#I just feel so desperate for socialization

[starkeyslibrary]

FALLING OUT OF FRAME | Part 2

pairing: you x drew starkey

The morning sun filtered through the curtains, casting golden light across your shared bedroom. You stirred awake to the sound of Drew shuffling around the room, already half-dressed for his next press obligation. His movements were quick, almost practiced, as he buttoned his shirt and grabbed his watch from the nightstand.

“Morning, sleepyhead,” Drew’s voice was soft, a gentle whisper as he leaned over to kiss your forehead. He was already in work mode, his hair still damp from the shower, and you could smell the faint scent of his cologne. His presence should have been comforting, but today, it just felt distant.

“Morning,” you mumbled, rubbing your eyes and adjusting the blanket to wrap yourself tighter. You didn’t feel like facing the day. The night before had been difficult enough, and you didn’t know how to move forward from it. “What’s on the schedule today?”

“More interviews,” Drew said, running his hand through his damp hair. “Odessa and I are doing a segment for some morning show. Same old PR stuff.”

You nodded, your throat tightening, trying not to let your discomfort show. You had gotten used to this routine – being around Drew when the cameras were on, the endless interviews, the flashes, the constant attention. But this time, something about the way he said her name made it feel different. More real.

“You’ll do great,” you said, forcing a smile that didn’t quite reach your eyes.

Drew’s gaze softened, but there was a hint of concern in his eyes. “Are you okay?” he asked, his voice gentle.

“Yeah,” you replied quickly, but it was too fast. You knew it didn’t sound convincing.

Drew nodded but didn’t press further. He bent down and kissed you on the cheek. “I’ll be back soon.”

The day dragged on. You couldn’t focus, your thoughts a whirlwind of insecurity and doubt. You found yourself staring at your phone every few minutes, waiting for Drew to check in. But nothing. He was busy with the press tour, and every update you saw on social media made things worse.

Drew and Odessa. Odessa and Drew. Their names were all over the internet. You could almost feel the heat radiating from your phone screen as you scrolled through the clips from that morning’s interview.

In the clip, they looked so natural together, so comfortable. Drew’s easy laughter filled the air as Odessa leaned into him, her hand brushing his arm in what seemed like a casual, innocent gesture. But you knew better. This wasn’t just a movie press tour. This was a carefully crafted performance.

Still, it didn’t stop the pit in your stomach from growing.

“Working with Drew has been amazing,” Odessa said in the clip, her voice light, playful. “He’s so talented, and we just clicked instantly.”

Drew’s smile was warm, maybe too warm. “Yeah, Odessa makes it easy. She’s incredible,” he added, his eyes never leaving her face.

The host leaned forward with a teasing smile. “I can tell. You two have such great chemistry. Think the fans will start shipping you together?”

Odessa glanced at Drew, her eyes sparkling. “Maybe,” she said with a flirtatious tone. “But we’re just having fun. Giving the people what they want.”

The camera zoomed in on them, capturing the moment when Drew’s fingers brushed Odessa’s hand. You could feel your heart sinking, the jealousy and pain too raw to ignore.

The comments started flooding in within minutes:

@/user9819837: “I ship them SO hard! They’re adorable!”

@/lover987756: “Move over Y/N, #Dressa is the new endgame.”

@/user3012002039: “Their chemistry is off the charts.. bet it’s not just acting 😉”

You didn’t even realize you were crying until you felt the wetness on your cheek.

You tried to push the feelings away, focusing on something – anything – else. But the restlessness in your chest wouldn’t let up. Finally, you texted your best friend, Madelyn, desperate for someone who understood.

You: I don’t know what to do anymore. I saw the interview today. I can’t shake the feeling that something’s off. I feel like I’m invisible to him.

The reply came almost instantly.

Madelyn: I’m sorry you’re going through this. I get it, I really do. Maybe it’s just the PR stuff? They’re working, you know? But I know it’s tough. Have you talked to him about it?

You stared at the screen for a moment. How could you talk to Drew about this? Every time you tried, he dismissed your concerns as if they didn’t matter. As if this was just part of his job, and you needed to accept it.

You: I’ve tried, it’s like he doesn’t get how much it hurts to see him with her, even if it’s all fake. I don’t know if I can take it.

You stared at the text, hoping Madelyn would have something better to say. Instead, she was blunt, but kind.

Madelyn: I know you’re hurting, but you’ve got to be honest with him. He’s not going to change if he doesn’t know what you’re going through. You have to talk to him. For you.

By the time Drew came home, the tension between you was unbearable. You hadn’t spoken since the morning, and when Drew walked in, it was clear that something was off. But before you could say anything, he dropped his bag and ran his fingers through his hair, looking exhausted.

“Hey,” he said softly. “I’m gonna head out with the guys tonight. Some of the crew from Outer Banks are getting together. I’ve gotta keep up appearances.”

You stared at him, not sure what to say. He seemed so distant, like the space between you had grown too  large to bridge. You nodded, trying not to let your frustration show.

“I’ll be fine,” you said, even though it was the farthest thing from the truth. You didn’t want to spend another night alone, so you texted the girls group chat.

You: “Hey want to come over tonight? I need some company.”

Madelyn: “Of course! I’ll be there in 20 minutes.”

Madison: “Count me and Carlacia in! She is riding with me <3”

You were relieved when your friends arrived – Madelyn, Madison and a few others. They could tell something was wrong. As soon as they stepped inside, Madelyn pulled you aside.

“What’s going on? You look like you’ve been through hell.”

You didn’t want to break down in front of them, but the words tumbled out before you could step them.

“I don’t know how much longer I can do this, Maddie. The way Drew is with Odessa… it feels like he’s slipping away, and I’m powerless to stop it.”

Madelyn sat down beside you, rubbing your back comfortingly. “You’re not powerless, Y/N. He’s just – caught up in the PR stuff. But you have to talk to him about it.”

“I’ve tried,” you whispered, your eyes filling with tears. “I don’t know how much more of this I can take.”

The night passed in a blur of laughter and distractions, but the moment your friends left, everything came rushing back. You grabbed your phone to check for messages, hoping for something from Drew, but instead you were met with the flashing headlines on your feed.

“Drew Starkey and Odessa A’Zion Together Again – The ‘Dresda’ Romance Heats Up!”

You clicked on the article, your heart sinking when you saw the photos. Drew and Odessa walking together in the city at night. Their hands were brushing, and there was an intimacy between them you hadn’t seen between you and Drew in weeks. The photos made it look effortless, like they were a couple – nothing about it screamed “PR stunt.”

You felt your world crumble around you as the images loaded, one after another. Drew’s smile was wide and genuine, a stark contrast to the forced, stiff smiles he’d been giving you lately. Odessa was laughing, her head tilted back, looking up at him with that same spark you’d seen in their interviews. They looked perfect together.

Tears welled up in your eyes as the last of the photos appeared on the screen – Drew and Odessa stopped at a café, sitting so close their legs brushed. You swiped through the photos again, then again, hoping at the next swipe would somehow make it stop. But it didn’t.

Your heart ached in a way you couldn’t put into words. Drew was supposed to be your person. But now? It felt like he had chosen someone else – someone who wasn’t you.

The room spun as you tried to steady your breath. You curled up into yourself, feeling the weight of everything press down on you.

TAGLIST: @princesspeach124 @idiotussupremus @eitaababe @13tter @drewsephrry @drewstarkeyzwhore @cooper8224 @maybankslover @elyseesarchive @ietss @esquivelbianca @josephandrewstarkey @willowpains @wtfdudesblog

[netherfeildren]

Busy, Dying. Part 2;

Pairing: Joel Miller x F!Reader

Summary: In an in-between place called his life, Joel Miller is alone. In search of a cure. In need of a miracle. In want of God.

Can I interest you in a cure for loneliness? She'd asked him in a language without words. Taking it is the easy part. Letting her go is impossible.

-OR-

an a/b/o soulmates AU

Rating: Explicit 18+

Content Warnings: No Outbreak AU, Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Soulmates AU, Infidelity, Cheating, They're behaving badly and doing things they shouldn't be doing idk, HEA!!!!!, Angst, Fluff & Smut, Scenting, Angst with a Happy Ending, Group Therapy, Social Experiments, Explicit Sexual Content, Dom/sub Undertones, Complicated family dynamics, Discussions of self harm, Depression, Existential Angst, He’s a loser your honor!!!

Word Count: 6.3K

Read on AO3

Part 2;

It is your own conspiracy that if you say the words three times in the mirror—I am so alone I am so alone I am so alone—the feeling will go away. Banished ghost. 

You commit yourself to this practice religiously for three weeks before you feel you must absolutely return to the meetings held in the basement of the Emmanuel Episcopal Church or you might just die. 

The first Friday back, you watch him. He blunders around the crowd, struggling to find a seat when he rushes in late that evening, trying to sit as far away from you as possible and, to his great misfortune, ending up right behind you. Squashed between two old ladies, his big body comically trying to fold itself into the tight rows. You laugh at him the whole way through the meeting. 

He’s like a raging bull after that. Scowly and unapproachable as the omegas in the group inevitably make their meager attempts to talk to him. It makes it all the more irreconcilable, a man like that here in a place like this—all the while with a wife at home. 

You wonder about her. 

“That one has a bad temper,” Maria warns as the two of you watch him. They seem to know each other in some way outside of this church, and it takes everything in you not to beg for details. “Big and hairy like a bad, lonely dog.”

You say, “I think he’s shy.” 

She watches you very peculiarly after that, and tells you, “You’re lost, girl. Joel Miller isn’t what you need finding you.”

But you know this, you assure her, and you continue to avoid him. 

The following Friday, he’s the one playing the disappearing act. The next week, as well—no show. You start to dread even your own shadow, wondering where he is, wondering if he’s ever coming back, if he has children and how old he is. Wondering if he wonders about you. Wondering why you’re so obsessed.

Too full of curiosity for your own good, you hover when he finally appears once again. Circling him and Maria, desperate for any sort of information. 

His wife had been sick, he says. He’d had to take her to the doctor. 

You wonder if her sickness might be his baby—sick to your stomach at the thought of it yourself. 

Finally, the week after, the two of you break your fast from one another. 

“You’ve been ignoring me,” he says, coming up from behind, ambushing you once again at the dessert and coffee trough. This is supposed to be a safe space, yet it feels anything but with him near. 

“No I haven’t.”

“You’re not supposed to tell lies in church. It’s a sin.”

“I don’t believe in sin.” You turn to face him, and your stomach hurts. 

He’s got on a dark green fisherman’s sweater—well worn but knit sturdy. A thing that looks as if it’s been his for years. 

You’re feeling thin-skinned and unable to face him today, and for no good reason. You don't know this man. You have no right to punish him with your silence, no right to be angry, to wonder about him. But that sternness from before, the one that looked too heavy for him to carry, has been wiped away from his face now, and in its place he only looks very earnest, like he really wants to talk to you. And it’s only that, well you don’t know him, yes, but you’d felt that you needed to, or that you would. That you were meant to find him in this place, and you’re angry at yourself and at him at how wrong you’d been, still even after all these weeks of radio silence while he’d been busy caring for his sick wife. 

“Me either,” he gives a small huff of laughter, shoving his fists into the pockets of his dark jeans. 

Setting the donut in your hand back on the table—rude and gross, but it’s an afterthought—you wipe your sweet sweaty palm against your hip, appetite all gone now. The basement is suddenly unbearably hot, your heart beating in your throat. 

“Anywho, I gotta run. Somewhere to be—” you mumble, brushing past him. There’s a sudden rush of itching heat burning its way up your chest, your throat, ants crawling over your scalp. The room is stifling, your limbs leaden and too many bodies; so many disgusting, clashing scents: pheromones, and desperation and such terrible loneliness, and him at the center of it, ambrosial.

You’ll have to recite your mantra more faithfully in the mirror every night, not a single miss. Remind yourself, I am so alone, so that the feeling might go away, and you’ll forget him and the way he smells and his eyes like amber green river stones, more quickly. 

“Whoah, hold on,” he calls after you, following to the exit and up the steps to the world outside of this church. You’d brought a coat today, unable to enjoy the cold the way you usually do, uncharacteristically chill, aching limbs, miserable in the biting morning air. He calls your name, and you clutch the wool against your chest, trying to hurry away from his much longer legs and pace as he catches up. 

Suddenly, though, you change your mind. Whirling around to look up, you stop your running, and he’s right there, so close. “I haven’t been ignoring you. You were gone.” Mind changing again, your gaze falls, unable to hold his eyes. You watch his left hand flex like he wants to do something with it. 

“I know. I’m sorry.”

A scoff. “What are you apologizing to me for?” 

“You’re the most interesting person I’ve ever met in my entire life.” He says it quietly by way of explanation, like another apology. 

“You must not have met very many interesting people.”

It feels hot and cold at the same time out here. Your stomach still hurts. Your eyes ache as if you could cry, which is ridiculous because you have absolutely no reason to cry. 

“Maybe not,” he says very low. It seems he’s drifting closer, like you’ll float away. A car honks its horn loudly somewhere in the background, and you still can’t look at his face. His own coat is clutched in his fist and now the honker is shouting too, expletives and God’s name being taken in vain. 

“You should go back in there,” you tip your chin at the depths you’d just fled from, stealing a quick glance at his face, “Find someone else who’s interesting.”

He grunts once, a wordless no and lifts his coat to drape it over your shoulders—you decide you’re even colder now, you don’t think you’ll ever be warm again—and takes yours from your listless grip, draping it over his elbow. 

This man. “Aren’t you here to get to know people?” You demand, finally looking up at him angrily. 

“No,” he shakes his head. “Let’s go for a walk.” His palm at your bicep urging you towards Arlington and the garden sends all sound skittering out of your ears. He reminds you of your earlier words, that he might like to walk, and you can hear yourself agreeing while you look up at the muted light of the late November afternoon leaching through the cloud cover. Through the wool and cotton you feel your skin sucking heat from that singular point of contact, warming you entirely.

It had been blisteringly cold last night, the alluring taste of incumbent winter in the air, and a vicious frost had ermined all the tree trunks within the Boston Public Garden, roughened the surface of the grass. 

Joel chooses a quiet spot by the pond, the willow weeps above your head and all around the two of you the sharp autumn air is lightly laced with the fragrance of leaf rot. An elderly couple floats serenely in a lone swan boat at the center of the pond, not a ripple in the surface, as if they weren’t really there. 

Helping you to sit, he gently pulls his coat from your shoulders, laying the garment for you to rest on protected from the frigid ground and carefully looping your arms through your own coat now, he pulls the excess fabric of his up, draped over your shoulders once again, leaving you securely enveloped from the cold. 

“Here, let me help you,” he says, and the sudden gentleness in his voice makes you want to burst into tears. His character, that of some matryoshkin sort, one embedded in another in another, never knowing which is the realest one, the truest one, which will come next. Angry snarling dog one day, a gentleness that burns the next. You have the sense that a person could know him for decades and still never reach the center, never cease to discover more. 

Sitting before you—you perch alone on the island of his given coat—he tilts his head, leaning back braced on thick arms to look up at the swaying vines with just an impression of brilliant yellow-green, as if that were the color of the air. A sudden breeze stirs the softness of his hair, lifting a stubborn cowlick, and at that exact moment, the cloud cover parts on the face of the sun. In the brilliant shaft of buttered sunlight, his dark curls glint with specks of purest silver, leaving you wishing you could touch the fan of fine lines at the corner of his eyes, feel his age with your fingertips. 

“You’re angry with me,” he finally says, head still tilted towards the sky. You watch him very closely, learning. His voice is deep, quiet. He looks tired, the violet shadows beneath the brilliant hazel eyes. Still beautiful, the full, slightly sulky curve of his mouth surrounded by dark beard. He is everything, all of him, masculine. 

“It doesn’t matter.”

Finally, he looks at you, too. He’s got a big head, proportionate to his big body, that falls back heavily. You can’t help smiling at him, it feels too natural. 

“Now you’re honest.”

“I wouldn’t tell a lie here,” you say, and he sighs like you’re a supremely difficult little omega, too impossible to be reasoned with. But turning back to the sky, eyes closed now, there’s a smile across his mouth also, and you wish the two of you could sit here and laugh forever in this moment.

The silence between the two of you is marvelous enough to be unnerving. Settled beneath his great coat, you’d never believed you could feel the cold so little—learning every fine detail that makes up the man. Even inches away from him, he seems utterly unattainable, each of the two of you existing on your separate islands—you trace the woolen edge of his coat against the ground—some twenty years your senior and married. But the cold has given you such a feeling of grounding buoyancy. You’d awoken angry, miserable, so full of despair you would’ve been sick with it if it were possible. And now—you hadn’t felt this alive or awake in years, perhaps your entire life. He is a marvel, and there are bubbles in your head threatening to take you floating away, and yet, your feet are firmly melded to the ground in reality. 

How attractive, how delicious the prospect of intimacy is with someone who you know will never grant it. It fills you with something ferocious or hungry or snapping, something pathetic that makes you want it all the worse. And he, with a gravitational pull too strong to even think of escaping.

Yes. You hadn't felt so happy in years. 

“How old are you?” Breaking the silence, you ask him.

“Forty three.”

“You have a brother.” He nods. “I have one too.”

“Do you speak to yours? I don’t.”

“He calls me once a month. It’s all he can bear of me.”

“Mine won’t speak to me.” He sounds sad saying so. 

“Why not?”

“I hurt him. Scared him.”

“My brother, he says my whole life is papier-mâché. My values are all wrong, I’m a crowd-pleaser. It’s probably true.” You’d felt it impossible to better yourself, and yet still, you tried for him. “How did you hurt him?”

“You can’t change a man, only make him more secure. Depending on his character that may then bring happiness or strength or success. Tommy’s failure of this in me was more than he could bear, also.”

The willow becomes your confessional. “I spiked my own drink once just to see what it would be like. A doctor told me afterwards that I have self destructive tendencies. I want to hurt myself, but I don’t want to actually feel the hurt, which makes me all the more addicted to it. A supernumerary on the stage of my own life, too afraid of hurting and hungry for it at the same time.”

The heel of his left hand, you notice, is bearing down on an old acorn burr, and yet he seems not to feel the pain. 

He’s looking at you very intently now. Some glimmering streak in his eye. It almost looks aggressive, and a muscle flutters madly at the edge of his jaw. He straightens, sitting up to face you. The acorn burr is left flattened and disfigured in his wake.

“The last doctor I saw told me I was depressed. I never went back after.”

“Are you?”

He laughs surprisingly full of humor and then instantly serious again. “Probably. I’ve been watching my life, scratching at it trying to get in. I can’t. It’s right there.” The matryoshka shuffles, locked in his melancholy one moment, spilling brightness the next. 

You want to understand him so badly your hands shake with it. 

“What’s your favorite thing about your work?” You ask him. 

Where does his wife think he is right now?

“That’s a nice question. Maybe…” he thinks a moment, “Getting to make things that’ll go in people’s homes. The idea that something that came from me will be surrounded by a family.”

You can’t help yourself. “Why aren’t you at home?” You ask him imploringly, unbearably sad for him, sick with need, desperate to understand what it is he’s doing here, and all at once, utterly certain of what it is you are. “Don’t you love your wife?” The question is posed with no bravery, and yet it still comes out into the world demanding. 

He clicks his tongue, taken aback, a shocked breath, maybe even a small, reproving smile. A hundred different emotions coming to life across his face in that single moment. 

“I don’t know,” he finally answers. “I remember loving her. Maybe. At best? She’s a stranger. At worst? An excuse?” But he says it like a question. He’s asking you, not telling, for he isn’t even sure of it himself. You’ve caught him off guard. 

“No…” the click of his tongue snapping you to attention, “That's too generous. We’re trapped in a box together, but completely strange to one another.” It suddenly feels like he shouldn’t be telling you this—about her. You’re sure he shouldn’t be. 

“Do you hate each other?” You ask anyway. There’s something…your only example of love and marriage being two people who had always hated one another and filled the home where their children lived with more hate. It’s difficult to fathom something different than what that had looked like. 

If you were truly brave, you’d ask if he has children, too. 

“No,” he says immediately, a non option, his brow furrowed. “That would take too much effort.” 

Now you understand. He’s alone anyways. The feeling of urgency within you mounts. You’re frightened by this moment of discovery. 

“You’re Southern. Your accent…” You can’t discuss this anymore, needing to change the subject. 

“Texas.”

“When did you leave?”

“Long time ago.”

“Do you miss it?”

At his, he laughs like the question is ironic. “No. Where are you from?”

“Sometimes it feels like I can’t even remember.”

And as if he’d pulled the feeling straight from your mouth, he tells you that he understands what that’s like, and you can’t help it when you reach for his hand, being as careful with him as you would any shy creature, needing to hold him. 

-

“I’ve never been in love,” you tell him, childish look of recklessness and valor coming across your face as you pick up on the earlier thread of conversation you’d frightened yourself with. “It seems too daring, even grotesque.” 

He thinks he wants to capture that look in a bottle and take it everywhere with him. His entire body throbs with a heartbeat and the shape of your hand fits his as if every joint and muscle and soft ligament had been specifically designed for him to hold, filled suddenly with a terrible sense of foreboding. Looking at you, one just knows there’ll be a broken heart. 

Your small thumb smooths gently over his large one, and he marvels that such an exquisite creature would touch him. God, but you’re beautiful. Your touch, soft and enticing and painful all at once. No one had ever been so gentle with him.

“Won’t you tell me a secret?” You beg.

He will. He might give you anything in this moment. In the weeks he’d been kept away, he’d desperately counted the days and minutes until he could return to that place of worship and honesty. 

“I think about you,” voice hushed, the shaking of the leaves not loud enough to mask the soft breath you suck in as he gives you his confession. He maps the architecture of the small hands in his grasp, fingers tracing fingers, uncured clay fragile before the heat. He feels tired and strangely spent, almost drunk on your touch. His thumb slides upwards, marveling at the softness of your wrist, and then there, beneath the shivering distraction of your pulse and his disturbing search, the unlocked fragrance of your scent gland. It drifts towards him slowly like smoke rising from sleep.  

The air seems to pulse between the two of you with heat and premonition. That singular moment before everything goes terribly wrong, he can see it in your eyes. Such vibrancy, excitement, recklessness turned danger. 

“We should…” you feel him begin to pull away, grappling to hold on to the moment and his hand, “We should fuck.” He takes himself back, letting you go. Where else was this being led?

He cringes away from you. “Excuse me?” 

“Sex. You’ve had it before.” His mind reels. His body’s reaction at hearing your mouth say these things, the way it shapes them, the soft, full lips wrapped around the words.  

Looking away, he watches the pond’s couple help each other out of the swan. In his periphery, he can see you begin to bristle at his silence. 

“Don’t be peevish. It’s unbecoming.” 

He can’t help feeling angry. “I’m not. I’m old enough to be your father.” And you laugh at him. You’re deviating paths now, going opposite ways and angry at one another for it. 

“We could pretend that—if that’s what you want,” you say, voice husky and seductive. A small palm smooths up his thigh and his gaze snaps fire at you, hand clamping painfully at your wrist, fingernails digging at your gland, disturbing more of that gorgeous scent into the air. 

You make a pained sound. He needs to leave. He needs to never see you again.

“Don’t be disgusting,” he shoots back, hot everywhere. 

“Don’t be a prude.” He flings your wrist away, and you cradle it against your chest as if he’d hurt you. The heat turns to guilt pulsing through his limbs. 

Warring to wounded then, your eyes. You wrap your fingers around your discarded wrist. “What if we lose everything? What if tomorrow’s the end of the world? What if we’re so thoroughly cured of our loneliness after all this is done, we never feel like we need another person this way again?” 

His muscles tense with the need to flee or attack, the thought of you needing him, of being needed in such a way—he’s like some creature coming upon its mate. 

Despite his age, he had never tried to truly seduce anyone. He had never truly wanted anyone. Not in any real and base sort of way. Desire for him had been a mute and ordinary thing. But he could have you now, turned into a thing he’d never been before, he could mount you and rut you into the dirt like an animal. Never so much a product of his designation as he feels in this instant. 

He can’t even form word, and your body seems to pulse against his with embarrassed heat and indignation. 

“Have you ever even fucked an omega?” You spit at him meanly. 

“We shouldn’t be talking about this.” Voice carefully restrained, each syllable off his tongue is measured with his tenuous control. 

“Tell me anyways,” you demand, shoving his coat off your shoulders being the thing that almost makes him lose it. 

“It’s cold. Put that back on.”

“Tell me.” And he shouldn’t. You should have no sway over him. No demand of his honesty or anything else that belongs to him.

“Once. Only because I wanted to know what it was like.” He’s man enough to admit to himself the embarrassment he feels telling you this.

But it seems to quell some tremor in your eyes, and you sit back, palm petting at your throat as if you’re trying to soothe yourself. 

“I’m sorry,” you say, gaze averted, glassy, delirious look there. “I’ve always gotten my feelings hurt easily. I’m—” you shake your head quickly, sucking on your lip. “...too sensitive. Sometimes I feel like I’ll float away if I don’t find anyone to hold me down.” 

He should tell you that you’re not, wants to, but the image of you weak and pinned beneath him churns in his mind. Whole body aching suddenly, needing his hands on you before he does something truly heinous—he straightens abruptly, abandoning your reassuring warmth. Feeling suddenly cold despite the sweat dotting his spine. 

Without another word he turns to leave you there, alone, while the swan pair watches from across the pond as the two of you part ways. 

The next morning he awakens stiff and burning, his cock a brand of heat against his stomach. And works his entire day in a static haze, lavender spots at the edge of his vision where all he can think about is how you smell and the way your hand feels in his. By five o’clock, his fingers ache, spasming painfully from gripping his tools too hard. Breaking his weeks-long habit, he decides to attend the Saturday night meeting, full of constrained energy and sullen moodiness. Reasoning that a pretty, young girl like you wouldn’t waste her weekend in the basement of a church abandoned by God. 

And is sick to his stomach with equal measures elation and dread when he spots you sitting amongst the crowd of metal folding chairs—wearing his coat. He doesn’t hesitate even a little when he claims the seat next to yours. 

The two of you sit in strained silence the entire meeting, the other alphas and omegas surrounding throwing alarmed and intrigued glances your way as the tension brews hotter and more frenzied. 

His body hurts. This is a painful kind of lust. 

He listens to the speakers tonight with only half an ear, instead, occupied with the memory of what you’d looked like the other week eating a jelly and cream filled donut, imagining what your mouth would look like smeared with his blood and come. He can smell your body, how hot and trembling nervous you are. So unlike all that blistering, innocent valor from yesterday. 

The omega with the cruel husband turned sick one is taking her turn again tonight. Now that he looks at her, she has hair that at one time was vibrant red, now turned a softened copper threaded through with white. Time is such a painful, slow thing, Joel thinks. 

“Have you ever been with someone you knew you were too good for?” The omega asks the room, while the one beside him begins to shake, knee jolting nervously.

You’re anxious, and it makes him angry that you should be made so by his actions. 

Too rough for forbearance, his palm clamps down tightly on your knee, holding it still, and you make some supplicant whimper at the back of your throat. Almost imperceptibly, you draw away from him, the line of your shoulders growing rigid, and a wild, irrational sense of loss steals his breath. 

He’s been so busy lately, distracted. He’s hungry, overstrained, anxious himself. He doesn’t mean to be brusque with you. He just can’t help himself. 

Would we be here if we had? Someone lost in the crowd pipes back. 

The woman laughs, she has a kind face. “Me either.” You shove his palm off your leg as if it burns. “But there was someone… once. A chance, maybe. Someone I didn’t choose but should have. We were friends. We came very close to being happy.” 

And he suddenly feels a wave of desolation so overwhelming wash over him. He turns to look at you, your vibrating profile, so pretty, and he’s gentle this time when he touches your knee. Just to feel you. How terrible, he thinks, to only come very close to being happy. 

The speaker changes, and then it’s Maria’s voice talking to them all. Joel still can’t look away from you as you, in turn, refuse to look at him. “Stop, Joel,” you whisper. But he can’t. 

“At the start of this, we usually discuss a second option for those of you who aren’t able to find what you’re looking for in this. Sometimes it’s not so simple,” Maria tells them. 

A miracle move on drug, she calls it. 

The group’s coalition is sponsored by a pharmaceutical company, one testing a cure for loneliness. Something they think of as pilled perfection, something to numb the pain of loss. Any emotional wound, now with the potential to be a thing of the past. The young omega handing out the pamphlets had promised an easy cure, it seems this is what he’d been referring to. And if the potential side effects included an inability to hold on to any sort of emotional attachment afterward, well, the encounter groups they’d targeted thus far were grateful for it in the end anyway. They were all alone after all. 

“It’ll help you let go of everything you can’t let go of,” Maria tells them. “Help make you forget. Help make you un-lonely. We’ll be holding a session Wednesday morning for anyone who’s interested in being part of the trial. Our sponsor company, Firefly, is very happy to welcome as many of you as possible.” 

Beside him, you whisper, “Only a coward would take that option. What a cheat.” He hesitates, perplexed and wounded by your words. 

“You’ll never have to grieve or miss something you can’t get back, ever again. I know that for many of you, this is the ultimate fantasy,” Maria says.

“I think it sounds like something to help let go. Like what I came here for.”

You exchange cards. Now it’s your turn, the wounded look. 

When Maria’s through, bidding the group goodnight and setting them all free to mingle, you’re up and out of your seat before he can get a word in. He watches you go as if he were some sort of abandoned lapdog, only for a second, before he’s once again, striding after you. 

You weave almost drunkenly through the crowd, first heading towards the exit, then to the beverage station, then correcting and veering towards the back hall where the restrooms and catechism classrooms are. 

Gaining on you, he takes you by the elbow, pushing you deep into the darkness of the long hallway. Going far enough the din of desperate socialization turns a quiet murmur. You’re really in the belly of the beast now. So quiet and dust infused it feels as if it’s been years since a soul stepped through here. 

“What’s wrong with you?” Your face glows with fevered sweat. 

“I’m sick,” you mumble on the tail end of a whine when he shakes your arm into responsive compliance. “Let me go. Stop,” you fight, trying to claw away from him.

“No you’re not.”

“Yes, I am. I threw up all night. And you have the personality of a snarling dog more than a man. Has anyone ever told you that?” Shoving at his chest now feebly.

Ignoring your caterwauling, he takes you in entirely. “You’re not sick,” he says again, sure now. 

There’s a timeless hunger gnawing at his gut. Joel suddenly feels more himself than he think he’s ever felt in his entire life. 

Dragging you high against his chest by the collar of his own coat, he brings the tip of his nose slowly to the valley of sweet fragrance at the side of your throat. Inhaling deeply at the flushed, swollen scent gland there. The sound of your toes scuffing against the floor excites him even more. 

“You’re not sick. You’re going into heat,” he says slowly; gathering the overwhelmed, shivering creature as gently as he can in his arms. 

Your fingers claw at his own throat in return, as if digging for his own answering scent. “No. But it’s not time. I had one not so long ago.” You sound on the verge of tears, and he makes a deep, soothing sound in his chest. “My blockers...I— I can’t be. It’s not time yet.”

“It’s a breakthrough heat.” His other hand comes around to the small of your back and ever so slowly, he presses your hips closer to his. “It’s mine. Because of me.”

“No.” You shove back with renewed strength suddenly, spinning around to scurry deeper down the dark hall and then careening on weak legs into an abandoned classroom. 

Heart beating madly at the prospect of the hunt, he takes a singular calming breath before he’s prowling after the sound of your crying. 

-

“You need to not run from me right now. It’ll make my rut come faster,” his deep voice comes from somewhere in the dark unknown. 

You scramble around the children’s desks, weaving your way clumsy with disorientation to the far end of the classroom. You don’t want to go into heat right now. You can’t. Not with him. You need to be safe and alone in the confines of your warm, comfortable bedroom, far away from the temptation of him.

His heavy, panting breath sounds closer and there’s a shriek in your throat like a struggling kitten. 

“You want me to lose my self control. That’s what this is, isn’t it?” There’s a loud crash as he shoves one of the little desks out of his way, followed by your answering shriek. And then he’s here, coming up behind you but finding mercy enough to hold himself back at the last moment, panting as if he’d just run miles fighting against himself. 

“I’m sorry,” he says. “I’m sorry. Come here, baby. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to scare you. It’s okay.” He takes a step closer, and the slowing of his breath and soothe of his voice calms you in turn. “You’re only going into heat, that’s all, sweet girl. I’ve triggered it for you and I’m sorry. Let me come to you.”

You let out a high and harried sound, palm smoothing over your throat over and over again. “Joel,” you say once.

“I’m here. It’s okay.”

“It’s only that—”

“What is it?”

“I have to tell you something.”

“Tell me.”

“I’m embarrassed.” A helpless tear spills out over the edge of your eyelid. 

“You’ve nothing to be embarrassed about with me. Ever. We understand each other, you and I. Don’t we?”

And he’s right of course. You’d picked his face out of the crowd in instant recognition, after all. “I’ve had heats…but I’ve never—never had a, a heat with someone. With an alpha.” 

He’s utterly silent and you feel deranged enough you’re almost certain you can hear the pound of his heart inside his chest.

“You’ve never had a knot take your cunt?”

“No.” You swallow. “Never.”

You hear a muttered fuck, and his breathing goes quick and shallow and then even again. He has better control over himself than you do at this moment. 

“Then how?”

You flush full of heat, embarrassed. “T—toys,” you stutter. “Medication to help ease it.”

When he steps closer, only calm accompanies him. All is suddenly quiet. You want him. Your disjointed mind, overwhelmed by too many confusing emotions had gone into overdrive for a moment, but now, with the scent of hot, aggravated alpha surrounding you, it’s obvious this was all you’d needed to calm down. 

You can feel his hot breath against your forehead, the wash of heat on each exhale and the lingering scent of sweet musk at his inhale. You touch his cheek with shaking fingers and feel him turn ever so slightly into your palm, and then he’s bending slowly. 

First, it’s a soft, wet nudge of his mouth, your bodies held apart. Then his strong nose bumping into the side of yours, the splendor of inexperience turning to knowing, a nuzzle. Coming in again hungry, with the slick of tongue now, and the deep inhale of shock at first taste. Your breaths rush through one another, and you feel yourself backing away in maybe fear, more likely overwhelm, but his mouth follows your retreat and then his palms are at your waist, tugging you into himself, pressing you tightly to his body with a ragged groan. 

“Your mouth…Your mouth is so beautiful,” he says.

Everything in your lower belly cramps in painful agony, and you scratch at his arms and neck without much strength, trying to climb higher and take more of him into your mouth. Oh, you want this so badly. You want it to be everything you’ve dreamed of so obsessively the past weeks. Nothing else in the world exists except for your two mouths pressed together.

His lips burn a wet path across your cheekbone, sliding to the side of your neck to suckle at your scent gland. “Fuck.” His scraped teeth along the patch of sensitive skin. “Have you had sex before?” The question is gentle, understanding, his tongue tasting your sensitive earlobe, head ducking suddenly to give a sharp bite at your breast. 

“Yes.” His erection is pressed firm at your belly, hot even through his jeans and your sweater. His large body radiates heat. At your back, his palm finds the edge of your top, sliding underneath to make first contact, blistering skin against blistering skin. 

“But not an alpha.” He says it smugly, the bastard. Palm sliding down to your rump, tucking you more tightly against his hard cock. You shake your head at the crook of his neck, fingertips twisting in the back of his hair. Your breath comes in wet little pants that sound too pathetic to bear. 

“It’s going to feel so good,” he promises, rubbing slow circles low on your back with that wide, strong palm. “It’s different. It’s…” That palm slides lower, squeezees the curve of your ass. “It’s ordinary if it isn’t with someone…special. If there’s not the possibility of—” 

You tell him you understand what he’s trying to say. 

“I think it’ll be so good between us,” he finishes. 

At the waist of your skirt, his fingers press between your skin and the stretch of your tights, forcing his large hand into their confines. Your breath skips into his open mouth, panting into one another he cups you between your legs and suddenly all you can focus on is the tight ache there, the nylon soaked obscenely between your thighs. His arm around your back squeezes you tighter to his chest and his fingertips are pushing past lace edge to feel the slick swell of wet cunt. 

“Oh, Joel. Not here,” you moan. “Someone will come in.” He’s circling your clit, so sensitive and so swollen it hurts. You tug him impossibly closer, and he presses you back into the cold stone wall. “We can’t in a church.” Your protestations sound weak even to your own ears as you spread your legs wider for him. 

“I don’t give a fuck.”

He takes your mouth again, sucking deeply, groaning even deeper when he presses inside of you to the first knuckle. “Tight, baby,” he breathes into your neck, his hips slowly grinding into your pelvis. 

He feeds you more, then presses a second finger, holding still for a second, then another. Panting like a rabbit caught in a trap with three of his too thick fingers stuffed in your overstretched cunt. The sound of popping seams moves up your spine. 

“Can feel your little cunt shaking around me. Jesus—” he groans. It’s all mine, whispered into your hair. 

Suddenly, there’s the open and close of a door nearby. And then the sound of someone’s voice calling your names. Joel huddles you further into the dark corner, confined by the protection of his body, his fingers still moving in and out of you, stretching you well enough to burn as he presses as deeply as he can and with the utmost gentleness, pets lightly at the painfully sensitive mouth of your cervix. Humming in satisfaction at the feel of you. 

“Right there?” He hums. 

You’re crying, clutching at him even more tightly. Your name sounds again, being searched for, like a warning. 

“If I fuck you, nobody else ever will.” His voice is so dark it’s menacing. It’s recklessness, verging on a lie. Maybe it’s hope. 

Pressing lightly again, petting, petting, he pulls his fingers back a little, the loud sucking sound of your cunt trying to hold onto him, and you’re coming for him, crying into his neck, sucking on his scent gland so that the taste of him floods your mouth. The sound of a door opening, and you hear him growl at someone to fuck off in a very scary voice, his fingers never ceasing their steady thrust inside of your clenching pussy, and the frightened slam of a door. 

“It’s alright. You’re alright. That’s my good girl,” he pets and soothes at you, pressing a kiss to your temple, your eyelids, your mouth again and again.

Part 3;

Netherfeildren's Masterlist

Updates Blog

[xskyll]

Quirkless Deku AU in which, after All Might tells Izuku he can't be a hero, Izuku takes the words to heart and decides to completely cut heroics out of his life, so he isn't reminded of his failed dream. He doesn't have any social media and doesn't read news articles about heroes. If a hero is mentioned on tv, he turns it off. He buys the same, non-sponsored groceries all the time, and he forks out the extra money to go ad-free on things like YouTube, so he never sees them in commercials. We know he's a thorough person, and he applies those skills, avoiding heroes to an impressive extent and just focusing on whatever new career path he set his eyes on (Maybe botany? But this isn't just like, basic flower shop AU. He's super smart, so my boy is probably breeding award-winning new species of orchids or some shit.)

As such, he ends up being probably the only person in Japan who has never heard of Todoroki Shouto.

They have some sort of meet-cute, and at first, Shouto can't figure out why this guy is pretending not to know who he is (is he trying to be polite, pretending Shouto is normal??), but eventually he realizes Izuku legitimately has no clue who he is, and Shouto is soooo enamoured, because Izuku is so nice and seems genuinely interested in him, and for the first time, Shouto knows it's all sincere and not someone trying to get close to him because he's famous. He becomes desperate to keep his profession a secret, leading to some comically close calls. But the longer it goes, the harder he falls, and Momo keeps insisting he has to tell Izuku the truth because he can't enter a serious relationship with this huge lie between them. But just when he's about to fess up, something happens that makes it clear to him that Izuku isn't just out of touch with popular culture, he is /actively/ avoiding heroes and dislikes hearing about them, which makes Shouto think he'll stop talking to him, and he doesn't know what to do, and now Jirou is helping Momo scold him, and he's so stressed.

Of course, the boys don't realize they know someone in common. Bakugou somehow lets the cat out of the bag, not knowing Shouto was keeping his heroics a secret. (Back to botany...maybe instead of orchids, Izu specializes in poisonous plants? And a new poison is involved in some sort of crime, and the police want him on as a consult, and Bakugou ends up involved on the heroics end of things, leading to a reunion with Izuku who he hasn't seen since middle school. Somehow Shouto comes up in conversation while they're working on the case.)

And then it all goes to shit, Idk what happens next. Izuku is more upset about being lied to than Shouto being a hero, and Shouto has to prove he wasn't just messing around. I feel like there's a scene in there where Izuku cries on his mom's lap, and Shouto gets an earful from her. They make up, of course, and start dating. Since this is one of my ideas, they probably get married in the epilogue.

[breathofmyown]

Thanks to the convenient timing of a global pandemic, it was a few years after starting my transition before I was able to start going out to social events again. And I don't know, I guess I had kinda built up this idea in my mind that maybe this had finally fixed me. That I'll go out there, and I'll be so much happier and more confident as a woman that this social interaction business will finally be easier and people will like me.

Turns out I'm still the same person, just happier and with bangin tits. So it still feels like I'm desperately trying to hold up this too thin mask. And the moment I slip up people recoil in uncanny valley revulsion as they glimpse that I'm not actually a person. Just a thing that's cobbled together a little disguise after watching real people for decades.

what do you mean you can't write an email you can't even talk on the phone kids these days not even saying trick or treat you should enjoy small talk you should be at the club don't explain the joke piss on the poor reading comprehension these losers who only like children's media you should just quit your problematic special interest accessibility isn't about your sensory issues just wear ear protection and you'll be fine you have to go out and socialise every weekend pathetic virgins versus chads these neurodivergents never wash their asses oops I just mean white people you're using it as an excuse oops I just mean low support needs people I hate neurodivergent people oops I just mean able-bodied people kill yourself touch grass get therapy

autism website my ass

[coralchoral]

honestly thinking about the sonadow twitter takeover and how the plummeting to earth thing very much affected Sonic a lot more than it affected Shadow. like in a previous takeover Shadow even made it a positive memory about Sonic trying to save him.

Meanwhile in Prime, Sonic has a moment of saving Shadow from falling into the void that's very reminiscent of that other fall (in the same way Prime has a lot of motivations and references that only make sense from a fandom insider perspective).

Sonic also gets repeatedly tilted, loud and anxious, (which I'm pinning more on RCS's/whatever writer's sense of humor, as is all the voice acting gags) and is coping badly any time Shadow comes out ahead. I think Sonic's insistence on his ability to grow chest fur is as big a Cope as floaties=fashion statement.

But really, Sonic's repeat date suggestions and Shadow's own descriptions of Sonic's behavior (dragging out their races, etc "just to annoy me") reads, whether romantically or platonically, that Sonic just really wants to spend time with Shadow.

He feels he needs to justify it, though, insisting that he and Shadow have something other than occasionally getting in each other's way ("two sides of the same coin") (friendly competition being "why you keep me around-" seemed like odd wording to me).

Needing to make it meaningful, because that's what Shadow wants out of a relationship- Shadow /says/ he dislikes Sonic for being frivolous and inauthentic, that (for instance) his hugs don't mean anything, and that he doesn't want "(Sonic's) kind of hug."

Sonic really wants to spend time with Shadow because he's also intimately aware that that time is limited. Either Shadow's patience (and/or social battery) is limited and he's liable to make a batman exit if he doesn't want to be somewhere (not that we've ever seen Shadow do this in canon, he seems to awkwardly/quietly hang around as if he doesn't realize he can just hit the bricks (or he likes being there and has no idea how to express it re: smiling at Big the Cat) ), Or Sonic and Shadow will get caught up in their own lives again and not see each other until Fate Deigns to Allow Them to Cross Paths Once More.

And Sonic misses him.

(This ties in with my Sonic Frontiers is the Saddest Game Ever posting from a while back, too. Sonic is lonely AF and Needs Other People to Talk To or he'll start talking to the walls and robots, and Shadow will almost always either talk back or groan in exasperation, which is as good a reaction as any.)

All this, plus Sonic's opinion flip-flops (shopping with Amy vs shopping with Shadow, opinion on Orbot) could be either (Sonadow Optimist) Sonic is Down Bad and not even conscious of his mirroring Shadow/trying to appeal to Shadow, or (Sonadow/overall Pessimist) Sonic trying to appeal to the Most Popular Character Right Now and getting increasingly desperate as he is rebuffed.

A few of these Twitter Takeovers have had moments of Sonic in particular getting thrown off and not really able to recover. (which makes me question what the writing is like, if there's any at all and these VA's aren't just riffing on an outline. Considering they don't talk over each other constantly, there must be something like a script, but it also does occasionally feel like a bad roleplay (and I've been a bad roleplayer).) It leads to a Something Is Wrong feeling in the "We're doing this for fun" question-answering joke show. Sonic needs therapy. (We all need therapy.)

Meanwhile, Shadow really is pulling out all the grunts, groans, and whines with Sonic that, if scripted, would be egregious as hell to read or write. He doesn't make these noises in the games (or shows, really?) mostly because there's a sort of efficiency necessary to production that cuts out that interpersonal realism and partly because it's annoying? Shadow, you're the annoying one?

Unrelated, everybody latched on to Sonic's "Go off, King" but nobody even noticed Shadow's "Deal With It."(sunglasses drop) How soon we forget the sacred texts and/or the deep magic, I guess? (It's an old meme, but it checks out!)

[guiltycorp]

Damn i really want to know tf happened in the writing room of arcane s2. Some of the downgrades were inevitable due to the show's corporate limitations (not being able to progress the class war story in a meaningful way, having to tie things back to league of legends in terms of making playable characters more appealing to well, play... rip Mel and Viktor in particular), sure. But i still feel like it's even worse than that? There are so many bad decisions that i couldn't even start listing them all... the characters, plot, pacing, themes, it's just such a mess? Even the dialogue writing, it feels much more mm Marvel at its worst i suppose. What i am most bothered by is probably just the straight up harmful messaging so um... Cycles of violence and abuse can be broken by individual decisions to become a better person! Got nothing to do with systemic oppression, living conditions, mental health issues, you can just conveniently ignore aaall the social context, live laugh love and then things get better automatically yep, oppressors famously stop oppressing you when you show them that you're harmless and won't put up a fight anymore. Literally three out of three suicidal characters dying to redeem themselves? Not even in a tragic/cathartic way but in a bittersweet 'they finally atoned for their mistakes' way? Groundbreaking lmao. Romantic relationship between Vi and Caitlyn including no communication about their biggest fight, just conveniently skipping to sex and getting back together - would have loved that if it was framed as the unhealthy fucked up thing that it is, skipping over Vi's hurt and her background to once again become a cop, her girlfriend's direct underling at that (!) due to her not having any other support systems... But nope that was our cute lesbian romance wrapped up, a good thing all around, not concerning at all. Jayce telling Viktor that what he 'always admired about him' was his disability and his deadly disease (??? from a character who spent the whole s1 and first act of s2 desperately trying to help Viktor find a cure? sure) and that those imperfections don't need fixing, just wtf truly. Magic bullshit was also weird, some implications of 'natural magic is ok, but achieving that power through other means corrupts you into a crazy robot bitch or just wilts your trees i guess', but tbh it was written in such a weird and inconsistent way that we can skip this one... Yeah actually a lot of things were just such a mess that I feel silly pointing to specific moments or lines I didn't like, I mean duh, it barely makes sense as a story at all... I am happy we have s1 which comparatively was a masterpiece, and i also really enjoyed s2 act1, i truly believed it would lead somewhere good at the time, my mind still kind of cuts off the story at that point when i think about it, that WAS the open ending of the show to me (is it possible that there were rewrites? targeting act 2 and 3? idk, wishful thinking perhaps). Despite my extremely negative feelings about this season's conclusion i remain glad that so many people appreciate the show regardless, it is clear that there was STILL a lot of love in the process of its creation (although i'd argue that even some of the visual aspects of the show suffered in quality, once again i have to wonder about behind the scenes mood of it all) and i get very upset when i see creatives online despairing over reception of their projects even when i'm absolutely in the disgruntled crowd hahaha... ...however yeah, this wasn't great In a world that increasingly grows more and more right-wing politically... we really needed something different i think.

[stylestarkey]

TWO DOORS DOWN │ 02

𐙚 a rafe cameron social media au

pairings — famous!rafe X pogue!femaleOC (f.c christina nadin)

summary — IN WHICH the cameron siblings turn to social media in a desperate attempt to track their childhood neighbour, who also turns out to be a huge fan of sarah.

warnings — swearing!

navigation — masterlist 01 02

liked by cleoanderson, kiecarrera and 105 others

elynajavier i searched every corner of my house to find this photo … this you? @/rafecameron

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cleoanderson rafe does not look happy ↳ kiecarrera i mean ... she did bite him constantly ↳ elynajavier guys i was 4

popeheyward  poor boy actually looks miserable and it’s all your fault ↳  elynajavier you guys are seriously gonna make me feel bad 4ever

jjmaybank  can you find my mom too  ↳  elynajavier  … ↳  kiecarrera  … ↳  cleoanderson  … ↳  popeheyward  …

user1  holy shit THATS RAFE

user2  SOMEONE SEND THIS TO CAMERONUPDATES RIGHT NOW

liked by justkelce, rafecameron and 26,140 others

cameronupdates UNSEEN PHOTO OF RAFE FROM 2008!

photo credits: @/elynajavier

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user1  i did not even exist in 2008

user2  so this is the girl?

user3  i want to squish rafe 

user4  i can’t believe we found the girl they were looking for!

user5  RAFE LIKED OMGJDNBDJNGFX

note 𐙚 — i honestly didn't think you guys would read this at all so thank you thank you x3904905!! 😭 part 3 is also finished, i just need to edit a few things but thank you again for the support <3 - H <3

[skzaholix]

LOVE han jisung x reader w. maybe a little cringy but what is good love without cringe, this is gonna be a wilddd trip, jisungs mother isn't it... , lovesick!jisung gen. angst, fluff , starcrossed lovers sum. your world suddenly comes crumbling down when your lover feels as though you don't want him as much as he wants you so you choose to prove him that it isn't true. count. 2.8k

"they're a disgrace, jisung. do you want to love a disgrace?" the words replayed in your head as you sat rushed out of the home, jisung following quickly.

You both knew of each others feelings for one another, you both knew of the circumstances you both stood in but that wouldn't stop him, neither should it stop you, could it?

" y/n wait , i know what she said back there is bad but-" he attempted to find an excuse for his mothers words yet his mouth ran dry at the thought of any.

you sigh, discouraged and tired as rain poured onto you in heavy bunches, an uncomfortable feeling at best. "jisung-"

"oh how i hate when you call me that." he yells over the loud patters, not bothering for safety as he runs faster, grabbing onto you.

"ji, i'm sorry but i think we should just stop trying... i mean, no one wants us together and no matter what we try it never works." you turn to look at him, the rain covering up whats meant to be tears

"we just have to try harder, love. and if not, i don't think their opinions matter at all." he says, worry in his eyes as he calculates the possible outcome of this

"no ji, you don't understand. you're not the one being berated everywhere because of your social classing" you pull your arm from his grasp, looking at him with a cold stare.

he had never seen you in such a light towards him, perhaps he deserved it but who would he be if not a fighter for something he truly held valuable.

"okay, you're right i'm sorry-" he said huffing out a breath.

"no you're not sorry, you're selfish." you stare at him, expression blank as tears continued to fall with each passing blink.

his expression changed from one of worry to one of desperation.

"I'm... selfish?" he asked, his eyes saddening as he frowned.

"yes! you force me into this stupid relationship when all i get is reprimanded so yes, you're selfish."

you truly didn't mean it. jisung was persistant, he'd fight for something no matter what but you were tired, endlessly being dehumanized at the hands of anyone with any superiority.

"I thought you wanted- I thought you liked me..." he breathed heavily, his mind racing with many thoughts as he tried to mask the hurt. It was scary, how well he'd done it though, his eyes now showing a cold glare.

"Fine. I don't even know why I bothered, got my clothes all soaked for nothing." He said, his stare intense on you before he walked back into his home almost robotically.

your heart hurt as you watched him walk back into his home but you knew maybe it was all for the better.

The campus cafeteria buzzed with loud chatter as everyone prepared for lunch. Jisung sat at a table across the cafeteria from you but yet his eyes never seemed to stop looking at you. You were reading a book, paying little to no attention to your food.

Felix stared at Jisung with concern before following his gaze. "you alright? why don't you just go over there and sit with them?" He said, waking Jisung from his trance. "We're.. not together anymore," he said quietly before felix looked at him with a look of sympathy.

"Oh... I'm sorry," he replied as the table for the two had gotten quiet, of course before seungmin ruined the silence.

"Why are you watching them like a hawk then?" Seungmin asked, sliding his tray of food next to Felix's, giving a blank stare despite his ruthless remark, earning a glare from felix.

"Don't they look a little bad? I mean- not bad just... like they've been through a breakup and are upset?" Jisung was down bad, feeding off delusions in his head to prove to him that what you said wasn't true.

"No, they look the-" Seungmin starts, only to be stopped by Felix.

"I'm sure they're just as hurt as you are hyung" Felix suggests causing Jisung to nod.

Truth be told, you were. You'd taken a lot of effort to even get out of bed today and get ready, not to mention the self torment and strain you had to endure even trying not to look his way, it was torture.

Hyunjin appears at the boys table, his eyes squinted as he looked at the faces around him. "What's going on?"

"He's going through a breakup." Seungmin says, pointing at Jisung before going back to chewing on his food.

"A breakup? I think I have a good idea for you to get over it" Hyunjin suggest, cleaning closer to Jisung who only pushes him away.

"I don't wanna get over it. I want them" He pouts, covering his face in mental torment.

" this isn't right for your mental, maybe you should try to move on..." Felix says, bringing a hand to pat the man on his head.

"Right. That's why I suggest you go out with Yunhee" Hyunjin says with a smile on his face as Jisung glares at him.

"What?"

"Cmon, she's has a crush on you. She has had for a long time. Its way better than unrequited love."

"Hyun, that would be unrequited love" Felix says to which Hyunjin shakes off.

"He can fall in love with her, you can't fall inlove again, everyone knows that." Hyunjin says as Jisung sighs deeply.

"If i do it, will you shut up?" he asked, his eyes bored as Hyunjin nods with a smile.

You felt maybe you were doing right and that as time moved on you'd only get better. Yet, the thing is that the heart wants what it wants and the feeling of being happy will only be there for but so long before you're longing that true happiness once more.

That's exactly how you felt as you watched Jisung walk down the hall with Yunhee, the same girl who's always had a 'crush' on Jisung.

Yunhee was a bit of a childish person, spoiled, bratty, but luckily for her, rich.

she was also your mortal enemy who took it upon herself, even now at her big age to want whatever you wanted, even the things she knew you couldn't have, for example, Jisung.

You knew she didn't like him, she and her friends would joke about it everyday, stealing him from you just to see you with nothing.

She was using him, using your jisung.

"Hey ynnie!" You heard a bright cheery voice behind you belonging to no other than Felix.

You turned around to look at him, a playful grin on your face. "Aren't you Jisung's friend now? I saw you sitting with him yesterday."

He tilted his head, pouting. "Can't a guy have friends? I feel like a child of divorce."

You roll your eyes. "Why is jisung with Yunhee?" You ask, nudging your head towards the two.

Felix gives you a knowing look, a small smirk on his face. "Why? Jealous?"

You glance at him, scowling. "I just think it's ironic someone who says he's so hurt about a relationship is back with someone else in less than 72 hours" you cross your arms.

Felix nods, "Don't worry, he's just doing it for Hyunjin, they'll either be linked by the arm or complete strangers by time the college christmas party is over depending on how well they're communicating"

linked by the arm.

meaning dating?

obviously y/n.

uh oh.

truly you hadn't seen this one coming, you obviously weren't expecting for him to find someone else so quickly whilst you were still mourning. for that same person to be the one who never even cared about him.

you left hurt him just for him to be hurt again. there's no way you'd let yunhee go through with whatever trick she was going planning.

so you tried, speaking to him for the first time in what felt like forever

Jisung sat in the chair of the music room by himself as he looked over the notes for a song he'd been learning on guitar.

You'd been there everytime he let you listen to the rough drafts of his finishing project; it felt a little bittersweet hearing the finished version.

He played the notes softly, his eyes intently staring at the paper before he pushed his glasses up on his nose, letting out a sigh.

"Whoever's standing there you don't have to be a stalker, make yourself known" he said bluntly, causing you a little panic.

"Sorry..." You muttered but he recognised your voice instantly, his eyes widening as he quickly glanced back, putting his facade back on once more.

"What do you want?" His tone was cold, much like yours on the night you broke his heart.

"Can we talk?" You ask quietly, pushing the door to the music room closed a bit.

He let out another sigh, this time deeper and sounded annoyed. "What?"

"I wanted to talk to you about Yunhee" You started and the delusions in his mind almost made him think you were jealous, causing his heart to beat a little faster at the possibility.

"What? Are you upset i'm with someone else?" His tone and his heart are speaking two different languages because his tone is cold and upset but his heart is longing for you to want him, to accept him as much as he does you, if only he knew.

"What? No no, I just- Yunhee is only gonna hurt you, i don't think you should go out with her." You admit honestly, a look of concern in your eyes as you try to mask the feeling of hurt.

He scoffs, letting out a harsh laugh before standing. "You can't be hypocritical, y/n. It isn't a good look on you." he brushed past you before you could even get a chance at speaking.

Another thing about Jisung was that he was stubborn, very stubborn. And yet so were you.

A few days later, Jisung sat at the table with Felix, chewing on some carrot sticks they served which honestly were the first time they ever tasted fresh like they did today.

You rushed over, placing your hands on the table as a halt, getting the attention from both boys before Jisung looked back down at his food quickly.

"Ji..." You spoke, trying to get his attention.

"Jisung please..." You begged, walking over to the opposite side of the table to sit with him, gesturing to felix that now wasn't the best time to sit there to which he took the hint.

"Ji-"

"What do you want this time." He said, his eyes never landing on you, his attention only focused on the orange vegetable.

"Listen i'm sorry about what I said, i never meant to hurt you.."

"That's not gonna make me any less hurt, y/n. If this is an attempt at getting Yunhee gone, it's not working." He said bluntly.

"What? Jisung no-" He scowled at the name again.

"You know, you don't want me, neither do you want anyone else to. do you just hate me, y/n?" He asked, now staring at you with a death glare. If looks could kill, you'd be ready to be shipped off in a coffin.

You sit in shock and silence at his words, causing him to scoff in disbelief, standing up as he collects his stuff.

You manage to grab his hand when he walks by but he pulls it out of your grasp before you can even get a word out.

Two weeks has passesd since you last interacted with Jisung and everytime he sees you, he avoids you like the plague. You've come to the conclusion that he is complately done with you, that you're both done. It hurt like hell, you could barely even force yourself out of bed for the first week, let alone focus on anything besides the fact that you lost the greatest thing life can give you.

It was now lunchtime and you sat at your usual spot, now more caught up in a book than ever, anything to distract yourself from looking over across the cafeteria where they could see you. Luckily for Jisung, as you would've caught him staring at you from afar.

"Goodness, they look like they haven't been eating. You guys think its my fault? Fuck, i'm so stupid." Jisung scolds himself, covering his face as he tries to hide the tears threatening to slip.

"Han, I don't think you should be worrying about your ex when you have a nice date tonight with your new date." Hyunjin says although his still pats his back for comfort.

Han breathes in for a second, nodding slowly as he wipes the tears from his face, Felix's eyes filling with concern before his eyes glow with oppurtunity.

"Alright fine, this'll be the last date before i go off to weep in misery" He says before sighing deeply.

Felix turns up to your home with a big smile on his face, as he explains his idea of you finally speaking to Jisung, and tells you that Jisung also is going through a rough time and is only mad at you because he thinks you don't love him.

So thats how you end up at the party, standing awkwardly. You'd had over 6 drinks of some random non alcoholic drink to keep yourself from looking too awkward but now you've got to pee.

you walk to the bathroom which is very close but stop when you hear a conversation and familiar voices.

"jisung? nah i only need him to get back at y/n, remember?"

"ah, you think he actually is starting to like you yet?"

"that'd be a bummer, but it may benefit his parent's are rich. probably the only reason that bitch wants him."

"right, that's genius"

their conversation made your blood boil. she not only was using him to get back at you but she also was using him to get free money?

even if you couldn't win him back, you'd get your revenge before she thought of doing whatever she wanted to.

she walked out of ther bathroom, watching you stand there with a glare on her face. "Privacy much? no one asked you to be a stalker."

you stared at her , rage filling your eyes before you looked into your 7th cup, filled with juice inside, throwing it right into her face.

convienetly enough, Jisung was right outside the door to the bathrooms so he heard the loud shriek she gave and came inside, only to find you standing there holding a red solo cup outside down, leaking small drops of red juice onto the tile floors, causing Jisung to cringe before he walked over to you, looking at you in disbelief.

He grabbed your arm, softly, pulling you out of the bathroom and into a room more quiet, ignoring the screams from Yunhee.

He paced the room as you sat on a desk in the from, looking at him.

"What the hell was that?" He finally asked, looking at you.

"Ji- she said something bad about you! why are you upset with me?"

He glared at you, this time in an unrecognizable way. it was neither angry, nor cold, just frustrated?

"You... You confuse me Y/n. " This gets you to look up at him, your mouth dry, unable to answer.

"You tell me you love me, and want to fight, for me then you go and tell me i'm selfish when you cloud up every fucking thought I have, not even the valuables you say I want so bad can even match your value, how much I want you." Your eyes widen, unable to speak; he doesn't want you to anyways, he's not finished.

"Then you act all sweet and hurt, making me hurt for you yret, you can't even say no when I ask if you hate me and now... you're.. you're fighting someone for saying they want to hurt me, making me all fucked up."

The room is in complete in silence as you two stare at each other, desperation and shock in both of your eyes.

"say something please... do you love me? If you don't... I'll try, I'll get over it"

"ji... I do... I really really do but-"

"oh you know I hate it when you say "but" ..." he groans a little, moving closer as his eyes fill with desperation.

" I don't wanna go through that again... and I know it's unfair and downright selfish for me not to want you to move on but I just... I want you..."

he stares at you with hearts in his eyes as he softly grabs your arms.

"I'll do something about it... I promise it'll stop just next time tell me about this stuff, I can't lose you again, especially not like this." he says, staring into your eyes.

the room falls silent once more before you pull him into a passionate kiss, one filled with desperation, longing, and the taste of peppermint candy canes on his tongue.

"I love you, y/n so so so much."

"I love you so so so much as well, hanji"

AUTHORS NOTE: hello everyone this is the first part of amore, mio !! this was honestly a plot I had been drifting back and forth from but basically I can say I honestly got the whole idea for this series based on @dearbrisky ( this is a different plot than you asked for i apologize) asking for hopeless romantic hanji so i decided why not do a love trope for all members . I also wrote this all in the middle of the night and its not quite proofread so please tell me if there are any gendered terms used in here !! i'm also not the best writer so please do tell me if this writing g pace felt like whiplash

[autumnhobbit]

Genuinely think half the problem here is a lot of parents are not in a place themselves where they can teach their kids how to recognize when something is good, and how to handle the intricacies of emotions, attraction, and decency while navigating social relationships with other people.

When I was growing up, the way adults talked about relationships, both amidst themselves and directly to me, gave me the idea that marriage just sort of happened, like it was something you tripped into without conscious choice and were now stuck with. This led to a conclusion by me that any male I met could possibly be my future husband, which colored every interaction with stress and awkwardness and fear and kept me from actually being normal around other kids, because I had artificially inserted this importance into interactions that should have just been. Well. Interactions.

Looking back on it now, I can see that every single crush I had had absolutely nothing to do with looking at another person objectively, judging their character and decency, or even seeing if I liked them; if they made me feel safe, or engaged, or reinvigorated. I only had crushes on boys who I found cute or attractive. None of those necessary thoughts ever went into it, and none of the boys even liked or noticed me. Maybe one or two of them were actually people I liked and talked to. Hindsight also helps me see that when a guy was interested in me or had a crush on me, I was oblivious to it and was incredibly uncomfortable, because we were all kids and didn’t know how to talk or act and it just came off like them showing off around me or trying to talk to me when I didn’t know them, which led to avoidance on my part.

My husband was the first guy I ever met whom I actually liked and was interested in, and he was the first one who actually seemed openly interested in me. When I daydreamed about marriage as a kid, the only thing I thought about was a boy liking me. I never thought about what I would like about him, just about being appreciated and valued myself. Selfish, right? But I was emotionally neglected and it came out as desperately longing to be important to someone. And then when I found it, I realized it naturally came with a reciprocal effect on me. I do find my husband fascinating and comforting and I enjoy his company, I want to do things with him, experience new things with him, build a life with him. That couldn’t have happened if I dismissed him right away because I wanted to avoid the awkwardness of getting to know him.

I am aware we got incredibly lucky with each other, and I’m grateful for it. But what we have also took work that we both consciously chose to do. We had the guidelines of knowing that premarital sex wasn’t an option for us, and that certainly helped. But it’s tragic to think how many people could build happiness with someone if they could just let go of their fantasies and expectations long enough to see what’s really there and what could be if there’s mutual effort. But how could they? No one taught them, because no one knew how themselves. So many families of origin weren’t formed by conscious choice but by natural consequences of behavior, even if your parents are decently healthy and love you, they might well have no clue how to navigate relationships with others.

trads who use the term "courtship" are an immediate red flag to me

[pruneunfair]

"But Rashta got greedy." Breaking down a common argument

I'm sure that no matter what character you like more you've probably heard the "Rashta could've had a good life but she got greedy" argument, it's a common one that even though I was reading and thinking "I don't see the greedy part?" I chalked that up to me just not noticing it well enough like others until I shared this idea with my mom

Ive been constantly sharing what I read with my mom, she's a writer so when I want advice on writing or an opinion on a certain book I'll either get my feelings on a topic validated or my eyes would be opened to a whole new perspective. When I explained the plot of TRE and how the mistress was an escaped slave that immediately got my mom interested when I said "She ends up getting too greedy and it became her downfall" to which she replied "so dreaming and wanting more when your life is at rock bottom is greedy now?" In fact up until I mentioned that Rashta was a slave, she was under the impression that the mistress was a noble woman.

Greed is mostly known as a never ending desire for more even when you already have everything, it's an obsession with what you don't currently have and you'll go to great lengths to achieve more then you really need especially if there is no real reason for your desire for it. Money is the most famous example but it can also be greed for social media attention or more objects to buy and consume.

Rashta never had everything or really ANYTHING as a child, there was no safety net to fall on, no real noble background, not even parents that would guaranteed to protect their daughter. So the greed factor is lowered significantly when it's apparent that Rashta doesn't have the "everything" to want even more.

when she was found by the literal emperor she took the most logical decision at the time and became his mistress even though she was technically still a slave, she was just treated better then she was at the Rimwell estate. When I reread some key Rashta chapters where she at her worst so see the greed of her character I still couldn't really see actual desires for more and more, mostly desperation, hurting others to save her skin, jumping to conclusions and holding grudges, terrible but if I had to really pick a sin to align this with, it'd be wrath with a hint of envy not greed.

In fact for most of season 1 Rashta isn't exactly clamoring for the empress seat until push LITERALLY came to shove, even if she really wanted the throne more then anything there was no way she could get it just by "stealing" Sovieshu because if I abdicate my title as empress has taught me anything, it's that being the sole lover of the emperor isn't guaranteed to make you empress. At the end of the day even if Rashta was a greedy person who wanted Naviers throne to satisfy her neverending greed it would've all been based on her luck.

when Sovieshu offers the position to her she even wonders if it's really a good idea since she has no experience and she'd just be dethroned in a year anyway but she chose to say yes because it was for her child's chance at a prosperous future, no desire for power, money or the desire social fame was minimum compared to her real goal of guaranteeing her daughter a chance at life. The closest I can say that is remotely related to greed is that Rashta wore a few over the top dresses (like her wedding dress and that one purple one with the bows)

Finally when she does become empress Rashta isn't exactly looking for more, she was ready to just live in luxury under the impression that her safety was guaranteed and that was it, she didn't want more jewels, money, power, maybe she wanted more social attention from others but even then the chapters dedicated to empress Rashta were, again, based on her wrath rather then her greed.

Honestly if any character symbolizes greed more it's Heinrey

The guy started off as a prince, then a king and then a damn EMPEROR, yet he still stole more magic from the mages, he wanted to go to war with the eastern empire for practically no reason and was willing to doom his damn country if he went through with it considering that the west is landlocked so going to war all willy nilly with potential allies when you have to rely on other territories just for water.. it took falling in love at first sight with Navier to get him to put it on hold and only stopped when she found out almost 170 chapters later and even then, his daughter ends up getting the eastern empire thanks to power of random plot holes. Before meeting Navier Heinrey really just wanted to keep expanding more and more for no reason because I looked and searched and could not on my life find a reason as to why Heinrey wanted to go to war other then one claim that he wanted revenge for the past which.. really? If that is the case we'll thanks for almost instigating something that didn't need to be instigated.

He really doesn't give a damn, one way or another Heinrey will get what he wants.

[snazzy-snapple]

Arcane Season 2 was great and all; there were definitely some stand-out moments, and the animation GOD THE ANIMATION *chefs kiss* I can't fault anyone for loving it. But honestly, I was kinda disappointed with alot of it. Especially the ending. Piltover's treatment of Zaun has been historically shitty; Zaun should've left their asses by the end. 

Even after the war Piltover is still screwing Zaun over like- one seat at the council-one???? Idk how accurate the maps of Piltover and Zaun are, but they look to be about equal size; some even portray Zaun as bigger. The amount of Council Members representing/ from the Undercity should equate. Also, from my limited understanding of the lore told outside of Arcane, there is fluctuation in the amount of wealth and comfort in the layers of Zaun, so not every part of it is in desperate need as the Fissures. Maybe the places more well-off wouldn't mind Piltover representations- but honestly, I feel like this only adds to my argument. Every part of the Undercity has a differing aspect of and problem that needs to be addressed and well… represented. (congrats to Sevika though she deserves it).

 Honestly, I don't even think an equal Zaun/Piltover council is enough for me; let's take a look at Piltover's leadership, more specifically, how they picked. We only really get one example of this when Jayce replaces Heimerdinger where the other Councilors vote on the decision. The circumstances around Jayce being added, while unorthodox, shouldn't have that different of a system from when a Council member just dies. This means all the power and decision making of thousands and thousands of people is put in the hands of 8 rich assholes who get to pick who they make said decisions alongside. No wonder corruption is a problem. Piltover's own system of governance is in dire need of repair, which would never happen voluntarily because it'd require the Council members to give up their own power. What Arcane needs is a good old-fashioned social revolution. And maybe an actual revolution in Zauns case. 

Please keep in mind I'm looking at this from a show-watcher, not a LOL player pov, and I didn't take the time to learn all the lore surrounding the games. What I know mainly came from the show itself. Not to mention because Arcane is tied to LOL the characters and story have to follow a certain trajectory. 

Anyways, Arcane should've ended with Zaun and Piltover Divorced, Ekko in charge of everything everywhere all the time, and Jinx/Viktor are alive, The End. 

In all seriousness, though, I had a lot more problems than this. Piltover's bullshit is what really hit me hard with recent historical events and my own fears about the future. I hope no one takes this the wrong way; I'm pretty good at ignoring problems in media and just loving it because, well.. loving stuff is fun. Its fun to turn your brain off and be happy. And I've definitely done this with this Season at times. Thanks for listening; overall, the Season felt like a mess. But hey, I had fun.

[werewolf-beans]

Trust me, I REALLY UNDERSTAND the compulsion to feel included in the human experience. It's incredibly important for us, nonhuman or otherwise, to continue functioning in the society we were born into. It took me 27 years of life, but I'm finally confident enough to perform being a person and socialize in public and enjoy it!

But the idea that the performance is my identity is false. How I portray myself in public is rarely 1:1 with my internal narrative. I'm an animal that spends time with humans.

And here's the thing: I've looked at this from every possible angle. I'm studying behavioral neuroscience for my undergrad and I apply what I've learned to the lens through which I observe myself. I've talked about my traumas and their contribution to my self image in therapy. I've never been very religious, but I've explored spirituality and found connection with Earth and celestial bodies and my spirit within.

At the end of the day, though, it doesn't matter.

My internal narrative doesn't have to be palatable to humans. It doesn't have to make sense. It doesn't interfere with my functioning and desperate survival in society, so it doesn't matter how I frame it.

It's MY internal experience. I don't need to explain myself. I'm so so grateful that there are therianthropes and lycanthropes and nonhumans of all kinds who understand this feeling, who exist in a modern culture that doesn't understand how wild we feel.

The publicity of social media can do so much to bring us together, but it also necessitates that we concede to humanity, that we beg for their forgiveness and plead that we aren't weird nor dangerous nor ill.

My rant is over but I also need to express that this is a morally neutral action. It is in bad taste to generalize "we are human but also animal" to all of our community, yes, but they're just trying to survive and navigate all of this. Their philosophy of therianthropy is just different, is all.

Oh my God I swear I might just stop interacting with therian tiktok. Saw a video with 5.4 THOUSAND LIKES "defining" therianthropy as "a human who identifies as human who feels like they have an animal soul" dude no it is not!!!!!!!

[manasurge]

Back to work

[dailyloopdeloop]

DAY 71: shy

[infinitelystrangemachinex]

Veilguard vaguing:

It's not automatically a good thing, actually, that the game de-emphasizes or even outright removes racism against elves, and bigotry against other groups, from the story

[halfhumanhalfasleep]

anakin: why doesn’t anyone want to sit with me? :((

how anakin thinks he looks:

how he looks to the other padawans: