#I could write so much rn about every part you said you enjoyed and I’m TEMPTED but I won’t do that to you

[miraclewoozi]

🥹🥹🥹🥹🥹current emotional state 🥹🥹🥹🥹🥹

DON'T SWEAT IT. - l.jh

Today — the first time in a small forever that he forgot to check the battery on his earphones (and subsequently had them die on him mid-workout) — Jihoon is forced to notice you.

pairing; lee jihoon x fem!reader.  content; fluff / gym crush au / strangers to lovers / kinda idiots to lovers / smut towards the end (MINORS DNI). w/c; just a breezy 18k- and some change? warnings; swearing, this is only proof read once because if i read it again i was going to lose my mind. please let me know if i've forgotten any. smut tags under the cut ( not sure that this counts as a warning but a heads up: the gym weight units, whenever mentioned, are in kilograms not lbs because i’m british and the metric system, am i right? sorry if there are any other british-isms, i try really hard to avoid them/catch them on a proofread but there are inevitably some that have slipped through the net.  )

note; gym-selfie jihoon, you will never not own my ass. ( screaming internally this is the first fic i've written since my dan + phil youtube era. i don't know what i'm doing. this has been in my wips for about two months. it's a bit all over the place. that's. literally just me. bon appetite. <3 )

smut warnings: making out, grinding, fingering (f rec), oral (f rec), blowjob started/implied (at the end), protected sex (be safe out there gang), little bit of biting, no huge power dynamics? reader & jihoon are both switches (and simps), some use of pet-names (good girl/baby).

—————

He first sees you around lunchtime on an otherwise unassuming Sunday. 

As you walk in, the gym is wonderfully quiet. A handful of regulars mill about, making full use of the rare freedom of the machinery. One of the club’s personal trainers is marching an impossibly steep incline on a treadmill. It could just be any other weekend session in this criminally over-equipped and under-used gym: the town’s worst kept secret. But when the door slams shut behind you, his head jerks up; it, in this moment, is the loudest sound in the room. It’s sort of the only one he hears at all.

Today — the first time in a small forever that he forgot to check the battery on his earphones (and subsequently had them die on him mid-workout) — Jihoon is forced to notice you as he sits with dumbbells rested against his thighs. He catches his breath as he wonders who you are, if you’ve ever been to this gym before, why he doesn’t recognise you. Are you a new potential regular, maybe? Or just visiting the area and making good use of the cheap pay-as-you-go rates? Maybe, he considers, lips turning downwards in thought… maybe you’ve been coming here for a long time and he’s somehow just always been so in his own head that he’s never noticed.

The last, he thinks, is sort of unlikely. No. He would definitely remember a face like yours.

His heart rate slows more than he usually lets it as he finds himself watching you fill up your water bottle at the fountain, taking a long sip on your way over to one of the stairmasters. His brain blanks out when he realises that he’s not just looking anymore, he’s sort of staring, and swallows the saliva on his tongue hard, looking back at the mirror. He doesn’t want to be that guy. He isn’t that guy – he just got distracted by the loud noise, and this is exactly why he checks the damn battery on his headphones before he leaves the house. 

The only problem is that now, he can’t remember how many sets he’s done. He lies back and stares straight into a slightly sketchy light-fixture, neglecting to pick up the dumbbells that he put aside for his next set of pushes. Jihoon adjusts the position of his shoulders against the bench, arches his back off it slightly, digs his heels into the spongy floor beneath them and pushes the ones still in his hands until failure. 

Today, he finishes his routine and leaves the gym without allowing himself so much as another glance your way.

He neglects to notice that your eyes are avoiding him right back. 

—————

You smile at him for the first time on a Tuesday. Not the following one – a week and a bit later.

Seungcheol is with him tonight. Jihoon prefers to train alone nine times out of ten: this is a truth widely acknowledged, accepted and respected among his friends. Gym time is his down time, his equivalent of movie marathons and comfort food, of face masks and glasses of wine. But it’s not a hard rule: occasionally, someone will ask to tag along and use one of his guest passes, and Jihoon very rarely says no. There are two reasons. One, he isn’t actually rude, contrary to approximately eighteen running jokes in the group-chat. But also, it adds a little bit of variety to his otherwise very set-in-stone regimen, and mixing it up doesn’t hurt. Like tonight, for example. Seungcheol is pulling him into the studio off the main gym floor, his own gym bag packed with boxing pads and gloves for them to play with.

Variety.

Jihoon grumbles a little at the idea, at first. He has a very love-hate relationship with cardio, favouring a simple steady-state run over everything else, and it just feels a bit against his moral code to use gym time for something like this. However, he comes to discover very quickly that smacking Seungcheol’s hands is very therapeutic; Jihoon knows he’s maybe getting a little too into it when his friend asks if they can switch around, grimacing and shaking out his wrist after a particularly beefy punch. 

He agrees, albeit reluctantly, tugging off the gloves he’s wearing and pulling on the pads instead.

This half of the activity is considerably less enjoyable for Jihoon; he starts to cool down and loses his flow almost straight away and after about thirty seconds, his breathing is back to normal and he feels ready to go again. Even so, he does what he needs to do to be a good workout partner, and goes one step further into ‘good friend’ territory as he allows Seungcheol to vent about the bad day he had at work in-between hits, offering murmurs and looks of disgust when it feels appropriate. Suddenly, the impromptu request to come to the gym tonight makes much more sense, as does the slightly bizarre choice of activity, but Jihoon tries not to ask about it in too much detail.

They swing at each other for a few more rounds apiece, working up a healthy sweat and getting out a few frustrations as the hour wears on. On the last set, Jihoon switches out Seungcheol’s hands for a punching bag, putting a lot more of his weight behind every hit and really tiring himself out. By the end, his hair sticks to his forehead and his cheeks have flushed bright red; he only stops when he gets that weird, metallic taste in the back of his mouth that says he’s probably overdone it. Again.

“Hit the shower?” Seungcheol asks breathlessly as he finishes his last set of Russian twists and lies down flat on the floor, equally sticky and flushed all over. 

Jihoon pats his face dry with his towel, shaking his head. “You go ahead. I’ll have one at home.” 

He doesn’t give Seungcheol much of a chance to respond, already cleaning down anything he’s touched or managed to sweat on and riding out the high of the endorphins flooding his veins. Secretly, he hasn’t had a cardio session this high energy or this satisfying in a long time. He isn’t going to readily admit to that though.

“Nah, I’ll do the same,” Seungcheol agrees. He starts packing the gear he brought with him into his bag and they leave together after, heading towards the exit. 

That’s when he sees you again. 

He doesn’t notice at first; you’re stowing your things into one of the higher lockers, and you have your headphones slung around your neck as he walks past. It’s the sound of a song he vaguely recognises through your speakers that makes his head snap over from the conversation he’s in the middle of. They walk past at the moment you drop down from your tiptoes, and you flash a small (but insanely pretty) smile at Jihoon.

By the time he manages to process this fact, he’s already walked past you and you’re headed over into the main gym area, so even though he turns around to try and catch your eye, all he sees is your retreating figure. He stumbles over his own feet, not looking where he’s going, and just barely catches himself on Seungcheol’s upper arm before he actually does fall over. His older friend glances down at his bicep before he adopts a look that Jihoon has seen many, many times before: just never directed at him. His cheeks heat up further and he looks away.

“What was that?” Seungcheol asks, one eyebrow so far up his forehead that it’s disappeared almost entirely under his soggy hair. He looks so smug, so incredibly entertained. Jihoon wants to smack that expression off his face, immediately.

“Nothing,” Jihoon rushes, managing not to act on the violent thought even though he wants to. He clears his throat. “No-one. I-... they’re new, I think. I don’t know.”

Seungcheol lets out a soft laugh, pushing the door open for them both to leave through. “Yeah,” he scoffs, eyes glimmering with something Jihoon doesn’t think he likes the look of. “Nothing, my ass.”

—————

Three days later, he hears you speak for the first time.

Granted, you aren’t speaking to him – at least, not at first. But that’s not really what matters.

It’s late, and it’s a Friday night. Fridays are usually Jihoon’s days rest days, but sitting around his apartment had him feeling impossibly twitchy, with far too much energy to burn and no way to do so without leaving the house. And he knows that he needs to take days off, now and again. He knows that they’re good for recovery and that it’s healthy to take time to himself that involves not lifting weights. But what he also knows is that if he doesn’t manage to shake the weird buzzing feeling in his muscles, in his joints, in his veins, he’s never going to get to sleep. So, here he finds himself at almost 10PM, walking down the street to get to the gym.

To begin with, he doesn’t know (or really care) who it is that’s coming up behind him. He can hear quite clearly that the mystery person is on the phone, and that they’re in the middle of what seems to be a rather heated argument: his brain latches onto occasional words, phrases, curses. Every now and again, their voice drops to a deep, frustrated mutter and he cringes slightly, making a point to keep his eyes forward and down so as not to draw attention to the fact that this presumably private conversation has become everything but.

He touches his entry fob to the sensor on the door as he arrives and pushes it open. Jihoon uses the opportunity to stand still, to glance back at whoever it is that’s walked behind him for the past four and a half minutes, and his eyes come to land on you. He falters, noting how your eyes are a bit glassy and your cheeks are stained with what he can safely assume are tear-tracks. In this moment, he wants to run; he doesn’t want anything to do with that, and he certainly doesn’t want to hear any more of your call. It’s none of his business, and he feels plenty weird enough already with what he has overheard. But, for some unknown reason, he stays in place.

“No – no, you don’t get to-...” you hiss into your phone. “It was our fucking anniversary, you asshole.” Jihoon’s face tightens at that, lips drawn between his teeth and his eyes blowing slightly wide. You pass through the door in front of him, flashing a small smile as you go. Another smile, he thinks to himself, but he’d be an idiot to compare them in any way; this one is so dramatically dissimilar to the first, he thinks it could almost have come from a totally different person. 

Unfortunately, there’s nothing ‘insanely pretty’ about it this time. Your smile is tight-lipped and exhausted, slightly apologetic. Maybe even forced. He does try to return a warmer one to you, but he doesn’t know if you notice. 

“Look, I’m at the gym – we’re not doing this right now. I’ll call you later.” You hang up the phone with the kind of sigh that groans in the back of your throat.

A small part of him wants to take this moment and use it to ask if you’re all right, but an even larger part of him doesn’t. It isn’t because he doesn’t care. In a weird way, considering this is only the first time he’s clearly heard your voice and he knows absolutely nothing about you, he does care. But there are a few things that stop him. Not only are you a near-complete stranger, not only would he have no idea what to say to you if the answer happened to come out as a ‘no’, not only is he already coming over a little bit clammy at the thought of having a conversation with you… Jihoon isn’t stupid. He knows from the sound of your voice and the way you’re rather aggressively typing a message into your phone that it’s a ridiculous question.

You’re walking into the gym at 10 o’clock on a Friday night, your eyes literally brimming with tears. Of course you’re not all right.

He’s still standing in the open doorway mulling all this over, but Jihoon only realises when a gust of wind slaps over his calves and sends a draught not only through the reception area, but up the length of his spine. He comes inside fully as you close the locker you’re using – he notices, but he isn’t sure why, that it’s the same one as last time – and throws his things into the one he always uses. Two below and one to the left of yours.

It’s quiet tonight: just the pair of you and one middle-aged guy. Jihoon recognises him as the friendly man who seemingly knows everyone who comes in here – including you, apparently, judging by the way he strikes up a short but energetic conversation. When the other guy walks away, you clamp your headphones back over your ears and return to what you were doing before, occasionally bobbing your head or moving your lips in time with whatever it is that you’re listening to. Jihoon steals little glances at you now and again when you’re in-between sets, watching how you breathe deeper, how your skin glows with sweat as you tap your fingertips against your thighs.

He almost drops the bar he’s holding when you catch his eyes in the long line of mirrors. He turns away, swallowing hard, completely missing how your own gaze lingers.

Jihoon becomes so obsessed with not being caught looking at you again that he doesn’t even notice when you disappear off the gym floor completely. It’s only when he pulls his headphones off at the end of his session and glances around that he registers your absence: your third companion is long gone, and he assumes you must have snuck out without him noticing too. He settles the speakers back over his ears before pulling on an old zip-up, flicking the hood over his head to shelter him a little better once he gets outside. But he’s in no rush to get home so he takes his time, resting his bag between his abdomen and the lockers, replying to a few messages and clicking his tongue at some of the nonsense being spewed into the group-chat. 

He isn’t sure exactly how long he’s standing there for, but he does know precisely what pulls him back to the world outside of the device in his hands.

To begin with, he doesn’t notice you approach, lost completely in his screen. He doesn’t hear your footsteps, or the way you politely clear your throat to announce your presence so he can move out of the way. He misses your moment of realisation that he’s listening to music and has no idea that you’re standing three feet behind him. He doesn’t even see you walk up next to him, your hair still damp from your shower and sitting loose over your shoulders.

It’s only when you try to reach over him to grab the last of your things that he snaps out of his trance. The fragrance of your body wash hits him first, and oh boy, does it hit him. Sweet, and delicate. Then, he gets something beautifully fruity: it’s not a perfume (it doesn’t smell like a perfume), but it’s you. Your shampoo, maybe? A conditioner? He can’t tell. Whatever it is, the combination of fragrances has him feeling like he’s been slammed into by a damn freight train. He drops his bag to the floor, freezing for a second, and then finally moves away just as the little door swings open. 

“I’m so sorry,” he says hurriedly, tugging his hood down and pulling his headphones off completely. “I didn’t even think you were still here.” He can’t shake the smell of you, nor the feeling of your warm frame leaning so close to his own. God, why is his heart pounding like he’s just finished a round of sprints? Why can’t he breathe?

“No – hey, no, don’t be,” you rush, shaking your head. You finally succeed in pulling your coat free and start trying to get it on; Jihoon wonders if you often struggle to find your sleeves like this, if you’re always chasing them around like a puppy after its own tail. He does it too, sometimes. He gets it. It’s cute. “It’s okay. I was trying not to disturb-... I’m sorry.”

“You’re fine,” he tells you. For the first time, he’s able to smile back at you properly. 

Why is it so hot in here, all of a sudden? Do they shut off the air conditioning after hours or something? He’s breaking out in a sweat.

“Call it even?” you suggest shyly, extending out a hand now you’ve managed to get both arms through your sleeves. He looks down at your fingers for a second before reaching to shake your hand once, a semi-firm grip securing the ‘deal’. (He feels a bit like he’s been electrocuted after, but he tries not to make that too obvious).

It goes awkwardly quiet for a moment then, and Jihoon wishes deeply that he had it in him to say something. Anything. But his brain has gone completely empty and apparently, all he knows how to do is stand completely still like a fucking statue. He shifts his gaze from you, to the wall behind you, to the carpet beneath his shoes, all the while tugging at the collar of his sweatshirt as if it might bring him a tiny breath of fresh air. The gentle sound of you clearing your throat has him looking back at your face again though; he assumes for a second that this is maybe you about to announce taking your leave. All the while, he’s cursing himself out in his own head for being totally inept, and he’s not entirely sure that it isn’t written all over his face.

“Alone, today?” you ask, idly fiddling with your zipper and succeeding in taking him by surprise. He really didn’t think you were going to continue this. And yet…

“Hm?” he questions. 

You swallow before answering. “You… the last time, you were with a friend?” you explain, and now it’s your turn to look away. He wonders if you’re a little warm too, if he’s right in what he was thinking about the air-conditioning. 

“Oh. Right.” 

He nods. An annoying train of doubt in his mind wants to know why you’re asking about Seungcheol; if maybe it was him that you smiled at the other night, even though he knows your eyes weren’t looking up at the man he brought with him. He thinks maybe he should be used to these turns in conversation by now – you certainly wouldn’t be the first person to ask if one of his friends is available, after all – but somehow, he isn’t, and he has a slightly bitter taste in the back of his mouth as he goes on.

He really didn’t have ‘you being interested in one of his best friends’ on his bingo card for tonight, that’s for sure. 

“Yeah. I think he’s with his partner, or… I don’t know. I don’t really bring other people, often. That was a one-off.”

You nod silently and Jihoon can’t quite get a read on what that means. He wonders if you’re upset at the revelation of Seungcheol’s partner, or maybe that he doesn’t tag along to every session. Or maybe, maybe, you were just being polite, and you don’t really care what his friend is up to that means he isn’t here. But whatever it is that you’re feeling, you do far too good a job at hiding it; he’s suddenly very overcome with the desire to run, again, except this time he might just bury his head in the sand too for good measure.

“How much were you deadlifting, just then?” you ask in the lull, just as he thinks he might have perfected the best way to say goodbye that doesn’t make him come across as even more of a tool than he probably already has. It throws him off kilter, but somehow, he manages to answer you in reasonable time.

“Oh, God… uh, one… 160?” He says uncertainly. “That’s not… I can do heavier-...” In his mind, he slaps his forehead. “Wait, no, that’s-... I mean, it’s true, but I didn’t mean-...”

You bite back your smile as he talks himself in a circle but Jihoon is too flustered to notice, convinced that he now sounds like every arrogant gym rat on the planet. God, he’s given himself the ick.

“I guessed you could,” you say. 

Oh boy, this freezes him. Mid-thought, mid blink, mid-breath: he’s completely stuck. What does that mean? What does that mean? He only just manages to unstick his now suddenly dry tongue from the roof of his mouth, looking at you with surprised, confused eyes and parted lips. There aren’t any words on them, though. Like a deer in headlights, he just… stares.

“I mean, okay. Come on.” Your eyes visibly drop as you look him over, gaze lingering at his shoulders, his biceps, his waist. “You can get another twenty on that at least, right?”

He doesn’t know how to explain what’s happening to him, but if he thought he was burning up before? It was nothing compared to this, now. And there’s no way you haven’t noticed how everything from the base of his neck to the tips of his ears has suddenly started staining scarlet. He bows his head and pinches his lips tight, wrestling away the train of thought that appears as you drag your bottom lip between your teeth momentarily, still eyeing his arms. God, he’s never felt so overwhelmed in his life. 

“Something like that, yeah,” he strains. He’s trying so hard to be nonchalant, even though he knows all of his personal bests by heart. Deadlift, 195kg. He hit it a few weeks ago: a couple of days before he first saw you.

“Mm. You can tell.”

Jihoon tries to shake off the compliment, but he fails. In equal measure he wishes you’d stop (he doesn’t know how much more blood can rush to his cheeks before he keels over) and never wants you to stop talking. It’s all going straight to his stomach, though, and he doesn’t remember having felt this specific brand of nervous and excited and stupidly shy since he was in high school.

He can hardly keep up. This is the danger zone.

Maybe it’s a bad idea that he says the next thing that comes into his head in a desperate attempt to change the conversation away from how much he can pull. But somehow, his voice doesn’t break when he asks, “are you parked far away?”

What? It’s dark outside, and this part of town isn’t exactly known for its upstanding citizens and pretty flowerbeds.

“Oh,” you say, eyes a little wide. “I’m-... just staying close-by. I walked here.” The space between his eyebrows must crease a little too quickly because you immediately hurry to speak again. “Really. It’s like… not even ten minutes. All main streets. It’s nothing.”

“Ten minutes longer than I’d walk around here at night on my own,” he says lightheartedly. In tone, at least. He’s actually completely serious.

You laugh at that; he lets out a chuckle, too. Now, Jihoon doesn’t believe in fairies but he thinks that if they were real, they’d giggle just like you do. 

With a smile still on your face, you say, “what? A strong guy like you? Come on, now.”

Do you have to keep doing that? Fuck, he’s absolutely done for.

He tilts his head forwards, eyes closed, trying so hard to stop the muscles in his cheeks from lifting in a grin that it becomes a workout in and of itself.

“I mean it,” he says, taking what he hopes is a subtle breath to settle the fluttering in his chest. The next thing he knows, he’s leaning one shoulder against the lockers, a little reminiscent of every douchebag in every teen movie ever made. If he doesn’t think about it too much, he won’t cringe into oblivion until he gets home and replays this interaction over and over in his head instead of going to sleep. “Maybe I’ve just lived here too long. I might be jaded, but it’s still true.”

“How long is too long?” you ask.

“All my life,” he tells you.

“No way?”

“Mm.” A beat. “What about you?”

“I’m just staying with a friend, right now.”

“Oh, right.” He falls quiet again as he remembers the first time he saw you, remembers making the list in his head of all the possible reasons he hadn’t seen you before. The second was true, then.

Why does that feel like the worst possible scenario? He decides not to unpack that here.

“Maybe-...” you start, glancing down at your hands, which have been twisting in front of you for a few seconds now. Your chest inflates, filled with the words you’re about to speak, but only a breath comes out when you shake your head instead of saying them. “No, don’t worry. Scratch that.”

“Are you sure?” he asks, because he thinks that whatever you were about to suggest, there’s not much he would have said no to. He feels like it’s only fair to give you another chance to say it.

But you don’t.

“Yeah, it’s nothing.” You pause. “I… should probably get going.” He glances over your shoulder at the clock mounted on the far wall, squinting to see the time. 11:45.

“Shit. Yeah, me too,” Jihoon agrees. He didn’t realise it had gotten so late, so fast: he’s hardly ever out at this time. Lord, he already knows it’s going to be an open inquisition when he gets back to his apartment. His neighbours, Soonyoung and Seokmin, are about to have a fucking field day. 

But it’s already long past the time he usually goes to bed, so he asks his next question anyway. He still can’t shake the thought of you walking back on your own at this hour. “Do-… you need a ride?” 

He’s not sure if you actually consider it, or just wait a moment before you answer just to be polite. Either way, you end up shaking your head.

“It’s okay. I’ve-… got a call to make, so.” Your voice is a little quieter, lips tweaking up into a regretful half-smile, and Jihoon curses in his own head. How had he forgotten about that? “Thank you, though. Really.”

“Don’t mention it,” he says. “Just… get back safe.”

You smile and nod, taking a step towards the door and Jihoon does the same. He reaches the exit first and holds it open for you; when you’re both out in the street, he suppresses a shiver and looks in the direction of where he left his car earlier. Feeling the full force of the cold, it crosses his mind to ask again if you’re sure about walking home, but you’re already pulling a beanie down over your still damp hair and tapping something into your phone, so he doesn’t say anything.

“I’ll see you around, uh-…” you start to say, only looking back up when you falter, realising that this is the first time you’re about to use his name and it occurs to you both, at the same time, that you haven’t done this part, yet.

“Jihoon,” he introduces himself, lips quirking into a side-smile. His gaze is expectant and you respond to it perfectly. 

“Y/n,” you introduce yourself. 

“See you around, y/n.”

You split off in the opposite direction to where he’s heading. Before he clamps his headphones over his ears for the short walk up to his car, the last thing he hears is the retreating sound of a dial-tone. 

—————

He doesn’t see you then for two whole weeks. 

For the first couple of days, he only idly notices; it’s not a big deal — it’s not like you’re always there when he is, and he’s sure it’s the same vice versa. But he notices your absence, nonetheless. By the end of the first week, he casually wonders if you’ve had a change in schedule. Maybe you’re on a different working pattern, something that means you can’t be there on Monday and Thursday evenings and at 11:45am on Sundays. 

It’s not weird. He only knows this because prior to that first conversation, acknowledging you as you crossed paths by the free-weights became part of his routine. It’s fine that he sort of misses those little interactions, isn’t it?

Maybe you’ve decided to start training ridiculously early in the morning instead? He tried that once. Never again. It then occurs to him, in the middle of a self-enforced rest day as he sits in the dark nursing a headache, that perhaps you’re not well. He sort of wishes he’d had the guts to ask for your number the last time he saw you, now: he thinks he’d check in, see if you were okay, ask how work was going or something. 

Deep down he knows he’d probably actually just be staring at a blank text thread with a ‘casual’ message typed, tweaked a few hundred times, and ultimately unsent. But that’s fine. It’s the thought that counts. 

The next time he sees you isn’t even in the gym, at all. It’s a Sunday afternoon — he finished his morning session, went home, showered, and headed back out into town after some lunch with a few errands to run. He finds himself spoiled with the luxury of a spare few hours to kill and dips into his favourite coffee place, thrilled beyond belief to find that it’s not obnoxiously busy and that there’s only one other person in the queue waiting to be served. 

Oh, he thinks when he looks up from his phone and sees a vaguely familiar set of headphones sitting on top of a definitely familiar mane of hair, standing right in front of him. Oh, shit. It’s you.

Jihoon goes back and forth with himself over it but ultimately decides he probably doesn’t know you well enough to just say hello out in the wild like this, so even though the urge to do so strikes, he holds himself back. It’s agonising, though. He really wants to. 

You step forward to order and he’s typing out a reply to a message in his, Seokmin and Soonyoung’s three-way group chat, in which he’s literally been fighting for his life as of late. He made the mistake of mentioning you in passing a few days ago and ever since, he’s had to vehemently deny that he has developed his first gym crush, insisting that actually, he’s just made a friend. They don’t believe him, because of course they don’t. That would be far too reasonable. Seokmin says that Jihoon wouldn’t be blushing just from saying your name if you were really ‘just a friend’. Soonyoung argues Jihoon wouldn’t have mentioned you at all.

��I’m so sorry — bear with me, just-…” your voice is quiet but Jihoon hears you apologising to the cashier in front of you, and it snaps him clean away from the tiff he’s having with the men who live in his building. He glances up and you’re elbow-deep in the bag over your shoulder, red in the face with your bottom lip pulled between your teeth. He turns his head slightly and sees the small hand-written sign that says the card machine isn’t working, and they’re cash only, today. 

He can hazard a guess at your predicament. 

After another few seconds of you trying to find whatever it is you’re looking for in your bag, he starts feeling bad for you. This, right here, is his own worst nightmare. Should the roles be reversed, he thinks he would’ve just turned around and walked out. It’s exactly why he doesn’t bother with backpacks and satchels day-to-day: if it doesn’t fit in his pockets, he doesn’t take it out with him. The system isn’t perfect but it has saved Jihoon a decent amount of public distress. 

But the roles aren’t reversed, and he has his wallet already in his hand, so… he only gives himself a few seconds to wonder if it’s appropriate before he does the stupid thing anyway.

“Don’t worry — I’ve got it,” he says, stepping around you, pulling out the cash to pay for your order. You’re dumbstruck when you look  at him, head tilted to the side. The person stood behind the counter glances at you, then at him, and back at you; you don’t see this, however, because your eyes haven’t left Jihoon’s face since he appeared — as far as you’re concerned — out of thin air.

“I can’t ask you to…” you start to protest, but your hands have stopped fishing around and he’s moving the cash further towards the barista, who hesitates just a second longer. 

“You’re not asking. I’m offering. I’ve got you.” He says this with such finality that you quite literally can’t argue with him. The lady behind the counter accepts the cash and you nod, shyly, mouthing a thank you. He orders his own drink — an Americano, nothing exciting — and you both go to stand at the other end of the counter while you wait.

“Hi,” you finally say, and Jihoon can’t help but give a small chuckle. 

He doesn’t have anything hugely witty or creative in his arsenal, though, so he comes back with a matching, “hey.”

“How… have you been?” you ask. 

“Can’t complain, really,” he says. “Are you okay? I haven’t seen you around for a few weeks.” Oh, God — the second the words are out of his mouth, he wishes he could take them back. Why did he have to add that last part? Why didn’t he just leave it at the question? 

“Yeah — about that,” you breathe, ducking your head to conceal the heat that’s spreading over your cheeks. “You know how I said I was staying with that friend?” He nods, and you continue. “I was waiting for some stuff to get sorted out with an apartment and it all finally got resolved, so… I’ve been moving my stuff over to a new place.”

Jihoon feels his heart sink for a moment, but he keeps his expression pleasant and engaged. His fingers threaten to give him away as they fiddle with the aglet on the drawstring of his sweatpants. 

“Sounds tiring,” he says lightly, and you laugh again, nodding. It’s odd, having his heart taking residence low in his stomach and somehow also in his throat, all while hammering away at a mile a minute. All the caffeine in the world couldn’t have this effect on him. “Is it going okay so far?”

“Yeah.” You nod. “It’s a process, but… it’ll be worth it.”

The barista behind the counter announces herself by clearing her throat and slides your drinks across the marble surface with a little glimmer in her eye. Jihoon picks them both up, extending yours out to you. There’s a pause (in which he swallows a large helping of self-doubt) as he glances to the door, working through several combinations of his next words in his mind before he looks back at you. 

“Do you… maybe have ten minutes to sit with these?” He asks. You light up immediately, not even checking the time on any of your devices, nor the wall clock behind your head. He doesn’t let himself think about why it makes him giddy that you’re accepting the offer, just like that.

“Yeah — yeah, sure.” You smile, walking through the lines of tables and sliding into one of the big, comfy chairs by the window. He unzips his jacket and slings it over the arm of the other chair before settling in himself, his long fingers wrapping around the to-go cup. The drink warms his perpetually cold palms and he sighs sweetly.

“You must be excited to get into the new place, then?” he asks after taking a sip, letting it heat him up from the inside. It could be argued that this job is already being taken care of, but Jihoon is not about to go there.

“Oh, God yes.” You nod, relaxing back in the seat with your own cup. Jihoon subconsciously leans a little forward in tandem. “It’s been fun staying with my friend, but…” You pause, lips slightly parted, before going on. “Okay, a warning: I’m a terrible person for this, I know. She’s done me a huge favour, letting me stay there — but I can’t deal with how untidy she is. It’s driving me nuts.”

A chuckle bubbles in Jihoon’s chest, cheeks starting to ache as his smile grows and grows. It hasn’t fallen since he sat down opposite you, and doesn’t seem to be going anywhere, any time soon. “That bad?” he asks.

“You have no idea,” you groan, covering your face with one hand. He wishes you hadn’t — he thinks you look quite lovely when you’re all lit up like this. “She doesn’t clean her dishes after she eats — she piles them up in the sink for like, three days. I don’t think she’s used the vacuum the entire time I’ve been there. I keep finding wrappers and packets and mismatched socks everywhere —” 

His snort of laughter rolls off the back of his throat rather ungraciously and he settles back into his chair. You gently bump his ankle under the table with your foot, beaming at him. “I’m serious! I can’t live like this, Jihoon. I can’t!”

The more you speak, the less he can control the fits he’s descended into, and his abs start to ache after a while; there’s desperation in your voice but it’s just wrapped up so cutely in your lighthearted frustration and decoratively tied together with your sunshine smile… he can’t help it — he’s in pieces. It’s okay though, because you’re laughing too: it makes him think of fairies again, and he can picture you with dainty, intricately patterned wings under the soft lighting in the café. He wipes the corner of his eye with the heel of his hand as he starts to calm down, taking a few deep breaths all the way into his stomach.

“You’re so much stronger than I am,” he says.. “I couldn’t deal with that.”

“You know, I had a feeling you’d be a clean person, too,” you say, sipping at your coffee again. “I mean… I’ve never seen you use the gym showers, so I wasn’t sure, but…”

“Hey,” he says, mock-defensively. “I don’t trust the locks, okay? I shower at home!”

Your cup is lifted to your mouth and he can only see you from the nose upwards, but by the creases at the corners of your eyes, he knows you’re concealing a smile behind it as you nod back at him.

Ten minutes turns to twenty and then somehow becomes thirty — Jihoon starts feeling like you’re someone he’s known for years, and not just the person he accidentally ended up paying attention to in the gym just a couple of weeks ago. He bounces off you and you bounce off him. Both of you have long-since finished your drinks, too: there’s no real reason for either of you to still be here.

Except the obvious. 

“So, the apartment,” Jihoon says, leaning forwards again with his elbows resting on his knees. “Is it…?” He makes a few circular gestures with his hands with which he tries to imply something to the effect of ‘local’, or ‘nearby’, but he can’t quite bring himself to say that out loud. You seem to catch on though. Somehow.

Then again, you did say — a few subject changes ago — that Jihoon is on your wavelength. Maybe that’s it.

“About… a fifteen minute walk from here? Give or take,” you say, and his eyebrows shoot up his forehead so fast it’s like they’re on strings, being controlled by someone else. He doesn’t realise for a few seconds, by which point he isn’t even sure how to relax them. 

“No way?” he says, trying to feign nothing more than an idle interest. Obviously, he’s soaring. 

“Yeah. I’ll want to get back training soon, too, so there’s some incentive to get this done quickly. I miss it,” you tell him.

Jihoon comes out with what he says next without thinking. His mouth is moving before fully engaging his brain. It’s the coffee jitters. Apparently.

“Well, if you need any help with anything, I’ve got a car.”

“You’re too sweet,” you say. “I really couldn’t put you out like that, but…”

“You wouldn’t be,” he assures you with a shrug. “If I’m not working or in the gym… I’m never really that busy. It’s up to you, but-… I’d be happy to.”

You bite the inside of your lip for a moment, apparently mulling this over, before wiggling in your seat to pull your phone out of the front pocket of your jeans. You unlock the device and hand it over on a ‘new contact’ screen. 

Jihoon goes completely stupid: he thinks his brain stops functioning as he takes it to put his number in — for a moment, he’s staring dumbstruck, struggling to even remember the order of the digits now he’s under pressure, but it comes back to him eventually. His thumbs dart across the screen and he checks, double checks and triple checks that he’s typed it right before placing it back in your waiting palm. 

His fingertips brush against yours and it tickles, sending small shockwaves up his arms and straight into his chest. You smile down at your phone before glancing up at him.

“You need an emoji,” you tell him, and he raises an eyebrow at you.

“Huh?”

“Everyone in my contacts has one — I’ve been doing this since I was in high-school. You need to pick one, too.”

“Oh, uh-…” Jihoon swallows, and for some reason he’s completely forgotten every single little emoticon option there is. He draws a blank. “I can’t — you pick one for me. I don’t know.”

You narrow your eyes at him for a second, pouting your lips as you seem to scroll through the endless options. Now and again, you look up at him, as if trying to see what best fits him before you continue your search. He waits. And waits. And waits. He’s about to throw in an admittedly useless suggestion of some sort of boring animal when you turn your phone around to show him what you’ve chosen.

Jihoon, the contact name reads. And there’s the little angel face next to it.

“Oh, come on,” he says, blushing deeply. “You can’t be serious.”

“I totally am,” you say proudly, turning it back and pressing to save it. He hides his face in his hands. “If you won’t pick your own, you get what you’re given. You did this to yourself.”

“Wow,” he chuckles weakly, sliding his hands up into his hair and raking it back off his face. Your eyes move quickly across every inch and boy, does he notice. You shrug in response and test it, sending the same little emoticon to him. He blushes harder when it comes through and he saves your number into his own phone before placing it face-down on the table. 

More than an hour after buying your coffee, Jihoon stretches his arms above his head and checks the time on his watch. He frowns slightly, not sure how the afternoon got away from him so fast, and lets out a sigh.

“I think I need to get going,” he says reluctantly. Leaving you is absolutely the opposite of what he wants to do, actually. Alas, “I have some friends coming over tonight.”

“Yeah — yeah, of course,” you smile, leaning to one side to pick your bag up off the floor. “No worries.”

You both move to stand up and he throws his coat over his arm, leading the way out. He holds open the door for you to leave first, then follows you outside into the afternoon sun. 

“It was really nice to see you,” you say, turning to face him. 

“You too,” he agrees. “Text me if you need anything, okay? But actually do. Don’t just say you will?”

You laugh sweetly. Fairies. His ears might have actually caught fire this time. “Okay, okay. I promise. I’ll text you — thank you.” There’s a pause, but only a tiny one. “And for the coffee, too.”

“Don’t worry about it,” he insists, waving it off. You shake your head. He thinks your hands are twitching when you stuff them into your pockets but he can’t be sure. Your breath definitely stutters, though. 

“No, really. Um… next one’s on me?” 

He blinks, and blinks again. Next one? The next one? He feels like he’s malfunctioned and been forcibly rebooted. The next one? 

“I-…” he starts, his throat dry. “Yeah, okay. If you’re sure.”

“I’m sure.” You nod, smiling with — what he doesn’t realise is — relief. “I’ll see you around, okay?”

“Yeah. Yeah — I’ll see you, y/n.”

—————

Jihoon has no choice but to admit defeat to the group chat that night when Seungcheol and Jeonghan come over for a takeout.

Within minutes, his oldest friend is asking about the girl from the gym — he’s been just as relentless as Seokmin and Soonyoung in quizzing Jihoon, except it’s slightly harder to deny to Seungcheol because he did witness, first-hand, the way you had his friend tripping over his own feet with a single smile. At first, Jihoon tries to shrug it off. Play it down. Change the subject. He doesn’t mention that he’s actually spoken to you since he and Cheol trained together, or that he accidentally bumped into you and paid for your coffee, or that you stayed talking with him for as long as you did. He definitely doesn’t say that you exchanged phone numbers. 

He absolutely won’t confess to being smitten. 

All Jihoon willingly admits to is that from what he’s seen of you around, you seem nice, and with a roll of his eyes he does agree that he thinks you’re attractive. He gets a bit of a glare later in the evening when  Jeonghan asks if he’s thought about where he wants to take you on your first date, and Jihoon tells him to stop asking stupid questions and eat his chicken before he eats it for him. But all in all he thinks he evades the worst of it pretty well. For now, anyway — he knows their pestering isn’t going away any time soon. 

Especially not when, on their way out, Seungcheol leans close and whispers that whatever is going on with his gym crush, it suits him. Jihoon jabs him on the arm and the two men leave, laughing brightly.

It’s about an hour after his friends have gone home, having washed the dishes and cleaned up his apartment that Jihoon is sitting on his living room floor doing a few lower body stretches before he turns in for the night. He finds himself tapping into your text thread — not for the first time this evening — and skimming over the short conversation you had earlier. You messaged him when you got back to your friend’s place to thank him for the third time, and Jihoon replied back telling you that if you didn’t stop being silly, he was never going to respond to you again. Your reply came in the form of a “:(“ and his was a simple “:)”. That was it, but he’s been thinking about the exchange ever since. 

He’s not sure why. Nor is he certain what about that has him looking down at the messages and grinning like a fool in his apartment, alone, at 10:30pm on a Sunday night. He could probably take a stab in the dark at what it means, though. He rubs at the back of his neck with one hand as he changes conversations and types out a short message with the other. 

jihoon: fine. you’re right. 

seokmin: ?

soonyoung: probs true, does need context

jihoon: about the gym girl. you’re right. 

soonyoung: OH

seokmin: Hahahahahaha

seokmin: Yeah, you’re definitely the last to know, dude

soonyoung: fr even chan and hansol know atp lmao 

jihoon: they what?

jihoon: how do they know?

jihoon: they don’t go to my gym! i haven’t seen them in weeks!

soonyoung: because we told them????? 

seokmin: So, we might have told everyone

jihoon: blocking both of your numbers immediately.

seokmin: Hey! We’re just glad you’ve accepted it

seokmin: When do we get to meet her?

jihoon: blocked.

Well, great, Jihoon thinks as he fights the urge to lay face down on the floor and let the laminate cool his searingly hot cheeks. 

At least he’s admitted it now. 

He’s vaguely confirmed in writing that maybe he has a bit of a thing for you — it’s out in the open and at minimum, two of his friends know that it’s real. Straight from the horse’s mouth. Fingers. Whatever. No doubt by morning, all of his friends will have found out. The point stands that he hasn’t confessed to something like this since he was approximately sixteen years old, so whatever you’re doing to him, whatever this… is, it matters. 

So, he asks himself, standing up off the hardwood floor and stretching his spine, arms locked behind him and pushed back as far as they can go. He turns off all the lights, checks the front door, goes through the motions to get himself ready for bed. So… what the fuck am I supposed to do now?

—————

Come Monday evening, he’s about ready to hit the roof.

As far as bad days go, Jihoon thinks he’s in the running for one of the worst ever. He slept awfully, tossing and turning through the night despite the usual winning combination of freshly washed bed sheets and his white noise machine drowning out the occasional disturbance from the street below. He wakes up two minutes before his alarm is due to go off, only to discover he fell asleep before plugging his phone in to charge overnight, and it’s sitting at a very risky 13%. The gel he uses to keep his hair off his face at work has gone weird and only does half a job, strands tumbling back in front of his eyes the second he goes to leave his apartment, very nearly forgetting his keys. Then, to really put the cherry on top, he sees that — at some point between getting home yesterday and now — someone has scraped his car while parking up next to him. There’s a large scratch right down the passenger side, with no note nor reliable CCTV in his apartment’s parking lot to confirm who it was, and of course, the space is currently empty. 

All this before he even gets to work.

He fundamentally knows that starting the week off with a bad attitude will only lead to a really shitty remainder, but when Vernon sends his routine ‘Monday Motivation’ booster message — “you’re going to have a great day, today!” — into the group chat, Jihoon responds with a crude photo of his middle finger, right in front of the massive scuff on the bodywork of his Hyundai. Jeonghan replies with an ‘oof’, Wonwoo with a ‘yikes’, and Joshua, ever the comedian, sends a picture of Garfield lying face-down captioned ‘Mondays’ that nobody replies to. All responses feel kind of appropriate. But he pockets his phone without sending anything else, sighing again; he locks the car and checks the handle just in case before he finally heads into the building.

It’s going to be a long day. He just has to get through it.

Things don’t necessarily improve. He ends up in and out of meetings all day, so when 5 o’clock rolls around and he’s on his way out the door, he’s feeling a bit like he’s done nothing of actual value. Just, for some reason, thinking about you and tapping out a catchy beat on the top of his desk as he pretends to pay attention to useless presentation after useless presentation. But it’s still somehow been exhausting on his brain and on the drive back to his apartment, Jihoon feels so drained that he contemplates skipping the gym altogether and going straight to bed. This internal argument takes up most of his journey, but it does keep him occupied during the rush-hour traffic if it does nothing else. 

Nothing has ever been fixed by ruining a perfectly good routine, however — so no sooner than he’s back in his apartment, he changes out of his button-down and trousers and into his regular gym gear. His protein shaker is ready on the counter for when he’s home again, the lights are off, his bag is on his shoulder and the door is locked. He pushes against it a few times, checking out of habit, despite the fact that his only neighbours on this floor are Soonyoung, Seokmin and an elderly couple with a cat they’re not technically supposed to have. Nobody tells, though, because Boots has become everyone’s emotional support animal. The only actual security threat is Seokmin maybe stealing something from his fridge, but he’s only ever satisfied after the third test anyway. 

A quick warmup and a few easy stretches later, Jihoon sets about his business. Mondays are for training legs (and often, as a result, incapacitating himself for the rest of the week), and these workouts are always some of his most intense.

So intense, in fact, that he’s sweating buckets and cherry red when he steps away from the squat rack, tugging up the hem of his t-shirt to dry his face, a brief flash of his toned abdomen on full view. He’s just about catching his breath when he glances in the mirror, and his knees nearly give out when he sees you walking in. You lock eyes and smile at him in the reflection as you start to walk towards him.

It’s not just any smile, but he’s way too flustered to notice.

He spins around to face you, mortally embarrassed that you definitely just saw that, but in a weird way… kind of elated? You drop your headphones to sit around the back of your neck to greet him as you get closer. He pushes his hair back off his forehead and tries to act as cool as he can, but Jihoon suddenly becomes incredibly aware of everything about himself in this moment: his posture, how his arms hang by his sides, the exact positioning of his feet. The fact that he’s breathing pretty deeply, that his pulse is so loud in his ears that he can see your lips moving but can’t quite hear what you’re saying.

Shit. Shit, shit, shit — you’re talking. Focus. He needs to focus. 

“Sorry — what was that?” he asks, eliciting a soft laugh from you.

“I like your shirt,” you repeat, a fraction clearer. Jihoon glances down at himself, at the same sweatpants and tight black workout top he wears in here several times a week, and looks back at you with a raised eyebrow. God, he lets himself think for half a second, entertaining his own stupidity with the idea that you’re finding this as hard as he is, too. Maybe I’m not alone in this. 

“Oh?” he says. “Um — thank you?”

“How’d it go with your friends last night?” you ask, hardly skipping a beat, and he’s a little thankful that you skim over his poor attempt at gratitude for a compliment he isn’t sure he deserves. Instead, his confusion wraps itself around the fact that you actually remembered what he was doing last night. Hell, even he’d forgotten in the heat of the day he���d had, but you remembered. He’s sweating over it a little and briefly wonders what the chances are of the gym floor opening up and swallowing him whole.

Slim, he decides. But not zero. 

There’s hope.

“Yeah — yeah, it was nice,” he says, internally kicking himself for overthinking this so much that he’s apparently lost his ability to speak. In the space of 24 hours, he’s gone from giggling over coffee with you to completely weak just at the sound of your voice. It should be easier here, if anything — this is home turf for him. His comfort space. He supposes the tight fit of your gym clothes accentuating your hips and thighs isn’t helping matters, and neither is the wide neckline of your own t-shirt exposing your throat and a collarbone. But still. He’s not a teenager. He should be able to handle a little bit of skin. 

He clears his throat, rolling his head side-to-side. Focus. “Sorry — I’m-… I just didn’t expect to see you back here so soon.”

“Yeah,” you chuckle. “I-… couldn’t stay away. Missed it a little too much.”

“I get that,” he concurs, willing his eyes not to drop down your frame to a newly exposed area of skin just around your waist, your t-shirt riding up as you adjust your bag on your shoulder. “It’s good to-… have you back, anyway.”

“Good to be back,” you agree. “Hey — can you leave that set up for me, when you’re done? I’m on legs today, too.”

Jihoon doesn’t want to say that he knows Mondays are your leg days, as well, so he doesn’t. Even if it is true. He wonders if you would find it odd that he’s remembered. “Sure,” he says with a small smile, which you return. Just as you’re about to walk off to drop your things into a locker, he pipes up again. “I mean — hey, if you wanted a spot, or to-… do, you know… anything…”

“Are you asking me to train with you?” you ask, eyes bright and smile wider than he thinks he’s ever seen it. This is torture. He’s not even lifting anything and his heart is about to burst out of his fucking chest — God, maybe this was a bad suggestion.

“I-…” he starts, but he lets the breath out of his lungs and shrugs his shoulders. “Yeah. I am.”

“Give me two minutes,” you agree, hurrying off to put your stuff away and fill up your bottle.

He manages to squeeze another set of squats in before you get back, which is sort of a miracle seeing as how his knees have gone completely weak ever since you arrived. He’s scrolling through his playlist as you cross the gym floor on your way back to him, but he looks up and smiles as you approach. 

“You go ahead — I’ve just finished.”

He knows he’s really fucking done for when, after the first round, you add plates onto the bar to out-lift him. All before he’s even positioned himself behind you to be a good spotter.

Jihoon doesn’t go down without a fight though, and things get a little competitive from there. Both of you throw some of your favourite (see: most agonising) exercises into the mix over the course of the hour, taking it in turns on the equipment and creating a session that just about has him able to move by the time you’re finished. You talk to each other when you’ve got the breath to do so, otherwise focussing on your workout with more intensity than either of you remember training with for a long time. 

And so what if he has to turn away from you once or twice to compose himself when breathless whines spill from between your lips on your last few reps, the sheer effort of the movements pushing your muscles to their absolute limit? So what if he feels his entire body run a thousand degrees every time you sweetly encourage him to manage just one more? So what if his palm stays tingling for fifteen seconds every time you high-five him for a set well done?

You slide out of the hamstring curl machine with a deep breath and legs like two sticks of jelly at the end of the session, and he holds a hand out to steady you as you regain your ability to weight-bear.

“You okay?” he asks, and you nod, patting what’s exposed of your chest and neck with your towel. 

“Yeah. Yeah — just… fuck.” You laugh, laying your hand over the top of his and squeezing. Only for a second — not even, only for a breath — and really just to let him know that you’re okay to stand on your own, but Jihoon feels a bit like he’s been electrocuted straight up his arm all the same. “You don’t come to play, do you?”

“Says you,” he scoffs, only now moving his hand from your upper arm. “I was wrong about you — you’re insane. Clinically insane.” 

Using the paper towels he went to gather while you were finishing up, he wipes the machine clean as you stretch out your now slightly exercise-swollen thighs. 

“I was just gonna finish up on one of the stairmasters,” you tell him, taking a long sip of your water. His eyes widen to the point of comedy, eyebrows high on his forehead. You snicker at his horror, the rim of your bottle hovering tantalisingly over your bottom lip. “What?”

“That’s-… got to be a form of masochism,” he says, exhausted just at the idea of marching up the never ending staircase even for a minute. You almost choke on your mouthful of water, only just swallowing it in time before a sudden, uncontrollable laugh erupts from your chest. 

“How?!” you ask, covering your mouth with your hand. Just like yesterday, the urge to pull your arm away, to reveal your hidden smile strikes him. He doesn’t act on it, but he wants to.

“What do you mean, how? Why would you put yourself through that after what you’ve just done?” It’s completely lighthearted, and the rush of heat on your cheeks intensifies at the cocktail of shock and awe in his gaze.

You shrug your shoulders once. “I don’t know. Maybe I’m just better than you.” The way the tip of your tongue teasingly sits between your teeth as you grin at him sends bullets of adrenaline through his veins and Jihoon runs his hand over his face.

For about three seconds, he tells himself he isn’t going to take the bait. He’ll lose, he’ll admit it — he’ll put his hands up and say you’re absolutely, definitely better than he is, if it means he doesn’t have to push through a round of cardio after surpassing every single one of his physical limits. But God, he thinks you look completely irresistible standing there challenging him like this, your hands on your hips. His eyes don’t leave yours and yours don’t leave his; both of your chests stutter, just a little bit, and he can see your smile grow in his periphery.

How the fuck is he supposed to walk away?

“Ten minutes,” he concedes, matching your footsteps as you start to walk backwards towards his least favourite line of equipment in any gym, ever. “And you’re definitely getting the next coffee, now.”

��—————

That Friday, you finally text him again.

His muscles have just about returned to a working state and Jihoon is quite proud to say that he has regained the ability to sit down without needing something to hold onto. He got home from work, showered the day away and has just settled down into the sofa to start on the book Wonwoo has been on his ass about reading when his phone vibrates on the side table. He reaches over for it, trying to figure out which of his friends might be trying to get hold of him early evening on a Friday, and already going over excuses in his head as to why he can’t go out to do whatever they’re inviting him to. But when your contact name flashes up on the screen, every single thought disappears from his brain.

y/n: hey :)

y/n: just out of interest, how good are you at assembling furniture?

He furrows his brows at this. There’s a very obvious answer, which is that he’s not. He doesn’t want to reply saying so, though, so he goes for what he thinks is the next best thing.

jh: well…

jh: what are you trying to put together?

y/n: a bed :(

y/n: today’s your rest day, right?

y/n: can i bribe you with dinner after? :)

Oh? His brain stalls, fingers hovering over the keypad. He can literally see your face forming a little pout before growing into a hopeful grin in his mind’s eye. He doesn’t see how he could ever say no. 

jh: apparently yes, you can.

jh: text me the address? i’ll leave in 5.

He changes out of his basketball shorts and hoodie in record time, abandoning Wonwoo’s book on his couch in favour of attempting to look at least somewhat presentable for you. He tugs on a pair of jeans that he hasn’t touched in about 6 months and one of his nicer t-shirts instead, even going as far as to spritz aftershave on the column of his throat. You’ve sent him your address and he makes to leave, doing his regular essential item pat-down on his way out the door. He puts your new apartment into his phone as he crosses the parking lot, stupidly delighted to discover it’s only 7 and a half minutes away from where he lives, and settles into his car with a series of deep exhales.

The breathing exercises don’t achieve much. His head is still spinning when he parks up in the street by your new place and lingers just outside the building. He sends you a text to say he’s arrived and you reply saying you’re on your way down. You appear in the lobby just a few minutes later.

“Hey,” you greet him warmly, crossing the space and putting your arms around him in a hug. He goes limp for a fraction of a second before his arms slide around you, too. God, he hopes you can’t feel his heartbeat right now. He thinks that the effect you have on him should be considered dangerous. But whether you can or not, you tighten your arms to squeeze him once before you unwind them from around his neck and step away. 

“Hi,” he says, feverish from the tops of his ears all the way down to his toes. His hands find his pockets as you take a few more polite steps back.

“Thank you so much for this.” Your bottom lip finds temporary home between your teeth before you’re nodding back towards the stairwell. “I’m on the third floor. Follow me.”

He does. He walks up the stairs behind you as you ask about his day at work, and he tells you that he thinks today has probably been one of the best he’s had in about 2 months. When he asks how your day went, you turn your head back to look at him and stumble on the next step, gently laughing and saying that you think you’re at your tether’s end with D.I.Y, but it’s been pretty good otherwise. By the time you reach your floor, his thighs are aching, a bit of residual fatigue from your session earlier in the week making it a little harder than it ought to be. He can’t imagine how you’ve coped every day since then; if his own building didn’t have an elevator, Jihoon thinks he’d have been sleeping in his car.

You give him a little tour of the apartment, and he stands next to you at the window as you point out where you were staying with your friend a few blocks away. He thinks the view is seriously pretty in the evening light, enchanted by how he can see the tops of the slightly lower buildings and the street below, lined with neon storefronts and currently alive with shoppers and bar-goers, but… He cringes at himself for thinking it, but the view through the glass is nothing compared to the one he has inside. 

You’ve started to put up a few decorations and knick-knacks around the place too. He doesn’t know you very well, but he still thinks it’s very you — all of it, and he likes them. Even with the room full of boxes and half-unpacked cases, there’s so much personality in it already. Charm. He brushes off your attempts to apologise for the ‘mess’, as you called it, despite everything being neatly pushed out of the way of the main space. It’s easily tidier than any other mid-move apartment he’s ever been in. 

“Did you want a drink?” you ask him, walking over to the refrigerator and resting a hand on the door. “I’ve got wine, or-… anything, really.” 

“Just some water would be great,” he says appreciatively, and a few seconds later you’re handing him a bottle, turning another one over in your hand. “I really wouldn’t be much help after a couple of glasses, trust me.”

“Does this mean you are good at it, then? Before a drink?” you ask him. Is it hope in your voice? Or do you somehow know how hopeless he is, and are you teasing? He can’t tell. Regardless, clearly his evasion earlier wasn’t quite as successful as he hoped it would be.

“About that…” He chuckles, taking a sip from the bottle and glancing sideways at you. “I’m sure between the two of us, we’ll figure it out.”

“My knight in shining armour,” you say with a laugh, closing your fingers around his wrist and leading him through the door to your bedroom. You’ve managed to separate all of the individual pieces, but you haven’t made any real progress otherwise. He settles himself down on the floor and reaches for the assembly manual, pursing his lips as he looks at the little baggies of screws and bolts and various other things he doesn’t know the names of.

“Okay.” He frowns, looking back up at you where you’ve kneeled down a couple of feet away. You’re grinning innocently back at him, but Jihoon’s lips are more aligned with a pout. “You maybe should have mentioned that the instructions are in Swedish.”

——-

Ignoring the fact that you can’t understand the directions printed on the flimsy little pieces of paper, you get to work. It’s… an interesting process, but somehow between the pair of you, you successfully manage to assemble the bed in just under two hours by mostly following the diagrams (and having to backtrack several times because Jihoon managed to miss a few steps). At three minutes to nine, you’re both finally standing up off the floor, stretching out stiff joints and tight muscles; the bed is fully assembled and made up with your sheets in the centre of the room, headboard against the back wall, the lamp you set on the dresser casting a pleasant orangey glow on every surface.

“We did it,” you say, a little in shock, a lot exhausted, and absolutely starving. At least, that’s what he assumes you’re feeling, because it’s what he is. “We actually did it.”

“I mean, you did most of it,” Jihoon says. It’s true; at a point, he was just handing you the pieces you asked him for and holding parts steady so that you could fit them together. But if you want to call it a joint effort, he isn’t going to stop you, and the roll of your eyes tells him that you do want to call it that. 

“Shh. You helped,” you scold him, bumping his upper arm with your elbow. “I couldn’t have done it without you.”

“If you say so,” he chuckles, taking another sip of his water. Jihoon isn’t sure he believes you, but the way you’re challenging him to argue further with your tongue pressed against the inside of your cheek scrambles his brain. Any remaining argument dies on his lips. “We make a good team.”

“We do,” you agree, expression shifting into a shy smile, bumping his arm again, your elbow lingering against him for a second longer. “Come on, I think I promised to feed you, too. What are you in the mood for?”

A movie has been playing in the background for about an hour by the time your food arrives and you’ve eaten everything. Jihoon relaxes back against the cushions of the couch and you’re settled comfortably next to him: there’s plenty of space on either side of you both, so there isn’t really any need for you to have your upper arm basically pressing against his, but Jihoon is too comfortable to say anything and you certainly aren’t making any attempts to move away. You shift your legs after about ninety minutes, bringing them up underneath you so your thigh is pressed against his now, as well, and you’re twisted slightly so you’re physically facing him but your head is still turned towards the TV.

Everywhere your clothed body touches him is scorching, and he wonders if maybe he should’ve worn a thinner t-shirt, or at the very least something a little less heavy on his legs. His jeans, slightly tighter around the thighs than perhaps would be their peak level of comfort, are clinging to him everywhere and he’s so aware of himself, so aware of you, of your sweet body wash, your fruity shampoo, every single one of your breaths… He’s cursed people out for breathing too loudly around him before, but he thinks he could replace his white noise machine with an eight hour track of just this and he would sleep like a fucking baby.

One of your elbows is propped against the top of the cushions behind you and you’re resting your head in your palm, and (not for the first time this evening) he glances sideways to look at you. They’ve been fleeting glances thus far, only stealing fractions of a moment before he turns his attention back to the TV. But this? This is the wrong moment. Entirely the wrong fucking moment because as his head turns, so does yours, and you catch him in the act. Fuck, if he thought he was burning up, before? He’s pretty sure he’s somehow just descended straight to the second circle of hell, greeting all the other lusty sinners like old friends. Several of his thoughts tonight have been considerably impure, and in this half second of blistering eye contact, they all come rushing back.

The universe is really testing him this evening, and Jihoon is stumbling. It feels like any minute now, he’s going to explode.

He straightens his spine and looks back at the TV, trying to force his eyes to focus even though he’s completely swallowed by the feeling of your arm straightening across the back of the couch, your fingertips grazing over the skin at the bottom of his hairline. He can feel your eyes still on him, your gaze burning into his cheek, no doubt following as his tongue darts out subconsciously over his lips. But he can’t quite help himself, can’t get the image of how sweet you looked out of his head; he clears his throat quietly and looks over at you again, coming over almost completely blank the second he notices the glimmer your eyes hold when they’re trained on him. 

Any. Fucking. Minute. 

“Jihoon, I-…” you start to say, and he turns himself a little bit so that he’s facing you better, completely forgetting about the movie now. That’s not a great loss: he couldn’t explain the plot even if he tried. “I don’t know if-… you can tell me if I’ve read you wrong…”

“You haven’t,” he hurries. Relief starts to ease the tension between your brows, before you scrunch them again and cock your head to the side. “I’m sure you haven’t, I mean.”

In this new position, one of his legs is bent and sitting up on the couch beneath him and you’ve adjusted your own posture to accommodate. Your knee sits just over the top of his, more of your impossible body heat radiating through his clothes, and he glances down at the site of contact before he looks back at you. 

“I just-... I don’t know, I think I knew I was interested in you from the first time I saw you, but the last few weeks especially…” You’ve been rehearsing this. He can feel it. It’s written in your eyes, holding the weight of the words you’re struggling to say, and behind them he can see cogs turning as you try to get the words in the right order. (He knows how that goes, because he’s been trying to figure out how to tell you, too.) He nods, urging you to keep going.

“I can’t get you out of my head. I really like you.”

He short-circuits, then. Even though part of him knew what you were going to say, hearing it out loud flips a switch inside him and he stops functioning. Blinking at you slowly, lips parted, heart racing – he feels as if his brain has been sucked clean out of his ears and is floating somewhere way above his head. Way outside of a contactable range, way beyond any level of rational decision-making. Jihoon knows what he wants to say, of course – he knows that he wants to say that he likes you, and that he has for a while, and that maybe you should let him take you out on a date or something, but all of that sits just behind the barrier of his teeth, so…

He leans forward and kisses you, instead.

He almost can’t believe that he’s only wanted this for as short of a time as he has; it feels like it’s been building inside him for so much longer. Relief floods through his veins, the emotional dam finally breaching. It only lasts a few seconds, but with his lips pressed to yours and yours pressing back, the static in his brain goes quiet, the movie falls silent: everything stops, except you. He thinks you could’ve been carved from stone around each other — he thinks something just feels so inexplicably right. Your hand tightens in his hair and he gasps softly as he pulls an inch back, eyes heavily lidded and looking straight at you through his lashes. You move forward, leaning your forehead against his, and the feather-light hold he has on your chin slides up to your cheek instead. 

“I’m sorry, I didn’t know how to-…” he says after a long, long moment of remembering how to breathe, how to blink, how to exist in your space without combusting on the spot. He still isn’t sure he knows how to do any of those things, especially not now he can see every single line of your face this close. He’s trying, though. “But — shit, I’m crazy about you.”

You kiss him, then, harder than before, colliding in a mess of half-finished breaths and bumped, stinging noses. His other hand comes up to sit against your rib cage, yours pressing into the material of his t-shirt over his chest. He smiles and parts his lips as yours move against them, your tongue gently sweeping into his mouth, finding his own; a soft, low moan tickles the back of his throat, his fingertips curling slightly to tighten his hold. 

Jihoon isn’t sure how you end up on your knees, straddled astride his legs with one of his hands tucked between your thigh and calf, the other on the curve of your ass — he just knows that he doesn’t mind one bit. You’re warm and comfortable, the arch of your back pressing you into him deliciously. He’s kissing you like his life depends on it (he really fears that it might), and you’re doing the same back, licking against his tongue and rocking slightly with every separation and reconnection of your lips. He feels your fingers brush at the hem of his t-shirt and slip just underneath at the same moment as you pull away from him, and he’s so dazed, so fuzzy, so lost in you that he can only tilt his head back to stare up at your face. In your current position, you’re towering over him. It’s easily the best view he’s ever had.

“Can I-…?” you ask breathlessly. The new roughness to your voice goes straight to his cock and he has to restrain himself from bucking his hips upwards.

“Yeah,” he says, leaning forward slightly to try and aid you. Your hands tug at the bottom of his shirt and peel it up over his chest: he raises his arms slightly and soon, you can toss it to the unoccupied side of the couch. He shivers slightly as he relaxes back, both at the chill in your unheated apartment and upon noticing the way you’re staring down at him. It’s addictive. 

“Oh my God,” you whisper, jaw a little slack, smoothing your hands over his shoulders to feel every ridge of hard-earned muscle. You travel down his arms, over to his chest, down his stomach… Jihoon sucks in a breath, your warm hands absolutely searing against his skin, and his abdominals tighten beneath them. Tilting your head, you press a line of kisses down the side of his neck, your lips brushing against one almost unbearably sensitive spot when you continue. “Fuck, you’re so hot.”

He smiles bashfully, rolling his head to the side and giving you all the access you want. Your lips tickle euphorically against him as he tugs you flush against his chest, both his hands now tightly pressing against your ass, fingers kneading the muscle concealed by your pants. You’re sitting right over his clothed cock and he’s reasonably sure he can feel your pulse between your thighs, letting out a soft grunt when you roll your hips deliberately down into his own. Your kisses travel to the swell at the curve of his shoulder before moving back up to his lips, where he meets you with a fire that he’s never kissed anyone with, before.

“Says you,” he murmurs into your mouth, your teeth clashing, his hips pushing slightly up off the couch. Just enough to make you sit back from him, just enough for Jihoon to open his eyes and look at you. His hair, thoroughly scrunched up and pulled around by your desperately gripping fingers, fans out at all sorts of angles and his chest has taken on a rosy hue since you last looked at it. With swollen, shiny lips, glossy eyes, breathing deep, he looks completely blissed out, like a man who could unravel beneath you if you moved just right. All from a little tongue action. He’d usually feel embarrassed, but it’s hard to when you’re the person on top of him; to be honest, neither of you would mind much if he did.

You’re pushing yourself up and off him before he can really get his bearings and an audible whine of despair parts his lips at the loss of your weight against his cock. Fuck, these jeans were a bad idea: he’s straining against the denim so much that it hurts, and there’s a near perfect outline of his hard-on. He stops pouting the second you take hold of his hand and tug him upright, though, your eyes dark and determined and intense. He thinks he might faint, actually: from standing too fast and feeling as though all the blood in his body is pulsing through his aching dick, he has to take a moment to stop the edges of his vision going dark before you’re pulling him through to your bedroom.

Something flips inside him the second you have him there. Jihoon, who was more than happy to sit beneath you and let you take all the control in the living room, is pushing you back onto the mattress by your shoulder and slotting himself between your parted thighs the moment the door is closed behind him. He’s past the point of wanting you, now: he needs you, and he needs you to need him, too. 

And God, do you. You prop yourself up on one elbow, staring at where he’s now leaning over you with wide eyes and your bottom lip drawn between your teeth. He bends down and kisses along your jawline in response, nipping gently just below your ear. Your back arches up and in a flash, one of his hands is beneath you, snapping open the clasp on your bra with a few slides of his fingers.

“Wh-…” you start, giggling and panting at the same time. He smirks against your pulse point. 

He flattens his tongue against you and licks a salty bead of sweat off your skin. “What?”

“Had no idea you could-…” You’re cut off by a gasp as one of his hands slides under your sweater, slipping beneath the garment he just unfastened. His fingertips graze over your breast and a pleading sob escapes you. His smile grows even wider. “You were so…”

“So what?” he prompts, pinching your nipple between his thumb and forefinger. Another one of those beautiful sounds breaks the air above you. He does it again, massaging your breast with the palm of his hand. “Come on… talk to me.”

“So good,” you gasp, lying down flat and tilting your head back against the pillows. He rocks forwards to press his cock against you again and your thighs tighten around his hips, one leg hooking around his to keep him there. “So-… fucking good.”

You’re so impossibly irresistible to him, especially like this, and he sits up, settling on his knees to look down at you. Jihoon doesn’t even get the chance to move his hands towards the hem of your sweater to tug it off you though: you’re already grabbing it yourself, crossing your arms to pull it over the top of your head. He can see your bra now, and hell, it’s pretty even if it is just hanging off you. Baby pink and lacy. He thumbs over the material as he helps you pull it down your arms, briefly letting himself wonder if-…

“If only you’d been patient enough to see the set together.”

Oh, so you can read his mind now, too? 

You glance down to the small space between your bodies and his eyes follow, lips slightly parted, a heavy sigh on his breath. Fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck — he wishes he had. Even imagining it, he’s throbbing.

“You wear all this for me?” he asks, hands creeping up the insides of your thighs. You nod up at him and he smiles down at you. “Fuck. I bet you didn’t even need my help tonight at all, did you?”

You’re bucking your hips now as his thumb brushes, agonisingly slowly, over your clothed cunt. One arm has come up to cover your face: for the first time, he acts on his impulsive need to see you shy, see you needy, and leans over you to gently pull it away and pins your wrist down against the mattress. He kisses you, his fingers on the other hand pressing slightly more firmly to where he’s pretty sure your clit is.

“Y/n, you’re so pretty. Let me see you.”

“I didn’t,” you admit, voice wobbling as he works you up so much you’re actually soaking through not just your pretty underwear, but the leggings you’ve had on all night, too. He can feel it against the pad of his thumb and he raises his eyebrows for you to continue. “Just… really wanted you to come over…”

“Mhm. I know,” he soothes, bending low again and kissing down towards your chest. His lips purse over one of your nipples and he sucks it up into his mouth, flicking his tongue over the bud. He releases your wrist with the hand currently taking most of his weight and leans on his elbow, teasing your other tit with his fingers. The weight of it in his palm has him murmuring soft praises against your skin, telling you over and over how good you feel. You push up onto your elbows to try and press him closer — when his teeth tug just slightly, you’re about ready to beg.

“Jihoon, please,” you murmur. He short-circuits, again. Goes blank. His name has always sounded so much sweeter on your tongue, but this? This? Oh, he doesn’t know if he’s ever going to recover. That sound is going to stick in his head for days, months, forever, if he has anything to say about it. But even if his brain isn’t working, his body moves on autopilot: he sits up and hooks his fingers under your waistband, pulling your pants down your legs and discarding them onto the floor. 

He’s staring between your thighs with zero functioning brain cells and literal galaxies in his eyes, trying to figure out what cosmic miracle brought someone like you into his life, how on Earth he’s ended up between your thighs. The question is so overwhelming in his mind that he barely notices that you’re moving, at first. Jihoon doesn’t know what causes you to try and bring your thighs together — if it’s shyness or arousal, desperation, a search for friction? — but he stops you as soon as he realises, laying a hand on each of your legs, pinning your knees down now, instead.

“Keep your legs wide for me?” he asks, to which you punctuate a nod with an assenting hum. “Good girl.” 

You’re so wet that when he strokes two fingers over your covered pussy, pressing the fabric of your panties into your heat, they come away thinly coated in the arousal that’s seeped through them. He brings his fingers to his lips then, eyes fluttering as he licks your slick off them. You taste otherworldly and he doesn’t hesitate to tell you so with a groan.

“God,” he murmurs, tugging at the waistband of your panties with his other hand. His eyes ask if you’re ready — if you’re sure, and when you nod down at him, he pulls them off completely too. His middle finger slips between your folds, collecting the wetness dribbling out of you, and he drags it slowly upwards towards your clit. He repositions himself again, leaning down over you with his head at your neck, the heel of his hand resting against your lower abdomen. He draws small circles over the bud, laying open-mouthed kisses at your collarbone and listening to the gorgeous sounds you make, learning what you like, following each gasp and moan and chasing as many of them as he can draw out of you.   

At the same time as you start rocking your hips up to meet his hand, your nails scratching gently against his scalp again, Jihoon slips his finger down from your swollen clit to press it inside you. You gasp, high-pitched and needy, your cunt spasming around his finger and pulling it in deeper. He’s only in up to his second knuckle but the way you keen for him has him pushing further until it’s buried inside your pussy completely. 

“S’this okay?” he asks, but he knows your answer thanks to your vocal responses to him already slowly easing his finger in and out, in and out. You nod your head almost aggressively as he glances up at your face, your eyes squeezed tightly shut, jaw tense, throat bobbing as you swallow hard. 

“More — please,” you say not long after. A breath hitches in your throat when he does exactly what you ask, pressing the heel of his hand against your clit and positioning another finger at your entrance. He flexes his wrist slightly to get comfortable, pumping both fingers into you now, and he curls them upwards at just the right time to make your back arch off the bed. “Fuck — mhm, just like that—…”

He moves down your body slightly, reattaching his lips to one of your nipples as he fingers you deep and slow. He’s in no rush: Jihoon thinks he could do this all day and just deal with the RSI later on. You look so unbelievably hot with your face scrunched in pleasure, your thighs quivering as you fight to keep them apart like he asked you to, with your hips twisting down against his hand to try and get his fingers deeper and faster. When he lowers himself all the way down, settling completely between your thighs, he flicks his tongue out over your clit and your back arches up off the bed with a gasp.

“Don’t stop,” you whine, all high-pitched and rushed, both syllables merging into one hurried sound. “Fuck, fuck — please, don’t stop.”

“I’m not going to,” he murmurs, keeping pace and rhythm as he works you towards your high. God, he thinks there couldn’t possibly be anything in the world more sexy than watching you come undone from this angle. Your chest rising and falling in stuttered breaths, your hips rocking down against his hand, your pussy right on his mouth. Just the thought of it has his cock jumping in his boxers. “You gonna come for me, huh?”

“I-…” you start, releasing your death-grip on the bedsheets to bring a hand to cover your face. He clears his throat deliberately — perhaps it’s sort of closer to a growl than a cough — and he thinks maybe you really can read his mind, or maybe you’re learning that he wants to see every inch of you (especially like this), because a second later, it’s tangled up in his hair and holding him in place. “Y-yeah, fuck, I…”

“Good girl,” he coos again, and that breaks you. Your pussy tightens around his fingers and you feel yourself convulse, muscles clenching and releasing as you go over the edge with a cry. He eases you through your climax, tongue laving over your clit, fingers slowing but not stopping inside your cunt until your thighs close around his head in your oversensitivity. He takes the hint, then, and he slowly pulls away, sucking his fingers clean of your arousal while you take a few breaths to recover.

“Oh, my God,” you sigh as he moves back up and starts pressing small pecks over your chest and collarbones, your fingers lacing through his hair again to pull him up to kiss you. You groan softly at the taste of yourself on his lips, and can’t blame you. He still isn’t over it, either.

“You’re so gorgeous,” he tells you in-between kisses, one hand supporting the back of your neck to keep you close. “So pretty. So sweet. So good.”

“Shh,” you giggle, but he doesn’t. Just about every adoring adjective Jihoon has in his arsenal is murmured against your lips until you’ve gathered enough strength to get up on your knees and push him back onto the mattress, fumbling with the button of his jeans. 

He groans at the relief as you tug them down over his hips and thighs. “We don’t have to do anything else if you’re—”

“Shh.” This one’s a little more insistent, and he makes a show of clamping his lips back together. “You wore the tightest jeans on the planet, had your cock on-fucking-display for me all evening, and you think I wanna stop now?”

His jaw falls slack at the words that come out of your mouth. The incredulous way with which you say them has him involuntarily bucking up into nothing. Your expression matches his when you finally get his jeans all the way off and his thin, black boxer-briefs are the only barrier between you. The outline of his cock strains against them, tenting the fabric: Jihoon doesn’t miss the way you lick over your lips before glancing up at him through your eyelashes. It’s your turn to give him the look, now, asking that this last part is okay, with your fingertips hooked underneath the elastic waistband. He nods feverishly up at your heavy gaze.

“Please,” he groans, lifting his hips so you can pull them off. His length springs free the moment they’re pulled low enough, slapping back against his abdomen, sitting pretty against his toned muscles, thick and veiny and red-tipped. Desperate. His underwear joins the pile of clothes down the side of the bed as you throw one leg over him; sitting across his thighs, you take his cock into your hand, giving it a few gentle strokes. He fucks up into your palm when you squeeze your fingers around it.

“I need you so fucking bad,” you murmur, head spinning, and Jihoon isn’t in much of a better state himself; he’s fighting to keep his eyes open, fighting to keep his breaths coming. He sits upright, one arm behind him for support, and kisses you hard as you continue to tug at his length. 

“Need you, too,” he breathes, shifting so he has both arms around you. In a swift movement, muscles rippling, he lifts you off him and turns you over so he has you sitting on your now impossibly scrunched comforter.

He finds home back between your legs as you reach over into the drawer at your bedside and fumble around for a few seconds. He hears a little clatter and a rustling and when your hand resurfaces, you’ve pulled free a small foil square. You don’t even give him a chance to lean forward and take it; you’re ripping it open and looking up at him with the biggest doe-eyed stare he thinks he’s ever seen. He nods at the silent question, a grunt tumbling free as you roll the condom down his length. This is the most pathetic little bit of contact and he’s fighting demons.

“Okay?” he asks, shuffling back a little and giving you space to lie down flat on your back. You nod up at him, already wrapping your arms around his shoulders. 

“Mhm, just-... take it slow?” you ask him, anticipation rendering you already a little breathless. “S’been a while.” 

A grin blooms all the way from his lips to his eyes and he leans down to kiss you again, positioning his tip at your hole and pressing forward just enough to tease.

Your thighs tighten around his hips and he pushes himself further inside you with a stuttered groan, agonisingly slowly, inch by inch. He stills every few seconds, both to give you the time to adjust and so that he can take a steadying few breaths and not collapse at how good you feel wrapped around him; he stops pressing his hips forward before he’s fully sheathed inside your pussy and you let a whine slip, the stretch slowly easing. 

“You can move,” you tell him, laying a kiss to his chest. “I’m okay.” 

Jihoon gives a soft laugh. Oh, he wishes this was just to be polite, but no. He’s in real danger of losing control any second. “Yeah, this isn’t for you, baby.”

“Oh?” you ask. You clamp around him and he gasps at the tightness, hips jerking forward until he’s buried up to the hilt. Fuck, there’s a bruised cervix if you’ve ever had one; a high-pitched whine erupts out of your lips and he ducks his head down to your ear.

“I’m sorry,” he says. “You just-... fuck, you feel so good.”

“Mm, says you.” 

It’s another moment before he thrusts with intent, though. But when he does? When he pulls out halfway before sliding all the way back inside you, losing and regaining the feeling of your heat enveloping him entirely, hearing your gasps against his collarbone? The invisible reigns holding him back unravel and he settles into a slow but intensely deep rhythm, guiding your legs around his waist. You hook your ankles behind his back and somehow, you suck him in deeper still, your bodies touching everywhere they possibly can, so impossibly close.

The arm not holding his weight slides beneath your hips and raises them just a little. Now, at this angle, every time he rolls into you he grazes against your sweet-spot and you’re reduced to an incoherent mess within a few minutes. Good, he thinks, because he’s not doing much better, himself.

You hug him tighter after one particularly well-angled thrust, sinking your teeth into the muscle of his shoulder. He hisses at the sting, and your lips part as if you’re about to apologise but he doesn’t give you the chance to; he bumps your nose with his own to ask you to lift your head slightly, before he bends down and kisses you hard.

“Do that again,” he gasps, almost all of his weight against you as the hand not around your hips comes up to rest on your cheek. When your brows tighten, he swipes his thumb over your spit-covered, swollen lips. “Please. ”

So, you do.

Maybe not as harshly as the first time, but your teeth find his collarbone and you suck a bruise into his skin, drawing from him the highest pitched sound you think he could possibly make. He squares his jaw, ducking his head back down, biting on his bottom lip before he has no choice but to speak.

“I’m close, y/n,” he confesses, fucking into you slower, trying to stave it off for a few more seconds, his hips stuttering. “Can-... can you give me one more…?”

You nod, the knot in your stomach already growing tighter and tighter with every movement he makes, and when one of your hands unwinds from around his back to slide between your sweat-slicked bodies, he moves slightly away, letting you reach down.

It’s the sight of two of your fingers finding your clit and rubbing your favourite movements out on yourself that takes him past the point of no return, his cock sliding in and out of you messily, desperately, chasing the high that he’s right on the brink of. He kisses and nips just below your ear, breathy groans tickling your neck, and your high-pitched whine tells him you’ve hit your orgasm just as he starts to spill his into the condom, gushing around him, your walls fluttering and milking him for all he’s worth. 

—

You offer for him to shower first – an offer he gratefully accepts. While you’re taking your turn afterwards, Jihoon hunts down a fresh duvet cover in your room; he changes it, grabs you a glass of water for when you’re done, and sits on the edge of his bed with just the towel wrapped around his waist, scrolling through his phone. He looks up with a bright grin as the door opens and you emerge through it in your pyjamas, glowing from the light behind you, stray droplets of water clinging to your arms. 

You pause gently rubbing your hair dry with the towel, eyes brightening when you see him. “You didn’t have to do all this,” you say, and he pushes a hand through his own still damp hair with a laugh.

“It was the least I could do,” he counters. You raise your eyebrows at him, crossing the room to sit opposite him. He drops his phone down onto the mattress. “I couldn’t leave and make you change them yourself.”

“Leave?” you ask, picking up one of his hands and playing idly with his fingers. 

“I mean, it’s getting pretty late, so…” he says. “I probably need to get going at some point.”

“Or…” you say, tongue darting out over your lips. “Maybe you don’t.”

Jihoon looks down at your hands, then back up at you. Are you suggesting what he thinks you are, or has he still not quite come back to himself from earlier? It’s hard to say if the look on your face is hope, or something else.

“Are you… asking me to stay?” he asks. 

“Only if you want to,” you tell him. He lifts your hands up, pressing a kiss to one of your knuckles, then using it to tug you closer to him until he can plant one on your own lips. “I’ve probably got an old t-shirt you could sleep in.”

“Of course I want to.”

So you slip away from him to go rummaging through your drawers, trying to find the promised article of clothing. The whole time, he’s awestruck. Jihoon can’t take his eyes off you.

——————

He wakes up next to you for the first time on a Saturday morning. His sleep-fogged brain registers lying on an unfamiliar mattress, tucked beneath new bedsheets, eyes fluttering open to take in a room he doesn’t quite recognise at first. Part of him wonders if he’s still dreaming. When he rolls over onto his side, and his eyes land on the curve of your shoulders, the fall of your hair down your back, he has to ask himself the same thing again. 

All of last night must’ve been a dream, he muses, smiling shyly to himself and watching your frame rise and fall with every slow breath you take. There’s no way you really told him you liked him, too. There’s no way any of it could have really happened.

“Y/n?” He asks in the gentlest of whispers, only wanting to stir you if you’re awake already. When there’s no response, he moves a tiny bit closer to you, hesitating before he slips his arm around your waist and settles with his chest pressed against your back. A wildly insecure part of his brain tries to argue that just because you wanted what happened last night, that doesn’t mean you want all of this now. Maybe you only wanted to sleep with him, or maybe you’ll have changed your mind somehow now the sun’s come up. He considers moving away again, lying on his back and staring at the ceiling until you wake up and he can have a real conversation about where both of your heads are at with everything, but he barely gets a chance.

Those thoughts are silenced almost immediately, his brain falling quiet the second you roll over in his arms. You bury your head in the valley between his pectorals, tucked away from the world beneath his chin. His arms tighten around your sleep-warmed body.

“What time is it?” You ask. He contains a shiver at the softness of your voice, bliss running the length of his spine. Jihoon thinks that he could get used to this.

“I don’t know. Early, I think,” he murmurs, and you whine softly, burrowing deeper against his chest. “Go back to sleep.”

“Not if you’re awake,” you say. He’s not entirely convinced you can stick to that promise, though, with the way you yawn and he feels your eyelashes fluttering. 

“Don’t worry about me,” he tells you, the tips of his fingers ticking against your side. He ducks his head, pressing a kiss to your hair. A soft hum rumbles in your throat and he can’t hold back the smile that spreads over his lips. “It’s okay. I don’t mind.”

True enough, you fall back asleep curled up against him and Jihoon, to the sounds of your slowing breaths, drifts off too. A few hours later, at a far more reasonable time, you wake him up with a press of your lips to the tip of his nose.

Innocent, exploratory kisses grow heated in the warmth of the sun that streams through your blinds. Hands start to travel, sleep clothes get discarded, and you have him lying on his back, pressing kisses down his chiselled stomach when his phone starts to vibrate on the floor next to the bed.

He groans at the distraction, again as you shuffle up to sit on your knees and look at him expectantly. 

“Are you gonna answer that?” you ask, the tips of your fingers grazing his thighs. He shakes his head, no. “Come on, Jihoon. It might be important.”

“Not important enough,” he sighs. 

“At least see who it is,” you laugh. Despite a huffed protest, he props himself up on one elbow, leaning over the side of the bed and glancing down at his phone screen.

Seungcheol.

The arrangement to go for a run this morning comes rushing back to Jihoon, who slaps a hand to his forehead and reaches down to grab his phone off the floor, looking at you apologetically.

“Give me two seconds,” he says, and you grin wickedly up at him, ducking low to press a kiss to one of the lines that disappears down into his boxers. 

“Take all the time you need.”

He answers the call frowning, flopping his head back against the pillows. 

“Hey, look – I’m really sorry,” he starts to say, but Seungcheol’s voice cuts him off almost straight away.

“Jihoon, where the hell are you? I got to your apartment and your car wasn’t here, and Seokmin said he didn’t hear you come home last night. We all thought you’d died,” he hurries. Jihoon can picture the expression on the other man’s face perfectly, which is pretty unfortunate seeing as how you’ve moved to start palming his hardening cock through his briefs.

“I stayed out,” Jihoon says, a little wobbly. “I can’t make the run, someth-... shit.” You press an open-mouthed kiss to the outline of his length, the heat of your breath through the fabric sending him into overdrive. “Something came up-...”

The line goes silent for a second, and his breath stutters as you do the same thing again. Each press of your lips is euphoric agony, and he’s really not hiding this as well as he wishes he could. One look down at you tells him that you’re very proud of that.

“Dude,” Seungcheol gasps, snickering suddenly. “Tell me you’re not with a girl right now.”

“Shut up. Go away,” Jihoon grunts. “I’ll call you later.”

“Oh my God, is it gym girl? Did you finally-...”

“Bye, Cheol,” he hurries, hanging up before his friend can say anything else. He drops his phone onto the mattress, fake-glaring down at you and shaking his head. “You’re the worst, you know that?”

“Yeah?” you ask, pulling at the waistband of his briefs to tug them down his legs. “Let me make it up to you, huh?”

[scarlettmurphy]

STARCROSSED +ੈ✩‧₊˚ LOGAN HOWLETT.

logan and y/n — where you are completely in love with a man older then your father by a good 100 years.. and whose in love with another.

- content warning age gap. nsfw. sh. angst. not really happy endings! pairings: older!logan howlett x xaiver!reader

spoiler: horrible yearning!

note this is my first piece of work so i hope it’s okay! i love logan sm i had to write something for him — and this is really angsty :) pls ignore if there’s any bad grammar! i’m a bit lazy rn, also with the timeline for this fic i have no idea when im going for. im saying 2000s-2010s just remember its a bit scrambled timeline wise cos i wanted my favs here!🤭 enjoy!

you hated when he was around. you couldn’t stand it anymore. your longing glances to him, the yearning looks you gave him which were never returned and only thrown back into your face when you saw how he was looking at jean the way you looked at him.. it had all been getting too much. at first you acted like it didn’t bother you and part of your school-girl crush deluded brain pretend you were just seeing things but as the weeks / months had passed you realised that was the furthest thing from the truth.

recently you couldn’t even bring yourself to glance at him because it hurt too much and that wasn’t even being dramatic, the aching feeling in your heart wasn’t worth getting a glimpse of his timeless beauty so every time he was around you bit down the urges swallowed your pride and acted as if he was nobody to you, just a good friend. a father figure, a teammate.

it felt rude at first, to you since you were the only one noticing it, how you just stopped all those little things you were doing but you couldn’t help it or stop yourself from being like that because it was too hard to deal with — loving someone so much with all your heart but you knew you couldn’t have them. you hated to admit it but it destroyed you and that little part of you right now was falling into a full blown rage as you sat on the sofa alongside logan and wade — charles, hank, scott and rogue being present in the room too.

“i just don’t get her.” scott said out, repeating the same line over again, still bitching about the fight him and jean had after they all got back from the mission — everyone could hear the screaming and scott’s harsh gaze when he entered the room just confirmed it all and the second,of course, logan asked a question after wade made a snarky comment that set off scott and he hadn’t stopped mansplaining it since.

“yea’ well certain people don’t.” logan gruffly spoke out as y/n couldn’t stop her eyes from moving over to him at his words, feeling a sense of hurt coarse through her like it usually did whenever he spoke about jean or implied her. everyone knew what logan’s comment meant and y/n could see how scott was biting his tongue, clearly pissed off like he always was around logan. for good reason.

the tension only grew worse when scott couldn’t help himself and made a comment right back at him, his eyebrows raised as he stood from his seat. charles attention turning right to scott instead of logan, “and what’s that supposed to mean, asshole?” scott spat out like his words were venom.

rogue rolling her eyes at his words as hank shared a little glance with y/n who was cursing the entire situation in her brain as she couldn’t stop herself from looking at logan — those very same feelings boiling in her body as she saw the way his mouth twitched and his jaw clenched. how protective he was getting over jean, a feeling y/n couldn’t help have been wishing for the past two years of knowing the man he would get like over her — sure in a friends way he might’ve done it before, at least that’s how she saw but it never like this.

y/n swore she could physically feel her heart aching.

“pretty sure you know what that means pal.” logan bit back harshly, his words falling to the same tone as scott’s did as scott scoffed at what he said as he bit back with full frustration as charles clearly wanted to get involved - a little grimance pictured on his face as y/n studied her fathers expression, him clearly knowing what jean meant to logan, as y/n looked away before her dad could catch her staring her eyes falling onto a pissed off scott who downed the drink he had in his hand, placing it on the table.

“she picked me.” was all scott needed to say as the weight in the room shifted heavily on logan’s end as everyone could see the way logan’s face dropped a little, that comment taking the little coy expression he had right away but y/n didn’t even bring herself to look, scott’s eyes taking her in as if he knew what she was feeling in this moment. his eyes meeting her own as y/n felt a lump form her throat — the tightness almost burning — as he tutted at how silent logan was before he walked out the room without another word.

with this the room fell silent. everyone knowing the feelings logan must’ve been harbouring right now, y/n especially, as she glanced over to him not expecting to be met with his brown eyes looking back at her as he took in her expression before he roughly got up without another word — going right over to the door.

chaeles couldn’t help himself as he spoke up firmly the second he watched logan head for the door, “logan—“

“just goin’ for a piss, wheels.” he roughly said back before the door shut right behind him.

“more like a bitchless weaping session.” wade couldn’t help say as he had left the room, hank and rogue not being able to help their little laughs from coming out as y/n bit down on the inside of her cheek limiting the feelings she was experiencing as much as she could before she stood up.

“—i’m going to shower.” y/n said out lowly, her words slipping out quickly as the others nodded or hummed in agreement, wades eyebrows furrowing as he clearly felt he knew more of the situation then the rest did but he kept that to himself.

“take some pics for me!” wade called back to her, earning a little look from charles as hank scoffed in reply.

— +ੈ✩‧₊˚

that shower was more like watching a re run of singing in the rain which y/n couldn’t help watch the entirety of for no specific reason before she eventually hoped in the shower. the faint sounds of her speakers being heard as she hummed along to the lyrics of the specific song as she felt the cold water glide down her naked body.

swallowing the pain-filled whimpers that were aching to escape her wet lips as she acted as if the water gracing against all those marks and burns on her skin wasn’t killing her inside despite her ‘little’ case of immortality. immortality sadly didn’t mean you never experienced pain and y/n was clearly the leading case proving that matter as she soon got out the shower after washing her hair and her body.

wrapping the towel around her dainty body as she took in herself in the mirror, the thoughts forming in her brain being within the ‘self loathing’ category as she exited her bathroom. her face falling once she was met with the gruff expression on logans face which turned to one of shock as his eyes scanned over y/n immediately. him swallowing his own spit as y/n hands immediately wrapped around her towel just to make sure it wouldn’t fall.

“lo— shit, i didn’t know you were here.” she quickly managed out, her face a bright shade of red as she watched as logan didn’t move his gaze off her figure.

“—wait.” not a single word escaping his lips as y/n walked over to her bed where her clothes were laid out for her.

y/n’s breath was hitched and she swore she felt all the heat rush to her face as she took in the way logan was just staring at her as she grabbed her clothes with her other hand, taking a few steps back into the bathroom before she swiftly shut the door. her mind a mess as she quickly put on her pajamas before she sprung over to the mirror to double check her appearance before she walked back out to her bedroom.

logan being in the exact same place she had left him — not a single word had left his lips and his facial expression was the exact same as y/n nervously smiled at him.

“what are you doing— uh, here?” y/n asked him swiftly, her words rushed as she swore she could hear her heartbeat in her ears as she saw logan slowly seem to come back to reality, scratching the back of his neck as his lips parted as he tried to say something.

yet it took a little for something to come out as y/n swore she felt something growing in the air as logan finally spoke, his gruff tone a little knocked back then usual, “was coming here to bitch about scott. didn’t mean to see anything i shouldn’t have.”

his words sent a little chill through y/n’s spine as she managed a little smile on her lips, no matter how fake it was she still managed it, as she looked at him. his first words being all the confirmation her heart needed in this moment as she held back her feelings as she felt her heart tense.

“it’s okay.” y/n rolled out quietly, her attention falling over to her bed as she walked over to the foot off it — sitting down on the edge of the bed as logan stayed in place, his arms crossed as he leaned against the fireplace in her room now.

“so scott, you wanna bitch?” y/n trailed off into as logan looked out the window, seemingly lost in his thoughts as he shrugged his shoulders.

“nah, not anymore.” he said, his voice low as y/n took in his hush voice — his words only adding to the building up tension that was making the air thick as y/n looked at him. her eyes taking in every inch off him and how he looked, her mind wondering how he’d feel.. how’d he’d taste.

yet her thoughts were immediately cut short.

“—you seen jean about?”

his words were like a harsh hit round the face as she felt a lump for her in throat, her mind tingling a little as she glanced over to the door. she hated this, every inch of this. she wanted to scream, punch him in the face. confess right there and there at him but she didn’t. she couldn’t.

no matter how much it killed her inside. every second without him being like a gun shot to the heart as she plainly looked back at him, a soft smile growing on her face which was so fake it was indescribable as she nodded to her bedroom door.

“her room, i guess.”

her low words were enough to make anyone know she was hurt yet of course logan didn’t, or he didn’t show he knew as he gave her a playful wink.

“thanks bub.” he said with a nod as he went to walk out the room — his hand on the door when y/n heard his muttered words.

“sleep well y/n.”

his words fell into silence as y/n watched him leave, the door closing behind him being the utmost reminder of how her feelings will probably never be acknowledged. and that harsh reality left her alone in her bedroom for the entire night and with every toss and turn her mind was on one thing and one thing only. him.

— +ੈ✩‧₊˚

[redr0sewrites]

Can you write Vox x reader where like the reader just says like really unhinged things and just like vile things whenever they rage and stuff like the internet could be slow or smth and the reader is just like “IM GOING TO RIP OFF MY SKIN” idk man I’m kinda just self projecting rn like you can right anything with it tbh idk sorry for rambling anyway you don’t have to do this if you don’t wanna

THIS IS SO MEEEEE I LOVE THIS IDEA SM!!! sorry it took me a hot minute to reply to this i have over 70 hazbin hotel requests in my inbox 😭

🥀Cw: fluff, crack, silly vox

when he first met you, vox was charmed by your seemingly sweet nature- that is, until you were pissed

your unholy screech of how you were going to rip off your skin if he cut the wifi again was both endearing and confusing in his eyes

vox would just short circuit for a second, just blinking at you while he tries to process what you just said

once it clicks, he just starts giggling. vox very rarely genuinely laughs, most of his laughs are professional or part of the persona he adopts as the leader of vox enterprises, but when he's so shocked by what you just said, he can't control the booming laughter thay fills the room

he's wheezing and gasping, each barking laugh only pissing you off more

"what's so funny? if you keep laughing i am going to fucking break ur fingers like carrot sticks!" you snap, and vox only giggles harder

after a few seconds, you can't help but notice how adorable his laughter is, and soon you don't mind it as much

once you two are officially together, you notice how stressed vox often is, yet how he seems to visibly relax around you

the batshit crazy things you say, which normally disgusts other people, only seem to amuse him

its actually a wonderful dynamic because you bring some spontaneity and slight insanity into vox's otherwise irritating and depressing lifestyle, and vox balances out the crazy things you say and calms you down every time

you often find yourself searching for new phrases to baffle him with, and for new ways to make him laugh

after vox has a stressful day, he enjoys just listening to you ramble about the most insane things and adores hearing whatever fucked up saying you've adopted recently

vox notices himself beginning to copy your speech patterns. he only begins to realize when he slips in an exceptionally odd metaphor into a work meeting and everyone stares at him, yet his heart skips a beat at the thought

there's something so charming to him about the fact that he's adopting your mannerisms, and you truly make him laugh when no one else can

whenever another one of the vees pisses him off, he always comes to you for advice on incredibly deranged comebacks, and you never disappoint!

he's won multiple arguments by just repeating one of your fucked up sayings and the other vees being too lowkey shocked to disagree

vox LOVES IT when you diss people he hates, hearing you ramble some fucked up insults about alastor made him fall in love with you all over again

"that worm on a string fucked up karen cut bob looking ass- if i see him around here again im going to eat a fucking brick" *cue vox looking at you with the biggest heart eyes*

overall, you are both menaces, but you're menaces in love ♥️

vox lay with his head in your lap, the blue light of his screen illuminating the dim room as you rambled mindlessly about your day.

"and THEN, this fucking asshole tried to flirt with me! ME!! as if he doesn't know were dating! ugh, it makes me feel like i have an entire beehive living beneath my skin. i swear if he even looks at me again im going to lick wet cement i can NOT deal. how can you even work with him? he's such a fucking CREEP voxy, i'm going to cut off those ugly ass wings and shove them so far down his throat- hey, are you even listening?"

you look down to see vox half asleep, his eyelids drooping as his light dimmed. "keep talking.." he murmurs, looking up at you with a lazy smile on his face. "you're my favorite person t' listen to.."

i love the idea of vox with a partner who challenges his very idea of power. he clearly wraps himself in a sort of persona, surrounding himself with powerful people and acting like he's so serious and important. i love the idea of him falling in love with someone who can break down his walls in seconds, someone who can dismantle his entire bravado act and who allows him to truly be himself. this is such a wonderful prompt and i am eating this up. nonnie ur awesome!!!!

[ch4singchase]

can we get some luke fluff (or smut if your comfortable writing it 😩) i’m just in a luke mood rn

also, do you do anons?? if you do can i be this emoji?: 🩻

of course!! i was refering to asks about my fic but i can for sure write some asks in that case!!

I made it fluff, I hope you enjoy!!!

And also, I do anons, you're free to be 🩻 :))

LOVER | luke castellan x f!reader

"Oh," Sam's voice, your half-brother, startled you, causing you to jump. "So that's what had been going on…"

Swiftly, you turned to face him. "I have no idea what you're talking about."

"Don't you?" Sam arched an eyebrow, nonchalantly chewing on his breakfast.

"No, I don't," you asserted, furrowing your brows while trying to focus on your own meal.

"Oh," Sam's voice, your half-brother, startled you, causing you to jump. "So that's what had been going on..."

Swiftly, you turned to face him. "I have no idea what you're talking about."

"Don't you?" Sam arched an eyebrow, nonchalantly chewing on his breakfast.

"No, I don't," you asserted, furrowing your brows while trying to focus on your own meal.

"So... You haven't been avoiding Luke," Sam's statement nearly made you choke on a piece of bread.

Regrettably, this time, there was no escaping the conversation. Especially not when your eyes involuntarily shifted back to what you had been discreetly observing from afar since you sat down.

Luke was in his own table with other kids from his cabin, you could recognized some new kids seated next to the head counselor. As usual, most of them were playing around and talking out loud, caught in their conversations to care about someone eavesdropping.

However, lately, Luke wasn't talking to Chris or any of his other cabin companions. Instead, every morning, an Aphrodite’s daughter has been sitting right next to him, talking for hours before they parted ways to their respective activities of the day. Or so, many would have thought.

Last week, you were training archery with others campers, you quickly spotted Luke, which surprised you. He rarely went there by his own, most of times he would go there was to help a new kid to discover their gift. But, that time, there were no new kid by his side.

For a moment, foolishly, you thought he might be there for you.

How wrong you were.

In the blink of an eye, the same daughter of Aphrodite was whispering and giggling with him as if sharing some secret.

That moment, for reasons unknown, planted a numb feeling in your heart, making your chest heavy. Since then, you couldn't summon the strength to talk to Luke again.

Every time you saw him, the memory of his laughter at the girl’s words haunted you. The same laughter he once shared only with you.

As Valentine’s Day approached, you were convinced that this time, you'd have a chance.

How wrong you were, indeed.

“Please,” you let your head rest in your hands against the table, “Can we forget about this? It's still seven in the morning.”

“Of course not,” Sam exclaimed, alerting some of their siblings, “I had suspect you were acting strange lately, I should have know that it had something to do with your crush”

“He isn’t my crush,” I groaned.

Sam looked at you, unfazed, knowing too well that you were lying.

"He has been trying to talk to you for days," your brother said. "And you always made us tell him your excuses. Now I know they were just that—excuses."

"Sam, please, can we not?" you tried to argue, raising your head just enough to stare back at him. "I don’t want to talk about Luke."

"If you're worried that he's going to confess his undying love for that girl or something, you're wrong," Sam teased, smirking.

"I'm not worried about anything," you retorted, attempting to brush off the conversation.

But deep down, you couldn't deny the unease settling within you. What was Luke up to? Why was he spending so much time with that Aphrodite's daughter?

Days passed, and you continued to avoid Luke, unable to shake off the strange feeling of betrayal. The approaching Valentine's Day only intensified the emotional turmoil within you. You convinced yourself it was just another day, and you'd get through it without any significant changes.

On the night before Valentine’s Day, you skipped the bonfire, trying to return to your cabin. Staying there grew more scrutinizing with Luke's piercing gaze following you. The best you could do for yourself was to leave.

Yet, a hand grabbed you by the arm, forcing you to turn towards the owner of that hand.

Luke.

"What happened? You've been avoiding me for days," Luke's tone carried a tinge of sadness, shattering your heart even more. "Did I do something wrong?"

"No, you didn’t," you pulled your arm away from him. "Please, Luke, I don’t want to talk right now. We can talk about it tomorrow."

"Look, if there’s something wrong, I really want to make things right now," Luke pressured, taking a step closer to you. "Before tomorrow."

"I really need to go, Castellan," you raised your hands, taking some steps back before continuing your way to your cabin. "If you really want to talk with someone, talk with Sandy."

On Valentine's Day morning, however, reality hit you like a ton of bricks. Luke wasn't at his usual spot in the dining area. The absence of his laughter and presence left a void that you hadn't anticipated.

Panic set in, and you frantically scanned the room for any sign of him.

To make matters worse, the Aphrodite's daughter was also nowhere to be found. Confusion and frustration bubbled within you. What was going on?

Unable to contain your emotions, you excused yourself and headed towards the lake. You needed some space to yourself. The lake was one of the only places where you could think when everything became too loud, even your own feelings.

Usually, you'd ask Luke to go there with you; he helped you get your head back in its place. But his presence wasn't likely to help this time.

As you approached the familiar lakeside spot, you noticed something different. There was a blanket spread out, flowers arranged delicately, and a small basket filled with goodies. Confusion clouded your mind. Why would someone set up a romantic picnic by the lake?

You hesitated for a moment, contemplating whether to investigate further or leave. But a sinking feeling in your chest urged you to stay. As you got closer, you saw Luke, putting the finishing touches on the setup.

"What is going on?" you asked, wiping away some tears that were already gathering on your face.

Apparently, your presence caught Luke off guard. When he turned to face you, his eyes widened, and some of the plastic plates that he held fell upon the blanket.

"Hm, you weren’t supposed to be here right now," Luke scratched the back of his neck. "That wasn’t on my plan."

Your heart sank as confusion deepened. Was he referring to the Aphrodite's daughter, and you happened to stumble upon their secret rendezvous?

"I'm sorry," you stammered, feeling a mix of guilt and confusion. "I didn't mean to ruin anything. I'll just go."

"No, no, it's not that," Luke reassured, stepping closer to you. "I just wanted everything to be perfect, and, well, surprises work better when they're, you know, surprises."

You couldn't shake off the suspicion that he might be trying to cover up the real recipient of this romantic setup. "Perfect for who, Luke?"

Luke hesitated, his eyes avoiding yours for a moment. "Well, I... uh, I thought maybe you'd enjoy a nice Valentine's Day surprise."

The realization hit you like a wave, crashing over the doubts and confusion. But you didn’t give ears to it just yet, too afraid of the idea of being a fool once again, “That’s for me?”

Luke nodded, a sheepish smile playing on his lips. "Yeah, you. I wanted it to be a surprise, but you showed up a bit early."

You couldn't believe it. Yet, Luke sat on the blanket, silently inviting you to do the same.

As you settled onto the blanket, the air was filled with a mix of awkwardness and unspoken tension. Luke seemed hesitant, and you couldn't shake off the feeling that he might have misunderstood your avoidance.

"I've noticed you've been avoiding me," Luke finally spoke, his eyes searching yours for an explanation.

You sighed, feeling the weight of guilt settling in. "I'm sorry, Luke. I just... I thought you were… I don’t know, dating Sandy"

Luke's expression shifted to confusion. "The daughter of Aphrodite? No, she's a friend. She was helping me plan this surprise for you, but I wasn't sure if you'd like it. You've been avoiding me, and I thought maybe... well, I thought maybe I'd misunderstood something."

A pang of regret hit you. Luke had put so much effort into planning a surprise for you, and your avoidance had made him unsure if you would even appreciate it. You took a deep breath, deciding to be honest with him.

"I was avoiding you because I was jealous," you admitted, your gaze dropping to the blanket beneath you.

"Jealous?" Luke echoed, surprise evident in his voice. "Why?"

"Because I saw you at the archery range with Sandy," you confessed, avoiding eye contact. "I thought you were there for me, and then I saw you talking with her and… It’s complicated."

Luke's expression softened as he reached out to gently lift your chin, forcing you to meet his gaze. "I was talking to Sandy because she helped me with the date's idea, nothing more. And... Well, I've always watched you training."

Your eyes widened in surprise, "What?"

Luke nodded, a shy smile on his face. "Yeah, I've been skipping my own training to watch you. I didn't want to disturb you, so I just watched from afar. I just... I wanted to see you in your element, doing something you love. You always have that twinkle in your eye when you’re at archery."

A mixture of emotions washed over you—surprise, joy, and a tinge of embarrassment. Luke had been secretly watching you, and all this time, you thought he was spending it with someone else. The misunderstanding that had fueled the distance between you suddenly seemed trivial compared to the truth that unfolded.

"I had no idea," you whispered, a genuine smile forming on your face.

"I wanted today to be perfect for you," Luke said, his gaze filled with sincerity. "I hope you like the surprise."

Your heart warmed by his words, you leaned in and kissed him softly on the cheek, close to his lips. "It's more than perfect, Luke. Thank you."

As you both settled into the Valentine's Day picnic, the awkwardness gave way to warmth, and the day unfolded into a new beginning for yours and Luke’s life.

[lanareadsbooks]

I don’t understand us

This is part two to “I’m confused about us” tho it can be read alone,

Tags: fem!reader oral(f) receiving, spanking as punishment, crying reader, no real spoilers to the show, mean!billy, no use of y/n (I can’t do it! 😭) also this is kinda short but I’m writing two other stories rn. (Also this is not proofread)hope yall enjoy!

I’m still… confused about us. You thought as the cowboy bellow you ate you out like a starving man. But as good as it felt you couldn’t help thinking about how much your ass hurt since he had just smacked the shit out of it.

Your relationship with Billy made you torn. One second he was absolutely mean to you, pulling you over his knee for doing literally nothing. didn’t fold your panties? that did it. Didn’t do your homework right? That did it. Cussing when you stumped your toe? That fucking did it,

Sometimes it made you mad how he acted “is he not man enough to just ask me to be with him?” You thought, no he’s probably the manliest man I know. Than what is it?

Knock knock knock.

You heard as Billy hit your door, he usually just opens it but yesterday he walked in on you changing, he blushed so hard, you laughed thinking about that moment. Yes? You said as you opened your door. I’ve got to go out tomorrow so I won’t be back till early morning. You sighed internally. Billy was always going out at random times. But I guess that’s better than him having a real job and being gone every day.

The first time he went out he told you

“Don’t even think about sneaking out because I will know about it” he said dominantly. You laughed it off thinking there was no way he could actually find out about it. You didn’t go far. You actually just went down to the edge of the fence like 10ft from the house and pet the horses. Sometimes you wonder why the horses were always coming and going. Never seeing the same one more than twice usually.

But of course, the minute he got home he came up to your room. Hey when did you get back- you tried to ask but were cut off.

As he grabbed your face, not harshly enough to hurt you but it wasn’t pleasant. Why can’t you just listen?! He said with a bite in his tone.

I told you to stay inside. But no. only good girls listen. Your a bad one. ain’t cha? He said, letting go of your face. His words brought tears to your eyes. While your still defiantly a ‘’brat’’ as billy calls it. Sometimes your just not in the mood to have someone upset with you.

You sigh. Looking him in the eyes. Billy I-ugh its not a big deal. I was basically 5 ft from the house.you said sighing. Not a big deal? Little girl.

I decide what’s a big deal or not. He said darkly. And I say you disobeyed me. And since you did that you earned your self a good longgg spanking. He said with a condescending smile on his face.

I- billy your so damn mean, you said slightly pouting. Mean? Oh honey, ill show you mean. He said in a scary dark tone.

And boy did he. He made you sob over his lap by using your hairbrush. When you first started crying you heard him laughing. Above you. Is this his idea of fun? Making me cry? You asked yourself. The thought of it made you mad. So you rebelliously kicked your feet, something you had never done before. This… did not make things better for you. He just started smacking your ass a bit harder.

When it was finally over he gently picked you up and put you on your bed. You were still sobbing because your bottom hurt. And you were still upset billy had laughed at you. The whole spanking thing was embarrassing enough without him laughing at you. (you were also incredibly wet)

You had turned away from him as he sat on your bed. Usually billy tried to console you a little bit. Even though he wasn’t very good at it.

But you shrugged his hand off when he placed it on your shoulder. Stop that honey. He said in a much sweeter tone than before.

No go away. you said ,your voice muffled by the fact that you had your face shoved in your pillow. Sweetheart non of this would happen if you would just obey me. I shouldn’t hav to obey you! You said shooting up from your spot on the bed. You don lemme do nothing. You said with a slight lisp in your voice from crying so hard. I- I can’t even go outside. You said in a whisper. Ugh honey. Everything I do is to protect you. I’m not exactly a loved man around these parts, and I and can’t have anyone thinking they should use you to get to me. Ok? He asked.

You sighed, ok .you agreed. But quickly turned back over into the pillow giving the illusion you were still upset at him.

Now girl. He said in a laughing tone. What is it gon take for you to forgive me?

And that’s how we ended up here. With you grinding your face down on his nose like there’s no tomorrow. He didn’t mind, he defiantly didn’t mind

But you still didn’t understand your relationship. Some nights he had his face buried deep in your cunt, and sometimes he scolded you like a child or yanked you over his knee if you upset him. I don’t understand us. But oh well.

Ok that’s part two! I really like writing for billy but I really want to write for my true love. ✨Finnick✨ I’ve been in love with his character since we first saw him. Tho I write him kinda ooc and like to go a darker route so be prepared for that lol. But comment if y’all want anything else to be added into the next part. Love y’all! #-lanawrites<3

[2miniverses]

another night

warnings: a little bit of angst, mentions of stress from school

a/n: i haven't been very confident in my writing so this is the best i have rn... life got busy, i just turned 19 and i'm starting college this month so i've been having fun. anyway, enjoy this little drabble and i hope everyone's well!

a/n pt.2: lowercase is intentional, roommates to lovers?? maybe :3

wc: 561

minho’s in his head again. his life is good so there’s no reason he should be crying.

well, college is stressful, he misses his parents, and his childhood friends are far away, still living in his hometown and-

okay maybe he had a reason to be crying but it’s irrational. ‘this is a part of growing up’, he says to himself every night. this is just another one of those nights. just another night of him crying his eyes out about feeling an overwhelming feeling of loneliness while sitting in darkness in his comfortable queen-sized bed.

a knock interrupted the stressed man from his thoughts. he is lonely but not physically alone. he has a roommate named jisung, who’s unfortunately a night owl. he’s nice, adorable, and sometimes really loud when he brings his friends over to make music but other than that, minho has no problems with his younger roommate. minho wiped his eyes and opened the door, praying it was not obvious he was bawling his eyes out just now.

“hey. what’s up?” minho croaked out.

jisung tried to look at his face, the hallway light being no help illuminating the features of the man in front of him.

“are you okay?” the honey-blonde-haired boy asked.

“yeah i’m fine just trying to go to sleep,” the man sniffled.

“i think you’re lying. you know you can talk to me right?” jisung leaned on the doorframe with a small smile. “you said i could talk to you when i’m feeling down so the same applies to you.”

yeah, he did say that but he didn’t actually mean it. that’s lee minho, the man who tells everyone that he can deal with his problems independently. jisung was referring to some nights ago when he had a panic attack over an exam he had the next day. minho stayed there with him to calm him down and told him that he’ll be here.

that was the breaking point. minho started crying silently but the tear drops falling onto the wood floor made it obvious.

“oh, minho-ssi,” jisung said sadly, embracing him slowly. “i’m gonna take us to your bed okay?” minho nodded and let the younger take them to his bed

never in lee minho’s life would he think that he’d end up practically cuddling with his roommate after crying his eyes out for an hour yet here he was, calmer than ever. jisung was petting him like a cat and telling him random facts he saw while scrolling too far down youtube shorts which would get a snort or even a chuckle from minho which was enough for jisung to make him feel like he was helping.

“do you feel better minho-ssi?” jisung asked quietly, still playing with the other man’s hair.

“call me hyung, jisungie,” minho chuckled. “but yes i am feeling better. thank you so much.”

“you’re welcome hyung! it’s no problem,” jisung smiled down at him.

some minutes passed by and minho finally picked up his phone to scroll through social media before he went to sleep. he noticed the time and tried to get up from jisung’s embrace but failed.

“jisung, you should probably-“

he was asleep. minho shrugged and laid back down into his roommate— friend’s arms. he’s okay with falling asleep in his embrace. this is definitely better than how he spent his other nights.

[merakiui]

Hello! It is me, the anon that asked where you are in Penacony. I am also Amethyst Anon! I’ve sent ideas and stuff before about other stuff, mostly TWST, through anon cause I’m shy, but I want to be more involved with my blog so here I am off anon :3

Anyways, Sunday has officially rotted my brain. I lost interest in HSR because the Luofu storyline was kinda…meh to me, but seeing all this stuff about Sunday on tumblr made me go 👀 While I did have some things spoiled for me, playing it was still sooooo fun and every time he was on screen I was blushing hehe

Anyways, he has so much yandere potential that I came up with so many ideas that I might (?) want to pursue with writing once I muster up the courage to start writing again (I’ve got a difficult relationship with it rn 😫). I jotted them down in my phone and I just have to share them lest I explode. Dw there won’t be anything that spoils past where you said you’re at!

Okay, so there’s that ability that Halovians have that he referred to as tuning. When he used it to interrogate Aventurine I was scared and horny, and thought about Sunday using it on his darling. I don’t remember exactly how it works so this is at the top of my head but! everyday he’ll ask “Question: do you love me?” and of course you say no. It’s easy to answer that because it’s the truth. But one day when you say “no” you feel a searing pain in your head, like you’re being torn apart, and you’re horrified to realize that for the first time since he used his tuning ability on you, you’re lying. It doesn’t hurt to admit the truth (literally - the pain instantly goes away) but you feel your heart breaking forever…

I think that little diorama of Golden Hour he has in the pavilion technically belongs to every head in the family, but I like to think Sunday is fixated on it the most. Imagine he puts you there as punishment. Okay, you don’t want to spend time with him? (And he has so little free time, how could you be so cruel?) Into the makeshift doll house you go! He’ll loom over you like a giant and you can try to run and hide from his sight, but he can easily pick you up like you’re a little mouse, gently laying you on the palm of your hand. I think he’d like to undress and dress you while you’re so tiny, you’re his little delicate doll >:3c

So the part where the crew win the Soulglad competition and Sunday makes them answer three questions based on his life experiences, I felt like I was being personally targeted 😫 The fact that I had to choose one option or the other, with no room for nuance, and that for the first two I actually AGREED with him made me feel like he was psychologically tormenting me. Self aware Sunday who knows he’s in a video game??? I don’t think he’d need his tuning ability to manipulate you. All he has to do is talk in order to get you questioning yourself.

And perhaps my most unhinged idea…Sunday using tuning to make you cum without even having to touch you :3c

Hehe…those are my thots! I have so much more but they have to do with rest of the Penacony story! Btw the photo of him in the confessional…I instantly saved on my phone. Have you ever seen a man more beautiful?…And I also saved a screen shot of what Himeko said about him…

…Dom!Sunday aksiejskakakwnsnqjnan

( ˶°ㅁ°) !! Amethyst anon, hello!!!!!!! It is lovely to chat with you off anon!! I must thank you for always sending such wonderful thoughts hehe. <3

I am officially trapped in the Sunday pit. It's like Kikuo's Hole-Dwelling, only this is the Sunday-Dwelling, an inescapable pit in which all are destined to love him forever. Every day is Sunday if you're obsessed like me. OTL hsr cooked such an exquisite meal. I fear no character can compete with Sunday,,,, he is perfect. ✨

I'm happy you could enjoy Penacony despite being spoiled! The entirety of the Luofu storyline was spoiled for me, but I still enjoyed it because I got to fight Phantylia. She's so pretty uuwuwaaa. >w< that aside, I was also blushing whenever there was a scene with Sunday. I've taken so many screenshots of him,,, it's crazy how one man can rot my brain so intensely, but this is no different than my adoration for Scara and Azul. orz

The tuning ability AAAAAAAAAAA. That entire scene was so tense. I loved it. Poor Aventurine really didn't stand a chance. T_T Sunday plays 4D chess; it's impossible to beat him. That's such a brilliant idea,,,, Sunday using his tuning ability on you. The way you slowly but surely adopt different thoughts as your brain feels like it's burning. Inevitably, just as birds crash to their deaths, you will love him.

The Golden Hour model..... omg I had the same thought when Aventurine was shrunk and put inside it. Sunday who peers down at you and you're nothing more than a tiny ant from his perspective, perfectly palm-sized. He would treat you like a little doll and put you in all kinds of outfits, and you have no choice but to remain still because he could crush you between two fingers if he so pleases. Maybe he builds a small cage for you so that he can keep you at his bedside when he sleeps. :D

THOSE QUESTIONS!!!! I couldn't believe it, but I was also agreeing with him. It was a moment of, "Hold on. Let him keep talking." When Sunday also said that all days should be rest days (Sundays), I realized he may have been cooking with that one. ;;;;; self-aware Sunday is such a yummy thought... he's not asking the Trailblazer these questions; he's asking you, the person behind the Trailblazer. aaaaa it really is psychological torment. >_<

Tuning to make you cum without even lifting a finger or touching you...... omg that's genius. The way he'd be so coy and self-satisfied,,, smiling at you... maybe even doing that cute, sinister chuckle of his under his breath. He would be so mischievous with that once he realizes just how wonderful it is seeing you come apart from something like this. Sunday who becomes a little too attached to teasing you!!!!

AAAAAA your thoughts are all so scrumptious...... orz orz I'm eating them up like they're to be my last meal. The confessional scene is burned into my brain forever. Even now, I'm still shocked that such a beautiful character like Sunday exists. Nothing can ever surpass the greatness that is the confessional scene and all of Sunday's religious symbolism!!!!! >:D

AND THAT HIMEKO QUOTE!!!!! I also saved it as soon as I read it,,,, the "strong conviction and a desire for dominance." Himeko, you cannot do this to me.... making such an observation like that!!!!! It's dangerous for my heart. (๑﹏๑//) dom Sunday........... AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

[its-all-papaya]

This is truly devastating (I cheered.)

No but genuinely if you do end up writing parent!landoscar I will be your biggest cheerleader. Like oml I am such a sucker for these fics.

I personally adore the fics where they’re still drivers but one of them has a kid. They’ve always got the best mix of angst and softness. But honestly I adored the little blurb you wrote for the kiss prompts so if you end up going off of that I’m sure I’d love it too!

Dad!Lando is a rare gem and I am SAT for it.

- that one anon who talked about dad!Lando earlier lmao

Dad!Lando Anon !!!! welcome back !!!!

i also in theory enjoy the driver/parent combo. i don't think i could do like... irl landoscar circumstances + kid bc i can't imagine bringing a child into the way they exist rn, but i am attracted to the idea of ONE of them being a driver and the other being, like.... adjacent. i was considering this earlier bc i love my kiss prompt situation, but i don't really have a plot in mind for that landoscar outside of that specific scenario. like how did they meet? what else would i even make them do? i invented them for that exact moment and didn't really construct a world for them in my brain... but like. in theory, that oscar could be an f1 driver. and i did think about that earlier while i was at work, and it's cute for a lot of reasons. (i know i just said i didn't invent lore, but the lando from kiss prompt in my brain is a hot little mess, like loves emma SO GD MUCH that he can't stand it and wants to do right by her but like... is also just a scruffy little guy, you know? so like he for sure struggled through her baby years and she for sure loves him so much, but he's not a put-together parent. she's eating store-bought luchables on field trips bc he doesn't have enough forethought to put together a brown bag lunch. her socks probably never match and he learned how to braid so he could do her hair, but most of the time they're running too late in the morning for him to actually do it. but then oscar enters their lives and he's a bit awkward and says he's not good with kids, but his energy is so calm and he naturally just like. diffuses all their energy. combs through emma's hair after her bath and tells her stories about australia while lando scrambles to make her bed in a second flat bc he forgot he threw her sheets in the wash before dinner and never followed up. discusses her numbers and letters with her while lando microwaves instant oatmeal at like 7am. anyway. you see the vision?) i got really off-track, but imagining oscar as the naturally chill "parent" figure while also being extremely intense and dominant on track...delicious. and the first time emma goes to a grand prix she's like absolutely awestruck. oscar is god to her. and lando is like... literally how the fuck are you perfect at every part of your life and i can't even get my daughter to soccer practice on time once ever? anyway. all of that is to say. osc in his racesuit covered in champagne in mclaren hospitality after the podium and everything that goes with it and emma running top-speed across the floor until he swings her into his arms and she's squealing as he kisses her cheeks because "oscar, you were the fastest!" and lando is just. heart exploding. wants to kiss oscar until he can't fucking breathe anymore.

aNYWAY. visit my inbox again soon dad!lando anon ! like in a minute if you want ! i'll yap for another thousand years !

(sorry editing rq bc i realized i could use a max fewtrell mutual friend plot as their introduction in this hypothetical story. unfortunately Drawing Connections.)

[icanttalkimhavingacrisis]

Y'ALL I JUST WON A SHORT STORY COMPETITION!!! I also realised I didn't share the story with you guys so here it is, enjoy!! :D

(I'M SO HAPPY RN Y'ALL HAVE NO IDEA)

The Peculiarities of Ophelia Roux

Had it not been for the lady in red, we wouldn’t be where we are now. Her gloved hands, gently lulling the man to his final dream. Her gloves, disposed of meticulously, retrieved from the river Seine after a week from their disposal. The recounts of countless witnesses - she left behind so many of them, and yet none could identify her. No-one could tell me anything about the lady in red. Who was she? Why did she slip from my grasp once more?

I’m ashamed to admit it, but this latest death was not the first time I had come across the lady in red. Truth be told, she has become somewhat of a ghost, haunting my every waking moment, with her crimson cloak, her burgundy shawl, her ruby boots. Her outfit was always the same, crimson cloak, burgundy shawl, ruby boots. She always dressed the same, the lady in red - so said the witnesses. So many witnesses - to each crime she committed. Did she enjoy an audience? Did she get some sick pleasure from the cries of those innocents? Her entrances were swift and quiet, she'd take what she came for quietly - but her exits like a hurricane, so that all saw her little show, everyone partaking in her despicable game of charades.

So many had seen her. And yet - not one person could tell me anything more about her than what everyone knew - that she wore a crimson cloak, a burgundy shawl, and ruby boots. Once a witness claimed to know her true identity. I was ecstatic, ready to finally discover her name. We left the witness alone for not an hour. And in that time, in those minutes between 2:25 PM and 3:15, the lady in red has taken her soul, leaving behind a corpse and questions hanging in the air. My assistant asked me how I knew it was her. Was it not obvious? The perfection of the method - a shot, cleanly in the head, muffled by her burgundy shawl, so that not a soul heard the shot taken. And the obvious - her calling card. Even without an audience, she had to make sure this death would be accredited to her. A single red asphodel. Resigned, I left the police station.

As I walked through the snow, I thought of her. The lady in red. I had begun to call her Ophelia Roux privately, a name found through affection for her character, in relation to the image she had in my mind. It suited her so much more than her bland moniker, given to her by the common folk. Privately - I was relieved the witness did not share her name with me - perhaps I would find myself disappointed. I passed the Parque Monceau and walked on, the snow falling softly down onto the ground and crunching under my boots. It was growing dark, as though an angel up above was pulling a blanket over earth, so that God didn’t have to see what happened here at night. I finally made it to my tenement.

I turned the key in my door, opening it quietly and entering the apartment. I placed my bag gently on the cupboard where I kept my scarves and shawls, next to the wardrobe where I kept my coats and cloaks. I walked further into my apartment, sighing softly to myself. Perhaps, I thought, perhaps it was not designed for me to know Ophelia Roux’s true identity. I walked up to my kitchen island, pouring myself a glass of red. Perhaps this is what was written for me, neverending oblivion and ignorance in face of the truth. I sipped on the red. But then again, I thought, why should I care for what was written for me? Why should I resign to the power of destiny - allow it to control my present and future? No, I thought, I shall write my own destiny. I drained my glass and strode towards the hall, with one thing only in mind - catching Ophelia Roux.

But alas, I have been misleading you to an extent. You must forgive me, it was not a lie on my part - rather an omission of the truth. For you see - I am more than just a detective on a case, more than just a young woman, obsessed with the lady in red. No - I am more than that. For you see - I have seen her face. Just twice, no more. Once - at the charity ball where she made her debut. She - in all her chivalry - she saved me, pulling me from the depths of the fountain, thoughtlessly placed in the centre of some ridiculously rich philanthropist’s grand hall, where I found myself by some cruel accident. Yes - Ophelia Roux had been the one to pull me from that fountain, to save my life. Of course, before taking the life of that ridiculously rich philanthropist, and disappearing into the night.

And the second time was that very night. Yes, I saw her that night. I saw her in my hall. Darned demoness, she must’ve found a way to bypass my locks. I looked for my brown boots, to have something to wear - I was not planning to go out without shoes, after all - but could not find any brown ones. She must’ve taken them. In their usual place stood other shoes - her shoes. Her ruby boots. I turned to open the wardrobe, and in it was her crimson cloak. Panicked, I threw open my scarf drawer - and there it was, like I expected. Her burgundy shawl, with a burnt-out hole in it, about the size of that .22 calibre bullet that had killed my witness. I closed the wardrobe - and that was the moment I saw her face, just as I had remembered it. My lady in red. A lone tear ran down my cheek as I stifled a cry, knowing the inevitable. There she was - standing in my hall. Looking at me, from the other side of the mirror.

[trixie-troubleby]

I saw you wanted prompts so here i am.

I've envisioned them as Sportarobbie but ofc you're free to change that if you wanna (i chose these bc i had some cute ideas for these two options too and i wanna tell you but i won't rn to not influence you too much, i will probably once i reblog your writing tho)

Kinda angsty option: 6. "You can't die. Please don't die."

More random option: 87. "Hey! I was gonna eat that!"

maybe I’ll do the second one later sometime! For now enjoy some very minor angst! Thanks for the request!!

It was an accident. Robbie needed to stress that it was an accident. He hadn’t meant to– he would never mean to– He let out a series of swears as he rushed over to where the hero was laying unmoving, dropping his latest invention on the way. It wasn’t supposed to do this, this wasn’t supposed to–

He grabbed the hero’s wrist, which was somehow already cold. He tried to check for a pulse, but he was never very good at that sort of thing. “You can’t die.” He said, rolling his sleeves back and starting to press down on his chest. “Please don’t die.” He mumbled, keeping count of the beats in his head. “The kids will murder me–“ There wasn’t a response, but he kept going. “You can’t–“ There was still so much he wanted to do. So many plans to try, so many nicknames to give. “Please–“ His voice cracked. Some part of his mind thought this was embarrassing, the rest didn’t care.

He thought of all the time he’d spent with Sportacus. Every sly look or wink. The small nods and words the kids didn’t notice. The touches, rare and fleeting but treasured all the same. The exasperated smile. The way the hero said his name. All of it, overwhelming him. “You can’t die. I love you.” He paused beating on the man’s chest, only to move to his mouth. He opened the hero’s mouth with his hands, pressing his lips to Sportacus’ and blowing in air.

“Robbie?” Sportacus’ voice came from decidedly not where his body was.

Robbie jolted back from the limp body. He looked from the body to the standing Sportacus with a furrowed brow. “What the fuck?” He demanded, voice barely a squeak.

“It wasn’t real! It wasn’t real! I’m sorry! We’re sorry!” Pixel sprinted towards them, some of the other kids in tow. “The Sportacus was a hologram I’ve been working on.” He held up a remote, pressing a button and the hologram dissipated.

Robbie looked up to where the real Sportacus was standing, dumbfounded. Robbie’s face was burning. He felt like an idiot.

“We– we thought if you saw your schemes could be dangerous–“ Stephanie stumbled through her words.

“We thought you’d mess with us less! We didn’t realize–“ Trixie added.

“Kids. That was not an okay thing to do.” Sportacus said, crossing his arms over his chest. There was a gentle frown on his face, one that screamed ‘not mad just disappointed.’ Robbie almost felt bad for the kids. “You did not have my consent to have an image of me walking around. More than that, this was clearly very upsetting to Robbie. I know his pranks are not always fun, but he is not a bad man. And even if he was, it would not be okay to trick him into thinking he’d killed me.” Sportacus said.

Robbie swallowed. The kids’ eyes all turned to him, wide and apologetic and terrible. “I’m fine.” He mumbled, looking away from them. “Don’t worry about me.” He pushed himself up off the ground. Looking at the place on the concrete where moments before he’d been giving CPR to a hologram.

“Kids. I need to speak to Robbie alone for a bit.” Sportacus said. Some of the kids looked ready to argue, but a look from Sportacus told them how welcome that was. They scurried off, offering rushed apologies to Robbie.

Once they were all out of earshot, Sportacus walked over to Robbie, putting a steadying hand on his arm. “Are you alright?” He asked gently.

“That depends.” Robbie grimaced. “How much did you see?”

“I uh… saw and heard. Enough.” Sportacus said, hesitatingly, clenching and unclenching his fist.

“Right.” Robbie’s eyes flickered away from the fists. “Then in that case, I think I oughta go start packing.”

“Packing?” Sportacus asked, hand out in a flash, grabbing Robbie’s arm.

“No way in hell am I staying here when you’ve heard me make a complete fool of myself.” Robbie responded, looking down at the white knuckled grip on his arm. He shook the hand off his arm. Robbie started back towards his lair, crossing his arms over his chest and raising his shoulders in defense as he walked.

“Did you mean it?” Sportacus’ voice cut through the air with an enviable ease.

He didn’t have to respond. He shouldn’t have responded. He should’ve kept walking. He paused. “Did I mean what?” He asked, brow quirked as he glanced behind him.

“What you said?” Sportacus asked. “The last things you said.” He added. If Robbie didn’t know better, he would say that Sportacus looked nervous. “That you love me.” He cleared his throat.

”You uh– misheard me.” Robbie lied, crossing his arms over his chest. “I didn’t say that.”

“I heard you.” A small smile on the hero’s face.

“No, you didn’t!” Robbie insisted, feeling his face flush.

“I think I did.” Sportacus had the audacity to laugh. Robbie decided he would kill him for real. This was just cruel and unusual and–

Sportacus kissed him. A gentle innocent pressing of lips. He pulled away after the shortest time, looking up to Robbie with a warm grin on his face. “Thank you for trying to save me.”

“You’re uh– welcome?” Robbie cleared his throat.

“Can I kiss you again, or did I really mishear you?” The hero wore a quirked brow and a smug smile.

Robbie narrowed his eyes. “Watch it. Next time I’ll let you die.” Sportacus laughed, leaning up to kiss him again.

[thatdesklamp]

WAIT OMG-

been reading intrinsic warmth for a WHILE and your writing is top tier!! i always wondered to myself every time i’d read a chapter why the writing just STICKS, yk? i’m a MAJOR book girlie, i read 24/7.

AND THEN IMAGINE MY SURPRISE WHEN I READ ONE OF YOUR TAGS THAT YOU PUT UP ON ONE OF YOUR POSTS WHERE YOU WERE ANSWERING A QUESTION FROM ANOTHER LOVELY READER AND I SEE THAT YOU TOOK AN ENGLISH A LEVEL?

first of all (not 100% sure on this) but i’m pretty sure only british ppl take gcses, a levels, etc. YOU’RE BRITISH?

i feel like i’ve met my other half rn over something so tiny but yeah. IT LITERALLY EXPLAINS WHY YOUR WRITING IS SO GOOD:

i could point out the NUMBER of times i’ve seen juxtaposition, symbolism, foreshadowing in your fic to someone if they’d asked me to point it out for them. at first i thought you might’ve done it unknowingly, and then i decided that nope, bc foreshadowing is such a BIG writing technique that it simply couldn’t have been by accident.

it’s one thing to know about a writing technique and another to actually be able to SUCCESSFULLY incorporate it into your writing. if it isn’t clear enough, i’m saying that you did it AMAZINGLY. you’ve got a natural talent and i’m envioussss (in a supporting way ofc 😭).

you should really look into making your own book, and i think you EXCEL at the supernatural aspect of plot in stories. your writing is so unique and different yet so warm, it reminds me of autumn (my favourite season).

idk how to end such a long message, ultimately i don’t have a reason for typing this up and shit. ik you have tons of people probably saying the same thing and it might just get repetitive for you, but i wouldn’t feel comfortable not being part of said bunch-of-ppl-probably-saying-the-same-thing.

oh! and take your SWEET TIME updating. it’s your story, your fic, your writing. the ONLY thing we readers can give you as a payback and thanks is time, patience, and understanding <3333

RAHHH BRITTANIA 💪💪💪💪

Agh. Yes—I’m British (English to be precise, sweet sweet caroline etc), hence the use of ‘u’s in words like ‘colour’ and ‘humour’, and also why everyone’s parents are their ‘father’ or ‘mother’ and not mum/dad. ‘Mom’ feels too American but ‘mum’ feels too rah engerland, yk? I’ve mentioned previously that I’m looking forward to writing fics where the characters are actually from England and where I’m actually allowed to write them the way I talk, mostly. Good lord am I excited.

And yes lol I took English for an A-Level. Bloody smashed it too, if I get to brag, mwahaha. Didn’t take it any further (I’ve also previously said that I’m a # woman in stem uni student, which is true), but I still write a killer essay imo. Give me 10 minutes to do a refresher on ‘Othello’ (it’s been a while okay) and I can talk for donkeys about his tragic fall and how much of a wanker he is. Which he is! I’m a Desdemona defender for life.

You say ‘natural talent’. PLS. No!! God no. Not at all. I wish—that would’ve made it a lot easier, but whatever I can do rn is down to bloody years of toiling away on my shitty little laptop, I promise. I’ve got another anon ask that asked about some writing tips so I’ll do the bulk of them there but my number 1 will always and forever be to practise. Whatever skill I have now has been earned over the many years. You don’t even want to see some of the stuff that will never grace my ao3 page (atla had me in a chokehold through covid and I have never been the same).

But you are genuinely so complimentary: this is so so lovely of you. Thank you?? It’s really weird being someone who writes and also someone who enjoys analysing literature; you’re right, half of the ‘techniques’ are intentional (the number of times I’ve flicked through some chapters’ drafts and thought, ‘fucks sake none of this makes sense, I need to add some decent foreshadowing or none of this will make sense in two chapters’), but also so much of my writing is just thinking, ‘hmm, this doesn’t really feel right. No no, I don’t like the vibe of this. I want this to feel more GRAAHHH and less lalalala. Lemme change this up a bit’. Whether that leads to the whole, short sentences->speeds up the pace of the reader when reading the section->increased tension, mimics actual fight encounter, etc etc (all the stuff you blag on about in eng lit), then maybe that counts as intentional? And maybe not.

Making my own book? That’s lovely of you to say but I also really don’t have any ideas for anything non-fanfic’y! Lol. I love a good bit of canon compliance, that’s my issue. That being said—hey, another eng a level reference—I’ve made multiple references here to being the world’s #1 ‘Atonement’ hater. Unfortunately, it also lives damn rent free in my head and I’ve got the bare bones of a WW2-era, perhaps epistolary, longform fic buzzing around. (Fandom: Marauders. I’m a disgrace but here we go). I’ve written nothing for it and maybe I never will, but that’s one of the only things I can see as being more standalone from original canon. Anyway: it’s the fanfic life for me. Ali Hazelwood’s life is but a distant dream.

But anyway! Thank you again for your lovely words. The next IW chapter will take a very long time, I have to be frank, so thank you for the reassurance that that’s not absolutely disgraceful lmao T_T Thanks again!! <3

[taexual]

Dude where do I even start :ccc

This chapter, I really couldn't wait to have some free time and read it peacefully (peacefully meaning, squealing and losing my shit at every paragraph)

I loved the plotting ok, the attention to details, the way they all worry about each other and just fight against this urge to bury Sid alive, so inspiring and wholesome :D

Also, something I've absolutely always loved about your writing is this continuous narration of the characters thoughs, interactions and quirks, like it may be the simplest of things for other people (like writers in general and stuff) but for me these moments -of Luna finally exchanging a gossipy stare with Maggie, or Jungkook feeling devastated when Oc took her hand away, and then making sure that it wouldn't happen again-, they just add so much endearment, personality, depth to the story. Idk, it feels like every comma you write has a purpose, and will eventually add up to some beautiful metaphors, and revelations.

What does it feel like to be such a talented writer??

Now, regarding the lovey dovey stuff... What the actual fuck are you trying to do to me? I swear I cannot look more deranged giggling at my phone every 32 seconds jfc, have some compassion.

Like jk demanding that kiss in the park? Had me doing flips

The “I never knew how to love you quietly."

AND OC RECITING HIS ENTIRE SPEECH??!? ‘We have Sociology together, I saw you sleeping in class, very cute by the way, the professor does not know how to shut up, have you seen that new Studio Ghibli film, I recently watched their classic with some friends, My Neighbour Jungkook, I’m Totoro by the way, I thought maybe—wait—no—’”

“Not one period, nothing,” you continued, a melancholic haze in your eyes. “Just commas and an endless stream of thought. You could have asked me to bury a body, I would have said yes.”

STFU I ALMOST CRIED, THOSE ARE MY BABIESS

The rain listened. It had become a fundamental part of your present and a prophet of your future: the two of you were going to spend the rest of your lives listening to the rain and falling in love.

This destroyed me actually, get me someone to listen to the rain and fall in love with, rn please and thank u

Also watch me try and write 'transfixing. Beguiling. Effulgent. Pulchritudinous' next time I'm falling asleep to test my writing abilities fr, just you wait

He was almost ready to call Rated Riot’s next song “Smile Lines” and just sigh dreamily into the microphone for five minutes while Yoongi played gentle piano chords in the background.

As if their entire discography wasn't like this already, at least in my mind it is. But yeah, I can totally see him doing something like that next time oc does anything remotely endearing (breathing basically)

Ugh idk what to say, you have me screaming and crying for this couple, these characters and their story all the time, and I love you for it. There are also things I forgot to mention because my phone refuses to actually save things in the Clipboard, but overall this made my week, as your updates always do (and that paired with Ateez's performance in Coachella in a couple of minutes?? Yeah life feels worth living again 🤭🤭)

Thank you sm for this, take care of yourself pleaseee, ill be waiting for the next one cccc:

oh how i wish i could thank you eloquently, instead of going sskdhfksh at every word of your message 😭 i must stress that the fact that you noticed (!) these little moments between characters and you've enjoyed (!!!) them is the absolute highest reward i could get 🙏🏻 it's so easy to skim, you know?

babe making you giggle is my main purpose in life at this point, i don't know what to tell you. and you'RE SO RIGHT OMG he's so whipped for her, their next album is just going to be jungkook morphing from this 🥰 into just this ❤️ (like me for you rn, fr)

i also hope you have more peace and quiet to do the things you enjoy in your life!! i love you!!! 🥺🤍🤍🤍🤍 bless ateez btw

[sharkpupsblog]

😨 Lost Horse! 🐎 PART 6. Liar.

A Sabine x GN! Reader fanfic!

Hi!!! I have been feeling 💔 real poopy lately so i might . Take a break. 😔 If i do i will announce it on another post :( i want to keep writing but honestly I’ve been real blegh and I think i’m nearing burn out. Anyways i have nothing else to say rn so. Enjoy! :D

Edit: so sorry if y’all saw the draft that posted in the morning . 😭 i thought it was deleted since it didn’t show up scheduled or on my page??? Weird 🤨 anyways so sorry to those who saw it! Here’s the part! Enjoy!

Summary: You lie to Anne and you face the consequence of your action.

Warnings: mentions of feeling sick and mentions of eye contact.

You were never good at lying. Every lie you ever told was always discovered. Most of your lies were harmless. You usually lied about losing your homework or about doing a chore which you didn’t do. One time you even lied about your dad’s robe being cool. You told small lies that didn’t hurt anyone. Except the robe one that one definitely hurt your dad. Usually your lies never hurt anyone, they were small and they were harmless.

Until now… Now you were lying about having never met the druids most wanted enemy. You looked Anne dead in the eye, and you told her a druid took Khaan. You told her a druid whose name you did not know found you in the forest. You told her he took Khaan, and gave you your new mare to make the ride home. You felt guilt set deep in your stomach when Anne smiled at you. She believed you… She believed you were telling the truth. She believed you were being 100% honest with her. She believed you because what proof did she have to back up that you would lie to her?

The leader believed, but her friends didn’t. As you told your story Lisa, Linda, and Alex gave you looks that told you exactly how they felt. Lisa asked you “what was his name?” You repeated that you were too busy making your way out of the forest to ask any questions. Linda asked, “how did you keep the bridle?” You said he had a halter on hand, and when you saw it you asked to keep your bridle. You added that it was too cool to let him take it. Alex asked, “why are you at the docks?” You told her you were walking around in hopes of finding the group. Anne’s friends did not get to ask you any further questions because Anne spoke.

She told you she was sorry about Khaan. You gave her your best fake sad look telling her that it was “okay” and that he was in “good hands.” At least that part was true. You listened to her as she told everyone that since the mission was over it was time to go back to Valedale. Now you were riding side by side with Anne. You felt guilty for lying to her. Really, really guilty so guilty you felt like you were going to be sick. Your only comfort for how you were feeling was your mare. She neighed at you, and she nipped at your pants. She could feel how you were feeling. It did not take a magical bond for her to feel how awful you felt.

You smiled sadly at her giving her a pat on her shoulder which earned you another neigh from her. She was the only horse making noise. All the other horses were quiet. Just like their riders they too were highly suspicious of you. You had an awfully familiar scent of smoke. The scent and your mood only made their suspicions worse. If only their humans had a good nose like them. Then they would know exactly who you were hiding from them. Ever since you left Goldenhills you had all been riding in an uncomfortable silence. That was a full day ago.

The silence was slowly killing you. You were getting closer to your home. You were in the heart of Hollow Woods. You really wanted to ride back by yourself, but Anne said she had to deliver you. If she let you go alone and you got hurt Avalon would never let her hear the end of it. He would surely have her kicked out of the Soul Riders for not keeping an eye on you like she said she would. She couldn’t lose you again. When the silence became too much for you, you asked Anne if you could change the pace from a walk to a gallop.

Luckily for you she accepted. Now you were all galloping through Hollow Woods. When you saw Valedale show up in the distance you let out a sigh. You could not wait to be home. You couldn’t wait to order a pizza, sit down with your dad, and forget everything that happened. Some stuff was good though, so you decided to forget most of it but not all of it. You all slowed your horses as you rode into Valedale. You looked down at your mare giving her a big smile, she let out a whinny.

“You’re going to love Valedale, girl!” You didn’t know if the mare had a name, so you were just calling her girl. You did not see a tag on her bridle like the one Khaan had on his. Did Sabine even name her? Your mare let out a snort. The long ride had drained most of her energy. You comfort her by saying “we’re almost home girl.” When you made it home you got off your mare leading her into the little walk-in barn that belonged to Khaan.

Your dad bought it pre-built. It was set up quickly so Khaan would have somewhere to rest while he healed. Now the walk-in barn belonged to the mare. She stood patiently as you took off her tack and you groomed her. She relaxed as you brushed her mane. After she was all brushed you gave her hay, water, and some treats. She thanked you by licking your hand when you held out the treats. You said goodnight to her, and you headed home holding your licked hand away from you.

You walked inside, and you saw the Soul Riders in the kitchen. You thought they had already left. It looked like they weren’t planning to leave anytime soon since your dad was making them something to eat. It all started with them in your kitchen and now it ended there too. Your feelings had changed though, you went from anger to guilt. What an awesome change. You decided to join everyone for dinner, but first you had to wash your hands.

You laid down letting out a sigh as your sore muscles tried to relax. It was nice to be back in your bed. Nothing beat being back home in your own bed after a long trip. Your dad stood at your door. He smiled warmly at you, and you smiled back tiredly. “Goodnight” he said in a whisper. You replied to him with “goodnight dad” your volume was a bit louder than his.

Your dad gave you a nod before gently shutting your door. When his steps went quiet, and you heard his room door close you sat up. You grabbed your phone from your nightstand. It was charging, so you had to be careful not to pull on the cord. You opened up the contacts app, and you looked through it. You were really sleepy, so the screen looked like a blurry mess. It took you a while to find the number you wanted.

You pressed it being careful as you pressed the text icon. It was dangerously close to the call icon. You definitely did not want to call the owner of the number. It was late at night it would be rude to call her even if it were by accident. Your phone took you to the texting app. You watched as the little text bar flickered as it waited for you to write a text. You thought about what to write. You did not want to sound super formal… You also did not want to sound too informal… You thought it over for a bit.

When you felt like you came up with something good you started typing. ‘Hi! Meet in Everwind? Saturday?’ it was Wednesday so Saturday was two days away. You felt the text was good because it was short and straight to the point. You felt it was too lame and a bit mysterious, so you added a :) and you also added who it was from. You sent the text, and you put your phone back down on your nightstand. You were about to lay back down, but you were stopped by your phone buzzing. You looked at the screen seeing it light up. A text containing ‘sure’ with a thumbs up and a horse emoji flashed across your screen.

Ty for reading! :D while editing my wifi suddenly went down and everything i had on here was . Deleted. Thats it thats my last straw i am never writing again 💀.

[wonwoosthetic]

Hi I am a new follower I've been obsessed lately by ur amazing writings , specially amour haine & Co, such a an outstanding masterpiece, I love everything about it, how u express the emotions and how u leave that mysterious side to each character is just spot-on , I read all the chapters and I miss it already I hope u can upload soon , cuz this is probably one of the best series to ever exist , like bluntly talking, u outdid urself , bless u honey .🤗😚

It's the jeon wonwoo supremacy for me !!!!!

Heyyy!!! I’m so glad you’ve found your way onto this blog! Welcome!!!!🤗🤗🤗 I hope you enjoy it here ˙ᵕ˙ reminder: this is a safe place where everyone is welcome to express themselves and feel comfortable, I’m always here with an open ear and heart🫶🏼

You are too kind😭😭 thank you so much!!!!🤍🤍 oh god, I wish I could somehow express how much this means to me, literally every part of what you said touched my heart, I can’t tear up though rn haha I’m at work😭🥺😭 I feel so incredibly grateful to have people like you on my blog, so passionate about reading, reviewing, and truly enjoying written work on here🥰🫶🏼😭

I’m working on the next chapter to hopefully release it as soon as possible🫶🏼🫶🏼🫶🏼

UGH, YOU’RE SO SWEET I JUST WANT YO HUG YOU SO TIGHTLY!!!🤍🤍🤍🤍🤍 I hope you get to enjoy the future chapters as well!!🫶🏼🥹

P.S.: I actually laughed out loud at your profile pic HAHAHAHA megamind vernon is gonna haunt me hahaha

[cosmictapestry]

SO I WAS THINKING ABOUT EASIER BY THE CRANE WIVES + THE WAY YOU WRITE MORPHIENNE, specifically Dream’s perspective. The only peace I have ever know / Is the peace I made with you um??? Can someone say allies and friends for billions of years?? And if I were someone else, would this be easier? hooooh boy. The thing that gets Dream in the end is his inability to see himself as someone beyond his function. It’s debilitating him, and I think it’s a huge factor in why he struggles so much with letting Lucienne love him. If he was not one of the Endless, if he could be Better and Stronger and More Whole, he could do it maybe, but not now, and not with her. Please tell me someday / I'll at least be able to sleep. I am going to fucking cry.

Anyway I’m eating breakfast rn before work so I’m not exactly in the most coherent of mindsets and I don’t think I said everything I wanted to say, BUT DO YOU SEE MY VISION.

currently listening to this on repeat to Fully Understand Your Vision. it lives in me now etc etc etc. it’s literally exactly this like this is so so so correct. he cannot be something beyond his function he cannot be himself please don’t make him be himself. every time he’s ever tried he’s turned into a monster. the part of him that is Him is weak and afraid and cruel because of it. and he can’t fucking hurt lucienne if he hurt lucienne he’d destroy the universe along with himself. that’s his best friend man……….. that’s the person he knows best in all of time and space……… he loves her and he doesn’t know how not to destroy the things he loves so he’s just going to try his hardest to enjoy her company without letting himself believe that she truly loves Him too.

and yeah this is like. Extremely relevant to we divinity. and i try to keep it in my head the need to leave this empty bed and be nobody instead because it’s easier. and if i were not myself would this be easier. please tell me someday i’ll at least be able to sleep. starting a dream girlypop playlist solely to frame it around this song thank you so much

[twentyfivemiceinatrenchcoat]

HSHSHSHJD I know I already have another ask in ur inbox but I’m just. Super curious rn and I NEED to hear ur take because I trust you will give the best answer ever but. What music do u think stsg listen to? I know teen sugu listening to mitski has been talked about…. But….. what else !! Me personally I see gojo (teen and adult versions) being a biggg Bruno mars fan…. Occasionally listening to gaga…. Maybe some Beyoncé… Katy perry… you get the vibes :3 very upbeat songs that u can just vibe to I think. But DARE I SAY I think gojo would enjoy listening to songs from musicals. At first I think he would be like “musicals??? U mean like theatre??? Boring🤨🤨” (< envisioned teen gojo saying this all arrogant and cocky my little loser <333) but then you catch him screaming the lyrics to some Hamilton song when nobody else is around. He was trying to be cool infront of sugu okay. (He’s my little meowmeow) BUTTTT also. Aside from listening to sadgirl themed music (Mitski, laufey, pheobe Bridgers, etc etc) I feel like suguru would like “older” bands a bit? I know you mentioned him reading classics so it made me think. Maybe a bit of the smiths, the cure, etc…. Part of me wants to say he might listen to modern baseball but. Sigh,… would that be a controversial take chat….. is that just me projecting….. What do u think!!! This got way too long don’t look at me…. Curls into a ball in the corner of the room — stsg anon \(^ヮ^)/

STSG ANON MY DEAREST <3333 i put a bunch of cushions in the corner so you can curl up comfortably!! make yourself at home :3

goshhhh literally every single one of these are so real……… 😵‍💫😵‍💫 gojo listening to upbeat pop music so true, sugu listening to The Classics SO true……. i think he’d absolutely loveeeeee the smiths oh my god. he’s also 100% the type to wear those white tees w some band cover on the front…. oversized and a lil faded….. he’s so babygirl <3333 AND MODERN BASEBALL GODDDD YOUR BRAIN IS SO BIG i always think of him and toru when i listen to tears over beers :((( he would love them…. also can i just say . the mountain goats 👉👈 the front bottoms 👉👈 sugu loves them all !!!

with that being said . SOOOOO REAL SO TRUE SATORU WOULD BE A MUSICAL LOVER THERE’S NO DOUBT IN MY MIND …… technically i KNOW he’s more of a stem kid but in my heart he’s a theatre kid. it just makes sense. AND OFC YOU GET IT STSG ANON ……. ohhh he would love singing along 😔😔 he wouldn’t be able to help himself!!! i feel like he’s sort of embarrassed abt it in high school (”he was trying to be cool in front of suguru” CANON BTW!!!), but when he’s all grown up? COMPLETELY unabashed. he loves musicals so much. his favorite would 100% be the legally blonde musical no i don’t take criticism…. he stans elle woods as he should!! also plays the songs on repeat loudly and it irritates everyone else <33

sadly i feel like sugu would be the boring type :/// who doesn’t like musicals ://////// very disappointing but that’s just who he is . satoru would make him see the light though!!! i can see suguru really enjoying my personal favorite musical of all time…. the guy who didn’t like musicals (WATCH IT IF YOU HAVEN’T ALREADY IT’S SO GOOD IT CHANGED MY LIFE 😔😔😔) <333 bc of the meta commentary!! and i think he’d like the humour too. usually he just indulges satoru in whatever musical he forces him to watch but when they watch it he genuinely chuckles a couple times and looks interested so satoru gets SO hyped …… cuties

as you can tell i’m Normal abt musicals (i love them so much i would die without them) BUT ANYWAYYY your asks can never be too long stsg anon…. pls don’t worry….. you could write a whole essay and i would simply eat it up <33 THIS WAS SO FUN TO THINK ABT AND I AGREE W ALL YOUR PICKS!!!!