#How to count rows in Excel
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sharingknowledgewithmouli · 2 years ago
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Excel Row Counting: How to Count Text, Numerical, Blank and Data Rows Using Functions
Excel Row Counting: How to Count Text, Numerical, Blank and Data Rows Using Functions
Excel is one of the most widely used spreadsheet applications in the world and it is easy to see why. Its powerful features and flexible tools make it an indispensable tool for businesses and individuals alike. One of the most basic tasks in Excel is counting rows, but this seemingly simple task can actually be quite complex. In this tutorial, we will show you how to count the number of rows in…
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bucks-babe · 7 months ago
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Change My Ways For You
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Pairing: College!Fuckboy!Bucky x college!fem!reader
Summary: One of the only girls in school that didn’t want Bucky Barnes was somehow the one he fell in love with
Warnings: Smut, fluff, reader doesn’t take any of Bucky’s shit, himbo!Bucky, Bucky being a fuckboy,a bit of forced proximity, small part where Bucky is fucking someone else (ew), pinning, Bucky proving himself to be a sweet boy, non consentual kissing, Bucky being tooth rottingly sweet, Bucky calling reader sweets sweetheart and sweetcheeks, Steve is a dick (sorry not sorry), PROTECTED p in v (they are responsible in this one), fingering, fluffy smut, dirty talk, cockwarming?, so much praise, talk about STDs, delayed aftercare, talk about no aftercare, Bucky learns about aftercare so all is good
Word Count: 14.6k This is a long one
A/N: Thank you to @buckys-wintersoldier for beta reading and helping with the direction; however, any and all mistakes are mine and mine alone. This fic is the most adorable and full of emotions. The angst, the fluff, the feelings and especially Bucky. The way they act around one another — it’s absolutely great and definitely a read worth it!
“I have to admit, some of your grades in this class are less than I expected. Some of you have excelled in my class, but there are quite a few students to which their performance, to put it nicely, has been subpar.” A few students in the room look around, trying to see who looks guilty of having shit grades. You couldn’t care less; you know your grades are great so it’s not your problem if someone else is failing. 
All you want to do is get out of class and go back to your dorm to sleep, having stayed up way too late to finish a research paper for a different class. Your professor walks back over to his desk and leans back on it, sighing and taking off his glasses to wipe them on his sweater. 
“Now, while I understand that this course is not for the faint of heart, I still expect all of you to put in effort, and based on these,” he holds up the essays that were due last week, “I can tell that some of you just don’t care. Not even mentioning those of you who didn’t turn in your paper.”
You hear a scoff a few rows behind you and you know it’s Bucky Barnes without having to turn your head. He is the resident fuckboy, not caring about school or his education, just going to parties and fucking every living thing in sight. Sometimes you think that the only reason he is even in college is to have the “college experience” of “being free and having a bit of fun.” 
He’s never turned your head, rather just been a thorn in your side three times a week when you go to class, always joking with his friends next to him or talking about his latest trist. You don’t want to hear about how loud a random girl screamed when she came on his cock. You were here to get your degree and finally move out of this shitty town you were stuck in.
Honestly, you doubt that Bucky was even giving anyone orgasms. In your experience, men who brag about how good they were in bed were nothing but a disappointment, giving you about 30 seconds of mediocre sex until they came inside a condom and rolled over only to ask you, “did you cum?” The answer was always no. You didn’t have the patience to stroke any man’s ego when they couldn’t even make you wet. 
Bucky did nothing but make you roll your eyes, annoyed by the absolute gall of himself. “Now, because I don’t want my class average to go down because of a few dumbasses, I have sent some of you an email to meet me in my office after hours in which I will pair you up with another student in hopes that it will give you a kick in the ass since I cannot be bothered to spend more time teaching you.” You like your professor, you really do. He was one of the chillest professors you’ve had, but a twinge of fear goes through you. You fucking hope that he doesn’t pick you to help another student, especially Bucky.
You hang on to the sliver of hope that he won’t pick you. He knows that you’re busy, right? Between work and school you don’t have any time to tutor anyone. The topic stays on your mind long after you leave class, delaying looking at your email just in case he picked you to help another student. 
As the hours went by, however, you knew that you had to check it. You cursed when your laptop had battery; if it didn’t, it would have given you an excuse to not show up if you were picked. Nonetheless, you opened your school email, only to find out that you had been picked and you needed to go down to your professors office in a half hour.
Getting dressed, you had the most intense scowl on your face. This was the last thing you needed added onto your plate. You only hoped that he would pair you up with someone who didn’t need that much help, but you were proven wrong when you walked in only to find Bucky sitting down looking like he would rather be anywhere else.
“Take a seat, please.” You huff and sit down, moving your body away from Bucky as much as you could. You didn’t really feel comfortable around him. He’s never done anything to you per say, but you’ve seen his shameless flirting and it makes you uneasy and never want to be on the receiving end of it.
You don’t pay attention to anything your professor says, something about helping Bucky over the next few months until he’s passing or fails out of the course. You’re too lost in thought to care. On top of everything you have going on, now you have to help the one person you can’t stand.
Your professor dismisses the both of you with instructions to meet at least twice a week to study together. Bucky walks out before you and you assume that he has sprinted away to go to another party given that it was late afternoon, but you find him right outside the door. 
“So, sweetcheeks, I guess you’re gonna be seeing a lot of me now.” His eyes run up and down your body, like this was the first time he’s seen you. It makes you shift and wrap your arms around your middle, trying to soothe yourself. Bucky clearly takes this the wrong way and thinks that you like his hungry eyes and steps closer to you. “How about I give you my number and we can meet up, ya know, to study? Or if you ever need something, I’m sure we can figure something out.”
You don’t want to give him your phone, thinking about where his hands have been. Ever since his step closer to you, you can smell the scent of sex on him. If you look closer at his beard you can see the glisten on it, most likely from some girl he ate out right before he came to the meeting. 
“Just tell me your number, James so we can get this over with. I don’t want to help you and you don’t want my help. Clearly you don’t give a shit about this class and you only want to get in my pants.” He raises his eyebrows at your tone, a little shocked that you spoke to him like that. Before he opens his mouth you continue, “I mean, look at you. You’re flirting with me when I can fucking see that someone’s pussy was on your face, and that makes you think that I want to have sex with you?”
He opens his mouth one more time but you aren’t finished, finally able to snap at him for all the times he’s pissed you off. “I’m not going to be one of the girls you add to your roster so you can get that idea out of your head right now. The only time I am going to interact with you is when I have to, okay? Now give me your number so I can go back to my dorm and fucking sleep.”
Bucky is shocked, not having anyone talk to him like that. It pisses him off that you rejected him. Everyone wanted a piece of him, but he has time to change your mind. He can’t lie, your sass was making his pants tighter, but he relents and gives you his number before you walk away while he watches your ass, palming his dick through his pants. 
He needs to relieve the pressure in his groin and he’s sure as hell you’re not going to help him and his hand is nowhere near good as a pussy, so he goes out to Steve’s party, knowing that he can get a girl in minutes.
“Fuck, yeah baby, that pussy feels so good wrapped around my cock. Shit, love that ass too, you gonna let me fuck it? Yeah, I bet you fucking would too.” Bucky doesn’t know how the two of them ended up in the bathroom, fucking each other’s brains out, but he’s not complaining. When she offered to get on her knees and suck his cock he pulled her into the nearest room, cumming on her face before pushing her into the mirror, smearing her makeup and his cum all over the mirror.
The slam of his hips was brutal, surely going to leave bruises on her hips but he didn’t care, as long as she wasn’t complaining, he would do whatever he wanted with her, fucking her like she was a slut. “Fuck, baby, gonna make me fucking cum. Pussy is so fucking tight.” He lets a groan out, close to cumming. 
 Usually he didn’t make much noise during sex other than dirty talk, only breathing heavily and groaning when he was about to cum, but he was always composed. Sex felt great, but he never felt the need to moan. He never understood why men would moan like a slut just over some pussy, and he doubted that he would ever embarrass himself like that during sex.
“Love the way that ass bounces, so fucking hot.” This was the way Bucky fucked - from behind watching the girl’s ass jiggle. He wasn’t one to fuck any other way. Bucky didn’t give a shit to watch her face or look into her eyes, he just wanted to cum as fast as possible so he could move on with the rest of his day. He thought missionary was quite possibly the most boring position ever created, not like he ever made it to a bed anyway.
“Shit, gonna take my cum, bitch? Yeah, you fucking are, just a little fucking cumdump for me, letting me fuck you in a dirty bathroom, too horny for my fat cock.” He was babbling, just wanting to cum so he could go back out to the party and have another drink, maybe even pick another girl up for later.
Bucky lets out a low groan, filling up the condom with his cum. Once his orgasm is finished, he pulls out, taking the rubber off and throwing it away. Pulling his pants back up, the girl turns around, clearly affronted. “I didn’t even cum, baby.” Her voice was high and annoying, making Bucky roll his eyes. 
“Sorry, but your pussy made me bust early.” He chuckles knowing damn well that it was a lie. He just couldn’t be bothered to make her cum. Why would he put in the extra work to make her cum when he was just having fun? If she wanted to cum so bad she could have handled it herself. He wasn’t stopping her from using her own hands. Bucky either ate a girl out until she came to get her nice and wet if he was feeling generous that day or left her to her own devices while he took his own pleasure from her body.
She blushes, “oh, thanks, that’s sweet of you.” Bucky just wants to get the fuck back to the party and she’s talking too fucking much. “Maybe we can do this again.”
He can hear how hopeful she is and he felt just a little bit bad so he decided to humor her. “Sure, Sherry, whenever I’m free. You know college life and all, working hard in classes every day. Gotta keep up that 4.0 GPA.” As he heads for the door, he hears her squeak out, It’s Sally!
The next day is when you’re supposed to meet Bucky in the library to study, but it’s been a half hour and he still hasn’t shown. You decide to study what you need to. If Bucky wanted to fail you weren’t going to go out of your way to help him. You weren’t his mother; he was a grown man and he was responsible for himself. 
Nearly an hour later, Bucky stumbles in, clearly reaping the effects of the alcohol binge he must have been on the night before. It was no wonder  why he was failing his classes. When he sees you, a smile graces his lips, trying to make you forget that he was more than fashionably late. “Heeyyyy, sweetcheeks. You been waitin’ on me long?” The closer he gets the more you can smell the musk of sex and alcohol.
“James, are you wearing the same clothes as yesterday?” You know he is and you fight the urge to turn your nose up at the offensive smell coming off him.
“Huh? Oh, shit, I am. Well would ya’ look at that?” He laughs before plopping down in the seat next to you, his smell even worse than before. He tries to give you what you assume is a sexy look, but he just looks like he just awoke out of a coma. “How about you help me change them then, sweetcheeks? Maybe even give me a good scrub, make sure I’m real clean? Oh, and sweets, call me Bucky since we’re gonna get real close.”
There is no way that he is trying to have sex with you when his stink is filling up the entire section of the library. Anger bubbles up in your chest. You were here to help him and he is taking this whole thing like a joke. “I don’t have time for this, James. Unlike you, I actually care about my grades and don’t think with what’s in my pants.”
As you go to walk away, Bucky tries to grab your wrist, wanting to mess with you some more, but his motor skills haven’t come back yet and he was too slow. “C’mon, sweetheart, I was just messin’ with ya’, don’t get your panties in a twist.” Bucky holds his tongue about wanting to sniff your panties, not wanting to antagonize you further, but you just keep storming away and soon enough you’re out of Bucky’s sight.
Bucky huffs, annoyed that you walked away from him. Not because he actually wanted to talk to you, no of course not, it’s because no one has ever walked away from him. He walks away from girls after he fucked them, not the other way around. Grabbing his shirt, he lifts it up to smell it, turning his head away when the stench hits him. “Damn, no wonder she fucking sprinted away from you, Barnes.” Bucky stands up, almost falling over when gets lightheaded, the effect of drinking all night with no food catching up to him.
He slowly makes his way back to his dorm to shower and get out of his grimy clothes, feeling it stick to his skin in the worst way possible. He realizes that he only gave you his number and you didn’t give him yours so he has no way of texting you to see when your next session is. Maybe he would have made it on time if you texted him. It wasn’t his fault he was late. Honestly, you should have reminded him since you are supposed to be helping him.
The next day Bucky sees you in class and luckily he doesn’t reek this time. Instead of sitting in his usual seat, he goes down a few rows and plops down next to you. “So, sweetheart, I don’t mean to question your teaching methods, but seems to me like you’re a pretty lackluster teacher, runnin’ out on me like that.” You slowly turn your head, completely shocked at the sheer audacity of this man. How dare he say anything about you when he showed an hour  late and proceeded to ogle you like a piece of meat?
“Excuse me? You wanna say that again, James? Because I don’t think I heard you right, because you better not have just said that I’m the problem.”
“I was just teasin’ ya, sweets. But if this is gonna work ya gotta help me a little bit. I mean, you’re the teacher and all.” You wanted to slap that smug smirk right off of his face.
“If this is going to work, James, then you need to try. I’m not going to pull my weight and yours so get that idea out of your head right now. I’ll be in the library at 4:30. If you’re so much as a minute late, I’ll tell the professor to get someone else to deal with you.” With that you got up and changed your seat, not wanting to be around him for another second. 
Bucky felt his pants tighten again. He really needs to do something about your attitude, like fuck it out of you. It wasn’t a lie that he found you attractive and the thought of bending you over your desk and watching your ass bounce made his cock even harder. Bucky was contemplating asking the girl next to him for a handjob but the thought of her hands around his cock didn’t seem as good as what he thought your hands would feel like.
So instead of that, Bucky moved his seat to the back of the room so he could jerk off. A man has needs after all and Bucky has never had to worry about someone taking care of his boners until now.
Bucky decides not to push his luck and he actually shows up to the library on time, sans all of his books, but at least he’s there. He sees you in the corner, hunched over your laptop, typing away. You look cute too, with your tongue slightly passed your lips in concentration and eyebrows pulled together. Reading glasses perched on your nose. His sweetheart was working hard. What the fuck, Barnes? Bucky is taken aback by his own thoughts. He has never looked at a girl like that, when none of his thoughts are about how many different ways he could fuck them.
You roll your eyes when you see that Bucky didn’t bring anything with him, just the air of arrogance that seems to follow him wherever he goes. “Would ya’ look at the time, sweets? I’m early. See I happen to take my education very seriously.” You swear, if you roll your eyes anymore because of this man, they’re going to be stuck in the back of your skull. 
“Yeah, yeah. What did the professor say you needed to work on?” You want to get straight to business. The faster you get this done the faster you can leave.
“Uh, well. I don’t exactly know what.” He tries to smile to soften the blow of his incompetence as he sits next to you, but you are almost vibrating in anger at how useless he is.
Huffing, you angrily click at your laptop, going to check the email your professor gave you, knowing that Bucky couldn’t be trusted to remember. “James, please tell me how your grade is a 13% and you’re still in college?” You had no idea that someone could have a grade that low and not be kicked out of the entire course.
“What! No way, let me see that.” You slide the laptop over to him, showing the proof of his negligence. “Well, damn, we have a lotta work to do then, sweetcheeks.” You ignore his comment and pull up his most recent essay, surprised that he turned it in at all, but not shocked to see how terribly he did.
“James, what did you even think this essay was about?”
“Uh, nature and care?” Your mouth drops open and you just stare at him for a minute, making him squirm under your gaze.
“James, this was an essay on Frankenstein, and you were supposed to analyze the difference between nature versus nurture. You wrote about the fucking trees!”
Bucky clearly didn’t understand the problem with his essay. “Yeah, that’s nature!”
“No, James. Nature as in how you are, like how you were born, not how you were raised. You were supposed to compare how Victor was nurtured all his life but was full of hate and spite, but the creature never had any care but he was benevolent until everyone who encountered him abhorred him!”
You were talking too fast and Bucky didn’t understand a word of what you said. You were using words that he had never heard of before. “So, you can fix it, right, sweets?” That same sly smile was on his lips. The look on your face was enough to make him backtrack. “Uh, so we can fix this right? You know, since we’re a team now.”
The resting bitch face you gave him had him shifting his eyes around the library, trying to avoid it. As soon as he did, however, he regretted his decision when his party hook up locked eyes with him. His eyes immediately went to your laptop, typing random words onto the document you pulled up, trying to seem busy.
“So, sweetcheeks, I’m picking up what you’re putting down. So Victor is a bitch and Frankenstein is cool.” The sound of your voice correcting him by calling the creature Frankenstein is drowned out by the shrill voice of his past trist.
“Hey, baby, haven’t seen you since that party. See you're working hard, keeping up that 4.0 I see.” She lets out a giggle and strokes his bicep. You raise an eyebrow but don’t say anything about his supposed GPA. You’re taking great pleasure in watching Bucky squirm, clearly not wanting anything to do with her now that he’s gotten his rocks off. 
“And who is this? I bet my smart baby is helping her study, right? That’s so sweet of you to help out, really. Not everyone would want to help the ugly girl.” You wheeled your head back, about to bite her head off for daring to say shit about your looks when the foundation on her face was three shades lighter than her chest that was almost spilling out of her way too small top. Now you were never one to judge, but if someone comes for your looks, you come right back at them.
Before you got the chance to tear her a new one, Bucky interjected. “Ya’ know me, always helping out where I can, even those less fortunate than me.” His eyes were glued to her chest and you doubted that he even knew what she said to begin with. “Listen, Sandy, how about we catch up after I’m done and I can help you out too?”
The “sexy” look on her face dropped. “My name’s Sally, nevermind, you can have the ugly bitch!” Bucky cringes slightly at getting her name wrong again; he was never good with those. You don’t know why you were involved with their lovers quarrel, but a twinge of hurt sprouts in your heart. You didn’t even do anything to her and she had to come at you for your looks, and Bucky didn’t say a fucking word.
Grabbing your things, you pack them with more force than necessary, but you don’t give a fuck. “Sweetheart, where are ya’ going? Don’t listen to her, she’s just a bit jealous that I’m with ya’.”
How does he not see what he did wrong? You just glare at him before turning on your heels and walking away. There is no way that you’re going to spend anymore time or energy on him when he isn’t going to try. If it was anyone else, maybe you wouldn’t be so hurt, but for just one second you thought that Bucky wasn’t as bad as he made himself out to be.
“Sweets, c’mon, we still have that essay to write.” Was this man really following you down the hall? Yes, yes he was. 
You spin around, eyes ablaze just to walk back up to him and push his chest. “You have an essay to write because I. Am. Done. You don’t give a fuck about this and I refuse to put myself through this for nothing.”
“What did I even do?” Now you were shaking with anger.
“What did you do? You haven’t tried at all, showing up late, trying to get me to fuck you, and worst of all, you let someone talk about me like that right in front of you and didn’t say a fucking word. You know, for a second there I thought you might be a nice guy, but you proved me the fuck wrong.”
Bucky had the nerve to look angry at what you said. Pushing you against the wall, he stares into your eyes. “Sweets, you’re really starting to piss me off. I’m fucking trying and it’s not good enough for ya’. I ought to fuck that attitude right outta ya’.” His eyes drop down to your lips and you’re too stunned to speak, not expecting him to push you up against a wall. 
He was starting to scare you, getting into your space like this, but before you could tell him to back off his lips smashed against yours. It was rough and fast. Your lips stayed still but your eyes were wide open, shocked at what he was doing. You tried to push his chest, but he only got closer to you, wrapping his arms around your waist, one hand dropping to your ass.
You struggled to free one of your hands, but as soon as you did you slapped Bucky in the face as hard as you could given your angle. He pulls back, shock on his face at the fact that you hit him. “What the fuck do you think you’re doing! What made you think that I wanted to kiss you, asshole!” You try to wipe your lips, wanting to get the memory of his lips against yours off.
Bucky just stood there, not knowing what to say. He didn’t know what came over him. You shook your head and practically ran away to your dorm so you could shower and wash his touch off of you. The next day you were glad you didn’t have class with Bucky, but the remains of his kiss were still lingering. You didn’t even want to help him to begin with and this is how it ends up? With him forcing you to kiss him.
You didn’t want to tell anyone what happened, just wanting to forget the whole thing. But you couldn’t avoid Bucky for long since you did have to share a class together. He tried to come up to you, but you saw it out of the corner of your eye and switched seats before he could reach you. The entire hour and a half lecture was spent making sure Bucky wasn’t making his way any closer to you.
Instead of rushing out when class was over, you made your way down to your professors desk. “Professor, could I talk to you in your office for a minute? It’s important.” He might be relaxed most of the time, but your professor always made sure everyone in his class felt like they could talk to him if needed. 
Nodding his head, he leads you to his office and closes the door behind you, but not before you catch a glimpse of Bucky looking like a kicked puppy. He knew what you were about to talk about in that office, but there was nothing he could do about it. “Have a seat and tell me what’s going on. You’ve seemed off the past couple of lessons and I’m starting to get worried.”
You gulped, not knowing why it was so hard to say that you don’t want to tutor Bucky anymore. You didn’t want to let your professor down. Maybe it was because he reminded you of a father that you never had, but you just wanted to make him proud, showing him that you were capable of what he entrusted to you. He was looking at you, waiting to listen.
“Um, well, I have been distracted, but I think that it would be best for James to-” You can’t finish the rest of your sentence when you look at your professor. He trusted you to help Bucky and you can’t throw his trust away. “I think it would be best for James to have a more structured plan and I wanted to discuss that with you.”
The pride in his eyes was undeniable and you forgot about all the shit Bucky has put you through over the last few days. “Of course, what did you have in mind?” When you get out of his office, Bucky is still waiting, most likely missing the next party one of his friends is having.
You don’t even look at him, only grabbing the front of his shirt and dragging him with you all the way down to the library. “Sweets, listen, I didn’t mean to make ya’ feel-” Turning around, you cut him off and he stumbles to a stop.
“No, I don’t want to hear it, James. You listen to me. We will meet in this library every other day at this exact time and you will keep your mouth shut and work. Do you hear me?” Bucky feels his pants tighten, but doesn’t say a word about it, slightly scared to talk back to you. 
He just nods his head, finally noticing how beautiful you were. How your eyes held so much emotion in them, even when you didn't let it show on your face. Or how your lips form a small frown, the sides pulling down giving you an adorable pout. The small belmishes on your face, the tiny imperfections, created the most beautiful woman he has ever seen.
“A nod is not an answer, James. Use your words.” Bucky swears that he could have cum in his pants at that exact moment. No woman has ever been so dominant with him in or out of the bedroom. 
He gulps before finding his voice again, hoarse but still working. “Yes, ma’am. I won’t let ya’ down again. I swear.” You stare into his eyes for a few seconds longer, determining if you believed him or not, giving Bucky more time to appreciate every part of your face he didn’t notice before.
You let go of his shirt and keep walking and Bucky follows you like a lost puppy, eyes downcast to your ass but not being able to see much with your hoodie going down past it. Instead of going to the corner of the library you were at last time, you walk to one of the private study rooms. “Sit and get your shit out.”
Bucky wastes no time following your direction, loving how brazen you were. You sit down next to him, giving him the opportunity to smell your perfume, the light scent intoxicating. “So, teach, what are we working on first?” His eyes are bright and attentive, taking in your facial expressions. He’s trying to butter you up, make you less angry at him.
“We have to fix your atrocious essay. It’s worth the most amount of points so hopefully it will bring your grade up.” You root through his binder, nothing organized at all. When you find it and pull it out you sigh, not knowing where to even start. “Okay, first things first, you need to at least understand what this is about.”
You explain everything to him, stopping to see if he is still following along, surprised to see him paying attention, going so far as to interrupt every so often to ask questions. For the first time since he got to college, Bucky is trying. The two of you sit there for a few hours, going over the essay line by line, fixing his mistakes. To your surprise, his grammar wasn’t too bad. At least he had something going for him.
The next few lessons go by the same way, Bucky working hard to not piss you off, but also to improve his grades. There were no flirty comments, no complaining about you being bossy. He was falling for you, something that Bucky never thought would happen to him.
He didn’t know how it started. Maybe it was that day you told him off, grabbing his shirt and putting him in his place. Whatever it was, he didn’t care. You were so beautiful and smart. God you were smart. It amazed him how easy it was for you to explain the assignments to him. 
Bucky stopped going to parties, too. For once he didn’t find interest in getting shitfaced drunk and sticking his dick in a random girl; although it was giving him his first ever case of blue balls, it just felt wrong to have sex with another girl. He tried once at the last party he went to before he decided to stop going, but her hand on his cock didn’t make him pulse with need. Bucky ended up faking a phone call, saying that his friend was in the hospital and he needed to go see him.
As the weeks pass, Bucky can tell you’re getting soft on him, especially when you called him Bucky for the first time.
 “C’mon, sweets, it can’t be that bad helpin’ me out.” Bucky leans back in his chair, his signature smirk plastered on his face. 
“Don’t know what you’re talking about, James because from where I stand, I’m losing IQ points by the minute with you.” You still try to sass him but Bucky can tell you’re fighting off a smile. The two of you talk like actual friends now - no more jabs at his promiscuity and no more ogling.
“Ah, I think it’s the other way around. I can feel myself gettin’ smarter with ya’.” Bucky puts his head on the table in front of you, moving so he could look at your face. His eyes glisten, showing the sweet man hidden underneath his tough exterior.
“Oh, give me a break, Bucky, you’re just trying to butter me up so I’ll do all the work for you.” You smile, looking down at him with the same adoration he’s giving you. His name leaving your lips felt right, smooth and sweet.
Bucky’s eyes widen, not expecting his name to sound so damn good coming from you. He doesn’t say anything in fear of you going back to calling him James. Now that you��ve called him Bucky, he never wants to hear his first name come out of your mouth again. He wants to be your Bucky.
You can’t deny the feelings you’ve developed for Bucky. The man charming his way into your heart, but you know you can’t act on them. You doubt that Bucky has ever been in a serious relationship, only going for one night stands. Even though you’ve seen first hand how sweet of a man he can be, you still aren’t convinced that he would be interested in dating.
But Bucky doesn’t share the same sentiment. Today is the day he’s going to ask you on a date, hoping that you’ll say yes and give him a chance to prove himself to you, prove that he can be the man you deserve. Like always, you’re in the library before him, already set up and waiting. When you see him walking over you wave, the same gorgeous smile he fell for gracing your lips. 
You could tell that he was nervous, stuttering and not meeting your eyes. “Bucky, what’s going on with you? Don’t tell me that you forgot to turn in the essay that we’ve been working on.”
Bucky smiles sheepishly at you. “No, sweets, I remembered to turn it in. I, uh, well, ya’ know. I got a question for ya’.” Mentally slapping himself in the face, Bucky blushed.
Staring at him suspiciously, you pushed your laptop away, giving him your full attention. “Well, sweets, you’ve been so good to me over these past few weeks. Really turned me around. I didn’t think that I would be able to do all this college shit, you know?” It wasn’t a question that he wanted you to answer. “You made me change my ways. I don’t want to go to parties and get blackout drunk anymore. To be honest, I’d much rather spend my time with you.”
Bucky takes a deep breath while you gaze at him with a blank expression on your face, making him even more nervous than before. “Doesn’t matter what we’re doing, s’long as it’s with you I don’t care.”
You cut off his rambling, afraid of where he is going. “Bucky, what are you trying to say to me?” You know what he is trying to say, but you don’t know how to react to it. It’s not like you haven’t imagined what it would be like to go out with him, but that’s just not the man he is.
“I’m tryin’ to be romantic right now, sweets.” He lets out a little giggle, playing with his hands to try to calm himself down. “What I’m tryin’ to say is, would you like to go on a date with me?” Bucky feels his heart drop when you only stare at him, not even blinking. His knee starts to bounce, the anticipation becoming too much for him.
You sigh, thinking about what to say to him. The two of you have a good friendship, one that you never thought you would have, but starting a relationship with him is terrifying. “Bucky, listen.” Just from the way you started your sentence, Bucky regrets saying anything. “It’s not that I don’t like you, I really do, but I can’t deny that your past scares me.”
“What do you mean, sweets?” For a man so observant, he can be a little dumb.
“You don’t do relationships, Bucky. You’re used to no strings attached and dating includes a lot of strings.” Bucky clenches his jaw, of course his past would come back to bite him in the ass.
“I don’t want no strings attached anymore. I want to be with you and only you.” You close your eyes, putting your head down slightly. You want to believe him, you really do, but you don’t want to get your heart broken. Gently, Bucky’s hand grabs your chin, moving you to face him. “Let me prove myself to you, sweets, just give me a chance and if I blow it I give you full permission to kick my ass.”
That brings a small smile to your lips, but you’re still not convinced. “What if you get bored of me? Being with the same person over and over again?” Bucky’s heart aches at your words, not used to seeing you unsure of yourself. How could he ever get tired of you? He knows that he is the one who caused your insecurities. If he didn’t sleep around as much as he did, then you wouldn’t worry about his loyalty.
“Sweetheart, ever since you put me in my place, I haven’t touched another woman, can’t even think about someone who isn’t you touchin’ me. Just one chance is all I’m askin’ and I promise that I will show you how much I care.”
Closing your eyes, you lean into his warm palm, letting yourself feel him. His eyes hold so much vulnerability and you feel yourself losing the ability to say no to him. “Just one chance, Barnes. And if you hurt me I swear to God.” You’ve never seen Bucky smile so wide, pure joy adorning his face. 
The smile never left his face, only growing wider. “Wouldn’t dream of it, sweets. What about you come over to my dorm and we can have a movie night? Maybe you could even stay over?” He looks sheepish, worried you’ll turn him down. At the quirk of your brow he rushes to explain himself. “Not like that! Just to hang out.”
You head back to your dorm to get a change of clothes while Bucky waits outside so he could walk with you back to his. As soon as you walk out, he is rushing to grab your bag from you, insisting that he carries it. “Bucky, I can carry my own bag, you know. I’m capable of that much.” He loves your little attitude, never accepting his help.
Throwing an arm over your shoulder, Bucky leads you away, not giving you your bag back. His dorm is just what you expect from a college frat boy: trash can overflowing, clothes on the floor, food left out, bed a complete mess. Scratching the back of his neck, Bucky shyly looks at you. You decide to only give him a little bit of grief for the mess. “Am I allowed on the bed or have you fucked someone here?”
Bucky’s eyes widen, frantically shaking his head. “No, never brought anyone back to my dorm.” Toeing your shoes off, you ask him where the bathroom is, changing your clothes before you flop onto the bed, letting yourself sink into the fluffy mattress. For a minute, Bucky feels his brain malfunction. The sight of you in his bed is probably the hottest thing he’s ever seen. He would give his left arm to have you naked right now, his cock buried deep inside you, your pussy pulsing around his cock, moaning when he rubs little circles on your clit.
“You just gonna stand there, or are you gonna put on a movie, loverboy?” Shaking his head, Bucky nods and heads over to grab his laptop before climbing into bed, leaving space in between the two of you in case you didn’t want to be too close. “I didn’t know that hanging off the side of the bed was your style, but if you want to leave me to freeze feel free to do so.”
Bucky doesn’t know how to act around you, this whole dating thing is uncharted territory for him. He just moves over, your thigh pressed to his. Bucky had to will his cock to not get hard, the softness of your body was making it hard to think straight. The fact that he’s only jerked off for the past month isn’t helping either.
You move to get more comfortable, which so happens to include you snuggling into his side, curling your arms around his bicep. Bucky has no clue what the movie is about, the image of all the things he wants to do to you in this bed are too much for him. He doesn’t know what the feeling passing over him is. He likes this. He likes the feeling of your body pressed to his. Not in a sexual way, although he wouldn’t mind that either, but in a completely innocent way. Bucky never stayed around after he came, always getting dressed and leaving. He’s never had a woman press their body against his just to find comfort.
Somehow, Bucky is following along with the plot of the movie, but he knows that it was just because of how you interacted with all the characters like they could hear you. Bucky would usually hate that, he hates when people talk through movies, but he couldn’t find it in himself to be angry with you. If anything, he was glad that you kept talking, giving him the opportunity to hear your voice.
Halfway through the movie you stop talking. When Bucky looks down he sees that you fell asleep on his chest. Of course at that moment Bucky’s bladder decided that he needed to pee urgently. He tried to hold off for as long as he could, focusing on the part of your mouth and the bit of drool leaking from it. But try as he might, he needed to use the bathroom. 
He tried to maneuver you to not disturb your sleep but you woke up as soon as he moved. “Where you going?” Shit, he’s going to have to pee with a boner because your sleepy voice sent blood right to his cock. 
“Just gotta take a leak, be right back.” You just snuggle deeper into the pillows, humming in understandment. Bucky has to put one hand on the wall in the bathroom, leaning over the toilet at an awkward angle trying to push his erection down with his other hand so he could pee. It took a bit of work, but he was able to go without making a mess. Now, Bucky might be a lot of things, but unhygienic isn’t one of them and before he goes back to bed he washes his hands.
Once he walks back into the room he sees that you’re more awake than before but still laying in bed. He hits the lightswitch on his way over and turns on the lamp, letting the soft glow illuminate your features. “What took you so long? Almost fell back asleep.”
Before he could answer, you wrap your body around his and feel his hard cock through his sweats. Pulling away slightly, your face gets hot. That’s why he took so long. “Shit, sweets, I’m sorry. It’s just, well, you were in my bed, and you look so gorgeous. Not that I’m expecting anything! But the image of you is fucking hot. Fuck, I shouldn’t have said that.”
Your giggle catches him by surprise. “It’s okay, Bucky. Can’t imagine going from having sex all the time to being abstinent for a month.” With the soft glow of the lamp, you see Bucky’s blush. “Just don’t think I’m going to fix it for you though.” He shakes his head and chuckles lowly, pulling you back into him, keeping his pelvis away from yours even though his dick was begging for release.
Bucky doesn’t say anything back, but his hand moves to your waist, resting over your shirt. His thumb rubs small circles before he trails his hand up to your ribs and you can feel the heat of his palm through your shirt. For a few minutes he keeps his hand there, feeling your heartbeat, all the while moving his face closer.
He can feel your heartbeat pick up the closer he gets. You can feel his breath on your lips, warm and inviting. You’ve never been this close to his face, seeing all of his freckles up close. You don’t want him to pull away, not when your whole body is thrumming with need. Never in your wildest dreams did you think that Bucky could be this gentle.
He moves his hand up to your arm, delicately trailing his fingertips up and down, giving you goosebumps. Bucky is waiting for you to make the first move this time. The first time he kissed you was crass and unwarranted. The little gasp that leaves your lips when his palm rests on your cheek makes his cock jump.
Eyes fluttering shut, you lean in first. His plump lips meet yours and you moan into his mouth, not expecting his lips to be so soft and warm. You move your hands to his chest, pulling him closer to you, wanting to feel his whole body pressed to yours. You ignore the erection pressed against your stomach, completely lost in the sensation of his mouth on yours. 
Bucky frees his other hand from under him and wraps it around your waist, pulling you on top of him. The pressure of his hand caused you to arch your back, gasping when your core meets his hard dick. Bucky doesn’t waste the opportunity to put his tongue in your mouth, groaning at the taste. He has to use every bit of self control in his body not to buck his hips up, but he doesn’t have to because you grind down onto him, searching for friction. The harder you kiss him, the more his will slips from him and he was the first to break the kiss, a trail of saliva still connecting you to him.
Both of you gasp for breath, having deprived yourselves of oxygen for too long. “Why’d you stop?” God, you were perfect. Eyes wide, pupils blown, kiss swollen lips - Bucky knew that he wanted to keep you like this all the time, having you look at him like that was addicting and he was already hooked.
“If we keep going I won’t be able to control myself and I told you that I’m going to prove to you that I’m in this. That I don’t want you just for sex. I’m going to treat you right, make sure you know how much I care first.” You have to bite your lip to stop the moan leaving you. That was the hottest and sweetest thing you’ve ever heard. The fact that Bucky, the resident fuckboy, is denying sex because he wants to show you what you mean to him first has your cunt clenching around nothing.
You can’t think of words to convey how much that means to you, so you just slam your lips against his, kissing him with as much passion as you possibly could. Bucky has to use every morsel of restraint to move you off of him. “Sweets, you’re going to kill me with this.” The giggle you let out makes leaving his throbbing dick alone worth it, but you take pity on him and ask if he wants to go to the bathroom to fix his issue.
At first he declines, but he eventually caves and goes into the bathroom, shuts the door and handles his business. You scroll on your phone for a bit but you’re surprised when he comes back so fast. “Loverboy, this better not be a sign that you don’t last in bed, because when we do have sex, I want you to fuck me properly.”
As he flops back down on the bed, he groans. When, you said when, not if, when. “Sweets, if I hadn’t just came my dick would be rock hard again. You can’t say shit like that to me.” He rolls over, stradling you. “And sweets, I promise you, I’ll fuck you so good you won’t remember your name.”
You just raise your eyebrows, choosing to tease him a bit. “Well, based on the time you spent touching yourself, I’m not convinced. Hope your reputation hasn’t gone to your head because I’ll be honest if you can’t fuck me right.”
Bucky squints his eyes at you before leaning down, like he was going to kiss you again, but at the last moment, he pulls back and tickles your sides. Your laughter is easily one of his favorite sounds. “Bucky! Stop or else I’ll never have sex with you.” That makes him pause, even though he knew it was an empty threat and lays back down next to you.
“Okay, okay, sweets, I’ll leave you be. But I wouldn’t be opposed to you tickling me.” 
“What, is this a kink that you have, being tickled?” He scrunches his nose while he laughs, knowing what he was going to say next.
“No, but I would love it if you would tickle my pickle.” He smirks like it was the best joke ever told, proud of himself. You groan and turn away from him so he can’t see your smile. “C’mon, sweets, that was a good one.”
If you turn around you know you’ll see his puppy dog eyes. “Buck, that was the worst joke in the history of jokes.” 
“Ah, ah, I can hear your smile. You loved it.” You don’t respond, not wanting to give him the satisfaction of knowing that you liked his joke. It’s silent for a moment and you are about to turn back around but Bucky talks before you can. “Do you mind if we spoon? I mean, you don’t have to stay overnight, but if you want to, ya’ know.”
“Well, it is pretty cold outside, and I would hate to have to walk all the way back. And who knows, I could freeze to death at my dorm. Better be safe than sorry.” Bucky knows what you're doing and plays along.
“Of course, sweets, can’t have my girl freeze. What kind of boyfriend would I be if I didn’t keep my girl warm.” You skooch back, pressing against his chest and his arms circle your waist, chin resting on your head. “Night, sweets, I’ll see you in the morning.”
“Only if I don’t run away, loverboy.” You feel the vibrations of his chest as he chuckles before leaning back to turn the lamp off, falling asleep with your soft body pressed to his.
Over the next few months, Bucky proves himself to be the perfect boyfriend, always asking you how your day was, remembering all the little things about you, kissing you and holding your hand around campus, not giving a single fuck who saw the two of you. He wasn’t embarrassed to admit he was whipped.
“Buck, c’mon, this is the best fucking party of the year, you have to go. It’s gonna be packed with girls in slutty costumes, Halloween man, everyone wants to fuck everyone.” Bucky only rolls his eyes at Steve.
“Dude, how many times do I have to tell you, parties aren’t for me anymore. Hangovers suck dick and I have better things to do in my free time.” Steve doesn’t seem to understand how much Bucky loved you. He’s never said it, at least not yet. 
“Like what, hanging out with the nerd who hasn’t put out in three months? C’mon, I know you want some pussy and it’s gonna be on a fucking platter tonight.” Bucky sees red, not giving a shit that Steve is his best friend. No one talks about his girl like that, no one.
“Steve, I don’t know what the fuck is wrong with you, but you fucking know how much I care about her. If I ever hear you call her that shit again, I’ll put you in the fucking hospital. I couldn’t give less of a shit about how long I have to wait for her to know that I don’t just want a pussy to fuck, not anymore. I’m done with the parties and the random girls, okay. So get that through your thick skull.”
He doesn’t wait for Steve to answer, storming out of Steve’s dorm and walking away, not even caring where he was headed. He doesn’t know how he got there, but he stands outside of your door, raising his hand to knock. You always answer the door for him and this time is no different.
“Bucky, what’s wrong?” You were so tuned into him, reading him like a book. Without waiting you pull him into your dorm, shutting and locking the door behind him, leading him to your bed. His jaw was clenched, eyes set. If he was a cartoon, steam would be pouring from his ears.
“Fucking Steve.” He kicks off his shoes and gets comfortable in your bed, you following right after. You would go anywhere he goes.
Cuddling up to him, you pull him into you and his muscles relax at your touch, body responding to yours without thought. “What about Steve? You two get into a fight?” You never really liked Steve, but he was Bucky’s friend and you would listen to whatever he had to say about Steve. He was just like Bucky was before he met you.
“Being a fucking asshole. You wanna know what he said to me?” Bucky doesn’t wait for you to answer, only turning his head to see you better before continuing. “Wanted me to go to the Halloween party tonight, talking about all the girls that want to fuck as if he doesn’t know that I’m with you.” That doesn’t seem as bad as you thought, thinking that they got into a fist fight. It doesn’t surprise you that Steve was still trying to convince Bucky to go back to his playboy ways.
But Bucky wasn’t finished. “He had the fucking nerve to say that I should go because we haven’t had sex yet, like I give a shit about that. Fucking disrespected you right to my face.” You couldn’t deny that you were turned on by the fact that Bucky was defending your honor even when you weren’t there, not letting anyone bad mouth you.
“And what did you say, Buck?” Fuck, your voice was breathy, heartrate picking up. You wanted to hear what he said, how he told his best friend off. Bucky didn’t seem to pick up on your arousal, still too heated from his argument.
“Fucking told his ass that if he ever says that shit again, I’ll fuck him up. No one talks about my girl like that, don’t give a shit who it is.” You swear you could cum right now. Why was that so hot? Maybe it was because you’ve never had a man that didn’t let anyone disrespect you, or maybe you just liked to see him mad.
“I want you, Bucky. Want you to fuck me.” It just comes out, shocking the both of you. Bucky whips his head around, eyes as wide as your own.
“What?” 
“I want you to fuck me. I’m ready, know you don’t just want to use me.” Bucky’s dick is rock hard in seconds, all the anger in his body disapparating instantly. 
“Are you sure you want this, sweets? Because I have no problem waiting.” Throughout the course of your dating, Bucky can’t count the amount of times that he’s been hard and left his cock untouched. It’s gotten to the point where the two of you knew he was going to get hard when he was around you, not that it bothered you, knowing how much you were affecting him, but Bucky’s used to ignoring his erection now and he has no problem waiting for it to go away if you don’t want to have sex with him.
“Yes, Bucky, I think I’ve made you wait long enough. And to be honest, if I make you wait any longer I don’t think you’ll last more than a minute.” The mouth on you marvels Bucky every time. 
“Excuse me, sweets, but I’ll have you know I’m no two pump chump.” You only raise an eyebrow and Bucky huffs before kissing you again. It’s slow and hot. Bucky’s never kissed like this before, but with you he just can’t help but savor the feeling of your lips on his. He doesn’t want to rush, if he could he would kiss you forever, stuck in limbo, floating with only your touch to ground him.
You whine, hands pulling at his shirt, trying to get him to take it off. Bucky moves back, smirking at you. “Desperate, aren’t we? Just wanna feel me ‘gainst you, huh?” Teasing hasn’t been something Bucky really did, always hurrying to the main event, but he wants to make you crave him as much as he does you. 
The glare you give him holds no heat, not able to be mad at him when he’s looking so damn hot above you. Bucky relents, just this once, and takes his shirt off, revealing his toned stomach. He sucks a breath in through his teeth when your hands land on his abs. “Holy hell, woman! Your hands are fucking ice cubes!” You giggle but don’t pull away, sitting up and moving your hands across his back, slipping them into his sweats, finding his bare ass and squeezing.
“Well, loverboy, warm them up for me.” Bucky shakes his head in disbelief, chuckling at you. He takes your hands out of his pants and lays you back down, letting his warm palms circle the soft skin of your belly under your shirt. 
“Can I take this off, sweetheart? Gonna let me see those pretty tits?” Your cunt pulses at his words. Men that you’ve been with before haven’t talked to you like this, making you yearn for them.
“I mean, you can take it off but they’re not that pretty.” Bucky wheels his head back, clearly offended by your statement. For the first time, you shy away from his gaze. You weren’t exactly insecure about your body, but you also weren’t the most confident and you doubt that your body is better than the surplus of girls Bucky’s had.
“I beg your fucking pardon, sweets. I’m gonna need you to run that by me again.” Bucky lowers his face to yours, and you’re sure he is looking right through you. 
“Well, I doubt they’re the best pair you’ve seen, Buck. Don’t roll your eyes at me either.” You catch the eye roll Bucky gave you. He wasn’t rolling his eyes at you, but rather the words you were saying.
“I can’t believe my ears, sweets. The smartest girl I’ve ever met is saying what is quite possibly the dumbest thing I’ve heard. And that’s coming from the guy who is friends with Sam.” It’s your turn to roll your eyes and instead of saying anything back to him, you grab the bottom of your shirt and take it off, revealing your naked chest to him, foregoing a bra.
Like any man, Bucky gets distracted by the sight of your breasts on display for him. It takes him a second, but he shakes his head and comes back from his daze. “Fuck, sweetheart, you got the prettiest set of tits I’ve ever fuckin’ seen. Fucking perfect.” Bucky isn’t lying either, he really does think that you’re the most beautiful woman on the entire planet, every part of your body is perfection. “Should be a model, sweets, let everyone see how gorgeous you are.”
You feel the heat creep up your neck and rest on your cheeks. You aren’t used to being looked at like this. The look he’s giving you is so much different from when you first started working with him. It’s not filled with lust, although you can tell it’s there, but filled with awe and love. “Uh, uh, don’t look away from me. Want you to look at me while I make you cum.”
He pressed a chaste kiss to your lips before moving down to your neck, sucking on your sweet spot that he found the first time you made out. The little gasps and whines that leave your lips has his cock begging to be touched, but right now it isn’t about him, it’s about you.
You arch your back, pressing your soft breasts against his solid chest, drawing his attention away from your neck and to your tits. Trailing kisses down your chest, he swirls his tongue around your right breast, purposely avoiding your sensitive nipple. He doesn’t listen to any of your protests so you take matters into your own hands and grab a fistfull of his hair and jerk his head to where you want him to be. 
 The moan that leaves Bucky is pornographic, having no idea he liked his hair pulled that much. Bucky abides and takes your nipple into his mouth, sucking on it. “Oh, Bucky, just like that, feels good.” Bucky has to buck his hips into yours, never hearing something so sexy in all his life.
His other hand comes up to grab your other breast, rolling your nipple in between his fingers, every so often switching to give each one the attention they deserve. The longer he plays with your breasts, the more you feel your panties soak and you can’t take it anymore, needing some type of release.
Bucky pulls away with a pop, the cool air hitting your wet nipples makes you gasp. “Baby, I need you to touch me.” You can sense the words about to leave his mouth and answer his unspoken question. “Touch my pussy.”
Letting out a deep groan, Bucky grabs the hem of your sleep shorts, pulling them and your panties down when you nod. Your hand jets down to cover your pussy when you remember that you haven’t shaved, not expecting to have sex with Bucky tonight. “Wait, I have hair right now, maybe we shouldn’t.”
Bucky just blinks at you. He can’t believe that you would deprive him of your pussy because of a little hair. “Sweets, I have been a patient man, but I swear to God if you don’t move your hand and let me see my pretty pussy I’m going to lose my mind. You really think I give a shit if you have some fucking hair?”
You just smile sheepishly at him before removing your hand. “There she is. Look at her, so beautiful ain’t she? Yeah, she’s dripping for me, knows who she belongs to.” Fuck, you didn’t expect him to be so enamored with your cunt. “Ya gonna let me touch my pretty girl?”
You gulp before giving a breathy yes and Bucky spreads your legs a little wider and brings his right hand up to your pussy lips, gently tracing them making you twitch and giggle. “Bucky, that tickles.” Bucky smiles and his nose scrunches before his thumb goes from your hole up to your clit. “Fuck, Bucky, rub my clit.”
He just stops his movement, resting his thumb on your bundle of nerves. “This is where I’m in charge, sweets, and I don’t think that was a very polite way of talking to the man who is touching you.” You huff, not used to taking orders from anyone, but you want him to keep touching you so you relent.
“Will you please, rub my clit, loverboy.”
Bucky clicks his tongue at you. “Now, sweets, that didn’t sound very genuine but I’ll let it slide this time because I want to see this pretty pussy soak your sheets.” 
He starts to rub your clit from side to side, making you jerk your hips away. “Don’t fucking DJ my cunt. Circles, Buck, circles. You’re making me lose faith in you, babe.” Heat makes its way up his neck, his selfishness finally catching up to him. He doesn’t say anything, but switches up his method to what you said and you giggle at his confidence wavering.
His little slip up doesn’t slow him down, though, quickly finding the pace and pressure that seems to work best and draws those pretty sounds from your lips. Bucky knows that he isn’t going to be able to get enough of this, of you laid out before him, consumed by the pleasure he is giving you. 
“You want my fingers inside ya? Cause I wanna feel my pretty girl cum around my fingers.” You can feel the coil in the pit of your stomach, and you can’t remember if you’ve ever gotten to the edge this fast. All you can do is nod, moans and gasps the only sounds leaving your lips.
When his first finger slips inside you, your back arches and somehow the moans leaving you get even sexier and Bucky slips another finger in. “That’s it, pretty girl, suck my fingers in. Doing so good for me, knew you’d treat me so well. Don’t ya think, sweets?” The way he talks to your pussy has you leaking more arousal out.
“Please, Bucky, don’t stop, keep going just like that. M’gonna cum.”
A jolt of excitement shoots up Bucky’s spine. He wanted to see you cum so bad. Using every bit of self control in his body not to speed up, Bucky kept the same pace, curling his fingers to find that spongy patch. “Wouldn’t fucking dream of it, sweets, need to feel my pretty girl cum on my fingers. Promise I’ll feed her my cock after.”
Bucky groans with each clench of your cunt around his fingers, more desperate than you for your orgasm. “C’mon, sweets, give it to me. Can feel your clit pulsing. Be my good girl and give me what I want.” That was all you needed to fall off the edge, trusting that Bucky would catch you. 
Bucky’s sure that the sight of you cumming is the greatest thing in the world. He couldn’t dream of fucking you and not seeing you fall apart for him. He never stops moving his fingers, riding out your orgasm, only relenting when you push his hand away. It takes a few minutes, but you come back down, an open mouth smile on your face, eyes closed and Bucky falls even harder for you.
Blindly, you search for his pants, wanting to see his cock. “Bring him out, Buck, wanna see my new friend.” If it wasn’t for the orgasm he just gave you, Bucky would have been positive that you were drunk off your ass. Doubling over, Bucky cackles, not expecting to hear that come out of your mouth. “Don’t you laugh at me, loverboy, know your cock is huge. Let me meet him. Wanna put him in my mouth.” You give him a lopsided smirk.
“Don’t worry, sweets, you can meet him.” Bucky struggles to hold back his laugh. In all fairness, he did refer to your pussy as her, but the thought of you calling his dick him is hilarious. Nonetheless, Bucky strips the rest of his clothes off and you practically drool at the sight of his dick.
A little over average length, but thick as hell. You don’t think you’ve ever seen a cock that thick and you know he is going to destroy your cunt. Under his cock, his balls were heavy and full, the amount of cum in there building up just for you. Wrapping your legs around his waist, you pull him into you and Bucky has to catch himself with his arms so he doesn’t crush you with his weight. 
You both gasp when his bare cock rubs against your soaking cunt. Bucky has to close his eyes and think about all the assignments he still has to complete to stop himself from cumming on the spot. “Want it inside me, please, Buck, give it to me.” Bucky is near the verge of crying when you grind your cunt on him.
All you want is for him to fuck you until you can’t see straight and so does Bucky, but it takes everything in him to put away, knowing that the next words to come out of his mouth aren’t going to be sexy. “Hold on, sweets. I have to get a condom first.”
You don’t like that one bit, wanting to feel him inside you with no barrier. “Don’t need one, ‘m on the pill.” That has Bucky about to cum all over the sheets and your pussy. He knows that he needs to be responsible, not only for him, but for you too.
“Sweets, I, well, I haven’t been tested since my last partner. I’ve never done it without a condom, but I don’t want to risk it until I get tested.” He hangs his head in shame, yet again his promiscuity is coming back to bite him in the ass. What he wouldn’t give to feel your sopping cunt choke his dick, hell only knows, but his statement seems to sober you up.
“Oh, yeah, that’s probably for the best.” You can’t meet his eyes, the conversation awkward enough even if you weren’t about to fuck. Bucky takes in a deep breath and huffs out, clearly not knowing what to do next so you decide to lighten the mood. “Well, loverboy, you better wrap that bad boy up so you can prove that you can actually fuck me like you said you would. Top drawer. I got the good ones.”
You got Bucky to crack a smile before he gave a small smack to your thigh and walked over to your nightstand to get a condom. You wolf whistled when you saw his toned ass. “Damn, baby, you’ve been holding out on me?”
Bucky wheels around and says some clever retort, but you don’t hear it, not when his cock swings around with him, bobbing at the sudden change of direction. Not only that, but with each step he takes, his dick bounces up and down. “Sweetheart, it’s all yours. Stare all you want but close your mouth before I put somethin’ in there.”
Bucky rolls the condom down his length, giving it a few pumps while he admires you laid out on the bed, naked and ready for him to fuck you. Before he climbs back into bed, you stop him. “Wait, loverboy, do a little spin for me, let me see him move.”
Throwing his head back, Bucky lets out a belly laugh, and he just so happens to make his cock and balls bounce. “C’mon, s’all I want.” When he calms down, Bucky relents and circles his hips a few times, his cock, although stiff, moves with his hips and you have to close your legs to try to relieve the ache in your core. “Fuck, need you now, Bucky.”
“Yeah, sweets, you need my cock? Does my pretty girl need to be stuffed with my cock?” No smart retort comes to your mind, only the need to have him fill you up. It’s been way too long since you’ve had sex and you know Bucky’s cock is going to ruin you for anyone else.
“Please, Buck.” Fuck, the way you’re looking at him, with wide, pleading eyes, and a pout on your lips has Bucky’s dick pulsing. He climbs on the bed, in between your legs. “How do you want me?” You’ve overheard Bucky relive his one night stands more than once in class, before he fell for you. He was always adamant that the only positions worth doing were the ones where he could see the girl’s ass, and how boring positions where he could see her face were. 
Bucky stares at you for a second, cupping your face and leaning down to give you a tender kiss. “Want you just like this, sweets, wanna see you.” You swallow hard, willing yourself not to cry at how intimate he’s being. Despite your best efforts, tears well up in your eyes, making Bucky panic.
“Sweetheart, what’s wrong?” His eyes hold so much love, something Bucky never thought he would feel for a partner. You wrap your legs and arms around him, clinging like a koala.
“Not a damn thing, Buck, just love you. Love you so fucking much it hurts.” Bucky feels his heart swell. If this is what it felt like to love and be loved, Bucky would spend the rest of his life trying to keep you, show you how perfect you are, love you as hard as he can and then some.
“Sweetheart, I can’t even put into words how much I fucking love you. You are the best thing that has ever happened to me, made me change from the asshole I was.” Bucky had his own tears welling up in his waterline.
“Buck, make love to me, show me how much you love me.” Reaching down, you wrap your hand around his dick, drawing a gasp from his lips, and line him up with your pussy. He presses his forehead against yours, gazing into your eyes as he pushes in, cock stretching your cunt with every inch.
Crashing his lips into yours, Bucky tries to hide his moan, whiny and long, never feeling such intense pleasure. Neither of you can kiss, just gasping into the other’s mouth. When his hips are flush with yours, balls resting against your ass, Bucky has to stop. If he moves he’ll cum; he knows it. He’s never felt like he would cum on the first stroke, but the way your cunt hugs him has him doubting that he’ll last more than a few minutes.
You can’t handle it, the stretch of his cock almost too much, but you needed him to move. “Please, baby, move, need it.” The moan that leaves him is sinful and you involuntarily clench around him.
“Sweets, can’t. Need a minute.” His arms go to your waist, and he pulls you up, groaning when his cock shifts deeper inside you, and sits with his back against the headboard, keeping you wrapped in his arms, bodies pressed so close together you could feel every muscle. Bucky closes his eyes, resting his head in the crook of your neck, breathing in your scent and relishing in the intimacy of the moment, with your breasts squished against his chest, feeling every breath you take, loving your soft hands scratching his scalp.
“Do this with all the girls, loverboy?” The breathiness in your voice has his cock pulsing against your walls.
“Never, sweetheart, never. You feel so fucking good.” Bucky sounded like he was about to cry with how hard he was trying not to cum.
You wanted him to fuck you, pussy leaking down his thighs. You decided that if you annoy him enough he might just fuck you dumb. “Guess I was right then, loverboy can’t last in bed. Gonna tell everyone how I broke your cock, how fast you came for me.”
That seemed to strike a nerve and Bucky rolled over, pining you to the bed with his body. You gasped at the quick motion and the jostle of his cock. “Sweets, now is not the time to tease me. Use your mouth for something better.” He could already hear your, like what, so he cut you off before you could get anything out. “Like moaning my name while I fuck you.”
He doesn’t pull his cock out far, wanting to stay as close to you as possible. Pushing back in, he groans, having to will himself not to cum. You feel so good, pussy wrapped around him perfectly. “Sweets, love you so much, never wanna leave this pussy.” You whine, a jolt of pleasure going through your clit at his words. 
“Love you too, Buck. Want to stay like this forever, want you.” It’s Bucky’s turn to whine, rutting into you, the coarse curls at the base of his cock rubbing your clit, the sensation of your breasts pressed against him new. 
He can’t help it, you just look too pretty underneath him, grabbing both of your hands in his, lacing them together and putting them above your head and pressing his forehead to yours, staring into your eyes. His lips meet yours, both of your whines and moans mix together. 
The constant roll of his hips is pushing you to the edge faster than ever before. You take one of your hands, still laced with his, and place it over his heart, feeling the erratic beat. The coil in your stomach is curling tighter and tighter. “C’mon, sweets, can feel you clenching ‘round me. Give it to me, cum on my cock.” 
Bucky is doing his best to hold on, wanting this moment to last, to relish in the bubble the two of you have created. His moans get louder, his own orgasm creeping up on him. Wiggling your other hand out of his grasp, you run your fingers over the back of his head, crashing your lips on his before you fall off the edge, eyes rolling back and body quivering, his body the only thing grounding you.
He had to pull out, your pussy almost milking his cum out, but he didn’t want to cum just yet. He wants to make you cum again, this time while he looks at your face, seeing it scrunch up in pleasure. You didn’t seem too happy at him for pulling out, needing him to be as close as possible. “Keep fucking me, Bucky. I need you to cum for me.”
Bucky groans before guiding his cock back home, squeezing his eyes shut when he feels your pussy somehow got even tighter. Not wasting any time, he starts thrusting again, this time much faster, still rolling his hips, hitting your sweet spot every time.
Pulling his body away from yours, Bucky sits up, resting your thighs over his, keeping his dick inside of you, not missing a single thrust. With the new position, he can see your breasts bounce, but more importantly, how beautiful your face looks screwed in ecstasy. “So fucking beautiful for me, sweets. Love the way your pretty tits jiggle, look gorgeous when your getting fucked dumb on my cock, gonna keep you like this all the time.” 
In this position, your clit is being neglected so you reach one hand down, desperate to cum again. Bucky quickly swats your hand away, replacing it with his own. “Ah, ah, I’m gonna make my girl cum. Just want you to lay there and look pretty for me. Can you do that for me?” You just moan in response, thumb rubbing quick circles on your clit, bringing you to the edge again. “Use your words, sweetheart.”
“Yes! I’ll do anything you want.” You feel Bucky’s cock pulsing inside of you, thrusts becoming sloppy and losing their rhythm. “Cum for me, Bucky, fill me up with your cum.” You both know that he is wearing a condom, but the thought of his cum rushing into your pussy, stuffing you to the brim, is enough to have Bucky emptying his balls into the rubber, groaning deep, almost whining your name.
He can’t stop thrusting into you, still rubbing your clit, desperate for you to cum around him. “Sweets, so much fucking cum for you, know you can take it. Fuck, cum for me, milk my cock, get every drop out.” Bucky was right, you looked absolutely divine when you came. At that moment you’ve never looked prettier.
Bucky never felt an orgasm that intense, leaving him weak in the knees. Collapsing onto your chest, not able to hold his own weight up. You huff, air being pushed out of your lungs, but you don’t mind, his weight soothing, helping to bring you back down from the high of your orgasms. You both lay there, hands stroking each other until you fully come back to reality.
“Gonna pull out, sweets, okay?” Bucky has never had his cock in a girl this long after he’s came, and it was getting too sensitive. Words don’t come to mind and you just nod your head dumbly, both of you hissing at the sensation.
Without a word, Bucky gets up and heads to the bathroom to dispose of the condom and clean himself up. All of a sudden tears well up in your eyes, body cold and craving his touch. He’s been so sweet to you for the past months, proving that he didn’t just want sex with you, but now he’s walking away as soon as you’re done. 
The buzzing of your body goes away, dread filling you. Rolling over, you burrito yourself under the covers, facing away from the bathroom, not able to stop the tears from streaming down your face. It only takes a few minutes, but to you it feels like a lifetime, until Bucky comes back, sliding under the covers himself. 
“So, sweets, what do ya’ want to do? I could go for a bite to eat myself. Don’t know when the last time you ate was though.” Bucky, on the other hand, was basking in the afterglow of the best sex of his life, already thinking about all the things he could do with you, all the ways he could get you to cum for him.
When you don’t respond right away, Bucky thinks you fell asleep. Leaving a kiss to the back of your head, he gets up and puts his sweats on, not bothering with anything else and heads to your kitchen. He doesn’t feel like making a full meal so he decides to just make a quick sandwich and head back to bed after eating.
You burst into full blown sobs when Bucky leaves, assuming that he left your dorm all together, having no idea that he was just outside. How could you have been so stupid to think that he really wanted you? Bucky goes to take a bite out of his snack when he hears your sobs, immediately thinking the worst - he hurt you, did something you didn’t like.
Rushing back into the room, Bucky climbs back into bed, rolling you over without warning. “What are you still doing here? Thought you left?” How could you ever think that he would leave you?
“No, sweets, just went to make a sandwich. What’s going on? Why are you crying?” Bucky has never been so fucking scared in all his life, terrified that he hurt you.
“Thought you left after you got what you wanted. You just left me in the bed after we were done.” Bucky’s eyes widened, not expecting you to say that. He doesn’t know what he did wrong. He’s never stuck around after sex, confused at what’s going on with you.
“Sweets, I’m so sorry that I made you think that, but I don’t know what’s going on. Need you to talk to me. I don’t want you to think I don’t care.” Your bottom lip wobbled, of course he didn’t know about aftercare. It wasn’t his fault that he never had a relationship like this. It meant so much to you that he was asking how to fix his mistake.
“I get really sensitive after sex. It’s annoying actually, but I need to be held and told that you still love me.” You avoid his gaze, more tears making their way down your face, Bucky wiping them away. How could his perfect girl think that her needs were annoying or an inconvenience to him.
“Oh, sweetheart, come here.” Bucky pulls you into his lap, almost petting your hair. “You did so good for me, you know that? I love you so fucking much and nothing is going to change that, okay?” He pulls your head back to look into your eyes.
“It’s just that my last boyfriend said that he couldn’t look at me after sex, said he couldn’t see me the same way.” What in the fuck. 
“Sweetheart, I need you to understand that I know that I’m the fucking luckiest man alive to be able to be with you any way you let me. When I look at you I’m so proud to call you mine.”
You bury your head in his shoulder, letting him hold you and whisper sweet words in your ear. For his first time doing aftercare, Bucky is doing great and soon you come all the way down. Pulling away from him you giggle. “Love you too, Buck. Thank you for that. I know some men don’t care about that. After they get what they want they leave.” Bucky hangs his head in shame, thinking about all the girls he made feel like they were worthless. “I know that you did the same thing, but the fact that you were so willing to change means a lot to me.”
Bucky knows that there’s a lot he has to learn about being in a relationship, but he wants to learn it all to be the man you deserve. He is going to treat you like the goddess you are for the rest of his life, he knows it, already planning on picking out a ring, because he’s gonna love you for a long, long time.
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p0orbaby · 1 month ago
Text
Forgive Me, Father, for I Have Sinned
summary: two horny idiots risking eternal damnation for a quickie
warnings: SMUT 18+, sex in a church, yup, you read that right
a/n: loosely based on this request
word count: 2.6k
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“This is so wrong,” you breathe, the words practically dissolving into Leah’s mouth as she presses you against the back wall of the church hall. The stone feels frigid through your dress, even in the sweltering summer heat; it’s that old kind of cold that sticks around in centuries-old buildings, regardless of what’s happening outside. The whole place smells faintly of damp wood and incense, a mix of candle wax and lingering prayers that seems completely at odds with what’s going on right now.
“Yeah?” Leah murmurs, with that infuriatingly calm tone, as though you’re having a conversation about the weather instead of whatever this is. Her hands are already hiking your dress up higher, bunching the fabric around your hips, her fingers deftly working with the same quiet confidence she shows in on the pitch—calculated, precise. “Seems like you’re coping just fine”
You catch yourself almost laughing, but it comes out as a choked breath instead. Somewhere in the background, the distant murmur of the christening service continues, the priest’s voice droning on in a sort of meditative monotone that feels strangely far away. It’s all “bless this child” and “holy sacrament,” while you’re up against the cold stone, your knickers soon to be halfway down your thighs. You think about how the acoustics in churches are supposed to be excellent, but all you can hear is the maddening thud of your pulse in your ears and the occasional scrape of Leah’s teeth grazing your neck.
It occurs to you that maybe you should care more about the fact that you’re technically still within earshot of Leah’s great-uncle reading from the New Testament, or that her mum is seated just a few rows away with her eyes shut in reverent concentration, her face an expression of serene grace. Leah’s brother is the godfather, you think, or at least, you’re pretty sure that’s what she said in the car on the way here, when you were barely listening because you’d just spotted a stray thread hanging from the cuff of her shirt and were fixated on the way it danced back and forth as she gestured.
Leah’s fingers hook under your jaw, pulling you back to her with just the right amount of force—gentle, but insistent, like she’s read your mind and knows you’re distracted. “You’re thinking,” she says, her voice barely a murmur against your lips. “Stop doing that”
You glance around, a half-hearted attempt at convincing yourself that no one’s actually going to walk in, that the ancient, creaking door isn’t about to swing open and reveal this scene to some poor, unsuspecting churchgoer who’d only stepped out for a breath of fresh air. The kind of person who’d probably drop dead on the spot just from the shock, like a character in one of those Victorian novels who faints whenever someone mentions anything vaguely improper. You almost want to giggle at the thought, but Leah’s hand slips lower and that faint urge is replaced by a much more urgent kind of distraction.
“I’m serious,” you whisper, though you’re not even sure why. It’s not like Leah doesn’t know the situation is mental—she’s the one who pulled you into this alcove in the first place, after all. You’re not entirely convinced it wasn’t premeditated, either. There’s a flicker of memory—Leah’s hand on your thigh during the ceremony, her fingers tracing idle patterns just above your knee as if to say, this isn’t the place, but let’s see how far we can push it. The way she’d glanced at you, eyes gleaming with a glint of amusement that suggested she was already considering how scandalised everyone would be if you just vanished for a few minutes.
“This is your cousin’s christening,” you hiss, as if stating the obvious is going to somehow ground the situation in reality. But Leah’s lips are on yours again, and you’re suddenly very aware of the way her hand slides down your back, fingers dipping beneath the waistband of your knickers in a way that makes your knees wobble.
“Distant cousin,” she corrects, voice muffled against your neck. “Barely know him”
“It’s a baby,” you shoot back, though you’re already arching into her touch, your voice catching on the last word as her fingers find their mark. “Not sure how well anyone knows him”
“Exactly,” she says, like that settles it, as if committing some vaguely sacrilegious act in the back of a church is completely justified because the baby in question probably won’t remember this day beyond the dozens of poorly framed photos on the mantelpiece twenty years from now.
Your head falls back against the stone wall with a dull thud, the kind of sound that suggests ancient masonry, the type of historical significance that’s more suited to solemn reflection than whatever obscene thoughts are currently racing through your mind. You find yourself half-listening to the priest’s voice drifting in from the main hall, the rhythmic lilt of, “We commend this child to your care,” and you think about how ironic it would be if God really was watching right now. There’s a brief flash of Catholic guilt that flares up somewhere in your chest, though you aren’t even Catholic, and it’s quickly extinguished by the scrape of Leah’s teeth against your earlobe.
“Thought you didn’t believe in all that,” she whispers, her breath warm against your ear.
“I don’t,” you manage to reply, though your voice is strangled and you’re not entirely sure if you believe yourself. “It’s just… bad form, isn’t it?”
Leah lets out a quiet, breathy laugh—so close you can feel the vibration against your skin. “Well, you’ve never been big on good form,” she says, and it’s impossible to argue because she’s right and you both know it.
She’s always known how to push your buttons, ever since the night you first met—a benefit gala, of all places. You remember standing there in some ridiculously overpriced dress, holding a glass of champagne you didn’t really want, staring at a painting you didn’t really understand while Leah’s voice, smooth and confident, drifted over your shoulder with some cutting remark about modern art. “I’m pretty sure my dead nan could’ve done better than that,” she’d said, and you’d laughed, not because it was particularly funny, but because there was something about her nonchalance, the way she didn’t even pretend to be impressed, that made you feel instantly at ease.
The ease didn’t last, of course. There was that night in Paris—somewhere between the hotel bar and the Eiffel Tower, where you’d argued over directions and ended up wandering aimlessly along the Seine, half-drunk and clutching onto each other for warmth. You’d made up in a dark alleyway, pressed against a café’s shuttered doors, and you remember thinking then, as you do now, that Leah had a knack for getting you into situations that were entirely inappropriate and yet felt ridiculously right at the time.
“Jesus Christ,” you mutter under your breath now, half in frustration, half in something else entirely, your fingers curling into the fabric of Leah’s half open shirt, tugging it harder as she shifts closer.
“That’s the spirit,” she murmurs back, and there’s that smirk again, the one that makes you want to throttle her and kiss her in equal measure.
For a split second, you wonder if anyone’s noticed your absence. The baby’s mother—Leah’s aunt, or second cousin, or something equally convoluted—had been so preoccupied making sure the godparents were holding the child correctly that you doubt she even noticed the two of you slip out. The priest’s voice carries on, something about being welcomed into the flock, and you’re almost tempted to peek around the corner to see if Leah’s mum has adopted that expression she gets when she’s half-listening to anything vaguely religious—eyes closed, hands clasped together in front of her, the picture of devout piety. You’ve only ever seen her like that at weddings, christenings, and funerals, and you briefly wonder if she’s ever actually questioned any of it, or if it’s just habit by now.
“What would your mum say if she knew?” you ask, though your voice is breathless, barely more than a murmur.
“Probably something about needing to go to confession,” Leah replies, her lips brushing the shell of your ear, her fingers tightening around your thigh. “Or at least light a candle”
The laugh that escapes you is entirely involuntary, echoing faintly against the high ceiling, and you quickly slap a hand over your mouth, your eyes wide as though you’ve just been caught breaking some sacred vow. Leah’s grin widens as she leans in, pressing a kiss to your shoulder, and you feel the warmth of her breath against your skin, as though she’s branding you with it.
It’s insane, really. The whole situation is insane. There’s a plaque on the wall above you, some inscription dedicated to a saint you’ve never heard of, and you wonder if people are meant to kneel here to pray or if this spot is usually reserved for flower arrangements during weddings. You picture the church bustling with activity—weddings, funerals, christenings—the whole spectrum of life’s milestones, and here you are, using it as a makeshift boudoir. It’s enough to make you think about eternity and sin and all the other things people pretend not to care about but secretly obsess over in the middle of the night. You imagine explaining this to someone—anyone, really—and the look on their face. “We couldn’t help ourselves,” you’d say, as though that’s a reasonable excuse for dry-humping your girlfriend in the shadow of a marble saint.
Leah’s hand slips under the hem of your skirt, her touch gentle and yet completely assured, fingers tracing the line of your thigh with maddening deliberateness. Her fingertips are cool against your heated skin, and the contrast sends a jolt through you—a reminder that this is happening here, now, in a church where every whisper echoes like a confession. Her fingers slide higher, brushing against the damp lace of your knickers, and the way she smirks as she feels how wet you are only makes the whole thing more obscene.
The distant hum of the priest’s voice is a low murmur, as if he’s conducting a prayer in the background of your own private, silent worship. Leah’s touch is reverent in a different way—her fingers slipping beneath the fabric, tracing slow, teasing circles that make your hips twitch involuntarily. It’s a game she plays sometimes, just to see how far she can push you before you break; her thumb grazing over your clit with just enough pressure to make you gasp, but not nearly enough to satisfy.
You bite down on your lip, trying to stifle the soft whimper that escapes you as her fingers dip lower, stroking along your slick folds with an infuriating patience. She leans in closer, her breath hot against your neck as she whispers, “We could get caught, you know.” There’s a wicked glint in her eye, like she’s daring you to care, like she wants you to make her stop just so she can ignore you and do it anyway.
The idea of someone stumbling across you both in this state—your skirt hiked up, knickers pulled aside, Leah’s fingers deep inside you—is scandalous in a way that only makes you wetter. You can’t help but glance towards the arched door, half-expecting to hear it creak open at any moment. But no one’s there, just the faint rustle of hymn books and the distant shuffle of feet, the sound of polite society carrying on obliviously while you’re being shamelessly fingered behind an ancient stone pillar.
Leah’s free hand grips your waist, pulling your hips towards her with a firmness that makes your breath hitch, as if she’s grounding you in this very moment—her fingers curling inside you, her thumb finally pressing against your clit in a rhythm that’s far too sinful for this setting. “Look at you,” she breathes, her voice a soft tease, as though she’s amused by just how quickly you’ve unravelled. “Anyone would think you’ve got no self-control”
You would glare at her if you weren’t already clutching her shoulders to steady yourself, your head tilting back against the wall as a quiet moan escapes you. The pressure builds with each deliberate thrust of her fingers, the slick heat pooling between your thighs making it impossible to think about anything but the lewd wet sounds of her hand working you over. There’s a heat spreading through your chest, a kind of wild desperation that feels almost holy in its intensity. It’s like being on the edge of a fever dream, where nothing exists but the maddening insistence of her touch and the electric pull of release just out of reach.
“Shh,” Leah whispers, though her voice is laced with a kind of arrogant amusement, as if she knows full well you’re not capable of being quiet right now. “You’re going to give us away”
Your nails dig into the fabric of her dress as her thumb keeps circling your clit with a precise, unyielding pressure, and you swear you hear the creak of a pew somewhere in the background, the faint shift of footsteps as someone else moves within the church. The thought that anyone could be wandering towards the back at this very moment only makes your pulse quicken, your body tightening around Leah’s fingers as she pushes deeper, curling them in a way that makes your whole world collapse inward.
“Fuck—” The word slips out before you can stop it, and you’re not sure if it’s a prayer or a curse. Probably both. Your hips grind against her hand, chasing the friction, desperate to come undone in a way that feels almost defiant in this sacred space. Leah’s lips curve into a slow, smug grin against your skin, her breath hot and ragged as she watches you unravel beneath her touch.
“You’re close,” she murmurs, her voice low and throaty. “Aren’t you?”
You nod—there’s no point in pretending otherwise—your hands sliding up to bury themselves in her hair, tugging her closer until her lips are a breath away from yours. You kiss her then, hard and hungry, swallowing the sounds you can’t keep contained, your thighs trembling as she drives you closer to the edge. The faint taste of her lip balm lingers on your tongue, that familiar cherry sweetness that always reminds you of her bedroom, and the first time you kissed her, with one hand in her hair and the other fumbling with the hem of her shirt.
The climax hits you suddenly, like the shuddering crash of a hymn’s last note echoing through the church. Your whole body goes taut, your breath catching in your throat as Leah’s fingers work you through the wave of pleasure, coaxing out every last tremor as you gasp into her mouth. For a second, the world is nothing but a blur of sensation—hot and electric and thoroughly blasphemous.
Leah’s hand slows, her fingers slipping out of you with a final, lingering caress that feels like both an ending and a promise. You’re still catching your breath when she leans in close again, pressing a kiss to the corner of your mouth, her lips curved in that maddeningly smug way.
“Still think this is wrong?” she asks, and there’s a softness in her eyes, an intimacy that lingers despite the scandal of it all.
You let out a shaky laugh, your hands still tangled in her hair as you look up at her. “Completely,” you murmur, your voice breathless but certain, and you know she’s right when she smiles at you like that, because this might be wrong, but it’s the kind of wrong that feels so damn right.
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zvdvdlvr · 11 months ago
Text
— I Love You
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— 🧠 synopsis. A tough case leaves you in the more than willing arms of SSA Aaron Hotchner.
— 🧠 word count. 2,409
— 🧠 warnings. Foul language. Idiots to lovers. Friends to lovers. Weird plot. Possible jealous!Hotch.
Maybe it was the children that hadn’t been saved in time. Maybe it was the pitying glances from not only the team, but the police officers. Maybe, even, it was the way Aaron’s eyes flitted away any time y/n looked up. 
No, y/n was mad. Angry, spiteful, defiant- any other synonyms for angry. The fact that the unsub had been completely fooled by y/n’s act until he had promptly decided he didn’t believe y/n’s promise to help in any way she could to lower his prison sentence. That’s the thing with schizophrenics: they’re extremely paranoid.
Y/n was so infuriated, she refused to talk- a habit that she had learned from childhood. If she didn’t say anything, she couldn’t get in trouble. It was a bad habit that y/n had eventually stopped by the time she went to college because the anger she kept inside of her without any kind of release would always find a way to rot her from the inside out. 
So now, even on the flight home, y/n still hasn’t said more than two sentences in a row.
— 🧠
Aaron Hotchner was a man with excellent observation skills and the ability to adapt. He knew y/n’s habit of reserving herself to silence due to the amount of time they have worked together, but Aaron felt like something was different this time.
Instead of starting the pile of paperwork he already had, Aaron instead found himself watching y/n. She was always extremely sensitive to cases that dealt with kids, but this seem to hit home, adding to the fact that their unsub had blown his brains out within a five foot radius of y/n and the seven-year-old girl that had been the last victim. 
When the team had gotten to the scene, they watched the little girl dissolve into y/n’s arms, brain matter and blood on the latter’s face. The look in y/n’s eyes when Derek had immediately rushed to the two of them was one of complete despair. Aaron watched, paralyzed, as you picked up the little girl and let her scream and wail near your ringing ears. You turned, pressing her head down so she wouldn’t look at the dead body and look Aaron dead in the eyes and took the child to the ambulance.
Something in your eyes had provoked worry in Aaron. Did you feel guilty? Were you not allowing yourself to break down when you needed to be strong for the little soul in your arms? Was there something you were trying to tell him?
“Hey,” Hotch murmured. He sat down as carefully as he could (which wasn’t too impressive seeing as it was 1 in the morning on a plane).
When you didn’t say anything, Hotch sighed. “I don’t know what you’re thinking, but I need you to know you did what you had to do. What he did… that wasn’t on you, y/n.”
Then you looked up at him with tears in your eyes and Aaron felt his heart sink. “Oh, honey…” he whispered. 
And then you were in his arms, crying, while trying not to wake up the others. “Hotch, I-“ you started, sniffling. 
“I’m here, sweetheart,” Aaron all but cooed, lightly carding his fingers through your hair. He knew you blamed yourself because that’s how you are. You always strive to do the best you possibly could, oftentimes resorting to neglecting yourself whenever you did something that you knew you could have done better or simply because you forgot. 
“It’s all my fault, Aaron, I- I could have saved him but- I… I messed up and I- I don’t even know what I did! And that little girl…” you trailed off, another wave of tears threatening to overtake your ability to speak. 
Aaron’s throat bobbed as he struggled to find the words to comfort the woman in his arms. Long ago had he resigned to simply being y/n’s boss/borderline friend because he accepted the fact that- as much as he hated to admit it- he was older, not your type, or just simply unattractive. But he would do theoretically anything you asked him to do even if it caused him heartbreak in the future.
“You saved that little girl, angel. *You* did. If you save one of them, you save all of them. Focus on the good, honey, not the bad. If you can do that then you can do anything, and believe me,” Aaron smiled, “I have no doubt in my mind you can do anything.” 
Aaron held you and prayed to God that you didn’t hear how fast his heart was racing. He brushed your tears away and let you sleep on his shoulder, happy that he had hopefully gotten you out of your funk.
— 🧠
Later, Aaron woke up to Derek tapping his shoulder. “Do you want me to take our golden girl home?” Derek asked, with a softness to his voice that he had whenever he talked to you. 
Blinking away the tiredness from his eyes, Aaron shook his head. “No. No, I got her. Tjank you, Derek, but you need to go home and get some rest.” 
Derek nodded. “Get home safe,” he said to Hotch, a small smile in his face when he heard you sigh a little in you sleep and bury your head even further into Aaron’s neck.
Derek patted Aaron’s shoulder before taking his leave.
“Wake up, y/n,” Aaron murmured, heart swelling in his chest when he heard you mumble incoherent words.
Slinging his own go-bag and yours over his shoulders, Hotch helped you stand up.
“Hotch, lemme take my-“ you started, being cut off with a yawn.
“I got it, y/n,” Aaron chuckled. He let you slip your arm in his and all but lean on him as he made his way to his car. 
When he got you settled into the passage seat, Aaron tossed the bags in the back and started the drive to your house. 
“Aaron?” You asked, voice small.
He looked over at you. Despite the lack of light, Aaron watched you pick at your fingers. “Yeah?”
It took you a minute before saying something. You wanted to ask him why he kept calling you ‘honey’ and ‘sweetheart’. It’s not that you didn’t like it (you loved it), you just don’t think he could keep calling you that if he didn’t have any kind of attraction to you. You, though, you’ve been enamored with Aaron Hotchner since the day he shook your hand and offered you a job. 
Similarly, you wanted to ask him what he did when he got lost in his own mind; when he himself couldn’t pull himself out of his thoughts. 
So you settled on a breathless “Thank you”. 
Silence reigned once more as Aaron tried to pick out the meaning of your thanks. Where you thanking him for driving you home? For letting you fall asleep on him? For… being one of the best friends you’d ever had in your life without saying it?
When Aaron carried your bag to the door as you unlocked the it, he wondered if there was another universe where he was taking you home every night, going to bed with you, waking up to Jack begging for pancakes with you, dropping Jack off at school with you, and then going to work with you. Maybe, Aaron thought, somewhere in another universe I’m watching the woman I love fall asleep with my child in her arms. 
“Do you… need anything else?” Aaron asked, holding out y/n’s go-bag for her to take. 
Aaron kicked himself. He felt like a school boy whenever you’re around, and the fact that he’s standing in front of you and your home isn’t really helping his nerves.
“Would you maybe want to, uh… stay? For tonight?” Y/n blurted. Aaron’s eyes must have widened because he saw y/n become flustered. “I- you know, just for tonight. I need a ride to work tomorrow anyway… You- You might as well just stay.”
“If you want me to-“
“Please?” 
Aaron stepped into y/n’s house and immediately toed off his shoes. “Where do you want me to put this?” 
“I’ll take it.” She accepted the bag and walked to her room.
Aaron walked around the kitchen. Your house was clean and colorful. You had quite a few photos of the sunset framed by your television, but there were a lot more candid shots of the BAU then of your family. Hm.
“Come here, A,” you called from your room (?).
Dutifully, Aaron followed the sound of your voice, pushing your door open slowly and entering your room. Where you sleep. Where you get dressed and undressed. Where you live.
You walked over to Aaron and handed him a little pile of clothes. “These should fit. I guessed your size. If those don’t fit I have more men’s clothes.” 
“Why do you have men’s clothing?” Aaron asked, a smile toying at his lips. 
“Brothers, boyfriends… they’re comfy,” y/n shrugged. “Does it matter, Aaron?” 
Aaron watched you tilt your head, smirk widening. 
“Just curious.” He defends himself poorly, red tinging his cheeks as he scratches his head.
“Bathroom’s right in there,” you say, pointing to the door attached to your room. 
Aarom walks to your bathroom and shuts the door. He immediately releases a breath of air he hadn’t realize he had been holding. After turning on the lights, he changes into the clothes you gave him. Both owns smelled exactly like you, something that made Aaron smile.
He shut off the light and closed the door. “Thank you, y/n. I appreciate it.”
You looked up from your dresser. “You’d do the same for me. There’s nothing to thank me, Aaron.”
“What are you doing?” Aaron asked, approaching your figure. 
“I don’t think you would want to see me walk around in just a bra and boxers, A,” y/n laughs. 
The bluntness of your answers smacks Aaron in the face with a metal bar. “Boxers?” He finds himself asking.
You just laugh. “They’re comfortable.” 
“You don’t have to change your sleeping routine for me,” Aaron says quietly, eyes looking directly into your own.
“Are you sure?” 
“We’re just sleeping,” Aaron shrugs. “So there’s nothing to worry about.”
Your eyes flicker between your boss’s and suddenly your wondering how you got here. The line between boss/employee and more-than-friends/not-quite-dating was blurred and you didn’t even remember putting your thumb on how you felt about your boss.
“Okay,” you say slowly. You close the drawer, holding a sports bra and boxers. “I’m gonna go change and go to sleep… Do you want me to set up the couch or just sleep in the bed with me?” 
“What do you want, y/n?”
You direct your gaze to the floor. “I don’t care, honestly.” You weren’t just gonna tell your crush you feel safer when his touch is what lulls you to sleep, that you’ve been in love with him since practically the beginning of time, that you wanted more than just a night (of PG activities!) with him.
“I hear your brain going 200 miles an hour over there, sweetheart. What’re you thinking?” Aaron teases.
“Will you hold me, Aaron?” You ask, urging yourself to look into his eyes. Moment of truth, you think, he’s either gonna laugh in my face or I’m gonna fall even deeper in love with my boss as we cuddle.
Aaron feels winded at your tiny voice. Yes, he wants to scream, yes! “Go get changed, honey. I’ll be right here.” 
Then that smile is back and all Aaron wants to do his pick you up in his arms and kiss you, maybe spin you around the room. His heart swells in his chest again (it’s been doing that a lot lately, he notes) as you pat his arm in thanks as you pass him to head to your bathroom.
Aaron climbs into your bed, setting his essentials (badge, keys, gun, etc.,) on the nightstand. 
You flip off the light switch and pad over to the bed and slip under the covers. 
For what felt like a millennium, Aaron held his breath and waited. 
“Aaron, I have to tell you something. It’s been on my mind and… just hear me out. Please. You don’t have to say anything back and I understand if-“ you babble.
“Take a breath, y/n,” Aaron soothes. “What’s up?”
“I’m in love with you, Aaron Benjamin Hotchner. Like, if I had to choose between you over breathing I would literally spend my last breath telling you how much I love you. You are always on my mind, Aaron, and it hurts because I can’t do anything about it. I know I’m not your type, I know I’m just your co-worker, I know you probably aren’t looking to date anyone, but I just… I want you to know,” you ramble, words tumbling out of your mouth like Reid when he get’s started on some random fact. 
Aaron blinks, pupils widening. “Do you seriously think you’re ‘just a co-worker’ to me?” 
You swallow. “Yeah?”
“Do you think I would let just anyone call me Aaron? How often to you see me taking out Morgan for coffee when he gets cranky? Do I almost always end up sitting by Emily on the flight home after a case? Do I call Spencer ‘sweetheart’ and ‘honey’?” Aaron asks quietly, hand resting on your cheek while he tucks a loc of hair under your ear so he can see your eyes better. “Jack loves you. I love you.” Aaron laughs at how comically large your eyes get.
“Jack loves me?” You ask.
Aaron laughs. “He loves you ‘to the moon and back’.” 
“He loves that book, Aaron, don’t laugh at your baby boy,” you scold playfully.
“I outdo him though, because I love you to Saturn and back.”
You turn to the nightstand and shut the light off before turning back to face Aaron. “Will you hold me, Aaron? Please?” 
“C’mere, sweetheart,” Aaron says, opening his arms to welcome you into him. 
And then that’s when you know his words are true. His heart rate  is definitely elevated, but so is yours. “Will you tell me you love me, again?”
Aaron, now lying on his back with you clinging onto him like a weighted blanket, complied. Carding his fingers through her hair, Aaron lulled her mind off to a quiet, safe place. “I love you, angel,” Aaron whispered, pressing a soft kiss to y/n’s forhead.
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sunflowerwinds · 5 months ago
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first night traditions | e.w
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summary: back for your third summer in a row, you reconnect with your friends you hadn’t seen for a whole year, including one ellie williams. seeing her again brings back the silly crush you developed on her the first summer. you promised yourself that this summer would be different but your heart is betraying you.
pairing: ellie wiliams x fem!reader
contains: fluff, tension between ellie and abby, characters from a different au (steve & robin from stranger things), probably inaccurate depictions of summer camp because i’ve never been, maybe flirty!ellie :)
word count: 4.1K
a/n: i literally couldn’t think of any other name for extra characters. stranger things had been heavy on my mind even though 90% of the cast and production team are so insanely problematic. fuck the duffer brothers. but i am so so excited for yall to see what i have for this. a day late posting i apologize but i hope you guys enjoy <33
under the summer stars masterlist
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For the past two summers, you’ve been a camp counselor at Little Explorers Summer Camp. As irritating as the summer heat made you, being able to spend a month in this little paradise with the sweetest kids in the world made the burning UV rays worth it. You pulled into the parking lot, watching your friends from previous summers lining up beside you. You sent a text to your dads to let them know you’d arrived safely at the campsite.
As you adjust your minimal amount of makeup, you hear a knock on your window causing you to jump slightly and turn down your music that you had been listening to on the 3 hour drive. You turn your head and gasp in excitement as your good friend and fellow counselor, Jesse, tugs open your door.
“Oh my god, Jesse!” You chuckle as you step out of your driver's seat to wrap your arms around his neck.
He chuckled against your temple as he wrapped his arms around you, patting your back.
“Holy shit! Have you been working out? You nearly choked me out just now.” Jesse joked as he pulled back from your embrace.
You put your arm up to flex playfully, nodding with a cheeky smirk.
“Prepping for this summer, you know?” You shrugged your shoulders before looking over his shoulder to see a familiar blonde head making her way over.
“I think we should really put that to the test,” the blonde folded her own muscular forearms over her chest.
You make your way over to her to give her a tight hug as you had missed her presence dearly. Abby had become a close friend of yours after your first summer as a counselor being a year older than you and having more experience than you did.
“Abs, I missed you,” you laugh softly as she gives you a squeeze, slightly lifting you off the ground.
“I missed you too. Ready to deal with whiny kids and minimal air conditioning for a month?” Abby grinned from ear to ear as she pulled away, patting your shoulder.
“Oh, nothing but excitement and not at all fear,” you give her a thumbs up before you turn to see Jesse opening up your trunk to grab your suitcase.
You thank him as he breezes past you with your two suitcases, watching him walk down the gravel road to the counselors cabin. Abby mumbles ‘show off’ as Jesse lunges with your suitcases on either shoulder causing you to chuckle. The sun beat down on your exposed neck, beads of sweat already trickling down your back and centering on your upper lip.
You and Abby get to talking as you shut your car door, double locking it as you had the tendency to forget to lock your car. Abby explained to you how she had been excelling as a personal trainer back home, loving the differences she makes in people's lives. You were a barista at your campus when you weren't here at the campsite.
As you both walk up to the camp main office cabin, you notice a few other familiar faces. Dina, another fierce friend of yours, and Joel, one of the only mature adults in charge, both leaning against the old wooden railing with bright smiles.
“Well, who are those sexy ladies?” Dina shouts, cupping her palms over her mouth.
The sound caused the birds in the trees to scatter, you flinching at fluttering and squawking above you. You shake your head with a blush from not only the heat but her words.
“Dina,” Joel says warningly.
“What? The kids aren’t here yet.” Dina rolled her eyes playfully before making her way towards the two of you.
She threw each of her arms around your necks to pull you both into a quick but sweet hug.
“You’re one to talk. Hello? Your hair is growing and have you been doing squats?” You check her out as you admire her figure.
“My genetics blessed me.” Dina insisted with a bright smile.
The three of you were all sharing conversation as you walked up the steps, giving Joel friendly smiles and ‘hello’s. You peeked inside the cabin to see Jesse talking to the one person you were ashamedly the most excited to see. There she stood in a black tight wife pleaser, arms crossed in front of her chest as she nodded to whatever Jesse was rambling about. She even stopped her conversation with the man to walk up to you to give you the tightest hug, her toned arms wrapping around your frame.
Ellies’ sigh brushed against your temple, like she was relieved to see you. After all these summers, no one ever exchanged numbers so you yearned for her presence at the beginning of the month of June. Your dads already gave you a million pep talks but you told them your crush on Ellie was no more. Your heart betrayed your mindset as it fluttered at her grip on you, melting into the embrace without even realizing.
That is until Jesse spoke up.
“Jesus, Ellie, you guys are going to have a whole month together.”
This caused you to flip him off behind Ellie’s back. Ellie, sadly, pulled away regardless but didn’t let Jesse’s comment go unpunished and gave him a punch to his shoulder. He simply winced and rubbed the skin, shaking his head at the auburn haired girl.
“You’re just jealous because I’m her favorite,” Ellie snipped with a confident smile.
You couldn’t even lie as it wasn’t far off. It made you over think how you act around her. Have you made it obvious these past two summers how much you favored her?
“So are you guys excited for tonight?” Dina pipped in, raising her thick eyebrows as she glanced at everyone.
Every summer for as long as this camp has been active, all of the counselors take a night to go for a late night swim and a beautiful campfire to take the time to mentally and emotionally prepare for the next month.
The children come on Monday. It was Saturday so they had all of Sunday to prepare everything for the kids.
“Oh hell yeah. Dina and I are going to sneak into the dining hall to grab everything for the s’mores. What cabin did everyone get assigned to this year?” Jesse spoke up, grabbing the clipboard with everyone’s cabin and the amount of campers everyone had.
You glance at Ellie to motion to the clipboard. She grabbed your arm to tug you towards Jesse’s figure, peaking over at the highlighted names.
“Shit, Els, our cabins are right next to each other this year. T-Rex’s and Daisy’s.” You beam at her as you run your finger down the list.
“Finally. It’s been, like, three years and we’re right next door to one another.” Ellie looked over at you with just as much excitement in her sage green eyes.
You couldn’t help but match her excitement as you recalled the past two summers where the cabins you were assigned to were tens of feet away and you weren't able to see each other until lunch time or late at night. The cabins next to each other were usually teamed up to do activities with the kids together. More time to spend with Ellie.
Platonically and BFF-like, of course.
“Wait, Joel, where’s Steve and Robin?” You question the elder man as he walked through the screen door with a large box in his arms.
“Ah, those two will be here much later.” He paused to set down the box near a desk. “They missed a few exits and called ahead to let me know.”
You nod to yourself. Steve and Robin were like ying-yang twins. The brunette pretty boy and the freckled girl were the definition of platonic soulmates. It freaked you out how well they got along.
“Well until then, let’s all unpack our shit in our counselors cabins.” Jesse spoke up, grabbing one of his suitcases.
You agree and go to grab your suitcase when Abby and Ellie speak up.
“I can help—“
“Hey, no, I got it.”
You froze at the two of them reaching for your travel cases, looking in between the two of them.
“Guys, I can carry them myself,” you shake your head with a soft laugh but neither of the girls were having it.
“It’s like a mile walk to the Daisy cabin. I’m right next door. I can help,” Ellie emphasized, looking at Abby with a tight-lipped grin.
“A mile is not that far, Ellie. I really have no problem doing it.” Abby chuckled in Ellie’s face, grabbing the handle tightly to your carry-on suitcase with your toiletries.
Dina and Jesse exchange looks with you before silently maneuvering around the three of you to carry their own suitcases to their assigned cabins. Was there a weird tension between the two or was it just you?
“Okay! How about you both carry something? There. Problem solved.” You speak up, placing a hand on Ellie’s shoulder and turning to face Abby.
The two were driving causing your shoulders to set in a hunch at the strange encounter. The girls agreed on that before leaving the main cabin to yours. Abby’s biceps flexed as she carried the heavier suitcase with ease as Ellie rolled her eyes behind her, telling you to follow behind them so you could get settled in.
Reluctant already to walk in the shaded heat, you give Joel one more forced grin. He muttered ‘good luck’ before returning to his own tasks with what you swore was a teasing grin.
The walk to the cabin wasn’t as irritating as you were expecting as Ellie and Abby were right: you would’ve been complaining a lot more if you had a suitcase in each hand along with your carry on. The heat was causing your baby hairs to stick to your forehead, huffing in annoyance but keeping your snarky words to yourself as you arrived with the two very helpful girls.
Ellie kicked open the door, a soft grunt leaving her lips as she placed the suitcase she was holding next to your counselor bed. Abby did the same, stretching her palm in and out from the tight grip. You sigh as you lean against the doorway, feeling the cool A/C hit your face.
“See? Teamwork guys,” you give them both thumbs up. They looked back at you with panting chests but smiled at your words nonetheless. “I’ll catch up with you guys in a bit. Thank you, Els. Thanks, Abby.”
You give the girls a side hug — Ellie’s a little tighter than the blondes. Abby gave Ellie a look once over before leaving the cabin to have you and Ellie be on your own. Once the door shut, Ellie turned to you with a soft sigh. She placed her hands on her hips as she looked around at the cutesy decor that was floral themed. You took notice of how homey the bunk-beds felt in comparison to all of the other ones.
Sure, they were just as adorable but this one felt right. Or maybe it was the fact that a certain auburn haired girl was making you feel more at ease than ever.
“This is a cute little cabin. It suits you,” Ellie walked over to trace the mural of sunflowers with the campsite name in a beautiful cursive font.
“Right? It’s perfect. I mean, the Mushroom and Grizzly cabins were adorable but this feels a lot better for some reason.” You glance over at Ellie’s inked arm, sucking in a deep breath.
Ellie hummed in agreement, looking back over at you. You fiddled with your random bracelets, giving her the least awkward smile you could muster. She reciprocated the gesture right back and tilted her head to the left.
“I should probably head over next door to get all of my shit unpacked,” Ellie huffed out, walking over to you to be merely inches away from your face.
“I thought you were just going to annoy me for a little longer but if you wanna go, Els.” You tease, scrunching your nose at her.
She scoffed and leaned in, narrowing her eyes. “You love it when I annoy you.”
And how easily you could kiss me right now if you were willing, you thought.
“I guess I do since I keep you around,” you shrug your shoulders.
Ellie’s eyes poured into yours as she took a step back. Her hand reached at one of the ends of your braids, twirling it around her pointer finger. You watched her carefully as her smile slowly grew.
“You’re not sick of me yet?” She questioned, still messing with your hair.
Not in the slightest, your brain echoes.
“We’ll see. I’ll get back to you when the month is over.” You chuckle as she releases the dutch braid from her fingertips.
Ellie muttered ‘fair enough’ under her breath as she nodded to herself, a smile creeping on her lips. You watch her take a moment to glance around the cabin once over before inching towards the door.
“I’ll see you in a bit, okay? Campfire and then late night swimming.” Ellie pointed one finger at you expectantly.
“I know, Els. I’ll see you,” you give her one more nod.
“Wear something cute for the swim,” was the last thing she said before opening and shutting the door behind her.
You watched her now more blurred figure through the screen over the windows, waiting for her to leave before letting out a long sigh you weren't aware you were holding.
It was going to be a long month.
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After unpacking for what felt like centuries, you had everything in their correct places and were able to peacefully make your way to the campsite. All of the beds were made, your counselor door had your name in dry-erase along with the rules for the camp opposite of the door.
And maybe you took into consideration what Ellie said about the cute outfit and threw on a pair of brown cargo shorts and a loose white tee. You only brought three pairs of shoes so you landed on your black and white Reebok Club C’s. What’s underneath was also taken into consideration.
As you were shutting the door behind you, you turned around to see Dina standing right in front of you with her arms crossed and eyebrows raised. You scoot back as she had scared you with her silent presence.
“Hey D, everything okay?” You tilt your head at her as you make your way down the steps.
“What the hell was that with Abby and Ellie earlier?” She trailed behind you, speeding up her steps to walk beside you.
You glance at Dina as you recall how intense hours before were between your other two friends; one whom you felt more deeply for.
“I really have no idea. It was… freaky but hey, I got out of carrying my luggage.” You joke and Dina nods along with a weak chuckle.
“Yeah, that is true but I don’t know. Ellie and Abby have always been neck in neck for some reason. They get along enough to be cordial but those two can get on each other’s nerves fast.” Dina explained to you.
You never really noticed it before. You assumed it was because if you weren’t trying to make sure the children were pulling or cutting each other’s hair, bullying one another or making sure their bladders were in check. Along with your flourishing and embarrassing school-girl crush on Ellie blinding you.
“Why?” You question as the two of you were approaching the campfire that was sparkling and crackling under the setting sun.
“I really have no idea, babe but what I do know is that you’re not being any less obvious with your crush on Ellie.” Dina nudged you as she jerked her head to Ellie who was watching Joel pulling at the strings of his acoustic guitar, a bottle of Coke dangling from her long fingers.
The green eyed girl had a small smile on her pink lips as she watched the father figure in her life sing lowly with the tune. Her effortless beauty to you was always captivating. Maybe Dina was right.
“My crush is extremely under control,” you lie straight through your teeth.
“Suppressing it and not confessing is not having it under control,” Dina stated with a sigh, shaking her head.
“Okay, enough talking about it. Plus, I’m trying to move on, D.” You lower your voice once you approach the group of familiar faces.
Dina pressed her lips into a thin line as she respected your wishes. What you told her was half true. Yes, you did want this crush to wither away in the wind but you didn’t actually have someone else to fixate on.
”Robbie, hey!” Dina approaches Robin, giving her a quick hug.
Robin rested her chin on her shoulder with a soft chuckle, reciprocating the motion. You make your way over to Steve who was chugging a lime Gatorade. Everyone was wearing a mix of tank top and tees with either jean or cargo shorts with athletic sneakers. Steve, being the manwhore he was, had on 5 inch inseam jean shorts. He looked like he stepped out of a 1987 slasher movie.
“Hey, pretty boy,” you tease as you stare at his head of gorgeous hair.
Steve rolled his eyes playfully before wrapping his free arm around your waist from where you were standing quickly. You hear Ellie and Joel snort at your statement as Steve shakes his head at their laughter.
“What’s up, Bubbles?” He grinned up at you.
Now the entirety of the camp erupted into giggles at his nickname for you. Last summer, the children in your cabin pranked you with the help of Jesse and Steve. The idiots got all 12 kids an extra large bubble gun and doused you in soapy bubbles right after getting out of the shower. You swore half of them just went up your nose and in your mouth. The HD photo of you is hanging in the main office for everyone to see.
“Alright, alright, enough. You guys are asses.” Ellie spoke up but she covered her mouth to hide her own laughter.
You sit down next to Abby and point across the fire at the auburn haired girl.
“You better keep one eye open at night.” You shake your head, allowing the warmth of the fire and the soft tunes of Joel’s guitar put you at ease.
Everyone else ‘ooh’d’ and ‘damn’d’ at your words as Ellie merely shook her head. She didn’t believe you were going to really do anything to her. That is until the blonde sitting next to you threw her muscular arm over your shoulders, tugging you into her side.
“I’ll help you prank Williams. Let me know before we go on our weekly trips to town.” Abby whispered into your ear which caused weird shivers to trickle down your spine.
You send her a small smile with a soft ‘thanks’.
Before you knew it, everyone was sharing how their past year has been since the previous summer. The sticks were passed around with the huge marshmellows at the end, everyone roasting them to a slight crisp. This camp had been a second home to you and these people had become like family. You found out that Robin had finally made a move on that girl she had been cruising on for the past year and had a date with her when she got back from camp which everyone drank to. You pressed your melting marshmellow in between two graham crackers, a small amount of chocolate between the two as you weren’t the biggest chocolate fanatic.
Ellie was almost pressured into playing the guitar tonight but she insisted she saved it for the kids.
Just when you were trying to get over her she said something as sweet as that. God, you hated her. After everyone had inhaled their s’mores, a series of sighs and complaints about how hot it was trickled down the line of counselors.
“Screw it. It’s time for that late night swim.” Robin stated, standing up on her high-top Converse covered feet.
Even though the sun had been set for almost two hours now, you were still warm all over. The cool lake would be heavenly. Everyone except for Joel got up from their seats on the logs, making their way over to the lake.
“Y’all be safe now. Ev’rybody knows what to do when you’re done swimming right?”
They were scattered ‘yes’s’ and ‘got it, Dad’. In a sense, Joel was like a father figure to you all since each and every one of you viewed him as such; comforting and an older man.
Once he gave you guys the ‘okay’, the group took off in a sprint to the bridge overseeing the lake. You let out a loud laugh as you watched Steve trip over his shorts as he kicked the denim off. Everyone had left their clothes and shoes on the small wooden pier, each of you plopping in one by one.
You set your shorts aside hanging on the rail along with your shirt and shoes. You tried to ignore the negative thoughts about Ellie seeing your body in just your underwear; a pair of hipster panties and a bralette because you couldn’t stand wired bras.
”Come on! The water feels amazing,” you hear Robin shout.
You saw Dina shoving Steve’s head into the water with joyous laughter. Jesse, Robin and Abby will peacefully swim around in the dark water. The only source of light being the singular lamp post at the end of the pier and the moonbeams bouncing off the still water.
Then you see a familiar head of wet auburn hair pop up at the end of the wooden ledge.
“Don’t make me get out of this water and push you in,” Ellie warned but her smile showed she was only teasing.
You flip her off before motioning for her to back away from the pier.
“Move your head, Els. I don’t wanna risk accidentally kicking you in the face when I jump in.” You give her a pointed look.
“I could get a badass black eye though,” she raised a hand to push back her wet hair out of her face, giving you more of a view of her stupidly perfect side profile.
“No, seriously. I don’t want to hurt you. Please move.”
Ellie muttered an ‘alright, sorry’ before swimming backwards so that she was now in the little group, all eyes on you. You took a few large steps back, the rough wood tickling underneath your bare feet. You heard a few shouts of encouragement come from Ellie and Abby’s mouths.
Within minutes, you were sprinting off the pier into the deep water. The borderline freezing lake engulfed your body entirely. When your head popped back up above the water, everyone was cheering you on for the jump. You were shivering a bit until Ellie came up behind you, placing her palms on either one of your shoulders. The warmth of her hands eased your goosebumps that raised on your skin.
“So you did wear something cute for tonight,” Ellie said lowly, the cockiest and most stupid grin on her face.
At first, you thought she meant the clothes that were hanging off the pier but no, she meant the underwear that was now clinging to your body. Your cheeks flushed at her words, moving your falling bra strap back onto your shoulder.
“This is what was at the top of my suitcase.” You state before splashing her face with the water, leaning in closer so that you were inches apart. “Not everything is about you, Ellie.”
Ellie spat out what water got in her mouth before shaking her head as she smacked her lips against her teeth. It shouldn’t have been as attractive as it was.
“I missed you,” was all she said.
No sarcastic comment back. It sounded so genuine and maybe you felt bad for talking to her in that manner. You had to if you were ever going to move on from this fantasy world of Ellie liking you back.
“Well, I’m here now. I missed you more, Els.”
Ellie shook her head. “You can ask Joel. He’ll embarrass me with how much I was talking about how excited I was to see you again.”
Don’t, you shouted at your rapid beating heart. She misses me as a friend.
“I don’t think I have to ask. He loves embarrassing you enough on his own,” you reply with a shrug of your shoulders, kicking your legs through the thick water to keep yourself afloat.
Ellie chuckled as she agreed.
“Well, anyway, I can’t wait to have fun with you again. ”
You nod mindlessly, completely enamored with how soft and gentle her eyes looked under the minimal light as she spoke to you. You whispered, “me too.”
You were so screwed.
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tag list: @abbyshands @ih8chickentenders @elliesprettygirl @justhereforinspopics @be3flow3r @hearts4joongie @plutolovesyou @bready101
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hauntedhowlett-writes · 1 year ago
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the old college try
pairing: frat dad!joel miller x college student!female reader
rating: explicit (18+ MDNI)
word count: 5.1k
summary:
Family Weekend, or DILF Day as you and your friends like to refer to it, is when the University of Texas encourages the parents and families of its student body to visit the school and participate in activities that the Division of Student Affairs has organized. The fraternities and sororities have their own schedule that includes not-so-sanctioned house parties on frat row following the game. It’s your senior year and your last DILF Day so you’re hoping to go out with a bang. Literally. Enter Joel Miller, handsome single dad visiting his son at the Theta Lambda Upsilon fraternity house.
dear reader:
this is an extremely self-indulgent fic that i just had to write, so i hope you enjoy it! if you do, please consider leaving a comment or reblogging <3
content warnings:
explicit sexual content (18+ minors do not interact), alternate universe - no outbreak/no sarah, age difference (42M and 23F), dub con - sex under the influence of alcohol, no use of y/n, frat party stereotypes, keg stands and beer pong, semi-public sex (frat bathroom), mild daddy kink (not during sex), p in v, oral sex (f receiving), dirty talk, cheesy dad jokes, the university of texas as a plot device. please let me know if any are missing!
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You turn over in your bed with a deep groan, burying your face into your pillow. You reach your arm out from under the covers to grab your phone from the nightstand, smacking your hand around the wood surface until you find it and can bring it under the covers with you. Turning over, you tap the screen and squint at the series of unread text messages.
Ashley: Get up bitch! 
Ashley: It’s time to get ready!
Ashley: We’re going to be late if you don’t get up
Ashley: Don’t make me break into your apartment
Ashley: You know I can
You sit up quickly, shoving the blankets off of you and rushing to the front door, flipping the lock and pulling it open. Your best friend is across the threshold, knelt down on the ground with two bobby pins held up and her eyes wide in surprise.
“Aw man,” she laments, standing and brushing off her knees. “I wanted to test my skills.”
“I’m not paying to replace the lock,” you chastise, stepping back to let her in. “Sorry, overslept.”
“Figured. I’ll get your coffee started,” she replies, heading for your kitchen while you head back to your bedroom to start your morning routine. “Guess which frat is hosting the tailgate today?”
“Which one?” You shout from the bathroom as you run through your skincare routine.
“Theta Lambda Upsilon,” Ashley shouts back. The scent of brewing coffee paired with this excellent news has you perking up immediately. 
Your friend steps into your room with two mugs in her hands, passing one to you as you exit the bathroom and sit at your cluttered vanity, pushing aside products to make room to set your mug down. Ashley sits on your bed, folding her legs beneath her.
“The hottest frat hosting the tailgate and after party means we’ll get to see the hottest dads this weekend,” she says, shimmying her shoulders excitedly. “It’s simple genetics.”
“You dropped genetics. Remember? You couldn’t handle an 8 am class,” you say as you apply mascara. 
“I went to enough classes to know how a Punnett square works.”
You laugh, finishing your makeup between long sips of coffee. “It’s amazing you couldn’t tough it out through an early semester but give you an afternoon game and you’re trying to break into my apartment at the crack of dawn.”
“It’s DILF Day, baby. It’s like waking up on Christmas morning.”
Family Weekend, or DILF Day as you and your friends like to refer to it, is when the University of Texas encourages the parents and families of its student body to visit the school and participate in activities that the Division of Student Affairs has organized. The fraternities and sororities have their own schedule that includes not-so-sanctioned tailgates and house parties on frat row following the game.
As an out-of-state student, your parents have always skipped Family Weekend in exchange for buying your plane tickets back home for Thanksgiving and Christmas break, which leaves you with plenty of opportunity to ogle the hot dads that descend upon campus on this glorious weekend. You’ve never had the guts to actually pursue anything with anyone, but it’s your senior year and your last DILF Day so you’re hoping to go out with a bang.
Literally.
“What are you going to wear?” Ashley asks. 
“Shorts and that new tank top I got,” you reply, finishing your makeup with a pop of your lips after applying gloss. “And boots. Obviously.”
“Obviously,” Ashley nods as you rifle through your closet for the outfit in question - denim cutoffs and orange Texas Longhorn tank top that hugs your curves and shows off the perfect amount of cleavage. Finishing the look with your worn brown cowgirl boots, you spin for your friend who gives you a thumbs up. “Sexy. I reckon’ this year you’ll catch yourself a DILF.”
You roll your eyes. “Maybe. We’ll see.”
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Joel’s arm hangs out the truck’s open window, fingers tapping against the hot metal as he drives down the highway towards the Austin campus of the University of Texas. It’s Family Weekend and his son, Sean, started his sophomore semester at UT a few weeks prior and now lives in the Theta Lambda Upsilon fraternity house on campus after proving to Joel that he would take his classes seriously by doing well his freshman year. Joel’s always been close with his son as a single dad and the fact that Sean asked him to Family Weekend feels like a testament to that bond.
The campus is already bustling with the game day crowd, trucks parked in grassy areas along the road with their tailgates down, people setting up tents and tables and coolers. Joel drives slowly down the street until he’s turning down a side road and parking down the hidden drive his son had given him instructions to find. He hops from the truck, sneakers hitting the hot pavement and the sun already beating down on his arms as he makes his way towards the TLU house a couple blocks away. 
There’s a huge crowd of students and parents in shades of burnt orange and white on the front lawn of the two story fraternity house, red solo cups or cans of beer in hand. Joel looks around until he hears a familiar voice calling out, “Dad!”
Sean emerges from the crowd dressed in a white polo shirt with an orange Longhorn logo on the chest tucked into khaki pants, his curly brown hair slicked back with gel. Joel smiles, hugging his son and patting him on the back in greeting.
“Been ages since I saw you, kid. Have you gotten taller?” Joel asks.
Sean rolls his eyes. “You saw me last weekend!”
A voice calls out Sean’s name and the younger man throws an arm around Joel’s shoulders, dragging him along into the packed fraternity house. The scene inside is not unlike all the ones he’s seen in movies and TV shows - flags stuck to the walls as decor, a mysteriously sticky floor, and kitchen countertops filled with booze. Sean stops and grabs a red plastic cup, handing it to Joel. 
“Pick your poison,” Sean instructs, grabbing his own cup. Joel raises an eyebrow at him.
“Last I checked, you weren’t twenty-one,” he chastises, earning him another eye roll. 
“Like you didn’t know Uncle Tommy was buying me beer when I was a senior.”
“He what?” Joel asks, though the question is lost in the noise as Sean leads him to an impressive back deck hosting a beer pong table and two kegs nestled in plastic trash cans and surrounded by ice. 
Sean slips into the crowd surrounding the kegs, taking Joel’s cup from his hands, pumping the tap and filling each cup with ice cold beer, handing one to Joel. 
“Go Longhorns,” Sean says, tapping his cup to Joel’s and chugging the contents. Joel watches his twenty-year-old son with wide eyes and a torn conscience. 
“This is what I’m payin’ tuition for, huh?” He teases, taking a single sip of the cheap beer. A cheer erupts from behind him and he turns to look at what’s causing so much excitement.
You and a friend are at one end of a plastic folding table, glaring daggers at two boys at the other end, a single solo cup set on the table in front of you. You have a white ping pong ball held delicately between two fingers, your other hand propped on your hip as you squint one eye shut to take your aim for the cup that sits in front of the boys. You let the ball fly and it sinks into the cup, another cheer going through the small crowd gathered around you as you jump up and down excitedly.
Sean approaches the boys, slapping one of them on the shoulder. One of them shouts, “Redemption shot!”
“Oh, please! You can’t aim for shit, Chad!” You shout back. 
“Celebrity shot, then!” He suggests. The boy, Chad, reaches out to pull an older man to his side. “Dad edition!”
Your eyes scan the crowd, landing on Joel. You wave him over, the older man glancing around briefly before pointing to himself to confirm. You nod, smile bright as he approaches.
“I need a daddy for this celebrity shot, you wanna do the honors?” You ask sweetly. Joel swallows nervously, face heating at the suggestive tone and look you’re giving him. 
“Come on, dad!” Sean calls out. “Show ‘em what a Miller man can do!”
“Yeah,” you chime in. “Show me what a Miller man can do.”
“Alright, fine,” Joel acquiesces, moving to stand beside you. You slip a ping pong ball into his hand, standing so close beside him that your bare arm brushes his as you both watch Chad’s dad take aim for the single cup. 
The ball soars through the air, hitting the rim of the cup and bouncing off onto the table, rolling to the ground as the men groan. He feels you place a hand on his shoulder, your lips close to his ear as you whisper, “Come on, Mr. Miller. You’re my only hope.”
It doesn’t escape Joel’s notice that you keep your hand on his shoulder as he takes aim and throws the ball across the table, sinking it into the cup. You’re throwing your arms around his shoulders in celebration as the people around you shout excitedly. On instinct, Joel’s arms wrap around your waist, holding you close for a brief moment before coming to his senses and taking a step back.
“Thanks,” you say, looking up at him through your lashes. “I’m going to go inside for a drink. You want anything? I’ve got a stash of IPAs in a friend’s fridge upstairs if you want something better than Miller Lite. Consider it a thank you for winning me bragging rights over Chad.”
Joel should say no. He shouldn’t be taking up drink offers from someone half his age, but you’re giving him another devastating smile that has his resolve folding faster than a lawn chair in a hurricane.
“Sure.”
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The hottest man you’ve ever seen is currently following you upstairs to your friend Craig’s room for a beer. He’s tall and tan with sweet brown eyes and dark hair that looks like it would be a dream to run your fingers through. His broad chest and toned biceps press deliciously at the confines of the white UT Longhorns shirt he’s wearing. When he stepped up beside you to throw your celebrity shot at the beer pong table downstairs, you’d noted that his left hand featured no wedding band or a tan line of one left behind.
You reach the second floor and head for the last door on the right, marked with a PRESIDENT plaque. You reach into the pocket for the key Craig had given you earlier and let yourself inside, heading for the mini fridge in the corner and grabbing two Yellow Rose IPA cans. 
“So,” you say, handing the man one of the drinks. “You got a name, or should I keep calling you Mr. Miller?”
“It’s Joel,” he says, taking a long sip of the beer. You watch the muscles of his throat work, longing to press your lips against the tan skin. 
You tell him your name, holding a hand out to him for a handshake. His grip is tight, sturdy, and for a brief moment you think about how his sure, thick fingers would feel deep inside of you. He looks around the room curiously as he pulls his hand back.
“Craig and I have been friends since freshman year,” you explain. “I helped him pass calculus, he lets me keep my beer out of the grubby hands of his frat brothers.”
“Calculus, huh?” He asks, taking another sip. “Must mean you’re pretty smart.”
“Just a basic engineering prerequisite,” you joke. 
“Engineering? That’s impressive.”
You take a seat on Craig’s bed, crossing one leg over the other. Joel’s eyes track the movement and you smile, giddy at the attention. “What do you do, Mr. Miller?”
“Thought you were gonna call me Joel?” 
“Mm, I can think of a few things to call you.”
Joel nearly spits his mouthful of beer out, choking on the bitter drink. You rush towards him, patting him on the back as he coughs. After a moment of fighting for breath, the man seems to realize how close you are, his gaze flicking between your eyes and your lips, trailing down to your chest. 
You lean in a little closer, pressing yourself to him and you think this might be it, Joel Miller might be the DILF of your dreams as he leans into you as well. 
But the doorknob rattles and the door swings open, Joel jumping back in surprise as both of you turn to look at the doorway. Craig leans against the frame, an eyebrow raised and a knowing smirk on his lips. You roll your eyes.
“Hey,” he says, looking between you and Joel. “Ashley’s lookin’ for you downstairs. We’re headin’ to the stadium now.”
“I better find Sean, then,” Joel says. Craig’s eyes light up.
“You’re Miller’s dad? Hey, man, nice to finally meet you. I’m Craig, TLU president.” The men shake hands, patting each other on the back. “Sean’s a good kid, we’re happy to have him.”
“Good to hear,” Joel replies. 
“Well, guess I’ll go find Ashley.” You place a hand on Joel’s shoulder. “It was nice to meet you, Mr. Miller. Maybe I’ll see you later?” You let your hand trail down the man’s bicep as you leave and you watch his throat work around a nervous swallow.
“Yeah, sure,” he says. “See you later.”
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The Longhorns pull off an impressive win, a 49-0 blowout against Oklahoma that has the entire campus celebrating with abandon. If Joel thought the TLU house was packed for the tailgate, that crowd was nothing compared to the after game party. More alcohol, more people, and more noise is packed into the house. Joel sticks close to Sean, meeting more of his frat brothers and their parents with shouted introductions. 
When the stale air inside the house gets too overwhelming, Sean leads him to the deck. More kegs have appeared and his son bumps him with his shoulder, nodding towards where a few people are gathered around one, a man hoisted upside down by two people gripping his legs as he chugs directly from the keg tap. He spits the valve out as the crowd shouts a chorus of, “Twenty!”
“I bet you could do better,” Sean says. Joel raises an eyebrow at him.
“I know what you’re doin’, kid, and it ain’t gonna work,” Joel replies. Sean puts his hands up.
“I’m not doin’ anythin’. But if you’re too scared, you can tell me.”
“I’m not scared.” 
“Hey, my dad’s got next!” Sean shouts, dragging Joel through the crowd with an arm around his shoulders. Joel tries to argue but a familiar face in the crowd has the words dying on his tongue. You wiggle your fingers at him in a wave and suddenly he has the motivation to execute the most impressive keg stand of his life.
Joel grabs the cold handles of the keg, Sean and one of his fraternity brothers lifting him into the air so that he’s suspended upside down over the barrel of beer. People begin counting, shouting numbers as he attempts to focus on the beer flooding his mouth and drinking it down steadily. It’s been a long time since he’s done one of these, probably before Sean was even born, but if there’s one thing Joel has never been, it's a quitter.
After what feels like forever he spits the valve out with a gasp and he gets lowered back to ground as the crowd shouts, “Thirty-four!”
Sean’s frat brothers jump around him excitedly, hands patting him on the back and cheering his name. He laughs as Sean starts yelling, “That’s what I’m fuckin’ talkin’ about!”
Movement from the corner of his eye catches his attention and he turns his head just in time to see you disappear into the house. He tells Sean he’ll be back in a minute and follows after you, craning his neck to scan the mass of bodies crammed inside until he spots you on the stairs. 
When he finally manages to reach the stairs, he’s surprised to find them roped off at the bottom. Looking around to make sure no one is paying attention to him, he ducks beneath the barrier, taking the steps two at a time. The second floor is dark and empty but light spills into a hall from beneath the last door marked PRESIDENT.
Joel knocks on the wood, his head a little light from the rush of alcohol in his system but it has him feeling good. 
Confident. 
Maybe a little too confident because when you open the door, he wraps an arm around your waist, pushing his way inside as his lips find yours, a little noise of surprise swallowed by him as his tongue explores yours.
He comes to his senses when your teeth nip at his bottom lip, jarring him back to a reality where he is a mature adult who thinks with his brain and not his dick. He grips you on the shoulders, breaking the kiss and holding you at arm's length.
“Fuck, I’m sorry,” he says. “I didn’t even ask if it was okay to kiss you, just came bargin’ in here like a bull in a goddamn china shop and you probably don’t even want—“
“Joel?” You interrupt. He blinks.
“Yeah?” He asks.
“Kiss me again.”
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Joel kisses you again, but pulls away a second time to ask, “Wait, how old are you?”
“Twenty-three,” you reply, giggling as he mutters a low thank god before pulling you back into his arms. It’s another short lived kiss, the man leaning back once more as you huff in annoyance.
“Wait, how much have you had to drink?” He asks this time. 
“Less than you, Mr. Thirty-Four-Second Keg Stand,” you answer. He gives you a smirk that has your stomach doing somersaults. 
“You liked that, huh?” 
His hands slip into the back pockets of your shorts and you wrap your arms around his shoulders, fingers playing with the hair at the nape of his neck. He kisses you again, slower this time, like he’s savoring the feel of your lips against his. Your heart is racing as he pulls you even closer and runs his hands up your back, warm palms exploring your curves like he’s trying to map them to memory.
You’re lost enough in each other that the sound of the door opening doesn’t register until an upset voice is saying, “Ugh, come on! No fucking in my room!”
“Shit,” you yelp, tearing yourself away from Joel. Craig is standing in the doorway with his arms crossed. You grab Joel’s hand and tug him towards the door of the en-suite bathroom, pulling him inside and slamming the door behind you, flipping the lock.
“Hey, wait a minute—“
“It’s not your room, Craig!” You yell through the wood. There’s a muffled curse from the other side.
“Condoms are under the sink,” he shouts back. You grin victoriously at Joel, who’s laughing so hard he has a hand pressed to his chest. You step up to him, grabbing that hand and bringing it around your waist.
“You sure about this?” Joel asks seriously, stepping forward until he’s crowding you against the door. You tilt your head up to look at his handsome face, his dark eyes so intense as he searches your face that you feel giddy.
“I mean, the location isn’t ideal, but at least Craig keeps his bathroom pretty clean,” you joke, noting the clear counter space and surprising lack of dirty clothing littering the floor. 
“Answer the question, sweetheart. You sure about doing this with me?”
You reach up, tangling your fingers into his soft curls, pulling him close until your lips graze his as you respond, “I’m so fucking sure.”
Whatever tether of control Joel had been holding onto seems to snap with your words, the man kissing you so roughly that all you can do is hold on, your fingers curling desperately against his scalp as his tongue dives into your mouth and tangles with yours. He tastes like beer and smells like a mixture of cedar and sweat, the combination intoxicating as he presses close and surrounds you with it.
Joel trails his lips across your jaw, nipping your earlobe before continuing down your neck. He sucks the thin skin over your pulse before soothing the sting with his tongue as you writhe against him, gasping at the sensation. You can feel his smile against your shoulder and as he presses a thigh between your legs, you get a brief feel of his hard cock behind the barrier of his basketball shorts.
“So fuckin’ pretty,” he growls, hands trailing across your curves until he’s gripping one of your breasts, squeezing tightly.
“Not so bad yourself,” you moan. He chuckles darkly.
“The mouth on you.” He reaches two fingers into the low neck of your tank top, dragging it down over your breasts. He yanks the cups of your bra down in a similar fashion, the fabric bunched beneath your chest to expose your tight nipples to him. He dips his head down and wraps his lips around a tight bud, pulling it into his mouth as you gasp.
“Could show you some other things my mouth is good at,” you tell him as he releases your breast with a wet pop, lifting his head to look at you. 
“I have a better idea,” he says, dropping to his knees. He lifts one of your legs and wiggles your boot off, tossing it to the side before doing the same with the other.
“What are you doing?” You ask when his hands reach for the fly of your shorts. He pauses, looking up at you with concern. 
“I was plannin’ on eatin’ you out until you couldn’t think straight,” he says. His brows pinch together. “Do you not want that?”
“I-I’m not sure? I mean, no one’s ever…,” your sentence trails off, your eyes going wide.
Joel runs a soothing hand down your thigh, smiling up at you. “That’s a damn shame, baby. Let me show you how a real man takes care of a woman.”
You let him work your shorts and panties down your thighs, stepping out of them with a hand on his shoulder to steady yourself. He lifts one of your legs and settles it over his shoulder, opening you up to his hungry gaze. His eyes flick up to your face and he grins as he says, “Pretty all over, aren’t ya?”
Any smart reply you have died on your tongue as he starts kissing the sensitive skin of your thighs, starting at the knee that’s close to his face and moving up, up, up until you can feel his warm breath on your pussy. His tongue flicks across your clit, featherlight, but it’s enough to have you gasping his name. 
He starts a rhythm of messy swirls of his tongue over your sensitive bundle of nerves before dipping down to your entrance, the tip of his nose still brushing your clit and making you moan. You buck against his face and he immediately grasps your hips in his big hands, fingers curling into the flesh of your ass to hold you still as he lavishes your pussy with attention.
“Oh my god,” you pant, reaching down to tangle your fingers in his hair. He groans at the same time his lips wrap around your clit and the sound of his satisfaction has your orgasm taking you by surprise, washing through your veins and making you feel like you’re on fire. 
You feel breathless as he licks you slowly, thoroughly, his tongue making sure he’s gotten every last drop of your release. He leans back, slowly lowering your leg from his shoulder. His lips and chin are coated in your wetness, shiny in the light of the bathroom vanity, the sight making your cheeks feel hot and a nervous giggle spill free.
Joel grins, boyish and sweet. “Good?” He asks. 
“Great. Amazing,” you concur. “Ten out of ten. Your Yelp review will be glowing.”
“Shouldn't I be the one leavin’ the Yelp review? You were the meal after all.”
You blink at him. “Oh my god, that was so bad,” you say, laughter near hysterical.
He stands, his palms cupping your face and pulling you into a filthy kiss that quickly shuts you up, his tongue slowly exploring yours and introducing the musky taste of yourself to your taste buds. You reach down, palming his hard cock through his shorts and the responding groan you receive from the older man has you clenching in anticipation.
Joel breaks the kiss, pulling you against his body and turning until you’re facing the vanity, your hips pressed to the edge of the laminate counter. You watch his reflection in the mirror as he runs a hand down your back, pressing you forward slightly so that you’re bent over the counter, ass slightly tilted up. His hand continues lower until it’s running reverently over one cheek. He catches your eye in the mirror.
“You gonna let me fuck you just like this?” He asks. Your breath hitches as his fingers trace through your folds, one dipping into your entrance. He watches your face in the mirror, eyes dark and expression serious. “Answer me.”
“Fuck, yes, anything,” you say quickly. He thrusts his finger slowly, curling it against your front wall with every pull from your body. One finger becomes two, the slight stretch making you whine as he continues to work them in and out of you. “Joel, please.”
“Please what, baby?” He asks.
“Need you to fuck me,” you tell him. 
Joel grins, removing his fingers and urging you to the side so he can open the cabinet under the sink. He crouches down, rummaging through the contents for a moment before standing with a victorious expression and a foil packet pinched between his fingers. He shoves his basketball shorts and boxers down his thighs, just low enough to free his impressive cock, thick and long with a slight curve up that has your mouth watering. He rolls the condom on and then grabs your hips, the tip of his length sliding through your folds and making your breath catch.
“You ready, baby?” He asks, squeezing your hips. You meet his gaze in the reflection, your lips tilted in a smirk.
“Been ready for a while, old man,” you tease. He raises his eyebrows and draws his hand back, landing a sharp smack to your ass that has you crying out. 
Before the sting even fades, he’s pushing inside of you with one steady thrust until his hips are flush to your ass. Your fingers curl around the edge of the counter and you lift onto your tiptoes, trying to escape the sudden sensation of his cock stretching you so well. He chuckles darkly, tight hands on your hips keeping you from going too far.
“Old man,” he taunts, mimicking the higher pitch of your voice. He reaches forward, palm resting beneath your chin as his fingers and thumb press into your cheeks, tilting your head up so that your eyes meet his in the mirror as he says, “Eyes up, sweetheart. You watch how this old man fucks you.”
Joel draws his hips back and slams forward, the head of his cock burying so deep inside of you that your eyes roll back from the exquisite stretch and pressure. He sets a rhythm that has a constant string of moans and pleas spilling from your parted lips, a slow pull out and a rough push in that makes you see stars. If you dare to let your chin drop or your eyes shut, the strong hand around your throat reminds you of his demand that you watch.
“That feel good, baby?” He grunts. “My cock in this tight fuckin’ pussy?”
“Yes, yes, yes!”
“That’s right, who’s fuckin’ you so good? Say my name, sweetheart, wanna hear it from that pretty mouth.”
“Joel!” You cry out, the tight coil of pleasure in your belly finally unraveling, your cunt pulsing greedily around his cock as you cum. He curses, his rhythm going sloppy as he fucks you through your release and right into his own.
His hand leaves your throat and his head drops to your shoulder, soft kisses being left on your shoulder blades as you both catch your breath. After a long moment, he pulls back from you, removing the condom and tying it off to toss it in the garbage.
You straighten up from your bent position over the counter, fixing your bra and tank top back into place. Turning, you find Joel holding your shorts and panties. 
“Was that…are you…did you—“ 
You lean into him as you grab your clothes, kissing him softly. Pulling back, you murmur, “That was amazing.”
Joel sighs in relief, watching as you get dressed and tug your boots back on. “Good. That’s…good.”
“Why don’t you head downstairs first? I need to freshen up,” you suggest. Joel nods, but doesn’t make a move to leave. You raise your eyebrows at him and that seems to have him getting the hint. 
“Oh! Right, I’ll just…go downstairs,” he says. You giggle, leaning into him for one more kiss before he disappears from the bathroom and you busy yourself with fixing your appearance to look a little less well fucked.
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Downstairs, Joel wanders through the first floor in search of his son. He feels a flash of guilt for leaving him for so long, especially to fuck a woman half his age in a frat house bathroom, but the guilt is short lived when he finds his son with his tongue down the throat of a blonde girl in the living room.
“Jesus Christ,” he mumbles, turning to head for the front door instead. It’s getting late and now seems like a good time to head home.
He’s a few steps out the front door when he hears his name called out and you appear from the doorway. 
“You heading out so soon?” You ask, bottom lip jutting out in a pout that he kind of wants to kiss from your lips. He runs a nervous hand through his hair.
“Uh, yeah. Was gonna head home,” he says. Christ, he has no idea why he’s acting so weird, but you have him tied up in knots. 
“You know…my apartment isn’t far. Maybe…maybe you don’t have to go home just yet?” You say, looking up at him through your lashes.
Those knots of uncertainty loosen and Joel holds a hand out to you.
“Lead the way, baby.”
Joel Miller Masterlist
2K notes · View notes
ginxyy · 20 days ago
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Catching Flights & Feelings
A man who travels a lot falls in love with a flight attendant he always sees.
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Every time the airplane doors slid shut and the familiar hum of the engines filled the cabin, a flutter of excitement ignited within you. There, among the rows of seats and the soft murmur of passengers settling in, you found your rhythm. You had mastered the art of the skies, weaving through clouds with an elegance that could only be embraced by those who belonged to this world. But this time was different, and you felt it in every fiber of your being.
As you prepared for the safety demonstration, a familiar figure settled into his seat. Seungcheol, the charming man from Seventeen, had taken a spot in your section yet again. You had seen him countless times on your flights, flashing his twinkling smile and reverberating with an unmistakable aura that made him a beacon of warmth in a bustling, often chaotic environment. His fame was undeniable—his name echoed in the whispers of your colleagues and the excited chatter of fans during layovers but to you, he was just Seungcheol.
You grinned, feeling a spark of mischief dance behind your eyes. “Ready for takeoff, Mr. Celebrity?” you teased, your playful tone slicing through the air like a gentle breeze. You leaned in, letting a hint of flirtation lace your words, and watched as his cheeks flushed a shade of crimson that would put roses to shame.
“Only if you’re serving the drinks today,” he responded, winking at you with that disarming charm. His eyes held a twinkle that made your heart thump louder than the engines’ roar.
You resumed your duties, but not before braving a last glance at him. In that fleeting moment, you imagined the unexplored depths beneath his public persona and what it would be like to peel back the layers, uncovering the man hidden behind the celebrated façade. Unbeknownst to you, he was just as enamored with you as you were with him.
The days turned into weeks, and each flight became a cherished ritual. You found yourself counting down the hours until you could see him again. The more you spoke, the more a comfortable rhythm developed between you a playful banter that ignited during each in-flight encounter. You joked about turbulence, made puns about jet lag, and learned how to flirt through simple glances. If someone had told you that you could fall so hard over high altitudes and the scent of recycled air, you would have laughed. But here you were, caught in the spell of this endearing connection.
One evening, after a particularly grueling day filled with delays and turbulence, you were surprised to see Seungcheol waiting at the gate, a bright smile illuminating his face. He was flanked by a small group of fans, yet his eyes locked on yours with an intensity that made the world around you blur.
“Want to grab drinks after the flight?” he asked innocently, as if it were the most natural of propositions.
“Are we really going to discuss drinks? It’s the third time this week you’ve asked me out on a flight my heart can only take so much of the turbulence,” you teased, unable to suppress the way your smile widened.
He chuckled, the sound bubbling up like champagne. “So you admit you like it. I’m getting somewhere, then. What’ll it be? A flight to nowhere? I promise I’m an excellent co-pilot.”
“Just as long as I’m in the captain’s seat,” you flirted back, feeling the thrill of anticipation tingle through your stomach.
Following that, a spontaneous series of adventures unfolded between you both, hidden from the prying eyes of the world. Late-night conversations in airport lounges turned into coffee breaks in the bustling streets of Tokyo, and you found joy in navigating cities while flirting like teenagers. Seungcheol relished the simple pleasures, basking in the joy of being with someone who viewed him through a lens unclouded by fame.
“Do you know what I like most about you?” he asked one afternoon as the spring breeze whispered through the cherry blossoms around you.
“What’s that?” you replied, leaning in, curious and utterly engaged. His handsome features softened, and the earnestness written on his face made your heart skip.
“You treat me like a person, not just some idol. You’re refreshing like a breath of fresh air after a long flight.” His gaze held yours, desire and sincerity entwined. “You have no idea how much that means to me.”
Growing bold, you decided to take a leap of faith. “Maybe you should stop flying around so much and spend more time on the ground with me. I can introduce you to all the best coffee spots,” you suggested, a mischievous glint in your eye.
Seungcheol smirked, the corners of his mouth curling up with delight. “And I can promise to be your co-pilot on all your adventures. What do you say?”
You both spent countless afternoons rearranging schedules, mastering detours, and making memories amongst the thrumming heart of life. The world was a blur of new places and experiences, but what truly grounded you was the thrill of being together.
As weeks turned into months, the scenery shifted around you both, more vibrant and tantalizing than you’d ever envisioned. Cozy dinners after long flights, sneaking kisses behind the airport terminal… It was all a concoction of magic and spontaneity, and you thrived on it. In that whirlwind of romance, Seungcheol somehow managed to nestle himself firmly in your heart, becoming more than a fleeting passenger on your journeys.
One fateful evening, while stared into the pulsating city lights from your hotel balcony, you realized that your whirlwind romance fuelled by chance encounters and flirtatious exchanges had grounded itself into something deeper, more meaningful.
Leaning against the railing and looking out at the horizon, you felt him step up behind you, a presence that made the night warmer. “Are you going to share a drink with your co-pilot or just stare into the distance and dream?”
Smiling to yourself, your heart hummed the answer. “Only if it’s a romantic dinner under the stars.”
Underneath the vast expanse, wrapped in each other’s warmth, you both discovered that romance could blossom not just in the clouds but in every heartbeat you shared on Earth.
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chukys-mouthguard · 5 months ago
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#21 fluff for Matt Rempe please :)
Prompt: “You’re the only one I have opened up to like this.”
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“Did it hurt?”
You hand hesitantly moving to touch the black and blue mark that had found its place on Matt’s eye, trying not to inflict any more pain on him.
“When I fell from heaven? Nah, it wasn’t too hard of a fall.”
Rolling your eyes at him, he couldn’t help but laugh. His humor the one thing you could always count on, no matter the situation.
“Ha ha, you’re hilarious.”
“Well I sure think so!”
The two of you sat in Matt’s apartment as you’d put in your doctor cap and attempted to help his newly acquired battle scars from yet another fight. To be honest you didn’t know how he was still actively participating in the fights. His face surely couldn’t take another punch after 3 fights in a row.
“I mean, sure it hurts. It definitely doesn’t feel good. But, I kind of signed up for this you know?”
Walking the first aid kit back to the bathroom, you’d someone scoffed at his words. “Mmm, signed up for that? I disagree. I don’t know if anyone signs up for that.”
While he understood what you meant, he disagreed. Matt always knew he wasn’t going to be the next Crosby or Ovechkin. And because of that, he had to excel in other areas.
He sighed as you rejoined him on the couch, his demeanor now changing as he seemed exhausted. His body finally waving the white flag that it needed a break.
“I just, I love hockey. So much. And, I know that I’m not the greatest skater, I’m not scoring 80 goals a season, hell I probably won’t even play 80 minutes a season. But I know that I can support the guys who can do those things. And maybe that’s through fighting. Sure, I don’t necessarily love getting my face bashed in. But I’m willing to get punched in the face, if that means getting to put on that jersey and play in a place like Madison Square Garden.”
The emotion in his voice almost bringing you to tears, you knew how much he loved the sport. But hearing him talk about it like this, hearing him be vulnerable and not the joking goof ball he normally was. It was refreshing. For him to just be Matt Rempe, a normal 21 year old guy who is working his butt off to make a name for himself.
“I love that, every single thing you said. And I wish more people got to see this side of you. Because this I’m sure is more meaningful to people. Your love and passion for the sport, I’m sure your teammates would love to hear you talk like this too.”
He shyly laughed as he tried to climb off his sappy soapbox.
“You’re the only one I’ve opened up to like this.”
His fingers intertwined with yours as he leaned in to give you a kiss. A thank you for being by his side and supporting him through it all. And for putting up with him on days he looked like he’d been in a horrific bar fight.
“Well, I’m honored that you opened up to me. Now, let’s get you into bed, I have a feeling someone is definitely sleeping in tomorrow.”
“Oh yeah, please don’t wake me until at least 7pm.”
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beensbaee · 5 months ago
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𝒏𝒆𝒕𝒆𝒚𝒂𝒎 𝒔𝒖𝒍𝒍𝒚 𝒊𝒎𝒂𝒈𝒊𝒏𝒆 ˚ ༘♡ ·˚ ₊˚ˑ༄ؘ
summary; neteyam has always avoided y/n due to the fact that he cannot trust himself around her - but what happens when he is tasked to teach her?
pairing; neteyam!teacher x y/n
word count; 3.5k
HER BEWITCHING BOY
‧͙⁺˚*・༓☾
It was no surprise Y/n and Lo'ak were such good friends. Both of them had the same wild nature that always got them into trouble - and a distinctive laughter that caught everyone's attention.
Unlike Lo'ak, she was the tiniest bit more responsible. She was also more immersed in the clan too - often spending her free time playing with the younger children and asking the elders all sorts of questions - even finding new paths in the forest with Kiri to travel on.
Her relationship with little Tuktirey was just as sweet. She'd often find all sorts of ways to have the girl giggling and smiling, whether it was by making faces or telling her stories so silly that Tuk couldn't even contain her amusement.
There was just one Sully kid she wasn't close with. Neteyam was a year older than her - and he'd always kept his distance from Y/n.
She was not blind. She'd see how he'd be sitting comfortably with his family until Y/n would come. Even Jake had seen the way the boy's smile would falter as he would suddenly begin looking anywhere that wasn't towards her - giving her a curt greeting before excusing himself and leaving.
She'd try not to look hurt - but everyone saw how her ears fell in embarrassment at his behavior towards her. Lo'ak would brush it off, telling her to ignore him. Kiri herself would be confused but would always choose not to say anything as she took it upon herself to make the girl feel more welcomed and forget about her eldest brother's reaction.
Neteyam always seemed conflicted when his parents would bring up his apparent dislike for her - sometimes claiming he didn't notice he was treating her differently, and other times remaining silent when questioned why he treated her like she was something to avoid completely.
The truth was that he himself did not know either.
Well he knew, but refused to accept the fact.
‧͙⁺˚*・༓☾
Y/n was shuddering, Lo'ak howling with laughter as Kiri rubbed her arm soothingly
"It is ok, Y/n. Not everyone is perfect at aiming." Kiri said as a way to comfort the girl, discreetly kicking Lo'ak's leg and giving him a look that quickly stopped his laughter
"Eywa, I could have killed him." She groaned, hiding her face with her hands as Kiri looked at her with a frown
"But you didn't!" Lo'ak chirped up as Y/n sighed, slinging off the bow that had been on her back and holding the wood firmly in her hands
"As if he didn't already hate me enough." She mumbled, Lo'ak finally turning towards her with concern
"He doesn't hate you, Y/n. He's just... dumb?" He tried, but Y/n only sent him a sad smile
"He's a hundred times smarter than you!" She laughed, Lo'ak rolled his eyes as Kiri joined in with her own grin
"Come on, it is time to eat." Kiri said as the three teens made their way to the central part of the village where the clan gathered to eat meals together
After fighting over who sat next to whom, the lineup consisted of Kiri, Y/n, and Lo'ak in a row - everyone satisfied with the seating arrangement as they conversed amongst themselves. Jake and Neytiri sat a few rows down from them - and Y/n's eyes caught the familiar muscled back of Neteyam Sully as he sat down next to his parents and grandmother.
She winced, heart burning with shame as she looked at his bandaged leg. The same leg she had accidentally hit when wielding a bow.
Jake had insisted she'd be fine hours earlier when she refused to hunt with the weapon, handing her the bow and arrow and giving her a simple target  to practice her aim with while the hunting party was taking a break.
She'd usually hunted with a simple knife, expertly too. She'd excelled at many things - but her skills with a bow was not one of them
She'd fired it, her arm shaking with fear as her hand slipped. The arrow didn't stay true to its path at all and flew completely out of her sight. Moments after firing, they heard a sharp yell - Jake only turned towards her in disbelief with his mouth hanging open. Never had she seen her clan leader in such denial.
Her embarrassment was incomparable as she and Jake ran in the direction of the yell, only to find Neteyam kneeling over in pain as he held the gash on his leg with his hands, blood running over his fingers as he applied pressure to the wound.
Thank the Great Mother the arrow merely grazed him. Y/n had been brought to near tears as she apologized profusely for her actions. Neteyam merely bowed his head, mumbling that he was fine and clearly embarrassed himself by the situation as Jake quickly patched up the boy with his on the go medical kit.
He got up the second he was patched, insisting he was fine and leaving as Y/n finally gathered the courage to approach him
"Neteyam, Neteyam wait!" She pleaded, her voice desperate as he visibly froze in his path, slowly turning around to meet her eyes
"I know we are not friends - but please understand, I had no intention of hurting you. I am so sorry." She said, her voice was strained as she spoke, eyes pained as she struggled to convey her true guilt.
He remained silent, looking at her so intensely that she felt her back straightening subconsciously. He parted his lips as if to say something, mouth moving as he struggled to find the words before clamping it shut and shaking his head
"It is fine, Y/n. I am fine, please do not worry about me." He finally said, his voice foreign and eyes hard before he turned away from her, his muscles tense as he walked away.
She wanted to cry in that moment, her eyes stinging with shame as she turned away, unable to understand the clear aversion the Sully boy had for her.
‧͙⁺˚*・༓☾
Neteyam ate his food silently, occasionally cracking a smile at his fathers ridiculous jokes.
He couldn't stop himself from looking back to Lo'ak and Kiri, but his eyes didn't stay on them. They moved to the girl between the two.
The familiar feeling of his heart thundering in his chest returned as he looked away once again, closing his eyes while he struggled to keep himself from marching over to the trio and pulling her away.
He hated Y/n. He hated her so much sometimes.
He hated how he was reminded of her everywhere he turned. He hated how she'd braid flowers into her hair and how her clothes were always so out of place from the familiar brown and greens the clan wore - her pink and purple accessories only pulling his eyes towards her even more.
He hated how he couldn't control his heart around her. Never had he felt so out of control. He hated how easily she'd be able to have him do anything if she just asked, her voice a melody he'd listen to from afar - something similar to a drug. Something he desired so much but refused to have - the fear of addiction holding him back.
He'd promised himself it was just a small crush when he'd first seen her vibrant smile. 
He told himself anyone would have fallen in love with the way she so selflessly loved. 
He had to force himself to look away from her when she was doing simple tasks - eating, weaving baskets - even just praying - he'd find her eyes closed and content as her face was composed with eternal peace he wished to find.
He'd told himself to stay away from her completely because she wasn't someone he could trust himself to be around. The feeling of simply not understanding what he felt was what scared him so much. But her beauty - one that had his knees so weak he had to look away just to stand without faltering, was what terrified him the most.
Her beauty wasn't something unknown - she was the most enchanting na'vi in the clan through his eyes. Her delicate cheeks and round eyes with fluttering lashes had him in awe at times. But, as he watched another boy approach her as she ate - her curious eyes meeting him as he quickly struck up a conversation with the trio had him blinking rapidly.
He was seemingly talking to all three, but Neteyam did not miss the way the mystery boy's eyes would trail back to Y/n to seemingly try and catch a glimpse of her.
He clenched his jaw, looking down at the food in front of him with furrowed brows. Suddenly, he wasn't so hungry anymore.
He couldn't even be mad. He had no say over who spoke to her - and this wasn't the first time.
He'd seen numerous boys approach her before, and every time, he'd be watching the interaction from afar. Fuming with a clenched jaw as he struggled to kill the jealousy that was running through him like a storm.
The only thing that prevented him from intervening was Y/n's gently but sad smile as she rejected Every. Single. One. Nothing was more satisfying than watching her shake her head - indicating a polite no from her that had each boy walking away with slumped shoulders.
As if Y/n had felt his burning gaze, she lifted her head to look directly at him.
Her eyes - they had him swallowing the lump in his throat as he looked right back at her, refusing to break eye contact. 
She blinked rapidly as she stared back, her gaze struggling to hold the intensity in his eyes as she finally looked away.
He left dinner right after it ended, returning to his hammock with a pounding headache as he struggled to sort his thoughts.
‧͙⁺˚*・༓☾
"Neteyam."
He slowly opened his eyes to find his mother standing over him, her eyes concerned as Neteyam quickly sat up with his brows pulled together in concern
"Is something wrong, Mother?" He asked quickly, his voice tired as she frowned
"Yes. You went to bed so early. Are you feeling ok?" She asked gently as Neteyam automatically nodded his head
"Mother - I am fine." He said, but his voice wasn't convincing enough to her. Just as she was about to say something, Jake walked towards them with hurried steps once he heard their voices
"You awake, boy?" He asked, moving to stand next to Neytiri as Neteyam nodded his head, his annoyance present in his sigh
"Why is everyone asking if I am ok?" He questioned as Jake and Neytiri looked at each other - their eyes obviously having some sort of an exchange he was not apart of
"You seem distracted lately." Was what Jake settled on as Neteyam remained silent
Quickly, Jake's eyes lit up as if he thought of something. He turned to Neytiri with a glint in his eyes that had her look at him expectedly
"Now, I need a favor from you. Think you can do it?" Jake asked, his voice firm as Neteyam nodded his head
"Of course. What do you need?" He answered dutifully, his mind still hazy from being awoken from his slumber
"I need you to teach Y/n how to wield a bow and fire an arrow."
Jake didn't miss the way Neteyam nearly flinched at his words, his eyes widening the slightest bit as well. But, he remained still and silent and gave them no further insight as to how he felt by the request 
Neytiri watched him carefully as Neteyam finally nodded his head, his knuckles pale from gripping the sides of his hammock so hard as his lips were set in a firm line.
"Yes sir."
‧͙⁺˚*・༓☾
Y/n shuffled her feet as she watched Neteyam secure the last few necessary things they needed for the next few hours they were spending in the forest together inside of his bag.
His hands moved so gracefully - Y/n couldn't help but watch him as he placed one last arrow on his back, turning to her and gesturing his head towards the exit of the tent and towards the forest.
"Come on Y/n." He said, turning his back towards her as he led her into the forest, a clear destination in his mind as she recognized a few trees with markings on them with the path he was leading her on - clearly targets previous na'vi had used to practice with their bows and arrows on.
She felt her cheeks heat up as she realized the fact that these targets were probably made for children to practice their skills on.
Hunting with a bow and arrow wasn't required - and Y/n knew from the start she wasn't very good with one, so she didn't bother ever picking up one. But now, it seemed she'd have to learn how to master it, one way or another.
She turned to Neteyam, her voice quieter than usual as she spoke her true thoughts
"Do you think I am capable of even learning how to use a bow this late? Especially after..." She asked, her embarrassment evident in her voice as he turned to her with the same intense gaze she was used to seeing in his eyes whenever he looked at her.
"Well, of course you are. Mistakes happen." He said, silence following after his words as he saw the hesitation in her eyes - maybe it was his words, or maybe it was the fact that they'd never been alone together - and that he'd never really even spoken this much to her.
Finally, he smiled. It was such a small movement on his face, but she'd seen how his eyes had softened as the smallest of smile lines appeared. It was a change.
"Come here."
She obliged without hesitation, standing next to him only seconds later as he handed her his bow and an arrow. She grabbed his bow with careful hands, her fingers running over the intricately beautiful engravings in the wood as she admired it.
He was watching her, his gaze unwavering as he saw the small twitch of her lips as they formed a smile. She didn't notice his gaze - too focused on the bow, and he took the opportunity to look at her up close.
He'd never allowed himself to be this close to her - after the last time there had been such little distance between them her intoxicating scent had been the thing to keep him up for hours. But now, he closed his eyes and could only inhale it - his tail flicking as his senses recognized the sweet smell
"Hold it like this." He instructed
He didn't even recognize his own voice - it came out much rougher than he intended it to, but he forced himself to focus on the way her hands held his bow - searching for any mistakes with the way she was positioned that might be why she was having trouble firing an arrow.
His fingers mistakingly brushed over hers - and he felt himself letting out a breath to steady himself and calm his heart - it seemed like Y/n had also been thrown off by the small touch between them as she quickly blinked while staring at their hands.
Neteyam finally realized her mistake as he noticed the way her fingers went straight over the wood she was holding when they should have curved over the slanted piece.
He didn't trust himself to say anything without his voice giving away exactly how he felt, so he wordlessly moved her fingers - cupping his hand over hers and moving it into position and nodding his head
She met his eyes once he gave her the cue to fire her arrow, and she unleashed it - the strong string snapping it forward with impeccable speed as it hit the target right in its center
She looked at the target in disbelief as she let out a victory war cry one would use in battle - startling Neteyam instantly as she clapped her hands in pure excitement
"I got it! Neteyam I got it!" She exclaimed, her eyes shining with so much appreciation that she leaped towards the boy and tackled him with a hug
He only yelped as he fell backward and onto the grass, her body on top of his as she hugged him tightly - laughter spilling out of her as he hesitantly wrapped his arms around her - before tightening them and reciprocating her ecstatic embrace
They stayed like this for a few moments - both of them holding each other so close that every single previous cold and awkward encounter of the two of them before faded away - the two so lost in the moment as they laughed
Finally, she pulled away - her eyes still crinkled with joy as Neteyam felt himself quieting once again as he stared at her. But this time, it was not with the usual emotionless stare - but with a gaze so open and with no facade, she too quieted as she felt the atmosphere change.
Finally he looked away, unable to look at Y/n any longer as he began speaking
"I am sorry for how I have treated you in the past. I... it was shameful." He finally spoke, words Y/n had been wanting to hear for so long - she didn't even believe he'd said them
She knew he had one of the biggest hearts ever - the snippets she'd catch of him with his siblings had confirmed that. She knew there was a reason he typically avoided her - and she had a very good feeling she was about to find out what it was.
"It is ok." She said, the sweetest smile on her face as Neteyam felt his heart crack at the sight
All the times he'd been so awful, so cold and distant - she'd forgiven. Because she had a heart of gold - something Neteyam felt he didn't deserve. Something he thought he wasn't worthy of.
"Y/n..." He struggled to finish the sentence as he stared at her lips, parted and simply begging for him - the urge to press his lips against hers was overwhelming
"Y/n, I do not deserve someone like you. I could not look you in the eyes - or speak to you all this time because of how I felt. I feel so much for you - it is like my heart is set on fire when I look at you sevin -"
The word had slipped from his lips - but she'd heard it.
Sevin. Pretty
She felt her heart flutter as she heard his words. He thought she was pretty.
He smiled at her reaction before shaking his head and reaching for her hands hesitantly. She reached forward slowly, lacing their fingers together with sparkling eyes as he cracked a grin
He knew she felt something for him too - because of the numerous boys that had pursued her, she never held their hands the way she was holding his - nor did she stare at them with eyes so round and filled with such a tender kindness as she did with him.
She leaned forward, gently brushing her lips against his to see his reaction. But he merely pulled her back in - his mouth enveloping hers as he moved his arms around her.
He kissed away all her confusion that night, spending the hours meant for her training with her hands in his hair and his face pressed against hers.
‧͙⁺˚*・༓☾
six full moons later ⋆⁺₊⋆ ☾⋆⁺₊⋆
It was like a weight was lifted off his shoulders.
The tense Neteyam who'd always been frowning was replaced by one who couldn't stop smiling. He was the one who'd be more eager for Y/n to come over then his own siblings, the one who made Lo'ak gag dramatically whenever he and Y/n did anything even remotely romantic - the one who looked forward to seeing her the most.
In the beginning he wouldn't even stand next to her - and now, he refused to be separated from her.
They'd sneak out at night to gaze at the stars - a favorite pastime of theirs now as Y/n would lay her head on his chest and tell Neteyam anything and everything that came to her mind. Neteyam would do the same - saying things that would have Y/n giggling as she nuzzled her nose against his skin
"Tomorrow, you and I will have a date night." Neteyam said proudly, Y/n tilting her head up and towards with a smile 
"What is a date night?" She asked, her hands mindlessly playing with his fingers as Neteyam grinned
"My parents have date nights all the time - they go out to have their own private time, away from everyone else. You and I could pick all sorts of fruits to snack on - climb all sorts of trees with no one to tell us what to do." He said, voice gentle with his lips set into a soft smile
She smiled, gently moving her hand to his face as she traced over his freckles that glowed in the moonlight. He looked radiant in the day - but at night, he was bewitching. There was a certain thing about him and the night that comforted her more than anything else in the world
"Well then, we should have date night every night." She insisted as he laughed, the sound a melody to her ears as she merely smiled against him - the stars shining above the two for every date night they would spend together.
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i just want to tag @erenjaegerwifee for the request/idea! thank u boo for the inspo i hope you like it 🥺 took me a couple THOUSAND words to reach the part where he teaches her & they confess but i got there! 😅🤍
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summerclementine27 · 4 months ago
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Meet Me in The Hallway🌷pt. 1
summary: Mr. Styles has possibly interested Y/N more than his literature classes and she finds herself pining for him over the months.
pairings: professor!harry, student!reader
warnings: small age difference, mentions of smut
word count: 4.7k
note: i wanted to make this one part but it will be too long so there will have to be a part 2
part 2: https://www.tumblr.com/summerclementine27/757559698881986560/meet-me-in-the-hallway-pt2
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Tender days of mid-October
As I took my seat in the large lecture hall, a sense of anticipation loomed over me. Today, Mr. Styles was giving us the results of the last literature and theory criticism coursework I had handed in the previous week. This was my third class with him, one of two this school year, the other being Contemporary Literature. Last year, he taught me Introduction to Literature, a mandatory class for my degree. Though I dreaded it at first due to his choice of reading list, I ended up falling in love with the course because of the way he taught it. Some works I initially criticized him for choosing, he ended up using as examples and critiqued them himself, like "The Awakening" by Kate Chopin. Plus, it helped that he was impossibly handsome with his tall frame, tousled brown hair, and piercing green eyes.
When my friends noticed how much I liked his class, they were unfazed. However, as I became somewhat of a teacher’s pet in a class rudimentary compared to the others I took this year—such as Feminism and Literature, Historical Narratives in Fiction, and Postcolonial Literary Criticism—they realized that maybe the tall, green-eyed man was what had really piqued my interest, not discussing "Middlemarch" for four classes.
On days when I had his class, I dressed extra nicely, sometimes even daring to pair a clean collared shirt with a shorter-than-usual skirt. One time, I even left my wool trench coat on during the first period and stood up from my auditorium seat to take it off. Sitting in the back, the rows of chairs likely covered the lower part of my body, but I was sure the space between my long boots and short skirt was visible from his vantage point. Surely, my abrupt standing would grab his attention. What I didn’t anticipate was him pausing in the middle of a long train of thought to stare, then quickly catching himself and stuttering before continuing seamlessly as I knew he would. My friend Anika, seated in one of the front rows, noticed and turned to see what had caught his attention. To her dismay, I was playing games with someone totally unattainable again. But she knew I thrived on academic validation, and this little crush of mine would only drive me to excel in more classes.
"Are you serious, Y/N? He's our professor." she exclaimed once.
"I know, but he's just... different."
"Different? Or is it the way he looks at you when you answer a question?"
"Maybe both. Besides, this crush is making me work harder. You can't argue with the results."
"Just be careful. I don't want you getting hurt."
In fact, it drove me to do more than that. One time, Mr. Styles noticed my passion for poetry after I shamelessly defended the works of Sylvia Plath with a controversial view that modern poetry should not shy away from the stark realities of mental health. He gave me a few poetry anthologies and compilations, including his annotated copies. I fawned over reading his notes and even emailed him once, pretending that I had "accidentally" annotated something, forgetting it wasn’t my own copy after losing myself in the literature. He replied kindly:
Mr. Styles: "Please, feel free to annotate as much as you like. I would be honored to have your opinions inked on my favorite copies."
By the next semester, after encouraging me to join the poetry society, Mr. Styles nominated me for president, and I was thrilled to win. He insisted on celebrating, gently grasping my upper arm and smiling warmly as he said he expected nothing less. I brought a bottle of wine to his office, where he had asked me to meet him, only to find the entire poetry society there, ready to congratulate me. The gathering lingered for a few delightful hours before everyone left, leaving just the two of us to clean up.
"You really impressed everyone tonight, Y/N. Not that I'm surprised." He began once we were truly all alone.
"Thank you, Mr. Styles. I couldn't have done it without your support."
"Well, you deserve it. By the way, outside of class and school hours, you can call me Harry." He said in his thick Manchester accent.
"Only if you stop calling me Ms. Y/L/N." I joked.
"Hey! I only do that sometimes. Plus, I can't call out to you in class like, 'Y/N, will you read the next slide?' People will think..."
"...think I’m the teacher’s favorite?" I finished his sentence with a teasing smile.
I couldn’t take the lingering stares and supposedly accidental touches we were both guilty of. But I knew that if I really wanted this, if I wanted to be more than just a student he regretted being tempted by when I graduated, then I had to play the long game.
And indeed I did. I kept up my habit of always showing up well-dressed in elegant coats and well-fitting clothing. I accentuated my features with a light coat of makeup, even if I had to apply it on a bumpy bus ride to campus. I even signed up for his office hours, despite really not needing them, just to exchange thoughts and opinions under the guise of “wanting to make sure I'm on the right track.” I wanted him to get to know me more, to realize that despite my youth, I was mature and thoughtful.
At the start of the second year, he emailed me to come to campus a few times in August, a month before the start of term, to discuss my responsibilities as the founder of the debate team. The idea sparked in his mind after I excelled in the heated debate he chose to hold as our first-year final assessment. He was so in awe that he went as far as saying I could compete at a national level on the English debate team, which neither of us was certain of, but I accepted the compliment.
Our earlier meetings were spent cooped up in his office, reviewing why the last debate team failed almost a decade ago and planning the structure for the new team. We discussed everything from team dynamics to potential debate topics, ensuring we were prepared for any challenge.
On one of the hotter days in August, we took our meeting to the university courtyard, having grown tired of experiencing the last bursts of England’s so-called summer from his office window. It was a beautiful window, and a big one at that, but it didn’t compare to actually being outside. That day, I realized the majority of planning for the next few months had already been accomplished in our first few meetings, and I got the hint that he didn’t actually need my help now that I had settled everything I could that wasn’t on an administrative level. So naturally, I decided to have a little fun.
I was wearing penny loafers with black tailored pants that I got fitted for when I visited my mum in London in July. I had paired them with a light knit sweater that fit slightly loosely over my shoulders, often falling down to reveal a collarbone. When I saw him take off his blazer and loosen his tie, I took that as my green light to take off something of my own, knowing I was wearing a neat white tank top underneath. As I slipped the sweater off, covering my face with the fabric, I could see his face through the thin material, making out his features and briefly noticing his eyes on my body. Sitting up straight, I managed to remove the sweater from over my head neatly. Once he saw my face, a soft blush made it to his own.
"Did I mess up my hair?" I asked, as if I hadn’t planned on brushing down the strands that had likely gone astray or as if I was oblivious to the fact that I had just taken off my sweater in front of him.
"Um, yeah, a bit at the top," he said, chuckling as if he wasn’t just clearing his throat in a flustered manner before my face was revealed from under the sweater.
To my surprise, he reached out, inching himself closer to where I was sitting on the bench we shared. With two fingers, his index and middle, he gently brushed down the messy hair on either side of the top of my head.
"Thank you, Harry," I said softly.
However, nothing could have prepared me for what would happen later this year.
As the class settled down to receive their marks on the literature and theory criticism coursework, Mr. Styles walked in, dressed in a well-fitted navy suit with a crisp white shirt. He took off his coat and placed it on the edge of his desk, a departure from his usual habit of draping it over the back of his chair. He wasted no time before pulling out the papers from his leather satchel and making his way down the aisles of the lecture hall, passing out the papers to everyone. When he read out my name, I watched as his eyes searched for me across the hall, darting from one side of the room to the other. It was unlike me to skip his class, so he knew all he had to do was find me. I hadn’t planned this specific event, but I enjoyed it, nonetheless. Once he found me, he smiled sheepishly, yet much more subtly than he did when we were alone and made his way to me.
"Excellent work, Y/L/N," he said as he gently placed the papers on my desk. "I especially appreciate the effort of handwriting this," he remarked, although everyone knew he didn’t care if papers were written by hand or typed on a computer.
I had deliberately written my paper by hand after he replied to an email of mine. I had thanked him for letting me borrow his books, and his response was a charming note saying he’d enjoyed reading my annotations and adored my handwriting. For once, I was glad that my all-girls school had emphasized cursive writing, as I used it to add a romantic touch to my work.
When I finally read his comments and feedback, I was met with admiration and praise. In one of the margins, he had written, “Your insights are so compelling, it’s impossible not to fall in love with your analysis.” On the final page, at the bottom, he had added, “It’s a privilege to be your professor. Your brilliance shines so brightly that it’s clear this paper is a testament to your exceptional talent.”
Often times I worried that there actually was something going on between us, and that his praise and charming were remarks were not that of a proud professor, but of an infatuated man instead. So that day, I decided to address it.
As the lecture drew to a close, I lingered in my seat, carefully packing up my belongings with deliberate slowness. The classroom slowly emptied, the murmur of students’ conversations fading into the background as they made their way out. I wanted to be alone with Mr. Styles, to discuss something that had been weighing on my mind. By the time I made my way down the row of seats to his desk, the room was empty except for the two of us.
“Mr. Styles,” I began hesitantly, catching his eye as he gathered his papers. “I was hoping to ask you something.”
He looked up, a faint smile playing on his lips. “Of course, go ahead. I’m actually glad you stayed behind. There’s something I’d like to ask you as well.”
A sudden rush of anxiety gripped me. The possibility of crossing a line—whether I had done so with my subtle flirtations or if he were about to make a move that could alter our dynamic—was almost too much to bear.
My fantasies of him flashed through my mind. I had dreamt of intimate moments with him like kissing him, waking up in his bed, or better yet, on the couch in his office after a late romantic night together. I had once pictured us sitting on the floor around his small coffee table as we did one time when they ordered takeout during one of our August meetings except this time I would slip my shoes off casually and find a way to stroke my foot, clothed thin leggings, against his leg, looking at him with doe eyes as I dare to not so innocently asks if he ever thought about me sexually.
Hell, I even pictured him going down on me after laying me on his desk and even touched myself to the idea of riding him while he sat on his office chair. I would sneak into the small space between him and his desk and shut off his laptop while he graded my papers, cockily saying “We already know I got an A” – despite my crippling self-doubt without tangible affirmation – as I sit on his lap. In this fantasy he would laugh at my remark and gladly embrace me with a hand on my ass, the other intertwined among thick locks of my long hair, messing it up as I teasingly kiss him, ever so aware of the friction I’m creating between our crotches.
But still, to think that he would propose something to me in that moment, sexual or romantic, casually after class as if I haven’t been pining for two Octobers made me incredibly nervous.
I cleared my throat, trying to steady my voice as I met his gaze. “Mr. Styles, well, first of all this has nothing to do with the actual course itself, maybe a bit but...” I trailed off “It’s... it’s been on my mind for a while.”
He raised an eyebrow, curiosity evident in his expression. “Sure, go ahead. I’m happy to answer anything.” He smiled shyly to comfort me.
I took a deep breath, my heart pounding as I prepared to voice my concerns. “Do you think that maybe my behavior in class, my enthusiasm, or even my approach to your feedback has influenced you to… um… maybe to favor me? Over other students I mean.” I began nervously, desperately searching for an expression on his blank face.
“Maybe sometimes I get a little excited and forget that you are my professor and not my friend or something, I think I may have overstepped my boundaries but… but you treat me as an equal which, by the way, I have always greatly appreciated. I mean, it has offered me an opportunity to grow as a student like no other, but I still worry…”I trailed off, now a stern look evident on his face and possibly even hurt.
He paused for a moment, his gaze thoughtful as he considered my words. “I appreciate your honesty and self-awareness,” he said finally, his voice steady but soft. “It’s clear that you’re passionate and dedicated, and I value that. But it’s important to remember that I strive to maintain fairness in all my interactions with students.”
I bit my lip, feeling a mix of relief and apprehension. “I understand, Mr. Styles. I just want to make sure that if I take pride in these academic accomplishments… if I want to revel in the fact that I always receive praise from you and rarely any criticism – like todays feedback for example, which included no criticism, I want to make sure it is because I am worthy of it. And not because I won you over by involving myself in your extracurriculars or because we are… uh.. friendly.”
He looked at me with a reassuring smile, his gaze steady and sincere. “First of all, let me assure you that you are never inappropriate. The friendship we’ve developed is separate from our academic interactions. Outside of school hours, I call you by your first name to maintain that distinction. In the classroom, I evaluate you purely on your merit.”
He leaned forward slightly, his tone earnest. “The reason your feedback today contained no criticism is that your paper was truly flawless. If there had been any weaknesses or areas for improvement, I would have pointed them out without hesitation. I hold you in very high regard academically, and that respect extends to all aspects of your work. If I ever notice any shortcomings, I will address them so you have the opportunity to refine and grow.”
His expression softened, a touch of concern in his eyes. “The only issue I see here is that you are doubting yourself. Your achievements and the praise you receive are well-deserved. You have a remarkable ability, and I believe in your potential. My only hope is that you start to see in yourself what I see in you – a brilliant, dedicated student who deserves every bit of recognition they receive.”
I nodded, feeling a sense of relief and a renewed confidence. When I looked down at my lap I heard him continue:
“And of course I value the relationship we have fostered outside of class. Would I be the man I am today if you hadn’t introduced me to the wonders of Moroccan cuisine?” He tried to joke to ease the tension and unsurprisingly it worked as it earned him a soft chuckle of honest amusement.
“Theres the y/n I know and love” he bantered though I cant say my heart didn’t skip a beat at the mention of the word “love”.
“You know, there are many other cuisines you’re yet to try,” I said with a playful glint in my eye. “For someone who’s so well-traveled and cultured, it’s surprising how much you’ve missed out on when it comes to food.” I teased.
“Well, perhaps you’ll tell me all about it when we’re in Amsterdam for the debate competition,” he said with a smile, his eyes twinkling with genuine excitement.
I blinked, momentarily stunned. “Wait, what? You secured that for us?” My voice wavered slightly as my heart leaped with joy. “I can’t believe it! I’m so excited. This is incredible news!”
He chuckled, clearly pleased with my reaction. “I thought you’d like that. It’s an excellent opportunity, and I know how much you’ve been looking forward to it.”
I couldn’t help but beam, my excitement bubbling over. “This is amazing, truly. Thank you so much!” I stepped closer, touched by his thoughtfulness and dedication.
As I reached out, our hands brushed briefly, a fleeting touch that sent a shiver through me. His gaze softened, and I could see the sincerity in his eyes. “I’m just glad we get to share this experience together,” he said softly.
The moment felt charged, filled with unspoken words and mutual appreciation. I nodded, my heart full of gratitude and warmth. “Me too,” I murmured, feeling the depth of our connection more than ever before.
Time jump – December is getting ready for Christmas.
As we stepped into the hotel lobby, the excitement was palpable among the debate team. Amsterdam was already charming me, even though I’d only glimpsed it through the bus window. The streets were lined with picturesque canals and quaint buildings, each one more enchanting than the last. I couldn’t help but talk animatedly about how I’d dreamed of visiting the Netherlands ever since my father told me stories about the blooming flower fields when I was a child.
Harry, who had been sitting beside me on the bus, watched with a fond smile. “You really seem to love the city,” he said. “Maybe we could find a couple of free days between the training and the competition to visit the flower fields.”
My eyes widened in delight. “Really? That would be incredible. But managing a whole field trip with the debate team might be a bit complicated.”
He grinned, a glint of mischief in his eyes. “Well, we could go alone. Just you and me. A little escape from the team.” He added. “We could explore some other things too if we’d like.”
The thought of spending time alone with him, wandering through a sea of flowers, made my heart race. I felt a warm blush creep up my cheeks. “That sounds amazing. I’d love that.”
When we checked into the hotel and were given our room keys, Anika, my vice president, and I realized that Harry and I had rooms on a separate floor. In fact, they were deluxe rooms though him and I booked standard rooms for everyone when we went over the budget. Anika seemed particularly perplexed by this.
“Why did you get such a nice room and I didn’t?” Anika questioned, her tone tinged with curiosity as she approached me in the lobby.
I shrugged, trying to sound nonchalant. “Maybe Mr. Styles thought I needed a little extra comfort. You know, as president” I joked, not really sure if that was the case. “Besides, he probably just had to make decisions based on what was available.” I found myself lying, knowing I was curious myself.”
Anika raised an eyebrow. “Or maybe he’s using the budget money to splurge on you. I’ve noticed you two have become quite friendly. Could it be that he has a thing for you?” she teased, knowing I have spent months pining and flirting.
I laughed, shaking my head. “I don’t think so, Anika. We’re friends, and that’s all it is. I don’t think he feels anything else.” I said, confidant of my words for the first time in this conversation. “Plus, you are the only person other than me and Harry that got her own room. Others are sharing and you likely have a king bed all to yourself.”
“Harry? Is that his name now?” she smirked. “I guess you forgot to tell me you are on a first name basis. Are you holding out on me Y/L/N?” she joked though she was never oblivious to the fact that you kept some encounters with Harry to yourself, as if it would fuel the fantasy somehow.
I raised an eyebrow and gave her a playful grin. “Oh, come on. You have to admit everyone in the poetry society calls him that when we are outside the university.” I said, knowing that it was only one guy who was a family friend of Harry’s who got the honor.
She chuckled, but there was a hint of curiosity in her gaze. “Right. But you can’t deny there’s something a bit… special about how you two interact. Just saying.”
I rolled my eyes but couldn’t suppress a smile. “Well, if it makes you feel any better, I’m not holding my breath for anything more on this trip. We’re here for the debate, remember? That’s the focus. But if anything happens later…” I shrugged playfully as she returned my knowing smile.
“Fair enough. Just keep your eyes open anyway, okay? Sometimes things happen when you least expect them to.”
I heard Harry calling my name from the end of the hall. I turned around to see him walking towards me with a thoughtful expression.
“Hey, do you still want to gather the debate team for a brief practice session before the afternoon debate?” he asked, his tone carrying a hint of concern.
I shook my head, smiling. “No, no need. You were right; they need a break. Plus, everyone has their notecards and seems prepared.”
Harry nodded, his smile relaxing into a satisfied grin. “Alright then. Let’s head to the elevator; it’ll be a bit quieter now anyway.”
We walked to the elevator together, and once inside, he pressed the button for my floor. The confined space seemed to amplify the gentle hum of the elevator, making it feel intimate.
Harry glanced at me with a soft smile, his eyes lingering a moment longer than usual. “Your hair looks different today. Did you do something special with it?” he asked, his voice carrying a playful undertone.
I felt a tinge of embarrassment, my cheeks warming slightly. “I just blow-dried it differently since I was in a rush this morning,” I replied, trying to sound casual.
Harry’s smile grew, his eyes twinkling with a mix of admiration and something else I couldn’t quite place. “Well, it looks beautiful. I wouldn’t have guessed it was rushed.”
His compliment made my heart flutter, and I couldn’t help but smile. “Thanks, Harry. That makes me feel a lot better about this hectic morning” I tried to divert the conversation, feeling nervous at his focus on me.
“Yeah, well, at least you have matching socks,” he joked, and before I could ask him what the hell he was talking about, he lifted his foot, revealing his own mismatched socks with a playful grin.
I couldn’t help but laugh. “You and your accidental fashion choices,” I said, shaking my head with a smile, remembering that time I complimented his shoes only to find out he ordered the wrong ones online and couldn’t get them returned. He looked handsome in them anyway, I had told him.
He shrugged, his eyes twinkling with mischief. “What can I say? I like to keep things interesting. And besides, it’s a good thing someone’s got their fashion game on point around here.” He said, brushing off the fact that it was a rushed accident.
I playfully nudged him. “Well, I guess I’ll take that as a compliment. And for the record, I do have matching socks today, just in case you were wondering.”
Harry’s eyes softened as he looked at me, a warmth in his gaze that made my heart flutter. “Well, I must say, your socks are a lot less distracting than mine.”
I chuckled, feeling the tension between us ease into something more comfortable and light-hearted.
As the elevator chimed and the doors slid open to my floor, Harry didn’t make a move to exit. Instead, he turned to me with a charming grin, his eyes sparkling with warmth. “Let me walk you to your room. It’s the least I can do. After all, it’s not every day I get to be a gentleman,” he said, completely ignoring the fact that his room was directly across from the elevator.
I laughed softly, touched by his thoughtfulness. “You’re too kind, Harry. It’s just down the hall here,” I said, gesturing toward my door, which was a short distance away from his.
As we walked together down the hallway, the atmosphere felt lighter, filled with a quiet, pleasant tension. Harry’s presence beside me was comforting, and I found myself appreciating the little things—like how he occasionally glanced my way, as if trying to make the moment last just a bit longer.
When we reached my door, Harry reached out and brushed his hand lightly against mine as he opened the door for me. “Even so, a little extra time with you—well, when else can I talk about my accidental shenanigans and have someone listen intently?” His voice was low and warm, and his gaze lingered on me with an intensity that sent a thrill down my spine.
I felt a flutter in my chest at his words but remained blissfully unaware of the deeper implications behind his gaze. “Well,” I said, smiling as I unlocked the door and stepped inside. “Thanks for walking me. It’s always nice to have a bit of company, especially when the company is as pleasant as yours.”
Harry’s smile grew softer, and he took a step back, still holding my gaze. “Anytime, y/n. I’ll see you in a few hours. Get some rest.
“You too, Harry.” I said as he walked back to his own room.
——————————————————————
PART TWO IS NOW UP 🌷🌷
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almostfoxglove · 5 months ago
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AIN'T THAT A BITE
written for @studioghibelli's writing challenge
Fandom: The Last of Us (TV), The Last of Us (Video Game)
Rating: Mature
Central Characters: Reader, Young!Joel, Sarah
Central Relationship: Joel / Reader
Word Count: 6k
Pre-Outbreak & No-Outbreak AU
SUMMARY
It's the night of Jackson High's Sock Hop, the 8th grade dance which took you weeks to organize, and everything seems determined to go wrong. Thankfully, one student's dad—the handsome and brooding Joel Miller—comes to your rescue. READ ON AO3, if that's your jam!
Four weeks ago, volunteering to organize the eighth-grade dance committee had seemed like an excellent idea—a chance to make a solid first impression on the PTA and the chilly cast of your new colleagues while giving yourself a little excitement, some frivolous living beyond the usual boredom of your repetitive existence. Lesson plan, grade, report card, lesson plan, grade, report card—you love your job, but it gets old.
But now, on the night of Jackson High’s September Sock Hop, you know you’ve made a terrible mistake. Someone brought cookies with walnuts that had to be ceremoniously tossed, one of the speakers in the gym is crackling, three of your parent chaperones have bailed, and oh, yes—a sink in the girls’ bathroom has decided to spring a sudden leak and flood the place a mere fifteen minutes before the kids are due to show up.
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Drenched and sweating, you make a hopeless attempt to mop the flood of water with the gym’s supply of linens, turning the tiled floor into a swamp of soggy towels that squelch beneath your shoes. It’s all a futile effort—the burst pipe beneath the far left sink is spewing water faster than the towels can sponge—but here you are, trying anyway, looking like you’ve just taken a long walk in a fucking monsoon. 
A row of square mirrors sits framed above each ceramic sink, taunting you with your reflection. Your red poodle skirt has gone burgundy with water and your once pristine white button-up clings to your chest, translucent, peek-a-booing your bra. 
Real professional. 
“Miss Green?” comes a voice on the other side of the door, followed by a weary knock. “Believe students are arriving now.”
With a sigh, you take a final glare at your reflection as if looking again might fix things, then call out, “Alright,” with as much patience as you have left to muster. Outside the calculus teacher is waiting in his pin-stripe vest with a sorry grimace. He agrees to lock up that bathroom from use and with a tired thank you you click down the hall towards the school doors, stomach raw with nerves.
As promised the first, eager attendees stand outside Jackson High’s wide glass doors, giddy to be let in for the night’s event. Kids are in everything from pastel poodle skirts to leather jackets and waitress get-ups—you even spot the Broderick twins in matching, vintage baseball uniforms striped with strawberry red. Behind them stand their parents, some smiling and others bleary-eyed, who you force yourself to smile cheerfully for as you let them in, a clipboard held over your chest to hide your bra.
You don’t miss how the parents stare at you—soaking wet and clearly befuddled—and you mutter your apologies as they shuffle into the school. All but the main hall has been blocked off, leaving the children a one-way path to the gymnasium for the dance. You check your watch quickly; maybe you can sneak in a quick smoke around the corner before the rest of the eighth graders arrive.
Outside the air is perfect: your one reprieve. Blue-dark clouds haunt the star-pocked sky and the balmy remains of the dying summer sweep through the parking lot as a breeze. You breathe easily for the first time in an hour, lift your face, and close your eyes, stitching yourself together in the calm. 
When you’re steady again, you decide against the smoke break. Too many parents pulling up in shiny cars with the kids. It’s enough to feel them in your skirt pocket—an escape hatch when you need them, a totem when you don’t. A nasty habit, your mother always says. But you only allow yourself two cigarettes a year. Not so bad, as habits go.
You’re about to turn back in and see if you can’t call a plumber at this hour when a pickup groans into the lot—steely-blue, bold text stickered on the side. It pulls not into a parking spot but the drop-off zone, right in front of you.
Miller Construction Ltd.
Maybe miracles are real after all.
As the passenger window rolls down and the cab light blinks on inside, you rush over, desperation rocketing your heart around in your chest. A girl in a lilac poodle skirt blinks up at you from the passenger seat, eyes wide with surprise. She’s got her hair pulled back in two big, curly pigtails ribboned with bows, and looks adorable—exactly what you’d pictured when you took on the behemoth task of putting this whole stupid evening together—complete with a matching neck scarf and shiny black shoes. You give her what you hope is a friendly grin and start rambling.
“I am so sorry,” you say, before you bother looking at the driver. “But we’ve got a plumbing emergency and if there is any chance you might have a few minutes to take a look at it, you’d be a—”
Your sentence drops off as you at last hunch down to make eye contact with the man in the driver’s seat through the open window. Dark-eyed and frowning, all curls and scruffy beard and thick flannel shirt: your type to a T. In your pause his daughter stifles a chuckle, and you shake your head to restart your brain. Focus. Sinks to fix, floods to mop.
With a tight grin, you tuck a stray hair behind your ear. “Would be a lifesaver if you could, I don’t know, take a look. Even if it’s just to tell me we’re fucked and need an emergency plumber. We had a bunch of parent chaperones bail last minute, so we’re a little short on hands.”
Now the kid snorts, giggling. Shit—your teacher-voice has slipped. 
You close your eyes, horrified. Seems there’ll be no end to your embarrassment today.
Sighing, you step back to open the passenger door so the girl can hop out. “If you promise not to tell any grown-ups I swore in front of you,” you tell her. “I’ll give you all As when you get to my class in a couple years.”
“Deal,” the girl says, grinning at you. “But I’d probably get an A anyway.”
Despite yourself, you smile—this time for real.
“You ain’t her teacher?” comes the driver’s voice. Deep and coarse, all Texan. When you glance back, he’s still frowning, eyes narrowed at you.
“Tenth grade English and History,” you say. 
“And you’re workin’ the eighth-grade dance,” he says.
You shrug. “I’m new. Thought it’d go over well if I came in eager and offered to plan the thing.”
He hmphs, expressionless, his skin golden under the overhead light, eyes glinting with amber. You’re almost glad the kid’s not in your class; parent-teacher interviews would be torture. Sitting across your desk from this man, forced to pretend you don’t want him to ruin you. 
Beside you on the sidewalk, the girl shoots her dad a daggered look and crosses her arms. “He’s free,” she says. “He can do it.”
“Sarah,” the man hisses. 
“Oh, I’m sorry,” she snarks. “Do you suddenly have a social calendar I don’t know about?”
After a brief stare-down which Sarah seems to win, he huffs and mutters a cranky one second before pulling out of the drop-off zone to park. 
“I like your skirt,” Sarah says when he’s gone. Streetlamps have you both in a cloak of shadow, and the pale light radiating from the school’s front doors doesn’t quite reach this spot, but her inquisitive expression is unmissable in the dark. 
“It’s a little ruined,” you say sheepishly. “But I like yours.” 
Pleased, she gives you a little twirl, purple fabric blooming from her waist. “Thanks,” she says, when she stills again. “My dad sewed on the poodle.” 
Across the lot you hear the harsh slam of a car door cracking shut and spot her glowering father stalk across the asphalt, silhouetted by a distant streetlight, his shoulders unfairly broad. You nod toward the front doors. You’d never admit it to anyone, but the thought of this surly figure lovingly stitching a felt poodle to his daughter’s costume makes you a little weak in the knees.
“You can go on in,” you tell Sarah, and she waves at her dad before running inside.
Then he’s walking up the pavement, growing closer. Of course he smells good—like patchouli and something earthy and skin. Of course he’s rolled up his sleeves, baring his tanned forearms, one tensed by the toolbox clutched in his hand. You manage a stiff grin as he approaches, no teeth, to which you receive only a curt nod in reply. 
In silence, you walk him through the glassy doors, heels clicking as swing music crackles from the gymnasium some distance away. You catch, in the corner of your eye, the shape of his head turning as he watches Sarah running full-speed down the main hall to catch up with a group of girls that must be her friends. She launches herself at them, and even at this distance you hear the shrill of their joy, the sugar-high laughter, and smile to yourself.
“She’s sweet,” you say, guiding him into a branching hallway, away from the main event.
He grunts, then mumbles, “Pain in my ass is what she is.”
You chuckle. When you dare to look back at him again, you see his begrudging tone doesn’t match his expression. You swear his eyes flit quickly away as if you’ve caught him already looking at you. Hard to be sure, you think, in this dimmer light. But his cheeks almost look pink.
After a beat too long, you realize why.
You’ve dropped your clipboard to your side without thinking, unveiling your water-logged shirt, which clings sheerly to your skin. Grimacing, you cover yourself again. “Not much of a plumber,” you say quietly.
Once you’ve grabbed the keys back from your colleague, you drag this poor, probably busy dad to the girls’ bathroom and unlock the door, glancing down at his boots before you open it. “You don’t love those shoes, do you?” you ask.
His eyebrows lift, jaw tensing. “Sure they’ll be fine, darlin’,” he grunts.
You push into the bathroom before your brain has the chance to recover from darlin’. You’ve been in Texas all of six months and you still aren’t used to the pet names. Everyone here seems to call each other everything. Even the old woman who works the till at the grocer by your apartment calls you honey or angel, and you wouldn’t exactly describe her as the friendly type. Darlin’ isn’t even irregular. Bus drivers call you that. 
Difference here is that it’s this man saying it—which is to say, someone gorgeous with a voice that could melt you if you let yourself listen close enough. Your heart purrs, thrilled.
The bathroom is a calamity. Though the drains in the center of the tiled floor have meant no water has flooded into the hallway, there’s still an inch or so blanketing the tiles wall to wall. Under one of the mirrors, the guilty sink continues to spew: a graceful font of silver gushing from a fault in the pipe.
Over your shoulder you hear Sarah’s dad clear his throat before you step out of his way.
Fearless, he trudges through the mess unfazed, dodging the tides of boggy towels like this is the most natural habitat to find himself in. His boots and the ankles of his jeans blacken with water, and though you’re in some stupid, clacky pair of heels to go with your outfit, you follow him into the shallows anyway, riddled with shame. At the slosh of your footsteps behind him, Sarah’s dad turns to give you a cutting stare you cannot read and you freeze, caught.
“What?” you say.
“No reason you gotta be in here for this,” he says. “Might be wise to dry off a little, don’t you think?”
Does the corner of his mouth twitch upward, or do you imagine it—you can’t decide. “Right,” you manage. “Sorry. Thank you, seriously.”
You pivot to leave him to it, splashing weakly as you go, your skirt bunched in one hand to keep it safe from the splatter. In the doorway you can’t help but look back, and see him kneeling in the mess, tool in hand, his toolbox open and shelved on a not-broken sink. He spots you looking and this time, you don’t imagine it. He lets slip half a grin. 
“Got it from here,” he says.
You nod but don’t move and you don’t know why.
Well, that’s not true. You do.
Sarah’s dad cocks one dark eyebrow at you, bemused, maybe, by your hesitation. “You really have chaperones bail?” he asks, voice low.
“Three,” you say.
He grunts, then turns his attention back to the spitting sink, and you step out into the dim hallway without goodbye.
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You slip into the bathrooms in the teacher’s lounge to stand under the hand dryer for a bit, letting your shirt dry out. When it’s no longer see-through, you stand in front of the long mirrors looking at yourself, fussing. You retouch your lipstick—red, like your skirt, like your nails—though the hair’s a lost cause. The best you can do is run a hand through the end bits and say an empty prayer.
Then, finally, you emerge, and take off with a sidelong glance thrown at the closed door of the flooded girls’ bathroom as you pass.
You volunteered four weeks ago, and you spent three of those weeks working on the decorations in tiny pockets of time between the school day, your commute home, and all the hours you spend every evening and weekend on lesson plans and marking. Maybe it’s only September, but the whole staff has been working since August and it’s no slower now than it will be in the spring. Still, you gave up sleep. Gave up seeing friends. Gave up proper, home-cooked meals and reverted to the habits of your college days, eating boxed mac and cheese straight from the pot over the stove. 
Now, it all pays off. 
The gymnasium’s a goddamn ritz. Ribbons of twinkle lights droop from the rafters, sparkling above the scatter of a disco ball. You thrifted huge, vintage neon signs—with your own money, thanks so much public school district—that cast pools of candy-colored light on the shiny floor. Gingham tablecloths sheath the drink stands. You had to bribe the theater department to let you repurpose an old bartop set from some long-gone play. Painted that sucker with black and white checkers, even scrounged up some round, pleather bar stools to match. Instead of a bar-bar, it’s a snack bar—pastel cupcakes and dairy-free milkshakes and huge metal bowls of nut-free, everything-free snack mixes displayed behind the bar. Kids all get three snack tickets ‘cause the PTA had strong feelings about sugar intake, but hey. All the bar stools are full; the kids seem to love it.
Despite the last-minute disasters, you’re tempted to cry with relief. Slept three hours last night, painting the last of the stars that hang overhead, but they look like magic now. Glossy and twinkling while Elvis plays. It looks pretty close to perfect. And the kids, by some miracle, are dancing. The gym teacher comes out to show them some simple swing steps, and as clumsy as they all are, it’s fucking adorable.
“Hope you’re willing to do this for all the dances,” one teacher mutters to you as you pass. 
You flit from table to table, refilling and wiping down and checking in with chaperones—twenty minutes zing by in the blink of an eye. When the gymnasium door creaks quietly open, the dark shape of Sarah’s dad appears in the doorway. You set down your punch glass with a grin and scurry over. 
But he’s looking up when you make it to him, starstruck by twinkle lights, his face pink and blue with the neon light. Christ, he’s easy on the eyes. Facing this way, with none of the gym or kids or decorations in view, you can almost imagine that you’re standing in a bar looking up at some handsome stranger you might have a shot in hell at taking home. 
“Everything okay?” you ask, when he still hasn’t looked down, his hand flat and broad on the door to prop it open.
He blinks, wakes from his daze, and the look of wonder that just now softened him fades, his face stiff again. You step into the hall and the door slides shut behind you. The honeyed voices of The Isley Brothers muffle.
In the direct light of the hallway you can see he’s soaked—jeans wet to the tops of his thighs, his whole flannel clinging to his chest. One curl lays flat and damp against his forehead. He would’ve had to kneel right in the spray to work on the sink. Might as well have set a hose on the poor man.
Jesus, you must have ruined this guy’s whole fucking night. 
“Oh my god,” you say, eyes wide with horror. “I am so sorry—”
He lifts one hand as if to say stop and your mouth snaps shut. “Just water,” he grumbles. “Sink’s fine now. Joint was old and brittle. Had a part in the truck that’ll hold you over till Monday, but you’ll need someone to do a proper repair next week.”
You run a hand over your face, so grateful to him that all logical thought and processing flutters right out of your head. “Jesus, I could kiss you—thank you so much, seriously,” you start to say, hand still over your eyes as you stutter to a halt, realizing your mistake.
Heat boils in your face as you split your fingers to peek at him through your hand, but he doesn’t look horrified. He just rolls his eyes, a little playfully you think, and shakes his head like you’re being ridiculous. “Not necessary,” he says. 
You let your hand drop. “I’d insist that I’m normally the epitome of professionalism, but there’s no way in hell it’d be convincing,” you say, grinning sheepishly. 
Shrugging, he remains silent. Maybe you should take your friends up on their offers to set you up—you clearly need to get laid. Just him shrugging is doing things to you. Nevermind the tiny flick of his tongue that graces his bottom lip as he looks off down a roped-off hall. 
“Still short on chaperones?” he asks, not looking at you. 
“Yeah,” you admit. “But we’ll make due.”
Another shrug. “Could help out—‘m already here.”
Your eyes round. Though part of you wants to refuse, insist he’s done more than enough already, that he ought to get home and into dry clothes and forget about this mess, you don’t. It’s definitely selfish, almost greedy, but you don’t want him to go. Even if you only get to look at him across the gymnasium without saying another word to each other the whole rest of the night, you’d like him to stay.
A grin squirms across your face before you can stop it; you have to look away to smother it as you tap one foot against the floor. 
“Okay,” you say coolly, returning your gaze to him once you’ve gathered yourself. “But you can’t go in there looking like this.”
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The theater department’s costume room gives you the creeps. Has since the first day you stepped foot in this place back in August when you got the grand tour—anywhere with this many mannequins is cursed, frankly—and it turns out it’s even worse in the dark. When you swing open the door, pale light from the hall slants against the black floor, and you reach blindly across the wall for the switch as your heart patters with dread.
Then finally: light. Weak, stuttering, yellow, but light all the same. You breathe.
Regardless, stepping into the costume room feels like being squeezed. Cramped alleyways have been formed by clothing racks stuffed well past their capacity—gowns of past Shakespeare productions hang beside the gothic frocks of Morticia and Wednesday Addams—forcing you to inch between racks, grazed by a parade of empty sleeves.
Sarah’s dad, bless him, hardly fits at all, and has to shuffle through the aisles sideways to follow you on what must seem to him like a blind mission without any destination. 
But you’ve been in this place. You know exactly what you’re looking for. Turning a corner, the next section is too narrow for the man to fit through, so you point out a chair across the room by the mirror and tell him to wait. 
“And you can ditch the flannel,” you call out as he goes. “Can hang it over the heaters to dry.”
Though you hear the low thunder of him mumbling, you miss the words.
When you emerge from the dusty racks, unnerved by the looming, half-dressed mannequins standing guard over their lot, Sarah’s dad is sitting where you asked him to wait, stripped out of his flannel, left in a slightly damp white t-shirt, his shoulder blades faintly visible in the stuttering light. If him shrugging was doing something to you earlier—this is likely to kill you. 
You clear your throat as you approach and he quickly straightens his posture. When you’re close enough, you hold out the hangers to him, even give them a little shake when he cuts his eyes at you, doubtful. You roll your own in reply. “Come on,” you insist. “Sarah will love it.”
That gets him to stand, albeit with a scowl, but it still makes you grin. With a grumpy hmph, he takes the hangers from you and you duck between racks again to give him some privacy. Sure, maybe you’d like a peek as he strips off those wet jeans, but even you know better than that. So you stand in the disordered aisle of costumes and listen instead. 
For a long time you hear nothing, like he’s hesitating. You did have to guess the sizes, but you worked plenty of retail jobs in your early twenties. Aren’t so bad at guessing. Every breath in this room, now that you’re silent, feels agonizingly loud. Not just yours, but his. The swelling of his chest with air. 
Then finally—clink. A belt buckle slacking open. Your eyes slam shut even though you’re looking in the opposite direction, at some 60s-style dress from what must’ve been an old Hairspray production with construction paper polka dots duct-taped on. He lets out a soft grunt. There’s a shuffle of fabric. Then a wet slop as his jeans hit the floor.
Your whole body throbs with heady, certain want.
Yes, you definitely need to get laid. This is humiliating. 
When you hear the belt buckle’s metal clink again, signaling he’s got the new, dry jeans on, you feel it’s safe to speak again. “I never asked you your name,” you say, still staring at the costumes. You hear him set the next hanger on the chair and even though putting it on requires no further undressing, you’ll stay exactly where you are until he’s done. Don’t trust yourself not to leer.
More shuffling, this time of sturdier fabric. “Joel,” he gruffs, and after a pause adds bitterly, “I look ridiculous.”
Chuckling, you squeeze out of the aisles and find him standing before the full-length mirror wedged in the corner of the room, into which Joel is sneering at his reflection. 
Also, he’s dead fucking wrong.
The jeans are a little tight, but frankly they’re better this way. His thighs taut beneath denim, his calves hugged. He’s a little bow-legged. So Texan. From the waist down he might as well be a cowboy. From the waist up, however, he looks like he’s just strutted off the set of Grease, putting even 1978’s Travolta to shame. His white t-shirt sits crisply beneath the black leather jacket, which he snaps to adjust the lapels. Fits him perfectly, like it was made for those shoulders, and he’s raked back his wet hair, giving it the look of being gelled, one stray curl rebelling over his forehead.
He catches your eye in the mirror, mouth twitching again, but it doesn’t become a grin or a frown. You raise an eyebrow at him. “Don’t know what you’re looking at,” you say. “But you do not look ridiculous from where I’m standing.”
His nose scrunches as he breaks his eyes from yours in the reflection, ducking his head to rub the back of his neck. Seriously, you’d crawl all over this guy if he weren’t the dad of one of your students. Future students—whatever. But you’ll save yourself the humiliation, gotta get this show on the road, and so you jut your chin in the direction of the door. “Let’s go. Got kids to supervise, hands to keep from wandering.”
Joel balks, hands flat to fists in an instant, ready to kill.
“Oh please,” you tease, and wave one hand dismissively as you make your way to the door. “Like you weren’t thirteen once.”
You listen as he stomps after you, muttering a cranky, “Gonna have to be at all these fuckin’ things,” that makes your head fall back with a sudden laugh.
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The moment you return to the gymnasium, you’re needed by everyone—so and so needs to know where the extra ice is; what’s-her-face is concerned about the sugar content of the fruit punch; and some parent wants to talk about their kids’ English grade like this is the appropriate venue for such a conversation. You immediately lose Joel to the call of teacher-slash-host duties, and he slips past you, hugging the wall as he strides over to man the drink table which, in your absence, has stood without supervision. The man might as well be a saint—you manage to catch his eye and mouth a silent thank you across the gym, to which he half-grins from a pool of neon pink glow, setting you ablaze.
Most of the night you spend running around like a madwoman, responsible for switching in new music as each CD ends, refilling snack bowls, and pulling one student off another when you catch them kissing in the hall. Thankfully neither of them is Sarah, but you do have to give the kids a talking-to.
Late in the night, you’re chatting to some of your colleagues against the gymnasium wall and watching the kids shimmy to Rock Around the Clock, poodle skirts billowing like spinning tops, when you spot Sarah rush across the floor toward Joel—apparently only spotting him now. You’re too far to hear them, too far to read their lips, but Sarah’s runaway smile is obvious at any distance. She hops in place, delighted, and forces Joel to do a little spin for her. 
Though smaller, you catch his smile too. The dimple in his cheek as he fails to restrain his contentment at her approval. How he shakes his head, embarrassed to be fawned over. Adorable.
When the Spanish teacher makes his rounds with the school’s camera, snapping flash photos of the kids’ eager smiles and costumes as they pose with their milkshakes or friends, you tap him on the shoulder and point in Joel and Sarah’s direction. “Get one of them, would you?” you whisper, and he nods, shuffling off.
Joel spots him coming a mile off, camera in hand, and immediately frowns. He makes eye contact with you across the gymnasium like he knew exactly where you were standing, and shakes his head as if to say no way. You smile, wicked, and mouth yes. One of his hands balls to a fist. 
But when Sarah spots the photographer a second later, she wraps an arm around Joel’s waist to pose and his resistance crumbles. When you were thirteen, you’d have been humiliated to be seen posing with your parents in front of your classmates, but Sarah doesn’t seem to mind at all. Her adoration is obvious, abundant. Anyone can see how much she loves him—you can see, too, Joel’s love for her. Once the Spanish teacher raises the camera to shoot, he throws his arm around Sarah’s shoulders, looking down at her with a soft, grump-less grin. The white flash snaps in the dark gymnasium, photo taken, then Sarah returns to her friends.
You cut your eyes away when he starts to turn his head in your direction, returning your gaze to your colleague. Don’t need him catching you staring. Your dignity has suffered plenty tonight.
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You cave about twenty minutes before parents are due to pick up the kids at the end of the night—not due to stress, just exhaustion—and sneak out into the black night to smoke. Tucked just out of view of the parking lot and doors, you sink onto a wooden bench and light up, letting the tension unwind from your body. Gray smoke tendrils as you exhale a half-formed smoke ring. Never could get those right, but it’s fun to try while crickets croak unseen from the shadows, braiding their eerie melody. With every drag, you relax into a kind of trance, at one with the night. 
Eyes shut, you don’t hear him coming. It isn’t until he clears his throat that your eyes snap open and you realize someone’s caught you smoking.
“Shit,” you mutter, adjusting your posture to sit up straight.
Joel stands over the bench, caliginous in the dark. His hair has dried, curls loosening from each other. You hear a low chuckle that must come from him, but you can’t quite make out his face until he lowers himself onto the bench beside you—then you see he’s smirking. 
You tap ash onto the sidewalk beside your feet, away from him, unable to look him in the eye. “Not worth trying to defend myself, is it?” you joke sheepishly.
He adjusts his position, thighs spread just a touch, and crosses his arms over his chest. The leather jacket is practically criminal, it fits him so well. 
“That’s alright, darlin’,” he replies. “Don’t need to.”
You bring the cigarette to your lips to smother your impulse to smile, the filter stained crimson by your lipstick. You risk a glance at him. “You want one?”
Shaking his head, the corner of Joel’s mouth tugs. “Quit when Sarah came around,” he admits.
“Very responsible,” you say, and though you really shouldn’t flirt, it comes out a little snarky, like you’re teasing him. “Quit after college, but I get to indulge twice a year.”
Joel quirks an eyebrow at you, though doesn’t question the obvious flaw in your logic. “Miss it?” he asks.
You shrug and exhale a thin stream of smoke from the corner of your mouth. “Always think I do,” you say. “But it’s so much grosser than I remember. Can’t believe I used to smoke these everyday.”
He lets out a deep hmph, not quite a laugh. 
“I’m serious,” you say, grinning now. “These things are vile. They reek and make kissing gross. I might as well burn the clothes I’m wearing after this. Don’t even like it anymore—it’s just nostalgia, I think.”
Shifting again, Joel’s legs spread a little wider, though from the other side of the bench you’re still nowhere near touching. As you click one lacquered nail against your cigarette, ash rains softly to the ground. 
“Never minded,” he mumbles. He’s looking out at the dim street, not you. Streetlamps dot the street with coins of gold between cedar elms that have already begun to drain their color. The breeze is next to perfect, whisking your smoke politely away from Joel.
“Minded what?”
“Kissin’ someone who smokes,” he says matter-of-factly. His tone isn’t flirtatious—nor is his expression, his face still profiled to you—but goosebumps scale your arms all the same.
“Hm,” you hum in reply. 
Best not to dwell in this breath of quiet. The long pause in which you feel yourself want. You shift on the bench, cross your legs, and prepare to change the subject—but Joel beats you to it. 
“Looks good in there,” his voice rumbles, and in your periphery, he turns to look at you for just a moment, handsome and leather-clad. Practically put on this earth to punish you. You hold your breath until he turns his head away again. “Impressive.”
Your heart squeezes like he’s crushed it in his fist, but you tilt your head back and forth nonchalantly. “Guess it doesn’t look so bad,” you admit. To your surprise, this drags a quiet chuckle from Joel, and your eyes drop quickly to his hand where it hangs from his still-crossed arms—a brief and discreet glance, you think—and see no ring. It shouldn’t make a difference, but you're glad.
“Gotta be more subtle than that, darlin’,” Joel mumbles, despite the fact that he’s not looking at you.
You feel your face rash with heat. “Fucking eagle eyes,” you mutter, pinching the last of the cigarette to your lips for a final drag. You hold the smoke in your lungs as Joel laughs again, this time with more warmth.
He shakes his head. “Could’a just asked,” he says.
“You’re not even looking at me,” you say, smiling despite your embarrassment. You bend over to crush your cigarette against the bottom of your shoe, then pocket the spent filter, disappearing the evidence. “How the hell did you even catch that.” It isn’t so much a question as it is a whine. 
Joel shrugs. “Don’t have to be looking at you to be watchin’,” he says.
You can’t decide if you’re glad or disappointed that the moment you both look at each other, the whole of his face finally visible in the murk of nightfall—warm eyes, summer skin, that stubbly beard you’d like to nuzzle into—a caw of noise erupts inside the school and shatters the moment. The sound of students emerging from the gymnasium into the hall draws Joel’s attention first, and you allow yourself a long look at the back of his head to study his curls, just beginning to thread with gray, before you let the noise draw your attention, too.
“That’d be our cue,” you say, and you both rise from the bench.
As Joel starts shrugging off the leather jacket, you put a hand on his bicep to stop him and shake your head. So solid. Warm. He freezes under your touch, black leather slumped part-way down his arms, until you withdraw your hand. 
“Nu-uh,” you say. “You’re keeping that.”
He frowns. “Not sure I like the idea of stealin’ from Sarah’s school,” he says. 
You roll your eyes, wave one hand dismissively. “You saw where it came from, they’ll never miss it. There were at least half a dozen more in there.”
When Joel narrows his eyes at you, you narrow yours back stubbornly. Finally, he sighs and snaps the jacket back over his shoulders—a gesture that turns you to honey—and shoves one hand into the back pocket of his jeans. The also-stolen jeans. You’re gonna make him take those too. Not like anything that fits him is gonna fit any of the students here. You don’t even know why the theater department has costumes this size. 
“Least take this and sign me up for,” he gestures vaguely with one hand as he pulls something from his pocket and holds it out to you. “Whatever. More chaperonin’.”
Pinched between his fingers is a crisp business card bearing the same logo stickered to his truck. Miller Construction Ltd—Joel Miller, Co-Owner. His phone number is printed squarely at the bottom. You take it, running your thumb across the printed text. 
“Very generous,” you tease, and Joel looks down at you and grins, one dimple creasing his cheek. When you smile in return, his dark eyes slip down your face, landing on your lips.
As you make your way back up the path to the school, he walks close enough that his arm brushes against yours just once. Your body purrs with want, made worse when he smirks and leans toward you, lowering his voice. “Trust me,” he rumbles quietly. “Offer’s entirely selfish.”
Then, entirely composed, Joel yanks the front door open for you and winks.
Moodboard created by @studioghibelli!
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astroboots · 1 year ago
Text
EVERY YOU EVERY ME: Issue #2
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Pairing: Miguel O'Hara x female reader
Summary: Your streak of bad luck continues as you find that the universe is not done putting you in harm's way. Luckily, you have grouchy Spider-man to save you.
Word count: 3,500 words.
Content: Slowest of the burn, near death experiences, the emotional whiplash of Miguel O'Hara being a rude bastard and a total softie.
Astroboot’s Masterlist | Series Masterlist | Spiderverse Masterlist
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According to an article that ran in the New York Times: one out of every 40 New Yorkers will have a run in with a Superhero in the time they live here.
That might not sound like much, but considering that nearly 8.5 million people live in this city, it adds up to a lot of people. In fact, most in your friends circle have their own anecdotal story to tell.
I ran into Tony Stark at the Brandy Library and he asked me for my phone number. Bit of a sleaze but he bought our whole table a round of drinks.
Captain America landed on my Fiat on Manhattan Bridge. He dented the roof, but he was very polite about it.
Daredevil was hanging out at the fire escape ladder above the Meatball shop. Gave me tips on what to order.
It's nothing short of a miracle that having lived in this city for as many years as you have that this is the first time you've had a Supes encounter.
It'll be a great story to tell at parties. You fell out of the Chrysler building and were rescued mid-air. It blows all the other stories out of the water. Though, you'll probably leave out the part where he wished he'd left you to die.
You stare blindly at your computer screen. There are endless rows of cells on your excel sheet no matter how far you scroll. Uninterrupted numbers and reference codes for insurance claims that are waiting for your attention. But the numbers and letters all blend into an indecipherable sludge soup. All you can focus on is: 'I should've let you fall.'
Heat prickles your cheek, as you replay his words in your head.
What the hell.
That was entirely unnecessary.
You didn't deserve that.
Over the course of the last 24 hours, you've played the scene on an endless loop in your head, until the memory is worn and scratched like a used up VHS tape.
Did you do something wrong? You must've. Who has ever heard of a Superhero treating a civilian in this manner? You’re just a hapless innocent bystander who fell out of a building due to a supervillain battle they started. To blame it on you and then call it a mistake. Isn't that something a supervillain would do?
Gritting your teeth, you feel yourself seething of the memory of the windows next to you breaking and shattering out of nowhere as a bird-person villain with mechanical wings tumbled past you. Next thing you knew you were tumbling out the window. 
And then he saved you.
Did he mean to save someone else? Is that why he was so annoyed? But, you didn't see any other people falling from the building on your way down.
You replay the memory. Again.
The looming silhouette of his towering frame over yours as he sneered down at you.
He looked at you like he knew you. Like you had offended him with your mere existence. But you don't understand how. You've never met him before. Never met anyone who looked even remotely like him. You would've remembered a man with red eyes, they're not exactly common. Plus, you don't think you've ever met someone quite so tall. Your neck hurt with the angle you had to crane just to look at his face.
What could you possibly have done in your lifetime to piss off a Superhero you've never met before?
For that matter what Superhero is he anyway? You think back at the dark navy suit clinging onto every inch of skin, embellished by that bright angry red in the emblem of a spider.
Spider-man... 
Except Spider-man is known to be a swell guy with a great sense of humor. Not a rude asshole.
Aren't his colors inverted too? You pull up the browser on your screen and google "spiderman outfit". There's over 800 million hits. In all of them Spiderman's suit is primarily red with blue embellishment.
Whoever the guy is, you don't think he's your friendly neighborhood Spiderman that every New Yorker knows and loves.
With a hapless sigh, you click aimlessly on your screen, trying to look busy at work for the next twenty minutes until you can go on your lunch break. You go through the motions of your soul sucking tasks. Tagging each insurance claim into one of the following categories: approved/rejected/further missing information required.
Peering over your cubicle wall to the wall of windows, you spy the section that has been zoned off since yesterday. The broken window you were knocked out of has already been replaced, but there's still shattered glass and debris nearby.
Your stomach drops, the phantom sensation of the ground beneath you giving way. For a brief second you swear you can feel the weightlessness of soaring through the skies without anything catching your fall.
You stand up from your desk, solid ground meeting the soles of your feet to remind you where you are. 
The office.
There's a monotone drone of workers all around you grumbling and sighing just as unhappily. The quiet tip-tapping of keyboards of the working masses.
Is this the life you managed to escape death for?
Is this it?
It's kind of sad isn't it? You nearly died and lived to tell the tale, only to return to a life so unremarkable your brain didn't deign it necessary to provide you with any highlights (cause there are none).
The most exciting thing that has happened to you the whole of this year was being insulted by a grumpy superhero. The most you've wanted to live was during that span of ten seconds when you were falling out of a building to your death.
You glance at your clock, still 15 minutes before noon. You log out of your desktop anyway.
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You barely make it across the street from your office. The light is green as you cross Lexington Avenue when the screeching noise of tires tears down the street and rips through your eardrums.
A yellow taxi hurtles towards you at full speed. Through the car window separating you, the cab driver is staring up at you with wide-eyed horror. In that fraction of a second before the hard metal is going to collide and shatter every bone in your body, you only have one thought: Oh god, this is going to hurt.
Life doesn't flash before your eyes. All you see is the familiar blur of shiny blue and red.
Go figure that's the only moment extraordinary enough for your brain to think it's worth replaying before you die.
There's a blunt and forceful shove to the side of your ribs. Softer than you would've imagined a two tonne vehicle slamming into you would be. It doesn't hurt. It reminds you of that time you played football with your cousin and he body slammed you to the lawn. You've heard about this phenomena, the brain will try to protect itself by going unconscious if the pain is too extreme.
But there's no bright light, when you open your eyes all you see is the familiar shiny blue fabric.
A firm weight wraps around your shoulders, and you recognize this, the feeling of being held as you're pulled into their solid chest. There's not enough time for you to look up, you're slammed onto the ground, the solid warmth wrapped around you, absorbing the fall.
The pressure wrapped around you shifts then lifts away entirely. When you open your eyes for a second time, there’s no one there holding you. 
There's no one else there with you. Just the standstill traffic of cars and pedestrians gawking at you.
A concerned woman runs over to you, bending down to help you up on your feet. "Are you okay? That car came out of nowhere."
Your legs feel unsteady, wobbling as you put weight on it to stand up. 
“I’m fine, I think,” you respond, and look down on yourself. There are no scrapes, just a bit of dust on your work-attire from traffic.
"You're so lucky, Spiderman was there to save you."
You blink up at the woman in dazed confusion and it takes your brain a few seconds to process what she's telling you.
Spider-man...
In your mind's eye the flashes of blue and a vivid red invades your vision. It wasn't just your life flashing you by. Not just a figment of your imagination.
He was here. He saved you. (Probably not) Spider-man saved you (again).
A wave of gratitude washes over you. You take back every unflattering thought you had about the man not five minutes ago. Rude? Would a rude man save you, not once but twice in one day? No, of course not, you probably just misunderstood him, or misheard. After all, if he truly regretted saving you, he wouldn't have done it a second time... right?
--
When you get back at your desk, there's a post-it tacked to your computer screen, with an angry scrawl of a handwriting.
'Look BOTH ways before crossing!!!!!'
You stare at the note, and the way the word "both" is capitalized and aggressively underlined.
Rude.
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The universe is out to kill you. You're sure of it.
They say that death comes in threes after all. So no one can blame you for being a little bit on the edge after you've gone two for two within the time span of 24 hours.
You stay away from windows in tall buildings. You look both ways, twice, before crossing the street. You try to go straight home from work the minute you clock out from work, turning down any and all initiations with friends to go out after out of precaution. It's just not worth the risk.
And for a while it seems to work. For a while, there are no more incidents. A week goes by and your nerves start to settle and you are lulled into a temporary sense of security before it all goes to shits.
A ceramic flower pot on a windowsill tumbling off the sixth floor of a brown house by Chelsea that would have dropped on your head and split your skull if someone hadn't bumped into you from behind that you weren’t able to catch sight of.
A piece of scaffolding that comes loose and falls from a construction site in West Village as you happened to walk past, and would have been crushed under if you weren’t tackled away at the last second by someone who fled the scene before you could thank them.
A hot dog cart runs amok, hurtling downhill towards you between 184th and 190th street in Manhattan when the cart suddenly out of nowhere, against the very laws of physics like it’s being pulled by an invisible force and changes direction mere inches in front of you, hurtling through the air and crashing into the windows of a bodega instead.
Each and every incident leaves you with an ever growing sense of paranoia that this cannot be explained away by being merely pure bad luck. There are cosmic forces at force that clearly want you dead.
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On Thursday, there are leftover cupcakes from a client conference. Mary, the secretary in your team, boxes up four of them for you and tells you to take them with you, because, "you've had a rough week, toots."
It’s not a flattering assessment of you, but when you see your own reflection in the mirrors of the office toilets, you can’t help but think it’s an accurate one. You look rough. Eyes bloodshot with deep furrowed lines underneath. Your face is gaunter than you remember seeing it too. 
You take the cupcakes. 
It's the first good thing that has happened to you all week, and as small of a comfort it is, you take it as a win.
You eye the box from your desk the rest of the day, squirreled away in your tiny cubicle. You are determined not to eat one while at work. Because you'll be damned if Matt from accounting catches a whiff of your cupcakes and asks you to share one with him. You want to properly savor them in the comfort of your home at the end of the day.
But as often is the case when you have something to look forward to, the seconds, minutes and hours tick away with a reluctant drag as if time itself knew you wanted the day to end faster and decided it'd be fun to flip yet another cosmic middle finger in your direction. 
When it's finally time to end work, you get off your chair so forcefully it knocks it to the floor. You are practically jogging through the lanes of cubicles to get to the elevator, and nearly smack the security guard on the other side with how hard you swing open the front door. 
It's pouring outside, which, of course it is. You take off your jacket and cover your cupcake box with it, because you're not going to let the universe ruin the one good thing you've got going for you this week, as you run towards the station.
The moment you step into the damp and sticky station any remaining sense of joy in you evaporates. There's a hoard of tourists swarming the subway paying no attention to their surroundings. Tourists wearing their caps and backpacks and wheelies knocking over a 'Caution Wet Floor ' sign as they gather in a throng in front of the subway map, blocking the way as you hear the train approach.
It's not that big of a deal. A train comes every two to five minutes, and if you miss this one, you'll just get on the next one. It's not the end of the world. Logically, you know that. Emotionally and spiritually however, the world around you has just taken a little bit too much from you for you to concede to this minor little loss.
You are going to make this goddamned train.
Taking a determined step forward, you shoulder and push your way through the throng of people to fight your way to the front of the track.
You push a little too hard. Your feet skid across the slippery tiles, leg buckling from your own weight and you lose control, tumbling forward.
In your peripheral view there's a blinding light approaching. There's wind beating the sides of your face, and you can hear the screeching metal of the train right next to you. Your foot drops into empty space and you are falling into the tracks. 
Oh god why...
Why?
You just want to live.
The cupcake box flies out of your grip, splattered somewhere across the front pane of the train. There's a hard tug on your shirt as an invisible force you cannot see yanks you back, hard.
Your head whips back and for a fraction of a second, there are crimson eyes staring back down at you, you blink and then it's gone.
You land on your ass with a bruising force to your tailbone with a bone-breaking thud. The subway whizzes by with a demonic roar past you, inches from where you're sprawled on your ass on the dirty tiles of the subway station.
In front of your feet, there's a long streak of white frosting trailing down from your feet to the tracks of what looks like a crime scene.
Maybe it's the stress. Maybe you've just had a bad night of sleep (after many successive bad nights with little to no sleep). But something in you breaks at the sight of the frosting smeared across the dirty subway tiles.
Your eyes sting with exhaustion. Chest drawing in tight with a crumbling ache that makes you want to curl up on the cold tiles. You're just so tired.
There are people around you staring at you. No one in their right mind who lives in New York would sit on the floor of the subway.
But your legs are heavy and numb. You can’t move from the spot. Everything tastes like bile. You try to swallow and force it back down but it's no use, your throat has swollen shut. Your cheeks run wet and you press your palms to your eyes to make it stop but that only seems to make it worse. Snot runs down your nose and drips down your wrist. You're crying and you don't know how to stop.
Is this the rest of your life?
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In the morning, you wake in your bed with a sore ache that gnaws at your bones. Swollen eyes and a soreness that scratches the lining of your throat.
Your back hurts, and as you try to turn to your side to get out of bed a sharp pain surges up along your entire spine.
Fuck.
It's too bright. The sunlight is offensive. It stings your eyes and makes you sick to your stomach. You only have vague memories of how you made it back home. Feet shuffling through the subway in a daze like the walking dead.
God is that what you are? A dead man woman walking?
You crane your head and catch a glimpse of your clock on the bedside table. 9.13 You're late for work. But that's mind as well, you don't have it in you to make it in.
What's the point anyhow? You hate that place.
Besides, if the subway on the way over doesn't finish off the job this time around, then eventually a taxi will. Failing that the universe is probably going to send over a ninja assassin rat from the subway to come after your life.
There's a soft breeze coming in from the open window that grazes the back of your neck and you turn your head towards it. All you can see from your window is the brick wall of the neighboring building. Even though your apartment is on the sixth floor, you can't see a speck of the New York skyline.
Still the breeze is nice, though you don't remember opening the window last night. You never usually do. It is silly and paranoid. No human robber could possibly climb up your six storey building just to climb into your window and rob you. If they could, they’d find that there isn’t much to rob in your apartment, the most valuable thing you own is a complete Le Creuset Cookware set. 
Your eyes glaze over your work tote bag on the floor next to the window, drifting upwards and spot the pink box sat on the window sill and you stop. 
You didn’t put that there. 
You sit upright in your bed, setting your feet to the floor and force yourself to leave your bed as you pad over to the open window.
It's a fancy looking thing. Baby pink, and chiffon ribbon on its side. Wrapping your pinkie around it, you tug it loose. You perch your thumb against the corner of the lid when you stop.
It's not another one of the universe's assassination attempts is it? You're not going to open it to find a bomb ticking down are you?
You hesitate for another moment, taking a deep calming breath before you gather the courage to finally lift the lid. Inside, there is a gorgeous display of cupcakes adorned with white and pink frosting, topped with strawberries, chocolate shavings and on two of them there's mini macarons.
Way fancier than the day old Costco cupcakes you'd lost yesterday.
Picking up one, you take a bite. The frosting is light and zesty. The refreshing lemon melts on the tip of your tongue as the buttery cream floods your mouth with the rich flavor. It's the best thing you've ever tasted.
Lifting the box, you check the sides of it to see if there's any note left behind, but there's none.
Gladis Bakery. It's from a bakery you've never heard of before. When you google the name the place is outside of New Jersey, 58 minutes away and you would need to take a subway then switch to a tram.
There's no note attached, but you don't need one. The list of candidates who would be physically able to climb up six floors up the bricks of your apartment building to leave cupcakes on your window isn’t a long one. 
Something warm blooms in your chest at the thought, and your fingers linger on the top of the box, savoring the taste of lemon and sugar still lingering on your tongue.
You put your head out the window, not sure what you're expecting to find but find yourself disappointed all the same when there's nothing there. No people in the quiet street below, and nothing unusual above.
"Thank you for uhm... saving me,” you say into the silence with nothing but the traffic noise below to answer you. 
 “And the cupcakes," you add. 
There's no reply. 
~ To be continued.
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sylusjinwoon · 4 months ago
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{ 204 }
of painful auras and cute boys.
university au
jinwoo sung x fem.reader
there was an incredibly cute student who was in your class, and you could not seem to look away from him. each time you attended your morning classes, you would take note of how diligent he remained, always sitting near the front row while writing / typing out his notes on his slender laptop.
you assumed that he was a freshman like you, since his presence was not quite known by the upperclassman-
however, that didn't stop students across all classes from admiring him. from what little you gathered about him, you knew that his name was sung jinwoo, and he had plans of pursuing a degree in criminology after completing the required general education courses for the first few semesters. and despite how boring these classes were, each and every one of the professors were pleasantly surprised at how much he excelled in each and every one of them.
by the end of the fall semester, jinwoo had already reached the dean's list at the college, earning quite a few envious glares from his peers (which unfortunately, included you as well). it was odd, but, through the classes that you shared with him, you became aware of how his drive to succeed seemed to be taken up to the next level.
even if it was mildly infuriating to you, at the same time, you found a great source of motivation in him. throughout your high school years, you managed to scrape by with average grades (making plenties of c's and b's here and there, with true a's coming once in a blue moon)-
but seeing how devoted jinwoo was to his studies made you want to change your outlook on your university life. after classes, you would usually catch sight of jinwoo settled within the library with his textbooks spread across the tables as his hands diligently scribbled some notes within the confines of his notebook. he never seemed to carry that typical laziness seen within most freshman students after experiencing their first few weeks of college-
and you greatly admired him for it.
so... using your crush role model as your sole inspiration, you began to change your study habits and did your best to work just as hard as jinwoo. you would find a quiet corner in the middle of the library, (making sure you kept a safe distance from said role model and motivation), as you began your studies for the day. your eyes would glance up at him every so often, using his focused expression as a means to further motivate and inspire you to work harder.
your session starts out normal enough, with you comparing your written lecture notes to what the textbook chapter says. but the more you kept reading your textbook, the more you slowly began to feel a slight ache taking over the forefront of your brain. you shut your eyes for a few minutes, counting down the seconds that make up a minute by tens before reopening your eyes-
only to realize that your vision had gotten considerably worse.
for some reason, your eyes could only see weblike illusions, further marring your vision as you let out a soft moan in response. due to what you knew was an aura hindering your vision, you could feel the familiar pulse against your temple coupled along with the wave of nausea.
the lights used to brighten the library suddenly became too bright, making it painful for you as your breathing slowly became labored. the pain felt all across your head just kept mounting, becoming even more excruciating as you let out a soft moan, trying to relieve the ache by massaging at your temples, but to no avail. you were completely rendered helpless from the severity of your migraine, uncertain of what to do as hot tears were felt spilling from your eyes.
"hey, are you okay?" a gentle and calm voice calls out to you, but you could only manage a tiny whimper in response.
"no... i'm not okay... i think i'm having a bad migraine right now."
you hear someone, (a young man), click his tongue in response to your admission and try to meet his gaze, only to have that same aura place what looked like a static filter across your eyes, keeping the boy's identity hidden from you.
you listen as he lets out a hum before gathering your textbooks and notebooks together, placing them all neatly inside of your backpack along with your pencil case. "come with me, i'll help you."
clinging to his arms, you try to walk beside him, only to run the side of your hips against one of the tables as it made you wince in response. a rich chuckle was heard close to your ear when a smooth voice tells you, "hang on tight."
not even bothering to wait for your reply, you found yourself picked up by this mystery boy, gasping as you tried to fight against the powerful vertigo that courses through you. "w-whoa! d-did you just pick me up?"
"i had to... i couldn't have such a vulnerable girl continue hurting herself when she clearly can't see." amusement was heard within the richness of his voice, and had you not been feeling so nauseated and sick, you would have protested against his playful words.
with your vision still ruined by such a powerful aura, you could only put your trust within this perfect stranger as he carried you out of the library and back onto campus grounds. with your eyes clenched shut to avoid the intensity of the sunlight, you felt him walking to a more secluded area, hearing the grass crunching beneath him with each step that he takes before settling you down beneath what felt like an oak tree.
the shadows provided by such large branches was enough to help ease the ache on your eyes. your savior ends up joining you, kneeling down close to you as you felt the way he brushes back your hair before gently massaging at your forehead. at first, his touch makes you let out a soft hiss in response, but the more he kept caressing at your head, the less pain you felt-
like he was purposely soothing your migraine away with his gentle touches.
your eyes go wide, finally seeing the way the static clears away from your vision as you came face to face with sung jinwoo himself. you begin to tremble at the mere sight of him, tilting your head slightly at how his eyes seemed to glow a faint purple while he kept his hands against your head.
he sees your gaze and the way your lips remain parted for him, smiling down at you before removing his hand from your forehead. "do you feel better now?" jinwoo asks you with a gentle smile, and seeing such a beautiful sight up close was enough to make your heart pound.
you gingerly touch at your forehead and temple, the searing headache finally gone along with the sense of nausea. your expression was a bewildered one, yet it was filled with gratitude when you thanked him.
"t-thank you. i feel... so much better now... h-how did you do that?"
jinwoo simply gives you a tender smile and a wink, "sorry, that's going to be a secret for now. can't have you knowing everything about me too soon... because how else are you going to keep chasing after me?"
his teasing words make you lose all of your senses, for not even a single, coherent word could come from your parted lips. as you were left practically gaping at him, jinwoo hums before standing back to his full height, placing both hands within the pocket of his jeans while looking down at you.
you remain silent, seeing the way jinwoo's gaze seemed to flicker with an unknown emotion before becoming darker-
as if he wanted to look within the very depths of your soul.
the sheer intensity of his gaze was enough to make a sudden heat rush to your cheeks in response. yet as soon as that intense expression appears within jinwoo's stormy grey eyes, it disappears the next moment. a gentle smile paints his handsome features when he offers a hand to you, "would you like to join me for some coffee? i feel like you deserve a treat after suffering from such a bad migraine."
you were still unable to speak, simply nodding at him as you placed your hand within his, allowing jinwoo to help you up. he grabs both his and yours respective backpacks with little complaint, simply keeping his fingertips interlocked with yours as he walked with you to the nearest cafe.
as he walks with you, jinwoo could see shadowy wisps dancing around him excitedly, speaking to him:
"ah, it is such a great honor to be in the presence of our queen once more... congratulations on finding her, my liege."
and despite how you were unaware of jinwoo's beloved soldiers talking amongst themselves, he could hear them perfectly while letting out a secretive smile in response, giving your hands a gentle squeeze as proof of the happiness that he felt at being able to find you in this lifetime.
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a.n. - i am so sorry; i still have the worst block for jinwoo,,, but i hope you readers will enjoy this little drabble 🥹
all stories are written by rei; reposts, translations, and plagiarism are not allowed.
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muffinlance · 5 months ago
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State of the Muffin Report 2023-24
Happy belated birthday to my fanfics! Little Zuko turned six back in March. <3 
Behold, my annual roundup stats, because you can get fanfic from the math teacher but you can’t get the math out of the fanfic:
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[id: Screenshot of an excel spreadsheet showing my 2023-24 word counts. Important info is that over six stories, I wrote 104k words, for a monthly average of 8.6k and a daily of 284 words. End id.]
Fanfic:
After not touching the birthday fic itself since 2019, Little Zuko v the World is finally finished! Woooo.
Otherwise, a slow-but-steady sort of year on the fanfic front.
Serious Face Writing & RL:
Li’s Friends has now raised $4,206.21 USD for wildlife charity, not counting gift matches. <3
Finished the second book in my original fic series, Fox’s Tongue; The Skin Stealer’s Son officially launched yesterday! (Affiliate link, so that if you happen to buy it, Amazon pays me extra money for the privilege.)
I also created a secondary tiny human, and she is a DELIGHT. She was last seen a half hour ago crawling after her brother like a particularly aggressive tripod, Hop on Pop in one hand, and slap-screaming at it until he read it to her. My children. <3
Year Six (2024-25) Goals
Fanfic: 
Gonna finish the new case of Dark Night in Ba Sing Se. Gonna finish it so good. (This is a donation fic for the winner of my Fandom Trumps Hate charity auction and is therefore due by the end of the year, so woo artificial timelines! Ah external motivations, how I missed you from my school days.)
I’m incredibly excited for Blindsiding Badgermoles, and have that same lovely external motivation in the form of my sensitivity reader, so planning to focus on that this year.
Finish the current book of Towards the Sun. We’re currently on the final field trip, so that should be very doable. —I say, using the exact same wording for the third year in a row. Honestly this one’s less a goal than a joke to see how many years it’s actually going to take me. And hey, I’ve been making progress! We now have the delight that is Lady Jun! Third year’s the charm?
Serious Face Writing & RL: 
Get a solid start on Fox’s Tongue Book Three, Face of the Wolf King.
Get out large print editions of the first two books.
Continue raising children.
Special thanks this year goes to First and Secondborn, who blessed me with the ability to still manage over 100k in a year, which is way more than I anticipated at this time last year.
Cheers,
MuffinLance
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darkworkcourier · 2 years ago
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Could you write Ghost x fem!reader where she finds him attractive but is too shy to actually tell him but also can't hide the way she's feeling, so Ghost notices her interest and eventually they end up in bed (*cough* you know what I mean)? Also Ghost being gentle and protective towards her, plz
Ps. I love your writing!
Word Count: 8314
i’m incapable of short prompt fills, apparently! o, but i am filled with grief!
anywho, reader’s codename is ‘ladybird’ (hc that soap gave it to her because she’s lucky) but is otherwise nameless.
contains masturbation, oral sex, lots of feelings, wee bit of slow burn, ghost being like weirdly emotional and soft, and soap’s gratuitous and unfortunate use of emojis. 💀/🐞4ever
---
The first time it really hits you, you're in a helicopter about two miles above the ground—honestly a terrible place to face your feelings. It's a velvet-dark night, strategically chosen for the new moon, the countryside below nearly invisible. You're almost in a doze, caught up in the Chinook's blades' low, thunderous pulse and the sporadic rocking as it hits little glades of turbulence. Your eyes lose focus on some of the running lights, until they turn hazy, and its only when the man across from you moves his boot do you snap back to attention.
Ghost. Right. You learned his name a few weeks ago during your orientation, but he was deployed on a recon mission only a day later. Price summoned him back for this mission, but aside from a few gruff comments at the all-hands meeting, you haven't heard him say much.
For a moment, you think he might have dozed off, too. He’s leaning back in his seat, arms crossed over his chest, eyes closed. And that’s fair, you think; Soap told you he didn’t think Ghost ever slept.
You silently study him, the way his head rocks a little with the turbulence, how much taller he is than everyone else in his row, the peculiar illusion that the eye sockets of his mask are empty—
And suddenly they aren’t.
He’s looking back at you, dark eyes regarding you passively, even though the mask makes every look significantly more intimidating. For moment that goes on way too long, you don’t look away, your gazes locked. Your heart takes the tracheal elevator to your throat, beating loud enough to drown out the Chinook’s roar.
You look away first, and you swear you hear him snort.
The rest of the journey to the drop-off zone, you deliberately don’t look at him; but when you close your eyes, there he is.
All you can think is ohhhh, shit.
---
Military crushes aren’t abnormal. Put enough people at the peak of physical excellence in a room, throw around some form-fitting uniforms, and mix in a few adrenaline rushes—it’s a goddamn potent mixture. You’ve had your share of mess hall dreamy-eyed gazing sessions, and a few ‘I hate to see you leave, but I love to watch you go’ moments in gyms and fitness centers. That’s fine; that’s normal.
What you start feeling for Ghost isn’t that.
Nevermind that he’s rarely out of tactical dress, and if he is, he usually defaults to a hoodie or something that doesn’t exactly entice the imagination. And he’s never out of some variation of his mask, so you can’t think woah, pal, do you cut glass with that jawline because as far as you can tell, he doesn’t have one. No mooning over cheekbones, admiring the curve of lips. He has nice eyes, but ever since the night in the Chinook, you haven’t been able to meet them for more than a second before your heart does that terrible little samba again.
Per your mental checklist, aside from being tall and muscular, he doesn’t check all your normal boxes. By all those counts, Gaz or Soap are way better fits. Hell, Soap likes to hang around in his silkies like they’re pajamas, showing off plenty to keep your fantasy fodder trough filled. And you’ve caught Gaz doing push-ups in the lounge, his tight shirt doing wonders for his shoulders.
But it’s Ghost who makes you feel like a hormonal teenager. It’s Ghost that gets you antsy and fidgety when he enters a room. And it’s Ghost that you think about during your rare alone time in the shower, when your hands start drifting south and the tile walls are your only support.
You’ve got it bad for him, and you have no idea what to do about it.
---
You’re doing recon in Berlin when Soap notices.
The mission details are simple: a drug lord known as Keiler using a night club as a go-between for his suppliers and dealers—all further complicated by the fact that he has plenty of friends in the arms trade, and by Laswell’s reports, he’s very generous to those friends. The club is a front, a money laundering wonderland. Through your observation, drugs and alcohol are doled out in equal volume, all to the backdrop of skull-splitting bass and sharp scalpels of strobe lights.
The biggest obstacle is that Keiler likes to use a private room overlooking the club as his perch, and your intelligence says that at any given time, he has a small army defending him. Getting to him requires an incredible degree of finesse. Naturally, Ghost is the one to do it.
You, Soap, and Gaz are scattered around the main floor of the club. Gaz is out on the dance floor, Soap’s taken up a spot near the bar, and you’re in the lounge. It’s the first time you’ve done something like this (and in an outfit with so little fabric), and you’re really not used to being ogled and pawed by a bunch of drunk, drugged, or horny Berliners.
Soap must see your discomfort from his position, as you hear a dry, amused, “Feelin’ a little tense, Ladybird?”
You swallow hard and chase it with a sip of your drink, which definitely needs to be watered down. “I’m fine,” you say.
“You look like you just drank petrol.”
“You’re the one who ordered it for me.”
Gaz cuts in with a weary, “Do we have eyes on Ghost, yet? I’m starting to get tired of people grabbing my—”
“I’m here,” Ghost’s voice scrapes over the comms, causing you to sit up straight and look around. You catch sight of Soap who has his hand curled in front of his mouth, clearly snickering like a heathen.
“Think you scared the shit out of Ladybird, LT,” he says.
He’s lucky he’s on the other side of the room, otherwise you’d pretend to be extremely clumsy and find an excuse to spill your drink on his (very, very tight) shirt. You mouth ‘shut up’ at him, and he reaches up with his pointer finger to draw an invisible halo over his head.
Ghost ignores him. “I’m near the east stairwell, headed to second deck. Got one guard at the far end. Gaz, you seein’ anything I should know about?”
A pause, then, “Negative, Ghost. I’ve got what you’ve got.”
“Copy. Going to second deck now.”
Out of habit, your eyes go to the east stairwell, peering through the haze pierced with multicolored lights to see a single dark shape ascending. He disappears behind a catwalk, then reappears to the right, mingling with the crowd near the second floor bar. Once he’s there, he seems to fade into the throng of people, most in dark clothing, some in masks. Just like that, he’s invisible.
It’s hard to focus on looking calm and happy to be there, but you keep sipping your drink, watching the dancers and feeling the bassline of yet another techno song thrumming in your chest. You’re glad you’re not out on the dance floor, or being called to give come-hither glances to bouncers and guards.
Then, “Coming back down to first deck,” Ghost says, clearly agitated. “Too many guards and too many people. We need another way up.”
Soap grins. “Violence isn’t the answer, LT?”
“Negative. Start looking for another route.”
On cue, you stand up and cross the room to the bar, sliding in beside Soap. He’s fishing for another couple Euro from his wallet, pushing it across to the bartender with two fingers. The bartender gives him a brief nod and refills his glass, while Soap turns his attention to you.
“Any bright ideas?”
You frown and adjust the straps on your top again. It’s a stupid piece of clothing, always feeling like it’s going to fall off. “Only the emergency stairs by the front doors, but I can’t imagine Keiler leaves those undefended.”
Soap looks thoughtful and scratches at his stubble. “Yeah, but probably no civilians, either. And if the door’s alarmed, Ghost can take care of that.”
As if summoned, you feel Ghost appear before you see him, a huge presence over your shoulder that makes you jump. “Jesus!” you hiss.
And Soap, the traitor, laughs to the point of wheezing as Ghost takes up the bar stool on his other side. “I think you’re giving our Ladybird here a complex,” Soap says through his laughter.
Ghost rolls his eyes. From this angle, you can see Ghost in more than just the dim light you’ve been working with most of the night. He’s not dressed too far outside his usual fashion wheelhouse—heavy boots, black trousers, and a loose black hoodie. His hood’s pulled up over a black beanie and a skull-painted gaiter, and he’s foregone his usual thick coating of greasepaint for black-ringed eyes (is that eyeliner?) and a streak of smoke-colored paint that just manages to obscure the color of his brows. The downside (for you, at least) is that the combo manages to draw his eyes into sharper contrast, making them that much more intense.
Suddenly, your heart’s doing the thing again.
Ghost doesn’t seem to notice any change in you, but you think Soap’s actually looking for it. He watches you, brows lifted, mouth curled like a flirtation of a smirk. Briefly, he glances between you and Ghost, and then the smirk appears in full force, enlightenment dawning.
Before he can insinuate a thing, you’re shoving your half-empty glass across the bar top with a too-high, “Bitte.” The bartender only gives you a brief, unamused look before taking your glass and remaking whatever godforsaken cocktail Soap ordered.
It’s not a good distraction, and the damage is already done. Soap knows, damnit. His smile is too easygoing, but he turns to Ghost and starts talking about the emergency stairwell, which is a relief. Ghost looks over his shoulder toward the stairwell in question, and as he does, Soap looks at you and makes the gesture of zipping his own mouth shut, throwing away the proverbial key with a wink.
As he does, Gaz pipes back up with, “Ghost, you copy?”
“Yeah, Gaz?”
“You, uh, know anything about a big guy with a tattoo of a boar on the back of his head?”
Ghost looks toward the dance floor, brows furrowing. “Yeah, that’d be Bauer, Keiler’s right hand man.”
“Great. Glad you know him, because he’s here.”
Shit. He wasn’t supposed to be. If Bauer’s here, then either Keiler’s doing something more than his usual partying upstairs, or Keiler knows someone’s here looking for him. Either way, the mission just got significantly harder, and your night got that much longer.
With a grunt, Ghost pushes off the bar and starts making his way to the emergency stairwell. “I’ll take care of it,” he says. “Keep your eyes open. Out here.”
Once he’s gone, there’s a pause—a very heavy pause. Then, Soap looks at you with an expression that is just a hair too pleased. “Ghost, huh?”
Your face heats up, right as the bartender hands you your drink. You reach for your wallet, only for the bartender to put a hand up and shake his head. “Nein, für das schöne Mädchen,” he says.
For the pretty girl.
“Bet Ghost thinks so, too,” Soap says, and you resolve to definitely spill your free drink on his too-tight pants.
---
Weeks after Keiler’s nice and cozy in a maximum-security prison and the 141 is back at base, you have another miniature existential crisis.
It’s all an accident—just a tempest of bad timing and bad luck. Ever since you came back from Germany, you’ve had a tough time getting a full night’s sleep. It’s easy to blame the natural stress of your work, the long hours, the high-adrenaline action you see more than you ever did before this job. And, well, part of it has to come from Ghost. He’s occupied your thoughts more than ever since the night club.
Your solution is to hit the gym late at night, pushing yourself until you can’t keep your eyes open and no amount of insomnia can overcome it. The first few nights of this effort work fine—you end up in bed around one or two in the morning, and sleep until your alarm goes off. No one bothers you; no one hogs the machines. It’s kind of nice.
However, you don’t account for all the night owls that share the base with you.
You head to the gym late on a Friday night, towel around your neck, water bottle at the ready, podcasts preloaded. If you ever hit the gym during the day, you usually do so in a t-shirt and sweatpants. At night, you’ve started opting for PT shorts and a tank top, happy for the lack of eyes around the room.
Except for tonight.
You open the door into the gym, only to hear the mechanical drone of a treadmill and someone sprinting damn fast on it. For a second, you freeze, hiding behind the corner. Then, slowly, you peer around it, clutching your phone and water bottle close to your chest.
Jesus Christ. It’s Ghost.
Ghost, in a t-shirt. In sweatpants. Running on a treadmill set to the highest incline. Panting.
Ghost, with bare arms, showing a detailed tattoo on his left arm, and prominent veins running over his chiseled muscles. He looks like a fucking Greek statue, and that’s just what you can see.
“Ohhh, my God,” you whisper to yourself, immediately working on an exit strategy that doesn’t involve catching his attention.
Which obviously doesn’t come to pass. It’s something you probably should have learned on the helo ride—Ghost knows when he’s being watched. He turns his head, dark eyes fixing on you immediately. Briefly, he looks back at the treadmill, then down at his watch, and back to the treadmill’s controls. He slows it down, dropping the incline, until he finally steps off and starts walking toward you.
Abort, abort.
You think about fleeing, running back to your room or rolling under a table or hiding behind a counter like he’s a goddamn velociraptor in the kitchen. You do none of those things, because despite your training, you freeze up. No one could blame you, you think. It’s hard to do much else when a six-foot-something skull-faced wall of muscle walks up to you. And you must look stellar, holed up in a corner by the door, your water bottle and phone held up like a shield.
Ghost takes in the sight of you, eyes flicking up, down, up. Heat rises to your face, and down to—to nowhere, because it’s better not to think about it. You suddenly feel too vulnerable in your choice of outfit, naked under his gaze.
“Ladybird,” he says. Your nickname becomes a hot scratch of sound, losing its whimsy in favor of a tone you can’t define. “You need somethin’?”
There’s a patch of sweat by his collar. You stare at it, then at the floor.
“No, I just—  I was, um, just about to leave, and... Yeah, I’m gonna go.”
He’s silent until you finally look up at him, meeting his eyes for the first time in what what feels like an eon. He looks amused, but there’s a quirk in his brow like he can’t quite get a good read on you. “You look like you were about to use the gym.”
You look down at your bottle, phone, and towel like you’re just now noticing them. When you bring your attention back to him, you feel like you need to just kick the door open and escape, dignity be damned. “I... was,” you say slowly. Then, you rally yourself, trying to look upbeat and resolved. “Y’know what? You can keep using it. I’ll come back later.”
He shrugs, but you see it. Some secondary expression slinking around in his eyes like it’s working through the perpetually-moving cogs in his head. He gives you another one of those assessing glances, and for a second, you think he’s going to step into your space. His body language looks primed to do so, and you hold your breath in anticipation for it, unsure of what he’s going to do.
Then he takes a step back, and another.
“Suit yourself,” he says. “I wouldn’t mind it, though.”
Before you can process his words, he’s back on the treadmill, tweaking the settings and raising the incline again. The belt starts moving, and he’s back to looking like power personified, a vision in motion.
You have got it so bad.
It’s a hasty retreat to your room, and once the door’s shut behind you, you’re panting like you had run on the treadmill and lifted weights.
“Shit, shit, shit,” you hiss, discarding your things on the table beside your bed, kicking off your running shoes, then laying down and staring at the ceiling. He knows. He has to. Ghost’s whole job depends on him being observant, and he looked at you like he was reading a fucking book. 
You groan and press your palms into your eyes until phosphenes appear, dancing around and shimmering like fireworks behind your eyelids. You’re going to have to leave the 141 out of pure mortification. You’ll have to go into some kind of witness protection, change your name, and move to the other side of the earth. Or if you stay, you’ll have to pretend Ghost doesn’t exist. You’ll hide behind walls, slinking through the building’s HVAC just to avoid him like you’re working on a heist. Maybe you can convince Soap or Gaz to accompany you everywhere so you can hide behind their bulk.
But then, your horrible brain reminds you of what you’ll miss out on. It runs through a greatest hits reel of your crush so far—Ghost’s eyes, his presence stretching long over you like a shadow, his massive frame, his arms. The tattoo, detailed enough to tell from a distance, and then the thought of running your fingers over it, tracing all the fine points and lines. And are those his only tattoos, or are there more?
And his voice. Jesus, you replay the few words you’ve heard him say over and over, savoring each syllable, each quirk of his accent. Even the last thing he said—
I wouldn’t mind it, though.
That makes you open your eyes again, widening them as you take in the pocks and scrapes on the ceiling. He wouldn’t mind what? Having company in the gym? Having you, specifically, as his company? You don’t know what to make of it, or what he meant by it. Honestly, you feel like you don’t know anything right now.
Except that you want him. That’s the only thing you’re sure of. You want to know how his hands feel on you, how they would run over your bare skin, what the callouses on his fingers would feel like on the most delicate and sensitive parts of your body. Your imagination leaps ahead of you, guiding your own hand down into your shorts and under the band of your panties. You tease yourself, just dipping your fingers into the wet heat, trailing them over your clit like a hint to yourself, coaxing your arousal out of your panic.
His hands would feel different. When you rub your index finger over your clit, you imagine his finger instead, pressing gently against you, building up friction slowly, making you ache. You wonder if he’d savor your reactions, watching you get worked up, grinding against his hand to seek any kind of relief.
“Easy, Ladybird,” you imagine him saying, the nickname now a tease. And he’d know your real name, the one hidden away in your file. He’d whisper it into your ear, breath hot on your neck, his whole body eclipsing yours.
Your pace quickens, fingers running urgently between your clit and opening, causing your core to tighten and your breath to come in short gasps and barely-concealed moans. Ghost would tell you to let them out, let the whole damn base hear how aroused he makes you, how badly you’ve wanted him.
You breathe his name into the small space of your room, a whisper in the still air broken only by the low hum of the forced air in the vents. When you finally plunge your fingers in, it takes every bit of self-control not to outright moan and let everyone nearby know what you’re doing. Normally, you can stay quiet when you get yourself off, but you’re damn near frantic with this, whatever it is Ghost has done to you.
His fingers in you, fucking you in long, languid strokes, drawing himself out and pushing back in—all the while, watching your reactions. When you rock your hips to the pace of your hand, you imagine his voice again, “That’s right. Fuck yourself on my hand. Let me see you.”
You’d show him. Hell, you’d soak his hand, and it would remind him that it’s his fault you’re like this.
The wet sounds of your hand on your cunt is lewd and loud. It’s almost too much, enough to make you stop at the apex of your pleasure, to hide yourself under the blankets in shame and pretend that none of this happened.
But the vision of Ghost keeps you going, keeps your fingers moving in and out, crooking them inside and forcing out a gasp as a white-hot shock of pleasure lances up your spine and settles warm in your belly. The pad of your thumb presses against your clit, and you multitask on yourself, building up that friction, bringing yourself to the precipice.
He’d take you there. He might even pull you back from the edge over and over, teasing you with the fall.
“Do you want it? How bad? Show me.”
God, you would. Any way he wanted, you would show him. You’d beg and plead if that’s what got him to finally make you come.
So you whisper, “Please,” into the night, to a man who is never going to be in your bed, never going to touch you like this, never going to see your pleasure through to the end. The Ghost in your imagination has to stay there, behind locked doors and bulkheads, secured and contained for good.
But until then, you chase your orgasm with him, hitting that divine height and going into a freefall. Blood rushes in your ears, muscles twitching, heart racing. Your head comes off the pillow, back arching, toes digging into the mattress, mouth open on a moan that you refuse to let loose. You come way harder than you ever have using your own hand, enough that when you finally lower yourself back onto the bed, you grimace at the feeling of a wet patch on the sheets.
“Fuck,” you say, very emphatically. To yourself, to Ghost, to the whole damn situation.
Groaning, you reach over and grab the towel, wiping your hand and tucking it under your ass before rolling onto your back again and wondering what the hell you’re going to do.
---
You’re going to hide from Ghost, that’s what.
Captain Price gives the team a few days off to rest up for the next mission, and you decide right then and there that you’re going to spend every second off base, as far away from the barracks as you can get. You’ll get a hotel, order a ridiculously expensive amount of room service, and marinate in your feelings for a couple days until it’s all out of your system. Maybe you’ll go to a bar or coffee shop and chat up some nice person who isn’t a tall, broad, terrifying British soldier. And maybe you’ll have a night of incredible passion and twisted sheets, and it’ll be so cathartic that when you come back to base, you’ll be a whole new person.
That plan holds until your phone goes off while you’re packing up.
It’s a text from Soap: ‘wyd?’
‘Going off radar for a couple days. Why?’
He sends a sad emoji, then two beer glasses clinking together, a soccer ball, and then a big red question mark. Apparently, Soap only knows how to speak in hieroglyphs.
You smile, and type back, ‘Sorry, need to go clear my head.’
Skull emoji. Question mark.
‘None of your beeswax,’ you send, followed by the soap emoji.
‘that sucks,’ he types back. There’s a short pause, and then he types again. ‘cause he was looking for u earlier’
Your heart damn near comes to a stop, and you very hesitantly respond, ‘Why?’
‘idk. think he wanted to ask u smth’
Nope. You’re not taking the bait. If Ghost wants to talk to you, he can come right up and—and you can walk off in the opposite direction and act like there’s something incredibly interesting that you need to see right that second.
You type a few variations of ‘Then he can come and talk to me himself,’ but none of them sound particularly nice. Ghost hasn’t done anything wrong, so there’s no reason for you to act like he has. And for that matter, you’re supposed to be hiding from Ghost, not encouraging him to find you. Instead, you send back a clipped, ‘Okay.’
Nothing.
For one hopeful second, you think Soap’s mercifully let the conversation go, allowing you to go in peace to your nice hotel and your overpriced room service food.
Instead, you get the sunglasses emoji, a wink face, and, ‘k i told him to come see u’.
‘WHAT’
The only response is the skull and the little running cloud dash emoji, suggesting that Ghost is making a beeline right to your room. Panic seizes you and you fling your phone on your bed like somehow it’s going to help. It bounces harmlessly, then lands screen up, emojis taunting you.
Quickly, you start shoving the rest of your clothes and toiletries in your bag without a care as to where everything goes, eager to book it out of there as fast as your legs can take you. Once your bag is zipped up and thrown over your shoulder, you think you might be in the clear. Mission nearly accomplished.
Nearly.
Two solid knocks on your door almost make you hit the ceiling. You hold still, using that Jurassic Park wisdom again: if you don’t move, he can’t see you.
That applies to fictional dinosaurs, not trained killers, and certainly not Ghost. He knocks again, then follows it up with, “Ladybird, it’s me.”
Yeah, you know. That’s the problem.
Briefly, you consider going out the window, shimmying out and potentially getting caught on a base security camera for someone to laugh at later. That doesn’t make the problem go away, though.
You can just tell him you’re in a hurry, that your ride is at the gate right now and you don’t want to keep them waiting. Whatever conversation he wants to have, it’ll have to wait until you get back. It’s a good response. Solid. Foolproof.
And it dissolves the second you open the door.
He’s there, not vanished in the disappearing act you were hoping for, and all that want flares up again the moment you see him. He’s in casual dress like what he wore to the club—boots, jeans, t-shirt, hoodie, balaclava. His posture’s more relaxed, one hand in his hoodie pocket, the other hanging at his side. You meet his eyes, and your regret mixes with desire welling up inside you.
It’s that intense gaze from the helo, the brief but incendiary look from Berlin, the thoughtful gaze from the gym. You’re drawn up in it immediately, and this time, there’s no possibility of looking away. Ghost has you locked in.
He takes in the sight of you, dressed in your civvies, backpack on your shoulders, and raises his brows. “Going somewhere?”
Your mouth is cotton-dry, and you’re proud of yourself for putting a little syntax together. “Yeah,” you say. “I’m headed out.”
Right now, you should say. I’m going out right this second and I cannot be stopped. Do not engage.
But you don’t say that. You leave the words as they are, hanging between the two of you. In that moment, you’re two opposing fronts of contradictions—you want him to go, stay, talk, stay silent, touch you, leave you alone.
Ghost seems to sense this, that you’re not making any move to either speak to him or push him away. He doesn’t get into your space, staying right where he is while looking at you with his head slightly tilted. “Can I come in a sec?”
No. “Yes.” Please.
You take a step back, allowing him to walk into your room. His presence seems to fill it, like there’s too much of him and too little space to contain it. He closes the door behind himself, then finds a spot against the wall (the rare section that isn’t covered by posters or mementos) and leans against it. Still, still giving you your space.
You’re all nerves, waiting for him to speak, yet feeling like you should say something—to get all your feelings out in the open, exposed and waiting for him to pick over and do with what he will. But your anxiety and silence wins out, and instead you fidget, trying to find a point in the room to fix your gaze. Ghost takes all your attention though, holding it in a firm, invisible grip that can’t be broken no matter what you do. You get now, more than ever, why people are so scared of him when they end up at the wrong end of his skill set—he immobilizes them, rendering them completely unable to do a damn thing.
He watches you for an agonizingly long moment, then sighs. “Look, I didn’t want to bother you if you were busy, but Soap said you were around,” he says. Ghost doesn’t trail off or leave a space in his words for you to fill in the blanks. It’s a good thing—no place for you to misinterpret him—but it suddenly leaves you terrified at the possibility of what he’s going to say.
“Just for a little bit,” you hear yourself say, voice subdued and small.
He nods. “Then I’ll just get it out now before you go. More or less a question.”
Fuck. You feel a strange, uncomfortably cold sensation curl up tight and tense in your stomach. The feeling of standing at the edge of a long drop, knowing you have no choice but to let go.
His eyes are locked on yours, unrelenting, pinning. And then he says, “Do you have feelings for me?”
Right. No way to misinterpret.
You suck in a breath—a gasp, jerking at the question even though you knew it was coming.
You could lie. It’d be easy to do, just a few movements of tongue, jaw, and lips. No, I don’t. Three easy words. You could say you appreciate him as a teammate, as a professional, as someone you can trust in tough situations. He has your back; you have his. Anything beyond that is too much, to far outside of the commanding officer-subordinate hierarchy.
But you can’t lie to him. He’ll know. He’s trained in looking for tells, for the slightest quirk to denote that you’re holding back the truth. That, and you don’t want to lie to him.
Instead, quietly, you say, “Yes,” and inwardly brace for impact. Any kind of dressing-down from your C.O. and reminder of responsibilities and duties; or on a personal level, that Ghost doesn’t do relationships. You’re tensed up, waiting for its inevitable blow and all the shrapnel that’s definitely going to land right in your heart.
“Oh,” he says.
Oh.
Just one syllable, said deceptively, uncharacteristically soft. It belies so many things—possibilities, dangers. This man is fucking complicated.
And then he takes a step toward you. Just one. Just enough to close the gap that many inches. You don’t back up, but you’re too afraid to walk to him, unsure of what’s coming next.
He’s looking down at you, gaze passive, calm, and strangely open. You’ve learned new and interesting ways to read his eyes since you fell for him, but this one has an unknown definition, a kinesic oddity that you can’t translate.
And for a moment, you let yourself hope.
Then, he says your name. Not Ladybird. Not your rank. Your name. The sound of it is a rush in your ears, in your whole head, through every artery, vein, and capillary. He takes another step, slower than the first, drawing in closer before he says, “Do you want this?”
You nod. There’s nothing else you can do. You take a step toward him, looking up into his eyes and trying to read everything there. “Do you?” you ask. You’re still waiting for the rejection, as though Ghost is the type of person to lure you in only to shut you down.
Rejection doesn’t come. Instead, he steps forward to close the gap, one of his hands finding your waist.
“Yeah,” he says. “I do.”
Holy shit.
You stare at him in surprise, and the look on your face must be ridiculously easy to read. His other hand goes up under your chin, tilting your face toward him. The touch of his fingers is exactly like you imagined, the callouses on his thumb brushing over the soft skin underneath your jaw, causing you to shiver.
Ghost leans in close to your left side, skull’s grin close to your ear, and whispers, “Thought you hated me. Every time I looked at you, you’d look away.”
A near-hysterical laugh bubbles up in your throat, and comes out as a compressed, breathless giggle. All that time, you were so hopelessly in love with him, you couldn’t look at him without feeling like your heart was about to give out; and he interpreted that as dislike.
“God, no,” you say. “Total opposite.”
He laughs in your ear, and the sound chases out the remainder of that cold tension, replacing it with a newfound heat that feels good. “Wish I’d known sooner,” he says, and one of his hands goes up to push a strap of your backpack off your shoulder.
You ease out of it, dropping it to the floor, before reaching out and tentatively touching his waist in return. Through the fabric of his hoodie, you can feel how solid he is underneath, and you run your hand along his side in silent wonder.
Ghost moves back suddenly, and you only have a second to question why before the light goes out, leaving you in muted darkness permeated only by the bare sliver of sunlight filtering through your curtain. One hand finds your waist again, pulling you close, walking you toward your bed.
All you can think is no fucking way over and over, even as the back of your legs hit the side of the bed, and Ghost is lowering you down. Your back touches the mattress, head on the pillow, and Ghost is over the top of you, his hands bracketing your head. He looks down at you, mostly in shadow, only the bright white of the skull motif visible in the darkness. Then, his eyes flicker to his left, and he abruptly snorts.
You furrow your brow. “What?”
Wordlessly, his hand moves to the right of your head, and he picks up your phone.
Your phone which is still on, showing the emoji-heavy conversation with Soap. Ghost flips the phone to show you the last text he sent.
Skull emoji, kiss, black heart, red heart, ladybug, eggplant, peach, confetti ball, birthday cake.
“What the fuck, Soap?” you say under your breath, grabbing the phone from Ghost. You quickly turn it off and shove it onto your bedside table, groaning in embarrassment.
Ghost shakes his head, and unlike Soap, he doesn’t remark on it. Instead, he brings the situation right back on the rails with one hand going up under your shirt. Then, he says, “Close your eyes a second.”
You do, without question. You hear a faint rustle of fabric, and then his lips press against yours.
You gasp against his mouth, and that thrill you felt at hearing your name seems to rush back through you twofold at the thought that he took his mask off for you. He kisses you firmly, a guarantee that this is what he wants. You reach up with one hand, combing your fingers through his hair, nails scraping along his scalp and drawing out a quiet groan. He smells like standard-issue soap and laundry detergent, and the faint spice of cologne only just clinging to his skin. The feeling of kissing him is dizzying, entrancing, and the sound of it just hammers home that this is happening to you, in your room, with him.
He pulls back just a little, kissing a trail from the corner of your mouth down to your chin, then your jaw, and up to your ear. The sensation makes you shiver again, arching up into him involuntarily. You hear and feel an amused huff of breath, before he says, “What do you want?”
Good god, what don’t you want?
“I don’t know,” you say honestly. “Anything. Whatever you want.”
He nods against your neck, then tilts his head up to press a kiss to your temple. “Tell me if it’s too much, or if there’s something you don’t like. Communicate.”
You grin, mostly at the sotto voce version of his command voice. “Yes, sir.”
He huffs a laugh and continues kissing down your neck, down to the hemline of your shirt. Undressing comes as an easy next step, shoes off first (and they were on the bed, ugh), and then Ghost pulls your shirt up; you lift yourself enough to help him pull it over your head. In the darkness, he does the same, and you watch his silhouette remove his hoodie, then pull his shirt over his head and drop it off the side of the bed. You can’t see his face, but the faint beam of sunlight touches his hair and brings out a hint of pale gold. It feels like a secret shared between you, adding to that warmth building up inside.
He leans back down, kissing down your sternum to the upper hem of your sports bra. He starts to go lower, and you decide then that you’d like to take at least a little initiative.
“Wait,” you whisper. “Come back up here.”
He does, like he’s accustomed to obeying your orders rather than the other way around. You reach up and touch his chest, eager to feel this part of him, the one he typically buries under layers of clothing and gear. He sighs at your touch, head dropping down to rest on the pillow beside you.
He’s firm and toned with well-honed muscle earned through endless missions and exercise. At the same time, the skin of his chest is surprisingly soft—even the scattered network of scars and keloids that mark his body. You feel old and new wounds, some still raised as they heal, some concave with age. They’re long, short, thick, thin, orderly, and jagged. Starbursts of bullet wounds, hard lines of cuts, spatters of shrapnel, textured lines of old stitches. His whole torso tells a long, tragic story from cover to cover, chest to back.
But he leans into this read of him, letting you feel every scar, every painful moment. His breathing is steady in your ear, giving way to the occasional sigh as your fingers trail over his skin.
In turn, he touches you. You don’t have even a fraction of his scars, but you have a few he can note. You know when he touches them, by the way his touch lingers, learning each one. It feels reverential, or communal—the two of you engaging in a silent trust exercise. He doesn’t ask about them, and neither do you. All of that is for another time.
Ghost presses a kiss to your shoulder, then pushes up until he’s over top of you again. His free hand goes down to the waistline of your jeans, finger tracing teasingly over the zipper. “Can I?”
“Yeah,” you say, breathless. As if you’d say anything else.
He undoes the button, then the zipper, slowly pulling your jeans to your hips, then removing them entirely. He sits up on the edge of the bed for a moment, removing his boots, then his jeans. You lay there, watching him move, feeling your arousal start to grow and burn like a low flame.
When he touches you again, you silently agree that you wish you’d said or done something sooner. It’s bliss. He’s gentle with you, mindful even, in a way you’ve never experienced or anticipated from someone like him. He helps you out of your bra, letting you pull it all the way off before his hands palm your breasts in slow, deliberate movements. It’s an extension of his exploratory touches, learning your body inch by inch.
Your breathing quickens, and Ghost looks up at you in what you guess is concern. “Doing alright?” he asks.
Your face grows hot, and you nod, turning your head to kiss his cheek. “I’m fine,” you reply. “I just don’t know what to do.”
It’s not like you haven’t had sex before, but sex with him feels completely different, like it doesn’t belong in the same category. You’ve never wanted someone this badly, or had someone respond to you like this. It’s almost overwhelming, but Ghost reaches up and combs some of your hair away from your face before pressing a kiss to your forehead.
“Lie back a bit,” he instructs. “And tell me if you need me to stop.”
You do as he says, leaning up against the pillows as he moves down your body, leaving a trail of kisses down your torso to your hips. He’s a shadow moving over you, long and languid, and every touch just adds to the mounting heat. When his fingers touch the hem of your underwear, you shiver in anticipation, then arch your hips to give him a little leverage in removing them. In one motion, you’re exposed to him, even in the dark. Yet after touching him, and him touching you, you don’t feel as vulnerable. If anything, this feels safe. This feels right.
His hands go to your hips, then run slowly along the outer sides of your thighs. You think he might fulfill that fantasy from earlier, fingering you until you’re a mess, drawing out every last ounce of pleasure with his skilled hands.
Which is why it surprises the hell out of you when he goes lower, until his head is between your thighs, sunlight leaving gold stripes along his back.
“Ghost,” you gasp.
He looks up at you, and now more than ever, you wish you could see his face. You only see the faint shine of his eyes, but at that moment, it’s enough.
Then he spreads you, and licks a stripe from your opening to your clit.
If you were entertaining any thoughts before, any fantasies carefully curated in those rare hours of alone time, they flee in that single movement. Even the Ghost of your imagination never did this, tasting and savoring you in long, slow laps that make your whole brain short out like a blown fuse. The sound is goddamn obscene, especially as he leans in close and starts to lap at your clit. It’s a shock of sound in the silence, louder than even your own noises when you got yourself off.
Your right hand finds his head, fingers running through his hair as he licks you. He alternates between short laps and long strokes, tongue circling around your clit, teasing you, making you shudder and moan. It’s frustrating and fucking heavenly, the sensation of ebb and flow, receding and rushing waves of heat building up then flowing back.
Right when you think you can’t take the teasing anymore, he switches tactics. The teasing abruptly ends, and Ghost gets relentless.
You moan way too loud when he sucks at your clit, tongue swirling around it, the sound of his mouth on you loud as a gunshot. You swear they have to hear it down the hallway, or anywhere on base. At this point, though, you really don’t care who hears you, because they don’t have Ghost between their legs, getting them off in ways no deity ever intended.
Then his fingers join his mouth, index tracing circles around your entrance, dipping in slowly, tauntingly.
“Fuck.” The word is sharp in the air, as you arch at the sensation.
It’s too much; it’s not enough.
He tilts his head up a little, but when he speaks, you feel his warm breath ghost over your sex. “Let me hear you,” he says, words drawn straight out of your fantasies. Every door containing that imaginary version of Ghost is unlocked, every bulkhead breached—that Ghost and this one are one in the same.
And when he pushes that first finger into you, you follow his order to the letter.
It comes out as a broken wail, cut off when he starts thrusting and licking you in alternate strokes. His pace quickens, merciless, sharp eyes watching you from the shadows as your head rolls back on the pillow, chest heaving to catch a single solid breath. Your hands drop to your sides, fisting the sheets just to have something to hang onto, any kind of anchor as Ghost guides you through a tempest.
You moan his name, last consonant catching on a sob of pleasure when he starts to add a second finger. Only then does he pause, and the absence of his mouth is stark. 
Then he says your name, temporarily drawing you out of the cumulonimbus of arousal you’re flying through, briefly bringing you back to earth.
You look down at him, the silhouette of his head, small locks of hair sticking up from where your fingers combed through. You see him tilt his head to rest his cheek against your inner thigh, and his voice rolls out like a dull roar of thunder in your ears. “It’s Simon,” he says. “I wanna hear you say it.”
Somehow, hearing his real name in the midst of all this is almost too much. Like the last little vestige of a play on stage falling away and revealing the inner workings of the backstage, all the ropes and pullies holding the show together. He’s more exposed now, more raw, more human.
You reach down, trembling hand brushing over his cheek, over stubble and scar tissue, and the soft skin of a very real face.
“Simon,” you whisper. It sounds like a confession.
He doesn’t reply, but you feel him smile against your hand, briefly turning his head to press a kiss against your palm. Then he’s lowering himself down again, coaxing you out of the eye of the storm and back into the maelstrom. Two fingers thrust and curl, filling you, leaving you empty, touching places that send bolts of pleasure through you.
Your pulse becomes the thunder of the helo’s blades, your body trembling with midair turbulence. Simon fucks you on his fingers, tongue lathing over your clit, mouth fucking worshiping you. He takes you to that precipice, the long fall, the drop through cloud cover to a faintly-marked point on the earth.
The step off the edge feels like perfect, natural progression.
Your orgasm sweeps through you from toe to tip, a roll of white-out pleasure shaking you, wringing a cry out of your mouth that makes Simon fuck you harder. His fingers don’t let up, working you through the tidal wave, taking you to shore on the other side.
You’re boneless at the end, slumping back on the pillow and panting, shivering, taking stock of your limbs and extremities as they each come back online after the outage. You only vaguely register the feeling of Simon moving on the bed, coming up to lay beside you.
He murmurs your name, then kisses you, and you can smell and taste yourself on him. Your hand goes up to run along his jawline, one rogue thought telling you, yeah, you can cut glass with it.
How everything gets so gentle afterwards is beyond you. Simon’s hand is on your face, thumb brushing the soft skin under your right eye. You can feel his erection against your leg, and somewhere in the back of your mind—still tingling with pleasure, shimmering bright and brilliant—you know how you’re going to take initiative.
You break the kiss just for a moment, delighting in the soft sigh of protest you hear and feel against your cheek. Then you lean in close, pitching your voice low like his, hoping it has the same effect on him.
“Hope you don’t have any plans this weekend,” you say, brushing your hand over his shoulder.
You feel him smile against your skin, and he shakes his head.
“Thought you were heading out,” he says.
“Only if you’re going with me.”
One arm goes around your waist, pulling you close as he nuzzles against your neck. “We have some time, though, right?” his voice slides over you, suggestion clear and presented like a gift.
God, yeah you do.
---
Somewhere in between rounds, your phone goes off on your bedside stand.
Once.
Twice.
You don’t hear it, and the short buzz is drowned out by moans and the soft slap of skin on skin. When Simon makes a move like he’s going to check on it, you hook him back in place with your leg around his waist, pulling him in close, then kissing him silent. He falls into it, all too happy to oblige.
So you miss the skull and ladybug emojis, then the volume symbol.
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haikyu-mp4 · 5 months ago
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I am applying with Akaashi I am outgoing and driven
excellent, you're hired!! thank you for participating<3
Gossip central
Akaashi is your coworker and protects you from a rude customer, for the now hiring! event
word count; 674 – f!reader
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Working in a café gave you front-row seats to the gossip of so many strangers and familiar faces. Every other hour, you would sneakily pull Akaashi with you by the arm to whisper in his ear about some string of details you picked up while passing by table 4, who were discussing their shared friend’s failing marriage, or the grand gestures of the couple fighting at table 11, where the guy clearly didn’t understand what he did wrong.
That last one was still ongoing, and after leaving the back room with lingering giggles on your lips, you and Akaashi watched as the woman from table 11, by the window, stormed off and out the door. Her – perhaps now ex – boyfriend slumped back in his chair with a look of disbelief, and you did your best to divert your attention to the next in line at the register.
Social anxiety must fear this man, as it took no less than three minutes before he was loudly recounting the whole story to whoever over the phone. The other customers were one by one turning their heads towards him in disbelief or annoyance, some also glancing towards their closest barista in hopes that someone would handle it.
You breathed in through your nose and slowly let it out through your mouth, asking the newest hire to take over the register while you made your way around the counter. While walking towards the windows, you apologised to some of the customers and asked them to please enjoy their coffees. The man took no notice of you as you stopped beside his table, still yelling into the phone about how that bitch was such a psycho anyways. You cleared your throat, and then did it once more but louder, finally making him turn to you.
“Excuse me, sir. Could you please lower your voice or take it outside?” you asked kindly, a small smile forced onto your lips and hands locked behind your back politely.
The man scoffed, then gave you a nasty look while still holding the phone to his ear. “Oh really? Am I too loud for you?”
“The noise is disturbing the other café-goers and I do not believe it is necessary.”
He slammed his fist into the table and you flinched at the sound, taking a step back. “If they’re so offended, they can feel free to leave. What I do is none of your business, uggo.”
“Sir-” you pursed your lips trying to regain your patience. “I think you should calm down.”
He got up out of his chair, and you were about to turn around when a mop of short black hair appeared in your view. Akaashi’s steel eyes were on the emotional man, shoulder in front of yours to show he was there in your stead. You can relax, I got it.
“You will not be disrespecting our workers any more,” he instructed calmly, taking a tip from a book he read the other day and hinting that he might be the manager of the establishment, even though that was not the truth. To establish a certain dominance, which is often necessary with such simple-minded men. “We will not be taking any more orders from you either. You can leave on your own or I will call security to show you out.”
The man stuttered in his step, nostrils flaring at Akaashi and then at you. He huffed and rolled his eyes, turning to the side. “I won't be recommending this shithole.”
“Very well,” Akaashi concluded, moving so he was always somewhat between you and the guy until he had left the premises. Then he turned to you and his whole frame seemed to soften. He was shaking his hands a bit at his sides, probably loosening up the nerves, so you held one of them and squeezed it. “Are you okay?”
“I am. Thank you.”
He assured you later that he, in fact, did not think you were an uggo. “I find you to be very beautiful. The most beautiful, actually.”
masterlist
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