#I read my tags later on and wonder why did I write an essay

[saltedbiscuiit]

Matching pyjamas mayhaps?:3

[ghostoffuturespast]

Works In Progress 2023: A Cyberpunk 2077 Year In Review

I thought for a hot minute about doing one of those snazzy templates that’s been going around, but editing photos just ain’t my MO and rather than going by month I picked 12 favs that I’ve posted in 2023. Some of them were popular, some of them weren't. Overall, I think I did pretty good for just doing vanilla photomode on console.

You might be wondering why there's a picture of a sticky note. I don't remember when I started doing this, and I'm horribly inconsistent as you can see by the dates, but I'll jot down my word count for my wip chapter and then jot it down again when I remember to later.

I write slow. A lot of times I sit down to write and it feels like the wheels are spinning in place. My minutes and hours don't stretch very far, typically don't add up to much. But days, weeks, months. That's when I can at least measure the progress.

Fic: So It Goes 40/44 - 438,946 words

My V x River Ward and tinfoil hat conspiracy theory long fic. I've spent way more hours on this then I have on any of my VP.

I got tagged by @just-a-cybercroissant @therealnightcity and @wanderingaldecaldo to do some WIP Whenevers. I post my VP pretty regularly, so it’s always seemed silly to do work in progress posts for them, and I don’t know when I’ll have any new writing to share since in between work and the holidays, I haven’t had much time to sit down with anything since my last chapter update. And I've been feeling very... stingy, lately. Especially when it comes to mine and other people's writing. So take this WIP/Year In Review as my offering. Both these series, as am I, are all very much still works in progress. 

I confined my reflections for this year below the cut. If you don’t want to read my long-ass essays, you can admire the pictures, maybe check out my fic, or just move along and have yourself a lovely day.

We’ll start with the easy one.

VP

After at least a year of multiple playthroughs (I’ve played all the lifepaths, done all the endings), it only occurred to me at the beginning of this year to start taking VP. Part of the reason I never did before was because I didn’t realize it was a thing and then by the time I did, I figured I didn’t have much to offer. I play on PS5 and only have access to vanilla photomode, so seeing everyone else’s high-fidelity, ultra ray-tracing, modded, posed, full on virtual photo shoot photos, I was like there’s no way. (Not that I’m hating on PC modders, it’s just not everyone has access to mods or a PC capable of running the game, and I’m all for making art and creative endeavors accessible.) On top of that, all I’d ever heard from most other folks was how much vanilla photomode sucked. In the glamorous world of VP, I didn’t think there was any room for me.

But I started snapping pics anyway. And sure, there are a lot of limitations with vanilla photomode. But what that really translates to is opportunities to get creative. I am also a hoe for subverting people’s expectations, and very much believe when there’s a will, there’s a way.

Environmental and landscape shots were my first subjects before I started branching out into portraits and then capturing story moments. Through VP I found an entirely new way to enjoy a game that I’d already played a ridiculous number of times along with also finally being brave enough to share my V with other people too. I’d always worried about that before, if people would like her. Granted, I know Grandpa’s not everyone’s cup of tea, but whether you like her or not, I certainly think she’s made a name for herself over the past few months. Even if most people haven’t really gotten to know her the way I’d hoped. 

I’ve taken hundreds of photos this past year. Most of which I’ll never share. There’s a lot of flops, a lot of weird experiments, ones that didn’t quite turn out the way I’d hoped, but I’ve learned something from every single one of them. I know how to spot good lighting, frame shots to create optical illusions, get a very limited toolkit to work in my favor, parkoured on all of the things, and heck, I even figured out how to make Grandpa smooch other NPCs. I’ve done atmospheric, mundane, down right goofy, as well as things that most people probably thought weren’t fucking possible.

I can’t say how long I’ll keep doing this, I’m sure I’ll move on at some point, but for now I’m still enjoying myself. There's a lot to explore in this game and I just can’t stop digging Night City.

Now, for the more complicated thing.

Writing

So It Goes… My peace, my war, my greedy and most ravenous of ghosts.

I’m operating under the assumption that most people following me here probably haven't read my fic or aren’t all that interested in reading it to begin with. It’s fine. But you need to understand this fic, my writing, is the main thing that brought me here. This is also Grandpa V’s story. Most of you have met her, but unless you've been reading, most of you do not know her.

I wrote around 185,000 words and posted 10 chapters this year. 2022 was about 253,000 words and 30 chapters, along with several unrelated one shots. However, I don’t think I’ve done a single chapter this year that was less then 10k, and my longest managed to hit 27k. As of the last update I posted, the fic is currently sitting at around 439k words, 40 chapters, and still isn’t done.

I have four more chapters to write. I have written a metric shit ton of words. This is, by far, the longest and most intense creative project I’ve ever endeavored to complete.

When I started writing, I was expecting this fic to be around 100-150k. That seemed to be the average for most long fics. I did not plan on being an outlier. I'm not sure you can ever really plan for that, but I guess I enjoy subverting my own expectations too.

For those of you who are reading my fic, it is my sincerest hope that it shatters every expectation of where you think it’s going. It’s not a joke that I tagged my fic “#an ode to my tinfoil hat”. An ode it has turned out to be. I’ve been sitting on this theory for two years. I have told no one about it. I hope it sticks the landing and hits the way I want it to. I don't know if it will. But fuck, I just want to be done with it so I can move on with my life, take a break, and give myself the opportunity to make and focus on other things before I have to get back on the damn horse.

I wrote less this past year then I did in 2022. I had a lot of life changes, most of which were good, but with times of change come times of adjustment. Along with some realizations that maybe you don’t understand as much as you thought you did. Looking back, I’ve been in a state of unsettled, kuzushi, for a really long time. Which is not a good place to be. It’s how your ass ends up on the ground with a knee knocking out all your teeth. I thought I knew better. Thought I had enough practice to get away from it. But bad habits have good memories.

I think given the circumstances, I accomplished a lot with my writing this year. I don’t know if my writing is exactly where I want it to be. I doubt it every will be, but it’s evolved, grown, and I wrote a pretty hefty stack of words considering I started working full-time again, bought a house with my partner, moved, and have been dealing with the millions of other beans that life tends to throw one’s way. That being said, and for full disclosure, I’ve also been dealing with some of the worst cases of jealousy and envy I’ve had since I was a teenager. 

Frankly, it sucks. They walk with me every fucking where I go, hold my hands to whisper back all my doubts. Try to persuade me to my baser instincts, to be cruel and lash out. But that's not aikido. Luckily, I’m not 16 anymore so it’s at least been easier for me to identify the problem. Though I’m still coming up short in terms of actually being able to do anything about it, and will be for at least a few months more. 

Yeah, I keep talking about it because I don’t know how many people know that I've been feeling this way. And I’m tired of not talking about it in a room full of creatives, because yeah, I know I’m not the only one that feels this way. And not talking about it just makes all that pent up resentment worse for everyone.

Don’t get me wrong, I love writing. But with the way I work and think, it’s a slow, tedious, and incredibly time-consuming art. With how much my fic has snowballed over the course of writing, it’s left very little room for the other hobbies in my life. And as my fellow writers probably already know, writing is an incredibly insular craft. And unlike a picture or an image, which only requires a glance, reading a bunch of words requires time and commitment.

So, when you put yourself out there and share what you wrote, it’s a lonely feeling not knowing whether or not anyone connected with what you put on the page. Especially, when the people who do read aren’t compelled to voice anything and when the people you’d hope would read don’t. And then you're stuck in the dark, not knowing, because neither of us says a goddamn thing.

I started writing this fic prior to actually joining the CP2077 fandom. And I joined the fandom because I felt alone. I’ve been here a while now, albeit in a few different places, and that feeling still hasn’t gone away. I’m still trying to find camaraderie with my fellow writers and carve out something that kinda sort of resembles a home or a sense of community. I watch my peers around me as they seem to build that with each other, except me.

I’m envious of the things that people make and jealous of the relationships those have created and fostered between said people, because for the life of me, it’s been a struggle to cultivate that since I got here. I know it’s selfish, but I also don’t know what about me makes people so hesitant. There have been a handful of strangers that have shown up for me regularly, but as far as people I call friends in this fandom that have shown up and actually stuck around, I can only name one right now. (I know we're all busy. And I acknowledge my writing's not for everyone. I know maybe some of you are quiet, or shy, or probably a thousand other things. I get it. But that doesn't mean it doesn't hurt any less. People will never know unless you say. Never know unless you take the time to interact or engage. Be brave. And that's true for a lot of things.)

The propensity is for the negative to outweigh the positive. I've got a lot of numbers on my fic, so you would think things would be fine, but at this point they just feel empty. They don't bring me any comfort or real satisfaction. And I hate feeling like the people I know don’t care and that most of you are just talking around me. That I’m some kind of annoyance not fit to interact with. Which may or may not be the case. I don’t know. Again, most of you have never said anything. And maybe I need to accept the fact that most of you never will.

But this is me trying to start conversation.

It’s really shitty, knowing that the thing I want the most is also the thing holding me back. I know how to work on it too, not that it’s any guarantee. The problem is I’m still writing and in a needy state of greed. And because I’m slow, I don’t have the time or the energy to be generous. I can only take right now. I can’t give. 

Relationships require both.

I can’t bring myself to read other people’s writing. I can’t comment, or like, or share if I haven’t read anything. I'm desperate for conversation, but I also don't have the time or assurance to facilitate it with other people right now. And for some reason people never seem to want to talk to me, especially when it comes to writing. I want to be part of conversations, talk deeply with other people. But I can’t speak right now, I'm not in a place to offer generosity without someone first giving it to me.

And generosity and grace is what we all need.

Four more chapters and I hope my ghosts will finally let me read in peace.

[basmathgirl]

You reblogged a Gif set of the first episode of the fourth season of DW „Partners in Crime“. One of your tags reads “filed under: things they often did to Donna” in regards to the unflattering lighting. And now I’m wondering what do you mean by that or what are other examples of “things” they did to Donna in your opinion?

Hello kind Anon

I started collecting examples to show you, but it qucikly became like a school homework project, so I won't write an essay about it.

Basically, Donna was not meant to be seen as glamorous, sexy, the love interest, or cool; just some middle-age woman close to the Doctor's visible age. And and we all know how the media has long dictated that only women under 25 (or under 30, at a push) can be seen as a romantic co-star. Good grief, CT was in the film "Starter For 10" in 2006, where she plays the mother to an 18 year-old lad, played by James McAvoy who is only 10 years younger than her, and she was paired with an actor almost 20 years older than her!

Anyway, I've picked three examples to get you thinking.

Watching S4 makes you realise that several bad lighting, unflattering costumes, and dodgy makeup decisions were made. I'm going to start with the way Donna was introduced to us in the trailer at the end of Doomsday as opposed to The Runaway Bride episode.

Trailer:

Episode:

Not exactly flattering in comparison - if you ignore being lit like a character from Wicked. You'e never think these were filmed only a couple of months apart. And there was the whole disappearing cleavage shenanigans to take into consideration:

One minute it's allowed to be there; the next it isn't. Why? It's as if busty women aren't allowed to exist. DT certainly enjoyed the view but that's a whole other post..

They often put Donna in clothing I'd bought for my mum. Take for instance the outfit she wears at the beginning of Fires of Pompeii.

Very middle age-to-early pensioner in design, you must admit. Yes, tunics were the fashion at the time the programme was made but this is at the opposite end of the spectrum to Rose's 'little girl' pinafore combo or Martha's leather jacket. It's practical clothing that's not meant to be attractive but comfortable. Except all that nylon would have had her sweating like a pig in the Italian heat. Oh well. It's not as though they intended for her to look pretty. The dress Evelina gives her is a definite step up, but it is still very 'mumsy'.

Our last view of Donna was originally her wedding to Shaun Temple.

What could have been a pretty dress becomes a hideous outfit for Donna. They must have chosen the most unflattering hairstyle for her ever possible. But never mind, eh? She gets handed a winning lottery ticket so it doesn't matter if she doesn't look beautiful on her wedding day. At least she could look at the photos later and acknowledge Nerys managed to be pretty in a peach dress. The money should more than make up for it *chokes on my own spital*

Yes, I have many problems with the whole wedding scene in The End of Time where Donna gets her 'dream' of being married to a man who doesn't even stand next to her in most of the photos. Not that she seems to mind. We're supposed to believe she gets a huge pay cheque a happy ever after to fulfil the dream.

In case you were wondering, I'm much happier with the 60th anniversary specials.

[pluralsword]

Assorted Transformers Haikus, Batch 1

(you can also read these on Ao3. Notes at the end)

Blasts cut onwards Lasting peace must be brought forwards Wheels and blades tire

Language dancing My thoughts and yours communing Cityspeaking love

My poetry sung Pride of the Decepticons Yours truly Sky-Byte

Forging many wonders Mother to all and yet when will I get time with them?

One of the discord servers we're on has kicked off doing haikus as a writing exercise, here's some of ours, we'll release them in batches (and yes, we are still working on Chapter 18 of Addendum, it should be done soon life has just been getting in the way but it is almost done as it is, very excited to soon release it). We got a little meta with the last one. As you can tell we're really craving a story where Solus is alive and around to advise the Autobots or show up later in a story. She should get to her character concept and particularly her defensive pacifist sword wielding IDW1 backstory was an interesting take we'd love to see revisited without being a monarch, but instead a champion of democracy and autonomy. Alpha Trion can take a break or also be around.

Also for people wondering why G1 Arcee is tagged in something specifically about using blades that's because that was part of her original bio from 1986, and a bio done much more recently combining her overlapping G1 and IDW aspects (which would not be the first time that happened either), you can read more about that here in section 3 of an essay we wrote looking back on IDW1 Arcee's writing after immersing ourselves in it over the years, finding much more than just kinship to her, we felt this urge to dig further, to understand, feeling threads that were there regarding trans history, but not having much knowledge regarding historical transmedicalism, so we dug. We dug because we wanted to show that Arcee's writing from 2012-2018 not only is a beautiful trans story unique in science fiction, but that her personality there and in part in her Spotlight (which absolutely did not intend trans stuff and walked into a minefield in that regard that inadvertently opened up the opportunity for the writing and consulting team in Phase 2 and Phase 3 to figure out beautiful character arcs for her) are direct successors of the original personality frameworks for G1 Arcees, and to show the impact and legacy of both Sunbow/Marvel and IDW Arcees along with more Arcees combined on many versions of her thereafter. In regards to relevance to the haiku, Victorion noticed during Optimus Prime #21 what Arcee had already stated previously, that she did not want to be a warrior. This picks up on a refrain older versions of her character have also shown.

[wilmonsfolklore]

Hi Tina! :) I have a few fanfic writer asks for you: ❤️, 🏷, 💕, 🥳, 😎 (but no pressure to answer them all!)

I hope you day is going great <3

Hi Simon! Thanks for the ask, I hope you have a wonderful day. I ended up writing an essay about the questions for some reason so apologies for that!

❤️ What is your favorite line that you’ve written in a fic? This is a really hard question. I love the "Sometimes I'm so tired I wish I could just disappear" in With You By My Side because honestly I'm proud that I put that into words. And later in the fic the "He'd never thought he would let someone be this close to him, seeing him when all he wanted to do was disappear." Because it's so sappy and sad at the same time, and that was the point of that fic.

🏷 Is there a tag you like to search for when looking for fanfics to read? Most of the time I filter out the explicit works, and usually I prefer to read works with happy endings. But apart from that, no.

💕 What is your favorite fic that you’ve written? They're my children!! I love my chronic illness babies because I really wrote them for myself. I love my roommates AU because it's something I would read and because of how sickingly sweet it is. I love my post S1 AU because it made me think about canon and the characters a lot, and I'm proud of how it turned out. I love my S2 AU because I've always thought that when writing something that close to canon, there has to be a certain quality to the fic because it's so easily compared. I've always felt intimidated by that but I'm very happy I got over that and was pleasently surprised with how that fic turned out. I can't pick a favourite, sorry!

🥳 Why did you start writing fanfic? I've been writing fanfic for years and years. I think I first started writing it because I just saw a few different aspects in stories and thought it would be easy to put them together in one of my own. And in the fandom I used to be in, that worked. It was easy and fulfilling, because I got a lot of engagement even though the stories were bad and unoriginal. Once I tried to be more original and put more work in the engagement died down, and I stopped writing for a while. With YR honestly the same thing happened again. My first fic in this fandom is just all of my favourite tropes put into one fic. I'm not very proud of that, but it worked and I got a warm welcome.

And in general I write fanfic because I've loved writing my whole life and because I have limited time and energy it helps to have a frame of characters and canon to use. My goal eventually is to start writing original works, but that's not possible for now. And also the community!! Fanfic community is the best and I love giving back something because I read so so much.

😎 What fics do you prefer on a scale of canon compliant to wildly original? I love staying close to canon in my writing, since it requires less research and honestly makes it so much easier. I also love taking random canon elements, for example the video, and using it in a different way or timeline. But I wouldn't really write something where Erik is alive, because to me grief is such a prominent aspect of Wille's character in canon and I honestly don't know how he'd be without it. So. Probably more canon compliant.

[ladylokilaufeyson5]

Love Letters To No One - Remus Lupin x Reader

Summary: You write love letters to your friend, Remus Lupin, with absolutely no intention of sending them. Ever.

Warnings: none? 

Words: 0.5K

(This is gonna be a series, so let me know if you want to be added to the tag list :). Also, other parts will probably be longer)

Part One | Part Two | Part Three | Part Four | Part Five | Part Six

Dearest Remus,

I'm not quite sure why I'm writing this letter to you, seeing as you will never receive it. I guess I just needed somewhere to let my feelings out, and you always let me vent in letters, so this was the first thing I thought of to help.

Remus Lupin, I think I'm in love with you. Confession alert, sorry, but you're always on my mind and I'm always thinking about you. I'm thinking about the way you bite your lip when you're writing an essay, and the way your eyes light up with pure delight whenever someone gets you chocolate. I'm constantly thinking about the way you smile or laugh to yourself when you're reading a good book, and the way you smile at me every morning when we head down to the Great Hall.

I'm not quite sure when I fell in love with you, but I remember when I first started to fancy you. It was back in third year, when -

"What're you doing?"

You looked up from the piece of parchment you were writing on to see your brother, James, looking at you from the other end of the library. You probably should have felt embarrassed that your brother had just called on you very loudly from the complete other side of the room, but you were much more embarrassed to have him catch you in the middle of writing a love letter to one of his best mates.

"Writing a letter," you said back. He'd walked closer to you, and he was now at speaking distance. You discreetly covered the words on the parchment, before adding, "to mum and dad."

You couldn't lie fully to him - he was your twin brother, after all, and had a stupid "in-twin-ition" (his silly word play on intuition, not yours) - so if you ever did try lying to him, it was usually twisted with half-truths.

"Oh, okay. Well, Padfoot and I are gonna prank the Slytherins, and we were wondering if you wanted to join."

You pursed your lips, pretending to think about it, before shaking your head.

"No thanks," you said. "You have fun with that, though."

"Will do. See you later," James said, giving you a wave and leaving the library.

You sighed in relief and went back to writing.

It was back in third year, when we had to partner up for the essay in Charms. I was absolutely atrocious at Charms, but then you helped me. I remember you tutored me every Tuesday and Thursday night for six weeks straight. I remember apologising to you for wasting your time, and you told me that I wasn't wasting your time at all, and that you enjoyed spending time with me. Your comment stuck with me for ages, I swear, and I kept thinking about it. It was such a small thing, but it meant the world to me.

Anyway, I just really had to get that off my chest. You're never going to see this, but it was nice pretending that you would.

Forever yours,

Y/n Potter <3

[meganlpie]

Kiss Already

Based on this request from Wattpad:  Hey!! I saw your requests are open and I was wondering if I could request a professor snape x professor!reader please? Like they're best friends and spend time in each other's quarters all the time and all the teachers are like 'just kiss already' all the time to them individually. And then one night they're just vibing together in one of their quarters maybe drinking a bit (or not up to you) and he confesses his love for her and its all fluffy and they kiss and ahhhhh!! Thank you so much in advance and I totally get it if you don't want to write it xxxx

Here you lovelies are! Once again, familiar characters belong to J.K. Rowling. 

Warnings: Busy bodies! Fluff!

Pairings: Severus Snape x fem!reader

Severus was your very best friend. From the moment you began your position at Hogwarts, he was there, albeit reluctantly at first. While most people shied away from the "dungeon bat", you enjoyed spending time with him. You appreciated his no-nonsense attitude and the way he told it how he saw it. Did you wish he'd interact differently with his students? Sometimes, but otherwise, he was a wonderful person to be around. At least to you.

         Apparently he felt the same about you. The two of you were quite frequently found in each other's quarters, enjoying a cup of tea or a gaze of wizard's chess. Sometimes you would simply enjoy each other's company while reading or marking students' work. You grew close very quickly and the other professors noticed.

         "I don't understand why you don't confess your feelings already. It's quite obvious how you feel about one another," Pomona told you. You laughed lightly and shook your head. Severus hadn't shown up for breakfast yet, so Pomona and Irma decided to be busy bodies and comment on your and Severus' relationship again. "We are just friends, Pomona." Pomona hummed, but didn't press the issue, instead choosing to exchange a glance with the other professors. You continued eating, not knowing that Severus was having a similar conversation with a few other professors.

Severus' POV

         Severus tried not to sigh out loud as Filius continued to pressure him about his relationship with you. This was nothing unusual. It happened all the time since you and he began spending time together away from everyone else. "Truly, Severus, you should tell her how you feel. The tension between the two of you is stifling. Kiss and get on with it."

         Severus felt himself blushing for the first time in years. "Filius, what happens or doesn't between Y/N and myself is just that. Between us. My feelings for her are no one's business but my own." Albus and Filius exchanged a glance. "So you admit you have feelings for her." Severus' face grew even more warm. He didn't reply, but he knew one thing for certain. If the day continued this way, he was going to need a strong dose of Fire Whiskey when it was done.

         Later that night, Severus was getting ready to mark essays when he heard the door swing open. You and Dumbledore were the only ones with the password to his quarters, so he wasn't worried. He glanced over his shoulder to find you standing there with your own papers under your arm and a bottle of Fire Whiskey in your hand as if you'd read his mind.

         "Long day?" he asked with a chuckle. You joined in his laughter for a moment before replying, "Long week. Pomona and Irma are really on it this week." Severus rolled his eyes. Of course they were. You never told him what your conversations were about, only that they were bothering you about something. He knew the feeling, of course, but he was certain you weren't being bothered about the same thing.

         For a while, the two of you nursed your drinks and marked papers in pleasant, friendly conversation. Severus finished marking his papers first and took the opportunity to really study your face. He knew Albus and Filius were right. He did have feelings for you. They had absolutely blind-sided him, but they existed. But he said nothing because there was a part of him that feared your rejection.

         "Is there something on my face?" you asked, not looking up from the paper in front of you. "Hmm?" You laughed lightly and sat up. You stretched out, groaning lowly at something, probably your back popping a bit. "You've been staring for five minutes," you replied after you placed your hands in your lap. You finally let your gaze travel to Severus.

         "What's going on in that head of yours, Severus?" His brows came together. He wasn't sure how to answer you. Maybe it was Filius and Albus' words from that morning or perhaps it was the Fire Whiskey going to his head despite not having very much of it, but Severus desperately wanted to say something, anything, about his feelings. "Severus?" He met your eyes again. "What is it?"

         "I adore you," were the words that passed through his lips. You blinked for a second, clearly not understanding the sincerity of his words. Severus reached over and gently placed a hand on yours, something he did quite often, but this one felt different. "I adore you, Y/N. To the depths of my soul."

         Your bottom lip began quivering and Severus feared he'd made a mistake. "Severus," you whispered shakily, "I love you. I love you so much. I know I'm not as eloquent as you, but you have to know how deeply I feel for you." Severus swore he'd never felt such joy in his entire life before now. That is, until you pulled him into your arms, burying your face into his neck.

         He lost track of how long you held each other. Whispered words of love passed between you with ease. When you finally pulled apart, Severus felt himself shaking as he leaned forward to press a kiss to your forehead. He leaned back and was startled to find you staring at him in confusion. "What?" Your lips spread into a cheeky smile. "You missed," you replied, taking one finger and placing it on your lips. Severus rolled his eyes at you. "Silly woman," he muttered before kissing you like you wanted. Now, Severus was the happiest he'd ever been.

(a/n: I hope you like it!! I enjoyed writing it.)

Forever Tags: @fizzyxcustard​ @brewsthespirit-blog​ @sirkekselord​ @aikibriarrose​ @lady-of-lies​ @esoltis280​ @stories-by-shanna-p​ @motleymoose​

[peachhcs]

Love Languages Pt. 2

Pairing: Luke Patterson x reader

Summary: Pt.2 to Luke asking you what Love Languages are

Warnings: talk of drinking and cheating but that’s it

Word Count: 1.6k

Here is part two that you all have been asking for! I deeply apologize for how long it took me to get this up, school is really kicking my butt. I have a bunch of people asking to be on my taglist and I’m currently in the works of making one so comment or reblog or something telling me you want to be on my taglist! Make sure you specifiy for my series or for small blurbs/oneshots like this or both! 

Thank you so much for the amazing feedback! I love the comments and y’all are so amazing! 

I’m not sure if this will have a part 3?? but let me know if you want one haha. I won’t be tagging anyone in this because my tags got lost in my notifications, so if you want to be tagged again, make sure you read above! :)

PART 1

* * *

You didn’t mean to avoid Luke, it just kind of happened. Junior Year was no joke and it felt like every night and every weekend you had piles of homework to get done, so you sort of drifted from going to Julie’s house everyday. She didn’t mind, she understood just as much and kept you updated on how the band was doing. However, you still felt guilty for avoiding the boys. You were worried that Luke would think he scared you away by touching you, but you were feeling the exact opposite. You wanted to explore more and find out more but here you were, in your room at 12am trying to finish this nagging essay that was due in 8 hours. 

You felt your eyelids growing heavy but you shook your head, trying to keep yourself awake. The 3 monster drinks on your nightstand said enough about how much you were trying to keep yourself awake. You had 2 paragraphs left but you knew you were at a losing battle with yourself. The way your eyes were just glazing over at this point and rereading the same sentence over and over was becoming a very evident indication that you needed sleep. Before you could even think about quitting for the night, there was a noise from the side of your room and a grunt. Your eyes quickly darted over to where the noise came from and there stood Luke with that magenta pull over that you really liked. 

“Luke?” His eyes quickly darted over to you, clearly surprised to still see you awake.

“Y/n..hey..” He started and you pushed your laptop away to give him your full attention. 

“What are you..doing here?..” You weren’t really sure why he was here and you felt a small bit of tension in the room from avoiding him for the past few weeks. 

“I uh..came to see you..” His voice was small and you pushed your eyebrows together in confusion. 

“At 12 in the morning?..” You knew ghosts didn’t really sleep but it was still a strange sight to see Luke in your bedroom this late at night. 

“Yup..” He trails off and pushes his glance down to the floor. You raised your eyebrow, knowing he wasn’t telling you the whole truth. You two were still best friends after all, so you could read him like an open book. 

“Luke, seriously. What are you doing here?” You ask trying to push an answer out of him. He finally meets your gaze again and you see his small expression on his face.

“Why have you been avoiding me?” 

You blinked a few times at his bluntness. This time you were the one to avoid his gaze. You picked at your fingernails slightly, knowing Luke was watching you and waiting for an answer. 

“I don't mean too.. School’s been tough and stuff.” You say cringing at how lame that sounded even though it was true. Luke stayed silent for a moment, trying to decide if you were lying to him or not. You avoided his eyes and kept your glance locked on the floor. 

“Did I do something wrong? Did I overstep by touching you? I didn’t mean to scare you or anything..” Luke trails off and you frown. You quickly shake your head to tell him no.

“No, no, no. You didn’t do anything wrong. I’ve just been really swamped with homework..” You grimace to yourself for coming back to your really lame excuse. You watch as Luke steps a little closer, testing the waters. When you don’t object to him moving closer, he takes a slow seat on your bed beside you. 

“You look tired..” He points out, gently reaching to touch your cheek. It warms both of your bodies as your skin makes contact. His hands were..warm..and comforting. You weren’t sure what you expected but it definitely wasn't this. Who knew ghosts were warm? 

“I told you I’ve been swamped with homework.” You chuckle and this time Luke chuckles along with you. He gently pulls his hand away and folds them into his lap. You stare down at your feet for a few moments trying to figure out what to say next. This felt like completely new territory the two of you were exploring and by the energy and growing tension in the room; this was a little bit scary. 

“Do you think you know..why we can..touch?” You ask hesitantly. Julie was filling you in here and there at school, but it wasn’t much and they didn’t seem to come up with anything as to why you had the “powers” too. 

“No..it’s still all confusing. We think Julie’s mom has something to do with us being connected to Julie but we don’t know about you.” Luke says, side eyeing you and you weren’t sure if that was a hint for you to talk about your past or not.  

You didn’t really open up about your past. No one had ever really asked so you never really talked. Julie knew a little bit, she knew that your mom and dad fought a lot and you didn’t like being at home that much, but that was about it. You didn’t talk about it further than that, so when you could feel Luke trying to dig into your past more, you shrugged. 

“My parents don’t talk much about stuff. I don’t know.” You say, keeping it short and simple. Luke frowns a little at your answer, but he knows not to push so he doesn’t. The two of you sit in more silence beside one another. You picked at your finger nails while Luke’s eyes travelled around your room. 

“I ran out on my mom. She didn’t believe in my dream and though dropping out of high school was the worst possible idea. We got into a fight and I ran out. That was the last time I saw her face to face. I died before I could make amends with her.” You glance at Luke, surprised at his openness. Even though you guys were best friends, talking about stuff like this was kind of off limits. The memory hurt too much so you never talked about at home, parent problems. 

“Wow..I’m sorry. That must have been hard on both of you.” You admit and Luke nods.

“It was, but Julie helped me make amends with them last year.” Luke smiles a little and you smile too. You knew his little story was a play to get you to start talking so you took in a little breath. 

“My dad cheated on my mom a few years ago with..a few other women. My mom keeps trying to make excuses for him to keep him around. They fight a lot because my dad doesn’t want to stay but my mom keeps pushing it. They’re both pretty heavy drinkers, too. It’s not a very good mix.” You explain. It felt weird to say it out loud, but it also felt nice to talk about it with someone.

“I’m really sorry, Y/n. I can’t imagine how difficult that is.” Luke empathizes but you only shrug. 

“It’s a good thing Julie let’s me come over so much. She’s been there for me for it all and I really love her for that.” You say, smiling at the thought of Julie’s friendship. You really couldn’t ask for a better best friend to get through it all. 

“Yeah, Julie’s really great. She does it all.” Luke laughs and you nod in agreement. More silence fills in between you two but it was comfortable silence. This time you lean your head on Luke’s shoulder and he pulls his arm around you to bring you closer. You could feel the tension slowly fading away. Sometimes all it took was one meaningful conversation to break the barrier. 

“Oh yeah, I saw these on my way over here and I thought you might like them.” Luke smiles and you watch as he digs into his pocket before pulling out a small bouquet of those pretty Aster flowers. You sit up a little, instantly recognizing them. They were your grandma’s favorite before she passed away when you were little. 

“Asters?” You ask and Luke glances at you a little surprised.

“Is that what they’re called? They’re really pretty.” Luke smiles and hands them to you. You smile, smelling them and instantly getting that fresh scent of your grandma’s house. 

“They are very pretty. Thank you.” You smile warmly and Luke smiles again. 

“Yeah, you’re welcome. They just reminded me of you.” Luke says and you chuckle. That was something your grandma had said to you a lot. 

“You should probably get going. It’s getting late and the boys are probably wondering where you are.” You chuckle, glancing at how much later it had gotten and you still had to wake up for school the next morning. 

“Yeah, you’re probably right. I’ll see you at Julie’s tomorrow?” Luke stands up and sends you a hopeful glance. You chuckle and nod a yes. 

“Yeah, see you there, Patterson.” Luke smiles at your response. You watch as he hesitates to leave for a moment and you’re about to question him when in one quick motion he plants a kiss on your cheek before poofing out. 

You sit there, a little stunned, before allowing a small blush to creep its way onto your cheeks. You got up to put your flowers in your little vase on your desk. It added a nice touch to your room. If Luke hadn’t come in to make you more alert, you would have missed it. On your desk by the vase was a small piece of paper with writing on it. Upon examining it further, it was one of the last notes your grandma had written to you before she passed away. You thought you had lost that somewhere in your numerous papers, but there it was, front and center on your desk. 

I will be with you, today, tomorrow, and forever. You just have to look for the signs - Grandma 

[softomi]

now accepting boyfriend applications: literature

synopsis: phone dead, laptop gone, guess it’s an old fashioned having to sit down and talk to the boys who apparently are interested in the position of being your boyfriend. first; you just have to make it to your literature class. 

series: now accepting boyfriend applications

previous: now accepting boyfriend applications

next up: intro to business 

series taglist: @kyomihann @chesley-cant-deal @bluearmufs @your-consulting-fangirl @itsmeaudrieee @winunk @aegiseterna @katelyns-stuff @mochipk @3rachachoo @kyuudere

*bold means I wasn’t able to tag you*

general taglist: @graykageyama @tsumue @thesorebae @micasaessakusa @alouphen @waitforitillwritemywayout

Your phone was still charging, it’s in your bag plugged into a power bank and you’re hoping it’ll charge enough soon. You’ve made it to campus with five minutes to spare, you can already see Akaashi through the windows of the class. He’s absolutely cute and you’d be lying if you said you hadn’t thought about what it would be like to date him, but you were so blissfully in love with your ex that you never took the chance to fully indulge yourself to fantasize.

And while he’s in class looking like he just walked right out of a manga in a university setting; you look exactly as it would sound like, as if you just woke up and ran to campus. Your hair is a mess, you tried running through campus attempting to put it up in a bun, it’s lopsided and you’re using the hood of your sweatshirt to try and cover up the mess of a mop it is. It doesn’t help that the only reason you’re wearing a sweatshirt is because you didn’t have time to put on a bra so yeah, you’re walking around campus with no bra on and the ugly sweatpants with wine stains on it doesn’t do you justice either. You’re even decked out with a pair of sandals.

Honestly, how were you going to walk into class, look at Akaashi in the face, and just act as if he didn’t send you a boyfriend application. When he sees you, he’ll definitely retract his resume.

There’s two minutes left and you’re awkwardly poking your head in. No one is giving you the time of day but it feels like all eyes are on you when you step in. Perhaps you shouldn’t be too ashamed of your looks as you’re nearing the end of the semester and most girls have switched out their cute skirts for tracksuit pants.

You’re slowly going towards your seat, Akaashi diligently writing in his notebook and he finally looks up. Through his glasses, he meets your gaze, his lips slowly part and he’s blinking as if wondering if you were really you. As you pull into your seat, he stares down at his notebook, he’s stopped writing and everything in you is just screaming at you to not scream out loud because there was no going back on this weird friendship type relationship that you two have developed.

Akaashi shuffles in his seat, his body is turned to face you and he’s so close to opening his mouth when the teacher’s voice makes his thoughts stop. He turns back to face the front, no words exchanged as you pull out your notebook, pencil, and charging cell phone that’s just reached fifteen percent. For the first time since the beginning of the semester, you’re going to take notes and listen intently to this hour and fifteen-minute long lecture.

Only ten minutes have passed and your professor has done nothing but decided to review on what the difference between a primary article and a secondary article is because some people just don’t understand why Wikipedia is not an official source. You peek a look over at Akaashi. He, too, seems incredibly bored but his hardworking nature has him at least trying to focus on the professor despite the pen in his hand drawing circles on his notepad.

When he looks over at you, a small smile on his lips, you’re quick to turn away with a blush on your cheeks.

At thirty minutes, your phone is dancing on the edge of thirty percent. It’s enough to get you to start looking through your phone and you find yourself once again clicking on Akaashi’s email. You lean your arm onto the desk, tilting your body just enough that you think he wouldn’t be able to see that you’re looking at his boyfriend application.

You’re skipping passed official details, instead ceasing the scrolling when you reach his skillset. It’s all very professional sounding despite him referring to relationship and dating. It makes you crack a smile, you want to laugh out loud and not because it’s funny but because it’s actually really cute.

One of my skillsets is my height, considering your shorter height, I will be able to provide assistance whenever needed. While I may once in a while enjoy your smaller stature, I will try not to bring it up repeatedly to spare you of your feelings.

You bite down on your lower lip, suppressing the immense grin that wants to grow on your face. Through the strands of your hair, you peek another glance at him. This time he’s removed his glasses, rubbing his eyes slowly, a small yawn falling through his lips.

My biggest weakness is my busy schedule. I spend most of my days working part-time at the campus library and studying. As a literature major, I have multiple readings, essays, and assignments which may hinder my time to have a steady relationship but I believe that this weakness will later play a role as a strength in how devoted I am to what I love.

Well, that just made your heart skip ten beats.

My future goals include working as an editor, but right now my shorter-term goal would be to graduate with my literature degree on time. Another short-term goal I had developed over the semester was to ask you out on a date.

Your stomach spirals, you’re internally groaning at how cute this actually was.

“There’s twenty minutes left of class, during this time I’d like you to discuss with your revision partner about your last draft.”

Shit. You’re screaming in your head because this was not happening. Now you had to talk to Akaashi. The voices of students have now taken over the classroom, when you turn to look at Akaashi, a meek smile on you as he’s staring with his head tilted.

“Are you alright?” He’s asking so nicely, his voice soft and genuine. It feels like forever since someone has been so sweet to you.

Your hand reaches to scratch the back of your neck, a weak curve on your lips, “It’s been a pretty hectic twenty-four hours.”

Akaashi leans on his desk, cheek pressed against his palm and he’s asking, “Do you want to talk about it?”

Your lips fall into a small pout because he’s just so sincere. He’s always been. Maybe that was why you had just the teeniest of crush on him earlier in the semester because he remembered the small details. When he noticed you switched from coffee to tea, you ranted to him for five minutes about how your boyfriend was adamant on you changing your lifestyle by switching to healthier options. The next class time you had together, Akaashi brought you coffee because as long as your boyfriend didn’t know then it was alright.

“Are you sure you want to listen to me?” You quirk a brow at him, “Because I’ll talk for the rest of the time.”

Akaashi sits up straight, flipping his notebook, pen ready in hand, “I must have forgotten to list listening as one of my strengths.” Your face burns all of a sudden, he has the smallest smirk on his face when he turns back to you, “I’ll take notes, tell me what’s wrong.”

You’re not used to someone listening to you, you’re used to someone interrupting you. It felt awkward at first, just letting everything roll off your tongue, and your eyes keep darting to the way his pen moves against his notebook. Was he actually taking notes of your rant? When you finish, he’s smiling, there’s a warmth to his grin that has you internally groaning.

“What did you write down?” You’re leaning over now, trying to get a good look at his notebook and you don’t even notice that the embarrassment in you has lifted. You’re no longer plagued with awkwardness like you were an hour ago.

Akaashi tilts his notebook for you to clearly see his handwriting. A wide smile taking over your expression. She’s cute when she’s talking. He was indeed more straightforward than you had imagined, you pictured him as shy and cute, while he was definitely the latter, he came off boldly.

“If I have to be honest.” He states suddenly, “My friend threw together that application and then sent it to you and then messaged you.” Your expression falters but he’s adverting his eyes just slightly, “I was too shy to try and message to ask if you were alright and well, my friend tends to get a little out of hand.” He’s grinning once more, rubbing the back of his neck, “I guess it sort of worked out in the end.”

The professor’s voice draws your attention, “Once you’re done discussing with your partner, you’re free to leave.”

You look at the time, sparing a glance to Akaashi, “I’m sorry, I have to get to my next class.” You’re shoving your stuff into your backpack and he also quickly packs up.

“I’ll walk you.” He’s so eager that he almost knocks over his coffee cup, “I mean if it’s alright with you?”

“Sure, my next class is.”

Akaashi interjects, “Intro to Business, across campus.”

You’re surprised he remembers, a little impressed that it feels like he’s leading the way to your next class. For a moment it’s silent, you can tell he’s a little nervous but heck you’re also very nervous.

“You said two other guys sent you an application?”

Slowly you nod, “I mean one’s definitely a no, he’s just so cocky, definitely not my type. The other?” You think for a moment, “He’s really nice, funny, and we’ve kind of built up a friendship over the semester.” You notice how silent Akaashi has suddenly fallen.

“So.” Akaashi is quiet, “Then you would say that I’m up against him?” The two of you have stopped in front of your class, Akaashi staring down at you; the look in his eyes suddenly changes. He was getting competitive, “I’ll make sure to win you over.”

Your cheeks dust with a blush. He’s suddenly digging in his bag; he pulls out a baseball style cap. His hand tugging back your hood, undoing your sloppy bun to let your hair fall down. Your heart races at the way he sneaks in a stroke through your hair before fitting the cap onto your head. It’s loosely hanging until he leans into you, he smells of a deep forest and you’re tempted to just wrap your fingers on his t-shirt and pull him in a little bit more.

“You’ll probably be more comfortable with a hat than a hood.” He pulls away once he’s fixed the strap but his scent lingers momentarily, “You should get to class.” He states sweetly, taking in the cute way you’re trying to hide your face with his hat.

“I’ll message you.” You say as you slowly hang around the doorway to your class, “To return the hat.” And possibly more. You think.

The moment you turn away, a blushing grin on you with your heart beating rapidly; everything stops when you come face to face with Kuroo Tetsuro. He’s got a cheeky look on him, slightly eyeing the man still lingering outside of the classroom. The two men meet gazes and there’s a sharp sting between the two; an acknowledgement of an opponent.

[malfoys-demigod]

Favorite Quill - Draco Malfoy x Reader

Summary: After losing your favorite quill by accident, Draco makes the Holiday right with a surprise. 

Tagging @the--queen-of-hell​ <3 

A/N: I hope you all enjoy this fluff! 

One week until Winter Break. One more week until most students can go home, spending the Holidays with their respective families whom they have not seen in months. One more week until some students can finally have the castle to themselves as they spend a quiet little winter break alone at Hogwarts. 

What did everyone have to go through before Winter Break, though?

Quarterly exams. 

It was that awful week before the Winter Break where everyone would have to set their minds on studying mode instead of thinking about what presents they might receive during the holidays. 

People like Hermione Granger did not have a problem with that. She was part of those few people who were excited to take their quarterly exams as they were more prepared than ever. However, her friends Harry and Ron were part of the other set of people who just want to be done with the quarterly exams even if they did horrible in it. 

You on the other hand, was somewhere in the middle between these sets of people. Sure, you wanted so badly to take the Hogwarts Express train and see your parents as soon as possible. You haven’t seen them in months and being in their presence would really be glad to feel. But at the same time, you’ve been doing well with your academics that there was this feeling of confidence in you that you would ace your exams. 

One of those reasons why you can’t wait to take the exams was because of your favorite quill. 

You weren’t exactly superstitious, (maybe a little stitious - please get that Office reference) but you considered your favorite quill to be a lucky charm that you possessed. 

What exactly made it your lucky charm? Well it all started when you and your parents were in Diagon Alley.

It was that week before your first year at Hogwarts that your parents brought you to the famous Diagon Alley to buy your school supplies. Robes? Check. Wand? Check. Books? Check. Everything else was going well until seeing that one perfect quill by the other side of the street made everything perfect. Before leaving the alley, you couldn’t help but notice the simple yet white glowing quill, presented in the glass window of the shop across you. 

You tugged your father’s coat, signaling that you wanted to enter the quill shop before you all left for home. The moment you went inside, you made a beeline to the quill and felt the smoothness of its feather as you watched the white creamy color hollow in your eyes. 

The teller of the store went around to see you, infatuated with the quill. “Limited edition, very unique.” He spoke. He was explaining how there were only 7 models made for that very edition. One of each sent that to the 7 continents in the world and you were just lucky to have one of them sitting in a store in Diagon Alley. 

Your parents were fortunate enough to hear the story of the quill that they said, “How about we buy that, sweetheart?” It was a speechless moment for you as you were extremely overjoyed considering any child would be up in the moons if they hear their parents allowing them to get what they want. 

With that quill, you were always determined to do your best in your academics. Whether it be simply taking down notes, writing an essay, or taking exams, you always had your favorite quill with you, acting as that lucky charm every year. 

Draco of course knew this story. He was first curious to why you were infatuated with a quill. He first saw you during your first year by the library, writing an essay with a happy face. 

“Aren’t we happy to be writing an essay today, Y/L/N?” he approached you, standing up so confidently as he stood beside your chair. 

Usually you’d reply with a snarky remark just like him but you surprisingly smiled warmly and began talking about the story of your favorite quill. 

Draco too was a little surprised that there was no snarky remark but a pleasant story. “Well that’s quite a story you’ve got there, Y/L/N,” he gave a small smile and nod as he walked away. 

Now years later in the present time, you were having another year of winter break exams. There was nothing to be worried about as you were prepared and equipped with your favorite quill. 

It was the morning of the last day of examinations. One more day until you could pack your things and see your parents. 

You were in the Great Hall having your morning cup of pumpkin juice with Pansy, Blaise, and Theodore. Pansy was discussing her potions notes with Theodore while Blaise was teasing you about your obsession with your quill. 

“I don’t understand how that could be a lucky charm, Y/N. All you need is to be prepared with your studies and have a go with the test. No quill can magically show you the answers,” he teased. 

Pouting, you smacked him in the arm as he drank his juice. “Nonsense, Blaise! Don’t even bother as to what the muggles say, ‘jinx’ my luck.” 

Before Blaise could playfully roll his eyes, Draco entered the Great Hall nonchalantly as his eyes were on you. He hooked an arm on you as he sat down and gave you a kiss on the cheeks. “Morning, love.”

“Ready for the last day of exams, Dray?” 

“Actually, I was actually wondering if I could use your quill today,” he nervously asked, “I know you barely lend your quills to anyone, even me, but I really would love to ace my potions examinations before the day ends.”

Hesitant at first, you raised your eyebrows jokingly as you watched Draco use his secret puppy dog eyes on you with a pout in the end. 

“Promise you’ll give it back at the end of the day?,” you asked. Of course you would lend him your favorite quill. He was probably the only person you would lend your quill to. 

Draco planted many small kisses on around your face as a sigh of many thanks. Pulling out your quill from your sling bag, you looked at Draco with a serious face as you slowly and carefully lent your quill to him. 

“See you at the end of the day, sweetheart.” 

“With my quill.” 

— 

Draco felt a wave of relief in his body as he found you sitting in the common room reading the Daily Prophet. He dropped his bags and jogged towards the couch. “There you are, darling! I was looking all over for you,” he sighed. 

You didn’t mind Draco’s existence as he was standing, towering behind you while you calmly sat on the couch, continuing your reading. 

Unfortunately he was still standing behind you, waiting for a response from you as he brushed your hair with his fingers. 

“Go away,” you rolled your eyes, “I’m still not talking to you.” 

“Are you serious,” he asked, “you’re still angry at me?”

Angrily standing up, you threw the newspaper onto the floor and turned around to face a scared Draco. “Of course I’m bloody angry! It was only this afternoon that you lost my quill! I honestly don’t know how you can lose my quill in a castle we live in everyday!” 

“It’s a big castle, Y/N.” 

“Not helping at all!” 

You went to your dorm room and got a hold of your baggage and started making your way outside of the common room. 

Draco was still standing outside by the couches, placing a hand on his forehead. When his eyes met yours, he ran towards you, holding your forearm to prevent you from moving. 

“What.” 

“I’m sorry. You know that.”

“I’ll see you after the holiday. Quill-less.” Being the nice person you were, you planted a small peck on the cheek and removed his hand off from you and left the common room. 

Draco gave a small sad smile, looking down at the floor. His heels turned around and made a beeline towards the couch where you stormed off. He couldn’t help but notice tonight’s newspaper you were reading. 

There was a big advertisement on the last page located in the lower right side of the page. “Limited edition quills from around the world: coming straight to England for the auction of the year.” Then in the bottom of the message was a picture of the exact same quill that you had owned. This was fate! Draco couldn’t believe what he was seeing. He couldn’t believe his eyes. 

“Thank Merlin,” he muttered to himself. Even though he too was going home to Malfoy Manor to see his parents for the holiday, he still owled a letter to his father regarding the limited edition quill that was coming it’s way to England. “-must obtain it as soon as possible.” he lettered to his father. 

Of course this was Lucius Malfoy he was lettering to. Of course it would be obtained as soon as possible and when one says as soon as possible like the Malfoy’s, they mean in a span of three days. One day for Lucius to arrange a spot for the auction, a second day for the actual purchasing in the auction, and a third day for Draco to surprise you with the quill. 

He wasn’t going to come over to your house and present himself with the quill. No, he was absolutely more dramatic than that. In fact, he had already established a plan the minute he stepped foot on Hogwarts express on the way home. How did it go? Well, since this is Draco Malfoy, it went as dramatic as it can be. 

When Lucius came home with the quill, there lay Draco by the steps of the Manor as he finally watched his father apparated from the auction. Of course there were plenty of questions from Lucius considering how troubled Draco sounded from the letter. 

When Draco finally explained what had happened with you, Lucius scoffed in return, slightly scolding Draco for doing this to the love of his life. “You better come back with an accomplished task, Draco. I expect that my trip to the auction was for something worth doing. I do not want to hear how you’ve broken her heart more,” Lucius demanded from his son, who was nodding nervously. 

Draco hurried back upstairs to continue his plan. He started using your quill to write you a letter. A letter which contained him apologizing and stating his love for you. Along with the letter came the quill he finished writing with, the one he had his father auction for. He wrapped the quill in a gift box and had the owl send it to your house, as he dressed up in a fresh new black suit, along with flowers to apparate to your house. 

So there you were, warming yourself by the fireplace that was located in your living room. You were sipping your favorite hot chocolate drink, indulging in it until suddenly, a familiar owl stood by the slightly open windows in your living room. 

‘Is that Draco’s owl?,’ you wondered. Standing up, you were met with a gift box, a green one that was wrapped with white ribbons. Attached to the box was a letter that had a “M” stamped on it. Malfoy. Draco Malfoy. Of course. 

You could not wait so instead of reading the letter like what most people would do, you set the letter aside and started unwrapping the box with curiousness. You were taken by surprise when you finally saw what was in the box. The exact quill your boyfriend Draco had lost during the week before winter break started. Before tearing up, Draco’s owl somehow signaled you into opening the letter. 

‘-I hope you aren’t upset with me using your quill to write you this letter.

With all my love, 

D.M.’ 

Those were the last things written in the letter as you started shedding a tear. Looking at the quill, you were taken back at the mesmerizing glow of its color, as if it was the first time you laid eyes on it, exactly like the day you first saw its other model when you were 11 years old. 

Before you could cry even more, there was a voice from the back who spoke. 

“Don’t cry, my love. You know it pains me to see you cry.” 

Turning around, you saw Draco Malfoy, holding up a bouquet of your favorite flowers with a small smile on his face. “Hello, love,” he spoke again. 

Your body crashed strongly with his as you wrapped your arms around his neck, sobbing quietly. “I’m sorry,” you said. 

“For what? I should be the one saying that.” 

“I’m sorry for lashing out on you that day.”

“Hush, my dear. You had every right to. That was your favorite thing in the world. I’m sure you love that more than me,” he said playfully. 

“Of course not, Dray. But how did you get it? There’s only a few editions of those in the entire world? Don’t tell me it’s fake!,” you said, pulling away from him with an eyebrow raised at him.

“Nonsense, you know I only give you the best. In fact, that came internationally. I had my father hear about this and he auctioned for it. But I found out about it.,” he said confidently. 

“It must have taken a lot to purchase that.”

“Like I said dear, I only want to give you the best. “ 

“Aw.” 

“Now, why don’t we spend our day staring at this glorious crafted item the exact way you did with your old one?” he said with a smirk.

[spir1tfar3r]

Let’s Try Again

summary: Akaashi wasn’t a bad boyfriend. Hell, he was probably one of the best you had. Just sometimes he had trust issues. He didn’t like it when you hung around certain people (specifically your friend Evan from your history seminar), and it would bring out the worst in him - the part of himself he worked really hard to keep hidden. It was for that reason the two of you decided to break it off and move on. A year later and you bump into him in front of Coach Ukai’s store and you feel an entire wave of emotions break through the damn you spent twelve months trying to build and perfect. The moment you made eye contact, you knew you were a goner.

warning(s): my trash writing <3

words: 2.3k

a/n: So Evan is an oc I had for a story so uh don’t mind his annoying ass (I hate him in everything I’ve wrote for him ngl). I literally made a totally different banner and name but then realized it would work better for my Kageyama smau I’m going to do eventually so I changed shit. Also a fucking huge ass thank you to @thecowardwrites for not only helping me with reading it over, but she came up with the summary because I couldn’t think of anything. Ilysm bby and thank you🥺

reblogs are appreciated <3

‘Hey, I thought you wanted to get something to eat? Where are you?’ Akaashi had sent that text well over an hour ago. You didn’t have class for the rest of the day so he was a little confused as to why you weren’t answering but he didn’t want to spam you with messages in case you needed to talk to your teachers. A part of him had a few doubts on where you actually were but he trusted you, or so he tried so desperately to convince himself. But when he looked up from his phone to see you walking to him with your “friend” Evan, who happened to be a little too bold with where he was resting his hand on you at that moment, his chest began to tighten. He knew you would never do anything but almost every time you two had made plans somehow Evan would be involved with either coming with you two or being the reason why you’d cancel on your boyfriend. You were a wonderful friend, he wouldn’t ever blame you for dropping things in that moment to help your friends that may need you but when it was every date he tried so hard to plan for you, it began to get a little hard to tell if it was just anything more than just what he’s trying to make you believe.

“See you tomorrow Ev!” You said with a wave as the two split ways. You smiled at your boyfriend until you noticed the frown on his face. “Hey sorry, I was staying to ask help with this stupid essay and then got caught up talking to him. Did you still want to get food?” Akaashi bit his tongue, trying not to say anything, just taking your hand and nodding. He wanted to express how he felt about the entire situation but anytime he tried, you were too busy or he backed out at the last minute. It wasn’t fair to make you try and figure out how he felt, he knew that, but at the same time, he was well aware that you picked up on the signs of him being upset. Taking his hand and gently rubbing your thumb on his knuckles to help him relax and take his mind off of whatever is bothering him. Akaashi began to debate with himself, trying to figure out if now was the right time to talk to you about everything bothering him, or he was until your voice broke his train of thoughts. “Love? What’s wrong?”

His brows furrowed, not sure on what you were referring too. You gestured at the rather tight grip he had on your hand and he was quick to release the pressure he had on it. You patiently waited for him to speak, silently encouraging him to tell you what’s wrong. Finally finished with arguing with himself, he spoke up. “I don’t like Evan. I don’t really appreciate how basically every time we make plans he either has to tag along or you just cancel it to spend time with him. It’s getting to the point where I feel like you’re more his partner than mine. You almost spent two hours making me wait for you because you were talking to him. I would like to at least have one day where I can actually spend time with you.” He admitted. His chest hurt, panicking that he may have just messed everything between the two of you up. But Keiji knew that he couldn’t keep in how he felt anymore. It wasn’t fair that he had to express his feelings to his friends who always told him the same thing “just talk to y/n”. But how could he when you were always busy with your friend?

“Keiji I ask if it’s ok if he comes with us and you always say yes. I even ask if we can take ring checks and you also say yes. If it’s that much of an issue why do you agree?”

“Because I don’t want to feel like I’m controlling our relationship!” He finally snapped, standing still so you two won’t walk past people while having this talk. He hated how harsh he sounded when he said those words and how your face fell. You looked confused and maybe even a little hurt but he decided to keep going, tired of being silent. “I want you to be able to make your own choices and I don’t want to be considered as your “controlling” or “jealous” just because you spend much more time with him than you do with your own boyfriend. I’m just… tired. I’m tired of making plans with you or attempting to make plans when you won’t even be there. And I’m tired of having people ask me if we broke up because all they ever see is you with him. Even I’m beginning to have a hard time considering us dating when it’s so obvious how your friend feels about you.”

You let out a dry laugh, trying to convince yourself maybe it’s not as bad as it is. You were simply spending time with your close friend and he certainly didn’t have feelings for you right? “What are you suggesting? We break up?” You asked. Time felt like it was stopped whenever you asked that question. It was obvious by the hurt on both of your faces that you didn’t want to break up. Akaashi loved you more than anything in the world so losing you was the last thing he wanted. With a heavy sigh, he nods, trying so hard to get rid of the lump in his throat so he can speak.

“I think that would be the best. At least for now.” His voice nearly broke but he managed to sound firm. Or at least as firm as he could sound. Any hopeful part of you was long gone and you nod, trying to hold yourself together. Before you could do anything, Akaashi pulled you into a hug, placing a gentle kiss on the top of your head. “I’m sorry…” You didn’t say anything, instead choosing to bury your head into the crook of his neck to suppress any of your tears from falling. As the two of you pulled away from one another, you offered a smile.

“I’m sorry for everything. I hope things go well for you, Akaashi.”

It had been about a year since you had ended your relationship with Akaashi. You two hadn’t seen each other much on campus as you never had any similar classes and he decided to have the early morning ones where you took the later classes due to your work schedule. You even saw Evan less and less whenever he found out that you had broken up with Akaashi and took that as the moment to confess his feelings. It made you think back on what Keiji had said before you had broken up and you ultimately told him that he wouldn’t be anything more than a friend. Not liking that response, he seemed to have cut you out of his life, not like you cared anymore anyways.

“Y/n! Hurry up!” Yukie called out, taking you out of your train of thoughts. You playfully rolled your eyes and made a comment on how impatient she was. She had been looking for some drink for a while and when she found out Sakanoshita Store had it, she had practically dragged you along with her before your last class. “You’re going to be late if you don’t!” She added, hoping maybe that would get you to speed up. Letting out a sigh, you ran over to her before slowing your pace to match hers.

“I don’t see why I had to come with. Kaori wanted to go with you.” A groan left your friend and she shook her head.

“It’s for her! So she definitely couldn’t come along or it’d ruin the whole surprise!” She replied and you nodded, understanding why she’d been so secretive about the situation now. Or you tried to be as understanding as you could considering you were literally just getting a drink. The two of you continued to walk until suddenly your friend came to a halt, leaving you to bump into her back and nearly knock the two of you down. Before you could ask why she had just randomly stopped, you looked up and saw an awfully familiar boy with his best friend. “Maybe we should come back later—” Yukie tried to turn you around but you were frozen, not budging an inch as you watched the two talk and get closer to you.

“Keiji?” Your voice was soft but considering how close he and Bokuto were, it wasn’t a surprise that he heard you. The setter paused what he was saying and met your eyes, his widening a bit, clearly taken by surprise. You feel your throat tighten and your eyes begin to well up with tears. You wanted to say anything else, not liking how you only simply called out his name. He seemed to not be able to speak either, still surprised that he had finally bumped into you. And of course it just happened to be when he was explaining everything to his close friend. “I missed you.” The words left you before you even realized what you had said, leaving the three to stare at you in surprise.

“Uh… Bokuto? Want to come with me into the store so they can talk?” Yukie asked and he quickly nodded, dragging her away from the two of you because he knew Akaashi wouldn’t wish him to be there in case the two of you had gotten into some argument. Not that he really expected one, but he was scared that maybe he had overreacted a year ago and you would still be fairly upset with him.

“Sorry… for saying that. How have you been?” You asked and he gave a slight shrug, messing with his fingers, a habit he had whenever he began to get nervous.

“I’ve been alright. I started an internship at Shonen Jump which has been… interesting to say the least. How have you been?”

“Decent? I’ve been spending more time with my studies and Yukie being so obvious on her crush on Kaori.” You replied and he let out a soft laugh, something you missed hearing.

“She was pretty obvious about it back in highschool so I’m not that surprised. How’s everything going with Evan?” You slightly cringed at his name being brought up and Akaashi was quick to notice it. He would’ve said something about how you reacted but he didn’t want to ask you about something in case you weren’t comfortable talking about him. Before he could change the subject, feeling awful that he even brought Evan up, your voice had come out before his own.

“We… actually aren’t friends anymore. You were right on him liking me and… I’m really sorry that I didn’t catch onto it while we were together. I would’ve definitely spent a lot less time if I had actually known that was basically his motive during our entire friendship.”

Akaashi had let out a breath, not even realizing he was holding it in. He was scared that the two of you would have begun dating by now, seeing as it’s been well over a year since he had broken up with you. Seeing you raise an eyebrow at how he reacted, he spoke up. “I was actually worried I just overreacted. Honestly I wish I had because that was not fair to ever pin on you in general. I’m sorry that his friendship wasn’t as genuine as you thought it was.”

You shrugged, knowing there was nothing you could do about that anymore. You glanced at the store, seeing Yukie paying for the things she got.Taking in a breath, you took a chance at asking something you wish you’d done sooner. “Keiji… can.. we maybe try again? It’s ok if you don’t want to, I totally understand. I just miss you a lot and it sucks not having you in my life anymore.” He smiled, gently taking your hand and pressing a kiss to your knuckles.

“I would love to. I just wish you would’ve let me ask you that instead.” He replied and you gently smacked his shoulder. “You’re heading back to the school right? Bokuto and I can walk with you both if you’d like.” He adds, seeing his two friends walk out of Sakanoshita’s.

“Honestly? That would be great. I don’t think I can handle her being all soft for Kaori alone anymore.”

“I am not soft for her!! Shut up!!” Yukie yelled and the three of you laughed as she crossed her arms and shook her head. She glanced down at your hand still in Akaashi’s and she raised an eyebrow, silently asking you if the two of you were ok again. Knowing exactly what she was asking, you nodded with a smile and laying your head onto Keiji’s shoulder as the four of you began to walk back to the school. “About time you two got together again. Y/n kept on complaining about how much she missed you.” She mumbled and you gave her a look, telling her to shut up.

Akaashi laughed, kissing your temple when he realized you were basically glaring at her. “If it makes you feel any better, I did the same to bokuto.” He whispered and you pushed him away, a little bit embarrassed that he felt the same way you had. As you had gotten to the school, Akaashi pulled you into a gentle hug. “Do you want me to pick you up after class?” Nodding and letting out a soft “mhm”, he had let you go, aware of how much you hated being late. “Good luck with class”

“Thanks love.” You replied, kissing his cheek before following your friend into the school.

[jamiiviper]

The Jamil Essay

this is a reupload of a post i made a couple of weeks ago - previously it was an external link to a google doc, so it never showed up in any of the twst tags, but i worked so hard on this and i would really love it if more people read it, so i’m reuploading directly to tumblr.

to put it simply, this is a 3.7k word character analysis purely about jamil. and even with a word count like that i wasn’t quite able to cover everything i wanted to say, so who knows, maybe there’ll be a part 2 one day. i’ve also decided i do want to write a kalim version, so i’ll probably start working on that sometime soon! stay tuned!

trigger warnings: mentions of child abuse

jamil is the vice dorm leader of scarabia, who’s been kalim’s caretaker practically since birth. he puts on a facade of not standing out, preferring to remain completely average, and plans his life around kalim’s antics. as we learned in chapter 4, however, his true feelings are that he bears a lot of resentment towards kalim, and that he wants to stand out - he just wasn’t allowed to, as he can never surpass kalim.

in this essay i want to cover not just my personal interpretation of jamil, but also some common misconceptions that people tend to have about him. twitter doesn’t have this problem as much, but with tumblr i’ve found that there are very few jamil stans, especially in the theory and writing communities - meaning it’s quite common for people to misunderstand his character. in the fandom as a whole, it’s common for people to only acknowledge him insofar as “gay for kalim”. 

firstly, jamil’s character development in the main story - i would say he’s arguably the best-developed character in twst, since yana now has enough chapters available to flesh out characters after their main story arc ended. jamil holds very deep-seated resentment against kalim, to the point that he plotted to betray him for probably several years. he plotted to have kalim not just thrown out of nrc, but thoroughly ruin his reputation in the process. after his overblot, those feelings did not magically vanish - far from it. i think earlier twst chapters suffered from arcs being wrapped up a little too neatly post-overblot, but pomefiore’s arc has already proved itself to be the exception and thoroughly covers not just jamil’s continued dislike for kalim, but also the wider consequences for what he did.

since the twst school year begins in september, we know jamil is about 9 months older than kalim. from literally the day kalim was born, jamil’s life has been dedicated to kalim. possibly since the day jamil was born, and he was always fated to be kalim’s caretaker. it may even have been the reason he was born at all. either way, it’s not like he remembers those 9 months. all jamil has ever known is that his sole purpose must be to serve kalim. he must not have desires of his own, he must not do anything for himself - from childhood he was expected to be ready to give up his life for kalim at a moment’s notice. he can’t be good at anything - kalim must always be better (i’ll cover this in more depth in a later paragraph, this philosophy is key to his character). his own parents drilled this into him, even going to the extent of hitting him if he didn’t comply. it seems he has a normal relationship with his family despite this - he bickers with his sister like regular siblings, and pre-overblot he indicated that his desire to be free from servitude wasn’t just about him, he wanted to free his family. nonetheless, the psychological damage his childhood caused him is severe. is it any wonder his unique magic is mind control, when he’s never had an ounce of control over his own life?

moving onto his early teen years, we know both jamil and kalim were severely poisoned at one point, both falling into comas for around two weeks. although we don’t have a timeframe for jamil’s coma, we know kalim’s was when they were around 13 years old. if jamil’s was around this age too - probably a short while afterwards - i think it’s plain to see why jamil’s resentment began to build. he’d have been around the age where he first started to question why his life has to revolve around kalim. why should he be expected to die for someone he doesn’t even like, who’s spoiled and doesn’t realise how much jamil does for him? kalim takes everything for granted: status, friendships, freedom, and jamil is meanwhile left in the shadows with nothing. then one day kalim gets poisoned so badly he falls into a coma - how much do you want to bet jamil was blamed for that, at the age of 13? after that he’s expected to taste-test anything kalim eats beforehand, and eventually starts making all his meals for him because the risk of poison is so high otherwise. then one day he slips up, or it’s an undetectable poison, and jamil is the one to fall into a coma. is anyone blamed for that? does anyone pity jamil outside of his immediate family + kalim? no, probably not. after all, he’s just doing his duty, right? it’s truly… no wonder jamil’s resentment became so intense. he finally has proof that his life truly does not matter. although kalim certainly cares about him, he doesn’t understand jamil’s position. he sees jamil as a friend, an equal; jamil knows this can never be the case, and he also knows kalim is too privileged to ever hope to understand. 

fast forward on a couple of years to jamil receiving his nrc acceptance letter. he thinks that finally, finally he’s going to be free. four years of freedom - and who knows, maybe after that he can be free forever! he can finally excel at his classes and be his true self, without fear of upstaging kalim! 

and then kalim gets accepted a month late. for no reason other than his surname. 

and then kalim gets sorted into his dorm.

it’s a miracle he didn’t just overblot on the spot - but that’s his nature as a scarabia student. careful foresight and planning. this moment was, undoubtedly, the moment he started planning his betrayal. he had his one month of freedom ripped away, just like that. 

oh, don’t forget the fact that not long after, kalim was made dorm leader not because he notably embodies scarabia values at all, but because of nepotism. (side note: most scarabia stans agree kalim does actually reflect scarabia values, just not as obviously as jamil does, but either way jamil himself wouldn’t see it this way. this is a jamil essay so i won’t go in depth about this unless asked to!)

under kalim’s watch, scarabia - known for its intelligence and cunning - is turned into “the party dorm”. this seems to be the fandom’s perception of them too - i mean, just ask any non-scarabia stan what goes on in scarabia, that’s probably the answer they’ll give you. jamil would have probably loved the original scarabia; although we don’t know much about it, we know scarabia students are on a par with octavinelle when it comes to intelligence (paralleling azul’s constant interest in jamil). yet by winter break, scarabia is doing so badly in those same exams that they didn’t even place in the rankings…? without meaning to, kalim clearly harmed scarabia. instead of getting chance to study magic and show off, jamil is now essentially an unpaid, full-time party planner by the time his second year starts.

a few months later, winter break finally arrives, and jamil executes his plan to dethrone kalim. i may have just spent the last two pages defending jamil’s grudge, but his actions themselves are still indefensible. there’s evidence to suggest kalim knew what was occurring on some level - refusing to answer jade’s question about who was hypnotising him proved that 1) he probably had some idea deep down that jamil was betraying him 2) he doesn’t want jamil to get in trouble for it. nonetheless, this does not make what jamil did okay in the slightest, even if kalim allowed it to happen. jamil is, undoubtedly, the bad guy in this situation, no matter how sympathetic his childhood makes you feel. i could go into detail about why kalim acted the way he did, but again, this is jamil-focused.

i’ll skip talking about his overblot, because i covered his hatred for kalim in a lot of depth already and i want to talk about the general aspects of his personality like his desire for praise later on. so moving onto the end of chapter 4, we see jamil’s true self: a snarky, heavily opinionated boy who honestly just wants to be free to be himself.

but just like his freedom, that side of jamil once again only lasts for a brief moment. jamil almost loses everything after his overblot. practically every scarabia student hates him and wants him thrown out of the dorm - even kalim, his sole defender, can’t call him a good person. he’s a traitor. he says he trusts the scarabia students to work out that it’s better for them if he stays, but that day won’t come any time soon, and until then he’s keeping his distance from them all, because their hatred is that strong. if azul truly had been streaming to more people than just jade, his life would have been ruined beyond repair. so what does jamil do? he goes back to serving kalim. as a scarabia student, his foresight is good enough that he knows the option he hates the most is the only one that’ll be good for him in the end. for jamil, being himself is nothing short of a death sentence.

now i’ve talked for far too long about the timeline of his character arc, i can finally get to the good stuff: jamil’s personality, and how it’s changed throughout the stories we’ve seen so far.

the first thing that springs to mind when you think of jamil, other than “snake”, is probably “tired”. or “he’s going to snap”. something along those lines. which... yes, we know he is. he did snap. after chapter 4, this doesn’t seem to have changed too much, but i do get the impression that he’s somewhat less stressed out by kalim. his resentment has dissipated, for the most part (he does still openly insult him, though), so while he does grumble at kalim there’s no suppressed fury behind it. what replaced that fury?

guilt.

in 5-10, jamil tells azul that he intends to continue to obediently follow kalim around in order to restore his reputation, both inside and outside of scarabia. this does of course make him sound pretty selfish (as per usual), and in classic jamil fashion he doesn’t let his true emotions show, so it’s easy to take this at face value and assume he just doesn’t really care. i think in this case, we need to look more at his actions that we see throughout chapter 5. namely, the way it’s being emphasised how he’s silently watching kalim from afar - something he’s always done, yes, but yana seems to be really making a point of it in chapter 5. it’s not just kalim he’s distancing himself from, either. he’s staying away from the rest of the scarabia students too, as mentioned earlier. he never had any friends at all to rely on, even before his overblot. so by doing this, he’s effectively completely isolating himself. he clearly has a lot of thoughts about everything that he’s not sharing with anyone - just listen to the way he sighs at the end of the flashback in 5-10, how annoyed and frustrated he seems. if jamil was telling the truth about just wanting to restore his reputation, he’d probably appreciate kalim’s efforts, even if he dislikes kalim himself. he shouldn’t be upset by kalim persuading the scarabia students to give him another chance. not if he truly just wants to get back to normal. i think on some level, jamil feels incredibly guilty over his actions. he might not have even admitted to himself yet that he feels this way, and by saying things like “i just want to restore my reputation” he’s just trying to convince himself. after all, that’s something he has a history of doing.

ever since jamil’s first introduction, we’ve known jamil lives his life by the philosophy of “not standing out is the best way to succeed”. he hates standing out or receiving any kind of positive attention at all, because he thinks that it’ll only attract trouble. or so we thought, because as we learned from his overblot, jamil desperately wants to stand out. he’s powerful and intelligent, and he wants people to acknowledge that. he wants the praise and recognition he knows he deserves. this means that whenever he said he didn’t want to stand out, he was lying through his teeth - he probably constantly tried and failed to convince himself of this throughout his childhood. during his lab SR story, he even repeats it to himself in his thoughts, like a mantra - “I want to avoid standing out. I can’t be satisfied with this. I cannot be too good, nor fall behind, and neither should I get satisfactory grades or fail. This is the best shortcut to success.”. much like his feelings of guilt, jamil refused to acknowledge how much he truly wanted to show off, even in his own thoughts. he is awful at being honest to himself.

post-ch5, we find out that despite everything, jamil does still hold this philosophy, to some extent. he of course shows off his singing and dancing skills enough to be chosen as a main vocalist, and he says he wants to make a name for himself and show various people just how talented he truly is: kalim, his family, the asims and MC, to name a few. yet in the chapter before that, when kalim compliments his singing and dancing, he’s like “i don’t really want to stand out, but…”. which is honestly a little confusing at first because he does want to. i’d probably interpret it as something along the lines of he wants to show off to the people he cares about, but he still wants to keep his head down in general. so i think that to some extent, maybe he actually has internalised that philosophy now. the one time he truly expressed his desire to stand out, it ended in catastrophe for him. he has this tiny seed of doubt within him now, telling him his parents were right all along. but... he’s working past it, and applying himself as and when he’s comfortable doing so.

going back to him being bad at being honest, jamil’s a pretty big tsundere. there’s one person he does regularly receive praise from: kalim. yet despite desperately wanting to be praised, he often gets annoyed at kalim and tells him something like “this isn’t about me right now” or “what does that have to do with anything?”. plus when the praise is coming from kalim, it’s often in the context of kalim praising him to other people - as a servant, he can’t be seen accepting all these compliments, right? he can never be better than kalim. so he has to reject kalim’s praise. when it’s just the two of them alone, though, is when jamil gets embarrassed to the point he has to hide his blush under his hood. given his childhood, chances are that he doesn’t really know how to process being praised. he knows he wants people’s approval, but when he actually gets it, he just short-circuits. it was the same at his birthday celebration; although he wants to be the centre of attention, when it actually happens, he gets all embarrassed and tsun. i was trying not to let my own personal feelings spill in this but oh my god he’s so cute i can’t

next... this isn’t really linked to any previous topic, but i want to talk about jamil’s cooking! jamil cooks all of kalim’s meals, and regularly cooks entire feasts for kalim’s parties, too (as well as being in charge of getting any animals kalim wants to show off, decorating the dorm, making sure everything runs smoothly… you get the idea). his cooking is very good, and he has a lot of technical knowledge about cooking too - azul, whose parents run a restaurant, didn’t know about emulsification, but jamil was able to explain it to him. despite being so good, though, according to his dorm SSR homescreen lines he doesn’t actually like cooking very much. he says the fact that he cooks so much is “just how things turned out”. of course, he could just be being a tsun, but i do feel like he’s being honest with this - what reason does he have to seriously enjoy something he was forced into doing his entire life? However there is evidence that he might enjoy it after all; he’s particularly good at alchemy because of his cooking knowledge, and according to magical archives he’s completely neutral in motivation for both flying and history lessons, but has slightly higher motivation levels for alchemy, indicating that he can’t stop himself from putting a little bit extra effort into that class. i think it can be interpreted either way with the canon info we have currently, but regardless i would not say he’s the cooking fanatic people often depict him as. 

also, when jamil cooks, although his cooking is good, visually it’s usually very boring, to the point he and his sister would bicker over it. he has the technical skills to cook good food, but no idea how to present it. similarly, in his fairy gala SR he was told that although he perfectly memorised the dance, it was boring to watch - it looked like he was just executing the routine without any passion behind it. jamil is so emotionally repressed that he has no idea how to express his individuality. even in his bedroom, the only truly personal items he owns are a first aid kit (related to his servant position, not him as a human being) and a stereo + headphones set for dancing. he doesn’t have any other hobbies or interests - he doesn’t even know what people his age do for fun, because he’s never been allowed to think about such things. 

dancing is all jamil has that’s not directly related to serving kalim, really - but even that ties into his servant status. although he genuinely enjoys it nowadays and dances by himself for fun, he only picked it up as a hobby because kalim wanted to go to dance practice, and of course jamil had to accompany him. when his flashback after his overblot talks about him deliberately losing to kalim, the story focuses specifically on a dancing competition. which is why it’s honestly so important to jamil’s character that chapter 5 focuses on a singing and dancing competition. jamil finally has the chance not just to show off his skills in general, but his skills at the one thing he’s been allowed to love throughout his life. the one thing where losing to kalim at it hurt so much that it was such a prominent memory for him. when jamil was chosen as a main vocalist, he instinctively tries to say kalim would be better suited for the position, but stops himself and accepts it. it clearly means so much to him that he was chosen for this.

okay i started to scare people with how long this was getting when it was only 50% finished, i think if i write anymore people will actually be concerned for my health so i’ll leave it here. if you read all of this, thank you so much for putting up with my anime boy brainrot for over six full pages! i really.. really like jamil. again, i most certainly do not think his actions should be defended, but god if they’re not fascinating to read about. and i hope i covered the other sides to him well enough, the things that you’d never ordinarily pick up on because so few people talk about him outside of him and kalim as a pair (both platonic scarabia + romantic jamikali, i mean). he has so much depth to him that people don’t see and god i could easily have gone on for another few pages if i wasn’t forcing myself to stop. but please please talk to me if you want to hear more...

yana has treated him so well, jamil stans get too much food if anything but i’m absolutely thriving off it as you can see! thank you for allowing him to exist, yana-sensei!

having said that, i couldn’t stop myself from adding some extra facts about him below. please enjoy.

some fun jamil facts for your soul:

his sister used to bake him cookies on his birthday - specifically, these!

when jamil and kalim went to eat at the cafeteria with ruggie and leona, leona took one look at jamil and went “you look like you’d kill kalim in his sleep”

sebek and jamil find each other’s positions enviable. sebek wishes he could have been by malleus’ side from birth as jamil was with kalim, and jamil just… wishes he served someone he respected as deeply as sebek respects malleus (but he does think sebek is too enthusiastic)

jamil hates surprises with a burning passion, and despite being with kalim for 17 years is still not used to them. for his previous birthday, kalim held a huge surprise party, and i think he still hasn’t recovered from the shock

i think a lot of people already know that in his birthday SSR story he said he wanted a parrot after graduation so he could teach it to call him master, but it goes a bit further than that? it was actually first mentioned during his lesson chats, when kalim gets a parrot. jamil has to research how to care for it, and ended up wanting one of his own afterwards (but got too tsundere to admit it at the time).

also, he heard that the sorcerer of the sands’ parrot (iago) could speak as fluently as a human, and he got excited and watched a bunch of parrot videos on magicam, but was of course disappointed to find out that this was not the case.

he frequently uses flattery to try and get his way, like when he attempts to flatter vil during his SSR story - unfortunately he misjudged vil, as vil’s actually the type of person who hates meaningless flattery. because he does this so frequently, when he genuinely does give compliments people don’t always believe him.

according to the halloween event, jamil is surprisingly environmentally conscious, and insists on holding a sustainable halloween theme. after organising so many parties and seeing the waste they probably produce, i think there’s no wonder he’s so concerned about it.

[flufflepuffle296]

Heathers au: Beautiful Songfic

This is more centred around Veronica/Marinette so not really any mentions of Heather/Heather/Heather. Sorry if someone’s done this before I apologise I just got into Heathers like two days ago. Also I changed some lyrics and took others out to make it more “realistic”. Sorry I suck at endings, it’s 5:30am rn and this is my first fic so be nice please! (I’m on mobile so I can’t add the keep reading tag so sorry if you don’t like this) xxx

I brushed down my dress: I couldn’t give them anything to criticise me over. Everything had to be perfect. I had to be perfect. Chloé sat next to me, my beautiful fiancée, slipping on her kitten heels. She may be 3 months pregnant but no Bourgeois woman would be seen wearing flats. I was in a red floor length a line dress — I grew out of my childish pink years ago, before it even went out of fashion! My hair was twisted into two plaits that were knotted together into a stylish bun at the back. Chloé meanwhile had stuck to her white and gold aesthetic, currently in a slim fitting white dress, showing off her small baby bump, decorated with gold jewellery. I rummaged through my drawers, trying to find a lipstick, when a thin book toppled out. I picked it up, and laughed fondly when I saw what it was.

My old Collège and Lycée diary.

I flipped through it, landing on the page that stuck most clearly in my mind. It was the day my class reminded me of my current reality at that time, shocking me out of a bubble that had surrounded me during the summer holidays that year.

September 1st, 1989.

Dear Diary: I believe I'm a good person. You know, I think that there's good in everyone, but—here we are! First day of senior year!

And uh... I look around at these kids that I've known all my life and I ask myself—what happened?

I bit my lip. What happened? I knew darn well what happened. Lila Rossi. She came in, flaunting her friendships and connections, a new disability every other week to cry about, another rumour about me coming out every 3 days.

Alya ended our friendship, Adrien continued to cry about Lila’s feelings. Lila just kept doing what she did best. The class gave up on changing my mind and instead decided that calling me names would be better. Because logic?!

“Freak!” “Slut!” “Burnout!” “Bug-eyes!” “Poser!” “Lard-ass!” Were the insults they liked to yell daily. Yeah, they weren’t the most creative...

We were so tiny, happy and shiny. Playing tag and getting chased. Singing and clapping, laughing and napping. Baking cookies, eating paste.

Nino and Kim used to come over to the bakery when we were kids, where we’d gorge ourselves on sweets, before celebrating our sugar rushes by chasing each other in the park and then crashing on my sofa, cuddled in blankets and laying on top of each other.

Then we got bigger, that was the trigger. Like the Huns invading Rome. Welcome to my school, this ain't no high school: This is the Thunderdome. Hold your breath and count the days, we're graduating soon. College will be paradise, if I'm not dead by June!

But I know, I know, life can be beautiful. I pray, I pray for a better way. If we changed back then, we could change again. We can be beautiful...Just not today.

I scoffed at my optimism back then. Them changing? They never did, I don’t know why I bothered trying at that point. I should’ve moved on but hey! We all make mistakes. It’s just that sometimes you make 11 friendships worth of mistakes.

“Freak!” “Slut!” “Cripple!” “Homo!” “Homo!” “Homo!”

I cringed as I read their old “insults”. They would write homophobic messages across my locker, getting Alix to spray paint a few slurs across my work after I came out as bisexual.

Things will get better soon as my letter comes from Harvard, Duke, or Brown. Wake from this coma, take my diploma. Then I can blow this town. Dream of ivy-covered walls, no smoky French cafés. Fight the urge to strike a match and set this dump ablaze!

I had purposefully sent out applications to universities far away from these people, from Paris. All three schools accepted me, something I can’t say about my classmates, most of whom were rejected for essays on false information (sourced by Lila) and a quick scan over the Ladyblog meant not a single newspaper would even consider my ex-best friend. Gabriel Agreste, as I later found out through my internship in America, had to bribe several schools with double tuition to get even one to accept Adrien, after he got exposed as sexual harasser and disgraced hero “Chat Noir”. I turned back to my diary, having to peel off rock hard gum from the page that someone had smeared in “revenge”.

Le Chiên Kim. Third year as linebacker and eighth year of smacking lunch trays and being a huge dick.

“What did you say to me, skank?” He would yell, his fist raised in the hallway.

“Aah, nothing!” I then cowered. I may be Ladybug, but he was 150lbs of pure rage. No one can compete with that!

But I know, I know... Life can be beautiful. I pray, I pray, For a better way. We can be beautiful...

“Marinette! Wide load! Honnnnnk!”

He was the smartest guy on the football team. Which is kind of like being the tallest dwarf.

“Hey! Pick that up! Right now!”

“I’m sorry, are you actually talking to me?” He used to snarl, his hands covered in sauce from knocking my tray.

I stood my ground, I had been practising for this moment. “Yes, I am. I wanna know what gives you the right to pick on me. You're a high school has-been waiting to happen. A future gas station attendant.”

Kim then smirked, crouching down to eye level and pressing a finger to my forehead. “You have a zit right there...” he pointed out, causing the cafeteria to laugh at my expense.

I used to ask myself “Why... Why do they hate me?”

And hear Adrien whisper “Why don't I fight back?”

Watch as Max Googled “Why do I act like such a creep?”

Listen in on Lila stamping her feet in the bathroom asking “Why won't he date me?” Clearly frustrated.

Kim panicking as he wondered “Why did I hit him?”

And Chloé sob down the phone “Why do I cry myself to sleep?”

I would stay up late, screaming, begging. At my lowest points I would cry out “Somebody hug me! Somebody fix me! Somebody save me! Send me a sign, God! Give me some hope, here! Something to live for!”

I remember when I first met my real friends. The famed trio had gone into the bathroom and I followed after them, clearly my throat.

“Who are you?”

“Uh... Marinette Dupain Cheng. I crave a boon”

“What boon?” Chloé asked, filing her nails.

“Um. Let me sit at your table, at lunch. If our class think that you guys tolerate me, then they'll leave me alone...”

Chloé threw her nail file out and began circling around me, running her hands through my hair, commenting that “For a greasy little nobody, you do have good bone structure!” Before coming to a conclusion.

“And ya know, ya know, ya know? This could be beautiful. Mascara, maybe some lip gloss, and we're on our way. Get this girl some blush; and Kagami, I need your brush. Let's make her beautiful.” Sabrina and Kagami, chimed in, echoing her words.

“Let's make her beautiful...”

“Let’s make her beautiful...”

“Make her beautiful...Okay?” Chloé ordered, dragging me out with Kagami and Sabrina, driving me to her hotel. They sat me down, taking my hair out of its bunches and brushing it out. Kagami painted my nails a deep navy with surprising precision, manning my cuticles. Sabrina twirled my hair into a high bun, leaving a few pieces at the front to frame my face. Chloé came back from her wardrobe, throwing a blue blazer and grey skirt at me. I changed into my outfit for them, to which they clapped their hands in glee. They dragged me back to school, taking in everyone’s reactions to the new and improved me. This became my new daily outfit for the rest of the year — the class couldn’t find anything bad about it, and even if they did Chloé would threaten them with her father’s power.

I was happy with my squad. Kagami taught us Japanese and Chloé taught us American English that she’d picked up from her mother. I taught them self defence, under the guise of learning it from my mum, unknowingly training them for the day I would rip Chat Noir’s miraculous from him, before slamming it into Kagami’s palm. I needed help that day, so thrust them bee and the fox miraculous at Chloé and Sabrina respectively. They became permanent heroes, Kagami under the name “Noirette”, Chloé under the new guise of “Buttercup” and Sabrina “Renard Rouge”. Akuma attacks have never lasted more than 15 minutes since we got rid of that alley cat, and we’ve been closing in on Hawkmoth recently.

I shook my head, snapping the crude book shut, throwing the diary in the bin. Today was going to be the day I made peace with all that happened, our 10 year school reunion. Doesn’t mean I’m gonna make up with anyone, just that I will finally leave everything behind. I found my lipstick and smeared on the crimson lip, smacking my lips together. I grabbed my clutch and helped Chloé stand up, though she wobbled a little in her heels. I slid her miraculous into her updo, blowing a kiss at her as to not ruin her makeup.

We met up with Kagami and Sabrina in the hallway, Kagami in a wine red suit with gold jewellery, and Sabrina was in emerald green to compliment her red hair. We stepped into the limo awaiting us outside and set off, arriving at the school 10 minutes later. We walked up the steps, hitching up our dresses and arrived in the courtyard. It had been lit up with fairy lights, with stands of food and drinks scattered around the court. Our old classmates were huddled in small groups, whilst Mlle. Mendeleiev’s was in a large group, enjoying each other’s company after 10 years apart.

No one noticed us, until Rose pointed at me and whispered “Who’s that with Chloé?” The group turned to stare at us, trying to place my face. Adrien looked up from talking to Lila, who seemed to be flaunting a rather tacky Gabriel engagement ring, and whispered,

“Marinette?!”

The class began gossiping amongst themselves, “Marinette? Marinette? Marinette?!”

I ignored them, their childish ways were behind me, and walked up to Aurore and Mireille, fawning over their relationship. They turned Kagami, asking her about her life and squealing over her Olympic medal for fencing. I grinned as I watched my old class, happy that they had moved on from each other — well apart from Alya and Adrien, who were still hooked on Lila. I was finally, content! I thought back on my diary, one particular paragraph standing out to me at this time.

And you know, you know, you know, life can be beautiful. You hope, you dream, you pray, and you get your way! Ask me how it feels, lookin' like hell on wheels...My God, it's beautiful! I feel so beautiful... And when you're beautiful...It's a beautiful frickin' day!

Chloé boasted my achievements, my business, my awards, and the entire of Mendeleiev’s class started chanting “Marinette! Marinette! Marinette!”, much to my embarrassment. I boasted her’s in return, Sabrina revealed how far she’d come as a lawyer, Kagami swung her prized sword from side to side as she listened to us all catching up, laughing at the memories.

It really was a beautiful day.

[an-absolute-travesty]

Secret Santa fic!

Heya @all-eternity it was me all along! I hope you enjoy this :) very much looking foward to actually being able to follow you after this without looking sketchy lmao

Also shoutout to my lovely beta reader @keepersandqueens as if I don’t talk about Salas enough here lol

Warnings: underage drinking, drinking in general, hangover, drugs/medication mention (not abused, basic over the counter stuff dw), mentions of vomit (not described)

Pairings: Kam, background marelinh, ex titz

About: Kam coffee shop college au 

Word count: 5,205

Tag list (tell me if you want to be added or removed): @cadence-talle @ruewen-and-rising @lemontarto @a-lonely-tatertot @clearlyvacksen @percabetn @sewersewersewercouch @everyonehasthoughts @imaramennoodle @enbies-and-felonies @blxckh0les42​ @rainbowtay-11 @callas-starkflower-stew @impostertamsong @appalyneinstitute1 @stars-and-splendor @anna-without-an-e @mistythegenderqueermess @we-have-no-bananas-today @we-wont-dissapear @jadenightthewriter

Tam stumbled into his first 8 am class, anxiety making his heart feel like it was pounding out of his chest and stomach doing backflips.

If he could survive bouncing between foster homes, a short stint at juvie, and worst of all high school, he could survive college.

Well he thought he could until he saw a familiar person right next to the only available chair in the room.

God fucking damn it.

"Hey Bangs Boy!" Keefe waved him down, causing a scene. Tam had no option but to sit beside him, both because of the lack of chairs and the fact that everyone was now staring at him.

Not a great start.

"What a coincidence! I notice you still haven't taken my suggestions on your hair, I'm telling ya' you'd get all the girls and or guys and nonbinary pals with a man bun." Keefe looked smug at the fact he'd be able to taunt Tam for another semester, minimum. Tam was already making a mental note to check when he could swap out of classes.

"Keefe, if I knew you were going here I would've just gotten myself back in jail, oh wait, you were the one who got me in there in the first place." Tam shot him a look, praying that he'd suddenly develop superpowers and shoot lasers from his eyes.

"Hey, just because I came up with the idea...and helped with some of the execution, doesn't mean I'm responsible for you trashing your parents house. Besides, you were only in there for like 3 days max before you got out," Keefe said, shrugging as if 3 days in jail was no biggie.

"Most peaceful 3 days of my life," Tam sneered, turning back to the front of the room as the professor walked in.

"Good morning class!" the prof turned to the white board, writing his name. "I am Dr. Harding," he tapped it for emphasis.

The class was silent.

"And you say good mor..."

"Good morning Dr. Harding," The class said in unison, they all sounded tired and bored.

This wasn't going to be fun.

~*~

"Grande ice vanilla latte for...Hen-are-y?"

The man shot Keefe a look as he grabbed his coffee.

"Henry." He dropped a tip in the jar, fifty cents. How generous.

He had come in before, and never left good tips. Keefe made it a game to pronounce the names of anyone who wasn't a college student and left bad tips wrong, no matter how much they came in. It was a wonder he hadn't been fired yet.

As he turned preparing another drink, the bell at the top of the door rang. He ignored it at first until he heard a quiet, "Fuck," come from behind.

"Bangs boy!"

"Why are you here?"

"I work here obviously," Keefe walked up to the counter. "Now, what'll it be?"

Tam sighed. "Iced caramel macchiato with two extra shots of espresso."

"Size?"

"Venti."

Keefe whistled thinking about how much caffeine that was as he wrote down "Bangs Boy" on the cup.

"Alright, that'll be 5.75, may I ask why the insane amount of coffee? I believe I remember you saying caffeine makes you anxious in high school."

"Yes, but it also helps me focus, and I have a quiz tomorrow I haven't studied for."

"Fair enough," Keefe said, going to prepare the drink. "It'll be ready in five."

Tam nodded, walking off to the side and scrolling on his phone. Keefe made the drink, occasionally sneaking looks over at Tam. He didn't seem to notice, thank God.

Soon after, they finished the transaction.

"See you at class," Keefe said, he was trying to be genuine, but it came across more taunting.

Tam grimaced, muttered "Thanks for the coffee," and walked out the door.

~*~

The class fell silent as a disheveled Dr. Harding walked in, a pack of gatorade in one hand and bottle of tylenol in the other. He popped one as he sat down.

"Hello class it seems today I have the worst headache imaginable, just give me about 5 minutes of silence and we will go over your assignments."

Keefe leaned over to Tam's desk.

"Well, we know what he got into last night," he whispered. "Heard the bar on the corner of 5th was giving out two for ones for professors."

"Isn't that place run by the alumni?"

"Exactly. Gotta thank Alvar tomorrow, Fitz said it was his idea."

"Wait Fitz goes here too? Why did I not-"

"Boys!" Dr. Harding practically yelled. "I am tired of the racket." He put his face in his hands where his elbows rested on the desk, bald spot showing to the world.

"We were whispering!" Keefe made a 'what the hell' sort of gesture. Tam glared at him, hoping he could communicate 'I will kill you myself if you say another word' with just his eyes.

"Sencen, do I look like I care?"

Keefe winced a bit at the use of his last name. That was something Tam could understand.

"Look, boys," Dr. Harding stood up and turned to the chalkboard, writing something down. "If you all like talking so much, you'll love this next project."

He walked to the side, revealing the board, that read '10 page essay, due the 25th'

"With the person next to you, you'll be writing a 10 page essay on um...the importance of keeping your oil changed in your car. You'll then present it to the class. It's worth 25 points."

A student raised their hand.

"Luka?"

"Sir, I thought this was a psychology course?"

"It is. You are all excused."

With that, he left the room with his tylenol and gatorade in his arms. The students glared at Keefe and Tam as they all got up, muttering amongst themselves about the pure bullshittery of it all.

"So..." Keefe said, slowly standing. "Does the library tomorrow at 3 work? I have work until then, so it can't be any earlier."

"Yeah, sure." Tam promptly walked out of the classroom as fast as possible, he didn't know why but his anxiety was spiking. He tried to tell himself it was just because he was a useless gay that didn't know jackshit about cars, yeah, surely that was it.

Just a useless gay.

~*~

Tam waited at a table in the library, it was 3:05, Keefe was late.

He didn't know what else he expected from him, he always seemed to do stuff like this. At the same time, Tam didn't have the energy to be particularly mad at him. This was going to be the stupidest essay ever written in the history of man, might as well put it off.

The library door slammed open, and in came Keefe. He balanced a large stack of papers and books along with four drinks. He stumbled over to Tam and practically threw them down on the table.

"Sorry I'm late, I thought it would be nice to, like, get you a coffee, but I didn't know how much caffeine you wanted, so I got one decaf caramel macchiato, one normal, and one with an extra shot, and also hot chocolate for me."

He sat down in the chair by Tam, as if getting three different coffees for someone you were forced to do a project with was totally normal.

"Um...thanks, I-I can pay you back-"

"Don't worry about it." Keefe turned to him and smiled, bright and friendly. Tam was frozen. "Okay, now it's car time." Keefe turned back to the desk.

"Yeah."

They were silent for a while as they researched, Keefe going through his piles of papers and books and Tam on his laptop like any sane person would.

Tam finally worked up the nerve to talk.

"So um...this is out of nowhere, but I think you mentioned Fitz went here?"

"Oh, yeah." Keefe put down the absurdly large textbook that was set up in front of him. "He's my roommate, he uh thought it would be best not to tell you after everything, I guess."

"That's fine," Tam shrugged like he didn't care. "I'm over it."

He was, really. They only dated like 2 weeks, sure it ended with a...pretty big fight after Fitz claimed he wouldn't be able to date someone who had gone to jail and Tam reminded him it was his best friend that got him in there in the first place, but he was still over it. There was still something bothering him, nothing to do with Fitz himself but...something. He just couldn't put his finger on what.

"Alright, I'll take your word." Keefe shrugged, setting his giant book back up in front of him.

Tam felt the need to start talking again, but didn't. They were mostly silent for the next 40 minutes or so, just researching and the occasional word exchanged between them.

Keefe checked his phone.

"Shit," He got up. "Work emergency, I gotta go. Same time tomorrow?"

"Yeah that works."

"Chill, see ya' later."

"Bye."

Keefe waved (with a wide grin Tam would've called idiotic in high school) as he went out the door.

Tam found himself with a smile on his own face, he quickly stopped, hoping no one saw.

~*~

Keefe hurried into work, pulling his apron on as he saw the absurdly long line and a panicked Marella frantically making coffees behind the counter. She sighed with relief when she saw him.

"Thank God," She said as he stepped behind the counter with her. "There was a scheduling error, Forkle's useless at that stuff."

Mr. Forkle, their well-meaning but often mistaken manager, was out of town at the moment. The fate of the Starbucks rested on two college kids, what could go wrong.

And so they went, Keefe taking orders and Marella fulfilling them until there were no more to serve.

Marella, quite literally, threw in a towel she had wiped her face with. Promptly going to the back, presumably for her break. Keefe followed her.

"Alright, I think you can probably go back to whatever you were doing before this now if you'd like," said Marella, inspecting the small braids in her hair in the nearest shiny surface.

"Nah I was just doing a project with Tam for Harding's stupid class, he's probably left by now, I might as well rack up some overtime."

Marella turned back at him, clearly caught off guard at the name.

"Tam? As in my-girlfriend's-brother Tam? As in you-had-a-massive-crush-on-in-highschool Tam? As in dated-Fitz Tam? As in you-got-him-in-jail-"

"Yes! Yes! Why does everyone remind me of that, it was one time."

"When you get someone in jail, people tend to remember," Marella went silent for a second, thinking, before looking Keefe in the eye. "Wow, that must be awkward as hell, I mean seriously, if I were you I'd straight up file a restraining order just to avoid him. Maybe move to another country. I hear Estonia is lovely this time of year."

"Eh, it's not as bad as it seems. I mean it was awful at first, mostly because I tried to resume right where we left it on the taunting front, but I think it's ok now."

"Hm. Well good luck with that," Marella turned back to go to the front, but Keefe grabbed her arm to stop her.

"Uh, actually I need your advice on something. It has to do with Tam."

"Shoot."

"Well I was thinking of maybe, I don't know, asking him out or something? Look, yeah, it's an awful idea but is it 'he never wants to talk to me again' awful or 'he attempts to strangle me' awful?"

Marella looked him up and down, eyes uncomfortably cold, as usual.

"I mean, no hetero, but despite your annoying qualities you're a decent looking guy. Plus Tam's, like, super anxious according to Linh, so maybe he'll be too awkward to say no. You can probably squeeze at least one date in there."

"Wow, thanks Mare," Keefe mumbled, voice dripping with sarcasm.

"Yes, I try. Also don't call me Mare."

"Alright Ella!" Keefe called as the front door's bell rang, signalling a new customer. Marella went off to take care of it, unable to respond she growled back at him.

~*~

Tap tap tap tap tap.

Tam glared from across the table.

Tap tap tap tap tap tap.

"Why do you keep doing that?"

Keefe looked up, muttered a simple "Fidgety" and went right back to it, tapping his pen against the table. Tam said nothing more.

Keefe had been quiet for this entire meeting, something highly unusual for him.

"Ok, seriously dude, what's up? I haven't seen you this quiet literally ever."

He only seemed to get more fidgety at this question, his bouncing leg shaking the library table.

"I...um..." he looked down, running a hand through his hair "I have a test I need to cram for and no one to study with and keep me accountable. Y'know, ADHD issues."

Tam didn't overthink for once in his life but the moment the sentence was out of his mouth he regretted it.

"I have a test too, maybe we could study together?"

Keefe smiled his annoyingly charming smile.

"Sounds good."

"Good."

Tam quickly looked back down at his computer, trying to look like he was still doing car research when in actuality he was processing he just actively offered to spend more time with Keefe Sencen.

If Linh found out about this he'd never live it down.

He didn't think he cared.

~*~

Dr. Harding walked through the classroom door, clearly much less hungover than his last appearance.

The students waited, would they get an apology? Any sort of remorse?

"Alright, who wants to read first?"

Apparently not.

Keefe raised his hand with too much confidence for what their essay looked like. Tam gave him a confused look. He had his scheming face on, never good.

"Mr. Sencen!" Keefe winced at the use of his last name by the doctor. "What an amazing start, it's only appropriate. One of you boys come up and present."

Tam gave Keefe a look of 'do you want me to do it?' Keefe just smiled and got up from his chair. This would either be really good or really, really bad. Tam was all too familiar with the scheme face.

"Doc, I did depart from the source material a bit here, hope you don't mind. And I use 'I' because Tam had no involvement in this, he deserves full points for his essay."

Keefe cleared his throat, the room was so silent you could hear a pin drop.

"Doctor Harding deserves to get fired: an essay. (And it's only been a week!) Paragraph one, his drinking problem-"

"Sencen! Back to your seat now. I will see you after class, or I will not see you in my next class, understand?"

Keefe gave a thumbs up as he sat back on his chair with a thud.

A few minutes later, in the middle of another student's essay, he passed Tam a note with his loopy handwriting.

"The amount of comebacks I had for 'see me after class' is absurd but if I get kicked out there's no way Elwin is helping me pay tuition a second time."

Tam tried not to smile, certainly failing, as he wrote his response.

"Yeah I think the time you talked back to Miss Cadence she wanted to expel you. Lucky Principal Alina had a thing for pseudo-dad Alden."

"Oh God I haven't talked to him in a whiiiiiile."

"?"

"You haven't heard? Yeah, he sorta found out like ALL his kids were ell gee bee tees and freaked out. Della found herself a new gf though!"

"Sounds like a lovely extra punch in the gut for a queerphobe."

"Yep. Honestly I recommend looking through his Facebook sometime. Just a million rants about how the gays destroy everything, great entertainment."

"Duly noted."

At that point it seemed like the doctor started to take notice of their note passing, and they stopped quickly. Tam wouldn't be surprised if he did the whole high school read in front of the class thing with the way he had been acting so far.

Tam was 100% sure tenure was the only thing keeping this guy's job intact. Apparently being a drunk asshole wasn't near enough to get a person out of their position. He tried to ignore the professor's annoyingly smug face for the rest of the class.

~*~

Keefe sat in his usual spot at the library, Tam sitting across from him, his brown eyes dancing across the textbook page and lips mumbling along the words. He didn't have much to do, often finding himself just staring at Tam, quickly looking away if he seemed to notice.

Eventually he sighed, sitting back.

"Ugh, this test is in a week and I have so much other crap to do, I'll never get this all memorized by Friday."

Keefe silently thanked his brain for managing to get around the having to study thing. Yay, photographic memory!

"Oh, uh, well I'm free to study more tomorrow if that would help? We could do, like, flashcards or something."

Tam seemed to repress a smile. He did that a lot. Keefe always noticed.

"That's okay, I'm sure you have better things to do. The Starbucks is always pretty packed."

"Eh, sometimes you have to get away from Marella. She's mean to me."

"Not just you, once she told me if I ever made fun of Linh's cat's name again she'd make me cut off my own bangs."

Keefe nodded sagely. "The shorter you are the closer to hell. That's why you're worse than her."

"Hey!"

Tam flicked a stray rubber band at Keefe.

"I'm at least 2 inches taller than Marella...we measured."

Keefe thought up about 12 inappropriate jokes he couldn't make before flicking the rubber band back.

"Two inches only counts in roller coasters, none of which you can ride."

Tam stuck his tongue out before returning to his studies. Unlike Tam, Keefe didn't hide his smile.

~*~

Tam strolled into the Starbucks that Friday morning, no longer surprised to see Keefe working the counter. He could barely hold still in line as he thought about the amount of cramming he'd have to do in the next few hours.

When he reached the counter, Keefe said nothing, just busily worked making a drink.

He stuck it right out at Tam.

"One venti iced caramel macchiato with 2 extra shots of espresso because you have a test today in political science and still haven't studied everything and also a muffin because you probably haven't eaten today. On the house. Good luck with the studying."

Tam froze.

"I- um- th-thaks. Y-you too...sport."

Oh, you fucking idiot.

He quickly scurried out of the Starbucks with drink and muffin in hand. Wow, he had screwed that up.

But...

Keefe...

He...

He remembered his order and that he had a test and that he forgot to eat when he was stressed holy shit holy shit holy shit holy shit-

Okay, deep breaths Tam, you got this. You can totally handle a frustratingly cute guy showing care for you this is fine...

Not fine, not fine, gotta tell Linh.

He called Linh with no forewarning. Despite the fact that she was currently across the country at a different university, and it was about 3 am for her, she picked up. He barely let her get out a groggy "Hello?" before explaining everything. She only seemed to think a moment before responding.

"Hm. Well it's good to know that college is going good for you. Do you need advice or comfort?"

"Yes."

"Well, first of all, everything's gonna be okay. And I know that doesn't help much but just try to remember we're eighteen, and it's not the end of the world. Second of all, try to ask him out or something. It doesn't have to be framed as a date, like Marella and I got together on a walk in the park, seriously it can be anything."

"Thanks Linh."

"No problem, also can you hug Marella for me?"

"If she doesn't try to kill me first, yes."

"Nice. Okay go do what you gotta do, also don't wake me up at 3 am again or else I'll sic Purryfins on you, I had just gone to bed."

With that she hung up and Tam continued on his way, still trying to not completely freak out.

~*~

Keefe stared blankly as Tam walked right out of the door. Marella appeared by his arm.

"So, how'd it go?"

"Well, he called me 'sport'."

Marella inhaled through her teeth.

"Yikes. Comfort, advice, or distraction?"

"Distraction, please." Keefe replied, absent-mindedly preparing a cup for the next customer.

"Uh, well I meant to ask you what ended up happening with that ass of a teacher, but I got a bit distracted at your attempt to woo Tam-"

"Hey I said distraction not reminder. But basically I just got a slap on the wrist because, and I quote, 'Your father is Cassius Sencen! He wrote half the books we use in this class, I'm sure he can straighten you out!'"

"There's absolutely nothing papa Sencen could do to make you straight, I'm pretty sure he tried that, and it obviously didn't work."

"He actually tried a few times and it most definitely did not. Lucky he doesn't have my number anymore or else I assure you he'd keep trying."

Marella laughed.

"Well, moving on from grade A assholes, I'm supposed to tell you there's a party tonight. I'll have to send you the address later, I have it on my phone though, I am told there's gonna be booze, so I'm going."

"Eh, I'll probably go. Just to get my mind off everything."

"Thata boy." She lifted her phone. "And my shifts over in three, two, one, and I am out of here! See ya' tonight Hunkyhair."

"That's Lord Hunkyhair to you."

She just rolled her eyes and clocked out, leaving Keefe to deal with both the customers and his own thoughts.

~*~

Tam sat in his dorm room alone, constantly refreshing his grades for the possibility that his 70-year-old professor would post the test results at 1:30 am.

His roommate was gone for the weekend, actually he was gone most of the time. Tam didn't think they'd even had a full conversation before.

He jumped as his phone began to ring, a call from Keefe of all people. He hesitantly picked it up.

"Hello?"

"Tam! Tam Tam Tam Tam Tam" Keefe's slurred speech was too loud for a phone call, Tam held his phone a bit away from his ear. "...fuck wait why did I call you..."

There was a long pause, neither said anything.

"Oh yeah! I needed to tell you something...but uh I uhm I forgot what it was."

"Keefe, where are you?"

"At a paaaaaarty, well, actually just outside a party because it was hot in there, but now it's cold out here so uh yeah."

Tam sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose.

"Okay, send me the address, I'm coming to pick you up. Wait right there and don't move."

"Okie dokie."

Tam heard a thud sort of sound and the rustling of grass from the other line before Keefe hung up and soon after got a message of his location.

After 20 minutes of walking in the cold, Tam came up to what seemed to be a frat house with Keefe sitting on the lawn in criss-cross, patiently waiting in short sleeves and basketball shorts, way too little clothing for the weather. His ruddy face smiled as he saw Tam approach.

"Tam! I remembered what I was going to tell you." He stood up, face falling right after. "Oh no wait I forgot again. Ooh! You need a drink."

Keefe grabbed Tam's hand, pulling him towards the house. Tam stayed in place.

"Hey, let's get you home dude."

Keefe pouted.

"I don't wannaaaa."

He slouched down, pulling on Tam's arm like a child having a tantrum.

Tam pulled him back up to his feet.

"C'mon, if you go to your dorm without fuss I'll buy you ice cream tomorrow."

Keefe seemed much more ok with going along with Tam with the ice cream deal. He pulled off his own coat and placed it around the very drunk boy, he didn't complain.

Keefe began humming some annoying song from the early 2000s that was playing from the house earlier as they walked back in the direction of the dorms.

Suddenly, Tam remembered something.

Fitz was Keefe's roommate.

Shit.

"Hey uh do you think Fitz is at your dorm?"

Keefe nodded confidently.

"Yep! Said he was gon' study. Wouldn't come to the party because of his 'reputation' or whatever."

Around reputation he did exaggerated finger quotes, nearly knocking Tam's jacket off his shoulders.

"Hm...in that case let's go to my dorm, ok?"

Keefe shrugged, apparently willing to go along with most things in his current state. Thank goodness Linh had made Tam bring extra pillows and blankets to college, he could sleep on the floor and just hope Keefe didn't get sick on him in the night.

It was ridiculously hard to lead Keefe back to his dorm. He tried to pull down his pants halfway there and Tam almost had to carry him up the stairs but soon enough they got there. He sighed with relief as he led his inebriated friend into the room.

"Okay, you can stay here for the night. I'll sleep on the floor."

Keefe plopped himself down on Tam's bed laying flat for only a moment before sitting up with a snap and a look of realization in his eyes.

"OOH! I remember what I was gonna tell you again!"

"Oh?" Tam said playing along, expecting him to forget again.

He patted the spot next to him on the bed, Tam continued to play along, sitting next to him.

"So Marella said that I should just tell you this, and it worked for her, so I'm gonna. And uh and you have to promise to listen 'cause I'm not sayin' it again."

At this point Keefe grabbed his face with both hands, staring right in Tam's eyes and squishing his cheeks.

"You're listening right?"

Tam nodded, mostly to shake Keefe's hands off his face.

"Okay."

Keefe took in an over dramatic breath as if he was preparing to preform in the Olympics before getting another grin on his face.

"I really like you."

"You really like me?"

He nodded mumbling "mhm".

"What do you mean?"

"I mean I like you. Like, like like you."

"Like...as a friend?"

"I said I wasn't gonna repeat myself. As a booooyfriend." At this point Keefe fell back on the bed, looking at the ceiling. Tam's cheeks were burning.

"How long have you liked me like that?"

"Mmmm..." Keefe seemed to ponder for a moment, "Prolly high school."

"Oh um...good to know. You should get some rest. I'll be down here if you need me."

"Alrighty."

Tam shut off the lights and Keefe started snoring quick. Tam could only stare up in the darkness, unable to sleep.

~*~

Keefe woke up that morning in a room he didn't recognize to a killer headache and dead phone.

He turned to the side, seeing a pile of blankets and pillows with a large gatorade, bottle of tylenol, and a note next to it. Suddenly last nights memories came flooding back.

Oh, shit.

He scrambled out of bed, headache and nausea hitting him harder as he stood up.

Despite the fact his head was spinning, he picked up the note from the ground and read it.

Hey, meet me at the reservoir around 6, we need to talk -Tam

F. U. C. K.

Had he really said all that stuff last night? Surely it was a dream, right?

Oh God.

He gathered his few belongings, plus the things to help the hangover, and left the dorms as fast as possible. Only having to stop once along the way to throw up in one of the campus trash cans, hopefully no one would notice.

Keefe didn't have anything to do and he really didn't want to face Fitz so he went about his day in last nights clothing. Then again, it was a college campus. Someone walking around with rumpled clothes carrying a gatorade probably wasn't that big of a deal for most people. By 5:30 he sat impatiently in the empty park where the reservoir was located, it was colder closer to the water.

Just as promised, at 6 o'clock he saw Tam approaching on the horizon.

~*~

Tam was damn near a panic attack as he walked around the park attempting to find Keefe. Eventually he found him, sitting on a bench still in his clothes from last night, face once again ruddy from the cold. He sat next to him wordlessly.

"So," Keefe started.

"So," Tam replied, looking down at his lap.

"Tam I-" Keefe turned to face him. "I'm sorry about everything last night, I probably just made everything super awkward. Not to mention it's a giant violation of the friend code to even have a crush on your best friend's ex-"

"Yeah, about that."

"What?"

"You're gonna maybe kill me for this but uh," Tam pulled on his bangs. "I sorta talked to Fitz about it, I figured you wouldn't and apparently I was right. He said he was okay with it as long as we were ok with it."

"Are you saying what I think you're saying?"

Tam sighed, "Perhaps."

Keefe once again wore that shit-eating grin of his.

"Can I hear you say it?"

"Why don't you have to say it?"

"Already said it last night! Your turn now. Why did you take care of me while I was drunk?"

Keefe stared at Tam excitedly waiting for the answer. Tam sighed.

"Because I love you, little shit."

"Ooh you said it-"

Tam smashed his lips against Keefe's, both quickly melting into it. After only a moment they pulled away.

"Agh, you taste like gatorade and vomit."

"Well you taste like salt so really what's worse."

"Definitely the vomit."

Despite this, Tam leaned back in. This kiss was a moment longer than the last, and when Tam pulled away Keefe chased it.

"Ok, look I'm sorry but you look like shit Keefe you have to go change." Tam removed his jacket, throwing it around Keefe once again and helping him up from the bench. Keefe laughed.

"Yeah, you're right. Ooh now that we're a thing you need a new nickname!"

"I do?"

"You do, how about 'Bangs Boyf' ooh or maybe you can be my 'provoked partner' or my 'snappy spouse' my 'agitated accomplice' perhaps."

"Do you just have these ready and prepared for any situation?"

"A magician never reveals his secrets."

"You aren't Houdini, you're an 18-year-old boy that currently reeks of frat party."

"Eh that's basically the same thing. I've seen some 18-year-olds at frat parties preform tricks Houdini could never dream of."

Tam sighed dramatically. "It's a good thing you're pretty, you know."

"Hey!" Keefe jokingly shoved him.

For the first time Tam's smile wasn't repressed.

[readyourimgaines]

The Little Things

Summary: Derek knew fully well that moving in with Spencer was going to bring around some changes. Dr. Spencer Reid was different and Derek loved him for it. There were little quirks that the doctor showed at work and some Derek was still learning. So there must be some at home.

And a special thanks, of course, to @chaoticgremlinwholikescheese​ for helping me compile this list!

1. Alphabetizing Movies by Title

“Pretty Boy?” Derek was crouched down in front of their TV looking for their movie while Spencer did the dishes. The latter hadn’t seen Happy Gilmore and Derek couldn’t let that stand. 

“Yeah?” Spencer called from the kitchen. 

“I can’t find it?”

“What?” Spencer stepped away from the sink and went to the living room. Water dripped from his fingertips. “The movies are alphabetical. It’s between Hamlet and Ice Age.” He went to Derek’s side and gestured to the movie. “I was going to order them by director, but Hotch said most people don’t know directors very well. Which is a shame because J.J. Abrams destroyed Star Trek but Guy Riche-” 

Derek pressed a kiss to Spencer’s lips with a fond smile. Spencer blinked. 

“Sorry,” the doctor blushed. 

Derek just chuckled. “You know you’re adorable, right, Pretty Boy?” 

“You may have mentioned it a time or two,” Spencer laughed. 

“You can tell me all about directors later,” Derek promised. “I know a bit about the mainstream guys, but not a whole lot.”

“All you really need to know is that J.J. Abrams kills anything he touches and Peter Jackson doesn’t get as much attention as he should.”

*****

2. Morning Rituals

One thing that Derek very quickly learned about Spencer was that he 

had a specifically timed morning ritual when not on a case. And that if it was broken or disturbed, the whole rest of the day would go down hill like a train on greased tracks. 

He woke up at 6:17, was in the shower by 6:25, eating breakfast by 7:00, his bed made by 7:30, and shoes on his feet by 7:32. The last half hour before they left at 8:00 was free game. 

The first morning in their new place was the roughest. Spencer went 

about his usual morning, but Derek didn’t usually wake up until 7:45 because he took less time to get ready and ate in the car. So when Spencer finished breakfast and went back to their room to make the bed but Derek was still asleep… He paced for the next fifteen minutes and his head nearly went through the ceiling when Derek’s alarm went off. 

Spencer almost had a panic attack as he fumbled his way through making their bed and cramming his feet into his shoes. Needless to say, the extra half hour was spent- in vain- trying to calm the doctor down. None of the rest of the day lined up properly and Spencer was on edge and fidgety. Hotch even had to gently remind him to focus a few more times than the usual redirection of infodumps. 

That was the first and only time Derek didn’t follow Spencer’s morning routine. He found the same day that Spencer had a much simpler night ritual: Snack (sometimes) at 10:10, teeth brushed by 10:25, in bed by 10:35, reading until (supposed to be) 11:18, and then lights out. This routine was much more flexible and relaxed.

Derek found waking up and going to bed at the same time every day made the former much easier. He also found that Spencer reading to him most nights- no matter the book or topic- was very relaxing. And of course there were nights when Derek read to Spencer.

*****

3. Sugary Coffee

Derek took a sip of coffee from his travel cup and whistled. “Think I got yours, Pretty Boy. There’s enough sugar in this to hype up a six year old’s birthday party.” 

Spencer braced himself and took a sip of the coffee in his own cup. He was pleasantly relieved when the bitterly sharp taste expected never came. “I-I put sugar in both of them. I wasn’t thinking,” he said sheepishly. 

Derek shrugged. “You know what they say: I’ll try anything once.” He chuckled. “I’ll just brush my teeth for an extra three minutes.” 

Spencer scoffed as he got into the passenger seat of Derek’s car. “Who knows? Maybe you’ll like it. You don’t get the caffeine drop when the eight hour half-life is over.” 

“Is that why you put so much sugar in coffee?” Derek raised an eyebrow, thinking he already knew the answer. 

“And coffee tastes like battery acid. I’d rather drink vinegar than black coffee.” Spencer shuddered. 

Derek chuckled but didn’t say anything else as he pulled onto the street.

*****

4. Cuddly Sleeper

Even though Spencer wasn’t huge on PDA like Derek was, he sure was a cuddly guy. The second the door closed, he was a six foot koala. That included in bed- but usually not until after he was asleep. 

Some nights, Spencer would fall asleep reading. So Derek would take his book, close it, gently remove Spencer’s glasses, and turn out the lamp. Nine times out of ten, Spencer was curled up against his side before Derek was asleep himself. 

At first, Derek found himself wondering why Spencer wasn’t nestled against him before sleep took him. But after a while, it sunk in that the doctor unwound by reading. 

The look on Spencer’s face when he curled into Derek’s side always sent the older man over the moon. The absolute peace on the doctor’s face. One night, Derek almost woke Spencer up laughing. Derek rolled over to out the lamp and Spencer had gripped Derek’s arm tighter and whined in his sleep. Derek then had to assure his boyfriend- in soft whispers as to not actually wake him up- that he wasn’t going anywhere. 

Spencer never thought to question why his book and glasses were gone when he woke up.

*****

5. Leaves Books Everywhere

Anyone who had a 30 second conversation with Spencer- anyone who glanced at Spencer- could tell the man read more than he did anything else. 

Derek picked up the doctor’s satchel once and was moderately surprised the slim man hadn’t dislocated his shoulder with how heavy the bag was. But Spencer didn’t only keep books in his bag. No. They were all over the place. 

Their bedroom, the craft room where Derek made floor plans for his renovations, the kitchen, the dining room, the living room. Even both bathrooms and the basement. 

When the two first moved in together, Derek debated building an extension onto the living room for a library. He still debated it from time to time (just in case). But as time wore on, Derek grew to appreciate the countless (if seemingly random) books around the house. 

Spencer would read when Derek was working on floorplans, so Derek would read when Spencer worked on an academic paper or consult. 

“What’re you reading?” Spencer asked one night, finally looking up from his notebook. He was writing an essay on how handwriting analysis could help catch a serial killer and/or rapist. 

“I don’t even know,” Derek chortled. “Uh..” he looked at the cover, “it’s Introduction to Law by Joanne Banker and Yvonne Ekern.” 

“Oh! Hotch loaned that to me yesterday,” Spencer noted. “I should get that back to him soon.” 

Derek just shook his head. “You know, Pretty Boy, I didn’t read this much in college.”

Spencer smiled. “See? Maybe there’s a good side to not spending thousands of dollars on building a library,” he teased.

6. The Nightlight

In the bedroom, in the outlet closest to the door was a nightlight. But not just any night light. This nightlight made the move in the front pocket of Spencer’s satchel. 

“So what’s the story behind this platypus, Pretty Boy?” Derek had to ask one night as Spencer turned it on. “Because you’ve had this since before we were dating.” 

“My uh- my mom’s went on a sort of field trip with her hospital a couple years ago. It was on one of her good days. She saw this in the aquarium’s gift shop and bought it for me.”

“That’s pretty cute,” Derek encouraged. He knew Spencer didn’t open up about his mom often so Derek tried to learn everything he could about the woman during the rare occurrences. 

“We named him,” Spencer laughed. “Alfred Nicholas Brian Reid.” He giggled. “I just… He helps.”

*****

+1. Bleeding/Infected Hangnails

Spencer usually had something to stim or fidget with. A strip of paper, a pen or pencil to twirl, a shirt with a loose thread, something. On the off chance that he didn’t, the doctor somehow decided that his fingers were good enough. If Spencer didn’t have a hangnail, he’d start one. 

This was the one and only thing about Doctor Spencer Reid that Derek Morgan hated. He could see the minute flinch when Spencer held a utensil wrong and it pressed on the swollen skin. He heard the soft hiss when Spencer got tomato or orange juice in the broken skin. 

What Derek hated even more than that was when the hangnail would get infected. The skin around the nail or turn a greenish-yellow and harden. Which, in turn, gave Spencer another thing to pick at. 

“Pretty Boy, you gotta stop,” Derek sighed. He’d gone into a convenience store to get them something other than coffee- but tastier than water- to drink. While inside, he bought a box of Band-Aids and a tube of anti-bacterial cream. 

Spencer snapped out of his daze. “What?”

“Picking at your nails.” To prove his point, Derek took Spencer’s hand in his to show him, as well as to stop his current picking. “I know you’re worried about the case, Baby, but we’ll catch the son of a bitch and put his ass behind bars like we always do. You gotta stop destroying your hands.”

“I didn’t realize I was,” he admitted. 

“I know,” Derek said softly. He applied the cream and a Band-Aid to each finger that needed it (five in total between both hands). “We just gotta get you a couple of those fidget cubes Garcia has.”

Tag List: @mayonnaiseismycomfortfood​

[iridescentjin]

Powdered Moonstone and Pearl Dust

Summary: Things are not always as they seem at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.

Genre: Smut, some fluff, some romance

Warnings: Oral sex (m. and f. receiving), creampie, cumplay, threesome, dirty talk, dom!Taehyung, dom switch!reader, sub switch!Jungkook, mirror sex, ice play, unprotected sex, Jungkook has a weird spell to clean up cum? 

A/N: This large boi is half unedited. Sorry. I just couldn’t read it anymore. Thanks to my friend Katie for beta-ing the first 10K that I wrote. I don’t know if she wants to be tagged, so I won’t tag her. I hope that the requester enjoys this. I hope you all enjoy this. My work is protected under copyright law, so please don’t steal it.

Word Count: 18K+

The only sound you hear at your table hidden away in a back corner of the library is the scratch of your quill on parchment. You love that sound. It makes you feel accomplished and proud. Even if you were just writing a list of things to do, you would still love the sound. You know that you could enchant the quill to do the writing for you, but there is something so satisfying about scribbling out your own thoughts into writing. You hold the quill in your hand and continue pouring your thoughts out on the page in flowing, looping letters.

At your table next to the Restricted Section, hidden among the stacks, you finish the last of your Defense Against the Dark Arts homework. Even though you are only a week into the school year, your professor has assigned reading and an essay. You can’t say you mind, as DADA has always been your best subject. Now that you’re in your 7th year and in all of your NEWT classes, you are working toward your future career instead of just grades. The rest of your Slytherin classmates didn’t see loving DADA as an acceptable option, which is why you chose to hide away in the library to enthusiastically finish your homework.

If you were completely honest, which you only ever were with one person, you had wanted to be an Auror with the Ministry of Magic since you were a little girl. You could never, ever show that side of yourself to the rest of the Slytherins, or you’d be marked as a blood traitor. There was still animosity left over from the Second Wizarding War, and you didn’t want to cross any of your housemates whose parents were still Death Eaters.

You are so engrossed in your parchment that you don’t hear the man who sneaks up behind you. When you feel a hand on your back, you jump, making a thick, black ink mark across your paper. You turn around ready to smack the person who disturbed your peace and marred your assignment. Instead of being able to hit the person who did the transgression, you are met with two hands on either side of your face, and the offender captures your lips in a tender kiss. Even though you didn’t see him, there is no doubt in your mind that the lips pressed against yours belong to none other than Jeon Jungkook.

When your boyfriend pulls away, you slap him on the arm. “Look what you did to my paper!” you exclaim.

“Don’t act like you can’t do one swish of your wand and make that disappear,” he retorts, giggling and stroking the back of your hand with his thumb.

He was right, but you didn’t like to admit it.

“Still you can’t just go sneaking up on people and kissing them. I could have hit you with Petrificus Totalus, and then where would we be? Huh?”

He continues to giggle. “Well, I’m already stiff enough, if you know what I mean,” he winks at you, “plus, you weren’t near quick enough for that to even be a possibility.”

You snatch your wand off the table, turn to stand in front of him, and hold it against his throat, trying to look intimidating. He continues giggling. “You are incorrigible,” you scold as you roll your eyes.

You turn back to the table, passing your wand over the parchment, and mutter “Scourgify.” The ink from your flinch begins to lift off the paper and sink back into the inkwell, ready to be used again.

“You know that you’re the only person doing homework, right? I bet that isn’t even due for weeks,” Jungkook taunts as he looks down at your paper.

“Well, I like to be ahead. You know that,” you reply. “Plus, now that I’m in the NEWT class without you, I don’t have to worry about making sure you do your homework. I’m still adjusting to how much time I need. It will probably take me a third of the time now that I don’t have to convince you to do it without cheating.”

“If you would have just let me copy you, it would have saved you a lot of time,” he states, putting his hand on his hip. “But really, I’m proud of you for following your dreams, babe. I really am.” He swoops down and places his mouth against yours. Against your lips he mutters, “I know it isn’t easy with Slytherins being the way they are. Even since You-Know-Who got defeated, they still think that we all have to be evil.”

“I mean...the way you look in those pants is pretty evil,” you offer, smirk across your lips. You look him up and down, and he steps back to give you a full view. He had filled out a lot in the last year and even more over the summer, becoming a man. He’s wearing the same clothes he always wore, but they fit snugger than they used to. His tight black pants hug his thick thighs, his white button up is unbuttoned at his throat, his tie hangs loosely from his neck, and his gray sweater sits taut across his broad shoulders and firm chest. You feel an ache between your thighs as you stare at him.

“Okay, I think you’ve checked me out enough for today,” he goads. He wraps his arms around you, pulling you closer to him. You nestle into his chest and breathe in his scent. For as long as you can remember, Jungkook is the one who has comforted you and taken care of you. He is the only person who you ever felt accepted you as you are, and he didn’t mind that you struggled a little bit to express your emotions. He had helped you learn to show your love for him. He gives you a squeeze and lets you go.

“All right,” he remarks, “I have practice, so I’ll let you get back to your homework that isn’t even due yet, nerd.”

He places one more kiss on your lips then begins to walk away. You watch him, and he stops halfway down the row. He smiles and says, “I love you, y/n.”

“Yeah, yeah,” you say, picking up your quill.

“I’m not leaving until you say it back,” he chides.

“I love you too,” you mumble back, and he bounces off and turns down the main aisle, disappearing from sight.

You turn your attention back to your paper, but, before you can even start working again, you hear, “Wow, that was pretty gross.”

You are startled by the voice and find yourself wondering why, all of a sudden, everyone feels the need to come to your spot in the library. You have only ever been bugged here by Jungkook and even that was rare because he knows this is your spot to really focus.

You turn your head to where the voice came from, and standing in the stacks is a tall man with black hair that falls in his eyes, Gryffindor tie hanging loosely around his neck. His arms are crossed, and he is leaning casually against the bookcase.

“What do you want, Taehyung?” you ask, slightly exasperated.

“I was just coming to check out the restricted section, but then I had to witness that little love fest. I must admit...I’m a little jealous, but mostly I’m disgusted,” he offers with an ornery grin on his face.

“Well, the restricted section is right there,” you gesture toward the locked area, “have fun trying to get in. I’m going back to my common room now.”

“Oh come on, y/n. When are you going to banter with me? You can’t avoid it forever.” He is still grinning that same grin while watching you pack up your bag.

“I believe in my ability to avoid it forever, so I will. Goodnight, Taehyung.” 

You sling your bag over your shoulder and trudge off, away from him and the  former solitude of your favorite spot.

*******

A few weeks later, when the semester is in full swing, you slink down the hallway, trying to avoid eye contact with any of the passing students and slip into the Defense Against the Dark Arts Room. You were early to class because you liked to avoid the rush of students in the hall and pick your seat carefully. You lift your eyes from the floor, and you see that your professor, Bill Weasley, is standing at the front of the room, arranging the items on the desk and fussing with books.

He looks up when he hears the door shut and flashes a smile at you. The shock of hair on top of his head is wild and curly, streaked with silver amongst the red-orange. He’s used to you coming early to class, so he doesn’t seem surprised and keeps on fiddling with things at the front of the room. You slide into your preferred seat in the second row all the way at the end. You pull out your book, quill, ink, and wand and arrange them on the table in front of you. Opening your book to the reading from the night before, you skim through the pages.

“You know,” Bill says, seemingly to himself, “you could give any working Auror a run for their money with your use of Impedimenta, even Potter.”

You feel your face heat, and you know that you’ve turned a deep scarlet. “Thank you so much, Professor Weasley,” you mumble, “but there’s no way that’s true. I mean...he’s Harry Potter. I’m just some stupid wannabe”

He chuckles, shaking his head, “I’ve known Harry for a long time. He was a stupid wannabe once too. Probably more than you. You’re not so unlike him, you know?”

You smile up at him, but, before you can respond, the door opens, and students start to fill in the room. You are grateful that you have Professor Weasley because, even though he can be detached at times, he is still one of the only supportive adults that you have in your life, since your parents died during the Second Wizarding War.

You flinch when someone plops down in the seat next to you. People usually leave you alone because you are the only Slytherin in Year 7 Defense Against the Dark Arts, but, today, someone has chosen to invade your space. When you look up from your book, you see it’s Kim Taehyung, smiling in all his Gryffindor glory.

From what you know of Taehyung from the seven years you’ve spent at school together, you know that he is cocky and weird and aggressively friendly.

“Good morning!” he exclaims a little too loudly for how close he is to you.

You give him a confused look and try to convey your distaste for the situation through your facial expression.

He just smiles back at you and starts to unpack his bag.

“Taehyung, there are like 20 other perfectly good seats in this room,” you snap.

“Yes, I know, but I want this seat,” he says with a spark in his eyes that you can’t quite name. “Besides, I have made it my goal to befriend you this year.”

You sigh a heavy sigh and turn your attention back to your book until Professor Weasley starts lecturing. You find it hard to focus though because, next to you, Taehyung is making icicles and snowflakes with his wand. They hover just above the palm of his hand, spinning slowly, then he flicks his wand and they disappear. You can’t help but be mesmerized by the intricacy of each of the snowflakes, dainty and precise. Each time you catch yourself staring at his palm, you snap your eyes back up to the front of the room and try to focus on the ginger man.

“Just give in,” Taehyung whispers to you halfway through class.

“Excuse me,” you retort in a loud whisper that draws the attention of the students in front of you.

“You want to look, so just look.”

“No. Don’t talk to me during a lecture,” you say with finality, gripping your quill tighter. You force your eyes to stay trained on Professor Weasley for the time remaining while scribbling little notes on your parchment.

At the end of the period, you pack away your things quickly, making a point not to look at Taehyung, and you move out of the classroom as quickly as possible.

*****************

When you skulk into the common room a few hours later, you are met with a crowd of Slytherins of all ages. At the center of all the commotion is, of course, Jungkook. He has a big smile across his face, and he is chatting spiritedly with a 4th year named Camilla Astaroth. She is the Keeper on the Quidditch team, and, even though Jungkook denies it, she is clearly smitten with him. You make your way past the crowd, intending on simply talking with Jungkook later or even tomorrow.

As you pass, you hear a 6th year exclaim, “we’re going to beat Gryffindor this year for sure! Jungkook is unstoppable!”

You can’t help but smile about how talented your boyfriend is. He rarely tries something that he isn’t immediately the best at, and he has a knack for all things athletic. He tried muggle sports once with some of the 7th year Hufflepuffs when he was a 5th year, and he dominated them in basketball so much that they made him sit out.

As you reach the base of the stairs, you hear Jungkook shout your name. You turn around, and his huge grin is directed at you. The girl standing next to him does not seem pleased that you’ve taken his attention away from her.

He waves you over, and you shuffle awkwardly through the crowd. When you get to his side, he drapes his arm over your shoulders, and you sink into his side.

“What’s going on?” you ask quietly to him.

“We scrimmaged Hufflepuff today, remember?” You had completely forgotten, and you felt guilt immediately build in your chest. You had been so preoccupied with Taehyung and studying that it had slipped your mind. You mutter an apology to him while looking away.

“Hey, no. It’s okay. We won though! We completely destroyed them actually. 300 to 0. They never even stood a chance,” he declares, grinning widely.

“Jungkook was so amazing. The other team didn’t have any hope of keeping up with him,” Camilla pipes up. She’s looking at him like he hung the moon, and, in her defense, he does look super hot with his hair freshly washed and mussed a little with his shirt clinging to his frame. Camilla reaches out and runs her fingers along Jungkook’s forearm, staring directly into his face as she does it. 

As a knee jerk reaction, you want to punch her, lunge at her, tackle her, and pull her hair, but you refrain. Jungkook pulls his arm away tactfully and slides it around your waist, pulling you closer. He is subtly telling her to fuck off while also bringing you in closer, and you are loving it.

You lean up to his ear and whisper, “I want to get out of here.”

He presses a kiss to your temple. “Go to my room. I’ll meet you there in five minutes.”

You say goodbye to Camilla who gives you a half-hearted wave, and you head off up the stairs. You drop your stuff in the girls dorm then make your way to Jungkook’s room. His roommates are clearly out, either with the crowd in the common room or off causing trouble. You use the opportunity to pull out a large brown t-shirt from Jungkook’s chest of drawers. You undo the knot in your tie and unbutton the top two buttons of your white oxford shirt. You wrap your fingers under the hem of your shirt and sweater and pull it over your head. You fold each article neatly and set them on top of the chest. You slide your skirt down your hips and place it on top of the pile. Deciding to take off your bra as well, you unclasp it and toss it more haphazardly than the other items. Jungkook’s shirt slides easily over your head and the cotton caresses your skin. The shirt smells like him, and you breathe it in deeply.

You plop down on his bed, smelling his pillows as well. You two were still making time for each other, but, with NEWT level classes and Quidditch practices, it was getting harder and harder to find time to just be together without doing homework or planning plays.

The heavy wooden door creaks open, and your eyes flit to the door. Jungkook shuts the door behind him and latches the bolt so no one can get in. His roommates have seen you in his bed in the mornings before, but, since they aren’t here, the two of you have free reign to do whatever you want.

He runs his hand through his hair as he makes his way over to you. Sliding into the bed next to you, he wraps his arms around you and pulls you close to him. You tilt your head up to steal a kiss against his lips. He hums in approval.

“You know...I’m not tired at all. I’m too hyped up from the scrimmage.” He places a kiss on the corner of your mouth. He follows that by kissing along your jaw and down your throat. 

“Oh, is that so?” You kiss the top of his head as he sinks further down your neck. “I guess I could think of a few things to tire you out. That is if you ask nicely.”

Jungkook is biting down on the tender skin of your neck, down the slope of it to your shoulder. “Please.” He states it more than asks, but you are satisfied.

You pull him up to your face, and you press your mouth to his. Hungry and frantic. You take his bottom lip between your teeth and pull it out slightly before letting it go.

He runs his hand up your side. “I love seeing you in my shirt and nothing else.”

“I love being in your shirt, but I think I’d love being in nothing more right now.”

“I can arrange that.” He smirks and wraps his fingers around the bottom of the shirt. He pulls it over your head and throws it carelessly aside.

He takes a moment to just stare at your bare body in front of him, only your thin lace panties covering you. He passes his hands over your breasts, massaging them before leaning in to kiss your mouth again.

“Your turn.” You pull at the hem of his shirt. He stands up to take off all of his clothes. Every time you see his body, you feel taken aback. His waist is narrow, but his muscles are prominent in his stomach, arms, and thighs. The outline of his dick is visible through his underwear, and he is truly statuesque standing in front of you for a moment in just his boxer briefs. 

“Those too,” you mutter.

“If I take these off, are you going to get on your knees for me tonight?” He puts his hand on his hip. You love when Jungkook takes control. You often are dominant, making him prove he’s a good boy for you, and you love to see him beg you. But sometimes it is thrilling to see him command you around. Often Quidditch wins bring out the dom in Jungkook.

“Yes, I’ll get on my knees for you, JK. I’d do anything for you. You know that.”

He blushes a little and runs his hand through his hair again. You climb off of the bed and kneel in front of him. When he pulls down his underwear, you see that his cock is already hard. He strokes it while looking down at you.

“Are you going to suck my cock like a good girl?” he asks, never breaking eye contact.

You nod and wrap your hand around his shaft. He removes his own hand, and you begin the same rhythm, pumping. You lick from his balls to the head of his dick on the underside then swirl your tongue around the head. You wrap your lips around it and slowly take the whole thing into your mouth. You slide your lips up and down the shaft of his cock, and you feel his dick twitch in your mouth. You moan around him, feeling the heat pooling in your underwear.

“You like that don’t you?” He’s breathing heavily, but his words are still steady.

He thrusts his hips slightly, causing his dick to hit the back of your throat. You gag around him, and he moans a deep, heady moan. “Good girl,” he whispers. You loosen your throat and take him in deep again. You pull back and run your tongue over the slit on the head of his dick. Repeating this over and over, you begin to feel spit running down your chin and taste the saltiness of Jungkook’s precum.

“Y/n, you have to stop. It’s been too long. I can’t last, wanna fuck you.” He wraps his fingers around your chin and pulls your head gently away from his length. You bring your hand up and pump two more times around his hard member before you stand to meet him. You kiss him hard and almost immediately sneak your tongue into his mouth, hoping he can taste himself on you.

He pulls you against his body and lets his hands explore your skin. You can feel his cock pressing against you, and you are needy for it. You moan into his mouth and press your skin against his. His chest is smooth and supple, and your nipples grow harder at the contact. You love the way that his skin feels against yours, and you are dripping in your underwear just from the sensation.

“Baby, do you want me?” Jungkook says into your neck, his breath causing the small hairs on the back of your neck to stand up.

“Yes, I want you so bad.” You tangle your fingers into his hair and tug gently while rubbing your thighs together.

“Then beg.” He pushes your legs apart with his muscular thigh, but, instead of slotting it against your clothed core, he keeps it just far enough away that you can’t get any relief. Jungkook rarely asks you to beg, and you do it even more rarely. You run through the scenario in your head of what will happen if you refuse to beg. He’s already commanded you to get on your knees, so you know he’s feeling particularly demanding tonight. You can feel how wet your underwear are, sticking against your sensitive skin.

You are weighing your options when Jungkook repeats, “Beg for it, or I’m not letting you get any relief. I’ll tease you all night if I have to.” He takes your nipple into his mouth and sucks, causing your hips to buck into him. He lets it fall from his mouth and moves to the other one, biting gently.

You sigh deeply. “Jungkook, please fuck me.” You can hear the attitude in your voice.

“Not like that, baby. I want you to mean it.”

He slides his hand between the two of you and lines his cock up with your clothed folds. He pushes the head of his cock against your clit, and you moan deeply. Fuck fuck. Am I really going to beg for it? The sensation has you desperate for him to be against your bare skin. You roll your eyes to yourself, then you drop back to your knees. The sudden movement seems to surprise Jungkook, but he also groans and takes his cock in hand as you do it.

“Jungkook, I need you more than I’ve never needed anything. I need you more than water. Please fuck me.”

 He whispers an incoherent stream of curse words then asks, “baby, do you wanna ride me?”

You can see the excitement in his eyes, so you nod your head as you look up at him. He pulls you up off the floor and strides to the bed. He turns back to you and, in one smooth motion, drops your panties to the floor, then climbs onto the bed. He lies on his back, and you climb on top of him.

You hover over him for a moment, watching the impatience grow in his expression. He puts his hands on your hips and shifts his hips up. The head of his dick presses against your entrance then slides up your folds to your clit, slick with your own arousal. He does it once more before you acquiesce.

You wrap your hand around the base of his cock and line him up with your entrance. You sink down on to him slowly. Once you slide all the way down, you take a moment to adjust to the size of his cock. You think to yourself that it’s not fair that Jungkook is good at everything and also has a big dick. Once you’ve adjusted to him, you roll your hips, his pubic bone creating friction on your clit. You continue your motions, and Jungkook digs his thumbs into your hips. You can see on his face he’s trying to keep his hips still.

“I want you to cum before I do, baby. Wanna make you cum.” His eyes are wide, pupils huge. His hair is pushed off his forehead, and his chest is moving quickly with his heavy breathing. He shoves his hand between your bodies, and his thumb finds your clit. The pressure and motion from his thumb is unforgiving, and you start to lose the rhythm on his cock. Jungkook takes over the motions, and he is fucking you slowly but hard from underneath. You can feel his cock against the sensitive walls of your pussy, and as he continues stroking your clit, you feel yourself clenching, stomach tightening.

You mean to give him a warning, but you close your eyes, clench around him, and your body fills with warmth. It seeps into your brain, and everything disappears for a moment. You feel like your belly and chest are full of warm liquid as your muscles contract. You moan his name loudly as you cum, and, as you’re coming back down, he whispers, “say my name again. I’m gonna cum.”

In a breathy voice, right next to his ear, you moan out, “Jungkook, you fuck me so good.”

Then he’s coming, hips thrashing hard underneath you, fingers white from pressing against your skin so hard. You lean against his chest as you feel shot after shot of his cum fill you, and his dick twitches inside of you. 

Soon the motion of his hips stops, and the two of you lie there, his dick softening inside you, for a long time. You start to drift off against his shoulder, but he shakes you gently.

“Hey, I know you want to sleep, but we should probably clean up and unlock the door.”

You groan and lift yourself off of him, wincing at the feeling of his dick and some of his cum sliding out of you. Jungkook leans over to the bedside table, grabs his wand, and positions himself between your legs.

“You know you could just lick it off,” you suggest to him.

“As much as I would love to do that, it’s still not going to get it all.” He dips his head down and licks from your entrance to your clit and then shows you his tongue with the white substance on it. “See, this won’t do.”

He waves his wand over your pussy, and you think that you’ll never get used to the cooling, tingling sensation of the spell that Jungkook learned to clean up after sex. He’s learned it so well that he doesn’t even have to do the incantation anymore. You suspect that he perfected it alone long before the two of you started having sex two years ago.

Once he has cleaned you and himself, he leans down and picks up his shirt that you were wearing. He opens his chest of drawers and pulls out two pairs of underwear, one yours and one his. He throws your underwear over to you.

“I’m sorry...you’re keeping my underwear in here?”

“You’re the one who left it in here,” he scoffs. “Plus...I like to hold them when you aren’t around.”

You giggle, wildly amused at the idea of your boyfriend cuddling your underwear to go to sleep. “Wait...do you masturbate with them?” you ask with a serious expression. You can’t believe you’re getting turned on thinking about it.

“I don’t want to talk about this anymore. My roommates are probably waiting to get in.” He pulls the underwear up to his hips, walks to the door, and flips the latch that was keeping it closed. “You better put those on. They’re gonna be here soon.”

You reluctantly pull the underwear up, the shirt over your head and then snuggle under his covers. He crawls into bed next to you and pulls you against him. He presses a gentle kiss against your neck and your shoulder.

“Thank you for doing that, baby. I love you so much. You have been so special to me, even since we were 8 years old.”

“I love you too, Jungkook. You are special to me. No one will ever be special like you are.” You turn and kiss his mouth. He mutters, “Nox,” and the lights in the room go out. You drift off to sleep fairly quickly with Jungkook’s frame draped around yours.

***********

Jungkook is walking alone through the courtyard when thwack something cold and solid hits him the back of the head. He stands dumbfounded for a moment, unsure if he is having a stroke or what was happening. He brings his hand up to his neck and feels the cold, wet substance. He hears giggling behind him, so he turns to try to find the source of the laughter and, probably, the snowball. There, laughing to himself, stands Kim Taehyung, hand on his knee, eyes narrowed, mouth agape. No one else seems to have seen the exchange.

Jungkook has had enough. Taehyung has been bothering him for months: putting ice in his backpack, putting snowballs in his chair, making his hot soup cold. It really was a complete nuisance, not to mention confusing, and Jungkook was fed up.

He unsheathes his wand from his front pocket and turns quickly, robes billowing behind him. Feet slapping hard on the stone and earth, he marches over to Kim Taehyung, who is still giggling gleefully.

Jungkook grabs Taehyung by the shirt and shoves him back against the wall, placing his wand against his throat. Taehyung’s giggles die down a little bit, but the amusement remains in his eyes. He straightens himself out a bit and stares back into Jungkook’s eyes. Something about the joy in his eyes causes Jungkook to soften the slightest bit, and, when he realizes, he feels confused and annoyed by this. 

“Why won’t you leave me alone?!” Jungkook roars. “What did I ever do to you?!”

“Nothing. Nothing at all.”

“Then why are you bothering me?” Jungkook almost pleads back.

Taehyung drops his eyes. “Maybe I want you to do something to me.”

He raises his eyebrows suggestively at Jungkook, whose mouth falls open. While Jungkook stands flabbergasted, Taehyung wiggles out of his slackened grip, reaches out and straightens the younger man’s robes, and leans into his ear.

“I am interested in you, baby,” he drags out the last word, his deep voice seductive and suggestive.

And he floats away, across the courtyard and into the Great Hall. Jungkook looks around, and it appears no one heard what Taehyung just said. For a moment, he has the overwhelming urge to do anything for Taehyung, anything at all to get his affection. To have his hands against his skin. To have his mouth on his own. He shakes his head when he realizes the thoughts he’s having.

Jungkook clears his throat and adjusts his pants that are now slightly tighter. He collects himself and walks across the courtyard with the same confidence he typically carries himself.

***********************

Many nights, because you’ve struggled with sleep as long as you can remember, you sneak around the castle. You had been doing it long enough that you knew which portraits to avoid and which ones wouldn’t rat you out. You’d actually made friends with some of the paintings on the third floor across from the Room of Requirement.

You often find yourself in the Room of Requirement, practicing spells, studying, or just spending time alone several days each week. There are some days where it won’t open, and, though you’ve tried to do research, you haven’t ever found an answer as to why you can’t get in sometimes.

One night, you are wandering listlessly through a corridor on the second floor, where you know the paintings won’t bother you. You are examining one of the paintings because where there is usually one man who sleeps at night, there are now four men have a lively debate about codpieces. You are smiling to yourself when you hit something solid. At first you think you’ve walked into a wall, even though you know your way around without looking, but then you hear a voice say, “are you never aware of your surroundings?”

“Taehyung?” You hold out your wand and utter, “Lumos.” The light spills across the face in front of you, as he pinches his eyes shut and brings his hand up to cover his face.

“Oh shit, do you have to do that?”

“Nox. Sorry. What are you doing here? Just sneaking around in the dark trying to scare people?”

“I could ask you the same question.” 

It’s hard to see him now with the light out, little spots twinkling in your eyes from the sudden light of your wand.

“I asked you first.”

“If you must know, I don’t sleep well, so I wander around the castle at night. What are you doing?”

You furrow your brow, though you doubt he can see it in the dark. “The exact same thing actually…”

“Oh okay. Well, if it’s all the same to you, we could wander together?” Tae proposes.

You know he can’t see you, but you still want the effect. So you roll your eyes at him. “It’s not all the same to me. Goodnight Taehyung.” You stalk away from him, trying to put as much distance between him and yourself as possible.

A few nights later, you are on the seventh floor, leisurely strolling toward the Room of Requirement with your book bag slung over your shoulder. When you see the edge of the tapestry of Barnabas the Barmy, you feel a lightness in your chest that is immediately overshadowed by dread. You see a tall figure on the other end of the hall, and you groan at the sight of him.

“Seriously, Taehyung, can I do anything without you showing up?” you sigh in exasperation.

“Or is it you who’s following me because you’re actually secretly in love with me!?” he gasps then giggles.

“Seriously, Taehyung, this is my time to do work, and I don’t want you here for it. Get lost.”

“First, you can just call me Tae. We’re friends. Second, I come here several times a week. What gives you the right to say it’s yours?” he now looks serious and concerned.

So that’s the reason I can’t get in sometimes you think to yourself.

“We’re not friends, and I’m not going anywhere.” You fold your arms.

“Me neither. So I guess we have to share the space.” He folds his arms too and cocks an eyebrow at you.

You sigh and then move toward the entrance. “Fine.”

The door appears, and you pull it open, not holding it open for him. In the Room, where there is usually one desk with a lamp and several bookshelves, there are now two desks next to each other. The walls are still lined with books, but the selection seems to be slightly different.

You each settle into your own desk and work on your own. You are surprised by how quiet and diligent Taehyung is when he’s working on his own. The two of you work for several hours in silence. You start to feel your eyes closing and your head nodding, so you decide it’s time to go climb into Jungkook’s bed if his roommates left the door open. You start to shuffle your papers on the desk. Taehyung startles at the sound and blinks several times in your direction.

“Are you leaving? I think I was sleeping with my eyes open”

“Yeah, I got enough work done, so I’m going to get some sleep. You should too or whatever.”

He nods and starts packing up his things. You don’t deliberately slow your movements, but you do slow down. You and Taehyung leave at the same time. After you walk out the door, you make eye contact without saying anything.

“Well...same time tomorrow?” Taehyung asks.

“We’ll see,” you utter, and the two of you take off toward your respective common rooms.

The next night and several after that, you meet Taehyung in the corridor, entering the Room of Requirement together. You work silently for a few hours, then you leave together, parting ways in the spot you met.

A few weeks into your arrangement, Taehyung is sitting at his desk muttering to himself. It is distracting you, so you look over at him and sigh. He is waving his wand and, when nothing happens, huffing to himself.

“Oh my god, Taehyung. What is the matter with you?” you finally blurt out.

“I’m sorry. I was probably being loud, huh? I just can’t nail any of these stupid defensive spells. Counterspells? Sure. I got that down. Defensive spells? I couldn’t do one to save my life...and some day I might need to do one TO SAVE MY LIFE.” He is half-yelling and breathing heavily, and his eyes look like he’s about to cry.

“Okay...well, could you like...meltdown more quietly? Or somewhere else?” You know you’re being cold, but you’ve made a point to keep distance between yourself and most other people.

“Yeah. I’m sorry. I’ll stop.”

He loudly flips the pages in his book. He keeps sighing to himself and groaning. Even though he’s not talking, he’s being just as loud as he was before.

“All right, fine. If you shut up, I will help you with defensive spells. Just please stop sighing.” You stand up from your chair and walk towards him, wand in hand. “Get up.”

He stands and follows you into the center of the room. You hold out your arm and show him the bend in your elbow, the looseness of your wrist. You show him your stance.

“Okay now clear your head. All you want to think about is stopping any impending danger. Anything that can harm you will be stopped. Good. Okay, one deep breath in…”

You have yourself in position, and you cry, “Impedimenta!” 

Light shoots from the tip of your wand and shifts into a hazy cloud in front of you. It slowly dissipates into the air. You love the way that the jinx looks on its own, but it’s even more exciting with something is coming at you.

You look at the man next to you, “all right, Taehyung, your turn.”

“First, I told you, just call me Tae. Second, I don’t think I can do that.”

You scoff at him and walk to the other side of the room. You pull about ten books off of the shelf. You turn on the spot and hurl one of the books right at Tae’s head. You laugh as he dodges and stares at you in disbelief.

“What the fuck, y/n?!”

“Now, you better figure out how to use it, or I’m going to hit you in your pretty little face with a book.”

He gets himself into position, and you whip a particularly thick book at him. He steps out of the way and repositions himself.

“In a life or death situation, you don’t have time like that Taehyung. Do it. You got this.”

You cock your arm to throw another book, and, as it slips from your fingers, you hear Tae exclaim “Impedimenta!”

Light shoots from his wand in an unsteady stream, and the fog is much thicker than yours. However, the book hits the fog, hangs in midair for a moment, and thuds on the floor.

When the fog clears, you see Tae beaming on the other side. He runs to you and throws his arms around you, picking you up and spinning you around.

“All right, buddy. It’s just a jinx. That’s enough,” you grumble.

He apologizes and sets you back on the floor, clearing his throat and straightening himself out.

“I’ve been trying to get that for years, and I’ve just never been able to make it work before! I’m so happy that you’re here helping me! I’ll help you with anything you need help with too. It’s only fair.”

“Thanks, Taehyung. I do actually need help with counterspells but not tonight.”

You walk over to the desk and start to pack up your things. Taehyung follows your lead. When you walk out the door, you make the same eye contact that you make every night before you head your separate directions. This time, Tae, once again, flings his arms around you and mutters “Thanks” before he bounds off toward the Gryffindor tower.

Several weeks pass in which you have been tolerating Tae as your partner in DADA because he’s actually very skilled at counterspells. He has helped you perfect Finite after you had struggled with it for 3 years.

Professor Weasley seems to be thrilled by the progress that you’ve made. One day, he asks you to stay after class. Taehyung hesitates in the doorway, and you nod to him to let him know it’s okay to leave you here alone.

“I don’t know what you’re doing, y/n, but it’s absolutely working. You have never been more focused or accurate in the time I’ve known you. Your mental incantations are nearly flawless. Whatever...or whoever...is helping you is working.”

The way he paused on “whoever” leads you to believe he knows exactly why you’ve improved.

While Taehyung has helped you with counterspells, you have helped him with other defensive spells. The two of you have practiced together in the empty room after class is over and at night in the Room of Requirement, and you feel like you have grown as a witch because of it. That does not mean you like him though. You tolerate him. You tell yourself that over and over. You don’t like him.

****************

Tae climbs the spiral staircase to the astronomy tower, taking the steps two at a time. He has kind of started to dread Astronomy because it means that he doesn’t get to spend the time with you. He’s been smitten with you since Fourth Year, and he thought that you had to know it by now. He knows that you’re dating Jungkook, but he’d been pining after Jungkook since they were eleven anyway.

As he ascends into the astronomy tower, he sees that a few students who are usually there early are not there tonight. He breathes a sigh of relief. Being in Astronomy with Slytherin has proven to be challenging for the outspoken Gryffindor. He luckily has assigned himself the telescope next to Jungkook, and they have been talking more and more since the incident in the courtyard.

Taehyung had never really completely trusted men, but something about the way Jungkook talked to him made he feel like he wasn’t just looking for one thing. When Jungkook enters the room, Tae feels butterflies in his stomach. He wants to grab him and kiss him, but he knows that would destroy all the groundwork that he’s been laying for months. Instead, he just smiles and waves Jungkook over. Jungkook smiles back and makes his way to the corner where their telescopes stand.

“I’ve been looking forward to seeing you all week,” Taehyung laughs out then winks at Jungkook.

Jungkook shifts awkwardly, says, “yeah,” and forces a laugh.

Professor Sinistra enters the room and the side conversations die down. She explains that tonight, students are going to be identifying celestial bodies and mapping them. Taehyung feels elated when he hears her say that all students will be working with a partner. He knows there’s a 50% chance that Jungkook will turn him down, but they actually work pretty well together.

Jungkook turns to Taehyung and says, “hey, you’re pretty good at this stuff. Be my partner.”

He isn’t asking, and Taehyung simply nods in response. They scoot their chairs closer together and unroll the parchment on which they need to be charting constellations.

About an hour later, the two are laughing, drawing on their parchment, and taking turns looking into the telescope. Taehyung turns to Jungkook, and the two of them make eye contact. They both hold perfectly still just in that moment, and Taehyung can feel his heart pounding against his sternum. He can’t stop his eyes from darting to Jungkook’s mouth then back to his eyes. His eyes are wide when Tae meets them again, but he doesn’t look away. Taehyung wants nothing more than to press his mouth to Jungkook’s, to express all the things he’d been feeling for years. Taehyung sees Jungkook look at his lips for a moment, and then, face flushed, turns his attention back to the paper, clearing his throat.

The silence is broken when Jungkook pipes up. “Can I ask you something?”

Tae nods and waits for the question. “Why are you always messing with me? You said it’s because you’re interested in me, but, if that was the case, you could just talk to me.”

Tae sighs and brings his fingers to the bridge of his nose, squeezing gently. “It’s kind of hard to explain. Do you remember in 2nd year, you got a valentine from your secret admirer?”

“Yeah...I thought it was the other Slytherins making fun of me because I would scream and run away from girls. How do you know that?”

“It wasn’t the other Slytherins,” he exhales heavily. “It was me.”

He sees the realization dawn on Jungkook who opens his mouth as if to say something but then shuts it again.

“I gave you that valentine, and you rejected me. I was so hurt that I wanted to get revenge on you. So I started doing what I knew how to do.”

“Are you still mad at me for that? We were kids, and I didn’t know it was from you anyway.” Jungkook is exasperated. His face is flushed, and his chest is heaving. It’s clear to Tae that isn’t processing all this new information well.

“No, I’m not still mad. I stopped being mad pretty quickly. To be honest...it was the only time you talked to me, so I kept doing it. Plus, you’re really cute when you’re upset.” Tae blushes and rubs his hand on the back of his neck. Part of him is so bold and has no problem telling Jungkook how he feels, and part of him is so embarrassed that he wants to fling himself off of the astronomy tower.

They sit in silence for a second, both men with a deep flush in their cheeks. Jungkook picks up his quill and continues to write on the parchment. He stops suddenly and turns to Tae.

“Why the ice?”

Tae can’t help but laugh. No one has ever actually asked him about why he is so skilled with magic to create snow, ice, and all things cold. He is overwhelmed by the warmth that starts to fill his chest from Jungkook being the one to ask him.

“Well, you see, my family is originally from the mountains of Bulgaria. We moved when I was pretty young, and the climate was so different. We all didn’t know how to cope without the constant snow and cold, so one day, I decided to learn. I was able to make snow for my family. Single snowflakes at first then, slowly, more and more. Sometimes it would be a full blizzard in our yard, and the next yard over would be completely bare. It’s always something that meant a lot to me and my family. My parents loved it before they…” he trails off.

Tae turns his face away from Jungkook and stares out one of the many windows. He feels a warm hand on his arm, and it pulls him back to face Jungkook.

“It’s okay to be honest with me. To feel things with me. Emotions aren’t right or wrong; they just are.” Jungkook has a wisdom and sincerity in his eyes and in his voice that makes Tae’s chest clench. He feels like he’s going to cry.

“My parents died in the war. They were Aurors. They were in the battle here.” He takes a deep shaky breath. “Sometimes I go visit the place where they died, but, mostly, I avoid it.”

“I’m so sorry that you have to experience that,” Jungkook breathes out. He still has his hand on Tae’s arm, and he begins rubbing little circles on the skin with his thumb.

“Honestly, it’s okay. I don’t get too emotional about it anymore. I know they were doing what they loved and protecting me. They wanted me to have a better life.” Tae runs his hand through his hair. “Plus, they’re the reason I want to be an Auror. Keep the legacy alive.”

Taehyung gives Jungkook a faint smile, and, once again, the two men sit in silence, this time with Jungkook’s digits tracing patterns on Tae’s skin. They stay like that for what seems like an hour until Professor Sinistra announces that class is over. Jungkook drops his hand from Tae’s arm and packs up his things.

They descend the spiral staircase together, and, when they reach the corridor, they wave goodbye.

“Hey Taehyung,” Jungkook calls out.

“Just call me Tae. What’s up?”

“If you need to talk or anything…” he trails off for a second, bringing his hand through his hair, “I’m here for you.” They both nod and head toward their respective common rooms.

**********

Christmas hadn’t been your favorite holiday since before your parents died, and you could hardly remember the Christmases that you had spent together any more. Since your third year, you had been staying at the castle over the winter holiday. You used the time to explore the castle even further, read, and enjoy the common room alone. Plus, the house elves made the best food during the holidays, which was better than the frozen meals your grandma made for Christmas.

You wrote her a letter telling her that you missed her and loved her and wished her a Happy Christmas. Overall, you didn’t feel too bad because she had her sisters with whom she could spend the holiday.

The day that everyone is leaving for the holiday, Jungkook asks you again if you’re sure that you don’t want to go to his parents’ with him. You assure him that you are used to your Christmas tradition at the castle, and you would rather take the time to be alone. He kisses you deeply before he leaves to catch the train.

You enter the Great Hall to get lunch after you say goodbye to Jungkook, and there is only one table in the Great Hall. There are about 15 students at the table, so you find a seat away from everyone near the Professors’ table. You grab a sandwich off the table and begin to munch away, pondering to yourself what books you are going to read over the holiday.

You hear a familiar laugh across the hall, and you are jerked from your thoughts. Glancing down the table, trying not to noticeably look, you see Kim Taehyung spiritedly chatting with a 5th year Ravenclaw. You didn’t know that he would be staying at the castle over the winter holiday, and you don’t remember ever having seen him here during the break before. The way that your heart flutters and your stomach flips at the sight of him does not go unnoticed, but you force yourself to ignore it. You shake your head and guide your mind to thoughts of what Christmas must be like at Jungkook’s house.

His parents always loved the holiday season. They would decorate the house with white icicle lights, and they would fill the house with small decorations and enchanted candles floating in midair. You remember seeing it from across the street when you were younger and being filled with wonder. Your grandmother had a small artificial tree that sat atop a side table next to the sofa, but she was not full of cheer and Christmas spirit like Jungkook’s parents. You had seen their Christmas tree once as a child, when your grandmother took you to their Christmas party. You remember seeing the fake snow and beautiful ornaments adorning the tree. You had delicately taken one between your fingers to look at it. Jungkook snuck up behind you and shouted, causing you to wince and drop the ornament.

He had apologized profusely to you when you started to cry. You ran away from him and hid behind your grandmother. She wasn’t sure what was going on, but she finally agreed to leave after you begged her for ten minutes. That was the last time that you saw the Jeon’s Christmas tree in person, but they took a photo each year. You loved looking at the pictures of Jungkook growing taller and fuller each year, grinning widely, with his parents and his brother beside him. It made him seem so domestic, which was not something that you felt from him often. You couldn’t help but picture what it would be like there with them on Christmas.

But you were too attached to your tradition of spending the holiday at Hogwarts to let anything pull you away. You finish your sandwich and wipe your hands on your pants. You decide to start your holiday alone in the Slytherin common room and head that direction.

“Hey! Y/n!” you hear as you are reaching the grand double doors of the Great Hall. You turn to see Taehyung bounding toward you.

“Hi! I didn’t know that you stayed here for the holidays!” he exclaims with the enthusiasm he usually has at the beginning of every conversation.

“Yeah, I have stayed since 3rd year. What about you? You’re not usually here for the holidays, right?”

“No, I’m not. This year, my grandma went back to Bulgaria, and I decided I didn’t want to go because...well because I didn’t want to go.” He is holding something back from you, but you let it go because you are not in the mood to invite conversation.

“Well, I better get going. I’ll see you around, Taehyung.” you turn on your heel and set a path for the Slytherin common room.

“I told you to just call me Tae!” he shouts after you, voice echoing off the stone walls.

You spend the afternoon lounging around the Slytherin common room, enjoying the plush couch with your feet up over one of the arms. You sit in front of the fire and read while curled up in a large arm chair. You never feel at home in the common room when it is full of your housemates, but when you get to enjoy its coziness alone, you are always reminded of the homey feel that it does have.

You only leave the common room to go have dinner, and then you return to the common room. You spread out all of your homework across the floor and take your time deciding in what order you are going to complete it. After a few hours of scribbling on parchment, reading textbooks, and reciting incantations, your eyelids start to feel heavy. You slip into your room, comfortable to be alone there. For the first time in a while, you fall asleep easily.

The next day you decide to head to the library to work at your table near the Restricted Section. Your feet guide you to the table amongst the stacks while your mind wanders to thoughts of Jungkook and the future. When you drag yourself out of your thoughts, you notice a figure sitting at your table. Of course he’s there. 

“Why, y/n, it’s lovely to see you this morning,” Taehyung chimes, standing to pull out a chair for you.

“Taehyung, seriously, what are you doing here?”

“In the library? With all of my textbooks open? And my homework parchments unrolled? I’m not sure what I could possibly be doing, y/n.”

“I mean, why are you at my table?”

“Is this your table? Huh. I hadn’t noticed. It’s just a table a like.” He smirks, and you know that he knows exactly what he’s doing. “I guess you’ll have to sit and work with me this morning.”

You roll your eyes and drop your book bag on the table. The chair that Taehyung pulled out for you sits, waiting for you, so you plop down in it with a sigh. You pull out your books and begin to work. Taehyung proves to be a good person to be around while studying in the library as well. He is focused on his work, and it forces you to be focused too, though you steal glances at him every few minutes. He looks good like this, hair curly and hanging in his eyes, expression focused and intent. Your mind wonders if this is what he would look like on top of you, inside you.

Your breath catches in your throat at the thought, and you shake your head. When Taehyung looks up at you, you choke on the air you’re trying to inhale and start coughing uncontrollably. Taehyung bolts around the table to your side to try to help, but you push him away. You finally stop coughing, but your eyes continue to water. 

“Y/n, are you okay? What just happened?” Taehyung is concerned and his brow is furrowed.

You hastily collect your parchments and books from the table, stuffing them into your book bag.

“Nothing. I have to go.” You dart out of the library and away from the sinful thoughts that your mind had about Taehyung.

What the fuck was THAT!? I have Jungkook. I can’t be thinking about other men like that. And Taehyung of all people?

You descend into the Slytherin dungeon and spend the rest of your day hiding in your dormitory.

You feel Taehyung’s fingers against your skin, and an icy chill runs down your spine. He caresses your arms, your collarbone, your neck. He wraps his fingers in your hair and leans into you. “Just give in,” he whispers, and goosebumps rise all over your skin. He takes the tender skin of your neck into his mouth, sucking and biting at the skin. You can feel the skin of his chest on your bare tits, and you arch your back up into him. “You want to fuck me, so just fuck me.”

You shoot straight up in bed, breath heaving in your chest. You have a thin layer of sweat coating your skin, and you can feel the sticky wetness that has settled into your underwear. You chant, “it was just a dream” over and over to yourself while trying to steady your breath. You are overwhelmed by the images burned in your brain, playing on repeat. 

You decide that there is no use in just sitting in bed dwelling on the dream, so you get up, dress, and traipse out of the common room. The Room of Requirement seems like the best option for where to sneak off to in the middle of the night. You figure Taehyung can’t possibly be there because he had been working so long in the library earlier today.

When the entrance appears, you tentatively enter the room. You find that it looks much the same as it usually does, except there is an overstuffed sofa sitting in front of a low-burning fireplace in the corner. You think that it must be there because you need a place to be comfortable, and it was just taking care of your needs

However, as you get closer to the couch, you see the ends of two feet hanging off the side. You roll your eyes and decide to try to leave before he notices you. You make it to the door, but when you pull it open, the hinge creaks a loud, low groan.

Taehyung shoots up off the couch and and calls out, “Y/n!?” before he even sees you. His voice sounds a little panicked, but you figure it might be because he has just woken up.

“Oh, hey, Taehyung. I didn’t realize you were here. I’ll just leave you be…”

“No!” He looks slightly embarrassed by his sudden outburst of protest. “I mean...I would like it if you stayed.”

You sigh and realize that you’re having a hard time saying no to his puppy dog eyes. You sigh once more and make your way over to the couch. “Fine.”

He sits up and scoots over to one side, leaving room for you to sit. You ensure that you are as far from him as possible. The two of your sit in silence staring at the fire for a while before Taehyung’s voice cuts through the room.

“What are you thinking about so hard?”

“Nothing. It’s stupid.” You shake your head and your hand trying to indicate to Taehyung that it isn’t a big deal.

“No, it isn’t stupid. The way that you feel isn’t stupid. What is it, y/n?”

You feel the weight of what you’ve been thinking in your chest. It can’t hurt to talk it out with Taehyung, especially if you are vague.

“Okay. I-I had a dream about someone other than Jungkook. Like an...intimate dream.” You cast your eyes away from the man next to you because you feel like if he looks into your eyes, he’ll see that it was him.

“So?”

“So I shouldn’t be thinking like that about someone that isn’t my boyfriend. I know it’s just a dream, but I think about this person sometimes when I’m awake. Sometimes when I’m with him I just want to kiss him until my lips hurt, and I don’t know what to do with that because I love Jungkook so much, and I don’t ever want to hurt him.” You’re breathing heavy, and you feel the hot tears starting to well in your eyes. You are so angry with yourself for having these feelings toward Taehyung that you just want to cry until you can’t see.

“Well, if you’re feeling this way, have you thought about talking to Jungkook?”

“And saying what? I don’t want to break up with him. I want to be with him for the rest of my life.” The hot tears are spilling down your cheeks now, and Taehyung scoots a little closer to you on the couch. He rests his hand on your leg, and his palm feels like it’s burning your skin through your pants.

“I’m not saying you have to break up. Is it not possible to love more than one soul?” His tone is so earnest and genuine that you start crying harder. You slide closer to him and rest your head on his shoulder.

You don’t have anything else that you can say  to him, and you let the words that he just said ruminate in your mind. Is it possible?

Once you’ve calmed yourself down, you pull away from Taehyung a little bit. You lean back and look at him, and he peers at you through his lashes.

“Why are you here tonight? Couldn’t sleep?” you ask.

“Yeah. I’m just having a hard time this holiday, and sometimes I forget that men can make things complicated for me.”

You raise your eyebrows. You aren’t sure what he means, but you know that something has happened to him.

“I just don’t ever feel like I can trust them, you know? My mother was half veela, and so often times men just want things from me because of that. I can’t help that there is a mystical power to the way that I look, but I just wish sometimes that people wanted to know me for who I am.”

You had no idea that Tae was part veela, but you can see it now in his features. He is gorgeous, and you have noticed men falling over themselves to talk to him before. Besides his looks though, Taehyung has so many brilliant qualities, and you are sad that more people are not willing to get to know him more to see them.

“I want to know you for you, Tae.” Now you rest your hand on his leg. You are very aware of the several points of contact between the two of you. His hand on your leg, your hand on his leg, your thighs touching on the couch, shoulders pressed together.

He turns his head slightly toward you, and you realize that the two of you are just inches from each other’s faces. “Yeah?” he breathes.

You notice his eyes dart to your mouth and then back to your eyes. You can’t help but follow his lead. His lips are plump and pink and inviting, and you want to let your mouth rest on the pillows of his lips. Before you can think about it, he is leaning toward you. He presses his forehead and against yours, and his hot breath makes your lips tingle. 

A log in the fireplace crackles loudly, sending sparks into the air of the fireplace. You are dragged out of your trance, and you realize what you are about to do. “We shouldn’t do this,” you whisper. You stand up from your place on the couch and stare at Tae for a moment.

“I’m sorry. I have to go,” you apologize and slink out of the room without another word from Tae.

You avoid leaving the Slytherin common room except for meals over the next few days. Christmas dinner is delightful as always. You walk into the great hall and see the large table in the middle filled with dishes and platters and lots and lots of food. You are thrilled by the feast before you. The one large table stretches across the Great Hall covered in treacle tarts, roast turkeys, mountains of roasted potatoes, tureens of buttered peas, and silver boats of thick, rich gravy and cranberry sauce. Your stomach growls, telling you that you have plenty of room for all of the delicacies in front of you.

Tae sits further down the table and keeps glancing your direction. You try to ignore him while you stuff yourself full of food. You aren’t sure what to say to him, so you decide that after the feast you’ll just make your way make the Slytherin common room. Before you can make it out of the Great Hall, Tae steps in your way.

“y/n, I really think we should talk about this,” he says, sounding vulnerable and desperate.

“I really think we shouldn’t, Tae. Nothing happened.” You turn to walk away but are met with resistance. Tae’s fingers are wrapped around your arm, and his eyes are wild.

“Please y/n. I can’t lose you.” Tears begin to pool in the corners of his eyes, and the delicate honey skin on his face is turning pink.

“You aren’t going to lose me, Tae. I just need time, okay?” He finally nods and lets go of your arm. You can’t bear to look back at him, so you scurry off toward the dungeons.

You avoid Tae for the rest of the holiday, and, when Jungkook returns, you throw your arms around his neck, jump into his arms,  and kiss him deeply. He wraps his arms around you, grabbing firmly onto your ass, and presses you against him.

“I missed you so much,” you utter into his hair.

“I can tell,” he laughs. “I missed you too. Anything exciting happen while I was gone?”

“Nothing special,” you lie. “Just wishing I had more time to spend with you.”

Jungkook regales you about his holiday, and the two of you cuddle up together in his bed that night. You are so grateful to have him back with you, but you feel a peculiar tugging in your heart.

***********************

Fortunately, you still had 7th Year Potions with Jungkook, so you got to see him then. Your schedules were quite different this year, and you were finding less and less time to spend together. You were taking Defense Against the Dark Arts, Potions, Herbology, Charms, Transfiguration, and History of Magic. You had loaded your schedule, and, while at times you regretted it, you knew what you needed to do it to become an Auror. Jungkook, however, had already been scouted by several professional Quidditch teams for his skills as both a Seeker and a Chaser. In the last two years, he had decided he wanted to be in the midst of the action instead of just looking for the snitch, so he had made the switch to Chaser. You had to admit he was amazing. Since he didn’t really need his NEWT level classes, he decided to have a fairly easy year. He is taking Astronomy, Potions, Muggle Studies, Care of Magical Creatures, and Apparition (the only thing at which Jungkook had ever failed, so he had to retake it).

You are grateful for the time with Jungkook and, honestly, the time without Taehyung. He was in all your other NEWT level courses because there were so few seventh years in all of them. Not only that, but you were tutoring each other after classes and spending nights together in the Room of Requirement. Luckily, Potions was popular among members of your house and needed for most wizarding careers, so you got to take Potions with Sytherin and Ravenclaw.

In class today, Professor Slughorn is having you brew Amortentia. He says that even though he had you try it in 6th year to see who could get the closest, now he expects you to be able to brew it flawlessly. You are partnered with Jungkook, and the two of you have always worked well together.

You open your book to the ingredients list: Ashwinder eggs, rose thorns, peppermint, powdered moonstone, pearl dust, and a pinch of rose petals. Easy enough ingredients, but the directions are complicated and precise. You find yourself wondering how one does three-quarters of a stir. But you embark on the journey to make a love potion with Jungkook at your side. 

The two of you work diligently, taking turns delegating, gathering ingredients, and stirring. Slughorn checks in over your shoulder and makes some vaguely positive sounds in his throat before moving on. 

You feel your shoulders drawing up and your jaw clenching, with a thin layer of sweat on your face. Jungkook grabs your shoulders and stares into your eyes. He takes a deep breath, expression encouraging you to do the same. You inhale deeply and let yours go at the same time as him. He runs his hand up and down your arm twice, and then he turns back to the cauldron.

Jungkook has loved making potions since he was a little boy, long before Hogwarts. You had lived across the street from him growing up, and you often went to his house where his parents were making potions or participating in other magical practices. This was where you learned everything you knew about magic before you came to Hogwarts. It was more of a home than your grandma’s home in which you grew up. She was a muggle and did not understand the appeal of magic. She had four sisters who were also single, old women, and they all got together and gossiped most days. You usually just felt ignored and unwanted, but she had taken care of you, clothed, and given a home after your parents died.

You drag your attention back to the cauldron in front of you, realizing you’ve lost count of how many times you’ve stirred. You glance at Jungkook, and he holds up 7 fingers. You finish your last motions with the large spoon then pull it out of the mixture.

“You’re better with the incantations. You should do it,” Jungkook decides.

You wave your wand over the cauldron and mutter the latin phrases spelled out in the textbook. The cauldron bubbles profusely then immediately quiets, surface completely still. It has a pink hue with a pearlescent sheen. The smell wafts out of the cauldron, dancing in your nose. You smell fresh quills, Jungkook, and...you sniff again more deeply. That can’t be right. You must have done it wrong.

“Jungkook-ah, what do you smell?”

He leans closer to the cauldron. He a smile cuts across his face as he takes in the aroma. “I smell a Quidditch pitch early in the morning, fresh baked bread, and you.” 

When he says “you,” he turns and looks at you, hoping you’ll be as pleased as he is.

“I smell you too, Jungkookie,” you say and leave it at that.

He grabs your hand and gives you a huge smile, showing all of his teeth. You feign a smile, wracking your brain for any other explanation for the third smell, clear as if he were hugging you in his big arms: Kim Taehyung.

**************

It is a Saturday morning in early February, and the sun is already beating down on the grass. You make your way into the Slytherin section of the bleachers, ready to watch the biggest match of the year. Slytherin and Gryffindor had been rivals for as long as anyone can remember. Now that Slytherin had Jungkook, the rivalry became even more fierce. Everyone wanted the chance to destroy Jeon Jungkook, the Seeker-turned-Chaser who was already scouted by national teams. No one had between Slytherin yet this year, but you know that if they did, he would never hear the end of it.

The stands are filled with students from all four houses, and everyone piles into their seats shoulder-to-shoulder. You have a space between you and the person next to you because every still avoids the Slytherin Ice Queen who is also the Slytherin Outcast. You shrug and turn your attention back to the pitch.

The players have mounted their brooms, standing on the ground. Madam Hooch walks onto the field, talks with the players and releases the Bludgers and the Snitch. She takes the Quaffle and throws it in the air, and the game begins.

Jungkook is effortless on his broom, throwing and catching the Quaffle. He takes the first shot within two minutes of the game starting and the crowd goes wild when he scores. He scores four more goals before everyone sees the Seekers see the Snitch.

You look across the stands and see Tae staring directly at you. He motions toward the narrow hallways that connect the stands together. He points to you and himself and motions again. You roll your eyes, but you get up from your seat and make your way down. You watch Jungkook score one more goal and cheer his name loudly before you descend into the area in which you cannot see the match.

You walk toward the Gryffindor section, passing a couple of Hufflepuffs on the way. They give you a dirty look as you pass by them. Finally, you see Tae walking toward you, huge, boxy grin on his face.

“I love watching you watching him,” Tae exclaims. “I can see how special he is to you.”

“He is really special. He’s also super hot.” You shrug.

“Oh trust me, I have eyes.” Tae giggles and moves closer to you. You back away slightly. When he takes two more steps toward you, and you back away again, your back hits the wood behind you. 

Tae puts his arm up on the wall next to you and leans closer to your face. His eyes are fixed on your mouth, and you feel yourself swallow. He giggles again. 

“Do you think I’m special too?” Tae asks you, and you can feel his breath on your face.

“Yeah, sure, Tae. You’re special in your own way,” you breathe, trying to break the tension.

“I want to be special for you. I want to be special for both of you.” He leans down and presses his lips against yours gently. You freeze because you are not sure what just came over Taehyung. You don’t stop him, but you don’t kiss him back at first. He then snakes his hand around your waist and pulls you closer to him. He tilts his head and deepens the kiss. You can’t help the moan that creeps out of your throat as your body presses against his. You can’t think, so you just kiss him back, mouth working against his. You can hear the cheering in the stands, and an announcement of “Slytherin catches the Snitch!” drags you back out of the moment with Tae.

You pull away from him and gently push his chest away from you. He lets you go, immediately dropping his hands to his sides. You run off down the corridor, hand pressing gently against your lip, trying to figure out what the fuck actually just happened. Your heart is fluttering, and your stomach is doing back flips. It is unlike anything you’ve ever felt for Jungkook. Not better, just different.

You run back toward your place in the stands, but it’s too late. They have already announced that Slytherin has won, and most of the fans are trying to leave. You figure that you will catch Jungkook in the common room after he makes his way back. You decide that you are going to tell him right away what happened with Tae, but you haven’t decided yet if you’re going to tell him what it means to you.

Sound erupts from the Slytherin common room as soon as you say the password and the door swings open. Slytherins from each year are celebrating cheerfully. There is butterbeer and firewhiskey that they definitely aren’t allowed to have flowing, and the Quidditch team is in the middle of the room receiving high fives and pats on the back from your housemates. Jungkook is at the center of it all, and he is surrounded by first, second, and third year girls. He is smiling politely at them and making his way toward the edge of the room. His eyes catch yours, and he shoots you a huge smile, eyes scrunching at the sides.

You wave to him and try to fight your way through the crowd to him. You hear him say, “excuse me, ladies” to the crowd of girls around him, and he pushes his way toward you. When you finally meet, he snakes his arms around your waist and lifts you off the floor. He spins you around then kisses your mouth before he puts you back on the floor.

“Great job out there today, baby. I’m so proud of you,” you say into his ear. You trace your fingers down his arm and grab his hand. You squeeze it then say, “Can I talk to you about something later?”

His expression changes. His smile drops, and his eyes fill with concern. “Is everything okay?”

“Yeah, I think so. I just want to have a conversation with you about something I’ve been thinking about.”

“Now, I’m worried. Let’s just talk now.” He turns you around and guides you by the small of your back up the stairs to the boys dormitory. He brings you into his room and locks the door. “What’s going on?”

You take a deep breath and try to organize your thoughts as well as you can. You look into Jungkook’s eyes to try to steady yourself, but the desperateness in them makes your heart ache.

“You know I was doing some reading,” you pause for a moment, trying to stop your voice from shaking, “there are some relationships, especially wizards, where - uh - well instead of just two partners they might have three or even more. What - uh - what do you think about that?” you stutter a little over your words, but you get them out.

“I don’t have a problem with that. What does this have to do with us?”

“Well, you know, I’ve just been thinking that maybe there is someone that could potentially make both of us happy.” You peer up at his face from the floor, and there is pain in his eyes.

“Are you saying you aren’t happy with me? Y/n, I love you, but if you’re unhappy...I can let you go.” He’s crying now. Big, globular tears roll down his face, and he brings his hand to his chest.

You bring your hand to his cheek and run it through his hair. “No, no. That’s not what I’m saying at all. You make me so happy, but I’ve noticed both of us growing closer to another person who seems to give us each something that the other doesn’t, you know? And if you don’t want to bring him into this, I’ll shut down this idea right now. I would rather be honest with you right now than hold it in and things continue to be weird.”

He lifts his eyes from the floor and meekly asks, “Is the specialness gone?”

“No! Baby, of course not! Everything with you is still special. It is so special to me. I just think that Tae could be special too in a different way.”

His eyes glisten, maybe just from the tears, at the mention of Taehyung. “I just need time to think about this, okay?”

“Of course, baby, take the time that you need. Like I said, if you don’t want it, we don’t do it.” You bring your hand through his hair again and stand on your tiptoes to kiss his forehead. He unlocks the door, and you leave to your room. You feel a sinking in your chest. You don’t want Tae if it means that you can’t have Jungkook.

A few hours later, the party has died down in the common room, and you hear people dispersing to their beds or to the Great Hall for dinner. Then you hear your name. Someone is shouting your name. You fling the covers off of you and clamber down the hall to find Jungkook standing at the top of the steps to the girls’ dormitory shouting your name.

“Jungkook, what’s wrong!?” you blurt out.

“I can’t come in the girls’ dorm, and I’m ready to talk.” He smiles weakly at you, and you run up the stairs. You wrap your arms around him and pull him against you. He leans into your embrace and rests his cheek on top of your head. He holds you there for a few minutes then pulls away.

“If you want to try this with Taehyung, then I am willing to give it a shot,” he whispers, kissing your hair. “I think he could make both of us even happier.”

“Are you sure? I don’t want to make you do anything that you don’t want to do.”

He nods. “I’m sure. I’ve never been more sure of anything except maybe that I’m madly in love with you.”

“Baby, I love you so much! Should we go talk to him?”

He nods again, and the two of you go, hand-in-hand, towards the Great Hall, hoping Tae will be at dinner.

************

After you and Jungkook talked to Tae, things moved pretty quickly. The three of you start hanging out in the courtyard together, holding hands, stealing kisses in the sunshine. With Taehyung, it just feels easy. He fits in with the two of you, and, though there are some growing pains, the adjustment has been fairly easy. 

You continue to work in the Room of Requirement late at night with Taehyung, and he and Jungkook have started eating most of their meals together. You all spend time in the library, silently working on homework. You feel so comfortable and happy with the two of them that sometimes you forget that it wasn’t always this way.

***********

One night, you and Jungkook go together to meet Taehyung in the Room of Requirement. When the door opens, the room looks different than usual. The low-burning fireplace is in the corner again, light reflected in a full length mirror in the corner across from it, and there are hundreds of enchanted candles lining the walls. In the center of the room is a large bed, and the two of you look at each other, slightly confused.

The loud creak of the door causes the two of you to turn to see Taehyung standing in the doorway, mouth open. “Holy shit, did you do this for me?”

“No! It was just like this when we got here!” Jungkook sounds a little defensive. You realize that you two have only ever had sex with each other, and he might be nervous about the implication of the atmosphere of the room. You squeeze his hand.

“So, you don’t want let me love you?”

Jungkook clears his throat and stares wide-eyed at Taehyung who beckons him over with his finger. Jungkook obeys and walks to the other man, leaving you standing, dumbfounded and turned on already. Taehyung kisses Jungkook passionately, grabbing him by the back of the neck. Jungkook’s body seems to respond to Tae’s forcefulness, and he kisses Tae back with bruising force. Their hands are all over each other, and they press into each other like they are needy for the other’s touch. Taehyung peels Jungkook’s shirt over his head and settles himself behind Jungkook, kissing the skin of his shoulder and collarbone.

Jungkook leans his head back, resting it on Tae’s shoulder, exposing his neck to the man behind him. Tae runs his hand up Jungkook’s chest, making sure to caress his nipples as he takes a painfully slow route up his torso. He drapes fingers around Jungkook’s throat and gives one gentle squeeze. 

With his other hand, he grabs Jungkook’s belt loop and pulls him closer, so his ass is pressed up against Tae’s groin. Tae slides his hand up to Jungkook’s hip and pushes him against him, grinding his hard cock into his backside. He lets out a long groan against Jungkook’s neck, nipping the skin between his teeth, then running his tongue along the red mark he just left. 

His eyes drift up from Jungkook’s neck and meet yours. They are full of hunger, and he licks his lips without breaking eye contact.

“Come over here,” he growls.

You walk over, unsure what he’s going to want you to do. You find yourself standing in front of JK, unable to focus on anything except the wetness between your thighs and how good Taehyung’s long fingers look resting on the skin of Jungkook’s throat. Taehyung leans in and bites Jungkook’s skin again, right at the crook of his neck and shoulder, causing him to whimper and press his body back into Tae’s. Jungkook looks so pliant, and you want to watch him submit to Tae. You want to watch him do everything you say. Unable to control yourself any longer, you press your mouth against the other side of his neck, biting and sucking the skin, leaving your marks to mirror the one’s Taehyung is leaving on the other side. 

Tae pulls away from Jungkook, watching you marking the other man.

“Get on your knees, y/n,” Tae says in his deep, sultry voice, causing your pussy to clench, “show our Jungkookie how much you love him.”

You nod and sink to the floor in front of Jungkook. You look up at him through your lashes, and he looks like lust. His eyes are blown wide, and his hair is mussed up from Taehyung. His neck is covered in so many blossoms from you and Taehyung, it’s practically an entire bouquet. You reach up and undo his belt and his pants. His hips involuntarily jerk toward you as you pull his pants down.

“Shhh,” Taehyung scolds against his neck, tightening his grip again, “Let her take care of you.” He pulls Jungkook closer to him and grinds against his ass once more.

You reach your hand into his underwear and free Jungkook’s cock from the cotton confines. The skin is so smooth in your hand, and you slowly stroke his length, letting your fingers remember every inch of him. You position him directly in front of your mouth, stick your tongue out without touching him, and look up into his eyes again.

“Please,” he whines in a barely audible whisper.

You shift your eyes to Taehyung, who is rolling Jungkook’s nipple between his thumb and forefinger. He gives you a devilish smirk, and you know that he isn’t even remotely close to done with you.

You lick a stripe up the underside of Jungkook’s cock, and a deep throaty groan escapes him, filling the room. You roll your tongue around his head and along the slit, over and over, making more moans and whimpers escape him. Finally, you take him into your mouth, barely parting your lips and only allowing the tip in. You suck just on his head, and, once again, he whimpers and pants out “please.” It’s only then that you slide all the way down his cock, allowing him to hit the back of your throat.

While you work his dick, Taehyung continues leaving marks along Jungkook’s neck and shoulders. He leans in to his ear and whispers, loud enough for both of you to hear, “Isn’t it delicious to be loved?”

A bolt of heat shoots through you, and you moan around Jungkook’s dick. Jungkook’s hips jerk again, causing you to gag around him. He moans again, and his breathing is getting frantic and erratic. You can feel the signs of him getting close, so you let his dick fall from your mouth, and he whines at the loss of contact. 

“You can’t cum yet, Jungkookie. You need to show us that you’re a good boy,” you admonish him and stand to catch his lips with yours.

“Are you a good boy or are you just a little slut because you want to cum?” Tae asks, and you feel another rush of heat to your core. Jungkook shakes his head no, and you rub your thighs together to try to get some relief.

“Stop that, y/n.” You stop. “I think that Jungkook needs to show us he can follow orders. JK, lie down on the bed.”

He steps out of his pants and underwear that are around his ankles and goes to the bed. He lies on his back, hard cock resting on his belly. You stare at how beautiful he is, naked and submissive, hands trembling trying not to reach up and stroke himself.

“Baby, why don’t you show me you’re a good boy and lick my pussy?” You command as you saunter over to him. He nods in reply.

Taehyung moves in closer and runs his hand through Jungkook’s hair. “If at any point it’s too much, you just need to say ‘hinkypunk,’ okay?” Jungkook nods again. “Baby, you’re going to have to use words with us. Try again.”

“Yes. I will say it if it’s too much,” Jungkook pants. “Please let me eat your pussy.”

Immediately, you push your skirt and underwear down your thighs and step out of them. You climb onto the bed and straddle his face, slowly lowering yourself over his mouth. He brings hands up to grip your hips, and as soon as you are close enough, he licks from your entrance to your clit, flicking his tongue several times over the sensitive bud. You moan and toss your head back. He keeps licking steady circles on your clit, coaxing shudders and moans from you. He drops his arm from your thighs and brings his fingers to your core. He slips one finger inside you with ease because you are so wet. Your hips start to rock against Jungkook’s face as he continues pushing two fingers inside of you, curling them up slightly.

Facing out from the headboard, you see Taehyung palming his erection through his pants. He sinks between Jungkook’s legs and takes the head of his cock in his mouth. Jungkook moans against you, and you feel your pussy clench.

“Baby, you have to stop me before you cum,” Taehyung commands. “You can’t cum until I tell you, so you better not cum on my tongue. Do you understand?”

“I understand,” Jungkook mutters against you, causing you to roll your hips against him again. He flattens his tongue and lets you ride his face, intermittently moaning from Taehyung rolling his tongue around the head of Jungkook’s cock. He drops his nose all the way to Jungkook’s pubic bone. You see him swallow around Jungkook, and JK cries out, “fuck fuck. I’m gonna cum. Fuck!”

Taehyung removes his mouth from Jungkook’s cock with a pop and runs his hands up JK’s torso. “Good boy,” he utters as he presses gentle kisses to his hips and his belly. Jungkook writhes under him, whimpering.

“Make y/n cum,” Tae demands. “She deserves to cum.”

Jungkook focuses his attention back on your cunt. Picking up the pace of his fingers pumping in and out of you, he flicks his tongue in steady, slow circles on your clit. You feel the warmth pooling in your belly. With one more slow lick, you feel yourself tumbling over the edge, and you press yourself down a little harder against Jungkook’s mouth.

When you come down from your orgasm, you lift yourself off Jungkook’s mouth. “You really want to be a good boy, don’t you?”

“I am a good boy. I’m so good for you. I’ll be so good.”

Taehyung wraps his lips around Jungkook’s dick again. You respond, “Then beg me for it.”

“Please. Please, let me fuck you. I want you both more than I’ve ever wanted anything before. I’d give up my magic for you to fuck me right now. Please.”

You dismount his face and run your hand through his hair as you stand next to the bed. Taehyung crawls up the bed on top of Jungkook and presses his mouth to Jungkook’s glistening one. He moans into JK’s mouth. “I love tasting her on you.” He pushes his tongue into Jungkook’s mouth and grinds against him a little. Jungkook slides his hands up Taehyung’s shirt and presses his fingers against his firm skin. Taehyung pulls his shirt over his head and throws it aside.

“I want you to watch yourself fuck her. Babygirl, I want you to watch him fuck you.” He pulls his wand from his pocket and waves it in the air. The mirror from the corner moves closer. Taehyung whispers something in Jungkook’s ear that you can’t hear. He pushes himself off of Jungkook and moves toward you. He catches your chin between his thumb and pointer finger and angles your face to kiss him. You can taste yourself on him from Jungkook, and you feel your pussy clench at the thought. You continue moving your mouth against Tae’s, and you slide your hands down his torso and catch his belt. You undo it and the button to his pants.

You whine when Tae pulls your hands away. “Patience,” he whispers and guides you to the bed. You position yourself in front of Jungkook on your hands and knees, spreading your legs a little so he can see how wet you are for him and because of him. 

Jungkook grabs your hips and lines himself up with your entrance, but he does not enter you. You turn to him and say, “you’ve been a good boy. You may fuck me now.” He sighs in relief and pushes himself inside of you. You whimper at the stretch of his dick on your walls, but the sensation is already overwhelming to your sensitive cunt. Jungkook lets you adjust, and when you are ready, you push your ass back against him gently. He moans then starts to roll his hips into you.

You look to the side, and the mirror is positioned perfectly that you can see how Jungkook looks fucking you. He’s so perfect. He has his hands on your hips, digging in so hard that his finger tips are white. He toned thighs and torso look delectable naked and behind you. His hair falls in his eyes, and he keeps licking his lips. The thing you focus on the most is the way that his dick looks sliding in and out of you, shiny with your arousal. You watch it going in and out you and bring a hand in between your legs to rub your clit.

In the mirror, you see Taehyung position himself in front of you, his dick in his hand. How did he and Jungkook end up being so hot and still having big dicks? You turn your head to it, and you look up at Taehyung. “Use your mouth,” he orders.

You take his length in your hand pumping a few times, rolling your tongue around the head. Jungkook’s thrusts get faster behind you, and you look in the mirror again. The image of Jungkook snapping his hips behind you and Taehyung’s dick in your hand makes you moan loud. You lick all the way around Taehyung’s dick and then take the whole thing in your mouth. You moan around it a few times, taking it all the way into your throat and back out. Taehyung grips your hair firmly and lets out a few small groans. His sounds of pleasure make you feel accomplished and pride swells in your chest.

“Hyung, can I cum?” Jungkook huffs out.

Taehyung thrusts his hips involuntarily at the request, giving away his arousal for the man behind you.

“Yes, you’ve been good. Cum inside. Fill our y/n up.”

Jungkook snaps his hips erratically a few more times before he is coming inside of you. You can feel shot after shot filling your pussy up. You moan as you feel him painting your insides with his ropes of cum. Jungkook collapses on your back and holds you against his chest.

He finally pulls out of you, and you lie on your back on the bed. Jungkook lies down next to you, spent. You still have your t-shirt on, and it is sticking to your skin. Taehyung slides his fingers under the hem and pulls it over your head. He has his wand in his hand again. He produces an ice cube that he holds gently between his fingers. He brings it to his mouth and presses it against his lips, and the heat between your legs intensifies, goosebumps breaking out across your skin.

Taehyung takes the cube and brings it to your breast, tracing slow circles until he’s at your nipple. You cry out in surprise and pleasure. The cold sensation causes your back to arch off the bed. He removes the ice from your nipple and runs it over Jungkook’s, causing him to writhe against the mattress and grab your hand. Taehyung goes back and forth between your skin and Jungkook’s until the ice cube has fully melted. He licks the water off your skin then off Jungkook’s skin.

“Open your legs for me,” he says to you as he waves his wand over his hand again. This time the ice cube in his hand has a rounded shape. He rubs it on each of your nipples then traces it down your chest and belly, across your mound and down your outer lips. He takes the ice and rolls it gingerly over your clit. A guttural moan escapes from your chest at the frigid contact against your skin that feels like it’s on fire. He continues to pass the ice cube between your folds, specifically over your clit.

He presses his mouth against your center and sucks, collecting the water, your arousal, and Jungkook’s cum on his tongue. Then he rolls the ice over you again. Jungkook leans over and kisses your mouth while Tae focuses on your cunt. Jungkook takes your already sensitive nipples between his fingers and moves in the motions he knows drive you crazy. You can’t hold still against the mattress. You need relief. 

“Tae, I need you to fuck me now. Fuck JK’s cum into me. I want you both inside of me.”

Tae removes his hands from you. He stands up straight and takes his cock in hand. “I’ve waited so long to fuck both you. I don’t want it to end.” His dominating demeanor disappears for a second.

“Oh, Tae, the best part about being in a relationship with both of us is that you get to fuck us all the time now. You don’t have to worry. We will do it more. Hopefully a lot more.”

His confidence returns. He takes his cock and runs it up and down your folds, collecting your arousal, heating the skin that was cold from the ice. He pushes into you and moans. “I can feel how wet you are. I can feel all of Jungkook inside you. Wanna fill you up too.”

“Then fill me up, Tae. I want you to cum inside of me.”

“Jungkook, kiss me.” Tae continues pressing in and out of you slowly while Jungkook sits up to meet Taehyung’s demands. He captures Tae’s lips and they kiss each other, all teeth and tongue. Tae keeps one hand on your hip and brings one hand to tangle in Jungkook’s hair. While they kiss, Jungkook brings his hand to your clit. His thumb starts rubbing rough, unforgiving circles. You wiggle under the overstimulation, but Tae’s hand holds you firmly against the mattress. You feel the edges of your vision blurring, and you feel the tightness in your stomach. 

As you pinch your eyes shut, you focus on the feeling of the two men fucking you. Your mind goes dark with small sparkles of light dancing behind your eyelids as you cum harder than you’ve ever cum before. You feel your pussy clenching around Tae over and over. You feel a rush like water washing over you, and then you start to come back into the present. You open your eyes and both men are looking down at you with smiles on their faces. Tae picks up the pace of his hips and thrusts several more times, with a shout he cums inside of you.

You feel it fill you and start to drip down you as he continues to fuck his and Jungkook’s cum into you. You moan at the idea. Once he comes down from his high, Jungkook gets on his knees. Tae pulls his dick out of you, and Jungkook uses his mouth to clean him off, then he turns to you and licks your folds. He swallows all the cum that he can reach and looks up at Taehyung with a smile. 

Tae lifts him off the floor and lowers him onto the bed with you. He goes and collects both of your underwear and brings them to you. He then makes sure that the blanket on the bed is covering both of you. Once the two of you are covered and warm, he climbs in between you and lies down. You both turn to him and rest your heads on his chest. You listen to his heartbeat and his breathing. He rubs patterns on your bare back with his fingertips.

“Do you need or want anything other than cuddles? How can I take care of you?” Tae asks both of you.

“Just hold me,” you say.

“Tell me how you feel,” Jungkook mumbles, seemingly in his sleep.

“I know it’s early for me to say this, but I love you both so much,” Tae whispers as you are starting to drift off.

“I love you too Tae. I love you Jungkook,” you say, voice heavy with sleep.

“Love you both,” Jungkook says without opening his eyes. He curls deeper into Taehyung’s side and grasps your hand. The three of you fall asleep there like that, and it’s the best night sleep you have had in years.

***********

The rest of the year flies by. All three of you are preparing for your NEWTs, so you don’t have as much time to spend together. You all still make time, one night a week, to spend together in the Room of Requirement. Cuddling up with Jungkook and Taehyung makes you feel safe and loved like you never have before.

You find yourself ignoring the glares and scoffs that you get from people who see you walking with your fingers laced in Tae’s, Jungkook’s arm slung around your shoulders. You don’t care as long as you have the two of them.

During the week of NEWTs, Jungkook makes you tea with honey every night to help you get good sleep, and he rubs Tae’s back for him. To Jungkook the exams are less important, but he realizes that both of you need to do well to achieve your dreams.

By the last day of school, Jungkook has four offers from different national Quidditch teams to choose from, and you and Tae are eagerly awaiting your results to see if you were accepted into Auror training.

The three of you spend a lot of time at Jungkook’s house that May, trying to help Jungkook decide where he wants to play, deciding what you all will do if Jungkook has to move. One mid-May day, you receive a letter from the Ministry of Magic. Your heart pounds against your sternum, and you feel lightheaded. You run across the street to JK’s parents’ house and hold it out to him when he answers the door. 

“Do you want me to open it?” he asks. You nod slowly.

He opens the letter and takes his time reading each word. His expression is unreadable when he lifts his eyes. Your mind starts running through all the possibilities. Maybe you failed the Herbology NEWT, and now you can’t be an Auror.

“You’re going to be an Auror, baby!!” Jungkook exclaims, holding the letter out to you.

You immediately begin crying. “Shut up. No, I’m not. Don’t look at me.” You read the letter to yourself, and you see that it’s true. You’ve been accepted into the Ministry’s Auror Training Program. You are going to get to train with HARRY FREAKING POTTER. You hear the phone ringing, and Jungkook’s mom tells him that the call is for him. He comes back a few minutes later. 

“How lucky am I?” he says, beaming. “Both of my amazing, intelligent, fucking hot partners are going to be Aurors!”

You are elated that Taehyung is going to be joining you. There is no other witch or wizard that you would rather have by your side, even Potter.

Ultimately, Jungkook decides to stay in London to play Quidditch because, as he says, “he just can’t be that far away from his loves.” The three of you find a flat together in the city and begin your lives together.

On the first day of Auror training, Jungkook walks you and Taehyung to the entrance and kisses you both on the forehead.

“You’re going to do amazing. I love you both. You are both so special to me.”

You and Tae exchange the sentiment and then head into your respective bathrooms. When you come out of the fireplace inside the Ministry of Magic, you clasp one another’s hands, walking in to the rest of your life.