#I have been thinking about this for weeks | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

lauraneedstochill · 2 days ago

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can’t pretend

pairing: Jack Abbot x resident!reader summary: He is puzzled with you first, then vexed, and he can’t understand his feelings. In an attempt to get to know you better (or maybe to get you out of his head), Abbot accidentally crosses the line. (or, alternatively: what if Jack met someone similar to him in many ways. traumatic past included)

warnings: <rivals> to friends to lovers, slow burn, mentions of blood and injuries / I’m hinting at the age gap but you can ignore it / some complicated feelings and a LOT of Jack’s thoughts (his poor therapist will need a raise); assault. ANGST. / words: 7K author’s note: this is my first fic for “The Pitt”. I binge-watched the show in 2 days and didn’t plan on writing anything but my inspiration decided otherwise. I’ve never had a beta reader in my life, please be kind. ♡

Early at dawn, the sky is just the right color — the darkness slowly dissipates, deep purple at the edges, black fading into blue. If he squints and looks above the roofs, he can pretend he’s looking at the ocean. He’s been toying with the idea for some time but it’s more of a dream, a comforting mirage: him getting a small house by the beach, waves crashing softly in the distance, clean blue water blending into the bright blue sky. He’d wake up to the sunrise, take lugs full of cooling salty air, walk in the sand that glistens under the foaming swash. He’d probably adopt a dog — someone to pass his days with, just so the silence doesn’t get too heavy, doesn’t weigh on him when he can’t sleep at night.

A passing car honks down the street, loud and sudden, and Jack flinches, opening his eyes. That’s when the perfect image always falls apart. He is afraid he will get lonely with just a dog and with nothing to do, he will be going up the walls, bored out of his mind. But he doesn’t know how not to be alone. And some days he wishes that he did.

The air in Pittsburgh doesn’t carry any scents at this morning hour, and Jack’s gaze wanders down to the tree leaves writhing in the wind. He absentmindedly rubs his wrists when he hears the door creaking behind him.

“You know, security is getting worried about you,” Robby chuckles, his steps slow. “I heard the guys making bets on how many times a week you’ll come here.”

“Says the man who likes to brood in my spot,” Jack huffs without looking at him.

“Me, brooding? No idea what you are talking about.”

Robby gets to the roof edge but stays behind the railing, leans on it and slowly stretches his arms. His tone lets empathy in when he speaks up:

“Tough night?”

The sky is overcast, a mush of white and grey clouds the blue barely peeks through, and Jack sighs as he turns away. “Remember you told me about the kid who OD’d on Xanax laced with fentanyl? The parents sat by his bed hoping he’d wake up by some miracle,” Robby only nods when Jack throws him a glance. “I’m dealing with one of those.”

They both lost patients before, and both know that it doesn’t get easier with time. You have to tuck your grief away to walk into the room with their loved ones, offer apologies that carry little meaning, take even more grief in because this isn’t about you and this loss is not for you to carry. But they do carry it — Robby memorizes lifeless faces, Jack never forgets the names of everyone he couldn’t save.

“Brain dead?”

“Yep,” Jack drawls, hands gripping the metal rails. “He’s got three sisters, and all three were begging me. And I stood there feeling absolutely useless.”

Robby watches as his friend’s knuckles turn white. “If you couldn’t do anything then there was nothing that could’ve been done. And I’m really sorry.”

If only words could bring people back from the dead, Jack thinks bitterly but doesn’t say it out loud. He doesn’t want to sour Robby’s mood. And he can’t help but notice — it used to bother him way more, it sometimes would eat him alive; now Jack is mostly numb.

“I’ll sleep it off,” he mumbles.

“Not staying for the welcoming party?”

It takes a few seconds for the reminder to pop up in Jack’s head: a new senior resident, today is her first day. After Collins took maternity leave, Robby spent hours on the phone, glasses pressed to the bridge of his nose as he flipped through the applications, always unsure, never satisfied. And then he got a call and drove across the city to another hospital to meet her in person — he came back beaming. Jack must’ve zoned out so he didn’t catch the details.

“Don’t think I have a very welcoming face.”

“Should’ve seen the guys she worked with. I thought her chief of surgery would literally fist-fight me after I offered her the job,” Robby cackles.

It stirs Jack’s curiosity a bit. “She’s that good?”

“I believe she is. Skilled, confident, haven’t heard a single bad thing about her,” and even though his voice is certain, Robby dithers, bringing a hand to the back of his neck.

“But... ? I sense a but coming.”

“No-no, she’s great, really, and I made up my mind. It’s just that… She comes off as quite stubborn, and I feel like she is used to flying solo,” his eyes dart to Jack. “Reminds me of someone I know,” a smile grazes his lips, an unvoiced comparison he can’t help but draw.

Jack doesn’t see it, his gaze set somewhere on the horizon. “We all have to be team players here, that’s how it works,” he says dismissively. “I’m sure she’ll learn.”

The streets are getting busy, filling with people talking, rushing, making endless calls — and with more honking and more sounds that all merge into one unpleasant noise. And Jack is getting really tired.

“I should go back. Don’t want anyone to scare her off,” Robby puts a hand on Jack’s shoulder, a friendly but firm grip. “I’d also rather not waste my time on scraping your frail body off the pavement. Let me walk you out.”

“Frail body? You are three years older, you bag of bones,” Jack quips, and they share a laugh, and it warms up his heart a little.

But the warmth fades as they get inside, into the weave of corridors, into the crowd of nurses and other doctors pacing, the lighting bright and harsh, the smell of antiseptics clinging to the walls like mold. And it is not as overwhelming as it’s tiresome; once he is out on the street, Jack takes a few deep breaths. It’s hardly a relief.

As he passes by the park, exhaustion already on his heels, he suddenly picks up a sound, something between a whine and a small woof. Jack looks around to find the source peeping out from behind the bushes — brown eyes, wet nose, grey fluffy ears, one marked with a white spot. When Jack takes a step closer, the stray puppy immediately runs off.

On his way home he gets some dog treats and throws them in his bag. He tries thinking of pet names but nothing comes to mind. And when he falls into his cold bed, thick curtains not letting any light reach him, he dreams of standing on a long road framed with grass, a murmuring of waves heard through the mist. But he can’t see the ocean.

It keeps raining, and they have to close the roof — “Merely a precaution, sir, we don’t want anyone to slip. I heard the weather is supposed to clear up in a few days,” one of the guards assures Jack. His mood these days is just as gloomy as the sky. But he’s a man of habit, so every time Jack wants to get out to the roof, he instead gets more cases, drinks more coffee, barely a few words squeezed in between that aren’t work-related.

At first, he only catches glimpses of you.

On the days when your shifts overlap, he sees you tearing along the hallways, your hair up and your face focused, removing gowns to quickly put on fresh ones, your hands either in gloves or carrying the charts. You don’t speak much, and very few times Jack gets to walk past you, he is slightly puzzled by this combination of quiet and fast-paced.

Your first week is nearing its end when Dana prompts Jack to make a proper introduction. She calls him uncooperative and calls for you herself when she sees you leaving trauma#1. You swiftly come by the nurses' station and glance up at the board — and then you finally face Jack, your gaze so piercing, it catches him off guard. He clears his throat and manages a greeting, a bit coolly.

“Nice to meet you, Dr. Abbot,” you tell him calmly, offering a hand. And you don’t look away, and your handshake is firmer than he would expect. The next thing you are holding is another chart, eyes following the lines of words and numbers as you step away, Whitaker barely keeping up.

“She is so fast, she’s almost flying. Beautiful,” Princess notes approvingly, and Perlah hums in agreement.

Their voices snap him back into reality, and Jack inhales sharply, only now realizing his gaze is still on you. He looks down, pretending he needs to fix his watch. “What is this, a fan club?”

“Aw, no need to be so jealous. You will always be our favorite old white doctor,” Princess teases.

Perlah gives her a side-eye. “I thought Dr. Robby was our favorite.”

“Well, yes. But I have a soft spot for men in existential crisis,” Princess winks at him.

Perlah rolls her eyes. “They are all in existential crisis.”

“And I wonder why,” Jack deadpans, then picks a case just so he’s got an excuse to leave. And maybe an excuse to pass by the room you’re in, your gloved hands already stained with crimson.

He starts watching you more often, an impulse he can’t necessarily explain.

He’s careful, he’s not staring, but his hazel eyes always pick you out from the crowd. He’s taking mental notes: you lean on doors with your right shoulder when you rush in, you scan the injured head to toe in every case, hands moving quickly in tandem with your gaze. You never raise your voice but you keep eye contact — with the interns when you give instructions and with the patients to make sure they understand what’s going on. You are efficient with your work-ups, you’re the first one to come in and you stay late to turn your patients over to the night shift. You are meticulous and disciplined in a way he finds relatable; in three weeks' time there’s a foundation laid for him to grow respectful. But sometimes Jack can’t stop the thought: he is yet to see your smile. He is also yet to see you slip up, and that is bound to happen because no doctor is without fault.

A month in, he thinks you finally come close to failure.

A patient is wheeled in on a gurney, gesticulating, red in the face from how displeased or pained he is (probably both); still, as you talk to him, he makes pauses to listen. There’s blood on his chest and his speech is slurring, and Jack’s gaze follows you. From where he’s standing, he can see you clearly, so he can’t help but glance up a few times from his computer screen. It’s all the same routine and it seems to be working smoothly — but when he takes another peek, he sees you frozen.

Jack instantly draws near, alert and observing through the glass: the man is intubated, his shirt cut and chest bared — and with a nail sticking right out of where his heart should be. The monitors go off as the blood pressure drops. When Whitaker makes eye contact with him, Jack takes that as an invitation to come in.

“What do we got here?”

Whitaker looks half worried, half relieved. “Um-m, 41 years old male, nail to the chest, intracardiac. Prepped for the thoracotomy. Cardio is tied up with another surgery, and it’s at least 15 more minutes until we can get an O.R.”

Jack knows the patient doesn’t have that long. His gaze flickers to you but you do not meet it, and he can’t tell what you are looking at. There is no time to guess — if you’ve never cracked into someone’s chest, he’ll gladly guide you. And his guidance is assertive, if a little cocky.

“It’s not every day that you get to do a thoracotomy. And it can be daunting — also, pretty risky if you ask me—”

“Then it’s a good thing I’m not asking,” you retort abruptly without even sparing him a glance.

And then you pick the scalpel and make the first incision, your hands steady and never hesitating, the confidence of a tsunami sweeping rocks away.

Jack has to take a step back because it would be childish to argue when someone’s life is hanging by a thread. And all his doubts are crushed before his very eyes the way ribs are under the pressure of a steel retractor you are holding, the metal sinking into flesh and blood to give you access to the heart. After the nail is out — long but intact, you deal with excess fluid and with the bleeding — and you are more nimble than he is, than he’s ever seen the other doctors be.

“Well, call me impressed,” Jack says earnestly.

The silence is a little awkward — a couple of seconds before you give reply: “Thank you, Dr. Abbot.”

He wonders if maybe his compliment might’ve come as patronizing. What he knows for sure is that you do not need his help. But when he backs away, he sees a glint out of the corner of his eye — dog tags left in the pile of the man’s belongings on the floor. Jack has the same tags hanging on a chain around his neck. He almost doesn’t feel the weight of them but the memories they bring are heavy — sometimes an image flashing through his mind, sometimes a nightmare stirring him awake. And mostly it’s the latter.

But today, as his shift goes on, he isn’t thinking of torn limbs and collapsing buildings and bombings that looked like firecrackers in the night. Those weren’t the reasons he kept going back — he never once craved violence, never really cared about the money. For him, it was the roar of the adrenaline and the belief that even amidst the death and ruins, he could make a change. He hasn’t felt that for a while: the rush, the determination, the power held in your hands when you are cutting into someone’s body, fixing the organs and sewing the skin together, bringing the life back in. He lacks that spark, he misses it, he wants to get it back. To prove to himself that he still can do that — or maybe not only to himself.

So now he isn’t watching you but studying, with a diligence of a man who once had to learn how to walk again.

He starts work earlier just so he can get more patients — but also to listen in on your case reports and trail your steps, peek into trauma rooms you run in and out of. He often finds himself holding back the questions: damn, how did you do that? How come you easily catch things others take so long to figure out? You take on complicated cases: a feeble woman who can’t hold her food down, her arms marked with a red rash; a young jogger who keeps fainting, short of breath; a man whose neck hurts, the pain radiating to his chest. And you examine them and pick the clues to solve the tangle of the symptoms — it’s Celiac disease, it’s kidney failure, it’s spondylodiscitis and you know exactly how to treat it. But Jack knows all these answers too. And even if they don’t click in his mind as quickly as they do in yours, it’s still a victory: he’s not as rusty as he thought he was, he is enjoying this. He can’t believe he almost let himself forget.

When he decides to try a day shift for a change, he’s met with Dana’s worried face, her wondering out loud if he feels okay. She then proceeds to ask the same question two more times, just to make sure.

“You on day shifts may be the thing that saves Robby from a heart attack, you know,” her face softens.

“Are you saying you guys get way more action than us night owls?”

Dana grins. “What, you are already reconsidering your choices?”

“Like hell I am,” one corner of his mouth hints at a smirk.

The day is busy, and he can barely catch a break, but it isn’t a chore: he’s equally enthusiastic about a road accident that left a guy with a skull fracture, an appendectomy, a stoned teenage with a knife stuck in his thigh, a street worker with a leg broken in two places. An hour before his shift ends, they get a lacrosse team of middle schoolers, and the staff shares an exasperated sigh; but not Jack. He fixes broken noses and split eyebrows and some nasty shoulder dislocations, then goes to talk to their coach — a woman in her fifties, robust and perhaps too loud with her scolding. But her blaring voice cracks as soon as the kids are out of her sight. At some point, Jack finds himself holding her hand in reassurance, and she jokes that she’d gladly marry him if only she didn’t have a wife. She also promises that all the kids' parents will give the hospital the highest ranking. And they do.

Jack clocks out when the sky is colored orange, the shadows bleeding on the pavement, and his limbs hum but this weariness is pleasant. He is content, he’s almost joyous — the almost comes from you having a day off. He got to work with so many people, why would your presence make a difference? Jack persuades himself it’s not the reason he takes a few more mornings.

But when he comes back the next time, and you’re already there, there is this weird feeling in his ribcage — a spill of heat, a flutter of his heart. He blames it on the caffeine. You stand with your eyes glued to the chart while Princess lets out a big yawn.

“If another lacrosse team comes in today, I might actually quit,” she laments.

“Send them my way,” you say with ease, without missing a beat.

“That’s ten people,” she punctuates, incredulous. “We got lucky they were just kids. Grown-up men who slam into each other while voluntarily chasing a ball scare me.”

“I’m not easily scared,” you carefully tap on the screen, scrolling through some case report, someone’s illnesses broken into signs and terms; but you do pay attention to what she’s saying. You glance up at the nurse, your voice kind: “If you ever need help, please don’t hesitate to ask.”

And then you look over your shoulder as if you can feel him watching — and it’s the same as the first time: your gaze startles him, like would a fire eruption or a ball lightning. But Jack’s greeting stays rooted in his mouth because Mateo sprints in:

“Hey, there’s something wrong with my patient’s veins, can someone take a look?”

And you are by his side and following him out of the hall in what feels like barely a second.

“I’m so grateful for you!” Princess calls after you. Then she spots Jack too, her face expression turning smug. “Oh, hello there, boss,” and she grins like she knows a secret Jack wasn’t let in on.

Turns out, Robby showed his gratitude by taking a sick leave, the first in three years (Jack would’ve sent him home himself if he heard Robby’s muffled coughing one more time). And it left Jack with way more shifts to cover. He readily gulps coffee from his to-go mug as he skims through the list of patients. The others join him soon: Mel smiles at everyone, the ever-optimistic one, Whitaker looks like hasn’t slept in months, and Santos teases him about something Jack doesn’t care to listen to. McKay is running late. Langton walks briskly to the nurses' station, taps on the tabletop right next to Jack.

“Ready to get back in the game?”

“I’ve been in the game for more years than you can count on your fingers,” Jack gives him a cold stare.

Frank sighs, his fingers drumming on the wooden surface, although he sounds barely concerned. “Love the positive attitude. Dr Robby surely won’t be missed.”

“As if you are such a pleasure to work with,” Dana cuts in, hands on her hips. “You guys should redirect that buzzing testosterone into your work. No one is getting paid for whining.”

“Preach,” Jack huffs as he steps away.

He stops himself from immediately going to check up on you. And twenty minutes later, he is glad that he did — you walk back, unruffled as you always are, Matteo tagging after you. His patient is an old lady with thrombocytopenia she probably ignored until it got too bad: there are bruises sprinkled on her arms and legs, a splotch of dried blood under her nose from how often it’s been bleeding. You gave her a platelet transfusion but you suspect it’s cancer; you order more blood tests and bring her a blanket before she even asks for it. Her eyes well up, voice shaking with heartfelt gratitude. And Jack has to remind himself that he can’t pick any favorites, he isn’t in it for the long run; but if he was to pick, it would’ve been an easy choice. And no one lags behind today — he’s got a well-coordinated team, like gears interlocking in a clock, the harmony built out of weeks of practice. They make jokes, share work stories and snacks; but every time Jack’s eyes get back to you, he can’t catch even a ghost of a smile.

He finds that you are very hard to read. And it unnerves him, maybe just a little.

He tries for his attempts to look brief and nonchalant — a kind word here and there, a quick approving look, a dry joke — and you offer nothing in return. As thorough as you are with diagnosing, you take no part in other conversations, you rarely take breaks or stand around. By the time the noon rolls in, Jack is fighting the urge to grab you by the shoulders: hey, take a seat and have something to eat. And tell me how can I cadge a laugh out of you, just one will be enough.

Dana waves a hand before his face, the phone up to her ear. “There’s been some gang fight at the North Side. Four victims coming in, two critical — one shot in the stomach, the other has his head smashed in. Don’t think they both will make it.”

Jack’s bet is on the first guy but it’s the head injury that’s fatal — the victim is pronounced dead, face so disfigured they’ll need a DNA test. Mel looks away in shock, and Santos frowns. Your stare is blank and unimpressed. You volunteer to take the third guy with a pelvic wound — he’s rambling incoherently, the tight bandage over his hip already soaked; you press your hand to it on the way to trauma. Jack leaves the worst case to himself.

“Who’s down for an ex-lap?”

“Can I run the bowel? I’ve never done it,” Santos asks, hopeful.

“Sure. Once we open the abdomen and remove the bullet, you can have your fun,” he offers, and she runs along with joy.

Although Jack can’t imagine a procedure less joyful. Yet, he is fueled by his new-found appreciation for his job so he walks her through the steps: identify the entry wound and cut in, look for the bleeding and what the bullet might’ve hit. It missed the liver by an inch; but to confirm the damage they need to evaluate the area by hand.

Perlah peeks into the room. “Is he stable?”

“Well, unless Dr. Santos gets too excited and makes a bow out of his intestines,” her hands stop, and Jack breathes out a chuckle. “I’m just joking, keep going. I’d say, his vitals do look promising.”

“Then you can keep him down here for a bit. We have a guy with a balloon in his aorta, he’s gotta go up first.”

Jack blinks at her once, twice, the meaning of her words settling in. “Did someone do a REBOA?”

“You bet she did. And it was awesome,” the nurse then scrunches her nose. “Apart from the amount of blood. And by the way, the fourth one only has a broken rib, so no miraculous procedures needed.”

He doesn’t find it funny and he can’t find the word for it: it’s something in between confusion and offence. As soon as Santos’s done with stitches, he strides out to find you.

His turmoil momentarily recedes when he sees one of the cubicle curtains stained, the deep red lurking through. Jack pulls at the material and barges in — and then he’s silenced at the sight. The area looks horrifying: bright streaks of blood left on the floor, the anesthesia trolley, the table with the instruments that you are now collecting, a few droplets smudged over your cheek. Before he’s even angry, there is another feeling — a thought, a pull: if only he could brush that splatter off your face, a few brief seconds for one briefest touch. Of course, he doesn’t.

Jack keeps his hands behind his back. “You didn’t think you should consult with anyone first before doing a damn REBOA?”

“Why would I?” your eyes are on the tools.

“Because it’s dangerous as hell and since I am the attending—”

“I do know protocol. But I also know how fast a human can bleed out. It was a truncal hemorrhage, and you were hands deep in someone’s abdomen. Was I supposed to wait?”

He wishes you were meaner, rougher, anything that would give him an excuse to snap. But you aren’t doing this to show off — your tone is measured and your reasoning is simple: a man was dying and you knew how to save him. Jack realizes it is the same logic he often uses. And he can’t tell what is it that bothers him so much. If Whitaker pulled off something like that, Jack would’ve chosen to commend him. The same goes for Santos, Javadi or King, for any other intern or resident that he can think of... Except, they would’ve asked for his opinion or his help. You didn’t even think to.

Well, Robby warned him you’d be stubborn.

“I want to be informed about any life-altering decisions. At least give me a heads-up so I am not blindsided when a nurse gushes over it in passing,” Jack insists, head tilted slightly so he can catch your gaze.

What he really wants is for you to look at him. You grant him that one wish.

“Will do,” you tell him simply.

But your eyes are still unreadable, a book written in a foreign language, a manuscript he doesn’t know how to decrypt.

And either out of incomprehension or rejection, his brain makes an assumption: maybe you believe that you are better, maybe you think the rules weren’t made for you. You never really gave him cause for rivalry — you are in your final year of residency, and Jack is put in charge. But you are so bluntly independent and reserved, his every try to understand you feels like leaping in the dark. Later that day he can’t help but glimpse into your file — there’s hardly anything of interest: you previously trained in a small clinic, in a nice neighborhood, your letters of recommendation all consist of praises.

What adds to his moroseness is that you fit really well with literally everybody else. Langdon tones down his sarcasm, listens to you like he only does to Robby. Santos discreetly brings you cases she needs advice on, McKay and Mel enjoy your company when you get a free minute. Whitaker seems to be your favorite although Jack isn’t sure why — he deems him soft and insecure; but Dennis does a better job under your guidance. On rare occasions when he’s got a day off, Javadi always takes his place.

Jack figures out everyone’s relationships by his fourth morning shift; he hasn’t gotten any closer to figuring you out. He’s fighting the grimace at how bitter his coffee is when Javadi pops out in the hall and you follow suit. He catches scraps of your conversation: something about a teen with a gashed forehead. Javadi rambles — until you ask her nonchalantly, unprompted. “You don’t like the sight of blood?”

“What? Oh no, it’s fine! I’m totally fine,” Victoria stumbles over the words, but her denial is too meek.

From how nervous she is, Jack guesses that she’s lying. He almost wants to laugh — before a thought comes to his mind: how come he never noticed her fear of blood?

“It’s just a little disturbing sometimes... But I only passed out, like, once or twice.”

“I used to be like that. Fainted many times during blood tests,” you tell her quietly while entering some data.

Jack is so caught in disbelief, he can’t help a glance in your direction. But your sincerity doesn’t seem feigned. Javadi gapes at you.

“And how did you... what did you do to overcome it?”

“I found myself in a situation where someone needed help and there was no one else around to help him,” you shrug. And Jack discerns the subtle reticence behind your tone.

It only spurs Javadi’s interest. “Was there a lot of blood? Like, a heavy bleeding, a deep wound?”

Your fingers freeze over the tablet screen, your facial profile not betraying your true feelings. But Jack swears he can see the tension crawling down your body. You don’t give the answer right away, you weigh the words carefully before you say them.

“A drug overdose, he still had a needle in his arm and I must’ve missed it. Took barely a minute of chest compressions for the needle to fly out across the room. It was a lot of blood to me.”

Javadi’s hopefulness grows dim. “Yeah, I don’t like needles too. I tried drawing blood a few times but the process kinda makes me nauseous, and I can’t force myself to —”

“It’s different when it’s someone you care about.”

Your comment slips out involuntarily — and immediately you look like you want to take it back. But you get it together and meet her eyes, your voice carrying just the right amount of firmness.

“Listen, I’m not suggesting you should torture your family members. But you may not always have attendings by your side or someone else to take your place in case you feel like fainting. If you fall, you can hurt your head, you can hurt a patient, you can disrupt a surgery when every minute counts. I think you have a good head on your shoulders, and I don’t want to downplay your efforts. But please, figure it out. Otherwise, you won’t make for a good surgeon.”

You reassure her you won’t tell anyone her secret. Javadi manages a small smile, a hushed “thank you”. It is a sweet moment, a heart-to-heart chat you bond over; it’s also three times more words than you’ve spoken to Jack in weeks.

But he accepts your silence — as a challenge.

Jack keeps an eye on you, now critical, resisting the gravitation that’s been attracting him to you. Although it’s hard to find the reasons to be hard on you. Whenever he has questions — or more so when he can come up with some, you give detailed replies, and he’s left with nothing to complain about. Your patient satisfaction score is high, you are never facile or reckless with your judgment; with how smart you are, you can give odds to many doctors, him included. And Jack knows he is older, with years of experience under his belt — but he can’t in good faith wish for anyone to go through the same things he did to gain the same knowledge.

On his second week of day shifts he is still clueless about what to make of you. And Jack tells himself that he is simply looking for a connection — except, all his attempts look like he is trying to pick a fight.

“This is a teaching hospital. You are supposed to teach them things,” he grumbles as he meets you outside the trauma room. You got a guy who came in spitting blood — post-tonsillectomy hemorrhage, and things went south pretty quickly. He started choking, crashed, his airways flooded with liquid; you had to intubate him blindly. Whitaker spent an hour by your side, his questions endless — to which you did give answers, barely ever breaking focus, but you only allowed him to use suction.

“He’ll learn plenty if he is attentive enough,” you say, throwing away the gown, trying to put some distance in between you.

Jack doesn’t like it, he keeps pace with you. “Whitaker needs more practice, as much as he can get. He’s not supposed to stand there like some deer who wandered into the yard.”

You whirl around, so fast that Jack comes to a stop when you are separated by merely an inch. And your gaze burns, like lava seeping through the mountain’s restrain.

“And I needed the patient not to die on the table,” you bite back, then breathe in — and then add more coolly. “Dennis will get his chance to shine.”

“And when exactly is that gonna happen?”

“That’s for me to decide,” you state, like you would do a fact that can’t be questioned. “Thank you for your input, Dr. Abbot, but I have to get back to work.”

You turn your back to him and leave him standing there, and Jack almost feels helpless. And that’s the feeling he can’t stand. It simmers in him, it must be the reason his cheeks suddenly feel hot.

Dana tsks as she comes near, her brows furrowed and face visibly concerned.

“You know how I’ve been calling Robby a sad boy? I’m gonna start calling you a pissy boy.”

“Not the worst thing I’ve been called,” he dismisses, a humorless escape attempt. But her fingers grab at his elbow, and he pauses with an annoyed exhale.

“I’ve been watching you hammering away at her for days,” Dana makes sure to lower her voice. “If she was a student, I’d maybe let it slide, but she is a resident, a senior one. And nothing I am seeing suggests she isn’t doing well.”

His eyes dart to her hand; then he glares stubbornly at her. She looks unfazed.

“Jack, you will take it too far one day — and you will regret it,” Dana tries to reason. “She is a good kid and she’s really good at her job. Just let her be.”

“Thank you for your input, Evans. I’d prefer to get back to work,” he frees his arm, and she allows it. But Jack can feel her worried gaze as he walks away.

He doesn’t come home until the twilight hugs the sky, until he feels like he’ll pass out on the next step. Jack wastes hours on attempts to wear himself out: he walks the entire park three times, peeping about in case the puppy comes again. It doesn’t. He stops by the bar he hasn’t been to in a few weeks, orders a beer and sips on it, his musings soon drowned out by the blasting music. The alcohol tastes weird, and the bass guitar gives him a pounding headache. He takes a walk instead of taking a bus home, two miles on foot in hopes he falls asleep as soon as his head hits the pillow.

But the thought of you cuts into his mind as easily as a nail does into a human body, and it stays there, vexing and robbing him of whatever little peace he’s had.

He barely gets any sleep.

And his nights are dreamless.

It’s just another Friday, and these bring in a lot of drunks — from parties and family gatherings, from business meetings that ran late and tense until someone reached for whiskey. Jack stays behind for paperwork, a tedious pastime that keeps him pinned to an uncomfortable chair. He briefly takes eyes off the screen, stretching his neck — and then a noise catches his attention. It’s someone talking in a raised voice, someone who sounds too wasted to be reasoned with. Which sounds like a problem.

Jack finds the source with ease — the nurses all glance in the direction of the trauma room, and in support of their agitation Mateo all but flies out, his face hardened at the edges. Jack gets up and gets closer, his ears open and eyes watchful.

“Should we call security?” Dana asks warily.

Mateo brushes the suggestion off. “No, it’s fine,” — but it sounds like it’s not. “I just need a short break.”

“What’s wrong?” Jack interrupts.

And it isn’t a question but a demand for explanation Mateo can’t reject. He lets out a tired sigh.

“The guy got drunk and couldn’t hold his liquor, some passersby saw him sprawled out in an alley and called the ambulance. Came in with a nasty arm fracture. He’ll live though,” Mateo looks back at the room with obvious disdain. “Unfortunately.”

Jack promptly moves forward. “I will deal with it.”

“Hold on, Rambo,” Dana interjects. And she keeps her eyes on him while she talks to Mateo. “Did he get physical?”

“Nah, he’s too inebriated. Keeps trying to get up from the gurney but mostly he’s all talk.”

More can be heard from where they are standing — it’s some drunken yelling, a disarticulated chain of curse words. And then they hear something break, a dull sound of an object hitting a wall.

In a few seconds comes another one.

“I can’t just let him trash all of our equipment,” Jack gives Dana a pointed look.

She clucks her tongue at his persistence. “It’s not the equipment that I fear for.”

“Rest assured, Evans, I won’t give him another arm fracture.”

“I didn’t think you would, but now that you suggested it so easily—”

“Finally someone decided to take action instead of all this talking,” Perlah remarks, her gaze isn’t on either one of them. And Jack turns to follow it just in time to catch you running right into the room.

His heart falls. Why the hell are you even still here?

And it’s barely three heartbeats before a realization strikes: you can’t go there alone. He can’t let you.

Jack bolts to you without waiting for anyone’s permission. He comes in just in time to see you dodge the trolley the patient pushed at you — it slams into the wall and rolls over, the instruments scattering loudly across the floor. You don’t seem scared, but you are all tensed up, gaze fixed on the guy who’s screaming his lungs out.

“You won’t trick me! I won’t let you experiment on me!”

And you don’t look away once but you must’ve noticed Jack; your voice comes out low. “I think he’s having an episode. He needs benzodiazepines but I can’t get close to administer them.”

“And you should not,” Jack retorts, eyeing the guy with discontent. “You absolutely shouldn’t deal with him on your own. Not when he’s flapping around and yelling like a fucking psycho.”

“Silently watching him wreck the room didn’t seem like a good tactic either.”

In an instant Jack’s gaze is drawn to you, pulse racing as he is struggling to bite down his emotions: why would you put yourself in danger, why can’t you ever back down, why can’t he stay away? And unexpectedly you look at him, and your gaze isn’t a puzzle or a dare but an explanation: you can’t be mad at me for the thing you would’ve done yourself. I know you would have.

The room goes quiet but only for a moment — before another cry comes, and the patient lunges straight at you. Jack’s eye catches the movement, and at the very last second, he moves to stand in the guy’s way.

The drunkard crashes into him, hands swatting at the air, too uncoordinated to land a proper punch. And then all of a sudden he headbutts Jack. The pain is sharp, shooting toward his nose, but Jack manages to stay upright. He can’t see you stopping cold or the security approaching in a hurry and in worry.

Because Jack is only seeing red.

He breathes in through the mouth and grabs the man with both hands, rough and unflinching. Jack pushes him back to the gurney, then throws him on it, face flat against the pillow; his angry cries tone down to weak whimpers.

“Shut the fuck up. Stop moving,” Jack hisses into his ear.

He can taste the blood that oozed down to his lips and he can hear the sound of footsteps in the room. But he doesn’t let go.

Jack feels a hand on his shoulder — he turns to see one of the guards, Ahmad. “Man, let us handle this. C’mon, step away.”

Begrudgingly, Jack does. Ahmad quickly takes his place, he and two other guards strapping the patient down; Mateo wriggles in the middle to sedate the guy. He dozes off, a dark purple bruise already blooming on his forehead, drool at the corner of his mouth.

You are still standing at the exact same spot, but then your eyes land on Jack’s blooded nose, and you immediately fall out of the stupor. You rummage through the nearest drawer and get a few clean cloths, then call for Dana to bring an ice pack. The guards leave but Mateo hangs back; he pulls up a chair for Jack to sit on.

“Are you okay? Any headache or dizziness or—”

“I’m fine, no need to coddle me,” Jack waves off his concerns crankily. Mateo looks at you for some support.

“He needs a head CT,” you say, gaze glued to Jack. “Ask the radiology if they can squeeze him in.”

Mateo nods and takes off with no other questions asked. The silence is now laced with tension, and while Jack’s pain gradually subsides, his anger doesn’t. He’s not the one for chit-chats, and it’s not a 'thank you' that he wants — but an admission: he was right, and you were careless, and maybe this is the one time you can agree with him.

You lean over wordlessly and wipe the dried-up blood, pushing his head back to examine his nose. Your touch is light, fleeting, but his skin heats up under your hands. You take a penlight to check for septal hematoma; then your thumbs move from his cheekbones to his nostrils. Jack doesn’t wince or look away, eyes dark and boring into you, unblinking. You put a finger to his nose and move it slowly from side to side, watching closely as his gaze follows it.

And then you pull away, and something cracks in him, a line formed on the ocean floor after it’s shaken by an earthquake, a force that pushes waves to crash onto the shore. And all his feelings surge up, unstoppable like a tsunami.

You look for more cloths, and only with your back to him, you finally decide to speak:

“Doesn’t look like a fracture but—”

“Are you out of your mind?!” Jack bursts out, the stridency of his voice barely contained.

Your hands flinch at the sound. Jack misses it or maybe chooses to ignore it, too adamant in his displeasure, too wrapped up in it.

“Do you realize how dangerous it was for you to go here alone? What could’ve happened to you if security came late? Or do you just assume it’s not a big deal if you get hurt? Can you for at least a second consider the consequences of your relentlessness, can you imagine how dire they might be? And what it’s like for someone else to throw themselves between danger and you?”

But then you turn to him, and his tirade breaks off, the anger ebbing instantly as he sees your face expression.

It would be easy to assume he must’ve hit a nerve. Except, it looks way worse than that.

Your gaze is swept with pain, eyes wide and bright with tears you are holding back. An inhale quivers at your lips, chest heaving like you are scarcely managing to curb your feelings. Like there’s been a wall you’ve built meticulously over the years, and he didn’t just put a crack in it — no, he tore it down completely, drove through it with a bulldozer, only a mess of rubble left behind. And he knows that’s not something an apology will fix.

Jack feels the guilt already swirling in his chest as he sits straighter, eyes not leaving yours.

“Listen, I didn’t—”

“I heard you loud and clear, Dr. Abbot,” your voice is lacerating, a blade you’ve armed yourself with, steel that cuts him deep. “If my company displeases you so much, I will make sure to limit our interactions. Apologies for any inconvenience.”

You turn away, and when he sees you wipe your cheeks with one quick motion, Jack knows he is the only one to blame. But you don’t let him see your tears nor do you wait for him to talk again. You rush out of the doors, and the words he catches aren’t meant for him:

“Dana, please help Dr. Abbot with the ice pack.”

He hears her coming in and he’s almost ashamed to look — Dana meets his gaze with arms crossed over her chest, shaking her head in disapproval. She doesn’t say a thing and puts ice on his nose with a face that looks like she would rather punch him. Jack doesn’t even try to come up with excuses — he knows that he has none.

He fails to find you after the shift ends: you must’ve sneaked out to avoid him, and he can’t say that he’s surprised. Jack walks home in the rain, not bothering to open the umbrella, the street lights drowning in the puddles underfoot, the wind biting his wet face. He can barely feel it. And in the privacy of his apartment — a cold, half-empty space, walls void of any color — a thought that has been lurking in his mind finally takes shape:

Jack loathes being alone.

And he messed up so badly.

🎵 the title is a quote from Tom Odell’s “Can’t pretend” (the song is just so Jack-coded to me! highly recommend you give it a listen. the small part from 1:29 to 1:49 gives me heart palpitations and is very fitting for this chapter lol).

by “rivals” I meant it’s all in Jack’s head, he’s silly like that 😩 you’ll learn about the reader’s past in the next chapter!

I didn’t specify how big the age gap is exactly. google search told me you get into residency when you are in your 30s, and Abbot is def over 40. but some like to imagine the reader younger, so I didn’t want to ruin that for you.

there are definitely some medical inaccuracies (pretty sure ex-lap isn’t performed in the ER) but I am begging you to ignore that.

dividers by me & plum98.

» I plan on writing 3 parts in total (a prayer circle for my inspiration to stay with me, PLEASE). of course, there will be smut... they just have to learn how to talk to each other first. » read on AO3 » English is not my first language, so feel free to message me if you spot any major mistakes. reblogs and comments are very appreciated! tell me if you want to be tagged ♡

#the pitt #jack abbot #I’m so nervous about posting this I’m about to have a heart attack #lauraneedstochillinsteadshewrites #jack abbot x reader #jack abbot fanfiction #dr abbot x you #dr abbot x reader #dr abbot #dr jack abbot #jack abbott #shawn hatosy #the pitt fanfiction #the pitt x reader #the pitt imagine #the pitt hbo #abbotjack

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cathnospam · 2 days ago

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“One kiss won’t hurt our friendship, right Katsuki?”

You ask him that at least once a week, for the past 4 months. At this point he’s not sure if it’s a joke anymore.

“Shut up and focus!”

It all started at your graduation party, everybody was having fun and kissing each other;

Mina with Kiri

Ochaco with Deku

Jirou with Denki

Even Sero managed to find somebody to make out with in a corner. It left you and Bakugo the only ones out of your friend group kissless during all of that you both just shared glances at them and each other before heading back up to your dorms for the evening, he didn’t care much to continue the celebration and you were just feeling a little awkward seeing everybody paired up.

Later that night Bakugo came to your door to grab an aspirin from you after 1 two many drinks, “Stupid ass music is still playing I’m about to blow the fucking speaker up.”

“Here. Also, eat. You haven’t eaten since this morning so your blood sugar is probably low too.”

He glared at you with an annoyed look of confusion, “Don’t observe me.”

He says as he takes the other half of your sandwhich, eventually he just stayed in your room, making himself comfortable splayed out on your bed as you were finishing packing to leave on Monday back to your parents, and that’s when a night of comfortable silence between you both turned into you making a joke about everybody hooking up in your class except you both.

“Yeah, even Robot legs got some pussy tonight i think.”

Which led you to making a joke about you stealing a kiss from each other, I mean you figured why not, you’re hot, he might have a mean mouth, but your blonde friend was hot too, it wouldn’t mean anything, but Bakugo immediately rolled his eyes and scoffed at you. It wasn’t mean either it was more of a, “Yeah right as if.” kind of thing.

It wasn’t a direct no though.

Since then you’ve had a continuous back and fourth of asking for a kiss, which again he never ends up saying no like any of the continuous fan girls he got during 2nd year.

Once the new semester of Uni started it became a routine and honestly you never thought you’d actually wear him down.

“It wouldn’t hurt our friendship y’know…it’d be something we do once and never speak about again.”

“You’re insufferable.”

“No I’m a good kisser.”

“Yeah right.”

“Yeah too, but you wouldn’t know because you won’t just come here and let me take your kiss virginity.”

You probably took it a little too far with that, because you’ve been friends with Bakugo long enough to know he is a drama. Queen.

“Who the hell said i never kissed anybody before?! I probably have!” His voice cracked, already a sign that he was lying. He definitely never kissed anybody. You knew, he probably knew you knew, but he refused to give you the satisfaction even IF his face became flushed.

He got up from his desk to sit in front of you on the bed, uncharacteristically so he cupped your cheeks, your phone long forgotten between your legs having to be forced to look into his irritated face.

You never noticed how sharp and soft some features of his face were.

And how clear his skin was.

And how pretty his eyes were even if they’re fiery and mad, “Close your damn eyes.”

“I’m not closing shit YOU close your eyes.”

You matched his energy by cupping his cheeks, they were nearly burning to your warm touch, thumb caressing his smooth skin. The tension was so thick between you both, you swore you could hear both your heart beats quickening. His lips were grazing yours as you pulled him closer, your stomach was actually doing backflips seeing as Bakugo had the choice to push you off, curse you out and never talk to you again, but

He didn’t and you didn’t stop either until you pressed your mouth against his. You could taste the mint gum he had in his mouth when you started to move yours, Bakugo’s sweaty hands took grip of your waist, partially holding onto you and also wiping it off on your shirt.

You were surprised when he still didn’t pull away, for an inexperienced kisser he got the hang of the way your tongue was dancing to be let inside, which he finally gave you access, but completely took charge and slid his tongue into your mouth instead.

What turned into an awkward still moment of passion transitioned into a wet, sloppy make out session which him getting lost from what he’d experienced as his first moment of pleasure ever. His hands pushed you on your back firm on top of his pillows, but not disconnecting from your mewls against him.

He tasted sweet and savory, his lips were average sized and hot, but managed to consume you. This was more than a kiss this was damn near foreplay.

Both of your bodies felt so connected though. It felt right, something so foreign felt…comforting. It suckling and moaning noises until the harsh knock on Bakugo’s door broke you both out of your cloud 9.

“Shit—Who is it?” He barked at the door, hovering over your panting body, his chain dangling over your face seeing his sharp jawline clench out of irritation,

“Hey man, we are heading to get some food y’wanna come?” It was Denki and Kiri oh so unknown to the view right behind his door, that if they wanted to barge in because the door was unlocked could see their hot headed friend on top of his own friend and in between her legs.

“No I’m fine. Leave me alone.”

“Wait I’m hungry—-“

“Shut.Up.” He covered your mouth, almost growling at you for speaking, the footsteps eventually fade off and he sits back up. Looking away.

“Well I’ll be damned you are a good kisser.”

“Shut— I know I am.”

“Well. I figured, because I sure as shit didn’t know what I was doing.”

He snapped his head at you, realizing you were lying about being an experienced kisser. He didn’t know whether to feel prideful or mad, “You—“

“Well you lied too. I know you never kissed anybody. Thanks for letting me take your lip virginity though.” You giggle wiping the lips gloss you left on the corner of his lip, you weren’t sure because he had some black joggers, but you tried to not mention the somewhat obvious growing erection from between his legs that made him more embarrassed.

“If you tell anybody I’ll—“

“You’ll what…kiss me again?”

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infamous-if · 9 hours ago

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May 2025

Happy May! It's my favorite month because it's my birthday month and I'm one of those annoying people who treat their birthday like it's a national holiday (sorry)(yes im a gemini). I'm turning MC's age (26) so that's cool. I will now be auditioning for a big reality tv show pls watch out for it and vote for me.

I am CONFIDENT chatper 4 will be done in may. It's written. I just had a lot of logistical things i needed to work out. Plus I made a mistake in the earlier chapters that i didnt realize about until it came to bite me while writing this chapter (i fixed it). I have been doing a lot of moving around and even had to move my outline around—the same outline i barely rearrange—in preparation for the upcoming chapters. I've kinda been all over the place with this chapter because now things are happening. like actual things. real things. and im trying to prepare myself so im not a mess later. (ive learned from past experience). There are some things in chapter 4 that don't see a solution until later and it has me screaming. (i like instant gratification and this is the opposite of that)

But it is my favorite chapter. I'm really happy with how it turned out.

Something happens in this chapter that can go many ways which is why this chapter feels longer. Not only because of the Challenge but because of how this Challenge pans out. I think what this character and this week does will surprise some, maybe not others. But I'm excited to see the reactions of *that* anyway. heh.

I realized with every update the stats are my biggest problem and i realized it's because they don't feel like they're representing what i want them to represent. personality stats being measured in the story and will still influence flavor text so that hasn't changed but i've reworked the stat page to hone in on what truly matters in the story. for example, i made the attached/detached stat visible in the "band" part of the stat page. I've also added a Castmate/Competitor stat that ive always measured but i've renamed it and made it visible. That felt like something I didn't want to keep hidden. Stuff like that. You'll see it in the next update. All of this in preparation for the rest of the story.

This sounds like a huge change but it's not haha. I've just streamlined it so it better suits the story.

Yeah! This, like the other chapters, is a biggun. But I'm happy and proud of myself.

I've been asked again and i want to reiterate that patreon gets everything first, band tier and then fan tier and then to the public. The Seven POV should be up tomorrow.

Thanks guys! Can't wait to release Chapter 4 :)

#author update #update

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yueichihara · 3 days ago

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A date with Mephisto

Our little pretty crow was feeling down for being left behind on Sylus' birthday! So I thought about taking him out for a date.

cw: major fluff | yearning looks | Sylus x MC |

word count: 1,656 words

“I’m pretty sure there’s no need for this.”

You don’t need to turn around to know Sylus is still lingering behind you, his arms crossed and one brow arched as he shaked his head. “I am sure I need to do this.”

It had been about a week and a half since Sylus’ birthday, and Mephisto had yet to forgive you both for leaving him behind. Again. This wasn’t the first time you two went on a date alone, but it seemed to have been something he had been expecting to be allowed to tag along to. According to Sylus, he’d been pouting since that day, following instructions but refusing to get closer to you like he always did. You’d tried luring him out with snacks and shiny things, but he’d only let out a noise that resembled a snort and turned his head away.

You’d come to the conclusion that there was just one option left: a date with him. Of course, it wouldn’t be something you’d usually do with Sylus, but you needed to get his trust back. Both of you. So you’d go with this: Mephisto and you would go on a date, visit a few places, go for dinner by the beach, and Sylus would stay. Mephisto had cawed with an eager flap of his wings when you’d presented him with the idea, turning to look at Sylus with a smug glint in his eye, earning a glare from his boss.

You were currently in Sylus’ garage, looking for a bike to use as tonight's vehicle. Sylus had not been pleased with the idea, immediately refusing to stay behind and let you two go out alone. He’d only backed down when you’d teased him about Mephisto being more charming than him and taking you away. He’d laughed mockingly and closed the distance, lifting your chin with one finger as he leaned down. His voice was low, almost a whisper “Sweetie, I don’t think anyone else is ever gonna be able to satisfy your desires.” and then he’d kissed your cheek, his lips lingering more than necessary, before pulling away.

Now you turned to him and couldn’t help but snort, all that sass had suddenly turned into some kind of uneasiness, trailing behind you and still trying to dissuade you from going.

Narrowing his eyes, he walks closer “Care to share the reason for your good humour?”

Not letting him have his way, you walk away from him towards the bike that had caught your eye, acting unimpressed at his attempt to corner you. “My humour is good because I get to have a date with the most interesting character in the N109 Zone.” You take your helmet that had been hanging from your elbow and put it on as you settle yourself over the motorbike. You’d agreed to drive to the entrance of the base and get Mephisto from there. The garage’s door opens in the distance. “I am the ruler of this place and you find him more interesting?”

Smiling at him, you put your visor down and start the bike, making the engine roar to life. “It’s because you rule over this place that you’re not, mafia boss.” You don’t let him react to your teasing before driving away.

Mephisto lands on your shoulder as you take off the helmet, leaving the bike parked near the beach. There was a gathering of people in the distance, a band playing indie music was giving a free concert at the fair according to your research. It was a warm summer night, you’d worn a light dress and shorts beneath it for the ride, your make up matching the pink of your dress. It didn’t matter that it was Mephisto, you wanted to give a good impression to your date companion.

You wandered in between stalls, looking and enjoying yourself, talking to Mephisto about trivial stuff, him cawing in response every now and then. He nipped at your neck when you passed in front of one specific stall, filled with handmade jewelry and exquisite sea themed gems.

“Oh those are so pretty, Mephi!” You exclaimed, leaning closer to get a better view. “Tell me which one you want, I’ll get it for you.” Beaming with energy, he nuzzles against the side of your face before jumping on the table. “Careful!” You send an apologetic smile to the vendor.

“Oh don’t worry, I can see your buddy is eager to get something nice. Here,” He says, offering a box that was stashed away “these are the ones I save for people who have a good eye.”

Mephisto peeks into the box and uses his beak to rummage inside, looking for something that might catch his eye. You see movement from the corner of your eye a few stalls away, but when you start to turn towards it Mephisto caws at you, signaling that he’s made his mind and grabs the gem with his beak. You help him choose a matching chain before paying and heading towards the restaurant you’d made the reservation at. Wind was starting to rise this close to the sea, and you make it a point to dress better next time you came regardless of the season. You rub your arms as you curse at yourself for leaving your jacket inside the bike’s compartment.

Mephisto looks at you curiously and you smile at him, changing the topic. Announcing yourself at the door, the staff guides you to one of the outdoor tables where the view of the sea was stunning. The lights from the boats drifting in the distance contrasted with the darkness of the water, the stars shimmering in the midnight sky. Some of the other customers looked at you weirdly but you paid it no mind in favour of enjoying your company.

One of the waitresses brings over the menu, looking at Mephisto with curiosity but saying nothing about it. You’d obviously mentioned your companion for the night when making the reservation, and the staff had been kind and open about it. A sudden cold breeze makes you shiver, wondering if it would be worth it to change this beautiful scenery for a table indoors. But as soon as you see Mephisto watching the waves and the reflection of the stars in the water, as if they were pearls drifting away, you decide not to.

The smile vanishes from your lips the moment you feel a touch on your neck, your body tensing and readying for battle. Mephisto looks over and tilts his head, his eyes gleaming.

“Aaand… you’re dead, sweetie.” With an irritated sigh, your body relaxes as you turn to look at Sylus, his expression relaxed, a smirk playing at the corner of his lips. “You shouldn’t get your guard down just because you’re having fun.” He puts a jacket over your shoulders -your jacket-, before sitting before you on the empty chair.

“What are you doing here?” You ask him, but your words lack curiosity or bite, already knowing he’d been tailing you since a while ago.

He points to Mephisto with the tip of his chin “You should ask him that, he’s the one who called me over, kitten.”

Your eyes narrow on Mephisto and you playfully pinch his beak, your eyes then softening as you proceed to pat his head. “If you wanted us both to come, you should have said so, Meph.”

“Caw” He flaps his wings and motions to Sylus and you with his beak. “Caw”

You laugh looking over at Sylus, his gaze warm as he watches the two of you. Your eyes meet and you stay like that for a while before Mephisto nudges your hand.

“Caw” He says and points to your purse.

“Right! You want to give it to him now?” Reaching inside, you take out the necklace with the gem you’d bought before. “Here.” He grabs it with his beak and jumps over to Sylus. “What is it?” Sylus says, trying to sound annoyed but failing completely. “Oh. Is it for me?”

“Caw” You see as Sylus’ gaze softens surprisingly more as he takes the necklace offered from Mephisto’s beak, with a gentleness that leaves your heart aching.

“You should have seen the glint in his eye while he rummaged through the gems. He found something that goes with your aesthetic.” You lean your elbow over the table, your chin on your hand as you watch Sylus examine the gift. It is a deep red translucent gem, shaped like a natural heart. A delicate golden metal thread framed it, as if it were veins. The golden chain you’d chosen matched it perfectly.

“Thanks.” Sylus says looking at Mephisto, patting his head. “You, too.” He smiles at you and you grin at him. The sea’s icy breeze disappears as your dinner unfolds, lighthearted chat and laughs filling the space around you.

When dinner’s over, the three of you head over to the shore, few people around now that the stalls have started closing down for the night. Sylus holds your sneakers with one hand, the other firmly clasped in yours, fingers intertwined. You feel the sand between your fingers, still warm from the afternoon’s sun. Mephisto suddenly flies overhead, perching on a rock further away, giving you both space. You feel Sylus’ thumb softly stroking the back of your hand before he speaks.

“I initially refused, you know.” You look at him, knowing he’s referring to Mephisto’s invitation. He lifts your hand to his lips and gives it a kiss. As he puts it down again he looks back at you. “But he told me I shouldn’t be missing out on how beautiful your smile looked today.”

Your heart fills with warmth as you look over at Mephisto, his eyes locked on the moon. Looking back at Sylus, you say, a wide smile tugging at your lips “See? He is the most interesting character in the N109 Zone.”

#love and deepspace #lads #lads sylus #sylus #mc x sylus #qin che #sylus | qin che #sylus qin che #lnds sylus #l&ds sylus #love and deepspace sylus #sylus lads #mephisto #lads mephisto #sylus x mc #sylus love and deepspace #sylus qin

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salthusiast · 2 days ago

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Who you truly are

Viltrumite Mark x Female Reader

Summary: When the Invincible variants arrived on Earth, you never expected to get involved. It’s not like you knew Invincible personally. What you didn’t know was that you’d ended up housing one of these variants, and you didn’t know for weeks. Basically Viltrumite Mark pretends to be the Mark you know.

Word Count: 5.1k

Warnings: None! Maybe some violence, but if you watched the show, it’s basically nothing. Maybe slight ooc? In my defense this guy is pretending to be another person though.

Quick A/N: Hey, this is actually my first post on Tumblr so sorry if the formatting is weird or anything. Let me know if you guys want a part 2 :D

Life was so much simpler when you didn’t know. Who knew that in a singular month, your life would change so much? You could lie and say that you expected it to happen, but again that'd be a lie. Hell, even now you can barely believe the course of events that went down.

Sometimes you think about how many others got hurt during the war and its aftermath. You were so oblivious. You think about how he spared you like he did.

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

“Mark! Eve!” You call out, waving your hand to your friends across the hallway. Mark stops in his tracks, along with Eve.

Mark is more of your friend than Eve is, but you get along with her well. You walk purposefully to Mark, feeling like he may disappear if you take too long to get to him. It seems like he disappears all the time now.

“I haven’t seen you recently. Where have you been?” You approach him smiling.

Mark shares an indecipherable look with Eve, and chuckles awkwardly, “Around… You know, I’ve been busy with… stuff.” He says gesturing to his backpack. You raise an eyebrow seeing his backpack filled with books.

“Studying? You? My, we really haven’t talked in a while. The last time we all hung out, you bailed halfway through.” You smile teasingly, not truly mad, but more concerned than anything.

He grimaces, “I know, I know. I’m sorry. It’s just been so hectic lately.” He looks over at Eve once again, she seems to empathize with whatever Mark is going through. You can’t help but feel… insignificant.

Mark was once one of your closest friends. What happened for them to grow so close? You can’t even bring yourself to be mad, Eve seems to understand him way more than you ever could.

Perhaps at one point, you would have felt different about that truth, but Mark as your friend is more important.

“Woah!” You chuckle, “It’s okay, really. I just want to make sure you aren’t, ya know, dead.” You smile, jokingly gesturing to your neck as if it was slit. He smiles and shakes his head, “Nope! Still kicking. I’ll be around for a while.” He glances at Eve, who seems to find what he said extra funny.

You laugh, “Yeah huh... Hey, I was wondering if you’d wanna hang out with us sometime soon. You, William, me, maybe one of my friends? Serena perhaps?” You raise a finger for each person you talk about. “Eve is free to join us too of course.” You smile at her, which she returns in good nature.

Mark nods, “Yeah, I’ll make time for it. It’s been a minute since we’ve all hung out. Eve, would you wanna join?” Mark asks, turning to Eve.

“Sure. It’s been a while since we’ve all hung out as a group. I look forward to it.” She smiles at you. “I should be busy for a bit, but I’ll let you know when I’m free.”

You smile, “Great! That works for me!” You start to walk off before you stop abruptly and turn around. “You know we’re always here right?” You look at Mark and glance at Eve. He smiles back, but it looks more like a grimace.

”Of course.” Suddenly he stands up straight. “Oh shoot I gotta go.” He announces before looking at Eve silently expressing… something?

“No worries, see you guys…” They’re already speeding off to who knows where. They certainly have a mission in mind. They weren’t that rushed five minutes ago. Could whatever Mark forgot be that important?

(You didn’t know it at the time, but the reason he left was actually important. You later found out the reason on TV, even if you weren't aware it was him under the suit.)

“Hey, did you see what happened on the news?” Your friend, Serena, asks you later that day back in your apartment. She would often come over after classes to hang out.

You raise an eyebrow shaking your head, “No? Why? Anything interesting?” You sit down on the couch, leaning your head on the back as you respond.

“Somebody was trying to get Invincible’s attention earlier. He was talking for ages. Was claiming that he was the one who killed all those people in Chicago. I don’t know, he definitely has some issues he needs to sort out.” She waves a hand dismissively.

That catches your attention, “Really that happened today? How’d I miss that? Wait, he was mad that Invincible ‘killed those people,’ but he is trying to kill people to get his attention?” You ask, doing air quotes as you say “killed those people.”

“I’m not sure, it mainly just seemed like he wanted Invincible. I don’t know, I stopped questioning these villains a while ago. I only know the bare details.” She sighs.

You nod in agreement, “Fair enough.” You search for the remote and find it between the couch before turning on the TV. Perhaps this story is on the news?

“ . . . just in! The newest villain, going by the name “Powerplex” has been arrested. Invincible was there to stop him this time, but that did not come without a cost. There were two casualties during this specific attack by him, not even counting his other attacks during this week. The casualties of this attack were his wife and child, who were electrocuted to death. It appears he took them hostage to get Invincible’s attention. You will all be happy to know that he has been arrested. . .”

“That’s awful.” You frown. “Can’t believe he brought his wife and kids into it. That’s such a cruel thing to do… You think she knew what she was getting into with him?” You ask, turning toward Serena.

“I mean maybe he was just a good actor? Perhaps he was able to blend in for a while?” Your friend throws out suggestions. “She could’ve also known though. Not that it’s my business. We’ll never know, and I don’t think I want to know.” She sighs before standing up.

“It’s horrific in either scenario. Imagine living with somebody for that long and not truly knowing who they are.” Serena chuckles, but there is no humor. You both stare at the TV screen, watching as the reporter drones on about the details.

“I think I’m going to head back home.” Serena stands up, grabbing her keys and swinging them in her hand. You nod, “Okay, drive home safe… Don’t get electrocuted.” You give her a thumbs up and smile. Is it wrong to joke about events like this? Probably, but if you don’t laugh you cry so…

She gives you an unamused expression “Ha. Ha. Very funny.” She rolls her eyes good-naturedly, “I’ll see you later.” You wave as she walks out, turning your attention back to the TV.

You have no connection to Invincible or any of that “superhero” life. The idea of superheroes excites you, but after seeing what occurred in Chicago, you can’t help but feel like it’s not all it’s made out to be.

It’s not like you’d be able to help. You’d end up as a casualty, another body to clean off the field. The thought makes you shiver.

Every time you see a story like this you wonder if there is a universe where it was you that died. It’s easy to just brush these events off like nothing when you aren’t living them.

That was how most people do it nowadays. Doesn’t affect you? Not your problem. It was a frustrating way to live. You didn’t like to think about how people are dying every day due to these villains.

However, you can’t not think about them. Hearing about this whole situation with, what’s his name, Powerplex? It creates this feeling of dread, a feeling you’re unable to ease. Who is to say that you aren’t going to be the next casualty mentioned on the news?

It truly was easy for the whole world to live in that ignorance. It was easier for you to live in ignorance, then they appeared.

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

DAY ONE

Honestly, the first day wasn’t that eventful for you. It wasn’t until the late evening you even heard about it.

You didn’t live in an area that was immediately affected by the attacks, so it wasn’t as if your apartment suddenly came crashing down on you. Instead, you got a call from Serena. You raise an eyebrow before picking up the phone.

“Uh hey?” You wonder why she called you, it wasn’t like you got calls often.

”Oh my God, you’re okay.” She breathes out in relief, and now you know something is up. “Please tell me you’ve seen the news.” Her voice is filled with worry.

You stop moving, “No… You know I don’t check the news that often.” You respond. Admittedly, that's on you. You probably should keep up with the news more often.

She sighs, “Turn it on. There’s like over a dozen Invincibles out destroying major world cities.” You feel your heart drop before immediately moving to your TV and turning it on. You switch to the news.

No words are being spoken, they don’t have to. The screams of panic strike fear into your heart.

The camera shows a gigantic building in Chicago crumbling down. The cameraman focuses their lens on the figure floating above it all. Whoever it is, they’re wearing a white uniform.

The camera isn’t advanced enough to zoom in on their face, but you don’t find yourself doubting Serena’s information. Suddenly a white blur knocks the camera away, and it fades into static. You watch in horror.

“Oh shit…” You whisper to yourself, forgetting that you are still on the phone.

“It’s being recommended that we don’t exit our homes. We just pretend like nobody is home.” Serena’s words barely register, but you nod, forgetting that she can’t see your visual response.

“Okay… So we just sit here until they leave?” You ask, feeling stupid for asking the question. What else could you do? Fight them? You’d sooner kill a bear with your bare hands than somehow survive facing off one of them.

The silence between you two is loud, “Not like we have any other choice.”

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

DAY TWO

By this point, you had been living in relative darkness for a little over a day. Serena sent you a link to an article advising citizens what to do: keep the lights off, and stay away from windows. You don’t want them to know you’re there. You had occasionally gone to get some food and drinks from the kitchen, but besides that, you were pretty much locked in your room.

The small peeks you took of the outside world showed promise. Realistically, the chances of one of the variants coming to your suburban neighborhood to wreak havoc aren’t high.

You close the curtains and look away from the window. To be fair, they also aren’t zero.

After being bored and doing nothing for over a day, you were instantly aware when something changed in your environment. You felt your heart stop for a moment. It sounded like somebody entered your apartment.

You remain frozen as you try and listen for any more signs of life outside your room. Eventually, you hear something. A voice calling your name, whoever it is sounds familiar. However, that doesn’t mean you’ll come running out. You don’t respond immediately, sitting there in silence and fear, slowly inching towards the closet to hide.

On the way, you pass by your door, which was slightly cracked open. The intruder could walk in whenever they wanted. It wasn’t the most brilliant move you’ve made, but it wasn’t like you were expecting guests okay?

Your eyes widen as you take in who it is. “Mark?” You push the door open hesitantly. His attention immediately snaps to you. “What are you doing here?” You ask, exhaling slowly and calming your pounding heartbeat.

He stares at you stoically, before walking over to you, his steps are unhurried. Suddenly you realize that he left the door open behind him. You feel your heart rate spike up again.

“WHAT’S WRONG WITH YOU!?” You whisper yell as you push past him to the door. You accidentally bump your shoulder onto his while walking by, causing him to halt and falter in surprise.

”How did you get in? I thought you said you lost that emergency key I gave you.” You lock the door and turn to him again. He observes you silently.

“I found it.” He responds, tone even.

“Well yes, I kinda assumed that.” You respond dryly before feeling the anger leave your body.

“Hey…” You place your hand on his shoulder and he stiffens. “Are you okay? Did one of those variants attack you or your mom?” He finally looks you in the eye for the first time since he unexpectedly entered. His stare is piercing, it feels like he’s looking at your entire soul.

He pauses for a moment before answering, “They came through and destroyed my house.” His voice sounds detached like he’s somewhere else right now.

You feel your eyes widen and your heart drops, “Oh my God, is your Mom okay?!” You guide Mark back to your room, he seems to follow with no resistance. You sit on the floor, but he remains standing.

“She’s fine. She wasn’t there.” He responds, and you breathe a sigh of relief.

“That’s good… I mean not good that your house was destroyed, but good that she got out of there. I mean have you seen the damage that these Invincibles have done?” Mark looks at you like he’s expecting something, and you feel slightly unnerved. Maybe he’s in shock? You can’t exactly blame him. You do feel kinda awkward though. How exactly do you comfort somebody who just had their home destroyed and almost had their mom killed?

“I was watching the news when it started, there was this one I saw. I think it was Chicago he hit?” Mark freezes slightly, his eyes narrowing in on you, but you don’t notice.

“It was crazy… He didn’t look like Invincible at all. However, judging by how many of the other attackers look like Invincible, I want to say that this one was probably some weird Invincible variant in white.” Mark gives you a weird look.

“What’s wrong? Still worried? Don’t worry we should be safe here. I don’t see why an Invincible variant would attack me. I don’t even know who is under that mask. We’ll be safe here if you wanna stay until it’s over.” You feel like you’re talking too much at this point, so you stop before you embarrass yourself more than you already have.

“So I can stay.” Mark eventually speaks, getting your attention. The phrase is less of a question, and more of a statement, like he needs you to reaffirm what you already said.

You nod, “Of course, stay as long as you need.” You smile at him. Mark stares down at you before nodding and sitting right next to you on the floor.

You raise an eyebrow, “You know you can sit on my bed right? You don’t have to sit on the floor.” He looks at you and slowly nods.

“Right…” He sounds hesitant, but eventually stands up walking over to your bed. He sits down on it and looks back at you. He stares at you expectantly. You feel scrutinized under his gaze.

"Uh, is there something on my face?" You ask. He continues to stare at you before he looks away.

"You look different." Well okay then. Is that an insult or compliment?

“Uhh, I don’t exactly look much different than the last time I saw you. Maybe it’s the lack of sunlight.” You joke. He looks at you like you’re stupid. “Hey don’t give me that. Come on wanna play a game or something? I’ve been bored out of my mind here.” You stand up stretching.

“A game…” He repeats dryly. “What ‘game’ would you wanna play?” He asks.

You hold your hand out giving him the “wait” gesture. He watches as you search around your room before finally finding what you're looking for. “Here we go!” You show him your deck of Uno cards.

“Uno?” Mark responds confused. “You want to play this... ‘Uno?’” He gestures to the cards. You raise an eyebrow looking back at the cards.

”Yes…? Something wrong with that? I only have the original one if that’s what you’re upset about. Couldn’t find the Seance Dog version, I must've lost it.” You sit next to him starting to shuffle the cards.

”That’s not the problem…” Mark starts to sound unsure looking at the deck of cards. ”Do you perhaps have its original packaging?” He asks.

You blink in confusion, “No, why?” You start giving him his cards.

”I just need to see its instructions.” He looks at the cards blankly.

You sigh, “No, stacking plus twos and plus fours is not in the rules. Yes, we will play with it anyway.”

You give yourself your cards before setting the giant stack down and flipping over the first card, it’s a green four. “I’ll go first.” You place a green seven down.

Mark stares at the cards, before looking up at you. He stares at his cards for half a minute. “You gonna play a card or are we just gonna sit here?” You joke.

“Just…” He sounds frustrated, “Just give me a moment…” He looks at the cards.

After another period of silence, you eventually break it, “Dude just place down a seven or green, please. Whatever strategy you’re thinking of, it clearly isn’t working.” You chuckle.

He looks at his cards before slowly placing a green five down. “Right… I was just planning something.”

You immediately slam down a blue five. “Yeah sure, try all you want. You aren’t gonna win this time.”

He looks at you with the most serious look you’ve ever seen on his face, “I wouldn’t count on that.”

. . . . . . . . . . . . . .

“HOW?! YOU CAN’T DO THAT!” You point at the stack of cards in the middle, telling you to take 14 cards.

“The rules are the rules. Take the cards.” Mark points to the deck of cards, his lips upturned slightly.

You glare at him before smiling. That was the first time he’s "smiled" today. He’d been off all day, and if losing a game of Uno was what it took to cheer him up, it was a price to pay.

You both play a few more rounds before you get tired of losing. “Okay, you never win this much. Are you cheating?” You jokingly ask.

He scoffs, “Cheating? I don’t need to cheat to win.” He taunts holding his singular card in plain view. The words "UNO" in the back taunt you for the seventh time. The trace of a smile is gone from his face, but you can see the mirth in his eyes.

“Yeah, yeah, enjoy it while you can.” You sigh placing down your only play. You look up at him, and he stares at you for a long moment.

“You know dramatically holding out your move doesn’t make you mysterious. Just draw more cards, I know you don’t have a yellow or two.” You roll your eyes.

He looks at his card and sighs in the most contrived manner possible, a stark contrast to the serious demeanor he had when entering the apartment. “You’re right. I don’t have either…” He places his last card down, a wild.

You look at him blankly, he returns the stare with a smugness he didn’t previously have. You place your cards down before walking out into the kitchen, Mark follows you. “What are you doing?” He asks, the smug tone gone.

“I'm gonna sacrifice myself to those variants running around, that fate might be better than having a seven-time losing streak.” You respond sarcastically.

“You know what,” You point out to the window, “at least I would beat them in Uno.” You say referring to the Invincibles out destroying the world.

Mark looks at you, then at the window, then back at you, “I doubt that.”

You lean back on the counter dramatically, feigning offense, “Oh how you wound me! I think I could beat their asses in Uno! I bet at least one of them doesn’t even know how to play it!”

“I’m sure.” He replies, there seems to be amusement in his voice, but you can’t imagine why.

“Hey, I beat you in Uno all the time. Consider this your lucky day.” You grab a bag of chips. “I was going easy on you today.” You say before you begin grabbing chips out of the bag. “Want some?”

Mark looks at the bag, his face turning to a grimace, “I’ll… pass.” You shrug and continue snacking before putting the bag away.

”Suit yourself. Feel free to eat whatever I have, just don’t eat it all.” You gesture toward your pantry, his gaze following the direction you point.

You start to walk away, “Where are you going?” He asks as you pause.

”Pillows? Blankets? I need to grab some extra for myself. You can take my bed.” You look into one of your cabinets, grabbing an extra couple of pillows and a blanket.

“Is it not your bed though?” Mark asks, frowning.

”Well, yeah, but you’re my friend and my guest.” You smile walking towards your room, and he follows behind you. “I mean with everything you’ve been through recently, I’d feel bad if I forced you to the floor.” Mark remains silent.

You start to create a pile of blankets on the floor, rearranging the pillows how you like them. Mark watches silently.

“Hey, could you turn my TV on? Make sure it’s muted. As long as the lights aren’t flashing too bright on it I think we’ll be okay.” You ask Mark, he gives a hum of acknowledgment before heading back to the living room.

You finish setting up the makeshift bed before joining him. You look around making sure all the windows are closed and secure before joining him.

“Oh my God…” You whisper as you watch different clips play out on the TV. These Invincible are destroying cities. You can only stare in shock, you watch as buildings topple over, skyscrapers crumble to the ground, citizens get buried under rubble, and nearby life burns.

What you saw that Invincible in Chicago do was a fraction of the damage.

Mark doesn’t say anything, and the initial glance you took towards him when you walked in reflects that indecipherable look once again. Who knows what he’s thinking? These monsters almost killed his family.

You look over to him to see if he’s watching, his gaze looks detached and uninterested. You turn back toward the TV. “I’m sorry…” You mutter, feeling his eyes turn toward the back of your head.

“For what?” He asks, and he sounds genuinely confused. “You didn’t do it.”

You look back at him, his eyes reflecting disbelief at an apology. “No, but I’m sorry it happened to you.” You look at the screen, showing the burning buildings. It feels like you can hear their screams despite the muted volume.

He looks at you, not that you can see, as if you're a puzzle. “Why apologize for something you didn’t do? Seems pointless.” He asks.

You look at him, your eyes meeting again, “Sympathy, perhaps.”

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

DAY THREE

You open your eyes to the blinding light of your window. You blink the sleepiness away before processing that your window is OPEN.

You stand up quickly, tripping over your pillow before you reach to close the window and curtains. You look at your empty bed, perfectly made.

”Mark?” You call out. You open your door to see him in the kitchen with a mug in hand, windows all open, and lights bright as day.

You gape for a minute before walking over and closing all of them. Once you close them, you turn off the lights, you can still see, but you will admit you kind of missed lighting like that. “What are you doing?!”

Mark looks at you, raising an eyebrow.

You gesture wildly to the house around you, “Uhh I don’t wanna burst your bubble, but we are not Invincible. What are you gonna do if one of those variants attacks us? The attack on your house proves that nobody is safe.”

Mark looks at you uninterested, “Nobody will attack this place.”

”You can’t guarantee that, Mark.” You respond exasperated. “If you could, you wouldn’t be here right now.” You frown as Mark stares at you stoically.

“Look, I’m sorry. I really don’t want to take this out on you, but it’s scary out there. I don’t want to be this paranoid, trust me, but I can never be too sure what will happen.” You sigh looking at him.

“Hell I mean, one of those Invincibles could kick that door down, and we’d be toast. I mean how many even are there?” You ramble.

“Sixteen total.”

“Sixteen?! Damn.” You exhale in disbelief. “That’s sixteen different Invincibles who could essentially destroy the world. Wait, how’d you even know there are sixteen?” You ask.

Mark gestures lazily toward the TV. “Righttttt, that was a dumb question.” You sigh. Suddenly you pause that train of thought, “Wait, what happened to Eve?”

Mark takes a slow sip of his coffee, “Not sure.”

You frown in concern, “Have you had contact with anybody since they invaded?”

”Just you.” He takes another sip.

”Damn, that’s sad… Do we want to try and contact her?” You ask hesitantly. It doesn’t seem like he wants to talk about Eve.

He shrugs, “Lost my phone.”

You frown, “Oh… Do you wanna. . .” You look up at him, his eyes dead set on you. “You know what, never mind.” You make a mental note to check if you have Eve’s number later, and maybe ask what his whole attitude is about.

“Anyway, were you up long before I got up?” You ask, changing the subject.

He shakes his head, “No.” He responds.

“Okay good, I was worried I had slept in or something.” You feel your phone vibrate in your pocket. You pull it out and see that Serena sent you a new link, you’re so grateful that she keeps up with news better than you can.

”Hey it seems like the variants disappeared from the cities.” You casually mention, Mark looks up, suddenly interested.

“Where did they go?” He asks. You shrug in response, reading the rest of the article. He walks over to try and read over your shoulder.

“It seems like they all left at roughly the same time, perhaps something called them. Maybe they have a ‘Boss Invincible’ or something.” You joke.

Mark chuckles humorlessly, “You think?”

“You don’t think that?” You retort, smiling.

“No, I mean you’re probably right.” He takes a sip of his coffee. “It just sounds strange.” He continues.

You nod understanding, “Yeah, but I mean what else could bring them together? They have to have a leader of some kind. This attack seems too coordinated to just be unplanned.”

Mark sips his coffee loudly, “I guess.” It sounds like he wants to say more, but he doesn’t.

You feel your phone vibrate again. You check it and see a text from William. “Hey, William texted me! You’ll be glad to hear that he is okay.” You hear Mark hum in acknowledgment before opening the message.

It’s safe. They’re gone for good.

You look at the text message surprised. You have multiple questions.

How do you know?

Just trust me on this, I know some people who work with the government. The Invincibles are gone.

Mark notices your silence, “What is it?” He asks.

You turn towards him, “They’re gone gone. The Invincibles apparently vanished, completely. They didn’t just stop attacking the cities or get called away, they aren’t here anymore. They’re gone for good. ” This catches his attention.

“Are you serious?” He asks. His eyebrows furrow, is he mad?

”...Yeah.” You pause before confirming. “Are you okay?” You walk up to him, putting a hand on his shoulder. He immediately tenses up.

“Hey, they’re gone. They can’t do any more damage. Everything will be okay.” You try to reassure him.

He looks down before relaxing. “They’re gone.” He repeats, you nod. “All of them?” He asks quietly, you nod.

“All of them.”

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

“What do you mean they’re not all accounted for?” Cecil yells out walking down the hallway as one of the assistants follows closely.

“You mean to tell me that there is still one of those Marks out there?”

The assistant nods frantically, “We accounted for every single one that died, and the ones that were sent to that alternate dimension. There is still one here, and he’s not our Mark.”

Cecil stops walking, “Does Mark know?” He asks.

The assistant shakes their head, “No… We weren’t sure if we should tell him. I thought it was best to tell you first.”

Cecil nods in approval, “I’m glad you did… Do you know where he was last seen?”

“It was the Invincible that destroyed Chicago, he left after decimating that city. We aren’t entirely sure where he went. He could be on the other side of the globe, but we do know he hasn’t left the atmosphere.” The assistant replies.

"Good, we need to see if there’s a way to locate him. For all we know, he’s already aware that his counterparts have been banished. I can’t imagine he’d serve himself up on a silver platter for us to eliminate." Cecil starts walking towards Eve’s room, there’s a large chance Mark is still there.

“He can’t hide for long, sir. We’ll find him.” The assistant follows closely behind him.

"Like you already said, he could be halfway across the globe. We can’t leave a threat like that lying around ready to strike whenever. We need whatever leverage we can get right now. If we make it public information that he’s wanted, he might just leave the planet."

"I don’t know about you, but I don’t exactly feel safe knowing an evil version of Invincible is out there somewhere in the universe. We were unprepared for this attack, next time we’ll be ready." Cecil walks down the hall watching through the windows as more ReAnimen are being created. He continues to walk past them.

“There’s only one of him. We’ll bide our time. Keep me updated on any status updates on him. If you hear anything that sounds like Viltrumite sightings, I need to know as soon as possible. I will spare no expense, understand?”

”Yes, sir.”

#invincible #invincible fanfic #invincible x reader #mark grayson x reader #viltrumite mark x reader #mark grayson x you #mark grayson x y/n #invincible x you

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ggukivrse · 2 days ago

Text

the art of pretending – jjk | 02

summary. when you and jungkook show up to your much anticipated graduation trip and realise neither of you had the guts to tell your friends about your recent break up, there’s only one thing you can do to keep the trip from falling apart: pretend.

but somewhere between fake kisses and real feelings, you start to wonder if letting go was ever the right choice at all.

pairing: jeon jungkook x f!reader

genre/warnings: exes to lovers, fake dating, idiots to lovers, mutual pining, angst, fluff, (eventual) explicit sexual content, swearing, alcohol consumption, ft. seokjin, namjoon, hoseok, jimin, taehyung, yoongi + four female ocs

word count: 4.9k

notes: i dunno how to feel about this chapter, but at least it’s something for you guys loll. also if you can’t tell, i’m horrible with pacing so if it feels like too much of a fast burn i’m so sorry 😖 feedback, likes, comments, reblogs and asks are so so appreciated. enjoy reading my angels <3

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⤷ chapter two — broken cd

don’t think i’m over it / like i always said i was / like a broken cd / that plays on repeat

You shove the key into the door and twist hard, your shoulder still sore from hauling your overloaded backpack up the stairs. It's just one floor, but with the way the straps dug into your skin and your pride refused to let Jungkook help, it might as well have been Everest.

The door creaks open, hinges sticking slightly before giving way.

Amber light spills into the room — warm and rich, the kind of sunset that makes everything look softer than it is. The windows are massive, the glass thrown open to the breeze and the sound of waves crashing in the distance. You turn around to look out the door from the foot of your bed, and from here, you can see the ocean glowing gold under the falling sun, lazy and endless.

It smells like salt and clean sheets and something faintly citrus, probably the resort’s idea of a luxury air freshener.

And right in the middle of the room, unmissable and offensively neat, is one bed.

One.

You don’t even pretend to hide your sigh. “Great,” you mutter, dropping your backpack with a heavy thud. “A single bed. Very romantic.”

Behind you, Jungkook snorts. “What, you suddenly shy?” He brushes past, setting his duffel bag down with way less drama than you did. “I’ve literally been inside you. You’ll survive.”

You don’t laugh.

You don’t even look at him.

Instead, you stare at the bed. At the way the light hits the perfectly smooth duvet. At the two pillows, side by side. Like it was made for a couple. Like it was made for you and him.

He notices your silence, eventually.

“Too far?” he asks, voice low.

You shrug. “Just wasn’t that funny.”

He doesn't say anything for a moment, just shifts his weight and runs a hand through his hair like he’s suddenly remembered this whole thing is supposed to be an act. That you’re not really his anymore.

And maybe that’s what stings — the anymore.

You sit on the edge of the bed, bouncing once. It’s too soft. Too quiet. Too intimate.

You glance at him out of the corner of your eye. His jaw’s tight. He’s not looking at you.

There was a time you thought you’d marry him. That you were going to. You’d even gotten your nails done that week, like a fucking idiot.

You blink hard and look away before that memory can settle in your chest like it always does. Instead, you clear your throat and force yourself to speak like you’re not sitting inside the echo of what used to be.

“I’ll take the left side,” you say, voice flat.

Jungkook doesn’t even pause. “I figured.”

Of course he did. He always remembers.

You glance at the bed for a beat longer, then push yourself back up and move toward the window. The floorboards creak slightly under your steps, but the rest of the room stays still.

Outside, the sun is sinking lower, streaking the sky with deep amber and dusky pink. You fold your arms across your chest as the breeze brushes against your skin, cooling the leftover heat from the hike up the stairs.

You can hear muffled laughter from a nearby cabin — familiar voices, the clink of bottles. It’s already starting. The unwinding. The pretending. And you're still up here, wondering how the hell this is going to work.

“We should figure out how we’re doing this,” Jungkook says behind you.

You don’t look at him. “You want to map out how to play house again like it’s some group project?”

There’s a beat of silence before he responds. “I just think... if we’re doing this, we should at least figure out the basics.”

You scoff under your breath. “Basics. Right.”

As if you haven’t already been there. Like you didn’t build the foundation, the walls, the goddamn roof of your relationship from scratch with him, only to watch him walk out before it could become a home.

He shifts again, and you hear the slight squeak of the mattress as he adjusts his weight on the edge of the bed. “I know you don’t want to be doing this,” he says softly. “But no killing me in my sleep, okay?”

You finally turn to look at him. “I can’t make any promises.”

His mouth twitches, almost a smile. But not quite. “Yeah. Fair.”

You don’t say anything to that. You just watch him — how he can’t seem to hold your gaze for more than a few seconds. How his fingers keep twitching like he wants to be doing something with them.

He used to always touch you when he got like this. Knee against yours, hand slipping into your hair, thumb brushing your wrist. It’s weird seeing all that nervous energy go nowhere now.

“Look,” he says eventually, “if it helps, we don’t have to be over the top with it. Just enough to get by.”

You nod, slow and tense. “Keep it casual. Minimal.”

He hesitates, like he’s weighing something. “Right. But… you know they’ll expect us to—”

“No,” you cut in, voice sharp.

“They’ll notice if we don’t.”

“They’ll survive.”

“You’re saying Seokjin’s going to see us not kiss once this entire trip and just let that slide?”

You roll your eyes. “We’ve been together for years. Couples evolve. Maybe we’re just in our chill phase.”

That earns you another ghost of a smile. “We were never chill.”

He’s not wrong.

You were the couple everyone either envied or got annoyed by. Loud in your love. Touchy. Constantly wrapped up in each other like you didn’t know how not to be. There was never anything subtle about the way you felt for him.

You stare at the floor for a second. “I’m not kissing you.”

“Ouch," he mumbles, placing a hand over his heart.

You bite back a smile.

When Jungkook speaks again, his voice is quieter. “I just meant... if it happens, don’t freak out. That’s all.”

You narrow your eyes. “Why would it happen?”

He shrugs one shoulder, looking like he regrets bringing it up at all. “I don’t know. Habit?”

That word lands heavier than it should.

You study him for a moment. He’s not cocky. Not smirking like he used to when he’d tease you. He looks unsure, almost guilty. Like he knows he has no right to even suggest that kissing you is something that could still come naturally. Maybe it could. Maybe that’s the problem.

“Fine,” you mutter. “If it happens. And that’s a big if.”

His gaze flicks up. “Understood.”

You sit on the edge of the bed again, leaning back on your hands. Your head tilts back and your gaze reaches the ceiling. The fan above spins lazily, the blades catching a sliver of orange light every time they pass. It’s quiet enough to hear the wind outside, the occasional gust rustling the palm leaves.

“I’ll sleep on top of the covers,” Jungkook says suddenly. “Or on the floor, if that makes it less weird.”

You glance over at him. “Don’t be dramatic. I’m not actually gonna set you on fire.”

His mouth quirks. “Good to know.”

You pause. "Maybe."

Jungkook snorts under his breath, and for a second, it almost feels like nothing's changed. Like you're still in some random hotel room on a trip together, teasing and bickering until one of you caves and kisses the other just to shut them up.

But then there's a knock — two quick raps — and before either of you can answer, the door creaks open and Taehyung’s head pokes in.

He scans the room, eyes landing on the bed, then on you and Jungkook sitting a little too far apart to look like people who are supposedly in love. If he notices, he doesn’t comment.

“We're having dinner soon," Taehyung says, leaning against the doorframe. "Seokjin and Yoongi are already cooking. Told me to drag your asses down if you’re not there in ten."

You blink. “Already?”

"We only have a week. Might as well make the most of it," he replies with a shrug.

“We'll be there in a sec,” Jungkook says.

“Cool, but not too long," Taehyung warns, stepping back into the hall. "“Fuck each other later— I'm starving and I'm not waiting for you guys.”

And just like that, he’s gone again, the sound of his flip-flops slapping against the stairs as he yells something incoherent at Seokjin.

You both sit there for a second too long after Taehyung leaves.

Jungkook exhales slowly. “Well. That wasn’t weird at all.”

You glance at him. “He’s going to keep making jokes like that all week.”

“Oh, for sure.” He stands, stretches his arms overhead until his shirt rides up just enough to expose a sliver of skin, then drops them with a sigh. “We should head down before someone sends a search party.”

You don’t move right away. You watch him instead — the way he fiddles with his silver ring, the one you bought him for your two-year anniversary. He still wears it. You wish that didn’t mean anything, but your chest feels heavier every time you see it catch the light.

“Hey,” he says, noticing your stare. “You okay?”

You blink once. “Fine.” It’s a lie. You think he knows it, but he doesn’t push.

When you finally leave the room after spending twenty minutes freshening up, the house is buzzing. You can hear it before you even hit the stairs — the low hum of conversation, the clatter of dishes from the kitchen, laughter spilling through the hallways like sunlight through a cracked door.

The stairway smells like something good — grilled meat, maybe, and butter, and garlic — warm and rich and heavy enough to make your stomach twist. It’s a nice smell, a homey smell, the kind you’d associate with nights that end in full stomachs and sore cheeks from smiling too much.

You trail your fingers lightly against the wood of the banister as you go down, Jungkook a step behind you.

The main room opens up all at once when you reach the bottom — wide and airy, with big windows cracked open to let in the evening breeze. The kitchen bleeds straight into the dining area with no walls to separate them, just an island cluttered with drinks, half-unpacked groceries, and a giant speaker playing a playlist you’re pretty sure Kiara made.

The dining table is already half set, chairs scattered around it in the kind of casual, lived-in chaos that happens when twelve people try to organise themselves without a plan.

Bowls of chips, salad, and what looks like some kind of pasta are already on the table, half-covered with napkins to keep flies away. A basket of bread sits at one end, slightly squashed.

In the kitchen, Ari is perched on the counter, laughing at something Yoongi mutters as he chops a mountain of vegetables with terrifying precision. Seokjin stands at the stove, wielding a pair of tongs like a sword, flipping something in a pan with unnecessary flair.

"You two are late," Seokjin calls without turning around. "We almost started without you."

Ari shoots you a grin over her shoulder. "We figured you were busy... catching up."

You force a tight smile and Jungkook just huffs out a quiet laugh behind you, the sound brushing too close to the back of your neck.

There’s a low murmur of greetings as you and Jungkook make your way further inside — Namjoon waving a pair of tongs wildly in the air, Haeun tossing you a quick smile from where she's helping Jimin set out forks and plates.

You glance around for empty seats with a soft sigh.

There are two left. Right next to each other, tucked into the middle of the table, right between Kiara and Taehyung.

Perfect.

You feel Jungkook’s eyes meet yours, both of you registering the same inevitability. No words are exchanged — just a small, tired lift of your eyebrows and the smallest twitch of his mouth.

You move first, weaving through the scattered chairs and half-drunk glasses to get to your seat. The scrape of the chair against the hardwood floor feels unnaturally loud as you pull it out. You sit down carefully, pressing your thighs together, your palms flat against the tops of them under the table.

Jungkook slips into the chair beside you without hesitation. You can feel the heat of his body even through the space between you, the almost-touch of his arm resting on the table next to yours.

You stare straight ahead for a second — at the bowls of food, the condensation slipping down plastic cups, the crumpled paper towels that someone had already dropped on the table — and will yourself to breathe normally.

You can do this.

You have to do this.

For Seokjin and Haeun's sake. For everybody’s sake.

It isn’t long until all the food is set and everyone’s squeezed around the table, shoulder to shoulder, the energy a little loud and a little messy.

Plates are passed down, people piling food high with zero shame. Forks clatter, someone pops open another drink too close to Namjoon’s elbow, and Haeun lets out a squeal when soda almost spills across the table.

The conversations starts light — the usual catching up.

"I can’t believe you’re actually doing it," Kiara says, pointing her fork at Namjoon across the table. "Moving across the country?"

Namjoon chuckles, rubbing the back of his neck. "Yeah. Scary, right?"

Ari beams at him, reaching over to squeeze his hand briefly. "It's exciting. We’re ready."

"You’re insane," Yoongi deadpans. "But good for you."

"You’re just mad no one's trapped you yet," Seokjin says, dodging a grape Yoongi flicks at him.

You laugh, the sound almost surprising yourself with how normal it feels.

Someone brings up Hoseok, and Kiara sets her drink down with a soft clink, letting out a heavy sigh.

"His boss is a total asshole," she says, shaking her head. "Tried to tell him he couldn't take time off— even though he put in the request, like, six months ago."

There's a murmur of annoyance around the table.

Kiara rolls her eyes. "He’s still coming though. Driving down early tomorrow."

The conversation rolls on easily — Jimin complaining about the same landlord he's been cursing out ever since he moved out from the dorms on campus, Haeun sharing a horror story from her latest shift at the hospital, Taehyung and Yasmine excitedly telling everyone their plans of visiting Paris at the end of the year.

You find yourself relaxing in tiny increments, the night smoothing the edges of everything sharp inside you.

Still, every few minutes, a question sneaks your way. Directed at both you and Jungkook. Casual. Friendly. A little too curious.

"So, when’s the next trip?" Yasmine asks, her chin propped in her hand, a lazy grin on her face.

You freeze for a second — just a second — but it’s enough; enough for your brain to scramble, for your heart to lurch into your throat.

You open your mouth to answer at the exact moment Jungkook does.

"Hopefully soon—"

"Maybe end of the year—"

You both stop, the words tripping over each other in the thick summer air. A tiny beat of silence hangs between you, awkward and heavy.

Jungkook clears his throat softly. You let out a small laugh, too tight around the edges to sound natural, and tuck a piece of hair behind your ear even though it doesn’t need fixing.

"Uh— soon, hopefully," you say, forcing a smile, trying to smooth it over like it’s no big deal. Like your whole chest isn’t clenching painfully.

"Yeah," Jungkook adds, recovering fast, his voice easy. He stabs a piece of grilled chicken from his plate and pops it into his mouth like it's nothing

If anyone notices the tension simmering between you, they don’t say anything. You hope it’s because everyone’s too buzzed on good food and easy conversation, and not because they feel the awkwardness thick in the air and don’t know how to cut through it.

You’re just starting to feel relieved, letting yourself believe you might get through dinner unnoticed when Taehyung turns toward Jungkook halfway through the meal, nudging him with his shoulder. "Hey, I meant to ask you about—"

He stops mid-sentence.

His gaze flickers downward, quick, almost unnoticeable. Down to your hand resting by your plate.

You don’t catch it, too busy trying to butter a piece of bread without it crumbling to pieces in your hands, but Jungkook does, and you feel his body stiffen for half a second beside you.

Then, smoothly, he jumps in. "—about that new game drop next month. You getting it?"

Taehyung blinks, like he’s catching up to the new topic, then grins wide. "Obviously. I plan on absolutely destroying you."

"You say that every time," Jungkook shoots back, and just like that, the moment’s gone.

Buried under another wave of laughter and teasing.

You and Jungkook mostly stay quiet. You smile when you’re supposed to. You laugh when you have to.

You play your part.

And through it all, under the steady hum of old jokes and new memories being made, Jungkook’s knee shifts ever so slightly to rest against yours under the table.

You fight the urge to move away.

The beach is quiet this late, lit only by the faint glow of the moon and the scattered dots of stars overhead. The sky stretches wide and clear, not a cloud in sight, just a deep navy canvas freckled with light. The waves roll in steadily, calm and even, and the sand is cool now beneath your feet, the heat of the day finally burned off.

It had been Seokjin’s idea to head down after dinner, grabbing drinks for everyone before they could protest. Something about making the most of the night, getting “full value” out of the resort. No one argued. Within minutes, you were all slipping out of shoes and wandering down to the shore, half-full cups in hand, the buzz of dinner still clinging to the air.

Now, everyone’s scattered in loose clusters — some sitting in the sand, others walking along the edge of the water.

You hug your knees to your chest and rest your chin on top of them, eyes fixed on the tide as it pulls in and out, in and out. The repetition is comforting. Predictable. It drowns out the conversations happening around you — Taehyung trying to convince Yasmine to go in past her knees, Jimin narrating an elaborate story to Yoongi and Kiara.

Every now and then, someone laughs too loud, a bottle cap is flicked into the sand, or a sudden breeze sends someone scrambling to catch a napkin mid-air. It all blends together in the background, easy to tune out.

Jungkook is sitting a few feet to your right, legs stretched out in front of him, hands planted in the sand behind him for support. His head is tilted slightly up toward the sky like he’s trying to map constellations, or maybe just avoid looking at anything too real. He hasn’t said anything since you all got down here.

Neither have you. Not to each other, at least.

He shifts once, brushing some sand off his arm. His elbow knocks lightly into yours before he moves it away again without comment.

You don’t react.

Eventually, the group starts thinning. Namjoon stands up first, brushing sand off his jeans and helping Ari to her feet with that soft little smile he seems to save just for her. Yoongi follows soon after, muttering something about not waking up early tomorrow and Jimin follows.

The casual exits happen slowly, naturally, like everyone’s easing out of the night one moment at a time. No dramatic goodbyes, no announcements. Just people disappearing in twos and threes.

You stay put, your eyes still trained on the ocean. There’s something about the way the water moves that holds you there, like letting go of it too soon would mean snapping back into the real world — and you’re not ready for that yet. The sound of the waves fills in all the parts of your head that have been too loud lately.

You hear Jungkook shift beside you again, this time to sit up straighter. He doesn’t stand. Doesn’t move away either.

A few beats pass in silence.

Then, he speaks. Quietly.

“So…” he starts, voice careful. “How’ve you been?”

You don’t look at him. “Fine.”

“Yeah?” he says, and you can practically hear the awkward smile in his voice. “You always were a world-class oversharer.”

You glance over just enough to shoot him a look. “Do you want an essay or a lie?”

He huffs a laugh. “I’ll take a haiku.”

“Too bad. You get monosyllables.”

You hear the faint clink of his bracelet as he scratches the back of his neck. He lets the silence stretch between you, and you finally give in.

“Everything's been busy, I guess,” you say. “I’ve been prepping for a bunch of interviews and final stuff. The application season was a mess.”

“That’s good.”

You shrug. “It’s something.”

Another pause. This one hangs heavier. You know what he’s trying to do — pull you back into something like familiarity. The effort is obvious. It makes you tired.

Still, part of you — the small, irritating part that hasn’t unlearned how to read him — notices how tense his shoulders are. How he keeps his hands in the sand, fingers buried deep like he needs the grounding.

“I got offered a spot in a grad program in Berlin last month,” you say suddenly. You don’t know why, but the words tumble from your lips before you can stop them.

He doesn’t flinch.

But he does freeze — just for a second. Barely perceptible, but you feel it like a static shock between you. His eyes flick toward you, then away.

“What?” you ask, turning to him slightly. “Weird pause. What?”

He blinks like he wasn’t expecting you to press. “Nothing. Just… Berlin’s far.”

“Excellent observation.”

“Did you accept it?”

“No,” you say. You pause. “Turned it down.”

This time, he doesn’t mask it as well. There’s something in his face — not relief, not exactly, but something close enough to irritate you.

“What?” you ask again, sharper this time.

“Nothing,” he says, a bit too fast. “Just thought you’d take it. You always talked about wanting to move. To get out.”

“I still want to,” you say. “Just… not like that.”

“Like what?”

“Alone.”

He’s quiet.

You’re not sure why you said it. It wasn’t meant to sound like anything. But now it sits there between you — heavier than the air, thicker than the silence.

“I didn’t think that mattered to you anymore,” Jungkook says after a while.

Your laugh comes out short, dry. “Yeah. You gave up your right to guess what matters to me.”

And now he’s really looking at you, jaw working slightly like he wants to say something back — maybe something honest, maybe something dumb — but he doesn’t.

“Right,” he says finally, nodding once, more to himself than to you.

You exhale slowly, turning your gaze back to the water. You don’t know what kind of response you expected. Maybe an apology, maybe just silence. But that vague, self-soothing “right” somehow pisses you off more than either.

The tide rolls in and out again, steady as ever.

After a moment, you ask — voice even, deliberately uncurious — “What about you?”

He looks over. You can feel it. But you don’t meet his eyes.

“What about me?”

You tilt your head slightly. “How’s your life, Jungkook?”

There’s a pause, like he’s weighing whether or not this is a trap.

“It’s…” He drags out the word. “Fine.”

You glance at him briefly. “Wow. You’ve really evolved.”

He chuckles. “You set the tone. Thought we were keeping it short.”

You let out a quiet breath through your nose. “Just trying to get through the week, that’s all.”

“Right,” he says again. And for some reason, this one doesn’t irritate you as much.

He shifts his weight, drawing one knee up so he can rest an arm over it. “I've also been attending interviews and stuff. Still need to hear back from them.”

You nod.

“I moved,” he adds after a second. “Place near the river. Quiet.”

“You always said you hated the river.”

“I said I hated the smell.”

“Which comes from the river.”

He shrugs. “I like the quiet now.”

You hum like you don’t quite believe him.

The air’s cooled a bit, the heat of the day finally loosening its grip, and a breeze moves through just enough to lift strands of your hair. Above you, the sky is wide open — deep, dark, and dusted with stars. The kind of stars you never really see in the city.

You tilt your head back slightly, just to look at them. It’s the kind of sky that used to pull words out of you. That used to make both of you go quiet for good reasons. Stargazing had been your thing once — one of those low-effort dreams that somehow still meant everything.

It had even made it onto the bucket list you’d both scribbled out on a small piece of paper one night with a pink pen: “See the northern lights.” “Swim in a bioluminescent bay.” “Stargaze in the middle of nowhere.”

You wonder if he remembers. Part of you hopes he does. Part of you hopes he doesn’t.

You glance sideways. He’s staring at the water. The silence hangs — not awkward, just long. Heavy in a way that feels like a question waiting to be asked.

“I almost didn’t come,” he says eventually, eyes still on the water.

The words hit soft, but they land hard. You don’t say anything. Don’t even look at him. You just stay where you are, watching the water.

“I didn’t want to ruin it for everyone,” he adds after a moment, like that explains anything. Or everything.

You swallow thickly. You don’t know what to do with that — what to say to it — so you choose not to say anything at all. You push your hands into the sand beside you and stand up slowly, brushing off your shorts.

His voice follows you, barely above a whisper.

“But I figured... you’d be here.”

That stops you for half a second. Not because of what he says — those words are vague enough to mean anything — but because of who they’re coming from. You don’t turn around. You don’t give him the satisfaction of a response. You just stand there, staring at the water like it might offer you patience.

You hate how casual he says it. Like this was all some quiet inevitability. Like it wasn’t him who walked away.

Of course you’re here. You were always going to show up — for Kiara, for Taehyung, for your friends who matter to you. That part never changed. What did, was him deciding, out of nowhere, that the two of you couldn’t work anymore.

That four years together was suddenly a dead end.

So what exactly was that supposed to mean? That he knew you’d come, like he still understood you better than anyone else? Or that he was counting on it?

You feel the words gather in your throat — sharp, instinctive, just on the edge of spilling out. But you swallow them down, pressing your lips together until they stop trying.

You give the ocean one last look, then turn and walk away, mumbling a simple, "I'm going to bed."

Your footsteps are soft in the sand, but your chest is loud with everything you wish you’d said. The lights from the house glow a dull yellow in the distance.

When you step inside, the kitchen’s still half-lit — someone probably left a lamp on over the sink — but the rest of the place is still. You don’t bother turning it off. You just move through the space as quick as you can, back to the room you’re supposed to share with him for the next week.

The door clicks shut behind you, and suddenly the quiet feels heavier than the sand you tracked in.

You don’t change. Don’t brush your teeth. Don’t bother pulling back the sheets. You just lie down on top of the covers, facing the window, the sound of the waves leaking in through the small crack you left open.

You try not to think about what he meant. About why he said it. About whether he meant anything at all.

Sleep doesn’t come easily.

You lie there with your eyes closed, but your mind won’t follow. You shift, restless, each turn in the sheets only dragging up memories you wish you could leave in the past — memories you thought you'd already left in the past.

Eventually though, your body gives in. Your thoughts quiet. Your breathing steadies.

You don’t hear the door when he finally comes in.

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pedgito · 2 days ago

Text

ORBIT YOU ⋆⭒˚.⋆ CHAPTER ONE: MOON

↝ series masterlist | joel miller masterlist | full masterlist

summary — back in austin for an impromptu camping trip with your father and his best friend, you find that so much has changed, and not just in your relationship with your father, but with joel, too.

author's note — i've been missing my main dbf man and this started out as mainly smut but gained some plot. this man is exceptionally freaky and i love him

content warning — 18+ MDNI, dbf!joel, virgin!reader, age gap (20s/40s), camping trips, established dynamics, voyeurism, sexual activities in public, dry humping, inappropriate use of a sleeping bag, tent sharing, tension/angst, mutual masturbation, joel having copious inappropriate thoughts, this man loves eye contact

word count — 9.6k

It was as if speaking plainly was impossible.

“You know, the chickens have fled the roost so to speak,” Your father explains, slapping his sandwich together with an audible squelch as the mustard oozed out the side, “I ain’t dealing with your mother’s shit anymore either, there’s somethin’ for both of us to celebrate.”

“The girls moved out, just say that,” You translate, eyes rolling in tired amusement as you pick at your own sandwich and munch on the salty but mostly unflavoured chips, “ and it sounds like I’ll be intruding.”

“Couldn’t possibly, sweetheart,” He assures with a warm smile before taking a hefty bite out of the sandwich, sighing in delight.

He was laying it on thick right now.

“Don’t you ever think about how Joel is the catalyst to you and mom separating?” You ask curiously, “Or how you refused to believe me when I told you the first time?”

“I wasn’t being the best husband to your ma,” He admits, amongst other things, “I was tryin’ to make up for my own shortcomings, but with Joel—he was just wrong place, wrong time,”

“Or right time,” You counter, shrugging.

You hadn’t spoken to your mother since you left for college two years ago, making it through your entire freshman and sophomore year of school without a word and still, nothing. From one family to the next, the eventual expectancy that she would tire of the next one, but that wasn’t your business.

“I’m trying to make up for things,” He continues, ignoring your quip, “and I’m not wasting a week of nice weather inside.”

Things, you think with a flippant retort you bite your tongue over.

The countless days you had no one to rely on but yourself—but more obviously, Joel.

You watched Sarah and Ellie for months while he worked long hours, odd hours. It was like a sleepover, really. But, it lessened some of the burden knowing he had someone keeping a watchful eye on his girls and in turn, he picked up the slack where your dad had disappeared.

That was all it was—a genuine care for the well-being of one another and then when the situation between your parents grew more and more complicated, you disappeared.

He hadn’t spoken to you since you were seventeen, other than the few odd glimpses when he would catch you throwing out the trash while he was coming home from a long shift and an obvious absence of words or glances on your end.

Knock, knock, knock.

It’s so rhythmic and firm that you recognize it instantly.

“Joel,” You already knew, but your father confirms it.

You can hear the heavy step of his boots before you see him and your chest tightens, suddenly feeling claustrophobic as you pick at the flakes of bread on the napkin and listen to the quiet chatter of the two men before his voice creeps into the kitchen.

"Well, I'll be damned," he says softly. "Look who's back in town."

You force yourself to look up, meeting his weathered face and piercing eyes.

He looks older than you remember, more lines etched into his features and his hair more grey than the last time you saw him and extending toward the edges of his beard, but still unmistakably Joel.

He’s tanned from the kiss of sun, a slight sunburn to his nose from working outside as the grey fabric of his shirt stretches over his thick biceps, even thicker thighs filling out his jeans. And you realize as time drags on that you’ve never spent so much time examining so much of him, your gaze was lingering just as much as his own before your father tears the fleeting moment to shreds, clearing your throat to break the tension.

“I already packed my stuff in the car,” You tell your dad, before offering a dismissive, “Hey,” at Joel to mask how cornered you felt at the moment, avoiding his eyeline at all costs.

“Great,” He cheers, clapping his hands together once, “Joel, you ready?”

“Yeah ‘m all packed up in my truck and I’ll follow behind.”

“Oh, honey—did you wanna ride down in Joel’s truck? I know that little Nissan drives you crazy since you can’t sit still—”

“Well—he—he didn’t offer,”

He didn’t need to—you’d always been welcome. It had become a second home for a while.

“I don’t mind,” He shrugs, arms crossing over his chest as he shifts to lean against the open frame of the kitchen, “and I got the good music, no silly ass showtunes.”

Sweetening the deal, isn’t he?

Fine, since he was dangling the line so enticingly.

You’ll bite.

–

The summer heat hits you like a wall as you step outside. Joel's truck sits in the driveway, a hulking beast of metal and chrome that breathes an air of familiarity into your chest.

Late nights home from practices, missed buses on mornings when you were running late and Joel was on his way out the door for work and the many supplied meals when your parents were too busy arguing to cook dinner.

He opens the passenger door for you, and you climb in, the leather seat hot against your thighs.

Joel never forgot to be a gentleman. It was a stark difference from the empty-headed frat boys you’ve become used to, all honk and no help. You had one good date the entire year you were at college and it was with a professor in a diner out of town with the reality that you could both be spotted and reported to the dean, but he’d been careful. He cared.

But, it was once. No more.

Though, it has cemented your taste in men.

Unfortunately for Joel, he was a perfect match for you now.

You ignore the way the gesture makes your heart flutter against your ribcage.

As Joel settles into the driver's seat, you're acutely aware of his presence beside you. The cab of the truck feels smaller than it should, and you press yourself against the door, trying to put as much space between you as possible.

Wordlessly, he grabs the box of old cassettes and presses them into your lap as he starts the truck and it coughs and sputters to life, pulling slowly out of the driveway as he follows behind your dad, watching as you filter through the old tapes like you used to, picking your particular flavor of tune for the drive.

“So,” Joel beings after a long growing silence and a chunk of time on the road as your cross one leg over the other and stare quietly out the window, feeling lost on how to approach the situation as you’ve clearly grown and changed, a similar pinched expression that both his daughter’s carried when they were bothered or annoyed, all in the brow and drawn together, your fingers scratching absently where you were gripping your bicep, “how’s college been treatin’ you?”

Your last conversation had been the weekend before senior year of high school, something nonsensical and forgettable, but it was amongst your life imploding and Joel was tied up with work more often that he liked.

He had only tried to remind you that his house was home too, even if it was just for an hour or a night.

“Fine. I’m not gonna sit here and bore you to death with astrophysics so don’t ask,” You quip with a subtle smile, “If my dad can’t keep up I know you sure as hell can’t.”

“Is that an age joke?” Joel asks genuinely.

“I dunno, gramps,” You shrug, “is the moon round?”

It was rhetorical, right? Joel chuckles at how easily you fall back into your old banter.

“It’s not,” You tell him, “just so you know.”

Joel's eyebrows shoot up in surprise. "The moon's not round? Since when?"

You can't help but laugh at his bewildered expression.

"It's actually slightly egg-shaped. Technically, it's an oblate spheroid."

"Well, I'll be damned," Joel mutters, shaking his head. "Learn something new every day. Guess they're teaching you all sorts of fancy things at that college of yours."

The tension in the truck eases a bit as you fall into a comfortable silence.

You can’t ignore how his rugged features entice like no other, facial hair freshly trimmed and his hair slightly longer than what you’re used to, noticing the natural curl to his ends, beautiful hues of brown mixed in with an aged grey.

You chew at your cheek and ignore how quickly things could go sideways if he caught you staring, forcing you to suffer through a weekend of awkwardness.

You fiddle with the cassettes, finally selecting one and popping it into the ancient tape deck. The opening chords of Mary Jane’s Last Dance fill the cab, and Joel taps his fingers on the steering wheel in time with the beat. Tom Petty was a staple of late night drives with Joel and it easily transports you back to moments souring down empty roads singing your lungs out alongside a man who had become like a second father to you back then.

Though, that was clearly not the case anymore. Still vehemently aware of the strain of his neck as he looked out the rearview mirror or the way his hand stretched over his denim-clad thigh when the ache in his fingers returned from gripping the steering wheel for too long.

“You know he’s only been camping once, right?” You ask Joel, his nod almost instantly.

“S’probably why he asked me to come along, that and he loves to remind me how lonely I am.”

“Are you?” Your eyes are wide and curious when you peer over, making him do a double-take.

Get your fuckin’ mind right, Joel.

He shrugs and turns away, eyeing the road again.

“It has to be weird, not having Ellie and Sarah around, those two are—”

“Handfuls,” He finishes for you, “It’s a different feelin’, I guess. I ain’t lonely, but it feels more like…”

“No purpose?”

You’d hit the nail on the head.

“Yeah, kiddo.”

The somberness of it is a shift you don’t like, staring down at the fabric of your dress resting midway between your thighs, running your fingers along the stitched edge before you hit him with a question that has been bothering you for a long, long time.

There was no better opportunity than now, cornered.

“How did you end up in the house that night anyways?” You ask, “My dad won’t tell me shit.”

Joel knows exactly what you’re talking about.

The comeuppance of your mother.

“I was grabbin’ some parts to work on that piece of shit mower I still got,” He explains, rolling with the punches of your hard hitting questions, “Ain’t much about it, found ‘em in the kitchen and your mom had a big meltdown, she clocked me pretty good, too.”

“She thought dad set her up, didn’t she?”

“I dunno,” He shrugs, “Made me feel like shit for a while—”

“Why?” You interact before he can finish, though most of it was a blur now.

“You got real quiet—I didn’t see you much after that and I’ll be honest, thought you hated me for a good while and then some,” He explains, the song nearing its end as the truck fades to silence.

“It’s not like you were fucking my mom or something,” You respond crudely and it was a strange way to hear you speak for a brief moment before Joel realizes he’s not sitting next to a young girl anymore—you were all grown-up and sure of yourself, confident in the way you spoke to him now that the initial awkwardness had fled, “were you?”

Joel balks at your question and shakes his head in amusement.

“‘Course fuckin’ not—the lady was a whole mess of issues I wouldn’t touch with a fifty foot pole.”

It took three years for them to fully finalize the divorce.

It brought you to now. Twenty and living on your own, crippled by abandonment issues and desperate attention seeking problems that even you wouldn’t address.

And Joel was always good at giving you his undivided attention.

At least, he used to be.

You nod, a wry smile tugging at your lips. "Yeah, I figured. Just had to ask, you know?"

“She did try, long…long time ago,” Joel slips in as the campsite comes into view after a long stretch of silence, “but I very politely declined and shut my mouth about it.”

The admission makes you grimace and Joel can only chuckle.

–

“I’m sorry,” You stress for the tenth time as your father rifles through his trunk, tossing his tent to the floor but yours was blatantly absent.

You could have sworn…

“I brought my double for more room,” Joel interrupts the very awkward stand-off between you and your father, unspoken and unresolved tension that he wasn’t trying to insert himself in, “I can take that one and you both are more than welcome to—”

“No,” You respond, a sudden decisiveness to your voice, “I’ll share with you.”

“I think it’d be easier if you and your dad—”

The idea of sharing a tent with your father and his insistent snoring.

Absolutely the fuck not.

“Or I’m sleeping in the truck,” You decide.

“I’m sorry ‘bout her,” Your dad apologizes as he drops another box into the dirt.

“Oh, she’s alright,” Joel assures, “I guess I don’t mind sharin’.”

“Perfect, problem fucking solved.” You gripe before plucking your swimsuit from your bag and disappearing into the outhouse building a couple minutes down the path and Joel watches you storm off.

"She's always been headstrong," your dad mutters, more to himself than to Joel. "Gets it from her mother, I reckon."

Joel nods, unsure of how to respond.

He busies himself with setting up the tent, stealing glances down the path where you disappeared. The tension in the air is palpable, and he can't help but feel caught in the middle of something he doesn't fully understand.

As he hammers the last stake into the ground, he hears your footsteps approaching. You've changed into your swimsuit, a towel draped over your shoulder. His throat swells at the sight as easily as his cock in his jeans, sweating worse than a sinner in church even under the sticky, summer sun.

It’s just a two-piece bikini, charcoal in color and clinging to your skin, the threads of string digging into your hips where they were tied in tight bows and Joel has to force his gaze away.

Your eyes are red-rimmed from crying, but your chin is lifted defiantly.

Joel fears he may have been the reason.

That and a mix of your father.

“I’m going for a swim,” You announce, slipping off your sandals and tossing your discarded clothes on the dirt floor next to the freshly constructed tent, a wordless and dry-mouthed Joel licking desperately at his lips as he realizes you aren’t talking to him, but your father, his eyes trailing now dangerously to your backside as the fabric digs into the plumpness of your ass and makes it crease, the subtle curve of your cheeks pinching as you lean to one hip, awaiting any type of response from your father.

It’s revealing, provocative, and nothing he’s seen you in before and if he was your father—

But, he’s not.

He’s not.

All you get is a huff of acknowledgement from your father as he’s buried himself into the trunk of the car again.

It was clear that even with your mother out of the picture that things wouldn’t change. Always talking through you, never at you, never concerned with school or your interests. It felt stupid, emotional over something so feeble and otherwise meaningless to most.

You glance over your shoulder and catch Joel’s quickly averting gaze, the heavy weight of his stare crawling up your spine and lingering on your ass a few seconds, his face reddens over you catching him in the act but brushes it off as him being nosey, like watching the exchange between you and your father for too long.

Joel watches you float for an hour, tearing through a few beers in the process alongside your father before he comendeers the grill for dinner, bothering Joel for a favor as your father nods toward you in the water.

It was peaceful, too. The soft hum of birds flying north for the summer and the smell of slowly cooking meat, suddenly disturbed by water being splashed at your face and your head snapping to the side out of annoyance, peeking through one eye under the sunset.

The culprit?

A foot, eyes dragging up toward the owner.

Joel stands there, ankle-deep in the cool water, his jeans rolled up halfway to his shins. He looks sheepish, a beer bottle dangling from his fingers. "Your dad asked me to come get you. Dinner's almost ready."

You consider splashing him back but decide against it. Instead, you start wading toward the shore with a sigh, water dripping from your skin. Joel's eyes widen slightly as he takes in your form, backlit by the setting sun. He quickly averts his gaze, clearing his throat.

"Here," he says, offering you a towel he'd brought down. You try to maintain your aloof demeanor, but your body betrays you with a shiver that has nothing to do with the cool water.

"I was enjoying the peace and quiet," you reply, attempting to sound annoyed.

“We’re fishin’ tomorrow, that’ll be plenty of quiet for you,” Joel supplies, nodding toward the growing pile of food on the picnic table, “I’m not gonna pry, s’not my business.”

“I’m not asking you to,” You defend, snatching the towel with your fingertips rubbing against his palm in the process, stretching the towel over your shoulders as it pushes your breasts out, silently amused as you careful examine the way Joel’s eyes squint under the summer sun and avert.

"You're not subtle either, Joel," you tease, a smugness playing at the corners of your mouth while you try to keep a straight face.

Joel's cheeks flush a deeper shade of pink, though he tries to play it cool.

"Don't know what you're talkin' about," he mumbles, taking a long swig of his beer.

You step closer, invading his personal space. The scent of his cologne mingles with the crisp lake air. "Oh, I think you do," you whisper, “it’s alright, you know—I don’t mind.”

You were nothing like that young girl he used to know.

Joel swallows hard.

For a moment, you think he might admit that he’s noticed the differences about you; confrontational, confident, but still seeking something you couldn’t attain on your own.

Then your father's voice booms across the beach, shattering the moment.

"Food's gettin' cold! You two comin’?"

Assuredly, one of you would.

–

He’s thanking his lucky stars he picked a roomier tent, not out of benefit to you and the fact you were sleeping soundly beside him, but that he had enough room to keep a safe distance from your inability to stay still, wiggling and shifting in your sleep like a restless little weasel.

He can hear the rolling sounds of your father’s snores from the other tent as he leans up on his hand, attempting to shift the blanket back over your frame where it had slipped down before he’s carefully shoving the extra pillow he’d brought between you and him, punching the fabric into submission and molding his hand around it to shape before he feels the incidental touch of your ass against his knuckles.

Right, so much for space.

Even in the poor moonlight he can spot the shorts clinging so tightly to your skin that the side have shifted high enough up your hips that if he wanted to—and lord, he could—slip his fingers between your legs and along the fabric, assuring himself an immediate trip to the gates of hell.

Joel’s not sure where he lost his mind, whether it was the moment he spotted you back home or as you spoke to him so boldly earlier and called him out, or now, actively watching your legs separate as you rolled to your stomach and hiked your knee up slightly, shifting the blanket away again.

He's drawing the line here.

–

Though, he’s even more distracted as you’re perched on your knees in front of him the following morning, picking through the bait as you trade off between him and your father, forcing yourself to participate despite your distaste for the activity and the flashing NO SIGNAL on your phone every time you glanced at it.

You lean forward off the dock and rinse the dirt from your fingers and into the lake. Joel can't help but notice how your shirt rides up as you lean forward, exposing a sliver of skin at your lower back. His eyes trace the curve of your spine, lingering a moment too long before he forces himself to look away. Fearful that your father might catch his eyeline and see him ogling his daughter, but he pays neither of you any attention, eyes fixed on a spot out in the lake as you attempt to hand Joel another wriggling worm when the fish snaps the other off the line for the fifth time.

“Are you sure you’re putting it on there correctly?” You ask out of concern, watching him reel in the line with a frustrated grimace, glancing over at your absent-minded father once more.

“You wanna try?” He snips, quickly realizing how his voice came across and the way your shoulders sink, then he softens his tone, “Do you—wanna…”

“I don’t know how,” You admit, watching the worm wiggle in Joel’s palm.

“Your daddy never taught you?” He asks aloud, loud enough that it snags your father’s attention and he chuckles dismissively.

“Kid hates the outdoors,” You father adds insubstantially, your eyes dragging to his back as he leans forward in the creaky chair as he gets a bite, “it’s a wonder she said yes to any of this.”

It didn’t matter that he was wrong, because he was always wrong.

Joel knew how much you loved being outside, how often he would find you laying in the grass with Sarah and Ellie, staring up at the stars and pointing out the different constellations, a never-ending faucet of information that had bled into your interests at college,

“I gotcha,” Joel quips, attempting to pull your attention back to him.

You're focused intently on the task at hand, your nose scrunched up in slight disgust as you handle the slimy bait. He finds it oddly endearing, the way you're pushing through your discomfort to be part of this bonding activity that you could clearly give less of a shit about.

You were trying and your father didn’t care, but Joel noticed.

"Here," he says, reaching out to guide your hands. "If you hook it like this, it'll stay on better."

You grimace at the squelch as it slices through the worm, “Alright—I think I’m good for the day.”

Joel chuckles at your face, his hands lingering against your own despite their descent, rested gently in the palm that was settled against his knee, wholly inappropriate given the situation.

You turn your hand on his thigh, using the leverage to push yourself up and squeeze down at the same time, earning a quiet grunt and a look of pure annoyance from Joel as you smile all fresh-faced and innocent.

Your father chuckles from his chair, not bothering to turn around. "Giving up already? Figures."

You bite back a retort, reminding yourself it's not worth the argument. Your father waves dismissively, attention fixed on the water. Your eyes land on Joel again, who seems to be collecting just how detached you were from your father, but doesn’t find it the right time to play savior or make the trip any more insufferable than it was becoming.

When Joel finds you later, you’re half naked and sunbathing beside your shared tent, far enough out of view that he can’t see your father’s tent as he pushes his sunglasses up into his hair and shakes the nylon wall beside your head, your bare back on display as you make a noise of acknowledgment but don’t turn.

“We’re done,” He says plainly, squinting and averting his eyes as you raise up slightly, arm conveniently blocking the full view of your naked chest as you nod toward your swim top tangled by your feet.

Joel’s beginning to think you’re doing it on purpose.

He pulls at his jeans while he kneels, right at his thighs, picking up the fabric and passing it into your waiting hand as you finally turn on your backside, arm tucked over your chest as you slip the tied part of your top over you head, shifting the fabric over your breasts in one fluid motion before you peer up at Joel who’s decidedly avoiding all interaction suddenly.

“Catch anything good?”

“Yup,” He tells you, sounding forced.

You both move at the same time, rising to your feet but holding your hand out expectantly, Joel’s hand slipping into your own without a word, like a trained gesture.

“Ask it,” You tell him, subtly shifting the top more firmly into place as you exchange a brief look with Joel.

“I’m curious why you came - ‘cause your daddy or if it was for me, if you got some type of my plan I’m not privy to?”

“No plan,” You admit truthfully, “not for him—or you, actually. But, it’s sweet that you think I’m trying to trick you or something. I figured you knew me better.”

“I know you jus’ fine,” Joel grumbles, pulling his hand from your grip as you step away.

“Do you?” You challenge, “I mean, how well do you actually know me, Joel?”

“This ain’t the time for—“

“No, I mean—you’re obviously trying to give me the attention my dad won’t, right? It’s what you’ve always done. Is it guilt? Do you think you owe me?”

“You ain’t my kid,” He says decisively, “but I’ve known your dad a real long time, longer than you’ve been on this earth and you’re lookin’ at him like you wished he didn’t exist, I’ve seen those looks too, from my girls—“

And he notices the look appearing on your face now, that similar distaste that makes him feel helpless.

“He’s helpless, kiddo. You won’t even set that time aside to have a talk with him, all the animosity towards him about your mother, but you’re expecting his attention, seeking it out like this, from me—it ain’t right,”

“Neither is staring at me like you wanna split me over your lap,” You retort, “but you know he’s too preoccupied to notice, so you do it. And you’ll do it again, and again,”

“Watch yourself,” He warns, an authoritative warmth wrapping around his vocal cords that is the complete opposite of what he wants.

“You don’t get to play the victim here,” you fire back, the heat rising in your cheeks, not just from the sun.

The warm air around you feels suddenly suffocating, thick with unsaid words and unresolved issues, “You were there when it mattered, and now you’re acting like I’m the problem? I didn’t ask you to be that person for me, you did it yourself—”

Your accusation hangs heavy in the air between you.

Joel shifts his weight, grounding himself against the sudden intensity of your gaze. The way you stand, defiant and angry, claws at his insides.

He can feel the swell of frustration rising, a tide threatening to crash over both of you and consume you whole.

“I never said anything about you bein’ a problem,” he says quietly, but his voice carries an edge you’re not familiar with, “I was giving you what I thought was right in the moment, someone to talk to—you always did right by my girls, you’re a good kid—”

You nod at the utterance of those words, lips pulling into a tight line as you make a sound of disapproval and stare at him with a gaze that could make any man shrink with fear.

“You keep calling me a kid,” you call him out, “but, I don’t think you see it that way anymore.”

Joel doesn’t even know what to say, feeling cornered. You’ve always been able to read him so clearly, like you knew him better than he did. His heart races, nostrils flaring as he steadies his emotions and his face goes stoic, caught between the urge to defend himself and the undeniable truth that hangs in the space between you.

“Things change, alright?” Joel finally responds, his voice low but firm, waving his hand around casually between you and him, “I know you’re not a kid anymore. You’ve grown into—”

“Into what?” you cut him off, a bite to your tone that sets the tension even higher as you cross your arms, shifting on your hip as you step closer, eyebrows raised expectantly.

You feel it bubbling up inside you, a mix of anger and pent-up frustration that has been simmering for too long, laced with a dangerous edge of desire now that you had him so close, that things had undeniably changed.

“I think we both know my dad is just going through the motions, doing the absolute bare minimum. He’d be much happier with a son, but he got me—a spitting image of my fucking mother. He cares enough to keep me around, but he’s never been someone to give a shit about anything I have going on in my life, now or before,”

It spills out without trying, unexpectedly choked up as you utter the last few words.

You wouldn’t cry in front of Joel, you refused.

You sniff once, hard, and quickly blink away the burn of tears.

The silence stretches uncomfortably.

Joel runs a hand over his face, fingers threading through his hair in frustration. It wasn’t supposed to go like this. You were supposed to just enjoy the weekend together, catch up, and with some hope, go your separate ways on a positive note.

Instead, he was clueless.

He steps back, forcing distance between you, though it feels more like a pit. “I don’t know what you want from me,” he admits finally, his voice low and rough, “You’ve grown up, sure. But I still see that girl who used to come to me in the middle of the night sobbin’—

“Stop it,” you snap, your chin lifting defiantly. “Stop doing that—”

The silence lingered again, but it was tangible.

“I don’t need a lecture right now,” you continue, biting back as your blood rushes hot at the way his words twist in your gut to remind you of all the indecipherable emotions of your past, your heart pounding against your ribcage wildly. “Not from you.”

“Whattya lookin’ for then?” Joel challenges, the words undoing you completely, “Because you’ve toeing a line, real fuckin’ thin—”

He feels your hands first, curling around his neck.

His own hands are set at his hips, blinking once, twice, watching the way your eyes linger on his lips before you make the decision in your mind and push forward, pressing your lips against his own without thinking.

His mouth is soft but firm against yours, and more importantly, moving.

A hesitant exploration that quickly deepens as you angle your head to fit him better.

He releases a soft grunt at the force of the kiss, trading the angle of your head swiftly, lips parting briefly before you’re consuming him once more, your eagerness shifting you further behind the tent, into the large stump that your bags were resting against.

“I want you to fuck me,” you tell him boldly, breathless against his mouth, “Right—right here,”

It was like a bucket of ice water over him, ripping away with the sound of your voice.

He’d forgotten where he was, who he was, who you were—he’d slipped, misjudged, and completely underestimated you.

“I’m not,” He replies disjointed, his mind elsewhere, “we’re not doin’ this—”

Joel doesn’t give you time to argue, hand clasping over his mouth with a deep regret as he squeezed at his cheeks with his fingers, a self-inflicting pain to drag him back to reality, hands throwing back over his head as they ran through his hair.

He’s gone before you can speak, trailing away from the camp with an unknown end in sight.

–

When your dad asks where Joel was, you shrug.

You didn’t have a clue, it was the truth.

Eventually, he does return, but he won’t look at you.

You peel apart the peach in your hand quietly, face scrunching as the juices spray upwards and Joel takes the beer your father offers in silence, sitting in the only space of the picnic table that was open, across from you.

The two men carry on a meaningless conversation that you tune out, focusing on the fruit in your hand, aware of his eyes that lingered when you weren’t focused on them.

You can feel his gaze on you, watching the way your tongue catches the sticky sweetness that spreads down your palm, chewing quietly at the fruit.

The juice dribbles down your chin, your eyes dart toward him over the table, purely accidental.

Joel is trying to focus on your father, but his muscles are tense and neither of you ignore that force of the string that had you two bound together, though clearly at odds.

Your tongue dips out of your mouth to clean your face, hearing the conversation continue but focused on him, the clear strain in his throat as he swallows and brings his beer to his mouth.

“I’m gonna shower,” you speak suddenly, abrasively, as you toss the discarded fruit aside, not to any particular man, rather a blatant announcement that you were leaving.

When you’re gone, your father speaks, “She’s just like her mother,” he says candidly to Joel, your words ringing in his ears, “I’m sorry if she’s bein’ rude to you,”

“She’s always been a good kid,” Joel responds dismissively, eyes trailing toward your fading figure, “ain’t nothing I can’t handle or haven’t before,”

Your father nods like he knows, but even Joel sees right through it.

When you returned the fire at camp was already out, lights dimmed to nothing, and Joel’s tent door hung open enough that you could slip through quietly, like he’d prepared it that way.

You were halfway convinced sleeping in his truck was a better alternative.

The faint outline of Joel’s form is silhouetted against the small sliver of moonlight sneaking through the fabric—he wasn’t lying down just yet, rather resting, his foot planted into the ground while the other lay stretched out, his eyes only briefly acknowledging you as you step inside the tent.

“Jeez, you’re worse than the boys at school,” you complain, adjusting your shorts as you kneel your sleeping bag and Joel notices the distinct lack of fabric underneath, the material scrunching high up on your hip as you turn away from him on your stomach, annoyed, “you kissed me back, you know? I didn’t imagine that.”

“It’s inappropriate,” Joel says and you snort at his decision to take the moral high road over the situation, wiping your head to look at him suddenly, “should be worryin’ about boys your own age.”

“I do,” you retort, “they suck.”

“You’ve barely lived,” Joel retorts, “dated what—a couple of ‘em? You’ve always been careful, I dunno why you’re bein’ so reckless all the sudden, specially with your dad around and thinkin’ that I was—”

“Was what?” You inquire, pushing up suddenly to your knees, resting back on your calves

“Was gonna fuck you right here,” Joel cuts you off, his voice low and tight, eyes averting outside.

You don’t back down, your chin lifting defiantly. “I think you’re too pussy anyways.”

His gaze narrows on you, the suppressed desire in his eyes flickering like a flame. “You don’t know what I’d do,” he shoots back, his voice gravelly with restraint, “fix your fuckin’ tone.”

“You know, there was this guy,” you begin with a fond smile, but your eyes are speaking something different, “it was dangerous and stupid, but he was honest about how he was feeling.”

Joel speaks your name, stresses it, but you ignore him.

“He was my professor, actually,” You giggle softly, “and we both knew it was a terrible idea, but fuck—I just couldn’t say no and well, niether could he—he took me out, he treated me right,”

“What are you tryin’ to prove?” Joel asks suddenly.

“He didn’t fuck me, though—no one has,” you admit, “but I know what I want and who deserves me, it, and,” you scoff, “god, you can’t even look at me now,”

“That ain’t what this is,” Joel argues, staring you down with a challenge.

You scoff again, ducking your head to hide a smirk.

“Then what is it, Joel? Was that you bein’ there for me?” You tease the thickness of his southern drawl and pout for good measure.

His silence is enough of an answer and you shake your head in amusement, finally giving up.

You move with urgency, rolling up your sleeping bag out of frustration to flee toward his truck, snatching the keys at his side before he can grab them, but in your effort to run, his hand wraps around your ankle, the lantern at his side flicking on with the use of his other hand.

“Now, hold on,” Joel demands, releasing your ankle to wrap around the string of the sleeping bag holding the fabric where it was rolled together and tugs you back inside, zipping the tent closed in the process.

“Make it good,” you argue and he growls softly, the tone gruff and demanding.

Your heart races at the authority in his grip, the way he moves you so close there's barely any space left between your bodies. There’s a taste of fear, mixed with excitement, only our tongue.

Joel’s gaze darkens, his expression shifting as he studies you, “I’m not fuckin’ you—m’not,”

“I thought we already established that,” you reply monotone and bored, tugging back against the sleeping bag, “so, we’re done here?”

“You forget those on purpose?” Joel asks suddenly, unsure what he was referring to until his hand is guiding between your legs and beyond, to the clean pile of what used to be the clothes you were currently wearing, a distinct article left behind.

He’s got the fabric bunched in his grip, an opaque white cotton with faded blue flowers sprinkled in a distinct pattern.

“Is this how you want to play?” he asks, your gaze slowly dropping to the panties held between his fingers, presented to you like a prize, “Because I guarantee you can’t handle whatever you’re askin’ for, kiddo,”

Your lips part like you want to answer, but you can’t.

Joel seems beyond his resolve now, for the time being, at least.

He’s annoyed, irritated, mad, even.

It was a situation that desperately needed to be rectified, but instead, he gives in.

“Take your shorts off,” he leaves no room for argument, not that you would.

You nod hastily and comply as he pulls the sleeping bag from your grip briefly as you slid the nylon fabric down your hips, his eyes clearly avoidant as they focus on your face, the stuttering breath you release as you slid the fabric down your leg and off, feeling them pulled from your hands as he shoves the sleeping back back, but further, between your thighs.

“You’re all talk, sweetheart,”

He uses the endearment in a pointed manner, never demeaning until now.

“I’ll prove you wrong,” you argue back, meeting his eyes with a hunger you had no idea you could feel for another person until now.

“Use it,” Joel responds casually, “get off on it,”

It was the equivalent to a pillow, embarrassing that he was stripping you down to such a vulnerable state, arms balanced on his knees now with a look so fierce in his eyes that you had no choice but to listen, slowly rocking your hips against the rolled fabric as your hands fumbled to meet the floor in front of you, forcing you far enough forward that you’re only a handful of inches from Joel’s face.

Joel's gaze sharpens, eyes darkened with something primal that sends shivers down your spine. As you begin to rock against the sleeping bag, a wave of heat washes over you, bordering embarrassment, but there’s something lingering behind his eyes, empowering you.

“Just like that,” he murmurs, eyebrow twitching slightly, easily missed if you weren’t so close to his face, but your lips part and he can feel your shaky breath against his face, his voice wrapping around you like a serpent, “don’t even need me touchin’ you, do you? Is it that easy?”

Your teeth sink into your bottom lip, struggling to maintain eye contact as the fabric rolls against you, the pressure building in delicious waves, hips canting in desperation. You let out a soft whimper, feeling the way your body responds instinctively to the friction, each movement like a shock to your core.

“I think you can do better,” Joel offers, “that right?”

You nod eagerly, bound by his words, you shift your weight more firmly against the fabric until it feels different, stronger, more enticing. Your breath hitches at the sudden friction, the pressure heavy against your clit as you drag your hips back and forth hurriedly.

Joel’s gaze seems to wander then, from your face to the shake of your breasts under your shirt, to your bare hips and down to your thighs where they hugged the fabric, the smallest peek of your bare ass as your head finally falls, moaning softly with how fucking good it feels to get yourself off in front of him, even it was equally humiliating.

With the slightest bit of courage, your hand wanders forward in his obvious distraction.

It wasn’t hard to believe that he was enjoying this, but the physical reaction beneath the denim of his jeans is still surprising, your hand curling over the tent of denim, his cock hot and heavy underneath your palm.

His eyes snap to your face and your react immediately, half-expecting him to shove your hand away and snap himself back to reality, but he doesn’t.

“Can I see it?” you ask with a raw innocence, pure curiosity.

“This ain’t ‘bout me,” it was an excuse, but you weren’t buying it.

When you curl your fingers tighter around the bulge in his jeans—it’s a risk.

The way his breath hitches almost makes you chuckle with delight, “What’s wrong? Are you scared of me?” you tease him.

You moan again, softer, but through a laugh, head tilting to the side as your other hand presses against your thigh, angling your body so Joel can get a clear view of the way your cunt hugs the sleeping bag, slick smearing against the water-proof fabric, the feeling it creates in him is animalistic.

“Ain’t never been scared of you,” Joel admits, but the flicker of hesitation in his face tells a different story, still, he gives in. Again.

He’s leisurely about it, too.

He shifts, resting back on his palm as he makes slow work of his jeans, unbuttoning and unzipping as he watches your trading gaze, eyes fluttering shut occasionally.

When you catch the first glimpse of him, it was through his underwear, fabric straining against the thickness—it was the only part of the process Joel didn’t waste time with, pulling the fabric down far enough that he can scoop his balls up in his grip, every part of him larger than the next.

“Fuck,” you exhale, your hips stilling momentarily as you stare before resuming the frantic pace, “You’re so—”

“Big?” he finishes, with a cocky smirk that makes you roll your eyes—you’ve heard it countless times before, always feigning the truth for the benefit of the other, but with Joel, you couldn’t even lie.

You nod openly, tongue wetting your bottom lip as your eyes pull to his hand as it grips his cock.

His grip on his dick tightens, tugging at the base as you pick up the pace, your hips rocking faster against the fabric that turns slick with your arousal.

“This what you want?” Joel growls, voice much deeper than before and thick with arousal, “Can’t help but wanna be watched, huh?”

You nod again, frantically, staring between the way his dick swells and how he spreads his legs, tugging his cock firmly, eyes locked on the urgency of your movement and the devastating look on your face.

“Fuck!” you gasp quietly, aware that you two were never quite alone, back arching as you feel the muscles in your core clench around nothing, eyes closing as your orgasm washes over, gasping at the sudden loss of friction where Joel has seemingly pulled it away, cock tucked back in his jeans but still unfastened.

“What—what was that for?” you ask, panting.

“For thinkin’ you know everything,” he replies calmly, he tosses the sleeping bag aside, the fabric unrolling with the force and you try desperately to ignore how easily he had encourage you to deface yourself in front of him, “get some damn sleep,”

You dress quietly, watching as he relaxed on his back, blindly reaching over his head to dim the light inside the tent before tossing you your blanket it had strewn across the length of the tent, ignoring the way his hands follow up to cover your thighs with soft fabric, a similar gesture he had done before in your sleep but unbeknownst to you, almost like a reflex.

“You’re too fuckin’ reckless,” He tells you eventually, the quiet having lingered, “that shit you told me, coulda got you kicked out of college, what’s it all for?”

“I don’t know,” you answer honestly, tucking your pillow up under your head as you turn to him, ignoring the lingering ache between your legs and how Joel absentmindedly palmed his cock, visible even within the darkness, the soft rustle of fabric, “he was nice—seemed it, anyways.”

“Lotta kindness don’t come without a price,” Joel tells you, “you ever end up makin’ a decision like that again, you call me first—then I can talk some damn sense into you seein’ as I’m the only fuckin’ person you’ll listen to,”

Joel huffs out a bitter laugh, quieter than his words.

“Don’t know why,” He mutters, barely above a whisper.

“I can help,” you tell him, turning his head to look at you and where your eyes lingered, watching his hand shuffle underneath the blanket and up, flattening against his chest, “seems fair since—”

“No—no, kiddo,” He shakes his head, “you don’t owe me shit,”

He was wrong, astronomically.

But, you couldn't find the energy to argue.

–

You spent the next couple days switching between sunbathing, occasional dips into the lake, and tagging along for fishing trips that are some of the least exciting ways you’ve spent your life, but you were stuck here regardless of how much you wanted to flee now.

You’ve barely spoken to Joel or your father, though Joel can’t help but look over his shoulder every thirty seconds, just to make sure you aren’t going to disappear.

It feels like a collosal fuck-up, trying to prove yourself to Joel.

He’s never seen you as anything more than a surrogate daughter, whining about situations out of your control, and seeking approval from him in a way that could never be answered.

There had always been that underlying attraction, an innocent school yard crush—Joel was attractive, devastatingly so, but you had made the mistake of acting on a dream, a desire that should have remained just that—not…whatever your situation with him had turned into.

Your father was already several feet ahead on your nightwalk back from fishing on the dock, cooler in your grip as Joel walked ahead but stayed near, fishing poles locked in his grip.

Your silence unsettles him, knowing he had crossed a line himself, too.

Joel was never good with emotion or feeling, repressing everything for the benefit of everyone around him, but he would be lying if said he didn’t feel the same thing you had.

It was fleeting, a spark, but it was strong.

It lingered.

“We’ll pack everything up to head out earlier,” Joel says suddenly, grabbing your attention as you look up, calling out to your father, “go on ahead,”

Your father waves in response over his shoulder as he disappears into his tent and you walk straight past Joel, tossing the cooler into the dirt carelessly, annoyed that Joel had signed you up for something you didn’t really care to do when all you wanted to do was curl up in your sleeping bag and count the hours until you would be out of here.

Joel packs most of the truck and car up on his own, watching as you tuck away your own belongings in silence and eventually, he can’t handle it anymore.

He tugs you away without a word, a small noise of protest that he ignores until you’re a decent distance from the campsite, the back of your thighs hitting the empty picnic table, the area dead silent and empty and Joel’s gaze is the only thing you have to focus on.

“I don’t need another lecture,” you interrupt him before he can speak, but Joel smirks slightly, shaking his head.

Suddenly, he’s in your space, hands curling around the back of your thighs until you’re scooting back against the surface of the table, crowding in by his broad shoulders, eyes widening at his forwardness but not adverse to it.

Silently, he pulls at his belt, the metal clanging together deafeningly before his hands press down against the table on either side of you, nodding pointedly.

You can’t help but stare at the nonchalant twitch of his lips, leaning back slightly at his proximity as your heart hammers wildly against your ribs, fingers wrapped tightly around the edge of the table.

“What’s the catch?” you ask cautiously, though your tension eases with his laugh.

“It’s all you,” he explains, “you’re off-limits, kiddo,”

You pause at his words, brow furrowing.

“But, if you want it that bad, you can have it,” Joel explains.

You stare him down for a moment, attempting to read his expression, but you can’t.

“I’m not touchin’ you,” he elaborates further, “ain’t because I don’t want—I fuckin’....it’s just how it is, alright?”

You tilt your head, looking at him for a long, lingering moment before your hands drift toward his face, feeling how easy he melts into your touch, even if he tries to ignore it.

“I guess that is the only way to keep you from feeling guilty about fucking around with me,” you tell him plainly, “you can face my dad after watching me the other night, but touching me is where you draw the line? Okay,” there’s a tone of finality with it, like he was about to be checkmated.

You work open the button on his jeans, feeling his stomach flex against the brush of your knuckles, wasting little time as you unzip his jeans and quickly fit your hand under the waistband of his boxers, welcomed by the soft, velvety warmth of his cock, hardening instantly under your touch.

He exhales at your touch, using your other hand to pull his clothing down enough that it doesn’t hinder your actions, his fingers curling around the wood at either side of you until it creaks.

“Yup,” he relents, taking a shaky breath as your grip becomes firmer around him, tugging his cock at a devastatingly slow place, “fuck—you always were a quick learner,” he couldn’t help but add, followed by your soft laughter.

You stroke him from base to tip, your thumb rubbing over the bit of precum that had collected at the slit, watching the way his muscles tense in his neck, knowing there was plenty of time to admire his cock but right now, you were focused on him.

Joel had never been one to rush things, so you took your time with him.

His eyes never leave yours, either.

It was an intimate dance, a silent battle.

He swallows hard, glancing briefly at the distant tents before he leans in closer, his breath hot against your skin but not touching. Never touching.

You can feel the pulse of his cock as he grows closer, your opposite hands rolling his balls gently under your touch, his pathetic moan disguised by a poor attempt at a grunt.

“Don’t look over there,” you tell him, “look at me,”

Joel listens, surprisingly.

“Ain’t no way you’ve never—”

“Had sex?” you inquire, “Oh, I swear. Completely un-deflowered, I promise.”

“Shut the fuck up,” he swears, an empty threat that makes you giggle.

His lips are parted, close enough to your own that you feel the faint tickle of touch every so often, but completely of your own doing, although the rock of his hips into your tight fist are all him.

You can see the battle waging within him, his resolve waning with every glide of your hand against his cock, the heat radiating off him making you ache for him.

“Relax,” you whisper, your voice like honey as you lean in a fraction closer, teasingly brushing your lips against his. “Just let it happen.”

His eyes darken, a mix of lust and longing that only spurs you on.

You tighten your grip, stroking him slowly, relishing the way his brows knit together in pleasure while he fights to maintain control.

“Oh, you’re right there,” you tease playfully, voice soft, “you gonna come?”

Joel clears his throat and nods jerkily, “Ye—fuck, yeah.”

“Yeah,” you twist your wrist in a way that steals the air from his chest, “you gonna come for me, Joel?”

He nods, eyes set on your own, almost pleading.

You’d never seen him so vulnerable, yet there he was—caught in a moment of pure need.

When he does, it happens over a strung out “Fuuuuuuck,” that tumbles from his lips as he spills over your fist, grinning triumphantly at the way he falls apart without fear, his hips jerking forward into your hand.

Without thinking, you bring your hand to your mouth, licking around the mess he had left.

“Jesus, sweetheart,” he groans, tucking his flagging erection back into his jeans with a modicum of guilt at how greedily you lick up every last drop, “ain’t a damn thing innocent about you, is there?”

“Yeah, I’m sure there is…maybe,” you answer honestly, “you know—just because I haven’t had sex doesn’t mean I’m inexperienced, jus’....means I’m waiting for the right time…right person,”

Your words linger and Joel looks away in an instant, checking out toward the tents as he fastens his jeans, watching you wipe your damn hand against your own jeans.

“Fix your face,” you warn him, smile full of amusement, “you look like you just blew your load.”

“I did,” he retorts, “jesus—you never stopped being a little shit, did ‘ya?”

No, you hadn’t. And Joel knows it.

–

No one has to convince or coerce you into Joel’s truck the following morning.

Joel huffs out a chuckle of disbelief when he finds you more than chipper and bright-eyed about the fact you were finally leaving—he had already pre-negotiated about dropping you off back at college before bringing back your father’s supplies, since you had left your car back at your dorms and Joel wasn’t willing to let you cab ride there or force you to endure the ride back with your father, he was your only option.

You really didn’t mind. Not anymore.

“Seatbelt,” he orders, snapping his fingers as you continue to stare, arm resting against the top of the seat as you hold out your hand expectantly while he pulls onto the main road, “go on.”

“Phone,” you order in the same snapping tone, “you said I should call you if I feel like makin’ anymore stupid decision,”

He’d hoped you just…wouldn’t.

Joel sighs, taking one hand off the wheel to fish into his pocket for his phone before handing it over.

There’s a picture of him with Sarah and Ellie on his lockscreen, both girls squished into frame below him, his hand on either side of their heads as if forcing them together, their laughter clear and loud through the photo.

Joel notices you looking, the memory of it making him smile.

“They miss you,” he tells you, “should come down and visit ‘em during your next break, when they’re in town—your daddy told me you don’t come down for stuff like that but…you know Tommy and I don’t mind,”

“Tommy still lives with you?”

“Loosely,” Joel offers, “he’s in and out—works for me, he helps pay for shit so I’m not complaining.”

You hum in response as you watch him blindly put in his passcode, six zeros in rapid succession. Somehow, you’re not surprised. You input your number quietly and call your phone, doing the same with your own phone before handing it back to him.

“Don’t abuse it,” Joel warns you, placing the phone between his thighs,

“Me?” you feign innocence, “Never.”

Joel taps his thumb quietly against the steering wheel, deciding carefully on his next words but unable to keep them in, feeling the boil over.

“That stuff—it doesn’t leave there,” Joel says pointedly, “whatever it was, it happened, but that—that can’t happen anymore, understood?”

Your gaze flicks down to your lap, tongue swirling over your teeth as you nod, unable to look at him as he glares over at you, awaiting a verbal response.

“I gotta hear it, kiddo,” he presses.

“Already forgotten,” you promise, though your voice is hollow, “can we listen to something?”

Joel shoves the box of cassettes into your lap, knowing that this was a tactic to switch subjects, but he didn’t have it in him to argue.

The damage between you had already been done.

divider credit: @/saradika-graphics

#joel miller #pedro pascal #joel miller x reader #joel miller x you #the last of us #tlou #joel miller smut #joel miller fic #x reader #reader fic #fic: orbit you #my writing #tlou fic #the last of us fic #dbf!joel

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intromortal · 1 day ago

Text

✷ LIQUID SWEETENER ⸻ sim jaeyun

jake takes care of his sick girlfriend, but with an unexpected twist.

this work contains ⋆ smut. mdni. established relationship, reader has a fever, she's very annoying tbh but it's bc she's ME! it's okay tho bc jake is equally as bad. spitting medicine in someone's mouth... is this sanitary? absolutely not but i also can't bring myself to care, fingering, praise, degradation (use of slut like once? and pet), he's mostly very sweet tho i promise, oral f!rec, squirting, mentions of free use, multiple orgasms, quick aftercare, jake comes untouched he's down bad sorry ! ⸻ rules ⋆ m.list

length ⋆ oneshot ⸻ 5.2k words

✷ NIA — i finally got around to rewriting this omfg. this rewrite is for my sweet @heechwe and all the nonnies who asked for this to be posted again <3

It's not everyday Jake gets to take care of you, so when you're all sickly and weak, it's hard to evade his attentions no matter how hard you try.

Jake pouts when you shoot down yet another attempt to get you to take your medicine. "Why don't you just chug it? I promise it's not as bad as you think."

He’s been trying to get you to swallow at least a tiny dose of the sweet fever syrup for the best part of an hour, after every attempt to get you to down any kind of pill resulted in you hiding them somewhere underneath your cozy pajamas, against your burning skin.

"If it's not as bad as I think, why are you suggesting I just chug it?" Your voice is slightly muffled as you eye him suspiciously from under the heavy cover pulled up all the way to your nose.

"You're the one insisting it's disgusting without even trying it, I asked for the best flavor possible when I got it." He made sure to pick out a syrup that doesn't taste straight up radioactive, knowing you well enough to predict you’d make a big fuss about the nasty taste. Yeah, he can picture it right in his head, how you’d gag dramatically at the smell and just beg him to go get the tablets again—which you wouldn't agree to take anyway.

For how much you hate being sick, you seem to dislike the idea of getting better quickly even more.

“You would feel so much better if you just took your medicine,” he sighs, resting the cap filled to the brim with honey flavored syrup on the crowded comforter, careful not to leave it too close to the edge. He licks whatever residue is left on his sticky fingers. "Really not that bad. It's sweet."

"So it's not good either," you huff back, trying to wiggle yourself out of the cocoon of blankets Jake wrapped you in as soon as you fell asleep. "I'm not even that sick anyway.”

“Yeah?” Jake looks at you with an arched brow, then points his head to the little mountain of discarded, snot filled tissues overtaking your comforter, the ones he was in the middle of throwing away. “This right here is breeding grounds for bio terrorism allegations.”

He stops you from getting out of bed, securing the warm fuzzy covers around you again. “No need to leave, just tell me what you need and I’ll get it for you,” he whispers against your lashes, placing a soft kiss to your closed eyelid.

“Just wan’ you.”

His plump lips thin into that gorgeous wide smile of his as he speaks,“but you have me baby, I’m right here, yeah?”

He knows very well what you mean, and a frustrated grumble spills out of you at the thought. Cheeky bastard, of course he wants you to say the quiet part out loud. Neither of you is used to going without pleasuring each other for long periods of time, and anything longer than three days is eons according to Jake. You're surprised he's behaved as well as he has this past week, you thought he would be the one to cave in first.

“Want…more,” you crank one of your eyes open, struggling when a droplet from the wet towel on your forehead Jake promptly changed every fifteen minutes slips in it. You blink a few times, adjusting to the light in the room before looking over to Jake, his grin still wide and brightening up his whole face, his head turned to the side as he observes you lovingly, a strand of hair longer than the rest tickling the side of his nose.

If Jake has to be completely honest with himself, he's not particularly sad at you being a little sick.

Sure, it sounds mean when he says it out loud, but you're not doing so badly or in any kind of pain that would worry him, and he enjoys doting on you like this, with you having no choice but to take his love. Can’t blame a man for wanting to take care of his girl, especially when said girl has a streak of refusing to just lay back and let him do the work.

You're always hiding your pain and vulnerability from everyone around you, so he enjoys knowing he's helping make it at least a little better for once.

You—however—wouldn’t exactly agree that he's making you feel better, definitely not by walking around with damp hair from the shower and intoxicating the air around you with the lingering salty marine and musky notes of the cologne he always sprays on his fresh change of clothes. A smell you usually related to comfort and home, making your head spin in the best way possible, a whirlwind of anything but pure thoughts crowding your mind.

Jake takes notice of the subtle shift in the air around you right away. You had been–subtly at first—laying down little hints for him to pick up, you craved him. Had been craving him for what felt like forever, ever since you got sick. A nagging hunger that just grew further with every hour he silently ignored it.

Usually you would busy yourself with random tasks, keeping your thoughts clear of images of his hands, or his plush lips and how he always absentmindedly licks away at them or how—you get the idea. But being sick doesn't help, being physically weak and needing rest doesn't stop your mind from running wild. Made it worse, actually, since you have nothing to do but lay in your bed all day. If only he’d slide right next to you under your covers and—

“I know what you’re thinking,” Jake interrupts your thoughts, a hint of amusement shining through his smooth tone. You look up to him hopefully, breath caught in your chest fearing the next few words he's about to say. “And you’re still too sick.”

Really not being dramatic, but you're pretty sure a boulder just crushed you right on your chest. You groan, turning to the other side so you can properly sulk without having to look at Jake’s stupidly handsome face. A face you'd love to ride as soon as possible.

“No like, you actually hate me,” your voice is muffled by the pillow currently squished against your face.

“What are you even doing.”

“Trying to suffocate myself since my man hates me.” You grab the sides of the pillow and push them to cover your ears, making Jake erupt in a fit of boyish giggles.

“No I don’t, just want you to feel better first,” he whispers, and the loving tone makes your body feel light.

You suddenly push yourself up with your arms to look at him, nest of hair a mess from the speed of your movement. “I would feel sooo much better with your fingers deep inside me right now.”

He looks at you for a moment, really looks at you, assessing what to do in this situation. He too misses your touch, far more than what he lets on. Even just sleeping next to you—a pillow fortress separating you two by your request—turned out to be too much for him on multiple occasions. He often found himself silently sneaking out of bed to go and take care of his sudden little problems in the bathroom, trying not to wake you up because he knew if you caught him he wouldn't be able to get out of your claws.

And you really need the rest.

As if sensing his resolve wavering, you add, “don’t I deserve a little reward?”

“A reward… for what?” Jake is thoroughly amused by your desperation. You rarely ever get like this, and he enjoys every second of it. You can tell because he's pushing it a little farther than what he usually would, ending up punishing himself a little along the way too. On any other occasion he would've been all over you before you could even finish your sentence. But Jake doesn't care, not when he doesn't know when the next time he gets to hear you beg a little for him is gonna be.

“Well of course! For having fought this fever tooth and nail and having come out of it alive.”

“You still have a fever though,” he says. “Could kick your ass right down at any given moment.”

“That.” You glare at him with all the fake anger you can muster up. “Is such a mean thing to even suggest.”

“Don’t you care about me getting sick? Made a scene all week and now you’re okay with me touching you?”

“First of all—I only made you keep the pillows between us the first two days. And like I told you, I feel better, so if—” the words die in your throat as you feet the bed dip underneath the weight of Jake’s knee.

"No, no. Keep talking." He slowly gets under the covers, and it's not because he's testing your reaction. His presence felt different, the soft look in his eyes overtaken by something more primal, and you couldn't help but feel like prey under his watchful gaze. It felt intimidating in a way you weren’t used to. It made you squeeze your legs together in search of any friction, your already feverish skin somehow feeling even hotter.

You try to hide the way you gulp, eyes still fixed on his body as he gets comfortable on his side, facing you.

“Maybe you’re right,” Jake whispers against your cheek, his nose rubbing for a moment on your skin as he sneaks an arm underneath your body, pulling you flush to his chest. Even just that single touch sends an electrifying shiver down your spine. “Since you’re fully capable of talking my ear off…”

You reach for his hand wrapped comfortably around your waist and guide it down to cup your heat through your thin shorts, your own hand resting on top of his as you grind against it.

"I suppose you've had enough rest."

You take notice of how his breath hitches in his throat, his carefully crafted mask of calmness slipping as you use his hand. The illusion wears off even more when he tries to hide it with a gulp, his Adam's apple bobbing up and down. You know he wants it just as bad as you do, you're just willing to beg for it as long as it gets you what you want.

“I’ll—” you gasp when he flexes his fingers that tiny little bit you need to be able to feel them press against your fluttering hole. “I’ll do anything, just please make me cum.”

“Anything?” his voice is light and airy as he moves the fabric of the shorts out of his way. A deep chuckle tickles your neck, Jake’s mouth dipping down do leave open mouthed kisses on the sensitive skin.

“Anything, just… please,” you whine, flexing your neck to allow him more space, his tongue dipping to lick a stripe down to the juncture of your neck.

Had you not been so deprived of Jake’s touch, you would have found the way you're grinding up against his hand and moaning in his ear almost embarrassing. But you're desperate, so you can't bring yourself to care too much about how pathetic you probably look to anyone else.

The only people in the room are you and Jake anyway, and he seems to be thoroughly enjoying it. His cock is stiff in his sweats, almost painfully so, from feeling how wet you are through your shorts. Dripping already and he barely touched you.

"You're so fucking hot. You know that?" Jake nibbles the shell of your ear, making you arch further in his hold. “You'll do anything you said? How about you take your medicine then?” He moves his hand from your mound to grip your thigh, ignoring your weak attempts at clawing his arm to get the little taste of pleasure he took away from you back.

He kisses his teeth, eyebrows furrowing in faux disapproval. “Use your words. What will you do?”

“Take my medicine,” you whimper, looking into your boyfriend's eyes despite the tears aligning your waterline, and finding amusement swimming through his gaze. Little piece of shit. Not that you were about to complain or anything.

“Theeeere we go,” Jake sings in your ear, placing a soft kiss behind it before dipping down once again and resuming his sweet torture. “You can be good once in a while.”

You nod, lips thinning to keep quiet as if any wrong sound could make him change his mind and leave you hanging. The hand that was drawing circles on your thigh comes up to hold your chin, carefully tilting it away from Jake’s mouth as he sucks on a particularly sensitive spot on your skin. He smooths over your lips with his thumb, coaxing them to part once again.

“Let me hear how good you feel, baby,” he mumbles, mouth still latched on your neck, before taking a strong whiff off your scent. Had you not been so distracted by the wetness seeping out of your clenching hole and soaking your panties, you would've noticed how his eyes rolled all the way back in his skull at your smell.

His free hand finally slides under your shorts,and a gasp leaves you because of how cold he feels. Jake is always warmer than you, but your fever makes it so his touch feels icy against your skin. Your back arches slightly when one of his digits parts your sopping folds, your sensitivity heightened by the unusual difference of temperature.

“Poor little thing, she’s got a fever too,” he giggles into your neck, another digit joining in as he slowly drags them from your clit to your hole to coat them in your juices. “But it’s okay, I’ll help her feel better.”

Usually, his stupid little jokes would’ve made you groan and push his face away. But this time—blame his voice for being deeper and hoarser than normal, or blame your fever—it makes you clench around nothing, cunt feeling emptier than ever while he takes his sweet time playing with you, savoring the moment.

Your head digs deeper into the pillow, hips lifting from the bed to follow Jake’s torturous movements, desperate to feel something more.

“So needy…” he breathes into your neck and goes back to placing sloppy open mouthed kisses wherever he can reach.

A yelp leaves your mouth, eyes you didn't even notice you closed shooting open when Jake bites down on the junction between your neck and shoulder, just enough to rip you out of the trance you were quickly falling into. He smooths over the little bite mark with this tongue, a tingly sensation overtaking the pain in a matter of seconds, the pleasure overriding anything else.

Jake finally prods two of his digits into your hole, testing the waters, still careful not to push you too hard so soon. But your reaction is instantaneous, cunt fluttering against his fingertips right away. He has to bite down on his bottom lip to keep most of his noises in. “God… I fucking love it when you act like a little slut.”

Jake is so fucking turned on, he can barely think about anything but your pussy. The only thought in his mind is get her off, make her feel good, get a taste of her sweet cunt, sweet pretty and oh so delicious cunt… like a broken record. He feels like he was born for this and this only, as if his mission in life is just that of pleasing you. And to think he had deprived himself of such bliss for even a few days… Something in you seems different to him, almost animalistic, from the way you rut your hips against his hand as soon as he starts scissoring his fingers inside you, to the way you aren't even trying to hold in your moans like you usually would, mouth hanging open with a string of drool attached to your lips. And this is just from his fingers, he can do so much worse.

You yourself aren't doing any better, your brain basically turned to mush as you help Jake get you off by essentially riding his fingers, despite how weak you feel from the fever. His fingers are so long, hitting all the right spots you know you could never be able to reach by yourself, and his thick knuckles drag against your walls so deliciously.

“S-so good,” you gasp when he turns his fingers just the right way, hitting the spot he knows has you coming undone in just a few strokes.

The room is filled with the slapping sounds of his palm against your drenched cunt, more and more slick dripping down your thighs and onto the bed with every flick of his wrist, making it all that much more obscene and filthy. You can feel the familiar pressure building up in your tummy, and suddenly the overwhelming need to just grab onto something crashes on you, heavy and almost painful. You claw at his shirt, eyebrows furrowed in deep pleasure, unaware of the fact that Jake is not facing you anymore.

He looks at the comforter, over his shoulder. The cap filled with syrup is still there amidst the mess. He twists his body to grab it, careful not to slow down the relentless pace he's fingerfucking your cunt at. A few drops of the liquid spill onto his shirt as he takes a sip of it, a grimace overtaking his features as he tries his best to hold it in his mouth. You're still a moaning mess by his side, tiny brain turned to putty to the point you don't even register anything else happening around you, so hyper focused on the pleasure your boyfriend is providing you with.

“J-Jake, I’m so close.”

Perfect timing.

Jake grabs your jaw to turn your head towards his, applying the pressure you've learned means it is time to part your pretty lips and take his spit, like the good well behaved girl he know you to be. And you do just that; immediately following his movements like he trained you to, tongue sticking out too for good measure.

He bends down slightly to aim better, but this time, instead of the slightly bitter taste of his saliva you expect, he lets small amounts of medicine fall on your tongue.

You uselessly try to back away from him, but he holds you in place, fingers still working inside your cunt. Nor does he allow you to close your mouth despite your surprised gasp. His hand holds your jaw open, grasp getting firmer every time you try to break free from it. After all, you made a promise, and Jake's going to make sure you fulfill it.

“You weren't going to take it, huh?” Jake mouths against your lips once he makes sure you swallowed every last drop of the thick honeyed syrup, holding eye contact with you through it all, fingers never once slowing down their pace. “Little dumb pet thinks she can outsmart me.”

He smashes his mouth on yours, not so much a kiss but a silencing of any complaint you're about to spit at him. Those turn to even more whines when he finally brings his thumb to your clit, drawing harsh circles on it as he fucks you to your orgasm. It's almost instantaneous, you were so close already, his stiff cock rubbing against your thigh and his pants hot in your mouth, but his thumb so cold against your neglected clit.

“That’s it baby, so good for me, yeah.” Jake’s fingers gradually slow down inside you, making sure you got every last bit of pleasure you could possibly experience from this high. He too relishes in how your cunt pulses around his digits, making it harder to move them inside you. Oh, he wishes it was his cock being constricted like that instead, but that can wait.

You finally feel like you can breathe again, chest heaving to catch in as much air as you possibly can, forehead all sweaty from the exertion.

The sheets are drenched around you, and you can't even pinpoint when it happened, but you can immediately tell you aren't the only one who made a mess. Your gaze wanders to Jake’s pants, and a very evident stain on his crotch catches your attention. And fuck, if you aren't ready to do it all over again.

Jake looks absolutely divine; hair disheveled and soaked from the sweat, boxers and sweatpants full of cum. A waste, truly.

You sneak your hand in his pants, ignoring the loud hiss from overstimulation Jake lets out when you wrap your hand around his cock and pump a few times, your thumb swiping on his exposed head to collect some of the cum covering it.

Jake watches you, mouth ajar and cock stiffening again right away, as you lick your fingers clean. He slides his own fingers out of your cunt, lapping at them like a man starved, hoping to work you up just as much as you did him. His heart races in his chest as you keep looking at him, a little smile playing on your lips.

“That was so…” you speak up, giggling when Jake interrupts you by throwing himself over your figure, capturing your lips in an actual kiss this time. A very messy, very wet kiss. Allowing you to savor your own taste mixed with his and sweetened by the medicine.

“I think the word you’re looking for is hot.”

“Dramatic,” you interjected. “So, so dramatic.”

Jake curls an eyebrow at you. “You were the one acting like it’d kill you to swallow some syrup. And actually, let’s not forget–” He places a quick kiss on your nose before pushing you against the mattress further, his entire weight on you. “Ohhh no Jake! Please my Jakey! If I don’t get your cock right now I will DIE!”

“Well I still hav–”

“And won’t.” he deadpans, sensing where you're trying to stir the conversation. “But I’ve got a few ideas.”

You smile to yourself, feeling feather light kisses making their way down your body, with his messy hair tickling your skin every so often. He places a soft kiss on your mound, whining dramatically when you grab a few strands of his hair to stop him. He rests his head on your thigh, puppy-like eyes looking up at you, almost pleading for permission to continue what he started.

“I really don’t want you to get sick,” you say, voice coming out in a whisper full of care, your fingertips playing with his hair and enjoying the way he nuzzles his head further against your skin.

“Well if I were to get sick by touching you… I’d say the deal is sealed by now, no?” He places another kiss on your thigh, teeth slightly grazing the plush skin when you take too long to contemplate whether to give in or not. “Actually, I think some of this syrup would heal me right now.”

“Jake. I’m being serious.”

“What could I possibly even catch from eating you out that I haven't already by exchanging spit with you? Best pussy in the world disease?” He laughs at his own joke, gaining a roll of the eyes from you. “Let me tell you, the chances of that happening are close to zero anyway. I don’t have a pussy but I am the proud owner of a very fat co–”

“You are downright insufferable.”

“Okay so shut me up with a mouthful of this pu–”

The rest of the sentence is muffled against your mound as you push his head down, deciding you heard enough for the day. And the week.

“Okay, okay. Go on,” you giggle as you lay back once again, a deep sigh following as soon as his expert tongue makes contact with your cunt.

Jake's movements are slow and deliberate at first, as he takes his sweet time collecting all of the slick coating your lips and smearing it all over your skin. It's methodical in a way Jake very rarely is, nothing like the primal and messy mixing of his own spit with your arousal and grunting noises you're so used to. When he gets like this, it's purely to tease you.

You grab a fistful of his hair, the strands soft in your hand, and raise his head to force him to look at you.

You almost regret it when you're met with the sight of him licking his lips, his plump lips spreading in a grin that looks almost evil. His irises are entirely drowning in the dark of his pupils, and you'd be lying if you said it doesn't send a chill down your spine. The good kind, the type that also makes you clench your thighs against his frame.

"If you're gonna beg me to eat me out," you say, finding your strength again and being careful not to let Jake see any weakness on your features. "You better do it properly."

You try to keep a straight face when he erupts in a fit of giggles.

"Oooh, look at you—" he starts, clearly amused by your attempt to assert dominance. "I know what I'm doing. You know I know what I'm doing. It just seems to me that I've spoiled the princess a little too much lately." He lowers his head to your thighs, and litters soft kisses as he makes himself comfortable again. Somewhere along the lines, the harsh hold you had on his hair turned into your hand dragging him closer, but you can't pinpoint the exact moment.

Or you just really don't care to know, not when Jake starts lapping up at your cunt like he's starving.

"You taste so delicious, baby," he moans between licks, his nose pressing further into your heat with every movement of his. "So much better than any medicine. Fuck—you're gonna be my little cure from now on. Every time I'm sick, I'll just let you open your legs for me. You'd let me, baby. Wouldn't you?"

You nod vehemently, before realizing he can't see you. "Yes, please use me," you moan, spreading your thighs as far as you can while pushing his head closer to you, even when it's almost physically impossible for Jake to even breathe. Not that he would have it any other way.

The grip on his hair, the way you push and pull at it as if you have any command over the stimulation he's giving you, the way you sing for him with every flick of his tongue. It all makes Jake's head spin in the best way possible, his cock stiff again in his pants and throbbing against the very fabric he ruined with his cum only minutes before.

He grunts and moans into you, like he's the one being pleasured, and it all adds to the magic Jake is working on you. The vibrations only aiding in inching you closer to the second orgasm of the day.

"Jake, I'm close, please."

You don't need to say anything else, because he parts from your cunt for a single second. Just enough to let a gobble of his spit drip down right on your engorged clit, coating it in more shiny essence.

You're about the complain about the lack of stimulation, but he dives right back in, licking a singular stripe from your poor mess a of hole upwards. He can taste the remains of the syrup in his own spit still, and paired with the straight up divine taste of your own slick, Jake thinks he might be in heaven.

"So sweet, baby. So fucking sweet. It's like you want me to never stop fucking you with my tongue." He catches your little bundle of nerves between his raw lips, already wet with spit, suckling on it like he's trying to coax even more wetness out of you. He swirls his tongue around it, his eyebrows furrowing in both pleasure and concentration as he keeps toying and prodding at every single part of your pussy.

You're so unbelievably close to coming undone, every passing second just bringing you closer to the brink. All it takes to send you over the edge is Jake moaning with your numb right in his mouth, the small vibrations from it all you needed for the searing white feeling to envelop you completely, the familiar silent yet still deafening tingly sensation spreading from your core to all the limbs in your body.

Jake keeps lapping up all your generous body gives him, thankful for it all and careful not to let a single drop go to waste.

Your arm is thrown over your eyes as you catch your breath, this second orgasm completely emptying you of whatever energy you had left. Usually you would offer Jake to help him out as a little thank you, even though he told you time and time again that it wasn't needed and pleasing you what was got him off in the first place.

But as much as you denied it initially, the fever did take a toll on you, more than you would like to admit. So any further activity would have to wait.

"Yummy." Jake comes up from below you, drying the bottom half of his face with the back of his hand. Even if you're tired and spent, the comment is enough to make you remove your arm from your eyes just so you can give him a well deserved death stare.

He gets up from the bed, disappearing for a few seconds into the bathroom. "What's with that look? No 'thank you Jake, you're the best?'"

When you don't reply, far too weakened to even try to banter with your boyfriend, he walks back into the room with a towel and a worried look etched on his gorgeous features.

He gets on the bed again, careful not to move your body more than necessary, and starts cleaning you up with the gentlest touch you've ever felt him use. "Did i tire you out too much? You're still sick—"

"You were great. Don't worry," you stop his train of thoughts you knew you wouldn't hear the end of if you let him go on for any longer. "I just need a nap, then I'll be as good as new."

The tension in Jake's shoulders only disappears once you smile at him, his own face morphing to match your own. It's one of your favorite things about him, how he's so careful and attentive to every hint and feeling on your face, he ends up mirroring them without even noticing.

He runs his hands soothingly all over your skin as he resumes cleaning you up, the room falling into a peaceful silence.

You almost fall asleep, but you should've known Sim Jake shutting up for once was far too good to be true.

"Look at the mess you made though. This is enough to start an entire pharmacy."

#✷ mortal works #jake smut #jake x reader #enhypen smut #enhypen x reader #enha smut #sim jaeyun smut #enhypen hard hours

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emmyrosee · 1 day ago

Text

Rintaro feels guilty leaving this time.

You’re expected to deliver your twins any day next week, and he’s expected to fly across the country for a charity event he really can’t even think straight for. You've assured him you'll be fine, his sister is more than capable of taking care of you while he's gone, but there's a pit in his stomach about the idea of leaving you.

But you send him anyways. With a kiss on his cheek and a promise to call him every day (if he had it his way, it would be every hour, but you wouldn't go for it).

The trip goes smooth enough, and he's grateful for you staying true to your word and calling him every night. It does make the time pass, you're safe, but he's more than eager to make it home to you.

He practically pushes his teammates out the door, he's the first one on the bus, his knee bounces anxiously the entire time- especially when the bus driver makes a wrong turn into straight construction, thrusting them in traffic for far, far too long without any service.

But you won't call him, right? Why would you, you've called him at night every day he's been here, and nothing of note has happened (not that that’s a negative to Rintaro, he’d rather your days be mundane and boring than active in your pregnancy).

His heart finally starts again once they pull into the airport parking lot, all of the teammates trying to not be annoyed at the events of the morning and trying to stay focused on the next steps of boarding the plane in a few hours.

Rintaro sighs, slipping his phone out and immediately calling you, not taking notice of just how many notifications bombarded his phone.

The line ring once, twice, and his shoulders relax as you finally pick up the phone. "Rin?" You ask, and you sound like you're in discomfort. But he merely brushes it off. You are very pregnant, after all, surely discomfort is normal.

"Hey babe, just got service from being in the bus, we've got a nasty delay because the fuck-head made us miss our fucking flight, so I might be home later than expected-"

“Rin, I'm in labor.”

Silence fills the line.

“No you’re not,” he says simply.

“As much as I would love to be kidding, I’m not. I’m 10 centimeters, babe.”

How you’re so calm right now, is beyond him.

Him, on the other hand, leaps up with absolute panic, a screechy “WHAT?” echoing through the airport. It catches more than a few looks from other people, but all Rin can think about is you.

You in the hospital, legs up in stirrups and gown being the only thing adorning your body. There's probably nurses and doctors everywhere, and Kaiya and Akito on the couch at home with his mother, waiting for the news.

"WHEN?"

"My water broke a few hours ago, got to the hospital with your sister and now they're getting ready for me to push. Your timing truly is impeccable."

“And you thought now was the best time to tell me?!”

“I tried to tell you earlier, but you had no service!” You defend.

Fuck, he could scalp the bus driver for getting fucking lost.

"okay, okay, okay lets calm down-"

You snort, "yeah I'll get right on that."

"Please, for everything unholy, don't joke right now," he pleads, and he hears you offer him a laughy 'sorry' on your end of the line. "Are you okay? Do you feel okay?"

"Well I don't feel particularly good, for all intents and purposes." You direct your attention to something else and he hears bustling in the background, "Rin I have to start pushing. Stay on the line.”

"No! Wait for me, I'll-"

"Yeah I'm not waiting for you," you snip. “I'll... be fine. Just stay on the call okay? For me?

Rintaro tries not to pass out as you start pushing, doctors encouragement coming through on the line, followed with your grunts of agony as you try to bring your two new babies into the world. He knows you’re strong, you don’t need him there, but there’s something deep inside of him that hurts at the idea that you don’t, he’s so close yet no where near close enough to be right there next to you, and he anxiously looks around him as he tries to find a private place for him to cheer you on, call your name, scream it, his soul in agony over something he has no control over.

It could be four minutes or four hours, rintaro has no idea as you finally scream in agony as a small wail breaks over the line, one akin to Akito and Kaiya’s as the two of them entered the world all those years ago.

“Beautiful!” His sister cheers, “just a bit more for Sachiko sis, you’ve got this!”

“No more,” you weakly whimper over the line, and Rintaro tears up as he chews on his thumb.

“Baby,” he chokes, “you’ve got this, okay? You can do this, I’m right here.”

“No you’re not!” You scream.

“Yes I am! I’m right here okay? I’m not going anywhere!”

“Rin I need you-“

“And I’m right here. I promise. Just close your eyes, I’m there, okay?”

Hes not there. He knows you know that. But right now, he can’t feel sorry for himself. He goes silent and listens to the bustling of the doctors and nurses preparing to bring Sachiko into the world, and rintaro has no clue how long it’s been before you’re ready to push again.

“Ready, momma?” He asks, and you let out a sob.

“Im so tired, Rin.”

“One more big push okay?” He chokes. “Push!”

And you do. You let out another shriek as you start to push, rintaro can practically see your legs tremble and face scrunch and throat tight as you let out another blood curdling cry, and before he can think, another set of crying fills the line.

His twins are here.

And he’s not.

“Good job, angel!” He hoots.

“She did so good, Rintaro,” his sister assures.

“I know she did,” he says, hand clutching his heart.

“They’re so handsome Rin,” You babble, and instantly, Rintaro’s face drops. “Such beautiful boys, they're so sweet, so handsome…”

Boys?

Oh fuck. Rintaro briefly thinks back at all the purples and pinks in the closet at home.

Immediately, Rin tries to conjure up an excited tone, squealing out a soft “boys?” in confirmation.

“She’s messing with you," his sister snickers. You’re laughing exhaustedly too, among your sniffles of agony and above the screaming of the newest twin.

“You’re a fucking asshole,” he says, breathless and his chuckles easing out.

“You've got new baby girls, Rintaro," his sister coos.

“We got them, boys!” He announces, causing an uproar of cheers to come from his teammates. He feels his heart sink to his stomach as his throat begins to swell. “I’m so proud of you baby… my good girls.”

“They’re so beautiful, Rin. So beautiful," you cry.

He sits on his suitcase and tries to imagine them, desperately, tiny hands pawing at the air, crying at the newness of the bright light and the world…

All without him. He’s not there.

“Who was born first?” He chokes, desperate to keep his voice steady. It was a complete tossup with the names, whoever was out first or second is precisely how the names would fall. But he just needs you to keep talking to him.

You understand, and you answer shakily, “Sachie,” you sigh. “Sachiko was 20 minutes later.”

“Late; just like momma.”

“Watch it.”

He chuckles around a flood of tears, a hand coming up to bring his hand up to cover his face. Hot, bubbled tears slip down to roll over his thick fingers, trying to stay composed in the airport that’s bustling with too many people.

“Im so proud of you,” he chokes, eyes screwing shut. Not long after, a massive hand claps down on his shoulder, Komori’s eyes flickering with understanding and apology. He’s got nothing to apologize for, but Rintaro takes the kindness regardless and puts a free hand on top of his to squeeze the emotions out. “My amazing girl. Fuck, I can’t wait to see you.”

“Rin, I have to go,” you say, and he hears the gruff voice of the doctor. “I love you so much. Come home safe, you’re no use to me dead.”

“Okay, princess,” he sighs shakily, burying his face in Komori’s stomach to cry. “I love you.”

“I love you too, baby. You’re gonna be fine.”

He’s 99% sure he should be saying that to you, and not you to him. But regardless.

He waits for the line to die before taking the phone from his ear, blinking up at Komori with absolute heaviness in his heart.

“I should’ve been there,” he whimpers.

“You couldn’t control it, buddy.”

“But I should’ve been there. Not three cities over for some charity that I don't even care about."

It doesn’t matter the assurances Komori could try to pass him. It doesn’t matter that you’re okay, you’re strong and you don’t need him in this moment.

He should’ve been there to squeeze your hand, watch his two babies come into this world with you, kiss your forehead and whisper loving words in your ear.

And he couldn’t manage even that.

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spaceyaemonds · 3 days ago

Text

pairing: dr. jack abbot x reader

sum.: a quiet afternoon with dr. abbot.

warnings: age gap (jack is late 40s, reader is 23), unplanned pregnancy, jack is divorced, not a widower and mentions of his ex wife, it is mention that reader and her mom talk often. please let me know if i missed anything. minors DNI.

note: more of a filler chapter(i’ll consider this 6.5 instead of 7 LOL)!!! just a little look inside them, and we will definitely be seeing more soon!!! jack and reader will meet each others moms next chapter!! also, thinking about doing more drabbles set in this universe, like the proposal, is there anything specific you guys want to see?? unedited. and as always, any feedback is extremely appreciated, it helps keep me motivated. especially reblogs/comments/asks!

wc: 960ish

prev next

Over the past eight weeks, you’ve just about changed Jack Abbot’s entire life.

He goes to a farmers market on Saturday’s, brunch on Sunday’s with your friends, actually eats decent meals and gets a good night's rest at least three nights a week.

Also, he’d never admit it outloud to anyone, but he’s pretty invested in Vanderpump Rules.

Currently, he’s got your feet in his lap while he reads a medical journal, one hand massaging your ankle. Every once in a while, he glances up at you to watch as you knit what he thinks is supposed to be a sweater.

Ever since finding out the gender of the baby almost a month ago, you’d been determined to at least make something for the baby to wear. You got good at knitting surprisingly quickly, and so far have made three hats, two pairs of socks, and started a blanket.

You’ve got your bottom lip tightly tucked into your teeth as you concentrate on the yarn in your hands, and before he can stop himself, he’s reaching over and gently thumbing it out from between your teeth.

Finally, he thinks to himself when you’re wide eyes meet his.

You’re the most beautiful thing he’s ever seen.

“You’re gonna hurt yourself.” He gestures to your swelling bottom lip as you lick it.

“Sorry,” You let out a small giggle, “I didn’t even notice.”

He nods, hand going back to your ankle, “I figured.”

As he starts reading again, you take the time to watch him, head cocking to the side as you smile.

This hasn’t been so bad.

Sure, it’s been an interesting and difficult situation for both of you. But you like to believe that it could be worse.

He could’ve just not cared. Ignored you and went on with his life. Or pressured you into an abortion you didn’t want.

He could’ve done what he could to just take the baby the second she’s here.

But he really surprised you. He’s been so supportive and so good to you. It’s shocking, in all honesty.

You both feel a lot of guilt, though.

You think you’ve stuck him with you. That he’s only here out of obligation.

He thinks he’s ruined your life.

You work through it all, somehow. You talk him off his ledge more than he talks you off of yours, but you can tell when it’s eating at him more than he can with you.

Or so you think.

Jack likes to think he knows you pretty well despite the timeline of things.

He spends as much time as he can with you. Soaking up every moment of something he didn’t even think he ever wanted. Holds your hair back when you get sick. Rubs your back and feet when you ache. Tries some of the most interesting food combinations he’s ever heard of, some of which are better than others.

Fucks you when you’re insatiable and want him more than anything.

He isn’t quite sure it’s love yet, but he knows it’s on its way there.

He’s loved before. Hell he loved someone enough to marry her, but couldn’t love her enough to give her what you’re giving him.

Another source of guilt for him- one that he’s completely bared to you.

You didn’t know what to say, when he told you about what ate at him most. Why he couldn’t figure out what brought on the need, the desire, to do this with you, but he couldn’t even bring himself to try with her.

You just listen, rub his back, and whisper in his ear that some things just happened for a reason.

He appreciates you and the the way you just let him talk. Or just let him sit with you in silence. Whatever he needs, you somehow manage to give him.

One of the more recent favorites of his is when you take a bath. He can sit up against the cabinets under the vanity with a beer in his hand while you sit and talk about your day, things you want to do for the baby, or just read.

Life is more peaceful with you than he thinks it ever has been.

He glances back over at you, and sees the look in your eyes.

A look he knows all too well will result in him doing something he doesn’t exactly want to do.

“Spit it out, honey.”

You smile at the sound of his voice when he calls you honey.

“I was talking to my mom yesterday,” You trail off as he closes the journal he’s been reading and turns his body all toward you.

“Well?”

Jack knew your mom knew the basics, much like his own family did. How you got pregnant. How you met him. His age.

He knew that the last one had her concerned. Extremely.

The two of you talk most days, and she always gets distant when asking about the baby. Something about it makes him slightly uneasy.

“She’s coming to Pittsburgh next week. Wants us all to get together,” You look down, fidgeting with your fingers, “wants to meet you.”

He’s quiet for a long moment, making unease crawl up your chest.

It was a bad idea to bring it up.

“How do you feel about that?”

He sounds calm and collected, surprising you yet again.

“I mean, you are the father of her grandchild.”

You finally look back up at him, eyes meeting.

He sighs, shaky, “Is that all I am?”

You tilt your head to the side, “You tell me.”

It’s quiet for another beat before he shakes his head as he brings one of his palms to cradle your jaw.

“It’s only fair if you have to meet my mom, too.”

You laugh, nodding lightly before kissing his palm.

“Yeah, I can do that.”

He lets out a huff as he kisses the side of your head, “It’s a deal, then.”

#jack abbot x reader #jack abbott x reader #the pitt x reader #dr jack abbott x reader #dr jack abbot x reader #ahhhhh #🐝 writes #🐝 writes: the pitt

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risskia · 2 days ago

Note

can you write how each of the lads men would react when you tell them you want children? (or it could be any of them) (your fics are nice btw)

Reply: Yes that is so cute!! ────────────────────

✦ You tell the LADS men that you want children ✦

PAIRINGS: Xavier x reader, Caleb x reader, Sylus x reader, Zayne x reader, Rafayel x reader TAGS: slight suggestive content, mostly wholesome cute fluff, short blurbs

────────────────────

“Xavier, I want to have kids.” You announce.

You two are currently in Jeremiah’s greenhouse, helping him tend to his flowers. Xavier’s hands still on a potted plant as he looks to you, his eyes wide.

“Right here?”

“W-what?” Your face turns red. “No! Of course not! I meant, when we get back h–”

But Xavier is already pushing you up against the cool glass of the greenhouse, his chest against your back and fingers dipping below your waistband.

“Too late,” he hums, pressing soft kisses to your sensitive neck. “ You’re absolutely right – I want children too. Right now.”

You two are at Sylus’s favourite restaurant when you casually bring up that you want children.

Sylus’s hand stills, as he looks up at you from his steak with an indiscernible expression. You peer at him nervously, trying to gauge his reaction. Does he want children too? Is he okay with the idea of raising them?

“Anyways – that was just a thought – let’s talk about something else.” you quickly say.

The next day ── .✦

“Sylus!” You call out as you push open the door to Sylus’s apartment. You kick something by accident – a gold pacifier? You look down at it, beyond perplexed.

As you step into his apartment, you’re met with the sight of piles upon piles of various baby clothes and toys, stacked neatly across the living room and dining hall. You’re speechless.

Sylus walks out into the living room in nothing but his red silk pajamas. He mimics your aloof expression when he sees you.

“What? You said you wanted children.”

“Sylus – it was just an idea!”

You notice something : ever since you’ve casually mentioned wanting children (you don’t think Caleb would even notice), Caleb has been seeming really fatigued, sometimes even dozing off in the middle of the day just to wake up with a start.

You don’t question why and just go about your day as usual.

Until one night, you wake up from a bad dream. You sit up groggily, yawning and rubbing your eyes tiredly, just to find Caleb missing from bed.

Instead, a dim glow radiates from the study desk. Caleb sits at it, carefully jotting down notes on a notepad that you’ve never seen before. You sneak over, and tackle him by surprise. Caleb lets out a yelp of surprise as you jump onto his lap.

“Pips! What are you doing, being awake right now?” he asks hoarsely. You huff.

“I should be asking you the same thing.” You turn to look at his notes – and that's when you realise that they’re all about pregnancy and taking care of newborns. You giggle as you flick through his notes, and Caleb just looks at you with resignation.

“This is what you’ve been losing sleep over? You’re adorable.” you tell him, twisting over in his lap to squeeze him affectionately by his cheek. “10 health recipes for pregnancy? How to take care of newborns… side effects of pregnancy and how to manage them…damn, you’re thorough.”

“I need to come prepared, okay?” Caleb nips at your fingers. “I’ll make sure to take care of you when you’re bearing our child. I’ll make sure you have everything and anything you need. All for my wife.”

When you tell him that you want children, Zayne pauses for a second, looking at you carefully.

“Are you sure?” He looks at you with a gentle expression, reaching a hand out to hold yours. “I need you to be completely certain. This is a huge decision, after all.”

“Positive,” you reply eagerly. “Zayne, I’ve been thinking this over for months.”

“Okay. Give me a second.” Zayne pulls out his phone and clicks onto a contact, holding it to his ear.

“Greyson?” He pauses. “I’ll be taking a one week leave.”

Your jaw drops. Zayne? Taking a whole week off his job? That is unheard of. Zayne continues to dish out a couple of instructions to his assistant over call before he quickly hangs up. With his full attention back to you now, he leans forward and kisses you softly on the cheek.

“Zayne,” you say slowly. “What…why…”

“You want children, right?” A playful smile tugs at his lips. “We’ll have to work on that all week. That way, it can be guaranteed that you get what you want.”

Your face heats up at the implications of his words. Zayne leans forward once more, this time pressing his warm lips to yours.

“Let’s start now.”

“...so that’s why I want children.”

Rafayel gets flashbacks to those birth-giving videos he has the misfortune to chance upon.

“But, darling,” Rafayel says, sounding pained. “Giving birth looks excruciating. What a miserable process. I don’t want you to see you in pain, ever.”

You laugh at his words, squeezing his cheek. “Rafayel, it’s going to be OK.”

“Are you sure?” he frets. “I wish there was a way you don’t have to go through the suffering, ever. I wish I could be the one giving birth.”

When he kisses you, he is extra gentle in the way he holds and touches you. His hands snake down to your thighs as he pulls back to look at you with wide, adoring eyes.

──────────────────── .✦

#love and deepspace #lads caleb #lads rafayel #lads sylus #lads xavier #lads zayne #lnds #lads #lads boys #lads men #sylus x reader #xavier x mc #caleb x reader #rafayel x reader #zayne love and deepspace #fluff #lads fluff #pregnancy #writing

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chastiefoul · 1 day ago

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kiss your best friend and see his reaction!

ft. nanami kento, gojo satoru, geto suguru, sukuna, toji fushiguro modern/no-curse au | fem!reader | fluff, light-hearted basically the kiss ur best friend challenge/trend and it went a little too well

➝ gojo satoru

he hadn't been confused when you told him you needed him for a short video, since that’s already a part of his job description anyway as your best friend for as long as he remembered. but when you started the recording without saying anything satoru looked at you with a tilted head, expression beyond confused.

“wait, why am i supposed to do her-“

your sudden kiss drowned his question promptly, his eyes widened at the touch of your soft lips. the touch that he’s been dreaming of since who knows when—and gods it didn’t even come close to the real thing. a sensation that made him feel like he’s walking on clouds, and is currently devouring something that’s even sweeter than his mochis. he grinned into the kiss, wrapping his arms around your waist pressing your body close on his before spinning you around slowly out of excitement, his hair brushing your forehead ticklishly.

satoru didn’t stop—he’s not willing to stop, as if that was the only chance he had to taste your lips. he had to forced himself to pull away, his eyes in a haze; looking at you like a man who's drunk in love, his mouth agape.

“that’s—i, it’s unreal. you’re unreal. do you know how long i’ve been wanting to do that?”

he brushed a hand over your lower lip, a man who’s so desperate already wanting to go in for seconds. now that he knew how you taste, he became insatiable.

“no, tell me.” you smiled, feeling kinda stupid for even thinking that he’d reject your kiss when he’s acting like a lovesick fool instead; a mirror of how you’re acting, you’re sure. “you have no idea,” he replied, already kissing you again as if it hurt to pull away.

➝ suguru geto

“so i’m supposed to just stand here?” he eyed you suspiciously, searching for answer from someone who usually had a detailed instructions to prevent him from making mistakes in making your videos— even resorting light threats.

you hit the record button while wearing an easy smile, even though your chest was practically about to burst from the nerves. you approached him slowly, folding your hands on the back of his neck to stop them from shaking slightly.

suguru hasn’t catch on to what you’re doing, leaning closer instead. you stared at his handsome face before planting a kiss on his lips, and it caught him off guard for only a second before he reciprocated the move, the most passionate you’ve ever seen him. his arm around your back, the other on your waist, grabbing it like it’s his last lifeline.

your tongues dancing against each other, as if fighting who had been waiting for it more. and it went on for a while, no one came out as a winner but no one was complaining. both of you stared at each other, his hand rubbing your back lovingly.

“is this why you looked nervous just now, sweet girl?” he smiled endearingly as you nodded. “as if you don’t already know you have me wrapped around your finger,” he said lightly, couldn’t even entertain the idea of him rejecting you since it’s so ridiculous. “well you’re a closed book, sugu. it’s hard to read you sometimes,” you claimed, resting your head on his chest.

“then one thing you have to know about me is that your kiss was one of my dream come true.”

“one of?” you asked, narrowing your eyes. “kiss me again and find out, pretty girl.”

➝ nanami kento

the blond man looked as stiff as a board in front of your phone camera, not quite used to it despite him always end up agreeing to your whims albeit reluctant. “do i need to do something here? some sort of dance again perhaps?” he asked, wincing at the latter sentence as he remembering last week where he made himself a fool.

“no no, just stand there, ken,” you said, pressing the red button on the screen before going back to the man. “alright-“ he didn’t have a moment to prepare himself when you kissed him suddenly, and it took everything out of nanami to keep his knees to stay still and support his weight properly.

a kiss that took his breath away, an inconvenience that he’ll welcome anytime, anywhere. his hand instinctively reach for the skin under your ear, holding your jaw to deepen the kiss, not close of having enough of you.

camera be damned, every part of his body was a natural at the feeling of your lips, rolling his face to taste every inch of you; the usual reserve in his gestures were nowhere to be found, as if he had finally let himself be selfish for a moment.

nanami finally managed to pull away before slowly realizing that he’s still on record. everything was.yet he couldn’t find a part of him that could let go of you, his thumb brushing over your cheek gently. “you could have... told me before doing that,” he said, his tone was not deceiving anyone; that’s a man without regrets.

“and miss the chance to catch you off guard?” you grinned.

“you’re a handful, do you know that?” he said with a little sigh, wearing the widest smile you’ve ever seen him with.

“yet you kissed me.”

“yes, and and i was not even close to being done,” nanami replied, leaning in.

➝ sukuna

“what is it today?” he said exasperatedly, looking like he’d rather be anywhere else. and he would be, if it wasn’t for you following him around until he agreed to be in your video. “just stand there kuna, it’s easy right?” you said, setting up your phone despite the turmoil you’re currently experiencing.

you’re about to kiss your best friend. you’re about to kiss sukuna.

“knowing you i can’t even trust that even for a second,” he said grumpily. “really appreciate the enthusiasm,” you said rolling your eyes. “c’mere and start already.” and you did, even when he eyed every single of your move with suspicion, wondering what mischief you’re up to that day.

you cupped his face and he lets you, as you captured his lips with a kiss. and he lets you do that too.

and sukuna could not be more enthusiastic even if he tried, his mouth moved faster than his mind, who’s still registering the fact that you’re really kissing him. his lips stringing you along to the march of his drum. that’s a man who has been depraved of your kiss, even though he had never experienced it, his hunger was as clear as a day.

he deepened the kiss by taking another angle, the impact made you walk two steps behind before he put a hand around your neck, holding you close. he groaned when you pull away, chasing your lips like a madman.

“wait.” you panted, and sukuna did in fact wait albeit hanging on his last thread. his forehead resting against yours. “what?”

“i—it’s just, this is new.”

“then we better get used to it fast,” he replied quickly, his patience reached its end; ten seconds. he parted your lips with his thumb, when that met no resistance from you who’s as eager as he was he leaned back in, beyond ready to have another best kiss he’s had for his entire life.

➝ toji

“toji, please look like you want to be here,” you pleaded, seeing his nonchalant expression who had just finished yawning for the nth time in just ten minutes. “i don’t know how that’s like,” he said uninterested. “just a minute and you’ll be free,” you sighed, worried that his low energy wasn’t a good sign.

oh how you were wrong.

the moment your lips brushed against his toji had the biggest grin before kissing you back passionately. his hands roamed at your sides, all the way to the behind of your thighs. you understood what he meant as you jumped and wrapped both legs around him, he supported your weight effortlessly.

you gripped his hair as you held him closer—as close as you could be, escalating the kiss even more before you both reluctantly pull away, still panting.

there’s an annoying smile on toji’s face. “so how long have you been holding that in hm?”

“too long. now shut up and kiss me again.”

“atta girl, don’t gotta tell me twice.”

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tojisteddy · 2 days ago

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Mean nasty daddy simon when you try to rile him up? (The piss kink one made me..... realise stuff)

Feenin | cw: dark content, 18+ mdni, daddy kink (icky), meanie!simon/toxic (ish), p in v, unprotected sex (don’t try this at home folks), smol degregation, overstim, cunnilingus, edging (to hell), breath play, p in v, cum play, dd/lg dynamics, slight sub-drop, some after care, blackcat!reader

a/n: I’m sorry if this is too long. I just had a vision and had to map it out. Lmk what you think.

No one is surprised when Simon brushes you off.

He could be a complete and utter asshole, he’d brush off plenty of women in his day. Other women too. But he was doing it to you, his girlfriend. His precious kitty, who he sworn he cared deeply about.

All you wanted was for him to look at your outfit, tell you how pretty you look, hold your chin in his hand and adorn you with a peck on your pretty lip lined lips. But he simply gave you a glance and went on talking to Soap. You blinked, once, twice. He was kidding, right?

Not when you’d spent more than an hour curling your hair and getting it absolutely volumized and every curl in the perfect spot. Not when you’d picked out something undoubtedly sexy to have him eating out of your palm.

Did you look too uppity— god no. Never. A little slutty of course, a little minx— the way you liked it. The way the blonde, tattooed man should have. He does.

Soap gave you an apologetic smile, “You look great lass. Out ‘f a magazine.” And you did.

Who wouldn’t want to be with the girls out of a fashion magazine? Clearly not the man you’d actually want attention from.

“Thank you Soap,” you tried not to speak so tightly. with that, you turned, digging yourself out the small ditch you’d gotten stuck in— your feelings— and continuing to option D.

If the brute couldnt be bothered, you go seek attention else where.

It would never be your first option, or your second… or your third— the last resort— not since you’d been with Simon. But there was a rare occasion, like now, that ass hole would really try to make you mad. So you did what you had to do to get his attention. Show him what he was missing in the exact moment.

It was easy to get it too. You had the allure, pretty smile, a voice anyone would be at the edge of their seats to hear, enchant anyone with the sway of your hips to the music. It didn’t take long for you to find yourself sat next to some stranger at the bar. A fuck boy right of the bat, drowning you in compliments just as you wanted. But he was someone you and Simon both knew looked like the type you’d used to fuck.

Pretty, tall, too far gone up their own ass for their own good— men who looked right off of Paris Fashion Week.

The exact opposite of Simon Riley.

You were just playing at first. A little causal flirting never hurt anyone most of the time. A playful push of the shoulder, biting your long manicured nail and looking at him like he was the prettiest thing ever, a small giggle, playing with the necklace Ghost had gifted you so that the guy would look down at your perfect tits. No harm, no foul.

It was when he’d bought you a martini and coincidentally started talking about a show he was watching— your favorite show. You weren’t flirting anymore, you were fully indulging in deep conversation. Unknowingly making the guy think he had a chance against the rugged man who was staring you down now that you actually looked like you gave a shit about the man beside you.

You’d known Simon had to be watching by now. You felt it in your gut, those butterflies flying higher and higher. You couldn’t help that smug smirk that got on your face. The idiot beside you thinking it was for him.

Enough of the bullshit.

Simon stood from his seat, he didn’t need to yell, didn’t need to call out your name, didn’t even need to look directly at you. You saw him stand in the corner of your eye, then move towards the exit. You scramble to get up, eyebrows furrowing, your nose flaring. Not because you have to leave, because he didn’t give you the reaction you wanted.

He never did.

“Where you going? We were just having a good time right?” You-didn’t-even-know-his-name, asked as you double checked your purse.

“My boyfriend just left, we’re going home.” You say as if he should’ve already known that. Games over.

The drive home was quiet, so was the shower you too took together, and then he’s telling you to go to your room and think about what you did wrong. You didn’t even get the chance to refute it, he just went to his room— where you usually slept together— and shut it.

You woke up with a puffy face, you’d cried yourself to sleep before it even really got to the bad part. Your first instinct was to rush to where ever Simon was but you’d head the music from the garage blaring, so you knew it’d be harder to get your words out the way you wanted.

Push through it like Simon told you to.

So you occupied an hour or so of your time with other tasks, getting dressed just to stay in the house, eating the breakfast Simon left for you. Cleaning off the shelves of Simon’s large movie collection.

And here comes the hard part. Talking it out. Apologizing because you fucked up. Crossed the line.

“I’m sorry Pa,” you squeeked out over the music. And he knows you’re looking down on the floor, he can see you rocking in your little kitten heals from the corner of his eye, beyond nervous. But he doesn’t look up from the car he was tinkering with, just turns down the volume to the music. He doesn’t have to verbally say it, ‘for?’

“I’m sorry for flirting with that guy. I was- I was mad you didn’t pay attention to me. I wasn’t usin my brain like you tell me to. ‘Nd it’s not an excuse for bein tipsy.”

“No, no it’s not.,” he shuts the hood of the truck with a sigh. Moving over to wash his hands at the utility sink. He comes toward you, really taking you in— his gorgeous babe. You looked like the sexiest thing alive last night. Simon knew that. The asshole just likes fucking with you a little bit, get you riled up so he can fuck you. Tell you you’re the best thing in the world, his fucking girl. The blonde didn’t expect for you to play his game better than him. Get him jealous and pissed off.

His kiddo learned fast, didn’t you? Sweet thing. So loveable.

Flirting was a line never to be crossed with either one of you. You’d danced on it last night and the man would have to show you what that actually meant. But jeez, how fucking pretty did you look right now in your denim pencil skirt, cheetah print and lace cami, light make up just for a day in the house, gold hoops, your curls flowing down your back— the most adorable pout on your trembling, glossed bottom lip— he’d ruin it. Ruin you.

In the best way of course.

Simon holds your chin in his fingers, pecks your lips— you want to cry, you want to melt. It’s all what you wanted this whole time but you knew you can’t take, and take, and take. Someone’s gotta give.

“Dad’s gotta teach you to a lesson, doesn’t he kitty?”

You already want to say sorry again, maybe rewind and cancel out your prior actions and shake the sense into yourself. But you nod, tell yourself just to wait it out. Be a good girl for once.

“Yes sir.”

Simon wouldn’t let you cum.

The fucking demon, the bastard— had you running to grasp on to your own sanity.

He snatched your skirt off, spreading you thighs open on the hood of that old unfinished car Simon had been working on and ate. His tongue running through your folds, down to your hole, sopping up any of your sweet fluids that flowed out, making sure to catch every drop. Then slowly worked his tongue up to your fat clit. Swirling it around in his mouth before full on French kissing it.

Just when you felt your eyes cross, you tried to close your thighs that were pushed back with Simons large hands, that magical feeling coming to you— the blonde gave your cunt a harsh smack that got car wet from your juices.

“You’re not cumming that fuckin fast, are you?”

You want to scuff and shove his face away. But you’re trembling just from the thought of cumming. You wanted him to fuck the daylights out of you. “I-I’m fine.” You force out, turning your head away.

You so easily fall for the little bit of teasing. Simon’s little kitty, he’d fuck your little brain up. He’d continue eating away at you, sucking, rubbing, licking— until your mascara was smudged, tears falling from your face and not letting you cum.

But he was just getting started.

He fucked you againt the car, squeezing and pulling at your breasts through the seamless cami and then right as he felt you clench, with a smack to the ass, Simon would pull out. Stroking his own dick till he released all over ass. Then again, your leg over his shoulder, shoving all of his veiny cock in your sobbing pussy that was aching for release. Pulling away and cumming on your stomach. In between your thighs, right on your fucking pussy. Not giving a fuck that he worked it into you when he fucked you again.

And now, you’re on the ground, knees scrapping the concrete of the ground while he fucks you, rough. His hands gripping your hips enough to leave a bruise. You can feel it building inside your stomach, you shimmy your ass against Simon for more but you know he won’t give it to you by the swat he leaves on your ass, going to rub your more abused and misused clit.

Your sobs were loud, clawing at the ground, you babble, “Daddy, I wanna-“

“Shut it.”

“But-“

“[+],” he warns through a grunt, yanking his dick out of you again and you shake you head. Like a child who’s gotten their favorite toy taken away, crying even harder. Simon’s hand goes back and forth against his shaft, and holding you tightly by your hair.

“Spent all that time last night, talkin that pricks head off, now you’re gonna shut the fuck up for me. Be my little sex doll, yeah?” Simon rubs the tip of his dick on your ass, then in between the two globes, shuddering at how good you made him feel. His cum spurting all over you. He thrusts his dick a couple more times, making sure it’s properly smeared.

He groans at the sight of you, it’s fucking filthy the mess he’s created on you, dripping down to the floor.

“Hold y’self open for me.” Your hands aren’t even steady anymore, you’re quivering. You reach behind, your manicured nails spreading your pussy lips open. And it’s like if you stared at the sun for too long, seen Jesus rise from the tomb— your pink insides, glistening with his cum and your shining slick.

“Stay there.” And then you hear his footsteps going away and the door to the garage that’s connected to the house, close.

“Daddy, I don’t- I can’t-“ you stumble over words, but there no immediate response. In fact there’s no response at all. Just the sound of the breeze, music low from when Simon turned it down, cars passing in the distance, you can’t even hear the tv in the living room. It’s silent— like he’s gone.

And you wrack your brain, your eyes start to glisten— what if he’s gone and he doesn’t come back? What if your left here and someone comes and sees you in this state?

The embarrassment builds, worry, you’re scared— “Daddy! I can’t do this anymore- please! I’m sorry!” You keen, still unmoving, just in case he changed his mind. He’d come for you. You wanted to be good.

And then, you hear the sound of a car pulling up. Not passing, it’s coming through the paved brush, and soon it’ll come up go the house. They’ll get out for car—

Someone’s gonna see you like this, your skirt god knows where, heels in two different places while you were a disheveled, stupid and fucked out mess. You plop down on the ground, your hands in your lap, one hiccup comes out— and right on queue, the garage door comes down. The dam breaks open.

The delivery driver doesn’t see you. He goes straight to the front door. Your favorite food in hand because the blonde knows his sweet girl needs a treat after this punishment—

“Everything alright sir?” The delivery driver asks.

“My kids just ‘avin a little cry,” no a big one, your sobs were echoing loudly. Even to where they stood. The delivery man gave an understanding nod and went about his way. Ghost placed the food down on one of the end tables and immediately went to you.

You feel arms wrap around you, pulling you close. You try to shove them away but he holds onto you tighter. Snaps in your face and you finally open your puffy eyes. Lashes clunked together as you struggle to look at the big man holding you’.

“Fuckin ‘ell, hey look at me, look at me,” and he turns your head to look at him, “I’m right ‘ere. Daddy’s right here.” Simon lifts you holds you against his firm chest.

“Y-youuu, left Daddy. You left!” You get out through your hiccups and ragged voice. Clutching onto his shirt.

“Just like you did to me last night, right? Dad doesn’t like when you go runnin off like that, do I?”

“No sir, ‘m sorry. I wasn’t good- I was bad.”

Simon brushes your curls back, planting a soft kiss to your cheek, coaxing you, “You just made a mistake ‘s all. It’s okay. You’re okay. You learned your lesson.”

Your concept of time is off, you don’t even realize Ghost has now put you on the bed, gently placing you on all fours, he rubs the fat of your ass, down to your thighs. Then angles himself to your hole, “Gonna let you cum once, okay? Did fuckin perfect for your Daddy, gotta treat you.”

Ghost sinks into your heat, deep, snug— just as he molded you pretty cunt. Ghost is slow this time. Immediately thrusting into your g-spot, the sound of your thighs clapping against each other bounces off the walls. You mewl, arching your back further into him. Drool starts forming down your mouth and Simon wipes it, just before covering your mouth.

“Shhhhh, just feel it kitty. You got it. S’okay.”

You can’t breath— you try through to through your nose but it’s not helping going straight to your brain. It makes you dizzy, while you moan out Simons name in muffled cries while he drives you further and further to the brink of your first orgasm of the night.

Simon gives you one last thrust, and that’s what it takes for you to unravel around him. And it’s fucking euphoric, earth shattering. Life changing. You let out a scream, muffled by Simons hand. Your gooey walls gripping onto his cock. The man finally lets you go and you fall against the mattress, chest heaving up and down, as your legs shake, tears drops falling against the sheets. Simon kisses your scalp as you shake, he mumbles, “Did so good for me doll. Took your punishment so well. Knew you could, so proud of you.”

You hiccup, eyes finding him as he slowly slides out from you. Throwing his pants on and then going over to the pile of stuffed animals you had on the floor. He lifts your two go to’s. A Miffy rabbit or the stuffed stripped tiger.

“Miffy or George?” And you sniffle, eyes slowly blinking at the two objects he’s holding out.

You point, “G-eorge.” Your voice is shot for sure. Ghost would worry about that later.

“Yeah? Fuckin good choice kitty.” He hands you the stuffed animal. Kissing your full lips, once, twice.

“Gonna clean you up, alright? Go to sleep, Daddy’s got you.”

Your eyes flutter shut, cuddling onto George tight, “Okay Daddy.”

a/n: if you ever wonder why it takes me so long to do requests. This is why. I do it for the plot. I need plot. Istg I’m writing it, I just gotta have the vision and proper inspo. This was fun to write tho. Luv you babes lots.

most recent masterlist more meanie!simon.

𝔱𝔞𝔤𝔩𝔦𝔰𝔱<3: @bruisedfig @tessakate @sevikasblackgf @mocha-the-muse @mims900

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