#I know it’s a triangle I am looking at the shape | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

tsunodaradio · 9 days ago

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past lives ⛐ 𝐂𝐒𝟓𝟓 & 𝐂𝐋𝟏𝟔

the past and present sit together under amber light, waiting to see which of them will speak first.

ꔮ starring: carlos sainz x reader x charles leclerc. ꔮ word count: 14.6k. ꔮ includes: romance, friendship, hurt/comfort, angst. mentions of food, alcohol; profanity; mildly suggestive content. childhood friends!charles, husband!carlos, ferrari teammates carlos & charles circa 2024. google translated french & spanish, yearning..., not a love triangle, inspired by & references past lives (2024) ꔮ commentary box: this was an insane idea that i wasn’t sure if i could pull off, but i like how this turned out! here’s to things that ache (and heal) over time 🩹 𝐦𝐲 𝐦𝐚𝐬𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐥𝐢𝐬𝐭

The classroom smells faintly of glue and crayons, with sun-warmed linoleum beneath your knees and the whir of the ceiling fan stirring the heavy Monte Carlo air.

Outside the window, the harbor glitters like a postcard.

Inside, you and Charles Leclerc learn to count to ten.

You’re both five years old, sitting cross-legged on a faded rug patterned with cartoon fish. Madame Noelle holds up felt numbers and makes the class repeat after her. Un, deux, trois, she says. The class echoes. You don’t. You’re busy elbowing Charles.

“You skipped seven,” you whisper conspiratorially.

He hisses back, “I did not.”

You raise your hand dramatically. “Madame, Charles skipped seven!”

Charles scowls. Madame Noelle sighs. Monaco is too small for tattling.

She knows both your mothers, has been to at least one of your birthday parties. Everyone in this principality has bumped shoulders at the boulangerie or shared a table at a family friend’s yacht party. There are no strangers here, only people you haven't seen this week.

Charles kicks your ankle under the rug. You kick him back. It means nothing. It means everything.

At pick-up, your mother is waiting outside the gate, sunglasses perched on her head. You find her chatting animatedly with Pascale, Charles’ mother. They laugh together like they’ve known each other since the womb. Maybe they have.

You tug on your mother’s hand and declare, with all the confidence of a child who has never been told no, “I am going to marry Charles.”

Your mother glances down at you, amused. “Really? Does he want to marry you, too?”

You shrug. “He likes me, so he will if I tell him to.”

Pascale overhears and grins. Your mother shares a look with her that says, Can you believe them?

But they can. In Monaco, lives are lived out close together—childhoods overlapping like waves on the shore. With the world’s shortest national coastline, you and Charles are just one ripple of many in the glittering state.

Later, when you’re older, you’ll wonder how much of your life was shaped right then. In that kindergarten classroom. In the shadow of that city where everybody knew everybody, where declarations like marriage seemed both innocent and inevitable.

You grow up with Charles like it’s the most natural thing in the world.

Playdates become the rhythm of your weekends: afternoons on the beach building sandcastles until the tide claims them, climbing the rocks along the port with scraped knees and competitive shouts echoing off the sea. Your mothers exchange weekly texts like clockwork.

I'll bring them over after lunch.

Can Charles sleep over tonight?

They’re being impossible, but at least they’re impossible together.

One particular Sunday, they coordinate a park playdate. You’re not sure why it’s just you and Charles this time, no siblings in tow. Nonetheless, you go along happily, swinging your legs in the backseat while your mother hums along to the radio.

The park is quiet in that late-afternoon lull—shadows long, sun beginning its descent. Your mothers talk a few paces away from the benches, Pascale’s voice blending with your mother’s. You only catch pieces.

“Next year. Maybe sooner,” someone says.

“It’s a good opportunity…”

“...How she’ll adjust…”

You squint in their direction, but before you can piece together the puzzle, Charles nudges your shoulder.

“Race you to the fountain,” he sing-songs, already halfway across the grass.

You bolt after him, the words and worry dissolving like mist. Charles is all laughter and wild limbs, calling out taunts over his shoulder. You chase him through the warm dusk, the weight of whatever your parents are saying left behind in the dust kicked up by your sneakers.

Not too long after—it’s your last week in Monaco, and everyone knows it.

The class of twenty-something ragtag children all stare at you, expectant and wide-eyed. You keep your chin up. You pretend not to notice.

“Is it true?” asks Delphine, whose pigtails are always uneven. “You’re leaving? For real?”

You nod, folding a worksheet in half just to have something to do with your hands. “Yes.”

“But you’re coming back, right?” Louis chimes in from the next row. “For summer or something?”

“No,” you say, just as firmly. “We are moving. For good.”

There’s a murmur, the kind that ripples through a classroom when someone says something adult-like and absolute. Someone asks, very quietly, “Why?”

You straighten in your seat, full of something that feels like pride but might just be anticipation. “Because I want to,” you declare.

That doesn’t go over well. Delphine frowns, and Louis looks like you’ve just admitted to liking math. So you try again, voice louder this time: “Because nobody from Monaco wins the Nobel Peace Prize for Literature.”

They blink at you.

You blink back.

And then, realizing that your audience is a sea of confused eight-year-olds who still think cooties are a legitimate illness, you amend with a sigh: “Because nobody from Monaco can become a star.”

That, they understand. Or at least they pretend to. They nod in solemn agreement, the kind only children can muster when they don’t really get it but don’t want to look stupid.

Outside, through the open windows, you hear the faint rush of traffic and the Mediterranean breeze tousling the palm trees. Monaco is small, after all. You’ve always known this. It’s beautiful and glittering and good for birthdays at the yacht club, but your parents have always wanted more for you. You’ve inherited their greed, their ambition.

You wonder if Charles will understand. You wonder if you’ll have to explain it to him at all.

He says nothing of your big move, even as you neatly pack your life—an admittedly short one so far—into boxes and suitcases. He doesn’t say anything even on your last day, where you cry and cry and cry over your classmates’ handmade letters, your teachers’ kisses to your forehead, your friends’ tight hugs intending to tether you to this hometown.

The afternoon sun stretches long shadows down the narrow, cobbled street. Monaco always glows this time of day, like the buildings are pretending to be golden just for you. The breeze carries salt and something blooming. It’s probably the last time you’ll walk this way with Charles.

He trails you on his bicycle, feet dragging occasionally on the asphalt like he can’t decide whether to coast or stop. You’ve both been quiet since school. Not solemn, just—holding something heavy between you.

He always gets quiet when you cry. He’ll tease you relentlessly until you burst into tears, and then he’ll lapse into silence as if he doesn’t quite know what to do with your sniffles and your bloodshot eyes.

When you reach your gate, you stop and turn. Charles does too, resting a sneaker against the pavement to balance. He doesn’t get off the bike. He just stares.

You stare back, waiting. He squints up at you under his mess of curls, face red from sun and something else. When you deem him mute and incapable of human emotion, you turn to head into the house you will have to say goodbye to.

“Hey!” he hollers.

You stop in your tracks, turn around. In all your childlike incredulity, you shout back, “What!”

He opens his mouth, closes it. His hands twist the handlebars.

Then: “... Au revoir.”

You blink. The word hangs there, too formal, too final. It should be bye or see you or even just a shrug. But it’s au revoir, and Charles’s voice cracks just slightly when he says it.

Before you can answer, he pushes off the pavement, pedaling hard. His bike wobbles once, then evens out, then flies. He doesn’t look back.

He rides like he’s trying to beat you to your next destination, like if he gets there first maybe he can make you stay.

You watch him go, the sun catching in his spokes, the street swallowing the sound of his wheels. And then you start to bawl, enough that when your mother finds you minutes later, she worries if she is making the wrong choice.

The next day, the ferry leaves early; you are made to wake even earlier.

You watch the orange haze of sunrise ripple over the sea as your parents haul your suitcase over the ramp. The harbor is already busy—tourists heading out, commuters looking bleary-eyed and determined, early-morning joggers looping around the marina in practiced silence. There’s no real ceremony to your departure. Just you, your family, and a handful of belongings you insist on bringing. Your mother lets you carry your books in your own little backpack, though she says it’ll slow you down.

Everything’s happening too fast and not fast enough. The boat rocks slightly as you step on board. You don’t look back.

It’s a long journey. You sleep through most of it, your body curled up in the stiff seat next to your mother’s. You wake to the sound of her voice murmuring into the phone and to the sight of unfamiliar architecture flickering by in a blur through the window.

By the time the ferry and the train and the car ride are done with you, it’s already night. The lights outside your window stretch on and on, and you can’t tell where the city ends. The apartment is bare but warm. Your room has a real desk. Your father says he’ll hang up curtains soon. You nod, exhausted.

Your mother makes you brush your teeth before bed. You’re not too tired to dream, though.

And when you wake up the next morning, it hits you all at once.

You are in Madrid.

You will be in Madrid for the rest of your life.

It’s exam season when you finally cave and make a Facebook account.

It’s not something you’d really planned. You’d held out through the first year, ignored the growing notifications from the university group chats, smiled politely every time someone asked if they could tag you in something and you had to say, again, you didn’t have one. But now, holed up in the library with a half-drunk espresso and three books splayed out in front of you like some kind of ritual offering, you finally give in.

Peer pressure wins. You make the account for the lack of better thing to do. If you’re going to procrastinate, you might as well be productive about it.

You’re careful with the information you put in—just your name, your birthday, your university. No profile picture yet. You don’t even add anyone at first. You just lurk.

It’s surprisingly entertaining: scrolling through photo albums, stalking classmates’ friends of friends. The world feels smaller somehow, everyone connected by a handful of mutuals and grainy phone camera photos from nights out. It reminds you of the country you left behind a decade ago.

Maybe that’s why, on a whim, you search his name.

Charles Leclerc.

You don’t expect to find anything. Maybe a tagged picture from a karting event or a blurry group shot at some childhood birthday. But he has a profile, public enough for you to see everything: his cover photo is a racetrack, the Monaco circuit gleaming under dusk. His profile picture is newer—him in a race suit, holding a trophy with an almost bashful grin.

It hits you in the chest, how familiar he still looks.

You scroll down.

He’s posted a handful of times over the years. A race result here, a thank you to sponsors there. But it’s one particular post from three months ago that stops your heart cold.

A sepia snapshot of the two of you, all missing front teeth and dirt-streaked cheeks. The post has a fair amount of engagement. A dozen likes, a couple of amused comments from elementary classmates. It’s the caption that’s the real clincher.

Quelqu'un a vu cette fille?

Has anyone seen this girl, Charles is asking. A shout into the void. A prayer to a nameless god. A shot in the dark, except it hits its target.

You read it once. Then again. Then a third time.

You don’t overthink it. You copy the link to the post, click Message.

YOU [2:51 PM]: i think i know that girl.

It’s foolish to think Charles will respond immediately, but you can’t help it. You refresh, and refresh, and refresh, until you feel pathetic and you’re fairly sure you’ve memorized every word on the Facebook masthead. You’re about to log out when you hear two pings.

A friend request. And a response—

CHARLES LECLERC [3:32 PM]: Might need some proof.

It’s the worst week of your life as a uni student, yet you can’t help it. You smile, your fingers already flying across your screen to figure out a way to prove.

Skype IDs are exchanged. A schedule is set; 9 p.m. your time. You don’t immediately realize Charles is racing, that he’s in a time zone completely different from yours. That he cuts some corners and loses some sleep to make it possible.

Later that evening, the video call connects with a faint chime, and there he is. Older and clearer than memory.

Charles, on your laptop screen. His hair is longer now, flopping a little over his forehead. There’s a sharpness to his jaw that wasn’t there before and a slight dusting of stubble he’s probably proud of. But his eyes? Still the same. Green like the clovers that once grew on your front lawn; flecks of brown and gold that soften when they find you.

“Woah,” he starts, and you privately note his voice is deeper, a little rougher. “It’s really you.”

“Hey,” you say, grinning. Your voice comes out steadier than you expected. “It’s really me.”

He leans toward the screen like it might somehow give him more of you. It makes you feel shy, the thought of being reached, being seen, being found.

“So, uh,” you scramble for something to say, “Como estas?”

He raises an eyebrow. “Was that Spanish?”

You wince. “I meant… how are you. I meant to say it in French.”

“Ah,” he says, laughter dancing at the corners of his mouth. “Trying to impress me?”

“I live in Madrid now, Leclerc. It’s survival.”

“Then survive in French. I missed that voice.”

The words catch you off guard, make your stomach twist in a way that feels both ancient and brand new.

The conversation slips into French, as natural as breathing. You talk about university, about how big the world suddenly feels. He tells you about racing, how fast things are moving—literally and otherwise. You nod along, even when you don’t fully understand the intricacies. What you do understand is the light in his eyes when he talks about it. You remember that look.

It was the expression on Charles’ face when he was hoisted up on his father’s shoulders, watching the racecars zip past Monaco’s famed chicanes. You had sat with the Leclercs in the grandstands, had hung out your window with Charles in hopes of catching glimpses of the famous drivers.

As a child, his hands would curl into fists in the air, as if imagining a steering wheel. As if he was in the car himself, bringing home honor and glory to his own.

Suddenly, the screen freezes. Charles’ face is mid-laugh, frozen pixelated. The audio drops.

“Charles?” you ask. “Hello?”

For a beat, nothing. Just the whir of your laptop fan.

Then, his voice crackles through. “I’m still here.”

The call steadies. He smiles. “Still here,” he says again, softer now, like a promise. Like a heartbeat.

You don’t say anything. Just nod. Because you are, too.

You lean back in your chair, trying to play it cool. “Well, good. Would be tragic to lose you to dial-up in 2014.”

He laughs. The same laugh. That’s how you know you’ve really found him again.

Something in you settles at that. Some small knot that had been twisted tight since you last saw him on your doorstep.

The conversation finds its rhythm. The first few minutes are spent marveling at how strange it is to hear each other after so long, followed by awkward attempts to remember who last spoke more fluently in which language.

The banter smooths out the awkwardness. Charles tells you about life in Monaco. He mentions his brothers, the narrow streets, the usual local gossip. And then, a little sheepishly, he talks about his time in Formula 2.

“I am hoping to make it to Formula 1 soon,” he divulges sheepishly, like it’s not something he’s allowing himself to hope for just yet.

Your eyes widen. “Seriously?”

He nods. “I know, I know. It doesn’t even make a lot of sense but…” A beat. A full pause. “Can I say something like this?”

“What do you want to say?”

He lifts his eyes to yours through the grainy screen.

“I missed you,” he says, awkwardly. A little rushed, like he had to leap over a ledge to get the words out.

A short silence swells between you, thick and unexpected.

“Me, too,” you finally say, just as softly. “It doesn’t make any sense.”

And somehow, that makes it feel more real.

The next few months are full of effort. Real effort. Not just the half-hearted, “Let’s keep in touch” people promise and never follow through on. You and Charles really try.

There are Skype calls that happen at three in the morning for one of you and just after dinner for the other. Sometimes he’s bleary-eyed in a hotel room in Malaysia, apologizing for the bad connection as his face turns into a mess of pixels. Sometimes you’re half-asleep on your dorm bed, earbuds in, whispering so you don’t wake your roommate. The conversations are short sometimes, just a check-in—

“You okay?” “Yes. You?” “Tired. But okay.”

—and other times they stretch past midnight, both of you forgetting time zones and alarm clocks. Those are the best ones. The ones that feel like old times, like you’re just two kids again, killing time before dinner, no eight-hour difference between you.

But the connection doesn’t always cooperate. There are lags that make you talk over each other, then both stop, then laugh. There are missed calls. His, because he fell asleep after a race; yours, because you didn’t hear your phone buzz in your bag between classes. There are moments where you’re mad at yourself for missing him, mad at him for not trying harder, even though you know he is. You both are.

He sends you photos sometimes. From tracks you’ve only seen on the television. Podiums. Pit lanes. Hotel rooms with terrible wallpaper. One morning you wake up to a video: him walking through a paddock, the sky overcast, his voice saying, “Thought you’d like this. It’s raining here, just like home.”

You try to send stuff back, too. Little pieces of your life. A snap of the cafe where you study. A blurry photo of your friend’s cat wearing your scarf. Once, a voice memo of you reading a poem you found in a used bookshop that made you think of him.

You both say “Miss you” sometimes. Not often. But enough. Just enough to remind each other that you’re still there, still trying, still looking for the right time to align.

Still wondering what it means to hold on to someone who isn’t really gone, but isn’t really there either.

There is only so much that effort can mean, though. There is only so much that it can do.

When there are more missed calls than actual ones, when there are less messages of substance and yawning gaps between responses, you can’t blame the frustration from bubbling. The expectations from crumbling much like the sandcastles the two of you used to build.

You and Charles deny the deposition for a good six months.

The Last Call connects after three missed tries. His face appears on your screen, half-shadowed by the dim hotel lamp behind him. He looks tired. You probably do, too.

You sigh. Not dramatically. Just... worn out. “Charles, maybe we should stop.”

He blinks, straightens a little. He stutters first in English, but then falls back in French. Your language of choice whenever the two of you were talking about something you wanted to keep secret, something that felt close to both your hearts. “Stop what?”

“Trying so hard to keep up. It’s... it’s not working, is it? Maybe we should just let things happen naturally. If we talk, we talk. If we don’t…”

His mouth opens, then closes again. You see the flicker of something in his eyes before he leans back, smile forced. “Right. Yeah. I mean—it’s not like we’re dating or anything.”

You laugh, but it sounds like a question. “Exactly. We’re not.”

He nods a little too quickly. “It’s probably better, anyway. Less pressure.”

Somewhere on his phone, a flower order confirmation remains open in another tab. A delivery to your dorm; blooms the color of your eyes, with the question he’s been meaning to ask since you first reconnected. He quietly files for a refund while you’re not looking.

You shift in your seat, arms crossed. “So... I guess we’ll just talk whenever. No more trying to schedule around time zones and bad Wi-Fi.”

“Yeah. No big deal.”

“No big deal,” you echo.

You both nod, your heads bobbing up and down in unison. You are both trying to convince each other. Yourselves.

“I should go,” you lie.

He nods again. “Of course. Good luck with finals.”

“Good luck with Monaco.”

His smile falters, just a little. “Thank you.”

You end the call. The screen goes dark.

Charles does not win in Monaco that weekend.

You nurse the heartache the only way you know how: you wander. Feet on autopilot, you find yourself at the little bookstore a few blocks from campus, the one with the crooked shelves and the windows that fog up in the rain.

You trail your fingers along the spines of used novels and yellowing travel guides. The ache dulls in the quiet of it—the soft rustle of pages, the low hum of the radio playing something old and slow. You’ve always liked it here.

The owner, an older woman with thick glasses and a perpetual cardigan, catches you lingering and offers you a job before you even think to ask. Just weekends, she says in lilting English. Just enough.

You take it. Happily. The bookstore becomes a sort of sanctuary. You shelve poetry collections and ring up cookbooks and memorize the names of regulars. You surround yourself with other people’s words, and for the first time in a while, you remember why you left Monaco in the first place.

You wanted to live inside something bigger than the state. Bigger than legacy or expectations. You wanted to become someone you hadn’t already been written into.

One overcast afternoon, the bell above the door jingles. You look up from the counter.

The man who steps inside is tall, dark-haired, sun-kissed in a way that suggests he’s just gotten off a plane. He squints around the shop like it might bite him.

“Hello,” he says in Spanish, smiling a little too politely. “I’m looking for a cookbook. For my mother. She is very picky.”

“Do you know what kind?” you probe.

“Something European, maybe. But modern? She does not trust anyone under sixty, but also hates anything too traditional.” He shrugs helplessly. “It’s a minefield.”

You laugh, already scanning the shelves behind you. “We might have something. Give me a second.”

He waits, hands in his pockets, looking around with polite interest. When you hand him a hardcover with a bright cover and minimalist title, he grins. It’s a nice smile, you think to yourself, as he turns the book over in his hands as if inspecting the weight of it.

“This might actually work. Thank you.”

You smile and take the book back so you can ring it up. “No problem,” you say, your eyes lingering a little too long on his five o’clock shadow.

He’s too distracted giving you equal attention to notice your staring. He pays with crisp bills and shining coins, his fingers brushing lightly against yours when he takes the book he just purchased. You’re convinced the transaction will end there, but then he offers his hand.

“Carlos, by the way. Carlos Sainz. Not the rally driver,” he adds quickly. “His son.”

A corner of your lip quirks upward. It’s a familiar name and title, but not one you have any particular attachments to. “Should I be impressed?” you ask, taking the hand of the legend’s son.

He laughs. “Only if you want to be.”

You shake his hand. Warm. Steady.

Something shifts. You don’t know what it is yet. Just that it feels like a beginning.

Carlos keeps coming back.

At first it’s little things: a recipe book for lentils, a thin novella in Spanish, a battered biography of someone you’ve never heard of but pretend to. Then he starts asking for weirder things. A Basque cookbook from the ‘70s. A philosophical treatise on sports. A slim poetry collection by a woman who disappeared in the Pyrenees.

You find most of them. He always smiles like he’s genuinely surprised.

“You’re magic,” he tells you once.

You snort. “No, I’m just stubborn.”

You learn things about him in the quiet way people share when they’re not trying to impress you. He races too, he says one afternoon, fingers brushing the cover of a travel memoir. Karting at first. Then cars.

You try not to ask who he races for, try not to let your thoughts spiral to Charles. You’re not trying to build a replica.

Carlos never pushes. Never oversteps. He just shows up. Makes you laugh. Leaves the space open for something soft to grow.

One day, he buys a copy of Letters to Milena. Doesn’t say why. Just nods when you hand it over.

Then he disappears.

Days pass. Then weeks. Then months. You think he’s ghosted you and hate yourself for how much it hurts.

Then one Saturday, the bell rings. You look up. And there he is.

He looks sheepish, holding a paper bag like it’s breakable. “I was traveling,” he says, by way of apology, “and racing.”

You open your mouth to say it’s fine, but he’s already placing the bag on the counter.

Inside: dozens of letters. Handwritten. Folded. Numbered. On hotel stationery, napkins, scrap paper. Your name on every single one.

“I didn’t know your address,” he says quietly, nervously. “But I still wanted to talk to you.”

You stare at the pile. Something rises in your chest, fast and helpless.

You lean across the counter to kiss him, and he sighs against your lips like this is all he thought about while jet-setting across the world.

The kiss tastes like courage and paper and something new.

It feels like the first page of a different story.

You and Carlos have been together for a little over a year now.

It’s quiet, mostly. Private. Not secret, but not something for cameras or press releases either. He doesn’t post you on social media. You don’t go to the races. Not because he doesn’t want you there—he asks, more than once—but because you can’t watch.

You try, once. Sit down with the race queued up, fingers curled into your sleeves. You make it five laps before your stomach starts turning. Before the sight of him—helmeted and flying—makes your breath catch in your throat. Too many angles, too many ways it can go wrong.

You text him afterward.

Good race. I think. I had to turn it off. Sorry.

He replies almost instantly.

That’s okay. I race faster when I know you are waiting for me at home.

And that’s the rhythm of it. He drives. You read. He flies. You shelve books and write.

On one of his rare weekends back home, the two of you are curled up on the couch in your flat, empty takeout containers on the coffee table, his head in your lap. He’s scrolling through something on his phone—team photos, maybe, or grid updates—when he says, absently: “There’s this new guy.”

“Well—not new. Just new to the grid. Really talented. Weirdly poised,” Carlos says, “Name’s Charles. Charles Leclerc. Ever know him? He is from Monaco too.”

Your heart stutters.

You run your fingers through Carlos’ hair like nothing’s changed. Like the air hasn’t gone tight in your lungs.

“Yeah,” you eventually manage. “I knew of him.”

Carlos doesn’t catch the pause. Or if he does, he lets you keep it. He just hums, eyes still on his screen.

You lean back into the cushions, forcing yourself to breathe steady.

You knew Charles Leclerc once. And you still do, somewhere. Somewhere in the part of your chest that hadn’t quite let go. But Carlos is here. Carlos comes back. And right now, that’s what matters.

You tighten your fingers in his hair. He looks up and smiles.

For a little while, you let yourself forget the name still echoing in your head.

The future doesn’t arrive all at once.

It comes in quiet mornings and shared coffees, in lazy Sunday afternoons rearranging the furniture, in long drives where nothing matters but the road and the sound of Carlos singing off-key beside you.

You keep dating. Keep building. A life. A rhythm. A future.

By 2021, you’ve settled in Madrid, your days divided between the bookstore and the pages of a manuscript you’ve been quietly shaping for years. Carlos is more than just your partner now. He’s your home. The person you find yourself planning for. Planning around.

That same year, two very good things happen.

Your book gets published. The small, strange novel you thought would never leave your laptop finds a home with a local press. The cover is understated, the first print modest, but it exists. It is yours. You hold it in your hands while Carlos opens a bottle of wine and insists on a toast.

He reads it in one sitting. You catch him wiping at his eyes before he grins and says, “You wrote me into this, didn’t you?”

You shrug, but you’re smiling so wide that there is only really one answer to his question.

And then Carlos signs with Ferrari.

It’s the dream, the thing he’s been working toward for years. When the offer becomes official, he tells you before anyone else. You scream. He picks you up and spins you around the flat like something out of a movie.

You celebrate both victories in a tiny tapas bar with your closest friends. You drink too much. He kisses you too long. Everything is golden. Not golden like Monaco used to be, but golden in a Madrid way—golden like the stars hanging low from the sky, like the city that often threatens to swallow you whole, like the boyfriend that always keeps his promises.

It isn’t until a week or so later that you see it. The promotional posters, the news articles putting them side by side.

Carlos Sainz and Charles Leclerc. Ferrari’s newest duo.

You stare at the name for a while. It doesn’t hit like it used to. No twisting in your stomach. No sharp intake of breath.

Because your life is not a detour anymore.

You live in Madrid. You have a book with your name on the spine. You have a home filled with secondhand furniture and shelves bursting with stories. You have Carlos—his warm hand in yours, his letters tucked in a shoebox under the bed, his jacket draped on the chair you always forget to put away.

Charles is no longer a tether.

Your heart is here, and it is full.

So you keep writing.

The stories come faster now, shaped by time and the steadiness of the life you’ve built. Your second novel wins a regional award. The third becomes a quiet bestseller. Your name is suddenly spoken in book circles, whispered in lit fests, shortlisted for prizes you never dared dream of.

Carlos races in Ferrari red. You watch from home sometimes, peeking between your fingers, your stomach still tight with nerves. But you’re learning. You can watch without unraveling. You can hope without fear.

You remain private. Still keep your names from headlines, still skip the red carpets. It’s not secrecy; it’s sanctuary. Carlos says it best, one late night on your balcony with a glass of wine in hand: “Let them talk about podiums and scandals. I just want to come home to you.”

When the two of you decide to marry, it’s the same.

No press. No spectacle. Just family and friends in the garden of your shared home, chairs borrowed from neighbors, fairy lights strung by your best friend the night before.

Carlos wears a suit that doesn’t quite match and his grandfather’s cufflinks. You wear a dress you found in a vintage shop, altered at the last minute when the zipper gave out.

You exchange vows barefoot, toes curling in the grass.

Carlos’s voice is low, earnest. He stumbles once, laughs nervously, then says, “I don’t know where I’m going to finish every race. I don’t know what the next season will bring. But I know you. And I know I want this for the rest of my life, more than any podium that I could ever have.”

You say, “You once handed me a bag of letters. I have never stopped reading them. I promise to keep reading, and to keep writing—us, together—for as long as you will have me.”

People cry. Someone drops a champagne flute. Carlos kisses you before they even pronounce you married.

The reception is homemade. Empanadillas on mismatched plates, a playlist you threw together last-minute, your uncle insisting on a toast that turns into a twenty-minute story about how he once met Fernando Alonso in a petrol station.

Carlos spins you around the living room for your first dance. Your cheeks hurt from smiling.

Later that night, the house is quiet again. Everyone’s gone. It’s just the two of you, tucked on the couch in your wedding clothes, eating leftover cake with forks straight from the box.

Carlos rests his head on your shoulder. “Married,” he says, tasting the word.

“Yeah,” you hum. “Mi marido.” My husband.

“Mi esposa,” he responds in the same dazed, reverent tone. My wife.

And for once, there is nothing left unsaid. No past to outrun. Just the thrilling certainty of a life still being written together.

The news breaks while you’re at the bookstore, helping a teenager find something that will make her cry. Your phone buzzes once, then again, and then it won't stop. You glance down and see the headlines before you can stop yourself; they fly over your lockscreen, obscuring the photo of you and Carlos from your first real date.

Lewis Hamilton signs with Ferrari for 2025 F1 season.

The air drains out of the room.

You close the shop early. Carlos is already home when you arrive, slouched on the edge of the couch, remote forgotten in one hand, still in the hoodie he wore to training that morning. He doesn’t look up when you enter.

You drop your keys and cross to him silently, kneeling in front of him. His eyes are red but dry.

“They told me this morning,” he says, voice hoarse, “before the news went out.”

You don’t ask who told him. You don’t ask why they couldn’t wait, or why they chose someone else. You already know the answers wouldn’t help. And you’re not about to lie to your husband, to try to coddle him into believing the team will give up its anointed heir for him.

You want someone to blame.

Ferrari, for discarding Carlos after he gave them the best of his years. Charles, for staying. God, for the cruelty of it all.

But there’s no fight that matters more than the person in front of you.

So you climb up beside him, pull him in, let his weight fall against your chest.

“They’re going to regret this,” you whisper fiercely into his hair. “You’ll be back. You’re not done.”

His arms tighten around you. He doesn’t say anything for a long time.

Eventually, he murmurs, “I’m scared.”

“Me too. But I believe in you more than I believe in anything.”

There’s a long silence, heavy but shared.

Outside, the world turns without mercy. But inside, you hold the man you married and swear, silently, to weather this with him. Just like you always have.

That season, Carlos races like he has something to prove.

Because he does.

Every lap, every press conference, every qualifying session. He drives like he’s being chased, like every corner holds the future hostage. You see it in his posture, in the tension in his hands when he laces his boots, in the clipped answers he gives to questions that dance around what everyone already knows: he doesn’t have a seat next year. Not yet.

You watch now. You watch everything.

Your anxiety still curls under your ribs like it always has, but you’ve learned to carry it. You sit through practice, through qualifying, through the races themselves, heart thudding in time with the engines. You count his pit stops under your breath. You only breathe when the checkered flag waves.

Watching Carlos means watching Charles, too.

It’s strange, after all this time, to see him again so often. On screen. In red. Next to Carlos. Older. Sharper. Still familiar.

He does well. Consistent. Composed. He and Carlos don’t speak much on camera, but you see it in the glances they exchange—in parc fermé, in briefings, in the margins of the paddock. There’s respect there. Maybe even something more complicated. Something rooted in memory.

You feel a pull sometimes. Not quite longing. Not quite regret. Just that soft ache of having known someone deeply, once.

But the man you wait for at the finish line is not Charles.

You watch your Carlos fight for every point. For every scrap of validation. He is relentless. Brilliant. You see the fans rallying around him. The journalists softening their tones. The world beginning to understand what you’ve always known.

Carlos Sainz is not done.

And more than anything, more than your own nerves or history or unspoken what-ifs, you want this for him.

You want him to keep driving. To keep writing his own story. Not just to prove them wrong, but to prove himself right.

Because he is meant to be on that track.

And you are meant to be right here, watching him fly.

Madrid holds its breath on the Saturday he brings it up.

You're folding laundry in the living room, half-watching the news, when Carlos walks in from the balcony, the sun painting warm lines across his face. There’s a careful energy in his step, a wordless deliberation that tips you off even before he says anything.

He stands behind you for a moment, then wraps his arms around your shoulders. “The Monaco Grand Prix,” he says, like it’s just another city, just another circuit.

You pause, folding slowed. “You want me to come,” you say plainly.

He nods. “It’s... it might be my last one there. Maybe ever, depending how the year ends. And it’s the place you were born, you know? I want to do it with you there.”

You look up at him. His eyes are hopeful but cautious, like he’s ready for the refusal. Like he’s already preparing to let it go if you so much as flinch.

And you do flinch, but not for the reasons he thinks.

Later that evening, after dinner, you set two cups of tea down at the dining table. Carlos joins you, still in his soft clothes, hair damp from a shower. You don’t know where to begin, but the weight of the past demands light.

You sit down across from him and say, “There’s something I haven’t told you.”

He watches you, quiet.

You tell Carlos. Not the same fantastical way you weave your stories; not the careful tales you chart on Microsoft Word. No, you just give him the truth. The one school in Monte Carlo. The green-eyed boy next door. The Skype calls, and the quiet ending of it all.

A long pause settles between you.

Carlos is still, absorbing. Then: “And you did not tell me because...?”

You meet his eyes. “Because I didn’t want to make you doubt anything. Because he doesn’t matter now. Not like you do,” you manage. “But seeing him again—through the screen, in the paddock—it made me realize I needed to tell you before Monaco. You think I’m afraid of cameras or press or whatever. I’m not. I’m afraid of ghosts.”

Carlos leans forward, both hands on his mug. “I’m not afraid of him.”

You smile, small and sad. “I know. But I needed you to know why I’ve stayed away. Why it might hurt to watch you drive on a track he’s on, in the city that once knew us.”

He reaches across the table, takes your hand in his. “Then come,” Carlos earnestly. “Not for the cameras. Not even for me. Come for you. For the part of you that’s grown since then. For the life you chose.”

You let the silence hold you both for a moment before nodding. “Okay,” you say. “I’ll be there.”

Carlos kisses the back of your hand, gently. Gently.

“It will be the race I remember most,” he promises. You don’t doubt it.

Your arrival at Monaco rips through the news like a raging tsunami.

You don a paddock past that declares Guest of Carlos Sainz, and a sort of confidence that indicates this is not the first time you’ve walked down these roads. At first, the media labels you as Carlos’ girlfriend. And then they see the glint of your ring under Monaco’s perpetual sun, and the title changes. Wife, the press whisper amongst each other, their cameras flashing, flashing, flashing.

Journalists dig for details. They find your writing. They put your accolades in the headlines. Someone interviews an old and withered Madame Noelle, who fondly recounts your aspirations for a Nobel Peace Prize for Literature. You make a mental note to tell her of your nomination.

Mere hours after you show up on the paddock, you get a frantic call from your publicist. “What have you done?” she demands. “Your books are flying off the shelves!”

“I went to a race,” you respond dazedly.

Carlos stays with you through it all. He guides you past the cameras, past the fans, past the Monégasque who begin to recognize you. Carlos keeps a hand on the small of your back, his presence cool and steady.

Especially when the inevitable happens.

When you step into the Ferrari motorhome and face your ghost. The one dressed in the same red apparel as your husband. The one with eyes you could make wishes on.

Charles looks up at the sound of the door opening and his gaze lands squarely on you.

Carlos doesn’t interrupt.

He sees Charles looking at you and simply steps aside, giving the moment air. Not leaving, not disappearing. Just pausing, the way someone does when they know something sacred is unfolding and their presence might shift its shape.

You step forward. So does Charles.

He’s older than you remember, but not by much. It’s more in the way he carries himself, in the lines near his eyes, in the heaviness that clings to his smile. He looks at you like he’s trying to understand something that changed when he wasn’t looking.

“Hey,” he greets. It’s small. Careful. Am I dreaming is the unspoken question.

“Hi,” you reply. No, you’re not becomes your wordless reply.

There’s a beat. Then another.

He almost smiles. “You’re here.”

You nod. “I’m here.”

At first, something flickers across his face. Something warm, hopeful, almost boyish. For a second, he thinks it’s about him.

That it was always about him. That the years and oceans and silences had all been waiting for this moment to make sense. That you're here now in Monaco to watch him break the supposed curse, to watch him fight for the title that has eluded him for years.

Then Charles sees the ring.

Then he sees Carlos, not far behind you, giving you space but not really gone.

The realization is slow. Painful. You watch it click into place.

“Oh,” Charles says, voice thinner now. He clears his throat, eyes flicking away for just a second before he finds his composure. “You’re—oh.”

You try to smile. It flickers and dies.

Carlos returns then, subtle but certain, his hand sliding around your waist like muscle memory. The touch grounds you. All at once, the nerves unravel. The noise, the flashing cameras, the ghosts all fade.

You lean into Carlos without thinking. Your body remembers where home is.

Charles watches the way you soften in his arms. The way your shoulders drop, how your breathing evens out. He sees it.

His expression is unreadable.

Not angry. Not sad. Just—fractured.

Like someone watching the ending of a story they didn’t know was being written without them.

Pleasantries are exchanged. You find a corner in the motorhome as Carlos goes off to do his thing. There is something in your chest that you can’t quite name, three languages and decades of writing later.

Later that evening, the hotel room is quiet, soft light spilling in from the lamps as Monaco murmurs beyond the balcony doors. You move through the familiar rhythm of the evening. Washing your face, brushing your teeth, folding your clothes over the armchair. Carlos is already in bed, shirtless and scrolling through his phone, but you can feel the tension under the surface.

He’s been reliable all day. Every time the press got too close, his hand found yours. Every time you faltered, he anchored you. But now, here, in the private dark of your shared life, the questions rise.

You slide into bed beside him, tucking your knees close.

Carlos puts his phone down, turning to face you. “Do you think he missed you?”

You pause, contemplating. “I think he missed the crybaby he knew a long time ago.”

“You were a crybaby?”

“Most of the time, Charles would just have to stand around and watch me.”

Carlos’s face shifts—just slightly. A flicker of something unspoken. His eyes go distant for half a second before he schools his features into something more neutral.

You catch it.

“Are you upset?” you ask gently.

He hesitates, and then shrugs. “No.”

It’s a lie. A visible one. You’ve known him too long not to notice when his mouth tightens just so, when his shoulders tense even as he pretends they haven’t.

You reach out, brushing your fingers against his arm. “Carlos.”

He looks at you, that flicker of hurt still in his gaze. Not because he doubts your words, but because he wishes he had been there first.

“I don’t have the right to be mad,” he says quietly.

“Of course you do,” you tell him instantly. “You’re my husband. You can be mad, or confused, or jealous, or whatever it is you’re trying to pretend not to feel.”

Carlos sighs, eyes flicking toward the ceiling. “He’s your childhood sweetheart. And it’s not like you’re going to run away with him.”

You laugh without meaning to.

Carlos looks at you again, semi-serious. “Are you?”

“Definitely,” you deadpan. “I’m going to throw away my life with you and run away with Charles to Monaco.”

Carlos doesn’t think that’s very funny.

You soften. “Do you even know me? I’m not going to leave Madrid for some... for Charles.”

Your husband’s eyes hold yours. “I know.”

A pause. Then, more quietly, he adds, “I know you.”

You curl closer to him, your fingers finding his under the covers. The silence that follows isn’t heavy this time. It’s whole.

Between free practices, with the sounds of tires screeching and engines humming just outside the hospitality suite, you scroll through your phone aimlessly. News alerts. Emails. A weather update. And then—

A Facebook notification.

You tap it open.

A message from Charles. The first in years. The app displays the last time you spoke: 2018. It’s a strange timestamp, haunting in its simplicity. A frozen past.

His message is short, straight to the point.

I know it’s been a while. If you have time while you’re in Monaco, maybe we could catch up? Would be nice.

You stare at the screen for a long time. You tell Carlos about it when the two of you are back in your hotel room, because everywhere else feels too public for a fact so intimate.

“He messaged me,” you say simply, showing him your phone.

Carlos reads it. Looks up, searching your face. “Do you want to go?”

“I wanted to ask you first.”

He smiles at that, gentle and firm all at once. “You’ve never had to ask for my permission.”

You nod, grateful. As you move toward the closet to pick an outfit, Carlos watches you with a kind of amused affection.

“What?” you ask, glancing over your shoulder.

Carlos grins ruefully. “Just thinking about how good of a story this is.”

“The story of Charles and me?”

“Yes. I can’t compete.”

You frown, turning to face Carlos. “What do you mean?”

“Childhood sweethearts who reconnect and realize they were meant for each other,” he says, half-joking, half-not. Enough to give you in second thoughts on whether you should go at all.

You walk over, hands on your hips. “We’re not meant for each other,” you say exasperatedly.

Carlos chuckles, his arms instinctively going to wrap around your waist. “I know, but in this story, I’m the evil Spaniard standing in the way of il predestinato’s destiny.”

You grab the nearest pillow and attempt to smack him with it, a laugh bubbling through your unease. “Shut up,” you huff.

He catches the pillow midair, chuckling, and you lean over to kiss him quickly before turning back to the closet.

The Oceanographic Museum of Monaco perches over the sea like it’s always been there. Unchanging, while everything else around it has moved and morphed and grown. It’s one of the few places in the Principality that still feels untouched by the glamour and spectacle. It’s where you and Charles used to sneak away on slow afternoons, pretending you were explorers, eyes wide at the glowing tanks and coiled sea creatures.

There aren’t many places Charles can go without being recognized anymore. But there are places that will keep his secrets. Places he grew up in, just like you. Places that remember who he was before the rest of the world knew his name.

You walk past the same entrance where you once lined up on school field trips. There’s a hum of nostalgia in your chest as you step inside, taking in the cool dimness, the sound of water lapping gently against glass, the muffled echo of voices.

You spot him by the jellyfish tank. His posture is looser than you remember, but still unmistakably him—tall, arms crossed, brow furrowed in thought. He’s dressed lowkey: baseball cap, neutral jacket. Still, you’d know him anywhere.

You walk up slowly. “Leclerc.”

He turns, startled. His face softens the moment he sees you. But there’s a beat—a pause like he’s searching for the right thing to say.

So you save him the trouble. You step forward and wrap your arms around him.

He hesitates for a breath. Then his arms come up around you, awkward and homely and unused to closeness like this from you, of all people.

When you pull back, your hands still on his arms, you both take each other in.

You laugh.

It bursts out, sudden and genuine. The absurdity of it. The familiarity. The age on both your faces and the way the years folded in on themselves like they never passed at all.

Charles grins. “Woah.”

“Woah,” you reply, breathless.

For a second, it feels like nothing ever changed. Even though everything has. You hug him again, more out of instinct than anything. It’s clumsy, short, but filled with everything you can’t quite say yet.

Charles sighs as you part. “I didn’t know what I’d say,” he confesses in fluent French. “I still don’t.”

“We don’t have to say anything clever,” you assure him, your French just a touch rusty but not any less sincere. “We’re here. That’s enough.”

You begin to walk the halls of the museum together. You are not strangers to the exhibits. Coral reefs, deep sea creatures, the huge skeletal models you used to dare each other to touch. But neither of you is paying much attention. Your conversation is light, filled with small talk: racing, writing, Madrid, the sea.

At one point, Charles stops by the virtual Great Barrier Reef exhibit.

“I should take a photo of you,” he says suddenly. “You, back in Monaco. It feels right.”

You laugh. “I don’t know if this is my most photogenic light.”

“It’s perfect,” he says, already raising his phone.

You pose at his incessant prodding, your entire form stiff in the blue glow of the exhibit. It casts oceanic shadows over your face, and you can’t help but feel a bit self-conscious.

Then Charles giggles—the sound so much like the laughter you remember from your yesteryears—and it breaks the tension. He snaps a few pictures, and you ease into it, eventually throwing up a peace sign.

When he’s done, he lowers the phone and smiles at you. “I’ll send them to you.”

You nod, heart warm, throat tight. (The photos never find their way to your inbox.)

It’s strange, being back. But it isn’t bad.

Not yet.

You sit at the far end of the museum, near the panoramic window that looks out over the endless stretch of the Mediterranean. The sun has dipped lower in the sky, and the light filters through the waves of the aquarium glass, painting you both in watery hues. There’s a hush here, the quiet that comes after the reunion adrenaline dies down, replaced by something slower. The final lap after a race.

You glance over at Charles, who’s scrolling through some of the photos he took of you. His mouth curls slightly at one, and you can see him pause like he’s committing the moment to memory.

“So,” you ask, voice casual. “Are you seeing anyone right now?”

Charles looks up, surprised—not by the question, but maybe by how directly it’s asked. He pockets his phone and responds, “Yeah. I am.”

You tilt your head, smiling a little. “Serious?”

He runs a hand over his face, sheepish. “We just started talking about getting married,” he admits with a hesitance that has you blinking in confusion.

“Do you not want to get married?”

“I don't know.”

Your brows furrow. “If you love her, why don’t you know?”

He shifts in his seat, his leg bouncing slightly. “It's a little complicated.”

You don’t push, but you do watch him. After a beat, he relents. “I think I want her to marry someone more impressive than me.”

The quiet deepens. Not with discomfort, but with a kind of understanding that doesn’t need words. The two of you feel very old in that moment.

Not just in years, but in the way time has moved through you both. In the way the years have taught you to doubt what you give, to second-guess what you’re worth. The sea outside rolls on, unaffected. Timeless.

You rest your chin on your hand, looking out the window alongside him. “You’re still Charles,” you say quietly.

He doesn’t look at you. Just offers a tired smile. “Maybe that's the problem.”

You don’t respond. What is there to say?

Some people grow into the people they were meant to be.

Others spend their lives trying to prove they were always worth becoming.

And some—some just carry the weight of both.

Charles breaks the silence first. “What about you and Carlos?”

You smile, unable to help the way you grin whenever your husband’s name comes up in conversation. You tell Charles as much as you can without boring him. The bookstore kiss over the counter. The backyard wedding with cheap champagne. The hyphenated surname, the apartment you share.

You don’t mention the late-night talks, the bruises of uncertainty, the ache of Carlos carving out space for himself beyond the shadow of Ferrari. That part is too tender. Too recent.

Charles waits until you slow down. “I always figured he had someone,” he muses, “but he never said anything.”

“He wouldn’t,” you confirm. “He likes having some things that are only his.”

Charles’ gaze shifts, flickering somewhere to your hand. “I never thought it would be you.”

You can’t answer that. You don’t know how.

Silence slips between you again. This one is sharper, harder to bear. Your wedding ring feels impossibly heavy on your finger, like it’s pulling your entire arm down. You shift in your seat, suddenly aware of the weight of everything—not just the band of gold, but what it means. What it promises.

And what it leaves behind.

You return to the hotel late, just past the hour where the city outside softens and falls silent. The streets are darker now, shadows pressed up against the cobblestones, and inside, the room is gently lit. Carlos has left the bedside lamp on, waiting for you.

He’s in bed already, phone forgotten on his chest, eyes intense when they land on you. He doesn’t ask about your afternoon with Charles. You don’t offer anything. Instead, you slide in beside him, into the familiar ease of his warmth.

There’s no ceremony to it. No need. Just a glance, the softest touch of your fingertips along his jaw. He turns into it, eyes falling shut, and then his lips find yours.

You kiss like people who know each other’s shapes. Who’ve made a home in each other’s arms. The kiss deepens, slow and deliberate, his hands tracing the line of your spine as if to remind himself: here, here, here.

You let him. Letting your hands cup the back of his neck, letting yourself be unraveled with quiet sighs and whispered nothings. The world narrows to this. To the hush of skin against skin, to the reverent way he holds you, to the way your name sounds like a promise on his lips.

In the afterglow, you lie curled against him, chest rising and falling in rhythm with his. The silence is gentle, not heavy.

Then, Carlos speaks, his voice barely above a whisper. “Do you know that you speak in French when you talk in your sleep?”

“I do?”

“You never sleep talk in English, or Spanish. Just French.”

You tilt your head up. “I didn’t know that. You never told me.”

Carlos is quiet for a moment, fingers idly tracing patterns on your bare shoulder. You realize it’s his—your; a shared thing, now—surname. S-A-I-N-Z.

“Most of the time, I think it is cute,” he mumbles. “But sometimes... I don’t know. I get scared.”

You shift slightly. “Why do you get scared?”

He exhales slowly. The deep and dying breath of a weight he has carried for God-knows-how-long. “You dream in a language that I can’t understand,” he says in a voice so small that you don’t immediately believe it’s your husband you’re speaking to. “There’s this whole place inside of you where I can’t go.”

Your heart tightens at that. You reach up, brushing his hair back, and press your lips against his. The kiss is soft, lingering. A gesture that tries to say: come in. Come close. I’ll show you.

The Monaco sun is high and soft at once, glittering off the Mediterranean like sequins scattered by the gods. In the Ferrari garage, the air hums with nerves and reverence. You are here as Carlos’ guest. As his wife. But the Monégasque crowd, ever discerning, ever nostalgic, knows your face too well. They know you are here for Charles, too.

Charles’ mother finds you first, arms warm and familiar as she pulls you into a hug. Her voice is full of joy, like no time has passed. “Tu as grandi,” she says. You’ve grown up. You smile, because you know she means more than just your height.

Charles’ girlfriend, standing nearby, offers a polite smile. Tight. Controlled. She’s beautiful in a sharp, curated way. You return the smile, equally curated. This is not your moment. Not anyone’s, really. Not yet.

Carlos starts at P3, the sun catching in his visor as he climbs into the car. You squeeze his hand before he goes, press your forehead to his briefly, whisper something soft and private. A murmur amid the noise. A prayer to all higher powers. A ritual, as sacred as the vows you exchanged on your makeshift altar.

Charles is at P1.

The race runs steady. Smooth. Monaco is a street circuit notorious for its tight corners, but today it moves like silk beneath the tires. You stand with the engineers and crew, your eyes locked on the screens, barely blinking.

Lap after lap, Charles holds the lead.

Something blooms slow and aching inside of you. Not betrayal. Not regret. Just a deep-seated knowing. Of inevitability. Of time folding in on itself.

You remember it all: how you and Charles would sneak down to the port as children, watching the grandstands rise piece by piece, pretending the world was being built just for you. How he once said he’d win here someday, and you told him you’d be watching.

Is that a promise? he had asked, and you sobbed at the thought of him thinking otherwise.

Years and years and years past that afternoon, Charles Leclerc crosses Monaco’s finish line first.

You don’t hear the cheering right away. Not over the rush in your ears. Your heart feels stretched, as if it’s holding two lives at once.

A hand presses a tissue into yours.

You startle, realizing your cheeks are wet. You hadn’t noticed the tears. Not until someone—perhaps one of the crew, perhaps someone else entirely—offers comfort in the silence that follows greatness.

You take the tissue. You press it to your face.

Charles has won Monaco.

And for reasons too vast to name, you are crying.

Carlos finishes P3. The moment he finds you after the awarding ceremony, he is champagne-soaked and bright-eyed. His face is alight with something close to joy, but not quite. The smile he wears is wide, yes, but not as full as you hoped it would be.

Still, he doesn’t hesitate. He pushes through everyone—engineers, media, crew, well-wishers—to get to you, to honor the first race you have watched in person.

He wraps his arms around you and kisses you with the kind of devotion that carves out a space in time. When he pulls away, he whispers against your lips, “That one was for you, mi amor. For the little girl from Monaco.”

You close your eyes, and your heart stirs with something profound. You don’t know if Carlos knows the full weight of what he’s said, but you appreciate it. So much.

You try to tell him, try to choke it out, and it’s a mess of gracias and merci and thank you, like you can’t settle on which language you want to be grateful in. All of them, perhaps. It’s what he certainly deserves. He wills your indecision away with another kiss that feels like a promise in its own right.

After the moment quiets, after he’s pulled away to do media and you’re left watching from the side, your eyes drift.

And there’s Charles. He’s fresh off the podium, hair tousled from the cap, face flushed with the unmistakable color of victory.

There is too much that cannot be said.

You reach out your hand, and he sees it, understands it. He takes it. You squeeze his hand, and he squeezes back. Just once.

And in that moment, you think back to a classroom high on a hill, where you once told Charles, told yourself, that nobody from Monaco becomes a star.

You want to laugh. Or cry. Or both. You want to go back in time and shake your younger self by the shoulders, to tell her Vous avez tort. You are wrong.

You are holding Monaco’s star in your hands right now.

The bedsheets rustle as you and Carlos get ready for bed. He’s uncharacteristically contemplative, sitting at the edge of the mattress with his towel still slung over his shoulders from the shower. His hair, damp and curling slightly. His gaze, a thousand miles away.

He doesn’t speak right away. Just stares at the floor with an intensity that makes your chest ache. You reach for the lamp switch but hesitate, sensing something lingering in the air.

Finally, he says, “I’m trying not to think of it as a metaphor.”

You shift until you’ve settled beside him. “What do you mean?”

He glances at you, a weak smile barely tugging at his lips. “Charles finishing P1. Me finishing P3.”

You let the words sit between you before replying, gently, “You’re forgetting the part where I love you.”

Carlos exhales and turns his face toward you fully. “I don’t forget it,” he admits. “I just have trouble believing it sometimes.”

Your heart fractures at the edges.

“It’s not you,” he says quickly, earnestly. “It’s not anything you’re doing wrong. It’s just…”

“The noise,” you finish for him, knowing of the voices in his head that he wars with everyday. They are commentators; they are his parents. They are you, too, sometimes, but they are also his own voice.

He nods, ashamed.

You reach up, thumb tracing the curve of his cheek. “Then let me be louder.”

He blinks, eyes dark and wide, as you lean in. The kiss you press to his lips isn’t urgent or rushed. It’s deliberate. Patient. A whisper of devotion, spoken without words.

He melts into you slowly, and you keep kissing him like a promise—like if you keep your mouth on his long enough, he’ll never again question the truth of your love. Like your lips could spell out every assurance in a language only the two of you understand.

Carlos pulls you closer, and when you break apart to breathe, his forehead rests against yours.

He doesn’t say anything. He doesn’t have to.

You are his proof.

And you hope, as he closes his eyes and holds you tighter, that tonight he believes it in every bone of his body.

Carlos is already awake when you stir the next morning, his arm heavy around your waist, his breath warm and steady against your shoulder. You turn slightly to face him, eyes still adjusting. His gaze is soft, but a storm brews beneath it.

“Charles invited us out for a drink,” he says, voice low, like he’s not sure if he should be saying it at all.

You try to blink the sleep out of your eyes. “When?”

“Tonight. After press.” He hesitates. “I thought about not telling you.”

The confession lands gently, but not without weight.

“But you did,” you murmur, which loosely translates to Apology accepted.

Carlos’ hand tightens slightly around your side, grounding himself. “I could not keep it from you. Even if I wanted to. My conscience would not shut up,” he grumbles.

You breathe in slowly, watching the way his eyes won’t quite meet yours. You understand. How could you not? The history. The years. The tangle of past and present between the three of you, unspoken but undeniable.

Your fingers go to brush through his hair, still a little mussed from sleep. “We don’t have to go. Not if you don’t want to,” you reassure him.

His brow furrows. “I want you to go. That’s the problem.”

You let that settle. The truth of it.

Carlos shifts, pulling you closer. So close you can hear his heartbeat against your ribs. He holds you like he’s scared he already lost you. Like saying the words out loud made the fear real.

You wrap your arms around him in return.

And you think: maybe this is how you survive the past. By meeting it, side by side, in the present.

By bringing it to a dimly-lit speakeasy tucked away beneath the facade of an unassuming storefront. Velvet drapes and low jazz hum in the background. The amber lighting casts soft shadows across the walls. It smells of aged wood and whiskey, and even before you descend the narrow staircase, you can feel Carlos’s fingers brush yours for reassurance.

He doesn’t hold your hand. He rarely does in public. But this, tonight, is a little different.

Charles is already there, seated with a drink in hand at a table tucked into the farthest corner. He looks up as the two of you approach, eyes flicking first to Carlos, then to you. The smile that spreads across his face is genuine, if a little tentative.

Carlos is the first to speak. “Charles.”

They hug—tight, familiar, and briefly forgetting whatever weight still hangs between them.

You and Charles meet eyes next. The sight of him feels like catching your breath halfway. You step in, arms wrapping around him in a hesitant embrace. He holds you a second longer than expected, like memory pulled him in. When you pull apart, his smile is softer.

“Alexandra couldn’t make it,” he says, voice low and smooth. “But she sends her regards.”

You nod, offering a polite smile. “Tell her thank you.”

The three of you settle in, the velvet booth hugging you in close. Carlos sits next to you; Charles, across the two of you. Carlos’ thigh rests against yours beneath the table, grounding you. You can feel the tension in his leg.

Charles orders a round for the table. The server doesn’t ask for names. Of course they don’t. Everyone in Monaco knows who Charles is, who Carlos could be, who you once were. Even here, in the quiet corners of this exclusive speakeasy, the walls feel like they’re watching.

Drinks arrive. The ice clinks.

No one speaks for a moment. Then Charles clears his throat. “So... this is nice. I wasn’t sure you’d say yes.”

Carlos shifts slightly beside you, and you glance at him before replying. “We figured it was a good idea.”

Charles meets your gaze again. “Yeah,” he croaks. “Good idea.”

He takes a sip of his drink. Carlos rests a hand on your knee beneath the table.

And for a moment, the past and present sit together under amber light, waiting to see which of them will speak first.

You’re halfway through your drink, something citrusy and burning slow, when the conversation finds its rhythm. Easy, like skipping stones across a still lake. Carlos and Charles laugh about something from the garage, a story involving Lando’s half-zipped fireproofs and a mistakenly swapped helmet.

You lean back, watching them with a kind of quiet wonder. They’re good together, you realize. Not just on the track, but here too, outside the cars, outside the race. Carlos glances at you when he says something particularly ridiculous, like he’s checking if he’s still funny to you. He is.

The three of you have settled comfortably into English, but it meanders. You break into Spanish when Carlos exaggerates a story.

“Mentiroso,” you chide, nudging your husband beneath the table.

Charles grins. “What did you say?”

You look at him slyly. “I said he’s full of it.”

“Which is probably true,” Charles says, lifting his glass.

Later, you tease Charles with Frenchisms, dropping a mon pauvre when he recounts a rough stint in the simulator. He shoots you a pointed look, mock-offended.

“She says that when she’s trying to make me feel small,” Carlos stage-whispers.

Charles chuckles, then, almost offhandedly, says, “Well, he did ask me for French lessons once.”

Your eyes dart to Carlos, eyebrows raised. “Did you?”

Carlos hesitates for a beat, a sheepish smile tugging at his mouth. “Yeah. It was to understand you better.”

The warmth from your drink rises to your cheeks. You search his face. “Because of the dreams?”

He nods. Something in your chest pulls tight. Tender and aching. The idea of Carlos, awake in the middle of the night, trying to catch scraps of your unconscious language and learning a new one just to keep pace—it overwhelms you.

The irony is not lost on you, of course. The happenstance of him having asked Charles, of all people. But that is only second to the sheer affection you feel for your husband in that moment.

You reach for Carlos’ hand beneath the table, and he squeezes it twice in a wordless Te amo.

Charles, for once, gives you both a moment. He looks away, sipping his drink. But there’s a softness in the silence that settles. A quiet knowing.

You think, perhaps, he understands what it means to still be learning the language of someone you love.

With a little more alcohol in your systems, you and Charles slip into your native tongue.

Carlos scrolls on his phone, thumb lazily flicking past a feed he’s not really reading. He’s two drinks in, one leg bounced lazily beneath the table, but he hasn’t said much since you and Charles code switched.

You and Charles speak quietly, close enough to be overheard, yet cocooned in a language Carlos doesn't quite live in. You laugh softly at something Charles says about your shared childhood, but the ease falters when he leans in, eyes fixed on yours like he’s carrying something too big to keep anymore.

Charles says, “It is good that you immigrated.”

“I agree,” you say, words already beginning to slur just a bit. As if you’re unable to keep up with all the words within you.

“Monaco is too small of a country for you,” he muses. “It’s not enough to satisfy your greed.”

You both laugh, the kind that makes your shoulders shake and your cheeks ache. Carlos looks up briefly, sips from his drink, goes back to watching a video on mute.

And then Charles drops a quiet bomb, almost offhand. Spoken in the French that Carlos tried and failed to learn.

“I didn’t know that liking your husband would hurt this much,” Charles confesses lowly.

Stunned silence.

The air crackles around the three of you.

It’s as if something invisible but potent unfurls between you and Charles—a door that had always been there, just never opened. Now it’s swinging, slowly, soundlessly, wide.

Charles is not done. “When we stopped talking,” he says, “I really missed you. Did you…”

He trails off. You know what he means to ask. “Of course,” you respond. Bien sûr.

Charles’s tone sharpens, almost accusing. “But you met Carlos then,” he says.

You stiffen. “You met your girlfriend then, too,” you reply, the defensive edge in your voice unmistakable. You feel the shift in energy between you. Even through the buzz of alcohol and the nostalgic glow of memory, there’s a thin, tense wire stretched tight across the table, taut like a rubber band.

Are the two of you really being jealous of each other—here, now, with your husband sitting right next to you?

Charles catches himself, remembers his place. His expression softens. “I’m sorry,” he says. Je suis désolé.

You breathe out. “It’s okay.” C’est pas grave.

“I guess seeing you here again has made me have a lot of weird thoughts.”

“What kind of thoughts?”

“You know.” Charles hesitates, then seems to decide he’s gotten this far. “Seeing my first love after all these years. I shouldn’t have let her go. Thoughts like that.”

Carlos doesn’t look up from his phone, but somehow, the room feels smaller now. Like it knows too much. Like all three of you do, even as you try to protect your husband from it through the smokescreen of language.

Charles’ voice comes low, like he already knows this is the last time he'll speak this truth aloud. He goes on, the hypotheticals spilling out of him in one fell swoop. “What if I'd gone and found you in Madrid? What if you could have come back to Monaco? What if you had never left?”

Your breath catches.

“If you hadn’t left like that, and we just grew up together, would I still have looked for you?” Charles goes on. “Would we have dated? Broken up? Gotten married? Would we have had kids together?”

The room fades. The soft jazz, the warm laughter from another booth, the low murmur of Carlos's scrolling. All of it falls into a hush.

Charles pauses. His eyes are steady now, holding yours with a painful clarity. “Thoughts like that,” he finishes lamely.

You don’t speak. You can’t. Because there’s a weight to the moment—one that sits heavy in your ribs, tearing you up from the inside.

And then, he adds, gently: “But the truth I learned here is, you had to leave because you’re you. And the reason I liked you is because you’re you. And who you are is someone who leaves.”

There it is.

The ache spills into your chest before you even realize it’s taken root. Because it’s not unkind, what he says. It’s not bitter. It’s worse—it’s honest.

In that honesty, something beautiful and impossible hangs between you. A version of your life that will never be lived.

Charles sits back then. Just slightly. As if he’s letting go of a memory before it can burn him.

You sit across from him and let the ache settle in quietly, like a language you’ve always known how to speak.

Quelqu'un m'a dit drifts from the bar’s speakers like a whispered secret, Carla Bruni’s voice smoky and lilting in the familiar French. You recognize it immediately. The lyrics stir something in you. You let them settle into the silence between you and Charles, where his confession still hovers like dust in a beam of light.

I am told that our lives don’t have great value, Carla sings. I am told that the time that slips away is a bastard and that it’s making coats from our grief.

You finally speak, your voice half-swallowed by the velvet dark around your booth. “The girl you remember doesn’t exist here.”

Charles looks up. His eyes are soft. “I know.”

You nod once, slowly. “But that little girl did exist. She’s not here in front of you, but it doesn’t mean she’s not real.” A beat. You breathe in, steady. “Seventeen years ago, I left her with you.”

Charles exhales. He looks like something fragile just cracked inside him.

“I know,” he says again. “And even though I was a kid, I loved her.”

There is no shame in his voice. No hesitance. Just the truth.

You both laugh; the sound, an exhale of something too old to cry about.

The song goes on. Someone told me that you still love me, Carla croons.

Charles adds—softly, earnestly, even as his heart breaks in real time—

“To Carlos, you’re someone who stays.”

You don’t say anything back. Because that, too, is the truth.

Carlos looks up at the mention of his name, brows lifting as if surfacing from deep thought. His eyes shift between you and Charles, searching for context. Charles smirks, the crooked kind of smile that’s equal parts tease and defense mechanism.

“We’re talking shit about you,” Charles teases, the way only an old friend can joke, as though time hadn’t passed and no lines had been drawn.

Carlos’ expression flickers through something complicated—surprise, amusement, a flash of wariness. But it softens when you lean into his side, your head resting against his shoulder for a fleeting second. The kind of gesture that makes things make sense.

A minute later, you excuse yourself to the bathroom.

The table goes still. The music, ambient and moody, flows like a whisper through the speakeasy. Carla’s voice is now a distant echo.

Charles watches your retreating figure. He doesn’t speak for a moment. Then, out of nowhere, he says to Carlos, “Thank you.”

Carlos turns to him. “For what?”

Charles doesn’t answer. He just shrugs, looks away like the answer should be obvious, or like saying it out loud might ruin it. The words aren’t necessary. Not here.

Carlos studies him for a moment, quiet. “You are welcome,” he says simply. Accepting grace for the time spent as teammates, for the woman he loved well enough that Charles became nothing but a footnote.

The moment stretches out. Heavy, but not uncomfortable.

And then, Charles—perhaps for the first time in years—lets the emotion rise unchecked. His lips press together, nostrils flaring just slightly. His jaw tightens. The tears don’t fall dramatically. They come silently, one blinking past his lashes and trailing down his cheek like a secret.

Carlos sees. He does. But he says nothing.

He turns his gaze away, choosing not to acknowledge what should never be spoken between them. It’s the kindest thing he can do.

When you return, the two men are sitting just as you left them. The moment is already buried, tucked between the folds of music and memory, where it will stay.

You tell Carlos you’ll walk Charles to his car. He nods once and stays seated, watching as the two of you slip past the velvet curtains and back into the night.

The speakeasy door closes behind you just as the last notes of Carla’s song follow you out, fading like breath in winter.

I am told that destiny is making fun of us. It doesn’t give us anything and it promises us everything.

Charles walks beside you, his hands in his coat pockets. The streetlights cast soft halos on the pavement. There are no paparazzi here, no fans, no noise. Just you and him and the silence of streets that seem older than memory.

“We should do this again sometime,” Charles says. His voice is light, but the words are heavy.

“Definitely.”

You both know it’s a lie.

Monaco will likely never be in your orbit again. Not like this. Not with this kind of ache. Not with this kind of clarity.

The walk to the parking lot is slow, like your feet understand what your heart refuses to say out loud. You think about destiny—how strange and cruel and circular it can be. Charles, golden child of Monte Carlo, boy who was born to drive. He fulfilled his. You know it just by looking at him.

You have yours too. One that took you far from the Riviera, far from childhood ghosts, and into a life that is yours.

Somewhere between the beginning and the end, you and Charles became people who no longer quite fit into each other’s stories. Maybe you were never meant to. Maybe that’s the point.

He stops at his car, turns to you with that soft, sad smile. You hug him one last time. He lets go slower than he should.

“Take care of him,” he says.

“I will,” you promise. You would do it even if Charles didn’t ask you to.

He nods. Then, quietly: “Take care of you, too.”

Charles gets into his car. You stand there a moment longer, watching him ready to drive off into the city that raised him.

You don’t cry then.

Destiny doesn’t owe you that.

You turn around, the weight of Charles’ goodbye already settling in your chest, when you hear him call out—

“Hey!”

It’s just a word. Just a sound. But the way he says it, like it comes from somewhere deep, somewhere old, turns the air electric. For a moment, it doesn’t feel like you’re in the present. That single word—“Hey!”—rewinds everything.

It’s summer again. You’re a child. You’re in Monaco. You’re at your front door, and Charles is on his bicycle. He says au revoir instead of je t’aime because he is too young to understand the latter. He bikes the entire length of Monaco and back, passing by your house a dozen times even though you’ve already been taken away by a ferry that Charles will curse for months to come.

The memory flickers on like a fluorescent light about to burn out.

You turn to look at Charles now, in the dim glow of the parking lot. For a moment, you’re fooled. You could believe he’s still that boy, standing at your front porch and watching his whole life as it’s about to split in two.

Charles has stepped out of his car. His face is flushed with everything he doesn’t say. There’s conflict written all over him.

The desire to speak versus the need to stay silent. The affection versus the reverence. The sting versus the respect. His hands twitch slightly where they hang by his sides.

Finally, he says, voice softer than it's been all night, “In a past life. Do you think...?”

A supposition. It is the closest you will get to each other without betraying what you both currently have.

Smiling sadly, you manage, “Maybe.”

He tongues the inside of his cheek. An old habit, one that kept him from crying. “Okay,” he croaks. “Alright.”

“Charles…”

“No, no,” he says quickly, holding up a hand, the tiniest of smiles breaking through the storm in his eyes. “I’ll take 'maybe'.”

You swallow, and it feels like you’re swallowing every version of the past that could’ve been. “Okay.”

His gaze lingers. The moment stretches, enough that you feel every second like you’re learning how to count for the first time again.

Un. Deux. Trois. Quatre. Cinq. Six—

“Maybe in a next life, too,” he says.

You blink. “Charles—”

“See you then?”

Your mouth stays parted, but the words don’t come. This one is an invitation you do not know how to RSVP.

Charles gets back in the car. The door shuts with a soft finality.

He drives off.

And just like that, the spell breaks. The memory fades. Monaco is now. Monaco is then. And you’re walking back to Carlos.

You head back into the speakeasy.

You begin crying.

With each step, you cry harder.

You are crying like the little girl you once were, except Charles is not there to watch you cry. He is not the one with a hand hovering awkwardly over your shoulder, not the one with a conflicted expression at the sheer enormity of your emotions. You cry alone.

Your heels click across the floor as you re-enter the bar, the sound too loud against the low music and warm hush of patrons. No one looks your way, but you feel like a spectacle anyway. A walking memory unraveling at the seams.

Carlos is waiting for you.

He’s not on his phone. His drink is untouched. It’s like he’s been watching the door the entire time, as though he truly wondered if you might not come back. If you might run away with the boy you once loved and never stopped missing.

When Carlos sees you in tears, his expression crumples. His mouth parts slightly, his brows pull in. There is no jealousy in his face. No accusation. Just sorrow. Just heartbreak, raw and unhidden, like he’s feeling your pain along with his own.

You stand in front of him, unable to say a word.

Carlos doesn’t speak either.

He watches you for a brief moment. Then he reaches for you.

You fall into his arms. He wraps them around you, strong and warm and sure, and holds you while you cry. And cry. And cry.

You bury your face into his shoulder, hands clutching the fabric of his shirt like it might anchor you to the earth. He strokes your back slowly, murmuring something you can’t hear but feel in the weight of his hold. It could be English, or Spanish, or French. You’re not sure.

You are crying like the little girl you once were, except this time—this time—someone does something about it. Someone stays. ⛐

#charles leclerc x reader #carlos sainz x reader #charles leclerc x you #carlos sainz x you #f1 x reader #formula 1 x reader #formula one x reader #f1 imagine #formula one imagine #⛐ kae prix #⛐ cs55 #⛐ cl16 #i keep writing longform im sorry guys .. this will b my last for now ..

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ckret2 · 2 months ago

Note

i am FASCINATED by the little scraps i've heard about bill's uncle. am i allowed to know more about him. and if the answer is no do you have a chapter estimate for when i am

yeah sure, I already made a post on Bill's mom, I've finally got enough material to make a post on Bill's dad.

Bill got his gorgeous eyelashes, warm color scheme, black limbs, and personality from his mom. He got his shape, his brick lines, and his slitted pupil from his dad. His dad's a self-made businessman*! (*His dad got suckered into joining a multi-level marketing scheme and now he makes money by suckering other people into joining the MLM scheme.)

And: his dad has a brother. They're twiiins!

Bill keeps targeting twins. (The Stans, the kids, TBOB says Pyronica's got a twin sister Hydronica...) I imagine Bill's twin obsession is rooted in something close to home.

Because Euclid & Euler's eye split in half mid-development, they have unusually oval-shaped eyes—a common sign of twins. They've been going to an optometrist since they were toddlers to deal with poor eyesight and floaters in their peripheral vision. They've had a mix of surgery, corrective lenses, and medication to narrow their field of view to the area they can see clearly. So when baby Billy said he was seeing "bright white dots" on "the outside of everything," Euclid went aha! He knows exactly what Bill's seeing!

He did not, in fact, know what Bill was seeing.

Bill's parents didn't regularly visit family, but Euler was the one relative they saw most often. He was the first person to snap out of the "haha it sure is funny how Bill can guess when somebody's about to knock on the door" rationalizations to realize that Bill really could see things no one else did.

And since Bill's parents are sort of disasters who think starting a cult is a great get-rich-quick scheme, Euler was one of the most emotionally stable role models in Bill's life. It sure is a good thing that Euler was a constant presence and nothing happened to him during Bill's tender formative years!

"But wait," you say, "you told us that Bill got his shape and slit pupil from his dad. But wouldn't that mean he got genes for a square? And how could he have gotten a slit pupil if that wasn't a genetic trait, but a consequence of an eyeball splitting in half?"

Triangles and slit pupils don't run in Euclid's side of the family. But squares and twins do.

I imagine Bill's twin obsession is rooted in something close to home.

"So Steve exists in your headcanon—?" No. He's a stillbirth his parents pretend doesn't exist. He's a crime Bill committed before he was born. He's the imaginary phantom Bill's parents are searching for when they look at Bill—starting fires, hallucinating, spitting up his medicine—and wonder what he'd be like if he was different. He's a symbol representing a source of unconditional love and support that Bill deserved and needed, but never had. Steve's all those things—but he doesn't and never has existed.

And there at last is my Euclid headcanons post. If y'all are interested & didn't see it, here's my Scalene headcanons post! And some headcanons about shape twins that still basically work post-TBOB, we just know now that Euclideans don't need a line and a polygon to reproduce.

(95% of my headcanons about Bill's dad & uncle are pre-TBOB. The only difference is that I originally designed Euclid & Euler as green trapezoids that had split from a hexagon. Trapezoids so that Bill and his dad could do this, green so that Bill's dad could be the original color Bill was designed as before the Gravity Falls crew made him yellow & so that his family could be money-colored: gold-colored Bill & mom, dollar-bill-colored dad.)

(After TBOB/TINAWDC revealed his dad's a triangle and either red or blue, I decided to make the twins blue-green (because I wanted to keep in that "bill's original color scheme" reference) and finagle it so that Euler could still be a trapezoid; after Pyramid Steve came out, I suddenly had a really good thematic reason to make them blue-green. I'd been playing with the idea of making Bill a shoulda-beena twin, Steve finalized that decision by giving me a physical design that could tie into Bill's extended family.)

#euclid cipher #scalene and euclid #bill cipher #euclydia #the book of bill #gravity falls #headcanons #my art #pyramid steve #anonymous #ask #(the funny part of their names is that even though they have similar spelling they're pronounced entirely differently)#(you'd expect yoo clid and yoo ler. but it's yoo clid and oil er)#(anyway since i'm not updating the fic this week here's your substitute art/headcanon post)

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try-set-me-on-fire · 6 months ago

Text

They’ve got the little window over the sink open and Bobby keeps calling through it, asking for ingredients, utensils. Eddie clatters around the cabinet by the fridge.

“Third shelf,” Bobby says again, elbow on the sill. It doesn’t help any more than the first time he said it.

“I don’t even- Bobby, I don’t know what I’m looking for. Just- you can’t just use a normal spatula?”

“The flexibility and sharp edge of a fish spatula,” Bobby says, also for the second time, with a strained sort of patience, “Is perfect for sliding under-”

Buck’s arm reaches over Eddie’s shoulder and plucks a long slotted spatula from Bobby’s elaborate and baffling collection. “Got it.” He kisses the side of Eddie’s head as he keeps moving, lips catching the top of his ear. “It’s better for-”

“Pancakes, fritters, any sort of delicate patty, yeah, yeah, I heard.”

Bobby and Buck grin at him with identical raised eyebrows, it's kind of uncanny. “He’s not hopeless after all.”

“I do my best,” Buck says, smacking Eddie on the back and heading towards the door. “He’s come a long way.”

Eddie crosses his arms. “I don’t have to keep handing you shit. We’re not at work. I could make you walk inside every time.”

Bobby grins wider. “And I could give you all the burnt tater tots.”

Eddie pouts. “I’m reporting you to HR for unfair retaliation in response to labor concerns.”

“We’re not at work,” Bobby says, serenely. “Hand me the tenderizer.”

Eddie was sent in here, originally, like half an hour ago, to cut up the two giant watermelons Hen and Karen had brought direct from the farmers market, but he’d only got the knife halfway through the first one when the side quests started coming. He finally returns to the cutting board as Buck and Bobby’s voice drift further away, towards the grill. He cuts the thing in half and then stares at it so long he jumps a foot in the air when Maddie suddenly appears next to him.

“Woah,” she laughs. “What secrets of the universe does that watermelon hold?”

Eddie coughs out a chuckle. “I was just- debating the best shape to eat.”

She hums thoughtfully. “Big choice. Little cubes? Little cubes are nice. Or, like, slices?”

“I’ve always been a fan of a nice wedge.”

Maddie makes a triangle shape with her hands. “It is a classic.”

“Kind of makes your plate top heavy, though.”

“You’ve got two watermelons,” she points out.

“Wedges and cubes,” Eddie nods. “I like your way of thinking.”

She grabs a bowl from a different cupboard — why does everyone know this kitchen so well already? This is the new Grant-Nash residence house warming party, Eddie’s got lost on the way to the bathroom like three times since he got here — as he cubes the first melon. “How was the movie?”

“Hm?”

“Didn’t you and Buck go see Conclave earlier? The trailer looked interesting.”

“Oh, yeah.” Eddie scoops the cubes into the bowl and rinses his hands off before starting in on wedges.

Maddie laughs behind him. “… and how was it?”

“Oh! Uh- yeah, I mean- you know, horror movies, they’re fun.”

Maddie tilts her head. “Wait, wasn’t that one a drama?”

“Uh-”

“Wait.” She wrinkles her nose. “Were you just- were you making out with my brother literally the whole time?”

Eddie, hands up, gives her a bare teeth grimace of a smile as she cackles and whacks him with a towel. “Hey- I mean, I kind of looked up once, they were in some sort of- I don’t know, a theater or something? It was really dark in there? It looked kind of creepy.”

“Oh my god.”

“There’s a lot of Catholicism themed horror movies,” Eddie weakly tries to defend himself. “How was I supposed to know?”

“By watching it!” She laughs. “Why spend the $12?”

“My air conditioning is broken,” Eddie says sheepishly. “And it was 10 AM on a weekday, the only other person in there was 80 years old and snored through most of it.” He frowns. “Which also makes more sense if it wasn’t- I don’t know, I thought it was like The Conjuring?”

She laughs again, helpless giggles while she covers her face. Her daughter laughs the same way sometimes. “Don’t you have catholic guilt? Wasn’t that a thing?”

Eddie shrugs. “My abuela always says once I commit to something I never do it by half.”

“So, making out all through a movie about the pope?”

Eddie points at her. “Gay making out all through a movie about the pope.” He frowns again. “Damn, it was really about the pope? Okay I’m not- look, I’m not feeling guilty about that but, uh, if you ever talk to my grandmother or Pepa, uh-”

“I don’t think it would come up,” she says, patting his shoulder.

“They’re not- it’s- they wouldn’t like me making out with a girl during a pope movie, either, it’s not the gay thing.”

“I know, Eddie,” she says, more kind than teasing. “Everybody’s really happy for you,” kinder still.

“Oh.” His cheeks are probably bright red. “Uh. Thank you.” His ears burn as he busies himself with the watermelon again. “You know- I wouldn’t’ve got here, without Buck.”

Maddie comes close, presses their elbows together until he looks back up at her. “He deserves someone who doesn’t commit to things halfway.”

It makes Eddie laugh with soft edges, because: “I think… I’ve always been all the way, with him.”

She smiles so wide her nose crunches. “I know.”

There’s a tap at the window, and there he is, Buck himself. His nose is a little pink from the late October heat, he’s smiling real big. “Hi.”

“What do you want now?” Eddie’s tone is snappy but he’s sure his face is pure mush.

Buck sticks a thumb at Maddie. “Chim’s threatening to, and I quote, ‘eat five hundred tater tots,’” Buck pauses, presumably in service of Chim’s love of dramatic effect, then continues, “‘and then fall into a coma.’ So, like, if you wanna do something about that you might wanna get out there.”

“W-” Maddie starts to ask, and then shakes her head. She grabs the cube bowl. “At least he should have some fruit, too.” She flashes them a grin as she walks out the door, their laughter following.

When Eddie looks back at the window Buck has his chin in his hand, smiling at him. “What?” He laughs, ears hot again.

“Admiring the view,” Buck says, with the combination of flirtatious and earnest that Eddie has come to expect but is never prepared for. “Food’ll be up soon. Come and join us?”

Eddie leans forward over the sink. “Cap doesn’t need anything else?”

Buck shrugs, very close now. Eddie almost laughs wondering if he’s on his tiptoes in the dirt out there. “He can get his own shit. I’ll eat your burnt potatoes.”

Eddie closes the last half inch of distance and does laugh, right into Buck’s mouth. “We can share,” he says, magnanimous, because Buck’s always been all in, too. He can go halfsies, it’s only fair.

There’s shouting outside, Buck pulls back, drums on the windowsill. Smile, wink, turn. Eddie grabs the wedges, and hurries out the door.

(Ao3)

#my writing #buddie #firearm #shrug! here’s a little thing!

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felibrary · 2 months ago

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synopsis: they say the ‘eyes are windows to the soul’. anyone who glances at phainon would immediately notice—the chrysos heir's cerulean gaze is solely fixated on you, starstruck and overflowing with love."

wordcount: 0.5k | content & warnings: gn!reader, tooth rotting fluff, phainon is head over heels, phainon tries cringe flirting methods gone wrong, b99 ref the ones who get it get it ; drabble

author's note: hey hoes guess who's back. 1) was at the psych ward 2) had purple hair 3) now have turquoise hair 4) fake ginger guy and i had a fight but now we're talking again..kind of

being loved means feeling safe.

there isn’t a moment where PHAINON takes his eyes off you. he always ensures that you’re safe because who knows what dangers will strike—putting you at risk would be the least thing he’d want.

whether that’s ensuring you get home safely, making sure you take care of yourself and aren’t neglecting your needs, affirming you whenever you feel sullen—you name it. phainon is always willing to take care of you.

those actions are enough to make anyone falter, but for you, it’s the small things that matter. the little and what others would consider trivial gestures that make your heart race.

—

“phainon, is everything alright?”

you throw him a worried glance as he hasn’t said anything for the past minutes, which is beyond usual for the chrysos heir. on any other occasion, he’d talk your ear off, and you’d happily listen as you nod along, but this time, he’s entirely quiet.

he, on the other hand, doesn’t seem worried in the slightest; no, on the contrary, he looks rather amused. “yes, why’d you think otherwise?” he places his chin in the palm of his hand and leans into it.

“you've been staring at me for the past minute, and i’m concerned,” you inform him while trying to study his expression—in vain, you might want to mention.

phainon chuckles, and his cerulean eyes that were surveying you take shape into crescent moons. “nothing, really. just admiring how nice you look and how lucky i am to have you.” he opens his eyes, and you can only scrutinize the way his white eyelashes flutter.

if you wouldn’t know otherwise, you’d think phainon’s eyes were jewels the way they glimmer and gleam as they softly look at you.

—

“did you just try the triangle method on me?”

you exclaim in disbelief, as if you couldn’t believe that your boyfriend has seriously tried to swoon you by using some silly technique. when he called out your name and didn’t say anything, simply staring at you, you thought that at first, perhaps phainon was just frozen in place.

but to think that his cerulean eyes would then wander from one of yours eyes to another, eventually down to your lips and back to your eyes, would lead his eyes to glisten with something similar to mischief and…—

“oh god, please don’t tell me you just licked your lips,” you groan irritatedly.

at the mention that phainon seemed to jolt. “whaaaat?? ho…” the chrysos heir tries to play it off, by innocently looking away, but the smile that crinkled at the corners of his lips told another story.

“wanted to kiss me so bad that you tried chapping your lips by licking them, seriously?” you remark sarcastically, not expecting anything out of it.

“‘wanted to kiss me so bad’ title of your sextape,” phainon whispers in a silly voice, trying to imitate yours in the process. “phainon!” you lightly slap him on the shoulder, cracking a smile while doing so.

“can i still get the kiss, though?”

it’s not the way he says it because his eyes say more than enough. those blue eyes of his were going to be the death of you at some point—you just know it.

end note: well, actually, he was just pleading like a puppy who had been kicked out by his owner, begging to be taken back

this is dedicated to the og phainon fucker who posted 10 insta stories with the same picture of phainon and different songs: @azullumi (who would've thought...) ANYWAY azul my beloved sweetheart, i cherish you more than anyone. i think especially in those times, the periods where i struggle and suffer in misery for various reasons, i remember that i have friends who care about me, and that most importantly includes you. yes, indeed, love is supposed to feel safe and whenever I'm with you i feel safe. your words are like raindrops dribbling down my skin and cleansing me from all the impurities and harms i have inflicted. you're so much more than just an online friend to me, you're my platonic soulmate and my comfort person. it's been a year since we've known each other now and that's actually so surreal, don't you think? love you lots xx

#phainon #phainon hsr #phainon x reader #phainon x you #hsr x reader #honkai starrail x reader #honkai star rail x reader #honkai star rail fluff #phainon fluff #hsr x you #hsr fluff

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gay-dorito-dust · 8 months ago

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wahhhh reading that hurts me 😭 could you please write a part 2 where they all find out that it was bill who possessed reader?

Tag list: @babypeapoddd @i-am-tiredd @sly-thou-pookie @x-seyaa @sweetlumpkinseedlin @kawaii1369 @roo024 @lightmaren

Part 1 right here

‘What?’ Ford asked.

Bill cackled. ‘For someone as smart as you sixer, you sure are stupid as not to notice the obvious signs of whenever I’m possessing someone. I mean out of everyone you should know better.’

Ford clenches his jaw. All this time he had thought you had betrayed him when in actually you had been loyal to him and his family, up until he and his brother ostracised you even more then you already were for the past thirty years. He made you feel like shit, and he could tell that Stanley felt the same amount of guilt as he clenched his fists in silent anger; Ford then levels Bill with a glare. ‘You possessed y/n! My assistant!’ He roared at his once muse.

Bill only chuckles. ‘Correction!WAS your assistant Stanford! And pushed you through the portal whilst wearing the face is someone you cared for,’ Bill then gasps as he looked at the guilt ridden faces of the Pines Family and feeling the joy bubble up in his triangular body, the look of defeat and realisation was all too sweet, ‘Oh wait! Someone you once cared for before throwing them out like they were nothing to you, not once letting them the space to explain what had happened and how I tricked them into making a deal with me.’ He finished by pretending to wipe a tear from his one eye after cackling some more at the hilarity of the situation.

Humans loved to cause more problems within problems they didn’t fully handle properly as they stockpiled on top of each other, giving him the leeway to get what he wants without issue or confrontation from the pathetic family.

Possessing you during a brotherly squabble was perfect! Ford had cut all ties with him and decided to call upon his idiotic brother- as though that would’ve ever worked in any timeline- to help hide his work but when things didn’t go Ford’s way, they fought. You were trying to stop the fight and bill took advantage of that by claiming he could help you stop the fight, fat chance, he was going to make it worse and leave you to be his scapegoat! It was a brilliant plan to make up for multiple set backs thanks to Ford’s sudden realisation of his hermit tendencies, everything was out in place for the ultimate betrayal by the hands of Ford’s assistant; you!

Bill found that Tragedy was at its finest when the betrayal comes from someone you love and it did.

‘They didn’t-‘ Ford began.

‘Say anything?’ Bill interrupts, causing Ford and Stan to glare at him as the demon cackle as he got in close to their shared triangle shaped prison, staring them down with his one eye, unblinking. ‘You and your piece of shit brother over here didn’t even let them speak! Never less believe them when they were telling the truth!’ He roared, ‘and now you don’t know whether they’re even alive so that you can apologise to them!’

Mabel slams against the bars of hers and dippers prison. ‘they’re alive!’ She shouts and Bill now looks at her, amused.

‘How can you be so sure shooting star? For all you know they could be dead, cursing your grunkles names as they die with an unsatisfying end.’ Bill mocked her as she falters in her resolve, he was right, how could she be certain that you were alive when Gravity Falls was literally on fire and demons from another dimension were running amok? She couldn’t and that’s what upset her the most.

‘Because we know our great aunt/uncle better than you bill and we know they’re alive!’ Dipper pips up this time as he laid a reassuring hand on his sister’s shoulder, smiling at her as she smiled back at him in thanks for having her back. Bill looks at the twins, hating their optimism and hope that you were okay and decided to destroy this by reaching into thin air and producing a realistic illusion of your unmoving body before them.

‘Are you so sure now pine tree? They don’t look very much alive to me!’ Bill exclaims as Mabel, Dipper, Stan and Ford could only look up the body that Bill claimed was yours in disbelief and shock. This couldn’t be how it ended, could it? They still had to apologise to you after all for everything and make it up to you however you wished!

‘No, no this is some foul trick of yours bill!’ Ford screamed as he threw himself against the bars, forcing himself not to cry at the sight of your body while seething with rage and a need to avenge your supposed death. ‘You sick son of a bitch!’ Stanley joined in as he felt even more useless than ever, he felt the most guilt out of everyone as his eyes seemed to refused to move from your supposed body. You couldn’t be dead, he refused to believe such bullshit lies, you were still alive and fighting with the rest of them! He knew it, deep down in his heart he knew it to be true!

‘No.’ Mabel cried as she tried to reach out to you as Dipper held her while silently crying himself, vowing to take down bill now more than ever as he tugged his hat down to cover his eyes. You were the most encouraging person he’s ever met and now you were gone, you asked him and Mabel to trust you when contemplating to stay with Stan, and they did believe and they never regretted doing so because you were right! You were always right and yet in the end you died thinking they hated you more than anything; which wasn’t true! Far from it and now…now they can’t make it up to you, they had lost their chance.

Bill had won over the pines family once again.

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doubletroubletag · 1 month ago

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so as a preface I wanna state that this blog is PG-13/TV-14 like the game, so there's topics regarding mental health, self harm, suicide (as they're factors in Siffrin's life, even if the focus isn't on these details its still something they live with) so it shouldn't be surprising that i don't take any issue with discussing the human body nor with depicting it.

in fact like, the comic (soon even!) will make jokes and tease the idea of showing nudity (NOT genitalia) because frankly, i do think the human body is funny. i've already made jokes about butts before so this isn't out of my realm of comedic bullshit. said nudity is censored, partly so i don't have to worry about comicfury/tumblr upping the rating/adding warnings but also the censor bars themselves are part of the gag

that said, while i don't think the human body is inherently sexual, i DO get anxious as hell talking about it even if my work doesn't flinch from any topics. (don't ask me how that works, i'm anxious just typing this LMAO?) anyway i just wanted to talk about this to get a read of what people think, and how I could go about it going forward?

i draw the Siffrins as skinny people. They're described as short and scrawny ingame* and I intend to keep true to that detail. But skinny doesn't mean bone-thin. I enjoy pushing body diversity in my work, and Siffrin isn't without fat. They (like me actually!) hold fat at their thigh-hip-belly area. my art has gotten more detailed/ anime-level realistic in proportion so this became more clear when it came time to not bullcrap-simplify the anatomy.

* (They're the same height as Mirabelle w/ heels on; the Running One and Siffrin afterward call themselves scrawny)

so like, the Siffrins are skinny. they're pear/triangle shaped, i didn't give them large breasts. despite that, i've gotten a few comments alluding to them being big? and that confuses me?

my only guess is that the outline just naturally makes everything look thicker AND/OR side angles could make it seem bigger? am I weird and have a distorted view of what's small? earlier today i even cut off the extra line thickness but i'm still getting comments on this. (NOT that anyone has been inappropriate or anything)

I know the jester pose itself DOES push things so, yeahhh, things are more emphasized, so maybe that's??? what's being referred to? my only hope is as the comic continues (it'll mainly be night segments like rn) and we see more of the two without a cloak it'll be more obvious they're not big honkers idk. like i'm just??? questioning my ar abilities here and way over thinking things 😭

#ooc #does loop big booba or is sam ok at drawing anatomy as they intended lets VOTE NOW #christ do i tag anything here or not cause like i said i personally don't view any of this as like. raunchy or anything but idk how others #are going to feel about it. maybe its how i was raised but i feel like i'm gonna get shot at for even bringing this topic up LOL #like im making it weird its on ME #AUGHhghhghhhhh

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6okuto-moved · 1 year ago

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gn!reader fluff | “y’see somethin’ you like?” osamu asks, barely glancing at you as he shapes the rice in his hands into a triangle.

the stool beneath you wobbles as you lean forward—he really should get a new one—and smile, palm resting on your cheek. “yeah, i like watching you work.”

your eyes follow the veins on his hands to his forearms, up to his biceps and his chest barely hidden by his stupidly well-fitting black uniform shirt.

he hums. “well, that’s nice t’hear-”

“i love watching you make croissants.”

osamu pauses.

he looks at you, but no eyes meet—yours focused on his hands that move to wipe themselves clean on a towel before resting on his hips. maybe if you were stronger, you’d notice the smirk on his face. “what colour’s my shirt?”

a smile tugs at your lips. “red?”

fingers flick your forehead before you can wave them away. “ack- god, ’samu!”

he snorts and pulls you off the stool, forcing your head into his chest and muffling your groan while he pinches your cheek. “i should kick ya outta my kitchen for harassin’ the chef.”

“but he’s so hot and handsome, what am i meant to do?” you huff.

“at least don’t say i’m making croissants. am i french?”

“woah,”—you push away from his chest—“take that back right now. you know i’d never date a french man.”

“then why’d ya say croissants?”

“i don’t know, it was the first pastry i thought of! i love, i don’t know, macarons—”

amusement lights up his face as his arm takes you back into a head lock. “macarons? the also french desert—”

“fuck, stop, wait, oh my god, please,” a sound between a laugh and cry escapes you.

osamu cackles when you smack his chest with one hand, covering your face with the other. the onigiri is forgotten on the counter as he pulls it away to uncover your face, fingers threading through the spaces between yours.

your laughter dies down, and after using your free hand to pick a stray grain of rice off his shirt, you pout. “whatever, not french man. are you gonna kick me out of the kitchen for ogling you now?”

he only rolls his eyes. “no, it’s not like y’don’t already ogle me outside of the kitchen.”

another smack comes to his chest as you scoff. “wow. okay, it’s because i love you, you know.”

“yeah, yeah, of course you love the hot, handsome guy who cooks for you,” osamu brushes off your defense and picks up the last finished onigiri.

motioning to the stool and pretending you can’t see the blush that paints his cheeks, or smile on his lips, he huffs. “now sit back down so you can taste test this for me.”

#6okuto.txt #osamu x reader #haikyuu x reader #very much related to my other samu post #still thinking about him. hrmghnnh #sorry 2 any french guys or their likers. c'est la canadienne en moi peut-être. qui sait

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slvt4buffw0men1111 · 4 months ago

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Assistance

Pt. 3, Pt. 2, Pt. 1

18+

Smut under cut.

Cw: daddy kink, slight degradation, overstimulation, choking, manhandling, rough sex

The rest of the week flew by. Sevika and you not interacting as much as you would like to due to all the cases her and Silco have to finish before the work week was over. You had about 3 hours left of work and you were making sure all the scheduling was correct for next week when you saw someone walk up to the desk in your peripheral.

“You ready for the banquet tomorrow?”, you here Sevika say. She was leaning on the counter her arms straining against her blazer, her biceps on display.

“Mhm almost I just need to find a dress, I’ll have to go tomorrow morning I haven't had much time this week to go look.”, you reply.

“Just take the rest of the day off we have no more clients coming and the mall is gonna be packed in the morning.”

“You’re not serious, are you?”, you say not believing her.

“I am serious and here, take the company card to get yourself something real nice. Want my date looking better than anyone in that room.”, she said getting out her wallet.

“Date? Thought I was your plus one.”

“Date, plus one, same thing, I just want you looking your best, even though you look astonishing in anything. Right?”, she smirked.

You couldn't say anything.

*Why is she so bold?!*

“I'll tell Silco you're heading out and I'll text you details for the banquet in the morning.”

“Ok Thank you.”, you get up and start gathering your stuff.

“And I mean it, buy something nice, treat yourself, the card has no limit.”

That’s how you found yourself at the mall at some dress shop. A very expensive one might I add. You picked up a price tag $649.99.

*HOLY SHIT*

You felt sick just touching something that expensive, but she did say no limits right, and to treat myself...

You wander around the store some more trying to touch the dresses as least as possible worried the oils on your fingertips would ruin the delicate fabrics. And that when you saw it a long silk Burgandy dress. It was strapless and had heart shape neckline, with a sexy slit running up the leg. It was perfect.

You obviously had to try it on before buying something with that price and it seemed even more perfect on. Accentuating all your curves and making your cleavage pop. You bought the dress not daring to look at the price tag. And made your way out the mall, before another store caught your eyes.

VICTORIA’S SECRET

Might as well get a new set to match your new dress. You decided on a black lace bandeau with a silk trim and red rose in the middle. A long with the matching panties that had a triangle cut out right above the ass. You bought the set with your card not wanting to push your limits and also not wanting finance department to see what you bought. You arrived home and got ready for bed. You couldn't sleep you had a shaking feeling inside, that feeling when you know something excited is happening the next day.

It was the next afternoon, Sevika texted you letting you know she’ll be there to pick you up at 6pm, that gave you 7 hours to get ready. First you went to get a mani-pedi you haven't had one in ages and you really wanted to pamper yourself for your “date” with your sexy boss.

You got home did a quick face mask and took a shower before starting on your hair and makeup. The makeup was natural with a bolder eyeliner, your lips painted a similar hue of your dress. Which you paired with some gold jewelry. (Or silver)

You were slipping on a pair of black kitten heels when you heard a knock on your door.

*She's early*

“One second!”, you yell out while grabbing your clutch purse and lipstick.

You opened the door expecting to see Sevika but instead saw an older man.

“Y/n L//n, is that you?”, he asked looking down at his phone.

“Yes?”

“Ms. Verma sent me to pick you up as she is caught up with something at the moment but she will meet you at the Banquet Hall.", he explained. He led you down your apartment halls out to a black range rover opening the door for you.

The drive was silent, you didn’t know if you should be mad, she wasn’t picking you up or flattered she sent such a nice car to pick you up. You made it to the banquet hall and saw Sevika outside the entrance doors. She looked noiceee. She was wearing a simple and classy all black tux that seemed to make her look even taller and intimidating than before.

The valet opened the door for you and you made your way towards Sevika. When she spotted you, she couldn't seem to take her eyes off of you. Her eyes made you even more nervous than before.

“Good to see you made it safely, Y/n, you look beautiful.”, she said clearly checking you out.

“Thank you Sevika, as do you.”

She held out her arm for you to grab as you both made your way into the banquet. There was lots of people all dresses in their best pearls and furs. You suddenly felt underdressed and underage. Everyone seemed to be Sevika's age or older. The older mean giving you look that made you want to cover yourself with a blanket. This didn’t go unnoticed by Sevika as she pulled you closer as you made you to your table. That so gracefully pulled the chair out for you.

This was lot more boring than you thought. Hours of hearing mediocre jokes that you had choice to laugh at and food that tasted like straight up hospital food in ridiculously small portions. You were ready to go.

“I’m gonna go wash up I’ll be back.”, you said quietly enough that just Sevika heard you. Which she didn't even seem too.

You went to the bathroom and sat on your phone for a minute before washing your hands and exit the restroom to head back to boring festivities of the night.

“Hello there young lady, you look very sexy tonight.”, said an old man who looked like he touched children. Ew.

“Ha thank you.”, you blankly reply trying to walk past him. He grabbed on your arm to keep from going and you felt his old wrinkly yet moist hand.

“Excuse me!”

“You're not excused why don't you come to my table and chat for a while pretty.”

“Shes not interested, you can let of go of her.”

*Oh thank god*

Sevika came standing next to you looking at the man like she was seconds away from killing him. Without another word the old man left as fast his stubby legs would let him.

“I’m so sorry, are you ok?”, she asked facing you.

“Ya I'm fine just grossed out.”

“I'm sorry, I should've came with you, these men here aren’t used to seeing such women, should've known they would try something. I can hurt him if you want me too.”, she said with eyes of rage and caring.

“No Sev I’m fine thank you, I'm just glad you got here when you did.”

She smiled at the nickname that came out your lips.

“You wanna get out of here?”

“I would like that.”, you said grabbing your clutch from her hand. She wrapped her arm around your waist as she said her goodbyes and walked you to her car. A nice sleek black Porsche 911.

You guys drove in silence for a while until Sevika finally spoke up.

“You want to come to my place, for a drink, you can say no I don’t mind”, she blabbered on.

“That sounds good to me.”

The tension in the car seemed to rise more after that. You couldn’t stop staring at the way the veins in her hand protruded. You really wondered what those hands could do.

You pulled up to a gate and Sevika pressed a button in her car that opened it and there you saw the most gorgeous and huge house ever. You knew she had money but lawd, the car should've given it away.

The inside was just as lavish as the outside. It had a homey vibe to it yet modern.

“What do you drink?”, she asked pulling out two glasses. Her blazer now off.

“I'll just have whatever you have.”, you said still soaking up her home.

She poured you some whiskey and made her way to chair next to you.

“That banquet was boring I know, you don’t have to lie.”, she said.

“Ya it was boring, that guy trying to feel me up was probably the most interesting thing that happened . Except it was actually quite scary.”, you say sipping on your drink.

“Ya I'm sorry about that, I’m gonna have to report his firm, but that means more clients for us.", she joked.

“I at least got this nice dress out of it though.”

“You really do look so gorgeous you know that dress makes you look even more sexy.”, she said her eyes on you.

“Why do you do that?”

“Do what?”, she said setting her glass down and putting her hand on your thigh.

“That, you tease me.”

“Don’t act like you don’t like it.”, she said her eyes staring into yours.

Your breath hitch as she started getting closer to you. Her eyes looking at your eyes then to your lips. That’s all you needed to close the space between you and kiss her. The kiss started off slow and passionate, like she was savoring you.

“I've been wanting kiss you since I first saw you.”, you said into between kisses.

“I've been wanting to a lot more than kiss you baby.”, she grabs your waist and hoist you onto the kitchen island. Her hands all over you back and thighs as you grab her neck and pull closer into you. Her thigh slots in between your legs making you let out a small whimper as you grind against her. The kisses getting sloppier and hotter by second. She starts to kiss down you jaw and onto your neck that will definitely leave marks. Your breath getting heavier.

“Fuck y/n can I take you upstairs?”, she asked still kissing your neck.

“Yes please.”, you breathe out.

Her room was so dark and organized, a huge California king bed sits in the middle.

She set you down on the bed not breaking the kiss. Her knee back in between your legs, your panties are soaked at this point and you're sure there's a wet patch on her pants.

“Sevi, I need you please.”, you whine.

“Yea, need me how? Use your words baby.”

“Touch me, I need you to touch me.”, you grind deeper into her knee.

She lifts you off you back so she can unzip your dress. She slides the red fabric down your body and she smirks at your lace covered breast and pussy.

“Fuck baby you knew this was gonna happen did you, huh?”

“mhm”, you whine. She takes both your breast in her and starts to grope at them. You let out more whines as she unclasps your bra letting your breast free. She takes one of your breasts into her mouth, sucking on your hardened nipple her tongue swirling around it. Her mechanical hand wrapped around you while her flesh hand plays with your other breast.

Your grinding harder and harder on her leg you pussy leaking all over her. She feels you seeping through her pants.

“Your pussy needs some attention, doesn't she?”. You don’t reply, too embarrassed to say anything.

“Answer me.”, she commands her mouth leaving your body completely.

“Mm please touch my pussy I need you.”

“Good slut.”, her hand travels down your body and she basically tears the underwear off of you, assuring you she’ll buy you a new pair.

“You’re so fucking wet for me.”, her finger slides along your slit pushing down on your clit. You let out a whimper before she slides one of thick fingers inside of you.

“Oh my god Sev!”, she slides the finger in and out a few times before adding in a second finger curling up into you really stretching you out.

“God you're so tight, how are supposed to take my cock huh?”, she teases. You moan at her words and squirm on her fingers.

She takes your pulsing clit into her mouth sucking on your bud and lightly grazing it with her teeth.

“Fuck se-” all you can do is moan her tongue making patterns on your pussy while she fingers you. Your so wet with her spit and your slick she slides in a third finger.

“Need to make sure you can take my cock baby.”, she said completely obliterating your tight hole. Finger pumping in and out, hitting your most pleasurable spot just right. Your stomach starts to feel hot and your legs begin to shake.

“I’m g-gonna cum”, you barely stutter out.

“Come on my face baby.”

You squirt all over you mouth and fingers she does her best to drink it all up slurping on your pussy, downright nasty sounds coming from you and her. You start to feel overstimulated as she's still eating your pussy and licking you up. Her fingers still deliciously hitting your g-spot.

“Sev I can’t it's too much”, you try to push her away but she doesn't budge. Your thighs now trapping her head, but she just pushes your leg back down and stares into your eyes as you come a second time on her mouth. She finally pulls away and climbs back on top you pulling you into a sloppy kiss. Tasting yourself in her mouth.

“You ready for my cock baby?”, she asked.

“Yes, I want your dick in me please!”

She stands up off the bed and walked towards her bathroom while removing her shirt. When she comes back out, she is naked with nothing but an 8inch strap harnessed to her hips. Not only is a long but it's also thick. Her body is better than you imagined rock hard abs, muscular thighs, and her arm so strong looks like she knock you out with just one punch.

“Don’t worry baby it'll fit.”, she said like she can read your mind.

“Open your legs for me”, you immediately obey her opening up and putting your pussy on display. She gets in between your legs. She starts rubs the tip of the strap up and down you wet pussy.

“Y’ so wet I don't need any lube baby.”.

“Open up for me.”. You comply and open up your mouth wide for her. She puts her middle and ring finger in your mouth and down your throat causing you to gag. She removes her fingers and wipes your spit on her cock jerking it off.

“You ready baby?”, she asked leaning over you.

“Mhm”

“I need words baby.”

“Yes, please just fuck me already!”

She doesn’t wait a second longer before she puts her cock in you. You moan at the stretch of her thickness. She doesn’t wait; she slowly she bottoms out completely in you before pulling out and putting it back in. She starts fucking you slowly at first but doesn’t last long, she speeds up and you moan and whimper in pleasure.

“Fuck daddy oh my g-”

That where you messed up. She looks at you with pure animalistic intents.

She takes your legs and put them up to your chest, your basically folded in half as she starts to fuck you hard and fast. You can only scream in pleasure she’s so deep in you, you swear you can feel her in her stomach. Your hands gripping bed sheets and pillows above you.

“You're so deep daddy”, you can barely get it out. She grabs you by neck with her mechanical hand and starts to squeeze your neck, not enough to stop your breathing, but enough to make you feel woozy in the head.

“You like daddy’s cock in your pussy huh, don’t you slut”, she growls in your ear. You nod your head as she continues to pound into your pussy. The sound of skin slapping and the wetness of your pussy fills the room. Your bodies radiating heat against each other. She feels your body stiffen up and your pussy tighten around her cock. She knows your gonna cum. She keeps her pace and starts to rub your clit.

“Gonna come all over daddy’s cock like a good little slut.”, that’s all she needed to say. Your eyes roll to back of head and open your mouth wide as you scream out to her. Your body twitching as you leak around her cock.

“Oh- fuck”,Sevika groans as her pace falters cumminv with you, she lets out a grunt and moans into your ear.

She collapsed on top of you, her breathing heavy against your neck. She starts to kiss back up you neck and to your lips. You two kissed for a while until Sevika grabbed you by your waist and flipped you over.

“I’m not done with you yet, ass up baby”, she spanked your ass. You arched your back putting your pussy on perfect display for her.

“fuck”, Sevika muttered under breath. Seeing the way your ass was shaped and your (her) personal heaven in between your thighs. Her hand touch around you ass, spanking you once more, and down to your weeping hole. She lines her cock back up and thrust all 8 inches into you at once. You moan deeply at the intrusion but she doesn't stop. She’s fucking you hard. Both hands on your hips as she pulls you deeper onto her cock. Your face smushed into the pillow, your moans and whines muffled.

“Could fuck your pussy all day baby”, she grunts using her flesh hand spank you. The added pain just made you squeeze more around her dick. Your moans getting louder. Thank god you weren't at your apartment. She takes her mechanical hand back around your neck to pull you up, your back now against your chest. The angle making her impossibly deeper into you.

The only sound leaving you lips were incoherent babbles and moans. Drool pools out of your mouth. You are officially drunk on her cock.

“Uh-uh fuck Sevi”, you manage to get out.

“You love the way daddy fucks your slutty pussy, don't you?”

“Yes, daddy I love it”

She looks down to where your two bodies connect. A thick white ring of cum at the base of her cock. It only makes her fuck you harder. The sound of her hips against your ass, your moans and her grunts, the way she has her hands feel on your body. It was all too much and so good.

“Be a good slut for daddy and rub your pretty clit and I'll let you cum”, you whine in protest. You don’t even think you have enough body strength left for that, but the urge to cum is stronger. You bring your hand down your pussy and start to rub fast tight circles on your clit. Only took 10 seconds until your twitching and cumming all over her dick. Your cum dripping down your thighs.

She gently sets you down onto the bed knowing you couldn't hold yourself up. She slowly pulls out her strap that makes you wince in discomfort.

“I’ll be right back baby”, she says before she disappears into her bathroom. She comes out with boxers on and in her hands a class of water, a rag, and a t-shirt for you. She turns you over and gently cleans in between your legs with the warm damp rag while kissing your thighs. She then has you sit up so she can put the shirt on for you.

“Drink some of this then you can sleep baby”, your eyes barley able to keep themselves open. She tilts your head back for you and you drink half the glass before you fall back into bed. Sevika climbs in next to you her arm on your stomach.

“Goodnight y/n”, she whispers but you don’t hear her as your already fast asleep.

You just fucked your boss.

Lmk if you want me to continue this story<3

#sevika x reader #sevika smut #sevika x female reader #sevika x reader <3 #sevika fanfic #sevika arcane #sevika #arance #arcane fanfic #wlw #lesbian

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earlysunshines · 5 months ago

Text

read your mind

kim minji x fem!reader

synopsis: minji nearly slices your head off upon your first meeting and it creates this weird unspoken tension that somehow draws you two closer.

warnings: wolverine!minji ; jean grey!reader ; xmen au ; blood, violence, trauma, fighting... everything that comes w x-men ; angst if u squint ; minji is still a loser in this one ; only some of this (very little) actually correlates to the x-men plot i just twisted everything LOLLL ; pacing iffy but lowk slowburn ; anything else i didn't mention ; not proofread!!!

a/n: had pneumonia three months ago, rewatched four x-men movies in two days, created this, ghosted, then decided to continue lololol ALSOwe’re going to ignore the fact that jean grey and scott r canon and that whole triangle bc this is MYY spinoff and MYYY fic…

minjeong and wonbin had brought in a girl, barely conscious, her body limp as they laid her on the lab table. metal blades protruded from her knuckles, glinting ominously under the fluorescent lights. as you watched, the blades retracted back into her skin, leaving behind deep cuts that healed almost instantly, the flesh knitting together as if nothing had happened.

gosh, you think, brows knitting at the sight.

you stood beside the bed, a syringe in hand, brow furrowed in concentration. the girl on the table had clearly been through hell—minjeong and wonbin had found her unconscious, battered and bruised—but the way her body had healed so rapidly, so unnaturally, left you with no choice but to sedate her. if only to prevent her from doing more harm to herself, or to others. you hesitated for a moment, watching the steady rise and fall of her chest, trying to reconcile the delicate features of her face with the lethal power hidden beneath her skin. taking a deep breath, you carefully lowered the needle toward her arm.

minji’s consciousness flickered in and out, the world around her a blur of shapes and sounds that made no sense. her senses were overwhelmed—the cold touch of metal on her forearm, the sharp, sterile scent of antiseptic filling her nose. her muscles tensed, every fiber of her being screaming at her to fight, to protect herself, even as her mind struggled to make sense of what was happening.

just as the needle grazed her skin, minji's eyes snapped open, wild and feral. in an instant, her hand shot out, gripping your wrist with a force that made you gasp, pain shooting up your arm. the syringe slipped from your fingers, clattering to the floor, forgotten as you were yanked forward.

before you could react, minji had you restrained, her arm across your neck, cutting off your air. she pulled you close, her breath hot against your ear, the pressure of her forearm against your throat tightening as the blades from her knuckles sprang out again, glinting dangerously in the corner of your vision. they were mere millimeters from your neck, close enough that you could feel the cold metal against your skin, close enough that you dared not move.

her breathing was ragged, her chest heaving as she held you against her, her eyes wide and unfocused, caught somewhere between fear and anger. she didn't speak, but the threat was clear in the way her muscles coiled, ready to strike. every instinct in your body screamed at you to struggle, to get free, but the sharpness of the blades against your throat kept you frozen in place.

“who the hell are you and where the hell am i?”

you look terrified for a moment, only a second or two before you adapt to the situation, tensing when the blades press more.

“maybe if you get your goddamn knives away from my throat, then i’d tell you.” minji hears, but the thing is, you haven’t opened your mouth at all.

she looks at you close, hearing the choked-out breath before letting go of you completely. you fall to the ground and cough out as she runs off, catching your breath.

minji has no idea where she is. she’s run out the room, but where exactly? she doesn’t know. the place is too bright, the lights glaring down at her from the ceiling. the halls are empty, eerily so, with a cold, metallic sheen to everything around her. it feels sterile, lifeless, like a lab from some dystopian nightmare.

she looks down and realizes she’s only in a sports bra and sweats, her skin prickling at the chill in the air. small tabs are stuck to her body, wires hanging from them. without thinking, she rips them off, the adhesive pulling at her skin but she doesn’t care. she’s more focused on figuring out where she is, what’s happened to her.

scanning her surroundings, minji’s eyes dart around frantically. she spots something in the distance—suits, like the kind you’d see in a high-tech facility, lined up behind glass. her heart pounds in her chest as she walks cautiously toward them, every nerve in her body on edge. as she moves, something catches her eye—a little shelf with a zip-up hoodie on it. she snatches it up, slipping it on quickly, desperate to cover herself, to feel even a little bit more secure.

she continues down the hall, her eyes flicking from side to side, taking in every detail of this strange, sterile place. the walls, the floors, even the ceiling—all the same dull metallic gray, reflecting the harsh light in a way that makes everything seem flat and lifeless.

“where are you going?” a voice suddenly asks, cutting through the silence—a different one this time. minji flinches, her breath catching in her throat. she doesn’t recognize the voice, and it sends a jolt of fear through her. without thinking, she retreats deeper into the corridor, ducking behind a small entrance area, peeking out cautiously to see if anyone’s coming.

her heart races, the fear pounding in her ears as she scans the hall, but it’s empty. no sign of anyone. she’s about to move again when a door behind her slides open with a soft hiss. she jumps, spinning around just in time to hear a faint voice:

“over here!”

minji hesitates, then steps toward the open door, curiosity and fear at war within her. she peers into the small space beyond, a strange room she doesn’t recognize. it’s not much, just a small chamber, but something about it feels… inviting. cautiously, she steps inside, and the door closes behind her with a soft click.

when the door opens again, minji steps out, and the environment has completely changed. she’s no longer in the cold, metallic hallway. instead, she’s in what looks like an old mansion, the kind you’d see in old movies, all dark wood and faded carpets, and the air thick with the scent of old books and polished wood.

“where are you going? over here…” the voice whispers again, closer this time. minji’s fear spikes. she looks around, eyes wide, trying to find the source of the voice, but there’s no one. she bolts, running down the hall, her breath coming in ragged gasps as she searches for a place to hide. she hears voices up ahead, the excited chatter of children, and she panics, diving behind a wooden pillar to avoid being seen.

her breathing is heavy, her body trembling as she presses herself against the wood, praying they don’t find her. she peeks out from behind the pillar, watching the group of kids pass by, their voices growing fainter as they move further down the hall. when she’s sure the coast is clear, she darts out from her hiding spot, sprinting down the hall toward a door in the distance.

her heart hammers in her chest as she reaches the door, yanking it open and slipping inside without a second thought. she turns, pressing her back against the door, her breath coming in short, frantic bursts as she listens for any sign that she’s been followed.

it’s only when she finally looks up that she realizes where she’s ended up: in a small classroom, the kind you’d see in an old boarding school. a few students—eight or so—are seated at desks, their attention fixed on a teacher at the front of the room. the teacher pauses mid-sentence, turning to look at her with mild surprise.

minji freezes, her heart skipping a beat as every pair of eyes in the room turns to her. she stands there, caught, her mind racing as she tries to figure out what to do next. she has no idea where she is, who these people are, or how she’s going to get out of here, but one thing’s for sure—she needs to move, fast.

“ah, minji.” the teacher says, “right, please have your homework done by tomorrow. please determine the velocities using the problems in the textbook, see you all tomorrow.”

minji watches the students leave, one of them catching her off guard, walking through the door as it closes before she can make it. she looks back at the teacher—the professor, eyes slightly widened.

“where am i?” she asks demandingly.

“two hours from seoul.”

“what am i doing here?”

he stares at minji, seemingly examining her before she hears the door behind her opening, snapping her head to see two unfamiliar faces.

“minji, i’d like you to meet minjeong—also known as storm.” the professor’s voice is calm and authoritative, drawing minji’s attention to the girl standing a few steps away. minji’s eyes narrow slightly as she takes in the girl’s striking white hair, so stark against her youthful features. there’s something powerful about her, something that makes minji’s instincts prickle, but she doesn’t say anything, just watches her closely.

“and this is wonbin, also called cyclops.” the professor continues, gesturing to the guy next to minjeong. wonbin steps forward, extending a hand toward minji, his expression friendly, if a bit cautious. the red lenses of his glasses catch the light, a faint glow emanating from behind them.

minji stares at his hand, her gaze cold, unblinking. she doesn’t move, doesn’t acknowledge the gesture. there’s a tense silence as the seconds stretch on, minji’s eyes flicking up to meet wonbin’s. her jaw tightens, a muscle jumping in her cheek as she clenches it. wonbin hesitates, then slowly lowers his hand, understanding that the handshake isn’t going to happen. he scoffs under his breath—minji hears it.

“they saved your life, you know?” the professor’s voice cuts through the silence, his tone gentle but firm. he looks at minji, as if willing her to understand, to see the gravity of the situation. but minji doesn’t respond, her expression hard, unreadable.

just then, the door opens, and someone else walks in. minji’s eyes flicker over, her features softening just slightly at the sight of you. you move quietly but confidently, your expression calm, composed, not betraying any of the distress or turmoil that might be lurking underneath your skin. minji’s gaze follows you as you pass by her, her attention completely captured, like you’re the only thing in the room worth noticing or thinking twice about.

you don’t say anything, don’t even glance her way, but minji can’t take her eyes off you, something about you making the tension in her shoulders ease, if only by a fraction. as you turn around, she takes in your features, soft and delicate, yet there’s a strength there too, something in the way you carry yourself. it’s captivating, almost disarming, and for a moment, minji forgets to be on guard.

“this is y/n,” the professor says, breaking the spell. “i believe you two have already met.”

minji’s gaze remains fixed on you, her thoughts racing, trying to piece together how she knows you. then it hits her, you’re the person she almost sliced earlier.

“right, y/n, if you could get her situated into one of the spare rooms for me.”

you make direct eye contact with minji, jaw tightening before you smile softly at the professor.

“of course.”

–

“i think you’ll find it comfortable here,” you say softly, turning on the lamp.

minji observes closely, looking around the room quickly before her eyes redirect back onto you as you turn on another lamp.

“where’s your room?”

“down the hall with wonbin.”

“four eyes?” she questions rudely. “is he always so… petty.”

you turn around, looking at her and raising a brow.

“how judgy you’ve only just met him…” you start, turning on the last lamp. “he’s just not willing to put up with people who don’t greet him properly—people who nearly slice someone’s head off.” you add calmly, tightening your jaw.

“i wasn’t going to cut your head off.”

“with the way your blades were against my neck? i figured that would’ve been my last breath.” you scold, meeting her eyes coldly.

minji stiffens, breaking the eye contact and looking down.

“are you always so… dense?” you ask minji, tilting your head slightly, a hint of challenge in your voice. minji stiffens, the doors behind her clicking shut on their own, the sound sharp in the tense silence. her eyes widen as she looks at you, caught off guard, claws out without thinking.

“did you do tha—”

“or are you still shaken up from being knocked out by jyp’s men?” you continue, your tone casual, but the words strike a nerve. you glance at her blades, the same ones from earlier. “gonna slice me for real this time?”

“i’m sorry?” minji’s voice is laced with confusion as her claws retract. her brow furrows as she tries to make sense of what you’re saying.

“people like us,” you say, your voice dropping into something more serious. “a lot of people aren’t fond of the gifts we have. and hearing about the way they reacted to your claws… they’re definitely more hostile to what you’re capable of.”

minji’s eyes narrow, her mind racing as she processes your words. “and what’s your gift?” she asks, a trace of skepticism in her voice. “you can move things with your mind?”

“you’re observant,” you reply, a touch of sarcasm coloring your tone. “you’re right on that. i also have telepathic ability.”

minji raises an eyebrow, the tension between you crackling like fireworks. “like the professor? you can get into my head or something?” she steps closer, almost sizing you up despite being only two or three centimeters taller.

“you say that like i’d willingly get into yours.” you reply sharply, your voice steady, but there’s a flicker of something in your eyes—hesitation, perhaps, or uncertainty. “like there’s even anything in a brain so hollow.”

“what, scared?” minji questions, her voice low, daring. she huffs, amused, “are you even able to?”

“what?” you blink, taken aback by her sudden boldness. after what happened earlier, you’d expect her to keep her distance, but here she is, practically taunting you, her lips curling into a slight smirk that sends your heart skipping a beat. there’s something about her—something infuriatingly compelling as much as she is irritating—that makes you sigh in defeat, unable to resist the pull of her challenge.

“i can do things that you wouldn’t even be able to comprehend,” you look down at her necklace, reading the characters out loud, “minji.”

her eyes narrow, and yours do too before they soften just barely.

with a reluctant exhale, you raise your hands beside her head, your fingers hovering hairs away from her temples. closing your eyes, you focus, the world around you fading into the background as you reach out with your mind, slipping past the surface of her thoughts.

minji watches you intently, her eyes fixed on your face as she listens to your steady breathing, notices the slight tremor in your hands. as you delve deeper into her mind, your expression shifts, your brows drawing together as you begin to see what lies beneath the surface.

suddenly, your eyes snap open, shock flooding your features. you stare at her, wide-eyed, your breath catching in your throat as you struggle to process what you’ve just seen.

“what did you see?” minji’s voice is quieter now, the cockiness replaced by something more subdued, almost vulnerable. she holds your hands, looking at you expectantly.

you hesitate, the images still flashing through your mind—minji being beaten, restrained, shot, stabbed, over and over again. the pain, the fear, the relentless violence—it’s overwhelming, a flood of horror that you can barely comprehend. and yet, you’ve only had a brief glimpse, a fraction of it, a sliver of what she’s been through.

“i saw… a lot,” you finally say, your voice barely above a whisper. there’s no need to elaborate—minji can see it in your eyes, the weight of what you’ve witnessed, the gravity of the memories that haunt her. and for a moment, the space between you feels more like a shared burden, there’s a quiet understanding of the scars that neither of you can ever truly erase.

the door opens and you look over to see wonbin looking at the two of you, minji’s still holding your hands—you shake them off quickly as if they’re molten lava.

“wonbin.” you sound surprised as you catch his pursed smile. you avoid minji’s eye contact, keeping your eyes away from her. “goodnight, minji.” you add finally, glancing at her once more before leaving the room.

minji turns to catch wonbin looking at her intensely, making her smirk subtly. her claws extend out of her knuckles slowly again, voluntartbis time. her eyes drill into his.

“scared of me near her?”

“not at all.” he responds, “just looking out for her.”

“right.”

“she’s been through a lot, it seems like you’ve shaken her up more than before. you nearly sliced her head off.”

minji gulps, claws retracting. “i didn’t— i wasn’t going to.”

“right.” wonbin says unconvincingly. he looks at minji closely before letting out a small sigh. “keep your distance from my sister. keep your claws away. you’re dangerous, you know?”

“sister?” minji questions, and wonbin shakes his head at the fact that it’s the only part of his response that she listened to.

“don’t get too close, minji.” wonbin steps forward, tensing his jaw as he looks down. “you’ll see what happens when i take off these glasses.”

—

it seems like you’re drowning, with your senses overwhelmed by freezing cold water.

opening your eyes stings you, you can’t even see through the blur of the water. your limbs feel heavy and your chest is tightening up by the second.you’re submerged, trapped in some suffocating abyss, and something sharp pierces through the murk—at least from what you can see.

long, gleaming needles approach, their edges catching a flicker of light and it all becomes much more terrifying—they’re heading straight for you.

you try to scream, but the water swallows it, muting your fear. the needles dig into your skin, injecting something searing and molten. you feel another sharp pain coming from your knuckles, and when you look down your eyes widen—there are claws coming out of your skin, slicing right through it. and then, just to make everything worse, the burn from whatever had been injected starts to spread through you like a wildfire, almost as if your bones were in flames.

oddly enough, you can’t seem to use your powers. it’s almost as if they never existed. the pain consumes every nerve, and the pain—it’s unbearable. your body twitches, jerks, and convulses, but there’s no escape.

and then the burn reaches your core. it feels like you might explode in seconds.

…

you sit upright, gasping for air, sweat dripping down your face. your chest heaves like you’ve just surfaced from drawing, and your vision is all blurry, the room darker than you could process.

“y/n! y/n, hey—look at me,” wonbin’s voice is urgent, his hands gripping your shoulders. he’s shaking you lightly, trying to break you out from whatever frantic episode you’re in. “it’s okay, i’m here. talk to me.”

as you blink, your breath slows, your mind racing to piece everything back together. “i-i’m fine,” you mutter, voice shaky. but the pounding in your head, the ache in your chest—it contradicts your response.

the sound of murmurs reaches your ears; hushed whispers, footsteps, and a few shadows catch your eye. you turn towards the door to glance at all the students—wide-eyed, worried, confused. they’re lingering, peering into your room—afraid to step closer.

wonbin’s features furrow, you can just barely see the flurry of emotions through his red shades. “you shook the whole house,” he says, his voice lower now but still laced with tension. “everyone felt it.”

you breathe out shakily, rubbing your face in your hands. shaking your head, you then wipe the sweat from your face with the back of your hand. “it’s nothing,” you lie, shifting uncomfortably under his gaze.

but then, out of the corner of your eye, you see her—minji. she’s standing in the doorway, not quite inside but not leaving either. she’s much bolder than the rest, clear in your vision rather than just a forehead and eyes. her eyes are locked on you, dark and intense, like she’s searching for something beneath your carefully composed exterior. there’s something else there too. care. concern. maybe even fear.

her gaze is scrutinizing.

your breath catches, and for a moment, you can’t look away. her gaze feels like it’s pulling you apart—slow and grueling—like she can see through you.

“y/n?” wonbin’s voice brings you back, he brings his hands over to your shoulders and you turn to face him. his eyes are glossed with worry, brows upturned just a bit.

“it’s fine, i’m fine.” you repeat, more firmly this time, brushing him off as you swing your legs over the side of the bed. “i just need some fresh air.”

he second guesses, watching you closely. you can tell he doesn’t believe you for a second, but he doesn’t push. instead, he glances toward the door, toward minji. when you follow his gaze, she’s still there, still observing.

you stand and gulp, ignoring the weight of her stare—everyone’s stare. you walk past without a word, trailing down the hallway as its cool air hits your skin. despite the chill in the air, heat still courses through you. the memory of the dream, of the fire, of minji’s eyes—it all lingers, and you can’t shake it.

you step outside, only clad in a t-shirt and pajama pants, so the wind sends a shiver down your spine.

making your way down the stone steps, you catch the pond in the distance, rushing over as you try to compose yourself fully. then you sit down on the bench, staring out into the water that’s illuminated by the moon and lamps nearby.

a short breath escapes you, you cling onto the edge of the bench.

the dream was so surreal, so vivid, so much pain, so much terror—and the fact that it’s all a memory from minji leaves you uneasy.

when you read her mind, the scenes went by in a flash, but each one still gave you goosebumps. it was bad enough as is, just getting quick glimpses, but the dream made you relive it—though just briefly. it made your eyes shut, trying to bury everything; how could someone go through all of that?

you lean forward, elbows on your knees, trying to steady your breathing as it grows heavy again. the dream—no, the nightmare—still clings to you, wrapping around your chest and taking your breath away. your hands shake, but you close them shut in an attempt to hide the tremor, even though no one’s around to see it.

at least, that’s what you think.

then you feel it—a presence. familiar, unsettling. your powers react before you can think, a rough, fist-sized rock lifting from the ground, hovering midair. it glides quickly, stopping a breath away from its target.

minji freezes, her eyes flickering to the rock floating just beside her head. “seriously?” she says, voice low but sharp—almost wary too.

you let out a heavy breath, the rock clattering to the ground as you force it down. “sorry,” you mutter, barely glancing at her.

she sits down anyway, keeping a noticeable distance between you. her posture is calm, her hands resting on her thighs, but you can feel the tension radiating off her. it mirrors your own. neither of you says anything at first, the silence filled only by the faint rustle of leaves and the occasional chirp of a cricket.

“you scared me,” she says eventually, her voice softer now, almost reluctant. “when the house shook, i didn’t know what was going on. everyone ran in one direction, i followed, and then… i realized it was you.”

you glance at her, then back at the water, the reflection of the stars shimmering on its surface. “yeah, well. wasn’t exactly intentional.”

her eyes linger on you for a moment before she looks away, exhaling slowly. “i didn’t know you could do all of that. i didn’t know you could be so… vulnerable, i guess.”

the words hit harder than they should, and you can’t decide if it’s an insult or something else. either way, you don’t respond. instead, you take a breath, forcing yourself to ask what’s been bothering you since you woke up. “the dream. the memory,” you begin, hesitant. “i saw you in it. kind of. do you, do you remember?”

“remember what?”

you rub your face with your hands, then relax against the bench as you stare up into the sky now. “needles, pain, water, burning in your bones…”

her brows furrow, and she shakes her head. “i— i wish i could. it’s all… bits and pieces. blurry. i can’t recall…”

you nod, but something about her answer stings. how could someone simply forget something like that? you don’t know how. you’re not sure you want to.

“must be hard,” you say quietly, more to yourself than her.

“yeah,” she responds, equally quiet. her voice lacks the sharpness it usually holds when she talks to you. instead, there’s something almost vulnerable about it.

the tension between you both feels lighter now, less suffocating. it’s not gone, but it’s better. manageable.

the distance between you stays as you sit in silence again, staring out at the water. it’s strange, the sudden wall that crumbled between you two. being with her is uncomfortable but not unwelcome. maybe it’s progress. maybe it’s just exhaustion. maybe you two just had a rough start.

“you almost killed me with that rock, you know,” minji says suddenly, breaking the quiet.

“you’d recover in a second,” you huff a dry laugh, the corner of your lip tugging just barely. “besides, you almost sliced my head off yesterday. i think we’re even.”

“doesn’t mean it wouldn’t hurt…” she argues lightly, and for the first time, you catch a hint of a smile. it’s faint, and fleeting, but it’s there. you don’t know what to make of it, but you let it sit between you, like the space you’re both finally starting to bridge.

you huff again, rubbing your eyes as you stand.

“i’m going back to bed.” you announce quietly, brow twitching as you observe her. she’s still staring out, but offers you a gentle nod.

—

two weeks into her new place of stay, she relearns that the whole world is out for her.

mutants, as they say. the claws that strike out her knuckles indicate that she falls into this category.

if you’re different from the average human, and not just some simple difference, something that makes you dangerous—being able to shoot lasers from your eyes, move things with your mind, change the weather in seconds—that’s what a mutant is.

she’s already well aware of this, but after two weeks of being enrolled in some ‘mutant’ academy, she’s forced to know it down to the bone. this means she’s reading textbooks, watching documentaries, and even sitting through lectures; she never signed up for any of this.

though two more weeks—a month now—into being at the academy, things are much… different. the sharp edges of that initial hostility have dulled, but they’re not gone. and the other students don’t treat her like an outcast (as if they weren’t ones themselves), instead, she’s accustomed to everything.

she still has that cocky edge, the attitude that makes you roll your eyes on instinct, but there’s something else too. a steadiness. she’s settled, not entirely comfortably but not bristling like she was in the beginning. most of this is the result of her spending one-on-one time with the professor, getting to know him for who he is and surprisingly growing quite fond of him. he’s the only person who’s shown so much devotion to someone like her after all.

you see her often—too often, maybe. often enough to see her change. training sessions, group drills, late-night strategy meetings where everyone’s half-asleep but still pretending to listen to the mentors. you two are paired up more often than not, and while the bickering hasn’t entirely disappeared, it’s lighter now. less venom, more banter.

wonbin isn’t happy about it. every time minji’s name comes up—whether that’s during late night talks when you two can’t sleep, during meals, or even when you two are sparring—his expression hardens, his jaw sets.

“i don’t trust her,” he says one evening, standing in the kitchen while you grab a bottle of water. he leans against the counter, arms crossed, looking every bit of the overprotective sibling.

he’s not your actual brother, but when two orphans grow up together nearly tied to the hip—he might as well be. he’s been in your life since the head professor took you in, he’s the first person you’ve let in your life. you know him like the back of your palm, love him like you two share blood.

“you don’t trust anyone,” you reply, taking a sip. “except minjeong, maybe.”

“i do have some trust for others. not including that girl with the claws.” he shoots back, his tone pointed. “she nearly killed you. i still think about the camera footage here and there. my sister, three blades held against her throat.”

you sigh, setting the bottle down with a little more force than necessary. “it was an accident, wonbin. and it’s been a month. she was new… woke up in a lab, and was scared. it’s reasonable for her to almost kill me, i mean, who knows what she’s been through? maybe you should let it go.”

he glares at you, but there’s worry in his look that’s buried beneath the annoyance. “just… be careful, okay?”

you don’t answer. instead, you grab the bottle and head out, needing to clear your head.

—

a day passes, it’s three in the afternoon and minji is dodging a sharp jab near her ribs from you. she swings back and her thumb just barely grazes your ear, making you back up just a bit.

it’s empty in the training room, each sound and movement apparent to both of you. you circle each other on the mat, it’s a routine now—intense, focused, and a little too competitive to be entirely practice.

she moves again, quick and calculated, aiming low with a sweep kick. you dodge once more, your body twisting fluidly as you counter with a strike that she deflects easily. her smirk is there, keen and familiar, and it drives you to wipe it right off.

but she’s good—too good sometimes for someone who’s been at the school for just over a month—which is why you’re often sparring with her or wonbin, two of few who match your level. every step, every move, feels like a challenge, a reminder that she’s no ordinary opponent.

until she slips.

or maybe you just catch her off guard, but your hit lands square in her back, sending her stumbling forward and down onto the mat. she groans, rolling onto her side, shooting you a glare that’s more annoyed than angry.

“lucky shot,” she mutters, pushing herself up to sit.

you hold out a hand, and after a moment, she takes it, letting you pull her to her feet. “you’re slacking,” you tease, using your power to grab a towel from the bench and make it float toward her.

she huffs, grabs the towel in the air, wipes the sweat off her forehead, then smirks. something about it is weirdly infatuating. you blink—why would you think that?

“keep dreaming.” she scoffs.

the session winds down after that, both of you cooling off in the aftermath. she sits cross-legged on the edge of the mat, and you drop down a few feet away, chugging water from your bottle.

“your brother hates me,” she says suddenly, her tone casual but mordant like she’s been holding it in.

you pause mid-sip, lowering the bottle to look at her. “he doesn’t hate you,” you say, though the words feel repetitive, like you’re defending him more for the sake of it than anything else.

she raises an eyebrow, her expression incredulous. “oh, come on. he looks at me like i’m one bad day away from murdering everyone in this place.”

her response makes your lips twitch into something near a frown. “okay, so he’s… wary. wonbin is like that.”

“wary?” she echoes, laughing lightly as she leans back on her hands. her shirt tightens around her torso and it doesn’t go unnoticed. you glance back at her lips as she adds, “that’s a nice way to put it.”

her gaze shifts, her usual sharpness softening into something more thoughtful. “i don’t blame him, though. i mean… i didn’t exactly make the best first impression.”

you shrug, mirroring her stance and leaning on your hands as well. “wonbin’s protective. it’s his thing. give it time.”

“time doesn’t fix everything.” she says so quietly that you couldn’t guess she was talking to herself.

you glance at her and she looks away. the vulnerability in her voice surprises you. it’s rare for minji to let her guard down, and you’re not sure if it’s the exhaustion from sparring or something else entirely.

“no,” you agree softly, “but it helps.”

she looks at you then, her eyes lingering like she’s searching for something. whatever it is, she doesn’t find it—or maybe she does, because she nods slightly, a faint, almost imperceptible smile tugging at the corner of her lips.

she stands up now, running a hand through her hair to tuck back strands that fell out her ponytail. “you’re annoyingly optimistic, you know that?”

you grin, using your power to ball up your towel in the air and fling it at her chest as you stand. she grunts and you chuckle lightly, “only for you.”

minji softens at the response, eyes meeting your back when you turn to walk away, leaving her there just standing like an idiot. she shakes her head, rolling her eyes at you.

—

the night is quiet, the kind of stillness that makes you aware of every creak of the walls and breeze of the wind. minji’s room, dimly lit by the faint glow of the boon filtering through the blinds, feels like a cage. her breathing is uneven, her body drenched in sweat as she jolts awake, the vivid images from her nightmare still gripping her.

it was all too real, as if she were reliving the memory of her cousin getting taken away right in front of her eyes again. it’s one of the memories that isn’t vague in her mind, the most painful one that stabs her heart deeper each time she’s reminded of it.

hyein’s face lingers in her mind—fearful, pleading, and then gone. the “mutant killers,” what her and hyein used to call them, their cruel laughter, the sound of a life being taken too soon. minji grips her sheets, her claws outstretched instinctively, the pain sharp but grounding. she stares at her hands, trembling, the metallic sheen of her claws catching the faint light.

“just a dream,” she whispers to herself, though the ache in her chest tells otherwise.

she covers her face with her hands, breathing in and out to regulate her breathing. the air in her room feels suffocating, so she swings her legs over the side of the bed and stands, still shaky. the rain pattering against the window soothes her just a bit, the steady rhythm just barely snapping her out of it. she heads for the kitchen, hoping water, a snack—really anything might wash away the lingering dread.

as she steps into the darkened room, she halds. the kitchen isn’t empty.

you’re there, sitting by the window in a wooden stool with your knees hugged against your chest. you stare out with earbuds in your ears, the wires stretching down to the phone on your table. only the light from the storm and candle on the table illuminate you, casting a slight shadow across your figure and features. minji pauses mid-step, unsure whether to stay or leave, but the slight tingle in the air—a strange pulse of energy—betrays her presence.

“it’s late.” you nearly whisper, but it’s loud in the silent area. you turn around, the slight shuffle cutting through the stillness.

minji stiffens, caught off guard. “how did you—”

you pull one earbud out as you glance over your shoulder to see her. “you’re not that subtle. plus… you’ve got that thing about you.” you rest your chin on your knee, eyes on her claws—out in the open and— “hard to miss.”

her claws retract as she moves toward the sink, grabbing a glass and filling it with water. “sorry if i uh, interrupted,” she mutters, her voice quieter than usual.

you shake your head, turning to face her fully now. “you didn’t,” you assure, gaze sharpening slightly. there’s a tension in her shoulders, and a little gleam of sweat on her forehead. “bad dream?”

she freezes mid-sip, grip tightening on the glass. “what makes you say that? are you reading my mind?”

you shake your head, then shrug. “just a feeling.”

her laugh is short and humorless—forced—as she sets the glass down, sitting in front of you. “yeah. something like that.” she doesn’t elaborate, but the weight in her voice says enough.

you don’t push; instead, letting the raindrops in the background fill the silence. it’s steady, and soothing, and for a moment, minji feels like she can breathe again. she sighs, leaning her head against the wall beside her as she looks out the window.

“you okay?” you ask finally, your tone soft but probing.

she looks at you for a split second, her walls still up but not as impenetrable as before. “i will be.” she hesitates, then adds, “it’s… an old memory. nothing i can change now.”

“i get it, it’s the same with me.”

“really?”

“it’s why i’m here instead of asleep.” you smile weakly as you mirror her posture: head against the wall and eyes on her instead of the window. “memories are tricky like that. they never really go away. always popping up in your dreams, flickering through your mind while you eat, before you sleep… the latter.”

she nods, her gaze landing on you.

another silence settles, not as heavy this time. the rain continues falling in a rhythm, following its own dance against the glass. it’s a quiet backdrop to the unspoken understanding between you two.

“does it hurt?” your voice breaks the quiet, low and curious, almost hesitant as if you’re asking her to reveal her darkest secret.

her brows furrow slightly, her gaze meeting yours. “does what hurt?”

“when your claws come out,” you clarify, tilting your head. your expression is unreadable but there’s genuine concern in your tone. “it looks… painful.”

minji exhales, another soft, humorless laugh escaping her lips. “always.” she lifts her hand slightly, as if to gesture toward the faint lines on her knuckles where her claws emerge. “i’ve gotten used to it, though. at least, i’ve tried to. it’s only for a second.”

something about her tone tells you she’s lying, but you don’t pry. you frown at her response, the weight of her words sitting heavy in the air. leaning forward, you reach out, gently grabbing her hand. your thumbs brush over her knuckles, brushing over the bumps of her knuckles. her hands are warm and soft, which contrasts the nature of her mutation.

“you’re great.” you tell her, voice barely above a whisper. your gaze doesn’t waver, locked on her hand, the sincerity impossible to ignore. “you’re tough.”

minji looks way briefly when you look back up at her. her expression is caught somewhere between guarded and vulnerable. “thanks,” she murmurs. after a moment, her lips quirk into a faint smile. “you are too, you know.”

you tilt your head, the faint movement on her skin from your thumb halting. your brows knit. “me?”

“mhm,” she hums. “everyone here has been through their own thing. this place is full of… survivors. and you—” she hesitates, the faintest crack in her voice betraying her usual confidence that’s accompanied by banter and teasing. “i’m sure you’ve had your fair share.”

your weak smile mirrors hers as you nod, her words striking deeper than you’d care to admit. you don’t say anything at first, instead letting your thumb continue its slow, soothing motion across her knuckles. the movement is grounding, a small but significant gesture that seems to carry its own special weight. you can’t help but blush, unable to fight a bigger smile and admiration for minji.

“we’ve all got our… trauma.” you finally say.

“maybe,” she replies, tone lighter but still carrying a noticeable weight. “that doesn’t make us weak.”

you both fall into silence that feels less tense, more comfortable now. the rain continues to patter against the window, which offers a nice soundtrack to the moment.

her hand shifts slightly beneath yours, her fingers curling just the tiniest bit, as if testing the waters of whatever you two have. it’s subtle, almost imperceptible, but you feel it—and for now, it’s enough.

you hold four of minji’s fingers with your own, letting them sit gently against each other. you swallow shallowly before reaching for your earbud, putting it back on and staring out the window as something quiet plays.

minji closes her eyes, head still against the wall as her breathing slows into a relaxed pace.

—

the day has been long, with training focused on everyone’s specific power/mutation. you, minjeong, minji, and wonbin have your own space down in the floors below, away from everyone due to the intensity of your abilities.

later on in the day everyone gathered for dinner, with you sitting next to wonbin and minji chatting here and there with minjeong in between bites. you steal glances at her, she steals glances at you. neither wonbin or minjeong let this go unnoticed.

the dining hall is quiet after everyone is finished, the sound of chatter and dishes clinking replaced by the scrape of chairs being pushed in and the occasional clatter of plates. wonbin and minji are the last ones left, tasked with cleaning up after dinner. the air between them is tense, heavy with unspoken words.

wonbin works in silence, wiping down the long table with precision, while minji collects plates and stacks them onto a tray. the tension finally snaps when wonbin speaks, his tone low and clipped.”

“i don’t know what your deal is, but i’m watching you,” he says suddenly, not looking at her.

minji freezes for a moment, then slowly turns to him, a plate still in her hands. “excuse me?”

he sets the cloth down, finally meeting her gaze. “you’ve gotten closer to my sister. fine. but don’t forget how things started, the hostility, your attitude. don’t think for a second that i’ll let my guard down around you.”

minji’s jaw tightens, her grip on the plate firm. “you think i’m going to hurt her? if this is about sparring then don’t be an idiot. you act like i’m going to kill her—is that what this is about?”

“i’m just saying,” wonbin continues, his voice colder as he stares at minji’s knuckles, “if you so much as—”

“give me a break.” she interripts, setting down the plate with more force than necessary. “i’m not going to kill her, wonbin. stop worrying your head off like i’m some ticking time bomb. besides, y/n is more than capable of protecting herself.”

his eyes narrow. “you don’t get to decide what i worry about. she’s my family.”

“and what? you think i don’t know how much she means to you?” minji snaps back. “you think i don’t know what it’s like to have someone you want to protect? because guess what. i used to have someone too, but that’s not the case anymore. you treat me like i was placed onto earth with these claws willingly just to be a predator. i’m not an animal.”

the room feels charged, the weight of their words hanging in the air. you step into the doorway just as minji’s voice rises, catching the tail end of the argument.

“i don’t care whether you trust me or not. if you don’t? so be it. but don’t stand there and act like you know me, like i’m a threat.” she says, her voice tight with frustration.

wonbin’s mouth opens, but whatever he’s about to say dies on his lips when he notices you standing there. minji follows his gaze, her expression hardening when she sees you.

“great,” minji mutters, brushing past you with the tray of dishes. “enjoy your lecture.”

the door swings shut behind her, leaving you and wonbin alone in the now-awkward silence. you sigh, crossing your arms and leaning against the doorframe.

“really?” you groan, your tone equal parts tired and exasperated.

he frowns, rolling up his sleeves to his elbows before beginning to wipe the table again—as if it’ll distract him. “i’m just looking out for you.”

“wonbin, she’s not the enemy.” you reply, stepping closer. “she’s trying, and you’re not making it any easier for her. it’s been a few months and you’re holding on a grudge from first impressions.”

“those goddamn claws are always so close to you!” he hits his fist against the table. “always out and— hell, not everyone can get hurt and heal in less than ten seconds—”

“yeah, i know,” you cut him off. “and she knows too. believe me, she’s not proud of it.”

his wiping slows, and for a moment, he just stands there, gripping the cloth tightly. “i don’t trust her.” he mumbles under his breath, hands harshly running through his hair and gripping at the roots.

“i don’t care. i’m not asking you to,” you say, your voice softening. “i’m asking you to give her a chance. she’s not the same person she was when she got here. none of us are—she’s part of our team now. she’s a mutant, she’s one of us.”

“there’s mutants that want us dead.” he finally looks at you, his expression conflicted. “i just… i don’t want you to get hurt. i lost my blood-brother, and i can’t risk losing my sister too.”

“i know,” you say, placing a hand on his arm. “but you can’t protect me from everything. and you don’t have to. i’ve got everything under control, you do know that my powers aren’t limited to making a napkin move anymore, right? i’m not a child.”

he sighs out heavily, nodding slightly. “fine. but if she steps out of line…”

you smile faintly, giving his arm a light squeeze. “you’ll be the first to know. i can get into your head from a city away.”

the tension eases, and for the first time all evening, the room feels calm again. but in the back of your mind, you wonder if minji heard any of what you said—or if she’s decided to keep her distance.

—

the jet hums beneath your feet as the five of you prepare for landing. the professors—minho, namjoon, and hyeri—stand at the front, briefing everyone one last time. you and your peers, the strongest and oldest of the bunch, have been preparing and preparing for the day to come, for a mission like this. it never seemed like it would be real, something so significant.

wonbin has been sent before to find “mutants fighting destructively and wrecklessly in the mountains thirty minutes away from the city,” which was apparently one of the more risky feats. wonbin came back with a cut on his arm and lip, and he never gets hurt. he also came back with an exhausted minjeong, with messed up hair and a fragile body. of all the mutants that he met there, each one being equally as dangerous, he came back with one that changed things for the better: minji.

and now you’re scratching your pointer finger with your thumb, staring at the ground as you think about what might happen on this mission. tension in the air is thick, the weight of the mission pressing down on you and your teammates.

the task at hand was to rescue a group of mutants held by a militant anti-mutant organization, the same organization that had to do with minji being unconscious the day you met her: jyp’s men. they’ve been raiding mutant-safe zones and capturing young mutants, using them as bait to draw out larger groups of mutants for extermination—some of the people supporting this were mutants themselves.

your breath shakes just thinking about it—everything.

you glance over at minji, whose face is a careful mask of calm as she looks out the window of the jet. then you look at wonbin and minjeong, who are both looking equally nervous as they do determined.

“stay focused, and remember your training,” professor hyeri says, her gaze sweeping over the group. “trust each other.”

her words urge you to glance at wonbin, then at minji. wonbin makes direct eye contact with you, then looks away, tensing his jaw. minji stays unbothered, but her thumb scratches her skin the same way you had been doing.

the jet door opens, and the cold night air rushes in. you descend into the dense forest where the intel suggests the young mutants are hiding.

everything starts fine. the group moves in formation, sticking close and covering each other as instructed. but soon, things aren’t as simple.

blasts of energy light up the darkness as the mutants—ones against their own kind—ambush you all, their powers as unpredictable as they are destructive. you dart behind a fallen tree, barely avoiding a fiery projectile aimed your way. minjeong retaliates with a frost barrier, her hands trembling as she colds a harsh breeze in place, but steadying as she encases an attacker in a compact wind.

“watch out!” wonbin shouts, tackling you before you get hammered by a henchman running towards you. he quickly recovers, turning his head and taking off his glasses as beams shoot from his eyes, completely blowing the guy back.

wonbin puts his glasses back on, then puts a hand on your neck. he looks at you worriedly and you place a hand on his, “thank you,”

“you could’ve died.”

“i was going to send him flying,” you giggle lightly to lighten the mood, which is ruined again when a piece of wood is hurled towards you two. without looking, you lift your hand, making the wood stop and split into pieces in front of you.

wonbin rolls his eyes, then gets up. “stay safe, you’re an idiot sometimes.”

“whatever.”

the next few encounters were manageable—stunning blows, deflected strikes, and coordinated attacks as you worked seamlessly as a team. but the situation quickly spiraled when more mutants appeared, armed with advanced weaponry designed specifically to neutralize mutants.

chaos erupted from there.

one blast sent you flying into a tree, a sharp pain radiating through your shoulder and arm as you hit the ground. you gritted your teeth, using your powers to fling debris at the attackers whil simultaneously pulling out a chunk of wood from your forearm. the strain on your injury made your telekinesis falter. wonbin widened his eyes at the sight of you, running over and crouching next to you as a powerful optic blast from his eyes knocked several men back.

“stay down!” wonbin shouted through the chaos, but his voice wavered with concern as he noticed the blood staining your sleeve. “y/n, y/n jesus christ…”

minjeong was a blur, lighting shooting from her fingertips as she immobilized one of the attackers. her hair whipped wildly around her face, the storm she summoned cracking ominous above her.

amidst the disarray, minji became the anchor holding you all together. while you all lingered in the same area, she moved across the terrain with brutal efficiency. her claws tore through weapons and disarming attackers with practiced ease—the same way she made her way through the dummies back at the school, but much quicker. she looked angrier than you’ve ever seen her before, blood staining her knuckles and stabbing mercilessly.

but then, one of the men aimed a specialized weapon—something lethal and glowing with energy in your direction, meaning it’d not only hit you, but also wonbin and minjeong.

minji looks over, quickly taking her hand away from some man’s chest she’s just stabbed. her eyes widen, she hurries over, huffing and biting down as she pushes herself physically.

“get down!” she yells, throwing herself in front of you all.

you watched in horror as the shot hit her squarely, wonbin’s shoulder covering a bit of the image from the way blocked you. she staggered but didn’t fall, her claws retracting for a second. they emerge a few seconds later and she grits her teeth, looking down at you as she endures the pain.

wonbin looks up as well, flinching. a sharp gasp of surprise slips from him as a second shot follows, and then another, but minji didn’t budge. her body served as a shield, each hit accompanied by a guttural groan that made your chest tighten painfully.

“minji, stop!” you cry, trying to reach out for her as panic seizes you. the sight of her taking the brunt of the attack was almost too much to bear.

“stay down!” she snaps, her voice sharp despite what she’s enduring. there’s agony etched into her features, earning tears from you.

her claws extended fully as she leaped forward, taking down two men in quick, fluid movements. wonbin’s blast took out another attacker as he continued to hold you, while minjeong’s storm surge sent the remaining men scattering.

“minjeong,” wonbin starts, looking at the destruction, and especially at minji. she’s limping, breathing hard, the sleeve of one arm torn off. “gather any of the young mutants you can find—the refugees. i’m going to check on minji.”

“you are?” minjeong says, surprised as she looks between both of them.

but before wonbin can move, you push him off with your power, making him roll off of you and on the ground. he grunts as he pushes himself up, watching you run over to where minji is.

he calls out for you, but you push it in the back of your mind—what matters the most is minji.

she’s clutching her shoulder, on her knees, and soon falling back onto the ground. she lies there for a moment, staring up and groaning. you rush over to her side, pushing her hair away from her face and cupping her cheeks as tears flow. because of her powers she’s not bruised, there aren’t any cuts, but just the memory from before and her pure exhaustion are enough to have you ignoring your injuries.

“minji? minji, minji please.” her blinking gets slower as she looks up, then she looks over to you and smiles. “minji, are you okay? minji please…” you shake her, hands moving to the side of her neck and then her shoulders.

her blinking slows down until her eyes close fully for a moment. she smiles softly and brings her hand over to place it over yours. her claws are still out, but they retract slowly into her skin.

“ouch,” she groans, “hurts a lot.”

you choke out another cry and put your head down on her shoulder, tears staining the sleeve that hadn’t been blown up or torn. she brings her other hand over to rest on your head, fingers digging into your scalp just a bit.

“i’m fine, y/n. i just need a good nap…”

“still,” you say, voice light and airy and full of worry. “i can’t see you getting hurt like that again, i can’t.”

“why?” minji asks genuinely, watching you pull away to look at her through glossy eyes. “you know i don’t get hurt like everyone else.”

“i know, i just—” you close your eyes, sighing. “i care about you so much. seeing you hurt i just, i—”

“wow, you look really pretty right now.” minji mumbles, hand on your cheek now. “the dust and moonlight and… blood,” she giggles with a mix of pain and admiration, “really brings out your eyes.”

“you idiot,” you say quietly. your brows twitch as they furrow, from her words and also the sudden pain everywhere in your body.

“y/n?” minji asks as you go weak and collapse on her, breath shaky. “y/n?” she says again, voice much more worried as she tries to get up.

“i’m glad you’re okay, as long as you’re okay.” you sigh, feeling minji’s arms around you.

“y/n? y/n—” minji feels blood seeping through your suit and onto her, looking down to see a slight stain that leaked onto her skin.

—

minji stares at the floor of her room, her hands balled up into fists and pressing into her thighs. her thoughts are a loop, they’ve been a loop ever since the mission had ended. the endless memory of you being thrown into a tree, the look on your face that she managed to witness, and the blood—so much blood.

in the moment she had wanted to run to you, even before wonbin did. she wanted to pull you up, to do something, but the mission hadn’t allowed for hesitation. there had been too many enemies darting at her and four young mutants on the line. although she wanted to run up and protect you, she knew better.

but still, she thinks about how if she were faster, stronger—she could’ve maybe taken down the man that hurled you.

guilt festers, pressing heavily on her chest until she’s breathing heavier, and she pushes herself out of the room and onto the rooftop of the school. the night is still, the stars faint behind the clouds, and the chill of the air bites against her skin. she sits with her legs dangling off, staring at the sky like you’d do with her when you both couldn’t sleep.

it’s been almost twenty-four hours since you fell unconscious, twenty-four hours since the moment where minji had to watch wonbin carry you with tears in the corners of his eyes and your blood staining some of his forearm.

“minji.” professor minho’s voice breaks through the stillness, calm but firm. he looks out at the moon past minji, not opening his mouth as he telepathically says, “she’s in much better condition now, blinked a few times before returning to her state before.”

minji doesn’t think, doesn’t hesitate. her body moves on its own, programmed to sprint at the mention that you’re conscious again. she’s rushing down the stairs and through the hallways until she’s outside the infirmary door. she pauses, her hand hovering just above the doorknob, suddenly unsure. she takes a steadying breath before stepping inside.

wonbin is seated by your bedside, his large hand wrapped around yours protectively. his expression softens slightly when he sees minji enter, though the tension in his shoulders doesn’t fully ease. minji doesn’t say anything, just pulls up a chair across from him and sits down, her gaze locking onto you.

you’re pale, your arm and torso heavily bandaged. every rise and fall of your chest feels like a fragile promise, and minji’s stomach twists at the sight. she doesn’t know how long she stares before wonbin’s voice cuts through the silence.

“thank you,” he says, his voice quiet but sincere. it’s the first time he’s spoken with so much vulnerability to her. minji looks up, surprised, and sees the way his grip on your hand tightens slightly. “for doing all of that—protecting all of us out there. i mean it.”

minji nods, her throat tight. “i couldn’t protect her,” she murmurs, her voice barely above a whisper. “not enough.”

“we both tried our best. it was hard out there.” wonbin shakes his head. “you did more than enough for her, for all of us.” he hesitates, his lips pressing into a thin line before he goes on, “look, i know we’ve clashed… and i haven’t been… well, the best. to you, i mean. but i do appreciate what you did. thank you.”

a silent treaty—something like that—is signed. close enough.

minji nods again, the tension between them easing ever so slightly. they sit in silence, the faint hum of the machines monitoring your vitals filling the room.

minjeong walks in a moment later, her presence bright but subdued as she glances between the two of them and then at you. “she’s okay?” she asks softly, her gaze lingering on your face as she walks over to place a hand on your tummy softly.

“she’s tough,” wonbin says, voice steady. “she’ll be fine.”

minji stands, the chair scraping softly against the floor. she steps back, giving minjeong space as the other girl sits next to wonbin. minji’s look lingers on you for a moment longer before she turns and leaves the room.

she’s halfway to the door when she hears your voice—not aloud, but soft and clear in her mind.

thank you minji.

she freezes, her fingers hovering over the handle. her pulse quickens, the room suddenly feeling smaller, like it’s folding in on itself. slowly, she glances over her shoulder, her gaze locking onto your still-unconscious form. your lips are slightly parted, you’re still pale, and still. minji knows she’s not imagining it. the connection between the two of you hums faintly, along with the soft sound of your breath, fragile but unmistakable.

you didn’t have to do all that, but you did. you’re an idiot, you know?

your voice continues with the same warmth as always.

even if you are… i’d like to… i don’t know, spend some time together?

minji’s grip on the handle tightens, the weight of your words settling in her chest. she turns fully now, minjeong and wonbin perking their heads at her. her gaze softens as it rests on you. “you don’t owe me anything, only the promise that you’ll rest up.” she mutters, her voice slightly louder than wonbin’s clothes shuffling as he moves his arm a bit. “just take it easy, okay?”

there’s no response, only the steady beeping of the machines beside you. but as minji observes, she catches the faintest twitch of your lips—a subtle movement, tugging into something that’d be a stupid smirk if you were your normal self. it’s barely there, but enough to send a flicker of something unfamiliar through her.

she watches you for a moment more before leaving, not turning back. minjeong and wonbin look at each other, confused, before brushing it off and paying attention to you again.

—

a few days pass, and you’re finally on your feet again. the first steps are unsteady, your legs wobbling like they’re testing the idea of holding your weight, but you manage. besides, the pain in your upper body is worse.

still, wonbin hovers like a shadow, always within reach. his presence is both comforting and stifling, his sharp eyes darting to every movement you make as if you might topple over an second.

(which, you might. you’re not going to admit it though, he wouldn’t let you have the end of it.)

it’s not just during the usual times either. at lunch he’s seated right next to you, arms crossed and jaw tensed. occasionally, he glances toward minji whenever she approaches, staying in your peripheral as you two laugh over something he doesn’t know the context of.

the hallway is no different; as you and minji exchange casual remarks, he lingers a few steps behind, clearly within earshot. minji’s talking about how training is a bit rough after being shot multiple times from the event despite her healing, and wonbin’s behind listening—but not prying.

even in your room, when minji stops by with a book she claims might “keep you from getting bored,” he’s sitting on the floor against your bed, staring at minji through his frames and folding his arms like some overprotective sentinel.

neither of you mind it for now. minji spares him the occasional smirk or side glance, clearly aware of his hovering, but doesn’t press. sometimes she tries to get him engaged in your conversations, even if it’s about something stupid like ice cream toppings and food arguments. you’ve come to accept his protective streak, considering it exposes him to the minji you’ve grown to care for a lot.

a few days later, though, you’ve had enough. sitting on the porch with wonbin, you watch him from the corner of your eye as he fiddles with his phone, pretending not to be monitoring your every breath. you sigh and turn to him, your tone as light as you can make it. “won, i’m fine. seriously. i’m not going to collapse or break apart.”

he looks up sharply, his brow furrowing. “you’re still recovering. flimsy isn’t fine.”

you laugh softly, shaking your head and rolling your eyes. “flimsy is better than useless, and besides, i need to get back to normal at some point. hovering like a drone won’t make me stronger. you’re like some… medieval guard—that has lasers coming out his eyes.”

his frown deepens, but it’s slightly more playful. for a moment it seems like he might argue, but then he sighs, leaning back against the railing. “i just… i can’t have anything like that happening to you again.”

you reach over, patting his hand briefly. “i know. and i appreciate it. but trust me, i’ve got it. okay?” your fingers link with his and he softens just barely.

he nods reluctantly, muttering something about keeping an eye on you anyway, but you can see the tension in his shoulders start to ease further. a win is a win, you think with a smile, as the two of you sit in comfortable silence before you ask wonbin about how his aim has been getting. he responds with a groan and you chuckle.

—

dishes clinking against each other fills the quiet in the air of the kitchen. you and minji work together to clean up after dinner, the soft hum of the school settling into its evening lull. your movements are methodical, each plate and glass wiped clean and set aside, but your thoughts are anything but calm. every now and then, your look flickers to minji, catching her in the soft glow of the overhead light, her expression focused, her hands steady.

you’re halfway through stacking a set of plates when the words slip out. “i was scared to death,”

minji freezes, her hands pausing mid-reach for a plate. she turns her head, her gaze meeting yours with a hint of surprise.

you place the plate you’re holding down on the counter and step closer, your heart pounding harder with each step. “when you were on the ground… when they blasted you with those shots and we all had to watch, i though—” your voice wavers, and you swallow hard. “i thought i was going to lose you.”

minji straightens, her eyes softening as they search yours. “you know my abilities,” she says quietly, her tone careful. “i heal. i always heal. shoot me and the bullet will be pushed right out, stab me and the cut will close. those blasts hurt, they weakened me yeah, but i’m in one piece.”

you shake your head, taking another step closer. “i know. but still… seeing you like that—acting like a shield and taking all of that—i just… i didn’t know what to do. i was terrified.”

her eyes widen slightly, and for a moment, the air feels heavier, more charged. you’re standing so close now that you can see every faint scar on her hands that were left when she was younger, the tension in her shoulders.

“you weren’t the only one,” she says softly. “during your recovery… i kept thinking thinking about it, about you. i couldn’t do anything to protect you. it killed me seeing you like that.”

your chest tightens at her words, and before you can think, your arms move on their own. you pull her into a hug, your grip firm but careful. she stiffens for a brief second before she melts into you, her chin resting on your shoulder as her arms trap you tightly. her heartbeat thumps against yours, quick and uneven, matching your own.

“we’re both fine now, at least. that’s all that matters.” minji’s chin moves just a bit against your shoulder as she says it, “as long as you’re with me.”

when you pull back, your hands linger, fingers barely grazing each other’s arms. you stare into her eyes, and something shifts—there’s something in her eyes that wasn’t there before, or maybe you just never noticed.

minji’s cheeks are dusted pink, her lips slightly parted as she takes you in. she thinks you’ve never looked more radiant than you do in this moment, eyes filled with so much care it makes her heart swell.

you, on the other hand, see her in a new light entirely. she’s glowing to you even in the dimmed area. it feels like something undeniable is pulling you towards her. your hands reach over hesitantly, fingers brushing against the skin of minji’s cheek before you hold her there. her ears and brows twitch ever so slightly before she sinks into you, tilting her head into your hand and humming softly.

“minji, i think i—”

then, the sound of the door creaking open snaps you both out of it. professor minho steps in, his warm smile immediately taking in the scene. you two pull away, taking two steps back in one motion as you clear your throats. minji feels as if there’s a warmth missing on her cheek.

“i’ll take care of the rest,” he says, his voice calm but knowing. “you two go rest. there’s a lot of action packed recovery and training tomorrow.”

flustered, you make your way out quickly, coughing awkwardly. “yes, of course. thank you professor.” you shoot minji a quick, bashful smile before excusing yourself, your heart still racing as you leave the kitchen area.

minji stays behind, glancing down at her hands before returning to the dishes, her mind replaying the moment over. and as she stands by the sink, she keeps scrubbing the same plate like it’s the only thing she’s programmed to do while her thoughts swirl around in her head.

her heart beats too fast and her cheeks are still too warm.

professor minho watches her with quiet amusement as he picks up a small, dry rag. the comfortable silence lingers for a moment longer before he clears his throat, drawing minji’s attention.

“you know,” he starts, his tone casual but laced with curiosity, “you’re not usually this distracted.”

minji glances at him, her lips pressing into a thin line as if trying to play it off. “just tired,” she mutters, rinsing the plate and setting it aside before accepting the rag he hands her, drying her hands after.

minho doesn’t press right away, but his knowing look stays fixed on her, patient. finally, he speaks again, softer this time. “how do you feel about y/n?”

the question catches minji off guard. she freezes, her grip tightening on the rag she’s holding. her first instinct is to brush it off, but the weight of everything has her too raw to hide. and plus, the professor doesn’t need to use his powers to read her, or any of the students for that matter.

“she’s,” minji pauses, struggling to find the right words. her voice is quieter now as she leans against the counter with a hand on her face. “she’s the first person i’ve cared about this much in a while.”

minho’s expression softens, his small smile doesn’t fade. “i can see that.” he says simply.

minji looks at him, surprised by his lack of judgment or teasing. “you can?”

he chuckles lightly, nodding as he starts to clean the next few dishes. “i’ve known y/n for a long time. took her in when she had no one else. i’ve seen her grow, especially with wonbin, and struggle and learn and—the latter. she’s been and fought through things that most people wouldn’t spring back up from.” he pauses, his tone growing more thoughtful. “i know how much she cares, how deeply she feels for everyone around her—even if she doesn’t always show it. her and minjeong, wonbin, the professors, the rest of the students… but she cares for you in a very interesting way. she looks at you differently.”

minji’s heart skips a beat, her eyes widening slightly. “how she looks at me?”

minho nods. “it’s the same way you look at her.” he lets the words hang in the air before continuing, putting a dish away as he says, “whatever this is between you two—whatever it becomes—i think it’s good. for both of you.”

minji frowns slightly, her brows furrowing. “wonbin doesn’t seem to think so.”

minho laughs quietly, shaking his head. “wonbin is quite protective,” he explains, “he’s always been that way with y/n. they’ve been through a lot together, and he sees it as his job to keep her safe. but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t like you.”

minji looks up at him with skepticism painted in her features. “he barely tolerates me.”

“he did,” minho admits, “but ever since the mission, that’s changed drastically. you protected all of them—you protected him and the person he loves most. he sees that now. and whether he’s able to admit it or not, he respects you greatly for it. he even likes you… to an extent.”

minji raises an eyebrow, doubtful but not entirely dismissive. “you’re sure about that?”

minho smiles knowingly. “i’ve known wonbin a long time. trust me, if he didn’t like you, you’d know. the fact that he lingers around while you and y/n are talking? that’s his way of easing into it—and because he doesn’t trust his sister enough while she’s not fully recovered.”

“it’s just…” minji sighs, “i don’t want to make things harder for y/n. she’s been through so much already. i can’t be another scoop of worry on her plate.”

minho finishes washing the last of all the plates, getting lazy and deciding to scrub the silverware with his mind. the spoons behind him lift up and the sponge scrubs on its own in the air as he turns to face minji, leaning against the counter.

“minji, you’re not making things harder for her. if anything, you’re doing the opposite. y/n doesn’t let just anyone in, you know. she’s cautious, careful about who she trusts—and yet, she trusts you. that’s quite remarkable if you ask me.”

she doesn’t respond immediately, her mind replaying the way you had looked at her earlier, the softness in your voice when you spoke. it felt… different.

“i know both y/n well enough to see when something—or someone—means a lot to her.”

minji meets his gaze, her own uncertain but searching for reassurance.

“you think i mean that much to her?” she asks, almost hesitant to hear the answer.

minho smiles, a small, knowing smile that feels like the answer she’s been looking for. “i don’t think minji. i’m certain. and from what i’ve seen, you feel the same.”

she doesn’t deny it, she can’t. instead, she looks away, a faint blush creeping up her cheeks.

minho places all the silverware on the drying rack with his mind as he walks over to place a reassuring hand on her shoulder. “whatever this is between you two, don’t make it more complex than it is. just let it happen, don’t think too far ahead, don’t think too much. y/n doesn’t need perfection—she needs someone who cares. and you’re already doing that.”

she stays silent for a moment, taking in his words.

“and don’t worry about wonbin. he’ll come around fully sooner than you think. i think he already is. he’s just stubborn.” minho assures, taking his hand off of her before grabbing another rag to dry off her hands. “now, you should get yourself to bed. as i said, lots of training tomorrow.”

“right, yes. thank you professor.” minji says, nodding at him before pursing her lips into a smile.

“anytime, you’re my student afterall.”

minji nods once more before heading to the door. everything falls quiet again, she makes her way down the hallway as her thoughts swirl. it’s only when she gets to her room and closes the door, thinking of the way you’d looked at her earlier. she lets herself smile, just a bit, maybe more than that.

(she’s grinning from ear to ear)

she thinks that maybe, just maybe, this could work.

—

you and minjeong are paired up for sparring the next day, grinning as soon as the matchup is made. she huffs before raising her fists up, ready to fight. professor hyeri gives you the green light, yelling at the top of her lungs.

there’s the echo of punches meeting gloves and the occasional smack of a body hitting the mat. you and minjeong square off, circling each other. there’s a glint in her eye today—a little more focus, more drive.

it doesn’t take long before you find yourself flat on your back, blinking up at the ceiling with her smirking down at you.

“okay, maybe i’m still not fully recovered,” you groan, the sting to your pride a little heavier than the soreness in your muscles. you take her outstretched hand reluctantly, letting her help you up.

“or maybe,” minjeong leans in just slightly, her voice low enough so that only you can hear, “it’s the girl with the claws.”

heat rises to your face immediately. your grip on her hand loosens, and you shove her playfully as you step back. “you’re out of your mind,” you huff, shaking your head as if you’re dismissing her.

she shrugs, the ghost of a smile playing on her lips as she steps back into position. “am i?”

you roll your shoulders and raise your fists, ready to go again. punches fly between you—sharp jabs, swift swings, and quick dodges that nearly graze skin. despite the physical focus, the conversation doesn’t stop.

“you’ve been different lately,” minjeong says before moving her head to the side to dodge your punch. she aims a kick towards you that you narrowly block.

“i have not,” your tone is just as defensive as your stance.

“there’s something there. something you’re not saying,” she presses, her voice teasing but curious.

you focus on the sparring, refusing to meet her gaze, but it’s getting harder to ignore the way her words chip away at you.

then it happens; minjeong slips. not physically, but her guard falters as she glances at you, and it’s all you need. with a quick step, you sweep her off her feet, pinning her down as you hover just above.

“you’re distracted. maybe less talk, more fight?” you say, breathless but triumphant.

she groans, lighting hitting the mat and rolling her eyes in frustration. there’s no real annoyance in her expression—just a mix of surprise and admiration.

before either of you can say more, your eyes flick to minji, who’s sparring with wonbin a few feet away. her movements are fluid, rapid, and sharp. something about the way she moves, so uncontrollably but with precision at the same time pulls at you.

minjeong notices the shift in your expression immediately. “see? there it is.”

you glance back at her, your grip on her wrist getting weaker as your face heats up again.

“maybe… something,” you mumble, the words slipping out before you can stop them.

you’re standing above her, but a quick meeting between her hand and your ankle sends you falling on the mat beside her, making her laugh. another groan slips from your lips, but you smile as you get up when she does, rolling your eyes.

she sits back, watching you with an infuriatingly smug smile.

“i hate you sometimes, you know?” you grumble, shaking your head as you get up.

“you’re welcome!” she says with a light and teasing tone. “water?” she suggests.

“please.”

as you glance at minji one more time, catching her wiping sweat from her brow and laughing softly—surprisingly so—at something wonbin says, you realize minjeong isn’t entirely wrong.

—

by the end of the week you and minji haven’t spent too much time together—not alone at least. just the two of you and comfort in the air.

but now, you and minji sit on the schools rooftop, her legs dangling off the building as the moon shimmers. minji's in one piece, but your arm still has a suture covering a deep cut that’s almost fully healed—plus, there's a scratch still on your neck and pain lingering here and there.

it’s silent for a bit, your shoulders grazing then fully pressing against each other. that is, until minji breaks that quiet of the night.

"i wish i were more like you." minji states plainly, eyes angled down at the ground.

you look at her strangely, then mutter, "what?"

"sometimes i wish i could just figure out what you're thinking of sometimes." minji shrugs, “i’ve been wishing i could just make sense of things. if i could read minds and all that… maybe i could.”

"people who can't hold themselves back from doing that aren't the right ones to have my power, minji."

“i have self control, you know?” she chuckles and you raise a brow. she just shakes her head and smirks, looking back up at the moon in the sky. "i wouldn't pry into minds like that."

"sure you wouldn't." you scoff, dangling your feet.

"have you ever read my mind? other than... when i asked you to?” her voice is softer now.

"i don't like reading people's minds without permission, consent isn't just physical."

“so you haven’t…?”

“minji, i wouldn’t. not unless you ask me. i wouldn’t read any minds unless explicitly ordered, or something.”

minji turns to face you now, smiling at you. "what, you're afraid you'll like it if you read me?"

"ugh." you move your hand just a bit, your fingers softly land on top of minji's knuckles. she tightens her jaw and you smile. "you're an idiot."

"read my mind y/n." minji insists lowly, her voice near a hum. she shifts herself closer, your noses are half a finger apart. your fingers slide past her knuckles and up the back of her hand, your nails press against her just barely. "c'mon, you have my permission."

“there’s nothing in that hollow skull of yours.”

“hey!”

“am i wrong?”

“yes! just read it.”

looking at her, you shake your head lightly. minji’s smiling at you, her eyes moving from your own eyes and down to your lips here and there. she looks at you like that and you think that whatever you feel for her isn’t just maybe, it’s been a big certainly. and maybe it’s always been there, maybe she was always so nice to look at, talk to, and really just someone you were completely attracted to in the end.

the moon shines perfectly, the wind rustles her hair just a bit, and everything falls into place.

you lean closer, tilting your head and making minji grip the edge of the rooftop. your lips ghost over hers and your eyes are half-lidded before you murmur, "i don't need to use my powers to read your mind, to know what you want.”

minji feels lips pressing against her own, immediately reciprocating and cupping your cheek with her free hand. your hand grips hers tightly as she deepens the kiss, the hand on your cheek sliding towards the back of your head and the nape of your neck.

you pull away, smiling bashfully and turning away to hide your face. minji giggles, the sound echoes in the air and makes you smile harder. her hand is still on the back of your neck and you feel her pushing your head towards her so she can press a light kiss in your hair.

when you finally turn back to meet her face to face, she's smirking smugly, the look she gives you is enough to let you know that she’s about to tease the life out of you, so you use your powers, bringing two fingers up, bending them towards you to make her gasp as she involuntarily moves forward. you kiss her lips again to stop her before some snarky remark leaves her mouth.

she manages to pull away mid-kiss to sneak in a quick, "cute," before you pull her back in by the collar of her t-shirt.

—

minji stays the night in your room, you couldn’t bear being a few rooms away from her after knowing what her lips feel and taste like.

she watches you stretch, run a hand through your hair, and sigh as you flop onto your mattress. you stay there, breathing in, out, and open your eyes just barely to look at minji, who’s still standing.

“come, don’t stand there like an idiot.”

minji chuckles. “coming.”

she strips out of her crewneck sweater and sweatpants, to which you enjoy the scene greatly before she’s just in a tank top and boy shorts. she rubs her face before getting in bed with you both of you beside each other for a moment on yours sides, eye to eye.

you pull the blanket to cover both of you, especially minji.

“you know, i hated you so much when you first got here.” you admit, your eyes trailing down the curve of her nose and to her lips. “you almost killed me.”

“sorry about that.”

you smile, sighing contentedly. “i think getting to know you more made up for it.” you nearly whisper, then shuffle closer to kiss her lips briefly.

minji wraps her arm around you, keeping you close to her and humming. you close your eyes, finding comfort in her warmth.

“i think i love you.” minji’s voice is practically a breath.

“i think i love you as well.”

—

the sunlight is filtered by the window, which leaves a subtle glow on your face and minji’s cheek. minjeong pushes open your door, her footsteps are a little loud as she steps inside, ready to wake you up annoyingly.

you’re not one to sleep in, you’re actually the early bird who’s waking her up. but it’s nearly nine and training is at ten and breakfast has been ready and—

she freezes in her tracks when she sees the two of you.

you and minji are tangled together in your bed, still deep in sleep. minji’s head rests in the crook of your neck, her breath steady and warm against your skin. one of your legs is draped loosely over hers, while her arm curls protectively around your waist. the rise and fall of your chests follow after each other without any rush. slow and steady. there’s an undeniable sense of comfort in the way you’re both nestled so cozily together.

minjeong hesitates, her lips parting slightly as she takes in the scene. there’s something tender about it, something so peaceful that she almost feels guilty for intruding.

is y/n awake?

the familiar voice of professor minho echoes in her mind, pulling her back to the moment. she grimaces slightly, knowing she’ll have to explain—and not just to the professor.

“um… not exactly,” she replies out loud, tone laced with uncertainty.

what do you mean, not exactly?

minjeong glances at the bed again, biting her lip before responding. “well, they’re still asleep. both of them. together.” she pauses, “them being y/n and minji. minji’s… kind of clinging onto y/n. really closely.”

there’s silence on the other end, a notable pause that stretches long enough for minjeong to start second guessing herself.

finally, minho’s voice cuts through again, calm and composed.

let them sleep in. i think they need it.

minjeong blinks, slightly surprised by his response, but she can sense the faint warmth and smile in his tone.

“are you sure?” she asks, her gaze flicking back to the two of you. neither of you has stirred, both lost in the serenity of the moment.

they’ve been through a lot. they deserve the rest, minho replies simply, the weight of his words settling over her. and you haven’t finished breakfast. ah, also, you should go and explain things to wonbin, he’ll take it fine—i would assume.

“right,” minjeong nods to herself, stepping back quietly. she closes the door with care, leaving you and minji undisturbed. when she turns around, she’s met with wonbin, who’s a few steps from your bedroom door.

“is she awake? and where is minji?” he questions, tilting his head.

“how do i explain this…”

“...what?”

“just… look into her room.”

wonbin raises a brow before stepping past her, slowly opening the door to see the same sight minjeong saw before: you, minji, and coziness etched into your features and painted in the way your limbs meet.

he doesn’t know what to say, or do. he simply stares, observing the expressions.

“are you mad?” minjeong asks in a hushed whisper.

wonbin doesn’t respond for a moment, instead, tensing his jaw like he always does. he sighs, exhaling deeply.

“i don’t think i’ve ever seen her sleep that well.” he murmurs, “she looks so… peaceful.”

“minji does too.” minjeong peeks in, agreeing with him.

“i’m not mad,” he finally answers the question, “as long as my sister is happy.”

he smiles when you turn just a bit to throw your arm over minji, pushing her closer to you as if she were a teddy bear. you mumble something incoherent and sleepily press a kiss into minji’s hair subconsciously.

wonbin’s smile grows just a bit, then he steps out with minjeong and closes the door as quietly as he can. he starts walking towards the stairs, with minjeong catching up and walking beside him as he puts his hands in his pockets, looking ahead of him.

wonbin sighs, a mix of content and something joyous.

“i can’t be mad when my sister’s that happy.”

#kim minji x reader #kpop x reader #newjeans minji #kim minji #minji #minji x reader #newjeans x reader #new jeans x reader

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