#How do you not get PTSD from that. That would fuck me up SO bad

[shima-draws]

HHFHGHHH caught up with the Dungeon Meshi anime…can’t even describe how absolutely fucked up it was to watch Laios have to reassemble the digested bones of his dead sister (that were drenched in her blood) piece by piece. Like. Idk how homie didn’t go through a mental breakdown in the middle of that

[bunnyboy-juice]

spent the first hour and change at work deleting some old files and am having a grand ol time laughing at myself for not realizing i was a lesbian sooner

[pinkcasket]

ik bpd akechi is popular but honestly I'm dying on my bipolar + c-ptsd + npd/narcissistic and ocd features for c-ptsd hill

[ironmanstan]

.

[fizz-pop-thwip]

I struggle thinking about non consensual human experimentation as a whole, but what happened to Bucky really it does just make me sick.

To start, think of how his stomach dropped when he fell from the train, the fucking fear knowing you're dead. You have 2 seconds and then your dead, this is it.

Then you wake up to 1) being alive, horrifically unaware of the 70 years of hell ahead of you and 2) your arm being not only surgically removed but replaced with a metal arm, a foreign body, a parasite. You fight because what else are you ment to do? But you fall unconscious again.

You wake up to days and days of torment and torture and slowly loose hope that it will ever end, that you'll ever be saved. He didn't know that Steve was dead, how long did he yearn for Steve to find him? How mad did he get? Did he punch the wall, did he scream? Did they have to sedate him because of just how psychotic that made him? How fucking manic he would go?

How long till he lost all feeling, all emotion and hope?

When they started putting him in the chair, did he scream and cry? Did he beg for anything else? Any thing, anything, fucking anything. Did he beg for death? Did he feel himself slowly lose all of his memory, did he sob when he first couldn't picture Steve's face, or when he could remember the most important person in the world, but not a name or a background or a face, not a crumb.

The first time he's put in cryo freeze, does he remember his reflection? Seconds before he fell unconscious, never knowing how long it would be before he woke up again. Did he wake up, begging to just be put back in, the closest fate to death he could ever achieve? The closest thing to mercy? Does he catch himself falling asleep at night and wake up in tears, not even sure if it's been 20 minutes of 20 years.

Did his crys for help fall on the shiney leather shoes of scientists who showed no emotion, did he question if he was even human to begin with? Surely a human would be treated with even a fraction of care. No one treated like this was born from a mother, no one treated like this was ever looked at with maternal love.

He stopped feeling like a person, he didn't even remember he was a person. When things seeped though it just hurt, they hurt him, it made it worse. So he stopped it, he wouldn't let himself. It was impossible to live. He had no coping mechanisms, no outlet, he would show any signs of struggle and be hurt for showing humanity. He had to be what they wanted.

Even after he was broken in, no crying anymore. No begging for mercy. Did he spend his nights awake, just TRYING to remember what he forgot, FEELING the missing spots in his mind? Did he hold that metal arm close because he can't even remember how he got it anymore, all he knows is it makes his shoulders ache.

He was completely and utterly trapped, the more he suppressed, even the minor shards he remembered, the more mania he would experience.

Even once he's free, how do you come back from that, even if it was just a mental thing, the physical, real DAMAGE to his brain was enough to make him never heal again. Bucky is a walking fucking miracle and maybe THE survivor.

He is going to have memory problems, severly. He is going to have intense PTSD flashbacks, total hallucination level, breakdowns. Seriously, this level of trauma is NEVER leaving him, not fully. Phantom pains, endless nightmares, coping mechanisms that don't make sense but comfort him none the less.

He's going to have periods of times where he can't even stand being touched, not Steve, not anyone. Weeks where he can't shower or move out of a space his brain has deemed safe for fear of being hurt. Scratches at the seam between his flesh and the metal of arm, wanting it off, wanting it away from him. Again does it necessarily make sense logically? NO!! but does he feel it 100%? Yes!!

He gets better, his bad periods get less intense, more far in between but they never fully go away. As fuckimg depressing as it is, hydra made a permanent mark on his psyche. It's FUCKED.

Gods strongest soldier is Bucky Barnes.

[rosenclaws]

New Years Eve Hideaway || Worst!Logan Howlett x Reader

summary: It's New Years Eve and you were hoping for this to be the time to tell Logan how you feel, but he's no where to be found.

warnings: angsty kinda (Logan has PTSD and fireworks set him off), fluff, makeout sesh, alcohol/drinking, swearing.

wc: 1.8k

a/n: I thought of this last night and cooked it up in time for new years!! I'm from the west coast so I've got a long way to go until 2025 but I hope you all have a great new years eve/new year and stay safe and have fun <3333 Also if you see me reuse gifs no you didn't.

Wade's place is as lively as ever. New Years Eve was a celebration and for Wade it meant getting absolutely shitfaced and being around the people that you love. The music was turned up to eleven and his apartment was cramped. You said hellos and caught up with a few people you hadn't seen in a while like colossus and Yukio, you love Yukio.

"Wade! Nice party!" You shout as you finally find the host.

He's all decked out in gold glitter and those stupid new years glasses. He hugs you tight and offers you a cup of a mysterious liquid. "It's my own creation!" He said happily as he drank from his own cup. You look down and swear there's glitter in there and so you gently put it to the side.

"You ready for the new year?" You ask and he smiles.

Things were really looking up for Wade. He's back to being Deadpool, him and Vanessa are talking again, and he's got all the people he loves surrounding him. Not to mention a new (very hot) roommate. Your eyes dart around the room. You try to keep it subtle but Wade reads you like a book.

"Looking for Wolvie?" He says with a grin.

He clocked your crush on the man immediately. Relentless jokes and teasing at the both of you about hooking up, dating, a threesome. That last one earned him three claws to the stomach so he left that one alone, for now.

"The big bad wolf fucked off somewhere. Very rude if you ask me. You’d think the guy who did rubbing alcohol shooters would be all over free booze.” Wade shakes his head as he finishes the rest of his drink.

“You think you know a guy.” Wade’s attention gets turned elsewhere as Mary Puppins starts to piss on the couch.

When he leaves you let out the disappointed sigh you were holding in. You loved Wade you really did and you would have come anyway but you were really hoping to find Logan here.

As embarrassing as it sounds you wanted to use tonight to finally tell him how you felt. If things went well then maybe you’d get to have a new years kiss and if they didn’t go well you could blame it on the alcohol and hope he believed you.

You grab the weird drink Wade created and decided if he wasn’t here you might as well get drunk. As you move you fail to notice Shatterstar standing right behind you.

“Shit!” You curse as knock right into them spilling Wades mystery drink all over yourself. He apologizes and you tell him its no big deal. You lived down the street and you really didn't want to leave the apartment to change.

"Wade! Can I borrow your tide pen?" You ask knowing he has a whole box still stockpiled from before his red suit. He sticks his thumbs up and you weave your way through the crowd.

"Pretty sure this is Wades room." You mumble as you open the door.

The first thing you notice is how the room smells. Whiskey and cigar smoke. This isn't Wades room, it's Logan's. It's messy, the sheets are strewn everywhere. There's empty bottles by the bed but there's also pictures hanging up by a piece of tape. Some of Laura, some of Wade and Al, and to your surprise some of you. Its only group photos but you're there.

You're broken from your trance by a weird noise. A muffled noise, what the hell? Carefully you walk up and throw open the closet doors, hoping to god it wasn't a rat or something.

"Logan?" You ask in disbelief. This massive man is sitting on the hard closet floor. Clearly cramped and he's got a bottle of Jack Daniels in his hand.

"What are you doing?"

"Nothing." He grunts out. He's clearly not interested in talking but you're not going to leave him on the ground.

"Seriously? Look I'm sure if you wanted to ditch the party there's bars open all night." You try to joke but he doesn't laugh.

There's more to his face than his typical grumpiness. In fact it takes a second to notice. You sit down across from him and you see it. There's this far away look in his eyes, behind the rage, there's fear.

"I get it, the closet it can be nice. Comfortable." You reach out but hesitate. Silence settles over you and you tap your fingers on your knee, not really sure what to say anymore.

"You should go back to the party." He gestures his head to the door.

"I don't want to anymore. I uh, I really only came to see you." You confess. He raises an eyebrow but stays quiet.

"If you want me to leave I can but, It's new years and well...I have a walk in closet. You know the big kind that has more space." You offer.

He's silent and you think you've pushed it too far. This was stupid I mean who asks a man if he wants to sit in your closet. He gets up and places the bottle on the ground, holding out his hand to you.

"You just gonna sit there?"

You and Logan manage to sneak out of Wades pretty easily. Grabbing a pizza and a few bottles of soda (and one bottle of champagne) you head to your apartment. Your closet was much more spacious than Logans for sure but the two of you were still close. You turned on some movie on your laptop and you and Logan ate the pizza.

“God why is there so much singing.” Logan says with a groan.

“Because its a movie musical, look if you didn’t want to watch than you could have said something.”

“What kind of name is the Greatest Showman anyways.” Logan huffs and you roll your eyes.

Your shoulders bump into each other as he reaches for his soda. Though the movie was already half way through, you hadn’t really been paying attention. You were too focused on Logan. He was so close, his arms were big and so musclely.

That’s not even a word but you couldn’t think straight, not with your crush sitting right next to you. He smelled nice, like fresh shampoo. As the movies plays you notice the time, its almost midnight.

“The fireworks should be soon!” You move to go back outside to watch but Logan stays glued to the floor. That fear coming back into his eyes.

“Logan?” You crouch down next to him.

“Don’t worry about me sweetheart, go enjoy the fireworks.” You don’t move.

You don’t ask him to explain either but something tells you he shouldn’t be alone. You turn the movie back on and let it play, letting your head rest on his shoulder as his hand gently comes to rest on your knee. Both of you don’t want to move, afraid of doing the wrong thing.

“Fireworks. They just bring back bad memories.” He mumbles.

He’s over 200 years old but nightmares of his life before still haunts him. He fought in pretty much every war, lost friends, watched people die. He’s been surrounded by violence and gunshots all his life and in the heat of battle he doesn’t even flinch. Even as recently as last Tuesday he’s has bullets fired at him and he just spit them out.

But for some reason fireworks just get to him. It triggers something in him, this deep seated fear that makes him freeze. Most years he’s been shitfaced drunk and isn’t even awake by the time the clock hits twelve.

But this year was different. He had friends and a place to live, a party to go to. He had you. He knew you were coming and he wanted this year to be different. That maybe he gets to truly start fresh with the turning of the year.

But his brain just wouldn’t shut off, spiraling into what ifs and filling him with fear of loss and the worst possible outcomes. So he holed himself in his closet waited for the night to be over. Until you found him and you smiled that pretty smile and instead of laughing at him you joined him.

“That’s okay…Fireworks are overrated anyways.” You don’t know how to help, you don’t want to press but you want him to know you’re there.

There's muffled cheering through the walls and a boom echoes through the closet. Its not as loud but you can still hear it. Without thinking you grab Logan’s hand. Squeezing it tight as the fireworks outside start their show.

“Look you don’t have to-“

“I want to. I want to be here with you.” You cut Logan off before he even has the chance to feel guilty. You reach over and turn the volume up on the movie.

“Happy New Year Logan, there's nowhere I’d rather be than right here with you.” You say sincerely, a soft smile on your face.

He stares at you, it takes a second for him to truly understand that you want to be there with him. That its not guilt or pity you feel for the man, but something more.

Slowly the two of you lean closer, like a trance has spelled the both of you. The fireworks fade to the back as your lips touch. Both unsure at first but once you get a taste of Logan you want more. You wrap your arms around his neck as you pull him towards you.

One of his hands cup your face, his thumb rubbing your cheek softly as his other hand places itself on your lower back, bringing you as close to him as you can get. He tastes like cherry soda and his lips feel just right against yours.

"Logan..." You whine as your lips finally part. He groans as he ducks his head, moving his lips to your jaw and down your neck. Sucking a small spot when he notices you start to melt in his arms.

"Never had a New Years Kiss before.". He purrs and you find that hard to believe.

"Glad it's you." He captures your lips in another kiss as the fireworks seem to subside, not that either of you notice.

Starting off the year together, intertwined in each others arms. All Logan wanted was a fresh start, a true start where he changes from the man he was into the man he wants to be. This is the start to that, he's no longer the violent angry man he was. His world had been flipped upside down and sometimes he still wonders if he really deserves it all.

I mean, after all the pain he's caused how the hell could someone like you ever fall for him, care for him. It's crazy to think about but Logan is going to take this and hold on to it for as long as it lasts. Hopefully it lasts forever. Logan slams your laptop shut and moves it to the side, making room for you to lay down on the ground.

Maybe this new year isn't looking too bad anymore.

[wastemanjohn]

i'm not at all bothered about people disliking john because entirely valid tbh and someone else's opinion changes nothing for me. i just think the militant anti john brigade - that is, those that make up textually unsupported and entirely leftfield reasons to dislike him - are really missing out.

the thing is, we've got an absolute buffet of an interesting and irreparably fucked up character here. we could debate the absolute Horrors of john winchester and his a+ parenting for days on end literally from the two seconds of screentime he had. because he does suck! it's totally fair to say that canon john is selfish, neglectful and at best emotionally abusive. now i'm defo no apologist (see username) - but he's also the furthest thing from a cardboard shitty abusive dad. there is serious context for the things he does and the way he thinks.

john's life was hell man. his own dad, for all he knew, abandoned him. he went to war young and almost certainly came back with ptsd. these things alone don't exactly make life easy but then your wife burns to death on a ceiling and you're left a widower and a single dad to a baby and a pre schooler before you're even thirty? then discover that it couldn't even be a plain old housefire but no - there is actual Evil out there and you and your children are not safe and never will be?

the desire for revenge is understandable. the desire to do stupid and paradoxically dangerous things to protect your children are understandable. right, good or healthy? no. but understandable. and that's what makes a good sympathetic character.

basically i think a lot of negative readings of john exaggerate the badness of his intentions and ignore his humanity. it's also understandable that john is not a beacon of emotional regulation. it's also understandable that he cant always balance being emotionally and physically there for his kids with Fighting The Horrors. pour alcohol misuse onto this dumpster fire and you're not getting a perfect person, or a perfect parent. you're getting a broken human who was focused only on keeping his kids safe, alive, protected, and able to protect themselves. sure, he had tunnel vision about it. he did it very badly. he controlled sam as the youngest and parentified dean as the oldest. he made sam feel misunderstood and smothered. he made dean feel completely responsible for the welfare of his brother and dependent on john's praise and approval as his second in command.

john fucked his kids up IMMEASURABLY. he thought he was doing the right thing.

also - remember young john? remember how he's softly spoken and loves his cars and adores his girlfriend and respects his fucking elders and, to quote mary, "believes in happy endings"? remember the doting dad we see for like a minute in the pilot? is that not meant to show us that, had his life not taken the turn it did - he would likely have been an entirely different person? how is the tragedy of that not also completely DELICIOUS??

so why homophobic john? why john who beat dean senseless regularly? why john who gave no shits and wanted his boys to be miserable? why these embellishments that make him someone else, someone with nothing good inside of him, when what canon gives us is so much better?

come on guys. the tragic messy sad angry selfish HUMAN john we got in the show is an absolute treat. why are we making him an irredeemable, unfeeling and uncomplicated asshole who doesn't give a shit about his boys. ya'll saw him spending a good 50% of his screen time crying about how much he loved them right? and sam and dean KNEW he loved them. they also knew, or in dean's case came to realise, that he was a terrible father in many ways. real life is messy and nuanced. families are messy and nuanced. and imo spn got this so right.

[tsukimefuku]

blunt trauma ♰ nanami kento

summary: your mission is to execute a curse user. the issue? said curse user is nanami kento, your former high school classmate and the man who you still secretly love.

tags and cw: dark content, no use of y/n, sorcerer!f!reader, villain!nanami, +18, explicit smut (mostly rough with tender moments hate/love sex), unprotected sex (wrap it, ppl), masturbation, oral (f receiving), pv, from enemies to enemies who fucked 👍, drama and angst (i’m a latina who grew up watching telenovelas), mentions of death, canon-typical violence, ptsd, cursing, hurt/no comfort, this man is saltier than the sea and turned it into everybody else's problem. 

wc: 7.5k

notes etc.: somehow it became a character study. this is my rendition of what i think gege would make nanami to be like if they followed their original plan and had nanami be a villain. inspo list is so huge i had to make a playlist, i got carried away.

writing/reading soundtrack: playlist link ; main songs → way down we go (kaleo) and daylight (david kushner).

disclaimer: i do not in any way approve of (or encourage) the relationship depicted here. it is toxic and bad for all parties involved. this is fictional and should stay that way.

oh, father, tell me ♰ do we get what we deserve?

It felt like the air had been beaten out of your lungs by the very one and only blunt blade you ever knew when you heard the news from Gojo.

Of course the first thing he did when he finished wrapping things up was calling you. If roles were reversed, and this had been Geto, he wouldn't expect any less from you.

During the School's Exchange Event, Jujutsu High was attacked by multiple high grade curses and curse users.

One of them was your former best friend from high school, Nanami Kento. 

"Are you certain it was him?"

"Absolutely," Gojo replied on the other side of the line, "there were traces of cursed energy from his cursed technique. He was also spotted by one of MeiMei's ravens."

"And how many students did he…"

"Two students from Kyoto."

Your head instantly felt dizzy.

"He also killed around a dozen assistants and people securing cursed objects underground."

"Shit… shit," you muttered, forgetting for a few seconds what words were and how to form a coherent sentence. Following suit, your stomach dropped with a sinking ache the moment you made the obvious realization, uttering the most painful thing you had to say in your life — even worse than he's gone, so many years before.

 "This will earn him a death sentence, won't it?"

Gojo was silent for a few moments.

"Hey…"

"Tell me. I can take it."

After a bated breath — from your end, mostly — he confirmed your worst fears.

"Yes. It will."

Ever since Geto's and Nanami's defection, you and Gojo had a special type of shared sorrow over each other's failures to save the people you both loved the most. Call it trauma bonding or codependency, but you developed an unwavering sense of loyalty towards one another.

For that reason, he already knew what you were about to ask him, and you only would because you knew he wouldn't find it in himself to refuse it.

"When it happens, please, have me be appointed as the executioner."

"Of course."

Sitting with a glass of whiskey while gazing out of the window in an understated house just by the outskirts of Sendai, Nanami couldn't say he was fulfilled, unable to grasp the concept of feeling in any way elated ever since his teenage years. However, he was definitely satisfied that this plan had worked.

He managed to put a dent into Jujutsu Society, aiding Geto — or, at least, someone that looked like him, not that Nanami truly cared about it by this point — in retrieving multiple cursed objects that would be used for their inevitable fallout.

There had been a few casualties, though.

Two students and many personnel died — or rather, met their fateful end by the edge of his blunt blade —, but some deaths should be expected if Jujutsu Society was to be brought to the ground, down to its last brick.

Ever since that fateful day when he was nothing but a tall child sitting beside the cold corpse of his best friend, Yu Haibara, Nanami had simmered what would become a cauldron of absolute venom-dripping rage against Jujutsu Society.

To hell with saving other people — what about them? What about the teenager that would never grow to be a sorcerer, who became an inanimate nothing before ever getting the chance of making something out of himself? 

That face… Nanami could never forget it. It haunted his dreams, even a decade later. Such a stark contrast between the light-spirited smiles and this cold, gray monolith that laid in the morgue.

They had no right to rob their students from their youth, much less from their lives, but that's exactly what Jujutsu High did when they didn't even bother to check the mission appropriately before dispatching Haibara and Nanami to a certain death.

Nanami escaped, but just barely, by the skin of his teeth. Haibara, however, wasn't blessed with the same luck, and drew the short straw when his hitched final breaths met their end against Nanami's shoulder. Nanami, who carried his best friend on his back, desperately tried to win a losing race against death. 

Help was late to arrive.

They were too late for Haibara.

And, in a sense, they were too late for him, too.

The worst part, though, was when they were finally being transported all the way back to Jujutsu High. As he glanced over Haibara’s cadaver, now covered by a body bag, one particularly insensitive assistant very rudely stated, “at least there is a body to be buried.”

At least

There is a body 

To be buried

Those words echoed in his head for what felt like eternity. Was that the best they all had to hope for? To at least have remains left behind for the mourning?

In any case, that was why, even though he had to kill, Nanami never mangled any of his human victims — something not easy to do, given how his technique worked and how easy it was to split someone in half.

You had noticed this perverted benevolence while looking over the necropsy reports, a realization that just added insult to injury.

Let there be something for the funeral, I suppose, was what he told himself.

In his own twisted way, Nanami figured this was a kindness very few sorcerers received at their tragic ends, and decided he'd definitely be more compassionate than what Jujutsu High put their sorcerers through. 

In his eyes, those from Jujutsu High who died under his will were the ones granted a truly merciful death.

His peace was disturbed by the sound of the entrance door being brutally kicked in, flying its way across the living room. He pulled his blunt blade from the side of his armchair with his free hand, but quickly put it down when realizing it was you that had just barged inside.

He knew you very well — well enough to be certain you wouldn't come swinging at him immediately.

"I can see you still have a temper. Destroying the door wasn’t necessary, I would've opened it for you," he stated, sipping on his drink.

"I don't care," you retorted, "I guess you already know why I'm here, in any case."

"I do. You're here to carry out my death sentence," he stated, completely unbothered, as if talking about the weather.

As if he was just mundanely stuck in his ways. 

You huffed, placing your hand over your sword's handle.

"Precisely."

"We haven't spoken in a long time, why don't you take a seat?" Nanami inquired, pointing at the armchair right in front of him. "I want to finish my drink."

You glared at the curse user, as he, unfazed, kept gulping on his whiskey. Nanami was wearing a black buttoned shirt, black pants and black oxford shoes, and you couldn't help but see him as a grim reaper — this was a somber look, fitting for the equally somber man who carried it.

For a second, you took in his features — you hadn’t seen Nanami for a few years after the last time you crossed paths.

His shoulders had slightly broadened, and he still bore the same chiseled face, framed by his sand-blond hair neatly slicked back.

Nanami’s eyes traveled over you quickly, apparently doing the very same thing.

Time had left its marks. It was evident you both had grown up — and apart.

You knew this was a shit idea, but entertained it enough that you actually walked towards the chair and sat down. There were definitely things to be talked about, and you just about had a million questions for him.

Most of them, however, boiled down to what you immediately asked.

"Why did you do it?"

Nanami put his glass on the coffee table right in front of you.

"It was a necessary means to an end."

His words came with frost-bitten coldness, his voice embodying the monotone you once loved, but eventually, grew to hate.

You scoffed, incredulous at his reply, involuntarily clenching your fingers around your katana's handle as it laid on your lap.

"Necessary means to an end? Nanami, you killed teenage sorcerers!"

"As I said, and I don't like repeating myself," he interjected, "it was a necessary sacrifice for a greater cause."

"You're such a hypocritical, self-righteous ass!"

Nanami sighed, clearly displeased.

"We have always been able to keep some semblance of respect for each other, despite our… differences. Do not use that foul language with me."

You laughed bitterly, no amusement or fun in your voice as you did.

"Do you think I can still have an ounce of respect for you after what you did? You murdered my people! They were all sorcerers. You killed students, Nanami! Jujutsu High's students! Just like Haibara once was!"

He shot his eyes at you, and the aura of his cursed energy grew sinister at your words. 

"Don't say his name."

Yu Haibara, arguably the glue that kept the trio together. You were hot headed, Nanami was intransigent, and Yu was the conciliatory ray of sunshine that kept you two — but you, particularly — from constant quarreling as classmates nearly every day.

But back then, you'd argue with Nanami with love.

This wasn't the case now.

Not entirely, at least.

"He was my best friend too, the three of us were! Do you really think this is what he would've wanted?!" you questioned him, equal parts hurt and enraged.

"I'm not one to ponder on could've or would've been's. Haibara is gone."

"I'm not a would've been!"

You could still remember it. The day you realized why dealing with Nanami and hearing his sharp comebacks riled you up so intensely. 

You finally understood you were in love with him.

Ever since the first day you met Nanami, you envied the way he'd be able to keep his feelings in check when you constantly felt like falling apart. You felt jealous at how he was considered a greatly competent individual, regarded by all as the best of your class, while you were basically viewed as a ticking bomb nearing explosion. And finally, it made you livid the way how everyone treated him like the informal leader of the trio when the three of you were out on a mission together.

However, those were the same things that got you to admire your friend and, eventually, fall in love for him.

That day, you asked Nanami to meet you outside after class by himself — much to Haibara's dismay —, because you had something to tell him. It was a Tuesday afternoon, and the unforgiving sun of summer was already setting, casting an orange glow through the leaves of the tree you were both under.

After confessing your feelings for him and bracing yourself for being shot down, because why the hell would Nanami Kento, the brilliant, competent, and mature second-year, have any interest in the chaotic, hot headed mess you were, you realized he actually looked surprised. After taking a few moments to collect himself, Nanami told you how he had thought you actually hated him.

At last, somewhat nervous — but definitely intent on not letting it show —, he confided he had affectionate feelings towards you as well.

Your first kiss was awkward, as it would be expected out of two inexperienced people such as you and Nanami were at that age, but it carried the sweet taste of a blue spring marked by teenage years' innocence.

It felt like a promise.

Unfortunately, such promise was unmercifully cut short the very next day, when Nanami and Haibara were dispatched to their life-changing mission.

What an irony it was that, in the end, you were the one to actually mature over Haibara's death, growing up to be an upstanding sorcerer, loved and admired by peers and students alike, and Nanami was the bomb to blow up in everybody's faces.

What a cruel irony.

"I was there too, and I'm still here, having to pick up the pieces of what you deliberately destroyed!" you rasped, angrily.

"You weren't a 'would've been'? Where were you when we needed you? When I needed you?" his voice didn't conceal the tinge of hurt that those questions carried.

What a fucking low blow.

"Nanami, that's not fair. There wasn't anything I could've done in that situation, and you know that!"

You blamed yourself for a while for not going on that mission with them, until you realized that you too would probably have died if you were there. From the three, Nanami was the only one strong and fast enough to pull off an escape like he did.

He diverted his gaze back to the window.

"You were the one to bring up hypothetical scenarios. Let's indulge in them for a minute, shall we?" 

Nanami glanced back at you, and his next words brimmed with bitter resentment, even if his voice sounded more calm and collected than ever.

"You see someone you supposedly love slowly sinking into darkness. What do you do?"

"Don't you dare, you condescending prick! I asked you so many fucking times what was going on. You were the one who shut me out!"

Your voice carried a decade-old pain that resonated from the depths of your soul.

It came from all the times you entered his dorm room with his favorite sandwich after he had cooped up in there for days on end, and he didn't even bother to eat it. Every time you asked him to talk to you, said you were there for him, and was met by a vacant stare.

And, at last, the time when he cruelly blamed you for not being there when Haibara died.

The way he coldly told you about Haibara's last words.

According to Nanami, Haibara said he wanted to speak to you one last time, at least to bid you farewell.

And you weren't there.

Oh, the viciousness with which he blamed you, and decided you owed him something for this perceived failure. 

The next time Nanami talked to you, he asked you to leave Jujutsu High with him, just like Geto did, and swore to destroy them. You tried, pleaded, implored for him to reconsider and stay, but the very following day, you were met by an empty room where the person you once loved used to be. 

That emptiness had, paradoxically, filled you wholly with grief.

Gojo once told you that nobody could save someone who didn't want to be saved.

You still thought you should've tried harder, in a childish attempt at giving yourself an illusory semblance of control over that clusterfuck of a situation.

This is the gap inside our psyche that feeling guilty tries to fill, isn't it?

We can only feel guilty about the things we could've changed, right?

Your voice sounded decades older than yourself, burdening the weight of multiple lifetimes of hurt and grief. Your soul was too old for your own good.

"How can you find it in yourself to blame me for this?! No… This is a prison of your own making. You built the house of cards that is tumbling down on your head as we speak entirely by yourself."

He huffed intensely through his nostrils — Nanami’s version of a snort —, looking the other way before proceeding, each syllable hitting you with the deadly precision of his cursed technique.

"You abandoned us, leaving me and Haibara to fend for ourselves, just like Jujutsu Society did."

By that point, you began yelling, and your voice reverberated all across the room.

"The hell I did!"

You had to take a deep breath before proceeding.

"I just couldn't get behind this dumb idea that we should become curse users and bring down Jujutsu Society."

"Why didn't you come with me?" he finally asked, in an amalgam of pain, sadness, longing, anger, and stinging resentment. "I would have followed you to the deepest recesses of hell if you asked me to."

You huffed, laughing angrily in between your teeth, before thrusting your words like thorns against him.

"Funny you should say that. You'd go anywhere for me? How about staying? Why couldn't you have stayed for me, then?!" 

Perhaps that request was egotistical, but you didn't care. If only for a moment, you wanted to give yourself this small privilege — to want in a world of duty.

"I was the one actually left to fend for myself, right inside the belly of the beast, and you couldn't have cared less."

He stared at you, nothing in his eyes other than the void left behind after his spirit got killed with his best friend so many years ago.

"I didn't stay because… Because," Nanami stated, with a grave finality, "and you're the one who chose to stay. You're still actively choosing to, just like you did back then."

"That's not a good enough answer," you replied with a bad taste in your mouth.

"It's what you've earned," he coldly replied, "but in case you change your mind-"

"Enough," you interrupted him, incredulous that even after everything, this man had the nerve of suggesting you'd ever be interested in running away with him. "It appalls me you would even consider I could… After what you've done? No, never."

Nanami sighed, and for a brief moment, seemed to be actually disappointed under his resigned, polished visage.

"Well, then. Let's get this over with, at once."

In a split second, you pushed your chair on the ground, falling on your shoulders and rolling on your back, dodging his lightning-fast attack. It left a crater behind, right where you were seconds before. Nanami jumped over the fallen armchair, and you dodged him once again, spinning on your heels, unsheathing your sword as you did so, to deal a beheading blow on the back of his neck.

However, right before impact, you faltered, slowing down your movement.

Your own body held you back from taking his life.

He didn't seem to notice.

Nanami bent down just in time to avoid the blow, and swung his blunt blade towards your kneecap. You were quick on your feet, and jumped back, putting a good distance between the both of you.

"I can see you're actually fighting to kill," he noted, getting up on his feet.

"Of course. That's what I came here to do," you spat in his direction.

"You were never the practical one."

You scoffed.

"Guess I learned something from you."

He smiled at the irony of that, but his eyes didn't follow his expression. 

Nanami lunged at you, but while you thought he'd deal his next blow in your direction, he hit your footing, having you fall on the ground. Abruptly, his blunt blade descended in your direction, but you were able to catch it and have it slip to your side using your katana supported by your hand behind it, sending a sharp, loud sound around the vicinity, trembling against the bones and flesh of the house.

You rolled on your side when he struck a new hit in your direction, leaving another gaping hole on the floor, and you jumped yourself up. 

Before you could attack him, however, he took you by surprise, and you lifted your sword to defend yourself. Nanami hit your katana with his blunt blade, breaking it near where the handle and the steel met, launching your body back on the wall.

The impact knocked the air out of your lungs, and you fell to your knees, unable to recover yourself as you got up. Instantly, you heard his quick, steady steps sprinting their way in your direction.

You were cornered.

This is it.

You braced yourself for the impact, closing your eyes. You remembered his technique perfectly.

Precise, just as he was.

Deadly, just as he was, too.

You were to die at the hands of the man you loved, who had become a murderer and only a distorted, broken version of whom you used to truly love.

This seemed like an oddly cruel way to go.

However, the impact never came.

His blunt blade stopped as it was about to hit your stomach, and you opened your eyes, just to see his face mere inches apart from yours. His mountainous form blocked your view from anything else behind him, and Nanami, at that moment, actually looked like the menace he truly was. 

“Why were you appointed as my executioner?” Nanami asked, much to your surprise.

“I asked to be,” you answered, holding his gaze as something went through his eyes. A hint of anger, most likely, and some sense of betrayal, certainly. 

“So, you want to kill someone you once loved? You were always prone to self-penitence, so it stands to reason you’d do something idiotic like that.”

You scoffed, grimacing at him, feeling your entire body incandescent with rage.

“I fucking hate you, Nanami.” 

He inched his face even closer, brushing your noses against one another, eyes stone-cold and hauntingly vacant.

“I hate you as well.”

For a moment, you wondered if he had really stopped his blade before impact. You didn't expect it, but hearing those words felt like you just had been hit, victim of a blunt trauma, at how much they tore you apart. 

The same blunt trauma that severed the Nanami you once knew — the teenager with bangs, who'd always be carrying around a few spare changes to get soda cans from the vending machine for you and Haibara, in his own understated kindness — and this empty monster looking back at you.

"Good. Finish me off, then, and get your revenge for a crime I never committed. Being unfair and an all-around self-centered asshole certainly suits you, fucker."

His hand made its way up your neck, and you were pressed against the wall. The grip was firm, but not enough to choke you — it came more as a warning than anything else.

"I already told you to stop using that foul language with me," he ordered, low voice simmering with genuine irritation.

"Then make me," you challenged him, hoping for this torture to be over as fast as possible.

Just fucking kill me already.

His blunt blade fell with a thud on the floor, and you were confused for a moment, wondering if he really wouldn't give you the kindness of a quick demise. Did he plan on choking you to death?

Did he hate you that much?

His other hand came up, but before you could do anything to try to resist — which would be nothing but a futile attempt at survival, given that Nanami was physically much stronger than you —, his fingers snaked their way through the back of your hair, tugging it at the roots. 

His mouth clashed against yours, all teeth, tongue, anger, and hunger, and instantly every nerve in your body flared up with a raging fiery ember you hadn't felt in years. All the pent-up resentment, hurt, and desire you had for Nanami swirled together in your gut, guiding your hands up his hair, as you also pulled on it intently, robbing him of a gasp.

You intertwined your tongue against his, and he unceremoniously bullied his own inside your mouth, leaving no crevice unexplored, as his hand on your neck descended towards your waist, where he clenched his fingers with a vicious grip. You whimpered against his lips, and he grunted in return, pushing his body on yours. His throbbing growing cock could be felt, even through both of your clothes, as he pressed it right against the edge of your pants.

When you finally parted after what seemed like a not-long-enough eternity, you huffed and panted, and albeit less than you, he was panting too.

"I fucking… hate you…" you gnarled, glaring into his eyes. The hazel-brown gaze you once adored was now clouded and dark, like the muddy waters of a deep lake.

"Shut the fuck up," Nanami groaned back, strongly cupping your cunt with his large hand. You whimpered in surprise, and he pulled you in harshly for another kiss, letting go of your hair and sex to sink his fingers on the backside of your thighs, pulling them. You immediately jumped up and threw your arms around his shoulders, as he manhandled your legs to have them hooked around him.

He quickly took you both inside the room, and tossed you on the bed, having you gasping in surprise. Before you could catch your breath, he climbed his way on top of you, pressing your body down, and clashed his mouth against yours again, making you actually lightheaded from a lack of air.

You pushed against his chest, grunting uneasy, and surprisingly, he parted his lips from yours.

"What?"

You panted heavily, nearly hyperventilating, and mindlessly rested your hand on his cheek.

"C-can't breathe…" was all you mustered up to say, trying to replenish oxygen back into your system.

His eyes softened so discreetly you nearly missed it, and his cold-ivory enclosure slightly cracked under the affectionate touch he didn't expect.

Nanami had no idea how much he had craved it ever since you parted ways, and hated himself, just a little, for how much such an innocuous gesture stirred his old feelings up, throwing his heart against his chest in a fluttering rush.

I should be over her by now, dammit.

Nanami also brought his hand up your face, and ghosted over your cheek for a second before sliding his fingers delicately down over it.

You also weren't prepared for that, and your chest tightened all over your heavy heart as you remembered your first kiss.

The way he'd cup your face in his hands.

 So delicate, so lovely.

This touch, at this very moment, felt like a painful reminder of everything you had lost.

"Kento…" you cooed, voice strained in your throat, with all the things you were sure you'd never say.

He hummed your name in return, and kissed you while sinking your body against the mattress. This kiss was different, as his lips brushed gently over yours, and his tongue tenderly teased over the seam of your mouth. You welcomed him in, and you both explored these deep waters tentatively, as he upped the intensity after each stroke of your tongues against each other.

He tasted like whiskey, and bread, and the tainted love left behind as nothing but a reminiscence of less grueling days. You couldn't help but feel robbed by him.

You both had been missing out on this for all these fucking years.

"Why did you have to go?" you asked, pulling back from him, a tinge of anger to your cadence, and another of pain in your face.

"Why did you have to stay?" he spat back at you, equal parts saddened and resentful.

His mouth made its way to your neck, and you gasped with the sensation of his warm breath mingled with saliva against your skin, as he licked and bit his way around.

You couldn’t find it in yourself to push him away, and your eyes burned with the prickling sensation of tears that wouldn’t come. You were starved for his touch, his smell, his body, even if this was the murderer of your students, of your friends.

In your head, you felt like digging a hole and throwing yourself in it, to wallow in the misery of realizing that you were about to fuck the murderer of people you loved, and that it felt good.

A pool of heat and fire shot down your insides as your heartbeats throbbed in between your legs.

You hated yourself, and on top of it all, hated Nanami. 

Hated that you couldn't help but still love him, even after all he had done.

This was the setting tension in between the both of you, the two extremes of hate and love pulling against each other, all while the tug of war rope refused to snap to either side.

He pulled your shirt over your head, tossing it aside, and you undid his shirt, unzipping his pants. He unzipped you too, and quickly enough, took off your pants along with your panties with a single sharp tug.

Back to rough, but not entirely, it seemed.

His hand glided against your thigh and his fingertips slipped over your entrance, getting completely glazed by your already dripping arousal. He grunted, a guttural and intense sound deep in his chest, giving you another bite on the soft skin of your neck.

"Hate me?" Nanami asked, teasing his digits over your cunt, "doesn't seem like it."

You managed to scoff at him, which would prove to be a mistake.

"Go fuck yours-"

Before you could finish your sentence, he dove two of his fingers inside knuckle-deep, without any hint of a warning, forcefully stretching your walls around them. You immediately let out a whimper so pitiful you wondered if that was really your voice.

He seemed satisfied at that. Perhaps, even elated.

"Good girl," Nanami whispered right beside your ear, nibbling against your earlobe with his teeth, sending shivers down your spine. He began sliding his fingers in and out, and you bucked down against his hand while moaning and mewling, walls sheathing his digits as he finger-fucked your cunt, neglecting your clit as punishment for calling him a condescending prick earlier.

His palm rucked against your dripping folds, echoing wet slaps all throughout the room, as your arousal kept pooling on his palm.

He mumbled softly against your skin, bringing his mouth up to brush against yours, "hate… you still love me."

You instantly drew one of your hands to slap him in the face for this hurtful teasing, but he had quick reflexes — quicker than yours. He dodged himself back as your hand hit the empty sheets, and edged his fingers to hit against your soft spot, pressing it so violently, you let out a strained cry from the shooting overstimulation pain.

"Ah- Shit!" you shouted, face all scrunched up.

"Can't you behave for once?" he chided, "why is it so hard for you to j-just-“ 

Nanami’s breath hitched in his throat as he grunted, unable to finish his sentence.

You shut him up the only way you could think — grabbing his cock harshly over his boxers. It was extremely effective, and he immediately humped his length against your hand, while lowly groaning.

With trembling hands and a violent snap, you haphazardly pulled his boxers down to his mid-thighs, as his fingers kept mercilessly bullying their way inside you, sending vibrating waves all throughout your body with every thrust.

“Stop… telling me… ah-aaah-“ you rolled your eyes back with a loud moan, struggling to keep a train of coherent thought, gnarling your next words,  “what to… ah- do!”

His cock sprang out, slapping against his belly. The tip was already flustered red, leaking with pre-cum, and had a long, prominent vein on the underside.

To punish him back for the roughness, you grabbed his length with one hand, and with the other, pressed the middle of your palm against his flushed tip, glistening his arousal around it with enough force to jump across the divide between intense pleasure and painful overstimulation.

Nanami cursed with a feral voice through his teeth, immediately biting the side muscles of your neck with no semblance of restraint, making sure to leave a purple remnant of pain etched on your skin.

“Ah- ouch! Fuck!” you spat out, tightening your grip around his cock, but weakened enough to release the tight pressure against his tip, letting him fuck into your hand. His hips bucked erratically, and his lips pressed a quick kiss right where he had previously bitten.

He couldn't help it.

Suddenly, Nanami stopped his rutting fingers to press his thumb against your already throbbing clit. That instantly had you seeing stars as you cursed loudly in between moans and grunts, drawing your free hand to his head, ferociously tugging at his hair, as heat pooled in your lower abdomen like fiery embers of coal.

He grabbed your arm, pulling it away from his shaft, and removed his fingers from your walls, having them clenching around nothing at such a sudden emptiness. You began complaining, only to have your voice cut short by his tongue slipping its way inside your mouth, in a sloppy, wet kiss. 

Parting from you, Nanami’s eyes were glassy, and you were absolutely sure your gaze must’ve looked just as hazy as his.

In a brief moment, before you realized it, he slid himself down, and unceremoniously lapped at your already sensitive clit with his warm tongue, hot breath tickling against your sensitive skin.

Both of your hands descended towards his hair, brushing over his golden and now messy locks more tenderly than you expected. Nanami suddenly shivered and moaned into your cunt, edging his tongue down your folds and back, eyes fluttering shut the moment he tasted you entirely.

He felt a tinge of pain clench at his chest, realizing this was the taste he had missed out on for all that time — your taste, which would surely ruin him forever.

Nanami’s pain, however, was quick to turn into outrage, as he began sucking on your clit relentlessly, eliciting the most animalistic sounds you had ever uttered.

You instinctively tried backing away, and he pulled on your thighs, holding them with such a violent force that his hand was sure to leave an engraving of his digits over your plush skin.

Nanami was intent on dragging this orgasm out of you by any means necessary.

You had never given him anything he wanted from you — be it the company to fight against Jujutsu High or the same unwavering loyalty he had for you. So this was something he’d take.

If you wouldn’t be by his side, then the least you could do was to cum for him so fervently, he’d be sure to ruin you just as much as he felt like you had ruined him. You owed him that, or so Nanami thought.

“Aaah-- Kento! S-slow d-… fuck!”

You came with a thunderous shout, jolting your hip forward as your thighs tightened with inhuman strength to the sides of his head. Nanami made sure to deliciously lick your way down from your high, applying such a precise and perfect pressure on your clit that you could’ve wept from sheer satisfaction.

After your legs went limp, he slowly climbed his way back to you, pressing kisses all over your body, leaving a ghost of heat wherever his mouth traveled. When Nanami finally reached your face, he put his forearms against your sides, hands over your shoulders, caging you in, as he pressed his mouth against yours in a slow kiss.

You were floating in a calm sea, salty waves caressing your body every time they passed through, and it felt cozy. Inviting, even. As he parted his lips from yours, Nanami gazed into your eyes in the way he used to.

For a second, you got catapulted into the past, and the orange sun that warmed your cheeks through the leaves as you kissed for the first time seemed to shine its rays over again.

With his arms around you, the nonsensical feeling of being protected washed over your heart.

“Come with me,” he whispered with a sultry, husky voice. 

“Kento…” you cooed, sighing, wanting nothing more than for this moment to extend for infinity.

But it couldn’t.

You didn’t go with him, so many years ago.

And wouldn’t go now, either.

That wasn’t how it worked for the both of you.

Nanami understood it, and what seemed like another crack against his unwavering walls had formed the moment his brows furrowed above his eyes.

“Fine, then,” he said, with a tinge of genuine hurt to his voice.

You parted your thighs to accommodate his hips, and he obliged, guiding his hand down to align his cock against your entrance. You bent and hooked your legs around him, pulling him in, and as the tip of his length got pressed against your dripping cunt, he gasped slightly over your lips.

Nanami sunk in slowly, going through your already relaxed ring. However, it apparently wasn’t relaxed enough, or perhaps he was just too big, because you could feel every inch of stretching his cock made against your walls as he slowly bottomed out inside your cunt.

His mouth fell open and you exhaled a moan into it, breaths mingling together. You two drank each other in. Nanami pressed his forehead against yours, and you both held each other’s gaze, as he pulled your left wrist above your head, holding it there, pushing you down the mattress by your waist with his other hand.

After a moment for you to take him in, Nanami began rolling his hips into you, while his hand kept bruisingly pressing your wrist against the mattress. You could feel his balancing act of trying to love you and wanting to hurt you at the same time.

You weren’t so different from him in that sense, though. Your nails got dragged down his back with abrasive force, and for a second, you considered drawing blood from him. He grunted, and you saw the spark of cold-hearted anger flash through his now dimmed eyes.

You both wanted to love each other just as much as you wanted to hurt each other.

In a more forgiving universe, perhaps, he’d hold your hand tenderly, intertwining his fingers in yours. Maybe you two would be in the kitchen as he showed you one of his favorite bread recipes, and share quiet moments of understanding companionship when remembering those who had left this world too soon.

But this wasn’t that universe, unfortunately.

He was to die, and you were to carry out his execution. 

Except you couldn’t, because even if you still tried to cling on to any sliver of morals, even if his life was something yours alone to take, the mere thought of a world without Nanami was far worse than the reality of a world in which he was a murderer.

You insisted on fighting a losing game, and much to no one’s surprise, you lost. 

Good riddance to me, I suppose.

His grunts came hitched and stuttered against your mouth as he was now rutting himself into you, biting your lower lip hard enough to almost pierce the skin with his teeth. You moaned loudly, dragged around with pain and pleasure, the combo that seemed to summarize the gist of your relationship.

He let go of your wrist and descended his hand without a warning towards your already overworked clit, glazing his thumb against the ring of arousal you were leaving around him before starting to make circles around your nub. Your moans came out cracked and faltering, as you tried to resist the instinctive urge of fleeing that the overstimulation was eliciting.

“Give me… one more,” Nanami groaned lowly against your cheek, planting multiple kisses down the side of your face and your chin. His hair — which had already fallen from its usual slick arrangement — brushed against your fluttering eyelids, momentarily weaving golden sand colors over your your vision, and you drove both your hands to the back of his head, pulling him in for another kiss. 

You could kiss him like this forever. 

You actually wanted to, at that moment.

To his request, you nodded, and this was probably the first time you acquiesced to any request Nanami had ever made to you. 

Fulfilled, his thrusts and his finger over your clit became increasingly erratic, as he was now moaning your name against your mouth. You pushed your tongue over his, sliding your hands up his head to tug at his roots, and that was all it took to tip him over the edge.

Nanami came with a muffled groan, having your tongue still pushed inside his mouth, and kept pumping himself inside you trying to keep the comedown at bay. His thick, white cum got glazed all over inside you, and the slaps of flesh and skin began sounding ever more wet than they already were.

You weren’t so far off, with your walls fluttering around him, and he noticed it, keeping his now trembling thumb pressed and circling intently over your clit. With one perfectly applied nudge on your sensitive bud, Nanami finally pulled you over the edge along with him.

Some tears began pooling on the edges of your lashes, and all your emotions — anger, sadness, grief, longing, and a particular brand of despair you cultivated during the last decade — came crashing down as he wrenched your second orgasm from you.

Your body convulsed under him, fluttering walls expelling his softening cock out, as you shouted and grunted into his mouth. You didn’t know if you were more furious at yourself for still loving him, at him for loving you, or at Jujutsu Society for jumbling you both like pawns to be tossed around until you two were broken beyond repair.

Angry at them for sending the young out to have their spirits crushed too soon. For all the deaths no one got to mourn because there was too much work, too little time, and the wounded were always left behind to fend for themselves.

Just like you were.

And just like Nanami was.

You sat at the edge of the bed while putting your shirt back on, and looked back at Nanami, who had his buttoned shirt open over his chest.

“Are you still resolute on your decision of not coming with me?” Nanami asked, with a tinge of eagerness. Or maybe it was just your imagination.

You pondered for a moment, and knew exactly what the answer to that question was.

“Yes. I’m not coming with you.”

For a second, you caught the faintest glimpse of the person he used to be. Something aching to genuine disappointment.

The longing that flashed through him, unfortunately, was quick to go, as he began buttoning his shirt down, averting his gaze elsewhere.

“Why?”

“Because I’d hate myself for the rest of my life if I did,” you stated, sighing before continuing, “and it’s not because I can’t kill you or because I love you that I don’t despise you. You crossed an uncrossable line.”

He pursed his lips, and almost felt regretful for the path he chose.

Almost, since regret now would come ten years too late.

“You can’t go back. They will know you let me go,” Nanami remarked. Be it from him or from looking around this house, Jujutsu High would surely hold you accountable for this — for willingly letting the curse user and murderer, Nanami Kento, escape their wrath.

“I know that,” you replied, a tad bit more defeated than you expected, “that’s why I’m fleeing to Hokkaido.”

He sighed and looked at you. You held his gaze, feeling a little hint of anxiety at what he seemed to be simmering under the surface.

With a warmer expression — or as warm as he could muster it up to be  —, Nanami spoke again. 

“I truly want you to come with me. You’d be safer. We’d… be by each other’s side.”

For a moment, you faltered, open lips with no sound coming out of them. Blinking yourself back to Earth, you asked, “you mean together?”

Nanami kept silent, but nodded, waiting for your response.

He wasn’t just asking for you to come with him, but to be with him.

You wanted to. You did. Something Nanami never knew was just how much you wanted to follow him when he asked you the same thing, so many years ago.

But even though you wholeheartedly loved him with every minute part of your being, your loyalty lied elsewhere.

Not with him, but with the people he had killed.

Well, at least that was the comfortable lie you were capable of living with.

It would destroy you to realize the loyalty you had for the murderer of the people you loved. 

In the end, even if you weren’t a teenager anymore, you were just as much a hostage to your feelings as you had always been.

The ticking took a long time, but the bomb eventually went off.

With a decade’s old delay.

“I… just can’t. I can’t.”

Nanami reclined himself against the wall over which the bed rested, closing his eyes as he supported the back of his head on it. 

He never told you, but this moment broke his heart all over again.

He felt pathetically small.

Guess we get what we deserve, after all.

“You really do have a taste for penitence,” Nanami noted, his voice barely concealing the bitterness that tainted those words.

You scoffed, getting up on your feet, ready to leave as the first rays of sunshine began bleeding through the thick curtains that covered the bedroom’s window.

“Go to hell.”

He chuckled, a sound you hadn’t heard in a very long time. However, it sounded off-key. Wrong.

Sad.

“We’re already here.” 

At the end of it all, he wasn’t wrong.

You were doomed to always keep leaving each other.

If only the world had been a little kinder.

But kindness, it seemed, wasn’t in the cards for you.

End notes: I’m silently screaming. Oh my, this one took way longer than expected, but I enjoyed the writing process during every step of the way (I mean, if that wasn’t evident already from the fact that I made a playlist for this 😂). I forgot how much I was a sucker for gut wrenching angst. Hope you enjoyed it too! 🦉

-

Tag list: @actuallysaiyan @diogodxlot @jadedjane @redlikerozez @voiceless9000

@marvelousfanfictionbitch @kentocalls @ohhheymessa @magical-girl-b @simp-manhwa

@codenamesongbird

[theemporium]

can i request 💜 "You're the only one who gets to call me that, you know." with luke hughes please!!

thank you for requesting!🫶🏽

22. "You're the only one who gets to call me that, you know."

.

In a sport like hockey, you got used to being called a variety of different names for a variety of stupid reasons. 

Some made sense. Some had a funny backstory. Some were born from an embarrassing memory you could never escape. Some had no real correlation but it was used once and it stuck and now the whole team used it. It was just one of the dynamics of hockey that you got used to pretty early on. 

And the thing was that Luke didn’t hate his name. He didn’t, it would have broken his parents heart if he said as much. It just wasn’t exactly like he was ecstatic for people to throw ‘Luke Warren Hughes’ at him. Or at least, he didn’t like it when his middle name was brought into the locker room. 

Maybe it was PTSD from the teasing he got when he was in middle school. Maybe it was the fact it sounded a little like it belonged to a sixty year old man. Or maybe it was because he was so damn used to being known as ‘Luke Hughes’ or ‘the other Hughes’, that he sometimes forgot he had a middle name.

Whatever the reason was, Luke never liked it being used in the locker room by the boys. He didn’t really like the name being used, full stop. Unless it was one of his parents using it. He thought he managed to avoid it for years until he joined the New Jersey Devils and met the team—met you.

Because, for some fucking reason that was beyond his own understanding, every rule and belief Luke had went flying out the window when it came to you. 

Including the use of his middle name.

“God, Warren, couldn’t even use a comb this morning?” 

Luke felt his cheeks heat up as he lifted his head to find you wandering into the locker room. Most of the team were already out on the ice, but Luke was one of the stragglers that was still getting his gear on. It wasn’t his fault the team decided team pictures needed to be taken at an ungodly hour before practice. 

“Does it look that bad?” Luke questioned, trying to ignore the pleasant twist in his stomach when you flashed him a smile and made your way over to him.

“I think it looks cute,” you replied, lip tucked between your teeth as you reached out to gently run your fingers through his curls. “Curtis might give you some shit though.”

“Curtis always gives me shit,” he mumbled, letting his eyes flutter shut as your nails gently scraped along his scalp. 

“Hm, well tell him to come talk to me if he gives you a hard time for your curls,” you said, and even with his eyes closed, he could hear the smile in your voice. 

His cheeks burned as he tilted his head back to look at you, his own smile mirroring yours. “Gonna be my knight in shining armour?” 

“M’always gonna have your back, Warren,” you replied, your voice a little softer. A little more genuine. 

He swallowed. “You’re the only one who gets to call me that, you know.” 

Your smile widened. “Oh, I know. Jack told me you once got into a fight during a game back in middle school after some guy on the other team used it.”

He groaned a little at the memory. “Quinn and Jack gave me so much shit after that. They called me Warren for a week after that.” 

You snorted. “What did you do?”

“I told on them,” he admitted, a little sheepish. “They got grounded for a week.” 

You laughed and his smile widened at the sound.

“So how come you let me use it?” You asked, something else in your voice that Luke couldn’t quite name but it still made his heart speed up a little.

“I guess I like you more than them.” It was meant to come out light-hearted and teasing, but it felt far too heavy and suggestive once the words left his mouth.

“Enough to grab something to eat after practice?” You asked, so casual and calm like you couldn’t see the way Luke’s whole face was burning a pretty shade of red. 

“More than enough,” he said with a nod, unable to fight the grin off his face when you smiled back.

“Then better get your pretty ass out there before the boys make you do drills after practice for being late,” you teased, laughing as you watched him quickly shove on the rest of his gear before rushing out the door.

.

[avelera]

I feel like I don't have the spoons for this, nor the understanding of real-life PTSD enough to explore it, but I feel like it's worth examining Jayce's arc for signs of PTSD. Much has been made of the canonical mental illnesses and PTSD of characters like Jinx, and I've mentioned that I think Jayce might have generalized clinical anxiety, but I think it's worth looking at how much of his behavior might be PTSD related even before he goes to the Anomaly future.

Some possible places I'd look:

Jayce has been getting fed paranoia by Marcus and by the tension that is being deliberately ratcheted up by Silco and Jinx. Yes, he says awful, bigoted things to Viktor on the bridge, but it is worth pointing out that he's not saying this in a vacuum, there are people in proximity to him deliberately stoking his paranoia and that of the city for their own ends, literally Marcus is gaslighting him actively by telling him the Firelights are responsible and the best way to keep people safe is shut down the bridge.

The fight in the Shimmer Factory gets more wild to me every time I watch. Jayce should not be there for so many reasons but one of them is Jayce is not a fighter. I think his video game counterpart sort of obscures this, but unlike Vi who has spent her whole life fighting AND in prison for years, Jayce has never, ever wielded that hammer before. He didn't even have it until the day before! And suddenly he's up against the Shimmer-infused berserkers who are some of the toughest fighters in the whole show. He almost gets his head cut off, if not for features he built into the hammer like weightlessness and the shield, he'd be dead, and then he makes what I call the, "Jayce is Making Bad Decisions" Face (I need to make a gifset of this face btw, he makes it a couple times, also while resurrecting Viktor).

Ok I might make fun of the Jayce is Making Bad Decisions face, BUT on a serious note, it's clear the Fortiche animators are doing a superb job showing someone who has gone into "Adrenaline Mode". REAL fighters do not want adrenaline. Adrenaline fucks up your reaction times and makes you shaky and turns off your higher brain functions. I've been in a fight when fear adrenaline kicks in and you just start wildly swinging to get people away from you and that is exactly what happened when Jayce's face got scrunched up and he started shooting wildly, he just wanted to stop the threat because he's never fought before, unlike Vi. And then he kills a kid and the triumph of his first fight against an uncomplicated enemy just dies and btw, never returns except in that moment fighting more Shimmer berserkers and Renni but those are clear self defense and there's no triumph in it.

BRO gets HIT BY A ROCKET, has a pure panic response leaving living people who need his help in the chamber to save Viktor, and he doesn't go back as far as we know.

Ok so the things that me, as not an expert would be curious to note as possible PTSD responses would be:

Jayce not leaving the lab after the attack except 1) to go to the funeral (where he's attacked AGAIN) 2) to comfort Caitlyn after Mel basically tells him to, 3) to make weapons for Caitlyn's team specifically to keep a small group of people safe, not arm an entire army. Besides that, it looks like he spends all his time holed up in the lab, even after Viktor is gone, because that's his safe space and I think I read once that PTSD has a way of shrinking your world down to just the people and places you trust.

Dragging that hammer around with him in the Anomaly future. Look, Jayce is a city boy, he has no survival instincts, but it wasn't just a bad idea because it broke his leg, it was actively detrimental to his chances of survival because lugging an anvil around drained him of water and calories. Bro had a lot less chance of survival with it, but he thought he was surrounded by zombies (he wasn't, they're all dead and they're all controlled by Viktor, we learn he was never in danger, though I don't blame him for that). But that could also be a PTSD response, his actual emotional support hammer.

Clamming up and not talking to Mel about what happened because she's not in his circle of trust anymore, it's more or less shrunk down to just Viktor (once he can save him) and Cait, maybe.

Ok as usual this got longer than I intended by just... some things that are in my mind right now.

[kingkat12]

omg I love your fics so so so much and I think you would absolutely nail a fanfic where roman is teaching reader how to smoke? or something like that 😭 like it being really intimate and stuff ughh idk but roman smoking just makes me go absolutely feral

Roman..... teaching reader.... how to smoke....?

do you.... want to give me..... a heart attack......?

THIS WAS SO DAMN HOT IT MADE MY BREATH HITCH WHEN I READ THIS, you BET i want to write this!!! you know me, i love writing reader having her first time doing anything at all lol, this was PERFEEEECT!! hope i've done your request justice, thank you so much for this one!!<3333

nymphomaniac (roman godfrey x reader)

WARNINGS: 18+, smoking, mentions of sex, angst, flirting deluxe, Roman's mouth is FOUL

summary: not all lessons are good for you-- especially the ones taught by the notorious Roman Godfrey, who you also happen to have a history with

word count: 2,425

a/n: and this is NO WAY an encouragement to smoke, i don't smoke myself so... heh. read at your own risk i suppose, and be critical of what you read on the internet PLEASE!! mwah

How to smoke – a thorough guide by Roman Godfrey. That was a book I wouldn’t buy in a million years; why give a millionaire more money?

Thankfully, I didn't have to pay anything to get a free trial from the author of said imaginary book.

Roman sat next to me on the porch leading up to the house of the party we were at, having asked me to follow him outside to escape all the noise. I wouldn’t have gone with him, had I not started to get a headache from what I could frankly only call ear-rape. “It’s too fucking loud in there,” I muttered, shifting on the uncomfortable step. “There’s a reason I don’t go to these things very often.”

Roman shrugged, patting down the pockets of his jacket. “It’s not usually this bad when someone else hosts. But I heard this guy is notorious for being legally deaf, so that might explain it,”

“I wouldn’t be shocked if he did that to himself,”

With a laugh, Roman pulled out an orange-hued box of cigarettes, shaking his head. “It’s too bad you don’t attend parties that often. I never see you anymore, y’know? Just bring some earplugs if you’re so bothered by the damn noise,” 

Oh. My heart jumped with a jolt of pain. I cleared my throat; “Of course you don’t see me anymore, Roman… We broke up two months ago,” 

Despite seeing it coming from miles away, it had been the hardest breakup of my life. I knew whom I had gotten into a relationship with, knew exactly what kind of a guy Roman was, so I had been emotionally prepared for it when it all fell apart. The relationship had been more of a whirlwind thing, a lust thing, which had left me with a very bad case of being-walked-in-on PTSD. That one time Roman decided he wanted to go down on me at school, only for my math teacher to walk in on us in the classroom, was a memory I was sure I would never forget. Sadly. 

However, the bliss of being sexually compatible couldn’t carry the relationship forever, and I was aware of that long before he was. Around the time we hit the one-month milestone, I could see in his gorgeous green eyes that he was tired. Roman needed to be free to function, free to fuck any girl that walked by, and free to disappear for hours and come back whenever it pleased him. 

And what did I need? I wasn’t so sure anymore. 

If I were to use my brain and ponder that question once more, I would conclude that I needed to stop sitting next to my hot ex-boyfriend who was now lighting one of his classic cigarettes. Roman knew I didn’t approve, knew how many times I had told him it was cancer on a stick—still, I settled for the fact that he wasn’t scared of death. Actually, he probably wasn’t scared of anything other than real commitment. 

With a sigh, Roman nodded to himself. “I’m aware, but I’m still allowed to miss the sight of you,” He turned to me, his strikingly green gaze piercing mine— I held my breath. This was getting intense. Nonetheless, the next thing that rolled out of his mouth caught me off guard; “Do you have a lighter?” 

… What? “Roman, you know I don’t smoke,”

He shrugged, the corners of his mouth tugging into a smirk. “Worth a shot. I had hopes that you’d at least managed to become an arsonist in our time apart, maybe then you’d carry a lighter around with you,” Like this, faced with his heartbreakingly beautiful smile beneath the hues of the moonlight, I was reminded of the first thought I ever had when I met him; he was so… cool. Roman always looked so damn cool. I loved the way it made my heart flutter— the feeling of being with the coolest guy at school was still the most thrilling feeling of all. I felt cool, knowing he wanted to sit next to me instead of being inside the loudest party of the year hunting down his next lay. 

It was impossible not to smile back. “Don’t be so disappointed. At least I’m still a cannibal,”

Humored, Roman chuckled; “Glad to hear it,”

“And you’re still a nymphomaniac,”

That seemed to strike a nerve— Roman let out an offended huff, now patting down the pockets of his jeans. “Forget it. I never go anywhere without my lighter, anyway,” he mumbled.

Oh no. “I didn’t mean it as an insult! We were joking, Roman. You’ve never been the type to hide that you like… sex—” 

“Don’t fucking talk to me about sex right now, I’m too tipsy,” Roman’s words were harsh, snappy. He wasn’t looking at me anymore, now fishing out his usual red lighter; I hadn’t seen that one in a while. “No sex-talk. None.”

“Fine, Jesus!—”

“Thanks to you, I now have to smoke away the taste of you. Thank you,” he grumbled, a slight twitch appearing beneath his left eye as he brought the cigarette to his plush lips— oh, how I missed those. “Your perfume isn’t helping, either. So don’t talk about sex, because then I’ll start thinking about sex with you, along with how you taste after I’ve been going down on you for about ten minutes, squirming, whining, and then I start thinking of how much I miss it. So could you just—just shut up for a minute, okay?”

I stared at Roman in disbelief, my lips parting as my jaw threatened to hit the floor. He must’ve had a few beers too many to be talking so openly about… anything. I would go off on him about his use of words, telling me to shut up, but I was too stunned to think properly. With my mind still buzzing, I scooted closer to Roman on the cold steps of the porch, daring to lean my head down on his shoulder like I used to do when we were together. “You’ve only proved my point,” I breathed, closing my eyes. “Nympho.”

I knew him too well— I knew Roman would appreciate casual physical contact. He didn’t have enough of that in his life, anyway. Chuckling, amused, he lit his cigarette, inhaling with a quiet moan— something told me he had been waiting for a hit for some time. And just as I opened my mouth, ready to start my usual smoking-is-bad lecture, Roman cut me to it; “Don’t start talking about cancer now, either,”

“It is a cancer stick,”

“I don’t care,”

“You should!”

“But I don’t,” With a sigh, Roman exhaled, watching the smoke evaporate into the warm summer air. He leaned his head on top of mine, and I couldn’t help but think how the smell of the cigarette clashed with the comforting smell of his shampoo. It ruined everything. 

This conversation was one we’d had tens of times, and I wasn’t too keen on repeating it. “Roman…” I reached for the cigarette he lazily held between his fingers, feeling the softness of his hand against mine. “Maybe you don’t care, but I do. You need to take care of yourself.” I didn’t need to look at Roman to know his brows were drawn together as I took the cigarette out of his hand, holding it away from him. 

He sighed again, slower this time; “If you’d ever smoked, you’d see the appeal,”

“Yeah?” It was hard not to roll my eyes— “The appeal of cancer?”

With a low laugh, Roman turned his head, kissing the top of my head out of habit. Weirdly enough, it felt platonic for the first time ever, yet it didn’t fail to evoke a hard thump in my chest. It felt like I was being electrocuted from the inside, and my eyes sprung open—I was happy he couldn’t see that. “Not cancer, don’t be stupid,” he huffed. “Just use that pretty little brain of yours, I know it’s in there somewhere.”

If only he knew my brain was currently working overtime. “I’ll never see the appeal of inhaling crap that ruins your lungs. If anything, you’re the stupid one,”

Roman rolled his eyes, gently giving my head a nudge with the shoulder I was leaning on, motioning for me to sit up. “Let me show you, just once. If you don’t like it, you’re allowed to call me a nicotine-addicted nymphomaniac until the last day of high school,”

“And the day after. An extension for your favorite ex,”

“Nope. The day of graduation, and that’s it,”

I turned to look at the blindingly pretty smile on Roman’s face— how was it possible not to fall for this guy? He was gorgeous. “Fine,” I mumbled, knowing I would call him that no matter what behind his back until the day he died. “So how the fuck do I do this?”

Something in Roman’s green, green, eyes shifted. Maybe he was wondering why he had ever let me go in the first place— maybe he was thinking about the word to describe the color of my hair as it mixed with the grays of the moonlight? He cleared his throat, turning his body towards me as I mirrored him; “The first step is easy,” he said, reaching forward to place his hand behind mine, bringing the cigarette to my lips. 

My skin burned. Fucking burned, with every touch. 

Roman’s eyes were already big, which is why I was surprised to see they could get even bigger when he gazed down at my lips. “Open up,” he breathed, absentminded. 

Now, I could be sure he wasn’t thinking about the color of my hair. Maybe he was back to reminiscing about the taste of me? Or other nasty nympho things, as per usual.

I placed the cigarette between my lips, but Roman let out a short, alarmed sound that nearly made me yelp. “Now comes the trick,” he urged, leaning closer— I was unsure whether he was aware he was inching towards my face or not. The closer he got, the easier it was to focus on the single strand of his dark hair that lay over his forehead, straying from his stylings. It was so damn attractive— I had to hold myself back from smiling, now that I remembered the one time I caught him pulling it out of his gelled updo to lay it there on purpose. Cutie.

“The trick?” I echoed, realizing he had frozen to his spot just staring at my lips. I pulled the cigarette away from my mouth; Roman hadn’t said anything for about five seconds. This was bad. This was dangerous. It made me want to jump him and let him fuck me right here on the porch. 

“Uh—” Roman cleared his throat, letting out a breathy chuckle as he shook his head. “Sorry. The trick, right…”

God, I was two seconds away from bursting into flames like a phoenix. Was I still breathing?

“For your first time, you should— because this is your first time, right?”

“Yes!”

“You sure?”

“Roman!”

“Alright, alright!” Roman laughed, biting his lip as he tilted his head just a little. Had the cigarette not forced a space between us, I would’ve started wondering when he would kiss me. “The trick is to not inhale too much smoke for your first time. I don’t want you to cough up your left lung on my new shirt. And hold the smoke in your mouth for a moment, let it cool down, and only inhale it when you’ve taken the cig out of your mouth.”

If Roman one day actually did decide to write a smoking-guide, I could at least be sure the content would be explained simply and concisely. “Seems easy enough,” I mumbled, watching Roman’s pupils widen as I placed the cigarette back between my lips and sucked in a small amount of smoke into my mouth.

It felt like I was getting a mild burn on my tongue— it wasn’t pleasant. For a second, I got scared my eyes would pop from the shock, and I closed them to ensure the blood at least wouldn’t splatter anywhere if I happened to be so unlucky. But when the burning subsided, I finally dared to inhale.

My eyes sprung open, meeting the fascination in Roman’s green gaze as my previous headache caused by the loud music disappeared. My brain suddenly felt like it was buzzing with pleasure and energy. Before I knew it, I was half giggling against Roman’s mouth, letting my cigarette-clad hand fall by my side. “Wow,” I breathed, in awe of the satisfying whirring in my head. 

Roman looked like he was two seconds away from cooing at me, right in my face; “There you go, good girl,” he purred. “Do you get it now?”

God, I hated myself. Still, what I hated more, was that my hot ex-boyfriend was blatantly right. “I think I do,” 

Roman hummed, smirking as he reached for the cigarette in my hand, smoothly brushing his fingers across my skin on his way down. With a content sigh, he looked into my dazed eyes as he pressed his free fingers over the pulse of my wrist— “I still make your heart jump,” he breathed, leaning in so close I could feel the hotness of his breath against my cheek.

I swallowed. “You always will. It doesn’t mean anything,” My eyes flickered back and forth between Roman’s green eyes and his plush, pink lips despite knowing I shouldn’t. 

“It doesn’t?” he echoed, visibly amused as he raised his brows. 

“… Nope,”

Roman hummed, nudging the tip of my nose with his just as he always did—was this maybe just a habit, or was he going to…? The atmosphere was so thick, I could reach out and touch it. My breath had long caught in my chest, but Roman’s next words only made it worse; “Let’s talk about sex again,” he whispered against my lips, his lashes hanging heavy over his eyes.

“No. This is over. We’re just sharing a cigarette,”

“We could share a bed too,”

“Stop it,” I breathed, hoping he’d spot the desperation in my eyes. “It’s been two months. Aren’t you over this?” Please don’t make this any harder than it already is.

Roman stilled. With the next beat of my pulse against his fingers, his eyes softened with a new realization beneath the moonlight; 

“Over you? Never,”

[pinkcasket]

ik bpd akechi is popular but honestly I'm dying on my bipolar + c-ptsd + npd/narcissistic and ocd features on the c-ptsd

[cherienymphe]

Basic Training XIII (Peter Parker x Reader)

Warnings: NON-CON, DUB-CON, MURDER, violence, kidnapping, captivity, public sex, degradation, forced pregnancy, forced marriage, stockholm syndrome, ptsd, housewife kink, cop!Peter

➥ banner by @vase-of-lilies​ | divider by @whimsicalrogers​

➥ series masterlist

summary: A pit stop during a road trip ends tragically when a small town cop sets his sights on you. You’re the newest addition in a long standing fucked up family tradition.

~

Peter was at work.

It had been some weeks since the inevitable had happened, waking up to find Peter putting on his uniform. You had expected it at some point, but definitely not so soon. Or, at least, soon for you. It had been hard to hide the disappointment on your features when the dark-haired man had glanced at you, his own face falling some as he neared you.

“Hey,” he’d softly said, cupping your face as he leaned over the bed. “It’ll be okay.”

You hadn’t responded, only blinking, and Peter continued.

“I’ll only be gone a few hours, just to get both of us back into the swing of things. I’ll be back in no time,” he’d assured you.

He’d been right, of course. He had only been gone for a few hours that day, but what felt like no time to him felt like an entire day to you. You’d gone through every task like it was indeed nothing more than a chore, merely trying to find some solace in your cleaning and cooking and gardening, trying to find some way to keep your mind off of Peter’s absence.

In truth, all you’d accomplished was counting down the minutes until he returned.

You’d been in the middle of helping Pepper with lunch when familiar hands had settled on your waist. It had startled you, at first, before the familiarity of them set in, prompting you to stop what you were doing. You hadn’t hesitated to turn and wrap your arms around him, feeling so much more at ease with him home.

“What’ya making?” he’d asked after briefly acknowledging the other woman in the room when she’d done the same.

“Thor wanted subs,” you’d told him. “Pepper’s toasting the bread.”

He’d smiled at that, and it was something you did often, now. Unable to hide your relief at having Peter home, telling him about your day, and listening when he did the same. The town struck you as so small, from what you remembered anyway, but you were always shocked by just how much crime and mess Peter and the rest of the station had to deal with.

The day he’d come home with a bandage on his arm was burned into your memory.

“It’s nothing,” he’d kept reassuring you. “Just some asshole trying to rob a bank with bad aim.”

You hadn’t laughed at the joke as Peter had, and he’d quickly swallowed his chuckles down. He’d reached out to touch your face in the hallway, but you’d been intently focused on the light blood that had bled through a bit. He’d been right, of course. It was nothing, a flesh wound, a graze, but it hadn’t stopped you from worrying all the same.

The heaviness in your chest had shocked you. After all, you liked to think that Peter meant nothing to you, but that wasn’t entirely true. You’d hesitantly reached up to graze his arm just below the white gauze, eyes burning. Peter could’ve been seriously hurt, he could’ve died, and that had worried you for more reasons than one.

“Peter,” you’d softly started once in the privacy of your room moments later. “What would happen to me…if something happened to you…?”

Surprisingly, it was a thought that had never occurred to you before. These men were mortal and human just like anyone else, and considering their professions, the possibility of any of them dying should’ve entered your mind at least once or twice. However, as you’d stared at his arm, you realized that this was the first time you’d truly given it some thought.

You’d heard him sigh.

“Don’t think about that,” he’d tried to coax you away from the thought, making you look at him.

“…but you’re a cop…and clearly this town isn’t as boring and safe as I’d initially thought.”

You had multiple reasons to come to that conclusion.

“What if something does happen to you?” you’d quietly asked him.

Peter had stared at you for a while before slowly leaning in and brushing his lips against yours.

“That won’t happen, pretty girl,” he’d slowly assured you, continuing before you could say anything. “…but if that ever were to happen…you’d just still be a functioning part of the household with no title to your name.”

You had frowned at that. So, you’d still be doing as you did but just without Peter around. The thought had terrified you for one reason above all else, and his name was Steve. You didn’t even want to imagine the kind of trouble you’d get into without Peter around to protect you, and you had thrown your arms around him before you knew it.

He’d rubbed your back, making soothing sounds, but you’d shaken your head, burying your face into his shoulder.

“I think I’d rather just die.”

You had said it so quietly you were sure Peter didn’t even hear you, but if the way he’d paused was anything to go by, he’d heard you clearly.

You couldn’t survive in this place without Peter, and he had to know that. You felt like you were barely hanging on when he was around, and God knows that thread only became thinner when he went to work. If you had to face the reality of never seeing Peter ever again, you didn’t doubt that you’d lose all reason under Steve’s wrath and stern discipline.

“Don’t say that,” he’d whispered. “Besides, it’s not going to happen.”

You had to believe that because the alternative wasn’t feasible to you.

“You don’t know that,” you’d murmured back, fingers digging into his side and the uninjured arm.

“You wouldn’t want to live without me…? Even if you had something to remember me by?”

You’d stiffened at that, understanding dawning on you as to what he was hinting at.

Peter didn’t bring up the possibility of kids often. He probably didn’t want to scare you, but you knew what was expected of you…you knew what he wanted. On the off chance that Sharon or Laura brought their sons around or Steve or Margaret stepped out with Sarah, you were no fool. You saw the smile that lit up Peter’s boyish features. You saw the longing in his deep brown eyes, the desire to have children of his own someday…with you.

Of all the men here, if any of them deserve to have a kid, you supposed that it was Peter.

However, you wondered just how true that was. The man had kidnapped you, after all, and clearly had no qualms against his brothers and whatever methods they chose to punish their wives with. Peter wasn’t a good guy, no matter how good he made you feel these days, and so maybe he didn’t deserve any children.

…but you yourself had wanted kids someday…but not like this.

The thought of subjecting your future sons to the same fate as their father or your future daughters to the same fate as you made your eyes water. It seemed like such a cruel thing to do, but giving Peter children was inevitable, you supposed. It’s not like you had any means to protect yourself against the possibility, and since Peter had first had sex with you, he had never not come inside of you.

It was honestly only a matter of time.

“I…don’t know,” you’d honestly answered his question.

Without Peter, any child you had would be far better off with any of the other wives than with you. You doubted that you’d even be able to look after yourself, let alone a whole other person who’d completely depend on you. On the other hand, though, you didn’t know if you could trust your hypothetical child’s wellbeing with anyone but you. Especially with Steve around.

Someone had to make sure they didn’t grow up completely messed up by all of this.

…but then again…maybe you weren’t right to be that someone either.

After all, Peter had kidnapped and raped you, and you greeted him when he came home from work each evening. You smiled as you told him about your day. You clung to him in the dead of night and welcomed his kisses. Even then, as you held him and fretted over his safety and the danger you had never considered he’d be in before…

You yourself were already so messed up by all of this, so how could you keep the same from happening to anyone else?

“You’re doing so good, pretty girl.”

Peter’s soft encouragement went straight to the pit of your stomach, adding to the heat that was already there. The water in the bathtub jostled slightly, small ripples in the water from your movements. Peter’s hands were pressed firmly into your waist, and you could feel his gaze on you.

“So good,” he whispered, leaning up and brushing his lips against yours.

You felt so…full, much fuller than you did when Peter was covering your frame with his own, pressing you into the mattress and pushing his cock into you with a pace that had your breath shortening. Now, you were the one on top of him, lifting and lowering yourself, sliding up and down on his cock with every movement.

A simple bath had turned into something more when Peter’s hand dipped between your legs, a noise of mischief escaping his lips as you’d tried to shy away. He’d been smooth in sliding you back onto him, a hand resting on your back before he’d expressed his desire to see your face.

Peter pressed kisses along the expanse of your throat, tasting you with them and his tongue. Your bare chest brushed against his own with every rise and fall of your hips, your hands pressed into his shoulders to steady yourself. Sex wasn’t new to you, but you’d always thought of it as a chore more often than not. You’d thought it was just one of those things that wasn’t for you.

Peter’s presence proved that the fault lay with bad boyfriends.

Granted, it’s not like Peter gave you the choice to refuse sex, therefore forcing you to engage in something you’d always thought of as meh. He didn’t even allow you to disassociate as you had in the past, forcing you to be present and engaging and taking pleasure that you weren’t all that familiar with. You both hated and loved it.

Peter moaned into your mouth as he kissed you, a wet hand massaging into your back, and you kissed him back, hot and wanton and just as hungry for your climax as he was his. Every time you sank down onto him, your walls stretched, and with Peter’s hand on your hip, rolling it over his, you had to pull away and gasp.

The first time you came around him, you were in the tub, but you were in the bed when you stiffened around him for the second time. Peter talked you through it, whispering sweet nothings to you as explosions burst behind your eyes, one hand twisted with yours and the other tracing patterns into your thigh.

“Such a good girl,” he murmured into your neck, his chest pressed to your back as you lay beneath him. “We both have to wake up pretty early, though.”

He sounded sad as he said that, pulling away from you. You were still catching your breath when you turned to face him, eyes fluttering closed as he reached out to brush his fingers over your face. You were tired, but you still found the strength to stare back at him. Peter was pretty, you’d noted before, but it was something you hadn’t wanted to linger on then.

Your eyes drooped a bit as his hand danced towards yours, taking it and playing with your fingers. It was moments like this that made it so easy to pretend. It was dark outside, and in the room, the only light coming from the glow of the moon outside. The rest of the house was quiet, and the only sounds in the room were that of your labored breathing.

It was moments like this that made it easy to pretend as if Peter hadn’t kidnapped you, as if his brothers hadn’t killed your friends. It was easy to pretend like you were the only ones in this whole house, just basking in each other’s presence and the afterglow of taking pleasure in each other’s bodies under the cover of darkness.

Like a normal man with a normal job simply coming home from work and making love to his normal wife.

Peter’s fingers touched your ring, and you were brought back to reality.

“Not every couple has done it…but some of the others have…had ceremonies…”

Your brows rose at that, and Peter’s gaze remained on the thorned ring around your finger.

“I would really like it if we had one too,” he murmured. “I… I want to declare my love and vows to you in front of the whole family…and have you do the same to me.”

You didn’t know how to feel about that, and so you merely frowned. Your eyes met Peter’s when he finally glanced up, and his tongue darted between his lips.

“…because I do, you know.”

When you didn’t respond, your confusion must’ve been evident to him because he continued.

“I do love you.”

That word made you feel faint, and you quickly sat up. Peter followed, a hand on the back of your neck and the other still playing with your hand.

“I do,” he reiterated, making it hard to swallow. “You’re so open about what’s on your mind, and you’re never afraid to ask me anything you want.”

You hesitantly looked at him, pulling your gaze away from the sheets.

“…and now that you’ve finally settled here, I can see how caring you are. I see how worried you get when you think Jane is straining herself or when you think Margaret might be too tired on her feet. I saw it when you were more worried about your mom than…”

He trailed off, but he didn’t need to finish it. Maybe it was silly at the time to worry more about your free mom than your captive self, but you couldn’t help it.

“I knew I chose right, but it’s something entirely different to have it confirmed every single day,” Peter whispered, taking his hand and resting it under your chin. “…and you may not love me yet, but that’s okay because I know you will…just like I love you.”

Peter’s words were so…heavy. You found it hard to believe that he loved you, but then again, Peter had nothing but all the time in the world to observe you and watch you and take note of every flaw and quirk. Who were you to tell him what he felt? No man had ever told you that before, and there were layers to the fact that the first one who did was the same who’d stolen you away.

Something stirred in your chest at that.

“I want to make every promise in the world to you, and I want to do it in front of our family.”

Our family.

That was so strange to hear, but wasn’t it the truth? You had long accepted that you were never leaving, and despite what you personally wanted, this was your family, now…weren’t they?

“You don’t have to give me an answer, now,” Peter assured you, laying back down, fingers grazing over your lower back. “…but you know what I want.”

Yes, but what did you want?

You cared about Peter more than you wanted to admit. The thought of losing him in any way made your chest ache, but that wasn’t love. You knew what it really was, but your heart couldn’t decipher real feelings from ones brought on by circumstances and a means to cope. Your heart only knew that Peter was now in it, and his fingers on your skin and his devotional words made you feel things that you were ashamed of.

He pulled you back down to lie with him, resting your head on his arm as you clung to it. You looked up at him as sleep fought to claim him, his own lashes fluttering as he stifled a yawn. You were going to be with Peter forever, that was indubitable, and declaring that in front of the whole household wasn’t going to make it any more true than it already was.

You tilted your head back down, pressing your face into the arm of the man who loved you.

You had just got done taking the dish out of the oven when a familiar voice outside drew your attention. Peter’s laugh was loud, and you hurried to set the heavy pie and get your gloves off. He had been gone when you woke up, and Sam had told you that he’d had to go in early with Steve. You thought that meant he’d be home earlier, but no. This was one of those rare days where he was gone almost the whole day, and you’d been so anxious.

“Slow down, Y/N,” Christine called as you dashed out of the kitchen.

No other effort was made to stop you, and you practically tripped over your feet as you hurried down the hall. If Peter was having some important conversation with Steve and Tony, he put it on the back burner in favor of catching you as you flew into his arms.

“Woah, hey,” he chuckled, arm tight around you as he held you to him.

“I haven’t seen you all day,” you murmured. “You were gone when I woke up.”

You pulled away just a tad, hand twisting into Peter’s dark uniform as he gave you an apologetic smile.

“I know,” he sadly said. “This one screwed up some paperwork with a guy we arrested, and we had to go in pretty early.”

He jerked his head towards Steve as he said this, and you’d forgotten about the blonde’s presence entirely. Tony too. You barely spared them both a glance, only acknowledging them as evenly and respectfully as possible without putting in too much effort. You were already turning back to Peter when they returned the acknowledgement.

“Jane told me your favorite food,” you told him, pulling and forcing him to come with you.

He threw Steve and Tony a backwards glance as he waved them off, signaling that they’d continue whatever they were talking about later.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah, I made a cherry pie,” your tone was hopeful, nervous, and Peter’s gaze lit up.

“Really…?” he wondered as he stopped, more excited, now. “All by yourself?”

You nodded.

“It hasn’t been tasted yet, so I hope you like it,” you worriedly said.

The other man softly chuckled, and you briefly glanced up as Natasha walked by.

“I bet it’s perfect,” Peter assured you, kissing your cheek. “…and even if it isn’t, I’ll love it anyway. You made it, after all.”

You weren’t able to linger on his words like you wanted to, worriedly gazing at the redhead’s back.

You’d been worried for her ever since that day she’d told you she thought she was pregnant. She hadn’t brought it up since, and neither had you, too afraid of being overheard by the wrong person. You didn’t know if she was or wasn’t, and if she was, and Bucky knew, the whole house would definitely know by now. Thor had made a whole day of it when he found out Jane was pregnant, and considering what Natasha had told you about all of their efforts, you doubted that Bucky would be any different.

However, there was no word of it, and while Natasha didn’t seem as mopey as she had been, she was still…off. Quieter. She smiled more, now, especially at Bucky, and you’d found yourself wondering if she’d made peace with what he did to your friends so quickly. It seemed…unlikely but considering that she was in the same boat as you, with no chances of leaving, it’s possible she wanted to make peace with it for her own sake.

You wouldn’t fault her if she did.

None of this was easy, and especially so considering her own history with Bucky, so you felt no anger or disgust when their intertwined hands rested on the table between them. You didn’t blame her for the smiles she threw his way, or the soft kisses on her cheek that she didn’t turn away from. After all, you yourself had cut the first piece of pie for Peter, anxious to see how the brunette liked it.

“It’s great,” he hummed.

You’d been skeptical, still unsure of your own cooking skills, but Peter had assured you that he wasn’t placating you. He’d even fed you a piece, and you’d been shocked at just how good it really was. You and Peter had mostly been in your own world throughout dinner. After all, you hadn’t seen him all day, something that only strengthened your animosity towards Steve, and you felt like you had so much to tell him.

So, when dinner was over—and Natasha and Laura were cleaning up—you were disappointed as Peter stood too. The other men were heading towards the den to talk about work and the household as they did every evening after dinner. Peter’s hand was on your lower back as he walked you towards the stairs, and you knew your hesitation was evident.

“You’ve been gone all day,” you whispered, almost afraid to voice your desire to have him come upstairs with you. “…and who knows how long that will take. I don’t want to be asleep when you finally come up to bed.”

Peter tilted his head at you, studying you in a way you couldn’t place. His other hand reached for yours, fingers threading through your own, and you watched his tongue dart between his lips. There was a furrow between his brows, like he was thinking deeply about something before he glanced over his shoulder.

“Do you want to sit with me?”

You hadn’t expected that.

You didn’t quite catch what he meant at first, and then it was your turn to frown. You blinked at him, confusion and apprehension filling you.

“I can…?”

You couldn’t swallow down the small relief you were starting to feel. It would be different—unfamiliar—but at least you’d be with Peter instead of alone in your bedroom.

“Am I allowed to?” you wondered. “I didn’t think any of us could.”

Peter gave you an encouraging smile.

“It’s not common,” he honestly answered, pulling you along. “…but sometimes little Sarah can only be quieted by Steve so Margaret will bring her, or now, with Jane being pregnant and hormonal, she gets her way if she wants to rest in Thor’s lap.”

He chuckled at that.

You’d cleaned the den a few times. It was a large room with no windows, only brightened by the low light of lamps. The furniture was all dark wood and leather, and it had a bar that you’d never been tempted to use. You’d always been able to imagine the men sitting around and discussing police paperwork and what household business needed to take priority over others.

As Peter led you into the room, you realized you’d be witnessing it tonight.

“Peter…”

Steve’s stern drawl of his name reached your ears, half warning, half question.

“She’ll be good,” Peter lightly promised.

There were just enough seats for the men, and you realized why Peter had mentioned Jane sitting in Thor’s lap when she got in one of her moods. You didn’t hesitate to sit by Peter’s feet, curling your legs up underneath you as he took your hand. Truthfully, you didn’t care what they had to discuss, even if it was interesting and consisted of the mention of some woman who’d broken into a house.

You just cared about being next to Peter.

As you’d guessed, you were tired, and you were right to worry that you would’ve been asleep by the time Peter joined you. At some point during the meeting, your head drooped, and you did the right thing in leaning it against the side of Peter’s leg, your cheek resting on his thigh. Your hands curled around his leg, holding onto him as you fought sleep. Your lashes fluttered, and it was easier said than done…

Especially when you felt Peter’s hand on your head.

His fingers gently pressing into your scalp was soothing, and you slowly blinked, fighting fatigue. You were pretty sure Thor was talking, now. Or was it Stephen? Either way, it didn’t help, and you shifted, tightening your arms around Peter’s leg. The feel of his hand in your hair was going to put you fast asleep…if it weren’t for the feel of an oppressing gaze.

When you glanced over, your eyes met familiar blue ones, Steve hardly paying attention to a thing Stephen was saying. His cold blue irises were focused entirely on you. For a moment, you worried that you did something wrong, and you clung to Peter even tighter, and the brunette made an inquiring humming noise. You only shook your head in response, looking away from the blond and desperately wondering why he seemed to hate you so.

It was hours later when sleep evaded you. It was strange. You’d been so exhausted downstairs that you’d passed out almost immediately when you crawled into bed. However, your body had betrayed you in the middle of the night, waking and refusing to go back. Peter’s arm was comforting around your waist when you stirred, and you’d simply laid there for a few moments, basking in the feel and sound of him before making your way to the window.

The moon was only half full, and you used the glow of it to look down at your ring.

You thought about what Peter had said, about a ceremony, and you touched the thorned metal. You had never given marriage a lot of thought before, but you had never imagined it would be in the backyard of a large and beautiful country house, decorations and everything homemade.

You had also never imagined it would be to the man who’d kidnapped you either, but…

You sighed, shifting the ring a tad and blinking. It was true that your friends would want you to be happy, and that your mom, wherever she hoped you were, hoped you were okay. In a lot of ways, you weren’t, but in some ways…you were. No one in your life would’ve wanted this for you, that was sure, but you were in a bad situation, you were never getting out of this bad situation, and so why not make some good of it?

You glanced up, eyes running over the yard briefly, and you were about to look back down at your ring…

…when you saw it.

Movement in the yard made you blink, and it was so late, you almost wrote it off as some animal. You were out in the rural Midwest, hidden away amongst the trees, and so the odd animal here and there wasn’t uncommon. Jane had left a towel on the clothesline one night and something had dragged it off by the next morning.

However, looking closer, the figure was too large to be some animal.

They were moving across the yard, slowly and carefully, as if they were trying to go undetected. There was a sinking feeling deep in your gut, and you took a step closer to the window. You could feel yourself frowning, worry coursing through you as you watched some stranger figure move about. You were just about to call for Peter when the glow of the moon glinted off of hair.

Beautiful red hair.

Your lips parted at the sight of Natasha in the yard. It was too late for anyone to be outside, let alone her, and when she looked over her shoulder, her green eyes lifted right towards your window. You could tell that she saw you, her face falling just a tad, and you both blinked at each other. It didn’t quite click at first, unable to understand why Natasha was outside so late, but then your eyes fell to her clothes, clothes that she wouldn’t be caught dead in in the house.

Bucky’s clothes.

You felt like a bucket of ice-cold water had washed over you, and you placed your hand on the window, your gaze almost pleading. You silently begged her to come back, to turn around before she was caught. You shook your head, disbelief and horror and confusion tearing through you. You shook your head at her again, glancing at your door, trying to silently convey that you’d help her come back inside and lie if need be.

Anything to keep her from being thrown in that basement again.

However, Natasha silently refused, her only response being to step away slowly and continue going. You sharply exhaled, feeling frozen, and you didn’t know what to do. She didn’t look back again as she ran across the yard, and you pressed your hand to your stomach just as a familiar voice reached your ears.

“What are you doing up?”

Peter’s voice was groggy, sleep coating his tone, and you flinched. Blinking, you looked over your shoulder, heart in the pit of your gut as he rubbed his eyes. You stared at Peter with parted lips, eyes burning with tears, but you didn’t know why. You were confused. You were scared, but why did you want to cry?

Was it because you had to tell Peter that Natasha had managed to sneak out somehow, making a break for it? That her entire demeanor this past month had been a farce, a way to be sure Bucky wouldn’t be suspicious? That the discovery of what he did to her friends had indeed been too much for her and had pushed her over the edge to bring all of them down?

Were you crying because you had to tell Peter Natasha had escaped and therefore get her into more trouble than she probably ever had been in before?

“Y/N, what’s wrong?”

Peter had seen your face, now, sitting up with concern in his eyes, and you glanced over your shoulder. You could just barely make out Natasha on the other side of the pond, so close to the trees, and you exhaled.

Or were you crying because if Natasha succeeded, your time with Peter would be numbered? Peter was the reason you were here, the sole reason you were in this place, and yet, the thought of him behind bars and forever separated from you was too much to wrap your head around. The man was your sole comfort. Peter was who you clung to, the thought of being away from him enough to send you into a downward spiral.

Peter was all you had, now…

…and yet…

With all of that being true, your eyes finally met his again.

“I… I had a nightmare.”

The lie was said so softly, you almost couldn’t believe you’d said it. You watched his face fall some, scooting to the edge of the bed and reaching for you. Like an obedient lamb, you walked right into his embrace, and more tears spilled over before you could stop them. He shushed you, rubbing your back and soothing you, but you couldn’t be consoled.

The moment to stop Natasha was gone. Who knows how long it would be before Bucky discovered her absence. If Natasha was caught, you did not envy what awaited her, but if she succeeded…you did not envy what awaited the you in the future. You did not envy the version of you that would have to watch Peter be arrested and separated from you forever.

You didn’t envy the version of you that would have to learn to live without him.

You wrapped your arms around him and let Peter pull you into a kiss.

[utilitycaster]

So I alluded to this in tags but did not want to put this on someone else's post and so: I have been catching heat for calling various members of Bells Hells selfish since the start, and to be clear, I will keep doing this, because I have precisely no respect for the intellect of anyone doing this, but I want to underscore that it's not just that I find many of the party's actions profoundly selfish/self-absorbed; it's been a growing pattern in the people who defend them.

It is selfish to fail to take into consideration the perspectives of others and to act out of your own pain in a way that hurts other people. I categorically reject the idea that being traumatized, abused, or experiencing negative things in any way excuses you from having to consider how your actions can harm others. In fact, failing to do this makes you a worse person; to say "the world hurt me and I'll visit this pain on other innocents" is ultimately, an indefensible position on moral grounds. That doesn't, to be clear, mean I dislike it in stories, which should have conflict and moral grayness. But I do not find these characters to be people I consider to be good, if this is with any consistency the frame of reference from which they act.

To say "the gods did not give me things and therefore they deserve killing" is profoundly selfish and vindictive. Having no love for them is one thing; actively wishing harm on them is, in fact, self-centered in the extreme. But that's actually not what I'm here to talk about in regards to Bells Hells' selfishness, both because I've found trying to explain that the gods are living beings and murdering all of them is, you know, bad, to some of the fandom has failed for the reasons I'll discuss later in this post. And, granted, this is a hypothetical, and we may look back in a month or so when the dust clears at a party that defeated Predathos and say "ha, good job guys," but should Bells Hells release Predathos deliberately? That is a betrayal of the Exandrian Accord. If you want to side with the man who destroyed Molaesmyr (and make no mistake, there is no way to do what he was going to do without siding with him; intent only matters if Predathos escapes despite Bells Hells giving it their all, not if they have slightly different motivations for fucking over their allies), that's a valid story, but to take the job and choose to fail to deliver? That is selfish. Someone else could have taken the job. The Doylist excuse that these are the characters the cast happened to be playing at the time does not, in fact, hold water; they could in fact have rejected the Moon Plot, or chosen to become the villains of this story. I would have, in fact, enjoyed that as a story! But this idea that they're not just assholes who think more about themselves and the shitty things various people mostly unaffiliated with the gods did to them during their childhoods than the vast destruction wrought by Ludinus across all of Exandria, is not one the narrative has ever supported.

What's really struck me, though, is a theme of selfish defenses in the fandom. I think bringing up personal anecdotes can be incredibly helpful! I found that some of the people who spoke about their experiences with PTSD in reference to Caleb, for example, provided incredible insight. Notably, the people I'm thinking about were not the ones whose conclusions were "so he's in the moral right to do anything to anyone ever because of PTSD" (and indeed they were usually people who celebrated Caleb as kind of an asshole). But those anecdotes do not override the experiences of other fans. Or, to dredge up some tiresome arguments, Beau is allowed to get pissed off at Caleb's behavior, even if his actions come from a place of trauma.

The two things that really stand out to me (outside of the bizarre ambient noise of white southern ex-Evangelicals acting like they're an oppressed class on that basis that has clung to the discourse like the slime it is) are the recent defense of Ashton on the basis of "punks/leftists are allowed to do this and I identify with Ashton so how could you be so mean to me, a leftist punk and therefore a good person and therefore I can do whatever and you have to like me," and the defense of the various Vanguard members (sans Ludinus) as being victims of a cult and therefore the trail of bodies they leave is fine because various fans have talked about having family in cults whom they forgave. I will speak bluntly here. I'm Jewish, and your argument of "you should be nicer to cult members because a lot of white southern people fall into cults, like one of my parents" is, to me, a combination of insulting, horrifying, and makes me hope your cultist parent gets hit by a car before they hurt more people. Should you wish to forgive your family? Fine, it's your business. To act as though it is a failure of strangers that they are not more generous towards a fictional character because you are sucking your own dick about how good you are at forgiveness? That is a level of entitlement that goes so far beyond the pale I struggle to imagine how you function in society.

I don't think Bells Hells are doomed to this epithet - they have a chance to do the the right thing - and I believe that those entitled fans can change. But yeah man, they - and you - have been really fucking selfish, and the digging in of your heels is doing nothing to convince me you're capable of even hearing the perspectives of others, let alone considering them.

[leonkennedybreedingkink]

NEUTRON STAR

real dad!leon kennedy x reader

tags: dddne. discussion of incest and noncon, implied child abuse (one line), spit, vomit discussion, hallucinations, victim blaming, discussion of ptsd and anxious behaviors (from personal experience). reference to my dark vanessa btw.

Session transcript, October twenty-first, 2018. [15:03]

Patient: Kennedy

”Ms. Kennedy, would you tell me why you’re here?” Your therapist asks after five minutes of silence, her pen writing the date and time on the right corner of her legal pad.

[Silence.]

A steadying inhale. “The court ordered me to.”

More scratching. ”And why is that?”

“They say I’m traumatized.” You answer, audible clicking noises as you pick at your cuticles.

“Why is that?” Your therapist asks, eternally patient and blank.

“‘Cause my dad and I had sex.”

The pen stops scratching, then scratches again briefly. “Would you elaborate?”

You scoff audibly.

[Silence.]

“My dad and I had sex. That’s it.”

More scratching. “What led to that event?”

A long sigh through one’s nose. “Um, I came home from college for the weekend. I was hanging out with my dad and doing nothing when I… felt weird. My, my wine tasted salty, I almost spat it out.”

Scratching. Patient’s wine was drugged by father.

“My head… felt fuzzy. Couldn’t move my arms or legs, they felt so heavy. I thought I was gonna throw up and choke on it, like Jane.”

”Jane? Is this a friend of yours?”

”No, um. Breaking Bad. She was Jesse’s girlfriend. She did a speedball with him and Walter rolled her onto her back on accident. When she puked, she choked on it and died.” More clicking. “That’s what I mean.”

”I see.” Scratching as she writes down the events in order. “You may continue.”

”Anyway, uh,” Your voice wobbles slightly. “I was in and out of it. Dad, um.” You clear your throat.

[Silence.]

”He… pulled down my pants, my sweatpants. He… fingered me, and it hurt, cause I was dry. Despite the wine.” Your voice lowers ashamedly. “I came.”

Patient focusing on smaller details outside of rape by her father.

“Then he pulled down his pants and got on top of me.” Sniff, sniff. Rustling as your therapist hands you a tissue box. “Thank you.”

”You’re welcome.”

You clear your throat. “Then we had sex. He drooled in my mouth. I was… I was drooling a lot, there was a wet spot on the couch the day after. I threw up the entire day afterward.”

The scratching stops. Insistence on ‘sex’ instead of rape. ”Was this… a pattern?”

A loud sniffle. “Pattern?”

”Did he violate other women?”

”I don’t fucking know.” You blow your nose and toss the tissue out. “How do I know they didn’t want it, if he did?”

Patient blames other hypothetical victims.

”Did he violate you any more after this initial encounter?”

A derisive laugh from you. “It wasn’t a violation, it was sex. With him. The law says a lot of things are wrong without taking nuance into account.”

A scratch as your therapist underlines insistence on ‘sex’ instead of rape. “How often did your encounters with your father occur?”

Your voice lowers. ”At least twice a week.”

Violations from father at least twice a week.

“All the specifics.” You snort, blowing your nose again and throwing out the tissue. A soft squelching noise as you squirt some hand sanitizer into your hand and the wet sound of you rubbing your irritated and chafed hands together.

Patient compulsively washes hands.

“Is this the point where you diagnose me?”

“No, that comes after a few more sessions of getting to know you.”

Another derisive laugh.

”Are there any encounters with your father that stick out in your mind?”

”Chickenshit.”

[Silence.]

”I’m sorry?”

“You’re a chickenshit.”

”Why is that?”

“You won't call it what it really is. It’s just sex, it doesn’t mean anything.”

Patient is in denial.

A deep inhale from your therapist. “What you just described to me sounds like no consensual sexual encounter I’d ever heard of. Are there any encounters with your father that stick out in your mind?”

Clicking. Clicking. Clicking. “We went hunting over Thanksgiving break. Mom died close to Thanksgiving. We, uh, went up to the cabin and got settled in before we had sex again. He made me promise not to tell anyone, afterward.” Pause, dead air. “And I didn’t.”

First encounter: Patient was home for the weekend from college and was drinking. Father drugged her wine and raped her on the couch. Patient threw up all day and the day after.

Second encounter: brought patient up to a cabin to go hunting, raped her, and made her promise never to tell anyone. Patient followed instructions.

”We went hunting in the morning and brought home a doe. I thought—“ Your voice breaks and you clear your throat. “When dad slung her over her shoulder, I saw myself. And when he showed me how to butcher a deer and when I was butchering it, I saw myself again.”

Patient hallucinated herself as the deer her father killed and brought home for meat.

“I threw up outside.”

“That must’ve been distressing.”

A snort. “You think?”

Scratching. Patient extremely defensive as a response to long-term trauma—uses sarcasm and humor to deflect.

”Is there anything about your relationship that sticks out in your mind? Did he manipulate you?”

A haughty scoff. “Him sharing his feelings isn’t manipulation. That’s what’s wrong with psychiatry, it pathologizes normal human behavior.”

Patient exhibiting protective behaviors over her father, herself, and their relationship. Cognitive dissonance to distance herself from what happened as a protective measure.

“What feelings did he share with you?”

[Silence.]

”That he was lonely.” Your voice quiets down. “He’s my only family, and I’m his only family. We’ve only got one another, since mom died. He didn’t wanna lose me. That’s why we got so close.”

Use of present tense when describing her and her father’s relationship. Father employed emotional manipulation to groom patient into accepting a sexual relationship after the second rape.

“So your father intentionally isolated you from everyone else and made you feel as though you were the only one who could save him.” Your therapist says patiently.

”No, he didn’t.” You say stonily. “I still had friends and people I could talk to. He never took my keys or anything like that.”

”I mean emotional isolation. Your father very carefully whittled you away from your friends and made you feel as though you only could be understood by him.”

”Well, he didn’t, no matter what the DSM or ABC or whatever the fuck says. He’s my dad, he’d never hurt me.”

Stomping, and a door slamming shut.

Patient has hit a wall when it comes to recovery: cannot fathom her father raping her willfully and has mental walls in place to avoid reality of incestuous sexual abuse.

Session three transcript, November fourth, 2018. [29:58]

Patient: Kennedy

“Before we get started, I’d like to thank you for coming in for another session with me.”

”The lawyers are paying for it, figured I wouldn’t waste their money.” Click, click.

“Right, I see.” Patient is not coming of her own volition. “Actually, I’d wanted to ask you a question before we continue from last time, if that’s alright with you.”

”Uh, okay. Shoot.” Rustling as you adjust yourself.

”Since your father’s incarceration, how have you been sleeping?”

[Silence.]

“Not well.” You don’t speak very loudly, it’s hard to hear over the recording. “I have to down a bunch of nyquil every night just to go to sleep. And even then, um… I don’t sleep well. I have a bunch of waking interruptions and nightmares.”

“Would you be willing to tell me what the nightmares entail?”

Rustling as you shift again. ”It’s dad. Always him.” You clear your throat. “It’s almost always the first time we had sex, too. I… can always taste the wine. And… my tears.” Your voice wobbles. “And… the pain. Like he was gouging at me from the inside. Even after I came.”

A sniffle and rustle as you take the tissue box. “Thank you.”

”What happens after you wake up?”

”I can’t sleep. I don’t. I get up and watch TV or play on my phone, since there’s—“ You cut yourself off, blowing your nose.

Scratching of a pen. Patient has nightmares and acute stress response to said nightmares. Patient afflicted by insomnia.

“Since what?”

”Since there’s nobody else for me to wake up. I slept better when we slept in the same bed.” You murmur, almost inaudible. “My dad and I, I mean. He… it was like having an octopus in the bed. I’d always wake up sweating because he runs so hot and he’d be clinging to me. I didn’t sleep in his bed until after our second time.” Your words muffle as you put your face in your hands.

More scratching. Patient and father codependent, typical of familial abuse survivors.

“Is there anything else you’re experiencing since your father’s incarceration?”

Cracking as you pop your knuckles nervously. “I can’t see police lights anymore. I… they make me hyperventilate. I feel like I can’t breathe. I can’t watch Buffy the Vampire Slayer anymore.”

Scratching: trauma responses to related stimuli (e.g., police lights).

”How come?”

”I got to season six in my rewatch. And… Buffy’s almost raped by her boyfriend in an episode. Onscreen, violently.”

[Uncomfortable silence.]

“I couldn’t see, and I was back on the couch with him on top of me. I felt… phantom pain. And I was crying. I couldn’t stop.” Your voice breaks and you pull a tissue from the box, blowing your nose and throwing it out. Wet squelching as you sanitize your irritated hands.

Your therapist adds, patient exhibits trauma response to sexual abuse related stimuli. Beneath your name, she writes Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder with anxious facets.

“And all—“ your voice breaks, soft sniffles leaving you as you try to keep it together, “all I can think is that I wanted it. I must’ve told him, shown him, something. I must have.”

Rustling as your therapist stands up, pouring a glass of water from a pitcher.

“Thank you.” Your voice is wet and raw as you take the cup, soft swallows echoing through the recording.

Brief silence as your therapist waits for you to compose yourself. “I think we should have a discussion about personal responsibility.”

A mirthless chuckle. “I’m sure. Isn’t this the part where you coddle me and tell me that I didn’t do anything wrong?”

”It is, because you didn’t. Let’s unpack this.”

A groan under your breath. “Goodie.”

”So, what makes you think you did something to tell him you wanted him to have sex with you?” Patience, must meet the patient where they’re at.

”I… I don’t know.” Your voice quiets like your head dips forward. “Maybe it was unconscious.”

”I see. You wanted your father to have sex with you. But you saying that you wanted it and broadcasted it to him unconsciously doesn’t answer why he had to drug you.”

Footsteps and muffled sniffles and sobs, a door opening and shutting.

Your therapist lets her last client out for the day, locking the practices’ doors behind her and walking out to her car in the lot, heels clicking on the pavement and sidewalk. Her phone rings in her bag and she pauses, pulling open her bag and fishing through the mess in her bag to pull her phone out.

It’s you.

You’d reluctantly accepted her phone number after session eight, for use during emergencies.

She picks up, putting her bag back over her shoulder and walking to her car. She unlocks it and tosses her bag in the passenger seat.

“Ms. Kennedy?” She asks after a period of quiet sobbing on your end of the line.

”He—“ You clamp a hand over your mouth to muffle a loud sob. “He said he didn’t want to see me. Ever. And I’m no daughter of his. He—He thinks I sold him out and left him to rot.” The last word trails off into sob into your palm, wet and ragged inhales almost painful to listen to.

Oh. You’d gone to visit him today, you’d made a remark about that after the last session.

“I didn’t, I told him I kept the promise, I swore to him.” You’re nearly incomprehensible through your tears. “It was those other bitches who’d made that complaint and got him locked up, it wasn’t me.”

Your therapist listens silently, heart breaking with every sob.

”And he’d—“ A dry sob. “He’d told me that he loved me so much, that what we did was a natural extension of his love for me as his daughter, that he didn’t want to lose me, he needed me like air. Did he lie? Was it all a lie? He’s my only family, he’s all I’ve got.”

You sob between your words. “He’s all I’ve got and he’s cut me off. I have nobody. And I—I felt so small, like I was nine and he was having a fit again, breaking glasses and all that shit.”

A pause as you keep sobbing, making no effort to muffle yourself. “I wish my mom was here. I wish he was here. I just want—“ A pained inhale.

Your therapist cries with you.

“I just want a hug. He’s my dad, and I love him, and I just want one last hug.”

She sits in silence with you, intermittent sniffing coming through the receiver. Eventually, you blow your nose and sanitize your hands.

“If it’s not a love story, what is it?” Your voice comes through, heartbreakingly small and raw.

You know the answer: rape, incest, abuse of power, emotional manipulation and abuse.

“I… I need it to be a love story. It has to be, because I have nothing left if it isn’t.”

[yet-another-heathen]

Wick's Whump Drive - I

This is a commissioned piece for @light-me-on-pyre, who was kind enough to participate in my ongoing whump drive for Palestinian aid.

Want in? Donate $5/€5 or more to ANY Palestinian fundraiser, send me the receipt, and I'll write a custom whump drabble for you, too.

Prompt: "How would you write deconditioning?"

[ My lessons on how to write realistic conditioning can be found here. ]

---

TW | realistic whump recovery, emotional whump, brief argument, PTSD, flashbacks, intentional deconditioning attempt, implied past character death (whumper)

It wasn't the word itself this time. It was the way Caretaker said it.

"Kneel."

Whumpee went down hard. The mental cursing began when his knees were about two inches from hitting the ground. Too late to stop the movement. Plenty of time to hate himself for following through.

Where his knees hit, the jarring spike of stacking bruises felt like a punch. Failure.

Another. Fucking. Failure.

Whumpee groaned in frustration, hands balling in his hair. Then he was on his feet again, pacing. "Again."

"Whumpee, I think we've had enough for toni—"

"No! No, I need to try again! I have to get this right just once before I stop." He turned again on his heel, leaving another path in the carpet. "We keep going. I just— I just need to keep going."

Caretaker raised an eyebrow, not moving from where he knelt. With that endless patience that was beginning to grate on Whumpee's nerves, "...we have been at this for an hour. Your nerves are getting more and more frayed by the minute. You said yourself that this works best when you're calm."

"And what if I'm wrong?" Whumpee whirled around on him, tears in his eyes. "I keep failing. I've barely managed to stop myself three times this whole week. Out of what? Four dozen attempts? Five? Every time I quit I end up backsliding more and more. I can't keep giving up. This has to work."

"It will be easier—"

"Are you going to say it or not? You said you would help me!"

Caretaker looked taken aback. And just as quickly, his expression shuttered.

"What do you think I've been doing for the last hour?" he asked. "Don't forget— I still get to say 'no', too."

The reminder hit like a slap. Not because Caretaker was wrong. Because he was right.

It had taken everything Whumpee had just to keep making it through the practice sessions. With how bad things had gotten, he barely had the capacity to take care of himself right now. Let alone worry any of the people around him.

Was that how he'd been acting? Was that what Whumpee was denying him? Even the choice to be a part of this?

After standing there for another far too long moment, Whumpee let out a sigh and came back over to Caretaker. He slipped to the floor beside him, folding his knees up to his chest, back pressed to the couch.

Quieter, rougher, "...Yeah. Yeah, you do." He couldn't bring himself to look at him. "I'm sorry."

Although Caretaker didn't say anything, Whumpee could see the moment the tension in his shoulders let go. The fight passed over them like a distant shadow.

"I don't know how much longer I can keep doing this," Whumpee murmured. He wrapped his arms around his knees, resting his chin on his forearms. "Between the nightmares and the memories... I'm just... I'm so tired." Quieter still, "I can't seem to get that monster out of my head."

"You've not been sleeping." It wasn't a question.

"...I've been trying to. I really have. But I end up just laying there, thinking the same five thoughts on repeat, over and over and over. Things haven't been this bad since—"

A flash of bright light. Wrists rubbed raw. Whumpee was doubled over, arms wrapped around himself. Screaming himself raw with a flood of relief and despair and a hundred other emotions that he could never admit aloud. Blood spreading on the cement floor. Blood that finally, finally wasn't his own.

Whumpee flinched, twisting his face away from the sight. As if this was something he could just look away from. As if the memories weren't printed into his retinas like the afterimage of lightning.

He took a few slow, steadying breaths, shaking on every exhale. Clenched his trembling hands, open and closed. Open and closed. Eventually he managed a raspy, "...since before."

Caretaker watched, worried. But he knew better than to reach for Whumpee without asking first.

"Whumpee... you've been butting up against this same block for weeks now. I've watched you try everything except the most obvious thing there is. You need to rest." Whumpee opened his mouth to say something, but Caretaker cut him off before he could argue. "—I'm not telling you to quit. I know why you can't, and I would never ask it of you. But there's a difference between giving up, and taking enough time to catch your breath before the next sprint."

Whumpee averted his eyes again, throat working against the burn of building tears. But he was listening.

Softer, "You said this was something you'd be working on for the rest of your life. If that's true, then there's time. For just a few days... give yourself some of the softness you went so long without. Take enough time to be gentle with the man you're trying so hard to save."

The words had hit their mark. He watched as Whumpee's face crumpled. His breath hitched once, and he broke into a sob. Then Whumpee finally reached out for him, and Caretaker didn't hesitate to pull him into hug.

He buried his face against Caretaker's chest, everything he'd been holding back falling apart at once. Pain. Despair. Hope. Grief. All of it came pouring out with his voice.

"There. I've got you," Caretaker murmured, closing his eyes. Exhausted, but relieved that something had finally gotten through. "...I've got you."