it’s done with now.”

“I never pegged you as the dramatic type.”

“I like to think I’m unperceivable,” you comment.

Oikawa grins, “I’ve always liked solving puzzles.”

“I’m a person,” you retort, “not a stick of cardboard cut-out just to fit with something.”

“So what you’re saying,” Oikawa says, smirking, “is that you’re already the full illustration?”

“I deserve to be the whole piece,” you laugh. “I invest into things that fall in line with that.”

“I don’t think being just a piece right now is bad,” he says. “You’re what, only 23?”

Laughing, you wave him off. “You’re making it seem like I’m a lot younger than I am.”

Oikawa smiles with you, the happiness shared—amplified even. “You are young.”

“Sometimes it feels like that,” you admit. “But I think I’m at the part of life where I should be taking control of my time a lot more seriously. Leaving things up to the universe or fate or whatever hasn’t really been good for me.”

“But serendipity is nice,” he chimes.

And you nod, swiftly admitting that he does have a point. “Serendipity lead me to thinking that caramel was the one meant for me.”

Oikawa stares at the brew in your cup, eyebrow raised in question. “But don’t you like caramel?”

“I do,” you smile. “But not exactly enough to drink it for the rest of my forever.”

“What do you want to drink forever then?”

“You know you jump from one question to the next pretty quickly,” you note, laughing.

“I don’t wanna dig too deep,” he tells you, leaning back against the back of the chair, his shoulders slumping. Oikawa looks relaxed, you note. Like leaves just swooshing back and forth depending on the feel of the breeze, he looks like whether he turns towards the right or left, somehow he’s always going to find a nook to settle into place.

You envy the fact that he seems to be the type to find a place wherever.

“So what do you wanna drink forever?”

What do you see in that seat in front of you?

“Well,” you start, relenting. “I almost would have settled for caramel, but maybe it’s still a drink I haven’t even heard of yet.”

“So like a surprise,” Oikawa grins.

“Serendipity,” he adds, not even a minute later.

You take a sip, the taste familiar. While the voice in the back of your head reminds you that you’ve always been quite fond of the familiar, Oikawa smiling at you like he means to stay with the intention to reintroduce you to something that is everything but that, in a way, excites you.

You grin. “I don’t know about that, but I guess if it’s what’s meant to come then that’s what I should focus on building on top of, right?”

He clinks the corner of his drink with yours, laughing at the dull sound of plastic clashing. “I have a feeling that you think you’re running out of time.”

“So you mean you’re playing detective now,” you say.

“I’m a stranger,” Oikawa shrugs. “I’ll pass by here and after I leave you’ll probably only remember me as that really hot dude you bumped into at your friend’s flower shop.”

Rolling your eyes, you lean back on your own seat, huffing. “You left out conceited.”

“I think the adjective hot covers the important parts.”

“So you mean for me to just swoon at the memory of you?”

At your words, Oikawa smirks, right before it mellows into a smile, as if he’s triumphant. “So you mean that you admit you swoon for me?”

Knowing that this is mostly just empty words, you only laugh again in response. Not a lot of what Oikawa shows you hangs around what’s vague. You’ve always appreciated the clarity in whatever this was or is going to be, so the smile you let out is honest.

Oikawa stares.

A bit of silence settles in, but you let it, finding it comfortable. A little more passes before he smiles again, his eyes unwavering on yours.

“Did he ever tell you that you smile pretty?”

You should have said a solid no.

(Because that was the truth.)

Instead, you remember how you turned away and smiled in a sad kind of way, as if you’re missing something. “No,” you recall you said. “But he knows the kind of coffee I like.”

“And that’s enough for you?” he asked, and when you opened your mouth, thinking you had a response, silence was the only thing that met you halfway.

You think about it. Was it enough?

The more you allow for the thoughts to settle in, the clearer the heartache becomes. You come to realize that there is heartache that’s even present, in the first place, because to an extent you invested a part of yourself into this.

Tsukishima Kei didn’t just become the flow that moved with your day, nor just someone who fell into your clockwork. He wasn’t love, but the idea that he could have been was what rooted itself in your thoughts.

You let him take the seat you meant to save for what you hope would be permanent, and unknowingly, intertwined your vines with his. This whole time, you thought you faced the sun.

But when Kei nods his head towards you every morning as if it’s just a polite greeting—like all you are to him now is just a gesture—you realize that the sun you’ve held this whole time was just the bits that was filtered through the leaves.

(Komorebi.)

There’s an ache, but it’s dull.

The two damned sachets are still in the cabinets, collecting dust, and it bothers you how no one seems to want to touch it. You see the way he frowns at how bright his highlighters are, then try not to remember how

But while you thought that way, what doesn’t dawn on you is how Kei wills himself to turn from the window, and ignore the sun.

Slivers of the light he’s always thought was yours still dance in his desk. The way it comes is gentle; filtered through the leaves from the trees outside, on the canvas of his space he sees spaces. Of where there is light, and where there is shade, there in the spaces in between written are the thoughts he tries to ignore.

Though there was a lot that remained unsaid, the tragedy of the story was made known through the sight of the sun—from his eyes at least—that’s begun to look dim.

Kei stares at the yellow on the paper and thinks it’s out of place. He recalls, even though it’s a memory he actively tries to push down, the coffeeshop the two of you often spent your weekends at together.

There, he was reminded of how perfectly in place he had felt.

There, within your company, and conversation. While you were sat in the chair he thought he had always been saving for something, he hoped that he was sat in the place where you saved for yours.

Though there was the absence of explicit communication, he hoped the little things at least spoke to you. The coffee he used to place on your desk, that was made in the way he memorized by heart now. The pillow that he can’t help but notice you still using, on your chair, and the two pieces of caramel left on the cabinets.

(Like they’re there, just waiting.)

(As if on pause.)

(He hopes that this is just a pause.)

And he wanted to ask you too, to at least put words to perhaps quell the worry undeniably raging in his head.

His mind begs him for clarity—for answers. But the most he can do is feel his fingers twitch and throat lump when you pass him, muttering another, “Goodmorning, Tsukishima-san,” without looking in his direction.

The yellow on his paper is too bright and he hates the way it looks against the ink. It looks like a stain, he thinks.

You calling him Tsukishima-san instead of Kei feels like it’s a stain.

(But it eats him alive when he can’t bring himself to do anything other than sit still, rendered into absolute silence, even as the memory of seeing you at the café yesterday, sat across a man who took his seat.)

You were smiling, like you would towards your 9am everyday, so his words were left to remain as just thoughts.

His thoughts, like being just barely strong enough, almost pushing past that final barrier in his throat, but dying before it could overcome the final hurdle.

You’re more than just a question and an answer, he acknowledges his thoughts say.

You’re more than just pastel highlighters, sachets of caramel, and a stranger with a story that sat in the seat he saved for his someday for a while.

He sighs, his eyes still transfixed on the stain of yellow.

And it’s his almost that had him choosing to look towards you at the very last second, smiling. With patience, he gives himself a countdown from ten to breathe, before he looks at you.

You’re facing away from him, like you have for a while now, but even if the light wasn’t there, in the safety and secrecy of his thoughts, he admits to himself that you’re beautiful.

There’s a lot of uncertainties that come with life, but this moment, founded in the heart of everything that had been unclarity, he finds a moment of understanding. Time doesn’t stop, because it was founded with the intention to move—in a linear pace, so instead of losing himself, he rides the steady flow of his thoughts instead.

As if it’s another secret, he murmurs your name instead.

And because the world is a traitor to the almost lovers who arrived into their own set of conclusions in the silence, you hear him.

You don’t say his name, but he admits that he wished you did.

Like the day before, at the sight of seeing you offer him a smile, regardless if it was just for formalities, his hands are already clamming up. There’s a sprig of your hair, on the left side that’s a little askew, and he itches to reach forward and fix it.

The way you call him Tsukishima-san flashes in his mind again, so he pulls back.

He meant to unravel himself then and there—almost.

(He realizes how much he loathes that word.)

You look at him a little funny, but you maintain your patience anyway. It looks like he’s holding to a lot of something that he needs to say, so even if you’re apprehensive of his intentions now, you think you still have it enough in you to listen.

For a while he gives you just silence.

“Are you seeing someone?” he blurts, the sudden spike in volume of his voice a little awkward.

Furrowing your brows together, you try not to squint towards him. “Why would that concern you?”

“I saw you out with someone yesterday,” he murmurs, his voice more on the quiet end.

Half of him hopes you wouldn’t hear, that the world would be on his side just this once, but as always, it never was one to favor the uncertain.

“Tooru,” you say, testing the waters. “His name is Tooru.”

“Congratulations,” he tells you, but before you could respond, he’s already turning away. You know it’s not like you to leave whatever this is as just another hanging thing with the intention to just be left behind.

But he turns away, rationality tells you.

The more you dwell on your thoughts, you know there’s not much of a need to actively try to seek for closure in something that gave you nothing but blurred lines and a hazy outlook right from the beginning.

You turn away too, but somehow, the silence that you thought you had grown familiar to by now seems a little colder.

There’s sunlight that comes, but it’s filtered.

In the spaces between light and dark, Kei crumples his paper, fishes out a fresh copy from the side, and grabs a pencil to circle what he needs instead.

(When he passes the paper off to you, you try to ignore the way only your name was circled with permanent ink.)

“You know,” Oikawa hums one day. “You need to try being a little more blunt.”

The fact that he’s picking you up from work now should have been a red flag, about how comfortable he’s been settling into your life, but each time you think you’re aware enough to ask the question, he always beats you to the punch with something else.

Like now.

His hands are on the wheel, steady. There’s a kind of look in his eye you can’t quite read, and you’re suddenly thankful for the fact that he has to legally keep his eyes on the road, and not on you. He steals a few looks, though, and it’s through the feel of his eyes watching you from the rearview mirror where you’re reminded of how close you’ve gotten to him.

In proximity, literally, and more as just people.

In this sense, it terrifies you.

You don’t pull away though.

It doesn’t feel like things are clicking into place much like it did with Kei, but what you’re holding onto now, you see, is clarity. Or what you think clarity should be like, at the very least.

“Down this street, right?” Oikawa asks, breaking the silence, but not exactly the flow of your thoughts.

You think to yourself that it’s a little odd that he knows. Though the more you put some thought into it, it’s been a lot like it lately. Your car’s been in your garage more than usual, and he’s waited outside your office for a majority of this week. And the last—and the last before that.

There was consistency in his presence—the kind that was so intense and so tangible that it began to have you feeling like you’re supposed to be on the edge of something.

Perhaps right on the cusp of a change, that’s meant to be delivered all in good nature. You shift in your seat, opting to look at the window to your left, thinking that anywhere but the rearview mirror is a good view in the moment, and sigh.

Oikawa catches it, like always.

(You don’t know how to feel about constantly being seen this much.)

“Tough day?” he questions.

“An understatement,” you laugh. You find that Oikawa always has this way of looking at you like he knows you more than he lets on, and while for the most part, it didn’t exactly bother you, for now you find that you have to physically fight the urge to turn away.

In the end, you succeed, because your eyes are on the road ahead instead of towards him. Still, you feel the pull, so the most you do is catch a glance at a red light.

“Tsukishima Kei,” he says, quickly catching you off guard. “I remember him from highschool.”

You shift in your spot, interest piqued. “You know eachother?”

“Just acquaintances,” he laughs, his hands still on the wheel. “Knew him for a while that’s all.”

“So basically strangers,” you mumble.

He steals a glance: one that you don’t quite catch. “Yeah,” he says, hands on the wheel, foot on the brakes, and his eyes on you. “A stranger.”

And it’s in your eyes, that are cast down at his words, as you mumble, “same,” where the questions he didn’t dare pose to you are answered.

He gives himself a moment to take a breath, then when he sees that the light’s still at red, he taps his finger a couple times against the steering wheel before he takes another and holds it this time. “So it’s him,” he says, and the silence has never rang this loud.

“You’re a lot more obvious than you give yourself credit for, you know,” he laughs, a little louder this time when you choose to stretch the silence as your reply.

“And that’s a bad thing?” you counter, challenging him.

“Depends on how you look at it.”

“How are you looking at it?”

Briefly, Oikawa considers skirting around his words, but decides against it anyway. “Like I said,” he says, easing his foot slowly off the brakes when the car in front moved. “You could try being a little more blunt.”

“By blunt you mean….” you trail off.

Down this road, right past the house with the oddly shaped tree, and you’re home. It still doesn’t sink in when Oikawa pulled the brakes before you could even dictate to him where your driveway was.

“By blunt I mean if I ask you why you’re angry, you can answer it without sugarcoating anything,” he says, his hands on the wheel and the key still in the ignition.

Your hands pause before you could feign the notion of nonchalance. In a way, you suppose Oikawa had a point, but like always, vulnerability was something that wasn’t just given. Though to be fair, you didn’t want him to fight for something you weren’t willing to even lay on the line either.

The silence in the car is stifling.

“What do you think?” he says, breaking the tension that’s been steadily rising. “Can you?”

A pause, then, Oikawa shifts, unbuckling his seatbelt to face you. “Will you?”

And truth be told, nothing exactly overcomes you. It doesn’t happen like how they depict in the movies or write about in novels, where you become washed over by a certain kind of grace that’s overwhelming or empowering.

There’s no clarity that gives healing, or answers for the matter, but what does come to you is the feel of your shoulders slumping against the seats as you lean back instead of move forward to leave.

You know you don’t want to stay, and you know you aren’t stuck, but you still won’t move. Simultaneously it baffles you and intrigues you.

Oikawa’s still silent, and the low hum of the car’s engine hums. From the corner of your eye, you notice all the trinkets in the car that probably isn’t his, yet the way he holds on to the steering wheel and relaxes into the seat makes it seem like the latter. Perhaps he just had a way of making himself blend in the background, looking like he’s home even though in reality, he’s quite far from it.

“I’m just a stranger,” he says. “When I go your secrets go too.”

“Why should a person’s pain always have to be a secret?” you ask, letting what comes, trickle.

It starts slow. They don’t come as words, but rather bursts of emotions. You’re apathetic, then you’re tilted. Angry, then okay. On the cusp of disbelief, then tired. But what breaks your heart, you realize, is how you can’t seem to find a trace of joy in any of them.

And that’s when it’s made clear to you.

“I’m angry because there is no joy,” you say, your words coming out slow. Your breaths remain controlled, as is your pose, but there’s a part of you that wishes you’d move. Not in the sense where you’d break free for the sake of letting go, and letting loose, but the stillness grips you too tight and you feel like you can’t breathe.

Letting a semblance of a lifelong ache go should have you breathing by now, but instead you’re here, trying to catch up with air.

It’s disorienting. You’re inside a car, parked in your driveway, with a stranger who doesn’t feel like a stranger sitting on the driver’s seat staring at you like all he’s done his hold life is hold your truth. For the most part, you felt as if you haven’t been holding on to it yourself, so perhaps just feeling the full weight of it now is just overwhelming.

You like it; then you fucking hate it. The notion of risk is terrifying to anyone who’s stood on solid ground their whole life, and now, standing at the depth has you feeling like there’s nothing but unsteady waters beneath your feet ready to pull you under.

You throw a lifeline.

“I’m angry because I don’t want to be just another convenience,” you finally exhale.

“It’s scary, you know?”

“I’m angry because I feel like at my age I should just be saving. That fucking seat across me, investments for the future, and myself,” you sigh. Your shoulders begin to tremble, but Oikawa doesn’t hold you. What he does is lean back, and face forward again, letting what comes cascade over you in private.

“Is that why you’re so guarded?” Oikawa questions, tentative.

A sliver of the aching piece of you leaks. “Does it seem that way?”

He smiles, then crosses one arm over the other. “There’s nothing wrong with being a little more cautious sometimes.”

“But that’s the thing,” Oikawa pauses, “remember to only do that as a sometimes kinda thing.”

“I don’t want my life to just be a series of conveniences, Tooru,” you confess. “I want to be chosen as much as I want to choose. We’re all given a choice, aren’t we?”

He nods. “We are.”

“I’m terrified of marrying because of convenience and washing the dishes too fast because I can’t stand to be in the same room as who I’ll end up with.”

Oikawa juts his bottom lip, then blinks. “Who says it’ll be like that though?”

“Because if you choose what’s just convenient, that means you’re just relenting to what’s there.”

“You’re overthinking this,” he points out. “You’re okay.”

“Now I am,” you reply, voice just barely above a whisper. “But that’s because I’m taking control of what I can now and making sure I won’t end up in that position.”

“You’re gonna be okay you know,” he says.

“You say that like you know what’s going to happen to me to the end.”

“Maybe I do,” he laughs.

You shake your head, choosing to ride the lightness of the conversation instead of allowing yourself to further be pulled under. There’s limits when it comes to giving pieces of yourself to a stranger, but regardless of what you showed, you can’t deny that you feel a little lighter.

“You know sometimes I wish you did,” you breathe out with an exhale. “Would you give me a head’s up?”

“Then how will you learn if it doesn’t catch you by surprise? That’s the fun part in life.”

“Making mistakes?”

“Bingo.”

You snort. “I’m not enlightened about anything from this conversation by the way.”

“That wasn’t the point,” he hums. “I got you laughing didn’t I?”

“For now,” you sigh, rolling your shoulders.

“That’s enough.”

Unbuckling your seatbelt, instead of stepping out of the car you just readjust your position to lean back against the seat, sighing. “I guess,” you relent. “Thanks.”

His eyes anchor themselves on your profile again. “That’s my girl,” you hear, and by the chuckle you can tell that only means to convey his happiness.

Exhaling a sigh through your nose, you mumble, “Don’t call me your girl.”

Beside you, Oikawa quirks an eyebrow, challenged. “Because it’s too soon or because you just don’t want me to call you that?”

“And Nina,” he says, to which you turn your head to. At your attention, first he offers you a smile, before he continues, saying, “You’re young. You can take a couple detours if you feel like it. Just don’t tell yourself that everyone who takes that seat is automatically gonna be the convenience thing or the one. We’re all in the inbetween stage of life right now.”

“For someone my age, you talk like you’re so old.”

“Hey,” he laughs, arms raised in mock surrender, “Thought I’d end up in Nationals and only trained in Argentina to get exposure for when I come back home, but now I play for the fucking national team there.”

“Shit happens,” he says. “You never know.”

You never know, Oikawa told you then, and you had smiled at him and muttered your thanks before you left the car.

He knew that if he was a little braver, and a little more full of himself, he would have leaned in for a kiss on the cheek at least, but not today. Not with you. It’s not that there’s something about you, but rather, it’s feeling like it’s everything about you.

Oikawa Tooru was never the type to believe in clichés much, so this was considered as one of his predicaments.

“You never know,” as the words Iwaizumi told him when he contemplated buying that ticket back to Tokyo just for a while.

You never know, as the thought in his head when he switched lanes at the very last minute and visited Hanamaki’s flowershop instead of meeting up with an old fling he’d begun to have doubts with.

You never know, as the phrase he tells himself time and time again, because this could lead to something better.

(And it’s you, as the something better that met him in the middle; his heart, unprecedented.)

He really should be driving home by now, but instead of doing that, he’s rounding your neighborhood two more times.

You never know, he told himself, the day after he met you at the flower shop, phone in hand, three minutes before he made up his mind to press the call button and ask you for coffee the very next day.

You never know, turning into irony because all he knows is that he’s fucked.

The more he thinks about it, he should really have listened to reason instead of spontaneity. He could have stayed on his lane and drove in accordance to his schedule. Had he stayed where he was meaning to go that day, he could have drove down the streets of your neighborhood and not know where to turn. The streets could have stayed unfamiliar, and it would have been fine.

(But that’s not the case, because now he’s going on his third turn, and instead of merging with the highway, he makes another turn towards your street again.

Huh, Oikawa thinks, suddenly remembering the sight of you beside a bloom of hydrangeas. Never knew daises were that pretty.

- (italics-flashback) -

“You know you really need to stop being so impulsive,” Hanamaki points out.

Oikawa takes the seat across him, sliding in after a quick roll of the eye. Accepting the can the former slides towards him, he sighs, before opening the tab and clinking it together for a quiet cheers.

The brunette sighs. “Just got caught up in fate, that’s all.”

—Fate, like the story that started with hello. Hydrangeas and roses, and a light illuminated that streamed in through the glass, filtered by leaves.

Fate like seeing you against the light of Komorebi, and thinking to himself that perhaps this is what they mean about feeling the roots of a promising maybe take place and hold still.

“Love isn’t just built on fate,” Hanamaki shrugs in front of him. “It’s the little steps you choose to take every day.”

Oikawa snickers. “Wow, so you’re a poet now.”

“I’m not,” Hanamaki deadpans. “You know I’m shit with words,” he adds, holding his bottle out.

Oikawa leans forward and clinks his against his friend’s, laughing. “But here you are.”

“Here I am,” he laughs. “I chose to be,” he says, looking around the shop, the look on his face telling him that this is what he means by home.

(—Like he chose to be here.

Nine in the morning where he should be on a train to Miyagi to spend the last week of his trip. It’s a choice, he thinks, that he made when it was 8:48, and he was still too delirious on the high that he could just about do anything regardless of time.

At 8:55, despite the truth of the matter shown crystal clear to him, he still pressed on. ‘It’s fine,’ he thought then. ‘Just a quick stop and I’ll still have time to pack.’

And it’s a quick stop that looks like that café down the road, where it’s just a 10 minute walk from your place. He’s never been the type to particularly enjoy coffee as much as you, but he supposes a couple brews is worth it to try. The most he knows is your schedule that runs from eight to six, and that your favorite time of day was nine.

Perhaps it’s how the sun feels on his palms, and the kind of warmth it gives that’s only met through this time of day that makes you fall in love with the hour. From what he remembers about the comments you say in passing, he knows that it’s always under the light like these where you favor having your usual cup of coffee.

And because spontaneity is what drove him to pull at the roots of the maybes that have already dug into the soil, he still doesn’t budge when he recognizes the telltale shade of blonde just a few spots in front of him at the café.

It’s a choice too, he thinks, to nod his head towards the blonde in acknowledgement when he turns and allows for the person behind him to take his spot.

“Oikawa-san.”

Truth be told, he wasn’t sure if a greeting was due, but he supposes that social etiquettes dictates the things that must be done, and so, he follows.

“Tsukishima Kei, right?” he asks, as if it’s the first he’s said that name in a while. “ Though a semblance of truth is with his words, he still keeps his reservations.

It’s silence, for the next few while. A couple steps forward, and a silence that isn’t exactly comfortable to prolong or share, before it’s Kei who takes initiative and turns to face Oikawa, as he says, “Congratulations, by the way.”

“Nina’s a great girl,” he adds, after Oikawa lets the silence hang. In front of him, Kei shifts his weight from one foot to the other, basking in the awkward of the atmosphere because of Oikawa’s lack of response.

It doesn’t strike dawn on Oikawa until he’s moved up a couple more spots up the line, where he’s face to face with the cash register, what Kei means to deliver with his words. Mouth forming into a small ‘O’, his thoughts just blank.

There’s a saying that he remembers often, and it’s ignorance is bliss. In most cases, for the sake of keeping his peace of mind, he would agree. In the moment, he disagrees.

“Can I take your order?” was just supposed to be a question, and it shouldn’t have made him think too hard. And looking at it from a more objective point of view, he would have just texted you, asking what you felt like drinking that day, and that would have been the end of that.

Phone in hand, and your contact that he’s still been meaning to save on the screen, he’s halfway to shooting you a text, but before he could, someone’s already beat him to the punch.

“She likes caramel latte with sweetcream cold foam on top on a regular day,” Kei says, beside him, towards the cashier. Afterwards, he looks at Oikawa, adding, “But on weekends if she feels like it, she’ll usually order an iced shaken passion lemon tea with two shots Asian dolce sauce and sweet cream cold—“

“We’re not together,” Oikawa interrupts, though he doesn’t break the chain of his actions. As if running on autopilot, he speaks with a smile, pockets his phone, fishes out his wallet, and hands the cashier his card.

From the side, Kei watches as he smiles his thank you: the first towards the cashier, then next towards him.

“We’re not together,” he clarifies, repeating his words with a little more grip to his tone. “You don’t have to worry,” Oikawa smiles. )

Oikawa shifts, eyeing Hanamaki. “You see,” he responds to his earlier words, “I can think that love is like that—that it’s the little choices and shit, but if it doesn’t work out—“ he pauses, heaving a sigh, “—then I can just tell myself that maybe it’s not meant to turn into love. And that makes it okay.”

The atmosphere dips, and Hanamaki chooses to keep his silence.

He watches as Oikawa nods his head, evidently trying to convince himself. “I’m okay,” he reaffirms, first to himself, then to Hanamaki who stares at him with a careful eye.

“Tooru…”

(And he means when he say that he’s okay, because truly, how could he not be when he’s stopping by your office and seeing you beam at him with the same streams of komorebi illuminating you like a halo behind your head.

He’s okay, when he sees that the purple dinosaur charm still on your keyring looks too identical to the one on Tsukishima Kei’s that’s set on top of his desk, next to a stack of papers.

He swears he’s okay, because a maybe is all this will ever be, and he’s made peace with that. Though on second thought, there was no issue to even make peace about—at least he thinks.

Thinks.

He thinks he’s okay, still, when after you say your thanks, you follow up with “How’d you get my order right?” and when he answers that he didn’t, you looked somehow happier when he nodded his head towards Kei’s desk.

“Ah,” he heard you reply. “Thanks, still.”

There’s a bit of red on your cheeks he wants to blame the light for, but he knows better. Ignorance is bliss, and in the moment, he craves for it.)

Oikawa sighs, leans back and cocks his head back to stare at the ceiling. There’s an absence of stars, but the blankness suffices. To his distant right, he hears Hanamaki swing back another gulp, before he too, follows suit and blinks at the starless ceiling.

“But I’m not gonna lie,” Oikawa says. “It stings a little.”

To be fair, he tried to make it only sting. And because the world can only give so much mercy, it only offers him this.

A seat beside yours, under the midnight sky that covers the secrets he knows he’ll have to try to hide. Like the red on his cheeks, the fidgeting of his fingers, and the nervous tap of his toe inside his shoe. You face him, a question in your eyes, but for the while that the silence is one of comfort, he resides in it like he would home.

And it’s nice, Oikawa thinks.

It’s nice to be like this and stay like this.

You can watch the stars, and smile at the moon. Should the world have given him more time than he has, he thinks in another life, he would have loved you under komorebi. Through a foliage of green may the sun come, and you’ll hold your hand out like the illuminated light comes just for you to take.

(And it’s warm, Oikawa thinks.)

(The palms of your hand looks warm.)

“The seat’s already taken isn’t it?” he says finally, breaking the silence.

You look at him, on the cusp of an apology, but he cuts you off before you get the chance to say a word.

“It’s okay,” he says, voice forgiving. When you turn to look at him, he has his own apology in his eyes. “Please don’t tell me sorry.”

“I’m not sorry about anything, Nin,” Oikawa smiles. “I won’t say I was sure about you, but there’s too much uncertainties hanging around for me to try to keep this up. Don’t wanna burden you with that too,” he continues with a laugh.

“You say that Tsukishima’s that almost for you, but you know the difference between calling someone an almost and a maybe?” he questions, though he doesn’t look at you. To the midnight skies he shifts his eyes instead, and so you do the same, hoping to see clarity within the haze of the clouds.

(You don’t see a thing.)

“An almost means that you’re sure about it enough to pursue it,” he says. “An almost means that you’re getting there.”

(You see the moon.)

Oikawa stares at your profile, and thinks of the hydrangeas. “Do you like hydrangeas?” he asks, seeing the memory of you from day 1.

You nod, eyes still to the moon. “Yeah.”

In your eyes, he sees the tendrils of what is meant to eventually bloom as love. “Would you accept it if I gave you one right now?” he asks, prompting the question for his ending.

By some mercy, you turn to him. Mindlessly, you ponder for a few moments, before you shake your head. “Maybe,” you say. “I’ve always loved daisies the most though.”

He laughs. “Noted.”

“Moon looks pretty tonight, doesn’t it?” he asks, sealing the ending close.

“It always looks pretty,” you smile.

He supposes the silence that comes is the first of peace. A moment more, under the midnight skies, and though his fingers itch to reach forward and hold your hand, he wills it to lie still.

You smile, again, and he knows the clock’s up.

“I think I’ll head out first, actually,” Oikawa says, getting up with a stretch. “Early train to Miyagi tomorrow; might as well make the most of it before I fly back to Argentina.”

“Should I say see you later?” you ask.

“Of course, you can,” he smiles. “But I should probably leave now. Seat’s taken right?”

For just a little bit more, the last traces of midnight stays, before dawn breaks.

Hanamaki stands beside him, upper body leaning against the railing, his eyes to the skies, where dawn slowly starts to break. “Did you really cancel your flight?”

Oikawa chuckles, shaking his head. “Of course not.”

“But you extended it,” Hanamaki replies, laughing with him.

Oikawa nods, a slow smile tugging at the corners of his lips. “That I did,” he admits, nodding his head.

“Never thought you’d be the type to go this far,” he says. “Say if it worked out and she asked you to stay, would you?”

“Maybe,” Oikawa laughs.

“So almost.” Hanamaki notes.

A nod. “Almost.”

“I almost didn’t go to your shop that day, by the way.”

“But you did.”

(A truth he would never replace.)

So Oikawa smiles, blinking at the bleeding colors of dawn that steadily breaks. “I did.”

There’s a lot of things about you that Tsukishima Kei can best describe as beautiful.

Like the way you tuck your hair behind your ear when you lean forward and get some work done. Your photos of your friends by your monitor, and the stack of sticky notes behind your monitor that you refuse to throw away because you think you might need them later.

Komorebi, and the filtered light it brings, because it’s warm. The feel of residual warmth that lingers on the surface of the mug long after the coffee’s gone.

A lot of what’s beautiful is you.

Your pastel highlighters, and the way you wave at the cat that loiters around the parking lot.

Tsukishima Kei learns to love the word ours, and further appreciate the taste of caramel only when it’s shared.

Like what he wants to do now, he supposes. Lately it’s felt like you’re starting again, from square one all over again, as he stares at the same contents in the fridge and the cabinets. Only this time, most of the questions he has are already answered.

He knows you like crème brulee over strawberry shortcake and it’s just because. You prefer spring over winter, because the winter’s too cold for you to take. When you say good morning, just to him, it feels nice and he feels seen.

And most importantly, he knows your favorite kind of instant coffee is the caramel ones from nescafe.

Like the two sachets still left alone inside the cupboards in front of him.

“Ah,” he hears, and when he turns, he sees you, awkwardly standing by the door looking unsure about where you are.

“I was just making my way out,” he nods towards you.

Sheepishly shaking your head, you refute his words, “No need,” you smile. “I’m just making coffee.”

“Ah,” he comments. “Busy day ahead, right?”

“Yeah,” he smiles.

“The other day,” you hear him hesitate. “The thing with Oikawa-san…” he trails off. “I’m sorry if I crossed any boundaries.”

“You’re fine,” you smile.

“And with you—“ he extends, almost as if he’s in a panic. “I’m sorry.”

“I know I used the word convenience, and I’m sorry,” he repeats. “I need to be a lot better with my choice of words.”

When you keep your silence, his eyes snap back up to yours, a little frantic. “Not that I mean it’s an excuse though, I mean, I’m sorry. I want to get to—no,” he interrupts himself, before he relaxes his shoulders with a sigh, and just looks at you, defeated. “I like you.”

“I’m sorry too,” you smile. “I looked at things a little too extremely than I should have, you know,” you tell him. “I think there’s just a lot between us that needed to be said.”

“We never really spoke much out loud,” you note, casting your eyes to the side, towards the cupboard with the two sachets of caramel.

“But thanks for always getting caramel though,” he hears you say, and he smiles. “Thanks for the keychain too,” you add.

“You kept it,” Kei notes, nodding towards your ring with a fond look.

“Of course I did.”

“Can I make you a cup?” he offers, watching you round the corner, walking towards the table.

“Yeah,” you answer. “I’d love that.”

Gesturing to the seat across here he’d take, you nod towards him. “This seat taken?”

Recognizing the familiarity in gesture, Kei grins. Like memorizing the patterns Komorebi casts on the blank space in his table, he finds his puzzle begin to click into place again.

Perhaps this is a start, or perhaps this could be just a detour that will be for now, at best. You smell caramel in the air and see your 9AM light leak through the door and spill into the room. It’s peace, as the place you choose to settle in.

Komorebi.

Sunlight filtered through the leaves.

May it fall on your hands, or kiss the skin on your face. You’ll accept it as the light it is, where it will illuminate you regardless of the patches where the shade overlaps the light. Light and dark, intertwined, but what you hold and feel is still light.

(Still could be love.)

A seat that’s empty, and your hope for the mundane to be redefined into all the words of love.

His purple dinosaur keychain and the fact that the plethora of messages you’ve delivered over moments of little nothings are now pushed back into the light, and made clear.

(Is this seat taken? you ask, much like he did in the days before.)

“All yours,” he says. (You answered.)

(All yours.)

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