#I looked it up on Ao3 and there absolutely is

[d-z20]

The Agent Next Door part 3 (NSFW)

Pairing: Agent Rio Vidal x Reader

Summary: When a ghost from Rio's past resurfaces, the safe haven you’ve built together is threatened. As danger edges closer, your bond deepens in unexpected ways, testing your trust and strength in each other. Amidst fear and uncertainty, you discover just how far both of you are willing to go to protect what matters most.

Warnings: 18+ MDNI, angst, smut, fluff ending, fingering (R recv), oral (Rio recv), praise kink, slight power bottom Rio

Words: 4.2k

A/N: The angsty third (and final?) part as promised

AO3 | Part 1 | Part 2 | Master List

Under Her Protection

You’re sprawled out on Rio’s couch, nestled comfortably against her side as the TV plays in the background. It’s the kind of night you’ve both come to love—no plans, no rush, just the two of you together, half-watching some crime drama. You can feel the steady rise and fall of her chest as you rest your head there, her arm slung casually around your shoulders, fingers absently tracing patterns on your arm.

It’s a rare, peaceful moment, one that you’ve started to cherish more and more. You glance up at her; she looks different like this—softer. The usual tension in her jaw has melted away; her sharp features relaxed in a way you rarely get to see. You smile to yourself, the sight of her at ease filling you with a quiet kind of joy. She’s not just the composed, authoritative FBI agent you first met. Here, she’s Rio—your Rio—and you could watch her like this forever.

You press a kiss to her jaw, feeling her smile against your lips.

“Enjoying the show?” she asks, her voice teasing. You know she couldn’t care less about what’s on the screen, but it’s a running joke between the two of you—mocking the exaggerated, overly dramatic FBI agents depicted on TV.

“Oh, absolutely,” you drawl, playing along. “I just love how accurate it all is. Clearly, every case is solved in a day, and all agents wear heels and leather jackets.”

Rio chuckles, pulling you closer. “It’s ridiculous,” she snorts. “Half of this would get thrown out in court in a heartbeat. And don’t even get me started on the ‘enhance the grainy footage’ bullshit.”

You grin, enjoying the rare, playful side of her. “I bet you’d never pull a stunt like that. The great Agent Vidal would never dream of cutting corners.”

She raises an eyebrow, her smirk sharp. “Oh, you’d be surprised what I’ve pulled off. Sometimes rules are more like... guidelines.”

You laugh, leaning into her, and she squeezes your shoulder lightly. For a moment, everything feels easy—peaceful.

Then her phone buzzes, cutting through the quiet. She lets out a small sigh and picks it up, her expression immediately shifting as she reads the message. The shift is so sudden it makes your stomach drop. Without a word, she gets up and walks to the window, peering through the blinds like she’s expecting to see something—or someone—out there.

“Rio?” You ask cautiously, sitting up. “What’s wrong?”

She doesn’t answer right away, her shoulders visibly tense. Finally, she lets the blinds fall back into place and turns to you, her expression grim. “That was work,” she says, her voice low and controlled. “Someone I put away years ago just got released on parole. He... wasn’t supposed to get out this soon.”

You frown, confused. “Why is that a problem? Didn’t he serve his time?”

Her jaw tightens, and for a moment, you think she won’t answer. Then she sighs, running a hand through her hair. “The last time I saw him, he threatened to ruin my life,” she says quietly. “He’s dangerous. And vindictive. If he finds out where I live... who you are... how much I lov—.”

She doesn’t finish the sentence, but she doesn’t have to. The implications hang heavy in the air. You swallow hard, suddenly very aware of the weight of her job and the risks that come with it.

“Hey,” you say softly, standing and moving to her side. “I’m sure it’s fine. He probably doesn’t even know you’re here.”

Her eyes meet yours, and for the first time since you met her, you see real fear there. “Maybe. But I can’t take that chance.” She pauses, her hand brushing your arm. “I want you to stay here. At least until I figure out what’s going on.”

The seriousness in her tone leaves no room for argument, and you nod. “Okay. I’ll stay.”

You settle back onto the couch together, but the atmosphere has shifted now, an unspoken tension lingering in the room. Rio keeps her phone close, her other arm wrapped protectively around you, her eyes flicking back to the window every so often.

You try to focus on the TV show, but your thoughts keep drifting. It’s unsettling, this shadow of a threat hanging over the two of you, and you can tell Rio feels it too. Her grip on you tightens every time she hears a noise from outside, her thumb rubbing circles against your arm as if she’s trying to soothe both of you.

Eventually, you turn your head to look up at her. “You know, I don’t need a TV show when I’ve got my own personal action hero right here.”

Rio snorts, shaking her head. “Is that what I am now?”

“Yep,” you say, grinning up at her. “Neighbour, fashion critic, and now... bodyguard.”

She rolls her eyes but leans down to press a kiss to your lips, soft and lingering. “Just stay close, okay?”

You nod, your heart fluttering at the protectiveness in her voice. “I’m not going anywhere, Rio.”

Relief flashes across her face, but it’s fleeting. She takes your hand, leading you to her bedroom without another word. The silence between you is heavy but not uncomfortable—it’s charged, humming with unspoken worry and a need for closeness.

When you get to the bed, her hands are on you immediately, tugging you close. There’s a new intensity to her touch, her fingers gripping your hips firmly, almost possessively. She kisses you hard, like she’s trying to stake her claim, her mouth moving with an urgency you’ve never felt from her before.

“Rio—” you start, but she cuts you off with another kiss, her hands sliding under your shirt, nails raking up your skin. Her lips move to your neck, sucking and biting hard enough to leave marks that you know will last. It’s not just passion—it’s something deeper, rawer. Like she needs to prove to herself that you’re here, that you’re hers.

You let her take the lead, your own hands roaming her body, trying to reassure her in your own way. But she’s relentless, her mouth trailing lower, her teeth grazing your collarbone. She pushes you back onto the bed, her weight settling over you as she pins your wrists above your head.

Her gaze is dark, her eyes searching yours. “I need to know you’re safe,” she murmurs, her voice rough. “I need to feel it.”

You nod, your heart pounding in your chest. “I’m not going anywhere,” you whisper, and it’s the truth.

Her grip on your wrists tightens briefly before she leans down, kissing you again, slower this time but no less intense. 

The night is a blur of heated touches and whispered reassurances, her possessiveness never crossing the line into discomfort. Instead, it leaves you breathless, the depth of her need for you pulling you even closer.

When you finally fall asleep, tangled in her arms, the weight of her protectiveness wraps around you like a shield. Even as your mind drifts, you know this is only the beginning of whatever storm is coming. But with her by your side, you’re ready to face it.

—

You’ve been staying at Rio’s apartment for a week now, and every night, her hold on you seems to grow tighter. Even in her sleep, her arms remain locked around you, as though her subconscious refuses to let you out of her grasp. It’s a level of protectiveness you’re not used to, but you can’t deny how safe it makes you feel.

The days are a strange mix of normalcy and subtle unease. You run errands, cook together, and share quiet moments on her couch. But in the back of your mind, there’s always a faint sense of being watched. You’ve chalked it up to paranoia—Rio’s warning had a way of sticking with you, and you tell yourself you’re just imagining things.

Still, it’s hard to ignore the nagging feeling when you start seeing the same person more than once. A tall figure with a hood pulled low over their face, lingering at the edge of your vision. You’ve seen them on the street, at the corner store, and now again as you leave the grocery shop, arms full of bags. You glance over your shoulder, your pulse quickening as you catch sight of them just a few steps behind.

You quicken your pace, gripping the bags tightly. Your heart pounds in your chest as you cut across the street and head for the apartment building. You take a chance and glance back again. They’re still following.

By the time you reach Rio’s apartment door, your hands are shaking so badly you almost drop your keys. You fumble with the lock, finally getting the door open and slamming it shut behind you. You lock it, bolting the deadlock for good measure.

You text Rio immediately: I think I was followed. Just got back. Door locked.

The response comes quickly. Stay put. Don’t answer the door for anyone. I’m coming back now.

You breathe out, trying to calm yourself, but as you read her words, a new sound sends a chill down your spine. A faint rattle at the door.

Your stomach drops, and you freeze, staring at the door as the sound grows louder. It’s not your imagination. Someone’s trying the handle. Your mind races, and you grab the closest thing within reach—a table lamp. It’s not exactly a weapon, but it’ll have to do. Your grip tightens on the lamp’s base as the rattling stops, replaced by a loud bang.

The door crashes open, splintering the frame, and the hooded figure steps inside. They’re taller than you thought, their broad frame filling the doorway as they pause, scanning the room. You take a shaky step back, your heart pounding in your ears.

“Well, well,” he says, his voice dripping with malice. “Look who’s made themselves right at home. You must be the little pet she’s been keeping around.” 

Your mind races, and you instinctively take a step back, trying to put the kitchen island between you and him. “Who the hell are you?” you demand. 

He smirks, leaning against the doorframe. “You don’t know me, but Rio does. She’s the reason I spent the last ten years rotting away in a cell. Thought I’d pay her back by taking something she cares about.”

He lunges at you with a knife, and you barely manage to swing the lamp, hitting him across the face. He staggers back, but only for a moment, then charges at you again. You fight back, kicking and screaming, but he’s strong—stronger than you expected. He pins you against the wall, one hand around your throat. 

“That’s right, scream for her,” he growls. “Let’s see if she gets here in time.” 

You’re gasping for air, your vision blurring, when suddenly, the already broken door is rammed open again, falling off its hinges from the force of the action. 

Rio barges in, her gun drawn, her expression a mixture of fury and fear. “Let them go,” she says, her voice deadly calm, the kind that promises retribution. 

The man tightens his grip on you, pulling you in front of him as a shield. “Shoot me, and you’ll hit them,” he taunts. 

Rio’s eyes meet yours, and you can see the raw, helpless anger there. You’ve never seen her look so terrified.

The man tightens his grip on you, and your vision starts to black. Your pulse pounds in your ears, the lack of air making your limbs feel heavy. Rio stands frozen in the doorway, her gun unwavering, her eyes locked on the man holding you.

“Let them go,” Rio repeats, her voice low and seething with barely restrained fury.

The man smirks, his grip loosening just enough for you to gasp for air. “You really think you’ve got the upper hand here, bitch? You’re so predictable—always running to play the hero.”

Rio doesn’t flinch. “This is the last chance I’ll give you. Let. Them. Go. Now.”

He sneers, then suddenly shoves you away with all his strength. You stumble, hitting the edge of the kitchen counter hard before crumpling to the floor, pain flaring in your side. Rio’s shout of your name echoes through the room, but you can barely focus as you clutch at your ribs, trying to steady your breathing.

The distraction is all Rio needs. She lunges at him before he can turn back to her, knocking the knife from his hand as they crash to the floor. The struggle is brutal—a chaotic blur of punches and grunts as Rio fights with a ferocity you’ve never seen before.

He manages to pin her briefly, his hands going for her throat, but Rio uses the momentum to roll them over, her knee pressing into his chest. She grabs the cuff of his wrist and twists him onto his stomach, forcing him to let out a pained shout as she pins his arm behind his back.

“You should’ve let them go,” she growls, forcing his face against the floor. He thrashes beneath her, but her grip is unrelenting, her strength fuelled by sheer fury.

She pulls her cuffs from her belt, snapping them onto his wrists with a finality that fills the room. She grabs his hair and yanks his head up, knee still pressing into his back. “And now you’re going to pay,” she says coldly before smashing his face into the ground, breaking his nose, and knocking him unconscious.

Her eyes flick to you, her expression softening with worry. “Are you okay?”

Before you can answer, Rio pulls out her phone, calling for backup. Her voice is calm and clipped as she gives the necessary details, but her free hand remains clenched at her side, still shaking from the adrenaline.

When the call ends, she crouches next to you, her hands ghosting over your body, careful not to touch the areas where you’re clearly in pain. “Hey, let me see,” she murmurs, her tone gentle now. “Where are you hurt?”

You wince as you shift, trying to sit up. “Just... my side. Think I hit the counter pretty hard.”

Her jaw tightens, and for a moment, you think she might explode all over again—but she just exhales, brushing a hand over your hair. “Backup’s on the way. He’s not going anywhere. I promise you’re safe now.”

You nod weakly, and she leans closer, her forehead briefly touching yours. The tension in her body doesn’t ease until the distant wail of sirens signals that help has arrived. Even then, her focus stays on you, her protective presence a shield between you and the man who dared to threaten what she holds most dear.

With the chaos finally under control and the intruder hauled away in handcuffs, Rio keeps a steady arm around you as she guides you back across the hall to your apartment. You can still feel the tremors in your hands, the echo of fear and adrenaline in your veins, but her presence is grounding.

As the door closes behind you, she doesn’t let go. Instead, she leads you to the couch, sitting beside you with her arm securely around your shoulders. “You okay?” she asks softly, her fingers brushing a stray lock of hair from your face.

You nod, leaning into her touch. “Yeah. Just... processing.”

A flicker of guilt crosses Rio’s face. “I never should’ve left you alone.”

“You couldn’t have known,” you reply, reaching up to squeeze her hand. “And you came back in time. That’s what matters.”

She exhales heavily, her arms tightening around you protectively. For a while, neither of you speak, the silence broken only by the rhythmic sound of her breathing. Then she shifts, her thumb brushing against your knuckles. “I mean it, though—I’m not letting you out of my sight for a while.”

You roll your eyes but don’t argue. The truth is, you don’t mind the idea of her staying close.

As the evening wears on, you begin to feel a sense of normalcy returning. Wrapped in her arms, you finally let your guard down, the weight of the day melting away. You tilt your head up to meet her gaze, your heart skipping as you notice the way she’s looking at you—soft yet intent.

“You’re staring,” you tease, your voice quiet.

“Can’t help it,” she murmurs, a faint smirk tugging at her lips. “You’re kind of hard to look away from.”

Your cheeks flush, but before you can respond, her lips capture yours in a kiss that’s slow and deliberate, like she’s savouring every moment. You respond eagerly, your fingers tangling in her hair as she shifts to deepen the kiss.

Somehow, the two of you end up lying on the couch, her body pressing against yours as your hands roam freely, exploring the familiar territory with renewed fervour. She pulls away just long enough to catch her breath, her forehead resting against yours. “Bedroom?” she whispers, her voice husky.

You nod, your heart racing as she helps you to your feet. The walk to the bedroom is brief, but each step feels charged with anticipation. 

You guide her to the bed, her hand sliding into yours as you both move with an unspoken understanding. She lets you press her down gently so she’s sitting on the mattress, her signature smirk tugging at her lips. “So, this is how it’s going to be tonight?” she teases, her voice low, challenging but still laced with warmth. Her eyes glint with curiosity, though you can sense she’s enjoying this shift in control. “Guess I can let you take the lead. Just this once.”

You can’t help but laugh softly, leaning down to press a playful kiss to her lips. “Call it a thank you for saving me. Hero perks, right?” You reply, your voice just as teasing.

Her chuckle rumbles low in her throat as her hands settle lightly on your hips, grounding you. “You’ve got an interesting way of saying thanks,” she murmurs, tilting her head to expose her neck—an invitation and a challenge all at once. “But I’m not complaining.”

You take her challenge with a grin, leaning down to press your lips to her neck, your kisses starting soft but quickly growing more heated. You find the spot just below her ear where her skin is most sensitive, and when she lets out a low, pleased hum, you focus your attention there. Your tongue darts out, followed by a sharp nip of your teeth, before you suck on her skin, leaving a mark to match the ones she gave you just nights ago.

She tilts her head back with a soft gasp, her fingers tightening their grip on your hips. “You’re getting good at that,” she murmurs, her tone teasing but breathless. Her words spur you on, and you trail more kisses down her neck, each one deliberate, each one claiming her in your own way.

As your lips continue their path, your hands slide over her body, unbuttoning her shirt and tugging it off. Your eyes roam her, taking in every inch of her toned body and the way her muscles flex under your touch.

“Enjoying the view?” she teases, arching a brow, but there’s a flush on her cheeks that betrays her confidence.

“Absolutely,” you reply without hesitation, earning a quiet laugh from her.

Your hands move to the waistband of her pants, your fingers brushing against her skin as you pull them down, leaving her bare before you. You grab her hips, pulling her into you so she’s perched on the edge of the bed, your legs pushing her knees further apart. Her dark eyes meet yours, filled with a mixture of anticipation and challenge, and you can’t help but feel a surge of affection and desire for her all at once.

“You look good like this,” you say softly, your hands trailing up her thighs as you kneel between them.

Rio leans back on her palms, her smirk widening. “Show me just how grateful you are, sweetheart.”

Looking directly into Rio’s eyes, you drag your tongue through her wetness. 

“That’s it,” she breathes, her voice huskier now. Her nails coming to dig lightly into your shoulder as her body shifts beneath you. 

Hooking your arms under her legs, you push your face further into Rio, tongue pressing firmer against her clit and she rolls her hips at the sensation. Your tongue swirls over and around her bundle of nerves, eliciting more praise. “You’re so good at this, sweetheart,” she says, her tone uncharacteristically tender.

The praise makes your stomach flip, and you press your thighs together, feeling your arousal soak your underwear.

You notice the subtle change in her demeanour, her usual teasing grin replaced by something softer, more vulnerable. Her hands grip you tightly, but there’s a gentleness to her touch you hadn’t expected. “I don’t give up control often. But with you... it feels right.” Her voice falters slightly, and the admission makes your heart ache with tenderness.

As her orgasm builds, she finally lets go entirely, her usual defences falling away. Her head tilts back, her breathy praises and quiet gasps filling the space. After she reaches her peak, she pulls you up to her, her arms wrapping around you tightly as if grounding herself. “You’re incredible,” she whispers into your ear, her lips brushing against your temple as she catches her breath. “But don’t think I’m done with you yet.”

Her smirk returns, this time sharper, more determined. Before you can respond, she drags you down on to the bed, flipping you gently onto your back. Her strength is firm but careful, her lips curling in amusement at your surprised expression. “Your turn,” she murmurs, her voice low and promising. She begins to trail kisses down your body, her actions deliberate and knowing. “Let me show you how grateful I am,” she adds, her grin growing as your body arches beneath her touch.

With that, she strips you, her soft hands feeling all over your body. When her fingers trail up your thigh, she lets out a soft chuckle at the feeling of your arousal dripping. “Seems like someone enjoyed the praise.” 

You whimper as her fingers press lightly against your clit.

“You made me feel so good, baby.” Her middle finger slides lower. “Such a clever girl.” She teases your entrance. “You know exactly how I like it.” She pushes her finger in.

“Yes, fuck, yes,” you moan as it curls inside you. “More.”

Rio slides another finger in, biting her lip and groaning at how easily you take it. "Oh, darling, you’re taking me so well,” she praises, starting to pump her fingers in and out. She adds a third, and you feel the familiar tightening in your stomach. She picks up the pace, fucking all of the tension from the night out of you both. “You look so good like this,” she coos.

Arching into her touch, head pushing into the mattress, you keen, “Oh fuck. Rio, you’re going to make me cum.”

“That’s it, sweetheart; you’re doing so well, cum for me,” she whispers against your skin, kissing your neck.

Your mouth falls open, a breathless cry escaping as your orgasm overtakes you. The tension that had been building within you shatters, a wave of heat and pleasure coursing through your body. You arch into her, every nerve alight, the sensation so overwhelming that it renders you momentarily weightless. A strangled gasp follows, your voice raw and unrestrained, her name slipping from your lips like a plea and a prayer all at once.

—

Later, as the two of you lay tangled in the sheets, Rio’s arms wrap tightly around you, holding you, refusing to let go. The tension of the night seems to fade, replaced by a sense of closeness you hadn’t fully realised until now. She presses a kiss to the top of your head, her fingers tracing absent patterns along your back.

“You know,” she begins softly, her voice barely above a whisper. “I don’t usually do this—let people in, I mean. I don’t let myself feel this way.” She hesitates, her grip on you tightening slightly. “But with you... I can’t imagine not having you here.”

Your chest tightens at her words, and you tilt your head to meet her gaze. The raw vulnerability in her eyes makes your heart ache. “Rio...” you begin, your voice trembling slightly as your hand brushes against her cheek. “I love you.”

Her lips part in surprise, and then her smile grows, soft and genuine in a way you rarely see. “Took you long enough to say it,” she teases, though her voice is thick with emotion. She leans down, brushing her lips against yours in a kiss that’s slow and tender. When she pulls back, her eyes lock with yours. “I love you too, you know.”

You crack a small smile. “So, I guess you’re gonna be the one crashing at my place now, huh? Seeing as it’s your door that got kicked in this time,” you say, breaking the tender moment.

Rio blinks at you, then lets out a soft laugh. “You’re never going to let me live that down, are you?”

“Not a chance,” you reply, grinning now.

[sorcererofsolitude]

Enid: Howdy, girlies! Guess what? I got this new stuffed animal! What should I name it?

Wednesday: s o u p s p o o n

Enid: Um, absolutely not! Pick something nicer.

Wednesday: s p a t u l a

Enid: I don't thi-

Wednesday: w h e a t g e r m

Enid, pursing her lips: Looks like you're on naming duty, Fangs!

Yoko, t-posing and staring up at the ceiling:

M O I S T C O T T O N B A L L

Enid: ...You know, I used to think you two were opposites, but now I know you're on opposite sides of THE SAME CRAZY COIN!

Silence.

Divina, timidly: I think Pistachio is a nice name...

Enid, lighting up: See?? That's why Divina always gets to name my stuffed animals.

Yoko, shaking her head: The system is rigged.

AO3: SorcererOfSolitude

[pedgito]

𝐅𝐎𝐑𝐓𝐍𝐈𝐆𝐇𝐓 | Lucien De Leon x reader

↝ masterlist | requests? | ao3 | update blog | fic rec | ko-fi

summary | it was never a favor, allowing him to take up space in your apartment. but, time after time, he finds his way back and somehow, it brings an unexpected normalcy to your life.

author's note | in my heart, it's still flores. but canonically its de leon. i had the opportunity to watch the movie and hot take, it was...alright. but pedro's character made me just as feral as i expected. so here's this absolute monster for no reason other than, well, me ovulating.

content warning | 18+ mdni, the uninvited spoilers, set post-movie, roommates to lovers, enemies to lovers, reader works in the film industry, financial hardship, shitty living situations, lucien is a schmooze and a drunk, but also a sweetheart, angst, feelings, reader has shit luck with dating, there's also smut in here somewhere i swear (oral, couch sex, unprotected piv, all the good stuff)

word count — 11k (sorry lmfao)

“Lucien?” You grumble around the chewy granola bar you’ve snatched from the craft table, “Lucien De Leon?”

The agent, Lucien’s agent—James, also working for a few of the on-set cast, looked hopeless.

He nods, squeezing tight at the phone in his hand, one more inconvenience text from snapping it in half.

“No,” You refuse, chewing at the sweet and sticky granola, “why—why me? My tiny apartment?”

“He’s exhausted any other chance,” The agent explains vaguely—yeah, real convincing, this guy, “listen—I like you, you’ve helped me in plenty of binds. It’ll be two weeks before he’s leaving for work, I just need somewhere to keep him for a while.”

“You’re making it seem like I’d be dog sitting or something,” You retort, watching as the agent glanced down at his phone, notifications spilling in, “this is Lucien—controversy magnet, and he’s rude—”

“You’ve gotta get to know him—”

“The one set I’ve worked on with him he spilled my coffee on me and acted like I made him do it. Fuck him, tell him to sleep on a bench.”

“I’ll pay you,” He scrambles, “Just—please?”

You pause, narrowing your gaze. Being a production assistant hadn’t been the life of luxury, minimal pay in an overpriced city in a shitty apartment with barely decent and affordable rent was nothing short of miserable.

“How much?”

“A thousand,” He offers—a shrug of uncertainty follows.

Silence stretches.

“Two thousand? Come on–that’s a thousand for each week.”

“Make it three and you’ve got a deal.”

The agent is quiet for a few seconds before he caves, sighing heavily, “Fuck, fine. Three. Can I drop him off tonight?”

“Tonight?” You balk, “You know, you’re actually the worst.”

His hands grip your shoulders, shaking you with far too much force than needed, “You’re a lifesaver, thank you.”

He’s long gone and buried in a phone call before you grumble a disgruntled, “You’re welcome.”

-

You consider later that evening that disclosing the recent…activities around your apartment complex would have been a good idea, especially with someone as high profile as Lucien taking up space in your one bedroom apartment.

Three break-ins in the past two weeks, noisy and unruly neighbors both above and sandwiching you—it wasn’t exactly peaceful or safe, but it was something. 

You wait with a creeping anxiety as you tap your chopsticks against the homemade ramen you’ve made for yourself, one true moment of happiness in the day as you’re finally sitting down to relax, feet aching terribly.

It was coffee runs and constant back and forths over forgotten supplies or paperwork—it was the perfect job to keep you active and on your toes, never sure when someone might blow up on you for whatever reason it may be—you were nothing special, helpful, but when it came down to it, you were more or less in the way, so you often made yourself small out of habit. 

The knock that startles you is hurried, like a panic. It sends your heart rate skyrocketing but your name echoes on the other side of the door, scrambling to open the door, you’re faced with two men.

The agent, James, a decent man despite his unorganized and erratic personality—and Lucien, a piss poor disguise covering his face.

You snort, addressing the ball cap and sunglasses with an amused expression, it was doing nothing to cover the instantly recognizable wispy brown hair of his and aquiline nose—the upcoming king of stage and screen. It was a wonder he even made it here in one piece.

“A natural chameleon,” You joke, widening your door to let them inside—the apartment was clean, thankfully. You’d scramble to get home after work and pick up, given you didn’t have much time to actually prepare, “seriously—get inside before someone clocks you.”

The agent stays though, like his feet were planted.

“He’s all yours,” He tells you, “you’ve got my number—don’t let him leave. I’ll check in when I can. Keep an eye out for paps.”

“Hey, no—” You interject, watching as the agent turned on his heels and departed, “we didn’t agree to—”, turning the corner with a shout of a long, helpless, “that!”

You sigh with a deep frown, turning over your shoulder to find Lucien with a chopstick in hand, noodle dangling from the utensil with a curious face, sniffing it cautiously. 

“Hey!” You chastise, plucking the chopstick from his fingers, “Stop that.”

He looks at you curiously, obviously taken aback by your tone of voice and lack of intimidation by him, like a startled cat.

Jesus, okay.

You force a calming breath through your nose and look up at him, “Would you like some?”

“Is it gluten free?” Lucien inquires, peering over your shoulder at the still steaming hot bowl of soup.

“Actually, yeah,” Your brow furrows, “it—it is.”

“Sure,” He shrugs, beginning to remove his cap and glasses, along with his jacket, resting them haphazardly on the kitchen island as he takes a seat on the only other unoccupied barstool in your kitchen.

“Oh no,” You swiftly rectify his actions, “we’re not doing this—there’s a coat rack for a reason and a shelf by the door for things like,” You walk toward the front door, hand circling the object like a cherished belonging, “keys—sunglasses, hats,” You stress the final two words and point at the items before jutting your thumb frustratingly at the door, “—if you don’t mind, while I make your dinner.”

It was clear he’s spent most of the past several years with people ready and waiting on him, never questioning or ordering around, but it was basic human decency, you weren’t going to allow him to be amiss to it.

He obliges quietly, a surprise to you. You hide the satisfied smirk as you pour the broth into the bowl along with the noodles before placing the bowl on his side of the island, placing another dish near him, scattered with different toppings.

Lucien looks silently intrigued, the ends of his mouth curling down in interest as he sprinkles various toppings over his food, beginning to eat silently as you return to your own meal.

After a long enough silence and Lucien’s occasional slurping you decide to set a hard boundary, given the various personalities you’ve dealt with in the industry, it was you being proactive out of habit.

“Let me be clear, I’m not doing this out of the goodness of my heart,” You inform him, locking eyes with his intense stare, something you hadn’t forgotten, not since the on-set incident, “This is still my home. Don’t be an asshole about it.”

“James said you were a firecracker,” Lucien smirks slightly, resting his chopsticks along the top of the bowl, “and a little bit of a bitch, but—”

“Good, he hasn’t lost his mind then.”

“Don’t worry, I’m a professional at this shit now. You won’t even know I’m here.”

Highly unlikely, you think.

He even makes a point by grabbing his bowl and emptying it before placing it in the sink before extending his hand out to your own bowl. You watch him wash the dishes, something that looks unnatural, but you aren’t going to complain.

“You always cook like that?” Lucien asks curiously over the running water, head turning over his shoulder briefly.

“No, only Friday. I never have time otherwise, work is…busy,” A generous way to describe it, but Lucien doesn’t seem to care or question, drying off the last dish before extending his hands out by his side in a grand gesture.

Maybe he was expecting a roaring applause, but you don’t give him the satisfaction. You offer him a genuine thank you but it doesn’t extend beyond that before you’re trailing a few feet over toward the living room, a clean pillow and blanket draped over the couch, along with a fitted sheet if he felt like using it. It was all unmade, allowing him to set it up himself.

“Also,” You clasp your hands together at your front, “James didn’t mention this because I didn’t tell him but we’ve had a string of break-ins for a while now, so—always keep the deadbolt locked. Please.”

His eyes widen, looking around the apartment for the quickest escape. You were on the seventh floor, the only other escape option was a less than reliable balcony that you barely used.

“I have a bat,” You tell him, before pointing toward the door beside the entrance, “in the shoe closet, but I think we’re okay.”

“Think?”

You shrug, “It hasn’t happened yet, but the police have shit response time around here.”

Lucien looks overwhelmed, but nods.

“Oh, and the neighbors like to have really loud sex—walls are thin. Have fun.”

“No puedo creer esta mierda—” He mumbles under his breath as you turn your back, a sharp flap of a sheet, and a short laugh from you follows.

“Blame your agent, Lucien.”

He didn’t think you’d understand him, but your astute hearing proved otherwise. 

Lucien was putting on an act with his gesture, clearly. 

He doesn’t respond, pouting his way through the process of setting up his new bed for the next couple weeks in silence, ignoring the soft click to your door as you turn in for the night, the creeping and soft city noises filtering in through the thin apartment walls.

It wouldn’t be an easy night but he's never really liked big, empty houses anyways.

—

The weekend is uneventful; you fear it might be a dream, too good to be true, a complete fluke.

Maybe he had a change of heart overnight, but Lucien is overly polite.

He deconstructs his bed both mornings, packing it away in a corner of the living room, listening to the television at a reasonable volume with fresh coffee in the coffee pot, he cleans up his dishes and leaves a marginal mess. 

The real kicker—he has the ability to keep the toilet seat down with your now shared bathroom attached to your bedroom, a real…gentleman. 

You eyed him suspiciously most of the day, when he’s unaware and preoccupied, wondering when the facade would drop. Does he even remember the coffee incident? 

He had to, right?

He approaches with a silent gesture of his emptied cup as you fill your own.

Fine—you pull the cup from his grip and fill it to the brim, sliding it back over carefully.

He sips gingerly as he raises it to his lip before speaking, “S’good coffee.”

“Thanks,” You answer nonchalantly, pouring a generous amount of sugar and cream into your coffee and stirring, watching as the dark black lightened into a soft brown, “are you a coffee guy?”

“I’m an anything guy,” Lucien responds, “but—good, it’s good. I’m impressed.”

“Why?” You ask with a little more bark than needed, a flippant tone rounding out your morning irritation as you readied for work. “Are you—you really don’t remember, do you?”

Lucien raised his eyebrows in question, expectant.

“Your last job, up in Hollywood Hills. You spilled coffee all over me, blamed me, then got me suspended for a week, because of your outburst. I barely managed rent that month”

His eyes narrow, recollecting the thought like he’d been stricken with temporary amnesia.

“You’re all so much of the same, y’know?” You continue, sipping generously from your cup as his face relaxes, following your movements with a casual glance. “Cocky, egotistical, little dicked men. Without me you wouldn’t have that ridiculous fifteen dollar hyper whateverthefuck water you insisted you needed in your trailer, or your dry cleaning? God forbid. Seriously, fuck you.”

“Wait—” Lucien staunches, hold his hand up in pause, “hold on—”

You wait for approximately half a second before you roll your eyes, pushing beyond him to gather your bag and keys, “You know, I don’t need a disingenuous apology. I’m not doing this as a favor. I’m being paid.”

James had lied to him, that much he was figuring out as he processed the situation. You weren’t someone offering up free charity, a helping hand for a starving actor in need—except that wasn’t the case for him. Despite his team's careful guidance; he was a repeat offender of bad choices and money management, a part-time alcoholic, and a serial flirt. He knew how to play his hand and he was good at it, but with you—it was clear that you were a challenge.

But, it was only a couple weeks. He could survive that. He was a people person first and foremost and he’d charm the hell out of you if given the opportunity. 

“James said he’d be by in an hour to pick you up for your meetings today—lock the door when you leave. Please.”

Still speechless, he watches you leave with a stiff, crisp shut of the door.

He couldn’t remember, racking his brain for one incident after another. His own fair share made him cringe in hindsight, but he…couldn’t remember. He’d almost hoped you were a fresh face, leaving him free of judgment, but it was clear that this situation was about pure survival.

-

“You did do that,” James confirmed to him as they left the first brand meeting that morning, “It was the morning of the big awards show—you remember?” He doesn’t wait for Lucien’s response, continuing, “Poor kid got her ass chewed out and had to take a trip to the clinic for the burns. It was…a mess. Never cried, though. I’ll give her that.”

And, like a strike of a match, it floods back. You’re shocked expression, mouth slightly agape as the sting of pain settled in, bracing for the impact of Lucien’s wrath because you knew. A man allergic to accountability, oozing power, it was almost too easy.

“Shit.”

“Yeah. Apologies seem pointless now, but it could help. But…be genuine.”

“I’m genuine.”

James gives him a certain look, one that argues otherwise.

“I am.”

Only time would tell, really.

By the end of your work day, it was with great relief as you stepped through the door of your apartment until you remembered one fine detail you had told Lucien more than once.

Lock the door.

The eeriness hits you as the door clicks shut behind you, the place falling into a dead silence for a brief moment, your bag hitting the counter as you maneuvered your keys between your fingers, ready to take on what you could with what little strength you had to offer.

Just maul their face off, that seemed like the best option.

You count the seconds in your head, breath held tight and constricted in your chest. You quickly check the available pathways—living room, kitchen, before slipping down the hall, left with the only room to flee if not away from your apartment.

Bedroom light off, not a thing out of place, pristine even—but your eyes track toward the bathroom light seeping underneath the gap in the door. With careful, measured movements you approach the door although you haven’t thought through the actual process of what you wanted to do.

But, before you can react the door is swinging open as the bathroom is plunged into darkness, revealing a sopping wet Lucien, towel tied tight around his waist as he slings a smaller one over his shoulders, completely relaxed until he spots you.

Both of you scream—you out of anger and fear, Lucien at the incoming hand that he snatches by the wrist, your eyes landing on each other, your nostrils flaring in frustration.

“You’re insane!” Lucien shouts, shoving your hand away, “You nearly tore my face off.”

“I thought you were an intruder,” You seethe, “—what kind of maniac showers with the front door unlocked while home alone?”

“You said you had a bat,” Lucien excuses, “I could have defended myself.”

You sigh, plucking the keys from your grip before you toss them on your bed, stepping away from Lucien and away from the radiating heat of his body as it glistened, obnoxiously.

“Get out,” You snap, “get out—go—”

“I was just gonna…grab my clothes and come change in,” He weakly gestures toward the bathroom, earning a sharp look of distaste in his direction, “alright—alright, Jesus.”

He pauses for a moment, though. Before the lightbulb clicks on and he’s scrambling into the living room and back in record time, shoving a small white envelope into your hands.

“What is this?” You ask tensely, blindly ripping at the seal as you stare at him.

“It’s uh—what I owe you, for the coffee thing. I…I remember now. Figured I could pay you for the work I made you miss…is that about right?”

You peer at the wad of cash. It was indeed, enough.

“You’re unbelievable,” You reply, shaking your head.

It gives him false hope, wondering if it was all going to be brushed under the rug and that he could continue the rest of his stay in a somewhat semblance of peace, but then your expression flips and oh…that’s not…

“Are you physically incapable of saying the words “I’m sorry”—would it kill you? Allergic to accountability? God, you know what, I’m gonna call James and tell him I just can’t do—”

“No,” Lucien panics, hand around your bicep as you attempt to push past him, immediately recognizing the fierceness of his grip he loosens it, calms himself, “no—please, listen…I…I didn’t think you’d care enough to hear it. I do remember now and I was a dick, I was trying to offer a gesture of good faith. Peace, even?”

“Is this even your money?” You ask curiously, brow furrowed as you help up the envelope.

“Yeah, yeah—I pulled it out of my savings. Why? Do you…not want it?”

You quickly snatch the envelope away, “No, I’ll take it. But, words mean a lot. Like calling me an ignorant little bitch.”

“Okay, okay. I am sorry. I had a lot going on and I know that isn’t an excuse either, but I am.”

You tilt your head in examination, peering through the raw emotion on his face, whether he was putting on a masterclass in acting or not, it was believable enough. You could remain bitter, even if it meant suffering in silence, but you liked the peace just as much as he, so you compromise.

“You still have to get out,” You inform him, walking your fingers tauntingly toward the door, “and I swear, Lucien, if you used all the hot water—”

-

Lucien was insistent about rehearsing at least five hours a day, even on weekends. Luckily, most of those days you were spared, but when you’re barricaded away in your bedroom, sound travels. And Lucien doesn't care much to stifle his performance, maybe it was a weapon to backfire at your inconsiderate neighbors, but it was driving you insane.

He’s stuck on one scene, clearly a building tension that explodes and apparently he can’t nail, having heard the lines a hundred times over through the muffled walls—your first instinct was to complain, tell him take it elsewhere, but you remember your deal with James. Lucien just needed a place to stay for a while and this was his job.

Eventually, you poke your head through your bedroom door with a cautious expression, watching Lucien examine his face in the mirror, filing through various emotions before he finally gives up, tossing the script against the counter.

He spots you as he turns, already gearing up to apologize or maybe even excuse—but instead, you speak.

“Is it for an audition?”

“How’d you know?”

“The yelling, the emotion—I guess? I help on set with self tapes from time to time. I’ve learned to spot the difference between just memorizing lines and trying to feel the script.”

Lucien pushes his lips out in thought, tongue rolling over his teeth as his hands settle against his hips, pushing the sweatpants lower on his hips as he stands, deliberating.

“Just ask,” You tell him.

“You any good?”

It was a genuine question, not meant to attack your own ego. Besides, it makes you laugh.

“I’ll get your good side,” You promise him, surfacing from your room as you beckon for his phone with your hand, getting straight to work.

It only takes a few minutes to find a solid place to set up, against one of your cream colored walls, pictureless and plain, but with ample lighting from inside and out, it highlighted the wispy grays in Lucien’s untamed curls hanging over his forehead, the wrinkles creasing there as he looked down at the script and examined the text.

“Do you have them memorized?” 

Lucien nods absently, his finger trailing down the side of the paper until it was suddenly gone, snatched from his hands with a smile on your face as you pointed for him to slide into frame. You take a step back, watching the screen with a careful eye before motioning with a finger for him to move a few centimeters to the left, “There. Perfect.”

You flatten out the creased paper as you speak, “From the top?”

Lucien smiles halfheartedly—the stress washing from his face for a moment—and nods.

–

You could keep up, that much was obvious.

Lucien is used to the monotone voice on the other side of the camera during auditions, forced tones and half-cocked emotion, it was hard to act against and with, but he’s learned to push through for the sake of a role. 

It was an emotional scene, almost a requirement to have that intensity to act against and Lucien caught your eye line at one point, face buried in the script as you uttered the lines with teary eyes, letting your own emotion fill you to the brim and flow out, giving him a real and authentic reaction to act against.

He watched it back with a grin, mostly out of his own cocky admiration for himself but the secret you’ve been hoarding, a welcome surprise.

“Have you never considered acting?” Lucien asks curiously, emailing the video off to his agent.

“Cameras are daunting,” You shrug, folding and filing away some freshly washed towels as Lucien reclined on your couch, “I prefer being behind them.”

“You’re a natural,” He offers honestly, “that’s really rare.”

You shake your head in amusement as you riffled through the unfolded laundry, separating in different piles until you come across a no longer white blouse, stained a soft pink—and of course, Lucien. It was Lucien who offered to take laundry down the night prior, needing a moment away from being cooped up in the apartment, swearing he had it under control.

“I told you not to put this in the wash load with the colors! Look at this—” You held up the obviously stained blouse, crumpling up the fabric and tossing it to the couch with a frustrated huff.

“To be fair, it’s been years since I did my own laundry,” Lucien responds casually, “—don’t worry, I’ll have James buy you another.”

Your face twitches, actually twitches.

“No, no—it…it’s fine. It’s only a shirt,” You tuck a loose hair behind your ear as you heave the towels into your arm, “just—whites and colors, always separate them.”

And while living with Lucien had mellowed out some, it was still tumultuous at times.

Fighting over the bathroom was a regular occurrence, both of you guilty. But, that could be worked through, it wasn’t the end of the world. Occasionally it was the lights, a bad habit of Lucien’s to leave them lingering in his wait, lamps and fixtures, nothing was safe. Opened cabinets, items forgotten and out of place. It was all tedious and frustrating, picking and choosing your battles as they came, brushing far too much under the rub for the sake of peace.

You knew it was almost over, enjoying a quiet night to yourself while Lucien was apparently out at dinner—you weren’t sure, you didn’t really care, but you enjoyed the glimpse of what was to return to you, tucked away on the couch while half-dressed, hand stuffed into a freshly popped bowl of popcorn.

It was Friday and your neighbors never failed to come home from a rowdy night of partying with everything but sleeping on their mind, getting straight to business and your grab for the remote was immediate, turning up the volume to drown out the obnoxious moans and groans of drunk sex happening on the other side of the wall.

Lucien arrives back somewhere near the middle of the movie, the soft laughs from you pulling his attention to the couch as he clocked the nineties rom-com on the television, your cheek resting against your balled up fist, placing his wallet against the counter to signal his entrance.

“Loud enough for you?” Lucien jokes, approaching the singular piece of furniture in your living room, fingertips pressing against the arm of the couch as he takes in your appearance, shirt barely reaching beyond mid-thigh, thick socks keeping you warm as you curled in on yourself, careless that Lucien was definitely looking you make a noise in question, the words processing in a delayed manner.

You reach for the remote, pausing the movie briefly to reveal the reason; the insistent thump of wood against cheap sheetrock and moans, squealy and high-pitched, forcing a raised eyebrow from Lucien that needed no words.

“Nevermind,” He concedes,hands thrown up in defeat with a chuckle hidden behind his teeth, walking closer to examine the screen, filing through his internal rolodex of films and drawing a blank.

“Are you going to keep standing there like a total weirdo or are you going to watch the movie?” You ask with a joking tone, tucking your feet underneath you as you made room, glancing down at your phone as a notification brought the screen to life.

Lucien catches the faint tug of a smile on your face as you type away, clicking the phone into sleep mode a few moments later before continuing the movie without a word.

You’re not sure which one of you succumbs to sleep first, but it didn’t matter, finding that you both aligned together easily as you slept, covered with a blanket that Lucien must have snatched somewhere near without disturbing you—and when you wake in the middle of the night, complex quiet throughout, you can’t even find it in you to move.

–

Lucien’s length of stay was diminishing quickly and you were relieved, only a few more days and things would be back to normal, you’d be three thousand dollars richer, and you wouldn’t have to confront the fact that Lucien wasn’t entirely as bad as he seemed, temper aside.

You’re both on your way out the door on a weekday morning when you spot him, navy blue hoodie draping his body, one you favored because of its size and comfortability.

“That’s mine,” You utter as you’re fisting your keys into your hand and tucking a makeup applicator away in your bag, “that’s…mine—why is it on your body?”

Lucien looks down, perplexed. He could’ve swore…

“It’s mine, I swear,” You’re peering over his shoulder and pulling at the collar, examining the tag by his neck, or lack thereof—you always cut them out, hated the feeling against your skin.

“It’s mine,” You say with finality, “But, it’s fine. I’ve been meaning to replace it anyways. And now that you’ve worn it, definitely.”

“Ouch,” Lucien chuckles, shaking his head at your bluntness, “I guess I deserve that. I did think it was mine, though. Swear. Must’ve gotten mixed up somehow.”

 “Oh, well, just burn it now—oh, shit, before I forget,” You point your finger at his chest, stopping him in his tracks, “I’ve got a date tonight. I’ll more than likely be gone when you get back here. I’m leaving a key under the mat, you know the deal. Respect it…protect it like you give a shit if anything happens, it’s all I have.”

“Date?” Lucien teases, “Sounds—”

“We’re not doing this,” You cut him short, finger raising higher in reprimand, “don’t do that.”

Again, Lucien values his well-being, so he admits defeat. 

It was difficult for him, his eagerness to please and charm, to command the conversation and impress—but with you, it was impossible. Truly, it was mesmerizing to him.

It was several hours later when Lucien arrived at the apartment, pointedly locking the door behind him as you had reminded him several times—he wasn’t completely aloof.

His orders takeout on a whim, disguised under a fake name and the careful directions to leave at the door, having practiced the art of subtly when it came to laying low, enjoying a couple beers from a pack James had bought him as a small celebration for a week of good, decent meetings. 

Things had been looking up recently and it made Lucien unsettled in a way, but thankful nonetheless, sipping at the beer generously and relaxing well into the night, dusk turning to black skies and few twinkling star lights, drowned out by the thick smog of city pollution. It started raining eventually, a soft pattern picking up gradually and he, for natural reasoning, is slightly concerned. So, he stays up despite some lingering exhaustion, barely hitting a quarter beyond eight o’clock when the door handle rattles, soft curses on the other side of the door that send him to his feet, peering through the peephole to spot a sufficiently blurry outline of you.

And what he opens the door to is not what he’s expecting, although, he wasn’t even sure what he was expecting in the first place, but this…it wasn’t it.

You were wet, clothes dripping and rain water pooling at your feet, everything sticking to you like an uncomfortable glue, cold and shivering, your bottom lip trembling.

Without thinking, Lucien shifts into action. 

He doesn’t ask a single question, not at first. Silently pulling the items off of you as you allow him; keys and purse first, clanging against the counter before he’s pulling your coat of, blouse, even kneeling down to remove your shoes before he’s carrying the clothes to the bathroom with you in tow, turning on the shower until it was steaming up the mirrors, heat radiating through the room as you pulled at the button of your jeans weakly, fumbling with cold and feeble hands.

He holds his hands up, careful not to approach in a way that would startle you or force you into attack mode, which seemed unlikely with the disheartened look on your face and he asks quietly, “Do you need help?”

You’re quiet for a long, tense moment before you nod, trying to quell the full body shivers as he assists you in stripping down to your underwear, also soaked. He pulls the curtain back and helps you over the side of the tub with the solid weight of his hand and speaks again despite your silence, “I’ll wait in your room—do you need anything?”

It doesn’t take a genius to piece things together as Lucien settles against the edge of the bed and it angers him for some forlorn reason, a feeling he hasn’t experienced in a long time. When the shower cuts off, he straightens, hesitates—should he leave? 

You’d want privacy, right? Yeah. No, definitely.

He rises to his feet without another thought, his awful timing sending you straight into his chest as you swung the door open, towel snug around your body and smelling sharply of fresh, citrus body wash.

“S-sorry,” You stammer out, “you don’t—you don’t have to wait around, Lucien. Or give a shit, either. I don’t expect you to and I don’t care—”

It was unusually cold. He’s become familiar with your snark, that sharp and cunning personality, but this was different. This was a push, a defense of hard and impenetrable walls building up before his eyes and he speaks without thinking, hoping that it slips through the cracks.

“Regardless, I’ll listen,” Lucien provides—it wasn’t an overwhelming expression of fake, forced care or, god forbid, love. But, it was a raw enough response that it grabs your attention, “—if you want me to.”

—

He cranked up the heat while you dressed, flipped open his leftover takeout, and listened. You weren’t used to this and for a while, you were half-expecting him to find a way to turn the situation on himself, a sob story for a sob story. But, he doesn’t.

“This sushi…” You savor the taste, eyes falling closed.

“Good, isn’t it?” Lucien smirks, popping another into his mouth with careful precision, chopsticks in hand.

You could cry, it was such a strong and startling feeling that it caught you off-guard, “Yeah, really good.”

You clear your throat, tears shoved aside, “Have you ever ditched a date before?”

Lucien shakes his head with a subtle frown.

“Right, Lucien De Leon,” You respond jokingly, that magical emphasis around his name, “any woman would be dying for all of….this,” You gesture to him lazily with a faux disgust that couldn’t even be forced, both of you divulging into a laugh.

“Hey, you said it,” Lucien shrugs with a pointed wink that you shouldn’t find so attractive, but the natural charm he emits makes it impossible, “—but, no. Can’t say I have.”

“Even the ones who wouldn’t put out?”

“At the risk of sounding like an asshole—“ Lucien begins, but you follow the rhythm of the conversation and it isn’t long before the lightbulb strikes on and you’re nodding.

“Right, you probably don’t have an issue in that department. Stupid question, sorry.”

You pluck the last piece of sushi off the styrofoam and chew, speaking behind your hand, “I should’ve known that dude was a prick, only stared at my tits the entire date.”

Out of reflex, his eyes drag to your chest and you click the movement in an instant, “Not helping,” You warn him lightly, “I guess I was too blunt, he kept…touching me. I told him I didn’t feel comfortable going back to his place, he made some excuse to go to the bathroom and I waited for a half hour. Until the server came by with the bill—so, not only did he ditch me, I paid a hundred dollar tab and I didn’t even eat my food.”

Even in Lucien’s wild days, he couldn’t imagine doing that. Not when he was drinking more heavily, partying, hooking up on a daily basis—before his first failed marriage, it was foreign to him. 

“You could’ve called me, or James, shit—an uber.”

“Phone died,” You shrug lamely, “it doesn’t matter, anyways. And don’t get me wrong, casual sex—it’s fine, but I got too hopeful, I guess. All men are the same.”

“Come on,” Lucien jests, “that’s not fair.”

“Fine, enlighten me, then.”

“You can’t expect fairytale shit—I mean, I’m one failed marriage and plenty of missteps in my life. Do you think I’m a bad guy?”

“Do you want me to answer that honestly?” 

Lucien sighs in defeat, scratching at his mused hair as he tosses the empty food container aside.

“I’m fucking with you,” You offer in a quieter tone—even if you weren’t friends with him, he didn’t have to put in the effort to help or listen, but he was, “I’m—just, thank you.”

“I’m in good graces now?” Lucien asks curiously, that playful mischief gracing his face with a smile.

You make a motion with your hand from your head as you grab, like pulling a thought and throwing it away, “Coffee incident? Forgotten—unless you pull some heinous shit.”

“You know, I might actually miss this,” His finger does a swirling motion, encompassing your living room, “you—eh,” a shaky hand motion that earns a jab to his thigh from your foot, “shit, ouch—that was a joke.”

“I know,” You concede with a smirk, “—I won’t, though. I want my couch back. And my bathroom.”

“If it makes you feel better, I think you’re a catch,” He tells you, “although, I do like the ones that bite, so—“

You reach forward this time, swatting playful at his chest with the back of your hand, but his fast reflexes beat you, your fingers smacking into solid rings.

He snickers softly and examines the grimace on your face as you pull back, “Pobrecita,” He coos mockingly, reaching for your hand and pressing a gentle kiss against the skin, “see what I mean?”

You ignore the heat that strikes through your body like a freshly lit match, pulling your hand away with a distinct eye roll. 

He’d be gone soon and this would all be a ridiculous memory to think back on. 

There was no room for newly evolving feelings, or worse, infatuation. 

—

The three months you spend falling back into your normal routine is monotonous, safe, but the kind of security that has you itching for change. You find yourself checking on Lucien more often than you should, regular social media checks, the occasional subtle question to James when you happened to catch him on set. It wasn’t healthy, but you couldn’t help yourself. 

He did seem more erratic, often coming across other quick clips and social media stories of him at the club during waking hours, pure reckless abandon, he was having the time of his life—you couldn’t blame him, but it was…slightly alarming.

It was a Saturday night when all hell broke loose, police sirens raining down the street as you raced to your open window, peering down at the obscured face of a man in cuffs as he was roughly shoved into a police car before there’s a pounding knock at the door, your heart nearly bursting out of your chest at the sound.

Turning on your heels and swinging the door open, you can’t help but find yourself speechless at the sight.

“Think they caught your burglar,” Lucien notes under his baseball cap, eyes catching the cascading red and blue lights outside your window, duffel bag at his feet and a regretful look on James’ face.

You tilt your head at the discovery, your brain working overtime before your eyes widen.

“Just hear him out,” He pleads with prayer like hands, phone sandwiched between two begging palms, “Lucien—go,”

Lucien seems to stutter-step in his mind, not expecting to be the one leading this proposition as he side-eyes James, “I…need a place to stay…again,” Lucien squints his eyes and stares up at the ceiling, looking almost embarrassed, “for the next six months.”

“No,” You nearly shout out incredulously, “the first time wasn’t a trial run.”

There’s a long moment of tense eye contact and uncertainty.

An underlying worry in your gut at the sight of Lucien, a little worse for wear but still mostly himself, gripping tightly at his carry-on bag in his hand, thumb rubbing nervously at the leather strap.

Goddammit.

–

He’s paying the entire six months of rent he planned on staying there while he filmed for a movie they were shooting a short ten minute drive from your complex, a quaint little studio gracious enough to let the crew film free of charge—he’d given you the whole spiel, in one ear and out the other still wondering how you’ve tangled yourself in this web again.

“Can I just ask you one thing?” You inquire, helping him file away some of his clothes in a drawer you had emptied out for him like this was normal. He makes a soft noise of acknowledgment with his lips pursed together, tired sunken eyes staring back at you, “Why not get your own apartment? A house? I mean, you’ve got the money?”

Lucien clears his throat, scratching at his neck where it jostles his chains, fingers slipping under the silk fabric of his shirt, “I, uh—feel weird…livingalone,” He rushes out, quickly turning to grab more clothes as you stand, hand placed against the top of your dresser as your brow furrows, feeling like you’d just fallen deaf.

“Come again?”

A small huff as Lucien passes a stack of expensive shirts, material that had to be ethically sourced or…some bullshit like that, he’s told you the story before in passing.

“I don’t like living alone, ‘s why I float,” He offers lamely, tossing the empty duffel into the corner of your room—you’d pick it up later, it didn’t matter, “I left all my old stuff to my ex-wife, it was easier that way.”

Often you had to remind yourself that Lucien was older, nearing his late forties while you were still managing through your late twenties, a big thirty on the horizon.

It dawns on you then that you don’t know much about Lucien at all outside of tabloids and gossip sites, the rumor mills running through Hollywood—you often find yourself reminding you of the fact he was still a person, with troubles, clearer now more than ever.

“It wasn’t always like this,” He assures you, “I’m a fuckin’ mess, I already know.”

“I think we’re beyond judgment, Lucien,” You assure him, “You saw me sobbing and nearly naked—just keep this place clean, like you give a shit about it, alright?”

Lucien nods dutifully, “Yes, ma’am.”

–

You learn quickly that his long term stay meant that little quirks were beginning to surface—always organizing your things out on the sink opposite of his own, a small gesture that didn’t go unnoticed when you were rushing out the door on days he wasn’t given a call time. Or how he always made sure there was food waiting when he arrived before you—takeout or not. He wasn’t a great cook, but he could manage.

In turn, you tried to cook more often. And he loved to hover, but not with a homey, warm feeling that made you feel safe, rather like a curious dog nipping at your ankles. And more so, he would finish his own plate before looking cautiously at your own before you nod, allowing him to pick from your plate with a greediness that made you giggle under your breath.

“My ex-wife never cooked,” He had told you once, “I mean, she tried—but she was terrible. And this,” His tongue pokes at the inside of his cheek as he steps at the homemade ravioli, “is there anything you can’t do?”

“Say no, apparently,” You gave him a solid once-over, a look from head to toe—he’s never offended anymore, taking the playful jest in stride, it had already been a month and it was beginning to feel like normal, again, having him there.

Your conflicting schedules meant a lot of time away from each other, which wasn’t bad. It almost helped more than you expected and while your apartment wasn’t well-fit for a roommate, Lucien made the place feel less empty.

You couldn’t say it out loud, but you were starting to understand the charm. You could see beyond the facade and the persona—a troubled man with ambition, purpose, but a mountain of struggles. The drinking wasn’t a surprise, nor his uptick in smoking. He always smoked out the window so the smell wouldn’t permeate, but the drinking started to become…an issue. 

It wasn’t that Lucien couldn’t handle himself when he drank, but he often did it to fill the dead time—so he said—when you were still at work, fighting with his own demons in his mind. He always ended up on your bed those nights, curled up in a fetal position at the wrong end and you couldn’t find it in yourself to move him, draping a blanket over him before you decided to spend the night on the couch. It was a weekly occurrence after a while, slowly growing in frequency.

He always apologizes, tells you he won’t do it again, but eventually you find yourself melding around him, sleeping in a way that keeps you comfortable and doesn’t disturb him. You don’t judge him, don’t think any lower of him—but there was concern and Lucien could see it growing with every passing conversation as the weeks dragged along. 

By the third month, the dam breaks.

You don’t sugarcoat anything for him either.

“Do you need rehab?” You ask bluntly, watching him peel the gold-flaked under eye patches from his face, shoulder leaned against the doorframe, “Or, like, therapy?”

“I’m not an alcoholic,” He defends, washing his hands under the warm water, “I can get sober if I wanna, but it helps with the stress, you know?”

“No,” You respond honestly, but softly, “I don’t. Unless this is just some big excuse for you to sleep in my bed, which if it is—”

Lucien chuckles, toweling his hands dry, “You caught me.”

“You would tell me if it was getting bad, wouldn’t you?”

It seemed like the least he could do, considering how greatly you were carrying the burden for him by allowing him to stay in the comfort of your own home, treating him like a human. You ignored the tabloids anymore, always negative and nefarious toward him, like he wasn’t allowed to make a few mistakes along the way. He had to be perfect, given his troubling start in the industry. DUIs, cheating, eventually settling down to marry but that didn’t work out great for him either—you’d done some research lately, out of pure curiosity to understand what he wasn’t always willing to share, but you preferred to hear it from him.

Lucien squeezes at your chin in a comforting manner that makes you grimace in feigned disgust, forcing a gentle laugh through your nose as he answers, “Yes, I would.”

–

When he should, he doesn’t. 

Award season was approaching and work was hectic, Lucien had wrapped on his next project and his previous one was gearing for a big release and line of promos, which meant Lucien had to be on his game.

The lamp in your living was broken, a shattered glass bottle on the floor beside it, a trail of clothes following to your room and a heat in the apartment that was sweltering in a way that had you stripping down immediately to the thinnest layer you could manage without getting to your underwear, jeans and a thin strapped top as you walked barefoot toward your room.

You weren’t sure what you were expecting or hoping for, but it isn’t this.

He’s naked, completely bare, save for the blanket draping his groin to save his modesty, out cold but skin obviously clammy, reeking of alcohol and sweat and you can’t help scrambling to the floor, unable to form any type of tangible sound. You check for a pulse, fearing that you might have just found yourself in an inescapable scandal, but it was there. That soft thump, thump, thump under your fingertips before you press the back of your hand to his skin and despite the sweat, he’s cold. He must have sweat out most of the alcohol in his system, your eyes dragging to the forgotten bottle on the ground.

You sigh, eyes falling closed as you gather your thoughts. You devise a plan, slow and methodical—first was to clean, grabbing the clothes and broken glass from the ground, leaving no trace of his mayhew before you’re returning to your room and straight for the bathroom, immediately turning on the cold water, the stream forceful as it pushed through the showerhead.

“Fuck,” You curse to yourself as you glance at Lucien who is mostly dead-weight, struggling to understand how you can get him from one point to another—with another quiet huff you approach him, shifting until you can get your arms under his armpits and heave him up, blanket falling from his waist as you yelp, eyes shooting toward the ceiling as you continue to drag his slumped body toward the tub, “okay—god, Lucien, you fucking owe me.”

It takes some maneuvering and the unbelievability that you are so incredibly close to his bare ass and dick in a way that most would fall over backwards for, regardless of the situation—it felt wrong, seeing him in such a manner and so completely helpless, but you shove the thought aside as you finally get him in the tub, the cold water waking him almost immediately.

It starts with a gasp, a sharp tug of the curtain and coarse, “Shit,” that assures you he was alive and well, coherent, even. A small smile tugs at your lips as you hear him let out a string of curses before he finally settles.

“There’s a bottle of water and some Advil on the counter—take it,” You instruct behind the curtain, “I’m going to grab dinner—try not to hurt yourself, please.”

He doesn’t acknowledge you, not that you expected it. And it doesn’t take long to grab the food either, calling it in and driving there and back in about twenty minutes, finding Lucien freshly showered and sitting on the stool near the counter, eyes telling a story of exhaustion but his insistently bouncing leg telling another.

“Chicken or steak?” You ask nonchalantly, holding the styrofoam containers in both hands.

He takes a moment to answer, unsettled by your calmness, “...steak.”

You hand it over without a question, grabbing a couple drinks before you’re digging in, standing opposite of him rather than sitting, eating in a silence that grows, thickens.

“It’s quiet,” You note the obvious before you scroll through your phone, searching for a soft tune to play through your speakers, something to fill the air, “better—how’s the food?”

“I like it,” Lucien responds with a full mouth, somehow endearing as he swallows and sips at the second water you offered him, attempting to help keep him hydrated, even if it was still annoyingly hot in your apartment, “—I…I think I broke your AC.”

“You did. I’ll put in a work order for it to get fixed,” You answer, a solution to the problem, “are you okay?”

If Lucien was being honest with himself, he can’t remember the last time anyone has asked him that—not genuinely, anyways. He falls silently, biting at his bottom lip in deep thought as his eyes squint, poking quietly at his food.

Talking was hard, you understood that. But, you hoped there was some trust built between you in the past few months, that you hadn’t laid your vulnerabilities out bare the night you came home rain soaked without the ability for him to share too. Plus, he’d broken your favorite lamp.

“It’s complicated,” Lucien diverts, but that doesn’t stop you, eyes lying in wait as you laid your utensil down to listen, “—I’ve got two kids. One, he’s eighteen…awesome, awesome kid. His name is Raynor. I didn’t meet him until a few years back, I’ve been tryin’ take make up for that. We even went on a roadtrip a couple summers back.”

Lucien fiddles with the cap on the water bottle idly, speaking further, “I, the other, my daughter, she’s a couple years old—it was a crazy night with a co-star,” You clock the information immediately, knowing who he was talking about without the confession, and he knew too—it wasn’t exactly a well kept secret in Hollywood as Delia was now married, to another co-star, raising that child, “a long story for another time, but we’re going through this nasty court battle.”

It would explain his financial situation a little, his willingness to take roles as he could, but the growing stress on his face as weeks passed, the tendency to hide or ignore the situation rather than face it—you understood, to a degree. 

“So, all the drinking? The transiency?”

“It just helps,” He shrugs—helps him forget, temporarily, before it all comes barreling back at him, “she wants to revoke shared custody—she’s got her more anyways, with my work and everything, but she wants to deem me unfit, make it—” Lucien’s throat tightens, exactly why he wanted to avoid this conversation entirely, “she wants to erase me and the moment the press gets wind—”

All hell would break loose. 

“Lucien, I don’t think it works that way,” You assure him, even if your knowledge was slim, “there’s…that's your right, she’s your child.”

“Given my history, the judge could consider it,” Lucien replies lackluster, ashamed, “look—I’m sorry to dump this shit on you, I fucked up your apartment, I can find another place to stay and I’ll pay out the rest of the rent like I promised.”

You look at him with a gentle expression, tilting your head until his eyes finally rise, “I asked,” You remind him, “and I hated that lamp anyways, so you did me a favor,” It was a lie, but given his emotional state it was acceptable, watching as he forced a weak laugh, “I’m not kicking you out either, if the media publishes anything about it, you hunker down here. I can deal with a few paps, you know? We do work in the same industry, after all. I may not understand the full scope but I do understand, Lucien.”

He returns a look with sad, red-rimmed eyes as you reach to clean up your shared dinner, before approaching him with a careful few steps, a hand gliding over his bicep and your fingers rubbing at the small dip in the back of neck, your first real initiation of genuine touch. He was a touchy person himself and seemed at ease by the feeling, your lips coming to press a soft kiss against his cheek. Kind, friendly, you pat at his back.

Something changes between that touch and the look he gives you as he turns, eyes flicking toward your lips out of desire, silently he pushes logic aside and leans forward, pulling your chin into his hand like he has before, a familiar touch followed by a foreign one, plush lips against your own that has you swimming in a mix of emotions, eyes falling shut briefly before you realize what was happening, lips parting slightly as the tip of his tongue touches your own before you’re ripping away, eyes wide.

“Oh my god,” You utter out, wishing the words had stayed inside of your head, “I, uh–I’m—”

You stutter relentlessly before you’re scrambling toward your room, door falling shut with a soft click as you sink into your sheets, heart racing uncontrollably and your hands covering your face, unable to face what you had just escaped from as a knock comes a few minutes later on your bedroom door.

You couldn’t face him. You couldn’t.

Eventually, he leaves. Slow footsteps that eventually lead toward another door that closes too, unsure of where he was wandering off to, but you couldn’t think about that, not with the conflicting, battling emotions in your head and chest, a startling yearning coming from just a simple touch.

He was everything you despised—somehow finding level ground, adoring him, caring about him, it was never supposed to go this far. He started as an inconvenience, a disruption to your life…and now, you weren’t sure you could imagine it without him there, in some form.

It takes a couple hours, already deep into your slumber, but the dip of weight in your bed startles you for a moment before the movements stop, the strong press of a back against yours, and an unspoken security that pulls you both under quickly.

He’d gone out drinking again, but at this point, you couldn’t blame him.

–

He awakes to a sweet smell, distinct and fresh. And air, cool air. It can’t be dawn, the sun is too far in the sky to be early morning. Lucien rises with a heavy grogginess, rubbing at his eyes as he finds his footing and walks toward the living room of your apartment, finding your back turned to him as you fiddled with the buttons on your AC as you bid someone goodbye, a man carrying a toolbox descending toward the hallway.

He gears up for an apology, the words balancing on the tip of his tongue.

Suddenly, you’re in front of him, two filled mugs in hand, coffee just the way he liked.

 And Lucien doesn’t know when or why the feeling overtakes him, but he kisses you again. It isn’t a simple peck. It was full, all-consuming, feet lifting off the ground type of kiss.

No, literally—you rise to your tiptoes as the cups jostle in your grip as two large, warm hands curl around your back and his lips melt against your own, earning a starling gasp that slips through slightly parted lips, followed by his name after a moment too long.

“Coffee, coffee,” You mumbled quickly, “hot—burning, my toes,” Lucien pulled away quickly at the words, watching as the tan liquid pooled at your feet before he rushed to clean up the mess.

You watch with an amused expression before you finally hand the cup of coffee over, “Good morning to you too, I guess,” You smirk, biting down on your cheek to stifle the laugh that was fighting it’s way out, “please don’t tell me you’re still drunk.”

“I need to apologize,” Lucien tells you, “...again—I’m—I’m sorry for kissing you—again, like that, assuming that was something you wanted. I got pulled into the moment—”

You’ve had all night and morning to think it over, mulling over the emotions and feelings, still not quite sure, but you couldn’t help the swirling feeling of nervousness that had grown more frequent in Lucien’s presence, his looks, his flirtatious nature and touches. You were under his spell completely.

And if you didn’t want to kiss him, you would have stopped him.

Besides, you didn’t want to be the bearer of more bad news after his terrible night, having been let go from your job position that morning, no notice—you were still reeling, but didn’t want to burden Lucien with the news.

You needed something else to occupy your mind.

“Drink,” You instruct, taking a seat on the couch as you sip at your coffee in silence, watching as Lucien mirrored your actions and sat at the opposite end, legs out-stretched and his chest on display, tanned skin with neatly trimmed chest hair, soft tummy leading into the charcoaled, stretchy lounge pants leaving little to imagination as he fidgeted in his seat.

“Where’d you go last night?”

Lucien’s face immediately flushes with guilt, “The—a bar. I didn’t drink. I swear, I—”

He makes a small noise of frustration and closes his eyes, “I did something stupid, I needed a distraction, alright? I shouldn’t have kissed you, that’s not what you wanted, I know that.”

With a silent reservation, you press the coffee cup into the table in front of you before slowly make your way toward him on your knees before you pluck the half-empty mug from his grip and return it to a similar spot, feeling a surge of bravery as you climb onto his lap—there’s some underlying stupidity there, you think. But, fuck it.

“You don’t know what I want,” You assure him, fingers dragging along the top of his head before you’re tugging at the stands to tilt his head back, kissing him soundly, sweet dark roast on your shared breaths as you lick into his mouth, the opposite hand pressed flat against his bare chest. It takes a while, but eventually his brain catches up, along with his movements, and his hands curl around your bare thighs, fingertips grazing the silk shorts you wore to bed the night prior, like butter against your soft skin as his fingers climb and dig, pressing into your skin as you continue to discover every inch of him he had to offer—mouth, tongue, neck, chest.

It was a dormant hunger that had awoken after careful thought and pure primal need, tired of waiting things out for perfection when you had something tangible in front of you.

He’s mumbling your name softly as you lean into him, the bottom of your lip dragging against the tip of his nose as he pulls you away, strong hands encompassing your face as he looks at you, searching your glazed over eyes, “What are you doing?” He asks, apparent concern.

“Distracting you,” You tell him, immediately diving back in to kiss him, nipping at his chin playfully, a shaking sigh falling from his lips, “are you distracted?”

He chuckles weakly, “What happened to me being a cocky, egotistical, little dicked man?”

“I can go back to hating you if you want,” You respond, nipping at his ear before you pull back to look at him, so close you can feel his breath against your lips, “If you’re into that sorta thing.”

He could see in your eyes that you needed this too, a way to shut your brain off for a while, months of failed dates you’ve told him all about, in detail, he can’t help but chuckle at your eagerness, stifling a groan as you core grinds against him, cock stiffening with the movement.

“Maybe,” He’s undecided, “we’ll see how this goes.”

You smile wide, feeling a surge of pride as he returns the kiss more fully, a hand twisting around the back of your neck as he kisses you fully, all wet and uncoordinated but it makes your heart flutter in excitement.

“Let me taste you,” He begs, clawing at your top in an attempt to get his hands on your skin, pushing up the fabric as you follow his movements, top off, stripping your shorts down along with your underwear, an eager Lucien gripping at your hips to maneuver you down into the cushion as he hastily shoves the table away with his feet to make room for him on the floor, no reprieve as he hooks your legs over his shoulder and splits his tongue through your folds, licking up the center.

A man of his word, he tastes. Noisily he licks and prods, tongue dipping inside of along with wandering fingers, sucking gently at your clit until you’re yanking at his hair, hand curling over the back of his scalp, fingernails digging into the top of his back, moans spilling from your lips like a flowing river, the rapids rushing through, walls clenching around nothing but cool air as Lucien parts from you, admires. 

He’s got two hands on your thighs to keep you open, “Wider,” He coaxes, your breath quickening as he squeezes at your thighs, “right there, don’t move.”

He shoves his pants down his hips, the heel of his palm rubbing down his shaft as he wraps his fingers around his cock, jerking himself off at the sight of you, glistening and eager, your fingers digging into the cushion fabric—you’ve seen him before, naked, in starkly different context. 

But, he had nothing to be ashamed of, your eyes counting the faint splattering of freckles on his chest as his hand glides over his cock, tugs, thumb sliding over the tip to spread the precum down his shaft and you don’t hear him calling your name until his hand touches your skin, gliding over your knee as he taps, coming to with a weak, “Huh?”

Lucien laughs under his breath before he’s beckoning you closer, pushing up with your palms as he cups his hand under your chin and asks—no, demands, “Spit,” He tells you, following his order without missing a beat, the saliva dripping into his hands as you push it past your lips and he moves closer, knees settled on the plush rug in your living room, guiding you until your ass was nearly hanging off the couch and using your saliva to aid the tug of his cock.

“No condom,” You quickly interject, slightly out of breath. His mouth opens like he wants to respond but you quickly shush him, “we can avoid the spiel, I’m on the pill.”

Lucien shrugs with a cocked smile, “Just checking. You alright?”

You nod eagerly, dying for a reason to shut your mind off.

It was the perfect angle, his hips just level enough with your hips that he slid in with ease, adding his own string of spit into the mix as rubbed it down your cunt and pushed his cock inside—deeper, deeper, the head of his cock sliding against your folds teasingly as he rocks his hips until he’s fully flush inside of you.

Your anxious hands are taken hold by him, curling around his wrists instinctively before they’re being shoved over your head and against the back of the couch, his towering frame leaning over you as his hips piston you at a bruising pace, deep enough that it aches. It’s been long, so long and you feel pathetic for already wanting it so bad, core pulsating with an insatiable need.

His breath is hot, wet against your skin as his teeth graze against your breast, sucking the skin between his teeth as you gasp, “Louder,” Lucien coaxes, “let ‘em hear you. Think they deserve it after all they’ve put us through.”

You laugh at that, full-body and airy, eyes falling shut as Lucien plants a foot against the floor, changing up the angle to an intense degree, his cock slipping out briefly as he adjusts, catching glimpse of the string of shiny slick that connects you both before the thick head of his cock pushes back in, a soft squelch of admittance, a tell-tale sign of your obvious enjoyment.

If he knew this would shut you up, he would’ve tried seducing you months ago—though, he had a feeling the attempts would be futile, he was floating on his own cloud of disbelief that after all his wrong-doings, his missteps, it hadn’t pushed you away.

“Show me—huh, show me what you like,” Lucien pleads through baited breath, hair sticking to his forehead from the sheen of sweat, his own hands leaving yours with the silent promise that you wouldn’t move them, finding purchase underneath your thighs and pushing them up toward your chest, your fingers gripping around the back of the couch in desperation, “touch—touch yourself, show me.”

The drag of your hand is slow, but eventually your fingers hover over your cunt, pressing against your sensitive clit as you circle, slow and intentional movement that rips a loud moan from your chest matched with his pointed thrusts, feeling his stamina weaning as he watches, hips stuttering.

“You’re a fucking dream,” Lucien admires, “makin’ a damn mess, too. You hear that?”

He slows down on purpose, partially for his own benefit but he’s proving his point, that sticky squelch of arousal, his faint grunts mixed with your quickly rising moans.

“Does it make you nervous when I stare?” He asks curiously, eyes locked on your pussy, watching his cock split you open, gripping him and pulling him back in eagerly with every thrust, “Look at me—answer me, baby.”

There’s something so distinct in the way he says it, laced with an addictive drug.

Your eyes peel open, bleary behind near tears and you shake your head.

“Do you wish it did?” You counter, earning a subtle head shake from Lucien as he pulls out.

A moan of disappointment leaves your mouth before he’s quickly jostling your around, chest against the couch, his hand spreading wide over your back as he bends you over, fisting his cock as he feeds it back into your greedy cunt, the swollen head making you gasp as it pushes through your over-sensitive folds.

He uses the leverage as his hand climbs, gripping at your shoulder to pull you up, bracketing your body into the couch with a knee at your side, pressing you tight into his chest, his hand sliding around to your chin and turning your face to his, lips parting as he fucks you with a newfound ferocity, eyes rolling back so deep you aren’t expecting the fingers that find your clit, circling the senstive nerves until you’re tipping over the edge, soft encouraging words pulling you through your orgasm like a gentle wave, his fingers slowing down as you resurface.

He comes soon after, his hips stuttering out of pace again as you lean forward, feeling him pull out at the last possible moment before he’s painting thick strips of come against your lower back, the fingers of his left hand digging into your skin as he grabs you tight, the tip of his cock sliding against your ass.

You collapse with a content laugh, oblivious to Lucien searching frantically for something to clean you up before settling on one of the kitchen towels, your body slumped lazily against the couch and sighing when you feel his warm touch, the words slipping out on their own accord, “I got fired.”

“What?”

He tosses the dirty towel aside and passes over your clothes, pulling his own lounge pants back up his hips, sans underwear—and it makes you curious how often he does that normally, comfortable as he takes a seat, legs spread wide as he settles into the cushion.

“They called this morning,” You explain easily, pulling your top over your head and maneuvering your panties and shorts back on, “wouldn’t give me a reason, but it doesn’t matter.”

Lucien’s brow furrows in thought, rubbing his thumb against his fingertips out of habit.

“Is this one of those situations where you’re gonna ask if I’ll sign an NDA?” You half-joke.

He shakes his head almost immediately. He doesn’t seem to find it amusing, almost slightly concerned—or wounded?

“Come work for me,” He insists, “I’ve been needing an assistant.”

“Isn’t that a conflict of interest?” You ask him, staring at his flush chest and mused hair, evidence of rigorous sex all over his face, it was almost enough to have you confessing some unspoken feelings, but you weren’t that easily broken down.

“It doesn’t have to be.”

“Are you just trying to find a reason to stick around longer?” You tease him, a smile peeking out behind your tired expression, “Because it won’t work.”

“No—I’m serious about getting my shit together,” Lucien promises, “I might need a little help…but I want to.”

“Can I think about it?” 

Lucien nods, hands dropping to his lap as he fiddles with a ring on his finger, eventually trailing toward the chains around his neck before his head is popping up, a quizzical look on his face.

“Wait—was that because you were having a bad morning?”

The sex, he means.

A smile breaks out on your face, “Nothing an orgasm won’t fix.”

He can sense it isn’t the full truth, but he doesn’t pry.

“Damn straight,” He chuckles, both of you falling into a comfortable silence.

–

Your answer doesn’t come for a solid week, thinking over the pros and cons. It was complicated, indeed bound to be messy if you allowed it, but Lucien was promising to double your pay, no undermining, no hovering—it seemed too good to be true.

But, you were taking the risk.

Lucien was still awaiting the imminent release of the court documents, the storm of press, but when you were secured in the safety of your apartment, hidden under the blankets as Lucien clung to you, head buried in your chest and his cock still buried inside of you, a slow and lazy day was what he needed, but he also craved you—and he was addicting, impossible to deny.

“We can’t keep doing this when I start working for you,” You remind him.

“Who says we can’t?” Lucien asks curiously, adjusting his hips as he slides deep inside of your cunt, peering up at you with soft eyes, “We keep it casual, if we decide we wanna stop. We stop. It won’t affect your job. I’m not that much of a dick, baby.”

“Well, for starters, you can’t call me baby at work.”

Lucien nods dutifully, listening to you divulge into a long lists of hardset rules, eventually pulling your focus back to him, his hips moving at a slow but gradual pace until you can’t focus any longer, giggling loudly as he buries his face into your neck, a sufficient end to the conversation.

The rest could be figured out later.

-

dividers: @/saradika-graphics

[mawrmyy]

Gold Dust Woman || Rupert Campbell-Black x Taggie O'Hara

wc: 2.5k

warnings: 18+ minors dni !! this is basically just porn but they're so in love, oral f!receiving, fingering, unprotected piv (wrap it up y'all!!), nicknames (Angel, Sweetheart), Rupert is WHIPPED

a/n: HI!! this is my first time publishing something in forever, and my first time EVER publishing something like this!! I'm trying not to be nervous about how well this does because honestly I had so much fun writing it! Hope you enjoy <3

link to this work on ao3

─── ⋆⋅☼⋅⋆ ───

“I can’t breathe without you,” Is what he’d told her, before kissing her until the both of them were breathless. 

One hand around her waist, resting on her hip bone, while the other cups the back of her head tenderly. He’s licking into her mouth, a kiss that is all teeth and tongue and every ounce of desire that has piled up throughout these long months of watching from afar. 

Rupert is a bad man. He knows it. He’d promised Declan that he wouldn’t touch Taggie, and at the time he really did plan to keep that promise. 

But Christ, Taggie, with her copper hair and her golden freckles, with the loveliest goddamn smile he’s ever seen. Who’s lips he just found out taste like cherries and sunshine and yeah, he’s fucked. Absolutely, irrevocably fucked.

She’s the first to break away, gasping for air. Rupert rests his forehead against hers, praying she doesn’t notice the slight tremble in his hands where they rest upon her body. 

“Come over,” he whispers against her lips. “When the party’s over, I mean. If you’d like.” He can see a flash of hesitation in Taggie’s eyes, but just as quickly as it came, it’s replaced with something else, something deliciously sinful. 

“Okay,” She tells him with a soft smile on her kiss-bruised lips. Rupert huffs out a relieved laugh before ducking down to kiss her once again, this time slower and sweeter, savoring the taste of her on his lips.

There are footsteps nearby, faint voices growing louder, and Taggie jumps away from him, straightening out her blue dress. He immediately misses the warmth of her in his hands, the way her body felt beneath his fingertips, internally cursing the bastards who dare disrupt this moment. He clears his throat, trying to act as natural as possible, picking up a bottle of wine from the table and reading the list of ingredients. 

Taggie washes her hands in the kitchen sink, splashing cold water on her face and steadying herself against the marble counter.

Charles walks into the kitchen with Caitlin beside him, talking about God knows what. They stop rambling when they notice Rupert and Taggie’s decidedly unnatural stances.

“We were just–” Caitlin says after an uncomfortably long pause, bursting into a fit of giggles before she can finish her sentence. 

“Just grabbing a glass of water!” Charles finishes for her, barely keeping his composure as a smile threatens to break out on his lips. Caitlin gives her sister a double thumbs-up before her and Charles run out of the kitchen, laughing loudly. 

Taggie is looking down at her hands when Rupert glances back at her. He can make out the bright red flush of her cheeks, her eyes wide with embarrassment. He can’t help but smile to himself at the sight of her– the way she’s practically glowing under the warm yellow fluorescents, how she looks like the sun itself. 

He comes to stand behind her, hands finding her waist once again like a moth to flame. His fingers move to brush her hair to one side and he presses his lips to the back of her neck, lingering there for a long moment before whispering into her skin.

“I’ll be waiting, Angel,” he says, before disappearing back into the crowd in the other room. 

─── ⋆⋅☼⋅⋆ ───

He’s a bad man, is what Rupert thinks to himself as he paces around his sitting room, mindlessly biting his thumb. Of course Taggie wouldn’t come. What was he thinking to himself, asking that of her? She must’ve come to her senses. After all, he’s rotten, tainted, old. Old enough to be her father. Christ, he’s a bloody idiot.

A knock at the door shakes Rupert from his thoughts. He rushes towards it, swinging it open quickly. The second he sees her standing under the doorframe his heart warms, all of those dreadful thoughts he’d had just a moment before dissolving immediately. 

“I’m so sorry,” Taggie apologizes breathlessly. “Daddy drank too much and insisted he wasn’t tired, he just wouldn’t go to sleep. And Caitlin, she kept nagging me, asking where I was going and I just couldn’t get her to stop,” She keeps yammering, and Rupert just smiles, eyes scanning her face, her freckles, her lips. 

“Taggie–” He tries to interrupt, but she keeps blabbering out apologies. Saying something about having to clean the kitchen. His smile grows wider, fonder, on his lips. 

“Tag.” Rupert says, firmer this time. She finally pauses, catching her breath and looking up at him. “It’s alright,” He assures her softly, before cupping her cheek in the palm of his hand. She melts against him, nestling into his warm skin. 

They stay like that for a moment, gazing into the other’s eyes, relishing this fleeting feeling for as long as they can.

Taggie is the first to lean in, tilting her face up and rising to her tiptoes. Rupert catches her lips with his, kissing her softly. She tastes so sweet, like citrus fruit and everything he’s ever wanted. 

The kiss is gentle and tender and it’s not enough. Taggie’s fingers curl into his shirt, pulling him closer to her. His hands greedily roam all over her body— neck, chest, back, hips, arse. She’s still wearing the same blue dress she wore at the party, and Rupert feels absolutely feral, gripping the back of her thighs hungrily.

He drinks her down like smooth whiskey. He can’t seem to get enough.

Taggie breaks away from him for just a moment.

“Bedroom,” She gasps out breathlessly, before wasting no time and kissing him again. The two of them scramble to his room, laughing into the other’s mouth at every item of furniture that they knock down on their way there. 

Rupert pauses when they reach the doorway, taking the time to kiss her properly, devouring her like a man starved. Still, there’s something sweet about it, how he takes her bottom lip between his teeth, the curl of her fingers on the nape of his neck. 

With a surge of confidence, Taggie unbuttons and shucks Rupert’s trousers and pants down, planting her hands on his chest and guiding him to sit on the edge of the bed. She blushes furiously as she toys with the buttons of his shirt, her lovely fingers trembling just slightly. He smiles fondly at her, and she smiles back nervously. 

A single, reckless thought crosses his mind—

Mine.

Taggie pushes Rupert’s shirt over his shoulders, fingers tracing over the defined muscles of his upper back. He melts like butter in her hands, letting her mould him to her liking. 

With Taggie standing between his thighs and his clothes discarded somewhere on the tiled flooring, he hesitantly runs the pads of his fingers over the line of her collar bone, following its trail to the sleeves of her dress. He looks at her, waiting for approval. The decisive nod of her head is all the confirmation he needs before slipping her dress down her body. 

She’s standing almost completely bare before him, cheeks flushed rosy-pink, and he’s sure he looks like a disheveled mess because fuck, she’s heavenly. The northern lights, the stars, every wonder of the world pales in comparison to the sight before him.  

“Oh, Tag,” He says breathlessly, before pulling her down and kissing her hungrily. His cock is impossibly hard by now, and Taggie takes notice, stroking him lightly. Rupert groans as soon as she touches him, and he can feel her smile against his lips. 

She stands up straight, guiding him to sit against the headboard of the bed. He complies easily, but not before taking her with him, tugging her into his lap so that her thighs straddle his middle. She laughs at his eagerness, and the sound of it is like windchimes, like goddamn music to his ears. He kisses her neck, right below her jaw, and she lets out a content sigh, her eyes fluttering closed for just a moment.

He guides Taggie’s hips with his large hands, rocking her back and forth on his lap. He can feel how wet she is through her plain cotton panties. Her small, breathy moans make him see stars.  

Normally, he’d take his time. Tease her until her lashes are dewy from tears, make her fall apart with his fingers, his tongue, before finally sinking into her. But tonight he’s impatient. He’s just a man, is what he’d like to say, but honestly he’s not so sure if that’s true. Tonight he feels so animalistic, so feral for her, that he’s not so sure he’s even human anymore. After all these months of secret glances and fisting his cock late at night to the thought of her– he needs her now.

In one swift motion, Rupert rips her panties off, tossing the torn fabric to the floor. Taggie lets out a small gasp, and he can’t help the smug grin that curls onto his lips. She leans down and kisses it right off, still slowly grinding her wet cunt over his dick. 

It seems he’s not the only one that’s desperate tonight, because moments later she takes him into her hand and lines his tip with her weeping hole. She sinks down onto him slowly, panting out shallow breaths, and Rupert’s fingers dig into the fat of her hips because Jesus Christ, if he doesn’t steady himself he’s going to come right now.

And she looks like an angel on top of him, glowing under the pale moonlight, and he wishes he could worship her like she deserves, but right now he’s just desperately focused on not blowing his load. 

His fingers travel from her navel up her soft tummy, cupping her perfect tits, before descending once again and drawing slow circles on her clit. Her eyes squeeze shut at the delicious pressure, and Rupert swears he’s positively drunk on her. She's so tight around him, so wet and warm, and she looks like sunshine incarnated and feels like everything he’s been missing. 

“Tag–” He rasps out, “Fuck, please– slow down, sweetheart–” but she can’t hear him, her ears ringing at the overwhelming pleasure when he hits that sensitive spot inside her. 

He squeezes his eyes shut, trying to think of anything other than how it feels like she was made for him. 

But he fails.

He comes with a guttural groan, painting the inside of her cunt white. He covers his eyes with his hands out of embarrassment as he feels Taggie’s movements come to a sudden stop above him. The room goes completely silent for a few moments. 

When he looks at her, she’s staring at him with her eyes wide and mouth agape.

“Did you just–” She starts, and Rupert grunts shamefully.

“Shit, Tag, I’m sorry,” He apologizes softly. Her expression remains the same, and Rupert wants to bash his head into the nearest wall. “I’ve never– this has never happened before. I don’t know what– fuck, I don’t know what’s wrong with me,”

Rupert may be an asshole, but even he is well-mannered enough to make a woman come at least twice before he even lets himself think about his own pleasure. He expects Taggie to be angry. Perhaps a slap to his cheek. God knows he deserves to have some sense slapped into him. 

His heart tightens at the sound of soft laughter above him. She’s giggling, pink lips parted and eyes sparkling brightly. She leans down to kiss him, and he lets her, cupping the back of her head in the palm of his hand.

“You’re not mad?” He asks when they part, and her brow furrows as if he’s just asked her whether or not pigs can fly.

“Of course not,” She replies, so sweetly and earnestly that he has to physically hold back from saying those three words he’s been itching to tell her for a long while now.

“Besides,” She continues, the corners of her lips turning slightly up. “I think it’s kind of sexy, how you can’t resist,”

Rupert huffs out a laugh, quickly maneuvering the two of them so that he lays on top of her. Taggie squeals at the sudden movement, wrapping her arms around his neck.

“Good,” He tells her, trailing kisses down her body until he’s sitting on his knees between her legs, “Because you can hardly blame me, Angel.” He takes her foot in his hands, placing the heel to rest on his shoulder and pressing a tender kiss to the ankle. He continues kissing and nipping up her thigh, higher and higher and—

“Oh!” Taggie says with a gasp, just as he nearly reaches her core. Rupert halts his movements.

“You don’t have to– I mean, no one’s ever done that for me before–” She mumbles, and he smiles, cutting her off by pressing a feather-light kiss to her inner thigh.

“Idiots,” He mutters into her skin, souring at the thought of Ralphie and how he most likely never considered Taggie’s pleasure before his own, if at all. 

“Please,” He says. “Let me make it up to you, Angel,” He scans her face, waiting for her reaction. She lets out a shaky breath, before giving him a single nod. 

He wastes no time, flattening his tongue and licking a long stripe from her pussy up to her clit. She lets out a loud moan, her hands flying to his hair. She tugs at his dark locks in an attempt to pull him impossibly closer. Rupert loses himself in her, lapping at her sweet juices. He looks up at Taggie from where he is between her thighs, watching her freckled chest rise in fall with every gasp of air she breathes. 

Her whines are the sweetest poison, and he hums into her wet heat, completely surrounded by her. His large hand snakes around her to squeeze the soft flesh of her arse, and he can feel her breath hitching, cunt tightening around his tongue. He presses a kiss to her clit, pushing two long fingers into her entrance and curling them inside her, searching for the spot that’ll make her scream. 

Taggie’s getting close. He can feel it with the way she clenches around him. Her moans get breathier, shorter, before she goes completely silent and still, eyes squeezed tightly shut.

Rupert climbs up the bed to kiss her, still pumping his fingers in and out of her, letting her ride out her high. She kisses him back with fervour, tasting herself on his tongue, and he groans into her mouth.

He wraps his arms around her, and she places a soft kiss to the center of his chest before resting her cheek there. 

She feels like home, he thinks to himself over and over.

“Don’t get up tomorrow,” he tells her as he mindlessly traces patterns with his thumb on her bare back. She hums noncommittally in response, her own hand resting on his hip.

“I mean it, Tag,” He tells her. “Stay with me. Let me make you pancakes,” She’s quiet for a long moment, contemplating.

“Alright,” She says finally, and he can hear the smile in her voice. “As long as they’re not burnt,” She adds. 

He snorts at the cheeky comment.

“No promises, Angel.”

─── ⋆⋅☼⋅⋆ ───

Hope you enjoyed this little drabble! I'm literally so obsessed with these two it's not even funny 😵‍💫

[netherfeildren]

Busy, Dying. Part 2;

Pairing: Joel Miller x F!Reader

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

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

-OR-

an a/b/o soulmates AU

Rating: Explicit 18+

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

Word Count: 6.3K

Read on AO3

Part 2;

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

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

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

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

You wonder about her. 

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

You say, “I think he’s shy.” 

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

“No I haven’t.”

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

“I know. I’m sorry.”

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

“It doesn’t matter.”

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

“Now you’re honest.”

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

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

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

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

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

“Forty three.”

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

“Do you speak to yours? I don’t.”

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

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

“Why not?”

“I hurt him. Scared him.”

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

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

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

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

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

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

“Are you?”

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

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

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

Where does his wife think he is right now?

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

“Texas.”

“When did you leave?”

“Long time ago.”

“Do you miss it?”

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

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

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

-

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

He cringes away from you. “Excuse me?” 

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

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

“Don’t be peevish. It’s unbecoming.” 

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

“It’s cold. Put that back on.”

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

A miracle move on drug, she calls it. 

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

“No you’re not.”

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

-

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

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

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

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

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

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

“I’m here. It’s okay.”

“It’s only that—”

“What is it?”

“I have to tell you something.”

“Tell me.”

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

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

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

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

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

“No.” You swallow. “Never.”

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

“Then how?”

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

“I don’t give a fuck.”

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

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

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

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

“Right there?” He hums. 

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

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

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

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

Part 3;

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[vezpr]

corporal: ch 2 - expectations

SUKUNAxF!READER ☽☾ HEIAN ERA AU ☽☾ ONGOING SERIES ☽☾ AO3

☽☾ 𝐜𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐬: CH1: PUNISHMENT ▪︎ CH2: EXPECTATIONS

☽☾ 𝐬𝐲𝐧𝐨𝐩𝐬𝐢𝐬: You are such a menace that your father decides to offer your eternal servitude as a gift to the King of Curses.

Sukuna has not accepted such a tribute in years, more often opting to eat the young girls rather than put them to work, which is perfectly acceptable as far as your asshole dad is concerned.

Will the demon make an exception for you?

☽☾ 𝐰𝐚𝐫𝐧𝐢𝐧𝐠𝐬/𝐭𝐚𝐠𝐬: 18+MINORS DNI, blood and gore, violence, abuse, true form sukuna, eventual smut (still not yet), references to cannibalism, angst, I suck at tags

☽☾ 𝐭𝐚𝐠 𝐥𝐢𝐬𝐭: @sodapop182 ; @moonchhu

☽☾ 𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐝 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭: CH: 3.5k TOTAL: 7.7k

If you would like to be added to the taglist, please comment something to that effect. But please put an age in your bio so i don't have to block you. lmk if I'm doing this right, I'm an absolute virgin and open to suggestions. Thanks for reading. 🖤

Tearing through the woods outside of the shrine, you don't think about your sister, this time. You don't think of your father or his men, your mother, nothing. No memories, pleasant or unpleasant, swim up through the ink of night as the trees claw at your clothes and skin. Your mind is eclipsed with a fear as hot and red as the fire in your lungs.

You have not known fear like this for a long time, perhaps ever. All the running that you did from your father and his men was done more out of spite than fear. You had certain expectations of them. You were familiar with their cruelty and the limitations placed on it by society, or by your mother, perhaps. You father was not a kind man, by any means, but his eyes softened somewhat when they looked at her. The only power that you had was that of being able to put them through their paces. Here, you did not even have that. The comfort of expectations does not exist for the monster at your back, no more than the limitations of ordinary men. 

So, you run, spurred by terror long after your rapidly depleting stamina should have forced you to stop. It feels like hours have passed when you finally come to a halt, hands on your knees, panting, muscles burning. Hyperaware of every sound, every sensation, even the trickle of sweat down the line of your back is enough to raise your hackles, but there is nothing but the ragged sound of your own breathing in the stillness.

As you try to slow your respirations, you ask yourself what it is you're so afraid of. Pain? You are overly familiar with pain. Your heart gradually slows as you come to the conclusion that Sukuna can only hurt you or kill you, just like any other man. Pain you can endure. And death? Well, if you are dead, then you won't be bothered, will you? You'll just be dead. What would wound you more is humiliation. Your mouth presses into a grim line as you ponder it.

Did the bastard confiscate your things and let you go, trusting that you would meet your own end in the forest without his help? Not the worst plan, you decide, as it occurs to you, for the first time, that you really have no place to go, no plan beyond running. Beyond escape. You've never had to plan beyond that because you've always been outnumbered, overpowered and dragged back.

Does he think you will return on your own? You scoff into the darkness at the thought. I'd sooner hang myself from one of these trees, you think to yourself as you look up at the branches, silver in the Autumn starlight. Still. Quiet. Unnaturally so, as if the earth itself is holding it's breath. Hiding. 

Even before you hear it, you feel it, looming large and lethal at your back. Larger than Sukuna, even. Much larger. It shifts it's enormous weight, rustling the leaf litter. As you peer over your shoulder, your eyes widen and your heart hammers against your ribs like you never stopped running. A reptilian chittering sound blooms out of the dark: a bony whisper, a rattlesnake kind of warning. The moon outlines it's dark shape in indigo, a moving mountain that tears trees right out of the earth as it moves after you. How you didn't see or hear it before is a mystery. 

Your feet slam against the shuddering ground with the slowness of nightmares as a scream claws it's way out of your throat. You don't make it very far before a root hooks your foot and sends you sprawling. A sickening snap followed by bright sparks of pain shoot up from your wrist as you catch your fall with your hand. When you look down to see splinters of bone jutting out of a ragged wound, a hysterical sob escapes your mouth. You clutch your injured limb against your chest as your heels churn at the dirt, propelling you backwards, too slow as the monster stops short in front of you. 

It is too awful to look at, a twisted amalgamation of drooling faces and colorless eyes shining with idiot hunger as it prepares to stuff you into its many jagged mouths. You dig your chin into your shoulder, squeezing your eyes shut and baring your teeth as you feel it's hot, putrid breath against your skin. Thick, black saliva drips into the dirt between your feet and burns it like acid, white tendrils of smoke rising from the bubbling pool.

The chittering sound rises again, like a demonic chorus of cicadas. Distantly, you realize the effect is created by all of those throats babbling at once. You find yourself too breathless to scream as it's clumsy teeth try to find purchase in the flesh of your calf, only succeeding in lightly scratching and slobbering all over it. Perhaps in frustration, its crying slowly rises in pitch, high and keening.

Then, there is another, quieter sound, that cuts the wailing short. It is soft like a whip cutting through the air before it cracks, like the hiss of lightning parting the sky before the thunder of it crashing back together. Crashing like the quivering weight that descends upon your lower body as the monster inexplicably falls to pieces at your feet. You blink owlishly at the dismantled pile of flesh, hardly daring to believe that it is truly dead, even as its quivering breaths grow still.

Your legs throb under the lifeless weight of it. It is impossible to drag yourself out from under it with your one good arm, so you resort to wiggling on your back in the dirt, removing yourself inch by excruciating inch. You haven't yet had the time, nor the prescence of mind to worry about what lurking horror might have so effortlessly ended the dead thing that pins you to the dirt. That mystery is soon solved for you when a familiar voice comes out of the dark behind you.

"Tch. Pathetic."

You cease your struggles and crane your neck back, pressing the back of your head into the dirt to meet Sukuna's garnet gaze. He leans against a tree, as if he can't be bothered to hold himself up, looking only vaguely interested in the scene before him. 

"Me, pathetic?" You spit, redoubling your efforts to writhe out from under the dead thing. "Was I not easy enough to kill? You had to sic your pet on me?" The thought had only now occurred to you, that Sukuna had unleashed this thing on you, but the notion already has your blood boiling with rage.

Sukuna snorts, "Not mine." His eyes leave you in favor of examining the corpse. "Hm. A grade two, this one," he mutters.

Your eyes follow his and you notice a jagged, black fang, about the length of your outstretched hand, lying in the dirt by your hip.  Glancing back to ensure his eyes are still focused on the monster, you stretch out your good arm and wrap your fingers around it. The edges bite into your fingers, but you clutch it like a lifeline, headless of the pain. 

"Well, do you intend to finish the job, or are you just going to stand there, blabbering nonsense?" You sneer, craning your neck to look up at him. 

His eyes snap back to yours and he smirks, lazily peeling himself away from the tree and stepping towards you. "So eager to die, arent you?"

He lifts the bulk of dead flesh away from you with one hand as he hooks another into the pit of your injured arm and drags you to your feet.

Gritting your teeth, you swing your good arm, arcing your makeshift weapon to catch him in the back, but he snatches your wrist away with yet another arm. Now, you are leaning awkwardly against his chest as he supports most of your weight. You legs are not as useful as you might have hoped. They burn painfully and buckle at the knees as the blood rushes back to your cramping muscles. 

He eyes the monster's tooth in your hand with mild interest. "You want to hurt me with that?" He asks with a mean grin. "Go ahead."

With that he lets go of you and takes a step back.  You cry out in frustration as your traitorous legs buckle underneath you and you land on your knees at his feet. He throws his head back and laughs as you snarl up at him and swing your makeshift weapon at his legs, which dodge your clumsy blows effortlessly. 

"For weeks you lived in peace with me and now all these theatrics, for what reason?" He muses as he steps this way and that to avoid your rageful attacks. It doesn't take long for him to grow bored of this game, and you are taken aback when he sinks to his knees in front of you. Even so, he towers over you so that you have to hyperextend your neck to see his face. His lower set of hands snatch you up around the waist while the upper pain pin your arms to your sides. You grunt at the pain in your broken wrist, but he takes no notice.

"I asked you a question," he snarls, holding you at eye level. 

He huffs when you only writhe in his grip and scream in his face until your throat is raw and you are too breathless to continue.

"Fucking feral little rat," he mutters. "Is it because I touched your leg?" He asks, eyes dragging the length of your body. 

You scoff. Of course it wasn't just that it's...

"Are you throwing a tantrum because I didn't ask permission? Hm? And what was the plan? Where will you go?" He cuts off your thoughts by echoing your own thinking from earlier. It has you subconsciously biting into your cheek hard enough to draw blood. Infuriating.

He smirks. "Just a spoiled little princess playing at running away. Well. Time to grow up, little girl, and realize that you will always belong to a man. Before, you belonged to your bitch of a father, and now, you belong to me."

No longer able to hold in your rage you shreik and slam your head forward in an attempt to split his smirking lips. Of course, he leans away and you only succeed in tossing your hair, drawing another cackle from his mouth. 

"You want to hurt me? Try, brat," he bellows to be heard over your shreiking as he presses his forehead against yours hard enough to bruise. The moment he releases your good arm you sink the oversized canine into his temple and drag it down, flaying his cheek. A second swing and his larger, upper eye is reduced to a wobbling jelly running into the bleeding wound. Slick with gore, the tooth drops from your hand and Sukuna slams you down on your back with enough force to steal the air out of your lungs. 

Then he is folded over you, hand on your jaw tilting your gaze to his wounded face. "Look at me," he instructs and your stomach lurches as the flesh bubbles and warps. Then it is takes its old, unmarred shape, as new and smooth as ever. You stare at it, blinking as if that brief interruption of sight might return it to ruin, as it was seconds ago. As if to dispel your disbelief another of his hands grasp your broken wrist, lifting your hand so that your fingertips brush his new skin. At the same instant, your injured joint transforms the same way his wounds had until it is new and free of pain.

Speechless you stare at your hand on his cheek until you realize that he is no longer holding it there. He leans in until his lips are nearly brushing your ear. "I can touch you however I like, whenever I like," he says, slipping a hand from your waist to trace the angle of your hip bone and the curve of your outer thigh through your ruined kimono. "I can break you and mend you, break you and mend you and never, ever let you die." His hand slips from your jaw to your throat where he squeezes briefly before, suddenly, he hauls himself off of you.

"So, brat," he says, standing over you haloed in the pink light of dawn, "if you are ever so lucky as to have me touch you again, try not to overreact."

All you seem to be able to do is slide your eyes stupidly from your healed wrist to his unblemished face until all the breath decides to leave your lungs at once. The sky, blushing with dawn and tattooed with skeletal branches, fades to black.

...

Emika, grinning, face tilted toward the dappled sunlight, laughter bubbling out of her throat. It is a musical sound until it changes, distorts into a horrible chittering, vacous and reptilian. Her mouth opens, impossibly wide, a poisonous womb that delivers a wailing many-faced blackness that swallows the world. Closer, the newborn horror leans in until all you can see is a single wet, red maw screaming its hunger and eager to feed on you. It is made of hunger and fear. Its tongue lolls out and begins to twist and warp. It pales and changes shape, grows four garnet eyes, a tattooed jaw, a laughing mouth. Sukuna's face leaning close to yours. "Look at me," he says, surrounding you, a universe that leaves you no choice. He is still laughing when he tilts away, falling out of orbit as gravity pulls your back into the dirt. He is replaced by a robin's egg sky seen in patches through the green leaves of spring.

Emika's face glides into view, a smiling autumn moon in the Spring sky.

Her bamboo sword taps your neck.

"Dead," she says.

Dead like the warrior she once daydreamed of being, with a katana on her back and a pretty servant girl at her side.

"Dead." She smiles, haloed in sunlight.

Your eyes blink open. Even as the nightmare fades you realize it holds too many parallels to waking life for comfort. Finding yourself suspended above the ground in an unfamiliar position, your body jerks, your legs inadvertently tightening around Sukuna's waist. He is carrying you like a child on his hip, his lower arm hooked under your backside while his upper one supports your back. Your chin rests over his shoulder, your cheek pressed into his neck. Finding this abhorrent, you squirm weakly.

"I can walk now," you mutter, but you are so tired. Your eyelids, leaden. 

"Walking has caused you enough trouble, wouldn't you say?" He chuckles, a sound that is becoming increasingly annoying. 

In any case, the dead weight of your body against his is enough to refute your claim. 

Your eyes flutter closed, head lolling against his neck. He smells of smoke, blood and earth and he is warm against you. The effect is like a sleeping tincture.

"I want to know," you mutter against his skin as you struggle against your rapidly retreating consciousness. "I want to know what is expected of me."

You are too exhausted to think of your statement as an acquiesence, but that is what it is. Sukuna is taking you back to the shrine and you are accepting it. Perhaps that is why he laughs. Your eyes pop open at the hateful sound and you hope that he does not discern the increasing tempo of your heart with the way that your chest is pressed into him. Wouldn't want to give him the satisfaction.

"Expectations," he says. "You can't live without them, hm? How, then, would you rebel?"

You clench your teeth. He is unbearable. You hate him. God, you hate him. But you are just so tired right now.

"I have no expectations of you, rat." He continues after a pause, although he thinks to himself that you are really more of a mouse, at the moment, as you go limp again with sleep.

...

When you wake again, from a long sleep that is blessedly dreamless, there is nothing to greet you but silence and the shrinking light of early evening. You lie for a moment on the futon, staring at the dark grid of ceiling in your chambers.

Under the thinning haze of sleep that still clouds your mind, a flickering flame of rage persists. When you look down at yourself, filthy with mud, blood, and mystery secretions from whatever that thing in the forest was, it grows brighter. Cast off and forgotten like a broken doll. You flex your healed wrist. Why does it make you even angrier?

I have no expectations 

You tear off your kimono and toss it aside, fuming.

Rat.

You tear the linens, ruined by your dirtiness, off of your futon and thrust them away to join your clothing on the floor.

"Maybe I will go around naked, then," you fume, stomping towards the door, but you stop there, losing your nerve. "Bet you wouldn't expect that. Bet you would find that you have some expectations after all."

spoiled little princess

"Maybe I will go around like this is my home and you are an unwanted guest," you hiss into the silence.

time to grow up and realize you will always belong to a man

You retrieve your dirty kimono and shrug into it, gathering the fabric loosely around your chest with one hand while you rip something clean out of the wardrobe with the other. The shoji door slams against the doorframe as you storm out of the room not bothering to close it. 

now you belong to me

Uraume and Baba look up from their work, picking vegetables for dinner in the courtyard as you tear across it without sparing them a glance. You make quite a sight, blood-streaked and furious. 

"He'll be getting his kicks with that one for quite some time, I'll say... yes," Baba croaks as her milky eyes track your movements.

"Baba!" Uraume scolds.

"It's the truth," Baba crows. "It is!"

...

The steaming water of the hot spring soothes the aching muscles of your legs. This makes encroaching on his territory doubly satisfying, even if he, being a morning bather, in your limited experience - doesn't find out. You close your eyes and hold your breath, sinking to the bottom on your knees. Your fingers rake through the matted mess of your hair, breaking loose the dirt and dried blood. You stay under until your lungs burn and then burst to the surface with a sharp inhalation. 

"What the fuck do you think you are doing?"

You startle at the sound of Sukuna's voice booming over the soft gurgling of the water. He is standing at the opposite end of the spring, kimono pooled around his feet, hands frozen at his waist in the middle of loosening his hakama. 

"Whatever I want, since you have no expectations," you retort, having recovered quickly from your surprise.

He snorts. "Alright."

You glare at each other through the rising steam.

You are the first to avert your eyes when Sukuna resumes undressing, unceremoniously dropping his hakama. 

Your back is turned and you make a point of staying submerged to the shoulders as you make your way to the edge of the pool. You movements increase in urgency, heart thumping faster as you hear him splash into the water behind you. Unwilling to let him see your bare skin, you pull your clean kimono into the water and put it on while still submerged. 

When you drag yourself over the lip of the pool in your dripping robes, he is laughing. Your skin erupts in goose flesh that cannot be entirely attributed to your soaked clothes and the chill in the air. Although it pisses you off to no end, you try to at least appear unperturbed. Chin held high, you make it a point not to look at him as you march back toward the shrine, as if he is beneath your notice. You hope he feels it.

"Come here, rat." 

You pause, your back still turned to him.

"I said, come here." He repeats.

Vacillating between the desire to defy him and the desire to seem unafraid, you settle on the latter and make your way back to the water's edge. There is a deliberate slowness in your movements, to show that you are in no hurry to obey him.

Sitting on the lip of the pool, you let your calves dangle over the edge, lazily treading water. 

"What do you want?" you hiss, meeting his crimson gaze.

[unhingedangstaddict]

Because the weather is absolute garbage (well below freezing temperatures and snowing) and I'm feeling kinda unmotivated atm here's a small teaser for the next chapter of All Of You, All Of Me (Intertwined) - my bucktommy mpreg fic

The next morning Tommy walked to the coffee shop and arrived early, only to find Evan had also just arrived. “Hey.” He said as he approached Evan.

“Hey, why don’t I grab us drinks while you find us a table?” Evan suggested.

“Sure.” Tommy agreed.

“What do you want? Not that I forgot your usual order but you probably can’t have your usual because the caffeine…” Evan frowned. “Not that I’m trying to police what you eat or drink!” He added quickly.

Tommy had to chuckle a bit at how nervous Evan was. For a moment it could almost be Evan’s regular old nervous excitement and not the new much more complex nervousness that Tommy had instilled in Evan yesterday with just just five words. “You’re fine. Get me a decaf mocha with raspberry syrup-” Tommy could see Evan’s face twisting into one of confusion or perhaps disgust. “It’s what she wants. I’m not exactly a fan but it does taste good.” Tommy explained, gesturing vaguely at his stomach.

“Got it. Coming right up.” Evan nodded and went to order.

Tommy got them a table in a quiet corner of the coffee shop and waited patiently for Evan, who soon came over to the table with their drinks in hand.

“Have you uh, have you had a lot of cravings?” Evan asked as he set Tommy’s drink in front of him, then sat across from Tommy.

“Yeah. This drink is one of two consistent repeat offenders and there’s been lots of one time cravings for different things too.” Tommy nodded. Tommy knew they should be talking about more important things but Evan was nervous and it was probably less nerve-wracking for him if they eased into it, and maybe it’d be easier for Tommy too.

“What’s the other consistent one?” Evan wondered.

“Lucy makes fake gagging noises every time it comes up,” Tommy admitted. “Grilled cheese with peanut butter and tomatoes on it. Usually needs to be on sourdough bread, cinnamon-raisin bread on one particularly notable occasion though.”

“Like all together in the sandwich heated up?” Evan wondered.

Tommy nodded and shrugged. “It's what the kid wants. Can’t wait til she decides she’s sick of them.”

“No kidding.” Evan mumbled and sipped his drink.

“Look, I’m sure you have things you want to say and ask, and so do I. There’s a lot up in the air at the moment and I just want to make something super clear before we get any further.” Tommy told Evan.

“Okay,” Evan sat up straighter and made sure he was showing that he was paying attention.

“I know I told Lucy, to tell Eddie, to tell you this, but I wanted you to hear it from me directly also. If you don’t want to be involved, I don’t expect you to. The last thing I want is for you to feel trapped by this in any way. So, if you’re not interested you can walk away now, no hard feelings. I can’t promise she’ll never get curious or grow up and find you herself, but if you don’t want to be a part of this, I will keep you out of it as much as I can.”

“Tommy I want to be involved-” Evan started.

“And if that is genuinely what you want Evan, then great.” Tommy cut in. “But if you think there is even the smallest chance you’re gonna wake up one day and regret staying, just walk away now. It’s one thing for us to break each other’s hearts, it’d be another to do that to our daughter.”

“I know I just found out but I swear I’m not going anywhere. I- I’ve been a sperm donor before- I told you about Connor and Cameron’s son- and I’m not interested in doing that again, Tommy. I want to be a part of my daughter’s life.” Evan insisted.

Tommy nodded and almost smiled. “Okay.”

(Read the full chapter on ao3)

[ariesize]

emmrich x rook: and i'll do anything you say (if you say it with your hands)

A/N: I definitely did not write an 8k word fic about Rook going crazy insane over Emmrich's hands. You definitely can't read it on ao3 here or below the cut.

TW for smoking, drinking, blood.

It’s not something she notices when they first meet. She’s a little busy stopping the end of the world and her priorities are in other places at the moment. It takes a little while, a few weeks after he is officially a member of the team and settled in. After Weisshaupt and Minrathous and all of the other horrors they've experienced recently. 

It happens during a game of Wicked Grace, of all things. 

Rook isn't playing but is happy to sit, enjoying being surrounded by a few members of her team Varric’s team - you're just a placeholder baby. Harding brought the cards, Lucanis picked the wine, and Davrin and Emmrich were all too happy to join in on the game Harding proposed. 

It's a good thing Rook didn't take a hand of cards for herself, as her concentration has wandered to one subject in particular. One person, completely oblivious to where Rook’s thoughts have ventured over the course of the evening. All he’s doing is holding a few cards, passing them back and forth and it's not special in any way - truly a perfectly ordinary moment during a perfectly ordinary evening. She barely even knows him, but all Rook can look at, all she can think about, are Emmrich’s hands. 

All of him is pleasant to look at. He looks good, presents himself in a confident way that she noticed immediately upon their first meeting in the Necropolis, but what's taken her aback are his hands. The rings adorning his long thin fingers glisten just so in the candle light, the delicate way he holds the cards and the way he picks up his wine glass, the bangles on his wrists that make the most pleasing sounds. Rook is entranced. Hypnotized. She has never wanted anything more than she wants those hands on her, in her, anywhere near her as often as she can have them. 

And he has no idea, is none the wiser to the turn of Rook’s thoughts. She knows this is completely inappropriate; he would absolutely never want to fraternize with a girl young enough to be his student would he? She tries to snap out of it, tries to pay attention to the game in front of her but her eyes keep catching the glint of his rings, keep noticing the way he fiddles with which card to place down, how he organizes them just so with fingers skimming the top until they land on the perfect card. She wants to know how those rings would feel caressing her face, her body. Would they be cold? Would they leave marks if he pressed down with a little force on her throat or hips? Would they sting if he slapped her across her ass? Would he keep them on even when-

She snaps out of it, drinks the rest of her wine, abruptly stands up and excuses herself while quickly mentioning that she needs to clean her knives, enjoy the rest of your game, goodnight everyone. Turns heel and all but sprints out of the dining room. It's rude, she knows, and will explain herself properly tomorrow if asked. I just can't have them getting rusted or dull - old crow habits, you know. It's a flimsy excuse but still perfectly reasonable if anyone were to pry. 

When she's safe behind the closed door of the meditation chamber, she does not continue to think about her teammate. She does not sit on the green velvet chaise lounge and think about his hands on her, his voice so rich and smooth and gentlemanly. He's always ready with a compliment and oh, how she loves it when he tells her nicely done, Rook! Would he have such compliments ready if she got on her knees, ready to do as he said? 

Rook tells herself she can do this once, get it out of her system, look him in the eyes tomorrow and claim she's never touched herself to thoughts of him. How improper. Where is her sense of decorum!

But tonight she uses her own hand and pretends it's his. She digs out the two rings she has in her pack, little trinkets she’s picked up here and there, places them on her fingers and grips her throat just so and there, just faintly are two little indentations. Tonight she can pretend there's more and the hand who gave them to her isn’t the one between her legs but the one that is currently across the courtyard and far away from where she wants it to be. 

Tomorrow she’ll set her head straight. Tonight she comes with his name on her lips and knows immediately she's absolutely fucked. 

-

Rook’s lounging on the couch in the library, comfortable as the day is long. There was no reason to leave today so she's taking time to relax - the fact that she protested for a long time when this was suggested by Varric even though her body was screaming for a break notwithstanding. She's not planning, she's not preparing, she's not strategizing like she knows she should be. Instead, she's laying on the couch, an apple in one hand and a knife in the other. She's cutting pieces and eating them, snapping the slices with audible crunch while her attention is on the scene in front of her. 

Standing at the bookshelf are Lucanis and Emmrich. She’s fully staring at them, watching them pick books off the shelves and return others to their spots all nice and neat. What they're searching for, she hasn't a clue, and truly couldn't care less because that's not at all relevant to her train of thought.

No, she's staring at Emmrich’s hands again. Moving across spines, flipping through pages, tracing lines on the page and softly reading them out to Lucanis. Rook cuts the apple, puts the slice in her mouth, closes her lips but doesn't bite. No, that would be far too rational and her brain is not functioning at the moment. She gently pokes and prods it with her tongue, swirls around it a few times and pulls it out with a gentle pop, a small trail of saliva still connecting her to the fruit.

The men in front of her are none the wiser, still speaking in hushed tones about demons and spirits and gods. They have no idea that Rook is daydreaming not of an apple slice, but a certain necromancer’s finger in its place. She gently bites the apple, pulls the slice away from her mouth, thinking that instead maybe this is what it would be like to pull one of his rings off his fingers. He might hold his hand out, ready for her to spit it back into his palm. She would do that with each ring if he asked her to.

She'd do anything for his hands to be on her, his attention turned away from the book and his gentle voice, a little deeper and a little darker perhaps, could be teaching her instead of Lucanis. 

She's completely lost in thought that when she goes to cut another slice from the fruit she misses completely. The knife, thankfully a slightly dull one from the kitchen and not one of her blades, goes directly across her palm and not right through it like it could have. Blood seeps out the cut, not deep enough to warrant any real worry but enough for Rook to gasp in pain loud enough to rouse the interest of her two friends. 

“Rook? Everything alright?” Lucanis asks, seemingly noticing her for the first time since she sat down over half an hour earlier. He and Emmrich walk over to her, see her bloody palm, and leap into action. 

“It's alright, please there's no need to worry. I just cut myself by accident. It's not even that deep,” Rook protests. She stands up, begins walking away to go clean and wrap her hand, when Emmrich steps in front of her. 

“Mind if I lend a hand?” he asks, and oh how Rook would have begged to hear those words in any other context but this. He gently takes her hand and examines her palm, says “Come upstairs with me, if you want. I can clean and wrap it for you,”. 

“No, it's alright, thank you, I don't want to interrupt-” she starts, fumbling her words as she looks at her hand in his. More blood is rushing out, threatening to drip down her arm and onto the floor, but she doesn't care. She needs to get out of this situation before she embarrasses herself even further. 

“Rook, please, I wouldn't have offered it if I didn't want to help. It'll only take a moment.” Emmrich says, and well, she might as well let this cut be worth something. She grumbles in agreement, allowing him to pull her along up to his rooms. 

On the stairs, she glances down at Lucanis. He’s regarding the two of them with squinted eyes and a smirk on his face, that bastard. 

“Crows know better than to cut their hands while slicing apples, Rook.” he says, his voice dripping with sarcasm. 

“If you tell Viago about this I'm sending you back to jail.” Rook deadpans. 

At the top of the stairs she follows Emmrich into his study. He points at his desk and tells Rook to take a seat, it'll only take him a moment to gather supplies. She sits on top of it, not sure if that's what he meant but not wanting to be trapped behind the piece of furniture either. Oh how she's thought of this scenario many times since the Wicked Grace night. In none of them was she bleeding, however, but she's still slightly shocked to have even gotten to this point. 

She makes a note to pull herself together when he emerges into view, sleeves rolled up and carrying a tray with bandages, cloths, and what she assumes is some form of antiseptic. His rings and bracelets, she notices, are still on.

“I apologize, but this might sting a little,” Emmrich says as he takes a piece of cloth and motions for her to place her hand in his. He gently starts wiping away the blood from her palm, careful not to put any pressure on the cut. It’s a little messy, more blood seeping from her palm with every swipe of the cloth. He’s gentle and diligent and so concentrated that she can't help it if her heart rate goes up. Being the object of his attention is too much. Her face is flushed, she’s shaking a little, and worst of all she can feel the heat between her legs building all too vibrantly. 

All because he’s touching her, and her blood is on his hands. There's a few smudges on his fingers, barely any at all really, as he holds her hand with her palm facing upwards. Rook didn’t know she had a thing for blood until this moment, but she’s so flustered by this sight that she wishes the cut was deeper, more bloody, covering his hands while he patches her back up. He’s so gentle but still maintains perfect control over her, flipping her hand around and moving it this way and that. Emmrich could tell her to pick up a book and start reading it outloud right now and she would listen, do exactly as he said. 

“Please be more careful next time you decide to eat an apple. We wouldn't want our fearless leader to chop off a finger,” he says, his tone light and humorous and miles away from where her own thoughts have wandered.

Rook smiles, laughs a little, says she promises to save the injuries for the battlefield. He presses a different cloth, this one soaked in antiseptic, to her hand. He was right - it does sting a little, but her blood is still on his fingers and she wants to offer to clean them for him, bring them up to her mouth and indulge in her fantasy from earlier.

The hand holding hers moves up her wrist just a tad, but it's enough to clue him into her current state. He presses down gently, furrows his brows a little. “Rook, your heart is racing. Are you sure you're feeling alright?” he asks. 

No, she wants to say, I am feeling quite troubled and am in need of your assistance. It wouldn't take much to bring his hands up to her face, mouth, throat, or down to her chest, her hips, between her legs. He's staring at her with concern written clear as day across his face and not realizing the position they are in. She’s fully sat on his desk while he stands in front of her close enough that when they look at each other she has to tilt her head up a little. He's not quite between her legs but a little repositioning and that could be fixed. It's the perfect set up. It's all of her fantasies mixed into one. 

“I'm just still a little distracted these days,” the rational part of her brain that is luckily still connected to her mouth supplies. “It's been a difficult few weeks. I haven’t been sleeping that well,” she adds, hopefully convincing him that that's truly the only thing in her mind. 

He hums in agreement, now slowly and methodically wrapping up her hand. The blood is seeping through the bandage but only just so. Not enough to make a mess. Not enough to, say, get on any other surfaces, any other present parties who have no idea what they’re doing to her. Rook sighs, closes her eyes a little, wills away these thoughts in favor of trying to have a normal conversation and not thinking about getting bent over this desk and fucked into next week. 

Her eyes snap open and she prays that she didn't say that out loud. 

“Well, I’m no healer, but if you have trouble sleeping you are more than welcome to stop in for a chat and a nightcap,” Emmrich says while letting go of her hand and cleaning up the bloody rags. She isn’t surprised by the invitation. She knows he enjoys a few vices in life, he knows his wines and she’s smelled the smoke from a pipe he keeps stashed away on more than one occasion. 

“That's incredibly kind. Thank you, Emmrich.” she said, still looking up at him through her lashes. She knows exactly what she's doing when she bats her eyes, once, twice, lets her mouth rest into an easy smile and tries to look as innocent as possible. The eye contact they’re making is full of tension. He looks down at her lips, only for a moment but it's enough for Rook to notice.

A-ha, she thinks, I got you.

He looks back up at her, his mouth slightly agape in what can only be the realization of their predicament hitting him all at once. He’s again holding her bandaged hand between them, their eye contact unbreaking and it would be so easy to move her legs, spread them slightly so he’s properly standing between them. She could nudge him forward with her foot and wrap her legs around him, so simple then for him to take her face in his hands and kiss her until her brain is quiet. The desk behind her is clear of anything breakable and all she would have to do is lay back and-

Emmrich clears his throat, breaks their eye contact first, steps away from a position that seems to be closer to her than he was a moment ago. Was he as wrapped up in the moment as she was? Drifting into her space, compelled by the same force that’s been driving her mad for weeks on end? 

“Well!” he says, a little loudly and a little too forcefully, “Lucanis and I were in the middle of some terribly interesting research and I should be getting back-” 

“Of course!” she interrupts,  “I’d hate to take up any more of your time!” Rook states, sliding off of his desk and walking over to the door. She pauses, her hand gently pushing the door open. “Thank you again, Emmrich. I just might take you up on that nightcap soon.” 

She leaves, doesn’t look back, but doesn’t hear him move to go downstairs either. She claims that as a win. One small step in the right direction.

-

Rook has upped her flirting significantly since she cut her hand. He has to have noticed, there can’t be any way he hasn’t. There have been some moments, none of them confirming or denying anything other than the fact that he likes to be around her as much as she likes to be around him. 

Moments in his study, in the kitchen, in passing in hallways or on their long treks across the various areas of Thedas where their help is needed. He comes with her almost everywhere now. She's not sure when that started but now it's an unspoken rule that if she's heading off towards danger, Emmrich is by her side. If anyone has noticed they have kept it to themselves, bless them. 

This night is one of those where she is reminded just how much she cherishes her crew. They’ve all gathered for family dinner as Taash has started calling it. Dinner has since ended, Lucanis and Neve are in the kitchen under the guise of cleaning up but really just wanted an excuse to talk away from prying eyes and ears. The wine is flowing freely and quickly, smiles are on everyone's faces, conversations are loud and everything is perfect. 

Rook is sitting with Bellara and Davrin, the three elves swapping silly stories from their previous lives. Davrin is telling a story from his childhood that has Rook and Bellara in absolute stitches. Davrin seems more calm and cool than other Warden’s she's met before. He’s serious when he needs to be, don’t get her wrong, but he knows how to unwind and how to spin a tale so interesting that you can’t help but give him your undivided attention. 

Rook goes to take a sip of her wine and notices the glass is empty. She looks around for the current open bottle and spots it next to Emmrich. At that moment he catches her looking from her glass to the bottle and raises his eyebrows in a silent question, gesturing to the bottle and then to her. Rook nods and smiles, holds her glass towards him slightly to show him the poor, empty state of it. He smiles and gets up, grabs the bottle and wanders over to the group, first topping off Bellara’s glass and filling up Rook’s.

“Oh! Thank you Professor!” Bellara says with a smile that could light up even the darkest, dankest cavern in the Hossberg Wetlands. If anyone was the physical embodiment of the sun and all things nice, it was Bellara. Her happiness was infectious as always, and heightened by the alcohol, Rook found herself to be terribly happy as well. 

Rook never addressed Emmrich by his title. Of course she recognized his profession outside of this team was a prestigious one, but she wasn’t his student or colleague so it never felt right to say it. Not to say she hadn’t thought about it. She’s definitely let her mind wander to a world where she’s sitting in the audience at one of Professor Volkarin’s lectures. She’s seen him get heated in debates with Lucanis and Bellara before and knows how passionate he can be when talking about the subjects he’s devoted his life to. She knows that focus would only come across even more intensely in a classroom setting. 

And so what if she gets a little turned on by that? He would be her authority figure in this situation. Maybe she could have studied under him, been his star pupil, the student he was most proud of. He would be ready to go with compliments, and she would get to watch him cast all day. The way he moves his hands while performing a ritual is exactly that, a performance. He takes on the role not of Professor or Necromancer but Conductor, his hands instructing a music unheard and unseen by Rook.

So, what if she sees a way to use this to her advantage. 

Emmrich is already correcting Bellara, asking her to please drop the title in a setting like this, amongst friends and not in the halls of the Necropolis, when Rook pipes up from next to her,

“Yeah, thank you Professor,” she says. Her cheeks are red from the wine, her lips slightly parted as she raises the glass and  takes a sip. She doesn’t let the moment linger any longer and turns her attention back to her companions, but she hears his sharp intake of breath next to her. 

He recovers smoothly, leaving the bottle with them and returning to his previous spot. Rook glances at Emmrich out of the corner of her eye and sees him grabbing his glass and bidding his companions farewell for the evening. Harding and Taash quickly follow, and Rook knows now is her best shot. 

After a few minutes she too picks up her still full glass, apologizes for interrupting the story but she simply can’t sit up straight any longer and needs to go to her room before she passes out in the dining room. She leaves before anyone can respond and call out the fact that minutes ago she was wide awake and conversing just fine. 

Rook’s not exactly sober, but she’s sober enough to consider the possibility that he doesn't want her like that, sees her only as a friend, is repulsed by her even. She thinks it through, and by the time she's approaching the library she's made up her mind and decides there's no turning back now. She heads up the right staircase in the library and knocks at Emmrich’s door, and hears him yell a “Come in!” from the other side. Rook slips in and gently closes the door behind her. Emmrich is at his desk, striking a match and lighting up the contents of the pipe hanging from his mouth. 

“I had a feeling that might be you at the door. Please, come in!” he says, smoke billowing from his mouth and nose. It’s unreasonably attractive, seeing him like this. It’s a perfectly normal activity and yet he makes it look so elegant that Rook can’t help but find herself staring openly at him. 

“Thought I’d drop in for that nightcap and conversation you promised me a while back,” she says, trying to make her voice as smooth and steady as possible. They've had countless late night conversations and drinks together since he gave her permission to seek him out on sleepless nights but she's hoping this reminder evokes the memory of their almost almost kiss. She approaches his desk and leans her hip up against it, taking a sip of her drink. 

This is definitely one of the more relaxed states she's seen him in. His vest is off, his glove is missing, his shirt unbuttoned (only the top one, but she’s never seen it unbuttoned at all before) and lacking the usual skull collar pins, but his hands and arms are still covered in his gold jewelry.

He takes another drag from his pipe, says “Well there’s no better time than the present. Is there something on your mind?” on his exhale, not blowing the smoke directly at Rook but letting it waft around them, creating a haze in the room. 

“Not particularly,” she says, carefully enunciating each syllable. She thinks for a moment and then backtracks, tapping thoughtfully against her temple like an idea just came to her. “Actually, there might be one thing,” she says, letting the pause sit between them like the smoke in the room. 

“You see, Professor,” she says his title just to see if he would react. And he does, his eyes widening and his face going a little red, coughing slightly as he exhales more smoke. 

“Rook-” he starts, she tries to interrupt him but he talks over her, adding “Rook please, I have to insist that you do not call me that.” he says, the mood shifting from flirty to serious in an instant. Rook’s smile fades and she moves to stand up, already spewing apologies that she’s taken this too far, she’ll drop it instantly, let him get back to his evening when he reaches out and lays a hand on her leg to keep her still. 

Instead of kicking her out like she expects, he stands up and circles the desk, coming around to face her. It’s a familiar moment, exactly the one she wanted to recreate, just now with less blood and more heat and all Rook can do is look up at him, take a sip of wine and set her glass down next to her. Emmrich's pipe is burning away, seemingly forgotten about in favor of this moment between them. He’s not quite leaning into her space, but his height compared to her causes her to lean back against the desk, bracing herself with her hands behind her. 

“I apologize if I’ve gotten this all wrong, and I’ll stop calling you…that. I promise it won’t happen again,” Rook is saying, her eyes following his hands as he moves the one from her thigh and presses them together in front of him as he often does. Breathing deeply, her fears start singing full force in her head. She swears what they’ve been doing is flirting, and she doesn’t want to make him uncomfortable by her advances, especially using his title and their age difference as fuel. 

She’s worrying, clearly it must be plain as day on her face, because what happens next is something straight from her imagination. Pinch her, she might be dreaming. 

She’s about to apologize even further when she feels his finger under her chin, shutting her up more effectively than anything else ever has. He tilts her chin up just slightly, and she knows she looks like a mess right now. Rook feels her cheeks burning and knows her eyes are wide and glassy. 

“I’m not asking you to stop it because I don’t want you to leave me alone, and not even because I don’t like it,” he elaborates. “I only mention it because I’m finding that I do like it, maybe a little too much.” 

Rook is at a loss for words. She’s completely shocked, elated but caught way completely off guard.

“I have never had such a…relationship with a student before and I don’t intend on crossing those lines now. However, I have noticed the increasingly flirtatious way you act around me and I can’t pretend I'm not equally as affected by your presence any longer.” Emmrich says, his finger moving from under her chin, gently caressing her face as it travels up to her cheek. The rest of his hand rests against the side of her jaw, his fingertips just brushing her cheekbone. His thumb swipes gently over her lip, and Rook has to stop the moan threatening to escape her throat with all of her might. 

“There is quite a distance in the years between us, my dear, so please tell me if I’ve overstepped and taken this too far.” he says, his voice soft and low and she doesn’t feel real right now, doesn’t know if this is just the most realistic dream she’s ever had and she’ll wake up hot and flustered and aching with her need for him. 

To answer him she does exactly what she’s wanted to since that day she watched him play cards. She tilts her head down ever so slightly, opens her mouth and takes his thumb in her mouth. Looking up at him she gently sucks before releasing it, effectively rendering him absolutely stunned. Eyes blown wide, mouth hanging open, and she knows the walls between them are officially dust. 

“No, I don’t think you’ve misread the situation at all.” she says, her own hand coming up to grab at the one he has against her cheek. She takes it and brings it in front of her, and loses all sense of self control. Never breaking eye contact with him, she takes his pointer finger and licks a stripe up it, her tongue catching on the ring at the base (cold, she notes, just like she hoped). 

And that's the end of any distance between them. The end of the what if’s and the maybe, maybe not’s she cycles through daily. He gets his hand into her long, wavy hair, the other falls to her hip and he's pulling her head back, exposing her neck and trailing the gentlest series of kisses up to her jaw. He nips at the skin there, just a hint of teeth and tongue and Rook’s mouth is completely open now, the smallest exhale turning into a full on whine at the feeling of his lips against her skin. 

“Please,” is all she can manage and she's absolutely begging now, turning her head to chase his mouth with her own. His face is right there, a millimeter of distance between them. Emmrich laughs, not because this is funny but like he too can't believe what’s happening, before finally pressing their lips together.

Rook wants to shout from the rooftops. She wants to set off fireworks and pop champagne and celebrate. She's finally got him exactly where she wants. 

Instead she adjusts her position so that she's fully sitting atop his desk. Her legs are spread wide and he's standing between them, their bodies pressed together like they can't stand even being an inch apart any longer. 

And the kiss is better than she ever could have imagined. He tastes faintly of wine, more so of smoke and something clean and sweet and oh how she's never going get enough of that. His hand at her hip is gripping her tightly, fingers roaming closer to her backside and she can feel the metal of his rings so clearly and it's so much better than she ever imagined. 

Rook pulls away to get a breath of air and he's there immediately again, kissing her like he's a man starved and she's the sweetest thing he's tasted in so long. He pulls away and she's chasing him just as intensely, just as hungry as he is. It's filthy, all tongue and teeth and she needs him everywhere. His hands, his mouth, she'd make a million blood sacrifices just to stay in this place. On his desk with his hands holding her down with just enough force to keep her steady. 

He's everywhere now, in her space, his tongue in her mouth and his hands, his hands!, finally grabbing at her in almost all of the places she's yearned for him to be. They're on her hips, her waist, slowly moving up and over her breasts and pausing briefly on her throat. He's studying her, mapping out her figure with the scholarly dedication he saves for the greater mysteries of the fade and the undead.

She’s never wanted anyone as badly as she wants him. This wonderful man whose path she never would have crossed were it not for their fight against the gods. How funny it is to find something so precious, perfect and passionate at what could very well be the end of their lives. Well, if I'm going to die anytime soon it might as well be after I learn what pleasure truly feels like, she thinks as his hands continue roaming her body. Nobody has ever made her feel like this nor has she felt such intense desire for any of her previous partners. 

She moves to undo the buttons on her shirt, thanking the Maker she had the foresight to leave off the belt she usually wears for the evening, ready to grant him more access to her skin. He accepts this eagerly, pushing the shirt down her shoulders and taking a step back to look her over. 

And look her over is exactly what he does. Emmrich takes his time, letting his eyes trail over her like she is his most prized possession, a piece of art he'd been looking for all his life. She knows she must look slightly crazed and disheveled, her breaths coming fast and hard as she tries to regain her composure. Her blonde hair is pushed behind her pointed ears, swept off her shoulders to give him a view of as much skin as she can with her pants and bandeau still on. 

And it must all hit him at once, the reality of the path they’re headed down, because suddenly his expression is sober, not shocked but curious as if he doesn't know how this could have possibly happened. 

“Maker’s breath,” Emmrich whispers, turning away from her with one hand on his hip and the other rubbing the back of his neck. She is starting to get worried now, maybe this was too good to be true, maybe he changed his mind and doesn't want her after all. 

“Emmrich?” Rook calls out, fear and worry taking over. “Is everything alright?” 

He spins back around to face her, stands with one arm crossed over his chest and the other propped against it, his hand at his mouth with a deeply serious expression on his face. Every trace of want is gone from his features, and if it weren't for the red in his cheeks and a single strand of hair out of place no one would ever have known that only a minute ago he was kissing her silly and stupid. 

He breathes once, twice, opens and closes his mouth as he searches for the right words. All he ends up saying, however, is simple, cutting right to her nerves and her fears.

“Why?” he asks. Rook’s heart drops, all color draining from her face. 

“I'm sorry?” she asks. She's stunned. She thought he wanted her as much as she wanted him, but clearly that couldn't be any less true. He's looking at her like she's a lost child, a girl who doesn't know what she's doing. 

“Rook,” he starts, with such a softness in his voice and finally reaching out to touch her again. He steps in closer, not as close as they were earlier but close enough to cup his hand around her cheek. She leans into the touch, wanting to press her lips to his palm but holding back the urge. 

“Rook, please forgive me. I don't mean any insult - you’re absolutely marvelous, but I have to know. Why me? The gap between our years is almost as much as your own age. You wouldn't feel more comfortable with one of the others?” he's saying, and of course Rook should have expected this. 

“I don't want any of the others. I want you.” is all she can say in return, her hand coming up to press softly against his which still rests against her cheek. “I don't care that you’re older than me. In fact, it's kind of a turn on.” she says, a smile slowly returning to her face. “I wouldn't be here right now if I didn't want you, Emmrich.”

She takes their intertwined hands and starts slowly moving them down her throat, down her chest until they reach her tits. She grabs his other hand and brings it to her hip, tugging him slightly closer in the process. 

“You don't even understand how much I want you, how I've daydreamed of your hands on me since we met.” she says softly, grabbing onto the lapels of his shirt and pulling him closer. “How badly I want to please you.” Rook says, swiftly unbuttoning his shirt halfway, exposing more skin than she's ever seen on him before. “How badly I want you to please me.”

And finally, finally, his mouth is on hers again. It's gentler this time, not so rushed and urgent. He sets a slow but deeply satisfying pace, takes his time to rebuild the passion from earlier. She wants to go fast, wants his hands to stop roaming everywhere but towards her pants buttons, how badly she wants to show him just how ready and wanting she is. 

Emmrich must sense where her thoughts are because he's pulling away from their kiss, but this time he's grabbing her hands and tugging her along across his study to the bed he has tucked away in a corner behind the spiral staircase. 

Rook sheds her shoes and pants fairly quickly while walking across the room. As soon as he's back within arms reach she starts tugging his shirt untucked and unbuttoning the rest. She’s standing there in just her smallclothes now but there's something about the way he’s looking at her, looking so affected by her want for him that makes her feel stark naked. She pushes up onto her tiptoes and wraps her arms around his neck, pulling him back in for another searing kiss. He bites her bottom lip, so gently and softly but Rook wishes it was harder, wishes he would draw blood and kiss it away. She tucks that fantasy in a drawer in her mind, saving it for later - perhaps another time she can bring it up but now, today, is just about beginnings.

He takes a few steps backwards and sits on the edge of his bed and she's all too eager to join him, sitting down on his lap with her knees on either side of his thighs. His hands are on her waist, almost covering her entire midsection, and she slowly, slowly starts rocking her hips back and forth and the gasp he lets out is the most treasured sound she’s ever heard. She can already feel that he is enjoying this as much as she is, but she’s rewarded even further by his praise. 

Emmrich tells her that she’s exquisite, and doing such a good job, and it just about sends her over the edge there and then. His praise in their everyday interactions always flustered her but here, now, with his lips brushing her ear and his hands on her naked skin it’s otherworldly. He can tell she’s getting too restless, too antsy for this to move forward quickly so she can release this tension building inside of her, and does what Rook always hoped he would. He takes the lead, takes control, instructs her on exactly what to do.

“Darling there is no need to rush tonight,” he says. “Just relax, I promise I’m not going anywhere,” and how she melts, how she sighs and drapes herself over him like her body has turned to liquid. He’s rock hard under her and she’s wetter than she's ever been in her life and he still hasn’t moved his hands down further, rather opting to stroke up and down her sides, occasionally coming up to brush her face, her chest, or gripping hard onto her thighs. It’s driving her absolutely mad, and the more friction she seeks the harder the pressure with which he holds down her thighs becomes. It's hard enough to bruise now, and Maker how she hopes he leaves her covered in marks that only they know exist. She’s in ecstasy, in agony, in everything in between and is seeking a deeper sensation with great fervor. 

Emmrich’s kisses begin venturing down, moving from her lips down her throat and eventually to her chest. His hands move up to slowly unclasp her bandeau and expose her tits. He leans back just slightly, taking in her appearance slowly, savoring each new patch of skin, each scar because she truly is littered with them. Being a crow is not an easy life for multiple reasons but vanity gets dismissed almost immediately when wounds heal poorly, quickly, and the reminders of what once was stays in thin white lines. 

“Gorgeous, absolutely perfect,” he whispers like he physically can’t stop the words from leaving his mouth. Rook’s had enough - she’s writhing in his lap like a pathetic lovestruck fool and needs him to do something now. As much as she’d rather this sped up to the main event, she’s glad he’s so insistent on taking their time, reminding her she’s something to savor and not a quick fuck to pass the time.

She takes his hand, slowly moving it down from her waist to between her legs, only a thin strip of fabric separating her from his hand now. He raises his eyebrows at this, kisses her once, and finally lets his hands wander past her underwear, tugging them down and practically ripping them off of her. She shimmies out of them, kicks them to the floor and she’s finally, gloriously naked atop him and he's still almost fully clothed but the disheveled state of him is just as obscene. 

Emmrich brings his hands between them and starts to remove his rings but Rook intercepts, asks, “Please, can you keep them on a while longer,” and he smiles, laughs softly and says “Any particular reason why?” 

Her skin is burning, her face must be redder than the wine she was drinking only an hour before. “It’s just,” she starts, sighing and grabbing his decorated hand and kissing his palm, running his fingers across her lips. “Your hands, your rings, they’ve caught my attention once or twice,” is all she can provide before her embarrassment overtakes her arousal. 

“Oh do tell,” he says, enjoying this indulgence into her private fantasies. She can’t face him and say this so she does the next best thing, buries her face in his neck as he strokes her back, gently persuading her into telling him what’s on her mind. 

“I just…you have incredibly attractive hands,” she explains. “I may or may not have…frequently…fantasized about them,” she adds, her face absolutely burning with embarrassment. 

“There’s nothing wrong with that, Rook. If you tell me what exactly my hands are doing in these fantasies, I’d be more than happy to turn them to reality,” he says against her ear, kissing the tip of it and slowly running his finger along the edge of the other one. 

And the dam is broken, her brain has short circuited and everything is flowing freely. “Touching me, choking me, fingering me,” she blurts out, “Holding onto me tight enough to leave marks. Sometimes letting me remove your rings with my teeth.” 

“You spend that much time thinking about my hands?” Emmrich questions, not in a demeaning or accusatory way, but with lust and wonder and pure want drenching his words. 

“I told you. You have no idea how badly I want this, how badly I want you,” Rook says.

“Well, who am I to deny you of such an innocent request,” he says, letting his hands wander back down her body, rings still firmly in place. He lets one hand grip her hip, the other continuing to move south until finally reaching its destination, finally making small circles around her clit, so confident in his knowledge of her despite this being the first time he’s touched her. It’s like all those times she’s touched herself and imagined it's him, his deft fingers not even second guessing where to go because he just knows exactly what to do. 

The moment his fingers find that already throbbing bundle of nerves she’s absolutely done. Head tipped back, moans and sighs freely escaping her throat, it takes everything in her not to come on the spot. She holds on as long as possible, letting his fingers work their magic. Slowly he thrusts two digits inside of her, saying, “You’re being so good for me, taking my fingers so nicely,” and it's too much, not enough, she needs all of him immediately. 

And to think only a short time ago she had no idea what tonight held in store for her, had no idea what his hands felt like inside of her, what his voice sounded like as he talked her over the edge. 

It doesn’t take long to get there. Rook was already soaked through her smallclothes when Emmrich kissed her for the first time. One of his hands is in her hair, the other expertly coaxing her towards her release, his praise ringing through her ears. His rings are cold against her entrance, his lips are on her neck saying her name, telling her she’s amazing, and finally the waves of pleasure are crashing over her brain, her hips stuttering on his hand as his fingers trace circles around her clit and move back and forth within her. 

This time, when she comes with his name on her lips, he’s actually around to hear it, to kiss it out of her and tell her how wonderful she is, how perfect she feels, how good she did. 

She spends one moment, two, breathing and regaining control over her senses. He’s still hard beneath her and she immediately feels bad for neglecting him, for making this evening all about her. Her hands move to his waistband, trying to undo the buttons and pleasure him just as he did her, but his hands stop her from moving any further. 

“You don’t need to worry about me, Rook. As far as I’m concerned this night is about you,” he murmurs, lips ghosting over hers as she’s still catching her breath from earlier. 

“I need you, all of you,” she whines, the heat building up inside of her again at breakneck speed. She’s been thinking about this encounter for so long that she’s not going to let it be over that fast. 

“Then I am more than happy to oblige, my dear.” 

-

If the rest of the crew wasn’t wrapped up with their own affairs or actively trying to save the world, maybe they would have noticed the little glances between Rook and Emmrich. They don't see the stolen kisses in an empty kitchen, his hand gently resting on her thigh after family dinner when they're all still gathered around the table, grateful for a slow evening with each other. 

They don’t seem to notice Rook entering and exiting Emmrich’s study at odd hours in various states of dress and undress. They don’t see her pressed up against his bookshelves, or on her knees with his hands in her hair. They absolutely don't hear her moans and cries of joy, don't hear his steady voice talking her through her orgasms or the sweet nothings he whispers into her skin in the early hours of the morning. 

They definitely don't notice the time he bent her over the couch in the library, both of them slightly thrilled with the knowledge that anyone could walk in and see them. He had to keep his hand over her mouth to keep her quiet (which only wrecked her further). 

If they see the little bruises on the base of her neck, her collarbones, her arms that look suspiciously ring shaped and are only a finger's width apart, they don’t ask questions. 

It’s Neve who figures it out first, unsurprisingly. She and Rook are walking back to the eluvian after a meeting at the Cobbled Swan when she asks, 

“So, care to share what’s been going on with you and Emmrich?” She’s got a knowing look in her eyes and a friendly, teasing tone in her voice. 

“There's not much to say,” Rook says, knowing she looks incredibly guilty at the moment. She can feel her cheeks and ears heating up. She shrugs and continues, “He just…is so knowledgeable. About the fade, I mean. And I’ve been learning a lot from his instruction.” she continues futilely. Neve can see right through her if that smirk is anything to go by. 

“Oh I'm sure,” Neve says, smiling and elbowing Rook softly on the arm, detouring their route while Rook is distracted. They arrive at Neve’s favorite fried fish stand and as they get in line she adds, “You’re telling me everything while we eat. Spare no details; I want the full story.” And Rook is laughing, butterflies are fluttering in her stomach and she feels like a schoolgirl giggling about her crush. She obliges and tells Neve everything, secretly excited that they've been noticed, all too happy to gossip with her friend about this aspect of her life. 

Later, when they've returned to the lighthouse, Rook makes no excuses and heads directly up to Emmrich’s room, sparing a mirthful glance at Neve who shakes her head and laughs. She's giddy to tell him the ruse is up, that Tevinter’s finest detective has figured them out.  He's seated at his desk when she opens his door, reading over his correspondences from colleagues at the Necropolis and the latest updates from Myrna and Vorgoth. 

“Give me twenty more minutes to finish up and respond to these and I’m all yours,” Emmrich says as Rook walks over to his desk. “Maybe thirty, but no longer than that.” he adds as she walks behind his chair and wraps her arms around his neck, gently placing a small kiss on his cheek. 

“I just wanted to let you know I’m back from Minrathous. And that Neve has figured us out.” she says, savoring the way he immediately loses concentration on the materials in front of him. 

“Come again?” he asks, brows furrowed and mouth open in that delightful, flustered look he used to get when she first started flirting with him. 

“Turns out we haven't been as sneaky as I thought,” she says, moving to lean back and rest against his desk. Her arms are crossed over her chest but her voice is light, the smile she's had since her lunch outing is still plastered on her face. 

“It was bound to happen eventually with all of us living in such close proximity to one another,” he responds, much more carefree and accepting of the situation than his initial reaction was. “As much as I enjoyed this being our little secret I can’t find it within myself to care too much about the others knowing,” he adds. 

“Well, that’s all I wanted to share. I’ll leave you to it then,” Rook says as she pushes off his desk and makes for the door. She pauses when she feels Emmrich’s hand reaching out and grabbing hers, stopping her in her tracks. She turns back to face him, her eyebrows raising as he reels her back to him. 

“I thought you needed twenty or thirty minutes to finish up what you were working on,” she teases, her voice dropping to an imitation of his from earlier. She jokes, but is all too ready to go along with whatever plan he’s concocting for the rest of their afternoon.

“Well,” he says as he leans back in his chair and she settles down on his lap, knees on either side of his thighs and arms circling around his neck. “I’m sure Myrna and Vorgoth will be fine if I take a little longer than usual to get back to them.” 

“Whatever you say love,” Rook sighs as his lips meet her neck, his hands already gripping onto her hips. The world will keep turning outside of this little bubble they’ve created, the questions from their companions will start immediately once Neve confirms everyone's suspicions. 

They’ll start to really notice the glances, the touches, the private conversations in crowded rooms. But for now it's just them, alone, and Rook finds she doesn’t mind one bit. She’d follow him anywhere, do anything he asked, just to have these moments of peace at his side.

[geothewriter]

Zutara Week 2024 - Festive

This year I partnered up with the legendary @demaparbat-hp for this prompt response. Please check out her corresponding post and artwork! I am literally still so shaken by the incredible artwork that goes along with this story! No, seriously, this is absolutely incredible! Give her praise!

Y'all, this is the fluffiest thing I've ever written. Enjoy!

-------

Zuko decided to make the next Winter Solstice memorable after his and Katara's first one together lacked a certain magic.

On their first Winter Solstice together, Zuko shared a simple dinner with Katara in the Palace. Foods from her home mingled with spiced Fire Nation dishes, filling the table with a plethora of vibrant colors. He tried his best to find all of the best ingredients, and while she smiled, there was a vacancy in her eyes when she looked across the spread. Just the two of them. She assured him that she loved the thought and the food was exquisite. Perhaps too much so, he added in his head. It was made with perfection, not love. The kitchens were incapable of adding that ingredient. He knew what was missing. He knew what he couldn’t fix that night. Everyone had been so busy in that first year that there wasn’t a chance for friends. He was the Fire Lord and was busy, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t take some time away from the world’s affairs for someone who gave him his world. Even as the meal ended and they retired for the night, he began plotting. It wouldn’t be easy. No, compared to his normal responsibilities, the plan that rapidly formed that night was doomed without the most meticulous preparations. Luckily he knew just the person to contact and swore on his honor that he’d write a letter to Sokka the next morning. Early? Yes. Without reason? No. Even starting this soon he knew it was likely that everything may only line up more than a year from now. He hoped Katara was patient. He’d try.

Continue reading on AO3!

[squirrel-in-the-woods]

ahh thank you for the tag!!

this is gonna be long I talk a loooooottttt but nvm

last song: i was studying and my go to study song is "pied piper" because 1. music keeps other noises out of my head so I can tune it into the background for the next 10 hours and 2. the song literally has a lyric in namjoon's verse telling us to go study lool

currently watching: it's been three years since I watched any show 😭 but I watched wild robot a few days ago because I was in a very pissed off mood does that count?? also I fricking love that movie wall-e and wild robot have my heart

three ships: ehehehe 1. brelwyn from legendborn, I cannot get them out of my head and I don't even want to they're so cute; 2. kenji and nazeera from shatter me series, where do I even begin I love them so much I finished the series for them lmaooo like comon what is cuter than "woman I look at you like I'm in love" like comon and Kenji is a whole mood like god and oh boy nazeera is soooo cool dude; 3. percabeth from percy jackson series, you cannot go wrong with them they're the cutest ever like comon seaweed brain is the epitome of nicknames and god I could go on and on about their dynamic I love them sm!!

favorite color: can't choose one buttttttt purple!! purple!! purple!! purple!! purple!! purple!! purple!! my whole room is purple lmfaooo but I mean yeah I looooove purple and might be the reason I love bts and bree as well; I also really fricking love deep red like the cherry shade or the blood red shade like they look absolutely stunning; and I also looooove black so yeah hehe.

currently consuming: this reminds me I still haven't had breakfast and it's lunch here 😭 prolly gonna get up and get my lunch it's roti and sabzi (vegetables?? idk how to explain damn) and the sabzi I don't like very much but nvm

first ship: ooof if we start from the start I loooooooooove enemies to lovers okay wo it's no surprise that juliette and warner have my heartttt (this was when I actually found out what shipping means before that i just took canon as written in stone, if I'd known shipping and ao3 when I was reading hp series boy dramione have my heart, I lover Ron and hermione but comon academic rivals to lovers is a bomb trope)

last movie: wild robottttt it has my heart ✨

currently working on: mathematics 💀 physics 💀💀 chemistry 💀💀💀 just kidding apart from studying I have like three fic ideas that I want to write but yeah when I get in the mood ig. and my stylus broke but I have eight fanarts in progress lmaooo

tags: @thestarchaptersanctuary @thejudeduarte @jkriordanverse @isthataraccoon @ismyteadoneyet @massiveladycat @shuggyjiggy @megnificent-reads @mynotetrash @inastarlesssky @crissaeatscake

Tag game: tag nine people you’d like to know better.

Tagged by: @oneshoulderangel

Last song: At the moment, I have "Losing Your Memory" by Alan Star stuck in my head, which I suppose makes it my current song, not my last song. Hm. I get songs stuck in my head very easily, but the last one I had there for a significant amount of time was a mashup of different language versions of "Les Rois du Monde" for about a week. "Lehetsz Király", the Magyar version, is probably my favorite of them. It's worth a listen.

Currently watching: Normally, the answer would be "random mostly terrible old movies/shows" or "nothing much", but I currently have a hyperfixation on the musical Roméo et Juliette and have been watching it in multiple languages. (Thus, the song).

Three ships: This is hard. Maybe as a result of being on the ace and aro spectrums, I'm more likely to care about which characters are interacting than whether it's romantic or platonic. Here goes:

Kedivere/Bedikay. It can be romantic, platonic, or queerplatonic, but whichever way, I'm here for it. I probably spend too much time thinking about how in Cullwch and Olwen, when Cai gets mad at Arthur and marches out, Bedwyr stays behind, keeps acting like nothing's happened, and isn't the one to avenge Cai's death. The feeling of betrayal on both sides has a lot of unexplored potential. And the version where Bedivere dies and Kay fights to bring his body back safely while mortally wounded himself... And the version where Bedivere survives Camlann and Kay isn't said to fight in it, so they might be left together after their world has fallen apart...

Platonically or queerplatonically, Galahad and the Grail Heroine. I really like the tragic Grail Quest friendships, but I like theirs most, maybe because there's something weird and otherworldly about them both. I like it when characters are strange and endearing and doomed by the narrative.

Ever since reading John Matthews' retelling, which I read before the original, I've had a soft spot for Caradoc and Guinier. The Story of Caradoc is very disturbing, and I have some major qualms with Caradoc over a detail Matthews cut out, but all the same, there's a reason these two have the best track record with magical fidelity tests. Each of them would go to the ends of the earth for the other, and together, they're stronger than any curse.

Favorite Color: Blue, particularly royal blue and some teals.

Currently consuming: Black licorice with chocolate.

First ship: This is a hard one, since through elementary and most of middle school, I tended to go along with whatever I thought the author's intentions were and was more likely to unship something. The first non-endgame ship I got invested in was Sonya/Nikolai in War and Peace. I didn't like Nikolai, but Sonya did, and she was my favorite character, so I wanted her to be happy. The first non-canon couple I thought was meant to be together was also in War and Peace: Marya Bolkonskaya and Julie Karagina. My eighth grade self did not think their letters could be interpreted platonically. I still don't.

Last movie: If the musical doesn't count, the last movie I watched was Quest for Camelot, which was awful. Though not Robot Monster-level bad, Robot Monster has an elegance to its simplicity which Quest for Camelot lacks.

Currently working on: Various fics, most of them Arthuriana or CotRK-related (I am woefully behind on the Badfic Bingo), and (theoretically) an epic-style poem, though I haven't gotten much of it written for quite a while now.

Tagging: @gawrkin, @emperorcandy, @wildbasil, @gorewound, @knightsofsomethingorother, @ladyminaofcamelot, @tasosotaso, @amashelle, @gingersnaptaff (I have no idea who's been tagged so far, apart from the people on @oneshoulderangel's post, so I apologize for any multi-tags)

[yallthemwitches]

“Can I… can I touch you?”

And maybe as a sequel to study session?

Hello Anon! Yes! I'm glad you asked for a sequel for this one because that was one of my favorite kinktobers to write! Perhaps that's why I (once again) went in expecting a micro fic but ended with 3k words...

I feel like I write too much crazy, frantic jily so it was nice to have a sweet but sexy moment. (it's still smut after all)

Here's the link to Study Session, though you don't need to read it before this one!

Read under the cut or AO3 here!

“Do you have anything between third and fourth period?”

She had said it as a joke—-well, sort of, but either way she had underestimated the hope a teenage boy could gather from such an offer.

When she enters the common room he is facing the door, wringing his hands nervously. His hair is still wild from their stint in the library, and she tries not to note that his tie has also remained in a similar state of dishevelment, clearly having been tugged in a manner that school regulations don’t allow. 

“Er, hi.”

He jumps out of his seat and walks towards her, almost sheepish in his movements. His eyes are unable to stop flickering to her lips then downwards, evident that their earlier moment together is still fresh in his mind. 

“You said something about meeting again…after third.” 

The sheepish tone of his voice creates a stir in her chest accompanied by a burning heat traveling downwards. James Potter, quidditch hero, most popular boy in school, did not only want her but was absolutely powerless because of it. 

“If—if you were just having a laugh about that then I’ll just..”

“No, I wasn’t.” She stutters, “...I wasn’t having a laugh—I mean.” It bubbles out and her face flushes red. So much for keeping an upperhand.

 James’ eyes grow wide and bright, his typical crooked smile starting to tug at his lips. 

“Yeah?” 

She could practically hear his confidence growing, his ego reentering his body.

 “Well, all the lads will be out for the next two hours besides Peter, but I —“

“--You told him to shove off,” she finishes for him, the heat from earlier that day now back and pooling heavy between her legs. He doesn’t need to elaborate on where he was referring to, the stairs to the boys dorm practically pulsing from the corner of her eye. 

If she hadn’t intended to sit on his lap back in the library, there is no mistake of intention now. James nods, rare blotches of red appearing under his rims and Lily has to work hard to not think about how the last time she saw his cheeks in such a way, he was grinding an orgasm out of her with just his leg. 

“So— should we...” His eyes flicker to the stairs, an air of excitement and impatience setting in on his features. “I mean, again– if you want to.”

She takes a step closer, arms aching from staying next to her sides and not sliding back in their now familiar spot around his neck.

“Lead the way.”

~ ~ ~

The boys’ dorm is just about how she imagined it, a clutter of books, quidditch supplies and various contraband. Any other time she might have tried to take a closer look, but she doesn’t get far enough in the door before James rounds on her with newfound confidence. Suddenly, something warm and heavy wraps around her waist, pulling her flush against him. 

“You are just lovely.” He cups her face, stepping close enough so her legs part to make way for him to slot himself against her. 

“I can’t stop thinking about earlier—how you smell, how soft your lips are, the feel of you against me…” 

He sidles them over so her back touches the door and his hand juts out until she hears the click of the lock sliding into place. 

“I still feel like I’m dreaming— like this can’t be real. I must be suffering from potion fumes….laying in the hospital wing, hallucinating—-“

She pulls up, slanting their lips together. He sighs an oh into her mouth, his breath hot and sweet. They are sweet probing kisses, not like the ones in the library where the urgency to simply be together was unbearable.

“Stop talking Potter.” 

He laughs, mouth recapturing hers, drawing her even closer. With privacy the gift of time is palpable, allowing them to move out of the realm of fever dreams and into reality.  She feels his hands wrap tighter around her, finding her arse and giving a small squeeze, pushing a smile into her lips. 

Hands find nests in each other's hair. Tongues move like silk contrasting with the hard, playful nips they exchange to lower lips. She savors each small sound he makes into her, all a perfect bundle of adoring and awe.

Unsurprising, he can’t stay quiet for long. “Lily—I’m so…” but the words get stuck in his throat, her attention going towards something hard beginning to press into her thigh. Experimentally, she shifts against it and he makes a low humming sound, the hand resting on her arse tensing up and waving her forward to repeat the motion. Another hand curls around and dances along the hemline of her shirt, tickling the spot of midriff starting to show. 

“James–” she breathes out, holding onto him for support as he kisses his way to the sensitive place behind her ear. “I want you–.” 

At the confession his hands contract and his lips become more frantic, trading light butterfly kisses for open mouthed ministrations. It makes finishing her thought almost not worth it. 

“--I want you, but I’d also like to enter the room first..” He pulls back and gives another genuine laugh, one that makes her burst with pride. Reaching up on her toes, she can’t help but place a kiss where his neck is exposed from his outburst and the feel of her lips snaps him back into gear, turning her in his arms and waddling them forward towards the bed across the room. His erection strains against her arse as they move, each step a little zing of pleasure. 

“How rude of me,” he whispers against her ear. They stop in front of the bed and he turns her back to face him, eyes clouded as though sleepwalking. “Welcome to my bed.”

His Bed. It’s almost humorous how one single noun is capable of making her heart beat out of her rib cage. How many times has she imagined what he does in this bed? How many times has he thought of her?

He sits on the edge and pulls her down onto his lap. It’s all too similar from that morning—the way her hands circle his neck, how her body positions in a way that even the slightest movement creates friction between her center and his ever present erection. Settling in, they both let out a moan of relief, both evidently yearning for the same thing since the last couple of hours. 

“I’m absolutely mad for you Evans,” he murmurs and she wastes no time pushing their mouths together again, a sailing feeling in her chest taking over. She puts a hand to the front of his shirt, edging it under to find the hot skin of his abdomen and he sighs a soft gentle sound that she immediately wants to hear again. 

“That’s funny because I’m absolutely mad for you too.”

The look in his eye changes from hazy to dark to purely euphoric, responding with a deep kiss. She shifts over him until she is back straddling his waist, legs curling around his waist until she can feel the familiar brush of him against the spot she yearns to be touched most. 

“Can I take this off?” A hand stalls at a button of his shirt while the other has already begun wandering the length of his chest underneath, hungry to feel what she already knew about his stature. In response, he unlatches his hands from around her to unbutton it, shucking it off with his tie in one movement. 

Christ.

She pulls back to get a better look at him, unabashedly darting her gaze from his abs to his toned shoulders.  She had seen him shirtless before during quidditch, the vision of him pumping his fist in the air in victory after a match easily being a replaying image in her mind, but never this close, never touchable.

“You’re fit–” she murmurs, catching the burning look of a stroked ego in his eyes. She doesn’t let herself think about her next move, moving her hands to her own blouse and unbuttoning down the front. A quiet fuck escapes his lips when her shirt finally flaps open, exposing her bare breasts to him and the cold dormroom air. His eyes roam her chest, a haggard breath coming from his open mouth.

“Merlin…”

She has the immediate desire to cover up, feeling the weight of his gaze on her. His hand remains modest on her waist, clearly frozen from shock. 

“I—I don’t wear a bra,” she says deadpan, wanting to fill the silence. A grin breaks out on his face, eyes sparkling. 

“And I thank Merlin for it everyday.”

Her cheeks blaze and now she does cover up, crossing her arms over her chest. 

“What do you mean?”

James cocks his head, a glint of mischief in his eye. “Evans, I hate to break it to you, but I don’t think there’s a bloke in this castle over the third year that hasn’t noticed.”

She turns her head, trying to mask obvious embarrassment. It isn’t like she's not aware either, but to hear it from him, make it too unbearable to think about. Sensing her shift in mood, he cups her chin and pulls her head back to look at him, eyes now soft. 

“No, don’t hide yourself. You have no idea—no idea how much I’ve even tried to imagine you like this.”

He places a hand on one of her crossed arms and she slowly lowers them. She watches as he licks his lips, eyes growing wild again at the sight of her. 

“--And apparently my imagination is rubbish because—because, I mean fuck.”

He inches a hand up from her stomach towards one of her breasts, eyes flickering between watching her expression and the path to the newly exposed skin. Stopping just underneath, he leans in and gives her a soft kiss, begging for permission.

Taking his hand, she finishes his path for him, her hard tit pressing into his warm, enveloping palm. He sucks in a breath, eyes becoming heavy lidded as his fingers curl around her soft skin. 

“Just unbelievable…”

She grins, tugging lightly at the strands of hair at the back of his head.

“What?”

“How absolutely perfect you are.”

Her body surges with pure adoration. She hinges forward, pressing the bare skin of their chests together until he is falling back onto the bed, taking her down with him. They scramble with laughter for a moment, situating themselves properly so she hovers over his laying form. A hand traces the muscles of his abdomen down to his waistband, fingering at the fabric before continuing downwards to the tent of his pants. Lifting her hips up, she presses a hand against his erection, smoothing her thumb around the outline of him beneath the fabric. 

“Is this alright?” She asks, knowing the answer just by the look on his face. She makes another hesitant pass with her thumb and a shallow moan escapes his lips, head starting to fall back. 

“It’s incredible. Please, don’t stop.”

She doesn’t. Leaning forward to kiss her way back up to him, he shuffles himself lower so he can take one of her tits into his mouth, his tongue swirling hot circles around the hardened peak. The sensation makes her hips rut automatically, pressing downwards into where her hand continues to touch him through his pants. 

An arm wraps around her and before she can dissent, he flips them. Her skirt has already bunched up to her waist, exposing a pair of plain black knickers that catch his attention immediately. Eyes roaming around the bottom half of her body. 

“Lily—can I touch you?” He asks softly. 

“You’re already touching me.” She responds, teasing, but he is too far gone for games, eyes dark and glassy with pure want. 

“No–I mean, here.”

His hand moves to rest just above her pubic bone, fingers angling down towards her center. All amusement falls from her, replaced with a thrashing need to feel him touch just inches lower from where they lay. 

Breath catches in her chest. Suddenly it feels like they are moving in water, slow and steady against each other. She takes his hand and wills it downwards, his fingertips skirting over the fabric of her knickers as they round down in between her thighs. He takes a sharp inhale when he reaches what she already knows: her knickers are completely soaked through. 

“Godric help me.”

He moves to press harder into the fabric, but she holds his hand hovering, just barely away from her center. She reaches between them with her other hand, finding his waistband and tugging. 

“Take these off.”

His eyes grow impossibly wider, tearing his gaze between where his hand is being held and to her face. 

“ I will…in a moment, first I want to–” 

Her grip on his hand tightens and her cheeks blaze. 

“No. I want to touch you too.”

He needs no more convincing. He undoes his pants and she pulls at his waistband, deliberately taking his underpants with them. Upon seeing him fully nude, her jaw slackens. She had seen men naked before, been touched and pleasured to various degrees in the past couple of years, but nothing prepared her for him. Months of sneaking glances, watching how lithe his body moved during quidditch, dreaming about how his body could possibly feel moving inside hers did not even get close to the way he looked now. 

“Lily–if you don’t want to keep going…” He stutters out. Coming out of her trance, she realizes that she had been staring for too long, swept away by the sheer reality of him. 

“C’mere, please.”

He shifts back over her and the feel of his tip slightly wet against her hip makes her surge with giddiness. His hand goes back between her legs, a finger experimenting with pressing down and drawing small circles into the damp area. In turn, she reaches down and takes him with a loose fist, palm sliding easily up and down soft flesh. 

They exchange soft, whimpering sounds, hips pushing to meet hands, open mouths molding together to catch each other’s moans. 

“James–” She lifts her hips and tugs down at her knickers, letting them slip down and off her legs. 

“Absolutely beautiful–” he gasps, watching his finger sink into her. Her body squeezes around him, zapping her with pleasure with every twist and flex of his fingers. The pumping of her hand speeds up, giving more attention to smear some of his precome around his crown. His head collapses down, forehead pressed against hers, moaning deeper with every turn of a hand. 

“I want you inside me,” she whispers, then repeats again. His hand stills, eyes pulling up to look at her with a delirious wonder. 

“Lily—”

“Please, I need you. Unless…unless you don’t…” 

A chaotic laugh explodes from his mouth, doubling him over. He kisses her, his tongue pressing her mouth open so he can speak directly into her. 

“I have never wanted anything more in my entire life.”

Her heart swells. She hitches a leg up, opening herself up wider for him to sidle down against her. He takes hold of his cock, smearing his tip into her folds before finding her entrance and pressing lightly so just the smallest bit of his crown stretches into her. 

“Holy fucking merlin–,” he groans, watching his cock sink further into her, “you feel so good, so tight.”

The way he feels inside of her is unparalleled. His movements are slow and gentle, adorations pouring out of his mouth against her neck, her chest, her cheeks—anywhere he can press kisses while he dips in and out of her, filling her up. 

The heat in her stomach mounts, pooling with adoration and pleasure and something that frighteningly feels already, impossibly, like love. He checks in on her, taking her face with his hand and looking into her eyes, searching and finding just as much happiness and desire as she sees staring back.

“Just like that, love—” he urges her on, helping her hips grind up against him while his thumb teases her clit with tiny circles. 

It feels like she is mounting a steep mountain, almost to the peak where her pleasure surges in a great big orb. He must feel it too because his adorations turn into coaxes, pressing her towards release. 

“That’s it–Oh, Lily I can feel it. I can feel you’re close. Fuck—come for me. Let me feel you come—”

Something inside her snaps and everything disappears besides the soft kisses James presses into her skin and the feel of him still moving inside her. Her whole body clenches and relaxes, an ecstatic pleasure flooding all the way to her toes. His voice breaks through the haze, thin and straining.

“Baby, you feel so good, so impossibly wet—can I—”

She grabs into his hair, pulling him down for a searing kiss. 

“Come inside me, it’s ok. I want to feel you too.” 

He gasps, letting go. A warm sensation fills her and trickles down her thighs, him making his final few thrusts before slowing to a halt and drooping over her. He remains inside of her while their heartbeats slow in tandem, his slowing breath tickling the side of her neck.

“What are you thinking about?” He whispers after a few moments pass. A thumb passes over her cheek to move a stray piece of hair. 

She hesitates, before answering. “I’m thinking about how I don’t want this to end.”

He presses a kiss into her neck and she wraps her arms around him, holding them together as though the moment he gets up they will be back to being just “Potter and Evans:” two friends who laugh and talk but nothing more. 

“Then we won’t let it end,” he murmurs. She opens her eyes to find his staring back, something shining behind the irises. 

It’s consuming—the sensation he creates within her. Even as just mates and study partners she feels it: the desire to take him within herself and keep him there forever. To experience every single thing with him,good or bad, because anything with him by her side seems bearable and worth it. 

“Go out with me.”

He chuckles, hearing the words he has thrown at her for years being finally sent back like karma. His face bursts with pure unfiltered joy and he swoops down to press his lips to hers, his happiness contagious. 

“Gladly—anything you want, Evans.” He says between kisses. Still inside her, she can feel him start to harden again, impossibly rebounding by the force of sheer elation alone. 

“Ah—James.”

He kisses his way down to her chest, a smile still caked onto his face as she squirms under him, the slick feel of him moving again inside her gaining momentum. It’s impossible for her not to smile too and the feeling from before reappears: not just pleasure, but perhaps already love. It explodes from her and she giggles, just as ready as he is to tangle together again. 

“But I have to warn you,” he says, eyes glinting as he presses their foreheads back together, “I don’t think I’m ever going to want us to leave this bed. Not for Hogsmeade, not for the world.”

[babyb1ues]

one and a half-cat

word count: 2187 tags: fluff, established relationship. inspired by Yes, Cat Caretaker. does not follow story plot. [ao3]

He hadn’t noticed until late in the day. He had stretched, headed to the kitchen while dragging his feet, drunk some water, and retreated with every intention of throwing himself back into bed. It was only a coincidence, born of ingrained situational awareness, that he had caught the sight of something odd atop his head, a blur of an object he couldn’t really pinpoint. 

He stands before a mirror, staring at a set of animal ears—the ones of a cat, he thinks—sitting comfortably above his head. Xavier blinks, tries to rub his eyes for good measure. The ears remain there, they twitch when his head tilts—not a headband you had put on him, then. They move on their own, a muscle reflex. Xavier wonders if he can control them. He focuses his attention towards the sounds coming from the open window, where he knows birds often perch themselves. His eyes stay on his reflection, watching as his ears rotate, tuning into the outside noise. 

It’s so much clearer and richer than what he’s used to. He can listen well beyond his window, even from outside the apartment complex. Xavier can hear the bird, winds flapping in the air, before it flies down and settles on the ledge. He turns, a strange fixation taking hold of his senses as his eyes take in the small animal. He analyzes any minute movement, and he can’t seem to take his eyes off of it, as if something called him forward.

The soft brush of a feather against his leg breaks him out of the stupor—except it’s not a feather but rather fur. Xavier looks down, a long, fluffy tail sways behind him.

He doesn’t know how it got to this, still has a hard time believing any of it it’s true and not a hallucination inside his head. So he does what any sensible person would do, and goes on to find a witness. 

It’s a good thing you like cats. When you open the door, Xavier doesn’t know if you’re going to scream from shock or squeal from excitement. You do a mix of both. He finds it amusing when your face visibly shifts emotions, before settling into something like absolute confusion. 

“Why are you, uh, dressed up as a cat?”

“I’m not.” Xavier makes his way to your living room, taking a moment to find a suitable spot to sit on. He gravitates towards the end of your couch, reclining against the armrest where a small, knitted blanket lays. He brings his feet up, clad in just socks. If his sudden posture is strange, neither of you make a comment on it. “I just happened to wake up like this.” 

“You just happened to wake up with… cat ears?”

He nods. You watch as his ears twitch, both fascinated and bewildered at the sight before you. “These are obviously fake, right?” You reach for the ears, strange and realistically fluffy. Your fingers dig around his hairline, trying to find a headband, an elastic, or anything to give away the fact that they’re nothing but an adornment on his head. Only, there’s nothing. Nails scratch his scalp as you shift through pieces of hair and Xavier nearly melts at the touch. He closes his eyes, head lolling sideways, and almost to your surprise, goes completely limp. 

You hold his face so as to not have him topple over, and he stirs if only slightly, his lips move a fraction, like if he had said something under his breath, even though you can’t hear a word. He doesn’t nuzzle your hand, for that would require some capacity of consciousness—he seems to have completely fallen asleep, under 1 minute no less.

You stand before him, hands cupping his cheeks. He’s asleep and you don’t know what to do with yourself, or with him. You tilt his head, slow and experimentally. To the left—he doesn’t move, and then to the right. His eyes still shut. His face remains squished against your palms. A small pinch, then you pull, stretching his cheek almost uncomfortably. Xavier rustles in your hold, but doesn’t do anything else that might indicate cognizance.

Not knowing what else to do, you decide to gently lay his head down, so it rests on the cushion instead of having his neck painfully craned. Just as you’re about to pull back, his hand suddenly grabs at your wrist. Xavier sluggishly opens one eye, baby blue staring at you.

He murmurs, words sort of muddled. “---gonna leave me?”

“I was… going to let you sleep.”

He lets your wrist go. You watch as Xavier stretches, his fists unfurling and extending like a cat would his paws. “No need,” he shakes his head through a yawn. “I’m awake.”

He doesn’t look really awake to you, maybe just barely lucid. 

“If you say so.”

“Do you have any treats?”

“Do I— Sorry, what?”

His head tilts, looking at you like you he’s the coherent one.

“Treats.”

“I don’t have cat… treats—oh! You mean human… snacks.” You nod, assuring yourself. Of course, that must’ve been what he means. He wouldn't actually crave cat food, would he? “I made a batch of cookies yesterday.”

Xavier perks up at the mention of baked goods. “Lead the way.” As he stands to follow, you notice something peeking from behind his legs. He doesn’t get to take a step as you hastily turn his body around, and you stare, wholly perplexed at the long, and incredibly poofy-looking cat appendage coming from his tailbone.

“You have a tail.”

He hums. “Yes. I guess I do.”

“You didn’t think of letting me know.”

“I forgot,” he shrugs. “It’s just, kind of there.”

Of course, as if the set of ears wasn’t enough, he’s got a tail to match too. You take a deep breath, collect your bearings and decide to file this whole affair for later.

Xavier tags along into the kitchen. He’s quick to realize that his tail, just like his ears, is able to move involuntarily. It swishes on its own when he takes a whiff of the cookies sitting on the counter. And just like his ears, he decides he wants to put his range of control into test. He makes a point to brush his tail against your lower back when he passes by to grab a plate. You startle, not anticipating the feathery touch. None of you make a comment on it. Xavier also happens to have forgotten to get a cup, to his great convenience. He walks back, his tail lightly curling around your waist as he steps next to you. He sees you freeze up from his peripheral vision.

“Are you okay?”

“Yeah!” you reply, a little too quickly. “It’s just, you know. Tail. Kinda weird.”

“Is it?”

“To wake up half-cat? Yes, I think. Actually, do you mind if I—” 

He doesn’t expect it when your hands close in around the base of the tail. He jumps then, shoulders tense and pupils shrinking as he feels your fingers prod at the skin of his lower back. An instinctive part of him almost wants to snatch it from your curious hold, but he forces himself still, and waits. 

“Huh,” your palms carefully trail the length of the fur, marveling at the softness of it. Xavier suppresses the little thrill rumbling in his throat. “It’s attached to your skin. At least it’s pretty.”

“Do you like it?” He swishes the tail, as to showcase it further. 

“Yeah, sure.” You tag at it, somewhat playfully. “So, you’re actually half cat, then. Care to explain?”

The only thing Xavier offers is a shrug. “Don’t know. Aftermath from yesterday’s wanderer, maybe?” 

You nod to yourself, trying to make sense of a situation that is, somehow, very much real. Your boyfriend has suddenly woken up with traits of a cat, a ridiculously cute one at that. Somehow, they even manage to match the color of his hair. He can’t possibly go outside like this, you think. A cute boy with fluffy ears and a fluffy tail, you can imagine the kind of ruckus it would cause. 

“Is there anything else? Cat-like wise?”

Xavier hums, remembering the moment right after he woke up. “I think, I almost pounced on a bird.”

You stare incredulously. “Okay, well. Maybe we should find out, just in case you decide to hunt a mouse too, or something.”

When you return to the living room, you do so while holding an object. It’s one of those magic princess wands, with long ribbons hanging from the top. He remembers you had gotten it at one of the local’s festivals as a prize. Xavier did not think you’d find use to it, he knows now he was wrong. Against his own will, his eyes follow the wand as you sway it in front of his face. 

He grumbles, forcing himself to look down as to not continue being played. “It’s not funny.”

“It’s very funny,” you laugh. “Come on, kitty cat!” You pull a yarn ball the size of your palm out of the pocket of your sweatshirt, and throw it in his direction. “Fetch!”

Xavier makes a sound of indignation, something like a scoff and a grunt. “I’m not a dog. And this feels demeaning.”

There’s a frown and petulant pout shaping his usually serene features. “Oh no, I’m sorry,” He refuses to look your way, choosing to make a show of his displeasure. “I didn’t mean to offend you.” Your hands give a tentative touch to his waist, wanting to be close but giving him the space to turn away if he wished to. “Will you forgive me?”

Xavier’s gaze remains somewhere else, even though the crease between his brows softens. “Fine,” he says, tone curt. “Under one condition.”

“Whatever you want.”

The corner of his mouth twists, a barely hidden smile. He clasps your hand in his and drags you towards the bedroom, leaving you with no choice but to walk after him. Xavier doesn’t break the hold even as he rearranges the pillows in your bed. He tilts his head, analyzing his work with narrowed eyes, and something is missing, he thinks. One pillow, two pillows, three— His face brightens with satisfaction when he snags a blanket from the corner of your bed, hiding beneath the comforter. He sinks his fingers into it—warm and fluffy and exactly what he needed. 

He crawls into the bed, leaving you to clamber after him. Xavier seems to fold into himself, as he tucks his body next to yours. One of his arms circles your waist, while the other one lays flush against his chest. You think it’s funny, in a way. Such a tall frame reduced to a ball of warmth. He’s never been one to shy away from cuddles or skin contact, but this—you’ve never seen him in such a state, so utterly soft and vulnerable. It makes you wonder if he was like this once, perhaps as a child. His head rests in the space where your neck meets your shoulder. Fuzzy ears tickle your cheeks, but it’s so endearing you withstand it. 

“This is your condition, huh?” You play with his hair absentmindedly, fingers intertwining with silver strands. The tip of his tail slowly sways as he hums in response. “You could’ve just said you wanted to cuddle, you know.”

His face turns to the crook of your neck, voice muffled. You can barely make out the words when he mutters them into your skin, like an imprinted whisper. “Let’s just stay like this.”

You huff out a small laugh. The top of his head bumps against your chin as he nuzzles into you. He holds you and you hold him, melting into each other. They’re rare these days. Little, transient moments, where you get to be with him like this, enveloped in a blanket of blissfulness where nothing else exists, no threat, no city to save, just him and you. 

His cat traits will be gone come tomorrow, and he’ll be gone along with them. An early morning return as you prepare to leave; missing each other by a margin of time. You kiss the crown of his head. Your mouth lingers there, unmoving. Xavier’s fast asleep, slumped and snuggled against your side. He always did look calm when he rested, like nothing could ever disturb him, nor thunderstorm nor rain. But there’s something different, influenced by the feline characteristics, maybe. He hides in your skin and wraps around your limbs, as if he wanted to make a home in your body. You hold him a little tighter, in such a way you’d think he would slip from your arms if you didn’t. 

There’s a soft, rumbling sound emanating from his throat, a little purr. 

“We can stay like this,” you mumble into his hair. The rumbling seems to grow a little louder, seemingly reacting to your voice. “For as long as you want.”

And when he returns, along with the early morning rays, it will be as him. Just Xavier, no ears and no tail. And you’d take him all the same. 

[ren-144p]

Seconding started with a pin with my whole chest!! That one is SO dear to my heart. Below a few personal favorites to add to the list. Please mind the tags on these :) As mentioned, early Zaundads fandom skewed dark and messy.

the last drop / what was and wasn’t and silco and vander / tales of a knife by revelisms

Last Chance by Blue_Daddys_Girl

There's only one way their story ends, Silco knows. Yet still in their last moment alone together—their first in so many years—he offers Vander one last chance.

it is snowdown by zevlore

It is Snowdown in the undercity, and the snow is soft and grey and slushy, and she is uncomfortable in her skin. Four vignettes into Vander's life.

hit count by ducky (conscious_mess)

An attempt to flesh out their backstory. (Relationship breakdown drabble that got out of hand. Still counts as drabble because they "become sodden by movement through muddy water", so ~nnnyehh~)

Silt Verses by JeanLuciferGohard

Pump 47 is failing. It’s water to their waists now, slick with Fissure-filth and sucking grime. Vander huffs shakily, squinting up the mineshaft like anyone’s coming. “Never thought it’d be like this.” Silco barks a raw, ugly laugh, head lolling back against the rock. “That was always your problem,” he says, “lack of vision.” You learn a lot about a man when you're both about to die underground. Or: Faith is a young man's game. Silco's old before his time. Character Study.

For enjoyers of more light-hearted things, I remember having a great time with these:

Warmth by BiCaptain

The worst part came when her dads came face to face with each other.

The Fluffiest Little Murder Boyfriend uwu by Fiddlezips

Silco is a Yordle. He stands just taller than Vander's thighs, which is a generous comparison. His fur is short, fluffy around his long ears, and grey beneath the dirt. “Zaun Gray” is how he describes it, and his small mouth twitches into a smirk each time.

And for those looking for Zaundads of more smutty variety:

Cage Match by Zkyfall

Life since Silco moved out has been Hell for Vander. Trying to juggle his job with suddenly being primary caregiver for the girls, all while wrestling with the guilt that maybe the separation is all his fault. The stress is killing him and he doesn’t even have his favorite go-to outlet: fantastic sex with Silco. When Vander sees an ad for an app-controlled cock cage, he's intrigued. Finally a way he can get his submission fix, even without his favorite Dom! What could possibly go wrong?

To break new ground by Rimeko

“Now,” Silco adds, “I don’t want your apologies, but I do want your dick. So can we do just that, or do I have to fucking gag you too?” Ahem. Reconciliation sex? Zaundads bingo event: Edging

i'm breakin' a sweat (i think i need some ventilation) by zevlore

“You,” Silco pants, practically gasping for air as Vander continues his assault on his exposed collarbone, hands deftly sliding the rest of his and Silco’s clothes off, “are insatiable.” Silco's been spending too much time working. Vander convinces him to take a break, among other things.

Locked by IAmANonnieMouse (and the following Denied and Freed)

Vander isn’t that strong. If left unchecked, he’s selfish and insatiable, unable to think of anything but his own pleasure. That’s why he needs someone like Silco to keep him in check. To lock him away and throw away the key.

Useless by Fiddlezips

Silco is used to disappointment. After all, his plans—whenever they involve Vander even a little—do have a tendency to fall through.

Unfortunately back in the day I was not utilizing AO3's bookmarks nearly enough so I know I am missing a ton of good ones. New folks should absolutely go out and explore the Silco/Vander tag on their own because I remember there were a lot of incredible fics around these past few years!

Either way, happy reading! It's nice to see the ship getting traction again :)

Anybody want to create a quick quintessential Zaundads fanfic rec list?

I was away for a long time between seasons, so I probably missed a ton but those are some of the longer/meatier ones I remember, particularly one of the more fix-it category.

While the World Turns Around by Blue_Daddys_Girl

In a chance meeting Vander sees Silco for the first time since the fateful day he's come to regret so deeply. Silco has changed—they both have. Vander can't stop thinking about him.

Reconciliation AU by Rimeko

If the cannery scene went down differently, if Vander got thrown into Stillwater with Vi instead of (maybe) dying, and if Silco eventually got them both freed. What, then? What to do with the ruins of what once was? How to deal with love and betrayal and everything that went down in the meantime, and how to move forward.

Stillwater Marriage by Alishatheninth

AU in which Vander does not insist on having one last pipe, therefore gets out of Benzo's shop before Silco has Deckard kill all the Enforcers. Vander decides there's really little to be lost by simply handing the reins to Silco. Silco has to deal with a slightly different set of challenges, and does so in his own, slightly deranged, way.

started with a pin by bloodinthewine

Silco doesn’t expect to find anything extraordinary when he accompanies his daughter to her first Pride parade. Vander, an infamous and experienced leather daddy, finds him anyway. (or The Leather Daddy AU) 

And just some personal favorites of mine that I remember:

underground utopia dynasties and dystopia by leonshardt, which I think is the original prostitute!Silco stories.

Old Griefs and Childrens Faiths by GoddessofRoyalty, an A/B/O story which always made me hope for a parent!trap style story where Powder tries to reunite Silco and Vander

There are some mores that I love, including some smut ones, but everybody please mind that season 1 Zaundad fandom often skewed more dark, messy and angsty.

Anybody else have any favorites? Any other popular fics I missed? If somebody was joining late, what would you recommend to them?

[5-puthyyy]

You're Looking A Little Green

AO3 LINK

Word Count: 5k

Summary:

Rio waits a moment, sniffing deeply then sighing out and nuzzling her nose to Agatha’s skin. Gods, she missed this scent of dark Magick, of lavender and honey, of maple trees and something so distinctly Agatha. “Tell me you want me.”

Agatha’s jaw tightens, though her head movement opens up more of her neck for Rio. “I don’t.”

The Green Witch chuckles, her soft lips brushing against Agatha’s sensitive skin. “Ah, ah, ah…what did I just say? No lies,” Rio’s hand digs into the curve of Agatha’s hip, “Tell me you want me…and not her.”

━━━━━━━━━▲━━━━━━━━━

Rio's drawn to the powerful Magick of the hex and finds Agatha flirting with a powerful witch that isn't her. I cannot be blamed for the filth that follows

WARNINGS! -- (18+ ONLY) SEXUAL CONTENT, CHOKING + BLOODPLAY + BREATHPLAY

Rio Vidal did not feel. She simply came into existence, filled with a singular purpose to collect the lost souls of the dead. Death was not made to feel. But, Gods, if anyone were to challenge the very rules of the universe, to disrupt the natural order of all things? Of course it would be Agatha Harkness. Who else?

She has to call it love because Agatha’s love is all she has ever known. It is cruel and gentle, angry and serene, it is wicked and sinister and everything in between. And Rio could not get enough of it, enough of her torturous little witch. It was one thing to use the Darkhold and hide from Death. Besides, she enjoyed the chase, the hunt, being the predator running after its prey. But what she could not stand was this.

Rio was drawn to the raw, chaotic magic of this place – what kind of all-powerful Green Witch would she be if she could not sense it? – and was unsurprised to see Agatha had found her way here too. Her clever girl could always sniff out power, always greedily eager to take as much as she could.

“Ridiculous,” Rio scoffs quietly, watching through the window of Wanda’s living room. She could do nothing but watch, the anger in her belly brewing into something even darker, dangerous, twisted and ugly. Jealousy.

That is one of the many emotions she had not felt until Agatha and she can wholeheartedly say it is the absolute worst one. Her black heart can stand heartache, can stand betrayal, can stand the endless torture of Agatha’s glare of hatred because those feelings had to come from somewhere. It has been a form of comfort to know after all these centuries she can still affect her witch, still make her feel, just as she makes Rio feel.

Jealousy is ugly. It makes her feel ugly, inside. It takes a blow at her security and makes her question herself, whether she is good enough for Agatha, whether the witch has decided to move on from her to someone solid, something real, something tangible and within her grasp. It is what she deserves, after all. Despite the playfulness, the chase, the books of history the two have together, Rio could never shake off the belief that Agatha will never truly want her for all she is. She cannot. Agatha hates that she wants Death, and that hatred will fester until there is nothing left. No love, no hate, just indifference.

“Do you really?” Rio recalls the first time Agatha told her how she felt for her, the two of them having floated around each other for weeks, a youthful, anxious mess, “Do you really love me, Agatha? Me?” Rio asked, voice shaking, hands trembling as she held Agatha’s blushing cheeks.

The witch sighed, a sound deep and upsetting that struck Rio uncomfortably. “I fear I do.” 

Fear. She feared it, hated it, did not want to feel what she felt. And Rio? Rio had not wanted a single thing since the beginning of time until she looked into Agatha’s eyes and decided she could not go on without having her. She loved her, wanted to be consumed by her, felt nothing but her.

It wasn’t until…until Nicky that it went terribly wrong and Rio saw their relationship for what it was. Agatha could not force her feelings to disappear, so she did, and she made it perfectly clear that she did not want Rio. But with their feud and many fights that inevitably led to Agatha’s teeth biting her lip until they tasted like copper, Rio realised that Agatha needed her. And Agatha hated Rio for it.

“What the fuck are you doing here?” Rio is pulled out of her dark thoughts by an angry voice she cannot help but smile widely at.

“Hello, my love,” She greets Agatha smoothly, huffing as the angry woman grabs her by the arm and guides her across the lawn, around another house, and then into the quiet privacy of her four walls, “Hmm,” Rio takes in a deep breath of relief, her bones feeling more at ease in Agatha’s home. She can feel the thrum of her lover’s Magick in here, “I like it here. It tastes like you.”

Agatha grunts angrily, shoving a fist against Rio’s chest as the Green Witch licks at the air with wild and wide eyes. “You just couldn’t help yourself, could you? It is so on-brand for you to show up here and ruin everything for me.”

A sinister smirk splits across Death’s face. “Now why would I sit back and let you have all the fun?”

Agatha grunts yet again, this time stepping towards Death with a raised pointer finger. “This is more than just fun, Vidal, this could be–The power she has is–You know what she is. You can sense her Magick. This could change everything for me,” Agatha stutters her way through the sentence, clearly taking a more calculated route against this witch. Rio can see how serious this is to her, and she honestly had no plans to ruin it. All she wanted was to see her.

With soft eyes, Rio steps forward, her fingers daring to brush down Agatha’s jaw. “You are all I sense. Your Magick is all I ever want to taste.”

Agatha sucks in a sharp breath at the confession, never quiet growing used to Rio’s blunt nature. There are never any lies here, never a nervous thought that blocks the truth from tumbling out of her mouth. The honesty was always refreshing. But in moments like this, all it does is make Agatha want to kiss her until Death herserlf needs a breath of air to stay alive.

“Not now, Vidal,” Agatha replies coldly, forcing her eyes away from Rio’s impossibly sad ones. The power those eyes have had over her…

“Why don’t you want me?” Rio asks with a frown, crossing her arms over her chest, in typical Rio-fasion.

Agatha can’t help but scoff. “What is wrong with you?”

Rio’s face suddenly hardens in realisation, forcing distance between them as she steps back towards the door. “Do you want her? Is that it?” Rio doesn’t know why she asked. The very idea of answer that says to ‘yes’ has her first imagining she has insides and those insides are twisting like snakes.

“I want her power.”

At that, Rio growls a terrifying noise, deep and dark. “You want her! I saw the way you looked at her in there, Agatha,” She accuses, unable to shift the images out of her head. She watched them through the window: she cannot forget Agatha’s easy smile, so carefree and playful; the light touch of Wanda’s hand brushing Agatha’s hand; the blush tinting Agatha’s cheek.

Her witch suddenly smiles knowingly, eyes low as she tilts her head. “Oh, honey…” she mumbles in fake sympathy, holding Rio’s chin in her hand, “You’re looking a little green,” she spits out, her hold tightening.

Rio gulps, always being one to submit to that storm in Agatha’s deep blue eyes. “Well, I am the Green Witch,” she mutters rather weakly, huffing at the flash of amusement reflecting back at her.

“You are.” 

Rio straightens her back. “I am.”

“You’re Death.”

She glares darkly. “I am.”

“Her power is no match for yours.”

Rio growls, teeth snapping at the woman still holding her chin like a pup. “It’s not.”

Agatha raises a brow “No?” she says infantalisingly. 

“No being is more powerful than me,” Rio declares, flipping the two of them around.

Agatha gasps as her back is pushed against the front door. “So act like it,” she demands, raising a leg until her thigh is pressed against Rio’s, “Sulking at me, pouting like a sad puppy…” Agatha pouts mockingly, cackling at Rio’s huff and glare, “Here I was thinking you couldn’t get more pathetic chasing me around when I clearly don’t want to be found.”

“Oh yeah?” Rio’s eyes flick to the basement where she knows Ralph’s dead body is, “Explain him,” she asks with a smirk. This has always been their game. Kill, collect, fuck, over and over again, because that is the only line of intimacy Agatha is comfortable with, all Rio can take.

“I kill because I want to, not because I want you.”

Rio can see the quiver of her lip, the twitch of her brow. It’s subtle but she knows her witch by now. “Hmm…” she hums before leaning in to breath against Agatha’s ear, “Okay, Agatha. Have it your way. Be in control.” 

Agatha wavers at this, suddenly shoving Rio back. “I am,” she defends herself, marching off to the kitchen.

Rio follows, keeping enough distance to make Agatha uncomfortable. She knows how much her witch hates being observed. “Sure you are.”

Agatha spills the water she tries to pour into a glass, grunting in frustration as she slams her fist against the countertop. “Are you that jealous?” She snaps her head to Rio, turning on the attack, “God, you’re so desperate you need to tell yourself this lie to fuel that delusion in your head. I do not kill for you, Rio. I have not killed for you in deca–”

“Do you remember the first time?” Rio interrupts her casually, leaning against the fridge door, “You were so nervous to present me with that old witch’s soul. A gift, you said, remember? For me…” Rio’s words slip out like honey, sultry and smooth, “Courting Lady Death herself, you said.”

Agatha scoffs, arms crossing over her chest. “I say a lot of things.”

“And not a single lie. Not to me,” Rio manages to lower her voice even more, almost down to a whisper. The husk is something Agatha always struggled to resist, but she does her very best to deflect.

“How would you know?” Agatha snaps defensively but Rio sees right through her.

“Hmm,” she hummed, stepping close enough for her nose to brush against the back of Agatha’s pale neck, “Tell me.”

Agatha sucks in a breath. “Tell you what?” she whispers back, nails digging into her palms as a last resort, screaming inwardly to keep her hands to herself.

Rio waits a moment, sniffing deeply then sighing out and nuzzling her nose to Agatha’s skin. Gods, she missed this scent of dark Magick, of lavender and honey, of maple trees and something so distinctly Agatha. “Tell me you want me.”

Agatha’s jaw tightens, though her head movement opens up more of her neck for Rio. “I don’t.”

The Green Witch chuckles, her soft lips brushing against Agatha’s sensitive skin. “Ah, ah, ah…what did I just say? No lies,” Rio’s hand digs into the curve of Agatha’s hip, “Tell me you want me…and not her.”

At those words, Agatha allows one moment. Just one moment of vulnerability where she holds Rio’s freezing cheek in her hand, lets Death lean into her touch. She sheds a cold layer away from her harsh eyes, the last cloud of the storm fading to bring forth the Sun. Rio takes it all in, soaks as much of Agatha as she can before the inevitable goodbye.

“Show me,” Agatha says instead, breaking the silence as she pulls Rio’s face close to hers, “Show me why I should want you.”

Rio has never been one to back down from a challenge; a soft smirk stretches her lips before she finally attaches their lips together. She can count the exact amount of hours, weeks, years since their last kiss. Agatha was in her leather phase then, her hair curled with a rebellious purple streak. Each first kiss ignites that same fire within her, just like the first time they ever kissed all those centuries ago. 

“I will never tire of kiss–”

Agatha rolls her eyes at Rio’s interruption. “None of that today. You want to be jealous? Show me just how possessive you can get.”

Rio frowns at this, brushing her nose against Agatha’s softly. She misses her dearly, so intensely that her hollow chest aches from being far from her.

Agatha can see the conflict written over Rio’s face and knows the one thing she can say to flip that switch. With a wicked smirk, she shoves Rio’s chest again hard enough for her to stumble back.

“If you can’t, I’m sure Wanda wouldn’t mind helping her neighbo–”

Before she could even finish, Rio’s hand gripped her neck and shoved her against the fridge. A filthy moan escaped her throat before she could control it, which would typically please Rio but the Green Witch could see nothing but red at this moment. 

“Say her name again, Agatha. Go on.” Rio plays with her prey, fingers tightening their grip as her other hand dug painfully into Agatha’s side.

“Mmm, why, I’m tempted, so tempted,” the witch teases, chuckling darkly with purple swirls in her eyes, still trying to take back a little control, “If you don’t fuck me hard enough, I may even think about her.”

Rio slams her lips to Agatha’s in a brutal, angry kiss. She shoves her invading tongue into the witch’s gasping mouth with no warning, attacking, claiming, swiping every surface she can. Every action screams possessiveness; she needs Agatha to know who she belongs to, who she will always belong to.

Nails scratch along Agatha’s stomach as she pulls her shirt up, lifting until it’s covering her face. Before Agatha can take it off, Rio’s lips are already attacking her new skin. She mouths at the top of her full breasts still covered by a forest-green lacy bra.

“Wow,” Rio suddenly chuckles, pulling the strap with her teeth until it snaps back against Agatha’s reddening skin, “You wore this for me. You knew I was coming the moment you killed that man, didn’t you?”

Agatha huffs, finally dragging her shirt over her head, her hair a dishevelled nest which makes her look even more alluring. “Oh, you wish,” she denies, but her eyes say otherwise, refusing to hold contact with Rio’s for more than a second.

The Green Witch remains consistent in her gaze, twisting her head to catch Agatha out in her movements. “You expect me to believe you just happened to be wearing my favourite colour?”

“It happens to be Wan–” Agatha’s words are swallowed up by Rio’s tongue again, this time paired with hands that rip her bra to the ground and immediately squeeze as if claiming her new territory. Agatha knows Rio will take her right then and there if she wanted to, but she was still wary of this sitcom reality and how much of this Wanda can really see. She did place her runes very carefully but that witch’s power is unimaginable chaos. “Maybe we should–”

“Shut up,” Rio’s tone drips with authority as she pinches Agatha’s hard bud. Her face flickers to her true form for a moment, the dangerous look being enough to send a quick heat between Agatha’s legs.

Agatha utters no other word, just a frustrated groan at herself for reacting this way to Rio. It’s a hopeless feeling knowing there was nothing that made her weak but her.

“Spread them.”

Agatha clenches her jaw as she reluctantly spreads her legs apart. Rio sends a pleased smirk her way, those chocolate eyes darkened with desire.

“Good girl.”

Agatha bites her bottom lip hard to suppress the downright pathetic moan, but a whine slips out widening Rio’s already cocky smile. The embarrassed witch turns her head away but Rio forces it back with a flick of her fingers, black and green tendrils of Magick finally making an appearance.

Runes won’t work on her. Agatha found that one out the hard way a few decades ago, a rookie mistake which ended with Agatha tied in the air, high and not-so-dry. But that’s a story for another time.

Agatha arches her back into the touch, making an executive decision that if she is to play with Rio, she will be the one manipulating Death into doing what she wants. “I’m always good for you, sweetheart. Why don’t you feel how good I am?” Agatha husks seductively, biting her bottom lip in the way she knows drives Rio to madness.

Death pants at the shift, feeling Agatha spread her legs further apart, begging for her touch. “Wicked…” Rio mumbles as she buries her face in Agatha’s chest right between her breasts. The woman is quick to push them together, using herself to gently push Rio over the edge of control. “Fuck, you’re sexy,” Rio moans into her chest, licking, biting, sucking as she claims her. It only takes a moment for her hand to leave Agatha’s hip and slither between her legs. She teases over the lace, both of them sighing at the first touch.

“That’s right, baby, feel me, take me,” Agatha chants and pants, covering Rio’s hand with one of hers. The latter presses her thumb to Agatha’s clit, leaning back up to swallow her gasp. They kiss languidly as she lazily trails her thumb up and down, feeling Agatha get wetter by the second as their tongues glide together. Gods, she loves kissing this woman. Kissing Agatha is the closest Rio will ever get to Heaven.

Soon enough, though, Agatha’s patience runs thin and she shoves her own panties to the side. Rio feels that slickness on her fingers immediately, growling into Agatha’s lips. She bites at her wicked witch’s bottom lip once in punishment before descending to her knees.

Agatha tries to resist making a comment, really, she uses all her willpower. But Rio looks up at her with such adoration, eyes as wide as a puppy’s. It’s so pathetically cute.

“I knew you’d end up on your knees for me. You always do,” she tries to soften the blow with a gentle finger brushing the hair out of Rio’s eyes, but it does nothing to soothe the now angry witch. Suddenly, Agatha’s hands fly up, wrists bound against the fridge with Magick. “Come on, play fair.”

“You want to talk about fair?” Rio huffs, shaking her head as she decides not to tread on this topic. Instead, she focuses on the glistening mess in front of her. She drags Agatha’s panties to the floor, practically salivating by the time she’s done. Though she wants nothing more than to have that delicate slick on her tongue, she needs to punish Agatha, needs to make her want her, make her beg.

Rio starts slow with a wet, delicate kiss to the inside of Agatha’s thigh. It immediately quivers at the touch, Agatha attempting to spread her legs further to entice the tortuous witch into giving her what she wants. But Rio remains strong, grounding herself with the taste of Agatha’s slick that dripped down to her thighs. She glides her tongue over, moaning at the taste, circling her skin, painting out her name over and over again. The moment Agatha growls in frustration, Rio’s there to bite down hard enough to bruise, silencing the witch. It’s a warning, a shout to be patient or else.

“Will you be good for me?” Rio asks as she looks up, her eyes dilated and high on the power she has over Agatha.

“I thought you called me a good girl,” Agatha rebuttals, voice trembling slightly though still filled with sass.

Rio pretends to contemplate for a moment. “I suppose I did. But I think a real good girl would beg. Wouldn’t you agree, sweetheart?”

Agatha doesn’t bother hiding her reaction to this, bursting out into laughter at the audacity. Her? Beg? She hasn’t begged for Rio since before– “No.”

Rio lifts a brow, fingers tightening around Agatha’s thigh. “No?” Agatha stands firm in her answer, a seriousness in her eyes that Rio can’t help but shake her head at. Her stubborn little witch. “Fine, Agatha. Have it your way.”

The first swipe of her tongue transports Agatha to another fucking universe. Blue eyes immediately disappear into her skull; her heart catches up in her throat at the sensation; her legs lose all control and she’s sure she’d be on the ground if it weren’t for the Magick binding her wrists. She has always been loud, proudly so, and this is no different. Screw Wanda. Let her hear.

“Fuck, yes, fucking finally,” she whines, moans filthily, rolling her hips to the rhythm Rio sets.

Fuck control, Rio thinks. Fuck it all; this is real power. Having Agatha like this, hearing her like this, being the one to string these sounds out of her. This is fucking power.

She slides her tongue expertly through Agatha’s folds, circling her clit but refusing to touch it yet. She teases as much as she can, feeling gush after gush of wetness and bringing her tongue back down to lick up as much as she can. Her tongue traces along Agatha’s entrance, teasing for a moment, waiting, waiting…

“Rio,”

Her name. Her actual name, not Vidal, not Death, not sweetheart or baby or whatever diversion. Rio.

Without a second to waste, she thrusts her tongue up, immediately moaning at the throb of Agatha’s tight, wet walls.

“Rio, fuck, oh fuck, don’t you dare stop,” her goddess of a witch moans above her and Rio looks up with eyes filled with worship. What she would do to this woman, for this woman, what she had already done. She will spend eternity wanting nothing but her.

Rio thrusts, twists, curls her tongue until Agatha is writhing, rolling her hips, begging with her body. She waits until that moment, until she tightens just so, before Rio pulls back completely.

Agatha immediately groans at the feeling, almost predicting it. Her groan twists into a frustrated, angry scream, face and cheeks red, eyes wild as she glares down. “Fuck you!”

Rio’s eyes darken as she slowly ascends. “Watch your fucking tongue,” she warns, voice low, controlling.

Agatha leans towards the danger. “Why don’t you make me?”

“I think you’ll beg me to make you.”

Agatha laughs at this again, her need to retain control and protect her ego too high. “This again? I’d sooner let you leave me like this than beg for you to–” Her words catch in her throat as soon as she feels something familiar pressed against her thigh. Agatha doesn’t need to look down to know what it is.

“Cat got your tongue?” Rio smirks that fucking smirk, victory already in her eyes. “You know which one it is?”

Agatha gulps, her teeth pressed together hard. Of fucking course she knew which one it was. It’s the only one Rio would use. Dark green, deliciously thick, just long enough to hit that one spot that sends Agatha over Mount Everest, and, the most important part…it’s enchanted.

Rio can feel every little touch.

“You sure you don’t want to beg?” Rio tempts her again, this time adjusting between Agatha’s legs so the length of her strap presses against Agatha’s slick heat. They both grunt at the feeling, their mouths an inch apart.

Agatha breathes in a laugh. “You’ll be the one begging in a minute, hun.”

“Oh, yeah?” Rio pants, starting a slow grind. It was a calculated risk, snapping her for this strap to appear. It drove the both of them mad, Rio already feeling her grip over her self-control loosening. Agatha felt so fucking warm, so wet. Rio’s mind is filled with memories of her heat, nights spent pressed so close together she’s shocked their Magick never somehow merged them into one. She craves that closeness with her again.

Agatha twists her hips as subtly as she can, trying to get it to slip in as Rio distracts herself with dirty thoughts. “Don’t you want to feel me, baby? Don’t you miss it? Miss…me?”

Rio groans, the sound a mix of pain, want, sadness, joy, everything. Agatha makes her feel it all. She pulls back suddenly, eyes wildly pulsing with desire as she looks over Agatha’s marked body.

Agatha recognises that look of possession. “That’s right, sweetheart. If you want me to be yours, all you have to do is take me.”

Rio only had one card left up her sleeve, and it better fucking work because Agatha uses her words to play Rio like a fucking fiddle. She knew exactly what to say, when to say it, and what it was going to get her. Using her bodily strength this time, Rio unbinds Agatha’s wrists and spins her around. Within seconds, the witch is bent over the kitchen island, back arched, legs spread obediently for Rio.

“Shit.”

Rio smirks, immediately dropping a hand to spank a pale cheek. Agatha moans loud and open, greedily pushing her ass back for more. Rio gives her nothing, though, only scraping her nails along pale skin.

“Rio,” Agatha warns through gritted teeth, gasping as Rio teases her with the head of her strap. It presses against her entrance, pushing that tiny bit through before pulling back completely. “Rio!” she scolds, feeling desperation crawl up her throat. She wants to be filled by her so badly, craves it, misses it dearly. It’s always been her darkest, deepest desire, to be taken and used, treated like meat and bones by Lady Death herself. And that fucking witch knows it.

“You know what to say, Agatha. Good girls get what they want.”

Rio teases her strap again, grinding her teeth together to hold back her own moans at the feeling of that wet slick dripping over her head. It’s so simple for Agatha to say one word, one fucking word just so Rio could sink into that heat and never fucking leave. Gods, she loves her stubborn witch.

“Fuck, okay, just fucking fuck me! I want you to fuck me!” Agatha yells out, fingers gripping the edge of the island, turning whiter by the second.

With that, Rio thrusts hard, deep, whimpering at the sudden tightness, moaning with her lover as she screams in pleasure at the invasion. But she stills after that.

Agatha feels so fucking full, hasn’t felt this full in years; it’s exhilarating, it’s endless pleasure and pressure, it’s that maddening stretch that has her panting like she’s in heat. But Rio won’t fucking move. “Move. Fuck, Rio, you can move, baby,” Agatha says, reassures, letting Rio know she doesn’t need a moment of adjustment.

But the Green Witch has outdone herself today with her tricks and self-control. “I don’t think I heard you say it yet,” she husks, chuckling wickedly into Agatha’s ear as she presses up against her. Her hips are too close to Agatha’s for the witch’s hip movements to do anything and it has her almost sobbing in frustration.

“Rio,” she pleads, her tone sounding far less controlled, the sass almost gone completely. 

“You have two choices, my love,” Rio risks her choice of words, knowing so when Agatha freezes completely, “You can either say the magic word now, or I can fuck you until you’re screaming and leave you just as you’re about to–”

“Please,” Agatha breathes out, so soft Rio almost misses it. Rio freezes, not expecting Agatha to give in that easily. But Agatha takes her lack of response as a want for more, and she can’t risk the second option. She can’t. “Rio, please, I…I need you, my love.”

My love. Love, love, love…

Rio breathes out shakily, failing at shoving the feeling inside her chest away. She embraces it instead, gripping Agatha’s hips with strong, controlling hands. “I got you,” she whispers soothingly, pulling her hips back, groaning at the delicious drag of those tight, wet walls. “I got you, baby.”

Agatha won’t sob, she won’t, but she’ll shake, and she’ll whimper and whine, and she’ll bite down on her hand so fucking hard she draws blood. She lets her body go, trusting Rio’s hands to hold her, to control her hips, her pleasure. It feels like she’s floating as Rio rolls her hips over and over again, moaning behind her, whispering soft praises. It must be Magick, she thinks, to feel this way. To feel so free yet controlled at once.

She moans greedily at every thrust, begging for Rio to go, “Harder, fuck, please,” and “Faster, just like that, fuck, please don’t stop,” as she’s pushed closer and closer to the edge. She was close enough with Rio’s tongue inside, but this? Being filled and stretched to her limits, and hearing Rio’s loud, untamed moans of pleasure behind her knowing she can feel every inch of Agatha wrapped around her soul? Nothing could beat this feeling.

“Tell me,” Rio suddenly demands, her mouth to Agatha’s ear, panting filthily, biting on her earlobe. “Fucking tell me, Agatha,” she growls into her ear, teeth sinking into her neck, tongue licking the blood, lips sucking until she’s marked bright and red. 

Without another thought in her head, Agatha pants as she’s pushed back and forth by Rio’s hardening thrusts. “I want you.”

“Again,” Rio demands, groaning as Agatha’s walls tighten at the authority in her tone.

She’s weightless, her mind knowing nothing but Rio, her body feeling nothing but Rio; Rio’s strap buried deep inside her, stretching her walls so painfully good; Rio’s nipples, hard as they brush against her back; Rio’s hand suddenly creeping up and around, gripping her throat giving her that thrill of danger. All she can taste is Rio on her tongue, Rio’s Magick, Rio’s hot breath against her neck, can smell the scent of death and soil, fresh grass and the smallest hint of jasmine. She knows with every bone in her body that she belongs to Rio and she always will. She cannot escape Death.

“I want you,” she pants, her tone leaving no room for doubt, “I want you, Rio, I want you, only you, always you, I want–” She’s unsure if she can’t speak because of the intense wave of pleasure that hits her when Rio’s other hand sneaks between her legs and thumbs at her clit, or if the pressure of Rio’s grip around her back took her breath away. All she knows is Rio.

The ringing in her ear doesn’t cease as her eyes roll to the back of her head, body shaking, trembling as Rio ignores her, continues thrusting as hard and fast she can. In Agatha’s haze of pleasure, she realises Rio’s using her to chase her own high and that only pushes Agatha over the edge again. She can’t stop falling, can’t stop the guttural, almost animalistic moans from echoing in the space. The only thing that grounds her is Rio’s safe hands, Rio’s erratic, high moans as she thrusts faster and faster until her hips still, pressed to the brim inside Agatha’s pulsing walls. 

Her eyes close at some point. She’s still in the same position, Rio’s still buried deep inside her. But she’s holding her, still, face pressed into the back of her neck as her body shakes gently. She’s crying, Agatha realises. And she blames this moment of vulnerability for the tight, sad feeling in her chest at the sound. She knows how badly her love wants to be with her, knows how much it is killing her to be apart, knows of the torturous pain.

Agatha sighs, pressing her cheek to the cold marble of the island. 

Death comes for us all. 

Well…she comes for Agatha the most.

masterlist + guidelines

this is so filthy im embarassed anyway

[hypnoneghoul]

Symbol on the Surface Chapter 13

WC: 1,5k

Relationship: SwissAlps

Tags: Transmasc Swiss, Pregnancy, Mild Dysphoria, Fluff

“Do you know what ‘seahorse dad’ means?”

Notes: Tysm to @jimothybarnes for beta reading :3

Chapter 1 here or on AO3.

Read chapter 13 under the cut or on AO3.

It has always been rare for Swiss to feel dysphoric, and even though he’s been experiencing it more since he started showing, it still doesn’t happen that much.

It’s only sometimes that he’ll catch a glimpse of his reflection somewhere and fall down an ugly spiral that he has to be fished out of by his mate.

By the time Christmas comes around, Swiss is five months pregnant and he is huge.

Being ghouls, they don’t really celebrate Christmas, but everyone loves the atmosphere and the fun of it, so every year they simply…skip the christian parts. Most of the Abbey does; it’s a big thing and the name of the festivities is up to everyone’s personal preference—Christmas, Yule, Winter Solstice, or nothing at all.

One of Swiss and Mountain’s favorite parts about that time are sweaters. They love getting matching Christmas sweaters that half the world’s population would cringe at; they have so many stuffed in the back of their closet—waiting for their time to shine year after year.

Unfortunately, this year they have not accounted for Swiss’ current size. It’s been so busy, neither of them thought about the sweaters until they saw someone else wearing them and remembered about their little custom.

The multi ghoul tries. He looks for the most stretchy sweater there is and gets Mountain’s, instead of his own. They are a little oversized, anyway, it should work.

More or less…

“It’s okay if it doesn’t fit, darling, we don’t have to wear them this year,” Mountain assures him, but he knows Swiss won’t budge—and it’s not only about the damn sweater. It’s about tradition, but also about how his body is changing. He doesn’t particularly like it.

Swiss grunts as he wiggles into the sweater—refusing his mate’s offer of help—and eventually he does get it stretched over his baby bump, but the knitwear is holding on for dear life.

Mountain sighs, looking down at a strangely distorted reindeer. He looks up at the multi ghoul’s face when he hears him sniffle, though, and his heart breaks a little.

“Oh, my darling…” he coos, coming up to Swiss to hug him. “It’s okay, we can find you a different one that doesn’t squeeze you so much. Maybe Aether or Omega have something.”

“It’s not–not about the sweater,” the multi ghoul cries, whining into Mountain’s neck.

“What is it then, my heart?” he asks gently as he rubs Swiss’ back.

“I look like a sack of potatoes! How can you even look at me, I’m all swollen, and then there’s these–these fucking stretchmarks, and–and…” he sobs, but the last part seems to get stuck in his throat.

Mountain wants to know what he’s working with before he addresses every single concern of his mate. He also knows that it’s going to make everything worse if Swiss keeps some part of it in, so he prods gently, “What’s the ‘and’ about?”

The multi ghoul sighs before shoving his face further into the other’s neck to mumble out something incomprehensible.

“My heart, you know I didn’t catch that.” Swiss groans, but moves his face.

“I look like a woman…” he mutters; still quietly, but understandably now.

“My darling,” Mountain starts, pulling back to look into his mate’s eyes when he speaks, “my beloved mate, light of my life, I need you to listen to me, okay?”

He waits for Swiss to nod before carrying on, “You’ve grown because you are carrying our children inside you. Our kits, our babies; you’re going to give them life, bring them into this world! I can only imagine how it feels, and I wish I could take all the hardships of it away from you, but it truly is a wonderful thing and I couldn’t be more proud of you. You do not look like a sack of potatoes, or a woman. You look absolutely beautiful, my handsome man, and I know you can see in my eyes that I mean every single word. Can you not?”

“I can…” the multi ghoul replies quietly—as if ashamed that he’s even dared to doubt his mate. “I love you.”

“I love you, too, my heart,” Mountain smiles and brings Swiss close again for a tight—albeit careful—hug. It lasts a good couple minutes before the earth ghoul notices that his mate starts to shift his feet in discomfort; even though he doesn’t say anything. The earth ghoul pulls away. 

“Do you know what ‘seahorse dad’ means?” he asks, suddenly having remembered something that Rain had mentioned to him a couple weeks ago.

“I don’t think so…” Swiss admits.

“When seahorses make babies, it’s the males that carry them,” Mountain explains. “Apparently trans men that get pregnant are called seahorse dads because of that.”

Swiss stares at him with his mouth slightly agape for a moment. It turns into a smile before he bursts into tears again. The hormones have really turned him into a mess.

“That’s so cuteee,” he all but wails, his crying now cuteness-induced, instead of…the other kind of crying. Mountain considers it a win.

“It is,” he chuckles, wiping Swiss’ tears away, “let’s lay down and I’ll show you some pictures, hm?”

“Okay,” he sniffles and follows his mate to the bed. He cringes at the tight sweater he’s still trapped in, though. “Ough, help me out of this damn contraption.”

Mountain laughs, but helps free him, indeed.

“I’ll text the group chat and get you a sweater for this year, my heart,” he promises, and Swiss doesn’t doubt it. He knows that if Mountain didn’t manage to find one to borrow, he’d make one from scratch overnight—just so his mate wouldn’t be upset. That’s how much he loves him.

The earth ghoul lays down first and Swiss joins him right away. He snuggles himself into Mountain’s side, resting his stomach against his mate’s hip and his face in the crook of his neck. Swiss inhales deeply, trilling at that familiar scent he loves so much; the smell of the first days of summer.

As promised, Mountain gets out his phone and sends out the ‘sweater wanted’ text first, then moving onto TikTok to find some seahorse dads for Swiss—both the actual fish and pregnant trans men. The former makes the multi ghoul shed some more cuteness-tears, and the latter succeeds in boosting his confidence and chasing the dysphoria away.

They stay in bed for a little while—as they’ve been doing most of their time for the last couple weeks. Swiss needs all the rest he can get and Mountain doesn’t want to step away from him for even a second. He doesn’t have anything better to do, anyways; all his outside work is paused for the winter after he and the other earth ghouls have secured everything against the cold.

So Swiss and Mountain keep snuggling—the earth ghoul caressing the other’s stomach as he purrs—until a phone buzzes somewhere. It got lost in the sheets, but once it’s recovered, the multi ghoul chirps happily at the message.

It’s from Omega, he sent Mountain a couple photos of the sweaters he has and could not only borrow, but give away. Apparently, every time they were on tour in the winter, Terzo had gotten the older quintessence ghoul a silly Christmas sweater, so he’s got plenty.

“I can go get them right now,” Mountain offers, “got any favorites, darling?”

“Hm…” Swiss stares at the pictures, zooming in and out and thoroughly analyzing every sweater offered. The earth ghoul gives him time and after a moment he makes his decision. “This one!”

Mountain smiles, kisses Swiss on the forehead and jumps out of bed to go grab it. Omega’s only downstairs, so it’s only a moment. The multi ghoul uses that time to go to the bathroom—it’s not a quick business nowadays.

When his mate returns with the sweater, Swiss is ecstatic. He’s buzzing with excitement and if he weren’t pregnant, he’d be jumping up and down. Mountain laughs as he helps him wiggle into the sweater and while it’s clear that it wasn’t made with pregnant people in mind, it fits nearly perfectly.

The earth ghoul could just about cry, seeing his mate so happy over something so…basic and small. He brings him in for a hug.

“Merry Christmas,” Swiss purrs, nuzzling the side of his face against his mate’s.

“Merry Christmas, my heart,” Mountain whispers before kissing him—deeply, but softly. When they pull away for breath, the earth ghoul winks and gets down on his knees before Swiss.

At first he thinks he’s about to get a naughty early gift, but instead of pulling down his pants, Mountain pulls up the bottom of his—not that long ago Omega’s—sweater. Swiss looks down at him with his brows furrowed in confusion as his mate kisses his bump.

“Merry Christmas to you, too, little ones,” Mountain mumbles and Swiss tears up once again.

Taglist: @arkeusruin @skele-bunny @everybodyshusband @ratsummer @jazz-bazz @mac-and-thefox @karmicbias @wine-irytatus @ghoultrifle (if anyone from here wants to be removed lmk, and also if anyone else wants to be added)

[howlsofbloodhounds]

Want to know more about canon killer, but honestly Tumblr is kinda hard to navigate, ya got like a post about it, outside or in your blog, please?

Here’s a Google doc. It wasn’t made by me and some of the links are very out of wack, but it’s there. I’ve been thinking about making my own canon Killer google doc sometime.

I made a ao3 canon killer facts thing like awhile back, like a year. It has absolutely 0 links and I need to go back and fix it sometime, some of the stuff is outdated and worded weirdly so im not really gonna link it, but you can find it on my pinned post.

But I would mostly recommend going to the search on my blog and looking up/clicking on the tag #canon k1ll_sans. You’ll find canon posts I reblogged from his creator and posts I made/reblogs I tagged with it.

I would also definitely recommend giving Killer’s friend, Color and his AU, Othertale, a look if you haven’t already. You can find stuff about his canon on my blog under the tags #0thertale and #canon c0lor sans, but if you don’t want to do that, there’s a link to a google doc I made highlighted in green on my pinned post.