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[mostlysignssomeportents]

Working class Dems who campaign on economics beat Trumpists in elections

I'm on tour with my new, nationally bestselling novel The Bezzle! Catch me FRIDAY NIGHT (Mar 22) in TORONTO, then SUNDAY (Mar 24) with LAURA POITRAS in NYC, then Anaheim, and more!

The Democratic Party Pizzaburger Theory of Electioneering is: half the electorate wants a pizza, the other half wants a burger, so we'll give them all a pizzaburger and make them all equally dissatisfied, thus winning the election:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/06/16/that-boy-aint-right/#dinos-rinos-and-dunnos

But no one wants a pizzaburger. The Biden administration's approach of letting the Warren/Sanders wing pick the antitrust enforcers while keeping judicial appointments in the Manchin-Synematic universe is a catastrophe in which progressive Dem regulators (who serve one term) are thwarted by corporatist Dem judges (who serve for life):

https://pluralistic.net/2023/07/14/making-good-trouble/#the-peoples-champion

The Democrats – like all parties in two-party systems – are a coalition; in this case, a "progressive" liberal-left coalition with liberals serving as senior partners, steering the party and setting its policies. These corporate dems like to color themselves as "neutral" technocrats with "realistic, apolitical" policies that represent what's best for the country:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/09/05/not-that-naomi/#if-the-naomi-be-klein-youre-doing-just-fine

This sets up the left wing of the party as the starry-eyed, unrealistic radicals whose policies are unpopular and will lose elections. But for a decade, grassroots-funded primary challenges have made it possible to test this theory, by putting leftist politicians on the ballot in front of voters, especially in tight races with far-right Republicans (that is, exactly the kinds of races that the corporate wing of the party says we can't afford to take chances on).

The 2022 midterms included enough races to start testing these theories – and, unlike traditional midterms, these races enjoyed high voter turnout, thanks to the unpopularity of GOP positions like abortion bans, book bans and anti-trans laws. Jacobin teamed up with the Center for Working-Class Politics, Yougov and the Center for Work and Democracy at ASU and analyzed those races:

https://images.jacobinmag.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/11134429/CWCP-Report-2024.pdf

Their conclusion: candidates from working-class backgrounds who campaigned on economic policies like high-quality jobs, higher minimum wages, a jobs guarantee, ending offshoring and outsourcing, building infrastructure and bringing manufacturing back to the US won with a 50% share of the vote in rural and working-class districts. Dems who didn't lost with a 35% share of the vote:

https://prospect.org/politics/2024-03-18-how-actually-existing-democrats-run-for-office/

In other words, in the kinds of districts where Trumpist politicians are beating Democrats, running on "left populist" policies beats Trumpist politicians.

That's the good news: if Dems recruit leftist, working class politicians and put them up for office on policies that address the material reality of voters' lives, they can beat fascist GOP candidates.

Now for the bad news: the Democratic establishment has no interest in getting these candidates onto the ballot. Working-class candidates, by definition, lack the networks of deep-pocketed cronies who can fund their primary campaigns. Only 2.3% of Dem candidates come from blue-collar backgrounds (if you include "pink-collar" professions like nursing and teaching, the number goes up to 5.9%):

https://jacobin.com/2024/03/left-populists-working-class-voters

All of this confirms the findings of Trump's Kryoptonite, an earlier Jacobin/CWCP research project that polled working-class voters on preferences for hypothetical candidates, finding that working-class candidates with economically progressive policies handily beat out Republicans, including MAGA Republicans:

https://images.jacobinmag.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/08125102/TrumpsKryptonite_Final_June2023.pdf

Since the Clinton-Blair years, "progressives" have abandoned economic populism ("It's not a burning ambition for me to make sure that David Beckham earns less money" -T. Blair) and pursued a "third way" that seeks to replace half the world's of supply white, male oligarchs with diverse oligarchs from a variety of backgrounds and genders. We were told that this was done in the name of winning elections with "modern" policies that replaced old-fashioned ideas about decent pay, decent jobs, and worker power.

These policies have delivered a genocide-riven world on the brink of several kinds of existential catastrophe. They're a failure. The pizzaburger party didn't deliver safety, nor prosperity – and it also can't deliver elections.

Name your price for 18 of my DRM-free ebooks and support the Electronic Frontier Foundation with the Humble Cory Doctorow Bundle.

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/03/20/actual-material-conditions/#bread-and-butter

[jaylver]

WIN ONE WIN ME — L.HS

SYNOPSIS: who knew being angry and impulsive can get the captain of the hockey team to notice you? cussing them out when they were losing wasn't the best idea, but it definitely made lee heeseung's head turn, leading to him making a deal with you to win a game in order to get your number. but that wasn't enough for him, he was determined to make you his.

PAIRINGS: ice hockey player!heeseung x afab!reader

GENRE: strangers to lovers, college sports au, romance

WARNING(S): profanities, violence (fight), suggestive content (no smut), heeseung is a retired fuckboy turned good + y/n is a party goer, drinking, partying, jake being a footballer aka a soccer player ( NOT american football )

WC: 14k

AUTHOR'S NOTE: aaaa it's finally here ! hope y'all enjoyed it and PLEASE let me know how it was, give me some feedbacks and thoughts, it's been A LONGG WHILE since i've been writing so i'm worried i'll be crusty. anyway, enjoy !

part 1 of 'no competition' series | series masterlist | masterlist

© jaylver 2023 all rights reserved.

“I'M SO NOT HAVING FUN ANYMORE,”

Friday nights were always preoccupied by hockey and hockey only. It has never changed ever since Yunjin, your best friend, gave you an introduction to the school’s ice hockey team. Being the massive sports fan you were, you obviously got hooked on watching their games live. But there were downsides to being a fan which includes witnessing the team losing.

You swore you were already in a foul mood that day, courtesy to your professor and shitty customers, you found yourself seeking solace in the hockey game, which turned sour almost instantly. Just your luck for the day, huh?

“It’s just the first period, Y/N,” Yunjin sighed, glancing up at the jumbotron, wincing a little at the scoreline. They were currently 3 goals down and Yunjin's reassurance didn't help at all.

“I suppose so,” you replied glumly.

The second period rolled by in a flash, but there wasn’t much of a positive outcome either. The team managed to score two goals, but the opponents out performed them and scored one more goal, continuing their lead.

You groaned loudly, along with many other disappointed students. 15 minutes of intermission ended rather quickly, bringing everyone back to reality.

“Oh come on, score already!” you shouted out in irritation, stirring other students to yell out in agreement as well.

The game was going slow and your patience was eventually growing thin. The clock was ticking, meaning the game was about to end soon with the team losing tragically. You shook your head in defeat, wrapping an arm around Yunjin’s shoulder and placing the other on your hip.

“For fuck’s sake, score already, idiots!” you yelled out.

Just when you did so, someone skated by, his head turned to look at you, meeting your eyes for only a brief second before disappearing into a sea of hockey players. You blinked. Did that just happen? You whipped your head to find Yunjin staring back at you, as if asking the same question.

“Did–”

“That–”

The two of you paused.

“Yeah,” you both said in unison, returning your attention back to the game.

As expected, the game unfortunately ended with a defeat for the home team. You and Yunjin decided to leave the arena immediately since it was already getting late, but you two also made sure to have a quick stop at the cafeteria to get some pizza before continuing the journey back to the dorms.

“I heard someone’s throwing a party soon,” Yunjin said through a mouth full of pepperoni pizza.

“Who is that ‘someone’?” you wiped your hand clean of pizza grease, then threw yourself on Yunjin’s bed, causing her to let out a grunt.

“That made me choke and I would’ve died. I don’t want my cause of death to be something related to pizza,” she grumbled, closing the pizza lid and taking the napkin you handed her.

“I thought you loved pizza?” you blinked innocently, flashing her your best smile and she threw you a dirty look.

“Think we got a little side tracked,” Yunjin mumbled thoughtfully. “If I’m not wrong, it was by one of those football chads? Was it Jake?”

“Jake might play football but he’s so not a chad,” you argued, unknowingly defending said boy.

Jake sim was, in fact, another popular athlete in your school who unsurprisingly turned out to be another playboy. You remembered the small heartbreak you had when you discovered his true identity, secretly wishing he was like any other non-fuckboy guy in the campus. But life’s unfair sometimes and somehow, that didn’t stop you from being acquainted with that golden retriever-like boy.

“You’re only saying that because he gives you free booze and free passes to football games,” Yunjin raised an eyebrow at you and you feigned ignorance. “Anyway, I think it’s that Yeonjun guy who’s throwing that party. He’s that rich kid, remember?”

“Yeah, I do. I saw him multiple times at games,”

“Didn’t he flirt with you?”

“Correction, he tried. Luckily Jake was there to stop him or else I would’ve given him a black eye,” you frowned.

“Would’ve loved to see that happen,” Yunjin shrugged while you narrowed your eyes at her.

“You’re praying on my downfall,”

“Never. Also, are we going to talk about that hockey player staring deeply into your soul just now?”

You rolled your eyes at her words. “I don’t think I would count 2 seconds anything—”

“Of course it does! Have you seen those love at first sight tropes in romcoms?”

“I think you watched too many of them, Jen,” you squeezed her cheek and she slapped your hand, deadpanning at you. “Who is he anyway?”

“If I’m not wrong, he’s number one, Lee Heeseung, the captain. I think he’s in your English class too? Ring a bell?” Yunjin raised an eyebrow at you.

“I think I do remember him. He’s the one with fangirls lining outside, right?” Yunjin nodded at your words and you laughed, thinking back to the time where your professor had to chase a group of girls away before class started. Why? Because of Lee Heeseung’s sheer presence.

“Let’s not forget his messy hookups. Yikes,” Yunjin shuddered at the thought, suddenly rubbing her chin with a small frown. “Don’t you think we’re a bit uneducated when it comes to their players?”

“I mean,” you hummed, nodding a little. “I guess you’re right, we’re always there for the game and some beers and we barely bothered to find out which player is which,”

“We should pull up their Instagram profiles next game,” Yunjin suggested with a wink.

“Oh, I think you’ll definitely be on it,”

“Obviously,” Yunjin smirked. “Anyway, up for a facemask?”

You huffed, a small smile appearing on your face. “You know I wouldn’t say no to that.”

“THIS IS SUCH A TYPICAL CHAD THROWN KIND OF PARTY,”

You found yourself complaining once more as you and Yunjin entered a big house. The living room was basically filled to the brim, along with loud music booming throughout the room and the smell of alcohol invaded your nostrils, this was pure hell. You turned to look at your best friend, silently cursing at her for bringing you here. Yunjin gave you her typical shrug as though she had read your thoughts, dragging you away from the vicinity.

"It's Yeonjun, what did you expect," Yunjin hissed, taking you further into the house.

"I also can’t believe you put me in this slutty dress,” you groaned. At this point, you were practically pulling your dress down every ten seconds from the way it kept riding up and you started getting beyond irritated by it.

“If not, you’ll turn up in your casual crop tops and denim shorts,” she shook her head in disapproval. “I can’t let that happen, not when there's rich guys here,”

"I'm here for a party, not to choose my next rich bachelor," you said in distaste, the last thing you wanted was a frat boy. “So, what are we going to do now?” you asked, holding tightly onto Yunjin’s hand as if your life depended on it.

“Enjoy ourselves, duh? I’ll go get some drinks. Sprite for you?”

You nodded, a little bummed out that you were missing out on some good booze since somebody, aka you, had to be responsible and drive back to the dorms without risking getting pulled over. You were already a broke college student, a fine would definitely not help your case.

Now here you are, stuck helplessly in the middle of a party with people you don’t know. Great. You thought about the possibilities that could've been if you decided to stay at home instead of leaning against a wall in a skimpy black dress and it had you groaning internally.

It was then the universe had heard your pleas of boredom and decided on some ‘fun’, except that ‘fun’ consisted of someone’s back bumping into you and their drink splattering all over onto your dress. You jumped in surprise and the boy who was practically pushed onto you had let out a small “oof” before fully realising what he had done.

“I’m so sorry,” he placed his cup aside and picked up some napkins from a table nearby. For a split moment, he was about to wipe your dress, then he paused, turning flustered when he realised what he was about to do, and instead, handed the napkins to you.

You gently dabbed the napkins on your soaked dress, a frown on your face as you felt the sticky substance stick to your skin uncomfortably. “It’s fine, you didn’t mean it anyway,”

You looked up from your dress, finally meeting his eyes. He blinked, seemingly trying to register who you were.

“It’s … you,”

“Me?” you pointed at yourself, a little dumbfounded at his words.

“I didn’t expect you to be here,”

That’s when it hit you. The very same eyes that stared back at you during the hockey game, the one that Yunjin had told you about. “Lee Heeseung?”

He resembled a bambi, his large innocent brown eyes gazing back at you, a look of curiosity behind them. He had a tall stature, his hair covering his forehead and it was styled plainly, not to mention his loosely buttoned up shirt clinging comfortably onto his frame. Now you understand why Yunjin said he has fangirls, you were shamefully about to be one too.

“Yeah … that’s me. What about you? Why’re you here?”

“Do you … recognize me?” you cringed a little at the memory of you practically cussing his team out, praying he would somehow forget it all.

“How could I not? You’re from English right? Shakespeare presentation, eh?” Heeseung recalled and you nodded, impressed that he remembered something from so long before, but most importantly, he remembered you.

“But of course, how could I forget, you’re also the person cussing us out on Friday too. I’m charmed, actually,” he chuckled nonchalantly as though it was nothing, but you, on the other hand, panicked a little and eyes only widened in a mix of horror and embarrassment.

Heeseung seemed to notice the panic in your eyes, waving his hands in reassurance. “Don’t worry though, I thought it was funny,” At his words, your shoulders relaxed, breathing out a sigh of relief.

You let out a nervous laugh. “You guys did your best. There’s always a next time,”

“Right,” he nodded, then averted his gaze back to your dress, instantly coming back to reality as he remembered the current problem in front of his face. He removed his jacket in a flash, carefully placing it over your shoulders. The sudden proximity had you gasping quietly, the waft of his cologne infiltrating your senses.

He was close, so so agonisingly close. A wave of shock passed through your body as you felt his gentle touch, almost feather-like as it lasted only just a second, but now with his hugging your body, you could finally breathe an air of comfort once warmth engulfed you.

“Sorry about your dress,” he pulled away, flashing you a genuine apologetic smile. “I thought the least I could do was give you my jacket,”

“No worries, you didn't do it on purpose anyway, it’s not your fault,” you assured him, being a little self aware that numerous wandering eyes were now on you and the campus’ popular hockey team captain. You felt like a deer caught in the headlights.

“Actually,” Heeseung started, “I can borrow one of my friend’s shirts so that you can change? I don’t think it’s a good idea walking around like that, plus my friend lives in this frat house anyway,”

“If you insist,” you gave in, not wanting to reject his help as he seemed so keen.

You silently followed Heeseung through the crowd of bodies, trying your hardest to not get swallowed with the way people were shoving around. Heeseung noticed you lagging behind and smoothly took hold of your hand, pulling you closer to him. You didn’t say much, letting him guide you up the stairs into someone’s room.

You glanced around the room. From the way it was decorated with random posters, sports magazines stacked on the bedside table and dirty clothes littered the floor, you were instantly convinced that this room belonged to a frat boy.

Heeseung surprisingly continued to keep his hand in yours, using the other to dig through a pile of clothes until he found an oversize shirt and a pair of pants. “Here,” he handed you the clothes, finally letting go of your hand, stepping away with his hands in his pockets. “I think all the bathroom’s full so it’s best to just change here,”

“You think so?”

“I know so, I’ll leave it up to your imagination to think about whatever that happens in there,”

“Right …” you faltered at his comment, the two of you remained staring at one another. That’s when you cleared your throat, fumbling with your clothes. “I would appreciate it if you turned around … unless you want a show?”

“For free? I can't say no, can I?”

“You wish. Now turn around,”

Heeseung shrugged, a mischievous grin on his face as he threw his hands up in defence and faced away. You stood behind him, cheeks flared while you practically yanked your skimpy black dress off. Yunjin would not be happy knowing she’ll have to do laundry.

You reached over to the back of your dress, practically yanking forcefully onto the zip that was unwilling to budge even for a bit. God, why me? Why now? Internally conflicted, you didn’t know whether to bear the shame and ask Heeseung for help or to just stay silent. But to your luck, the zip was stuck no matter how you pulled it.

“Heeseung?”

He hummed in response.

“I need your help,” you swallowed, trying your best to not shrivel up and dig a grave in that moment. “My zip is stuck.”

Momentary silence filled the air. It seemed Heeseung, too, was having some internal conflict. In a second, you heard shuffling behind you, feeling the warmth of his body close as his fingers reached for your zip, his other hand on your waist. You felt his fingertips grazing against your bare skin as he dragged the zipper down, hearing a faint gulp from him. You squeezed your eyes shut, swearing to never come to parties again.

“You’re good to go,” he whispered, coughing awkwardly.

“Thanks,” you met his eyes in the reflection of the small mirror placed on top of a dresser in front of you. Realisation seemed to hit him and he averted his gaze, taking a look around the room instead.

You practically yanked the dress off, pulling the shirt over your head and the pants on, stumbling a little from the sudden hit of nervousness. Could it be his presence that made you nervous? You hated this feeling.

“I’m done,” you declared, suddenly feeling the tension in the air.

“So, I can look now?” Heeseung joked and you rolled your eyes, but smiled at him.

“Keep your eyes closed forever then,” you bumped his shoulder, sitting down on the bed.

“Should we stay here instead?” he suggested and you narrowed your eyes at him in suspicion, to which he scoffed. “Of course no funny business, who do you think I am?”

“Playboy Lee Heeseung, no?”

He groaned. “That’s what people think of me even though it’s completely false,”

“You do have fangirls, don’t you?”

“But I don’t date them, do I?” he retorted. “I don’t even go to parties much these days, coach has been up my ass,”

“Sucks to be you,”

Heeseung scoffed, turning to look at you with a question in mind. “You’re a big hockey fan?”

“Ever since I was a kid. Why?”

“I notice you’re always there every game night with your friend,”

“So, I’ve caught your attention?”

“A pretty girl like you surely wouldn’t go unnoticed in my eyes,” he was close now, a challenging glint in his eyes as his gaze fell to your lips from time to time.

“You’re funny, Hee,” you couldn’t resist smiling.

“How can I make it up to you?” his eyes met yours, a sly grin on his face. “About your dress, I mean,”

You had to stop yourself from rolling your eyes, knowing damn well what lies in his words. Maybe he was just like every other campus athlete, but at that moment, you didn’t seem to care, your interest only increasing and you couldn’t tell if this was his plan all along.

You thought about his question for a moment, pursing your lip. “How about you win the next game? I think that’ll help a lot,”

Heeseung nodded thoughtfully. “If I do, can I get your number too?”

“Why not?”

“Shall this be a deal?” he smirked, ready for a challenge.

“Sure,” you shrugged nonchalantly.

“I’ll win the next one, just you wait,” Heeseung's words were filled with utter determination and confidence. He was definitely ready to tell you 'told you so' and prove you wrong.

“Well, I’ll be waiting,” you glanced down at your phone, noticing over ten messages from Yunjin. Shit. “The clock’s ticking and I need to go. See you, captain,”

“Wait,” he caught hold of your wrist, stopping you in your tracks. You turned to look at him, a big question mark written over your expression, anticipating his next words. “Can I at least know what your name is?”

You grinned. “It’s Y/N,”

"Get ready with your phone number, Y/N. I'll be looking out for you at the next game. Keep the jacket too," he winked and you waved a small goodbye, exiting out the door and dashed down the stairs with your dirty clothes in hand, wearing Heeseung's jacket, completely unaware how quick your heart was beating.

When you spotted Yunjin, you practically fell into her arms as she started ranting about why you shouldn’t run away without her knowledge, but all of it eventually drowned out into white noise. The only thing you could think of suddenly was Heeseung. Lee fucking Heeseung.

"Y/N," she sang out your name, tapping your head to catch your attention. “Why are you in a different outfit? You got laid didn’t you?” she gasped and you slapped her arm.

“Heeseung spilled a drink on me and took me to his friend’s room to change, that’s all,”

“Heeseung?” she gasped again, a teasing grin slowly forming and you knew that trouble was in that mind of hers. “You and him didn’t smoochy smooch … right?”

“We’re not there yet, hello?”

“There’s something called a hook up, you hopeless romantic,” Yunjin shook her head. “This sounds like the start of a hockey romance based on the books I've read," she squealed and you only sighed.

"Please read some self help books too,"

"Never," she huffed, leaning in and dropping her voice so that only the two of you could hear what she was about to say. "What did you two talk about? A private hook up after games? We need some spice in your hockey romance plot!"

"Oh my god, I rather drown than fuck that man. You do realise he has fangirls chasing after him? They'll choke me in my sleep if I slept with him,"

Yunjin wrapped her arm around you. "I'll choke you first if you don't bag that man. He's tall, hockey captain, hot most importantly," she winked. "One down part is that I'm pretty sure he used to fuck around quite a lot too. But then a messy hook up traumatised him,"

"How so?"

"She was crazy from what I heard. That's why no fangirls will come at you for revenge, they know he's a whore, but they'll just line up instead," she led you out to a flight of stairs, where there were some questionable couples making out, but that didn't stop you and Yunjin from sitting on the landing.

"Totally not a red flag," you said sarcastically. "I don't know how to feel about him. He was nice, quite flirty. Maybe he's like those Wattpad cliches where he's actually a nice guy?" You said, sipping onto the drink Yunjin got you.

"Who knows? Judging from the past rumours I've heard here and there, he definitely was a manwhore, but he’s also a sweet and genuine one," Yunjin clicked her tongue. "I did hear he's quite a sweetheart aside from his fuckboy tendencies."

"A manwhore with a kind heart! Just my type!" You clapped your hands and Yunjin chuckled at your comment. “Anyway, I swore I'm done with hockey boys a long time ago. I don't want to like him,"

Ice hockey has always been one of your favourite sports, but hockey boys? They were a whole different story for you. A core memory from highschool that you wished to never revisit was the fact that you had your heart broken by a hockey boy. He was considered your first love, a best friend, that ended up breaking your trust.

"This is why you should date a footballer,"

You snapped out of your momentary daze, looking up to meet Jake Sim’s eyes.

“Present to me a perfect candidate then,” Yunjin crossed her arms, frowning at Jake. She wasn't a big fan of him, considering his notorious playboy tendencies, but over time he did gradually warm up to her.

"Me!"

"I'll rip your head off first before you get a chance with Y/N,"

"Ouch,"

You and Yunjin shared a look, then burst out laughing.

"What's up, Sim? Do you have something for me?" You questioned Jake, wondering what his purpose was for his sudden appearance.

"Nothing, I'm just bored," he said plainly, though you and Yunjin were a little unconvinced.

"Okay? Any games coming up?"

"It's currently a short break for us. I'm glad or else my legs will snap in half soon," Jake pouted, resembling a puppy, which you couldn't help but find endearing. "You should totally come and learn to kick some footballs soon. Jake Sim is always up for some training," he winked.

"I'll be the next running candidate to take over Messi, right?" Yunjin joked and you nudged her side, giggling.

"Only if you learn at Jake Sim's personal training," he shrugged, a small smirk on his face. "Anyway, I really want to watch the hockey team and I heard you guys were regulars. Mind if I join?"

You raised an eyebrow at Yunjin, shooting her a wordless question. Yunjin scrunched her nose, thinking for a moment before shrugging. All while that was happening, Jake was just standing there staring, a little unimpressed.

"Hello? I don't appreciate this mind linking conversation that I'm not a part of," he placed his hands on his hips, his head tilted to the side.

"Alright, sorry," Yunjin mumbled.

"Fine, you can tag along," you said, watching the boy before you grin.

"Let's go!"

"IS IT NORMAL TO BE FREEZING COLD HERE?"

Jake had his arms around himself, shivering slightly even though he was already in layers. You and Yunjin followed the boy to your seats as he marvelled at the size of the rink.

"I barely watch hockey games, I'm more of a summer sports kinda guy," he tucked his hands into his jacket pockets.

"Well, it's just your lucky day, you'll be witnessing a win too," Yunjin winked, passing you a knowing glance.

"How do you know?"

"Team captain over there–" Yunjin nodded over at Heeseung, who was practising on the rink with the team, looking good as always, which only further annoyed you. "–made a deal with Y/N. I'm sure his determination will mix well with his competitiveness,"

Yunjin glanced over at you, a small smirk on her face. "And here he comes," she sang and you whipped your head just in time to meet his eyes.

Heeseung skated over, a small smile on his face. You felt Yunjin nudging your side in excitement and you slapped her hands away, ignoring her giddy expression and you returned a lopsided smile to Heeseung.

“Y/N!” you managed to hear his muffled voice through the glass, which he tapped on a couple times to get your full attention.

“I’m going to score one for you tonight,” you were surprised with the determined glint in his eyes, proving Yunjin's statement immediately, and after a quick wave from him, he skated away to join his team, preparing for the game to start.

Jake whistled, fanning himself. “I definitely felt the tension.”

“Shut up.”

The second period ended with a draw, both teams were not willing to back down for just a little, even creating small brawls on ice from time to time, causing the tension to be heightened. The third period was equally heart stopping and gut twisting. You had to occasionally grip Yunjin's arm whenever there was a close chance to score.

There was a sudden switch in the atmosphere, the home team had dominated possession of the puck, the blades of their skates working overtime trying to reach the other end to the opponent’s goal post. One hit after another, the puck travelled from one player’s hockey stick to another, until it reached star player Park Sunghoon, who had defenders swarming him and it left him no choice but to pass to his captain, Lee Heeseung.

With one swift hit to the oncoming puck from Sunghoon, it shot into the back of the net, leaving the goalie absolutely defenceless. The arena erupted with shouts and cheers, not expecting the sudden turnover from their home team, the speakers were blaring music, followed by announcing Heeseung’s name, which was welcomed with deafening screams. Shamelessly, you, Jake and Yunjin were part of the screams, clapping and jumping.

The team jumped onto Heeseung, but somehow, he escaped them all and started skating towards your direction, pointing his stick at you and shooting a wink. 'For you' he mouthed slyly at you before rejoining his teammates.

“See, I told you Heeseung will win it for Y/N,” Yunjin said, seemingly pleased.

“MVP,” Jake clapped, a shocked expression on his face.

You, on the other hand, were trying to digest everything that just happened. The moment where he dedicated the goal to you had you unintentionally blushing, realising a sudden change in feelings. Maybe, just maybe, he wouldn’t be so bad if you gave him a chance. Countless thoughts swarmed your head even until the end of the game.

Now, here you were, waiting for Heeseung at the parking lot, your friends peeking in the car from a distance.

Yunjin shot you an encouraging thumbs up while Jake only laughed at Yunjin’s efforts. You glared at them, waving them off and you reciprocated back with a middle finger. That’s when you heard a rough cough behind you. Fuck.

“Y/N?”

You turned around slowly, looking as though you were just caught in the middle of commiting something you're not supposed to. “Heeseung,” you laughed nervously. "Congrats on the game! You played well,”

“Thank you,” Heeseung grinned. “I’m glad you came. I mean, you always do, what am I even saying?” he rambled, scratching the back of his neck in embarrassment.

You couldn't help laughing, finding the way he got nervous was cute. He was cute too. Undeniable. "That was a nice goal by the way,"

"Well, I did say I wanted to score one specifically for you. I'm a man of my words, you know?" He chuckled, getting shy eventually. "I'm glad you liked it though,"

"Of course I did," you gave him a small smile, fidgeting your fingers slightly.

He straightened up, regaining his composure. “So … our deal,”

“You’re lucky I like you enough to actually stick to it,” you grumbled, shoving your hand into your pocket to dig out the piece of paper.

“You like me, huh?”

“Not in that way yet,”

“‘Yet’. So I do have a chance. I’m happy to know,”

“Do you want my number or a black eye?” you threatened rather unseriously, a teasing tone laced in your words.

“I’d prefer a kiss, but your number shall do for now,” he grabbed the small note from your hand, unwrapping it to find a candy in it. “Apple flavoured, what a nice surprise,” he mumbled under his breath.

“You’re cute, you truly have a way to my heart huh?” he looked up from the candy, storing away your number safely into his pocket.

You caught yourself speechless from his words. On average, you were typically unfazed by these comments. Countless boys had tried them on you and all of them turned out to feel icky instead of making you kick your feet, giggling. But this time, Heeseung proved you wrong.

"Coming from Lee Heeseung himself, should I be flattered?" You tried your best to stay nonchalant, keeping your heart rate down as much as you can.

"I don't know? You tell me," Heeseung leaned down, his face close to you now, making you slowly grow flustered.

"Count me a little flattered," you took the clothes from the other night from your bag, pushing it into Heeseung's hands, catching him off guard. "Here, relay my thanks to your friend,"

"Only to my friend? What about me?" Heeseung crossed his arms, staring accusingly at you.

"My number already counts as a ‘thanks’, doesn’t it?"

Heeseung narrowed his eyes at you, a smile itching at the corner of his lips. “Not enough. A date might suffice,”

“You are demanding, Lee Heeseung,” you huffed, but not rejecting his suggestion either.

“I’ll text you, pretty girl. I have a plan in mind, so you better clear your schedules,”

“Alright, captain.”

“FOR ONCE, I DON'T REGRET COMING TO A PARTY YOU SELECTED,”

You’ve always avoided frat parties, specifically frat boys, but this time, Yunjin managed to accomplish the unexpected by convincing you to a frat party. You had to admit, there was a small motive behind your agreement, which was to visit the richest frat house on the campus. Free expensive booze, a big pool, big everything, it was definitely going to be more than a party. All you had to do was avoid the frat boys and your night shall be made.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Yunjin snapped, but you were too busy checking out the vicinity to listen to her grumbles.

“They have a huge ass yard and pool,” you whispered to Yunjin, weaving through the growing crowd. The house was too extravagant, even the air in there seemed richer. The tiles were completely marbled, there were stairs leading up to almost four floors. You wondered how it was even owned by a frat.

“This is a rich frat, what did you expect?”

“Touche.”

You and Yunjin didn’t bother waiting for a second before taking some pregame shots. The vodka burned your throat, making you wince a little, but it didn't stop you from more. The moment Jake found the two of you, it was already clear you were already on the way to being completely shit-faced.

"Oh come on, you already started without me?" Jake whined, downing two shots of vodka straight.

"Couldn't resist," Yunjin pressed her lips into a thin line, shrugging slightly.

"Also, did you guys hear?" Jake leaned in, dropping his voice. "The hockey team from our rival school is coming to this party,"

"What?" You hissed, frowning slightly. "Who invited their asses?"

"I don't know," Jake shrugged, picking up another glass of alcohol from a tray.

"Speaking of hockey," Yunjin cleared her throat, passing you a knowing smirk. "Aren't you going to find Heeseung?"

"I–why would I?" You stammard, avoiding Yunjin's piercing gaze.

"He's clearly into you. Didn't you see him pulling that stunt that day? Scoring a goal for you and winning just for your number? That's the most commitment I've seen from him or just any man in general,"

"Hear hear," Jake raised his glass in agreement, then proceeded to down it without a second thought.

"I'll see what happens tonight," you said, but your eyes decided to go against you, unconsciously scanning the room hoping to see him.

"Tonight will be full of opportunities," Yunjin marvelled, throwing her arm around your shoulder and winking. "If you know what I mean," she whispered.

"The first you'll see is me getting drunk, not getting laid," you let out an exasperated sigh, pursing your lips and pausing as something caught your eyes. You furrowed your eyebrows, instantly noticing a group of guys filing into the room. They must be the rival team Jake had mentioned.

“Must be them,” Yunjin pointed out, taking a big gulp from her cup. Jake whipped his head around, scanning the group of guys that were yelling loudly, dabbing up one another and seemingly unlikeable as a whole.

He made a sour expression. “Great, hockey jocks,”

“As though your group of football guys are any better,” Yunjin quipped, only earning a sharp glare from Jake and he cleared his throat, gaze focused on a specific person.

“That guy there must be their captain,” he nodded at the group and you had to squint your eyes to see who Jake had his attention trained at. Almost immediately, your smile dropped, along with your heart. It was him.

You froze the moment your eyes landed on a tall figure, it definitely was him. He stood out from the rest, being the taller and bulkier one with messy hair and undeniable charm from the way he was already surrounded by different girls. Yup, that’s 100% Matthew, your high school lover, the hockey boy that traumatised your love life.

“Oh fuck me,” you cursed under your breath, the other two turning to stare at you.

“You want to fuck him?” Jake shrieked in surprise and Yunjin slapped the back of his head, causing the boy to hiss in pain, silently cursing.

“No, dipshit. That’s her …” she glanced at you and you nodded, giving her a green flag to continue, “ex.”

“Him? Matthew Son? Your ex?” Jake was flabbergasted, panning back and forth between your ex and you.

“Unfortunately. High school ex, to be exact,” you grumbled, pushing away the ill thoughts and bitter feelings that lingered for Mathew. You were a new person, you were never someone to be stuck in the past, you weren’t about to be affected by him. Never.

“I might need more drinks,” you rubbed the side of your head, slipping away before the other two could even say anything. Though the voice in your head was constantly affirming that his presence wasn’t affecting you, you still couldn’t help feeling unnerved. Seeing him was unnerving too.

The kitchen was unsurprisingly glamorous and the space was huge. Everything in there screamed fancy and expensive. The counter was made from marble, cupboards were also probably made from high quality wood and the wide variety of food in there could literally make it resemble a grocery store. Best of yet, you had it all to yourself. For once, your ex made himself useful enough by helping you attract everyone to the main room.

You spotted some leftover bottles of gin and decided to give your bartender skills some try. It wasn’t your first rodeo thanks to Yunjin. Ever since she started bringing you to parties and being someone who’s easily impressed, you found yourself learning some tips and tricks on how to mix drinks from a rando in a party one day. Soon, it became your favourite party activity.

It was quite peaceful being all by yourself. The songs playing on the speakers reverberated across the house, but you didn’t mind it as you mixed a concoction of gin and juice on the counter, praying it would turn out fine.

“You’re here?”

You turned around at the sound of the voice, almost toppling over your glass in shock, but the moment you met a familiar set of doe eyes, you released a breath of relief, your heart unknowingly beating faster.

“You’re here too? I thought no parties for Mr Hockey?” you leaned back onto the counter as he walked to your side.

“Thought I’d give myself an off day after yesterday’s win,” Heeseung shrugged, glancing at you from time to time. “Surprisingly, I always see you at every party I go to,”

“I was dragged to every said party by force,” you thought of the she-devil, Yunjin, who somehow successfully convinced you to attend every party with her. “Do you want a drink?” you offered, nodding towards your half made drink.

“You’re making them?” Heeseung eyed the bottles.

“I am a woman of many talents,” you said smugly, continuing your drink mixing, feeling Heeseung’s piercing stare on you.

“A woman who wouldn’t poison me right?” he peeked over your shoulder, closing in on your face, his body only inches away from yours till the point where you could feel the heat radiating off him. Lee Heeseung definitely knew what he was doing.

“You’re doubting my abilities now then?” you kept your cool, pouring alcohol into a new glass for Heeseung.

He smiled. “Just trying to make sure,” he murmured into your ears and you could tell he was enjoying teasing you. Sly fucker.

“No promises,” your voice came out in a whisper, turning a little to the side to meet his pair of bambi eyes and your breath hitched suddenly upon realising how close the two of you were, you were only an inch apart from touching each other’s noses. You were scared to move even the slightest, shying gradually from his eyes sweeping your features.

“What if I said I wanted to kiss you,”

You scoffed, growing immune to his charms. “I thought you were a gentleman, Lee? No candlelit dinner first?”

He cracked a grin, chuckling slightly. “Sometimes I skip that part and jump to dessert first,” he winked and you rolled your eyes, pushing his face away and he burst out laughing. “I’m playing with you. I’m obviously a gentleman, can’t you tell?”

You hummed, raising an eyebrow at him in scepticism. “I can’t.”

“You love breaking my heart, Y/N. I’m hurt,” he frowns, feigning innocence as he laid his head on your shoulder, clutching at his chest and you found yourself smiling unknowingly at his dramatics.

You decided to play along, patting Heeseung’s head in so called “comfort”. “Oh, what can I do to fix your broken heart, Heeseung?” you exclaimed.

“Come to Jay’s birthday party with me?” he stared up at you with pleading eyes. Those bambi eyes will eventually be the death of you.

"Why?"

You've heard of Jay Park one too many times. From the campus cafes to the local club, he was everywhere, and you didn't know if that was a good or bad thing. He was another one of the popular hockey players from Heeseung's team which you've seen at almost every party you attended ever since your first year.

Yunjin told you only one thing upon seeing Jay Park: "don't meddle with him" and you've stuck to it.

"That's a bold invitation," you considered for a moment, still quite unconvinced. "Isn't it just a bro only party?"

"He's the one asking us to bring a plus one," Heeseung huffed, removing his head from your shoulder, a small pout on his face. "Worse part is that it's in a club,"

"Are you trying to persuade me or dissuade me?"

"What I mean is, I'll be with you there. It's also a VIP lounge given how loaded Jay is and knowing him, he probably rented it out too. Plus, they'll finally get to meet the girl who cussed them out!"

You buried your head into your hands in shame, embarrassment burning your cheeks red. "You can't be serious,"

"Unfortunately, I am. But they'll love you, don't worry, pretty,"

You glared at him while he only returned a cheeky grin back at you. “Fine,” you groaned out, ultimately succumbing to his words, unable to deny the effect he had on you. Curse him. “When and what time?”

“Next Saturday night,” his grin widened at your words, satisfaction washed over his face. “I’ll pick you up at 7?”

“Sounds good,”

“That’s that then,” he glanced over at his shoulders, hearing faint shouts of his name outside of the kitchen and passed you an apologetic smile, as if expressing that it was a shame he couldn’t stay longer and you couldn’t lie, you wanted him to stay longer. “Remember to send me your address, gorgeous.” he waved his phone in the air before backing away and disappearing out the door.

It was about to be a long week ahead.

“SET ME UP WITH ONE OF THEM, PLEASE. I NEED THE MONEY,”

Saturday, to your dismay, unfortunately and eventually arrived. You didn’t know whether to be excited or absolutely dread the party, a certain feeling of anxiety clawing at your insides just when you think about meeting new people. Yunjin could only roll her eyes at you as she added more eyeshadow.

“It already sends shivers down my spine thinking that I’ll be speaking to them in person and you expect me to go ‘hey guys, my friend needs someone to be her sugar daddy, you up’?” you deadpanned, applying a layer of lip gloss.

“That’s exactly it,” Yunjin smiled pleasantly and you feigned gagging, making Yunjin laugh and almost poking the mascara wand into your eyes. “Also, do you consider this a date?”

“He did say he wanted to take me out, but having him take me to a club as a date? I don’t think he’s the sleazy type to do so. I take it as him taking me as his date … like a friendly invite,”

“Friendly invite?” Yunjin exclaimed incredulously, inching closer to check on the details of your makeup. “Did you see the way he looks at you? There's nothing friendly about that, he’s hooked,”

“You’re giving me false hope, Jen,” you sighed, standing up to change into an outfit Yunjin picked which, in her words,was definitely ‘life changing enough to have Heeseung on his knees’.

“Not false hope if it’s literally just the truth,” Yunjin shrugged, helping to clasp a necklace around your neck. “Come on, give me a twirl,” she squealed excitedly once you were done struggling balancing on one leg putting on the dress and shoes.

You complied with Yunjin’s request, begrudgingly giving her a small twirl. At the same time, you took the chance to glance down at your dress, satisfied that for once an impulsive purchase benefited you. The dress was a shade of midnight blue, hugging your body tight and showing off your curves in the best way as if it was custom made. All in all, as Yunjin would describe, it was simply ‘pants dropping’.

At the ‘ping’ of your notification, you saw a text from Heeseung saying he had already arrived and your heart jumped. With one swift hug from Yunjin and an ‘encouraging’ saying along the lines of ‘hooking up’ and ‘protection’, you were pushed out of the door and soon into Heeseung’s car.

“Hi, pretty girl,” Heeseung greeted, a half smile on his face as his hands rested on the steering wheel. He paused when his eyes landed on your figure, his gaze sweeping you from top to bottom, making you a little self conscious. He whistled under his breath, blinking slowly.

“Eyes up here,” you stared pointedly at him, crossing your arms, but you had to admit, you were checking him out shamelessly as well, the smell of his vanilla cologne in the air and his loose button up shirt wasn’t helping either.

“My bad. I was just admiring you. You look pretty,” he turned his attention back to the road, heading to wherever the club was located, just in time to not notice the slight blush to your cheeks.

“Really? You don’t look too bad yourself either, Lee,”

“Why thank you. I’m flattered,” he shot you a wink and you could only roll your eyes at his antics.

The rest of the conversation continued in a casual flow, making you feel at ease and your anxiety eventually lessened. The jokes he cracked made you laugh and with the way he answered your questions, you knew he wasn’t anything like the playboy people made him up to be. As much as you hated to admit, you were giving him the benefit of the doubt. Will it hurt you? Maybe.

After Heeseung pulled the car into park, you got out and you were instantly in awe at the exterior of the club. This was in fact a place where rich kids party, judging from the amount of ferraris, mercedes and other luxurious cars parked outside, you made sure to keep yourself away from the snobby rich kids or who knows, Yunjin’s wish might even be granted tonight.

Wordlessly, Heeseung offered you his hand and you intertwined your fingers with his, letting him guide you further into the club as you pushed yourself through the crowd, and soon arrived in a large room that was almost the size of someone’s living room. “You’re kidding,” you murmured, amazed by the size of the room and the decorations littered across every wall.

“Told you Jay was blessed with money,” he leaned down to whisper in your ear, shooting a sweet smile.

“I should set him up with Yunjin,” you said thoughtlessly and Heeseung chuckled.

“He’ll like that roommate of yours,”

“Heeseung!”

You were interrupted by an approaching figure who was easily recognizable with that head of freshly dyed white hair. Park Sunghoon, another ace of the hockey team. Thanks to Yunjin’s valiant effort in finding every player’s instagram profile, you were now able to recognise who was who.

“Hoon!” Heeseung greeted back, giving his best friend a side hug.

Unfortunately for you, Sunghoon was quick to turn his attention to you instead. “Y/N right? Heard many good things about you,” he extended his hand, a sneaky grin on his face.

You accepted his handshake, fighting the urge to roll your eyes at his words. “That’s me,”

“You’re a regular at the hockey games, how are they?” Sunghoon kept you company now that Heeseung went away to greet the others, but you didn’t mind, finding yourself growing comfortable with the Jack Frost look alike.

“Do you wish to listen to my boring five hour analysis on each game?”

“I think it would be longer than five hours,”

“Exactly,” you clicked your tongue, then narrowed your eyes in suspicion at him. “Plus, how do you know I’m a regular? It’s not like I score front row seats every game,”

Sunghoon glanced around as if searching for anyone who’s eavesdropping, then he gestured for you to come closer, which you did, though clearly confused. “I think Heeseung will kill me for saying this,”

“Why?” you whispered back, your smile twisting into a frown. “Oh god, is Heeseung a stalker?”

“What?” it was Sunghoon’s turn to be utterly confused, staring back at you as though you’re the crazy one. He shook his head. “Heeseung might fool around sometimes but he’s definitely not a stalker or a Ted Bundy wannabe.”

“Thank heavens,” you let out a sigh of relief, but Sunghoon definitely wasn’t done yet.

“Anyway, what I was about to say was, Heeseung has always paid attention to you, Y/N. English class, hockey games, he’s got sharp eyes, ace for a reason eh? He’s genuine about you. Believe me, I’ve heard about you since day one, and I mean this in a nice way, but I’m sick of him constantly talking about you without doing anything at all,” a small grin appeared on Sunghoon’s devilishly handsome features.

“I must admit, he was a player, but I can see he’s changing and I don’t think it’ll hurt to give him a chance. He’s a sweetheart, so just don’t break his heart, will you?” he glanced behind his shoulders, noticing Heeseung entering the room with one of his teammates and a girl. “Heeseung’s back and I know he’s going to kill me if he finds out. It’s nice meeting you, Y/N. My date’s here, see you!”

Sunghoon gave you a small pat on the shoulder before walking away, leaving your head in a frenzy state. Lee Heeseung, captain of the hockey team, the school’s ace and pride, basically Mr Popular, was into you? Yunjin was going to strangle you in either excitement or surprise when she found out.

“What were you guys talking about?” he slithered smoothly to your side, bumping your shoulder gently.

“Hockey. Was wondering if he wanted an analysis on each game,”

Heeseung grinned, shaking his head gently. “You’re a menace,”

There were basically zero chances to be alone together, which you suddenly craved after Sunghoon basically dropped a big bomb on you, till now you still couldn’t swallow. Heeseung had you close to his side as he introduced you to each of his teammates and their dates, including the birthday boy Jay, and somehow all of them remembered you from that fateful night on Friday.

“So, how did you meet our dear Heeseung here?” Jay wiggled his eyebrows, passing you a glass of champagne that probably costs way more than you imagine.

“Oh, it was magical, I fell into his arms and he confessed his love for me,” you sighed dreamily, fanning yourself. At your words, Jay nudged you, a wide smile on his face and you waved your hand, stifling your giggles. “Kidding, it would totally be a wattpad cliche if that happened. He’s in my English class and we met at a party,”

“I’m surprised he’s somewhat won you over,” he raised a questionable eyebrow at you. “You are aware of how he was right? Or are you the type to scream and cry after figuring out his past fuckboy history?”

You gave him an unamused stare. “If I minded his past, I wouldn’t be here anyway. But he does seem like a changed person, I’ve heard stories from my roommate and they were … interesting,”

Jay let out a soft laugh at that. “I can tell he’s serious about you, trust me, he’s the type to not back down when he sets his mind to something. Let his hockey be an example,” he shrugged. “I know my best friend, Y/N. Unless he fucks up then I’ll punch him for you,”

You placed a hand on your chest, a bemused grin lit up your features. “You’re truly a gentleman, Jay,”

“Hey, I’m supposed to be your gentleman!” Heeseung appeared behind you, his arm thrown around your shoulder. If you could explode right now, you would. The amount of skinship you had with Heeseung was unhealthy and unknowingly, you found yourself succumbing to it each time. “Let’s go to the dancefloor outside? The guys really want to go,”

Now you were in the middle of the dancefloor, swaying your body to the beat of whatever song the DJ was playing and it was nice that it felt like you were in your own world, carelessly and mindlessly dancing to your heart’s content. You were surrounded by the boys’ dates, who you’ve found yourself befriending quickly, while Heeseung was nowhere to be seen after dancing for only a few minutes. Rude.

“Hi,” you snapped your head to find Jay squeezing through towards you, trying his best to not get his expensive shoe stepped on. “Where’s Heeseung?”

“That’s a question I’d like to ask too. He’s definitely not with me though. I thought he was with you at first … but I guess not,” you shrugged, frowning slightly as you wondered where that man would have run off to.

“I thought he was with you,” Jay huffed, annoyance clear in his features. “I swear if he’s out there wasted, coach is going to—wait…” he faltered, his gaze trailed over your head and being naturally curious, you followed his gaze, turning around and from a distance, you couldn’t tell what Jay was even looking at, until you pinpoint a familiar someone in a dress shirt you saw not long before.

There he was, sitting at the bar, back facing the dancing floor as he sat close to a girl, whispering into each others’ ears and laughing. You swore you didn’t care, but the heart doesn’t lie, you were jealous and it wasn’t helping how Sunghoon was just saying Heeseung was serious about you only hours before this. It was comical.

“Oh,” Jay said under his breath, taking a big gulp from the glass in his hand.

“Yeah, ‘oh’,” you said flatly, not realising you were practically shooting daggers into the back of Lee Heeseung’s head. Jay let out a small laugh that eventually turned into a cough once he saw you giving him a side eye, an apologetic smile appearing on his face.

“You know, Y/N, I have a plan,” his smile slowly turned into a smirk and it dawned on you, Park Jong Seong’s gears were in work and you didn’t know what you’re about to get yourself into. “Don’t give me that look, my plans are the best,”

Your frown deepened, resuming to give Jay a sceptical look as his smile continued to get more playful. Oh you were in for a treat. “Why don’t we make Heeseung … jealous? I mean, it is clear that he likes you, a little push won’t hurt can it?”

“Have you been watching too many romcoms?” you shot him a look of exasperation, noticing the similarity between him and Yunjin. One was already enough, you didn't need two. Jay nudged you softly, wiggling his eyebrows in encouragement for disaster.

“I bet you the moment he sees you with me, he’s going to burst and before you know it, you’ll be celebrating your one year anniversary—”

You held a hand up, silencing Jay before he could continue further. You started chewing on your bottom lip, a small habit of yours, as you found yourself in disbelief once these words left your lips. “Fine, why not?”

Jay shot you a wink, closing in on you and you placed a hand on his chest, raising an eyebrow. “No funny business, Jay,”

“You have no faith in me. It’s common bro code to not get with your best friend’s girl,”

You let Jay dance close to you, appreciating the fact that he was maintaining a respectful distance to you, setting a clear boundary between the both of you. Contrary to popular beliefs, he might actually seem not too bad. “I feel like Lee Heeseung might’ve been peeking at us,”

“You think so?”

Jay glanced at the direction of the bar, catching Heeseung’s piercing gaze and he smirked, leaning close to you. “Oh, he’s so watching us,”

"You're kidding," you turned around, still moving your body to the music, squinting your eyes to find Heeseung staring back at you, jaw clenched and lips pressed into a flat line, practically glaring daggers into Jay's head.

"You're not," you said mindlessly, hearing Jay burst out laughing behind you, but it all faded to grey as your eyes followed Heeseung's figure disappear behind a corner.

"He's leaving," you spun around, meeting Jay's panicked expression. "I'll go find him,"

"Did our plan work a little too well?"

"We’ll find out soon," you patted Jay's shoulder, whispering a quick thanks before welcoming the challenge of squeezing past sweaty bodies.

You figured Heeseung was heading back to the private room from the looks of where he was going, so you followed his trail around the corner, stumbling slightly and immediately regretting the amount of drinks you had. In the very next moment, you regretted more than just the drinks, you were contemplating your existence.

"Y/N?"

Son Matthew was staring back at your limp figure leaning against the wall for support, a mix of shock and confusion in his face. You, on the other hand, was about to sink into the ground in shame. Being tipsy and struggling to stand was already a moment you would never want anyone to see, let alone your cheating ex.

You cleared your throat, gripping onto the wall to straighten up, avoiding his wandering eyes as much as you could. The awkward tension in the air was palpable, you were aware how rigid the man before you was and you knew he probably didn’t think of bumping into you here out of nowhere.

“So…how are you—”

“Save the small talk please,” you interjected, sighing deeply at the usual post breakup ‘how are you’s and awkward catching up.

“Look, I never got to apologise and I know you hate me for it—”

“Of course I do!” you exclaimed, getting heated gradually and the alcohol in your system wasn’t helping one bit. “I walked in on you and her in the bedroom and you expect me to stand there to wait for your apology? It’s the fact that you never bothered to apologise after anyway,”

He looked down in shame, knowing every word you said was true and undeniable, meanwhile his silence only hurt you further. First loves always hurt, and seeing him here again after many years made you realise that you truly deserved way more than a hockey jock like him.

“I’m playing against your school’s team next week,” he said weakly, trying to change the subject. Great, another day to dread when it was supposed to be you and your best friend’s day.

“Good luck,” you didn’t know what to say, finding yourself in an awkward position. “Or not really,”

Matthew nodded slowly, clearly getting uncomfortable and you were too. “So, are you talking to someone now—”

“Yeah, she is,”

You felt an arm snaking its way around your shoulder, tensing for a minute until you realised whose voice it was.

“Lee Heeseung?” Matthew’s demeanour changed in a flash, suddenly seeming more spiteful and filled with jealousy. This was giving you deja vus of the red flags you’ve experienced in your past relationship. It made you feel sick.

“Son Matthew,” Heeseung cooed, eyeing him readily. Heeseung and Matthew had always been somewhat rivals ever since they started playing hockey. Matthew had mentioned a ‘rival’ once too many times in the past and lucky you, you were able to piece it together after entering college where you’d watched their teams play against each other once for a cup competition.

“Long time no see,” Heeseung said coolly, a small smirk on his face as he stared back at your ex, whose expression was twisting into a foul look. “Ready for the next game?”

At Heeseung’s mocking tone, Matthew scoffed. “You haven’t changed, eh? Still the usual overconfident Lee Heeseung,”

“They don’t call me ‘ace’ for no reason, right? Hey, I deserve some bragging rights,” you rolled your eyes at Heeseung’s words, which seemed to tick your ex further. He really knows how to rile someone up, doesn’t he?

“See you on the ice,” Matthew grumbled, walking past Heeseung and you, making sure to mumble ‘jerk’ loud enough for Heeseung to hear, prompting him to let out a laugh as he waved your ex tauntingly goodbye.

“How friendly,” Heeseung gritted out through a forced smile, his eyebrows furrowed, obviously annoyed but then he turned to you, a quizzical look replacing his previous agitated expression. “How do you know this guy? He’s a complete douche,”

“He’s my ex,” you admitted not so happily, noticing the slight surprise in Heeseung’s face.

“He wasn’t trying to do anything to you right?” Heeseung asked at once, his eyes flashed with worry as they darted around your face to your body. You softened at his words, shaking your head and reaching over to take his hand in yours.

“I’m fine, really. It was really awkward though,” you tried to laugh it off, but in reality you were so ready to dig yourself a grave. “You’re not wrong, he is a jerk and I don’t know what I even saw in him when he literally cheated on me,”

“Speaks a lot about his character for being so shit off and on ice. I’m sorry, Y/N, you deserved more than someone like him,” Heeseung squeezed your hand gently, passing you a consoling smile.

“It’s alright, Hee, I’ve gotten over him years ago. I hope you guys beat his ass next game,” you swung his hand lightly, beaming at his presence, but not noticing the fact that he was trying his best to hide a smile.

Heeseung cleared his throat. “I’ll trash him for you, Y/N,”

“Sounds like another challenge. I’ll take you up on it,” you smirked.

“You have to stop tormenting me, I swear,” Heeseung sighed wearily at your antics, but he couldn’t resist a lopsided grin. “Anyway, where were you even going?”

“To get a drink,” you blatantly lied through your teeth, unwilling to admit that you were actually looking for him. There’s one thing that Yunjin always preached and it was to never let a man know you’re chasing him. In times like this, you were about to listen to her teachings.

“You had fun dancing with Jay?” Heeseung smoothly brought up, completely having zero intentions of either sugar coating nor hiding his jealousy, and you were stunned by his straightforwardness, a small grin tugging at your lips.

“He offered me company, so I took up that offer. Someone here was off flirting with someone else, no? I thought you were a gentleman?” you said teasingly, but in secret, you had to admit you were a little upset. Just a little.

Heeseung stared back at you, a look of amusement and deadpan on his face.“I wasn’t flirting, Y/N. She was asking what drink I got since it looked funky and being the gentleman I am—” he gave you a smirk and winked, “— I answered her question, but she couldn’t hear me so I had to lean in. It’s genuinely a misunderstanding from someone else’s point of view,”

Noticing the slight lingering doubt in your features, he smiled at you reassuringly, throwing his arm around you and started guiding you back to the private room. “You do know I’m yours for the night, right? I won’t leave you for someone else. I told you I’ll have you by my side and I’ll stick to it,”

“Just for tonight?” you said curiously, peering up at him.

“What are you trying to say, Y/N?” he raised his eyebrow at you quizzically, but you just brushed it off, flushing a little at your own words, meanwhile Heeseung sneaked a small smile after noticing your panicky behaviour.

“Let me take you home,” Heeseung offered, pushing the door open to a room scattered with people here and there, some making out on the couch and some at the corner having small talks. The contrast was certainly there.

“What about the whole birthday celebration for Jay? Cake?”

“Oh he’s too drunk for that,” Heeseung waved his hand dismissively, as if this was a common occurrence. “Sunghoon will help him out, don’t worry,”

“If you say so … then I won’t decline your kind offer,” you furrowed your eyebrows, pursed your lips and stared pointedly at Heeseung. “Did you drink?”

“Mocktails, Y/N, mocktails. I’ve been pulled over before and trust me, I want none of that again,”

“Bad boy Heeseung … interesting,” you nodded slightly, a mischievous smirk on your face, to which was met with Heeseung unamused laugh.

“I’ll dump you here if you call me that again,” he huffed, picking up your jacket and bag.

“What happened to being yours for the night?” you said in a sing-song tone, looping your arm around his and pulled him through the door, making sure to wave a half-drunk Jay along the way out.

“Might have to make some adjustments then.”

“Mean.”

NEVER IN YOUR DREAMS WOULD YOU EXPECT YUNJIN TO absolutely embarrass Heeseung the moment he dropped you off at your doorstep. But that was exactly what had happened. 

"Oh Heeseung," Yunjin opened the door with a hand placed on her hip, staring straight at Heeseung with a vague smile.

"Uh … hi?" Heeseung greeted back with uncertainty, panning back and forth between you and your roommate.

"Kissed Y/N yet?" 

You and Heeseung immediately froze on the spot, blinking in question back at Yunjin, and you swore to yourself that you couldn't take anymore embarrassing moments for the night or else you'll soon be six feet under. You felt heat travelling up to your face and embarrassment crawling onto your skin.

"Well! Goodnight, Heeseung. Thanks for the ride!" you instantly pushed Yunjin back inside, closing the door but just enough for you to peek your head out.

"Don't mind her, she likes to think … outside the box sometimes!" you whispered to him, an apologising half smile on your face and ears burning a scarlet red, which Heeseung mirrored and finally after a last goodbye, he left and you were alone with Yunjin.

"I'll kill you, Huh Yunjin."

"Fuck."

It's been a few days since that interesting exchange and you've already texted Heeseung about it, being able to sigh a breath of relief when he was cool about it and sparing the trouble of chasing Yunjin around. Soon, with the mountain load of work, it was already Friday night hockey in a blink of an eye.

“You whore! You lying whore," Yunjin hissed, sucking her teeth. "I heard a specific someone is done with hockey boys? Is she in the room with us now?”

You were caught guilty at once, passing Yunjin a dirty look as you pulled Heeseung's jersey over your head. "It just … happened. Oh my God, am I actually in love?"

"Let's not jump to conclusions first, genius," Yunjin poked your forehead. "Do you like him?"

"Yes."

"No hesitation. I've truly lost you to him, huh?"

"You're always my number one, Jen," you rolled your eyes at her antics, picking your stuff up and starting to make your way out to the arena with Yunjin clinging onto your arm.

“But the problem now is who’s going to make the move first?” Yunjin hummed, chewing thoughtfully on her bottom lip.

“I’m hoping he would,”

“Why don't you do it?”

“This isn’t the first day we’ve been friends, Jen,”

“Right …”

Being somebody who's afraid of confrontation, you find yourself stuck in the middle. Currently torn between wondering if you were finally ready for something new and worrying if Heeseung would treat you right. 'He's serious about you' rang in your head from time to time and you couldn't lie, you started reciprocating the interest he had in you over time.

"If you like him, just go for him," Yunjin spoke out of the blue after a moment of silence, as if reading your thoughts and sensing something off. "I'm serious, Y/N. He's a nice, genuine guy, and seeing the way he treats you, you deserve someone that gives you their all,"

"Yunjin I'll cry right now," you stopped in your tracks, pouting at your best friend while she could only laugh, throwing her arms around you and continuing to drag you towards the arena.

"Aren't they playing our rival team today?" Yunjin recalled, frowning a little upon realisation. "That means he's there too, no?"

"Unfortunately," you pressed your lips into a thin line, breathing out slowly. "You do remember me telling you that Heeseung and I bumped into him at the party right?"

“Yeah?”

“They’re definitely going to cause a scene tonight, I can feel it in my bones,” 

“It’s not that serious,”

“Remember Matthew’s lifelong rival since high school that I’ve mentioned before?”

“Don’t tell me it’s …”

“Heeseung. Small world, right?”

Yunjin raised her eyebrows in surprise, whistling quietly under her breath. "Quite unexpected," she said breathlessly, not realising that you were now already at the arena. "I'd love a fight,"

"You just love chaos,"

"And you're right," Yunjin smiled sweetly at you and you pushed her face away, earning a laugh from her. "Is Heeseung not meeting you pregame?" She nudged your side, raising her eyebrows expectantly with a knowing smirk on her face as she led you down to your usual seats in the arena.

"He did text me…" you said, seeing Yunjin's eyebrows rising higher. "But he said his coach is more strict for today so no pregame meetings,"

"Lame," Yunjin booed.

"He also said he's treating dinner tonight after the game,"

"Not lame," Yunjin switched up and practically almost jumped out of her seat, clapping her hands. "Let's feast tonight. Go team!"

"MAN, I NEED SOME POPCORN FOR THIS,"

Nervousness started creeping up on you as you witnessed the heated start of the game, both teams clashing roughly into one another and fouling left and right. Yunjin was entertained; you were worried and stressed.

"They keep fouling our team and no time outs, you're kidding," you threw your hands up in frustration, noticing other students grumbling as well.

"Are we surprised? Big games are like this," Yunjin shook her head, crossing her arm and leaned back into her seat.

Two periods went by rather quickly, both teams were tied and obvious vexation hung in the air. You noticed Heeseung was practically flying around, chasing the puck with vigor, bumping hard into other players in order to reach the goalpost, but to his dismay, he missed the shot, earning groans from many, you included.

The third period rolled over in a blink of an eye, the tension heightened as the two teams were finding ways to score desperately. Your eyes instinctively followed Heeseung's speeding figure, but something in your stomach told you things were about to turn sour real quick.

Heeseung was zooming across the defenders with ease, guiding the puck towards the goalpost, until a distinct figure, who happened to be the one and only, Matthew, skated up next to him and started causing trouble. You couldn't tell what was exactly happening, but the aggression between the two was getting heavier by each second.

Next thing you knew, Heeseung rammed into your ex, sending him flying to the glass panels, but that wasn't all. Heeseung completely forgo the puck, throwing his gloves to the side and skated up to Matthew, sizing him up.

Both teams were extremely caught off by this sudden fight between them, everyone started panicking the moment Heeseung grabbed Matthew by the neck, but your ex seemed unfazed and continued uttering something to him, leading up to the part where Heeseung punched the latter in the face.

You and Yunjin audibly gasped and so did everyone else in the arena, including the players on the bench and the coaches who were yelling over the noise. Those on the ice made their way to the fight, trying their utmost best to rip the two apart, but Heeseung had his hands practically glued on Matthew, not wanting to let go as he was seen screaming at him.

"I mentioned wanting a fight but not like this …" Yunjin muttered, now standing and occasionally tip-toeing to see what was happening. "Matthew obviously egged him on and pissed Heeseung off,"

"Heeseung has the worst temper on ice, he knew what he was doing," you frowned, getting worried as you watched the referee sending both of them to the penalty box. Heeseung threw his helmet on the floor in frustration, his wet strands of hair sticking onto his forehead.

"Well, at least the team is winning," Yunjin pointed out to the score line, where a glorious 3-2 was showing on the jumbotron. The home team managed to score the winning goal after the game was resumed, taking advantage of the opposition's bewilderment from the fight to mess their strategy up.

The crowd was cheering and jumping, food got scattered around onto the floor and the away fans could only leave in silence. Towards the end of the final period, Heeseung's penalty ended and he joined the team in exiting the ice, face still a little sour as his coach started telling him off.

“You should find him after this,” Yunjin tapped your side and you nodded in agreement, making sure to text him beforehand. 

‘Locker room’ was the only thing he texted back and you slowly got anxious, curious as to what had really happened between him and your ex on ice. One thing’s for sure, it definitely wasn’t something good. 

You stormed up to the doors of the locker room, heaved a breath of courage and pushed your way in. Lucky for you, by the time you got there mostly everyone was gone, except for Heeseung and Sunghoon, both sitting on a bench, whispering aggressively at one another. That was until Sunghoon caught your approaching figure, giving Heeseung a final word before standing up.

“Y/N,” Sunghoon passed you an awkward smile, a first aid kit in his hands. “I’ll leave him in your hands, I have an appointment with someone now,” he basically thrusted the box into your hands, whispering a quick apology and thanks before scampering away.

You felt helpless and confused as the box sat in your hands, then you started advancing slowly towards Heeseung and soon, you were standing directly in front of him, prompting him to stare up at you, still managing to crack a smirk even when his face looked rough. His left eye was bruised, lips cut and cracked and practically bleeding, his knuckles red and bruised. Overall, he was quite literally a mess.

"You're wearing my jersey,"

"And you're bleeding right now, is that important?"

"To me it is,"

"You're a fool. You have a bruised eye now," you fingers grazed against his cheeks, gaze travelling from one end to the other of his face.

"Do you still think I’m cute?"

"One more word and I'll add a bruise on the other eye," you gave him a side eye and he only responded with a chuckle, patting the empty spot beside him and you complied, sitting down and your shoulder touched his, leaving zero space between the both of you.

“What happened?” you hissed, staring pointedly at him as your hands dug through the items in the first aid kit.

“Do you know what you’re doing?” Heeseung grunted, nodding at your actions and you only returned an unamused look.

“I do, now stop avoiding my question,” you hissed, applying some ointment on his knuckles, causing him to flinch in pain, face screwed in discomfort. “What happened, Hee? I saw,”

Heeseung was reluctant, but he gave in eventually, anger evident in his gaze and tone. “It was your ex,”

“I know you are rivals, but you could’ve just ignored him—”

“No, you don't get it, I can’t! He was talking shit about you,” Heeseung ran a hand through his hair in frustration, adam apple bobbing as he tried not to burst out. "'Go back to that slut', 'do you enjoy my leftovers'. I can't just continue playing after the shit he said, there's no way I'll stand there and do nothing,"

"It's okay, Hee—"

"It's not," he huffed, his frown deepened, running a hand across his face. "It's not okay and I wasn't going to let that man call you names and walk free,"

You couldn't resist a smile, your heart thumping against your chest and your gaze softened, placing a hand on his. "Thanks for standing up for me. Really."

"I always will at any time, I care about you, Y/N, and I don't want anything bad happening to you," Heeseung blurted out, his face gradually turning red upon realising his own confession, making sure to seem nonchalant as he switched the topic. "You should've seen his face when I actually punched him. He was all talk only,"

"He's like that, unfortunately," you sighed as you finished wrapping some compressible bandages over his knuckles, whispering a quick 'sorry' when he winced.

“Honestly if you keep pulling these tricks on ice, I might think you’re into me,” you added boldly, referring to the other time where he dedicated a goal to you and he, too, realised the same, the tip of his ears turning a slight red.

“What if I told you I am?”

“Oh, I know,”

Heeseung leaned back, an amused grin plastered on his face. You couldn't tell if he's glad you knew or if he's in horror. "Am I that obvious? Am I too transparent?"

"Well, would you rather me be dumb and not take the hint?"

"Definitely not that," Heeseung leaned back closer to you, letting you clean the small cut on his lips. "I have a feeling someone ratted me out to you,"

"Partially, but I did have a feeling," 

"Motherfucker," he hissed under his breath, then his eyes widened, a look of panic flashed across his face. "So … you know I liked you before this, then do you … like me?"

You rolled your eyes, in disbelief these words were coming from the fuckboy himself. "If I didn't, I wouldn't be sitting here," you were finally done patching him up, placing everything back neatly into the box as he watched your every move. "You're fantastic at hockey but you're terrible at feelings, Hee,"

"I'm easily intimidated,"

"I didn't see you being intimidated while fighting,"

"Intimidated by pretty girls, I mean,"

"How charming," you mused, bumping his shoulder softly. "When and how did it even start, I thought you were the type to fuck around,"

"I've noticed you since English class and after some time, I saw you at my games too. I didn't want to approach you since I was worried you'd think of me differently because of my past—"

"Fuckboy-ness?"

"You could put it that way," Heeseung clapped his hands, leaning forward to rest his arms on his thighs. "I just liked you. You were funny at presentations, charming, passionate in things you liked. I wanted to get to know you better and after meeting you, it just … clicked,"

"But at the party, why did you even bother asking my name when you already knew who I was?"

"First impressions matter, Y/N. I didn't want to seem like a whole ass stalker,"

"You could've mentioned that you knew my name from English. 'Oh you're Y/N from English', there,"

"Are you teaching me how to flirt?"

"I'm teaching you how to flirt with me,"

"Alright then," Heeseung turned his body to fully face you now, a look of seriousness on his face. "Y/N from English, I like you. So much till the point where I feel suffocated. I don't care if you'll beat my ass after we lose and I'll listen to all of your analysis, will you go out with me?"

"Yes and I like you too, jackass. Now shut up and kiss me already," you wrapped a hand on the back of his neck, pulling him in towards you and attached your lips to his, instantly melting against his touch the moment he snaked a hand across your jaw. 

You couldn't believe this was happening, it felt like a dream. His lips were soft, the taste of mint on his tongue lingered, the feeling on his lips on yours was intoxicating. He was intoxicating. 

Heeseung broke away momentarily, his forehead remained pressed against yours and you could feel his breath against your lips. "You're really romantic, Y/N,"

"You bet," you giggled in between kisses, your hands pushing him back a little as he practically chased your lips like a starved man. "You should go change,"

"Fuck, you're right," he glanced down at his hockey gear clad body. "It's getting late too, I'll drive you back. Want to stop by a drive through? I told you tonight's my treat,"

"I'm down,"

"Let me get my clothes, wait here," Heeseung stood up, ready to walk away but halting abruptly. "Tomorrow night, dinner, is that okay?"

"Are you asking me out on a date?"

"It's whatever you like,"

"Pick me up at 7,"

"On it," Heeseung nodded slowly, taking note of it mentally. "Also, does Yunjin want some food too?"

"If you buy her some, you'll immediately be on her good list, just saying,"

"You two are so alike, it's scary,"

"We're besties for a reason."

IT'S BEEN FIVE MONTHS EVER SINCE THAT NIGHT IN THE LOCKER room. You remembered coming home with Heeseung tailing behind you after, a bag of food in his hands and a welcoming Yunjin greeting him at the door.

"You two finally kissed, didn't you?" Yunjin mentioned carelessly in between bites of her burger and you swore you saw Heeseung's soul escaping his body. "That's the shade of lipstick Y/N wears on the side of your lips,"

Heeseung's hand flew to the side of his lips, touching the spot where you gave him a small peck of encouragement before getting off of the car.

"I'm glad you two are together," Yunjin continued, not noticing the flushed state you and Heeseung were in. "It's been months—oh God, I need to tell Jake this,"

And she did, leading to Jake calling you up the day after where he basically shouted through the phone. Since then, you had a plus one to every football game Jake played in.

"You guys are so annoying," Yunjin grimaced at the sight of Heeseung leaning his head onto your shoulder.

It was currently a Saturday night just after Heeseung's playoff match in which he scored three goals, so now, the team and your friends were at a nearby bar celebrating the victory.

"Stop being jealous," Heeseung defended, dropping his voice and closing in. "That's why I told you to go for Jay,"

"Him? Only God can put up with him, I barely know him and I already couldn't stand him,"

"Someone will eventually," you shrugged, taking a sip out of your mocktail.

"Good luck to them," Jake mumbled, holding his cup up for a toast and downed it all within the next second.

The night ended with a very drunk Yunjin along with many other drunk hockey players stumbling over their feet. Jake offered to take Yunjin home and she could only splutter out some responses, while you and Heeseung went by yourselves.

"If we can win the playoffs, I'll literally explode," Heeseung was currently the happiest man in the world, one hand holding his girlfriend while the other was close to touching the playoff trophy. He could ask for nothing more.

"It'll happen, Hee," you assured, running your thumb across his finger softly. "It's bound to happen, the team is strong. You have to believe my analysis too,"

"Pfft, fairs, your analysis does always hit the spot,"

"See? I'm always right,"

"Yeah yeah," Heeseung chuckled, pulling the car to park once you've arrived at your dorm's carpark and you two just sat there naturally, a sense of ambiance in the air as the radio played quietly in the background.

"I love you,"

Those three words were the first to break the silence. Heeseung looked like he was in disbelief although he was the one who said it first. Meanwhile, you were starting to smile like a fool.

"Did I—"

"I love you too, you idiot," you grabbed his face before he could continue, knowing well he'll end up rambling in the end. You pressed a chaste kiss on his lips, earning a stunned look from him until he eventually returned the favour.

"Was it too soon?" He mumbled against your lips as he gradually pulled away.

"I was actually wondering when you'll crack,"

"Fuck off," he scoffed, squeezing your cheek gently upon seeing your playful smirk. His gaze softened, eyes evidently filled with affection, anyone could literally vouch for how whipped this man was."I love you, stay by me forever, please,"

"Say less, captain." 

Hockey boys might've scared you once, but this time, one of them ended up mending your broken heart and won you over instead, and thankfully, he was here to stay. For a long time.

[tsukisrants]

First Prize - Jeon Jungkook

Pairing: Jeon Jungkook x Fem!Reader

Genre: Smut

Word Count: 3.068

Warnings: Boxer!Jungkook, Possessive Behavior, Violence, Spankings, Manhandling, Dom/Sub undertones, Name-Calling, Hair-pulling, Fingering, Rough sex, Spit, Creampie.

Summary: "I need these eyes, little one. I need my number one fan, huh? Or I'll lose my mind, and we don't want that, do we?”

smut under the cut

A blow.

Another one.

The pungent smell of blood intoxicates him.

His mixed with that of his opponent.

Anger rises in his chest, overwhelming and distorting him.

Clouding his senses.

The gaze of the audience turned towards him. People look at him and devour him with their eyes.

Among them, yours.

You, who look at him with your childish eyes.

With that curiosity and desire.

Your eyes, his fuel.

Everything around him catches fire.

The flames blaze uncontrollably and his body is moved by an intoxicating adrenaline that creates addiction.

Despite the pain, the fatigue.

He wins.

The opponent falls to the ground.

He, on the other hand, stands triumphantly.

The shouts rise, the screams caress his ears, and he revels in every moment of glory.

He was born for this.

You, on the other hand, tremble.

You look at him with dreamy eyes, as you have been doing for a long time now.

Since you were dragged, against your will, to one of these fights.

You didn't want to come at all, but in the end, you gave in, and thank heaven every day that you did.

You saw him, and since then you have done nothing but come back.

Come back to him, for him.

Enchanted, bewitched.

At every encounter, you stand in the front row.

At every encounter, you have eyes only for him.

You scream his name, you smile.

You smile and everyone's eyes are on you.

But yours? Yours are only on him.

Your gaze belongs to him completely, like every single part of you.

And fuck, he likes it.

Jungkook lives for the desire he has for you and for the desire you have for him.

At every encounter, he checks if you’re there.

But as always, he does nothing.

He looks at you.

He observes you, and burns your skin with those dark pits.

Jungkook keeps playing this little game with you for a while.

Then, one evening, you don't show up.

You miss a fight.

You didn't want to, but exhaustion didn't allow you to move.

Too tired from work, you skipped a fight.

That night, they had to urgently take Jungkook's challenger to the hospital.

Furious, he ended the evening by downing a bottle of vodka, and then picking a fight with a group of idiots, emerging victorious.

Jungkook never loses.

At the next fight, you are there.

You are there, you have returned, and when you look at him, your curiosity turns into confusion, then fear.

In his eyes, the deepest darkness.

Jaw clenched, he delivers precise and devastating blows.

He wins, because he can't do otherwise.

He wins, and you timidly exult.

He steps down from the ring, drinks a drink.

He downs it in one gulp, and you remain enchanted watching his neck shine under the dim light of the gym, his Adam's apple moving up and down.

He redeems the winnings, and leans against the wall.

His friends congratulate him, now accustomed to his successes.

He crosses his arms, and then you notice.

Jungkook is looking at you.

Your hands tremble, and you look around, as if to make sure that he is really looking at you.

You want to run, to escape from him.

But your body seems unresponsive.

It is no longer yours, but his.

Dominated by his eyes.

With a nod of his head, he gestures for you to follow him.

Before you can realize it, you are following him.

A dark corner, and a hand that grabs you.

He pulls you.

You are in a room you have never seen before, you realize it is the room where he prepares before the fights, before dominating the whole world with the strength of his fists, of his body.

"You weren't there last friday," he says.

You gasp, trying to find the words to answer him, completely caught off guard.

"I-I... no, I wasn't there," you reply.

He approaches you, making you step back.

Your body collides with the wall, and he towers over you.

One of his hands next to your face, and you feel your breath catch.

With the other, he grabs your chin.

He forces you to look at him.

You part your lips, and you have to forcefully suppress the moan of astonishment that tries to escape from your throat.

"Don't do it again. Don't miss again, I need you there."

His confession leaves you stunned.

Your confusion clear and evident on your face.

"I need these eyes, little one. I need my number one fan, huh? Or I'll lose my mind, and we don't want that, do we?"

You shake your head. No, you don't want that.

God.

He needs you.

He just said it, and he did it with his eyes locked into yours. He meant it.

He means it.

"I will never miss a fight again, never," you promise him.

As you say it, you truly believe it. You would be ready to do anything for him, and it doesn't matter if you don't really know each other: you belong to him.

He smiles, and Jungkook's smile scares you.

It excites you.

It makes your panties wet.

You feel warmth spreading through your body, your skin filled with uncontrollable shivers.

"Good girl," he says.

His words burn: they set your mind to flames.

There’s nothing in the world you want more than to hear those two little words over and over again.

As he speaks, the hand that was holding your chin moves.

Jungkook rubs his thumb against your lips, his tattoos marked with scratches and splatters of blood make the image even more exciting than it already is.

Jungkook pushes his finger into your mouth, pressing it against your tongue.

The taste of his salty skin is enough to elicit a faint moan from you.

"These eyes, little one. They make me want to hurt you, do you understand? I want to destroy you," he growls, hungry.

He pushes his finger even deeper into your mouth, making you gag.

Jungkook fucks your mouth with his thumb, and you take everything he gives you.

You cough.

He moans at the sight, releasing your mouth.

A trail of saliva connects his thumb to your parted lips, and Jungkook's breath becomes more labored. Heavier.

"Do it. Hurt me. Do whatever you want to me," you beg him.

In an instant, he grabs you by the hair.

His hand tightens with force at the base of your neck.

The strength with which he pulls you excites you: you love the idea that he can do whatever he wants with you, that Jungkook is so much stronger than you that he can bend you and fuck you whenever and wherever he wants.

A cry of pain escapes you, and he laughs.

Jungkook laughs as he drags you by the hair across the room, until he positions you in front of a table.

Once there, he forces you to move as he pleases, shoving you around like a rag doll.

He pushes you down, bending you over the table.

You flinch, tears of pain streaming down your cheeks, meeting your lips, still wet with your saliva.

You feel the taste of your own tears, let it intoxicate you.

The cold surface of the table against your cheek keeps you anchored to reality, and when Jungkook pushes your face forcefully against it, you find yourself squeezing your thighs together.

You love to suffer for him.

You've dreamt of him at every encounter, and finally it's reality.

He’s finally giving you the pain that you craved for so long. Too long.

"From now on, you're mine. Say it."

"I'm yours."

Then, he spanks you.

Hard.

Jungkook's hand collides with your ass, again and again.

Over the skirt you're wearing.

The black one, the one you know is a provocation made for him.

Designed for him.

The one that hugs your body, short in just the right places.

Then, he pulls it up, making it tangle around your waist.

He grabs your panties, and then Jungkook tears them.

They're the pink ones, with the sweet pattern you love.

He loves them even more.

Jungkook gets off to the thought of corrupting you, ruining you for anyone else.

Scraps of fabric from your ripped panties fall to the ground, forgotten.

"If I see wearing a skirt like this again I’ll make sure you regret it, you hear me? You don’t wear shit like this, not without me, do you understand?", he asks.

In another circumstance, you would have probably screamed and resisted.

But now, for him, you would do anything.

Everything is so wrong that it feels so fucking right to you.

When you don't respond, he spanks you one more time.

"Do you understand?", he asks again, leaning forward to grab your face, pressed against the table, and forcing you to look at him.

Your gazes meet and you feel insignificant under the weight of Jungkook’s.

You love feeling this way.

You don't want to be anything other than a little toy for him to use and fuck.

"Y-yes! I understand!", you exclaim.

He smiles satisfied, before pushing two of his fingers deep inside your mouth.

In their rightful place.

With his other hand, he unbuttons his pants.

He pulls down the zipper, then pushes them down, letting them slide down his thighs.

You can't see the scene clearly, but you hear the metallic sound of the zipper being pulled down, the buckle of his belt briefly hitting the table.

He lowers his boxers, stained with his pleasure: a wet spot that marks the level of his desire for you.

He pulls out his cock, and you widen your eyes.

It's big.

Thick, long, and shining from how wet he is, drops of pre-cum sliding down his pulsing tip.

You want it in your hhmouth, in your pussy.

"Good girl, lick them for me, make them wet," he encourages you.

He fucks your mouth with his fingers, once again forcing you to choke on them, pushing them deep into your throat.

As he watches the scene, he touches himself.

His hand moves quickly against his cock, his hips pushing forward in a desperate attempt to receive more friction.

Jungkook grunts and hisses in pleasure, gritting his teeth and wetting his lips with his tongue.

Then, your mouth is left empty.

Jungkook brings those same fingers between your legs, rubbing them against your pussy, before plunging them into you without any regard.

"So tight, so warm for be, fuck...", he murmurs.

He's not talking to you, but to himself.

As if you are nothing more than a little fuck-toy. Nothing more than a flashlight.

Perhaps you really are nothing but that.

He moves his fingers quickly, thrusting them inside you.

The sound of your wetness, of your pleasure, echoes in the room.

It’s all so fucking messy.

You are wetter than you have ever been before, and it is solely and exclusively for him.

Hot droplets of your juices splash down his hand, down his wrist. The veins of his forearm popping out with the strength that he’s using to finger-fuck you.

You feel your wetness trickle down your legs in rhythm with the thrusts of his fingers inside you.

As he touches you, he rubs his cock against your flushed and sensitive skin, against your ass.

He leaves behind a glistening trail of his pleasure, his pure desire for you. Your ass wet with his pre-cum.

When Jungkook deems that he has stretched you enough, he pulls his fingers out of your pussy.

You feel empty without a part of him inside of you, and it feels so wrong not to have him inside of your body.

"Open," he orders, tapping those fingers on your lips.

You open them, and he forces you to taste yourself, pushing those wet fingers against your parted lips and then against your tongue.

"You make me so horny, baby..."

When he's satisfied, he cleans his fingers on your face, on your cheeks.

He grabs you by the hips first, then his hands slide down your body: he spreads your legs, firmly grabs your ass, and keeps you open for him.

From above, he lets his saliva slide onto you, onto your throbbing pussy.

He spits on your pussy and the sound is enough to make you moan loudly, gasping his name.

Your fluids mix, becoming one.

He rubs the tip of his cock against you, pushing it inside your pussy.

Just the tip.

It's not enough, not even close to being enough for you.

"Beg me. Beg me to give you my cock, come on, you fucking slut," he groans.

You can clearly feel that Jungkook is teasing you.

The humiliation burns fiercely in your stomach, and only serves to make your pussy even wetter for him.

You are now lost in your own perversion, and decide to let go.

To embrace your deepest desires and needs.

"G-give it to me. Please, Jungkook, please... fuck me, fuck me..."

He does. Jungkook satisfies you, because he can't resist when you beg him so sweetly to fuck you.

"Fuck, baby," he pants.

He buries himself in you completely, and a moan similar to a scream escapes your lips.

Your folds open up to accommodate his length, the lips of your pussy hugging him tightly as your tight walls suck him in.

"You're such a dirty little whore. You like getting fucked like a bitch in heat? You were made to take my cock, made to get fucked like nothing more than a flashlight."

You tremble. You nod and moan.

Jungkook laughs as he fucks you. He laughs at the state you're in: desperate and lost in the pleasure that he is giving you. His cock thrusts inside you again and again, hitting all the right spots, driving you crazy.

"Yours. Only for you. Your whore, only yours, y-yours only, J-Jungkook please..."

Hearing you say it drives him crazy.

He grabs your wrists and, pulling at them, he holds them behind your back, bending your arms.

With one hand, Jungkook keeps you still, gripping your wrists so tightly that you're sure you'll wear his marks for days. While he fucks you he releases the adrenaline of the encounter, the anger of not having seen you last time, and the explosive desire he has had of you for weeks.

He spanks you.

Again, and again.

He does it until the mark of his hand is imprinted on your ass, a mark that will last on your skin for a long time.

You are his.

His and only his.

You belong to Jungkook.

With each spank, you thank him.

He grits his teeth, thrusting into you forcefully and violently. He pushes his cock into your wet pussy with precision and fervor.

The sound of his length slamming into you makes you tremble, it's a sound so obscene, so wet that it brings you close to the edge.

He understands, recognizing the signals of pleasure building relentlessly in your belly.

One of his hands slips between your legs, his rough fingers teasing your swollen and pulsating clit.

He moves his fingertips against you in fast circular motions, in rhythm with the impetuous thrusts of his cock.

You pulse around his length, the orgasm getting closer and closer.

"Come. Come on my cock, little one, go ahead," he growls, abusing your clit until all you can do is tremble, caught in spasms.

Jungkook's voice caresses your ears and gives you the final push you need to finally let go and surrender to pleasure.

"C-Cumming, K-kookie! F-for you, I'm cumming for you!"

You cum, just like that, trembling and covering his cock with your pleasure.

Drops of it splash down his cock, and your pussy pulses against him again and again, making him grunt and moan.

Even Jungkook trembles.

He leans forward, burying his face in the hollow of your neck and bites you.

He bites your shoulder, sinking his teeth into your sensitive skin, and Jungkook buries himself even deeper in your hole, now almost at his limit too.

You are exhausted, hypersensitive. Your clitoris begs for mercy, and he shows a little compassion by stopping teasing it.

He pants against your neck, his warm breath colliding with your skin, and your body feels like it's filled with pure electricity.

Then, he grabs a piece of skin between his lips and starts sucking.

Next to the bite, a purplish bruise now occupies your otherwise pristine neck.

Despite the tiredness, despite your body begging for mercy, you take his cock, again and again.

You let him use you to pleasure himself.

You let Jungkook use you to empty his balls, thrusting inside you as much and as hard as he wants.

"I'm gonna cum, fuck, kitten..."

You beg him to do it, to fill you up, to mark you indelibly.

You beg Jungkook to cum inside you, to give you every drop of his thick, warm cum.

"Take it. Fuck, baby, I'm cumming. Christ, can you feel it? Feel it, feel my cum inside you, take it all, every fucking drop."

As he says this, he releases your wrists, now adorned with the marks of his hands.

Deep bruises that will hardly fade.

He grabs you by the hair and turns your face to the side.

He kisses you, bites your lips.

Jungkook's saliva mixes with yours and drips onto your chins.

"All my cum in your pussy, little one. The best pussy I've ever fucked, all mine..."

With these words, he buries himself in you one last time, fulfilling his promises: he fills you. He claims you. He makes you his.

Hot spurts of his cum fill you, and part of you believes to feel every drop filling your pussy.

He thrusts into you and both moan in unison, seized by violent spasms of pleasure.

You both stay still for a while, locked together.

Your breaths mirror each other.

You both tremble and gasp.

Jungkook gently kisses your shoulder, right where he bit you minutes ago, leaving the mark of his teeth.

The gesture is gentle, contrasting with everything you just shared.

Yet, it feels so right.

"Mmh, baby. Here it is, the first prize," he whispers, softly rubbing his cheek against yours.

You smile, reveling in his tender caresses.

Despite his words, though, you feel that in reality, it is you who have won.

[moonchild9350]

You Have Me

Summary: You've been best friends/roommates with Jeongin for awhile. You thought you knew everything about your friend. However, one night you find out a little secret about Jeongin that is just too good to ignore.

Pairing: friends to lovers, nonidol sub Jeongin x soft dom fab reader

Genre: Smut: 18+ MDNI please

Word Count: 3.2k

Warnings: lots of teasing, dry humping, handjob, pussy job, oral sex (f and m receiving), p in v penetration, creampie (wrap it up folks), use of term noona, phone sex in a way, somnophilia, voyerisum, masturbation, edging, dirty talk I think that's it lol

Notes: I love dom Innie but I also just love the concept of sub, whiny Innie. The concept just does things to me lol. I hope y'all like it!

Likes, comments, reblogs are greatly appreciated :)

Masterlist

Please do not copy, translate, modify, use, or repost this work elsewhere without my permission. ©moonchild9350 (2024)

“Argh! Dammit nooo!” You scream, banging the controller on the floor.

Jeongin, who was sitting above you on the couch chuckled at your distress. You were playing a round of zombie royale with your best friend and roommate Jeongin and well it wasn’t going so well. You had just died, resurrecting as a member of the undead. Jeongin was still alive, fighting as best as he could for the team, as your numbers were slowly decreasing.

“It’s ok noona,” he said while trying to fight off a hoarde. “Look for an elixir so you can join us again.”

You nodded, beginning your search. This was a typical Friday night for both of you, neither of you having to go into work the next day. You loved these nights, spent playing video games late into the night, snack wrappers scattered around you, as you played whatever game you decided on earlier in the day. It was late, you both playing one more round before you decided to call it a night.

Jeongin was doing well, he was completely focused on the screen. He was trying to win it for the team, and by the looks of it, he’ll probably succeed. It was silent as you both focused, the sound of the buttons on the controller being rapidly pressed echoing throughout the room. You had just found an elixir, when Jeongin yelled in victory. He was the last human standing as the other team’s player succumb to the dead.

“Fuck yeah!” Jeongin yelled, getting up to do a little victory dance. You laughed as he danced around the room. You decided to get up and dance with him because why not, you were on his team anyway. After spinning around the room and brining out your insane dance moves, you both collapsed on the couch, laughing your heads off as you tried to catch your breath.

Jeongin turned to face you, “good job noona, even though you became a zombie.” You playfully hit his shoulder, with a grin on your face.

“Hey! I could have made it just so you know. That zombie came out of nowhere!”

Jeongin laughed, “I know, I know.” He took a deep breath and said, ���let’s clean up? I’m kinda tired.”

You shook your head yes as you got up and started picking up food wrappers. Jeongin gathered the controllers, putting them on the docking stations. After cleaning, Jeongin said goodnight, giving you a hug. You sat back down on the couch, not quite ready for bed. You were so happy to be living with your best friend, most days filled with happiness. You’d known Jeongin since middle school, as you were neighbors. You became fast friends after you saved him from some not so nice kids that lived in your neighborhood. They thought he was a nerd and therefore a loser.

You thought the opposite, so you stuck up for the new kid on the block. Jeongin appreciated your kindness and the rest is history. Now you live together and you even work together. You couldn’t imagine life without him. He’s still a nerd, which you loved, but over the years he’s become handsome. You noticed it and other women noticed it too, especially those at your work. Not a day goes by they’re not flirting with him.

It’s been awhile since Jeongin has brought a girl over, which shocked you. You’d discuss what be thought about the new girl at work or if he’s found anyone on a dating app. He’d deflect his answer however, saying he’s not interested in dating at the moment. You’d never push him, not wanting to make your best friend uncomfortable, but you did find his reaction odd. Whatever his decision though, you’d respect it, as it wasn’t your place to meddle in.

You had put on a tv show, turning the volume down so as not to disturb Jeongin. Everything was calm and peaceful until you heard a moan. You froze on the couch, listening for the sound again. Seconds went by without a sound so you dismissed the disturbance, thinking it was the tv. However , minutes later, you heard another moan. You picked up the remote and muted it, listening for the sound and…there it was again. It was definitely coming from Jeongin’s room.

You got up and made your way to his door, placing your hand on the door handle. You twisted the knob, not knocking as you guys didn’t really care if you came into each others rooms, and opened the door. What you saw caused you to gasp.

Jeongin was laying on his bed, his head thrown back. He wasn’t wearing any pants or boxers and was stroking his hard cock. You were frozen in your spot, watching as he glided his hand over the shaft, before circling his wrist over the head. His breathing was shallow, as he let out little moans.

You really should move, leave him be and go to your room. You were about to do so until you heard a voice, a woman’s voice come from his…his phone?

“How does it feel baby? Does my hand feel good?”

“Ye..yes Noona, it feels so good,” Jeongin whined, stroking his cock a little faster. He whimpered, jerking his hips up into his hand.

Was your best friend talking to a sex line? You were shocked. At that moment, something switched in you. You closed the door and walked towards your best friend. He has yet to notice you in which you were amazed. You climbed onto his bed, straddling his legs causing his eyes to fly open, shock all over his face.

He tried to cover his cock with his hands, hiding it from your view, but you slapped his hands away, rising your eyebrows daring him to try to cover himself again. You watched as he swallowed, uncertainty on his face. But he was horny, he was hard, and the woman on the other side of the call was still talking, edging him on.

“Stroke your cock harder for me baby. Can you do that? Be a good boy and listen ok?”

Jeongin hesitantly reached down to touch his cock once more, unsure if he should comply, but you slapped his hand out the way, grabbing onto his member instead, as Jeongin let out a gasp. You looked down, getting a good look at his cock. It was pretty, a nice length and slightly thick, enough to stretch you and fill you up nicely you thought . You ran your finger over his pretty pink tip, pre-cum leaking from the tip, pushing your finger down slightly.

Jeongin let out a little whimper, the pout you love forming on his face. You looked him in the eyes as you started to stroke his cock, working your hand up and down the shaft. Jeongin let out a loud moan, his hips bucking up into your hand. You grinned at the sound, before leaning down to spit on the head. You watched as it dropped down his pretty length, mixing with his precum as you worked his cock.

You watched him squirm at the mercy of your hand, watching his face scrunch in pleasure. The sight in front of you was beautiful, a sight you could definitely get used to. You could feel your arousal drip into your panties, soaking the material at the thought that he was feeling this way because of you.

“Does baby boy feel good hmm? Imagine my pretty lips around your cock baby, yeah? That’s it baby.” The woman on the phone said.

With a glint in your eyes, you leaned down before wrapping your lips around his cock, sucking the head into your mouth. Jeongin let out an animalistic howl, you’re sure that even the neighbors heard. You bobbed your head, before taking him to the hilt, the hair framing the base of his cock tickling your face. You peeked up to look at your best friend, letting out a moan at the sight of him gone, his mouth wide open, chest heaving, as you sucked the soul out of his cock. You massaged his balls before leaning down to take one into your mouth.

Jeongin began to thrust his hips upwards, gently fucking your mouth. The woman was still speaking, but neither one of you were paying attention to her voice. You licked a stripe from the base to the tip before wrapping your lips around the head once more, suckling the tip. Jeongin’s moans got louder and more raspy. He was close, you could tell, as he fell apart in your mouth. But you weren’t going to let him have it that easily.

You lifted your head, your lips leaving his cock with a pop. Jeongin looked at you with wide eyes, letting out a whine at his fading orgasm. You crawled up his body to hover over him. While looking him in the eyes, you reached over and disconnected the call, a smirk on your face.

“Mmm learned something new about my best friend tonight,” you purred, your finger brushing down his chest, as you pinched his nipple. “You like to be told what to do huh? You get off on being bossed around.”

All Jeongin could do was whimper, the answer clear in his eyes. Straddling his legs, you gave an experimental grind of your hips, the feeling of his cock dragging against your clothed core causing you to let out a sigh.

“You didn’t have to call some random hotline Innie baby.” You said as you rolled your hips again.

You had him where you wanted him, his eyes dragging from your face to where your hips met his cock and back to your face again. You watched as he swallowed loudly, his Adams apple bobbing with the motion.

“Noona, please,” Jeongin whispered out.

He was losing his mind. His best friend was on top of him, who just gave him the best head of his life, and is talking to him like he’s nothing. He’s cock twitched at the thought.

You grinned down at him before saying, “you know why you don’t have to call some random woman Innie? Hmm?”

Jeongin shook his head no, his words stuck in his throat.

“Because you have me baby,” you purred as you took off your top. Your breast were on display, your nipples hardening as the cold hit them.

“Now let’s play some more Innie. Here’s the rules, no touching unless I say so. You’re going to do what I say. Got it?” You said, brushing the back of your hand across his cheek.

Jeongin nodded fervently, watching as you got up to take off your sleep shorts, dragging your panties with them. He couldn’t take his eyes off your body, the vision of every wet dream he’s ever had. He wanted to touch you, but he remembered your rules, not wanting to disobey. He likes when women tell him what to do in bed, not that he’s had much experience, most women not comfortable doing so. But here you are, his best friend, in the flesh, ready to make his dreams come true.

You straddled his legs once more, dragged his cock through your lips, the slide was easy between your slick, your spit, and his precum leaking from his cock. You ground your hips faster, the tip of his cock hitting your clit deliciously over and over. Jeongin was a whining mess, his fists opening and closing at his sides. You smirked at his obedience, the act turning you on even more as more slick gushed out your pussy and onto his pelvis and cock.

You looked at his pretty lips, parted in ecstasy. How many days have you thought about his lips, his mouth and what it could do. What better time to find out but now.

Jeongin watched as you lifted your hips and stood up, making your way towards his head. He looked up at you, a pout on his face as he waited for your next move.

“I’m gonna sit on your face baby, make sure you eat it good.” You said as you squatted over his face. Joengin’s eyes were huge as he looked at your pussy, subconsciously licking his lips. He let out little whimpers as you got closer to his face. You grinned at how eager he was.

“You’re gonna do what I ask right? You’re gonna make me feel good right baby?”

“Yes, yes noona! Need your pussy, sit on my face noona.” Jeongin said as he made to grab your hips to bring you even closer.

“Did I say you can touch me?”

Jeongin looked at you like a kid that got caught. “I’m..I’m sorry noona.” He said quietly.

“It’s ok Innie, I’ll let it slide this time.”

You lowered yourself over his face, his breath fanning across your lips causing your pussy to clench in anticipation. Jeongin grabbed your hips harder and pulled you down onto his face, letting out a loud groan as he licked up your slit, before sucking your clit into his mouth. You were at a loss for words, as he suckled the bud and rolled it against his tongue. You watched as he made out with your pussy, pulling your further into his face. You started to grind your hips, riding his tongue, as your arousal pooled into his mouth. His nose tickled your clit, the stimulation causing shivers to run down your back.

Jeongin grunted before shoving his tongue into your entrance, licking your walls over and over. You were shocked at how fast you felt your high approaching, the feeling of a band tightening in your belly. You sped up your hips, riding his tongue faster and faster, the thought of Jeongin not being able to breath as your smothered his face with your pussy not even crossing your mind. Jeongin let out a loud muffled moan, the vibrations causing you to tip over the edge. You rode out your high, your thighs squeezing together against Jeongin’s head, your body contracting against the force of your orgasm. You rocked your hips once more before lifting them, scooting down so you could see Jeongin’s face.

His pupils were dilated and his face was wet with your slick as he licked his lips. He moaned at your taste, making sure to get every drop he could. You leaned down to press your lips against his, tasting yourself on him. The kiss became heated quick, as he pushed his tongue into your mouth, the two appendages fighting for dominance.

“Put it in Innie, go ahead baby,” you murmured against his lips.

Jeongin grasped his cock, stroking it a few times and running it through your lips. He pressed his length against your entrance before you rolled your hips down as you sank down onto his cock. You sat up and rolled your hips again and again, as the feel of his length rubbing your walls felt just right. You reached down for Jeongin’s hands and placed them on your breasts. He immediately squeezed them, brushing his fingers over your nipples.

You let out sighs as he was hitting your spot over and over. He continued to fondle your breasts, pinching your nipples every now and then as you sped up the motion of your hips. You rode his cock hard and fast, as you barreled towards your orgasm again. Jeongin was close, you could feel it as his cock twitched within your walls. His moans became louder which each swivel of your hips, as little whimpers fell from his lips.

He brought his fingers down to your clit and began to rub your bundle of nerves in sloppy circles, his fingers slipping and sliding from your slick. With the added stimulation, you fell over the edge, your pussy clenching over and over on his cock. Jeongin thrusted his hips into yours before letting out a loud growl, ropes of his cum hitting your walls and dripping down onto his pelvis. You collapsed on top of him exhausted, your legs throbbing from holding yourself up.

Jeongin wrapped his arms around you, holding you close. You both laid there in silence, your breaths becoming more steady with each passing moment.

“Thank you noona,” Jeongin whispered, breaking the silence.

You lifted your head up to look at your best friend, blush spreading across his cheeks. You smiled at him saying, “anytime bestie.”

Jeongin’s softened cock slipped out your pussy, both his and your cum sliding down onto his abdomen. He shifted you to the side, getting up to go grab a towel. He wiped you down gently, before wiping the cum off himself. He got back into bed, pulling you to his chest and pulling the blanket over both of you.

“Never thought you were a dom noona,” Jeongin chuckled.

“You’re one to talk,” you said, “never thought you were a sub.”

“Touche” Jeongin said, hugging your close.

He ran his fingers through your hair, his mind running a mile a minute. Did this change your relationship? Did you want to be more than friends? He wasn’t sure how to bring it up to you. Besides you had drifted off to sleep, your breathing steady as he held you. Oh well, he thought. You both could discuss this later.

The next morning, you felt a pleasurable sensation in between your legs. You thought it was dream, as you may have been dreaming about Jeongin and how he felt within you last night. You laid there in bliss, letting the feeling take over. However, you realized it felt too amazing…too real. Your eyes snapped open and looked up. Jeongin was hovering over you, as he let out little pants. His cock was buried within your walls, as he brutally snapped his hips into yours.

“Morning noona,” he breathed out, his pace never faltering. “Couldn’t help it noona, needed to feel you.”

“Shit Innie,” you breathed, as you rested your head against the pillow again. You didn’t know how long he was buried between your thighs, but you could tell Jeongin was close. He snapped his hips into you again and again, as he moaned and whimpered, “so good, so so good.”

You sighed out and brought your fingers to your clit, rubbing the bud. “Close Innie, close.”

Jeongin hummed and with a few more thrusts of his hips, he stilled and buried his head in your neck, his cum flooding your walls once again. The feeling triggered your release, your walls spasming around his cock, milking him dry. He whimpered into your neck, slowly rocking his hips into yours. He laid there on top of you once he came down from his high, pressing soft kisses onto your neck. You threaded your fingers through his hair, closing your eyes feeling content.

“Noona?” Jeongin said, his voice muffled from being buried in your neck.

You hummed out in response, signaling for him to go on.

“What does this make us?” He softly asked.

His question made you freeze. What were you? That was a good question. You have been best friends for a long time. Would this change things between you? You hoped not, you didn’t want to lose him. But what’s life without a little risk?

So with a steady voice you said, “I guess this makes you my boyfriend.”

You felt Jeongin let out the breath he was holding as he continued to nuzzle into your neck. He pressed a kiss there before lifting his head up to press a gentle kiss to your lips. He broke away and smiled at you, his dimples that you love so much popping out. He took a breath and said,

“I like the sound of that noona. Good thing you found out about my secret huh?"

Taglist: @jehhskz @jeonginsleftcheek @thesilvernight0wl @armystay89 @palindrome969 @slut4hee @ivydoesit23 @amarecerasus

[qqueenofhades]

I'm watching the results come in for the French legislatives first round, and I have been following American presidential race and supreme court from afar. I am depressed. Please say something wise that will give me hope. I never thought to live through times like this.

Anonymous asked: Hey I know you said you’re avoiding posting about politics so absolutely feel free not to reply, but any tips about not getting hopeless? Especially when the fellow young people in your life are all clamoring to talk about how both parties are the same, they won’t vote, etc, etc (😑)?

Welp. It seems that what the people want to hear at this point is some Wise Words From Internet Grandmother Hilary, so... I will do my best to see what I can come up with. It bears repeating, as I have said many times before and will do so again, that I still have heard no better advice for living through The Horrors than the Gandalf: "So do all who live to see such times, but that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given to us." Because, yeah. That, in its simplest essence, is it. We cannot control The Horrors. Individual people have never been able to control The Horrors, and five thousand-odd years after the invention of documented human history, here we still are, making the same stupid fucking mistakes. That is pretty maddening to deal with, and if you try to think of it like that, it is impossible to wrap your head around and it will only drive you crazy. So, then. What?

I will freely admit that I am scared too. Despite my best efforts, the post-debate furor wigged me out, I had to log off all social media and news sites for most of the weekend, not look at anything aside from one site I trust for two minutes, and try to get myself back in an okay headspace. So yes, rule number one: STOP DOOMSCROLLING. Please get a muzzle on that little voice in your head that says you HAVE to look, you HAVE to read everything, you have to KNOW JUST IN CASE HOW BAD IT COULD POSSIBLY BE. Then you look at stuff that makes you upset, and that leads to other stuff that makes you more upset, and then there you are in a stew of anxiety and anger and everything else that doesn't help. Do not look at the Bird Site Formerly Known as Twitter or news sites or anything else that is liable to have stuff that upsets you, especially in Panic!!! moments like this. It is designed to make you feel worse and it obscures the fact that nobody actually knows. Like, I devoutly hope that the anonymous "adviser to a prominent Democrat" and the NYT editorial board and everyone else screaming about how Biden should drop out right now step on ten Legos a day for the rest of their lives, but they also DO NOT KNOW (and given the NYT nakedly admitting to a personal vendetta against Biden for not giving them an interview, everyone can see exactly what this crass and unbelievably stupid sabotage attempt is, but yeah). Even if they get quoted in prominent publications, they do not know what is going to happen. They are not prophets. The NYT has, as noted, showed its ass 800 times before and keeps coming up with polls that are so ludicrously pro-Trump that it's becoming a cottage industry to debunk them. They are crass and cynical and trash and all that, they have vested interests, they have a platform, but repeat after me: WE DO NOT KNOW "FOR A FACT" THAT EVERYTHING IS DOOMED AND WILL NEVER BE OKAY AGAIN IF WE DO NOT LISTEN TO THE ALMIGHTY NEW YORK TIMES. In fact, the NYT has been so fucking wrong so fucking many times that at this point, I would bet on it being the other way around.

As part of my Bad Headspace Night on Friday night, I did picture the worst-case scenario of Trump winning, American democracy being overthrown, fascists around the world being emboldened, etc. It was a nasty mental picture and I didn't like anything that would come about if it did, but I had to remind myself that even if it did happen, well, the world would still be here, and good people who care about its future would have to do something to make that future happen. It would be ten times harder and it would be the result of another unimaginably evil and cynical fascist sabotage campaign, but... those are not exactly unprecedented in human history. (See: making all those mistakes over and over again.) People in the past were faced with those same exact moments where everything seemed monumentally hopeless and doomed for a generation, and they fought back, and they won. That's the thing. Fascists are evil and awful and terribly unnecessarily destructive, but they are not unbeatable, and they never have been. If we make the choice to resist them, then, well, they can be resisted. It will not happen by posting vaporous screeds on social media, or sitting on your ass and waiting for some miraculous savior/revolution/whatever to swoop in and save you, but it can happen, and it can work. That's what is very hard to remember in the current Horrors, but it's the way it's been for as long as there has been evil. It is not the be-all and end-all of the human experience and never will be.

Likewise: if a la the second anon you're being surrounded with people who are saying stupid things and making you feel worse: just don't be around them any more. It's that simple and you should do it. You can unfollow people who are posting defeatist rubbish, or you can avoid spending time with people railing about how everything is already doomed and voting is useless, etc. You may feel guilty because these people are your friends or you don't want to cut off contact, but you need to do what is best for your mental health, and if all you hear is BS, then, yeah. Pull the plug, cut the cord, do whatever you want. You do not owe anyone else your headspace, your attention, your mental health, or anything else, especially if it is demonstrably idiotic and incorrect. Find ways to do something. Go out and volunteer. Put down the phone (again, this cannot be overemphasized) and stop looking at doomerists on Twitter who get their engagement fix from making you upset and angry. Read a book, watch a TV show, visit a friend in real life, take a walk outside (if you don't live in a furnace, which unfortunately a lot of us do right now). Just sit and close your eyes and meditate. Stretch or move your body. Drink water. Super basic ordinary things that get you away from the increasingly frantic death spiral mindset and put you back in the reminder that things are never over and there is still a lot of time for everything.

As I said: I am doing this myself right now. It is not easy. I know it is not. I wish that we lived in a kinder timeline where this was not necessary, but as Gandalf says, nobody ever wishes for this and yet it happens nonetheless. But we can still control how we react to it and identify the things that are doing their best to make us feel terrible and doomed and hopeless, and make a choice to move away from them. We do not know what's going to happen, no. But we also do not know that everything is doomed, and you know what, it usually ends up not being that way. So that's what I can offer for now. Courage.

[inthedayswhenlandswerefew]

1968 [Chapter 10: Poseidon, God Of The Sea]

A/N: Only 2 chapters left!!! 🥰💜

Series Summary: Aemond is embroiled in a fierce battle to secure the Democratic Party nomination and defeat his archnemesis, Richard Nixon, in the presidential election. You are his wife of two years and wholeheartedly indoctrinated into the Targaryen political dynasty. But you have an archnemesis of your own: Aemond’s chronically delinquent brother Aegon.

Series Warnings: Language, sexual content (18+ readers only), violence, bodily injury, character deaths, New Jersey, age-gap relationships, drinking, smoking, drugs, pregnancy and childbirth, kids with weird Greek names, historical topics including war and discrimination, math.

Word Count: 7.2k

Let me know if you’d like to be tagged! 🥰

💜 All of my writing can be found HERE! 💜

It’s Friday, November 1st, and it begins like every day does: with you sneaking a birth control pill and swallowing it with a handful of cool water from the sink. Aemond is usually gone before you wake up—writing speeches, reading newspapers, strategizing with Otto and Criston and Sargent Shriver—but you always lock the bathroom door just in case he reappears. You’ve popped the tiny pink pills out of their circular packages and hidden them in hollowed-out tampons, each opening sealed with cotton balls. You don’t like taking the pills; you don’t fully understand how they work, and you don’t like feeling out of tune with your body’s own rhythms, but they are infinitely better than the alternative. You can’t imagine having to carry Aemond’s child now, sacrificing your comfort, your health, your future, your life for a man who doesn’t know the real you and doesn’t want to. You return the modified tampon to the box you keep in the linen closet, then begin to pin up your hair.

When you venture downstairs, you’ve thrown on a long flowing floral skirt and chunky black sweater, black flats, small unceremonious gold hoops in your ears. You’ll have to change before the journalists arrive to fawn over the children as they bake homemade apple pies this afternoon. You’ll have to wear whatever Aemond tells you to. But presently, it’s Aegon you’re looking for; you begin with the basement.

He isn’t sprawled across his futon, he isn’t lazing on the floor. He isn’t there at all. As you stand on the steps, you see only Eudoxia, muttering irritably in Greek and crawling around on her hands and knees as she picks globs of red out of the shag carpet.

“What is wrong with him?” she says when she glances at you. “Can you believe this? Melted candle wax everywhere. He is a pig. A pig! Someone should make bacon out of him. Then he could finally be useful. He’s just about fat enough. He could feed the whole family, and all the dogs too.”

You don’t know how to reply; you can’t apologize for helping to make the mess, you can’t agree that Aegon is a plague and nothing more. “Do you want help cleaning up?”

“If Aemond saw me putting you to work, I would be deported back to Tyrnavos.”

“No, Doxie. Asteria would fall into the sea without you.”

She peers up at you through fallen strands of her hair, dyed a palpably artificial pitch black. Then she grins, large doughy cheeks, crinkles around her eyes. “Go help Aemond win his election.”

“Yes ma’am,” you say dutifully, and head back upstairs.

In the living room, Aemond and Otto are hissing like snakes as they leaf through the Wall Street Journal. The newspaper reports that Nixon’s poll numbers are climbing in this crucial eleventh hour. They can’t decide if that’s true or if the Wall Street Journal, a Nixon-friendly publication, is trying to give him a little extra momentum as Election Day approaches. Criston nods at you from where he sits on the couch, looking exhausted, dark shadows around his eyes and shoulders slumped low; Aemond and Otto don’t notice you at all. You keep moving.

There is chatter and giggling and the clanging of bowls and pans in the kitchen. You peek inside from the doorway. Fosco, Helaena, and the nannies are making pancakes with the children. Butter sizzles, spatulas scrape, bubbles appear in wells of batter. Helaena is lifting Evangelos so he can pour a cupful of smooth, milky batter into one of the pans on the stovetop. Cosmo, drizzling maple syrup over an ambitiously tall stack of pancakes, waves at you. You smile and wave back. In the corner of the room, Ludwika is smoking one of her Camels and shooing away Aegon’s second-youngest son Thaddeus, whose fingers are covered with flour.

“Please take your paws elsewhere,” Ludwika says, flicking ashes into the kitchen sink. “This dress is Prada.”

Fosco spots you. “Would you like some pancakes?” he asks as he approaches, wiping his palms on the apron tied around his slim waist. Flour dusts his eyeglasses. “We have enough batter to make about 500. Although I cannot promise they will not be burnt. Our chefs are rather inexperienced.”

“Thanks, but I’m not really hungry.” You take one last look around the kitchen, wondering where Aegon could be.

Fosco understands. His voice drops low and discrete. “I have not seen him this morning.”

“He isn’t usually up yet.”

“He’s not, this is true.” Fosco taps his chin, leaving white dabs of flour there. “Maybe he’s sailing?”

“Maybe. I’ll check.”

“And I have no idea where you’re going or why,” Fosco says with a wink before returning to the stove.

Outside it’s grey, misty, only 50 degrees. It would be a bad day for sailing. The wind rips at your clothes and your hair like a man’s lustful hands; the waves are choppy and treacherous. You think of Icarus plummeting into the ocean, of Andromeda being offered as a sacrifice to assuage Poseidon’s wrath, of sirens beckoning doomed sailors. From where you’re standing in the backyard of the main house, shivering with your arms crossed over your chest, you can’t see Aegon’s boat Sunfyre bobbing in the rough surf. You turn left to investigate Helaena’s withered garden.

As you walk, the hem of your skirt dragging dead autumn leaves, you skim your fingertips over the evergreen emerald hedges, cool and damp. At the center of the garden—like a diamond in a wedding ring, like the sun surrounded by its planets—you don’t find Aegon smoking a joint or napping under Zeus’s shadow, only a silent stone circle of gods who watch you with unmoving, all-knowing eyes. You spin slowly, studying each of them, deities who loved and cheated and offered mercy and cursed and killed. From his gurgling fountain in the middle of the clearing, Zeus glares at you most fiercely, wielding his lightning bolts, aching to loose them. The wind rattles the leaves of the hedges; crows caw from somewhere out in the mist.

“Oh! You’re here, darling?” Alicent says from the arched doorway cut into the greenery. She’s pushing Viserys in his wheelchair. Sparse white spiderweb-strands of hair hang limply from his head, mottled with liver spots. His fingers are bony and clawlike. “In this awful weather?”

You scramble for an explanation. “I just, um, needed some quiet.”

“Yes, the children are very rambunctious this morning, aren’t they?”

“Children?” Viserys echoes, as if he is only just learning of them.

“Your grandchildren,” Alicent reminds him. “Aegon and Helaena’s kids. Orion, Spiro, Violeta, Thaddeus, Cosmo, Daphne, Evangelos, and…” Panic crosses her face. She realizes she’s forgotten one, but she doesn’t know who.

“Neaera,” you say.

“Of course. Such a sweet girl, gentle like a lamb.”

You weren’t blessed with that sort of disposition. Sometimes you wish you were. Life seems easier for women who don’t feel bitterness or forbidden ambition, who pain moves cleanly through like clear water. They have no thorns for it to snag on and grow roots into the bones, the soul. They are never at risk of becoming poisonous like Jupiter’s moon Io. “What brings you to the garden on a day this dreary?”

“I feel close to them here,” Viserys rasps.

You stare down at him, baffled. “Close to who, sir?” You rarely interact with the ailing patriarch of the Targaryen family. He is often confined to his bedroom, attended by Alicent and Eudoxia and his nurses, and even when he is physically present his mind is sluggish, alien, impenetrable. Now Alicent’s eyes are downcast, and she drifts away to inspect the statue of Poseidon, a formidable bearded man holding a trident and with dolphins and sea turtles emerging from the waves of white marble at his bare feet.

“I left them back in Greece,” Viserys says, his gaunt face vacant, distant, vaguely sad. He is bundled up in a thick wool robe that hides how skeletal he has become. “I thought about having them brought over to be interred at the mausoleum, but it felt wrong to disturb their bones. Now I cannot visit their graves. I can only hear them here, among the gods our ancestors worshiped.”

“Who…?”

“Aemma and Rhaenyra,” Alicent tells you from where she now stands by Aphrodite, gazing longingly at the goddess of love. You notice that she is clutching a komboskini in one hand; she must believe that what her husband is saying is blasphemy, but she doesn’t condemn him. “Viserys had a wife and daughter before he met me.”

You feel a sudden and overwhelming stab of grief for the old man; you are thinking of Ari. “What happened?”

“The sea took them,” Viserys explains. “A riptide off the coast of Euboea. We found their bodies three days later.”

“Oh God. I’m…I’m so sorry for your loss.” You don’t know what else to say; it’s too disastrous, too unspeakable.

“Aemma was pregnant. It was a boy. She delivered him in the water, a coffin birth.” And you know from his face, his voice, that Alicent and her children never stood a chance, that Viserys has only one true family, only one set of names carved into the scarlet chambers of his failing heart. You think of Aemond’s heart, claimed by Alys and her son; you think of your own.

“They’re at peace, Viserys,” Alicent says. “They are in heaven with my mother and Ari and Mimi.”

He continues, as if he hasn’t heard her: “I thought that if I made something of myself in America, if I helped contribute something incredible to the world, then they would not have died for nothing.” Viserys reaches out with trembling, gnarled hands, and when you realize he wants to hold yours you let him. His grasp is weak and cold. “Aemond will be president. He will save countless lives, he will save this nation’s soul. And you have made that possible.”

Where’s Aegon? Is he okay? Why is no one else ever looking for him? “Thank you, sir.”

Viserys begins hacking, doubling over in his wheelchair, and Alicent hurries to soothe him and provide a handkerchief that Helaena embroidered green spiders onto. When he has recovered, you leave them with the gods: Viserys to grieve his old life, Alicent to mourn the one she never had.

You plod through sand dunes out to the Atlantic Ocean, peering into the fog as you search for Aegon’s sailboat. Still, there is no sign of him. You glance back towards the main house as sea spray peppers your cheeks and your knuckles. You’re beginning to get nervous. Where the hell is he? Is he passed out somewhere, is he sick, is he hurt?

And then, at last, you see him: sitting at the bottom of a small bluff so he is invisible to anyone not at the water’s edge, arms linked around his bent knees, not smoking, not drinking, not gulping pills, just gazing out into the waves that thrash and rumble beneath a grey sky, his too-long blonde hair whipping in the wind. He wears one of Daeron’s army jackets over a white turtleneck sweater, ripped jeans, no shoes, a collection of other men’s dog tags slung around his neck.

“Hey,” you say as you join him, dropping down onto the cool, crumbling sand.

Aegon smiles. “Hey.”

“It’s strange to see you awake before noon.”

“Yeah…I didn’t really sleep.” No, he didn’t, you can tell: his eyes are bloodshot and his voice tired, husky. He is watching you, so hopeful but so afraid. “What are we gonna do?”

About us. About Aemond. “If he loses on Tuesday, I can leave him.”

“What if he wins?”

You don’t have a good answer. You shrug, avoiding Aegon’s eyes. “It’s not forever, you know? It would be four years, and then…”

“Four years?” Aegon says. “No, I can’t wait another four years. I’ve been waiting my whole life for something like this. And what if he gets a second term? Eight years? I’ll be almost fifty. We’ve already lost so much time, I can’t surrender another decade.”

“Aegon, first ladies don’t quit. It’s never happened before, not once since 1789. It’s a part of the democratic process. People aren’t just voting for Aemond, they’re voting for me too. You know that. You told me we were a package deal, and you were right. If they trust me and I walk away, it’s…it’s…it’s treason, it’s abandonment, it’s wrong. And Aemond needs to have the political credibility to get what he wants done.”

“Look,” Aegon says, like it pains him. “I get that my life is already half over, and I haven’t done anything worthwhile with the last forty years, but I want to be different. I want to be better. And I can do that, but I need you to give me a chance.”

“You think Aemond would let me leave? If I publicly humiliated and undermined him?”

“We don’t need Aemond, we could figure it out—”

“What do you think he and Otto would do to you, Aegon? They would ruin you anywhere you go, they would have you declared mentally unfit and take your children away.”

“They don’t own us!”

“They do,” you insist. “And if you try to fight them it will destroy you. You’ve never cared about strategy, and I love that you’re truthful, and I love that you’re real, but I need you to understand what you’re asking for right now.”

“But he breaks the rules,” Aegon says, and his eyes are glistening. “He has Alys. He has a kid out of wedlock.”

“Yes,” you agree softly.

“And what, I’m supposed to hope Aemond loses?” Aegon swipes tears from his eyes with the heel of his hand. “Because that’s the only way I get to touch you? Nixon wins and more draftees get butchered in Vietnam, and Daeron doesn’t come home, and the white supremacists get to resegregate the beaches at Biloxi, Mississippi and wherever the hell else they want to, and civil rights protesters get attacked by police dogs, and teenagers get sentenced to decades in prison for marijuana possession?”

“I’m sorry.” You can’t tell him he’s mistaken about any of that. He isn’t.

“I’ve spent my whole fucking life in a cage, but I’ve never felt this powerless.”

“Aegon?”

“Yeah.”

“Am I…” It’s terrifying to ask. “Am I the same way Mimi was when she was younger? Is that why you like me?”

“No,” he says immediately. “No, you’re different than Mimi. Mimi was fun, and we could party together, and I cared about her, obviously, but…” He stares out at the ocean, shaking his head. “She wasn’t as strong as you. And she couldn’t really get to me. I feel like you could kill me if you wanted to, you could reach inside my chest any time it crossed your mind and crush me in your fist and I’d be gone.”

You stretch out your fingertips until they collide with his sweater, warm yielding flesh woven over his ribs. “Not so easy,” you say. And then Aegon smiles and he leans in to kiss you, the ocean roaring like an ancient beast, a titan, a maelstrom. The wind rakes through your hair and stings your eyes. You ask when he rests his forehead against yours, your hand on his face, your thumb stroking his cheek: “Do you wish you could go back to when you hated me?”

“Never. I’ve gotten used to not being alone.”

“The kids made pancakes. You should go have some.”

“Come with me.”

“You first. I’ll be five minutes behind you. We shouldn’t walk to the house together.”

“Why?” Aegon teases. “Because people might think we fucked in the basement last night?”

“I’ve already told them. Aemond is waiting for you in the kitchen with a bazooka.”

Aegon laughs and struggles to his bare feet, slipping on the sand. “Okay. See you soon.”

“See ya.” Once he’s gone, you recite the full length of Here’s To The State Of Mississippi in your head, then trek across the sand and through the backyard to rejoin the rest of the Targaryens.

When you open the sliding glass door, Otto is standing in the hallway. His icy blue eyes sweep from your simple black flats to your windswept hair, still pinned up but unacceptably tousled. “Why the hell aren’t you dressed for the reporters?”

“Because they won’t be here for another two hours. Surely you are well-acquainted with the itinerary that you yourself arranged.”

“Don’t get yourself in trouble, girl.”

“Remember when you used to defer to me about things? Were you stupid then, or are you stupid now?”

“Do you know what Joe Kennedy did when his daughter Rosemary threatened the family’s reputation?” Otto says, eyes glittering cruelly.

You really don’t know; you weren’t aware that JFK had a sister named Rosemary. “What?”

“He took her to a surgeon to be lobotomized. Now she’s hidden away in a little cottage in Wisconsin, can’t speak, can’t walk, with full-time nurses to wipe the drool off her face and change her diapers. How would you like that? Would your obscene little flirtation still be worth it? We could tell people that you were in a car accident or fell down the stairs. The doctors go in through the eye socket, you know. And you’re awake the whole time.”

“You can’t do that to me,” you say, shellshocked.

“Oh, if that’s what it takes, I’ll find the will somehow.”

There is shouting from the basement, and you and Otto both bolt for the staircase. At the bottom of the steps, Aegon and Eudoxia are embroiled in a ferocious confrontation, red faces, hands itching to slap and shove. Aegon roars, jabbing his index finger at her like a petulant teenager: “I told you to stay the fuck out of my room!”

“You are filthy, you leave crumbs everywhere! We will have mice!”

“Where’s the garbage?” Aegon demands. “Huh? Where’d you put it? Out by the curb?”

“It has already been picked up.”

“No, no way! That’s bullshit!”

“You’re too late!” Doxie says. “The truck went by 20 minutes ago. And why is this a problem? What precious heirloom did I steal from you? An empty rum bottle? A magazine full of naked women? Candy wrappers, cigarette ashes, melted candle wax? You live like a pig, you should not be so outraged when you are treated the same as one.”

“Aegon, what happened?” you ask. Otto is equally bewildered, surveying the markedly clean basement, his brow knitted into deep crevices.

Aegon doesn’t answer. He only glances at you—frustration, anger, but shame too—and then sighs in defeat and stomps up the stairs to the main floor of the house.

Eudoxia looks at Otto and shrugs nonchalantly. “At least there were not so many used condoms this time.”

Your gaze catches on the end table by the futon. The empty cups are gone, the ashtray is spotless…and there is no folded white corner of a receipt poking out from under it.

The math problem from Mount Sinai, you think, that relic, that talisman, that worthless scrap of paper that Aegon never wanted to talk about but kept so close to him, just like you cling to the card he gave you and Aemond cherishes his engraved Ouija board. It’s gone. It’s almost like it never happened.

~~~~~~~~~~

After the journalists arrive and the apple pies, so quintessentially all-American, are made—you help Cosmo with his job, layering strips of dough into lattice crusts that turn golden in the oven, glinting with sugar crystals like diamonds—Aemond’s retinue begins the last of their campaign stops by travelling via limousines to Philadelphia, just an hour and a half across the width of New Jersey and over the Delaware River. In your penthouse suite at the Ritz-Carlton, you soak in a bath opaque with bubbles, steam hot and dewy on your skin. Your hair is long and free. The Zenith radio out in the kitchenette is playing Tomorrow Never Knows by the Beatles.

Your hands have just slipped beneath the hot water—your skull full of Aegon, things he’s done, things he’s said—when you hear the bathroom door open behind you. You rest your arms on the spotless white rim of the tub, porcelain-enameled steel, and try not to look like you’ve been interrupted. Aemond’s footsteps cross the linoleum floor, then he kneels by the bathtub and wraps his arms around you, his long uncalloused fingers skating over your shoulder, collarbones, nipples, before linking like a long necklace. He likes you best like this, when your scar is hidden, something that might have been a nightmare or a sad story that happened to somebody else. He rests the mutilated left half of his face against the right side of yours; his eyepatch scratches against your temple. You shift uncomfortably, you can’t help it. You don’t want him touching you. His arms tighten around your ribs.

“You know, JFK’s mother went through a crisis of sorts as a young wife,” Aemond says calmly. “She realized her husband was a hopeless philanderer and tried to leave him and go back to her parents. But her father sat her down and explained that she had made a commitment. Marriage is for life, and you don’t abandon your vows when the circumstances prove difficult. So she went back to Joe. And if she hadn’t, there never would have been a John F. Kennedy, or a Bobby, or a Eunice or a Ted, or a million other things too.”

“I am so fucking sick of hearing about the Kennedys.”

“You used to love being compared to Jackie.”

“I’m not her. I’m never going to be her.”

“I’m giving up things too,” Aemond says. Now he’s combing his fingers through your hair, unraveling tiny knots, yanking at your scalp. “If I win, I won’t be able to see Alys and our son. It would be too risky, someone might catch me. For as long as I’m president, I’ll have to be apart from them. You don’t think that’s painful? But Alys understands. She knows it’s for the greater good.”

“Please stop touching me.”

“You’re mine to touch as much as I want to.”

You stare at the seafoam green wall and try to pretend you’re in another place, another year.

“I’ve been thinking,” Aemond says sympathetically, an appeasing sort of tone, like he’s trying to strike a bargain. “I’m a realist, I’m aware that I can’t keep you locked up in a basement or put you in a straightjacket for the next fifty years. That doesn’t serve either of us. If you are truly desperate to be rid of me, there’s nothing I can do to change your mind. And I require a partner who is fully committed to my cause, my legacy. Not a captive. I can’t fight Nixon and you too.”

You twist around in the tub to look at him, skeptical, amazed. Is there a way out? “So what are you offering?”

“I need you for as long as I’m president,” Aemond says. “If I win, I need you for at least four years, probably eight. And a short while after that to establish myself in retirement and fade from the headlines, another few years. But then…we could work out some arrangement that is mutually agreeable.”

The hope is so fragile, so fearful, splintering glass. “You would let me go?”

“We’d have to negotiate the details, particularly as far as our future children are concerned, but…yes. In some sense, at least.”

You can’t find any words. You don’t want to offend him, to shatter this moment. And yet the price is so steep. Four years, eight years, ten years. But then…but then…

Aemond smiles, his remaining blue eye bright and cunning. His fingertips trace the slope of your jaw. “I care so deeply for you. You are my Aphrodite, you have made my wildest ambitions possible. You will help me save this country. I am worshiped because of you, I am trusted, I am envied. No one has a wife as beloved as mine, and everybody knows it. So I feel…I’ve considered…” His hand moves down to your throat, drawing invisible chains of gold or silver. “If you’ve given me so much, I can extend some mercy in return.”

“You can’t harm Aegon,” you say. “Or take his children away, or do anything else to punish him.” And then you lie, a necessary fiction, an invention, a myth, Prometheus stealing fire to give it to humans, Zeus hiding Io from Hera. “He hasn’t betrayed you.” And he’s saved me over and over again.

“Of course I won’t harm Aegon. I need him too. This act he has now of the devoted, reformed, tragedy-besieged single father? People adore it. At this rate, I’ll be able to make him the attorney general for my second term if he uses the next four years to rack up some experience. And his children are gold mines for the photographers. They have filled the void left by our own son’s death.”

“Ari,” you say.

“What?”

“He had a name. He wasn’t just ‘a son’ or ‘our son.’ His name was Ari.”

“You’ll feel better once we’ve had others.” Aemond stands and holds out a hand to you. He’s wearing a black suit like he’s getting married, like he’s going to a funeral.

You gaze up at him, not wanting to leave the water. You belong to him, but when he touches you it feels like the earth dying when Persephone is stolen away by Hades each autumn, it feels like Eurydice’s spiderweb-fragile life evaporating when Orpheus dared to look back at her as he led her out of the Underworld. “What if I can’t get pregnant again?” you ask. “It took over a year the first time. And the surgery…what if there’s too much scar tissue, what if I’m just…just…broken?” There’s real pain in your voice that staves off any suspicion Aemond might have. You do want more children, you believe, you know; just not with him.

“Then it is God’s will. But we’ll keep trying.”

Aemond draws you out of the water like a fish from the sea, something to devour, skin and muscle, delicate bones sucked clean.

~~~~~~~~~~

The sunlight is cloudless and glaring. Leaves swirl in the brisk wind in jewel tones: gold, ruby, fire opal, honey calcite, tiger’s eye, red jasper. Aemond has just finished a speech at Franklin Delano Roosevelt Park, standing in a stone gazebo that you can’t help but think resembles a Greek temple, tall columns that house deities of love and death, oceans and fire. Alicent and Helaena have taken the children to attend the opening of a new public library on the other side of the city. The rest of Aemond’s entourage—you, Criston, Otto, Ludwika, Fosco, Aegon—are arranged in a semicircle around him on the stage. Only 50 yards away, there is a small parking lot full of police and press vehicles. Philadelphia residents have walked miles to hear Aemond speak, to glimpse him, to cheer for him, to take leaves he’s stepped on or loose threads from his navy blue suit as relics like the bones of a saint. You match him, as you always must: navy blue dress, high heels, hair neat, makeup mature and understated, gold jewelry gleaming on your ears, throat, wrist. Ravens flap their wings from the skeletal limbs of bare trees. A car radio is blaring Break On Through by The Doors.

“Senator Targaryen,” a reporter calls as flashbulbs strobe dizzyingly. “What do you think about Tommie Smith and John Carlos getting death threats for raising their fists in the Black Power salute at the Olympics in Mexico City?”

There is a split-second lull; it is a difficult question. Aemond must remain the savior of the hippies and college kids and civil rights activists, yet he must not let the old-money urban elite or suburban families mistake him for a discord-sowing radical. You and Aegon exchange a glance; Otto placed him on the opposite side of the gazebo, and this is not a coincidence. Then Aemond decides what to say. “Peaceful protests—even those that can make us confused, defensive, fearful—are not a threat to democracy,” he speaks into the microphone steadily, deliberately, commandingly. The crowd leans forward as they listen, enraptured. Journalists’ pens fly across the pages of their notebooks. “They are not the harbingers of some doomed descent into anarchy. They are a manifestation of the fact that we have already failed. Our nation has failed, our laws and our leaders have failed, and this is our chance to address those dire inadequacies. I urge every single American to listen to what Mr. Smith and Mr. Carlos have actually said about their concerns and their hopes, to be empathetic, to be honest when reflecting on what our country has achieved and yet so desperately still needs to improve upon. These men are not enemies of the United States. They are the United States. They are a part of us, and we are a part of them, and we must not allow prejudiced, ignorant voices”—he means Wallace, he means Nixon—“to draw divides between us. The harassment that Mr. Smith, Mr. Carlos, and their families have experienced is a travesty. It is something that we should expect from a fascist or communist regime, not from a democracy. And to do my small part to show my admiration for them and atone for the mistakes of this nation that I so fervently hope to make better, I would like to personally fund private security services for the households of Mr. Smith and Mr. Carlos for the foreseeable future.”

The crowd erupts into applause, cheers shouted, signs held aloft. Your eyes snag on one, clutched by a middle-aged woman bundled up against the cold; only her eyes—grey, tearful, shining like quarters—are visible above the red plaid of her thick wool scarf. On her sign is a large photograph of a young man in uniform, maybe nineteen, maybe twenty. Below the photo in red marker is written: Ryan Farrelly, my youngest son, burned to death in Phan Thiet on September 21st. Bring Daeron home! Bring them ALL home!

The woman waves at you. You raise your hand wave back. And then there is a sound that comes from everywhere, a boom of thunder, an explosion, bullets like the one that demolished Aemond’s left eye in Palm Beach back in May, a lifetime ago, a truth that has become mythology. There is something hot and sticky splattered across your face, and you can’t see; when you wipe it away with your sleeve and open your eyes, there is a hole in your palm that you can look through like a window.

Where else?

But when you check your chest, your belly, you are whole. It is only a hand would, and that won’t kill you. It doesn’t even hurt yet, though the blood runs in torrents down your arm. You peer frantically around to see if anyone else is hurt.

Aegon, Fosco, Ludwika, Criston??

People are rushing the stage to shield Aemond and his family from bullets. Police are tackling somebody in the audience and beating him bloody with their batons. Aegon is screaming and shoving through the chaos as he fights his way towards you. Otto slams him against one of the columns of the gazebo and holds him there, because Aegon is not the one who’s supposed to get to you first. Now Aemond’s arms are around you, and he is ushering you down the stone steps towards the parking lot, and Criston is running alongside him and telling Aemond that the closest hospital is Jefferson Methodist, but UPenn is better and only two miles farther.

“Who else?” you ask as you cradle your hand against your chest, blood turning your dress from navy to black. Now it hurts plenty, like waking up from your c-section, like a crimson wave that is scalding and crushing and dragging you under to be drowned. “Is anyone else—?”

“No, just you,” Criston says, a reassuring grip on your shoulder. “Don’t worry. Nobody else is hurt.”

“Senator Targaryen, this way!” a police officer is yelling, and he leads the three of you to his black and white car. Criston leaps into the passenger seat; Aemond pulls you into the back with him and slams the door. The sirens shriek and the police officer careens out of the parking lot, Criston giving directions, Aemond yanking off his suit jacket to wrap around your hemorrhaging hand.

“I’m not going to lose it, am I?” you ask dazedly. None of this seems real. You wish Aegon was here. “I need my hands.”

“No, honey. I don’t think they’ll have to amputate.” Then Aemond stares down at the blood on his palms, warm scarlet ruin, water and oxygen and iron that once pulsed in your arteries and veins and now stains him. He frowns, then wipes his hands on his white shirt until almost all the blood is gone from his skin. He is cleaning you off of him. He is readying himself for the cameras that will undoubtedly be waiting at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania.

Inside the glass doors of the building, dust motes circle in aisles of sunlight; you watch them as doctors and nurses push you towards the operating room on a stretcher.

“We’re going to take excellent care of you, Mrs. Targaryen,” a doctor says as he ties a sterile white mask over his nose and mouth.

Don’t let Ari die, you almost murmur in response; and then you remember that’s already happened.

There are needles gliding into your veins, bright lights, pain vanishing like the memory of a dream dissolving when you wake.

~~~~~~~~~~

Four hours later, you are propped up in bed on a mountain of pillows, your hand surgically repaired and bandaged, morphine in your IV drip. The doctors think you shouldn’t lose much function—the bullet was from a pistol, blessedly small in size and missing most of your major tendons and nerves—but you won’t know for sure until it’s healed. Ludwika is here with you, lounging in the chair beside your bed and flipping through a copy of Cosmopolitan with her Louis Vuitton stilettos propped up on the ottoman. She is content to be here, but this is technically a job; she has been tasked with supervising you while Aemond and Otto meet with the Philadelphia police who are investigating the attack. The rest of the family—everyone except Aegon, who you suspect has been forbidden to enter the premises—has already been here to fret over you and ask if you need anything. But you aren’t in the mood for visitors. You are stunned, and aching, and you hate hospitals. You keep thinking of tiny babies in incubators, priests in black robes.

Your room is already filling up with flower bouquets. Every few minutes, the phone rings and Ludwika has to answer it. Each time she announces who it is—“Oh, hello Lady Bird, so nice of you to offer your well-wishes!” and then looks to see if you nod, agreeing to take it. The current first lady says that you are already as beloved as Jackie Kennedy and Eleanor Roosevelt. Pat Nixon calls you a gladiator.

There is a mint green Zenith radio on your nightstand, the volume turned way down low, and a television mounted on the wall. NBC news is on, but you’ve muted it to attend to the barrage of phone calls. There is a knock on the doorframe. Aegon stands there in his khaki pants and ill-fitting viridian button-up shirt and tan moccasins, wide searching murky blue eyes, carrying a white Dairy Queen cup.

Ludwika observes him as she puffs on a Camel cigarette. “I am suddenly struck by the inspiration to spend Otto’s money at the gift shop. I hope they take American Express.” She rolls up her magazine, shoves it into her oversized Gucci purse, and clicks in her heels out of the room and down the hallway.

Aegon commandeers the chair and drags it closer to your bed so he can feel your cheeks and your forehead, so he can get a good look at you. “Hey, little Io. You hurt your hoof, huh?”

“It’s not that bad. The caliber of the bullet was really small. Who shot me? One of Wallace’s Klansmen?”

“No, just some insane guy who thinks Aemond is a Russian double agent trying to overthrow capitalism here and put us all in gulags. I heard you could see right through the wound.”

“Yeah, I had a hole in my palm.”

“Just like Jesus.”

“I guess they fixed it.”

“Messiah status revoked.” Aegon sets the Dairy Queen cup on your nightstand. “I brought you a lemon-lime Mr. Misty.”

“I need to get out of here.”

“They gotta make sure you’re okay, babe. You could spike a fever or something.”

“Aegon,” you say seriously. “I can’t be in a hospital. I need to leave.”

He understands; his voice is gentle. “I might be able to get you out tonight, okay? I’ll try. I’ll talk to the doctors.”

“Okay,” you whimper.

Aegon turns up the Zenith radio, Van Morrison’s Brown Eyed Girl. He sings along, snapping his fingers and shimmying his shoulders, his hair shagging over his eyes:

“Hey, where did we go?

Days when the rains came

Down in the hollow

Playin’ a new game…”

Reluctantly, you give him a smile. And you think very clearly, though you don’t say it: I love you.

Aegon leans across the bed to rest his head on your lap. He says softly as you run your fingers through his hair with your good hand: “Maybe Aemond will lose.”

“Yeah. Maybe.”

On the muted television, Nixon is giving a speech in Charlotte, North Carolina to a euphoric crowd. You can’t hear the people gathered there, but you know their applause are thunderous. Nixon is flashing peace signs with both hands and beaming radiantly, this man who was once so poor, tragic, ordinary, unwanted, unloved. He has learned what it feels like to be a god.

~~~~~~~~~~

It’s Sunday, November 3rd, and your hand hurts like hell. You swallow your pills, smiling a little. Now Aegon is getting clean and I’m the one swimming in a haze of narcotics. Who could have predicted that? Still in your robe and bare feet, you swish to the hotel bathroom to wash your face, brush your teeth, rebandage your hand and make sure it isn’t growing dark insidious vines of blood poisoning.

When you venture out to the kitchenette, Aemond is in a sapphire blue suit and seated at the table, reading the Wall Street Journal, his face hidden by columns of black ink and interspersed photographs. This is unusual; he should be scheming with Otto and Sargent Shriver by now.

“Everything okay?” you ask with only vague interest as you go to the refrigerator to get yourself a leftover slice of apple pie, meticulously wrapped and packed in a cooler by Eudoxia before your departure from Asteria. Aemond doesn’t answer. You plop a piece of apple pie onto a plate, return the rest to the refrigerator, and then turn to your husband. And only now do you register the newspaper’s front-page story.

The photographs, all three of them, are of you and Aegon. They are blurry, taken from a distance, but you recognize the moment immediately. You can feel it again: ocean wind in your hair, his lips on yours, your hand on his face as you willed him to be closer, healed, permanent. You are sitting at the edge of the Atlantic Ocean, turbulent and perilous. The journalists must have been north of you, shrouded in mist, their camera shutters clicking feverishly. The headline reads: A Family Affair?

And you remember what Aemond said on your 23rd birthday before he left for the Washington State Convention in Tacoma, how he scolded Aegon when he saw him lighting a joint in the backyard at Asteria: You know journalists will sneak around trying to get photos. You know we’re never truly alone out here.

You can’t speak, you can’t breathe. Aemond knows. The whole world knows.

Slowly, Aemond lowers the newspaper so you can see his face, scarred and hateful and horrifying, lethal like the volcanic hellscape of Jupiter’s most cursed moon.

~~~~~~~~~~

What are my earliest memories? Aegon getting drunk on his futon in the basement while I played with toy soldiers on the green shag carpet, Aemond with his poems and his myths, Helaena letting a praying mantis creep across her knuckles, Criston teaching me how to swim and sail, my mother cleaning sand from my face and hands and giving me water to wash the grit out of my teeth, my father wandering through the doorways of Asteria like a ghost, always on the periphery of my vision, and I had the sense that if I reached out to touch him my hands would pass resistlessly through his skin and sinew like a stone through water.

These are the things I think of here in the rain-dripping darkness, bruises down to my bones, eyes swollen almost completely shut, teeth broken and throbbing like blows from a hammer, fingernails ripped out. I know Tessarion is here because I can hear her, soft sympathetic squeaks, the padding of her tiny feet. I know John McCain is still alive because sometimes he taps back through the cracked concrete wall. I have run out of folklore, so now I tell him the truth. I tell him that I am afraid each beating will kill me as my body becomes a stranger, someone weak and brittle and helpless. I tell him that all my life I wanted to run as far as I could from home, but now I would crawl back to them through razor wire, I would fall into their arms in a shredded bloodstained heap and I’d be happy to do it. Isn’t that funny? I mean, I don’t laugh much these days. But maybe you can appreciate the irony.

Has the election happened yet? Has Aemond won? I’ve lost track of the days, but it has to be getting close to November 5th. What happens if he can’t get me out? What happens if Nixon wins?

I don’t want to be a hero anymore. I don’t want to have adventures like Heracles, Achilles, Jason, Odysseus, Perseus, Orpheus, Ajax. I just want to go home. Please let me go home.

I can hear keys jangling against the lock on my cell door. My heart jolts into a breakneck, pounding rhythm; I think that sound will terrify me all my life. Some things you just can’t forget, you know? Some things dig down deep and build a home in the marrow of your bones, a rust-red cave of immutable memory. I know exactly what the communists want from me. They’ve been asking since they dragged me out of the Loach four months ago.

Everyone has a breaking point. This is mine.

[nhlclover]

𝐉𝐄𝐀𝐋𝐎𝐔𝐒𝐘 | 𝐑𝐔𝐓𝐆𝐄𝐑 𝐌𝐂𝐆𝐑𝐎𝐀𝐑𝐓𝐘

summary: a rare spur of jealousy leads to misplaced anger against your boyfriend

warnings: slight angst, kissing, NOT proofread soz

a/n: he is doing so good in the tournament rn

word count: 1.3k

Being Rutgers girlfriend doesn’t demand much. He likes kisses, taking me on dates, and just simply being in each other's presence. However, being Rutgers girlfriend also means I double as a hockey girlfriend. This means attending all the games, being there so that he can vent about the games and being a motivational speaker. I truly didn’t mind it though. Getting to see him live out his dreams made it all worthwhile.

Tonight was another game, this one against Ohio State. Normally I attend the games alone and sit in a section separate from the student section. However my friends, after seeing a video from the UMich hockey account that showed Mark fighting another player, wanted to come and see a game. This also meant they wanted to sit in the student section so they could “be in the thick of it”.

We joined the sea of students, also dressed in blue and yellow. Some people around us had signs, most of them chirping the opposing team, Ohio State. When the boys skated out, the student section roared. People banged on the glass, pumping up the others while they did their warmups. The noise only slightly diminished as the game started, with chants starting every few seconds. By the end of the 2nd period, it was 2-0 for Michigan. The student section was slightly less rowdy, as people went to the concession stands.

“Okay, but number two was the best, right?”

The mention of my boyfriends' number made my ears perk up. I look at the three girls sitting in front of us who are the only possible owners of the voice.

“His last name was McGroarty, go look on Instagram.” One of the girls says.

I look at her phone, see her type in Rutger’s last name, and click on his profile. “He is so cute.” She squeals.

“I don’t see a girlfriend.” Another girl says.

With Rutger's newfound fame from being drafted by Winnipeg, to UMich and the World Juniors, we thought it best to keep our relationship just between close friends and family for the time being. It was good, for the most part, except when girls would assume he was single just because he had no posts about his girlfriend.

“You know, I heard they go to Milo’s frat’s parties a bunch.” One of the girls says. “You could try and find him at the party Friday?”

There’s a twinge in my chest and my ears heat up. Who are these girls to think that they can just get with my boyfriend?

I thankfully didn’t have to endure much of their conversation any longer as the boys skated out onto the ice to begin the third period. They finished the game, winning 3-1 with Rutger securing the win with an empty netter.

We get up, walking out of the stands to where Rutger and the rest of the team will exit the building from. We’re about halfway there when I realize the girls from earlier are walking to the exact same place. The twinge from earlier returns and a wave of heat takes over my body. My friends and I stop a few feet away from the girls, who continue to talk about Rutger, adding in a few comments about Ethan and Mark.

The door opens, a few of the guys spilling out. You spot Rutger walking out beside Dylan. Before you can even get to him, the girls from earlier are by his side. They ask him about the game, telling him how well he played.

“Are you coming to the party on Friday? Beta Theta Phi?” One of the girls asks.

“Um, not sure. Maybe?” He tells them.

“Well, I’ll be looking for you.” She smiles, walking off with her friends.

I expect the twinge to dissipate as the girls leave, but it stays. Rutger joins my side, tossing an arm around my shoulders. “Hey girls, did you enjoy the game?” He asks my friends.

“Yes, are you kidding? We saw two guys start swinging at one another then proceeded to fall on their asses. There’s nothing better than that.” Melanie tells him.

“You ready to go?” He asks me. I nod in response, saying goodbye to my friends.

Johnny joins us, walking back to their shared dorm together. I’m noticeably quiet on the short walk home, letting Rutger and Johnny talk about their game while I try to navigate what I was feeling. I felt as if I was mad at Rutger, but couldn’t figure out why.

We get in their dorm, both boys flopping down on their respective. “I’m absolutely wiped.” Johnny sighs, pulling out his phone.

Rutger has his arms open, waiting for me to climb in as I normally do. When Rutger notices my hesitation, he props himself up on his elbows and looks at me with a confused look on his face.

“I think I’m probably going to sleep at mine tonight.” I tell him, stepping towards the door.

“Woah, woah. Why?” He asks, climbing out of bed and walking towards me.

“I just feel like being in my own bed tonight.” I lie straight through my teeth.

“I know you’re lying, y/n.” He says. “You always stay over after a game, plus you love to stay the night because you get to wake up in my arms.”

“Well… I just want to sleep at my place tonight.” I tell him.

Rutger's expression turns from one of confusion to one of hurt. “Babe, talk to me. What’s up?”

I glance behind Rutger's shoulder, seeing Johnny looking at us rather than at his phone. Realizing that he probably should let us talk alone, he scrambles out of his bed.

“Yeah, I’ll just… go to Luke’s or something. Maybe I’ll have a sleepover with Fants.” Johnny chuckles, pulling on some shoes quickly. He slips out the door leaving us alone.

“Can you tell me what’s up now?” Rutger asks me.

I sigh, sitting down on his desk chair. I open my mouth to speak but putting my thoughts into words seems impossible.

“I was sitting in the student section and these girls in front of me were talking about you, calling you cute and stuff, and saying how easy it would be to get with you.” I explain. “Then they came to talk to you after the game and I hated it! I don’t know why but I absolutely despised hearing them talk about you.”

I finish ranting, turning in his chair to look at him, only to see a smirk on his lips. “No way…” He says. “You’re actually jealous.”

“What? I’m not jealous.” I say, crossing my arms on my chest.

“Oh yeah, you are. You’re talking about how much other girls crushing on me is bothering you. Plus you’ve got this brooding look and your eyebrows are furrowed and you’re kind of pouting…wait.” He says, stepping towards me. “Are you trying to turn me on right now? Cause it’s working.”

“Rutger I’m serious.” I say, wiping the grin off his face.

“Sorry, sorry. But you have nothing to be jealous of. I’m all yours and no one else's.” He tells me, coming over and grabbing my hand. He pulls me up from the chair, placing his hands on my waist. “Other people are going to find me attractive and that’s something that’s gonna happen. I mean guys look at you all the time.”

“Other guys don’t look at me.” I say.

“Yeah they do, I’m pretty sure Luca had a thing for you for the first few months we were dating.” Rutger tells me, making me laugh. “Don’t tell him I told you though.”

“We’re always going to find each other being jealous of people that are attracted to the other and that’s just something we have to deal with.” He tells me. “But as long as we both know we’re committed to each other, there’s nothing to worry about.”

I give him a soft smile at his words. I lay a hand on his cheek, bringing him down to me. I softly kiss him, hoping the gesture works as a way to tell him thank you for easing my worries.

“You know,” Rutger starts as we separate. “Johnny’s sleeping… not here tonight, so we have the place to ourselves.” I laugh as he pulls me over to the bed.

[maximoffgxrl]

hi i’m not sure if you still take requests but would if you ever have time a yelena belova x reader (platonic) with lots of cuddling and kisses? just a whole ton of fluff and it doesn’t need to be too long? if you can’t/don’t want to do it that’s totally fine but i have such a soft spot for sweet yelena <3

Home {Yelena Belova}

Pairing: Yelena x gn!reader (platonic)

Summary: Yelena arrives from a mission and all she really wants is you

Note: yelena is the best i swear <3 hope you like it! this request has been sitting on my drafts for months, but now it’s finally here!!! so, enjoy 💕

You sighed as you flipped another page on your book, a pink highlighter on your hand and a bunch of loose pages resting in your lap. Were you studying on a friday night again? Yes. Sure, you had promised to yourself that this kind of nerdy behaviour would be left behind in high school, but who could blame you? It's not like you had anything else to do and you actually enjoyed studying.

- Oh, absolutely not. - a familiar voice with a thick accent sounded behing you and you smiled.

- Hey, Yelena. - you turned your head towards the voice, seeing the blonde girl climbing out the window. - Nice to see you're home again. And still unable to use the door.

- I already told you, sometimes I need to climb the window so I can make sure that no one else can climb the window. It is science. Just like your book. - she said, taking off her shoes and coat, her cheeks red from the cold weather. - Now, what are you doing reading a book? When I left, a whole week ago, you were doing that exact same thing.

- Well, I have to. It’s called studying. And if it helps, it was a different book last week. - you answered, watching as the blonde went straight for the kitchen. - But I wanna know about you. Your super secret mission went well? Where were you, after all? Now you can tell me, right?

- Bolivia. And yes, it went well. No one blew me up and it was not for lack of trying. - she said, frowning at the refrigerator. - Now, tell me, Y/N, this studying of yours does not require eating? There’s nothing in here.

- I was planning on ordering something later and I didn’t know you were coming home today. - you said, finally closing the book and resting your head against the armchair. - What do you mean they were trying to blow you up? Are you okay?

- Peachy. - Yelena said, sitting on the sofa. - I wasn’t even shot this time. It’s a big win.

- I don’t think I’ll ever get used to this. - you glanced at her with your eyes a little widened. You still remembered when, a year ago, Yelena showed up holding your announcement and asking if you were the one looking for a roommate. At the time, you didn’t knew you were getting a best friend and a giant headache all in one person. - You know, every time you leave I get worried sick.

- That is very sweet, Y/N Y/L/N, but you don’t have to worry. I am the best, so yeah, no danger here. - she smiled and you held back a laugh. Yelena could be so unintentionally conceited sometimes. - Now, will you please stop with the books, order some pizza and watch a movie with me? I missed you a lot.

- Own, Lena, I missed you too! - your heart melted at the russian’s words, smiling at her. - I’ll just bring this stuff to my room and then we can watch anything you’d like, okay?

She agreed with her head and you piled up all your books, papers and pens and carried them to your room, leaving it all on your desk. Fishing a blanket out of your closet, you picked up your phone and went back to the living room, sitting comfortably in the armchair again as you dialed the number of the pizza place you guys always ordered from.

- The pizza will be here in 40 minutes! - you yelled to make sure Yelena would hear you and went back to your phone, waiting for the girl to come back.

A few minutes later, she showed up in sweatpants and a My Little Pony white t-shirt, her hair wet and carrying a sweet lavender smell. She used your shampoo, but you didn’t really care, just watching as she practically fell onto the couch, resting her head against the pillows.

- So, what are we watching? - you asked, toying with the remote.

- Can we watch the one with the sirens again? You know, the one with the song that was stuck in my head for like a month? - she asked with big puppy eyes.

- Barbie A Mermaid Tale? - you asked with a laugh. Yelena was a big Barbie fan, but she specifically loved this one. - I think we’ve seen this at least five times.

- Please? It’s my favorite! - she pleaded, holding her hands together. - I love the evil fish.

- Okay, okay. But I’ll choose the next one.

- YES! - she exclaimed in pure delight, making you laugh again. If there was something you loved about Yelena, was her almost childlike joy about the little things in life. It was adorable.

You were about to press play when she cleared her throat, making you look in her direction only to find her already staring at you, brows furrowed.

- What? - you asked, a little confused.

- Aren’t you forgetting something? - she asked, rolling her eyes at your absolutely lack of perception. - Cuddling, Y/N Y/L/N, you’re forgetting the most important part of a movie marathon. Get your ass on this couch right now.

You couldn’t help but smile as you got up, laying beside the blonde on the couch and throwing your blanket over the two of you. It wasn’t long until Yelena’s arm was around your waist and the russian’s cheek was resting against your head. You hummed in contentment, feeling relaxed and warm and safe, like you always were with her.

- Now you can start. - she said simply as she placed a kiss against your forehead, making your heart melt all over again.

- It’s nice to have you home. - you said softly, grabbing the blonde’s hand and kissing her knuckles. - You know I love you, right?

- Yeah, you big softie, I love you too. - she said rolling her eyes as she kissed your cheek. - Now shush, my movie is starting.

You just smiled, too enthralled in the feeling of being in Yelena’s arms. She was home now, and it was all that mattered. After all, she was your home.

[fictionalmenxyn]

Heya! I hope you're doing well 🫶🏻🫶🏻 may I request some hcs about how would tf141, könig and alejandro react their s/o is single mom? Also I thought it'd be funny like they swear and their s/o just says "tsk, don't use that word again"

Of course I can do this for you! :)

Ghost

At first he’s hesitant not to be in a relationship with you

But rather to meet your kid/s he thinks they aren’t going to like him or find him scary

But you reassured him and told him you have mentioned what he looks like

As soon as he felt confident enough the kid/s met him

They loved him completely they found him cool as of what he does and that he does the same thing as their mom

He shows them cools things like in the garden and teaches them to use stuff to make hits or whatever

They love him and he loves them

Not just he teaches them stuff but they teach him stuff

Like their favourite games, play football or even play on the x box

And once he found out there are army games he was happy to play on the x box with the kids

Soap

Instantly in love with the fact you have kids

Definitely buys them things before they meet him

And when you mention what they like he keeps a note on it

So if they liked drawing like him he’d buy something related or if your read or play games he’ll buy something like that

When he meets them they enjoyed how entertaining he is and how energetic he can be

He was particularly one with the kids

Like if they want to play a prank on you he’s definitely a part of it and helps them

If they want a bed time story he’ll read to them and let you have a rest as he knows it can be hard as a single parent

Sometimes if the kid/s have worn him out he’ll read the book and fall asleep laying next to them

He’ll make pancakes and help you with cooking, sometimes even get the kids to help

Gaz

Definitely first saw them on FaceTime first before in person

And they lived chatting with him so much they got his number so they can FaceTime together

If they are almost a teen they definitely send him funny TikTok’s

When he meets them in person it’s like they already knew him

They have so much fun together it honestly warms your heart

If they are young and heard him swear or you and they say it in front of him he’ll say something like ‘oi, that’s my word I coined it’ kinda like Tony from avengers endgame with his daughter Morgan

Definitely let’s then lay on him if they are little so they can watch Netflix on his phone while you cuddle to Gaz’s side

Let’s you do whatever as he like Soap can guess that being a single mom is hard so he’ll look after then while you do your daily routine especially in the morning

The kids love when he takes them to school they like to show their friends that he’s their ‘step dad’ and he feels proud when they call him that

You allow the kid/s to call him ‘step dad’ and only because Gaz is comfortable about it

Price

Your kid/s are somewhat shy so when he got to their level he spoke ‘don’t worry I won’t bite. Besides I have a gift for you’

Buys them something like a small toy or sweets to win them over

After a hour they came round and loved him cause like who doesn’t? He is such a father figure that Gaz isn’t just his ‘child’ but your kid/s are now his kid/s

He makes them breakfast and lunch if you are busy to go to your other job or if you were packing their pe kits

Definitely tells them things and tells them to tell you. Like he’ll say ‘go tell mom she’s pretty’ and then the kid/s will run to wherever you are and tell you

Tells them cool stories of his past or ‘war’ stories. You make the kid/s hot chocolate so they can have it while listening cause you know the stories are somewhat long

Watches movies every Friday night as it’s a new tradition in the household

Can’t say no if your kids give the puppy dog eyes. He caves every time sometimes he comes home with them after a day out and they have ice cream over their faces and a toy in hand

Loves when it’s like a presentation thing or a school play as he loves seeing the kids faces light up when they see you two sat in the audience

He’s also there for them no matter what. If they need to vent he’ll go to the living room or somewhere private so your kid can tell him everything and he’ll comfort them and then help find a solution

Alejandro

They didn’t know he was Mexican but once they found out they found it quite interesting and fascinating

As every kid would do they’d ask him to say somethings in Spanish and they’d find it so cool and he loved that

They’d most likely ask to teach them

He’d definitely get them to try new food that he would make and somehow managed to get your kid (if they are picky) to eat any type of food

Definitely loves taking them to the beach if it’s close by. Definitely helps make sand castles while you sun bathe and then will grab some water in the bucket and him and the kids would tip it over you for a laugh

Tries to help you and the kids as much as possible. If your getting ready still he’ll take the kid/s to school. He’ll help them get changed or make their lunch

Definitely like Gaz when it comes to trouble making. And obviously he will get away with it just by giving you a quick kiss and saying ‘only doing it cause the kid/s wanted me to’

Takes them to play places with you. You two will have a chat and a drink while they ran around and get all their energy out

Definitely fun and the kids are obsessed with him

Definitely in love with you even more and loves the kid/s

König

Honestly he’s more shy than the kids and nervous cause of his height he thought he’d scare the kids away

When he first met them your kid/s went up to him and introduced themselves

He found that they were quite polite and friendly so he became more comfortable

If they are a girl he’ll go into the garden and make daisy chains or plant flowers

and if it’s a boy he’ll play games or take them out of a bike whatever they want to do he’s fully up for it not matter the gender or interest

He wants to try his best as he has never been a ‘father figure’ before so he was nervous but he tries his best and you can see that

Loves taking them to ice cream shops or parlours anything sweet related he’s up for it as he has just as big of a sweet tooth as your kid/a do

Loves cuddling up and watching movies together. You on one side and the kid/a on the other

Definitely likes to watch animal documentaries with them especially Sir David Attenborough. For some reason since he’s been with you and you were to watch it he was fascinated by the show and Sir David’s voice

Overall, he is a brilliant father figure to the kids and loves them with all his heart he is glad they like him and want him around

Hope you like it!

Sorry it took so long I haven’t had as much time or motivation but it’s finally here. Also I am open to requests again and just to know that it won’t be out exactly the next day but it would be out soon.

Have a good day/night!

[otdiaftg]

The King's Men - Chapter Twelve

Day: Friday, March 8th / 9th* Time: 10:30 PM EST

"Hello?" "Hello, Junior. Do you remember me?" Neil's heart lurches to a sick halt. It isn't his father or Riko, but he would know this voice anywhere. It is Lola Malcolm, one of his father's closest people and one of the two who'd tried teaching Neil how to wield a knife so many years ago. She'd been in and out of their house so many times Neil had thought for a while she lived there with them. She poses as Nathan's personal assistant, but her job is to get rid of the bodies Nathan's circle create. She is worth her weight in gold. Not a single one has ever turned up again. Neil tilts the phone away from his ear and takes a long, slow breath. It doesn't help. His lungs are full of shards of ice, chilling him to the bone and cutting him up from the inside out. It is an age before Neil finds his voice again and he can't keep a thick edge from it. "I didn't give you this number, Lola." "So you do remember me," she says. "Now you see, that's bad, because if you remember me, you remember who you are and where your place is." "I made my own place." "You don't have that right." She gives him a beat to respond, but Neil has nothing. "Are you listening? It is time to go. If you make this difficult for us, you will regret it for the rest of your very short life. Do you understand?" Neil wants to be sick. Lola trashed bodies; she didn't often make them. That was what the rest of Nathan's people were for. Neil remembered faces better than he remembered names, but he can guess who Lola has brought with her. Lola's business partner of choice is her brother Romero, and where Romero goes Jackson is never far behind. The three are Nathan's inner circle. They answer only to Nathan's right-hand man DiMaccio and Nathan himself. Neil could have tried outrunning one of them. He won't make it past three. For a moment he is so scared he can't breathe, but fast on the heels of fright is an irrational and wild anger. He is halfway to winning Andrew's trust, a weekend from his first vacation, and one month from semifinals. There are only four matches left in championships. Neil is so close to everything he wants and Lola is here to steal it away. "Put a hand on me and you'll regret it," Neil says. "Oh, what's this?" Lola says, entertained. "Has the baby finally inherited a spine? Your father will be glad to hear it." "My—" Neil chokes on it. "He is in Seattle. You'll never get me that far." "He is in Baltimore," she corrects him. "His parole hearing was on your birthday. They had to notify his family when his case came up. You must have missed the memo, being dead and all, so I'll fill you in. They made a final decision last week, and the feds swung it so he'd get released back to Maryland this morning. They're hoping being back in familiar territory will make him careless." Neil can hear the savage smile in her words. "Don't worry, kid. They'll never know you stopped by. I'll make sure of it." Neil blinks and see's that zero on his eyelids. He is out of time. For a moment Neil feels the weight of Andrew's mouth against his. He digs his fingers into his lower lip and tries to breathe around them.

Art used with permission by Aymmidumps. Thank you @aymmidumps!

*Due to the Leap Year, I have opted to highlight the day rather than the date to keep the events in occurrence to the 2007 year. I will continue to mark both days accordingly.

[hypermania]

transcript of the full thread:

"A very long thread: To the League fans, We found out this news along with you on Friday. I see the pain and anger and worry out there, which for the LGBTQIA+ fans of the show is of course compounded by what’s happening across the country right now. #ALeagueOfTheirOwn

So the first and most important thing to say is: Before anything, before you fight for the show or each other, please take care of yourselves. Reach out to your community and ask for help if you need it. You aren’t alone. Please be kind to yourselves.

As I’ve been thinking about what’s happened, I come back to a quote from Penny Marshall’s film: “The hard is what makes it great.” Making this show is so hard and so great. There’s quite a bit to say about what’s been hard, but at this point that’s in the past.

Of course, if we have an avenue to do it well, we will continue the show, and I love seeing the noise you’re making in support of that. The noise matters!

And it’s hard for me to imagine there wouldn’t be a home for a show that thanks to you was in the Nielsen Top 10 for three weeks, was the top show on Amazon for a month and in the top five for six, that was recognized by critics as something special, that’s been recognized…

…with awards from GLAAD, HRC and a million other organizations, that was on a million year-end top ten lists, and that has a built in and deeply passionate audience.

Amazon is pursuing different kinds of programming, but to the rest of the world this show is a hit and has huge value and even greater potential. But first things first, we have to win this strike and get a fair deal before we can explore what comes next.

But for a moment, I want to talk about what happens if the world didn’t quite change quickly enough for you to have all the seasons of this show that we want to give you.

If we don’t find a good path forward, I will still know that League did what it came here to do and, in its own small way, changed the world.

And that’s because of all of you, and the light you continue to shine on the show — How you let it matter to you, how you let it become a mirror, how you let it change you.

I’ve never experienced a response to a show that’s as deep, personal, creative and meaningful as what the fans have done with League. When we were making the season 1, we all wondered and worried about whether people would accept it on its own terms next to the film.

They have, and you did that, and so much more. You lit up the internet on your first watch throughs of the show, when you realized where it was going (and made all of us laugh in the process).

You wrote enough fan fiction for 100 novels and created an outpouring of art and creativity that could fill its own museum — I’ve truly never seen anything like it.

You lifted up a 95 year old who had just come out of the closet and made her into a celebrity who gets recognized wherever she goes. Every time any member of the cast appears at anything, you turn it into a convention.

You stop Abbi wherever she goes, and though I’m a happily inconspicuous person, and you constantly find me and stop me and give me gifts that now have a shelf in my house.

When thousands of you appeared to see D’Arcy at the stage door of The Thanksgiving Play over its run, you turned it into the hottest queer bar in New York. You made Max’s suit and Chante’s beautiful performance into a movement.

A mob of you went to Pittsburgh and saw all of our locations. You dressed as the characters and made our characters into one of the biggest halloween costumes of last year.

You came out, you changed pronouns, you started living more openly, you gave sermons in church about the show, you opened bars, and you got a truly mind boggling number of tattoos that say “to the five” and “rob the bank.” What else am I forgetting? I'm sure you'll remind me.

But most importantly, you made a community, you found each other and found joy, which of course is what the show is about. In many more ways than I would ever have let myself imagine while we were making it, you literally bring the show to life every day.

Thank you for making our work mean something bigger. We’ve heard from so many different kinds of people around the world who are watching League.

But, in a time when all queer people are personally and politically under attack across the country and HRC has declared a “state of emergency,” my biggest fear is that the many queer fans of League will take this reversal as one more invalidation, one more blow, one more…

…effect of the general politicization of our identities. Most of us grew up feeling invisible, and as we gain strength, the predictable backlash forces are trying their hardest to get us to go back underground.

In case anyone needs to hear it: You are not small, niche, modest, off-putting or marginal, and neither are your stories. You are multitudes, you are building, and your stories are universal. You are the most rapidly growing audience and consumer group in this country.

You are powerful. You are the future, and the people who don’t recognize your importance now will feel be clamoring to catch up in a few years. As Chante said so beautifully when we received the Human Right Campaign Visionary award, you are the main characters. Be proud.

Be angry if you that’s how you feel, but know that we are going to win, and don’t ever let this moment or any other make you small. The biggest lesson of the characters in this show is that, in a world that had no space for them at all, they LIVED. (Continued)

They found love, they did the things they loved, they won. You’re doing the same thing, and just like them, you are heroes. We are still fighting for League. But whether we win or lose this one, I’m so proud.

From the time when we began working on the season, Abbi, Deta and I said to each other — Let’s not hold anything back, for as long as we get to be here, let’s do this the right way.

We got so many notes wondering if the exploration of the queer world of the 1940s or Max’s world would be better saved for season 2, if people needed to start somewhere a little more familiar. I’m so glad we didn’t listen, cause now I’m sitting here without any regrets.

And no matter what happens, the people behind League aren’t going anywhere. Give us a minute, we will be back with more for you to watch and read and feel. We’re going to win.

And you’re not going anywhere either, because what you’ve built and what you are is bigger than this show. It’s the story of our community, that comes to us through the hidden history that League shows just one small part of: The bars got raided and shut down.

But the people didn’t go anywhere, and they opened a new bar, and out of those spaces came music, cinema, dance, culture — What we now see as mainstream was birthed from the spaces our predecessors were forced to hide in. They made joy there."

[ghostbeam]

1.5k, charcoal artist!dabi (again I’m so sorry), mentions of alcohol, dabi and reader are awkward, idk what this is but I kept it under 2k and that is a win for me

It’s been two weeks.

You haven’t seen him by your tree since then, but you haven’t taken him up on his offer and showed up at his place. You transferred the address from the pen on your skin to a scrap piece of paper and hung in on your fridge before you could lose it forever after washing your hands.

It would be weird to show up without calling, only you can’t call him because you don’t have his number. You don’t have classes in the same building, and you think it would be even weirder to walk around the art department to find him instead of just knocking on his door, like he asked you to. 

So, you do end up at his front door, double checking the address with the numbers outside, because Dabi seems to live in some kind of warehouse, and you would assume he wrote down the wrong address if it didn’t make complete sense in your mind that he lived here. You decided on a Friday night, because you assumed a guy like him would be out, and the thought of him answering his door right now is mortifying. 

But he does answer it, and his hair is sticking out in different directions even worse than before, and he’s yawning into his fist, and you’re realizing you’ve just woke him up. 

It stuns him a little, to see you. You’re cute all bundled up from the chilly night out, chin tucked into your scarf as you let your eyes fall over his form. 

“I didn’t think you’d come.” He tells you, leaning against his door frame, voice heavy with sleep. “Figured you thought it was weird that I gave you my address.”

“It was weird.” You nodded, shivering a bit from the cold. “Can I come in?”

He opens the door wider and lets you through. It’s mostly dark inside, one lamp in a far corner illuminating just a little bit of the room. He mutters a sorry as he passes by you, turning on lights overhead, half of the lightbulbs needing to be changed and not helping to illuminate the place much at all. 

“It’s usually brighter during the day.” He shrugs, turning back towards you. “The windows.”

He gestures behind him and you notice the large panels of glass against both walls. It must be nice in the day, all of the natural light, especially for an artist. 

You continue to look around. It’s mostly one giant room with ceilings as tall as the sky. There’s a small kitchen on the right side of the place, art that you assume isn’t his hung on the refrigerator, handmade mugs hanging on a rack by the sink, boxes of sugary cereal on the wooden island you think maybe he or someone else built.

There’s a bathtub to the left, just out in the middle of everything. It’s strange, and completely out of place, but looking at it gives you some sort of weird vision of the future in your mind. Reading in it, leaning back against Dabi and falling asleep, him peering over the edge and kissing you goodbye. A fond smile crosses your face.

Easels, and standing desks, and giant canvases full of abstract paint fill the rest of the room. A tarp on the floor in the middle of everything is covered with charcoal and red paint, pages and pages of unfinished sketches. Paperbacks lay on tables, stacked up against walls, three on his bedside table, all with bookmarks inside, unfinished.

“It’s a mess, I know.” He shrugs. “I kept it nice for a while, you know, in case you came, but then I kind of figured you never would. But you did.”

There’s something guarded about him this time, less open than he was when you met him on the grass. You can understand it. After all, you’re intruding. He was asleep. You should go home. 

“Maybe I should go home. It’s probably a bad time. It’s late, and—” You feel his hand wrap around your wrist, stoping your nervous ramble.

“Stay. Please, I want you to stay.” He tells you, and you can see that bit of vulnerability shine through, a little bit in his eyes. You nod, unable to look away from him. “You want something to drink?”

You don’t trust your voice, so all you do is nod, and when Dabi disappears into his tiny kitchen, you walk further into the room, entranced by his art. You wish you knew more about it, then, that you had something to compare it to, though you think maybe there’s nothing like what he does. 

He brings back a bottle of beer, and you take a long gulp because you suddenly feel hot alone with Dabi in his space. He chuckles under his breath and tugs on your arm.

“You wanna take this off?” He asks you, tugging on your scarf. You hand him your beer and take your scarf and coat off, letting him take them from you and laying them across his bed. He walks to one of the desks in the room, pulling the spiral sketchbook from the day before and a portfolio with handles from behind the desk. He hands you the book and drops the portfolio heavy on the floor. 

“Here.” He tells you, rubbing his palms on the sides of his pants out of what you think is nerves. “It’s obviously not everything, but you can start here, I guess. Or stop there, too. If you get sick of it.”

You say nothing, but you move to sit on the floor, opening the spiral sketchbook. It’s not all pretty or refined or finished. It’s a hand and an eye and the face of a friend and a tree and a body of water. It’s all scribbled and jagged, and there’s bits that are smooth, smudged over and shaded in a way that makes you feel like if you touched it, it would feel like skin. There’s splotches of red and yellow, blues and greens, a random water color on one page, ink on the next. 

And when you get close to the end, it’s all you. 

It’s not much, but it’s more than you expected. There’s no more mistakes here, nothing unfinished or crossed out or scribbled over. He’s careful about it. You’re speechless. 

You pull the portfolio into your lap and open the flap. Pages of all varying sizes and textures are stuffed inside. These pieces are much more refined. He’s worked on them for longer, maybe for a class. He has an unbelievable eye for the human body, how it bends and folds. You hate to think about how these are hidden away behind his desk. You’d put them up around the city, and on bulletin boards in cafe’s, and over every inch of your walls in your own apartment.

It makes you feel a little bit emotional, here on his floor with his soul in your hands. There’s this urge you have, to hug him, to push his hair from his eyes, to kiss his hands. You hold one page in between your fingers, the torso of a man and his arms around a woman, her head lying back against his chest. You stand up, and you look at him with your watery eyes, and you turn to walk away. 

You swing a leg over the weird, out in the open bath tub, and settle down inside, looking down at the piece you took. Dabi’s footsteps are slow as he approaches you, crouches down next to the tub and rests his forearms on it.

“You can have that one.” He says, resting his chin against his arm. “Or any of them. Tell me, and it’s yours.”

You don’t know how to tell him you want it all. Selfishly, you’d take every single piece if he gave them to you. 

You look at him, thumbing the corner of the page, yours now. You keep opening and closing your mouth like you want to speak. You want to tell him thank you, and you probably should if he’s really letting you keep it, but it’s more than that. Thank you for letting me see you. I have nothing like this that can show you the inside of my soul, but you can reach through my ribs if you want to.

His hand comes up to rest behind your head, the brush of his thumb against your neck, tender. You lean into it and close your eyes. When you open them, he’s much closer now, so close that leaning forward makes you bump noses. He smiles. 

“Will you stay?” It’s not a question of just to night, but forever, you think. Or at least that’s how it feels to you. You nod. 

“God, yes.” You answer, like you’ve been waiting for him to ask, like you’re whole life has led up to this moment in this empty bathtub. He brushes his lips against yours like he’s asking permission. You give him the slightest nod. 

He kisses you. 

[thehopefuljournalist]

unrelated- what's your favorite news story recently?

Hello, thank you so much for asking!! I've had a hard time because this week was actually full of news stories and I'm working on releasing them all to you guys!

But let me tell you about my favourite one from today :)

As an activist, working within my own country and out especially in climate-related themes, I believe in people-power, fully. I know, of course, that some people have more power and influence than others, but there's no denying that there's strength in numbers.

This recent, huge, protest in New York is such a hopeful turn, I think. I love seeing that I'm not the only one worried, that I'm not alone in my fighting. With numbers, we have a bigger chance of winning over our world leaders, and by doing that, to protect ourselves and our futures.

Well, this is my favourite news story from the past two days.

This past Sunday, 75K climate activists took to New York's streets in a “march to end fossil fuels”

Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez criticized the US continuing to approve fossil fuel projects, something which the Biden administration did earlier this year with the controversial Willow project in Alaska.

“We are all here for one reason: to end fossil fuels around the planet,” Ocasio-Cortez told a rally at the finish of the march, which ended close to the UN headquarters where world leaders will gather this week. “And the way we create urgency is to have people around the world in the streets.”

“The United States continues to be approving a record number of fossil fuel leases and we must send a message, right here today,” adding that despite record profits the support for the fossil fuel industry was “starting to buckle and crack”.

“This is an incredible moment,” said Jean Su of the Center for Biological Diversity, who helped organize the mobilization. “Tens of thousands of people are marching in the streets of New York because they want climate action,"

“This also shows the tremendous grit and fight of the people, especially youth and communities living at the frontlines of fossil fuel violence, to fight back and demand change for the future they have every right to lead,” she said.

The march came during Climate Week, as world leaders gather for this week’s UN general assembly, and a UN climate ambition summit on Wednesday.

On Friday, the national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, said Biden was not currently scheduled to take part in Wednesday’s UN climate summit. Biden has been praised by climate activists for last year passing a historic $369bn climate law but criticized for allowing oil drilling projects and the expansion of gas facilities in the Gulf of Mexico.

A decision for Biden to stay away from the UN climate ambition summit is “unacceptable”, said Su of the Center for Biological Diversity. “The time is now for Biden to lead on the world stage, and show he means it when he calls climate change the existential threat to humanity.”

During the march, the Rev Lennox Yearwood, head of the Hip Hop Caucus, likened today’s climate movement to the US fight for racial justice. 

Youth climate activist Vanessa Nakate, from Uganda, said: “When we say that we want climate justice, we’re not just talking about transitioning to solar panels. We are talking about leaving no one behind when you’re talking about addressing the injustices that come with the climate crisis."

Article published September 17, 2023 - The Gaurdian

Another article, interviewing a young climate activist

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Dean Obeidallah at The Dean's Report:

The push and pull between white supremacist rule and a multi-cultural United States is nothing new. But on Friday we saw a first in our nation’s history: A school board voted to restore the name of three Confederate generals to their public schools.  That’s right, in 2024, the right is naming schools after people who fought and killed to preserve both chattel slavery and white supremacy. This is just the latest salvo in the GOP’s campaign to move America backwards to before the Civil Rights movement.

This jaw-dropping event happened on Friday, when the Shenandoah County School Board in Virginia voted 5-1 to reinstate the names Stonewall Jackson High School and Ashby Lee Elementary School to honor Confederate Generals Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson, Robert E. Lee and Turner Ashby. This vote to celebrate the traitors who killed US soldiers in the hope of maintaining the barbarism known as chattel slavery was led by the conservative group Coalition for Better Schools. Now the school board will spend an estimated six figures in tax dollars to send a message that this area of Virginia is a place where white supremacy rules. This action is all part of the right’s response to the racial reckoning that was kicked off in the United States after the brutal murder of George Floyd in 2020 and the Black Lives Matter protests that followed. In fact, the names of these Virginia schools were changed in that very period.   But this is not simply a “reinstatement” of Confederate names. Rather this is a manifestation of the white right’s desperate efforts to maintain control in the face of changing America. After all, this is exactly what white supremacists did in the past when they felt challenged.

As a reminder, the greatest number of Confederate statutes were erected in the early 1900’s spearheaded by United Daughters of the Confederacy as Jim Crow laws were being enacted across the South.  These racist laws and the Confederate memorials were part of a scheme to both celebrate and preserve white supremacy. The next spike in Confederate monuments came from 1940’s to 1960’s. Why then nearly 100 years after the Civil War? Simple, these statutes were built in reaction to the Civil Rights movement to send a message that white power still ruled that area. It’s no coincidence that in 1956, Georgia redesigned its state flag to include the Confederate battle flag and in 1962, South Carolina placed the Confederate battle flag atop its capitol building. 

When it comes to schools being named after traitors who took up arms against the United States of America to fight for the Confederacy, want to guess when the biggest wave of that occurred? Was it shortly after The Civil War? Nope, it was following the landmark US Supreme Court decision Brown v. Board of Education in 1954 which ruled that segregated public schools were unconstitutional.  Between that 1954 court decision and 1970, our nation saw the largest spike in schools being after those who fought to defend slavery. In fact, the schools at issue in Virginia were opened in that time frame, with Stonewall Jackson high school opening in 1960. That’s right. The naming of these Virginia schools was part of the backlash to the Civil Rights movement and Brown v. Board of Education. The white officials in that area of Virginia at the time wanted to ensure that people knew white power still reigned supreme.

Dean Obeidallah gets to the point as usual. The renaming of a pair of schools in Shenandoah County, Virginia by reinstating the name of the pre-2020 names of the schools named after three treasonous Confederates (Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson, Robert E. Lee, and Turner Ashby) is a middle finger to common sense and a win for white supremacist values.