#I promise I'm trying to get back into it but it's just hard when I fall off for months at a time | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

seitmai · 16 hours ago

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“On my polaroid,” Bob explained. “To have while I’m gone.” You smiled softly. “Yeah,” you agreed. “That’s okay.” His expression perked up. He gave you a soft kiss. “Thank you, sweetheart,” Bob drawled, his accent sweet.

Urgh this was just such a soft and trusting conversation 🥰

“What do you want me to do, sir?” You asked. You wanted Bob to take charge of this. Not just because the pictures were for him, but because you were nervous. You were ovulating. You had been casually trying with Bob. The two of you had stopped using condoms, but you had started tracking your cycle. You were ready. You hadn’t told Bob. He wanted kids too, you had stopped using protection on purpose, but you were nervous about it.

No risk no fun as they say 🤭

“Smile for me, honey,” Bob called. The absurdity of the context pulled a giggle from you and the camera flashed again. He looked down at you thoughtfully, planning out his next masterpiece. He smirked when his idea came.

Oh he's having the time of his life 😌

“That’s my good girl,” Bob cooed as you sucked on his finger. The camera flashed again. He slowly drew his hand away from your mouth. He slid his hand to rest on your throat. The pressure was firm, but not restricting. The camera flashed again. His hands kept moving down to your breasts, squeezing them in a way that would leave bruises in the morning as the camera flashed once more.

There is something so hot about knowing there are some lustful bruises in places where no one gets to see them 😮‍💨

“I know, baby,” Bob cooed in understanding. “I promise that I’ll give you everything you want, but you have to be patient.” Something in his tone was different. He knew what you really wanted from him. He knew you wanted him to make you a mother.

He knows 😮‍💨

“Fuck! Bobby!” You cried out in pleasure. The camera flashed. Your walls pulsated around Bob’s fingers and your legs shook. You arched your back away from the mattress. The camera flashed. You opened your eyes to see Bob’s adoring stare as he flashed the camera once more on your sweaty, fucked out face.

🥵🥵🥵

“I know, baby,” he cooed. “Me too.” You moaned softly. Bob had gotten himself in position to take another picture. He had his thick cock in his hand, lined up perfectly with your wet slit. He held the camera in his other hand. His eyes flicked up to yours. “Ready?” He asked. You nodded quickly. Bob pushed his cock into you. The camera flashed several times—some photos on your face or your body, and a few at the spot where you were connected.

I just live checking in even in auch a moment of lust and passion, so hot 🤤

You came without warning, but kept your moans in. You weren’t supposed to come without asking. Bob kept fucking into you and you thought you’d gotten away with it when you came again. You were doing your best to keep your breathing even and not pass out as you recovered. Then Bob switched arms and pulled your other leg around his hip as well. You knew that you were going to squirt this time.

Oh he knows hat he is doing 🥵

“You’re so pretty when you come, baby girl,” Bob drawled. His accent was thicker when he used the low tone that he would pull during sex. He knew how much it drove you crazy. “How many times was that? Be honest, I know you came at least once without telling me.”

Not the thick accent 😮‍💨

“All you had to do was ask, baby,” Bob said with a smile. He began fucking you again, faster this time. If you wanted his cum he was going to give it to you. You clawed at his back and he left hickies over your chest and neck. Bob reached down between your bodies to rub circles over your clit. You moaned loudly.

I'm melting 🫠

“I’m not done, sweetheart. If we want you to get pregnant I should probably give you more than one load.” You whimpered at the thought alone. Bob could already feel himself getting hard again. He rubbed your clit slowly, making you clench and flex around him. It was just what he needed to make him rock hard again. You moaned at the feeling of him hardening inside you.

Already a dad that goes the extra mile 🤭

“Want to see?” Bob asked. You nodded as you scooted over to his side. The two of you looked through the photos, Bob complimenting something about you in each one. When you got to the photo you had taken of him you grinned widely.

🥰🥰🥰

“Could you write me notes on them? Like you do with my lunches?” Bob asked shyly. You grinned at him, leaning to kiss him gleefully. You pulled away with a smile still on your face. He always told you how much he loved the notes you put in his lunch everyday.

Urgh that is just the cutest 🥹🥰 and the perfect balance after such filth 🤭

flashes

pairing: Bob Floyd x reader

warnings: SMUT 18+, nude photos, fingering, m receiving oral, breeding, p in v, dacryphilia, squirting, minor degradation, minor praise, creampie,

summary: you buy a special set of lingerie when you know you're ovulating and Bob asks if he can take pictures of you while you fuck.

word count: 3.2k

“Can I take pictures of you?”

Bob’s question surprised you. You had sent him nudes before, and it wasn’t like he had never seen photos of you, but he had never taken any himself. You did look good. His jaw had literally dropped when he saw you. You bought a special lingerie set to wear that night. It wasn’t too fancy, but it was Bob’s favorite shade of blue and it was made of a thin mesh material that left little to the imagination.

“You want to take pictures of me?” You questioned.

“On my polaroid,” Bob explained. “To have while I’m gone.” You smiled softly.

“Yeah,” you agreed. “That’s okay.” His expression perked up. He gave you a soft kiss.

“Thank you, sweetheart,” Bob drawled, his accent sweet. He scrambled from his place on the edge of the bed. You had instructed him to wait there while you made your grand entrance from the bathroom after changing into your lingerie set. He fished his polaroid camera out of its place in the closet and loaded it up with a new set of film.

“Could you get on your knees for me?” Bob asked. You smirked as you fell to your knees in front of him. You reached for his belt, carefully unbuckling it and shoving his pants down his legs. He was already rock hard, the idea of photographing you had been enough to wind him up. You spit on your hand and then wrapped your fingers around his cock. He moaned softly. You leaned down and gave his tip a few kitten licks, cleaning up the precum that was leaking out of him.

“Look up at me,” Bob called. “Stick your tongue out.” You turned your eyes up towards Bob to find he was pointing the camera down at you. He took his cock in his free hand and pressed it down against your tongue before the camera flashed. Bob dropped the photo on the bedside table, where a stack of them would soon sit. While he was distracted you let his cock push down your throat. He gasped in surprise, knees nearly giving out beneath him.

“Jesus, honey,” Bob groaned. You hummed in satisfaction around him, pleased that you had caught him off guard. He was good at teasing you, and you always had to find your own ways to get back at him.

Bob turned his focus back down to you as you deepthroated his thick cock. He pulled your hair back into a makeshift ponytail so he could see you as your lips moved up and down his shaft. He groaned as he gently guided you up and down, keeping the control mostly in your hands.

“Look up,” Bob called. You flicked your eyes up to see the lens of the camera facing you. You gave your best innocent doe eyes as the camera flashed again. He pulled you off his cock, tossing the picture with the other.

“What next, Robby?” You asked as you licked your lips. He lifted you to your feet and pulled you in for a kiss.

“I want to get some of you in this pretty little thing you bought for me, sweetheart,” Bob told you cheekily. “Lay on the bed.” You quickly followed his instruction, climbing onto the bed and laying out on your back. You spread your hair around your head and adjusted the lingerie set. Bob was crouched on his knees, looming above you as he pointed the camera down at your body.

“Spread your legs for me,” Bob requested. “Squeeze those pretty tits I love so much.” You moaned softly at the idea. He was really indulging himself. You followed his instructions and the camera flashed again.

Bob kneeled over your hips so he could reach you better. He pushed his thumb down against your tongue. You closed your lips around it, letting your tongue slide against it.

“I want your bra off,” Bob told you. You leaned up from the mattress and pulled the fabric off, leaving you nearly bare in front of him. He grabbed your tits, thumb rubbing over your nipples briefly. He sunk his fingers around your round breast and flashed the camera again.

“Can I have your cock now, sir?” You begged. Bob smirked.

“No,” Bob said. “I want some pictures with my fingers inside your pretty little pussy first.” You sighed in disapproval.

“Hurry up then,” you whined. He chuckled.

“Be patient,” Bob told you. “I want to take my time with you.” As much as you were desperate for Bob’s cock you couldn’t help the small whimper that his words pulled from you. “Can you lift your legs up for me?” He requested. You smiled softly at him as you lifted your legs into the air so he could remove your panties. He tossed them off the side of the bed.

Bob looked down at your bare cunt, glistening with your arousal for him. He put the camera down and used both hands to stroke up and down your thighs. His touch was featherlight, drawing goosebumps to your skin.

“Robby…” You whispered needily.

“Please just touch my pussy, Robby,” you begged. “However you want. I don’t care. I just need to feel you there.” Bob smiled. He moved a single finger to your clit, gently rubbing circles around it to appease you. The moment Bob’s finger made contact with your clit your back arched in the air and your mouth fell open in a silent moan.

“Open your eyes,” Bob ordered. When you did the camera flashed on your face.

“Are you ready for a finger?” He asked.

“Can I have two?” You pleaded. Bob considered your request. You were being good for him and you were letting him live out this fantasy.

“Okay, honey,” Bob agreed. “Two it is.” He sucked his ring and middle fingers between his lips, coating them in his spit. “Ready?” He asked as he aimed the camera towards your dripping twat. You nodded furiously.

“Please,” you begged. “I need you.” Bob smirked. You needed him. Wasn’t that sweet?

“I’ve got you, baby.” No sooner did you feel Bob’s fingertips gently sliding through your folds. You inhaled sharply, waiting for him to give you what you wanted. He was filled with a wave of pride at the small sound. It made him desperate to give you what you wanted. He pushed his fingers into you, his movement quick enough to relieve your desire without being harsh. The camera flashed.

“Thank you, Robby,” You mewled.

“You’re welcome, honey,” Bob cooed back. He kept a steady rhythm inside you as he snapped another picture of your cunt with his fingers buried in it. “You’re so sexy, sweetheart,” Bob groaned as he felt you clench down on his fingers.

“I want your cock, Robby,” you whined.

“Come on my fingers first,” Bob pleaded with you. He put the camera down and reached down with his other hand to rub tight circles around your clit with his thumb. You moaned in surprise and kicked your legs against the mattress.

“That’s it, sweetheart,” Bob cooed. “Come for me.” He hooked his fingers against your walls, pressing into your g spot as he sped up his movements on your clit.

“You’re so beautiful, sweetheart,” Bob murmured. Tears sprung to your eyes despite his sweet praise.

“Your cock, Robby,” you whined. “Need your cock, please.” You sniffled as you fell into a state of total desperation for only one thing. Bob’s eyes softened upon seeing your tears. He quickly reached up to wipe them away.

“I’m sorry, baby,” Bob whispered softly. He crawled up your body, bringing the camera with him. “Didn’t realize just how bad you needed me.” He lined the swollen head of his cock up with your dripping hole.

“Always need you this bad, Robby,” you whimpered. Bob kissed your nose softly.

“Ohh, Robert…” You moaned slowly as you felt him fill the emptiness that you’d needed him to fill. Bob cursed quietly. You looked up at him. He was beautiful, his hair stuck to his forehead with sweat and his body tight around you.

“Can I take a picture of you?” You asked. Bob smirked.

“Yeah, honey,” he agreed. “You can take one.” He handed you the camera. You pointed it up at him and reached up, dragging your nails down his chest as the camera flashed. You handed him the camera and the undeveloped photo.

“Thank you, Bobby.” Bob put the camera and photo to the side and turned his focus fully on you. He leaned down on his forearm so he could kiss your neck as his hips fucked slowly into you. He grabbed your leg with his other hand, pulling it up around his hip so he could get just a bit deeper.

“Can I come?” You cried out suddenly, unsure whether you’d be able to hold it anyway.

“Yes, baby,” Bob agreed. You let the electric pleasure run over you, whimpering and whining as you did. Bob wore a proud grin as he watched your face contorting in pleasure and felt you clench down on his hard cock. Clear fluid sprayed out over his cock. Bob reached down and rubbed back and forth on your clit, splashing your cum all over the sheets. You were panting as Bob stilled his hips, still buried inside you.

“Including when you fingered me?” You asked shyly.

“Yes, sweetheart,” Bob replied.

“Four,” you told him quietly, awaiting your punishment for the two unpermitted orgasms.

“Why are you so horny today, huh?” Bob asked. You looked away. You knew exactly why. It was why you’d bought the lingerie. Bob wanting to take pictures had been a surprising bonus. “Answer me,” Bob pushed.

“I’m ovulating,” you admitted in a whisper. Bob groaned roughly. He made one quick and deep thrust into you, pulling a surprised gasp from you.

“You want me to get you pregnant, baby?” Bob asked, his voice as slow and smooth as molasses. You nodded. “Tell me, honey. Tell me what you want.”

“I want you to get me pregnant, Robby,” you told him. “I want you to fuck your cum deep into me.”

“Can I please come?” You begged.

“Yeah, baby, go ahead,” Bob told you. You fell apart on Bob’s cock, tightening down on him as he thrust into you. He moaned loudly, making a few harsh thrusts into you before you felt him coming deep into you. He kept fucking into you as he rode out his orgasm. You were slowly coming down. He leaned back onto his knees so he was upright and grabbed your hips. He lifted you and pulled you down against him, getting deeper than you had ever felt him before. The new sensation threw you into another unexpected orgasm and you cried out in pleasure, milking Bob’s cock for everything he could give you.

“Thank you, Robby,” you whimpered. Bob chuckled.

“Give it to me, Robby,” you whined. Bob didn’t need any other words of encouragement to begin fucking into you. He started off with a steady pace–not too fast, but not slow either. You were falling apart regardless, completely unable to hold in orgasms anymore as you lost yourself in the pleasure of Bob’s cock. He hit just the right spot and you felt the tightness in your stomach exploding again.

“Are you coming again?”

“Yes, Robby,” you gasped. “I’m–ungh–I’m sorry. I can’t h-help it,” you whined.

“Pathetic little thing, aren’t you?” Bob taunted. The degradation only made you come harder. His dog tags were dangling over you as he thrust in and out. You reached up and twisted the chain around your finger, tugging him down to meet your lips. He kissed you with a passion that reminded you of the very first time you kissed. His thrusts were getting more irregular as you continued pulsing around him. He reached down to your clit, desperate to pull one last orgasm from you. He rubbed against the sensitive nub, lubricated by his own cum leaking out around his cock.

You screamed out in overwhelming pleasure and came again. Fire burned through your body as every part of your body tightened and then snapped into a release. You were moaning loudly, not really aware of the sounds that were coming out of your mouth. You started squirting again, the fluid spraying out around Bob’s cock as he continued to fuck into you. He groaned loudly at the sight. Bob grunted, gasping loudly before hammering harshly into you with a deafening moan as he emptied everything he had into you. Bob rolled off of you after a moment. The two of you lay there, quietly catching your breath as the two of you each recovered from the strongest orgasms either of you had ever had.

“How many times was that for you, sweetheart?” Bob asked after a moment.

“Eight, I think,” you admitted.

“Jesus,” Bob said. “I hope the pregnancy hormones are this good too.”

“You came so much, Robby. I can feel it inside me,” you murmured. “It’s so warm.”

“Will you push it out for me, baby? Will you show me what I gave you?” Bob requested. He leaned up and grabbed the camera.

“That’s not gonna help me get pregnant,” you said.

“I’ll push it back into you, baby. Besides, I fucked my first load real deep into you,” he said.

“You’re so dirty, Robby,” you teased. Bob smiled. He kissed your thigh.

“Please, baby?” You rolled your eyes but smiled. You clenched your insides, trying to push out the thick cumload Bob had given you. Suddenly you felt the warm liquid dripping down your folds. “Fucking hell, honey.” He took one last picture. He scooped his cum back up onto his fingers, pushing it back into you again. He crawled up the bed to be level with you, putting the camera on the bedside table and picking up the stack of photos.

“You look so sexy, Bobby,” you said. Bob chuckled.

“Glad you think so, honey,” he said. You bumped your arm against him.

“You’re an adonis, Bobby. Completely out of my league,” you said with a smile. Bob rolled his eyes.

“Honey, I’m in a squad with adonises, but I ain’t one,” Bob joked.

“Oh, please. None of them even compare to you. You had me wrapped around your finger the moment I saw your eyes,” you said in reflex. Bob could tell you meant it by how quickly you said it.

“I love you, baby,” he said simply. You looked up at him and kissed him gently.

“I love you too.” Bob turned back to the photos.

“Yes,” you said simply. “Do you want them to be sexy or sweet?” You asked. Bob smiled softly.

“Both, just like you.” Bob flipped to the picture of his cum dripping out of your pussy. He hummed softly at it. “I sorta wish I could’ve had one with my cum on your face too,” he said. You smirked.

“I think I can make that happen.”

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javierpena-inatacvest · 3 days ago

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Chapter 21- Paradise

Summary: Now that you and Javi are married, it's time for you to enjoy two weeks of nothing but your three favorite "S's"- Sun, sand, and sex. Lots of Sex.

Word Count: 13.9K

Warnings: SMUT (18+) unprotected p in v sex, oral (f and m receiving) vaginal fingering, praise kink, marriage kink, big, fat, nasty, unspeakable breeding kink (WHOOPS), stopping birth control/starting a family, kind of semi-public sex (sex on the beach hehe), alcohol/drinking (y'all are getting wasted at the pool), I'm convinced these two can't have sex without getting caught (sorry, Chucho), Javi in a bathing suit, these two are so stupidly in love

A/N: ..... Hey.... Y'all remember when I actually wrote for this story.... 😭 I'm genuinely SO sorry that this chapter took me literal months to finish, but she is finally here!!! Thank you so much for all of your patience and the love you've shown these two even in this story's absence 🥺 I hope you enjoy these two horndogs on their honeymoon!!!

Series Masterlist Next Chapter Previous Chapter

“We have all of our bags?”

“Yup.”

“Passports?”

“Mhmmmm.”

“Plane tickets?”

“Yes.”

“We’re positive that we have-”

“Baby, I promise, I triple checked everything this morning, it’s all waiting by the front door, all we have to do now is just wait for my dad to pick us up and take us to the airport, and all my wife needs to do is take a deep breath and relax.”

My wife.

Even though you had been married for less than 24 hours, you knew the sentiment of finally getting to be Javi’s wife wasn’t wearing off on you any time soon.

Javi smiled, playfully crossing his arms and raising an eyebrow at you as you ran through your honeymoon inventory again, knowing damn well you looked like a fool in your frantic pre-traveling state. You more than trusted that Javi had everything the two of you needed before you left for the airport, but you just couldn’t shake the fact that you felt like you were forgetting something, despite all your checks and re-checks.

“Well, your wife will be much more relaxed once we land after being trapped in a flying tin can and have two feet on the ground again.” You sighed, trying not to let your fear of flying override your excitement to finally arrive in the Bahamas later that day. “God, I feel like I forgot to pack something important but I can’t figure out what.”

As you stared in frustration at your pile of suitcases, you could feel Javi sneaking behind you, flushing his chest to your back as his arms wrapped around your waist, pulling you closer to him as he rested his chin on your shoulder, planting a soft kiss on your temple.

“I think I know what it is.” Javi smirked, his kisses traveling down your jaw as he nipped at your ear, making you turn your head back toward him in confusion.

“Oh, so now you’re a husband and a mind reader. That honestly will come in very handy.” You teased, giggling while you shifted around to face him, draping his arms around his neck as his hands traveled down your waist, reaching down to grab a handful of your ass. “Jesus Javi, what in the world am I forgetting, because you seem pretty darn happy I can’t remember it.”

“You really don’t know?” Javi asked, almost mockingly, tightening his grip around your hips, peppering kisses along your jaw and neck, the hot words of his breath dancing across your skin.

“No, Mr. Mind Reader, I don’t, and you’re making it very hard to concentrate and figure out what it is.”

You were trying your best to genuinely let your brain run out its train of thought, but as Javi’s kisses across your collarbone became wetter and sloppier, trying to form any sort of coherent idea was practically impossible.

Javi paused for a moment, reaching both hands up to cusp your face, his broad hands cradling your jaw as his thumbs swiped across your cheeks, looking up at him to see the boyish grin spread from cheek to cheek.

“You’re forgetting something because you’re forgetting to bring it on purpose. Something we threw away this morning, remember?”

Oh shit.

You were forgetting something. Only, now that you finally remembered what it was, you couldn’t be happier that you had forgotten it.

Your birth control.

As Javi watched your face quickly fade from confusion to delight, your grin was just about as wide as his, biting down on your lip to try and contain your excitement while your heart felt like it was going to beat out of your chest.

The two of you could actually start trying for a baby.

“You remember now?” Javi teased, laughing to himself at how wide your eyes had gone, practically beaming from the inside out at your husband, feeling butterflies swirl in your stomach and heat building in your core.

Leaning up, your mouth met Javi’s in a sloppy dance of tongues and teeth, lips crashing together in electric excitement, grabbing a fistfull of the fitted green t-shirt covering his chest and tugging him closer towards you.

“How much longer until your dad is supposed to be here?” You rasped, already breathing heavily from your frantic kisses and anticipation.

Quickly, Javi looked down at his watch wrapped around his wrist, the gears turn in his brain, calculating if the two of you had enough time to do what he knew you were proposing.

“Fuck- Like, 40 minutes?”

Without saying a word, both of you agreed in silent, rushed nods that 40 minutes was enough time to give yourself enough of a buffer, and the risk definitely didn’t outweigh the reward, knowing there was no way in hell that you could wait an entire plane ride and arriving at your hotel room to fuck.

In an instant, your mouths were crashing together again, Javi grabbing the underside of your thighs to hoist you up, wrapping your legs around his waist as he carried you back towards the couch in the living room, the back of his knees hitting the sofa as he collapsed into his seat, you still straddling his lap without ever parting your lips.

Javi’s hands crept below the hem of your shirt, shuffling it over your head and tossing it on the floor before shuffling your shorts and underwear off to join your top in a crumpled pile on the floor. Your hands worked rapidly at the waistband of Javi’s shorts, lifting up off his lap to push them down his thighs, revealing the hard and weeping mess his cock had already become since carrying you over to the couch, your cunt aching at the sight of his length and how desperately you wanted to be filled by it.

“God, I wanna fuck you so bad.” You whimpered between your wet kisses, shifting yourself closer to hover over his dick, so turned on that you were convinced that your arousal was already dripping down your thighs at an embarrassing rate.

“Baby, you have no fucking idea.” Javi groaned, dragging his fingers through your folds, your body jolting at the sensation at the pads of his fingers rubbing over your clit, throbbing and aching under his touch. “Jesus Christ, you’re so fucking wet.”

Reaching down to wrap your hand around the base of his cock, stroking it a few times, you slowly lowered yourself down onto his tip, knowing that with your limited time and how turned on you were, you didn’t want to feel anything besides the sweet sting of Javi’s stretch filling you to the brim.

The two of you moaned in unison as you sank down on his length, bottoming out until you had taken every inch of him, taking a second to adjust to his size before rolling your hips over his lap in figure eights.

“F-fuck, you feel so good, Javi.” You whined, circling your bottom half faster, the friction of the hairs at the base of Javi’s cock rubbing deliciously against your clit combined with Javi groping at your breasts, sucking at one of your pebbled nipples while he rolled the other between his fingers, making your breath hitch in the back of your throat.

Javi began to let his hips rut up into yours, thrusting his length deeper into your cunt as you rode him, his hands sliding down the sides of your body and wrapping around your ass, massaging the plump flesh between his fingers while his lips crashed into yours again, catching each other’s muffled moans.

“F-fuck…” Javi whined, tightening his grip to try and maintain his composure as his thoughts began to flow straight from his brain through his mouth. “I’m gonna fuck you so full of me, Osita. Fuck a baby into you, get you pregnant, watch you grow our our kid and give us our perfect family.”

“Oh my god- fuck- yes. Please, Javi. Fuck, I want you to knock me up. I wanna- fuck- I wanna make you a daddy.” You moaned, running your hands through the dark curls of Javi’s hair as he began to pound into you even harder, his fingertips gripping your hips with bruising intensity as he guided you up and down his cock, the two of you both so lost in your own pleasure that you hadn’t heard a faintly familiar voice echoing from the front door.

“Javi, Mija, I know I’m a little early but I figured you’d rather get to the airport earlier than later!”

Little did poor Chucho know that today was one of the few times in his life that he would regret showing up anywhere earlier than expected.

Surprised by the lack of response, despite the packed and stacked bags waiting by the front door, an unsuspecting Chucho kicked off his boots and began meandering down the entryway towards your living room, where and even more unsuspecting you and Javi were half dressed and sprawled across your couch trying to make a baby.

“Javier? Mija? Are you two ready to leave soon? I was hoping that- Oh Dios Mio!”

“AHHHHHHH!”

With Javi’s back to his dad as you sat in his lap, you were the first to lock eyes with your now father-in-law, your jaw practically falling to the floor as you let out a panicked shriek, causing Javi to whip his own head around, terror running through his veins as he frantically threw you off his lap and tried to cover the both of you with the nearest blanket he could find.

“Jesus Christ, Pops!” Javi shouted, hands covering his face that had turned bright red in quite possibly the world's worst kind of embarrassment. “Why are you here so early?! Please just, I- I don’t know, for Christ’s sake, please go wait outside!” He sighed, pointing towards the front door where Chucho had just regrettably entered from.

“How was I supposed to know!? I figured I would be safe! Say no more, I will just go wait on the front porch. Aye, aye, aye…” Chucho replied, quickly scampering away towards the door, eyes peeled to the ground and arms up in self-defense, waiting until you heard the soft slam and clicking lock behind him before peering out from underneath your blanket shield.

“Jesus fucking Christ…” Javi groaned, hands still covering his face as you looked up at him, cheeks glowing beet red in embarrassment.

“Please don’t tell me your dad just walked in on us having sex…” You winced, absolutely knowing the answer to your question, but still somehow praying that maybe, just maybe, you were imaging things.

“... My dad definitely just walked in on us having sex.” Javi sighed, his face as almost as red as yours, scrambling to find your clothes scattered between the cushions, tossing them over to you, frantically trying to cover yourself up to save any ounce of dignity you had left.

“Well, looks like I am going to start walking to the airport because I don’t think I can ever make eye contact with your dad again…” You muttered, making you and Javi laugh just enough to try and ease the uncomfortable tension, wondering how in the world you were supposed to spend an entire ride to the airport with Chucho without wanting to crawl out of your skin. “I thought you said he was supposed to get here later!”

“Well that’s what I thought too, but apparently not!” Javi grumbled, shuffling his shirt over his head, combing his hand through his hair to try and fix the mess you had made raking your fingers through it.

“Guess we won’t have any worries about getting to the airport on time…”

“Guess you’re right about that. Fuck me…”

“Sure you don’t wanna start walking?”

While Chucho, you and Javi had seemingly made a silent pact to not say a peep to each other the entire car ride for the duration of your drive, every passing second seemed more awkward and uncomfortable than the last, truly regretting your decision to not grab your bags and walk along the highway to try and catch your flight.

It wasn’t until Chucho began pulling up to drop the two of you off that he decided it was time to break your truce, his eyes meeting yours in the rear view mirror as the two of you sat awkwardly in the backseat, bracing yourself the moment you could feel his mouth begin to open.

“You know, the night of our wedding, Lucia and I just couldn’t keep our hands off each other either, it was so-”

“Dad!” Javi interjected, his face physically scrunching in pain at the thought of how his father planned to complete the rest of that thought, trying to cut him off before he could get any further.

“Lo siento (Sorry)! God forbid I try to do something to ease the tension!” Chucho chuckled, throwing his hands up in defense at his statement.

“I don’t think where you were headed was the way to do that, Pops.” Javi muttered, letting out another deep sigh of embarrassment.

“Well lucky for you, it looks like we’re here.” Chucho smiled, pulling into one of the parking spots outside of your gate and turning off the ignition. “Here, let me help you with the bags in the trunk and-”

“Nope, already got it, Pops, please do not get out of the car.” Javi begged, practically sprinting out of the backseat to the trunk, you quickly following behind him, beginning to sheepishly unload your luggage from the car.

Of course, Chucho being Chucho was not about to take no for an answer, slowly fumbling his way out of the car to greet the two of you at the trunk with a mischievous grin stretched ear to ear.

“Pops, please, I told you I’ve got it, I-”

“Oh hush, Javier, I am just coming out to say goodbye, yo promento (I promise).” Chucho laughed, grabbing Javi by the shoulder, giving him a little shake.

“Bye Chucho.” You grimaced, leaning in reluctantly for a hug. “Thanks for dropping us off. S-sorry about earlier.” You couldn’t help but wince again, eyes darting to the ground at your last sentence.

“Oh mija, don’t apologize. Could be worse.”

“I’m not really sure how it could be…” You whispered under your breath, just loud enough for Javi to hear, making him hold back a snort.

“Besides, I think this bodes well for my bet I have placed.” Chucho smirked, crossing his arms over his chest as the two of you looked at him in confusion,

“Your bet?” Javi asked, raising an eyebrow at his dad.

“Mhmmm. The bet between me, your family, Mija, and the Murphy’s.”

“As much as I love a vague and cryptic guessing game, any chance you’re gonna tell us what that bet is?” You laughed uncomfortably, looking back between Javi and Chucho.

“Oh, don’t you worry, Mija. I think the two of you will know soon enough. Okay, enough of that! I will let the two of you go. Have a safe flight and a wonderful trip. I couldn’t be happier for the two of you. Enjoy your first of your many amazing adventures as a married couple.”

While you couldn’t deny you still weren’t far off from wanting to find the nearest hole and disappear in, you couldn’t help but feel your cheeks warm at the sentiment of Chucho’s well-wishes, placing your hand in Javi’s and squeezing it tight, beaming up at your husband with love and excitement.

“Thanks, Pops.”

“Claro (of course). Alright, mijos, adios. Have fun. But not too much fun, if you know what I-”

“Yup, we know exactly what you mean, bye, Dad!” Javi grunted, gently turning his father around and pushing him back towards the car making him laugh, giving the both of you one last wave goodbye before disappearing down the road.

“Jesus Christ, I’m glad that’s over…” Javi sighed, wrapping his arm around your waist, pressing a kiss to your forehead.

“You can say that again. What bet do you think he was talking about?”

“Honestly, no fucking clue. And truth be told, right now, I couldn’t care less. Because right now,” He paused, leaning down to hold your cheek in his palm, forcing your gaze up at him, “all I care about,” he paused once again, planting a playful kiss on your lips, “is getting my beautiful wife onto this plane so we can start our honeymoon.”

“Say it again.” You smiled, pressing up on your tiptoes to kiss him back.

“My wife. My beautiful, amazing, drop dead gorgeous wife, who has single-handedly made me the luckiest man in the entire world.” Javi smirked, biting down on his lip as his grip tightened around you, making you giggle.

“Easy there, Romeo, we still have a whole flight to get through, ya know.”

Fortunately, your flight and arrival to the Bahamas was much less eventful than anything that had happened this morning, the embarrassment of your father-in-law’s unfortunate timing quickly fading away as you strolled up to the front desk to check into your room for the next ten days of nothing but what you had deemed your three favorite “S’s”-

Sun, sand, and sex.

Lots of sex.

“Hi there! Welcome! My name is Cassandra, how can I help the two of you today?” A woman smiled politely from behind the check-in desk, quickly clacking away at her keyboard.

“Hi. We’re checking in for Peña.” Javi beamed, grabbing your hand in his, gently rubbing his thumb over both sets of rings wrapped around your finger, knowing there wasn’t a chance in hell he’d ever get used to the fact he was lucky enough to get to call you his wife for the rest of his life.

“Perfect! Let me get right on that.” She nodded, fingers tapping across the keys as she looked up your information. “Any special reason for your stay here?”

“Honeymoon.” The two of you answered in sync, laughing to yourselves at your well timed response.

“Well why didn’t you say that to begin with?! Let me see if I have anything I can upgrade you to for your stay!” Cassandra scoffed, almost comedically offended that your opening line hadn’t been “It’s our honeymoon, upgrade our room please!”

“Oh, you don’t have to-”

“Oh, honey, please. This is my favorite part of my job. Absolutely the least I can do for the two of you. Congratulations. Just give me one second here and…. Ah! Yes! I thought this one was available. Let’s upgrade you to the Ocean View King Suite. This one is one of my favorite rooms. You get the most beautiful view of the sunrise right from your balcony!”

You and Javi looked at each other beaming, grins plastered across your faces in surprise. “Thank you so much, this is so nice of you to do for us.” You smiled.

“Of course. Least that I can do. Like I said, it’s one of the highlights of doing this job. Alright, well, here are your room keys!” Cassandra grinned, passing the key cards and room information over the concierge desk and handing them to you and Javi. “If you head over to your right, there’s a bay of elevators that will take you to your room. I hope that you two have a wonderful stay, and enjoy your honeymoon!”

“Thank you again, we really appreciate it.” Javi nodded, stuffing things into his pocket before leaning down to give you a kiss and reaching back to grab his suitcase and your hand in his.

As Javi turned, leading the two of you towards the elevator, you couldn’t help but laugh at Cassandra’s face, her eyebrow playfully raised and head nodding in approval, pointing at Javi and giving you a thumbs up, as if you needed more confirmation that you had made a top-tier choice on the man you were going to spend the rest of your life with.

“What’s so funny?” Javi smirked, tilting his head in confusion at your giggles as the two of you stepped into the elevator with the small crowd of people on their way back to their hotel rooms.

“Nothing. Just some reassurance that I cleaned up pretty damn well in the husband department, which I can’t say I disagree with.” You snickered, reaching up to wrap your hand around his jaw, squeezing his cheeks in your grasp.

“You’re such a dork, you know that?”

“A dork who is now your wife, thank you very much.” You sassed, crossing your arms over your chest, making the two of you laugh quietly to yourselves until the ding of the elevator caught your attention. “Oh! I think this is us!” Quickly scrambling to grab your suitcase, you dashed out of the elevator as the doors parted, followed by Javi, trying to keep up with your excited pace.

“Alright, Mrs. Dork, we’re room 2331.” Javi grinned, pulling the information from the front desk out of his pocket, scanning the hallway for rooms approaching your number, watching you search in front of him with detective-like accuracy.

“Okay, let’s see, 2329… 2330… Here! Here it is! 2331!” You beamed, showing off the number of your room Vanna White style to Javi as he began to slip the room key into the card reader, pausing for a moment to stare at you with his sweet brown eyes in the midst of your goofiness. “What’s that look for?” You teased, smiling back at him.

“Just reminding myself of how lucky I am. I love you, Mrs. Peña.”

Mrs. Peña.

You couldn’t help but let your heart skip a beat at the sound of him saying it, still not quite sure that the incredible reality of your new last name had completely sunk in with you yet.

“I love you too, Mr. Peña. Now, you gonna open this door so we can put this room to use or what?” You smirked, raising your eyebrow at him playfully, gesturing towards your hotel room door.

With a quick swipe of your room key the two of you unlocked your door to get a first glimpse of your hotel room. At first, the both of you were convinced you must have been in the wrong place, because this was the most beautiful, luxurious hotel room that you had ever laid eyes on. Complete with a giant king bed covered in fresh white sheets, free standing tub, huge couch and living room area, newly renovated, and most impressively, a huge set of sliding glass doors that lead to your balcony overlooking a breath-taking view of the beach and ocean below you.

Mental note to self- you owed Cassandra at the big desk the biggest thank you ever.

“Holy shit, Javi. This is gorgeous.” You muttered to yourself, dropping your bags off at one of the closets at the front of the room as you began to wander and explore, gently poking and prodding around as if you were a tourist in a museum, rather than a hotel guest in your own room.

“It’s got no lack of options, that’s for sure.” Javi laughed quietly to himself, following behind you as he set down his own bags before doing an investigation of his own, the majority of which was spent watching you excitedly explore the in’s and outs of your new home for the next 10 days.

“No lack of options?” You asked, tilting your head in confusion, as you turned towards Javi, hands resting on his hips with a smug grin spread from ear to ear.

“Mmmhmmm.” He replied, making his way towards you until his hands were wrapped around your waist, pulling you against his chest to force your gaze up at his brown eyes, pooling with an equal combination of excitement and mischief. “No lack of options in this room for places I get to fuck my beautiful wife.”

“You’re so bad!” You teased, giving him a little slap to his chest as the two of you laughed, knowing that you had the exact same thought, he was just the first to say it.

“Oh c’mon, like you didn’t think the same thing.”

“Okay listen… you’re not wrong. I would be a liar if I didn’t walk in here and think about how many different furniture choices we could fuck on before we had to leave.” You sighed in a playful defeat, your breaths slowly transforming to light and giggly to low and needy as Javi slid his hands resting on your hips down to your ass, palming it in his grasp.

Craning his head down to rest in the crook of your neck, you couldn’t help but moan as he sucked at your pulse point, wet kisses consuming your neck and jawline as a damp patch began to pool in your underwear, falling apart under Javi’s touch.

“Well if that’s the case, what should we break in first, Osita? What does mi esposa (my wife) want? ” Javi hummed, slipping his hands under the waistband of your shorts and underwear, pushing them over your hips and down your legs until they pooled around your ankles, leaving your bottom half bare.

Snaking his hand between your bodies, you whimpered as his fingers ghosted over your core, grazing over your clit with just enough pressure to make you shutter in anticipation, feeling the slick of your arousal beginning to coat your thighs with want and need.

“F-fuck-” You stammered, trying to string together anything that resembled a coherent thought, “The b-bed. Fuck me on the bed, baby, please.”

Without another word, Javi had scooped you up under your thighs, forcing your legs to lock around his waist as he carried you toward the bed, mouths crashing together in a hungry mess of tongues and teeth.

Javi set you down, gently laying your back on the bed just enough to let your lower half hang off the edge so he could make a home between your legs, draping each one over his shoulders and pushing them open further to reveal the wet, puffy mess in between your thighs.

You should have been embarrassed with how worked up you already were from a few kisses and some ass grabbing, but with how excited you were to be here with your husband, without a worry in the world besides how many times you could disrespect your hotel room before you had to leave, you had no shame in how you were already dripping with anticipation as Javi’s eyes locked on your core.

“Fuck, she’s so pretty.” Javi cooed, admiring the glistening sheen of your slick covering your folds, planting gentle kisses along the soft skin of your thighs, creeping closer and closer to your center. You sat up on your elbows to watch as Javi’s fingers lazily traced your cunt, collecting your arousal, rubbing with just enough pressure to make your clit throb even harder than it already had been. “Always so wet for me, Hermosa. My perfect wife. Fuck, I still can’t believe you’re all mine forever.”

“Forever.” You whimpered, breath hitching in the back of your throat as Javi’s tongue dragged across your core with a broad, flat stroke, looking up at you with those devastatingly sweet, chocolate brown eyes, pulling off you with the look you knew all too well meant you were absolutely a goner.

“Tastes so fucking sweet, baby.” Javi hummed, carefully bringing two fingers to your core, sinking them inside your weeping hole to prod steadily against your g-spot

“Oh my god, fuck-” You whimpered, Javi working at a painstakingly slow pace that still had you writhing under his touch, his mouth and fingers moving in the perfect combination of pressure to already have a tingle beginning to build at the base of your spine despite the fact he had just started eating you out.

Your jaw went slack as his digits prodded faster, his tongue swirling and flicking against your sensitive bundle of nerves, ragged moans and whimpers escaping from your lips, growing louder and more wonton by the second.

“That’s my girl.” Javi cooed, pulling off you just enough to catch your attention, his fingers never faltering in pace, “Fuck, I could listen to you like this all day, Osita. All the pretty noises my wife makes just for me. C’mon, baby. You want everyone here to know who makes you feel this good, huh? Tell them, sweet girl, who makes you feel this good?”

“Y-you, Javi, fuck- You do, baby.” You moaned, feeling your pussy begin to flutter around Javi’s fingers as his smug smirk pressed back against your cunt, now sucking at your clit with a ferocious switch intensity he knew would send you over the edge in an instant.

Squeezing Javi’s head between your thighs, you cried out louder, chanting his name like a prayer with each second you grew closer and closer to your end, feeling arousal creeping through your body at a rapid rate.

“Javi, Javi, fuck- Oh, baby, Javi, I’m gonna- gonnaahhhhhhh-”

In an instant, your orgasm crashed through you, filling you with all consuming pleasure that had you seeing stars, sobbing out as your cunt clamped down around Javi’s fingers that were pulsing inside you through your high.

At this point, you were probably close to suffocating your poor husband, but it was his own damn fault for knowing how to make you cum so hard, your soul just about left your body.

Finally regaining enough inhibition, you let your legs fall open, freeing Javi from the thigh prison he had trapped himself in, still smirking with delight despite his red face and shortness of breath.

“Jesus Christ, Osita.” He laughed, standing up as he began to shed his clothes, tossing his shirt and shorts in a crumpled pile on the floor, followed by his already tented and stained boxers, revealing his painfully hard cock, slapping against his stomach and bobbing between his legs as it was freed. “You tryin’ to kill me, baby?”

“I could ask you the same thing.” You huffed, chest still rising and falling with heavy breaths as you came down from your high. “Sorry, not my fault you make me cum so hard I put you in a headlock between my legs.”

You and Javi both couldn’t help but laugh as he helped you slide further up the bed, crawling over you and caging you under his broad body, peppering every inch of your body with kisses and intentionally tickling you with his mustache in all the places he knew made you giggle the most.

“If I die between my wife’s thighs buried face deep in her pussy, I’d die a happy man.”

“Well I have no plans on intentionally murdering you on this trip, so count yourself safe this time, Peña.”

“Baby, I’m convinced you’re just trying to kill me slowly this entire trip, considering you have nothing packed in your suitcase besides bikinis and sundresses.” Javi sighed, arms planted around your head as he laid overtop of you, kissing up your collarbone and neck, all the way up your jawline.

“Javier Peña, we are literally on a tropical vacation to the Bahamas. Would you have liked me to pack, a parka and snow pants?” You teased, breath hitching in the back of your throat between giggles, trying to maintain your composure between the wet, hot kisses, Javi was planting across your skin.

“No,” He grumbled, “You’re the hottest woman I’ve ever fucking met, baby, you don’t think people aren’t staring at you everywhere you go? I can’t fucking blame ‘em, but they better notice that ring on your finger and know you’re off limits.”

Heat crept through your cheeks, butterflies swirling in your stomach from what he had said, picking up on the notion behind his thoughts. Javi wasn’t a jealous man, but fuck, was he a protective one, and God help any man who tried to knowingly make a move on you while he was around.

He wanted everyone to know you were his, and you just as badly wanted everyone to know he was yours.

“Maybe just the ring isn’t enough, baby.” He smirked, nipping and tugging at your skin with his teeth as he snaked his hand between your bodies to stroke himself and line his cock up with your entrance. “‘Cause you know what else isn’t in your suitcase?”

Your birth control.

You didn’t have to say a word to know exactly what Javi meant, your face swelling with a mixture of excitement and want.

“Javi, oh fuck-” You moaned, cut off by the sweet sting of Javi pushing into you, filling you up with every inch of himself until he had bottomed out, stalling for a moment to let you adjust to his fullness before slowly dragging his cock in and out of your cunt.

“Maybe,” he groaned, biting down on his lip at just how good you felt around him, warmth and wetness coating his length with each stroke, “Maybe that ring on your finger isn’t enough, Ostia. Maybe once they see you pregnant with our baby growing inside you, they’ll know you’re mine.”

It never failed to amaze you just how Javi knew how to make you short circuit with words alone, hoping the entire resort didn’t hear the absolutely pathetic whimper you let out at the idea of finally carrying his baby, showing off your family to the world, and the man who had given it to you.

“Fuck, knock me up Javi. Wanna- wanna make you a daddy.” You whined, wrapping your arm up around his neck, running your fingers through his dark and sweaty curls, tugging him closer to you until your mouths were molded in a messy clash of tongues and teeth.

“Christ- Yeah, baby girl? Fuck, I’ll give you whatever you want. I’ll fuck myself so deep inside you, it’s got no choice but to fuckin’ take. Keep you stuffed with my cum every day until it sticks.” Javi groaned, gritting his teeth as he grabbed the backs of your thighs, pushing them to your chest and pulling you closer to him so your back began to arch, giving himself the perfect angle to split you open and keep every last drop inside of you.

You could feel every inch of Javi filling you, perfectly punching against that soft, spongy spot inside your cunt with each thrust, keeping your thighs still pressed against your chest as the lower half of your legs wrapped around the small of Javi’s back, ankles locking together to keep him as close and deep inside you as you could.

“Dámelo, papi.” You cooed, wicked smile stretched from ear to ear watching Javi physically having to stop himself to let out a strangled groan, clenching his jaw and scrunching his face to keep from busting right then and there.

“Jesus, fuck-” Javi grunted, finally gaining enough composure to open his eyes and look back down at you beneath him, smugly smirking, “That’s how this is gonna go, huh?"

The chocolate brown of Javi’s eyes began to darken with lust, dragging his cock out and ramming into you so deeply, a pathetic whimper fell from your lips, nearly knocking the wind out of your chest feeling him practically in your stomach. Your whimpers quickly turned to sobs as he did it again, slowly dragging his length out of your wet, warm walls before pounding back in to you with a blinding intensity.

Leaning down, Javi grabbed your arms, pushing them outstretched above your head until your wrists were crossed over each other and Javi had them both in his firm grasp, pinning you to the bed with the weight of his body and grip. It was like something feral had ignited inside him, brow furrowed and teeth gritted with a laser focus, snapping his hips to thrust himself deeper and harder, melting you to a helpless puddle beneath him, your cries of pleasure and desperation only egging him on more.

“You want me to fill you up, baby? Then you’re gonna be a good girl and take every last fucking drop. Every. Last. One.” He huffed, syncing his words to each thrust, keeping a bruising grip over your wrists with one hand, and digging his fingertips into the meat of your hips with his other. “Tell me what you’re gonna do for me, baby girl. Tell me whose pussy this is.”

“It’s yours, Javi. Fuck, fuck, fuck- it’s yours, baby! I- oh shit- I promise I’ll be a good girl and take it all. Want you to fill me up, Papi.” You sobbed, arousal seeping through your veins as Javi’s cock punched against your g-spot over and over, each stroke faster and more intense, blinding your body with pleasure.

Your hotel room was drenched in the borderline pornographic sounds of skin slapping against skin, wet squelching of your pussy squeezing Javi’s cock tighter and tighter as you could feel the coil beginning to tighten in your stomach, crying out without any inhibition for your volume, Javi grunting and panting with equal intensity.

“That’s my girl. You gonna let everyone hear who this pussy belongs to? Let everyone know that I’m gonna fill you up and get you pregnant?” Javi mewled, watching the way your eyes were nearly rolling in the back of your head, snaking his hand gripping your hip down between your bodies to rub firm and frantic circles around your clit to help push you over the edge knowing how close you were.

As soon as the calloused pads of Javi’s fingers were pressed against your sensitive nub, you were seconds away from the brink of collapse, cunt clamping tighter and tighter around Javi’s cock, choking it with your velvety walls.

“Yes, yes, yes, fuck, fuck, I’m so close baby. Don’t stop, don’t stop, please, fuckfuckfuckfuck!”

Instantly, your orgasm crashed through your body, blinding white heat flooding your vision, pleasure shooting through every inch of you to the point you felt like you had left your own body. You could feel your body going limp beneath Javi, knowing he wasn’t far behind you given all his tell tale signs as you soaked his length with your arousal.

Javi’s thrusts had forgone any type of rhythm, now sloppy and erratic, his balls tightening and tensing in his stomach, babbling and moaning in your ear, whispering sweet nothings before he found himself in the same state of you.

“That’s it, hermosa. Cum all over my cock. Cum all over me before I fill up this tight little pussy so full it’s got no choice but to take. Oh fuck- Fuck, can’t wait to get you pregnant. See you carrying our baby. Gonna make you the prettiest fucking Momma-ahhhhhhh, fuck!”

With one final stutter of his hips, Javi was painting the inside of your cunt with thick, warm ropes of his spend, keeping himself flushed as tight as he could to your pelvis, making sure a single drop didn’t escape as he plugged you with his cock, cumming so hard he couldn’t help but whimper. The weight of his body slumped on top of you, syncing your heavy breaths, the sticky and sweaty sheen of your chests pressed together as Javi planted a slow and sensual kiss on your lips, swallowing your moans in his mouth.

“Holy fuck.” You half whispered to yourself, letting out a bliss-filled giggle.

“Jesus Fucking Christ.” Javi panted, quietly laughing along with you, gently brushing the damp and wild strands of your hair out of your face, “Fuck- You gotta be careful with that “Papi” shit, Osita.”

“Oh yeah? And why would that be?” You teased, smirking as you raised an eyebrow at him and bit down on your lip, knowing damn well why.

“Because if you keep that up, I don’t think we’re ever leaving this room.”

After dinner and giving a few more pieces of furniture in your hotel room a good test run, the two of you had happily called it a night on day one of your honeymoon, eager to explore the rest of the resort as the two of you rose with the golden rays of the sun beaming over the horizon of your ocean view window, flooding your room with warm and welcoming sunlight.

As much as the both of you were convinced you could have easily spent the next 10 days without leaving your hotel room, you made a pact that you would spend some time going to explore the rest of the resort after spending some much deserved post-wedding de-stressing in the sun by the pool, drinking as many mojitos and frozen daiquiris as you could stomach.

And as amazing as non-stop sex with Javi would have been, soaking up in the sun poolside with a drink on one side of you and a shirtless husband on the other, you’d say that this was a pretty close second.

“Another one?” Javi smirked, eyebrows raised at you as his brown eyes peeked over the edge of his aviators, gesturing at your nearly empty glass.

“I mean… if you’re offering.” You giggled, tipsy after a few drinks and hours baking in the sun, happily holding out the remainder of your mojito for Javi to exchange for a new one.

“I think the bartender and I are about to be on a first name basis pretty soon.” Javi laughed, shuffling out of his beach chair, grabbing his empty cup along with yours to bring back with him to the poolside bar that had been visited a questionable amount of times by the two of you since you had gotten to the pool this morning.

“Yeah? Are you gonna tell the bartender the frozen strawberry margaritas you’ve been getting from him all day are for you and not for your wife?” You teased, pulling your sunglasses down to look at Javi, playfully rolling his eyes back at you.

“Shut up. They’re fucking addicting. You had one, can you blame me?”

“I’m just giving you a hard time, Mr. I Won’t Drink Anything But Beer and Whiskey. Don’t worry, your secret’s safe with me. Although, I’m sure Steve would get a kick out of knowing you’ve downed like, 7 of these since we’ve gotten here.”

Setting down both of the drinks, you found yourself in a fit of squeals and giggles as Javi reached down to scoop you up out of your chair, carrying you bridal style to the edge of the pool before jumping in with the both of you, the refreshing cool of the pool water crashing over you as your bodies bobbed under the surface.

“Pendejo!” You laughed, splashing Javi as your heads peered above the edge of the water, Javi shaking his hair, damp and clinging to his forehead from your added assault, grabbing you by the waist before you could go any further, shifting you to wrap your legs around him as he held you, childishly swaying you through the water.

“Te amo, esposa.” (I love you, wife) Javi teased in a mocking tone, responding to your name calling.

“Joke’s on you, because I wanted to get into the pool anyways. You’re lucky you’re handsome. Mojito me, Peña.” You splashed again, rolling your eyes at his over exaggerated kiss before he swam away, shooting you a wink while he waded his way to the poolside bar.

It wasn’t long before Javi was making his way back, a drink in each hand, happily handing you your mojito as he got to the edge of the pool where you were sitting, lifting himself up to sit beside you and take a swig of his margarita.

“Miss me?” He smirked, raising his eyebrows at you.

“Terribly. Most agonizing 6 minutes of my entire life.” You teased, playing into the dramatics as Javi picked up your left hand, admiring the diamond ring and wedding band adorned on your finger before gently kissing it.

“Sorry to keep my wife waiting. I hope that you’ll accept this mojito as a token of my apology.”

“I think that’s a fair enough compromise.”

After a few more hours and several drinks later, it was safe to say that you and Javi had definitely both been in better states than you currently were, too far gone to care about the potential consequences of tomorrow’s hangover to stop yourselves.

“What time do you think it is?” You asked, sunkissed body sprawled out across the pool chair.

“Wife O’Clock.” Javi answered, snickering to himself at his answer.

“Javier Peña, that’s not a real time, you dork.”

“Half past mojito. A quarter ‘til my next margarita.”

“Jesus Christ….” You paused, one of the life guards crossing behind you catching your attention, “Hey, excuse me! Do you know what time it is?”

“Uhhhhh, looks like it’s almost 6!” The lifeguard replied, looking down at his watch before continuing on his path.

“6?! Oh shit!” You gasped, sitting up straight in your chair.

“What? What’s happening at 6?!” Javi inquired, seemingly less concerned with whatever was supposed to be happening then that had you so riled up.

“Javi, we're supposed to be at dinner right now! We made reservations at that italian place, remember?!” You grimaced, frantically starting to grab the towels and clothes you had scattered around the pool deck.

“Oh fuck! Shit, uh- okay, here, lemme help you!” Javi joined in on the gathering of any item that belonged to you that he could find, tossing it into the bag you had brought down with you, hoping that you didn’t forget anything that had come with you to the pool.

While the haphazard gathering of items was a good enough sign to any onlooker that you and Javi were more than likely intoxicated, the both of you didn’t realized just how drunk you were until you both tried to stand up out of your beach chairs, grabbing on to each other in a wobbly dance of giggles.

“Woah, I think I drank a little lotta margaritas.” Javi stammered, laughing to himself.

“Fuck, I did too. Jesus, how many do you think we had?” You giggled, face scrunching in anticipation of the number that was definitely going to be higher than you had intended when you came to the pool this morning.

You could see Javi trying to drunkenly calculate his trips to the pool bar in his head, counting across his fingers in a serious concentration, tongue sticking out of his mouth, as if it was going to help him focus better.

“Let’s see, I think after adding them all up… We drank a lot.”

“If we can’t even come up with a number, that’s not good. Fuck, I didn’t even bring real clothes! Our room is so far from the restaurant, there’s no way we’re even gonna be close to making it!” You pouted, shrugging your shoulders in defeat.

“Just put on the cute little dressy thingy over your bathing suit. Or just go in your bikini. You’re so hot they have to let you in.” Javi smirked, biting down on his lip as he looked you up and down, giving you his best drunken attempt at his bedroom eyes.

“Unfortunately for you, I don’t think the other patrons of this resort want to watch me eat pasta half naked, ya sicko.” You teased, giving him a nudge to his stomach a little harder than you had intended. “Okay, cover up will have to do, I guess. Do you have your shirt?”

“You don’t wanna watch me eat pasta half naked?”

“As much as I’d love to, maybe another time, weirdo. Okay, we have to go! Or else we’re not getting any pasta, naked or not! Focus, Peña, focus!” You commanded in your best pretend stern voice, grabbing the rest of your things in your hands while Javi stood there, admiring you like the drunken, lovesick fool he was.

“You’re so fucking sexy when you’re bossy.” Javi smirked, raising his eyebrows at you, “Okay, fine, fine fine, let’s go. Lead the way, Mrs. Peña.”

If you didn’t feel drunk enough after simply trying just to stand up out of your pool chairs and collect all your belongings within a 5 foot radius of you, you sure as hell did trying to drunkenly navigate the resort to find the restaurant you were looking for. After asking several employees, you somehow managed to stumble your way through the hotel to find your intended location, “Ciao!” , one of the higher-end dining experiences the two of you had planned for your vacation.

“Hi. We are married, and we are here to eat pasta.” Javi proclaimed to the hostess at the front of the restaurant, who was looking back and forth between you and Javi, riddled with confusion not only by Javi’s opening statement, but from the fact the two of you were nearly out of breath from running around every inch of the resort, clearly drunk, and still dressed in your swimsuits.

“Ummmm, okay? What’s the name on the reservation?” The hostess asked hesitantly, flipping through the pages of names and times written down for seating tonight.

“Peña. We were supposed to be here at 6 but we had a lil too much fun at the pool, but not enough fun that we completely forgot about dinner! We’re really sorry!” You explained, trying your best to keep your composure, biting your tongue to subdue your drunken giggles.

“Yeah, like, so sorry. I had a lot of margaritas today.” Javi added, turning his head to let out a little burp at the end of his sentence.

“I don’t see any Peña’s on the reservation for tonight….” The hostess sighed, flipping back and forth between today’s pages, clearly not amused by either of your antics.

“Oh no… Does that mean we’re not getting pasta? Shit.” Javi pouted, crossing his arms over his chest like a little boy.

“Oh wait, are- are you sure it was a reservation for today? I see Peña on here at 6 for tomorrow?”

“Oh shit…” You and Javi replied, nearly in sync, visibly grimacing at the fact that you had spent the past 45 minutes in an alcohol induced frenzy, running through the resort to find a restaurant you weren’t even supposed to eat at until tomorrow.

Whoops.

“My bad….” You shrugged, sheepishly frowning as you looked back and forth between the hostess and Javi, “Okay, well, um, we’re gonna- We’re gonna go then.” You winced, grabbing Javi by the hand to slowly drag him away from the restaurant, hoping that the physical distance would somehow spare you the embarrassment you had just subjected yourself to.

“You’re fine, just- We do ask that our guests wear more, um- appropriate attire when they come to dine with us.” The hostess scoffed, huffing at you and Javi, looking you up and down with your beach bound outfits and hands full of pool accessories as you continued to back away.

“She doesn’t wanna see us eat pasta in our bathing suits?” Javi whispered in your ear, making you snort so loud it almost hurt your chest, trying to keep from bursting into full blown laughter before making it out of eye and earshot of the hostess, jabbing him in the stomach with your elbow, only spurring him on further, “She doesn’t know how sexy you’d look shoving a fist full of garlic bread down your throat with nothing on but a bikini? Her loss.”

Now out of sight of the restaurant, you and Javi exploded into an obnoxious fit of drunken giggles, feeling completely idiotic for wasting nearly the last hour of your night in a whirlwind journey to nowhere.

“Well, looks like no pasta for dinner tonight.” You sighed, playfully throwing up your hands in defeat. “I am starting to get really hungry though… Like too hungry to go back up to the room and change and then come back down and wait at a restaurant for more food.”

“Yeah, shit, I’m really hungry too… Wait!” Javi paused, his face lighting up with excitement.

“What, Jav?”

“Didn’t we pass a pizza place on the way up to the room when we first got here?

The grin on your face was now equally as wide, almost certain that you and Javi were having the same drunk recollection.

“I knew there was a good reason I married you.”

Somehow or another, you had not only managed to find your way to “Papa’s Pizzeria”, you had managed to successfully order an extra large pizza for the two of you to split, and make it back to the room without any pizza casualties on the way.

Even a drunken you couldn’t help but realize how lucky she was to have married a man like Javi, and not just because of his excellent memory for pizza restaurants- What you had been through in the past hour and a half could have easily sent any other couple into an ugly spiral of arguments and blame they’d cast upon each other for “ruining” the rest of their night.

You’d been witness to so many relationships and marriages where couples barely managed to genuinely enjoy each other’s company, let alone have fun together. Cohabitation drenched in resentment and unhappiness towards each other, forced proximity the only thing keeping them together.

You were positive that there would never be enough “thank you’s” that you could send out into the universe for letting you marry your best friend.

Because what would have been a soiled evening for so many others, was quickly turning out to be a better night than you could have ever imagined, plans tossed out the window to sit cross legged in your king sized bed together, bodies draped in fluffy hotel robes as you mowed down on slices of pepperoni pizza, giggling over shared, drunken secrets with your favorite person in the world.

“Okay, your turn now.” You snickered, shoving another bite of lukewarm pizza into your mouth, giving Javi a playful shove into the sea of pillows at the head of your bed.

“I just went!” He protested, trying to talk through the mess of cheese, sauce and crust he was still chewing.

“Nuh uh! I just did, remember? We got off topic because we started talking about the Farrah Fawsect poster you had in your room that your mom made you take down, but you were the one who asked me about who my first celebrity crush was, remember?” You insisted, pointing your half bitten piece of pizza at him, forcing him to hold up his hands in defeat.

“Okay, okay! Can’t blame me for forgetting after thinking about that poster, though.” Javi shrugged, smirking at the thought of his 12 year old self gawking at the beautiful blonde actress hanging above his bed, “Shit…. Gimmie a second, let me think.”

“I’ve given you plenty of seconds, goofball! Like all the seconds I spared you thinking about Farrah.”

“Shut up. Okay,” he paused, taking another bite of pizza, “who was your first kiss?”

“Really? Why, you gonna go hunt him down?” You snorted, feeling like you were gossiping with your teenage best friend at a sleepover rather than with your husband, Javi laughing along with you as he shook his head, “It was Jack Mullins in the 7th grade.”

“Okay, and?” Javi prodded, smirking as he interrogated you for more information.

“It was at a Halloween Party my friend Sarah had at her house. I’m pretty sure we were playing truth or dare, and all my friends knew I had a massive crush on him because he was the cutest boy in the 7th grade. So they dared me to kiss him and I did it. It was so awkward, and I had no idea what I was doing. Pretty sure we kissed while the “The Monster Mash” was playing, too. I was so embarrassed after that I cried in the bathroom and then walked home and didn’t even say goodbye to anyone. Didn’t ever think I’d speak to him again and he ended up being my date to prom.”

“Wow. That was a way better story than I was expecting to get. “The Monster Mash”? Truth or Dare?” Javi chuckled as your cheeks turned red, watching your eyes at his enjoyment of your story.

“Okay, I was 12 Javi, some of us were weird, awkward teenagers. I’m sure that you were very easily the Jack Mullins of your middle school and had girls at the door lining up to kiss you.” You rebutted, having seen plenty of pictures of teenage Javi, thanks to Chucho, knowing whatever awkward phase he went through was only a fraction of your pre-teen pain.

“No, I wasn’t. I was a pretty shy kid. All my friends had their first kiss way before I did.” Javi shrugged, now sounding slightly more embarrassed.

“Okay, so what? They were 12 and you were 13? I don’t believe it. I would have had the biggest crush on you in middle school.”

“I’m being serious!”

C’mon, Javi, if I’m telling you about my Monster Mash kiss, I get to hear about yours!” You insisted, giving him the biggest fake pout that you could muster until he gave in.

“I- I was 16 when I had my first kiss.”

“You’re joking.”

“Why would I joke about that?”

“16?!”

“Osita, you’re making it sound like I was 72 when I had my first kiss, not 16.”

“Considering how cute you were, yeah, I am! Okay, spill! Now I need to know!”

“I’m telling you, I was a shy kid. Didn’t really come out of my shell until 10th grade when I started doing swimming. There was a girl on the team I always thought was really cute, but I was too chicken shit to do anything about it. All my friends had girlfriends and dates to go to homecoming with, and I didn’t have anyone, so they forced me to ask her. She turned me down, told me she already had a date. I was devastated. Went to a party with the team after, got drunk for the first time because I was so upset, and ended up kissing my friend’s older sister, Katie. Made out in the laundry room in the basement for the rest of the night. My friend found us after he realized we both had gone missing and ended up punching me in the face and almost breaking my nose.”

“Holy shit. That’s a way better story than mine.” You gawked, eyes going wide at the turn Javi’s story had taken.

“I wouldn’t say way better, just stupid.” Javi huffed, “You do dumb things when you’re young.”

“Well, you must have been a pretty good kisser even back then if she made out with you for an hour. Honestly, would have been dumb if she didn’t make out with you, in my humble opinion.” You giggled, scooting closer to Javi as you snuggled into his lap, resting your head on his outstretched thigh and letting out a big yawn. Resting his hand on your back, Javi pulled you closer, running his fingers through the sun kissed ends of your messy hair, smiling at all the tell tale signs sleep was beginning to creep through your body and the way you snuggled up next to him.

“Okay, one last question because all these mojitos are catching up to me and I’m getting sleepy.” You mumbled, feeling your eyelids begin to droop as you curled up in the warmth of his body, comfort flooding over you from Javi’s presence.

“Okay, hermosa. Your turn.” Javi cooed, his voice softening to match your sleepy tone, pressing a gentle kiss to the top of your head.

“If you could change anything about your life, anything you want, what would it be?”

Javi paused for a moment, his fingers still daintily stroking across your hair and back as he thought. Truthfully, there were plenty of things he wished he could change about his past. It would take him less than a minute to come up with a list longer than most people could muster in a lifetime. He had wasted so many years of his life, bitter and remorseful about the things he had done, condemning himself to suffer the consequences of his actions. And yet, somehow, despite all of the things he could have said, out of all the painful things he wished he could go back in time to change, there was one answer that prevailed above all the rest, an answer that couldn’t have been easier to choose.

“I wish there was a world where I would have met you sooner. That I would have gotten to love you just a little longer.”

He waited for your response, settling into the silence until it was broken by one of your soft snores humming against his thigh, signaling to him you were sound asleep in his lap, not having heard a word you said. He laughed softly to himself, remembering the first night he had stayed at your apartment, and how it had ended just like this, conversation flowing until the early hours of the morning until you couldn’t fight sleep any longer, eyelids shutting as you fell asleep in his arms. How he watched you gently drift to dreaming, wondering if he was, too. That somehow, some way, the world had managed to bring the two of you together. And even if he wished he would have gotten more time to love you before you’d met, Javi knew that he’d be forever grateful for every minute he had left with you.

Despite the raging hangover the two of you had the next morning after you woke up from your alcohol and pizza induced coma, the rest of your honeymoon had been some of the most fun that the two of you had had in years. You’d spent multiple days at the pool, soaking up sun on the beach and swimming in the ocean, eaten so much delicious food you were convinced you were going to combust, drank more mojitos than you’d like to admit, and had even gone snorkeling on a tour through some of the islands outside your resort.

You also had been having so much sex, you were starting to feel bad for the rooms on either side of you.

Everything about your honeymoon had been everything you’d ever hoped for and more, but with only one full day left of your vacation, you couldn’t help but feel a little sad that your perfect trip to tropical paradise was coming to a close.

“What’s that look for, porbrecita?” Javi laughed, sneaking up behind you on the edge of the balcony, watching you watch the sunrise with your cheeks propped up in your palms, pouting at the way bright pinks and oranges were greeting the sky. Standing behind you, he snaked his arms around your front so he could bring your back to his chest, kissing the top of your head while his arms settled around your middle.

“I don’t want our honeymoon to end.” You sighed, craning your neck just enough to look at Javi over your shoulder, “I’m sad it’s gonna be over.”

“I know, mi amor, me too.” He softly chuckled, planting a long kiss on your cheek, the whiskers of his mustache making you giggle, “But what if I told you I have one more surprise for us before we go home tomorrow?”

This made you swing all the way around, now chest to chest with Javi as you looked up at him in confusion, “What? I thought we were spending our last day on the beach just hanging out?”

“Well we are, but what if I told you I rented one of those fancy cabanas at the end of the beach for us to use to celebrate our last day here?” Javi smirked, watching your face light up at his proposition.

“Wait, actually?”

“Yes, actually.”

“But aren’t they like, super expensive to rent for the day?”

“I mean… they’re not that expensive.”

“Okay, the pause tells me that you spent way more money than you needed to on this, Jav.”

“And what if it was? I’m not allowed to wanna spoil my wife on our honeymoon?” Javi grinned, gently cupping your face and playfully shaking it, making you laugh again.

“Your wife doesn’t need to be spoiled, just getting to be here with you is more than enough.” You paused, giving Javi a little nudge as he dramatically rolled his eyes at you, chuckling to himself, “What, you goof?”

“I hope you know that because you’re my wife, I’m planning on spending the rest of my life spoiling you, whether you like it or not. I’d give you the fucking moon if I could, Osita.”

“Well lucky for you, a day at a beach cabana will do just fine.”

While you never would have asked Javi to purposely spend extra money on things you really didn’t need to make your trip any more special than it already was, you couldn’t deny that spending the day in your own private cove of the beach in a luxurious cabana with food and drinks being served to you at your request wasn’t a bad way to spend the last day of your honeymoon.

The daybeds in the cabana had made a perfect place for a shady, mid day nap for the both of you, lazily waking up from the soft kiss Javi had planted on your shoulder, exposed from your bikini top, freckled and sunkissed from days in the tropics.

“I’m gonna go for a swim, Hermosa. Be back in a sec.” Javi cooed, gently stirring you from your catnap.

“Mmmmmmkay.” You smiled, flipping over for another kiss on the lips before Javi slipped out from the flaps of your tent, softly blowing in the breeze. You sat up on your lounger, the sight of Javi in nothing but his bathing suit waking you from your brief sleep in a matter of moments.

Even though you had seen Javi in nothing but bathing suits for the past 9 days, you were convinced it was a sight you’d never find yourself getting over. There was no doubt that you had always found him incredibly attractive, but something about this trip had skyrocketed him to another level of sexy you didn’t even know was attainable. You weren’t sure if it was the unbuttoned floral shirts, excessive time spent shirtless, his messy and wet beach hair, or just the fact that now you got to call him your husband- truthfully, it was most likely a combination of all of the above.

You perked up, pulling back the fabric door of the cabana enough to watch Javi’s arms stroke through the ocean, popping his head above water with a brief shake before he was shallow enough to touch the sandy bottom again. As he sauntered in from the ocean, you couldn’t help but admire the width of his shoulders and chest, glistening from the sun and salty water. You let your gaze travel down to his swim trunks, feeling your mouth water at the way they hugged his waist and crept up his thick thighs. With each step closer to shore, you couldn’t stop staring at the way his trunks were clinging to his lower half, perfectly outlining his generous length.

Javi must have noticed the way you were staring at him by the subtle smirk that had broken out across his face as he approached the cabana, eyeing you up and down right back.

“You have a good swim?” You asked, feeling your stomach swirl as you took in every inch of him, glowing in the sunlight.

“Mhmm. Did you have fun watching me swim?” He teased, tongue tracing over his teeth while he raised his eyebrows, knowing damn well the effect he was having on you.

“Maybe. What, I’m not allowed to enjoy the view? Not my fault my husband is so handsome.” Your smirk was almost as wide as his, biting down on your bottom lip as Javi entered the cabana, letting the flap to the entrance close behind him before caging your body under his on the lounge chair, trailing hot, wet, kisses across your chest and stomach.

“Say it again.” He mewled, looking up at you with his big, brown eyes as his kisses trailed lower and lower, watching as he began to settle himself at the edge of the chair between your thighs.

“My husband is so handsome. You’re so handsome, Javi.” You sighed, feeling the damp patch in your swimsuit bottoms growing, soaking the fabric with your slick and arousal.

“You’re so fucking good to me. Fuck, I’m so lucky.” He groaned, slinging your thighs over his shoulders, eyes still locked on you while he began to tug at the strings of your bikini, leaving your bottom half bare.

There was a part of you that knew you should be worried about someone catching the two of you, barely concealed by the flimsy confines of your cabana, but the part of you staring at your husband between your legs about to eat you out seemed a lot more convinced that this was the best idea Javi had all day.

“You’re so fucking perfect. Everything about you. I’m the goddamn luckiest man alive, you know that baby?”

Your response to his question was nothing but a ragged moan, feeling him draping his arm over your hips to hold you in place as he slid two fingers into your heat. He curled his hand to reach the spot inside you he knew made you crumble before diving back in between your legs, beginning to lick you up like a man starved.

His tongue swirled against your clit, the firmness of each stroke and the deep press of his fingers making you writhe under his touch, shooting your hand down to grab fistfulls of his damp, curly locks to brace yourself as he ate you out relentlessly.

“Oh my god, fuck, Javi. Fuck, you feel so good. Fuck-”

You could feel him switching tactics, latching his lips around your sensitive nub, rapidly sucking at the throbbing bundle of nerves, working his fingers deeper in your cunt as he felt you begin to clench around him.

“Fuck Javi, fuck, right there baby- fuck, I’m close.” Your fingers were buried so deep in his curls, tugging just enough to pull his face closer to you as you could feel your orgasm building at the base of your spine, desperate for him to give you your sweet release.

His thick fingers bumped along your g-spot, curving them ever so slightly in the way he had memorized like the back of his hand to make you come undone. The tingle along your spine quickly spread down your legs, pleasure building rapidly throughout your body as you felt yourself on the edge of release. Lifting his arm off your waist, he reached up to grab your hand laying out on the lounge chair, engulfing it in his grasp as he intertwined his fingers with yours.

“Dameló, (give it to me) sweet girl. Let go, baby, I’ve got you.”

You could feel the pressure inside you snap, the tingling in your veins quickly transforming into full blown pleasure as your orgasm swept through you. You gushed around his hand, cunt clenching down on his fingers as you came, losing all sense of inhibitions as you cried out with a volume much louder than intended.

But with Javi’s fingers still curled, prodding against your g-spot, you had a feeling those cries weren’t coming to a halt any time soon. It was only moments after your orgasm had finished he was already on a mission to give you another, tongue lapping up every ounce of your slick as it pressed against your clit.

“Javi, holy shit, baby, oh fuck.” You whined, bucking your hips towards his face and arching your back as he circled around your bundle of nerves, your moans and whimpers only egging him on more.

Even after all this time, there was a part of you that still couldn’t believe how fast Javi could make you cum. He had memorized every twitch, every tug of his hair, every breathy whisper to know what made you fall apart under his touch, loving every second of watching you come undone for him.

You could already feel the tingling of your next orgasm beginning to creep up your legs and into your stomach as Javi sucked at your clit, greedy for him to help you hit your second high.

“Please don’t stop, Javi. Fuck baby, fuck, fuck, I- ahhhhhhhhh.” That was all it took before you could feel the waves of pleasure rushing through your body again, your pussy throbbing as your orgasm flooded over you.

Your legs were all but jello at this point, trembling around Javi’s head, still buried between them. Your last two orgasms had been so intense, you weren’t sure you could take a third, but with the way Javi knew your body, you also were convinced it would barely take anything for you to cum again.

“J-Javi- fuck, baby, fuck I can’t-”

“Gimme one more, Osita. C’mon, sweet girl. Wanna make my wife cum one more time.” You nodded, looking down at the shine of your arousal covering his smirk, knowing that at this point, you were so worked up and overstimulated that just the fingers already inside of you really were all you needed to give him your last orgasm.

Javi’s fingers had already sunk so deep into your cunt, already so overly sensitive to every push and pull of his hand, that the grip you had on his hand had become so tight, you could feel your knuckles turning white. You cried out his name as it fell from your lips, babbling incoherently as the third rush of pleasure crashed over you, gushing onto Javi’s fingers.

“That’s my good girl. My perfect fucking wife. I love you so much.” Javi carefully pulsed his fingers a few more times as he felt you clench around him, making you hiss as he withdrew his hand now soaked in your slick, bringing the digits to his fingers to suck them clean with a satisfied smirk.

It was only moments before his sly grin had quickly shifted to full blown panic, you, still too blissed out to wonder why he was scrambling to throw a towel over your bottom half and one to hide the erection under his as he sat himself in the chair next to you. Thank god Javi still at least had an ounce of inhibition left to see the footsteps of the server who had been periodically checking in on you strolling their way through the sand under the edge of the cabana, saving you both from what could have been an incredible amount of embarrassment.

“Hi, how are you two doing? Anything else I can get for you right now?” Your server asked, peeking his head in through the flaps to see you and Javi trying your best to act as natural as possible.

“N-no, I’m good. You good, honey? Need anything?” Javi asked, looking over at you as his hand ran over the back of his neck, trying his best not to grimace at the awkward tension stewing between him, you and your poor, unsuspecting server.

“You know what, I think I’m gonna have another drink.”

“Alright! Another mojito for you, ma’am?” Your server asked, whipping out his pad of paper to note down your order.

“No, can you make this next one a Sex on the Beach? That sounds really good.”

It truly took everything in Javi not to burst out laughing, choking on his own spit at your perfectly timed order, shaking his head at you in a humorous disbelief.

“Perfect, well I’ll be right back with your drink!”

“Thank you so much!”

Once your server had disappeared, you and Javi erupted in hyena like laughter, the combination of your joke and almost fatal timing throwing the two of you into a fit of giggles.

“You’re fucking ridiculous, you know that?” Javi chuckled, looking over at you as he shook his head.

“What? It’s our last day, figured we might as well have a little sex on the beach. The drink sounds like it’ll be good, too.”

Your mid-afternoon flight had made for an easy morning to pack up and soak in the last little bit of your honeymoon. It had given you just enough time to enjoy your favorite breakfast place, and have one more of the best blueberry waffles you’d ever tasted before your last shower (and shower sex) to get ready for your departure home.

While you were sad your vacation had come to an end, there was no denying that every last bit of your trip was absolutely perfect, and even more so that you got to spend it with the most perfect person you could think of. You were convinced you could have gone anywhere in the world for your honeymoon and you would have felt the same- in the end, it wasn’t the destination that mattered, it was the fact you got to spend it with your husband.

The fact that you got to spend every vacation together for the rest of your lives only made it that much sweeter.

While flying would never be enjoyable, you were thankful your trip home was fairly painless, granting Javi’s hand some grace, considering you didn’t feel the need to keep it in an iron grip for the two hours it took you to arrive back home.

You were also thankful that it was Steve and Connie who had offered to pick you up from the airport instead of Chucho, sparing you and Javi the same sort of awkward embarrassment you had endured on the ride to start off your honeymoon.

Well, it may not been the same kind of embarrassment that you had experienced with Javi’s dad, but it was foolish of you to think that Steve was letting you get away scott free.

At least he had managed to get creative with it, making a greeting poster with “Welcome home, lovebirds!” on it to help you find him and Connie in the airport crowd, making Javi let out a sigh loud enough that Steve probably could have heard it from the tarmac.

“Hey! There they are! Welcome home, Mr. and Mrs. Peña!” Steve grinned, pulling you and Javi in for a hug as you found him, Connie following suit with a much less dramatic greeting for the both of you afterwards.

“How was the honeymoon? Did you guys have a great time?” Connie asked, offering to take one of your suitcases, nudging Steve to do the same. “

“It was really nice. It was everything we could have hoped for. The resort was beautiful, the food was great, and the weather was fantastic. It really was perfect.” You smiled, looking up at Javi, nodding in agreement, reaching out to wrap his arm over your shoulder.

“Thanks again for picking us up.” Javi chimed in, the two of you now following along behind your friends as they began leading you through the airport towards their car.

“Don’t mention it, Jav. Least we could do.” Steve replied, reaching out to give Javi a little punch to the arm.

“We’re super excited to hear all about your trip!” Connie added, looking back at you and Javi with a genuine grin.

“Excited to hear if I’m gonna make good on my bet…” Steve muttered, laughing under his breath.

“Steve! Seriously? You promised in the car you weren’t gonna bring this up!” Connie huffed, giving her husband a slap to the chest, and a grimace that clearly was the silent way to ask “Will you please shut up?”

“What?! I put good money on it, I’m confident!”

“Wait, is this the same bet that Javi’s dad was talking about on the way here?” You asked, looking back and forth between Javi, Steve and Connie in confusion, perplexed as to what you and Javi had to do with whatever bet he and the Murphy’s were in on.

“Go ahead, Steve! Why don’t you explain?” Connie scolded, hands on her hips as she stared down her husband in all his big mouthed glory.

“You bet on it, too!” Steve retorted, holding his hands up in defense, pointing at Connie to claim her as part of the guilty party to whatever was going on.

“What the fuck are you guys talking about?” Javi asked, trying to cut to the chase of whatever cryptic game they were playing.

“After y’all left on your wedding night, we- shit, this does sound kinda bad when you say it to their face, huh?” Steve paused, letting out a huff as he turned back to Connie, grimacing in agreement, “Us and your family and your dad made a bet.”

“A bet on…” You led, waiting for your answer.

Steve sighed again, hands on his hips as he stared at the ground before looking back up at you and Javi, “A bet on how quick it would take after the wedding until the two of you announced you were pregnant.”

You didn’t even want to know how red your face was turning, but judging by the sudden pink flush of Javi’s cheeks, you had no doubt you looked exactly the same, if not worse.

“To be fair, your dad was the one who started it!” Steve exclaimed, pointing at Javi to let him know he wasn’t to blame for his friend’s embarrassment before shifting his finger to point at you, “And your brothers were the one who said we should make it a bet! I just wanted in on it!”

“Jesus fucking christ.” Javi sighed, face in his palm as he rubbed his temples with the pads of his fingers.

“I hope now you know we’re not gonna have kids just to spite all of you.” You teased, crossing your arms over your chest as you tilted your head at Steve. It was enough to catch Javi’s attention, eyes going wide that there was even a shred of you being serious, laughing to yourself as you watched the relief flush over him when you shook your head at your own joke.

“Yeah, okay, whatever you say.” Steve chuckled, his voice oozing with sarcasm, simply shrugging before turning back around to continue your journey to the parking garage.

Javi took his free hand, intertwining it with yours and giving it a gentle squeeze as the two of you trailed behind the Murphy’s soft smile on his face that despite his friends and families bet revolved around your sex life, there was a very real possibility that sooner rather than later, someone was bound to make their fifty bucks.

“What’d you bet?” Javi asked, feeling entitled to know how Steve had gambled after he’d spilled the beans on his little wager.

“Well, let’s see, y’all got married at the end of July, so July to August, August to September,” Steve paused, doing the quick math on his fingers as he calculated his answer, “9 months from now would be April, so I’ll be damned if you’re not tellin’ us your havin’ a baby by the fall and it’s here by the spring. And I know for a fact neither of y’all would be mad about that one bit.”

And as much as you both hated to admit it, it was one of the few things in life that Steve Murphy was very, very right about.

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@the-one-with-the-grey-color @persephone-girl @bitchesuntitled @pedropascallvr @millennial-teenybopper

@nastiasnow @vee-bees-blog @hopplessilse @mxtokko @its-nebuleuse @mandoisapunk

@msmorningstaarr @amyispxnk @honeyedmiller @mountainsandmayhem @picketniffler

@burningnerdchild @copperhalfcent @theoraekenslover @bloodyinspirationaldemon @vee-bees-blog

@samgirl4life @pigeonmama @pedr0swh0r3 @survivingandenduring

@javierpena-inatacvestnotifs

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marvelfanfics1 · 9 hours ago

Note

Ooo, Rafe calling little!reader who is back at the condo, and asking her to find the pen (feel like adding Sofia in this sinerio would get messy given what happened). She wears his shirts and sleeps on his side of the bed since she’s already clingy in little space, so him being away is really hard

Rafe weaves through the busy streets, scanning the stands for any kind of phone so he could contact you, luckily finding one in a secluded alley.

He quickly types in your number, raising the phone to his ear and continues walking, his eyes darting everywhere as he waits for you to pick up. "C'mon...pick up."

You're at Rafe's house, all comfortable on his side of the bed with various sweets around you while Bluey is playing on the tv when suddenly your phone rings.

You pick it up and answer it without looking who it is, just wanting to get this call over so you can enjoy being little. "Hello?"

"Hey, baby. I-" Rafe starts, smirking when you squeal excitedly at hearing his voice, sitting up on the bed.

"Daddy! You comin' home now?" You quickly ask, already missing him so bad that you wear his shirts every day since he went to Morocco.

"Not yet, I still got business to do here." He answers and you frown at that. "You gotta do me a favor, yeah? So I can wrap this up faster."

You perk up at that, you would do anything so he comes back home faster. "Wha' is it?"

"I just need you to find a pen that Groff gave me. Uh, it should be in the kitchen maybe." He instructs.

You get up from the bed, the crinkling of the candy packages being heard clearly through the phone and Rafe raises a brow.

"You're not eating the whole candy shelf empty, are you?" He asks, stopping to walk for a moment to place his hand on his hip. "Because I remember that I specifically told you not to go near it while I'm gone."

"Uh...nooo, course not daddy..." You murmur while making your way to the kitchen."

Rafe sees right through your lie like he always does. "We'll talk about this when I'm back."

"M'in the kitchen now." You change the topic, looking over the counter surfaces. "You mean like my cwayons?"

He chuckles. "No, no, um, like the ones I use for work, y'know? Look through the drawers, it should be in there." He says and you do, finding a black pen with golden engraving.

"Found it daddy!" You giggle in triumph.

"Good girl." He praises you, making you smile brightly. "Can you try and tell me what's written on it?"

"Oh, um, s'hard but...Riyadh, Mimouna, Essaouria, Maroc. That right?" You mumble, embarrassed if he couldn't understand.

"Okay, yeah, I saw a sign of that. Thank you, baby. You did a good job, proud of ya." He says, making his way to where he saw that sign of the hotel.

"Daddy...I miss you." You admit quietly, fiddling with the hem of his shirt that you're wearing, wishing he was here and cuddling you.

You are a clingy person in the first place and that only increases when you're little, the fact that he's already gone for a while and most likely will be for a bit longer has you feeling lonely and sad.

"I miss you too kid...I promise I'll be back soon, yeah?" He assures you. "I love you."

"Lub you too, daddy. Pwease be careful and don' talk to strangers!" You say, recounting what he often tells you.

Rafe laughs softly at that. "I will. Be good until I'm back."

Then the line goes dead and you sigh, going back to the bedroom to continue your Bluey marathon, snuggling back into Rafe's pillow that still smells like him.

Taglist

For everything:

@my-river-lilly @pauntedblacknails @fanfictioniseverything @devilslilbabysblog @buckymydarlingangel @hallecarey1 @daybreakwinter @loveshineslikethesky @wandaslittlewhore @vase-of-lilies @white-wolf1940 @simpingbutch @mischiefsemimanaged @alina02 @teddybearsgrr @doozywoozy @angelbabydoll28 @glxwingrxse @lilymurphy03 @veryvaughnny @lokigirlszendaya @youngstarfishdinosaur @little--baby--bear @minideathgoddess @rach2602 @gh0stgurl @flourishandblotts-inc @lovelyy-moonlight @yoruse

@mythixmagic @iris-xoxo-juhu

For Rafe:

@chiaraanatra @chimindity @erikasurfer

#little!reader #daddy!rafe thoughts #daddy!rafe drabble

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joezworld · 2 days ago

Text

Hey everyone seems real sad for some reason. Could not imagine why.

Anyways if you squint real hard you may notice a similarity to Thomas and the Jet Engine. That is intentional.

You can also squint and notice some similarity to several Traintober prompts. That is intentional.

Also, if you notice any similarity to any of SiF's character names... that's right! That is intentional. I did that and it's on purpose and I'm making fun of them. If you're from SiF either recognize that it was a dumb name or die mad about it.

Pip and Emma at The Top

2021 - The Summer

It was the longest summer since the last one. There weren’t any tourists - obviously - but even the inter-island traffic had died down considerably. The government on the mainland was skittishly enacting and then subsequently revoking plans to allow gatherings again, and the people of Sodor were prudently trying to keep the Island’s activities out of London’s sphere of notice.

As events were curtailed and people limited their own travel, the railway cut back on services, as they’d done several times before. Pip and Emma were the first to be relegated to the yards; while they could run a much shorter train - and often did - a shortage-related spike in the price of diesel fuel meant that it was more economical for James or Henry to take the two diesels' trains instead.

Henry had tried to make sense of how the economics on that worked out, but numbers were not his strong suit, and so he instead passed along his sympathies every time he passed the twins in the yard.

James (and no-one else) thought that he was being rather magnanimous by not endlessly laughing about how he was cheaper to run than a diesel. Several cutting responses had been prepared if he ever got too full of himself, but shockingly he’d kept the snickering to a bare minimum.

As the days stretched on into a week, and then two, a bigger problem soon began to present itself:

“I’m bored, Pip!”

“Me too!”

Pip and Emma were getting restless.

“WILL YOU TWO KEEP IT DOWN?! IT IS THREE IN THE MORNING!”

And they were more than willing to make that everyone else’s problem.

A few days later, and the diesels were overjoyed when an inspector came to them with instructions to report to the works.

Equally overjoyed were the engines in the big shed.

Pip and Emma arrived at the works in a right state, having been held up by trackwork along the main line.

“Two hours! Can you believe it Emma?”

“I don’t like running light engine, they can push us around too much.”

“Right? We’re express engines, not a train of old rubbish!” “I think they prioritized the rubbish train over us, if that smell at Kellsthorpe Road was anything to go by.”

“Ugh!”

Mr. Tedfield, the Works Manager, eventually arrived, bringing an end to their complaining. “Right you two. Seems like we’ve got some work for you.”

“Here?” They chorused.

“No,” he said quickly. “But the work is going to be a lot different from your usual job, and we’re gonna have to do some modifications.”

“Oh no,” Pip cried. “It’s going to be buffers, isn’t it?”

“How did you know?” The man was baffled.

“It’s the only thing it could be, sir.” Emma explained. “That’s what they said on the Eastern Region, back in the 1980’s. ‘Just some little modifications!’ and they came back from Derby with the ugliest buffers ever!”

“It was a hatchet job!” Pip agreed. “All their lower valances, gone!”

“Easy, easy!” Mr. Tedfield yelped, not expecting that sort of response. “I’m sure that we can do a better job than that!”

“Promise?” they said in worried unison.

“Promise.”

A few days later, and the twins were relieved to discover that the works were as good as their word. Unlike the Eastern Region “hatchet jobs,” they still sported all their bodywork. Holes had been drilled through the lower valances, and buffers, couplings, and air hoses now poked through. The fibreglass was a little rough around the edges, but everyone agreed that it could also look a great deal worse. (Apparently, custom fibreglass was one of the only things the works staff couldn’t do in-house, and there was a concerning amount of murmuring from the staff about how they’d change that.)

Rolling out into the sun for the first time since they were “slightly modified,” they blinked the light from their eyes to find Mr. Tedfield, the Fat Controller, and another man who they didn’t know waiting for them.

“Well,” Started Mr. Tedfield. “I’m glad to see that our concerns were unfounded.”

The twins knew he was being diplomatic in front of the Fat Controller. He’d already said “I told you so!” several times earlier in the day.

He continued. “So now we should probably tell you what we would like you to do!”

“Because somebody forgot to mention it earlier…” The other man muttered under his breath.

The Fat Controller looked from one man to the other, and shook his head slightly. “Pip, Emma, as I’m sure you’re already aware, we are not going to be running the Express to London anytime soon. So, with that in mind, you two are going to be assigned to mixed traffic work until passenger numbers allow us to put you back into normal service.”

“Mixed traffic work?” They said as one.

“Oh yes!” The Fat Controller looked quite pleased with himself. “We have quite a lot of cargo traffic coming in through the ports right now, and you two will help take the strain off everyone else.”

The man they didn’t know coughed slightly.

“Of course, how foolish of me,” The Fat Controller rolled his eyes. “I also recognize that you two have some… special abilities that the other engines lack, namely your high-speed capabilities. With that in mind, Mr. Hargrave, from the coach and wagon department here at the works, has had an idea.”

“Yes, right.” Mr. Hargrave said with pride. “So, back when we first started coming back to work after the lockdowns, the government gave us a whole pile of Levelling-Up money, to “get us back on our feet.”” He paused, bouncing on his heels. “Thing is, we’d already fixed up everything beforehand, because we didn’t want anyone locked away in the works during the end of days with their bits in pieces, so we didn’t have anything to spend it on, but we had to spend it, otherwise they’d take it back!”

“Government logic at its finest…” Mr. Tedfield said under his breath.

“Ain’t that the truth.” Mr. Hargrave agreed. “So anyways, we decided to just make everything as perfect as we could make it.”

He stopped for a moment, long enough for the Fat Controller to look at him. “Such as…?”

“Hm? Oh! Yes, the container wagons!” He said all at once. “We took all the container wagons that were sitting around idle - and some other stuff besides - and we took them and fitted high speed bogies and bearings to them.”

Pip blinked slowly. “High speed bogies?”

“That’s right! They ride like coaches now.” He said with childlike joy. “And they won’t weigh much more than them either, so it shouldn’t be much trouble for you two. High speed containers, all the way to the mainland!”

Pip looked at him, then at the Fat Controller. “Sir, why are we doing this?”

The Fat Controller looked much more reasoned. “Quite a few companies are willing to pay a premium for their shipments to arrive as quickly as possible. There’s a lot of congestion at the bigger ports in the south, and Liverpool is operating almost at capacity, so we have an opportunity to get some very lucrative traffic.” He smiled knowingly. “And if we play our cards right, some of the companies, like Amazon, might build a few warehouses just across the channel on the mainland, and then we can serve those in perpetuity.”

The twins slowly digested this. “But sir, will it matter if we can go that fast?” Pip asked. “Once we cross the bridge, we’ve got to deal with Network Rail, and they don’t know anything.”

The Fat Controller looked as pleased as punch. “But you’re not dealing with Network rail.” He said with a satisfied smile. “Our contract for this ‘express freight’ is to get it as far as Barrow-in-Furness. If Freightliner or Colas Rail happen to be tardy after that…” he made a gesture with his hands. “That’s of no importance to us.”

Pip and Emma blinked slowly. “So, you want us to go as fast as we can?” Pip said with an expression that was rapidly passing “gleeful.”

“I do.” The Fat Controller agreed, before walking away.

---

Across the Island, the trucks and wagons shuddered.

A few weeks later

Pip and Emma fit in surprisingly well on goods trains, and could soon be found on everything from trundling pickup goods to the Flying Kipper. The Works really had made every truck as “perfect” as they could make them, and so every train, regardless of what it was or who was pulling it, was rolling on new bearings and freshly-trued wheels. Bear, BoCo, James, and Henry claimed it was some of the easiest work they’d ever had, and even the trucks agreed with them!

Pip and Emma, however, were mostly focused on one thing: speed. They’d been promised the ability to go as fast as they liked, but there was a significant obstacle to it:

“Oh come on! How long can it take to re-lay one set of points!”

The Permanent Way and Signaling departments had also received a great deal of this “use it or lose it” government funding, and were furiously working to replace, re-lay, and re-wire seemingly the entire island.

Fortunately for the twins, the work was almost at an end, and as the summer began to wane, they soon found that more and more of the line was back up to full capacity. Shortly thereafter, the “Container Express” was a regularly scheduled train on the main line, running twice a day between Tidmouth Harbour and the yard in Barrow. Keen-eyed observers of the timetable would note that it was the exact same pair of slots previously occupied by the Wild Nor’Wester, which had last run in March of 2020.

The Fat Controller promised anyone who asked him that it was absolutely a temporary measure, and most believed him, save for one group in particular…

“Lads,” A voice murmured in the container yard one morning. “I think this is forever… ‘s our purgatory for whatever it is we’ve done to the engines.”

“Nah, this ain’t purgatory,” whispered another, as a two-toned horn blasted in the distance.

“Hi everyone!” “Ready for the trip?”

“This is hell. We’re in hell.”

A few days later - Barrow

The lift bridge over the Walney Channel operated very differently than it did pre-COVID. A train would arrive at the Vicarstown side of the bridge, then it would lower. It would stay down while the engines were turned round, or were uncoupled from their train and connected to a new one. Then the train would leave, and the bridge would go back up.

This happened two to four times a day, now that the lockdowns had lessened, but there was one constant - the same train that left the island would be the one to return to it.

Then, one evening in the late summer, the bridge rolled down for a train coming from the mainland.

There was a very familiar two-toned honk-honk as it rolled over the bridge and onto the Island, wheels click-clacking across the bridge joints in great numbers.

The rear power car vanished with a roar of sound and a whoosh of diesel exhaust, and then the train was gone into the distance.

The bridge slowly cycled back up. There was a new train on the Island of Sodor.

The next morning

Pip and Emma woke up much later than usual - the main line was undergoing its final “track geometry inspection”, and freight services had been curtailed for most of the day to allow the inspection to be done as quickly as possible.

Eventually, they were rolled out of the diesel shed mostly on BoCo’s urging, (“You two are not allowed to get bored in here.”) and made their way to the platforms of the big station.

“Oh, this is weird!” Pip exclaimed as she backed down onto a set of coaches. She and Emma had been coupled back-to-back for over a month now, and it seemed like nobody was in a hurry to position them “normally” for a short run down to Suddery and back.

“Not as weird as your- oh my goodness it’s you two.” James started his sentence with a considerable amount of venom, but squeaked halfway through his sentence before stopping altogether.

“What was that?” They both looked at him funny.

“Nothing!” He said quickly. “Nothing at all. I, um, I thought that you were somebody else!”

He vanished as though by magic, and neither Pip, Emma, nor the coaches had any idea of what to say until the guard waved his flag.

Making their way down the line, they encountered several other engines, each of whom gave them some kind of funny look. As they headed down Edward’s branch line, it was all they could talk about.

“Maybe it’s just how strange we look back-to-back?”

“It can’t be, Pip! You saw how Edward looked! I think he was actually upset!”

“Goodness, I hope it wasn’t anything we did.”

“I don’t think so. They all seemed to stop once they saw us.”

“...”

“What?”

“I just had a thought.”

“What?”

“Who looks like us, but can make everyone hate them in no time flat?”

“Oh no!”

Later, they arrived back at Wellsworth station with the return service. The train terminated here, instead of returning to the big station, so once the passengers had disembarked, they had to shunt the coaches out of the way. It was somewhat novel for them, and Pip took great joy in being shown how a shunter’s pole worked. Emma, on the other buffer, was busy eavesdropping; Edward was getting ready to bank Bear’s goods train up Gordon’s Hill, and he was fuming about something to the stationmaster.

“-that damn banana shows its face here again I will show them what for!” he hissed sternly, before puffing away in a huff.

The stationmaster didn’t say anything that Emma could hear, but he seemed to look very intently at the signals outside the station. There was one signal set for an arriving train.

Emma didn’t like that, it felt very ominous. “Pip, look sharp. I think we’re going to have trouble soon.”

Pip didn’t have time to respond, because at that instant, the two-tone horn of an HST rang out in the near distance. The rails hummed with the noise of an approaching train, and a 5-coach HST set pulled into the station.

The train was safety-yellow, and bristled with cameras, sensors, lasers, and measurement equipment of all kinds. Large “NETWORK RAIL” logos were plastered on every coach and both power cars, right next to the words “NEW MEASUREMENT TRAIN.”

It was glossy. It was shiny. It was freshly washed.

“Oh, must we dawdle around this dump? I know what sort of conditions this lot keeps!”

It was rude.

“Will you stop already? I would like to not be thrown off this island, thanks.”

Well, half of it was.

Pip closed her eyes to steady herself. Emma ground her teeth audibly. Of course it was them.

Quickly, quietly, they tried to reverse out of sight, but the camera-studded train saw all, and criticised everything.

“Oh I say!” The lead power car laughed mockingly. “I thought those rumours were wrong but look at that! You two really have been demoted to common shunters!”

“Hi Pip. Hi Emma.” The rear power car said, utterly defeated.

“Hi John,” They chorused, equally displeased. “Hi, Obs-”

“Do not use that name!” The lead power car snapped brusquely. On his side there was a big brass nameplate that read “The Railway Observer.” “Use my real name.”

“Not this again…” The rear power car moaned. He had “John Armitt” bolted to his side. “I know that you think it sounds better but I promise you it isn’t-”

“I’m sorry,” The lead power car snapped. “But are you undermining me in front of outsiders?”

“They’re our sisters, you numpty.”

“And they shall refer to me by the name of my choice!”

“It’s a stupid name!”

“It’s a regal name!”

Pip and Emma observed the bickering train with muted resignation. “Why couldn’t he have been at Ladbroke Grove?” Pip said to nobody in particular. “Would’ve done the world a favour.”

Emma just wanted to get this over with. The coaches had been safely shunted away, so it was just a matter of getting out of the yard - then they could go down to Tidmouth and get their next train. “And what name would you like us to call you?” She said eventually.

The lead power car puffed himself up like a self-important cockatoo. “I,” He proclaimed regally. “Am Murgatroyd. It is a noble name, with a rich history, and-”

Pip almost swallowed her own tongue from the sudden outburst of laughter, while Emma couldn’t even bring herself to look at him. “Oh my god, that is the worst name I have ever heard of,” She said, barely audible over Pip’s gale-force guffaws. “Why would you do that to yourself? Why would you do that to us?”

Murgatroyd turned red with indignation (which, thanks to his yellow paint, was actually a shade of orange) and started shouting. “How dare you, you- you- you low-class harlot! This is a regal name, chosen to signify-”

“How much of a pretentious twat you are?” John scoffed from the other end of the NMT. “Usually people can tell when you talk.”

The retort that followed was unprintable, and a vicious three-way argument soon struck up, lasting until Pip and Emma left Wellsworth for the harbour at Tidmouth.

The New Measurement Train left a few minutes after that, an argument trailing in its wake. The yard was silent after that.

BoCo, who had been trying to nap in the shed, looked around the yard. “I don’t think anyone will believe me…” he said to himself.

-----

At the harbour’s intermodal yard, Pip and Emma found their train already waiting for them… although it was slightly different from usual.

Fifteen container trucks sat mostly empty, with just a few loaded ones up at the front. Ahead of those were two low-loaders, one empty, the other… not.

“Finally!” Thomas the Tank Engine groused from atop the front low-loader. “It’s been ages!”

“It’s been two hours.” The low-loader rolled his eyes. “We left at 11:00. It’s barely past one.”

“Well, who asked you?!”

Pip and Emma were surprised, to say the least. “What’s he doing here?” They asked the yard supervisor. “Can we take him on this train?”

“As a matter of fact,” He consulted his clipboard. “You can. I spoke to the works, and they’ve “improved” some of the flatcars with the high speed bogies they had left over. Should be fine.”

“Should be?”

“That’s what they said.” He shrugged, flipping through the clipboard to a printout of an email. “They put it in writing.”

Pip had to squint to see the small text. “I don’t like that they put “It should be fine!” on an official email…”

Behind her, Emma rolled her eyes, in the process noticing something above them. “Wait, what’s that?”

The supervisor looked up. “Oh, that’s a jet engine for an airplane. Rolls Royce rebuilds them down in Derby.”

“Why is it here? This isn’t the airport.”

“Airport’s closed for a few days because they lost their electric transformer - surprised you didn’t ‘ear about it. Rolls didn’t wanna wait, and we’re quicker than a lorry it seems.” The man smiled at the last part. Everyone in the freight division was very pleased that this “hare-brained, half-baked, absolutely ridiculous” concept (as some “industry observers” had remarked) was proving successful.

Emma watched as the jet engine was craned onto a flatcar behind Thomas. “Oh great!” He scoffed as it was chained down to the car. “Not only am I getting shuttled around this Island like a piece of lost mail, but now it’s air mail at that?”

“Oh shush!” Pip said, somewhat bemused by the whole situation. “We’ll get you to Barrow double quick!”

“Barrow?! I’m going to the works!” Thomas was irate.

“If you ever listened,” The low-loader started. “You’d know that they don’t stop there, so we’re going to Barrow, and then back to Crovan’s on the pick-up goods.”

“Oh! Wonderful! I am a lost parcel! This is all Toby’s fault, the square-”

“Thomas,” Emma cut him off kindly. “It’ll be fine. Think about it this way - you can say that you went there on the Express! Won’t that be fun?”

“I’ve been on the express before…” Thomas said darkly.

“See? Then you know how fun it is!”

Thomas looked like he wanted to say something else, but before he could, the shunters allowed Pip and Emma to back down onto the train, and connected the coupling chains and air hoses.

Emma winked at him reassuringly, something which he felt was only unintentionally patronizing.

And then the train set off for the mainland.

Leaving the port was a slow affair - the container yard was off to one side, and they had to dodge Marina and Salty as they shunted cars into the bulk terminals by the yard throat. There were a lot of low-speed switches to navigate as well, and the train rocked from side to side as they crossed over. Thomas thought about saying he was getting seasick, but chose not to tempt fate after the seventh such switch made him actually feel a little nauseous.

After reaching the end of the harbour tracks, they came to a complete stop, and waited for several trains to leave the big station.

First came Gordon, who stormed out of the station canopy with the mid-day semi-fast behind him. His expression was thunderous, as were his clouds of smoke and steam. He passed by with a roar and a clatter and vanished into the tunnel towards Knapford.

Edward was a few minutes behind, with a train of ballast from the Little Western. The expression on his face was neutral, almost intentionally so - a clear sign to anyone that knew him that he was blisteringly furious.

“Oh no…” Emma sighed.

“What?” Thomas asked, watching Edward’s brake van disappear into the tunnel.

“Not what, who.” She said, resigned. “And you’ll find out soon enough.”

Up front, Pip grit her teeth and waited.

She didn’t have to wait long - another minute, and an unusual signal dropped into place: an up-bound train cleared for the down slow line. A very familiar two-note honk-honk sounded from inside the station, and then Murgatroyd appeared, a self-satisfied sneer on his face.

He roared out of the station, New Measurement Train shining brightly behind him, John on the tail end calling apologies to someone. It would have been a rather splendid sight, had there not been a massive cloud of sooty clag hovering over the station entrance, and trailing in his wake.

Pip smirked with a hint of schadenfreude - John wasn’t trailing any sooty exhaust smoke, and five empty coaches were not that heavy, so somebody was ignoring his fitters it seemed…

She would have been content to sit there smugly, her well-tuned engine firing cleanly on all cylinders saying more than she ever could with words, but naturally Murgatroyd had to make things worse.

“Oh good god!” He bellowed in mean-spirited mirth, his mouth twisting into a cheshire-cat smile. “Look at that! They really are Valenta freighters now! And they’re slumming it with a tea kettle! I thought that I had seen it all!”

He vanished out of sight before he could say anything else, the coaches streaming by in a yellow blur.

Pip could just see her reflection in the passing windows - they moved so fast it looked like a solid mirror - and it was not a pretty sight.

Emma, who’d heard everything, reckoned that if he’d gone on for one more sentence, her sister would be spitting fire and roaring loud enough to be heard in Cornwall.

Thomas, who had said worse to Toby and Daisy just this morning, suddenly felt a great sense of unease…

A few tense minutes later, and the signal finally raised, giving the train access to the main line. Pip set off with a roar, Emma reluctantly following her lead through the multiple unit connection. Thomas choked and spluttered from the wave of hot exhaust gases going right into his face, and barely noticed as the train rocked and rolled onto the Up Fast line.

Blinking and tearing up, his vision finally cleared just in time to see Pip’s cab roof disappear into the darkness of the tunnel to Knapford. It was much closer than it usually was, and with the train rapidly increasing in speed, Thomas yelped as it cleared his funnel by mere inches. “YIKES!”

Emma laughed, eyes shining in the darkness, and Thomas knew that the sooner he got off this train, the better!

After that, for a little while, the trip continued smoothly. Knapford, Crosby, and Wellsworth stations all slid past without issue. Traffic was extremely light, and they didn’t pass any down-bound trains in the entire period. In fact, if it weren’t for the occasional blot of Gordon’s smoke on the horizon, it would have seemed that they had the entire main line to themselves.

It was just past Maron station when the trouble began.

As they crested Gordon’s hill, the first signal past the summit had fallen to “approach” almost as they passed it, and some quick shouting at “control” on the radio had revealed that the last of the permanent way crews were taking longer than usual to clear the main line near Kellsthorpe Road station.

This meant that Pip and Emma were practically at a crawl as they reached Maron, and the train eased to a stop at the signal bridge just past the platforms.

Pip, still hot under the buffers from her encounter with Murgatroyd, was not exactly thrilled at the idea of “dawdling” in stations, and audibly fussed as they came to a halt.

Her poor temper didn’t help her train handling skills any, and the train lurched inelegantly to a halt, causing the slack in the couplings to run in, and the entire train banged against her and Emma.

There was much shouting and complaining from the trucks and Thomas at this, and Pip growled menacingly.

“Oh, well.” Emma said quickly, trying to put a positive spin on things. “At least it’s a nice day out-”

CLONK

Before she could even say anything, the signals rose to the “approach slow, expect stop” aspect. This meant that they were getting moved forward exactly one signal block, to the Cronk home signals near the Hawin Ab Viaduct.

“Oh come on!” Emma cried in frustration.

It was abundantly clear what was happening now: they were going to be yo-yo-ed up and down the main line. Yo-yo-ing was what happened when a fast train was stuck behind a slow one, and had to constantly stop at each signal and wait for it to clear. It was hard on an engine’s brakes, worse on their buffers and couplings, and worst of all, was annoying as sin. This was exactly the sort of constant, low-grade irritation that she (and Pip) did not need right now.

Pip’s driver was entirely unaware of this, though, and so he increased the throttle and watched with some bemusement as Pip let her engine furiously rev all the way to the top of the tachometer right from the jump.

She and Emma lurched forwards, and the entire train crashed into motion, each car yanking the one behind it as they all set off.

Thomas rocked back and forth against his tie-down chains. “Careful!” he shouted.

“Shut up!” Pip and Emma scowled.

Thomas frowned, ready to give them a piece of his mind.

“It’s no use,” tThe low-loader sighed. “They’re in a strop right now - best you can do is make them forget that you’re here, til they calm down.”

“When will that happen?”

“That, lad, is something that the smartest trucks in all the land have been searching for an answer to for many years.”

To add insult to perceived injury, Pip’s driver didn’t bother accelerating to any real speed, since they were only going one signal down the line. Pip and Emma stewed in their own irritation at twenty-five miles an hour as they rolled up the line towards the next signal. There was very little that could be done to make them more upset, but of course when there’s a will, (and a Murgatroyd) there’s a way.

“Oh, no…” John murmured to himself.

The New Measurement Train had been caught at a signal for almost thirty minutes, as the Island’s P-Way team cleared out in front of them. The positioning of this particular signal was not ideal, as it left the tail of the train caught on the exposed tracks of a windy viaduct. Furthermore, the signal, like all signals on Sodor, was a relatively vintage semaphore design that still used colored filters over a white light. He knew this from experience, having been all over this island for the last day, however he was hearing all of it now because his royal Murgitude had been griping and whinging about it literally since the moment they stopped.

And now, look at who was coming up to the signals on the fast line…

“Hi Pip, Hi Emma,.” he said weakly.

He almost wanted to tell them to stop further back, and be near him - away from the irritating mass at the front of the train - but looking at Pip’s enraged visage gave him pause. He stilled his tongue, and let them roll up to the signal mast next to Murg.

Judging from the way that the train screeched and bashed to a halt, Emma wasn’t happy either. A smart engine (or one with a functioning self-preservation instinct) would have kept quiet at that stage, however Murgatroyd was neither self-preserving nor intelligent, and John could hear his mocking tone from five coaches back.

Pip said nothing, and at first neither did Emma, but as Moron-a-troyd went on and on and on, John could feel a shift in the container wagons next to him. It was almost like they were cringing, trying to keep themselves as far away from whatever was about to happen next.

Finally, he could take the suspense no more. “Is it bad?” he asked the nearest truck.

“SHUT UP. I AM TIRED OF HEARING YOU SPEAK,” Emma bellowed, loud enough to be heard clearly at the other end of the train.

“It’s awful bad,” the truck whispered. “You can tell he’s never dealt with real engines before. One of us acts like that and we’d be the next Scruffey within a month!”

John didn’t know who “Scruffey” was, but he understood the sentiment regardless.

Silence reigned after that… for all of ten seconds, before Murgatroyd said something about “decorum” that set off a screaming row between all three of them.

It was bad enough that the Network Rail crew inside the coaches started making a fuss on the radio, and within a minute, the container train roared away, leaving the New Measurement Train in windy silence yet again.

After a few short seconds, John felt a “poke” over the multiple unit connection. Clearly Murgatroyd wanted to say something.

“Well,” he said, voice warbling from some damage in the connection that John hadn’t ever told anyone about. “I think they said their piece didn’t they? I tell you what John-old-boy, but this island produces some of the worst examples of engine-kind that I have ever seen. I think that one was breathing fire!”

At Cronk station, Pip and Emma were idling so loud and so roughly that the stationmaster radioed the crew to ask if something was wrong.

“That damned flying banana got them in a state, that’s what’s wrong,” The driver snapped over the radio. That awful measurement train had been nothing but problems since it showed up on the island, and he was willing to do anything to see them gone. Heck, if it wasn’t likely to make his engines even angrier, he’d give that train his path to the mainland, just so it’d be gone faster.

What they really needed was a good fast run, to get them back into their usual state, but with the P-Way team taking their sweet bloody time of it, it didn’t seem likely.

“If they keep going like this, they’re going to burst a manifold somewhere,” the guard poked his head into the cab. “We’ve got to calm them down.”

“I would love to see you try!” the driver retorted. “They’re not gonna stop until they’re good and ready.”

“I can hear you, you know!” Pip huffed.

“And? Are you going to calm down?”

A slow growl that shook the entire cab was his only answer.

“Go put the radio on,” he said to the wide-eyed guard. “They need something to keep their minds occupied.”

“Radio? Like, to control?”

“No, you nit! Like the radio radio! With music! There’s a circuit breaker on the electrical panel. Bottom row.”

Confused, the guard retreated from the cab and made his way to Pip’s electrical cabinet. Opening up the “low voltage” door, he traced his finger down the rows of breakers until he found what should have been immediately obvious: a handwritten label on some sellotape next to the last of the breakers. It said “TUNES” in shaky handwriting, and was one of the only ones not turned on. Hesitantly, he reached out and switched it on.

“-and that was “No Diggity,” by Blackstreet, here on ManxPirate, the eternally annoying voice of the Sudrian Sea. Catch our sound wherever you are, on 107.9 FM, 927 AM, 13.68 Shortwave, DAB, DAB+, and online at ManxPirate.co.im.

“Oh come on!” Pip groused. “Now they’re gonna do the adverts! This isn’t any better than listening to the moron!”

“And now that brings us up to about five minutes til’ the top of the hour, so we’re gonna run some adverts so we can keep the lights on. We’ll see ya on the flipside with DJ Geordie Poppers, who’s gonna run a very special block of music for us, right here on ManxPirate.”

“How often do they listen to this?” the guard asked with some astonishment.

“Too much, if I had any say in it…” the driver mumbled.

“Are you tired of your washing up smelling like mildew? Are you sick of having to pull down the drying lines at the first sign of rain? Then the new automatic clothes dryers at B&Q are just for you…”

The radio continued on with an inane advertisement about tumble dryers, and the driver put his head in his hands. “We’ve just got to make it to a song… I hope.”

Pip and Emma continued to stew in their own irritation.

-----

Far away, at Kellsthorpe Road station, the last of the P-Way Gang hauled their equipment off of the line, sharing a celebratory high-five as they did so. There was due cause for celebration: once the NMT traveled over this section of line, their yearslong work of relaying the entire main line would be finally over. In the station’s car park, a champagne bottle was popped, and the foreman revealed that he’d brought real crystal stemware for the occasion, instead of plastic.

Presently, a radio handset buzzed. “Is that the lot of you off, then?”

It was Control, sounding less than pleased with the delay…

----

At Cronk, the signals for the down slow line rose into the “all clear” position, while the up fast signals remained red.

Pip ground her teeth noisily.

“HI, I’M BARRY SCOTT, AND I’M HERE TO TALK ABOUT THE ALL NEW CILLIT BANG UNIVERSAL DEGREASER! NOW WITH NEW FORMULATION! SAY GOODBYE TO LIMESCALE AND RUST STAINS…”

The radio continued to play adverts.

Thomas was growing increasingly fearful of the look on Emma’s face.

A few minutes later, as an insufferably bad advertisement about comparing your car insurance provider finally faded out, a two tone honk-honk sounded behind them, and the New Measurement Train roared past in a cloud of exhaust and dust. Pip and Emma didn’t say anything, or even look in the general direction, but the raucous laughter that trailed in its wake said enough.

Mercifully, the radio had begun playing something else. “All right then, got those ads out of the way. So what’s up listeners? It’s DJ Geordie Poppers in the hooo-use, coming to you LIVE from our studios on the ever so beautiful radio ship Tharos out here in the Sudrian Sea. We’ve got a very special bit of music for you coming up now in the upcoming hour - it’s a rare daylight sighting of our After-Dark Eurobeat Power Hour! I’m gonna be spinning some CDs and MP3s with the most pulse-pounding beats this side of Mount Akina - so if you’re driving right now, sorry about this.”

As John got smaller and smaller in the distance, the music began to fade in, very gradually.

“And a bit of housekeeping here - we’ve heard from the artist and they’ve had a bit of a name change. Out goes Ken, and in comes Kendra. This is the extended version of “The Top,” by Ken (short for Kendra) Blast.”

Slowly, a piano track began to fill in.

Pip raised an eyebrow, irritation momentarily sidetracked. “Is this really the Eurobeat block, Emma?”

“I think it is,” she said, starting to go along with the intro.

Thomas, who couldn’t hear Pip or the radio, had no idea what she was talking about. He didn’t like the look on her face.

The trucks didn’t either.

“Lads,” the lead container wagon said with gravitas. “We may not make it through today unchanged. It has been an honor serving with you.”

“What?” The low loader that carried the jet engine coughed as the container wagons murmured about honor. He was relatively new, and this was not how he expected his day to be going.

“Laddie,” Thomas’ low loader said gravely, understanding at once what was about to happen. “You’re about to experience something that you’ve never been through before. I’d recommend preparing yourself.”

“What?!” Thomas yelped.

---

Back in Tidmouth, the people in “Control” were staring at the “big board.” For weeks now, the section of line near Kellsthorpe road had been a mess of green, yellow, and red lights, as the P-Way gang slowly finished the banked curve on the station’s east end. Trains, represented by little markers on the computer screen, waited for a free path, oftentimes with large delays, which showed up in flashing red and white boxes.

Now, though, their frustration was finally at an end. The last of the yellow was disappearing, section by section, as the P-Way gang reported that they were clear. Three of the four lines were bright red - clear but with no train signaled through - while the down slow line was a green and yellow stripe. It was getting shorter and shorter, as the little marker labeled 1Q01 moved steadily eastward. That was the New Measurement Train, finishing its final pass of the system.

Behind it, with the box flashing red and white from the delay, was 1B07 - the “Container Express,” already twenty minutes late. More trains were lined up behind it and the NMT, and others were queuing in a line that started at Kellsthorpe Road and went all the way to the mainland.

The yellow segments were almost entirely gone, with just one signal block outside of Kellsthorpe Road left.

There was a five minute safety delay coded into the signal control computers, specifically for when crews were working on the line.

It had been four minutes and fifty six seconds since they’d reported that they were clear.

Four minutes and fifty seven seconds.

Four minutes and fifty eight.

Four minutes and fifty nine.

---

The signal in front of Pip raised with a clonk.

There was still a slight haze to the air from Murgatroyd’s exhaust. In the distance, the plume of sooty white smoke he was making stood out against the clear blue sky like a signal fire.

“Emma?” Anyone with sense would recognize the danger in her tone.

“Yeah?” Unfortunately for everyone else on the train, they couldn’t do anything about it.

“I think we should catch him.”

“I think you’re right.”

In the cab, the driver looked nervously at the rev counter, which had started to climb rapidly.

“Here goes nuthin’,” he said quietly to himself, before advancing the throttle.

The music, which had been slowly building over the last twenty seconds or so, abruptly kicked into a high gear, with a frenetic electronic beat that belted along at 160 beats per minute.

White exhaust belched from the twins’ exhaust, before quickly turning black under the load. Their engines ramped up to an ear-piercing howl, obliterating any sense of quiet at Cronk station.

Thomas once again got a face full of noxious choking clag, and his eyes watered while his hearing was momentarily deafened by the noise of it all.

The train began to pick up speed, and the container wagons groaned in fatalistic anticipation. “It’s all downhill from here!” one of them shouted.

“What?” Thomas hacked from inside the cloud. He couldn’t see anything, and his hearing was ringing like a church bell.

In front, Pip could feel the unrelenting wave of horsepower and diesel surging through her system. She laughed joyously, with Emma soon joining in.

To everyone else, it seemed somewhat maniacal.

🎶 Final lap I'm on top of the world

And I will never rest for second again!

One more time I have beaten them out

The scent of gasoline announces the end! 🎶

The train vanished from sight, on its way towards Killdane. The stationmaster poked his head out of the station door.

“There goes trouble…”

The New Measurement Train rolled through Killdane with fleetfooted ease. The rails were clear and the light train was aided by the downhill gradient. From his position on the rear, John felt like the entire consist was weightless, with barely any effort required to keep the train at speed.

“You think we should go any faster?” he called up the multiple unit connection to Murg. They usually ran at well over 120, but today they’d barely crested 90.

There was a cough over the connection. “Oh, not today. We’re still the fastest train on this backwards island!”

Ah yes. A sudden excuse. Surely that was completely unrelated to the plume of smoke trailing in their wake.

“So, how’s cylinder four feeling today?”

“Shut up.”

John smiled pettily to himself.

In the distance, Killdane got smaller and smaller. A small dot of yellow could just be seen…

---

🎶 They all said I'd best give it up

What a fool to believe their lies!

Now they've fallen and I'm at the top

Are you ready now to die-ie-ie?! 🎶

---

At Killdane, the sounds of the NMT had scarcely faded before the sound of howling diesel engines filled the air. Heads turned to the east just in time to see Pip and Emma hammering around the curve into the station at full throttle.

The curve was banked, but not nearly as steeply as the ones to the west, and there was a piercing screeeeeech of steel on steel as the train whipped past.

“Slowdownslowdownslowdownslowdownslowdown!” There was also a piercing screech coming from the train’s cargo, as Thomas the Tank Engine felt himself rock back and forth atop the low loader. It really did feel like he was going to fall off!

Pip had a very determined look on her face, eyes focused well into the distance, but those who saw Emma in the brief moment she was in view noted an almost demented smile on her face. She was laughing.

All this happened in just a moment, and then the train was gone, roaring off into the distance at just below the line speed limit. The wind from the train’s passage rattled a lineside sign. It was a white circle with several thin diagonal slashes through it.

It was an “end of speed limit” sign.

🎶 I came up from the bottom

And into the top

For the first time I feel alive

I can fly like an eagle

And strike like a hawk

Do you think you can survive... the top?🎶

John noticed that the small yellow dot in the distance was getting bigger. Squinting, he couldn’t quite see what it was.

Whatever it was, it was slowly gaining on them.

Hang on…He thought.

The cameras that were blanketing his sides were supposed to be recording the lineside for defects, but nobody ever cared about the “going away” view. Very quietly, he “looked” through the lens mounted just above his eyes. It had a nice zoom, and could see much further than he could.

What he saw made him blink and look again. Then a third time. Then a fourth. After looking for a fifth and final time. He finally wrapped his mind around what exactly he was seeing.

“Hey Murg?” he said innocently.

“Yes? What is it?” Murg sounded far more irritated than he should be.

“Think you can get us into the triple digits? Some of the boffins are worried about their readings not being calibrated right.”

“Oh damn them all.” Murg cut the connection with a pained cough. John had a distinct feeling that the Infallible and Most Invulnerable King Murgatroyd was hiding exactly how bad cylinder four really was from everyone, lest he be seen as “weak” or “mortal” by his inferiors.

Well, he thought to himself with a hint of smugness as the train slowly began to increase speed. If he wants to play the perfect king, he’ll have to deal with the locals.

Behind them, Pip and Emma continued to get closer and closer…

---

James and his coaches had been waiting on the dratted P-Way gangers for over half an hour at Kellsthorpe Road, and set off with a will when the signal changed.

Of course, the signaling was all out of sorts, and he was running “wrong main” on the Up Slow line, but he didn’t much care. There wasn’t anyone in front of him, and was making “good” time on his way to Killdane. “Maybe we’ll still make it to Tidmouth before tomorrow!” he joked to his driver, who had long since given up on making light of the situation.

They leaned into the curve heading towards Killdane, and that awful banana of a measurement train streaked by in the other direction. James whistled derisively at it out of reflex more than anything else, and was quietly grateful that the unpleasant train had nothing to say in return.

In the distance, a giddy-sounding honk-honk drew his attention back to the line ahead, and he had just enough time to make out something streaking on the next line over before something-

Honk-Honk! Honk-Honk!

Brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA”

-ripped past them with a honk, a roar, and a scream.

“What was that?!” He yelped as the wind buffeted him.

“I think that was Pip and Emma!” his driver said, looking backward. “With a container train!”

“What?!”

---

🎶 One more turn and I'll settle the score

A rubber fire screams into the night

Crash and burn is what you're gonna do

I am the master of the asphalt fight 🎶

---

John watched as Pip and Emma got closer and closer. In a macabre way, he felt giddy about it. At their current speed, they were going to eat Murgatroyd for lunch and still have room for tea afterwards.

He had been paying such close attention to the rapidly-closing distance between the two trains that he completely missed the start of the banked curve until he was leaning into it. The rails bent underneath him and the ties whipped past at an odd angle as the whole world tilted a few degrees. They weren’t going slow, by any means, but the sensitive equipment in the coaches (and his years of experience) told him that they could have been going much faster.

“Oh Murg… you might want to speed up…” he sing-songed. “They’re gaining on us…”

“Who’s gaining on us? What?!” Murgatroyd was oblivious, as was his wont.

John wanted to say something else, but his voice failed him as he watched the container train, with low-loaders on the front, rocket through the curve at speeds that he didn’t even want to contemplate.

A train passed on one of the other lines, and he watched the smoke from its stack get whipped and roiled by air currents of the two trains passing each other.

Seconds later, Pip and Emma passed the train, streaking through the remaining smoke, and the force of their passage tore the cloud to ribbons.

---

🎶They all said I'd best give it up

What a fool, to believe their lie-ie-ies!

Now they've fallen, I'm at the top

Are you ready now to die-ie-ie?🎶

---

Pip was high on speed, and she was loving every second of it.

Emma was right behind her, literally and metaphorically; the sensation of pure motion and velocity was coursing through their systems like a drug.

In front of them, so close one could almost reach out and touch it, was the New Measurement Train. John was watching with restrained giddiness as they started to draw abreast of him. He said something, but the wind whipping by erased all sound. There was just speed, and that was more than enough.

Slowly, they pulled even with the coaches, and with each window they passed, another Network Rail employee could be seen looking up in astonishment.

In Pip’s cab, the driver was holding onto the controls with a white knuckle grip. Officially, he was the driver, he was in control of the train. Realistically, he was nothing more than a rider on a bucking bronco. He surveyed the line ahead, and gulped.

Behind Pip and Emma, Thomas’s eyes were right in the most turbulent part of the wake that followed the diesels. Air, superheated and filled with grit and soot from twin exhausts, poured into his eyes and swirled around his face. He couldn’t hear, he could barely see.

Behind him, the wind whipped through the turbine blades of the jet engine on the next low-loader. It had been secured for transport, so the blades didn’t move, but the wind rushing through it created a high-pitched howling noise that simply added to the cacophony.

Lost in the chaos of the wind and the noise and the exhaust, the container wagons and the low-loaders were holding onto each other for dear life.

“I’m not designed for thiiiiis!” one of them shrieked.

“None of us are!” the wagon ahead of him bellowed. “Just keep holding on a little longer!”

At the head of the NMT, Murgatroyd was trying very hard to ignore the slight off-beat throbbing coming from cylinder four. Something was amiss with it - what it was, he didn’t know for certain. Driver didn’t know either - blasted man hadn’t turned a wrench a day in his life; wouldn’t know the difference between an allen key and the keys to a house!

Of course there weren’t any fitters on board - “economic savings” kept them at home base - so he just had to deal with it.

Just so long as the underlings didn’t notice, everything would be fine-

“Oh Murgatroyd…”

“Yes, John?”

“You might want to look around...”

He looked off towards the Up lines, and was rendered momentarily speechless by the sight of Pip smiling wickedly at him.

“T-that’s not possible,” he said once he found his tongue. “That isn’t possible!”

---

🎶 I came up from the bottom

And into the top

For the first time I feel alive!

I can fly like an eagle

And strike like a hawk

Do you think you can survive...

I came up from the bottom

And into the top

For the first time I feel alive!

I can fly like an eagle

And strike like a hawk

Do you think you can survive... the top?🎶

----

Moments earlier

“So how late do you think we’re going to be?” Percy asked as the train rumbled through Kellsthorpe Road station.

“Oh,” Henry pondered. “We’re only allowed to do 45, and we’ve got to drop off the aluminium at Killdane, so probably two or three hours if we lose our path at all. Which we will.”

“Thomas is going to be absolutely livid when I get back.” Percy said from atop his low loader. “He was supposed to go in for his new cylinder block today, so if I’m not back, they’re going to have him stay in steam all day.”

“Oh, he won’t be thrilled about that.” Henry chortled. “I swear, he’s the only engine who likes going to the works.”

“They treat him the same way James treats himself. Of course he likes going there!”

“Hah! I hadn't considered that-oh dear…” Henry trailed off mid-sentence.

“What?”

“It appears that we’re about to go down the middle between Pip and Emma, and their favorite siblings.”

“What? The banana? Oh great.”

“Yes, they- oh goodness they’re quick-”

Anything else Henry said was lost to the deafening thunderclap made as the New Measurement Train and the Container Express roared past on the opposing lines. The wind felt like it was going to knock him clean off the rails, and Percy yelped in surprise as debris and exhaust fumes swirled around him like a hurricane. His boiler, a stout construction that could hold hundreds of pounds of pressure, felt like it was flexing and bowing from the vibrations in the air. He watched in open-mouthed shock as Henry’s cab windows were sucked out of their frames from the differential pressure, and were hurled through the air followed by every loose object in the cab, from hats and coats, to papers and even a coal shovel!

Behind and in front of Percy, open wagons of stone, and the coal from Henry’s tender sent huge plumes of dust and debris into the air, swirling and mixing into a funnel cloud that wrapped around the rear of the train. It danced in the tornadic airflow for a few seconds, before dissipating as the trains parted once more.

The silence afterwards was deafening.

“DID I LOSE A WINDOW?” Henry asked, almost unable to hear himself speak, as his driver applied the brakes and stopped the train.

Percy tried to make the ringing in his smokebox cease. Closing his eyes, he suddenly remembered seeing something in the fraction of a second before the world went topsy-turvy. “Wait a tic. Was that Thomas?”

“WHAT?”

---

🎶 What were you thinking, telling me to change my game?

This style wasn't going anywhere; it was kaput!

You want to see what I've done with this place; this whole thing?

You want to see that I changed the game?

No, I AM the game!

Before I knew where this was going, I would've listened to you

Right now, I distance myself from what you have to say!

I made this something way bigger than you're ever gonna be

I made it this far; and I'm taking it to the top 🎶

----

Pip and Emma laughed gaily as they overtook the NMT, and powered on towards Kellsthorpe Road like they weren’t towing several hundred tonnes of freight train behind them.

Murgatroyd gaped in shock as he was passed by the steam engine they were carrying as cargo.

The shock quickly turned into outrage, and he felt the red-hot sting of being one-upped surge through his system. His engine began to rev higher, urging the train to move faster damn it.

“Whoa there,” his driver exclaimed, laying a firm hand on the controls. “We want to make it to the mainland, right?”

“I don’t care!” Murgatroyd ground his teeth, watching as the container wagons slipped past him. “They can’t win!”

But no matter how he tried, his driver wouldn’t let him speed up.

He howled and roared impotently as Pip and Emma got further and further ahead.

---

On the platforms of Kellsthorpe Road station, several surveyors were getting measurements of the newly-relaid line.

Looking down the magnified optics of a theodolite, the true character of the railway could be seen. What appeared to be a straight and flat section of line was actually a ribbon of steel that undulated and flowed over the terrain. While certain sections had just been flattened and graded, it was impossible to fully eliminate the contours of the earth without starting from scratch, and so the line rolled with the small hills and invisible valleys instead of cutting right through them.

“Hey, look at that.” One of the other surveyors said from behind an optical level. “You can see the NMT from here.”

“Can you?” asked his coworker, who quickly pointed his theodolite down the line. “I don’t see it.”

“It’s just gone behind the dip. Should be back in a moment.”

He fixed his eyes on the dip in the terrain. It was actually visible to the naked eye, but its height differential - deemed to be “within acceptable limits” - and its presence directly under a road bridge - meant that it had survived the recent track relaying unscathed.

The surveyors waited for the train to reappear, the optics of their measurement devices making things appear much larger than they really were.

With that in mind, it was something of a surprise to see an HST appear two tracks over from where the NMT had been. They both looked to that line just in time for the train to crest the hill.

There was a brief moment, no longer than a breath, where both men could see daylight shine underneath the train as all the wheels left the ground.

----

Pip and Emma hooted and hollered with glee as they roared through the approach to Kellsthorpe Road station. High speed crossovers and the new banked curve meant they didn’t have to check their speed in the slightest as they charged onwards.

The station came and went in a flash, and they leaned into the new corner at unprecedented speeds. Behind them, Thomas wailed loud enough to be heard over their motors, but they paid him little mind; they didn’t realize - or understand - exactly what he was experiencing.

Behind them, now far into the distance, the New Measurement Train was just rolling into the station.

They had won.

---

🎶 I came up from the bottom

And into the top

For the first time I feel alive!

I can fly like an eagle

And strike like a hawk

Do you think you can survive...

I came up from the bottom

And into the top

For the first time I feel alive!

I can fly like an eagle

And strike like a hawk

Do you think you can survive... the top? 🎶

----

Further up the line, Bertie the bus was pulling up to a level crossing, just as the gates went down.

“That was a great song on the radio, wasn’t it?” he said to his driver, who was thoroughly regretting turning on ManxPirate, thanks very much. “I feel like I should be racing something! Ooh! I know! The next train that comes by, we’ll try and chase it, huh? Just like the old times with Thomas!”

Honk-Honk

“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA”

Whooooooooooooooooooooosh

The train passed in just a few seconds.

“Nevermind.”

-----

The song wound down to a stop, but Pip and Emma continued charging on.

The guard went so far as to pull the fuse on the radio, hoping that it would calm them down, but they were too far gone to consider dropping their speed until they reached Crovan’s Gate station. There, the speed limit dropped to 90; normally a mild inconvenience, but today it felt like they’d dropped an anchor behind them.

Still, they continued merrily along through the station as fast as was allowed (much to Thomas’s dismay) and continued east along the line.

As they cleared the station and began to speed up again, they noticed a cloud of smoke on the horizon.

There was still one more train they could catch…

-----

Compared to everyone else in this story, Gordon was having a blissfully uneventful day. He’d managed to put that vulgar measurement train almost totally out of his mind, and was making excellent time to the mainland when one considered the workmen-caused delay at Kellsthorpe Road.

There was a farm lane that crossed the tracks near Henry’s tunnel, and he whistled for it.

Honk-Honk

He was most surprised to hear a horn respond to him, and was flabbergasted to see Pip, then Emma, and then Thomas pass him like he was standing still!

“HiGordonByeGordon!” “HiGordonByeGordon!” “GORDON HELP ME!”

The train raced into the tunnel and vanished from sight.

Gordon could not believe what he had seen!

----

Eventually, the speed limits dropped, and the four track main line merged into two just after Vicarstown. Rolling over the lift bridge at a sedate twenty miles an hour Pip and Emma finally began to come down off their “runner’s really high.”

“That was great!” Pip gushed. “Just the sort of run we needed to clear everything out, am I right?”

“Uh, Pip?” Emma began to notice the state of Thomas. “I think we miiiiight have overdone this a little.”

Thomas could only whimper in agreement!

----

By the time the New Measurement Train rolled into Barrow station some thirty minutes later, Pip, Emma, and Gordon were all trying to console Thomas, to limited success.

“...Ahem!” Murgatroyd tried to slink into the station totally unnoticed, but John had no compunctions about making sure they were seen. “So, I assume that you two will be conducting all of this railway’s freight services from now on?”

“Oh,” Pip’s smile was very guilty looking as she turned away from the still shell-shocked Thomas. “Yeah. About that…” She swallowed deeply. “I’m… sorry about… y’know. All of that. The overtake.”

“What, me? Overtaken?” Murgatroyd tried and failed to play dumb. Well, a different kind of dumb from usual. “I hadn’t noticed.”

Pip’s smile grew much harder edged, and Gordon took the moment to intercede. “Look, Pip. You don’t owe that any apology of any form.”

Murgatroyd looked aggrieved. Gordon turned on him next. “And you. You are an uncouth abomination who have done nothing useful at all. Take the apology, cause no more trouble, and find yourself a better attitude elsewhere.”

Murgatroyd puffed himself up with self-righteous fury, and John regretted being an instigator.

“WELL, I-” He started.

“Oh shut up!” Thomas bellowed. “Stop talking before I come down there and peel you, you great useless banana! Everything that’s happened to me today is all your fault!”

Murgatroyd quailed under the impressive amount of vitriol Thomas was spewing, and he left in a chastised burst of soot and clag. John followed in his wake, not sure what, if anything to say. “Bye Pip. Bye Emma.”

Once the NMT had vanished from sight, Pip, Emma, and Gordon turned their attention back to Thomas.

“Great useless banana?” Gordon raised an eyebrow.

Thomas didn’t have the energy for a proper comeback, and simply stared at him knowingly.

“Fine, fine,” Gordon acknowledged the unsaid. “For an off-the-buffer moment after the day you’ve had, it was a fine jab. I’m just glad that you’re beginning to feel more like yourself.” He began to steam off towards the shed. “As such, I’ll be off.”

“Wait!” Thomas called. “Where are you going? Who’s taking me on the pick-up goods?”

“Thomas, I don’t take the pick-up goods,” Gordon called regally. “That’s what we have diesels for. I believe there’s two of them right in front of you!”

“ABSOLUTELY NOT!”

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

Post script: Low-loaders were subsequently banned from Pip and Emma's trains

#ttte #sodor #sodor shenangians #fic #trains #traintober #ttte gordon #ttte james #ttte boco #ttte henry #ttte edward #ttte thomas #ttte pip&emma #music #eurobeat #ttte percy #and just to make something clear #every aspect of this story has some kind of IRL basis #even that one

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charmwasjess · 3 days ago

Text

My tiny mountain town is a blue dot swallowed up in a sea of red. Our statistically-irrelevant town went for Harris. The larger counties around us all went for Trump. Here’s what this election looked like in the southeastern Appalachian on the front lines of that cultural divide:

Outright unprosecuted voter intimidation: in the few blocks walk from my house to downtown, I can see a prop skeleton dressed as a Harris supporter hanging from a noose, and Harris yard signs slashed with a knife, others just ripped down to the cardboard.

Gerrymandering - years ago, these little-known poorer districts were redrawn around population centers in ways that give likely Republican strongholds more weight, particularly in rural areas like mine. Republican lawmakers literally have opened prisons in rural counties in my state to artificially inflate population numbers with people who can’t vote due to their felon status to tip the scales.

Of course, the Electoral college, where US votes are decided by weight of a state’s respective collective population and importance rather than just the counted individuals votes

I’m not making excuses. I echo the rest of the world’s collective disgust and horror about the outcome. I am literally sick with my country. People will die because of this. People who don’t live here, people who didn’t get a choice or stake in the US elections, and who probably wish they’d never heard of the place. And people in my own community.

Yet it is so easy to picture this election as the ultimate triumph of laziness and inattention, particularly in “ignorant hillbilly” places like where I live, which generally go for Trump without any fight - at least not one that shows up on an election night map. But the Republican right has been working for decades to put the legal, economic, and societal pressures that lead to this in place here.

We fought hard. Grassroots campaigners, our organizers of LGBTQIA+ groups, leaders in our communities who showed up despite the fact that it put a target on their backs if shit went bad. Teachers fighting Republican-led mandates of ignorance and racism to choke out any thinking that might interfere with their political goals for their ideal voter base. Librarians who get death threats for having kid’s books dealing with gender or queerness in the public libraries.

These are not imagined examples, these are things that happen to real people I know in my tiny blue community. And the violent, right-wing party, the party that promised to make this second Trump term one of revenge and retribution, knows who those people are too.

The Charlottesville “Ignite the Right” attack happened in my backyard. I had friends on that street when a self-described neo nazi drove into a crowd and killed Heather Heyer and injured 35 others. Trump was president when it happened; he called the alt-right who invaded Charlottesville with guns and armor and torches that day “good people.”

I have no faith in my party now. It feels like we’re still trying to play a game we lost years ago, while the other side is busy winning a new game, one where they get to make up all the rules.

I realize that there are greater global trends at play - incumbents being ousted, a swing to the right, post-pandemic economic scrambles - larger issues than the difficulties of voter suppression in my rural American communities. I'm not in a great mindset to consider them this week. I've been politically active since I was old enough to vote, and it feels like we always build so much momentum and then slam facefirst into this fucking invisible wall.

Honestly? I’m so tired and depressed and anxious, I feel like I can barely function right now. At the same time, I’m disgusted by my own despair and whining. What gives me the right to stop trying now, when so many people across the globe are facing the same anger and exhaustion? When so many people are in more active danger, with less options than I have?

Anyway, I wanted to write something out about the election, maybe just to let go of the words and get them out of me. I'm a queer politically active liberal in a Republican-dominated rural space. Next week, I'll read all the posts about hard work and hope and building support networks. This week, I just need a fucking minute on the floor.

#to be deleted #cw for depression and US election stuff I'm sure everyone is sick of hearing about

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freshlyrage · 2 days ago

Text

Running Like Water

Chapter 33

pairing: Javier Peña x OFC (written as xReader)

fic warnings: NSFW Explicit Smut (18+ MDNI) language, strained family relationships, mentions of drug abuse, discussions of insecurities and body image issues, daddy and mommy issues

fic tags: Best friends younger sister, Life-long crush, Friends to lovers, Unrequited love, slow burn, Push and Pull, Small Town Dynamics, Secret Relationships, latina MC, Fluff and Angst, OFC!Jessica Alba face claim, sorry Lorraine I'm bringing you into this, Time jumps, 2 year age gap, pre-canon

word count: 7k

A/N: Missed you all!

What do you say to your ex-boyfriend after you make him come so hard he cries?

Age old question.

“Do you need water?” You ask, ankles wrapped around his lower back. Sated and satisfied, he nods before parting his body from yours. Eyes heavy lidded, staring at you bare covered in his come. Your questions sinks in and he takes back his nod with a furrowed brow.

“No-let me clean you.” He stands before you can protest that you can do it yourself. His jeans hanging low, sweat painting his hairline, he walks away.

You’re left alone on the couch, a bit shameful you’d say. You might never look at the couch the same again. Thank goodness Chucho only ever sits in his recliner, he’s saving you from decades of embarrassment. The tv was shut all the way off and the December breeze creeped through the window steadily then all at once. Sobering your mind that only had the capacity to be turned on. Your pleasure sensors doing its job.

He comes back, shifting his bulge with his palm. Kneeling before you, and wiping you clean. “We always seem to get here.” He whispers, leaning down to grab your panties off the floor. You thank him silently and pull them back on. He stands and watches you for a moment. He’s still licked with sweat and red eyed from his orgasm. “I don’t want this to be a step back-”

“It won’t be. We’re… human. And I’m almost getting my period so…” You ramble and he hums. You usually can keep it in your pants. And you talked up such a big game about boundaries just to fold the second your hormones whacked and Javier made the slightest reference to your previous sex life. You had an extraordinary forty-eight hour attempt of celibacy.

He nods, leaning back in the seat. “Going forward?” He crosses his arms. Your brows shoot high, he waits for you to set a new rule. His pants are still unbuckled and he looks fucked out. Too sexy for his own good, that fucking mustache drives you up a wall.

“Going forward…” You straighten up, criss crossing your legs. “I’d like to… not make it a habit while we’re figuring it out. But… if we get… in a mood-“ He chuckles, you stumble over your own words as if you weren’t just talking him through coming all over you. You narrow your eyes at him and nudge him with your foot. “No sex. Penetrative sex. No kissing.” You stabilize your voice, his eyes saddened at the last part.

“Can I eat you out?” He asks like it’s nothing at all, like he’s asking what’s the weather like. You think for a moment.

“Do you want to eat me out?” You ask, not sure why—

He looks down at your lap. “Please.”

You kick him. “Pervert… Yes you can. If! It happens to progress that way not just because we want to. We aren’t together-“

“Yet.” He nods. “Not together yet.”

You snort, “You’re confident.”

“Andrea. I know you don’t want anyone else.”

You scoff this time, sitting up. “You’re right. I don’t. But if you can’t prove to me that you’re ready I’ll have no fucking problem setting foot to New York alone. It wouldn’t be the first time.” Your face is red, feeling something close to anger. No, you weren’t trying to be controlling. You’re just not the passive twenty-two year old ready to just cry and move on. Over and done with it. “Tomorrow. I want you to visit Lorraine. I’ll come with you if you’d like, I can’t promise to help the situation because I might pop her.” You exhale, running a hand through your hair. Genuinely frustrated and violent when you think of her. Javier smirks and nods

“Okay. But I need you there with me.”

Flustered and frankly pissed off, “Alright.”

His under eye twitches and he opens his mouth just to shut it again. You squint at him, annoyed. “What.” You snap.

“You’re so sexy when you’re angry.”

“Shut the fuck up.”

“So you’re back together” Genie wipes her lips, just to take another bite of bruschetta that drips on the plate. You and Javier napped on the couch until four pm when the sound of a polaroid click and flash jolted you upright. Chucho stood at the couch without a clue, grinning as his photo developed. You yawned and Javier drove you back to your motel. He didn’t want to say goodbye, watched you until your waved at him from inside the room window.

Then you put on your bumiest clothes and drive to your brother's house. In desperate need of talking to a woman. As much as you missed your brother, you were absolutely thrilled to find that he took your niece to a birthday party.

Your lips tangy and oily, Genie was trying something new as a snack. “No. We aren’t-“

“So please explain this to me again.” She uses her bisquit to pick up what fell off before, grunting when it falls again.

You sigh, licking your lips. “He ate me out on Christmas.”

“That’s blasphemous.” She grins and you roll your eyes.

“Whatever, I think we were just high off of seeing each other. Missed one another, then we both felt shit about it the next morning. I told him we had to do this differently. I told him that we had to have rules because I want this to work so badly— Genie you don’t understand. I’m so tired of running around in circles.” You aggressively bite into another piece of bruschetta. Genie gives you a sympathetic nod, “I told him no kisses, no sex, just honesty. I need him to continue getting help—I need him to talk to Lorraine.”

Her brows shoot up, moving to stand and grab the bottle of wine left uncapped on the counter behind her. Internalizing all that you’ve said, she pours you another glass. “Don’t you think maybe… that won’t be a good idea. Like it’ll bring up old memories.”

And of course you’ve thought about it. You wonder if there’s a part of you who’s just being the jealous little girl you once was, You think that if he came back here, the same person he was in 1986 you’d be a bit crazy for making him talk to Lorraine. But that isn’t the reality, But that isn’t the reality, Lorraine intruded, she placed a wedge in the track of his life. Leaving him even more uncertain than he was before she came home.

There’s a part of Javier that stayed with her, a person isn’t made to be lied to in that way. You’re not sure if you can move on without officially leaving her in the past.

You shake your head, “Lorraine is more than an old memory. She baby trapped him, attempted to isolate him on purpose, so she could keep him. And it has nothing to do with me—or-me feeling like she was taking him away from me. Even if we weren’t involved she still took advantage of him. It was an abuse of power, simple as that.” You crunch so loud it acts as a closing statement. Genies brows raise a bit, internalizing all that you’ve said.

Genie is your family. She is your best friend. But she has also never left Laredo, Texas. She has lived her whole life in a bubble. She’s smart, she’s charming, she’s the only woman you’ve ever looked up to. But, she’s also very, very, southern—“You sound so damn therapized. That’s probably healthier than whatever I would have done!” She snorts and she means no harm.

You laugh too, you love her so much sometimes you forget she isn’t really your sister.

“What would you have done, Genie Diaz?” You quirk a brow.

“Spun that bitches jaw at the altar!”

“She was pregnant!” You cackle and Genie shrugs.

“You’re right. I forget she didn’t lie about that. I don’t know, maybe spit in her face or something, she ain’t pregnant now. You should try it this time.” She gives up on piling her tomatoes on her biscuit and begins spoon feeding herself. You do the same.

“I’m trying to be good—I want to be healthy and mature about this. “ You say, mouth full of tomatoes.

You playfully reach your spoon onto her plate, your silverware clanking. You find a scoop anyhow. “Huh. You’re really putting a lot of yourself into this.”

You frown, because she knows. Because you have to say it anyway. Say it out loud. Face solemn and inward. Everyone always said you could never keep an emotion off of your face.

“He’s the love of my life, so.” You shrug like it’s nothing to the ear. Genie smiles a small biting thing. You know she loves to hear it, you want to tell her to look away. But you don’t, “I will do anything to make it work. I’ll be thirty in a few years, I want to start building my life with him.”

“I don’t think I’ve ever been more happy to hear anything in my life.” She taps her spoon against yours, it’s like a hug. Like a kiss on the cheek.

You tap hers back and burn bright red.

This shit better work.

Is the first thing Javier thought of the second you left his house. Feeling aimless and confused, which could be unhealthy but he just figures it just the effects of missing someone so much.

He unpacks a few things, leaving most of it in its place. He’s ready to leave with you, if you say yes of course. He puts on his fathers records and picks up the living room. His brain was a bit clouded from the pseudo-sex you two had. Banishing himself from replaying it over in his mind. Ears hot with embarrassment and arousal thinking about the way you held his head when he came.

His semi died in his pants the moment he remembered he needed to just call Lorraine, see if she’s even willing to speak. Javier’s therapist had been suggesting that he do something like this for a few years now. She believed that the way it ended wasn’t truly an end. And it wasn’t, he never got to face her and just ask her why.

Granted, he’s been too fucking angry and rather never see her again.

But it was you that asked, so he’ll do it.

He knows he needs to, it petrifies him. But he wants to be with you so badly, the thought of this not working petrifies him in a whole other way. A way he won’t recover from. So he looks through his fathers phone book and finds her name.

It only took him two cigarettes, a lap around the kitchen and four minutes of silence to ring her.

It rings twice and he hears a child's screech. Javier feels his world crashing down on him for a second.

“Hello?”

Her voice makes him go cold. It makes him angry in a way that quickly turns to grief. All in twenty seconds. “Hello?” She asks again.

He blinks, ashes his cigarette and straightens in his seat. It squeaks the same way it did when he sat half asleep over fifth grade math homework. The thought scares him, he’s been in this house for too long. Change becomes too much when you can pinpoint exactly what you did in that very spot twenty years ago. What he would give to do it all over, to drool over homework while his mother cooked. Instead he sits here with years of trauma, on the phone with one of the perpetrators. He blinks three times, “It’s Javi.”

There's a small breath from the phone, some shuffling and a similar creak that only a wooden chair could make. “Okay…” Is all she can say and he wants to bang his head into the hand sawed table Javier built with his father when he was fourteen.

“I want to… talk to you. In person.”

“When… when did you come back to the states?”

“That doesn't really matter. When are you free?”

She does something that sounds like a scoff and his ears ring. He closes his eyes and sees you and everything clears up. “I guess tomorrow. Andy won’t be home.”

Javier’s brows furrow, “Who-”

“My son. My parents are taking him to the indoor waterpark. Does noon work?”

His eyes burn, chin usually strong but nearly quivers. He closes his eyes and can only feel heat surrounding his senses. His face an inferno, he feels so uncomfortable in his own skin at just a few words. He feels it, the isolation. Where would he be? How miserable would he have been with her. She speaks to him in that rude passive-aggressive tone she’d give him after a long day of classes. Like he was a child needing reprimanding.

He agrees with a simple sure and has what his therapist would describe as a panic attack. He cries again today. He feels stupid, exposed and weak. Unlike a man. He locks himself in his room for the rest of the night, doesn't come down for dinner and avoids thinking of you. He knows you’d cry with him and tell him he isn’t weak or stupid or whatever–he avoids thinking of you some more. He chooses not to be hopeful tonight, and that's what you are for him.

He feels even more embarrassed when he wakes up at eight in the morning and realizes he fell asleep because his panic attack took the energy from him. He wakes up an anxious mess and he calls you to tell you that he’ll be at your hotel in two hours. He barely lets you speak beyond the agreement, he wasn’t ready for this yet.

He showers and dunks his face in cold water, hoping his eye swelling will settle. He dresses the way he likes, denim, button up and boots. Burns one on the road, he knows you hate the smell.

His panic fizzles the moment he pulls his fathers truck into the dingy motel “hotel”. What a rare thing you two have got going. You come out of the room, locking the door behind you and he already feels better.

His lips twitch in a smile watching you struggle to work the overused key. He stares at what you decided to wear. Looking like a vixen, hair straightened, pencil skirt stretched across your behind taut like it's struggling. A sweater similar to yesterdays, white this time. And heels, like you're on your way to be the sexiest defense attorney in the state. He wonders if you could just forget it, fuck Lorraine, we can be fine without ever speaking of her again.

Then he panics and looks at his eyes in the rearview mirror, still swollen and he decides maybe you have a point with all of this. He swallows his fear.

“Hi.” You chirp, not too excited for the day but excited to be with him. He furiously avoids eye contact with you.

“Hi.” He leans forward to kiss you cheek fast and you feel like an absolute loser for getting full body chills. “You look pretty.” He turns the key and the car rattles. The day is gray and depressing. The moment you opened your eyes alone in the itchy sheets of the hotel, you beamed at the sound of Javier's voice from your temporary home phone. Left sad at the brief tone and the Lorraine related reality check. You stared at the popcorn ceiling and cried for a few minutes.

You see him now and figure maybe he feels the same way.

The line between your brows creases, in the way that bothers him. You can’t help being worried about him. He had gone through so much without you.

You observe his every move as he pulls out the lot without a word. Watching the way his hands look older on the steering wheel, thinking of what they’d look with a wedding band. You see a glimpse of the freckles on his cheeks that seemed to have layover from the Colombian sun. You see that under his eyes are puffy and that he’s clenching his jaw.

He comes to a light and you can’t help yourself. Your hand flies to the back of his head, nails gently scraping his scalp. He pulls his brows together and leans into your touch. “Hey…its okay we don’t have to-”

He grunts, “Andrea…”

“We can go home, find another way– I can feel how unhappy you are it’s-”

“Andrea, please don’t do that-”

You drop your hand. “Do what.”

The light turns green.

“Try to take care of me– try to change the plans just because I’m not happy about it. It's right for us–I want to get it right.”

You frown and your hand feels as if it’s been stung.

“I can't take care of you?” You whisper.

He clicks his tongue, “I don’t want you to worry about that. That’s for me to handle.” Still, Javier has yet to look you in the eyes. Your face is filled with heat.

“No.”

“No, what?” It’s meaner than he anticipates, you can tell in the way his forehead creases.

“No. That’s not how this is going to work. Yes, I shouldn’t coddle you and I’m sorry for my immediate reaction to you being upset. But as long as I’m around I’ll want to take care of you. Let me have that.” You cross your arms, feeling like a petulant child, also not caring at all. His chest puffs and you can tell he’s about to speak again. You cut him off before he even begins. “You hurt me when you don’t expect me to care just as much as you care about me.”

He looks at you, nostrils flaring and his face crumbles. He clenches his jaw and you watch the muscles in his face twitch, wanting to shut down and turn away. But he doesn’t, “You’re right. I’m sorry, I’m just trying—you’re the most important part of my life. I’m not used to feeling this… open.”

“We don’t have to see her today.”

He chuckles, “No. Now I have to see her today. She was just as callous and cold on the phone as she was years ago. It fucking pissed me off.”

You smile, leaning your head against the window. “I probably shouldn’t come in with you. For her safety.”

He snorts, a long loud beep snaps them both out of the little world they’ve created in that truck. Javier looks at the rear view mirror and cringes, before stepping on the gas. “How many times do you think that light changed?” He leans forward and readjusts himself to his regular driving posture. You take a deep breath and just shrug which makes him laugh again. “And I need you to bear witness to her manipulation.”

“I’ll try to behave.”

He raises a brow at you but returns to be inward. You allow him, he lets music play the rest of the ride.

The lawn is only slightly overgrown. Overgrown in the way that everyone’s lawn is in the winter. Even in a place where you don’t get snow, or really cold weather. Still winter is a feeling, feeling like your lawn isn’t important. There’s a mailbox too, only the last name Smithfield is on it. So she isn’t married which honestly comes as a surprise to you.

You’d assume in some ironic alliance of the stars she’d get all that she wanted and you’d suffer. Or maybe she realized she needs to be alone in order to figure herself out entirely.

Javier lets you knock when you ascend the stairs. There’s a cat on a porch swing. It meows at the sight of the two of them. Like the world’s softest guard dog. It makes Javier smile for the first time since he stepped out of the car.

You aren’t nervous, you had your moment to confront her. You’re not nervous in that way.

Javi though, you could almost feel it lift from him. Since the moment he picked you up, you saw it in the bags of his eyes and in the way he snapped and hurt your feelings. The way he gets in a headspace where he cares so much about everything and he can’t conceptualize someone else caring for him.

He’d look into the eyes of killers, men so ruthless, so deeply connected that bringing them to justice is a task nearly impossible. But when Lorraine opens the door his eyes dart to the ground first then to hers. But it’s no use.

Her eyes are on you.

You aren’t expecting it but it doesn’t show.

She looks the same, hair still blonde, brighter now like she goes for a touch up once and a while. Her cheeks lost its roundness and she’s skinnier in the way that moms get. When they realize that maybe they should focus on themselves too, fifteen pounds lighter later. There’s not a lick of makeup on her face and her nostrils flare at the sight of you. Then she looks at Javier.

“Well. Come on in.” She bites out in a tone that seems like an attempt to be nice. She turns and walks straight in. Javier follows first, taking a glance at you and clenching his jaw. The house is nice, modern, and tidy. The front door leads you to a hallway that brings you into the kitchen. Lorraine’s back is still turned. Picking up a toy from the floor and mail from the dinner table and placing it on the counter next to the stovetop. “I made lunch, I wasn’t picturing a third person here.”

She glances over her shoulder and runs her eyes from the top of your head down to your heels. You smile back and you know it disgusts her. She turns her face back to the food on the stovetop. It’s a casserole, she had no reason to complain about her lack of food other than to assert some pseudo dominance over you.

It’s laughable, you watch as she serves you a plate as well.

Javier shakes his head as he notices her comment was unnecessary as well. “Should we sit at the table?”

“Yes. Water?”

“Sure.” You respond and the sound of your voice has her shoulders tensing.

It’s a brown table with two chairs on each side and two at both of the heads of the table. You and Javier sit side by side.

Javi places his hand on your knee, soothing you to soothe himself. It makes you frown, it feels like the first time you aren’t hiding yourselves and it’s in front of Lorraine.

Someone who doesn’t deserve to see. The second Lorraine walks towards them with plates and forks and water and whatever she puts in that casserole Javier straightens up.

Lorraine settles down and sips her water, her eyes attempt to avoid you but they lose.

Javier doesn’t like this.

The way he stares at Lorraine is the way you pictured him staring down the face of officials, criminals, and his boss. It’s like in one moment all the nerves he once had cease to exist, all that was left was the anger he feels and the itch for confrontation.

Her fork drags across the plate in an ear aching screech. She takes a bite, waves the fork gesturing between the two of you. “So? You too finally together?” She says with a smirk, a knowing hint of sarcasm. She talks with the knowledge of her role in all of this.

Javier clenches his jaw, “No. We aren’t. I just got home.” He doesn’t entertain her

foolishness.

Her eyebrows furrow, she frowns and looks at you.

“Ah— that’s unfortunate-“

“Where’s your kid?” You cut her off, taking a sip of the water she served. The smirk is immediately wiped off her face.

“Andy is with my mother. Not like it’s any of your concern.”

“Well my relationship status wasn’t your concern either so I suppose we’re even.” A timer goes off in the kitchen, Lorraine startles. It settles something in you, she’s much more affected than you are.

She ignores the noise.

“I want to talk about the wedding—I want you to tell me about it.” Javi sits straight, pushing his lousy dish to the side, it clinks with your cup. He pats his pants, digging for his pack. He taps it against the table. “Can i?”

Lorraine shrugged. The apartment reeked of smoke anyway.

Here is where you need to take the backseat. Let him feel. Let him ask. It’ll be impossibly hard to just let it happen but he needs it. He lights up.

“What do you want to know?” She leans back, food abandoned only twenty seconds into the conversation.

Javier furrows his brows, like, what a stupid fucking question. “Why. Why did you lie? When did you decide to fucking lie? Who’s the father—just fucking tell me.”

“You were in love with another woman.” She looks at you and you feel that stupid pang of shame. “I don’t know why I fucking agreed to this—why did you bring her?” Her voice breaks but there’s no tears, she’s afraid of being vulnerable in front of you.

And you want to claw her eyes out. Flip the table over. Call her evil. And yet, you see a girl so insecure—so jaded by what she perceived as normal—and you feel pity beyond belief.

Javier doesn’t reply, neither do you. Because she knows why you’re here. How life would have been different for them if she hadn’t come back around. She knows, so she frowns and the facade is gone. The act, like she’s above all of this mess, like it was just some thing she did that she got over so he should too. It’s gone.

Finally she looks at Javier. “I- In high school you—we were so good. I fucked it up— I know. I thought because we already were planning a life that we could be adults and work through it.” She runs a hand through her hair. “I told you I was sorry—for cheating. I told you that you were it for me. That I’d try but it was written all over you. You were over me so fast, I couldn’t understand that. We were together and you were over me. I became the other woman in our own relationship. Watching you fucking glow whenever she was mentioned. Or watching you hold yourself back from talking about her.” She exhales, she avoids your eyes the entire time. Like it could maim her.

You can’t help it but you do feel an ache in your chest. Javier clenches his jaw once more, his cigarette sizzling before he drags again.

“I was stressed too, we said horrible things to each other when we were like that. Then we’d make up, and be sweet and it would be good. That’s what couples do…”

“They don’t Lorraine—they shouldn’t. We were worse than horrible when we fought, you know that.”

She shakes her head, “I was blindsided when you asked to separate. You’d say we weren’t together but we’d have sex and you still paid for everything.”

Your brows furrow and Javier has a face of guilt. Like maybe he doesn’t want you here anymore.

“We had an agreement.” He says lowly and Lorraine rolls her eyes and takes a sip of her water.

“Sue me then! For still having feelings for an ex boyfriend who is still living with me, paying for my life and fucking me at night.” She slams the cup on the table and your untouched silverware rattles.

Javier narrows his eyes at her outburst.

“Lorraine.” He says it like a whisper and her chin quivers. She could play the role of the heartless unaffected woman but she breaks character. “It was… irresponsible of us. Of me. I know that, and I’m sorry. It was six years of confusion and I really am sorry but I’ve apologized for this. Before I left, we had that talk, I was moving out. It was over that spring, you were seeing other people. I was going back home. You tried to baby trap me—that isn’t normal—that isn’t okay.”

“I wasn’t going to—then I saw the two of you at the wedding and my parents they-"

June 16th 1986

Lorraine is sobbing into her hand the second her aching body sits on her couch. Her parents followed behind her. Coming to sit down next to her. She put on a strong face when she walked in on them in the bathroom, telling each other they loved one another. She stared at herself in the mirror and smiled as tears threatened to fall. Her stomach is touching the sink.

Her parents were livid when she burst into tears on the car ride back. When through a snotty nosed red face she says that Javier was with Andrea.

They assumed he was the one who knocked her up. But she knows it doesn’t add up, she knows the man who did would never take responsibility in the way Javier would. She knows she can never find him if she tries. One drunken night with a man on a work trip. She continued to cry while they cursed his name, saying that he was less than a man.

“We will figure something out, he’ll step up once you tell him he’s his. You were together for nearly a decade! We know about Andrea. She was a fast little girl, brings shame to her family name.” Mrs. Smithfield paces then pauses to stroke Lorraine’s head. “She’s just a temptation.”

He held Andreas hand, comforted her at the sight of me. That was supposed to be me.

She remembers less than a month ago when she had just come home from her second appointment, getting on the phone with Genie. Asking about them, knowing the possibility of seeing Javier with you when you came back. She wasn’t prepared.

Lorraine hiccups, “I need him,” There it is, the truth. There's a part of her that loves him but most importantly she needs him. Overcome with that fact she can't seem to stop speaking through her tears. “He-he isn’t the father but I need him to be I can’t do this alone I-”

Mr. Smithfield storms out of the kitchen at that. “Lorraine Marie. What are you saying?” He booms and Lorraine’s mother sits back in the recliner, head in her hands. Lorraine begins to cry more. Burying her head in the crook of her arm. “Sweetheart! Do you know what they’ll say if they find out. Your mother would lose her spot on the board, we’d never be welcomed in the church again.”

He mutters curses he would never dare say outside the living room. Lorraine sees the looks of their disappointed faces. She sees the same face they gave her brother before they sent him away. She thinks of all they’ve sacrificed to be here. To give her this life, their status. She thinks of the way she was brought into this world. A saving grace of her parents' marriage. Her heart clenches in her chest. To help her sleep at night she may say it's at the thought of being with Javier but something tells her it's the thought of taking him from you.

“I…he doesn’t have to know it isn’t his.” She fills the silence.

Mrs. Smithfield lifts her head and there's a glimmer in her eye that maybe Lorraine should fear.

She accepts it.

Javier is stone faced the entire retelling. His hand is holding his fist in a ball at the table. Watching Lorraine justify her actions. Excuse after excuse, thinking that pity will save her. At least that’s what you see. Product of her own environment, he wasn’t foolish enough to accept that.

You hope Javier sees through her, he should. You know he’s worked on this in therapy, he told you he can no longer be manipulated by her.

She’s rambling, and then she’s silent. She stares at the children’s drawing behind Javier’s head for a few moments and her face crumbles a bit.

“My father was going to leave my mother. It had gotten so bad that despite his devotion to God and his-his dedication to maintain his image— he still filed divorce papers.” She lays her hands flat on the table then drops it into her lap. “But my mother was determined to keep her husband. She—had an idea of what her life was going to look like and she made sure of it. So she made sure their contraception wouldn’t work— and she saved her marriage with her pregnancy. That’s how I was brought along. That’s what I know — Javi I was going to do anything to have you again-.” She stares at him with an intensity like no other, the eyes of a manic woman. The eyes of a woman who hasn’t grown up.

Javier shakes his head, and sits up straight. Heat swarming his face, he’s angry and you watch. Still you feel out of place here, you look away to avoid feeling the urge to cry at his pain. Then his voice booms and he’s pointing his finger in her face. “It’s not good enough— you can’t fault your parent’s actions for your own decisions. Choices you made as an adult—a choice you didn’t have to make. We were over, I didn’t want you. Don’t go using the way you were brought up as an excuse.” He leans back in the chair like the burst of anger pained his aching body. He exhales and Lorraine stays quiet.

Your teary eyes stare at the floor parts and look into the eyes of Lorraine. Her chin quivers but she doesn’t cry. She looks at you finally.

“Then what do you tell her? Huh?” She points her chin towards you, crossing her arms. Mirroring Javier’s posture while you perk up. His nostrils flare.

“What are you talking about Lorraine?”

“Every time you leave her, every time you come back. Do you tell her it won’t happen again? Do you tell her you’re afraid of becoming like your mother so that each time you come home you can fuck up her life, keep her burning for you, and then blame it on it being the only way you know? Do you accept her dependency on you because you know she was neglected by her parents? Tell me Javi. Just fucking say it! Tell me it’s okay for you to be flawed and fuck up peoples lives, tell me I can’t live by those rules.”

You stand so fast, the wooden seat behind you clatters and falls. “Fuck you!” You yell, “You have no idea what you’re talking about. You don’t know anything about me— you don’t know how hard I've worked to recognize my issues and deal with them! You don’t know about our relationship.” You look at Javier, he’s completely shut down. You reach down and grab your purse, you gesture your finger between Lorraine, you and Javi.

“You see— the difference between you and us is that we know we’re fucked up. Everybody is fucked up! But we are trying to take responsibility and grow. You—you’re the same mean spiteful girl you were when you made the conscious decision to trap Javier into a marriage.” Javier’s brain catches up with his body only barely when he stands. Lorraine watches his every move like she’s expecting him to stay.

Your outburst harshly contrasts his tone when he does finally speak again.

“Lorraine—you will always be miserable and full of guilt and anger and fucking resentment for us if you don’t seek some help for your own fucked family trauma.” She stands too, wipes her face and you move away from her. You grab Javier’s hand and he stares at it for a second before following you toward the door.

You step outside and Lorraine follows after.

“Javi!” She calls from the doorway, crying hard. His brows furrow at her call, still holding your hand, he turns.

A crack of sun shining on his face as he looks into the eyes of his former fiancée.

He shrugs, “I never want to see you again. You’ve made my life hell for too long, I'm tired of knowing you. I hope you figure your shit out for your—for your son.”

It’s a harshness she deserves but a cruelty unlike Javi. You know it takes so much of him to be so headstrong. Your heart breaks for him as he turns away and drops your hand. Walking ahead of you as the sound of a screen door closing ends an excruciatingly long chapter.

He raises his fist to his mouth in a motion and sounds akin to a cough but you know he’s hiding his tears from you as you follow him into the truck. You swing the door open and settle in, your heart beating so loud in your ears you feel like your cheeks may burst. Shortly he loads in, sniffling and crying in the way that he does. Continuous tears and furious shameful wipes.

You’re so proud of him.

You’re brought back nearly four years ago.

You in the car, with your head in your hands. Crying so hard you think you might drown. Replaying each word your father said to you, waiting for a comfort that cannot be provided by a kiss or a hug. But instead—

He wipes his face again with a shaky hand, he can’t seem to find the strength to away.

You’re reluctant, afraid to overstep, afraid he won’t remember.

Still you reach your hand over to his shoulder, up his neck and with your pointer finger and thumb you rub his earlobe. His simple gesture of, I love you, I’m your family.

When he rubbed the beautiful bee earrings he got you in New Orleans.

You love him so much. You’re afraid to say it again. Instead you rub his ear to remind him. A quick pass that his brow relaxes at, your fingers caressing the shell of his ear. He leans into your touch for a moment before going frigid. You frown moving your hand to his jaw, holding his face with your face crumbled.

You feel young again.

“When we were little—when we were young you’d always avoid talking about your feelings—or your personal problems when all four of us would get deep at 3 am. You’d listen to all of us but you always sat quietly.” You’re rambling but you picture the night.

The summer before Javier’s freshman year, you, Genie, Frankie and Javier stayed under the stars way past curfew. The night Genie started crying when she told them about what happened with her dad’s friend. That sometimes she feels like the only person in the world who’s struggling. Frankie was already in love with her. He comforted her and talked about his dad. Which was a topic untouched between the two of you. You remember crying for him too.

You told them about the way you felt inside, you sat there wondering if your brother would feel bad for you. And Javi, young, fourteen year old Javi said nothing. He just gathered you when you cried. And Javi, who still, sometimes says nothing, just put himself out there in a painful display of commitment to bettering himself.

He knows what you’re talking about because his eyes soften at the mention. “I remember thinking how badly I wanted you to open up. How badly I wanted to comfort you in the way you comforted me-“ He closes his eyes and moves to part from you but you reach back out. “No— no one deserves to be manipulated and hurt in the way she hurt you. And i’m so—so fucking sorry I made you come here I thought it would be good for you-“

“Andrea-“

“No, Javi. Please. At Frankie’s wedding she got in my head— i’ll admit it. She made me feel ashamed of being in love with you—you told me you loved me that night and I’m sorry I didn’t say it back.” He wants to run, you know it, You see it on his face. “I can tell, I know you. She got in your head when she suggested that you’ll find another way to hurt me. But you won’t. I know you won’t hurt me again. You’re only finding a way to hurt yourself and I’m not letting that happen. When you hurt yourself—you hurt me, do you understand?”

His hands come to hold to your wrists. “I’m not good for you.”

You chuckle through tears, “You think that’s enough for me to leave you alone, you’re out of your mind. Please can we go home.”

His skin is so soft under your palms, “I’m sorry.” He gravels out, voice thick with emotion. You couldn’t care for an apology, you don’t need any. “I—I need to be alone for a moment. I need to process alone I think. I’m sorry.”

Your chest swarms with worry. Your hands drop from the side of his face to his shoulders, you inspect his face and let a beat pass.

“Are you sure?” You feel desperate. You want him to retract, you’re being bad but you hope he kisses you. He looks at your lips when you think this, he stares at you and looks pained. His hands remove yours from his chest and he turns towards the wheel, starting the car.

He never answers and you drive in silence. It feels like a closing of a door, you’re not sure which. You look for an olive branch when he pulls into your motel lot.

“Will you call me?” You ask, you try your best to let him feel on his own. After all, you were the one to put in place all these rules. Javier averts his gaze from you for a moment.

Then he does, his eyes soften at the sight of you. You’re vulnerable and open for him. Standing at the door of his car. “Yes. I will.”

A door inside cracks open.

#fic!rlw #javier peña #javier peña x ofc #javier pena fanfiction #javier pena x you #javier peña smut #ao3 #fanfic #javier peña narcos #javier pena x reader

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torakowalski · 8 hours ago

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Swimmer Steve - Part 11

And we're back! Where have I been? No clue. Well I've been right here but my ability to make words has... not. So we're starting slow, easing into it and hoping they don't notice me creeping up on them.

(part one | part ten)

Steve's part of the Olympics lasts six days, then he turns up at Eddie's door, lays his three(!) medals down on Eddie's dresser, crawls into Eddie's bed and falls asleep for ten hours.

He wakes up, eats some fried chicken that Eddie went out to buy, then goes back to sleep for another four hours.

Eddie, usually never ever able to stay still, discovers that lying on his belly next to Steve, watching him snore softly is way more soothing than any of the herbal teas Wayne likes to press on him.

"Morning," Steve says, blinking sleepily at him at like, ten at night.

"Morning, doll," Eddie says. "Sleep well?"

Steve yawns. "Hm, kept dreaming I was at the Olympics." He blinks around himself, exageratedly. "Well, what do you know?"

He looks so sleepy and smug that there's nothing Eddie can do but scoot over and kiss him. Steve makes a happy noise and hooks an arm around Eddie's neck, pulling him closer.

Steve stripped down to just his boxers before he fell asleep the first time, so Eddie's got nothing but smooth, hot skin under his hands. He still mourns Steve's chest hair, but maybe Steve can grow it for a while now and Eddie will get to experience it, at last.

"Did I dream it, or did we have the best friend chicken ever, at some point?" Steve asks.

Eddie would be more offended that Steve's thinking about food while Eddie's making out with him, but the poor guy has been living the high protein, low carb training diet for way too long now.

"You didn't dream it, but it was only maybe the third best fried chicken I've had here."

Steve's eyes light up when he grins. "You've gotta take me sightseeing before we go home. I want to see everything you've seen and eat everything you've eaten."

"Then your wish shall be granted, good sir," Eddie promises.

"Yeah, talk nerd to me," Steve says and hauls Eddie into another kiss, which Eddie happily gives him until Steve bites his lip, pulls back, and says, "Hang on, I need to piss."

Eddie laughs, rolling off him and flopping backwards onto the bed. "That the kind of romantic way you speak to all the girls, Harrington?"

"No," Steve says. "But I don't feel like I've gotta pretend with you."

Well shit, Eddie thinks, as Steve climbs off the bed and heads for the bathroom. Who knew Steve was gonna be sincere?

He lies on his back, watching Steve's ass unashamedly as he makes his way to the bathroom. He leaves the door half ajar, while he's peeing, because first and foremost: jock.

"I'm gonna shower," Steve calls. "Wanna join me?"

Eddie feels a laugh punch out of his chest. Hell yes, he wants to join him, but he's pretty sure Steve's joking.

Then he remembers that, wait, Steve doesn't have to worry about the Olympics sex curse anymore. Maybe he does mean it. Eddie's half way to sitting up, when Steve pops back into the room.

"No?"

"... Can't tell if you're teasing me," Eddie admits.

Steve looks at him then looks over at the dressing table. "Remember what you said the first time we kissed?"

"Was it oh my god, am I dreaming?" Eddie asks, racking his brain to try to work out what it actually was.

Steve grins at him. "You said you'd shower with me, if I brought home a gold medal." He reaches over and picks up the one gold, sitting it between his two bronzes. He takes a second, seeming just to need to look at it, then holds it up. "I know it was for a relay so I only won like, a quarter of it. But does this count?"

Holy fuck, Steve does mean it. Eddie always gets a little hard when they make out, but now he's hard hard and it maybe robs him of his ability to breathe. Or to answer questions.

Steve grin starts to fade. "But totally no pressure," he says, hand curling tight around his medal. "Sorry. Stupid joke, or well, not a -"

Eddie rolls up onto his knees and holds his hands out demandingly. "Give me my prize, Harrington."

Still with that half-grin only, Steve's eyebrows draw together and he lifts up the medal like a question.

Eddie nods. He can breathe now, but it's coming fast, and he feels hot all over.

Steve steps forward and loops the ribbon around Eddie's neck, murmuring, "Congratulations," like Eddie really is winning a gold here. Let's be reasonable though, if this is going the way Eddie thinks it's going, he definitely is the one who's winning.

#stranger things #steve harrington #swimmer steve #steddie #snippets #eddie munson #olympics au

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lovegalor333 · 2 days ago

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fresh start

part three (chapter 7-9) previous part • next part

word count: 7.1k

content warnings: panic attack mentions of selfh*rm and depression

Lily

"What time does your shift start?" Madison asked me as we sat together eating breakfast in our apartment.

Kelsey and Hannah both had classes today so had already left but Madison and I had Wednesdays free.

"Not until 11." I glance at my phone, it was currently 9:45AM. "But I'm going to get there a little bit earlier because I don't actually know what I'm doing."

"Whatever it is, I'm sure it'll be fun!" My roommate reassures. "Are you nervous?"

"Kinda, I don't want to mess anything up and I just hope everyone likes me." I say honestly.

"Hey, who couldn't like Lily? You're a ball of sunshine!" Madison compliments, "Don't stress it, they know it's your first day, I'm sure they'll be easy on you."

"I hope so." I huff finishing off my cereal before taking my bowl to the kitchen to clean it.

I had almost completed my first full week at UConn and I counted my blessings that it had been going well. I had made friends, enjoyed my first taste of classes and found a job. All things that worried me when it came to transferring. I'd also unintentionally met Paige and I don't know what the future holds with that but it feels nice right now.

We hadn't seen each other since our 'date' a few days ago but we started an almost constant message thread on Instagram. Paige sent the first message yesterday morning and it's basically been nonstop, back and forth from us both.

As if she knew I was thinking about her, my phone pinged with a notification,

[lily.kent] paigebueckers

just spoke to janet, you will be with us today

try not to stare pretty girl, you'll distract me

I smiled at the confirmation that I would be working with Paige and her teammates today, it put my mind at ease considering I'd met most of them already and of course I'd get to see Paige.

I cliked on the dm she had just sent and replied,

i cant make any promises

It was 10AM and my phone pinged again with my daily medication reminder. I went to my bedroom and swallowed down the pills that were singlehandedly keeping me alive. Without them, my brain just doesn't know how to function, it goes into full self destruct mode and getting out of that is the hardest thing of all.

I definitely still have some days that are hard despite being on medication but they're easier to deal with and come around less often.

I had decided a second coffee of the day was a good idea and I had just enough time to pick it up from, what's quickly becoming my usual spot, before my shift started.

The late August air was still warm so I had opted for a low waisted pair of jeans and a long sleeve t-shirt that stopped just before my bellybutton so the perfect amount of skin was showing.

I picked up my favourite order of an iced caramel latte with almond milk and took a slow walk to the athletics building, taking in my surroundings. More and more students had returned to campus over the weekend and beginning of this week so it was busy.

It reminded me of my old college and for a moment I was back there, in Massachusetts with no friends and just having been outed and anxiety hit me like a truck I almost toppled over.

I navigated myself to the nearest bench and sat down in an attempt to regulate my strained breathing. I remembered what my therapist had told me about panic attacks and how to handle them. I focused on my senses.

What was one thing I could taste? Coffee.

What was one thing I could hear? My heart pounding.

What was one thing I could feel? My phone clutched tight in my hand.

What was one thing I could smell? The perfume I had sprayed earlier.

What was one thing I could see? My eyes were closed in an attempt to block out everything around me but I opened them and one thing I could see was someone walking towards me.

My vision was slightly blurred as it always is when I have a panic attack but as they got closer it was clear it was Kayla.

"Lily, are you OK?" She asks dropping her bag down and kneeling in front of me.

"Yeah." I manage but it comes out unconvincing and shaky.

"Did something happen?" I can't even get myself verbalise anything this time so I just shake my head. Kayla quickly realises that I'm in so state to talk so she sits beside me and gently rubs my back until I eventually calm down.

"I have panic attacks sometimes." I tell the girl next to me, finally able to talk without feeling like my lungs were going to explode.

"How do you feel now?" She asks, a look of concern on her face.

"I'm OK now, a little shaky. They come out of nowhere most of the time." I explain, taking a sip of my coffee - which probably isn't helping.

"I can tell Janet you need to push back your start day, she'd understand."

I shake my head sternly, "No way. I'm not giving up before I have even started." I say standing up, my legs still slightly weak.

"It wouldn't be giving up Lily. Everyone has struggles." Kayla tries to empathise but I've already started walking to the athletics building again.

"I'm seriously fine, I've struggled with a lot worse than a panic attack." I blurt before realising Kayla knows nothing about my past.

"Ok, well maybe lets just take five before going in? You've still got fifteen minutes." She says looking at her watch.

"Ok." I give in and Kayla and I stand side by side as I take a few deep breaths.

"You got this and I got you." Kayla says after a few minutes of silence as she wraps me into a hug.

I hug her back, "Thank you, K. Sorry for the freak out, I can usually keep it under control."

"No need to apologise, I'm glad you weren't alone. Panic attacks can be scary." She says as we walk into the building and begin our way to the offices, a route I'm familiar with now.

"Do you mind not telling anyone?" I ask sheepishly.

I'd rather be the one to tell Paige about things, I didn't want her to hear it secondhand from anyone else.

Kayla mimes zipping her lips and I smile at her in response just before we step into Janets office.

"Hello Lily! Happy first day!" Janet beams standing up to greet me.

"Hi Janet, thank you. I'm super excited." I beam back putting on my best fake smile as I push back the remnants of the panic attack I just had.

Janet explains what my day will look like, "So the basketball girls are already on the court but open practice officially starts at 11:30. That's when you'll go in with the rest of the media outlets. You'll be working alongside Marcus who writes the sports column in the UConn newsletter. He'll explain your job more but write down as much as you can, take photos and videos and just be yourself!" She smiles and hands me a folder with the Huskies logo on the front with my name printed beneath it.

I open the folder and find a notebook, multiple pens and a mini microphone, the kind that plugs into your phone that you see tiktokers using in their videos.

"Oh there you are. Marcus, meet Lily. Lily, meet Marcus." Janet says and I spin around to the door that Marcus had just walked through.

"Hi Lily." Marcus says stretching out his hand for me to shake and I do. "Hi Marcus."

I wasn't expecting Marcus to be a fellow student but he was, he didn't look much older than me and had dark brown hair and eyes to match. He was handsome for sure, I'm lesbian but I could appreciate a mans beauty.

Marcus and I quickly acquainted as he told me exactly what we'd be doing today. It wasn't much different from what Janet had explained and before I knew it, we were walking down to the basketball court.

Paige

The ball had just left my hand and I knew it was cash, from my spot on the three-point line, when the doors to the court opened. My eye's flicked to the large digital clock on the wall, it was 11:30, media were here.

I watched intently as familiar faces filtered into the room and then one familiar face in particular brought a smile to my face, Lily.

Her effortless beauty always seemed to catch me off guard. Still being new to each other, I was seeing Lily in a new way each time. Today was the first time I'd seen her with her hair tied up, her perfect facial features on full display. She had a simple outfit on but the sliver of stomach on show between her jeans and shirt did something to me. I wanted to run across the court and hold her in my arms, feel her skin on mine, tell her how pretty she looked. Her smile shone from meters away and I could just about make out her sweet laugh over all the commotion going on.

I was so focused on Lily, I didn't notice the aggravatingly good looking guy stood beside her, until his hand came into contact with her arm.

Who was he and why was he touching her?

I watched intently as he pointed over to the stands where some of the media people had already began setting up. In all fairness, it looked like he was just explaining something to her but either way, he didn't need to make physical contact.

"You got some competition, P?" Jana joke nudging my side, obviously seeing the same thing as me.

I scoff, "That kids got nothing on me." I say and bounce the ball again few times before shooting another perfect three.

I glance back in Lilys direction to find her already looking in mine a small smile on her face, she raises her eyebrows and nods slightly as if to say "not bad", I give a quick bow in response and go to retrieve the ball.

We shoot around a little more before we all disperse to the different media outlets waiting to ask us questions.

My eyes fall to Lily more than I'd like to admit and I had to ask for a few questions to be repeated due to my lack of concentration. Lily never reciprocated any of my stolen looks because she was so engrossed in her job; jotting down notes, recording interviews and laughing along with the girls.

After what felt like an eternity, I was finally stood with Lily and Mr Shaggy Hair.

"Hi Paige, Marcus with UConn newsletter and this is-" Marcus introduced himself and tried introducing Lily.

"I know Lily." I say making eye contact with the brunette girl to the right of me.

"Hi Paige." She says softly, phone in hand already pointed in my direction.

"Paige, this was your first summer without injury, what did you do that you haven't been able to in previous years?" Marcus asks, pen poised to take an necessary notes.

I answered all of Marcus' questions before I had to move on, "Thank you, Paige. Nice speaking to you." He smiled genuinely. "Thank you, you too." I smiled back trying my best to also be genuine but probably failing.

I intentionally brushed my body against Lilys as I passed her, using my hands to manoeuvre around her small frame.

We wrapped media and hour or so later and the team and I were free to go but I lingered, shooting random shots while Lily and Marcus had a discussion before they packed up their things.

Marcus left but not before hugging Lily goodbye, I rolled my eyes watching the interaction before making my way over to her.

"My favourite journalist." I say draping my arm over her shoulder and pulling her close.

She laughed, "I wouldn't say journalist, I'm just helping out."

"Ok, my favourite helper-outer then." I tease and we both watch as the final few people exit the court, leaving us alone.

Lilys arm swiftly navigates itself around my waist and she steps in front of me, her other arm looping around my torso also so she was hugging me. Both my arms wrapped around her shoulders and we just held each other for a few seconds.

"So...Marcus?" I drag out looking down at the girl in my arms. I feel her body shake with a little giggle, "Handsome guy, right?" She says pulling away and looking up at me. A scowl forms on my face, "Not really." I say matter of factly crossing my arms.

"Oh, is this jealous Paige?" She asks jutting out her hip and placing her hand on the other. I turn away from her, "No..."

"Oh, I think it is." She says walking around and standing in front of me, extremely close, our toes are touching and her body heat is radiating onto me. She brings her hand to my face and directs me to look at her, "I am one hundred percent gay, Paige." Lily reassures her eyes looking directly into mine.

When we first met, Lily would never hold eye contact with me, as much as I tried but now she was and I could see every single fleck in her eyes. The light brown points making them sparkle under the bright lights.

"And I am one hundred percent regretting agreeing to keep this a secret." I say truthfully now bringing my hand to her face, stroking her cheek gently.

"But just us knowing is so..hot." She says soft and breathy. "The secret glances and touches." She continues, her hand smoothing down my chest to my stomach.

Her eyes linger on my lips and I run my tongue along them.

"Don't do that."

"What?" I ask innocently but a smirk creeps onto my face.

"Don't lick your lips while we're this close."

"Why not?"

She doesn't answer and we stand in silence, tension rising between us as the seconds go on. I move my free hand to her waist and pull her closer, if that was even possible and my hand on her face moves to her neck. I lean down and Lily leans up and after what feels like decades of waiting our lips reach each others and we kiss.

It's needy but delicate and everything and more that I'd imagined it to be. Getting a taste of Lily made me realise I'll never get enough. Her hands are all over me. My stomach, my back, my hips. She kisses me harder with an urgency I never knew I needed.

When we finally pull away from each other, both our chests are rising and falling at a quickened pace. Lilys lips are blushed and plump and they break into a soft, swollen smile.

"Let's get out of here," She says grabbing my hand, "and hope no one was watching the cameras." I'm still speechless as I follow her out of the basketball court, our hands linked together.

I drive me and Lily around Storrs for the best part of a few hours. Lily has her phone connected to my car and is playing her favourite songs.

Her playlists were filled with Lana Del Rey and I think it suited her perfectly. Lily was the embodiment of a Lana Del Rey song, the softness and vulnerability of Lanas vocals complemented the girl next to me without fault.

˖ ᡣ𐭩 ⊹ ࣪ ౨ৎ˚₊✧˚ · .

Lily

I'd barely left the confines of my bedroom in the past two days. I only got up from my bed to pee and grab bottles of water which were now scattered around my room, empty.

Kelsey, Hannah and Madison had periodically been coming in to check on me and bring me whatever food they had ordered in or cooked that day. I'm guessing at some point during all of this, Kelsey had somewhat explained to our other roommates what she had discovered about me, because no one asked questions and that's how I liked it.

I didn't have the mental capacity to explain the way I was feeling or why I was feeling it when I couldn't even understand it myself.

After having the panic attack on Wednesday, everything inside of me felt...off. After throwing myself into my first day at work, I spent the afternoon with Paige and it gave my mind respite from itself. But once I was home and alone with my thoughts, they took over and refused to be tamed.

I went through Thursday in an altered state, so distracted by everything in my head, I felt like I was watching myself from a third persons perspective. The day didn't seem real.

One thing that was clear though was my time spent with Paige. She met me after my final class of the day and we just sat and spoke and enjoyed each others company. Things felt lighter with Paige, easier to handle but I was not Paiges responsibility and I was not about to become a burden to her either.

Kissing Paige on Thursday night was bittersweet because I knew I wouldn't be seeing for a few days at least. I could feel myself slipping into a deep depressive episode and along with that came a whole lot of self isolation.

I isolate myself when I get like this to save the people around me. I'm a ticking time bomb when my thoughts darken and I wanted to minimise the casualties. I was the only casualty allowed.

I cried when Paige dropped me home. I cried for me and this inevitable dark cloud that appears whenever it feels like it. I cried for her because she had no idea what was going on. I cried for us because things were going well and I was about to ruin it.

I skipped classes on Friday and slept most of Saturday. Sleeping when I feel like this is the only time I have that allows the feeling to pause.

It was Sunday now and my roommates had invited me to go to brunch with them, of course I declined. I think they knew deep down what my answer was going to be but they asked anyway.

Kelsey hugged me tight before they left, telling me to call her if I needed to, I just hummed in response and watched the girls with sympathetic smiles on their faces leave.

Getting up from my place in bed, I caught sight of myself in the mirror. My hair was bundled in a bun on top of my head, undoubtedly tangled to hell. I had an oversized t-shirt on that I had previously cut to be off-the-shoulder. I looked a mess but I didn't have the energy or care enough to do anything about it.

The healed marks on my arm teased me to feel that of so familiar, temporary relief of physical pain. It was a mental battle that I had won up until today.

Paige

I knocked on Kaylas apartment door after hours, days actually, of deliberation.

"Oh hey, Paige." Kayla says smiling, opening her door for me to step in.

"Hi Kayla." I gave her a small smile in return that makes it obvious that somethings wrong. I've never been good at hidding my feelings.

"What's wrong?" She asks, perching on the edge of her couch.

I sit down too, unsure how to approach the subject without making overly obvious that something was going on between me and Lily.

"Have you spoken to Lily at all?" I ask, not really caring what Kayla thought, worry taking precedent.

She shakes her head, "No, I haven't. Not since Wednesday." She tells me. "Why?"

"I just haven't heard from her in a few days. I've tried messaging but had nothing in response." I explain.

It looks as though something clicks in Kaylas head when I say this but she doesn't speak up.

"What?" I push for her to say what she's thinking.

"Something happened on Wednesday. I promised Lily I wouldn't say anything though."

"What happened Kayla?" I ask, my heart rate increasing at the thought of something bad happening to Lily.

"I really can't say Paige. She asked me not to."

Ouch.

"She asked you not to tell me?"

"Not you specifically, anyone." Kayla says.

"I'm worried." I admit.

"Have you been to her apartment?"

I nod, "I walked past today and yesterday. I rang the buzzer but there was no answer."

"I could try calling her." Kayla suggests pulling out her phone.

"Please." I urge and watch as she presses call on Lilys contact.

The phone rings and rings and eventually goes to voicemail.

"I'm going to her apartment and if I have to break in, I will." Is all I say before leaving Kaylas apartment.

My mind reels with scenarios that could have happened to make Lily go completely MIA as I make the short trip to her building.

As I pull up, someone is leaving the apartment block and I jog from my car to catch the entrance door before it closes and I have no way of getting in.

I take the stairs two at a time to reach Lilys floor and I knock on the door.

Nothing.

I knock again, louder this time.

Still nothing.

Clearly her roommates were not home because they would have answered.

I knock again.

"Lily," I call out her name desperate for a response, "It's Paige."

I wait a while before knocking for the fourth time when I hear the latch of the door click and it slowly creaks open revealing Lily. She looks different, tired, like exhausted and...sad.

"Oh my god, Lily." I exclaim basically forcing myself through the door. "Are you OK?" I ask, my arms instinctively wrapping around her.

"What are you doing here?" Her voice is quiet and shaky and it takes me aback, she usually sounds so upbeat and cheerful.

"Where have you been? I've been trying to reach you for days. I went to Kaylas, she said something happened on Wednesday. What happened on Wednesday?" My words are rushed and messy.

"She had no right to tell you that. I asked her not to." Lily says, now out of my arms, she crosses hers over herself.

"I was worried. What happened Lils? Talk to me."

She just looks at me with heavy eyes and takes staggered steps towards the couch before sitting down.

"Is it me? Have I done something?"

"It's not yo-"

"Just tell me if I have. I'll fix it. I really like you Lily." I cut her off before she can finish her sentence.

"Paige." She says getting my attention, "It's not you. Please will you sit down."

"Was it Marcus? I'll kill him if he's done anything to you." I say now thinking of the worst possible things.

"Paige!" Lily says louder this time, "Just sit down." She flings out her arm that was across her chest motioning for me to sit next to her and as she does I notice array of white lines. Healed scars bestrewn across her wrist and inner arm.

She looks from me to her extended arm and quickly pulls it back to her chest before getting up and walking, fast to her room.

I follow after her in silence, unsure what to say in the moment.

When I reach her bedroom, shes pulling a sweater on over her baggy t-shirt.

"Lily.." I begin but I don't really know what to say next.

"You don't have to say anything Paige." She says, sensing my hesitation.

"I want to say something. I just don't know how." I tell her truthfully.

"Just say what you're thinking."

"What happened?"

"When - on Wednesday or what happened to cause my scars?" She asks sitting on her bed, crossing her legs.

"Both." I breathe out going and sitting next to her.

Lily inhales deeply, "I'll tell you, but I want you to know that's its OK if you want to leave after. I'll understand."

"I have nowhere to be today."

"No. I mean like really leave. Leave this," She motioned between us. "before it becomes something."

"Lily, why would I want to leave?" I ask genuinely. Theres nothing that she could say to me right now that would make me want to walk away.

"Because Paige, I'm a burden and being around me when I'm like this quickly becomes exhausting." She says, her head bowed down looking into her lap.

"Don't say that!" My voice comes out louder than I wanted and Lily looks up at me taken aback. "Sorry," I mummble. "but please don't say that. Being around you is not exhausting, I've never felt more alive than when I'm with you, Lily." I shuffle my body over to her, closing the gap between us on her bed.

We're side by side with our backs against the headboard, my legs extended in front of me and Lily's crossed in front of her. I place my hand delicately on her thigh to let her know I'm here whenever she's ready talk.

It takes her a while and we sit comfortably in silence, my hand on her leg and eventually her head on my shoulder, before she speaks.

Lily tells me everything. From her depression diagnosis at thirteen to her somewhat recent breakup and being outted and how that ultimately resulted in her attempting to take her own life. She explained the scars on her arm were self inflicted and she said it was hard to explain but she would rather feel something physically than mentally so thats why she did it.

As much as it was hard for her to explain, it was equally hard for me to understand. I didn't want to think of Lily hurt and understand it.

She had a panic attack on Wednesday that started this most recent episode. She said they come every so often without warning, she's on medication that helps her get through most days but she still has moments that she can't control.

I stayed mostly silent while Lily bravely shared such a vulnerable part of her. She cried at points and I wiped her tears but I didn't ask any questions, I just wanted to listen.

"Do you think I'm crazy." She sniffles, lifting her head from my shoulder to look at me.

I shake me head, "No baby. I don't think you're crazy. I think you've been through a lot in your life. A lot of shit that you didn't deserve. But what matters is, you're here. You're here trying, despite it all and I'm proud of you." I tell the doe eyed girl infront of me.

I place a hand on each of her cheeks and hold her face, wiping strays tears as they fall. I plant a kiss to her forehead, then one on the tip of her nose and I hover my lips over hers unsure if now is the time but Lily's the one to close the space, pressing her mouth to mine.

I kiss her gently at first as if scared to break her but Lily pushes deeper into the kiss, harder. Without breaking us apart, she manoeuvres herself on top of me, straddling my thighs. My hands find her hips like they were made for them and I hold on to her desperately as we continue to kiss.

"I don't want this to change the way you see me." Lily says breathlessly as we break away from each other.

"I knew you before I knew this and that's the Lily I see. The one who buys coffee for her friends when they're hungover, the one who smiles at everyone, the one who works hard. That's the Lily I know." I say to her as she stays sat in my lap, my hands caressing their way up her back.

"If it gets too much...if I get too much, I'll understand." Lily says playing with the strings of my hoodie.

"Can you stop saying stuff like that?" I take her hands in mine, "I want to be here. With you. Right now. Do you understand that? I'm choosing to be here Lily."

She nods a small nod letting me know she heard what I was saying.

Lily flips her leg off of me so shes back at my side. I shuffle down the bed slightly and pull her into me, my arm around her shoulders and head on my chest.

"One thing Lily," I say and she hums in response. "if you ever, ever get the urge to hurt yourself again, please come to me first. You're not alone anymore, I promise you."

˖ ᡣ𐭩 ⊹ ࣪ ౨ৎ˚₊✧˚ · .

Lily

This week was going considerably better than last week, thank god.

Paige had spent most of Sunday laid next to me in my bed, even when my roommates returned from their brunch plans, she didn't move. I was falling in and out of sleep for the majority of the day, my emotions had exhausted me and with my head on Paiges chest and my body encapsulated by her arms, I felt a sense of peace that I hadn't for a long time.

Paige reluctantly left my apartment that night after making me promise to never isolate myself from her again. She made it abundantly clear that I can always be open and honest with her and she'd never judge me. I made the promise, but I knew it would be hard to keep.

Wednesday had rolled around again and I had a completely free day. No classes, no homework and I wasn't due in work at all this week. From speaking to Marcus, it sounded like things got busier once the sports season really starts, which isn't until next week.

"Delivery for Miss Kent." Madison says in faux accent knocking on my bedroom door, coffee in hand.

"Ugh, I love you!" I say standing up from my place in bed and taking the iced drink from my roommate. I took a sip straight away and immediately felt like I could take on the day.

"What are your plans for today?" I ask Madison as we walk together from my room to the living room, each taking a seat on the couch.

"I have to get in the library today, how am I already behind? Actually, more importantly, who sets assignments on the first week?" She dramatically asks, eyes wide.

"Oh that's rough. My professors went easy on us." I say silently thanking the college gods.

"So what are your plans for today then?"

"I'm not really sure, I might take a walk around campus and maybe meet Kelsey when she breaks for lunch." I tell Madison my unofficial plans.

I wasn't sure what I'd spend my day doing but I knew I needed to do something, giving my mind downtime was dangerous. I didn't need to sit and think about everything, ever.

"Not seeing Paige?" Madison asks curiously and my head shoots in her direction but I try and play off my surprise.

"Um, no, why would I see Paige?" I lie.

I would love to see Paige today. I hadn't seen her properly since Sunday. I saw her on Monday when I'd popped into the office to meet with Marcus and we'd sneakily made out in an empty bathroom. And we'd briefly bumped into each other yesterday but she was with KK and I was with Kelsey so we kept it short. Maybe I'll message her and see if she's free.

"Oh I don't know, she only spent the whole day here on Sunday. In your room...with the door closed."

My cheeks flushed at the insinuation Madison was hinting at even though nothing like that happened between us. The most Paige I did was was kiss and OK, maybe I was in her lap and maybe I did get flustered and maybe I hadn't been able to stop thinking about her hands on my bare skin and her mouth on mine...

I'm texting Paige.

"We're just friends." I say matter-of-factly, standing up to go and find my phone.

"Uh huh," Madison pretended to agree, "sure you are."

Paige had finally asked for my number after days of using Instagram DMs as our only form of contact.

She had tried to save her contact as Buckets with a serious of drooling emojis but I overruled and we decided on Paige with a star emoji.

good morning p <3

good morning pretty girl

what are u doing today?

wanna hang?

miss me?

duh

ive got practice now but meet me after?

at like 11

i miss you too

ok see u soon 💋

I decided to take my time getting myself ready before meeting Paige. I took a hot shower and washed my hair using all my favourite products.

My phone was propped up on my vanity as i straightened my hair, Emma, my best friend from home, took up the entire screen as we were on FaceTime.

I caught Emma up on my first week at UConn, my account was explicit, there was nothing I couldn't say to my best friend. She begged for pictures of Paige but I didn't have any to send, "I'll take one today." I tell her as I begin applying my makeup.

I keep it natural with a skin tint, brow gel, mascara and of course lip liner, my one true love.

I bid farewell to Emma before hanging up, telling her I miss her dearly and she agrees that she has to come and visit me soon.

With my phone still in my hand, I decided to snap a picture and send it to Paige letting her know I'm ready.

I didn't expect one of Paiges usual quick responses considering she was at practice so I did the final touches to get myself ready before leaving.

Madison had called out a goodbye while I was on FaceTime so I left the empty apartment, locking the door behind me.

The walk to the training facilities wasn't far and took me less than fifteen minutes to reach. Even though I wasn't working today, I had my Staff ID badge around my neck to make it looked like I belonged there.

Walking into the building, I assumed I had arrived just after training had finished. The usual squeak of basketball shoes and balls was nowhere to be found. I made my way to the court peeking through the glass in the door seeing who was around.

My eyes landed on a lonely Paige, dribbling the ball before taking a shot. I couldn't see the basket but could only assume that UConns star girl had made it effortlessly.

I swung the door open and walked in, immediately grabbing Paiges attention. Her previous, serious expression softened as she looked at me, smiling now. We both took rushed steps across the court towards each other until we were face to face.

"Hello, pretty girl." Paige complemented wrapping me in a rather sweaty hug, I fake grimaced, "You're gross." I say trying to wriggle free but Paige is not only taller than me but stronger than me too, I was trapped. "You love my hugs." She protested still not letting me go, "Admit you love my hugs."

I did love Paiges hugs. They were so warm and comforting and I felt like nothing or no one could hurt me while I was bundled up in Paiges arms.

My lack of reply only makes the blonde girl hold me tighter, lifting me slightly off the ground, I let out a squeal, "Paige! Put me down!"

"Admit you love my sweaty hugs." She brings her mouth close to my ear to say that and the hairs rise on the back of my neck at the heat of her breath.

"I love your sweaty hugs." I admit in defeat as she lowers me down, my feet touching the floor once again.

"Thank you." She chirps pressing a quick kiss to my forehead.

"Where is everyone?" I ask looking around the empty room.

"In the locker room cleaning up." She nods her head over to a set of doors which I'm guessing leads to the locker rooms.

"Didn't feel like showering today?" I joke.

"Wanted to shoot around a little more, practice wasn't the best." She explains picking up the ball from where it had rolled to once she dropped it to hug me.

"I doubt that, Buckets." I smirk at Paige as she proves me right by sinking the cleanest three. She smirks back, "You want a go?"

I shake me head immediately, "No. No way." I say backing away from the basketball player.

She laughs and it echos around the court, "Come here, I'll help you." She insists beckoning me over.

"No Paige, I'll be terrible, I know I will." I remain adamant.

"You haven't even tried, have some faith in yourself. Now come here." The second half of her sentence is sterner than the first and the assertion of dominance catches me off guard.

"Yes ma'am." I mummble and walk back to Paige with slightly red cheeks.

"OK, stand here." Paige positions me on the free throw line, using her foot to push mine apart and using her hands to bend my arms in the way she wants. "Here." She hands the ball to me and I take if from her and she immediately giggles.

"What?" I huff, I knew I'd be terrible at this.

"You're so delicate with it." She smiles repositioning my hands on the ball, "Spread your fingers out more." I do as she says and she takes a step back as if admiring her work.

"OK, now shoot." She instructs and I do and it's terrible.

I throw the ball with all my strength and it flies out of my hands and smacks the backboard, missing the basket completely, before rebounding off and almost taking me out in the process. It acted more like a boomerang than a basketball.

Paige was quick to intercept the ball hurling towards me and caught it with one hand before tucking it under her arm.

She was trying her best to hold in a laugh as I just scowled at her and began to walk off.

"Hey, hey, hey." She called grabbing my arm before I could pass her, "That was a...good first attempt." She says leading me back to the same free throw line I'd just embarrassed myself on.

"Good? That's the exaggeration of the century!"

"One more go, I'll help." She hands me the ball again and I reluctantly take it, remembering to spread my fingers like last time.

Instead of standing back and watching, Paige steps behind me this time, her frame enveloping mine. We're so close I can feel her front pressed against my back, her hands cover mine over the ball and I wonder what we look like from an outside perspective.

Paige draws the ball back, my body moving in accordance with hers, before launching it forward and I watch in awe as the ball spins in the air before falling through the basket in a faultless swish.

"There you go baby!" Paige praises, her arms coming together around me, "That would've got you 1 point!" She says unwrapping herself from me, raising her hand for a high five.

I smack my hand to hers, even though that was entirely Paige, I was taking it as my bucket.

"And how many have you got?" I ask referring to points.

"Maybe like five thousand, career wide." She brags but I like it, Paiges confidence in her abilities is one of the most attractive things about her.

"I'm catching up." I tease picking up the ball once more and taking an unserious shot at the basket and to my surprise, I watch as it circles the rim before slipping through.

I snap my head towards Paige in shock, my mouth hung open, her expression mirroring mine.

"Sinking threes? OK Kent!" A familiar voice called out, it was Aubrey coming out of the locker room, a few of the girls following behind her.

"I try." I boast playfully, knowing it was a total fluke.

"Are y'all coming to grab lunch with us?" Ice called out, also emerging from the locker room.

I looked to Paige for her to answer, the girls were Paiges friends and I didn't want to ever feel like I was impending on their hang outs or make it too obvious that we had something going on.

"We actually have plans." Paige says and I raise my brows, did we?

"Cool! Catch you later." The team waved us goodbye as they all filtered off and out of the basketball court.

"What's these plans that we have then?" I ask Pagie once we're alone again.

"Oh, you know. Our usual."

Paige and I hadn't spent much time together in the few weeks we'd been acquainted and any time we were alone, the majority of it was spent with my mouth on hers and vice versa so I didn't know what our usual was.

I look quizzically at Paige, "Which is?"

"Well it requires a lot less distance between us," Say says returning the ball to its rack and walking over to me, "and hardly any talking." She finishes as she reaches me and dips her head slightly to kiss my lips.

I'm smiling as she pulls away, "Sounds like great plans."

"Give me ten minutes to shower and we can go back mine, seeing as the girls are out we'll have the place to ourselves." She tells me before jogging into the locker room.

˖ ᡣ𐭩 ⊹ ࣪ ౨ৎ˚₊✧˚ · .

#paige bueckers #uconn wbb #wcbb #wlw #lgbtq #fanfic #paige bueckers fanfiction #lovegalor333 #fresh start

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