#I will always be an old man who is always long winded and has a LOT to say about everything ever LOOOL
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i’m actually obsessed with your jealousy prompts…. what’s better than the most jealous mf around???
seungcheol + “they did that on purpose”
★ seungcheol x celebrity!reader ┆ word count: 970 ┆ part of my closed jealousy drabble game.
ⓘ established relationship, secret relationship, pet name ['baby'], angst [if you squint]. combined with another prompt c/o anon: "i'm going to scream."
"I'm going to file a complaint."
Seungcheol is being dead serious, and yet you laugh at him. You laugh!
"Baby," you start to say, your tone edged with that familiar exasperation you take on whenever you think he's being silly. He's having none of it tonight, though. He knows his theory is one hundred percent correct.
And so he juts his lip out in a pout, crosses his arms over his chest, and whines out his next words like he's some teenager instead of a 29-year-old man. "They did that on purpose!"
That, being the recent announcement of who would be the special hosts of MBC's year-end music show. When Seungcheol first caught wind that a member of SEVENTEEN might have the chance to share a stage with you, he had been ecstatic. While your relationship wasn't public knowledge yet, he was ready to make it glaringly obvious should he be chosen to be your co-host.
He's had whole daydreams about the moment. The hand he'd casually rest on the small of your back. The smile he'd give you that would have Twitter speculating for weeks. Maybe he could even post something vague on Weverse afterwards, some cutesy message of I'm so happy~ ❤️
Alas, all his hopes were dashed when the memo about the hosts went out this morning.
"They put you with Jeonghan on purpose," Seungcheol grumbles.
Jeonghan— the one person Seungcheol wouldn't be able to openly go up against. The company must've known Seungcheol would throw his idol image out of the window, must've known that there was only one person who Seungcheol wouldn't pick a fight with.
The fact that Jeonghan is being extra annoying— relentlessly teasing, calling himself 'Mr. Steal-Yo-Girl'— has only added insult to injury.
You reach out to tug Seungcheol into your side. Even though he's technically supposed to be upset, he can't help himself; the leader leans into your touch, draping himself over you.
Your couch has always been way too small for the two of you, even though Seungcheol insist it's a 'perfect' fit. He considers it perfect because he can always pull you into his lap and bury himself in you, which is exactly what he does now despite his sullen mood.
When your fingers instinctively entangle in his hair, a part of him relaxes. That very part bristles just as quickly when you quip, "Well, Jeonghan is the pretty one in the group."
"I'm going to scream," Seungcheol threatens.
You know your boyfriend enough to understand that he's at least half serious. "Alright, alright," you huff, giving his hair a light, reprimanding tug.
Seungcheol hisses at the sensation. You appease him by pressing your lips to his cheek.
You shift in his hold so your gazes can meet. The look on your face only makes Seungcheol's frown deepen. You're enjoying this. You're amused. You're not taking his predicament seriously.
"If he's so pretty," Seungcheol starts, ignoring the way you begin to roll your eyes as you anticipate what's to come.
"If he's so pretty, why don't you date him, then?" he asks, punctuating his words with a dejected sniffle. Seungcheol looks the part of a wounded puppy.
Eyebrows furrowed? Check. Lips pursed? Check. Boba-like eyes, meant to tug at the heartstrings? Check, check, check.
Unfortunately for him, your long-term relationship has steeled you to his petulance. You take his attempt at moping in stride, opting to press another kiss, this time to the corner of his mouth.
"Because I don't want him," you say patiently. "I want you, baby."
The words still manage to make Seungcheol's heart soar. He tries not to let it show on his face. He's trying to prove a point here. He refuses to be won over by sweet nothings, even if you're so lovely as you say them.
"You're going to be on stage with him instead of me." Seungcheol's arms tighten around your waist, his expression darkening slightly. "People are going to ship you."
A surprised bark of laughter escapes you. "How do you know what shipping is, huh?"
"You're changing the subject."
"Baby—"
The words come out of Seungcheol in a rush, fueled by his gripe with management's decision. "I want people to ship us," he grouses. "I want them to look at us and think, 'They look like they'd be the perfect couple,' because we are!"
Something softens in your expression, then, and Seungcheol knows exactly why. Promises of going public have been made since the beginning, but now it's several years in and there's no relationship announcement in sight for either of you.
Seungcheol's voice is quieter, a little more even, as he buries his face in the crook of your neck.
"I just want everybody to know that I love you," he says, the words muffled against your skin. "And that you love me, too."
You stroke Seungcheol's hair soothingly. He relaxes at the familiar ministration, letting his breaths even out.
"Soon," you mutter. "I promise, baby. We'll get that really soon."
Seungcheol bites back the urge to say that it's been soon for the past three years. This is something beyond both of your control. He's not about to make you feel guilty for something neither of you can change.
He settles for the next best thing. He tilts his head just so, allowing him to catch your lips in a kiss. It's sweet and unhurried. His favorite type.
It's the kind of kiss that makes the endless 'soon's worth it.
When you pull away for air, he wordlessly reaches for his phone. You're a bit out of breath as you watch him angle his screen away from you and type something out.
"What're you doing?" you ask, craning your neck to try and catch a glimpse.
"E-mailing the CEO of MBC," he says matter-of-factly. "To make me your co-host instead of Hannie."
"Choi Seungcheol!"
#୨ৎ game set play .ᐟ#seungcheol x reader#seungcheol imagines#seungcheol drabble#svt x reader#seventeen x reader#svt imagines#seventeen drabble#svt drabble#seventeen imagines#୨ৎ penned by ylangelegy#daegutowns#( THIS TOOK FOREVERRRRR I'M SAWREE )#( first drabble of the year. it is what it is !!! )#( sulky csc u mean everything to me )#( looked @ so many pics of pouting cheol for htis. )
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His Youngest Wife
Yan! Count Lysander Albert x Wife Reader
Manhwa : Marronnier Farm Near by the Imperial Palace / Marronnier Farm Next to the Imperial Palace / 宮殿の隣のマロニエ農場 / 皇宮裡的馬洛尼埃農場 / 황제궁 옆 마로니에 농장 / My Farm by the Palace
Author/Illustrations : Jung yeon / Ollcha(Art)
Manhwa : Fluff / Comedy / Fantasy Manhwa (17-18+).
Ilustrations Acount : ollcha🐥🕯
Count word : 1585 word.
HAPPY NEW YEARS MY DEARS🦋🎆. Is late but hope this years all our wishlist will be came true. this is the fic that i promised a few days ago, i hope you like old men like Lysander hahaha, he's so handsome, i can't hold back, and the fact the manhwa was warm slice of life genre and comedy, and all the chara was good and chef kiss! I think soons i will make other chara in this manhwa🤭, anyways, enjoy my story, i try my best to make it fluff but i guess is fail? Well, i hope you all have a happy new year, much love- Neva🦋🦋
might have some bad grammars, correct me if there are any mistakes in the words in the story I wrote. Anyways i hope you all enjoys my story,love.- Neva🦋🦋
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In the Bratania Empire, a prosperous, wealthy and stable Empire. Led by Emperor Iskandar Lionslore Deon Alekto. A handsome young emperor aged 22 years.
Under the emperor's division. There are 4 holy knight commanders
Namely;
Commander of the Holy Wood Knight of the High Elf Family.
Commander of the Holy Flame Knight of the High Vampire 'Noble One.'
Commander of the Warbear Family Knight.
Last was Commander of the Holy Wind Knight of the Golden Cat Sith Family. A 19-year-old cat fairy boy.
But... there is one noble who is right beside the emperor, Count Lsyander Albert.
The man who holds the responsibility for the internal affairs of the imperial palace and is also the direct representative of all Pro-Commoners.
The man who has entered his thirties, unfortunately... does not have a wife.
The reason is quite simple, namely because he is too busy working and does not have time to think about household problems.
Until one day, here he was, standing in front of the emperor who was busy staring at the small hut, watching his farmer neighbor and saying ideas that didn't make sense to him.
"Your Majesty, I believe that the idea of getting married at my age of 3 years old, is somewhat unethical"
Is, the emperor who was busy staring at his neighbor's house just snorted biasedly.
"Count. You know your age is no longer young, ethical or not, there is no prohibition for someone to marry, old or young as long as it is in accordance with the law"
Is looked at the count then patted the count's shoulder gently.
"Don't you worry about not being able to sell?"
"Your Majesty?!"
Count Lysander stared in disbelief at the emperor's clear words.
As for Is? He just chuckled as he walked away leaving the order, which for Albert was very difficult.
"You have 2 weeks, Count, get married or you will take care of all the internal work of the empire"
The Count just sighed roughly, while thinking in his mind, where could he find a wife?
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. .
For a week he searched for a wife, nobles, highborn ladies, even commoners to smallfolk he searched, but none of them fit his criteria.
Until entering the second week .. exactly one day before the 3rd week appeared. He met a woman, from a bankrupt noble family. A baron. A noble with a title but without power or wealth. His old heart beat fast as if he was drinking his favorite coffee even though he was drinking coffee, when he saw you he felt his life was in front of his eyes, he fell in love for the first time.
Working hard in a small grocery store, supporting himself. That woman is you, At first the count courted you in a normal and formal way. But you were too shy and always ran away when you saw him.
Until the count decided to use coercion, kidnapping you by force and marrying you by force.
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You, a young woman who is only 20 years old, still single and has never had a boyfriend, struggling to make a living by running a small grocery store, suddenly a man who is already in his thirties seduces you, for you the man is handsome, of course, from the way he dresses to how neat his hair is, you know, this person is an insider of the emperor. A noble.
Even though you are also a noble, the title of baron that you inherited from your parents means nothing.
But here you are?! In a luxurious room that you are sure, even the bathroom is bigger than the dilapidated hut where you live!
Unfortunately you want to run away but can't, because the one who married you is none other than, Count Lysander Albert. The emperor's official aide as the person in charge of internal imperial affairs and also the representative of the common people.
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Lysander, for the past 2 weeks has been observing his wife carefully, his wife who is so young and beautiful, different from himself who is old and looks more like a father than a husband.
During the day, Lysander did not dare to sleep in the same room or even touch you as the first night of the bride and groom. He felt very inappropriate to be with you.
Until one day, Lysander accidentally passed the garden in his residence. Seeing his beautiful and pretty wife, chatting friendly with several noble ladies there.
But the topic of their conversation was what made him silent and wipe his face.
Lady Istar and Lady Maurien. The two women openly spoke so brazenly and boldly to you.
"Lady... seeing how far your relationship with the count is, I do not expect more, the count is old lady. So lady do not be sad if the count cannot satisfy lady. That is normal, right lady Istar". Miss Mauren with sympathy made to pat your arm gently with fake sympathy.
"If I were you, I will certainly try my best to please the Count with my efforts, haa.. the Count is a perfect husband, even though he is old"
Meanwhile, Miss Istar, could only laugh awkwardly hearing Miss Maurien's bold words!.
"Thank you for your concern, Miss Maurien, but the issue of whether or not my husband is able to give me pleasure, that is my business, not yours. Excuse me"
You decided to leave the garden, arguing with the two noble ladies only drained your energy, for you, Miss Maurien's intentions were very clear. Jealousy, even though the Count was already in his 30s, his handsomeness had not faded at all, unmatched wealth, power equal to the emperor, even, being the emperor's father figure when he was little.
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Tonight, you slept alone as usual, the room was this big. Even the husband who married you by force had not shown his face for the past 2 days. It had been 2 days since you had been married to the count.
You were on the balcony, enjoying the night view, only to be surprised by the door to your room being opened roughly.
Turning around, there you saw, your husband, Count Lysander Albert. With hair that was... quite messy and untidy as usual.
The distance between the room and the balcony was also not that far, you could smell the scent of his expensive musk mint cologne at night with the cold air.
"Wife"
His hoarse voice with a deep that makes your hair stand on end. Lysander, looking at you who is so beautiful tonight, you are always beautiful in his eyes, always and forever. With a simple white nightgown, loose hair that moves softly due to the night wind.
"Wife, do you think.. I am like what they say?"
The sudden question made you think deeply, who does your husband mean as "they"?.
"I don't understand what you mean, husband and-" before you could finish your sentence, you were cut off by him first.
"Old and impotent, can't give you pleasure because I'm old, do you think I'm like that?"
Lysander stood right in front of you, gently holding your chin so that you looked right at him.
"Did... husband hear the conversation in the garden?". You felt that you were walking between fragile ice, just asking the wrong question. It could be that your relationship with your husband who was already distant became even more distant.
"Just answer, yes or no"
With a low growl Lysander stared at me sharply.
"I don't-"
"Are you not sure?"
Roughly and frankly Albert quickly pulled your waist, pressing your lips gently to meet, soft and warm, Lysander expertly explored every inch of your mouth and teeth, making sure every corner remembered him.
Gently releasing your embrace, Lysander brought your foreheads together, speaking softly.
"Wife... I know, I forced you to marry this old man, you must not love me either, but my dear, allow me to love you, show you, that I am not just an old man, I am also not impotent my dear wife"
Lysander gently led you into the room laying you down on the bed gently.
"Allow me, to show you, how good I can make you feel good, make you pregnant, make you the mother of my children in the future"
Lysander kissed your forehead gently, down to your neck and kissed your neck passionately with full of love.
"My love, I will show you, how long I can rape you, cry or beg, don't expect me to stop before you pass out"
That night, lit by the full moon that was willing to peek from the window, illuminating the high and beautiful sky at night.
Lysander or people who knew him as Count Lysander Albert, the prime minister of law under the emperor directly, claimed so confidently his wife for the first time, carrying out their first night that they did not have time to do.
Just when you had passed out unable to keep up with the brutality of your husband Albert. Lysander just stopped, chuckled softly before kissing your forehead affectionately, cleaning your entire body with love until it was clean and putting on his clothes that were big enough for you.
Hugging you gently, Lysander looked at you with love. Lysander whispered softly in the quiet night.
"Sleep my wife, I love you, even if the world ends, I will look for you to the end of the world, my wife. My love"
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Tag list; @snowflakes666 @nerdygoateepeanut @blurryperrtymoonlight @luminethebest @scenicelixir @n4muqr @cannyyyyy @athena-roy @sirenetheblogger @rai-xxx @thehopingfairy @ryusooze @yaoduriaa @merveeeeesworld
©️Nymphea0 2024 ,OG story, Project Dark Manhwa Character Story.
Please dont steal my work, or use without my permissions, Always be good people Dear. Much love, Neva🦋🦋.
#obsessed#possesive#yandere#yandere x reader#yandere male#yandere x darling#manhwa x reader#yandere manhwa#manhwa x you#yandere manhwa x reader#nevaerah
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—————
“Don‘t you know who I am?” It’s instinctive, and it comes out a little more arrogant than intended, but the man before him doesn’t even blink.
“Do you think I care?” he retorts, and there’s just as much bite. It makes anger flare inside of Thomas, hot and prickling at the sheer audacity. The man is shorter than him - only by a handful of inches, but still - he’s smaller, thinner, and obviously not as big a name, but it’s like he doesn’t seem to know that. He stares down Thomas with enough sass and fire to make it clear he considers Thomas a worthy opponent, which– wow. It’s been a long time since Thomas encountered someone this brave.
—————
Thomas has always been good at reading people, always had a knack for picking the needy ones - the desperate, starstruck boys and girls and everything in between who just want to be told they’re wanted, who invariably fall spellbound under his gaze and pliant under his hands.
The fledgling in the second row is perfect. He’s pretty, feathered black hair and pouty red lips, and his dark eyes fix on Thomas with the kind of wonder that doesn’t feel like flattery as much as it does certainty. He knows it won’t take more than a word or two – or maybe even just the right glance – to get him backstage, and then the deal is sealed.
He’s not using them, at least not any more than they’re using him. Everyone gets what they want out of the interaction, which is to say that no one gets what they want. None of the pretty young things get to keep him for more than a night, and he never gets more than a couple hours of distraction before it’s on to the next show, the next city, the next fucking night and he has to do it all over again – wind him up and watch him go.
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Yellow catcrow enjoyers I come bearing not one, but TWO new catcrow fics written as part of a collaboration with my incredible beloved most wonderful @anything-thats-rock-and-roll .
30/12/24 these two fics were literally just two ideas saved in separate docs with a handful of words in when we thought - why not?
It’s been a whirlwind of like. 30 hours at the very most but here suddenly they exist! Both can be read as standalones, but it’s definitely worth reading both (and not because I’m biased)!!
So for enjoyers of the modern and the weird, of actors and musicians and some good old-fashioned one night stands, I present you these :)
#dead boy detectives#catcrow#monty x cat king#monty the crow#the cat king#thomas the cat king#cat king#monty x the cat king#monty finch#dead boy detective agency#dead boy detectives fanfic#I have had so much fun writing these I am begging you check them out#to put it simply birds fic is a oneshot that is simultaneously a filmed scene in my fic it’s very confusing and I love it so much#save dead boy detectives
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Heyyy it's about the art questions
I would like to know your answer in 18 (the purpose) and 22 (artspiration).
I would also ask 3 but I'd completely understand if you prefer not to answer
The rest are already answered
Hope you have a great month. ;D
Hey there! Thanks for the questions!
⭐️3. Show us your oldest piece of art you have on hand
→ It was a real trip down memory lane to look back on some of these, but here's a sample of some old things from 2021-early 2022! (Prior to posting on social media in Aug 2022) Back then, I didn't have any real incentive to improve my art outside of drawing quick sketches like the pictures above. I had issues being cleanly (due to lack of motivation), committing to learning character details, and more LOL. →Fun fact, I drew on a very tiny 11 inch screen 4GB RAM laptop with horrible color calibration for about 3 years until finally getting something better in early 2022 too LOL. It might be noticeable in some of the above pictures with the color choices being a little too light or too saturated, LOL.
→As also seen at the bottom of this post, It might come as a surprise that I also draw fanart for my favorite assorted fandoms outside of megaten too, LOL. I just never post it in public since they're meant as warm-up doodles!
To be honest, 2020 thru late 2022 was a very low point in my life. I had given up on all creative endeavors at the time due to: My career, being diagnosed with a bodily issue of which the effects I still deal with even today, and other personal issues.
It truly wasn't until late 2022 (when I started posting online) that I truly felt confident picking up my tablet pen again and view art in a more positive light…!
NGL I had written out my entire life story here but ended up deleting it--it would have made this post terribly long regardless LOL💦 Perhaps it'll be a story for another time, though!!🙏 And it absolutely has to do with why the Samurai husbands mean lot to me!
⭐️18. What is your purpose for drawing?
→ That's a good question! For me, (especially due to my visual agnosia) it'd have to be the ability to draw whatever comes to mind with skill and precision. To not hold back and draw whatever comes into your mind's eye without fear or hesitation from others (or your own critical inner voice)… And to be able to properly convey the meaningful themes of your work as clearly as they come into your mind... That, to me, is true freedom.
➡️As for BL content: Despite not posting much of it in public (yet), my purpose in drawing BL (or OTP content in general) is to transmit feelings of love + warmth in my art! To depict tenderness, warmth, and love with affectionate, natural-looking body language to make it as believable + realistic as possible...That's always been my goal! →The world is a scary place out there. Though, if my OTP content can make someone feel a slight glimmer of peace, tranquility, or even hope to keep moving forward...then I'll be incredibly happy!🙏💕 It's always my intention to convey nothing but sweet wholesome vibes and warmth with my pictures, and I truly hope that feeling comes across too. ➡️I'll be super candid and say I actually really enjoy angst and raunchy content as much as everyone else! But drawing wholesome + sweet characters in love just comes much sooo much easier and naturally as breathing to me, LOL. Just because I don't post angst or raunchy things, doesn't mean I dislike it! ☝️
⭐️22. List at least one of your “artspirations.”
→ I tend to gravitate towards professional artists with thick painting (厚塗り) coloring styles, dynamic illustrations, and artists that have a strong grasp of anatomy, character design and storytelling! It's hard to pick just one, so here's a brief selection of ones that come up at the top of my head right now!
Thanks again for the questions! Have a wonderful January and rest of your 2024 as well!✨🌟
#askbox#walterjonathan#ワルヨナ#rare SMT1 waruo/yoshio content too LOL#trust me when I say that's only a mere fraction of what's locked away in the Vaults (tm) of old art#I will always be an old man who is always long winded and has a LOT to say about everything ever LOOOL#but I appreciate anyone who takes the time to read this nonetheless! I hope everyone also has a great 2024!
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──𐙚 think i need someone older (s & f)
olderBoyfriend!Jungkook x inexperienced!reader
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content: some plot first, loss of virginity, age gap of 9 years (he´s 30), thigh humping, little dry humping too, cowgirl, he talks her through it, dom!jungkook, "sweet girl, baby, love", "gguk" lowkey insecure reader, praise, making out, breast play, clit play, creampie, unprotected, hickies on him, big c!ck Jungkook, small karaoke session, he´s whipped and wants to take care of her, short mention of alcohol (bc of that fucking bar he has omg), allusions to reader being short, she's very feminine
note from cherry: i tried to do justice to the people who wanted this, i hope you´re satisfied mwah! sooo sorry if it´s not giving lmao writing this was lowkey exhausting, also sorry for typos as always
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Jeon Jungkook is exactly like his preferred alcoholic beverage; whiskey. strong, rich, smooth, smells like oak and a hint of vanilla caramel. Much like your introduction to the drink, you met this man in a bar.
A real man- none of those barely twenty-year olds that paraded around in their sagged sweatpants and with a bright tap of unlimited unopened snapchats lighting up the dark corners of the bar. Jungkook is pure masculinity, a chest so full with security, so grounded in his abilities that it was practically impossible to ignore how his large, brown galaxy eyes focused on your face, zeroing in on your cupid´s bow while you licked the stinging remains of your moscow mule away- he paid for it, of course.
Once the enticing conversation that felt almost comically easy faded, you expected him to try and take you to his house- mansion, as he revealed in a sidetracked sentence. Although you were looking forward to seeing the small metal pearls below and over his eyebrow move as they crinkle in pleasure, the tight ropes of virginity had not yet been released in your 21 years of living. Shackles that keep you tied down- as promised out of your own, admittedly senseless morality, not to be opened by a stranger. The key to your cuffs belonged to a lover.
It was unforeseeable, nevertheless natural for him to droop his heavily tattooed arm around your waist while escorting you out of the establishment. The sleeve of his white button down folded up along his forearm for you to see the beauty of his skin, wondering just how many more of those carefully crafted works of art he´s hiding beneath the business casual attire.
Once engulfed in the harsh, bitter wind that itaewon possesses, his arm only drew you in closer, so near in fact, you were able to notice a small scar on his cheek, one you hadn´t been able to notice in the curse of a dimly lit place. The more your eyes adjusted to him, so grew your anger at the lighting inside your place of first meeting- it had done an injustice to the man you had already been disgustingly attracted to, stole the wholehearted, inescapable allure of such a mature presence.
The gentleman looks down into your awaiting eyes, only to ask if he may have your number, upon your agreement, he proceeded to tell you that he would be walking you home, wanting you to arrive safely since it must be dangerous for a woman to walk the streets of a party district at 2 am in the morning.
That encounter was four months ago, and only a month after that initial conversation, he had completely taken over you. Swallowed you whole in just how well he treated you.
Insistent of using his black card to buy you anything you remotely showed liking in, dedicated to communication, random flowers that showed up at your office and a constant offer of a ride in his luxurious black mercedes-benz GT63s; no matter how long it took- even if it was a inconvenience, sometimes taking longer to get to you than it would have taken you to simply retort to public transport.
"I told you i´d make it for you, didn´t I baby? hm?" his velvet smooth voice rings, from how he´s standing, with his body pressed against your back, towering over you, you could feel the hardened muscles of his torso meeting you. His large, slim hands reach to either side of your waist, to the glass filled with ice that you´re holding in between your own, gently removing them to resume the task that you were occupied with. Your eyes glance to the bulging of his bicep, that loose, casual tshirt did nothing to hide just how big he had gotten due to his newfound hobby.
you whine- almost, biting down on your lower lip to prevent just that from happening, "thank you gguk" you say, turning to peck the very muscle that´s invading your line of sight. He hums, a low, satisfied sound from the back of his throat.
"c´mere baby" patting one of his muscular thighs, his eyes drift to your figure walking towards him, iced tea in hand, just like he had made it for you. Sweet, light, refreshing, much like your presence in his life. Almost like a sign from the stars that his hearts content was somewhere, bundled in the form of a shorter girl with eyes that could entrance any sailor- far less siren like, no, wide with love and purity. Just what he had yearned for in any women he had met before you-whether tangled in meaningless sheets or involved in a month long, semi serious relationship, Jungkook was yet to cross paths with the one woman that would make him turn so desperate, he would have begged for their happiness on his knees. It might be romantic, even a tad dramatic to admit that from the very first word that left your pink glossed lips, he knew better than anyone else that he was in deep, deep trouble. Upon seeing the curve of your waist, hearing that soft, lulling voice, that embarrassingly obvious fact only intensified after finding out just how delightful you truly were, it made him want to rip his hair out- do anything in the possibility of his grip to see even a glimpse of your smile, of that lighthearted, cheerful giggle you let out regularly. He was drawn in my your feminine nature, by the way you let yourself fall into his caring embrace.
He´s quickly directed back to reality as soon as your legs make it to either side of the thigh he had patted earlier, a familiar position for this equally familiar occasion. Muscle memory sets in for him, grabbing the large karaoke remote to hand to you while he turns the microphone on. "Can you sing something to me first?" the question sets his bunny smile off, nodding instantly "Sure love, chose a song for me" he says. Your mind floods with ideas, but you settle for a song you´ve heard him hum millions of times, mindlessly going about.
"Malibu nights?", jungkook questions excitedly while the instrumental sets in, he knew the answer, but his heart swelled with joy at the notice you took to this song. After all, he loved to sing. Another layer to him that has you melting, growing into the embodiment of love that is endlessly cherishing what little fractions were revealed to your eyes in each fleeting moment. His honey voice reaches beautiful highs and lows you can only compare to something angelically otherworldly in nature.
It made you want to know just how deep he could growl, how far his sounds can drop with the dirty nothings you would love to have whispered in your ear. You felt filthy for letting your mind wander to such extends when all he did was sing, lulling you into drunken harmony with him. Still, you consciously lean back into his body, letting him wrap his arms around your waist, encircling it with his vanilla oak scent.
During the past four months, you were doomed to have to shatter his hopes, reveal the truth that somehow felt shameful ; that you´re fully untouched. Nothing further than a bad makeout had yet graced your skin, it made you feel even smaller admitting something so vulnerable to a man that carries almost an entire decade of experience more. Much to your comfort, his hands found the curve of your cheeks immediately, telling you that there is nothing to be embarrassed about, he would hand you the full control, you set the pace.
Internally, Jungkook drooled at the idea that the woman of his dreams was to have her first, the most memorable, sexual encounter with him. Your body belonged to him, devoted to only remember the touch of his lips, the curve of his cock, how he would mold you to his shape without the intrusion of another man having tried the same. Not that he would have wanted you any less if that had not been the case, but for one time in your relationship, he was oh so selfish to want you all to himself, aroused that your first person induced orgasm was going to be his and his alone. The prophecy fulfilled when on one, alcohol induced night a week ago, two of his long, tattooed digits made their entrance into your tight hole, relentlessly filling you until your soft thighs shook, until after your third high, he licked his fingers clean and let you taste yourself on his tongue.
The tunes get lost in silence, he sets the microphone down, having felt the warmth of your mound beneath the tights while you tried to subtly gain friction, scooting back on him. His palms find your thighs, tightly flushed around his muscle. They´re shamelessly wandering up and down the thin material that prevents his hot, calloused fingers from feeling up your smooth skin.
"Wanna do that again, love?" jungkook mutters, his pillowed lips latch on to your exposed neck, right at the gentle curve that paints the beginning of your shoulder, soft, faint kisses that leave a trail of barely sounding sighs behind.
"Do what?" feigning innocence to avoid internal humiliation, you ask him, knowing he wouldn´t let it go, not until you told him to. The sound of his husky chuckle sounds right on the sweetspot of your neck, he sucks a little harder, encouraging you with the constant rub to your thighs. Instinctively, the heat inside your panties grows as do the intensity of your desperate moans, your hips push back on his thigh, seeking the solidity that grants you the portion of satisfaction your needy button longed for
"that" he simply says, having found an anchor in your hips now, your plaid skirt bunches around his hands, slowly- tortuously so when met with the deliberate little humps he helps you to complete on him. You practically whimper once his tongue glides across your skin, dragging from your shoulder, up your neck, intertwined with his open mouth, loud kisses that don´t seem to stop.
"that´s it... do you even know how cute you sound?" he smiles, and you feel it, you feel the smile rise to his lips with every additional kiss, every noise you grant the hungry male. "gguk, wanna see you" you whine- the high pitched noise has him twitching in his training joggers, semi errect but about to stand stiff, just as noticeably as that night seven days ago, having formed a huge tent inside his slacks, there was no hiding his attraction, no use to conceal his utter need for you.. nor his size, not that he would be capable to anyways.
To your request, he helps you turn around, now facing that dim glow on your slightly embarrassed features, taking note of how you nibble on your lip with every grind forward, "that feel good sweet girl?" he asks, ghosting his lips over yours faintly, just enough to see how much you need it, "mhm.. really good" you mumble back, chasing after his lips that he can't deny you of any longer, the kiss is gentle, but nourishes your heat further
"wanna feel even better?" the pit in your lower abdomen grows at the tone of his voice, something much stronger is seeping through his system, something that screams dominance, you nod- naturally wanting to get lost in it. Jungkook's hands stop assisting you, instead, they take to your shirt, "can i take this off of you baby?" he waits for that little hum of yours before swiftly tugging it away from your form
It's almost frightening how quickly your mind reverts back to wanting to run away and hide, your arms fly across your chest, everything you felt so good doing stops and he stops too,
"don't hide, you're perfect, you're so fucking sexy" his eyes trace your skin, hands wrapping around your wrists to pull your arms away, revealing your chest hugged into your bra, and jungkook almost forgets how to breathe properly,
he groans- groans that delicious deep noise that makes your head spin, even more so when you feel his appreciation for your body, hands pulling you closer by the waist so can bury his head into your cleavage. "so beautiful" he mutters, darting his tongue out to lick the slit between your tits, "wanna touch all over you, make you feel so good" he says, finding the clasp on your back to open it with one hand. a silent reminder of his experience, one you did not have in the slightest but somehow, it felt even better that way
"mh.. feels good gguk" you can't help but moan at the forgein sensation, his lips wrap around your hardend nipple, groaning sweetly while he sucks on it, carefully swiping his tongue over the little nub- your other breast is securely fitted into his palm, thumb playing with it just like he does with his mouth, mirroring every little flick
"feels so good doesn't it? you smell so good baby" his lips move to do the same to your other breast, switching sides with a trail of saliva sticking to his lips,
In that moment you feel so sensitive, so lost in his secure hold and at the same time, so small in his skillful dominance that you simply relish in the feeling, grinding your soaked core into his thigh over and over, long, hasty drags over his muscle while his lips work magic on your skin, squeezing a little tighter, sucking a little harder because every stuttered whimper fuels his urge to take care of you
"that's it baby.. keep going, you're so good" your hands find his dark chocolate locs, threading through it with the need to ground yourself. it feels as though every time your clit meets him, instead of getting you closer to sensational relief it adds to the ache, feeds into your desire to take and take more of him, be consumed by his strength
"want this off please" your excited fingers fiddle with the hem of his oversized shirt, earning a smug grin from your boyfriend as he detaches from you, discarding of his top
Although you have seen him shirtless before, it's impossible not to salivate at the sight, at his toned broad torso that curves into a unfairly small waist, large arms flexing when he reaches for your tits again, massaging them once more,
"like what you see pretty?" he says, teasingly cocking his head and biting at the metal ring on the corner of his lip, you blush- the slick drools out even more between your thighs, "so hot gguk, annoyingly hot" he chuckles, joining the sound with your airy giggle, but he sucks in a breath as soon as you shift in his lap, now fully straddling him, naked chest pressed to his with your head burried in his neck, "hmm.. what are you up to baby?" his hands find your back, soothing himself not to pounce on you because the strain in his pants is staggering his breath, your errect nipples are rubbing against his skin and it´s making him shiver, desperate, oh so desperate for you
but he knows all to well not to overwhealm your sweet, virgin body, to let you take all the time you need until he can feel every breath of your submission
"wanna feel you gguk, can i?" jungkook almost purrs at how innocently you ask, suppressing the need to grind his hips into your heat from below, "of course baby, anything you want. it's all yours"
he meant it, every vein cursing through his body belongs to you, working, pumping blood through him for the sole purpose of loving you, taking care of you. "all mine?" you hum, aroused by the confidence he emitts, your hands trace up his torso, creating a small distance between your bodies to feel up the hard lines on his abdomen with laboured breath of your own, lips finding every small patch of his neck that make him hum, make his sighs of pleasure slowly turn into groans "all yours my love" the answer wasn't necessary, not when you already started to leave traces of you on his skin, faint, red bruises on his neck that he's impatiently waiting to run around with
"you feel so fucking good, need to feel more of you, will you let me sweet girl?" his words are intoxicating, washing away any doubt or fear and replacing it with a intense craving of sexual desire "please gguk i'm so wet for you" the sound reaches his ears and shuts down his entire system, his hands carelessly rip down your skirt and stockings, leaving you in those tiny grey boyshorts that he looses his mind over "baby how did you hide all this from me?" his hands caress your thighs, your hips, up your waist and to the soft flesh of your stomach with hungry, insatiable eyes that long for a taste of your every inch
"all yours" you mimic him, sounding just like him with your sultry, shy voice, already wanting to remove his own bottoms which he catches on, ridding himself of the nuisance "yeah, all mine. this is all mine" he says, smiling softly
Your drenched underwear meets his errection as he pulls you back on his lap, hands sitting on your waist, you look so vulnerable- almost fragile in his grip, shyly moaning because the curve of his cock presses into your skin like it was molded for you, needy folds clinging to your underwear and your clit throbs- throbs begging for another taste of friction
"I don't know how to do any of this" he suddenly he hears you mumble, seeing how you're playing with your fingers that sit on his lower abdomen, your head is turned to them, a slight pout decorates your features
jungkook feels the need to sob- to take away whatever is making that pretty head of yours feel so threatened even though you're the best thing he has ever felt, the only person he ever wants to lay his hands on ever again
"that's okay baby, hey, look at me for a second will you?" you comply, craving his lead, his security to catch you, most of all that gentle, masculine dominance that floods your senses effortlessly
"you're doing so so well pretty, you don't have to worry okay? i'll take you through it, make you feel so good" he says, cupping your cheeks in his palms while sitting up a little to press kisses to your nose, your forhead, your lips and cheeks,
unable to contain your smile, you nod, gaining back the heartbeat in your willing feminity to let him take care of you, "thank you baby" you say with upmost honesty, pressing your lips to his in a kiss of adoration
"mhm.. come on, let's get this off of you love" his whipers lingers on you, fingers slipping beneath the waistband of your underwear before pulling it off your lifted legs, he moans at the sight of your bare cunt, slick attached to the cloth and glistening over your feminity
"so beautiful, do you even realize how lucky i am? how thankful i am that this sweet, sweet girl is all mine to love?" he says softly, so softly that your eyes gloss a little bit, feeling so utterly vulnerable in front of him, so sexy in the most feminine way possible. blush creeps up your cheeks, his hands find your inner thigh, dancing around the sensitive skin "you're too sweet gguk"
he returns your smiles, lifting your hand to kiss it before intertwining it with his own, lacing his fingers into you because being apart from your body feels like torture in this moment. but you're eyes are busied elsewhere, locked on the large outline that stands rock solid insides of his calvins, a small, wet patch that indicates his arousal decorating the very top
"go ahead baby, take it off" not needing to be told twice, you help yourself to his boxers, tugging them down in one, slow motion that leaves him biting his bottom lip, he pushes them down to his ankles, kicking them off
both of you sit like this for a moment that feels like eternity, raw, bare and without a chance to hide in front of the other's desperate gaze, comfort, pure love that's inseparable with a pulsing you can no longer ignore, not when he´s so big, so broad and decorated with a vein alongside his curved shaft
he grabs at the flesh of your ass, pulling you to sit your gushing cunt over his stiff length, cursing at feeling how soft you are, how much arousal truly spills from your body
"you're so.. big gguk.. m'scared" your whine makes him coo, stroking your head while a possessive grip that stays on your hip, his left hand tethering to your hair in the meantime, "don't be, you were made for me sweet girl, made for it" your head falls to his shoulder, arching your torso into his body with a small hump to his leaking cock, "that's right baby, feel it, feel how hard i am for you" spurred on by his encouragement, you tighten your hands on his bicep, rolling your hips over his, his entire shaft is coated in your essence, angry pink tip meeting your swollen clit repeatedly, so much so you feel your thighs shake, feel an impending orgasm waiting to flow over your body,
Ripping yourself of that sensation, not yet- you tell yourself
"want it gguk, want it so bad" jungkook hums, kissing your neck messily, cock throbbing beneath you, "want what pretty? talk to me" he says, his own desire to claim you all to himself becomes unbareable with each passing second that you stay put
You shift forward again, whining, "please gguk" he groans, twitching at how desperate you sound, entranced with how needy you've become for him, he didn't even have to make you beg for it, you just did
effortlessly perfect for him, "come on, tell me my love" but he has to hear more, he needs to hear the dirty confession falling from your pure lips
"want your cock jungkook, please" there it is- that submissive, whiny plead for him, it makes him feel alive, throwing his head back on the black leather couch momentarily "good girl, fuck baby you're so cute" he praises, taking the base of his cock into his hand but something stalls him, "do you want me to eat you out first? make it nice and slippery?" his teeth graze your ear, kissing over the shell of it, "no gguk i want it, want it now"- another nibble, "anything for you"
Your hips lift, hovering your tight, clenching hole over his thick manhood, hands sweaty and grasping at his firm shoulders, he spots your anxiety, wishing nothing more but to ease it
"sit down on it baby, it's gonna sting okay? but you're so good, I know you can take it" more, more reassuring words that you drink in, just as you sink down on it, wincing as your brows meet in frustration
"hurts.." you mutter, fingers digging into his tanned skin- you can't bring yourself to move down further, clenching your muscle tightly around only his fat tip that feels like it's splitting your drooling pussy open. his hands find your back again, "ssh baby.. i know... but you'e such a good girl, i know you can take every inch of my cock"
It takes a couple more kisses to your shoulder for you to sink down fully on his length, painfully so- having your hands claw into him, your lips trembling in confusion of why it feels so good to have him stuffed into you so deeply you can feel it inside your tummy, stretching into every crevice of your gummy walls. It's unlike anything you've ever felt before, fulfilling, deep pressure that you could get lost in- bathe in
Jungkooks feelings have synchronized with yours- he's unsure where you end or where he begins but you're clamped down on his cock, your skin already wet with sweat as it sticks to his unforgivingly, moans and shaky breaths fill in the silence, a unspoken question lingers, awaits for you to answer it
until you do, taking his large hands to your hips before pressing yours against his full pecks, a glint of confidence spites your eyes that makes jungkook want to hear you cry out his name over and over again
"oh fuck- baby you-" you whine, rolling your hips forward, mouth parted when you feel him move inside of you, slolwy, deeply "that's it my love, take your time, so sexy like this" his voice is far from stable, you moan again- the grinding becomes faster, assisted by his hands that pull you onto him just the way you like it- just like he said, you have it all, its all yours
"what- what if you can't come?" he needs to contain a laugh at that- the question is so absurd to him, so unimaginable that it makes him slightly angry why you couldn't understand that he could cum from seeing you alone, from one kiss to your chaste lips- he's already twitching at how sloppy, how loud your cunt is around him
"I almost came from seeing how needy that little pussy of yours is, you feel how hard i am don't you? all because of you baby" he mutters in response, you flourish at it, getting familiar with the grinding motion but you need more, you deserve more- so you start bouncing on him- up and down, slamming your own, curved hips down onto him. he's mesmerized by your pleasure, watching how your brows are knitted, how your lips leak with drool and airy moans, how your tits bounce- he gropes at them, cupping them greedily, his hands itch for your skin, for you to let yourself go on him
"good girl.. look at you, a natural at riding my cock- don't even need my help" you shake, exhaustion already growing in your eager hips but you cannot stop, you don´t want to stop taking every inch of his cock back into you, lifting your hips only to take him back in, "you're filling me so much" you moan into his mouth, having formed a unity with his lips that welcome you like home, "just like that pretty, little humps for me" he mumbles back, interlacing his tongue with yours
he tugs at your nipples with his inked fingers, reciprocrating the moaning, he mirrors you, throbs when you clench, explores your mouth when you part for him impatiently. it leaves you to no choice but to become his own reflection, your hips ground themselves in a stable rhythm as your fingertips roll over his own nipples, unexpectedly he whimpers, bites down into your shoulder cautiously
"That's it baby, driving me fucking crazy" he grinds his hips up into you, unlocking a feeling of bliss that leads you to errupt into pornographic moans, your hand flings to muffle them, eyes rolling back into your skull,
Jungkook is making love to you, letting you reach a state you would not have been able to imagine, not even in the slightest when all you have ever felt are your fingers hastily, uncoordinated on your bundle of nerves. still, he can feel you´re holding back, afraid to be loud- to take up space, but he's having none of it
"Dont be embarrassed sweet girl, you sound addicting, so cute, give me every little noise" sinful sensuality floods you with his encouragement, "gonna make you cum for me, deserve it don't you think?" you don't- in fact, you can't think, long gone into pleasure while his hips piston into you from below,
he slaps your clit gently, your walls clench from how good that feels, "i asked you something baby" he repeats, distracted by your droopy eyes that threaten to shut him out at any moment, "answer me sweet thing, do you deserve to cum hm?" he taunts, rutting his hips with a slower but harder motion, force that hits your g-spot- reels you back into the moment, you head moves frantically "yes, yes please i need to cum"
Jungkook groans in satisfaction, "that's right.. best little cunt, all mine" he goes back lapping at your chest, licking his way to any patch of skin that your addictive smell lurs him to- he feels all over your skin, sneaking his fingers to where your bodies morph into one so he can draw tight circles on your clit, stimulating you to cry out his name,
"Jungkook.. i- i can't stop it i-" you stutter, thighs tensing around him, the feeling is so overwhealming that you can't keep your head up, can't warn him more than that since you're already letting your dew sprinkle out- letting the shocks roll over your body
"just like that.. make a mess on my cock baby, you did so well, come for me" he rasps, his heavy balls release into your tightness at the thought that crosses his mind- the knowledge that he had made you orgasm, that your virginity belonged to him solely,
It embraces the both of you, fills you with a sense of euphoria that none of you wish to end
As the high washes over you, you break out into a small shudder, aware of his milky cum that splurts your walls white, aware of the oversensitive area between your legs that jungkook's fingers slowly stop touching, landing to your unstable and sore thighs instead.
his heavy breathing is woven into yours, contrasting how slowly, lazily he manages to caress your naked skin, finding comfort in your warm body
the small whisper of his name catches him off guard, he hums, pulling back to cup your face, "are you okay my love? feel good?" his eyes rank over your tired features, glowing before his very own eyes,
"so okay. I love you" you breathe out, pressing a kiss to his button nose,
"I love you too baby, so proud of you" his nose nuzzles against yours, "you were so so good"
your shy giggle lights up his face like it always does, "thank you.. for taking my virginity... felt so good" you mumble with your bottom lip tucked away between your teeth- it awakens his soft- still nestled cock, his hands grip your ass- feeling the flesh spill beneath his fingers "thank you for your trust baby, but god, you're gonna make me lose it" jungkook says into your neck, nose tracing the delicate line of your shoulder,
"why? is it too much?" unbeknownst to you, Jungkook rolls his eyes in annoyance, how could you be so fucking adorable?
"Let me show you why" he answers, making your head perk up a little,
"Wanna lay down for me pretty? I can give you another one, as many as you want. You deserve it, wanna spoil you, fuck i wanna give you everything you want" faintly audible as he's speaking into your skin, having already laid you down onto the cold cushions of his unreasonably expensive leather couch.
#redcherrykook#jungkook fanfic#jeon jungkook#jungkook x reader#jungkook x y/n#jungkook x you#jungkook smut
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peristalsis - i.
selkie!soap x reader. suicidal ideation. strangers to "lovers." . Running away from life to the Scottish Hebrides, you meet a man who won't leave you alone. . Masterlist. Ao3.
When your mother asks you if you’re planning to kill yourself, you have to lie to her.
To be fair to you, it’s a half-lie. You have no plans. Courage, you find, is as slippery as an eel in gloved palms—you don’t actually think you could do it if you tried. You’re deeply averse to pain of the bloody sort, and doing the deed would take a will and an energy you don’t really have.
But still. You’ve stopped looking both ways when crossing a street. You forget the stove is on, hot oil in the pan popping like the report of a handgun. The sound of shattering glass is the only thing that makes your heart sit calm in your chest, and the only thing that can make you fall asleep anymore is the notion that when you die, the earth will welcome the molecules of your body back into its folds.
So a half-lie is not the truth. You sit in the terminal, the afternoon smell of airport coffee in your nose as you swear to your mother that you’re not looking for a cliff to jump off of, or a convenient wave to pull you under. You’ve always wanted to visit Scotland, remember?
You can’t tell if she believes you. Probably not. People not planning to kill themselves don’t blow their savings on a first class ticket over the Atlantic with no scheduled return flight.
Especially not after quitting their job.
The flight over the Atlantic is uneventful. Quiet as money can buy. You sip champagne at your window seat, recline as far back as you can go, and watch the ocean, far, far below. Its depths exceed, you remember, the heights at which humanity can fly—but you can’t really tell, looking at it from so far above. It looks like nothing less than a thin veneer stretched overtop the crust of the earth. A puddle that could barely cover the soles of your feet.
There’s not a single murmur of turbulence across the fifteen hours you’re in the air. Much that you might’ve welcomed it.
Your connecting trip to the Hebrides is much shorter. The massive sprawl of Glasgow shrinks and recedes as you leave it behind, replaced not long after by a spit of an island chain that, from a distance, hardly looks worth populating.
You land on Barra, on a sandy stretch of beach still wet and compact from the receding tide. There’s a cottage here with your name on the rental agreement for the next month, and your mind is already there ahead of you, thinking about arranging your toothbrush and toothpaste on the bathroom counter and sitting and listening to nothing but cold island wind in the grass. The cottage’s owner has graciously agreed to drive you there.
When you step off the plane, you miss him at first. You’re expecting someone completely different—an older man in cable knit, perhaps more mustache than face, and the morose demeanor of someone for whom sunlight is as common on the island as veins of gold. So your eyes skip over the younger man, even despite the sign he’s holding with your name on it.
But then you look again. Because with a man like him, you can’t not look again.
He’s wearing a sweater, sure. But he also looks like a rugby team maverick—burly and tall, rugged, tattooed, flaunting a dumb haircut because he’s handsome enough to get away with it.
He stands out from the few people in the airport as if the whole world has adjusted its lens to bring him into focus, sharpening his image such that anything in his periphery is too blurry to notice. He does not in the slightest look like he rents out an old fisher’s croft in the least popular place in Scotland.
But then you catch your name. Do a double take. Clutch your suitcase handle a little tighter, because when you approach, the man’s eyes widen, look you up and down, and then crease with a too-confident smile.
“Bonnie!” he exclaims when you introduce yourself. He has a deep, rough voice, burred and low. More still, he’s kilted, plaid hanging at muscular knees, with an odd speckled pelt slung around his hips.
You’ve never seen that before—maybe it’s an islander thing.
“You must be Mr. John MacTavish,” you say. Up close, there’s a weathered look to him, as if buffeted by the salt in the wind.
“Johnny’s fine,” he says, winking. His eyes are a lively, vibrant blue. The color of the ocean in some place much nicer than this one. “Welcome to Scotland!”
Then, incredibly, “Johnny” pulls you into a hug before you even realize what’s happening, brawny arms closing around you like the noose of a snare. You go rigid—what the hell?—but this man, whom you have met only just now, doesn’t seem to notice, compressing you against the blazing pillar of his body in an embrace that flattens your lungs behind your ribs.
“Um,” you manage. He smells like axe body spray and diesel fuel, and cold ocean wind. It wipes the forefront of your mind blank, like sweeping an arm across drawings etched in sand.
After at least five whiplashed beats of your heart, Johnny pats your back several times and lets you go, grinning.
“Sorry, bonnie. Scots are huggers.”
Then without warning, he reaches for the handle of your suitcase, warm hand nudging aside your own. “Let’s get you down there ‘fore the tide comes in. Canny wait t’show you the place, I fixed it up m’self.”
You let him take your luggage and follow; he sets off at an energetic clip that you struggle to keep up with. He gestures with his free hand as he talks, motions rising and falling with the tenor of his voice.
“You know you’re m’first guest? Was startin’ to wonder if I was gonna have to sell the place, no one seemed all that interested. Guess I can see why, no internet, barely any signal. Me, I think that’s a good thing, people spend too much time on their phones, y’know?”
You make a noncommittal noise.
Were you this cold before he let go of you?
“But it’s a great little place to get away, I promise you, nice and quiet, and I updated everything m’self. Radiator in the bedroom and everything!”
Another noise from you.
Thankfully, you reach his car—a small truck, older than the both of you, with only one row of seats and what looks like large spools of rope in the bed. Johnny pauses briefly to secure your suitcase beside them with a couple of bungee cords, and then opens the passenger side door for you to get in.
“It’s not too far from town too,” he continues as he slides into the driver’s seat. You attach your seat belt. He does not. “You got your essentials there. A supermarket—think you call ‘em grocery stores? There’s that and a cafe and a pub. No bank though, so let’s get cash now if you need it.”
“I have some.” You’d exchanged for a few hundred pounds in Glasgow.
“Good! You want to stop by the store? Took the liberty of filling up the fridge too, but if there’s somethin’ you want—”
“No,” you say.
“Alrigh,’” says Johnny.
You feel his eyes on you—when you look at him, he’s smiling again. You are not pleased to find, through the benefit of close proximity, that he has dimples.
“What?” you ask, suddenly self-conscious.
“Nothin,’” he says.
Johnny drives you across the causeway from Barra to Vatersay, the latter of which, he helpfully informs you, is populated by less than a hundred people.
“More wildlife than anything,” he comments, as the ocean outside the window passes by. The water is dull and gray, hidden from the sun by an overcast sky. “That’s what the tourists come for. You here to see the seals?”
“Seals?” you ask.
“Aye,” Johnny says, grinning. “They come here for breeding season.”
You ignore the quirk of his eyebrows.
The cottage stands alone, a ways out from the island’s main village at the top of a modest hillock. Island grasses sway along the dirt road as Johnny directs the truck upwards, coming to a stop a few meters away from the house proper.
It’s quaint. Thatch roof, cobbled walls. A generator hooked up on one side. There are flower boxes flanking the front door, although nothing’s in bloom; it’s the wrong season for it. The window frames are unpainted, and the glass panes, despite looking recently cleaned, are crusted with salt at the corners.
And it’s smaller than it looked in the pictures online. Even close up to it, the blue-grey sky overhead, swimming with dun-colored clouds, swallows it up.
You exit the truck into a cold breeze that tugs at the collar of your fleecy sweater. You’d read online that this time of year was the last gasp of summer into the autumn months in the Hebrides—it hardly feels that way, with the chill that drags its fingers across your hairline.
“It’s on a septic tank so y’ve got alright plumbing,” Johnny goes on, hefting your suitcase over one brawny shoulder. “Canny say much for the water pressure in the shower, but other than tha’ it’s alright. Matters more that it’s hot, ‘f you ask me—and it is! Come on, I’ll give y’the tour.”
The cottage is not big enough to warrant one. Johnny shows you the four rooms—kitchen, sitting room, bathroom, and bedroom—in under five minutes. It ends with him leaned up against the counter, arms folded genially across his plush chest, grinning at you like he knows some embarrassing secret of yours.
“Was thinkin,’” he says, scratching the stubble on his jaw with one thumbnail, “this’d be kind of a honeymoon thing, y’know? That woman with the time travel show, lots a’folks been comin’ here lately ‘cause a’her.”
“Is there anything else to do here besides look at seals?” you ask.
Soap gazes at you through half-lidded eyes, smirking. “I dinnae think you leave the bedroom much on a honeymoon, do you?”
You flush. “I never really thought about it.”
“So you’re no’ married, then?”
“No. Not—not interested.”
Johnny lifts one brow. “In marriage?”
“In anything.”
He keeps fucking smiling. You have a barely controllable urge to smack him; you settle for wringing the hem of your sweater, imagining it could be his neck.
“So what brings y’here, then?” he asks, tilting his head like a cat playing with its food. “If no’ a honeymoon?”
You frown.
The truth is, of course, that nothing brought you here. Vatersay, nor the Hebrides, nor Scotland itself were actually of any consequence. You’re ambivalent about the ocean, and you certainly don’t care about seals.
You just hadn’t been able to think of anything you wanted when you asked yourself that perennial question. You wanted nothing.
You wanted nothing.
So you found as much nothing as you could and bought the soonest first class ticket heading toward it.
Your only stipulation had been no language barrier—so here you are now, cursing the lack of such, because it means this man, who belongs on this island no more than you do, is bothering to try and talk to you.
“Just wanted some peace and quiet,” is what you decide to say.
“Needed a change, aye?” Johnny nods sagely, as if understanding. “I did too, when I came here. Was in the army. Special forces.”
“O-okay,” you say, because you hadn’t asked.
“Didnae plan to stay,” he continues.
He turns his head to look out the kitchen window; on one temple is the ghost of a scar. A starburst-ripple in the shaved side of his dark hair—nothing more.
But something about it suggests that the wound it closed around was a horror to behold.
Then he turns back to you, the corners of his mouth quirked. “But somethin’ about this place is hard to leave.” The quirk turns into another smarmy grin “Bet when your month’s up, you’ll know what I mean.”
It seems rude to say probably not. “Maybe.”
The radiator in the kitchen breathes a swell of warm air through the room, blooming with Johnny’s diesel-and-ocean scent. There’s very little space between you, him against the counter, you across from him at the sink. Johnny’s bulk claims what little room there is to maneuver, and if you tried to move away, it would require first moving closer.
“So,” you begin.
“Here,” he intercedes. “Wanna show you somethin.’”
The only reason you comply is because he leads you outside, which is a step closer to him finally leaving you alone. Johnny circles around the cottage, revealing a footpath that leads down the hill. The ground transitions from soil to sand as you both walk; the wind picks up as the sound of waves grows. Eventually you reach what turns out to be a small cove, hidden by the curve of the island, flanked on both sides by cliffs of only middling height.
The tide is only now making its way in; probably why you hadn’t realized it was here earlier. You think you’ll be able to hear the waves when you go to sleep tonight.
“Oh,” you say, unable to hide that it’s impressed you.
“Yeah,” Johnny replies, smug. “All yours. Come down whenever you like. Dinna recommend skinny dippin’ this time a’year, though.”
You look at him, intending some sort of flat response, but what you see stops your words up in the chamber of your throat.
There’s something…different about him. There’s a sharp glint in his eyes that wasn’t there before. A dangerous cant to the angle of his grin. He suddenly feels very real to you—
Like standing in front of a wild animal.
Realizing, at the same time it does, that there is no barrier between it and you.
He looks you up and down. He doesn’t even try to hide it; too-blue eyes jaunt from yours down to your throat, the span of your shoulders, lingering on your chest before drifting down your stomach and hips. His nostrils flare as he inhales deeply, shoulders lifting as his chest expands, and you get the strange sense that he’s trying to smell you.
The ice that slithers through your veins, drips down the rigid column of your spine, wars with the spike of heat that breaks across your face. You feel here. You feel very present, your heart pumping wet in your chest, electrical wisps zipping to every nerve ending and back up your cerebellum to remind your brain of every part of your existing body.
Suddenly you are in Scotland, thousands of miles away from home, freezing fucking cold, only half of all the money you have in the world left in your bank account. Tomorrow stretching out in front of you. The next day after it.
Panic, which you thought buried, turns over in your belly, grave-dirt too light to keep it down. Hard earth is beneath your feet. A light drizzle is starting overhead. You begin to shiver, your nervous system’s effort to warm your hairless mammal body up, to save you from the cold and the wet and the fucking predator standing two paces away from you while gazing at you like it can’t wait to break your bones open for the marrow inside.
“Okay,” you finally snap, though you’re unable to keep your voice from quivering. “I really appreciate you driving me, Johnny, but—”
His eyes flash. The ocean-depths of them shift with an awareness beyond your ken, the dark edges deepening, the vivid blue swirling. The expression on his face transmutes into something unknowable—like the difference between the look on a pet dog’s face and a wolf’s.
Something isn’t there that should be, and what is in its place is entirely unfamiliar.
What is in its place is something your species evolved long past being able to understand.
Then, as quickly as it appeared, the flash is gone. Johnny is human again, as if he had always been in the first place. The thin crows’ feet at the corners of his eyes crinkle, as he gives you what he probably thinks is a sympathetic smile.
He doesn’t seem able, or perhaps willing to hide how amused he is, though.
“Long flight, I know,” he croons, meeting your gaze again. “Dinna worry, bonnie, I’ll let you get your rest.”
Whatever you were about to say dies. Your mouth hangs open. Johnny backs away from you, hands casually in his pockets.
“I’ll take you to see the seals tomorrow!” he calls to you before he turns away. A sudden gust ruffles the pelt hanging around his hips. “I know all the best spots.”
He throws you a casual wave, and then disappears over the rise.
You do hear the waves that evening, when you lay down to sleep. The covers are soft over you, cozy and warm even as the ocean wind hums outside.
You can’t stop shivering.
next
a/n: last fic of the year (probably)! i'm so into this one tbh. i figured out the ending a while ago and i'm so dang excited to get to it.
#soap x reader#soap x you#john soap mctavish x reader#john soap mctavish x you#john soap x reader#soap mactavish#soap mactavish x reader#soap mctavish#john soap mactavish#how the hell is his last name even spelled#mwritessoap#madi writes
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The Hero and Hope
Based off a world where everyone gets a Destiny they must fulfill. Bakers and Demon Kings (x) and Villagers (X). You? You are a Hero.
----------------
You are a Hero.
Nobody at the orphanage knows. The mark sets during the worst winter in three decades, when the windows have to be barred to prevent snow spirits from ripping them to shreds and the Director takes half the reserves and runs in the middle of the night.
Sarah, the only caregiver left in the rickety building, holds as many of the kids as she can while the snow spirits scream outside. You’d love to be in the circle of her arms, but you’re holding the door shut with as much strength as your eight-year-old arms allow.
She doesn’t tell you to get away from the door.
“It’s alright,” she says, voice trembling. Her brown hair, matted from the months indoors, hides her eyes. She croons to the younger kids like a bird, so softly and gently that you have to strain to hear it over the howling demons and roaring winds. “We’ll be okay. Our land’s Lord will send a Hero, you’ll see. We’ll be okay then.”
Your arms burn as intensely as your eyes. A Hero. Your stomach aches from hunger and your fingers sting from the cold. You aren’t sure how much good you’re doing keeping the door closed, but there’s something deep inside of you that tells you you must do something. The blows from the snow spirits outside vibrate up your arms, nearly throwing you back.
Heroes, you think, only matter if they show up.
Hope is traumatic. Eight-years-old and you’ve been returned from potential families twice. Three days ago, you found the beginnings of greenery in the woods behind the orphanage. When you excitedly raced back to tell the others that winter was ending, it was only to find the Director and most of the caregivers gone with a significant portion of the rations.
Then the storm clouds rolled in.
So that long, dangerous night, you don’t hope. You shut your ears to Sarah’s gentle comforts and the snow spirits’ shrieks. You focus on the burning in your arms, the blisters forming on your heels, the cold nipping at your fingers.
Hope is traumatic but trying is something you can do. You put your small body between all of the horrors outside the door and the other kids. You try to stand firm.
You don’t notice when the burning in your arms hides the arrival of a telling mark on your left bicep.
---------------------.
You are fourteen years old, one year shy of coming into your power, when a couple visits the orphanage intending to adopt.
Sarah is now the Director of the orphanage, awarded the position by the land’s Lord after that terrible winter six years ago. She’s different than she was then. You lost three kids to hunger before spring finally came and she held each one in their last moments.
You and Sarah never develop the close relationship she has with the other kids. But she always makes sure you have more meat in your meals than most and, when you hunt in the woods, you always let her decide how the food will be divided between dinner and winter stores.
“We’re Knights,” the potential adopters tell the Director. They’re a couple, a man and a woman with dark hair and muscular bodies. “Retired. We’re settling just north of here for good and are looking for a suitable child who can follow in our footsteps.”
Director Sarah looks at them coldly, leaning back in her chair and folding her hands over her stomach. If she notices you and two of the younger kids peeking through the crack in the door, she doesn’t say anything. “I apologize, Mr. and Mrs. Bahr, but it seems there’s a misunderstanding. We do not pair children with families based on their Destiny.”
“We’re not saying you do,” Mrs. Bahr says. Her gaze is cutting though her shoulders are relaxed. “Our Lord explained before we came. However, there is no rule against asking the children their Destiny, is there?”
Loophole. You pull away from the crack in the door, letting Hera and Josiah take your spot. You lean against the wall with your eyes closed. Orphanages aren’t allowed to disclose Destinies, but that’s where the protection ends. If someone sees a child’s Destiny or learns of it through some other means, that’s alright.
These people aren’t here to adopt because they want a child. They’re here to adopt for a guarantee. A guarantee of what remains to be seen. An heir like they claim? A prodigy for status? Or a weapon for them to control?
You listen for any other clues behind their motives, but the Bahrs don’t push the issue of Destiny again. They accept Director Sarah’s schedule for meeting the kids, even offering to host a picnic day at their estate as a treat. The couple wants to gain trust, you can tell, and by the end of the meeting it’s working.
Director Sarah sees them off to the door herself.
“We’ll wait for the invitation,” she says. She’s older now, her thin brown hair showing the beginning signs of going grey. But her handshake looks strong when she shakes Mrs. Bahr’s in farewell. “I’m sure the children will be thrilled.”
“I hope so,” Mrs. Bahr says. Her husband nods to the Director gravely, but Mrs. Bahr lingers. “I’m sorry if we came off a little…forward when we mentioned Destinies. Please believe me when I say that my husband and I aren’t so shallow. We are looking for a child – one we can call our own.”
“I see,” Director Sarah says. There’s a hint of warmth in her voice. “As I said, we look forward to your invitation.”
Mrs. Bahr nods and joins her husband in their carriage. They set off down the road without once having asked to meet one of the children on the first day of their introduction.
You can tell Sarah likes them.
“What do you think?” Sarah asks. She doesn’t turn from the road, even though the Bahr’s carriage is out of sight. “Isla?”
You don’t ask how she knows it’s you lurking in the shadows of the orphanage. Director Sarah is a Guardian. Her senses are elevated when it comes to those under her charge.
“I don’t think anything,” you say. You step out from around the corner with a sigh. No use hiding now. “They’re influential people if they were recommended here by the Lord himself. We’re fortunate.”
“You’re the right age for a Knight’s apprenticeship,” Sarah says.
“Hera hasn’t shown me her Destiny, but it’s probably something suitable,” you say. Hera is ten, one of the older kids at the orphanage. Last summer she lifted Josiah, only a year younger than her and already a head taller, out of the well before he could drown. “You should talk to her about what being part of a Knight family could mean.”
Sarah looks at you over her shoulder. The setting sun catches in her eyes, turning the warm brown into an unearthly amber. “I hope you can accept the possibility they might choose you.”
They won’t. “Aren’t I needed here?” you ask.
Sarah’s expression softens. “You are, Isla,” she says. She weighs her next words carefully. “But I am the one who’s responsible for all of you. I can take care of everyone. If the Bahr family is a good fit…”
“Sure,” you say flippantly. You shove your hands in your pockets and slink back into the orphanage. You don’t dare hope. “I’m going to help Josiah.” He’s on dinner duty tonight. He always cuts the onions too roughly. “See you later.”
You feel Sarah’s eyes on your back like a physical warmth.
-----------.
Being a Hero doesn’t change anything about you. You expected it to when you first noticed the mark but, even six years later, nothing’s different.
You aren’t kinder. When Josiah asks for your dessert, you steal a bit of his as punishment for even asking. When Hera asks for a bedtime story, you tell her one so scary that she has to sleep with one of the other girls. When Sarah asks you to fix the fence around the chickens, you whine and complain that you’re the only one who does anything around the orphanage.
“The curse of being the oldest,” Sarah says dryly. She hands you a hammer and a bucketful of nails. “Some posts were dropped off at the end of the lane. Make sure you’re back by sunset.”
Maybe you’re a little stronger than others. You can drag three posts at once and could probably drag more if you wanted. But another curse of being a Hero is that you’re very aware.
It’s not until you’re nailing a third rail to the fence that Mr. Bahr makes his presence known. You don’t turn even when he makes his steps purposefully heavy to avoid scaring you.
“You’re very strong,” Mr. Bahr says.
His shadow is long and thin, just like him. You observe it from your peripherals, unable to speak with the two nails you’re holding between your lips. You take your time pounding them into the wood. He’s arms, a sword at his hip, but his hands are loose at his sides.
“Good thing I am,” you say at last. You stand and turn in the same motion. He waited for you to finish without chastising you for not speaking right away. You perch the hammer on your shoulder. “Otherwise, the chickens would take over.”
Mr. Bahr laughs. Unlike when he was meeting Director Sarah, his face is relaxed and open. His blue eyes sparkle. “We couldn’t have that now, could we? I suppose we all owe you our thanks for preventing the coop’s coup.”
You want to laugh. You don’t. “Director Sarah won’t like you being here uninvited.”
“I just came to drop off an invitation,” Mr. Bahr says. He studies you for a moment and then smiles. “I hope you’ll accept, Isla.”
A chill races down your spine. How does he know your name? You wipe the sweat from your brow with a scowl. “Maybe I don’t want to be adopted.”
To your surprise, Mr. Bahr nods. “I can understand that,” he says. He looks up at the sky. The light is sliding from the sky, catching on the clouds and turning them a brilliant orange. When he looks back at you, he almost looks…sad. “Think of our invitation as a party, hm? No strings attached.”
For some reason your tongue feels heavy. It takes two tries before you can say, “I need to fix this part of the fence before dark.”
“Want some help?” Mr. Bahr asks.
“I couldn’t ask—”
“You didn’t ask, I offered,” Mr. Bahr says. He rolls up his sleeves and nimbly plucks the hammer from your grip. “I may be a Knight, but I’ve done my fair share of carpentry. Let me show you a few tricks.”
You listen quietly as Mr. Bahr shows you how to twist the nails to avoid splitting the wood. What would have taken you an hour to finish, he accomplishes in a quarter of one, talking to you the entire time.
It’s…odd to have an adult’s attention on you for such a long time. He’s careful not to get too close, always offering you the hammer to practice by setting it on the grass between you rather than handing it to you directly. When you manage to replicate his technique on your second try, Mr. Bahr is more excited than you are.
“Wonderful,” he compliments. He glances up at the sky. The first stars are twinkling. “I’ll be going now and you should too. Have a good night, Isla.”
Unlike the first time he said your name, it feels pleasant now. You mutter a goodbye and leave before he does, scurrying towards the orphanage with your bucket of nails clutched to your chest.
He’s gone when you think to check the road for his carriage. Did he walk here? Ride a horse?
You close and lock the orphanage’s doors behind you.
----------------.
The picnic isn’t scheduled until the middle of summer and it’s spring now. Still, it’s all anyone can talk about.
“We have plenty of time to get ready,” Director Sarah tells them. “The Bahrs will be dropping in from time to time until then. I expect everyone to be on their best behavior when they’re here.”
Josiah raises his hand. “I hear they live in a castle!”
“A manor,” Sarah corrects. “Given to them by our Lord for their years of service.”
“The Guard in town says they worked for the King once!” Hera says, wiggling in her seat. “Is that true?”
“You can ask them yourself,” Sarah says. She claps her hands together and starts urging the kids up. “It’s time for chores. Your assignment is posted by the kitchen…”
You stay seated at the breakfast table. You haven’t eaten your third egg or your last slice of toast. Your stomach feels queasy. You keep thinking about Mr. Bahr saying wonderful when you worked on the fence together.
You aren’t supposed to want to be adopted. You’ve had your chance and you ruined it both times. It’s not fair of you to imagine what it would be like learning swordsmanship from Mr. Bahr and what it’d be like to hear him praise you when you got the next move right. One of the other kids deserve that chance.
You can only do what you can do.
---------------.
Mrs. Bahr is alone the next visit.
No one recognizes her at first. She’s wearing a gown like a noble and her hair is gently flowing down her back rather than tightly pinned behind her head.
“I’ve received the Director’s permission to hold a lesson on writing,” she tells the children. She gestures to the bag she’s set on the table. “Come get a slate and a piece of chalk. We will work all together.”
The kids have never had slate and chalk before, not the real ones anyway. Sometimes you find a nice, flat rock they can draw on with charcoal, but it’s not as entertaining as what Mrs. Bahr brings. She watches everyone in amusement as they immediately start drawing instead of starting the lesson, flower and trees and swords.
“Look, Isla,” Hera says, tugging at your sleeve. You’re seated on the spare chair by the wall, away from the table. She twists from her spot to show you she’s drawn a shaky stick figure. “It’s you!”
Your eyes flick up to Mrs. Bahr. She’s not irritated by the distractions yet. You point with your bit of chalk at the drawing. “Which part of it is me?”
Hera points at a blob in the stick figure’s hand. “That’s the horned rabbit you brought home yesterday!”
You snort. The horned rabbit you’d killed yesterday wasn’t half the size of your body. “Are you sure that’s a horned rabbit? Looks like a turtle to me.”
Hera points to the stick figure’s face. “You can also tell it’s you ‘cause you’re frowning.”
“Hey!”
Mrs. Bahr claps her hands together. Instantly, she has the room’s attention. “I’m glad you all like my present. However, it’s time to get started.”
“Present?” Josiah asks.
“If you work hard today, you will be allowed to keep the slate and chalk as a present,” Mrs. Bahr says. She takes care to make eye contact with every kid. “Only those who work hard.”
It’s generous. You watch Mrs. Bahr from under your lashes as she talks everyone through writing the alphabet. It’s too generous not to be genuine. Try as you might, you can’t figure out any ulterior motive to spending so much on the kids. To look good? For who? For Director Sarah?
Director Sarah won’t be swayed by gifts like this even if the kids could be.
Mrs. Bahr stops well away from you, observing your slate from afar. “Very good, Isla. Do you know how to write?”
“No, ma’am.”
“Read?”
“Only a little.”
Mrs. Bahr hums. She doesn’t look disgusted by your stupidity or put off by your clipped tone. Your first family returned you when you told them. Mrs. Bahr’s lips curve. “Your letters are wonderfully steady. I can tell you will be a very good student.”
She turns before she can see you flush.
---------.
Over the next few months, there isn’t a week that goes by without at least one of the Bahrs visiting. They become a regularity around the orphanage to the point that even Director Sarah stops worrying about the state of their rooms with every visit.
“Kids will be kids,” Mrs. Bahr says when you ask her to wait while you tidy the toys in the parlor. “It’s alright, Isla.”
Your head spins. Sometimes, when one of them says something particularly bizarre, you feel like you’re outside your body. There was a time when they didn’t have toys to leave out in the visiting area. Thanks to the Bahrs, every child has a doll, a slate, a new set of shoes, and an abacus. You are still waiting for the strings that come with these presents.
There haven’t been any yet.
The kids love the Bahrs. Hera insists on baking fresh strawberry tarts for them after a day of gathering. Josiah carefully sounds out passages from their new books to show them that he’s still practicing his letters. Annie and a group of the younger kids spend all day weaving a flower crown for Mrs. Bahr that you have to confiscate before they can put it on her head.
“Go wash your hands,” you scold. Despite your tone, your hands are gentle as you push Annie to the schoolhouse. “Don’t touch your eyes.”
Annie blinks rapidly, trying to hold back tears. “I didn’t know it was poison, lady, I swear.”
“Oh,” Mrs. Bahr says, hand fluttering over her heart. She steps towards Annie. “Dear one—”
You give full body flinch when Mrs. Bahr stoops to hug Annie, but you don’t get between them. The Bahrs have won your trust in this. They won’t hurt the kids.
You sigh to hide your flinch when Mrs. Bahr stands. “Now Mrs. Bahr needs to wash. Poison ivy is no joke.”
“It is not,” Mrs. Bahr agrees. She ruffles Annie’s hair. “Go on, do as Isla says. Wash up.”
“We can go together,” Annie says with her big, blue eyes. She reaches for Mrs. Bahr’s hand and then thinks better of it. She tucks her hands behind her back and kicks at the ground. “If you want.”
“I’ll be right behind you,” Mrs. Bahr says, smiling.
Annie nods and races to follow her friends.
“I’m sorry,” you say as soon as Annie is out of ear shot. You busy yourself picking up the fallen flower crown and the various trimmings of poison ivy they’d used for foliage throughout it. You feel flustered. “They really didn’t know any better—”
“I know,” Mrs. Bahr says so gently that you have to look up at her. She’s frowning at your hands. “I’m more concerned about you. Should you be holding onto it like that?’
“I’m immune,” you say. You’re not worried that she’ll guess your Destiny from that. Lots of Villagers are immune to poison ivy, particularly the ones in this region who rely on gathering and hunting. “Since I’m in the woods so much.”
“Knights are immune too,” Mrs. Bahr says. She follows you away from the orphanage and to the tree line. “You’re quite the hunter, aren’t you? I remember Hera saying you slayed a horned rabbit.”
Heat comes to your face. You stomp ahead of her to deposit the flower crown in some denser foliage where the kids won’t be able to get it. “I get lucky.”
“I’d consider it unlucky to run across a horned rabbit,” Mrs. Bahr says. She examines the forest with interest. “A demon is a demon. Even adults have difficulty with horned rabbits.”
It hadn’t been difficult. You’d been armed with a sharpened branch and, when the rabbit leapt for you, you knew right when to stab. You clear your throat. “It was difficult.” Then when Mrs. Bahr doesn’t say anything, you add, “It was frightening.”
She believes you. She lays a gentle hand on your shoulder to get you to look her in the face. “The orphanage budget is enough that you don’t need to hunt, Isla,” Mrs. Bahr says. “I know I don’t like the idea of a fourteen-year-old out here alone and unarmed.”
“Almost fifteen,” you say, “and I had a sharp stick.”
“A sharp sti—” Mrs. Bahr cuts herself off with a deep breath. “Regardless of your…aptitude, Isla, it’s dangerous. I’ve spoken to the Director and she agrees with me. You aren’t to go hunting anymore.”
The forest suddenly feels too hot. The leaves overhead rustle, but you can barely hear it over the roaring of your blood. “Excuse me?”
Mrs. Bahr steps closer. “You’re a very strong girl, Isla, but it’s dangerous. If you want to go out with me or Mr. Bahr—”
You shake off her hand. “The Director agreed with you? She said I’m not allowed to go hunting anymore?”
“Out of concern for your safety.” Mrs. Bahr looks like she regrets saying anything. “Once Mr. Bahr and I explained to her what a risk a horned rabbit poses—”
You run away. Mrs. Bahr calls out after you, but you don’t stop. Beyond the sting of Mr. and Mrs. Bahr not thinking you strong enough to hunt, there’s a deeper hurt. The Director agrees. Really? Really?
“Isla? What’s wrong? I thought you were with Mrs. Bahr,” Director Sarah says when you burst into her office. She sets the papers she’d been reading down and frowns. “You look—”
“I’m not supposed to go hunting anymore?” you ask.
Sarah’s face blooms in understanding. “After what Mr. and Mrs. Bahr said about the increase in demons in the area, I agreed—”
“It’s summer,” you interrupt. You stalk up to her desk, your fists balled at your side. “It’s time to hunt.”
“The Bahrs have agreed to accompany you—”
“They only come once a week,” you say. You’re being so incredibly rude to the Director, but you don’t care. “I need to hunt three times that at least. The game has been moving deeper into the forest—”
“Where you are not allowed to go,” Director Sarah says, this time interrupting you. She steeples her hands in front of her. “I should have curtailed this activity long before this point, but I thought you needed it.”
“We need it,” you say. You can’t believe what you are hearing. “We need to store up rations, you know that.”
“Our budget allows us to purchase rations in town.”
“But what if that’s not enough? It’s better to have our own supply—”
“It will be enough.”
“It still doesn’t hurt to have some extra jerky—”
“The store we have will be enough.”
“But what if it’s not?!” You’ve raised your voice without realizing it, fists shaking at your sides. “The other kids are too young to remember o-or too new, but you and I do. That winter, we didn’t have enough. Why are you trying to stop me?” To your horror, your voice cracks. “I thought you understood.”
There’s silence in the room except for your panting breath.
“I’m sorry,” Sarah finally says. The sudden apology is enough to close your mouth against what you might have said. She meets your eyes. “You’ve always been so strong that I…Isla, you were a child. I will always be grateful for what you did that winter and for every winter since. I relied on you, a child, because I didn’t have any other option. We didn’t have another option. But now we do. We’re okay now, Isla. You don’t have to work so hard to protect us.”
“Yes, I do, I’m—” the Hero “—I can do it.” There is something inside of you telling you that that is what you must do. You think that it’s part of being a Hero.
((You’re worried that it’s because you’re scared.))
“My decision is final,” Sarah says. She picks up her documents and straightens them. “You are only to go hunting with an adult from now on. If I find out you went to the woods without one, there will be consequences.”
She’s using the same tone she uses on the other kids when they’re misbehaving. I mean business. You stare at her for a long, breathless moment. You jerkily turn to go.
Mrs. Bahr is hovering in the doorway. She looks guiltily between you and Director Sarah. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to eavesdrop…”
You shove past her and run to your room.
-------------.
Somewhat counterintuitively, as an orphan you’re never alone. You throw yourself face down on your bed.
A shocked silence swallows the occupants on the other bed.
“Is she okay?” Josiah asks Hera.
“It’s Isla,” Hera answers. There’s the rustling of bedsheets as Hera climbs out of bed and then the soft sound of socks on hardwood as she comes over. “You okay?”
You are not okay. There’s an intense war of emotions in your chest. Anger that none of the adults seem to think you’re capable. Betrayal that Sarah isn’t on your side. A sick fear at the thought of being unprepared for winter. And, now that you’ve run away so spectacularly, shame. They probably think you’re overreacting, but they’re wrong. They’re the ones who are being naïve. They’re the ones who—
A gentle hand on the back of your head freezes the thought. Hera pets your short, black hairs in an attempt at comfort. “It’s okay, Isla. You can just sleep. Sleep makes everything better.”
That’s what you tell the younger kids. The difference between you and Hera saying it? When Hera falls asleep, you work to fix the problem. If you fall asleep, no one is going to fix the problem for you.
You flip over, dislodging Hera’s hand. You look up at her as if seeing her for the first time. She’s ten, two years older than you were when the winter happened. She was four then. You want to ask her if she remembers, but instead you ask, “Do you think Sarah hates me?”
“What?” Hera’s eyes are wide. “No! What makes you think that?”
“Nothing,” you say. “It’s stupid. Forget I asked.” You turn on your side, your back to them.
“I know she’s worried about you,” Josiah says. He offers the information tentatively. “I overheard her and the Bahrs talking. Did they ban you from the woods?”
You don’t move. “What else did they say?” You’re afraid that he’s going to say they called you weak. Or, worse, a nuisance. “Did they say anything else about me?”
“Not really.”
Nobody hears anything useful around here. You close your eyes. “I just want to be alone for a little while. I—”
There’s a knock on the door. “Isla? It’s me, Marie. Can I come in?”
Marie? Too late you remember that that’s Mrs. Bahr’s name. She’s been trying to get the kids to call her be her first name. So far no one’s taken her up on it and she hasn’t pushed.
Hera opens the door. “Hi, Mrs. Bahr. Isla is being moody.”
You sit up with a squawk. “I am not!”
“If it’s alright, I’d like to talk to Isla for a moment,” Mrs. Bahr says to Josiah and Hera. “Alone.”
“Don’t let her yell at you,” Hera says as she passes Mrs. Bahr. “She never means it.”
You are going to strangle her. “I don’t yell!”
“That’s not an inside voice,” Josiah says. He dodges the pillow you throw at him, pulling the door closed behind him and Hera.
You are suddenly alone in the room with Mrs. Bahr.
You sit up further, pressing your back against the headboard. Mrs. Bahr doesn’t look mad. Her hands are clasped in front of her and she’s looking down at the floor. It almost looks like she’s the nervous one. You hug your pillow to your chest. “You can sit down if you’d like.”
Mrs. Bahr looks up at you. Her lips twitch. “Thank you, Isla.” She sits down on Hera’s bed gingerly as if afraid it wouldn’t be able to take her wait. When she’s settled, she says, “I wanted to apologize to you.”
Your arms tighten around your pillow. “Why?”
“Not for saying you shouldn’t hunt alone,” Mrs. Bahr says. She’s not a mind reader but sometimes it seems like she is. “For not understanding what hunting means to you. I would have approached things differently if I’d known.”
“Known what?”
“About what you’ve been through.”
The winter. That’s the only thing Mrs. Bahr could be talking about. She must have heard more of your conversation (argument) with the Director than you thought. “It was a long time ago,” you say. You really don’t want to talk about this with Mrs. Bahr. Not when you can still feel that winter’s desperation in your molars like a memory. “I’m fine.”
Mrs. Bahr is quiet for a moment. She studies you much like Mr. Bahr did all those weeks ago mending the fence. “I was a knight for 30 years, you know. I supposed it’s not weird that a Knight worked as a knight for so long. As soon as I came into my power at 15, I was compelled to hold a sword. To seek out evils and defeat them. To follow my Lord into battle no matter the cause.” She looks up at the ceiling. “I’ve had a lot of adventures and helped many, many people. But there was a time when I wanted to quit.”
You start. “You did?”
“I wanted to work in a flower shop,” Mrs. Bahr says. She leans back on her hands. “What a life it could have been! Waking up before the sun and hiking to the flower fields…I had my new house all picked out. It’d have a koi pond and a row of red rocks from the Harrow River. That’s where I met Ivan.”
Mr. Bahr. He’s been trying to get you to call him by his first name too. Unlike Mrs. Bahr, he’s much pushier about it. “What made you want to quit?”
“Exhaustion,” Mrs. Bahr says. She closes her eyes. “It seemed that there was a new threat to my Lord every day. An assassination attempt from a branch family. A territorial dispute. A new influx of demon beasts. It got to the point that I hardly left my Lord’s side for fear of returning to find him dead. He was the first Lord I swore my loyalty to. I always felt like I was failing those days. So I wanted to quit.”
You’ve felt like that before. Sometimes it seems like you never catch enough while hunting, that you’re never kind enough, that you’re never strong enough. You’ve never thought about working in a flower shop though. “Why didn’t you?”
“I did.” Mrs. Bahr laughs at your shocked expression. “I was in my twenties. They tell you things calm down after your teen years, but that’s not true. I handed in my resignation and fled for the nearest town.” Her smile softens. “Ivan followed me.”
“He was there?”
Mrs. Bahr nods. “We were sworn to the same Lord. He came galloping up with my resignation clutched in his hand. His face was so red!” She laughs. “’What does this mean, Marie? He was crying! You can’t quit! I haven’t beaten you yet!’”
“And that’s what convinced you to stay a knight?” you ask. That doesn’t help you. You don’t have a significant other to come racing after you.
“No,” Mrs. Bahr said. “Ivan didn’t know why I wanted to quit. I can’t do it, I said. I can’t keep the Lord safe. I’m not enough. You know what he said?”
You shake your head.
“He said, Of course, you’re not enough,” Mrs. Bahr says. She’s lowering her voice in imitation of Ivan’s. “You were never going to be enough.” You’re gaping at his harsh words, but Mrs. Bahr looks amused. “That’s why we have a squadron. The job is too big for one person. All you need to do is your part.”
You stare at her, not understanding.
“The world isn’t carried by one person,” Mrs. Bahr says. “I was so convinced that everything was up to me – the Lord’s safety, the next campaign’s success, or defense from monsters – that I buckled under the pressure. What I didn’t see that it wasn’t all my responsibility. I was part of a team. All I had to do was one part.”
You think of the winter night and holding the door shut. There hadn’t been anyone to help you then. Someone needed to comfort the younger kids. Someone needed to try and protect them. “What if there isn’t anyone else?”
“Then we do our best,” Mrs. Bahr says immediately. She meets your eyes. “But are you by yourself now, Isla?”
Yes. You open your mouth to tell her that, but the word won’t come out. Are you? Director Sarah looked so defeated when you accused her of not understanding. But didn’t she understand better than anyone else. You swallow. “No. There’s Director Sarah.”
“What does she do?”
“She takes care of us,” you say. “She makes sure the money we get goes to the right things.”
Mrs. Bahr smiles warmly. “That’s right. Who else?”
“…Hera,” you say. You remember she pulled Josiah from the well before Annie even had the chance to tell you what had happened. “She watches the younger kids.”
“She’s very good with them,” Mrs. Bahr says. “Who else?”
Your mind blanks. Who else? “Josiah. He helps us study.”
“And?”
And? “T-the Lord. He makes sure we have the funds for what we need.”
“Including winter provisions,” Mrs. Bahr agrees.
You frown. You suddenly see where this is going. “The amount of winter provisions he thinks we need.”
Mrs. Bahr hums. “What happens if he’s wrong?”
“That’s why I hunt,” you say. Maybe now she’ll understand. “So that we’ll be okay if he’s wrong.”
“What if you don’t hunt enough?” Mrs. Bahr asks.
Your chest is tight. You rub at your sternum and try to breathe deeply. “We starve,” you say. You wheeze and then clear your throat. “We’d starve, but that’s not going to happen. Because I always hunt enough.” I have to.
“This year,” Mrs. Bahr says, voice gentle and soothing, “say you don’t hunt anymore. The winter is harsher than expected and the orphanage’s stores are depleted. What do you think will happen?”
You laugh and gasp at the same time. “They’d all starve,” you say again. What doesn’t she get about that? “First the little ones then—”
Mrs. Bahr is shaking her head. “No, Isla, that’s not what would happen.”
Your temper flares. “That’s what always—”
“What would happen,” Mrs. Bahr says in her even tone, “is that Mr. Bahr and I would come deliver extra provisions to you.”
All the air is chased from your lungs. You feel eight again, small and vulnerable and cold. You’re shivering as you stare at her. “You would?”
“We would.” Gently, as if afraid she might scare you, Mrs. Bahr moves from Hera’s bed to yours. She puts a warm hand on your knee. “We’re a fortress. The Lord gives us part of the emergency fund in order to keep our stores and grounds ready for refugees. Mr. Bahr keeps fifteen percent more than the most generous estimate out of an abundance of caution. We would come and make sure nobody starved.”
For some reason, that makes you want to cry. You blink against the sudden heat behind your eyes. “Oh.”
“That’s why we don’t want you to go hunting,” Mrs. Bahr says. Her thumb rubs over your knee. “It was worth the risk before. You worked hard to keep everyone here alive. You are incredible, for that, Isla. I can’t tell you how much I admire your strength and your bravery. But things are different now. You don’t need to do as much as you did before. There are other people on your squad.”
But I’m the Hero, you want to say. Heroes are supposed to save the day, aren’t they?
Knights help save the day too.
You let Mrs. Bahr pat your knee for a long time. She seems content to let you think, her energy a pleasant hum next to you. A knot is untying in your chest. If you don’t hunt, it’s not the end of everyone. There will still be the funds from the Lord. Sarah’s always been excellent at stretching those as far as they need to go. And, if they aren’t enough, there’s something different this year. The Bahrs are here.
“You’d help us even if you’re only going to adopt one of us?” you ask.
Mrs. Bahr’s lips thin. She looks sad, but hides it quickly. “We’re Knights,” she says. “Even if we are retired. We’ll be here the moment you need us.”
You don’t hope. Hope is traumatic. But…
You believe her.
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(Part 2) (part 3)
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Thanks for reading! There will be a new part of Hope and the Hero every Friday!
If you'd like to read the whole story now, please consider supporting me on Patreon (X)!
There's also a new story up there, a sequel to my Dandelion villain story (X)
Summary: You are free of mind control for the first time in a year. The only things standing between you and your revenge are the heroes.
#my writing#second person#the hero and hope#long post#this part is 6k words and the entire story is almost 19k
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Marvel is Kryptonian
This takes place when both of them are first starting out. Clark started first. Then, the bubble popped. Now, since this is early in Supes’ career, that means, sure, there are other heroes around, but none else in Metropolis. So, when he heard of a hero that recently popped up who was suspected by the media to be related to him, he grew curious. He was even more curious when he found out the guy had similar powers to him, not to mention they looked alike. So, when he’s at work, writing a paper, imagine his surprise when he sees many people crowding around one of the tvs in the lounge. Lo and behold Captain Marvel, the guy he’s been hearing about is on live, fighting a giant monster somewhere in Kansas— wait a darn minute, he’s right next to Smallville. Looks like this is a job for Superman.
When Supes gets there, the monster goes down with one final punch from the Captain. When Clark saw the man floating, wearing a warm smile with his cape billowing in the wind, he was struck with the idea that maybe, just maybe they could be related after all.
Marvel: *notices Supes and gives a little wave, torn between wondering if Clark is another hero, or a dude who just happens to be wearing spandex*
Superman: *Flies up to him* “Hey.” *awkward*
Marvel: “Hey?” *also awkward*
*awkward silence of two super powered dudes floating mid-air*
Superman: “Right! Uh- Kal-El.” *offers handshake*
Marvel: *wondering what a “Kal-El” is* “I’m Captain Marvel? Or Marvel? Or Cap? You can call me whatever.” *shakes hand*
Superman: *little disappointed Marvel didn’t respond with his own Kryptonian name. Then says some form of greeting in Kryptonian*
Marvel: *confused at the sudden gibberish from the other man until Solomon translated it for him. Responds back also in Kryptonian*
Superman: *face lights up brighter than the sun*
They got burgers after that. They became super good friends after that too! I mean, sure, Clark’s new friend hasn’t really told him anything about himself yet, but that was fine! Marvel’s super nice, and he’s always willing to help the Kryptonian if Clark needs it. I mean for Rao’s sake, when he got mind controlled for the first time, the Captain was the one who held him off. Then when all was set and done he took Clark to get ice cream. (Buddy doesn’t know he’s boarding the Dad Marvel bus)
The media’s picked up on their new friendship too. There are more and then a couple videos of Marvel’s 8 foot 5 self, picking up a 6 foot maybe 4 inch Superman like he’s a toddler. People think they’re brothers, or at least cousins.
Speaking of cousins, we can’t forget about Kara. When Kal said that there was another Kryptonian, she was skeptical, but then she met Marvel. She was excited when she learned he could speak Kryptonian. She also found it awesome he spoke like an old man. The man also had no problem in learning any new traditions from her. And, he also had no problem in teaching her ancient traditions that she had no clue how he knew. The man looked at to be in his mid thirties at most. (He has knowledge of really really really old Kryptonian traditions and history because a long, long time ago a previous Champion got married to a Kryptonian woman and visited the planet whenever they could. Though, it wasn’t often due to their champion duties.) He also gets her to bake with him while he told her stories about old wars and conflicts she hadn’t even heard of. Not only did she get to teach more of their culture to Clark, she got to learn more about it from Cap. (Is also unknowingly boarding the Marvel Dad bus)
Also, Ma and Pa Kent love him and he helps around the farm as much as they allow him.
#billy batson#captain marvel dc#dc captain marvel#shazam#fawcett#fawcett city#fawcett comics#kara zor el#kara danvers#clark kent#superman
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safety - Part: I
Summary: After years of isolation, Joel Miller's life revolves around control and keeping danger at bay, his past as a soldier leaving him constantly on edge. But when a sweet, soft-spoken young woman starts working at the supply store, her innocence stirs something inside him. Despite his efforts to remain detached, Joel becomes obsessed with keeping her safe from the dangers he’s certain are lurking everywhere.
As his protective instincts morph into darker desires, the lines between safeguarding her and possessing her begin to blur.
Warnings will vary by chapter depending on the content.
Warnings: Dark!Joel, 18+ MDNI, Obsession themes, Stalking, Joel has major Trauma/PTSD, Mentions of military past, Manipulation, Power dynamics, Joel needs a hug and therapy. As per usual.
4k
Enjoy!
Part II Part III Part IV Part V
· · ───────────𖥸──────────· ··
Joel Miller wasn’t the type of man who sought peace or ease.
He’d spent too many years living a different kind of life-one built around routines of survival, discipline, and a level of alertness that never quite faded.
Now, back in Texas, he carried that constant vigilance like a second skin.
He’d settled in a small, secluded home just outside of Austin.
The area was quiet, isolated, the kind of place where nobody asked too many questions.
The locals respected boundaries, and Joel had made his clear. He kept to himself, lived a simple life, and preferred things that way.
People complicated things—something he wasn’t interested in anymore.
Most of his days followed a routine that he clung to with the same intensity he had in the service.
Early mornings were spent with coffee and silence, the smell of pine trees drifting through the windows of his old, weathered cabin.
Afterward, he'd take to the woods, either hunting or just walking trails he knew as well as the lines in his hands.
Out there, he could let his mind focus on something tangible—the tracks of a deer, the feel of the rifle in his hand.
There, his senses sharpened again, always on alert.
Joel’s awareness never dulled, not even after all these years.
Every noise, every shift in the wind or crunch of leaves beneath his boots, kept him on edge.
He was always scanning his surroundings, ready to react.
He knew it wasn’t just about the hunt.
It was the way his brain had been wired, after all the years of needing to be ready—whether it was for survival or something worse.
It wasn’t paranoia, just the reality of a mind that had been trained for danger. He told himself.
He didn't see many people. He didn’t want to.
But the thing about always being on edge was that it left little room for rest.
At night, the memories clawed their way in—images he’d rather forget but couldn’t.
Sleep was shallow and rare.
Even when he managed to drift off, he was often jolted awake by some phantom noise or sensation.
And once he was up, it was hard to shake the feeling that something or someone was out there.
He’d get up, check the locks, sometimes even patrol the perimeter of his land just to make sure.
In the quiet of his cabin, with only the crackling of a fire or the hum of the wind for company,
Joel would pour himself a drink.
Whiskey, usually. Something to dull the noise in his head, to take the edge off the constant tension that never quite left him.
But he never drank too much. He couldn’t afford to. He needed to stay sharp, always ready—just in case.
His life wasn’t complicated, and he liked it that way. He didn’t need company or connection, not anymore.
He kept things simple: survival, routine, and the solitude of the Texas wilderness.
It asked nothing of him, and in return, he didn’t have to share the parts of himself he’d buried long ago.
· · ─────
Waking up in the middle of the night drenched in sweat had become part of his routine, and after tossing and turning for hours, Joel would get up, make coffee, and try to focus on the small tasks that anchored him.
The sun was just beginning to rise as Joel Miller pushed the key into the ignition of his truck, the familiar rumble beneath him a small comfort in an otherwise uneasy world.
He had always been an early riser, but lately, the habit had turned into more of a necessity.
Driving out into the quiet Texas morning was one of those tasks.
The roads were mostly empty, and Joel preferred it that way—less to watch for, less noise, fewer things to trust.
He liked things simple.
Routine. Predictable.
After everything, it was easier to stick to what he knew, to keep the world at arm's length.
It was safer.
His hands gripped the steering wheel tightly, his knuckles turning white as his eyes flicked from side to side, scanning the road ahead and the landscape around him.
There was no telling who or what could be out there, even in a sleepy Texas town.
He wasn’t stupid enough to let his guard down, not after everything he'd seen.
Trust was a currency he couldn’t afford to spend, not anymore.
He kept the radio off, preferring the silence. It gave him space to think, to process.
Most of the time, though, it just made him more aware of the quietness around him.
Every little creak or snap of a twig was magnified, every shadow cast by the rising sun something to take note of.
He didn't trust the peaceful exterior of the world anymore.
Too much could change in an instant.
It was exhausting, always being on edge like that, but Joel had learned to live with it.
He couldn’t imagine doing things any other way.
As he drove further down the road toward the camping&outdoor supply store, he caught a glimpse of something moving in the distance—a flicker of motion between the trees.
His heart quickened, and his foot instinctively lifted off the gas pedal.
He slowed down just enough to check the rearview mirror, his eyes narrowing as he scanned the tree line.
Nothing. It could’ve been an animal, but Joel’s mind didn’t let him settle on that.
Even when he convinced himself it was probably just wildlife, he remained alert, tension rippling through his muscles.
"Could be anything," he muttered under his breath, gripping the wheel tighter. "Ain't takin' chances."
The camping store was a bit of a drive, but Joel didn’t mind.
The solitude of the open road helped him clear his head, as much as his thoughts would let him, anyway.
Hunting was something he could still rely on.
He didn't need anyone else for it, and it gave him an excuse to get away from people.
He wasn’t much for conversation these days, always keeping interactions short and transactional.
He liked the supply store too; the guy who ran it knew not to ask too many questions, just handled the sale and let Joel be.
It suited him fine.
As the store came into view, Joel exhaled, his mind already running through what he needed to pick up.
The truck tires crunched against the gravel as he pulled into the lot, parking in a spot that allowed him a clear view of the entrance and the surrounding area.
Old habits.
Joel turned off the ignition and leaned back in the seat, taking a moment to observe the store.
His hand absentmindedly reached toward the glove compartment, where his gun was stashed, just in case. He didn’t need it often, but knowing it was there kept him grounded.
After a few seconds of scanning the area and feeling satisfied that nothing was amiss, he stepped out of the truck.
The supply store wasn’t busy, just a couple of people browsing inside.
As Joel stepped into the store, the familiar scent of leather and canvas greeted him. Country music hummed low in the background, and the quiet atmosphere brought him a sense of calm.
The simplicity of the place was something he appreciated—straightforward, nothing complicated.
Just the way he liked it.
His boots thudded softly on the wooden floor as he made his way toward the back, scanning the shelves for the hunting gear he needed. It was his routine, one he kept to himself.
The sudden crash jolted him like a gunshot.
Joel’s instincts took over, his body reacting before his mind caught up.
His hand flew to his side, fingers brushing the handle of the knife he always kept on him. His eyes darted around the store, scanning for threats, muscles coiled tight and ready.
He felt that old familiar rush of adrenaline—the kind that came from years of having to be on guard every second.
His heart pounded, the edges of his vision sharpening as he prepared for the worst.
But then, he saw her.
Just a girl. Bending over, trying to gather the gear she’d knocked to the floor. No threat. No danger. Just her.
Joel exhaled slowly, the tension easing out of his shoulders as the world settled back into place.
He let go of the knife, though his pulse still hammered in his ears. He hadn’t been expecting someone like her to trigger that reaction. Not here. Not now.
But for some reason, he couldn’t look away.
She was clumsy, but calm—no panic, no rush to fix what she’d done.
It was as if she was used to things slipping from her hands, not bothered in the slightest. That softness, that ease, it drew him in like nothing else had in a long time.
And even though the tension from the noise had faded, he found himself still rooted to the spot, watching her.
His eyes trailed over her, catching the way her long, soft looking, hair tumbled down her back, how her tender fingers fumbled with the items before her.
She was a mess of soft edges, and he hadn’t seen anything that soft in years.
He’s not used to that.
His world had become hard, sharp, filled with things that made sense, with people who didn’t get too close.
People like him, always on edge, always prepared.
She stood up, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear, and for the first time, Joel saw her face.
Young. Too young. Early twenties, maybe.
Her cheeks were flushed a soft pink, her lips parted in what looked like mild embarrassment as she glanced around at the mess she had made.
But it was her eyes that hit him the hardest.
Doe eyed, wide, bright, completely unguarded.
So easy to read.
She looked right at him, her gaze catching his, and Joel’s breath hitched in his chest.
What was this girl doing? Looking at him like that?
She wasn’t supposed to look at him that way—not with that kind of openness, that kind of… trust.
Her blush deepened as her gaze flickered to the ground, but not before Joel saw it creep up her neck, warming her face.
She was blushing because of him.
When was the last time that happened?
“Oh! Sorry,” she said, her voice light, soft, but not the irritating kind of soft.
It was smooth in a way that made something settle in Joel’s chest. Normally, he hated small talk.
People’s voices grated on him. But hers didn’t.
Her voice wrapped around him, warm and gentle, and for reasons he couldn’t explain, Joel didn’t hate it.
“I didn’t see you there,” she continued, letting out a nervous laugh, her hands brushing against the fallen gear.
“I swear, I’m always knocking things over.” She smiled shyly, that blush still clinging to her cheeks, and Joel’s chest tightened again.
She was yapping—just rambling on in a way that would’ve made him turn his back on anyone else. But he couldn’t move.
He was locked in place, listening to her soft, musical voice as if it was something he hadn’t heard in years.
Maybe because it was. Maybe because no one ever talked to him like this anymore.
Most people avoided him.
They saw the hard set of his jaw, the cold glint in his eyes, and they stayed far, far away.
And that was just how he liked it. Less mess, less trouble.
But not her. She was still standing there, babbling about how clumsy she was, her voice a soft hum in his ears.
Joel felt something shift inside him, something he wasn’t sure he liked. He didn’t know her.
Shouldn’t care about her babbling, or the way her scent—something fresh and sweet—drifted toward him, making his head swim.
But here he was, standing there, drinking in her voice, her scent, like he hadn’t been around anyone like her in years.
Which, to be fair, he hadn’t.
Joel cleared his throat, forcing himself to speak, though his voice came out rougher than he’d intended. “Don’t worry ‘bout it,” he muttered, his words gruff, but his feet still rooted to the spot.
Her smile widened, and her eyes lit up.
The warmth in them caught him off guard. He wasn’t prepared for that.
“Thanks for not laughing at me,” she said with a small, bashful laugh, her fingers fiddling with the edge of her jacket. “Most people would’ve.”
Joel’s brow furrowed. “Why would I laugh?”
She shrugged, glancing at the gear still scattered on the floor. “I’m kind of a mess.”
Her words didn’t sit right with him. How could someone like her—someone so soft, so full of light—call herself a mess? He is a mess.
But before he could respond, she smiled again, her lips curving up in that sweet way that made his chest tighten all over again.
And that scent… God, he couldn’t place it, but it clung to her, swirling around him like a warm blanket.
His mind raced, cataloging every little detail about her.
Her soft pretty eyes. The way her smile made the corners of her eyes crinkle just a little. The way she smelled, like fresh air and something sweet. Vanilla?
He was reading her, studying her like he used to study his surroundings, picking up on every detail.
But none of it made sense. She didn’t make sense.
Normally, he’d be long gone by now. His thoughts already moving on.
But she was still talking, still smiling up at him, and instead of walking away, he just�� stared.
She cleared her throat again, glancing down at her hands before looking back up at him.
“Do you work around here?” she asked, her voice a little softer now, a little shyer.
Joel blinked, realizing he hadn’t said a damn thing in what felt like minutes.
He shook his head. “Nah, just pickin’ up some things.” His voice sounded foreign to him—rough, cold, not at all the kind of tone that matched the warmth she was giving him.
But she didn’t seem bothered by it. Instead, she tilted her head slightly, her lips curving up in that smile again.
“Oh, cool. What are you picking up?”
Joel stared at her, unsure of why she was still talking to him, still smiling at him.
But he found himself answering her anyway. “Just some gear. Hunting stuff.”
Her eyes brightened, her smile widening even more. “Oh, hunting! That’s cool. I’ve never been, but I always thought it seemed kind of… peaceful, you know? Just you and nature.”
Peaceful? Joel had never thought of hunting as peaceful. Necessary, sure. But peaceful? Not in the way she was describing.
He grunted, not sure how to respond, but she just kept smiling, her voice still light, still soft.
“Oh, gosh,” she said, standing up with a bundle of fallen gear in her hands, a sheepish smile on her face. “I could never hurt an animal, though. I don’t know how people do it. Like, I get hunting and all, but... me? No way. I’d be useless out there.”
Joel’s brow furrowed, still caught between the sharp edge of his earlier reaction and the softness of her voice.
“Right,” he muttered, nodding slightly, feeling more awkward than he had in years.
“Well,” Joel grunted, his voice a little rougher than intended, “it ain’t about enjoyin’ it. It’s necessary. You do what you gotta do.”
And for the life of him, Joel couldn’t understand why he didn’t just walk away.
He should’ve. He should’ve grabbed what he needed and left.
But something about her—her scent, her smile, her softness—kept him rooted in place.
He wasn’t good at this. Talking. Interacting. Especially not with someone like her—someone who looked at him like he wasn’t something to be avoided.
But she was smiling at him, her eyes wide and innocent, like she wasn’t aware of how the world really worked.
Before he could say anything else, he saw her blush deepen, her fingers fidgeting with the hem of her jacket.
She was nervous, but not in the way people usually got around him.
She wasn’t scared. She wasn’t backing away.
She was blushing because of him.
Hm?
As the awkward silence stretched between them, Joel cleared his throat, the sound rough and abrupt.
He hadn’t realized how long he’d been standing there, just staring at her while she kept talking, her soft voice filling the space between them.
He needed to go.
This whole interaction had lasted far too long, longer than he was comfortable with.
His chest tightened with a mix of confusion and frustration, and he could feel the tension creeping into his limbs, urging him to move, to walk away.
She was still smiling at him, her eyes bright, completely unaware of the storm brewing inside him.
“Right,” Joel muttered, his voice gruffer than he intended.
“I should… get goin’.” He nodded awkwardly toward the hunting gear in his hand, using it as an excuse to leave.
Her smile faltered for just a second, her eyes flickering with a hint of confusion.
“Oh, sure! No problem,” she said quickly, her voice still sweet, but there was something softer in it now, like she wasn’t quite sure what she’d done wrong.
Joel could feel her eyes on him as he turned away, the tension in his shoulders growing with every step he took.
He forced himself to keep walking, not allowing himself to glance back, not letting himself think about the way her scent still lingered in the air around him.
As he pushed open the door of the shop, the cool air hit his face, a stark contrast to the warmth that had been building inside him.
He needed to get out of there. Now.
“Have a good day!” she called after him, her voice still light, still warm.
Joel didn’t respond.
He just kept walking, his boots heavy against the gravel as he made his way to his truck, his mind already trying to shove the whole interaction into the back of his mind.
It shouldn’t have affected him like that.
Joel climbed into his truck, the door creaking as it shut with a heavy thud.
The sun was setting, casting a golden light over the horizon, but his mind was somewhere else entirely.
His hands gripped the steering wheel tightly, his knuckles turning white as he sat there, staring straight ahead.
He let out a slow breath, trying to shake off the strange feeling that had settled deep in his chest.
That girl—he couldn’t get her out of his head. It didn’t make sense.
Her smile. The way her cheeks flushed when she looked at him.
The softness in her voice, the way she smelled—fresh, sweet, and somehow... so pure.
His brow furrowed as the memory tugged at him, gnawing at the edges of his mind like an itch he couldn’t scratch.
He hadn’t felt like this in years—hadn’t felt much of anything, to be honest.
And yet, there it was. Something stirring inside him, something he couldn’t ignore.
With a grunt, he turned the key in the ignition, the engine roaring to life.
He needed to get his mind straight, back to reality, back to the things that actually mattered.
Surviving.
Not some girl in a supply shop.
It couldn’t be because of her.
But as he shifted the truck into gear, his grip on the wheel tightened even more.
He couldn’t deny the physical reaction in his body—the tension building low in his gut, the heat rising through his chest.
Joel shifted uncomfortably in his seat, his breath catching for a moment.
He hadn’t even noticed it before, hadn’t allowed himself to.
But now, as he adjusted himself, the realization hit him with a force that nearly knocked the breath out of his lungs.
He was hard.
His heart pounded in his chest, the weight of it settling low in his gut.
How long had it been?
He couldn’t even remember the last time he felt like this, the last time his body reacted this way.
But it couldn’t be because of the girl in the shop, right?
“Jesus.” He clenched his jaw, the muscles in his neck tightening as he fought the urge to dwell on it. “There was no way.”
She was just a kid. I mean, a woman sure. But so young, soft, innocent.
Completely the opposite of everything he was—everything he’d become.
Joel’s grip on the steering wheel tightened even further, his mind racing.
This was wrong. He shouldn’t be thinking about her like this, shouldn’t be feeling this way.
But the more he tried to push it down, the more it rose to the surface.
Her voice, the way she’d blushed when she looked at him, the scent of her clinging to the air around her like a warmth he hadn’t known he needed.
Joel shifted again, trying to shake the thoughts from his head. He’d drive home, clear his mind, and forget about it.
Forget about her.
But as he drove down the empty road, the tension in his body only seemed to build. It had been years. Years since anyone, or anything, had made him feel like this.
And the truth gnawed at him, whether he wanted to admit it or not.
It was because of her.
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New series incoming!! Thank you for the nice comments, they make me the most motivated to keep writing. :)
#pervert!joelmiller#joel miller#perverted!joelmiller#joel miller x reader#joel miller fanfic#joel miller smut#joel tlou#no outbreak au#pervert!joel#joel the last of us#age difference#smut#joel miller fic#joel miller fanfiction#joel miller x you#joel miller one shot#tlou smut#tlou joel#tlou fanfic#the last of us#tlou fanfiction#tlou fic#the last of us fanfiction#the last of us smut#joel miller x female reader#pedro pascal x reader#joel miller x y/n#dark!joel miller#dark!joel x reader#dark joel miller
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Getting caught in the rain with Arthur leads to him finding creative ways to warm you up.
(high honor) arthur morgan x fem. reader
I love this trope! prob been done before but I cant resist... 😔Can you believe I wanted this to be a short head canon post?? LMAO it ended up way longer than that. That's why it has a more casual thing going on despite being super long 🥲Happy thanksgiving! This is for the girlies who are stuck with family and need something absolutely filthy to read !!! 💕💕💕💕💕
Warnings: NSFW content, vaginal sex, while honor isn't too relevant, arthur is very sweet and hes kind of a weenie here, in a good way! arthur does not have bad intentions here, he's genuinely a sweet little man...
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Thinking of begging Arthur to take you away from camp for a while. Maybe you haven't had a bath in a bit or you're sick of hearing Swanson drunkenly parade around camp. But you've decided to ask Arthur, he's always so sweet to you and you know he won't say no. And Arthur and his stupid bleeding heart (the one that bleeds so much more for you) grumbles and pretends he's thinking about it but really he'd probably say yes to anything that came from your lips. He has no regrets when he sees the smile you give him. You're hoisted up onto the back of his horse, holding onto his waist so you don't fall. Arthur is desperately trying to play it cool.
Then the rain starts coming down, you're soaked through very quickly and Arthur, such a gentleman, sheds his coat to give it to you, except now he is soaked through as well. The both of you are freezing and he tells you that you have to stop until the weather clears. He’s cussing up a storm worse than the one you're in. You nod, just wanting to be warm, wracked by shivers. He comes up on an abandoned shack and guides you inside, shutting the rain out. You're standing in the center of the room, looking like a wet cat after a miserable bath, Arthur is kind enough to take his coat off of you, giving you a ratty old, moth bitten blanket but it doesn't do much of anything for the cold. Trying to get a fire going proves fruitful but it's a small one and the wind blowing in from the flue almost puts it out several times.
Arthur feels so helpless, sitting there watching your teeth start to chatter as you sit in front of the pathetic little fire. He's trying to apologize (Ah, I’m sorry, I didn't know it was gonna come down like that,) but you only tell him it's not his fault. He has to help, all he wants to do is help. Things aren't getting any better and he doesn't want you to come down with something on account of him being an idiot. And then he gets an idea. He’s red all over flushed at the thought but he knows taking your soaking clothes off would help. And he's standing there, awkwardly, one hand rubbing the back of his neck while he tries to hide under his hat. He’s gently clearing his throat, trying to get your attention.
“Maybe we could try… I…could…” he's nervously stumbling through his words and he's looking at you, sitting on the floor, desperately trying to warm your hands by the fire. You look up to him but he can hardly speak, so enraptured by the look of utter trust, reliance on him. His mouth hangs open but he swallows the lump of spit in his mouth. He tries to shake off these boyish jitters he gets around you. “Uhhh- I mean, it would be better if we weren't sittin’ round in these clothes, I guess, can’t be doin’ you any good...”
“Really, you think so…?” Your voice is quiet and meek, struggling to say anything past the clicking of your teeth and the shivers. “Well then, turn around, Arthur,” at your obvious attempt to be modest, he nods stiffly and turns towards the wall, listening to you take your dress and your underskirts off, landing in a wet plop on the floor. You whine, peeling yourself out of your undergarments before a quiet ok leaves your lips. He turns and you're desperately covering yourself with that dusty blanket, legs bare, fabric hardly long enough to cover the soft mound between your legs, the fat of your inner thighs squished together. Arthur has a hard time keeping his gaze from locking onto any of the inviting bits of skin you show him. You're embarrassed, biting your lip, squeezing your arms around yourself.
“Aren't you gonna- Arthur, you're gonna do it too, right?” Arthur has a hesitant nod and a course even though he just now thought he should probably follow along to help make you more comfortable. He’s removing his hat first, nothing to hide under now and he notices that you watch him take his gun belt off, unfastening his suspenders from his pants. You finally look away, his boots and his pants are peeled off and his shirt is unbuttoned. He’s breathing heavily now, naked as the day he was born. But you won't stop shivering. Your hair is still wet. And the fire is struggling to warm you from the bitter cold that clings to the dusty air. There isn't much left to burn for the fire.
“You want me to hold you?” It's out of his mouth before he can stop it, trying to smack away these thoughts about the glimpses he’s getting of your naked figure underneath the blanket. He swears it's only out of necessity, that you're just not warming up fast enough. “Don’t want you gettin’ sick on me,” He really does only want you comfortable. Unrealistically hoping this won't change what you most likely consider a friendship. You nod, vigorously.
“I think it would be ok, maybe if you just didn’t- didn’t look. Just- don’t look,” and you're desperate, curling up in his lap in front of the wavering fire. You're unable to look at him, but you still rub into him, enjoying how his body warms up a lot faster than yours. And both of you make some excuse that things would be better without that old blanket between you two. And suddenly you're pressed into him, his arms tight around you while he looks at the ceiling to avoid staring at things he shouldn't. Arthur struggles hard to keep from rubbing upwards into you, trying to keep you from sitting directly between his legs, afraid the way his body reacts to the feel of your body will scare you, scandalize you. But you only seem to want to be there more, getting comfortable with him. His chest hair tickles you, the hair creeps all the way down his torso. You giggle softly as it tickles you. His heart beats fast at the feel of you, so soft compared to the roughness of him.
As if all of the blood hasn't already rushed down to the very center of him, you just have to sit squarely on his lap. He tries to readjust you but it's too late and you've felt him, hard as a rock, pushing at you. He's so embarrassed, stumbling over an apology, “Shit-I-I’m sorry, I-” in that surly voice, all rough and low. you gasp and look over your shoulder. You see how he can hardly stand to look at you with his pretty blue gem-toned eyes. Instead he shows you his profile as he turns away.
“It's ok”, Arthur has no idea how he's supposed to look at you after this, he can't see himself looking you in the eyes for a long while after you've felt his cock nudging the swell of your ass, unable to deny his own reaction to you. Hopefully he’ll be able to dismiss it as a fluke and not a devastating hope that you’d be interested in him that he's been crushing down for months now. He's trying to will away the burgeoning desire just under his skin, tamping down fires that rage on. And you look up at him again with that look of trust in your eyes, too ashamed to continue touching you, wholeheartedly convinced you don't like him.
But then you're only closer than you were, looking up at him, so close, he's breathing in your scent, sweet and like fresh summer rain. His eyes search yours for any inclination and all you have to do is put your hand on his prickly cheek for him to lean and kiss you, hands on his broad chest, rushing over the warmth you can feel. How he ends up with you on his lap, tits pressed up against his hairy chest, his big hands squeezing at your hips, he's not too sure. Your arms are over his shoulders, playing with his light brown hair sweetly, rubbing the sore muscles in his back. And the glide of his tongue over yours is heaven, he swears. You whine into his kisses, the heat between the both of you licks over your skin, noses clumsily bumping into each other.
Then he’s on top of you, tucking you over the blanket. “You gotta tell me you want this, want me,” and all you can do is say “Yes, please, Arthur, please,” features showing your ecstasy, anticipating his hands on you.
His hands are rough; petting down your sides. Any worries he had about being too old, too ugly and too brutish for you are forgotten when you kiss him, spread your legs for him to fit between them. When you push your breasts in his hands when he goes to touch them. Your nipples are hard from the cold but his hands start to warm them up when he gropes at them, squeezing languidly at your breasts, grabbing handfuls.
It's not long before he’s pinning your thighs up with his hands, spreading you and licking eagerly between your legs, so selfless. Letting you moan as loud as you like, telling you how good you taste, the roughened pads of his fingers circling at the sensitive button at the top of your slit. And he's so strong, doesn't put much effort into keeping your legs up. He has dulcet praises for you, “Such a pretty girl, darlin’, jus’ beautiful,” making you soften and ease.
He’s so warm, holding you, like you wanted him to, messy kisses that taste like you. The very tip of him catches on you, dipping softly between your folds. Your nails dig into him, thighs clench tight. He's sweet talking to you, shushing you, rubbing hard at the delicate little nub, getting you as wet as possible. Saying how good you look. How he must be dreaming. That’s my girl is what he says when you soak his fingers with your own arousal, heat rising to the apples of your cheeks. Even more when he's working his cock inside of you, panting, he seems overwhelmed, mumbling and groaning praises to you, his sweet girl, perfect in that slow easy voice of his. You feel him carefully easing you open, hissing at the feel of you wrapped tight on him and leaking down his shaft. You can't say much but his name, begging him not to stop, feeling his fingers almost bruise the tender softness of your hips.
Arthur pushes so deep, a growl of pleasure leaking from his lips. You didn't think he would feel so big. Telling him how big he is and feels; “You're so big, Arthur,” in a wispy moan, makes him groan. He just wants to hear how much you like him. The rhythm he was trying to keep slow and careful speeds up. And he doesn't last very long, poor thing. It's been a while for him and he's flushed bright red, embarrassed and feeling a tad emasculated. The disappointed son of a bitch he lets out has you petting his hair back tenderly.
But all you have to do is give him a minute, kiss and nip gently, lock your legs around him so he can't pull away, until he's pushing his own seed deeper, mindlessly pinning you under his weight. He loves feeling so close to you, so small underneath him.
The way you feel clenching down on him, moaning for him, begging him to keep going has him rutting into you, following his instincts, brain feeling like it's melting. He's harder than he has ever been, listening to the sound of your wetness slide on him, the mess he’s left between your thighs sounding dirty and sticky. You don't have to tell him to keep rubbing you, grinding your hips into his so he can press into the perfect spot.
His thumb is rubbing at the very center of you, that tender bud, so sensitive, has you pushed to the edge and falling over, legs locking up behind him, bucking and moaning much too loud. You sink your fingers into the layer of fat over his broad muscles, arching your back, feeling so complete. Seeing you so relaxed, feeling so good because of him makes him push as deep as he can, making your toes curl, forcing more of his cum even deeper, a sloppy wet mess that drips out of you when he pulls out. But he revels in those few moments where he's catching his breath, still so deep inside of you, feeling you pulse on him.
Arthur can’t not hold you afterwards, unsure what to say. He thinks it might be too soon for I love you, maybe you’ll be scared away by his raw sentiments and his lovesick words. But you stare into his eyes; his heart jumps when he blurts it out in the silence, too late to shut his damn mouth. But you only smile and say you love him too. You're the farthest thing from cold, tucked into his chest, not even noticing that the rain has stopped.
Thank you for reading! SO sorry this ended up being so long. Excited to write more for high honor arthur, this was more fun than i thought... I love him 😔😳
#red writes#arthur morgan x reader#arthur morgan x you#arthur morgan#rdr2 x reader#high honor arthur morgan#arthur morgan x female reader#arthur morgan smut#rdr2 community#high honor arthur morgan x reader#arthur morgan x fem reader#red dead redemption 2 x reader
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Down Home 1
No tag lists. Do not send asks or DMs about updates. Review my pinned post for guidelines, masterlist, etc.
Warnings: this fic will include dark content such as non/dubcon, and possible untagged elements. My warnings are not exhaustive, enter at your own risk.
This is a dark!fic and explicit. 18+ only. Your media consumption is your own responsibility. Warnings have been given. DO NOT PROCEED if these matters upset you.
Summary: The world's most famous heroes walk into a small town diner and change your life.
Characters: Bucky Barnes, Steve Rogers
Note: Because of this.
As per usual, I humbly request your thoughts! Reblogs are always appreciated and welcomed, not only do I see them easier but it lets other people see my work. Thanks to everyone who reads this one and thank you for all your energy.<3
Love you all to Jupiter and back. Take care. 💖
It’s a slow day. Every day is slow out in Tumble Down. The township’s name tells the whole story. Everything there is in decline. It’s hard to imagine there was ever a time when the people weren’t tiny and forgotten in the hubbub of the bigger world. Since the mines closed and the canning factory was outsourced, it feels even smaller.
Smaller isn’t so bad. It’s simpler. You all know each other’s names and faces. You say hi and how are you and do what needs to be done. Simple is, simple as.
You here there isn’t much to do in most small towns. Not for fun or for work. You’re one of the lucky ones. You got a job down at the diner in your sophomore year. It helped pay for your daddy’s new engine and since then, it keeps you all afloat in the rising waters of disparity as they close in on Tumble Down.
You hum to the old radio that sits on the shelf you make sure to dust. The speakers crackle from time to time and the signal gets wonky in storm season, but the music’s never bad. It’s the classic stuff that always played in your mother’s kitchen.
You wipe down another table. Not because it needs it, just because it’s something to do. The day has been long and listless. Even the breakfast rush was lower than usual.
Darnell, the cook, whistles along from the back. Everyone knows he isn’t as mean as he looks. He just likes his space.
As you go back to the counter and lean on it, staring at the ticking clock, a roar cuts through the distance. You blink and look up, narrowing your eyes at the dusty country road outside. Wind rustles through the tall wheat in the field opposite and the noise rumbles closer and closer.
A man pulls in a motorbike. He’s going so fast that he has to circle the gravel lot before he can slow down. It’s not Lenny and his prized Harley but another man on a more modern-looking mount. Not far behind, another motorcycle zips through and the riders straddle their bikes as the survey the restaurant.
You narrow your eyes. You probably need glasses but you make do. The last time you got your eyes checked, you didn’t have enough for the frames.
The one man wears blue and red, an odd helmet on his head. Not a helmet at all but a sort of mask. The other man has dark hair to his chin and a beard to match. He’s all in black but his left arm shines with gold ripples. Not a sleeve, an arm, made of metal.
“Oh my lord,” you murmur in shock, “Darnell!” You holler over your shoulder, “you’re not gonna believe this.” You turn to the window as he pokes his head around, “not sure I do myself. Tell me my eyes aren’t lyin’.”
He looks above your head, an easy task for the mammoth cook. He hums and swirls around his spatula. “Thems those boys on the news. The one that was in the old war. Grandad’s battle.”
“I’m not going crazy with boredom?” You bubble.
He snorts. It’s as close to a laugh as you get from him. You spin back and hurry around the counter to grab a pair of menus. Still, you don’t want to seem too eager. You put down the menus and fiddle with a napkin holder instead.
The bell over the door jingles and swipe up the menus and turn. You really can’t believe it’s them. Yet, as Captain America removes his cowl, you’re certain. They look just like they do on the TV. Even with your sight, you can tell.
“Hello, fellas, how are you doin’ today?”
The dark-haired one, the Winter Soldier, glances at the other, his cheek dimpling, “well... we’re... uh...”
“We’re doing great,” Steve Rogers answers brightly. “Starving. You guys serve bacon? My buddy’s dying for some.”
“Um, yes, sirs, yes. Can I sit ya down?” You ask, hugging the menus closer.
“Please,” the Captain accepts as the other man stays silent and pensive, his eyes wandering down to the coffee stain on your apron.
“Just here,” you sweep away and wave them on with you. You stop beside the nicest booth and lay down a menu on each side, “have a seat.”
They do just as you bid. The blond puts his cowl on the table and unhooks the shield from his back to lay on the far end of the seat. He smooths back the sweaty strands of hair as his companion stretches his metal fingers. You sway nervously by the table, twitching as you remind yourself how to do your job.
“Well, can I get ya started with coffee? You look beat from the road.” You beam with the smile Mr. Welk says could outshine the sun.
“Not just the road,” the dark-haired one mutters as he rolls his shoulder. The one that connects to his real arm. “I’ll take one, please.”
“Can I get an orange juice, please,” the Captain asks.
“Course ya can. I’ll be right back. You have a look at the specials and give it a think,” you bounce and spin around.
You go to pour the orange juice and a cup of black coffee. Darnell lingers by the window. He only ever really appears to put a plate up but he watches the new arrivals.
You bring their drinks and step back, clasping your hands behind you.
“Did ya need cream or sugar for your coffee, sir?” You ask.
“Black’s fine,” he assures.
“No need for the sirs. Steve, Bucky,” Captain America insists, “we’re off duty.”
“Right, sorry about that, ssss...Steve,” you correct yourself. “You need some more time?”
“Think I’m decided,” Bucky intones, “what about you?”
“Set,” Steve confirms, “I’ll have the sunny side up with toast and sausage. Can I get some fruit on the side as well, please?”
He hands over the menu and you take it as you hold your smile. Your cheeks ache. Not because you have to force it but because you can’t stop. This is the most exciting thing to happen in Tumble Down ever. If Darnell wasn’t there, no one would believe you.
“Overeasy, bacon, extra bacon too, and some french toast, and uh... home fries.” Bucky offers up the second menu, “please and thank you.”
“Alrighty,” you preen, “I’ll put your order in.”
“Got it,” Darnell growls over the empty diner.
“He’s got good hearing,” you giggle nervously as you look between the men. “Ummmm, sorry, I’ll leave ya be.”
“You’re not bothering,” Steve assures. “I can see you’re dying to ask.”
He gives a gentle smile.
“Nah, oh, gosh. I’m sure ya get it all the time. I don’t wanna be one of those,” you put your hands up. “Really, you all look like you could use the peace and quiet.”
“Well, actually, I’ve been stuck with this meathead for days,” Bucky scoffs, “so please, I’d love to hear someone else’s voice.”
You laugh again. They’re funnier than you expect. They always look so serious on the TV.
“What... what are y’all doing here in Tumble Down? It’s a bit far from... anywhere.” You ask sheepishly.
“Tumble Down? Is that what it’s called?” Steve scratches his neck above his stained collar. “Well, we couldn’t get a signal so we’ve just been riding through. Saw the sign down the way and figured we’d get a bite.”
“He’s lying. He was falling asleep on his bike,” Bucky teases.
“Sure,” Steve shakes his head. “Only ‘cause I’m tired of you.”
You giggle again, “I thought y’all were friends.”
“Friends, partners, cursed with each other, have your pick,” Bucky snorts.
“He’s playing,” Steve says. “Look, we’re boring. Despite what you think. We’re a couple of old men bickering with each other. What about you? What about Tumble Down?”
“Ah, nothing really, sir. Steve,” you squeeze the menus tight at the edges. “Nothing going on since the coal law and that. Everyone’s all but run out. All but us.”
“Just you? Your family?” Steve wonders.
“Jesus, Steve, nosy much?” Bucky says over the brim of his mug.
“Sorry. He’s right. Like I said. Crotchety old man. I talk to the pigeons.”
You laugh again, “oh my, you are a hoot!” You slap your thigh emphatically, “I’m still my ma and pa. It’s just the three of us. They need help with the animals and that.”
“Animals?” Steve wonders, his posture shifting towards you.
“Chickens, cows. They got a farm. Was my grandpa’s. And his ma kept it going after he didn’t come home from... well, you’d know more about that time than me, I think.” You give a forlorn look to the floor.
“Oh, I’m so sorry about your grandfather. Great grandfather,” he corrects himself.
“Lotta good men gone,” Bucky mulls grimly.
“Yeah, my great granny said as much. I wouldn’t know though, but I heard the stories,” you dare to look at them again. “Sorry to bring up the bad memories.”
“Nah,” Bucky waves you off casually. “I got this nifty arm outta it.”
“And I got a shield so, you know, not all losses,” Steve chuckles.
“I s’pose,” you agree. “I’m gonna check on that food for ya. You good with your coffee?”
Bucky raises the mug, “delicious.”
You nod and turn with a swish of your skirt. You go up to the window and look over the ledge. “How’s it going, Darnell?”
“Going. I’m happy it ain’t Raylene here. She’s got a mouth on her, don’t she? Them sort don’t deserve that trouble,” he tisks.
“They’re nice. And Raylene is too. She’s just... Raylene,” you say, “can I help with anything?”
“I don’t wanna be rude but I’m tired of tellin’ ya to stay outta my kitchen. You know the grill likes to spit,” he shakes his head. “You go, I’ll let ya know when it’s ready.”
“Alright,” you back away and turn back.
Steve and Bucky lean over the table, their voices low as they chat. As you move around behind the counter, they both sit up and the former clears his throat. You smile as you take the cloth from your apron pocket and wipe the already clean counter.
As the radio buzzes, you hum without thinking. Stevie Ray Vaughan’s smoky voice mingles with the emotion plucked through electric strings. Your dad’s a big fan. He has old tapes with concerts on them and even went to one himself.
The bell rings and you nearly jump out of your shoes. You turn and scoop up the plates as you thank Darnell. He grumbles that he’s going out to have a smoke; his code for having a Tootsie Pop by the backdoor.
You bring the meals over to the table and set them down before the men. Their gazes make you sweat. It’s all a little more intense with no one else there.
“Thank you,” Steve says and Bucky echoes him.
“Not at all. Anything else? Water? Ketchup?”
“It all looks great as is,” Steve says, “you got a nice voice.”
“Oh, really? Ha, I was just humming out of tune. Sorry if I was too loud.”
“Not at all,” Bucky picks up his fork as he leans forward. He tilts his head. “You know this one?”
“Sure do. It’s Fleetwood Mac,” you answer. “One my all times.”
He grins and nods as he looks at Steve. Steve watches you with a smile of his own.
“Do you sing?” He asks.
“Me? Only in my shower or to the chickens. They usually hide in the henhouse then.” You tinkle with laughter.
“Ah,” Steve nods.
“But if... if ya really wanna suffer, I could try it,” you smile, “but uh, you know, Stevie Nicks, she’s one of a kind.”
“I’ve had worse,” Steve says.
You look between him and Bucky. You chew your lip and think. You follow the song as you try to recognise which verse it is. You squint and perk up as you catch your place.
“You just let me know when you’ve had enough,” you say before you start. Not only can you tell your pa that you met the super soldiers, you can tell him you sang for them. It’ll be a nice bit of excitement for the dinner table.
#steve rogers#dark steve rogers#bucky barnes#dark bucky barnes#dark!steve rogers#dark!bucky barnes#steve rogers x reader#bucky barnes x reader#marvel#mcu#captain america#down home#winter soldier#avengers
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love mirage
✧ pair: benjicot "davos" blackwood (fancast) x freader!secret-lover-betrothed-to-a-bracken
✧ theme/warning(s): slight/implied smut, angst, forbidden romance, star-crossed lovers. — (all characters mentioned are of age!) 18+
✧ word count: 1.8k
✧ author's note: hello! this is my first writing! this one-shot was spontaneously written as it was meant more for self-indulgence but i thought why not share it to others who also has a current obsession with the rising blackwood character, right? :-) anyways, reading fics under the benji tags manifested many scenarios in my head, and gave me inspiration to write something. lastly, forgive me for any possible grammatical errors, i still am an amateur in fictional writing. enjoy!!!
It was the dead of night. The sky had been painted in its darkest hue, the moon stood nearly at its peak, offering its gentle glow along the riverbank. The distant chatter that could be heard during a long day's labor was no longer present, replaced by the solemn silence of nature's symphonies—the flowing river, the rustling of leaves as they danced in breaths of wind, and the lullabies of insects as they clicked and buzzed.
The forest was no stranger to you; befriending the woodland for the passing moons. You often wondered if anyone would, or had, grown an inkling of your periodic disappearance following the hours of supper—what others would think of your father’s only daughter growing a rather sudden interest beyond the walls of your family's stronghold. You always made your way out stealthily, though his words echoed in your mind,
“You are our only hope, daughter. Do not fail us.” A stark reminder of your duty, which would soon bring honor to your family's name.
If it means anything, you knew it was wrong from the start. You had never intended anything as such to happen. For the name of a nobleman was bound to yours, yet your lips would chant whispers of another.
Time became irrelevant right before you met him on this cool summer night. There the young man stood, one hand steady on the hilt of his dagger, ever vigilant should danger lurk in the tranquil embrace of the silent woods; his tense body relaxing upon the sight of your cloaked figure before him—a beacon of familiarity. You had planned to tell him about your betrothal tonight.
Although it was not much longer that you would find yourself a whimpering mess under the Blackwood boy. Your sighs mingled with the saccharine words Benjicot spoke, adding harmonies of moans and gasps of pleasure in the serenity of the haven you both made. You often feared getting caught but Benji assured you in these remote lands, he doubted anyone would be near enough to witness anything— not even the treacherous act you both selfishly indulged in. You still pray to the Gods that they grant you both the favor that no eye spies this clandestine meeting; and the many before.
You never really questioned yourself on why you couldn't confide in your father about your betrothal; had you already envisioned the conversation—mayhem would ensue. It was simple, it was the decision he made—securing your family's position through a marriage pact, a political alliance they called it. Duty, you thought yet again.
You didn't know what, or whom, to shift the blame on—or maybe it was the complexities of guilt. your guilt. You knew the inevitable, yet your selfishness, your greed, your immature desire for love; tainting your rationale. Or that maybe you should feel resentment that your father and the Lord of Stone Hedge, Humfrey Bracken regarded their relationship as close as to being kin. Maybe then you would have the strength to ignore your obligations, this once.
You cursed yourself for thinking the way you did, and you cursed the Gods for the decades-old rivarly between the ancient houses—a hatred and feud born long before either of you were born; beyond your father's time, and his father's before him, yet its roots grew, multiplying the petty divide among those that followed after them.
It made you question what started the war between the two in the first place, as sin begets sin begets sin; however, unwavering was the tryst between you and Benjicot—untouched by the strife and grudges.
He knew. You were aware of his knowledge with the woven webs you had with the Brackens; about your father's bond with the red stallion lord. Your thoughts do not come to a plausible explanation as they endlessly spun in your mind.
And all it took was Benjicot's hips to lower into yours, silencing these whirling thoughts.
Your cloak drapes over you, offering its warmth from the breaths of wind, coming from the riverbank. It spared the watchful eyes of the forest spirits from your unneeded bareness. At your side, Benjicot lays as he adjusts his breeches.
“There’s a war soon to come,” he says as he stares at the sky, hands behind his head, ”And I ought for you to know that given the growing wars, you have not left my mind since.” he nervously confessed.
You hum in response, the weight of his words settling heavily in the quiet of the forest. "I fear what lies ahead, Ben" you whisper, your voice barely above a murmur, filled with both longing and apprehension.
He turns to you then, his gaze searching yours with an intensity that spoke of unspoken promises and uncertainties. "No matter what comes, my love for you will endure." he vows, his fingers gently tracing the contour of your cheek.
You turn your head and sit up, feeling around for your discarded garments to dress.
"Did I say something wrong?" he asks, sitting up, his expression betraying confusion at your abrupt reaction.
"No, it's not that." you breathed out, your back faced to him. It was this very moment you had feared since the first: the inevitable.
"Well, did you not finish as I had?" he ventured in jest, a playful side of him that you loved. "Or is it because I professed my love for you?", hoping his declaration had not caused you to pull away. "Trust me, I will make sure there's nothing—"
"My betrothal..." you did not let him finish, "it's to Aeron Bracken." you said, still facing away from him as you rose from the ground. You picked on your fingers picked in nervousness of his next response. The weight of your confession hung heavy in the air.
At first he thought he had not heard you clearly, as if the world had gotten awfully quiet. It was when you repeated once more, realizing his ears did not fail him as his blood got hot—of you saying the name whom ignited an unexplainable fury in him.
"Aeron Bracken," Benjicot repeated in disbelief of your sudden confession, "The Bracken twat, eh?" — the very same Bracken he encountered in fresh conflict, near the mill's boundary stones. Although he did not show it, the tension in the air was strong enough to burn and linger its flames; his knuckles turning pale as he clenched his fists at his side.
"A craven false king follower... is bound to your name, to you." he chuckles incredulously.
He paced in the clearing, his footsteps heavy as he turned to you. "And what are you to do about it?" He posed the question, pain plain upon his face, though hope bled through the mask of his composure. Deep down, he already knew the answer. He could scare tell if asking you such question was to self-inflict torment, or just a desperate need to face the harsh reality of your confession— not a difference between the two really.
You finally turned to meet his gaze, "It's my father's decision," you explained softly. "I... I cannot defy it." You stood before him, as your tears glisten in the faint light. Torn between love and duty.
"Ben," you pleaded, your voice shaking. "You know the stakes. It’s my duty. My family's honor—”
"Fuck honor!" he interrupted, his voice thundering through the forest. He strides towards you, "It was long gone the very moment we first met—" he huffed out. He knew in his heart that despite the love he developed towards you, the tangled web of your kinship with the Brackens would soon unravel the bond you shared— still, he gambled with the odds, just as you had.
He had ever hoped that the old Gods would bestow the blessing of his fervent wishes—that it would be you, not some other maiden, whom he would take to wife. He often dreamed of you bearing the heirs of his house, growing gray together, and watch as your blood flow through the veins that would carry on his legacy. Yet, it was only ever a distant dream.
You reached out to him, to calm the storm raging within him, but he jerked away. "Tell me, then," he challenged, stepping closer with fire in his eyes. "Where do your loyalties lie, beyond this," he motioned between the two of you. "Are you suggesting that your father, and even yourself, are to declare for the usurper cunt of a King?" he whisper-yells to you. “Or is this some sort of arrangement with those Bracken fucks, to get back at us Blackwoods, simply just using me as a pawn, 'cus you know I'm now Lord?" His words spitting at you like venom;
“Oh, you know where my loyalties lie," you spat, your voice filled with heartache, "But I won't stand for you questioning my integrity nor my family's honor to secure a future." You glared at him as your heart stung with hurt, "And to accuse me... I would not dare to commit something so heinous even if i could; I'm not cruel, Benji."
Benjicot's jaw clenched, shaking his head as he stood facing the river, incomprehensible words muttered under his breath.
"I never asked for this," you whispered, tears welling in your eyes. "But I have responsibilities. We both do." you sniffled, swallowing the tension of your throat away, "And I know you know..." you wiped your tears, "we know... that this was bound to occur, sooner or later, Ben." your voice was barely audible, even with the deafening silence the forest came to be. "There's a war coming."
The silence hung heavy in the air, thick with unspoken words and the weight of impossible choices.
Benjicot stood before you, his expression torn between love and anguish. His hands trembled as he gathered his scattered belongings, his movements reflecting the turmoil in his heart. You mirrored his actions, silently picking the remnants of what you felt is to be your last fleeting moment of happiness.
"I swear it," he finally spoke, "would that we were not bound by the enmity between our folks, I would have already vowed myself to you. Long before your father would have you promised to another."
His words pierced your heart with longing and regret, the bitter truth of your circumstances hanging between you like a veil of sorrow. “And I would have gladly accepted it,” you replied with a heavy sigh. "—my Lord."
The Blackwood male nodded, his gaze fixed on yours, filled with a depth of emotion that mirrored your own. With a heavy heart, you both silently acknowledged the futility of your love.
Benjicot turned away first. The distance between you both grew; and his silhouette became one with the dark forest.
You knew that somewhere, amidst the pain and heartache, you would find a way to carry on—a life of uncertainty but fraught with duty. As you walked away from the happiness and love that the forest had given you, the ache in your chest spoke of a love that was lost but will never be forgotten. It would be a bittersweet reminder of what once was, and what could never be again.
#hotd x reader#benjicot blackwood#benjicot blackwood x reader#bloody ben#davos blackwood#davos blackwood x reader#forbidden romance#star crossed lovers#hotd angst#i love me some angst#mmm mmm mmmmmmmm#i hope you guys like itttt!!!#kieran burton fancast#hotd fanfic#hotd
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theodore nott headcanons part two!!
is it headcannons or headcanons?? anyways i hope you guys like this one, ideas for a new fic are in plan...
masterlist
theodore nott masterlist
patriotically italian, esp now that its the euros this man is 10000% against anything english and his friends are still mad at him for last euros (same)
loves to go shopping with you, he’ll hold stuff for you, he’ll buy stuff for you, he’ll ask people questions for you, literally anything
dog person, hates cats
imagine doing that one trend with theo where your lipstick is smudged and you tilt the phone to him and he’s got lipstick kisses allll over
keeps a polaroid of you two in his phone case
has to hold hands all the time
definitely sappy drunk, most times he’ll talk about your future wedding and sometimes he wont recognise that it’s you and won’t let you touch him thinking it’s some random girl
loves watching you get ready
will take your makeup off for you after a long day/night
doesn’t text basically anyone apart from his friendship group and you, and is always that one person in group chats that never texts back to anything
uses "👍" like a dad
buys things for you if you mention them once e.g. if you say one day that you love blueberries, he'll show up with five boxes of them the next day
has all his family recipes in a box and doesn’t let anyone not even you see them, your favourite: his grandads tiramisu
sees mattheo breaking spaghetti, proceeds to try and break his legs
always has ink on his hands
you guys are not like those couples at theme parks who are basically doing it in a “family friendly” environment, you hold hands and kiss sometimes but nothing more
old moneyyy
knows how to ride horses for some reason
walked in your and pansys dorm once without knocking when you two were doing the jojo siwa karma dance, was traumatised, left silently, never spoke of it again and never came into the dorm without knocking
loves photography, hes always taking candid photos of you and random things he sees
the majority of his camera roll is you, old photos of his mother that hes been trying to recover from the Nott achives, and just random things he sees that he finds nice, from a painting in a museum to shattered glass in the sunlight on the street
loves taking in italian with lorenzo when he knows you don’t understand things, loves to see you get frustrated
if you speak a language other than english with your parents and you’re on the phone with them and he hears the one or two words he knows, he’ll get all happy and smiley and keep repeating that word/phrase, same with you when theo speaks italian (if youre not already an italian speaker)
super tall, touches the border of doorways when he walks by them, is called slender man on a daily basis as a result
resting bitch face
lorelai gilmore type comebacks
prideful, knows the status his family holds
fuck around and find out kind of guy
he’s got that built in dad feature of being able to fix absolutely anything from a shelf to the stove
princess treatment both ways
makes sure to wear a freshly washed shirt for a few hours so when you wear it, they smell like him
serves you first in the great hall
loves coming home with you and your family on holidays
does that thing of keeping a flower from a bouquet he gives you so he knows when to get you more
scorpio
if you are an air sign: that one lyric from chemtrails over the country club, "youre in the wind, im in the water" is so you two bc hes a water sign
kendrick supporter
academically smart, womanly stupid
would ask you to teach him how to make daisy chains and get frustrated when all his would break
he and blaise are the appointed spider catchers for you, mattheo, lorenzo, pansy and draco
cursive handwriting
favourite colour is deep blue
#theo nott x reader angst#theodore nott x reader fluff#theodore nott x y/n#theo nott x reader#theodore nott x reader#theo nott#theodore nott#theo nott headcanons#harry potter
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God is Fair|The Lore
Devotional Love with Suguru x Reader|Two-Shot
Part 1|Part 2|Part 3
the deets: ever since you were young, you knew you were meant for each other. he came into your life like a storm and grew closer no matter how distant you seemed. he swelled and captured your heart every time he was near. so why did you keep fighting him? w.c: 12.7k (holy f*ck) out of idk yet for part-two the rest (god bless) tags: fem!reader, mostly angsty….pretty much 90% angst for part 1, repressed feelings, jealousy, lingering lips and fingers, a little bit of self-depreciation at the end but pick that crown up love, reader gets a little violent at the end 😳|if i missed anything, pls comment or DM ☺️ angel’s note: this story started as one thing and ended up as another—so goes the way of life. PSA: most of the good, filthy, mack-nasty shyt is in part 2/3, but you’ve gotta wade through the fire first to get it. It’s always worth it|thanks for reading 🖤 earworm 🐛: Chihiro|Billie Eilish
Over time, you became perfectly molded to him.
As did his lips to your tender bud that sank under his sinful tongue.
Slender fingers grip and drown under his raven locks, barely saving you from the shallow breaths you must take to stay alive.
You’re just above water, and he steals your air, spelling poetry with his tongue over your folding petals.
Broken coos spill from your puffy lips—his favorite melody to ever grace his ears.
Whether it was today, tomorrow, yesterday, or forever—you fall—in and in and even deeper into his grasp. Under the waves and trapped in his ocean—he gently pulls you under—your lungs yearning for air, but you never want out.
And the way he dives in, drowning to taste every drop, every sweet, delectable sip of your nectar like he could live the rest of his life without oxygen—tells you that he doesn’t either.
You learned to love each other’s oceans and came to mix seas. Both treaded rough waters but learned to float with calm bodies.
Now you lie hand in hand, limbs weaved like vines through each other’s arms, as you cuddle. Completely spent from another night in each other’s depths. Grateful. Grateful for his love—his patience.
And wondering how on Earth you thought it’d be possible to exist without someone you swore you despised.
Suguru has always been the best—the best at being good, the best at being kind, the best at being quiet—the best at being better than you.
When you were eight years old, he made his quiet introduction into your quaint little neighborhood, arriving in a flashy Mercedes-Benz followed by two moving trucks that pulled right into the driveway directly across the street from your humble home. Heels painted with red bottoms adorning stocking-covered legs were the first things you saw as you watched from your bedroom window.
The sound of movers drew your attention. No one ever came to your city, let alone your cul-de-sac. You felt a shift. A change was coming.
A tall woman, her long, sleek ponytail blowing in the wind, stepped out of the driver’s seat wearing large couture shades that took up most of her face. The overhanging forecast made everything bleak and gray, but the sunglasses stayed. A man exited the passenger seat and came to the woman’s side. He gingerly took her hand and looked around with a small smile, gently rubbing her arm. She slightly grimaced and handed him what looked like one of those small, overpriced designer bags.
They looked so…out of place.
They had to smell like money.
What the heck were they doing here?
In a city like yours, one of those places where everyone knows everyone and everybody's business, you instantly knew that this couple would be the talk of the town. At least with the adults.
You blew air into your bangs. You weren’t expecting new neighbors, but they could have at least come with a kid—someone who might actually want you around.
“Hey, Bug,” your dad called from the garden.
He always left the back door open so he could hear you in case you needed him. He must have heard the rumbling of their heavy trucks now being unloaded with elegant furniture. Would all of that even fit in there? Their house was bigger than yours but not by much. “Sounds like we’ve got new neighbors. Might go by later and say hi if you want to come.”
“No thanks.”
You turned back to the window, resting your head on your arms. Meeting Mr. and Mrs. Richy Rich didn't sound very appealing to you and might only make you feel worse on this already gloomy Spring day.
For once, you wanted to be pleasantly surprised and not just surprised with something you wouldn’t expect, like hitting the jackpot or whatever.
And then you saw him.
Inky black hair drawn into a short ponytail, emerging from the back seat of the fancy car and clutching a book thicker than his torso. His starched white-collar shirt and beige shorts reminded you of school. He kept his chin tucked and looked like the wind just might knock him over if the book wasn’t keeping him upright.
He and the woman were near twins. Definitely mother and son. She smoothed her hands down her skirt and put on a genuine smile for him. The man draped his arm around the boy’s shoulders as he took in the neighborhood. Slow and sheepish. You thought his eyes caught yours when he looked behind him and you ducked under the window sill.
Sh—
“You can’t stay cooped up in here all the time, Bug,” your dad called again. It sounded like he might be wrapping up. “You don’t know what you’re missing out on.”
You inched back up to the window and peered over the edge. The boy looked like he was just as lost as to why he was there.
Anxious. Reserved. Kind of boring.
Not your speed.
You blew a raspberry and turned away. So much for that. You wouldn’t be missing much.
In your neighborhood, all the kids walked freely to each other’s houses to see if anyone was home. This was before everyone had cell phones to save time and figure it out for them.
You watched it happen with the other kids all the time. They’d visit each other and either stay inside (super rare) or gather the rest of the neighborhood to play in the cul-de-sac or park.
But you were never quite given a direct invitation.
The few friends you were close with moved away about a year ago, and the thought of making new ones who would eventually do the same kept you emotionally at arm's length. To make it worse, you swore the group you were left with undoubtedly hated you.
Why?
Because you had a history of sucking.
Everyone else in the neighborhood was naturally good at something. Anything. Everything.
But you?
You had to try.
Mess up. And try again. At almost anything you could name.
Basketball? Trash.
Tag? You were slow.
Football? Pssssh. As if—like you’d let yourself get hurt? You sat out every time.
So, the kids stopped inviting you or always picked you last. Both were grimy slaps in the face. Because you always knew you could be better. Delulu was the solulu if they’d only give you a chance. Or two. Or a few. But damn, you were trying.
At least you weren’t the only one being left out.
It’d been weeks since you saw the new kid on the block—not like you thought about him much after you dismissed him. But slowly, as the sounds of Spring beckoned him outside, he reminded you that the new “rich” neighbors did indeed have a kid.
It started with the curtains in his living room window gently ruffling before he’d peek out, scanning the scene for signs of life. Then eventually upgraded to gracing the neighborhood with his presence to sit outside. For hours, he watched from his front porch as the neighborhood kids dashed past your houses to play in the cul-de-sac.
It kind of made you jealous—the amount of space and freedom on their porch that his parents clearly weren’t taking advantage of. Only two plastic chairs and a small table occupied the space, and they weren’t nearly as lovely as the things you saw go into the home on move-in day. If it were up to you, you’d string up one of those hammocks big enough for two like you’d seen on TV and just float in the breeze under the overhang. It had been a frequent daydream of yours long before they moved in.
Instead, a gawking boy with too much time on his hands made it his home. Watching. Fiddling with his fingers and leaning on the rail. Watching. Always seeming too afraid to approach.
He had what you thought was the best house in the neighborhood (and probably the most money), and still, he looked so lonely.
With the background he seemed to come from, you thought he’d be more ballsy.
One day, you were, and you walked right up there, took the hand of the wide-eyed kid, and led him to the rest of the kids down at the park. His dad watched the whole thing go down from the kitchen window as he did the dishes, silently laughing as the boy stumbled behind you without saying a word.
This was your chance. You were so tired of the other kids being better than you. With him being the new kid, you thought he’d at least be somewhat on your level or maybe even a bit worse. Anything was better than being the odd one out.
You and the boy just a few inches shorter than you crashed the party right before the next game started. You beamed at the group like you had caught a prized fish.
“Guys, this is um…um…” Then you realize you hadn’t asked his name. And he was still holding your hand.
You dropped it and nudged him. “Suguru,” he said softly, seeming to avoid eye contact.
Suguru hadn’t seen that many kids in a group like this outside of school. He didn’t mean to look so anxious, but he wasn’t used to being in a neighborhood full of kids his age. He instantly felt like an outsider seeing how comfortable everyone was with each other, apart from you by his side. While soft smiles offered him a glimmer of acceptance, the stares made him self-conscious. He wondered if he could ever fit in.
You repeated his name in case no one heard him. Suguru. It naturally rolled off your tongue. Soft and sweet. Like the boy. He fidgeted with his fingers, but hearing his name felt reassuring. You looked at him and grinned. It was time to see what he’s got.
Tee-ball was the game. One you hated the most. Running was not your sport, and you certainly didn’t have an arm, so it never hurt your feelings too much when you weren’t picked for teams. But you made sure Suguru was. You wanted to see him in action.
Last summer, you guys found an old traffic cone to use as the tee and placed sticks around the field for bases.
You didn’t expect much from Suguru when it was time to bat because…look at him. He was so small and timid. The bat borrowed from someone’s dad was almost the same size as him, and you swore you saw his feet lift a few times during his practice swings. Too much of that and he’d be airborne. You prepared to give him a “job well done” pat on the back once he hit the ball a few feet.
Suguru squared up at the tee—on his way to join you at the bottom of the barrel.
And wouldn’t you know it?
He knocked the ball clear out of the park and didn’t even skim the cone.
Your mouth fell open before you remembered you were the designated retriever since you weren’t playing the game. You grumbled the whole walk and search for it.
And then he did it again. And again. And again.
And surprise, surprise, he excelled at every game he played after. Everyone wanted Suguru on their team.
You gaped at the feat—so much power, strength, and coordination in such an unassuming body.
And instantly hated him.
Not because he was the best or braggy about it.
It was the complete opposite.
He barely seemed to acknowledge it—not in an arrogant, dismissive way, but more like he was just happy to be involved and doing something. He was sheepish with compliments and even seemed nervous to receive them. He’d rub his head and give a little close-eyed smile before returning to the game.
And peer over to you on the sidelines for approval.
Every swing, every hit, and every game after, his purple eyes would find yours whenever he thought he’d done something worthwhile.
You tried to hide the jealous scowl, returning his shy smile with a nod and told him to keep his head in the game.
But he noticed.
He saw it. He knew you were unhappy, and he wanted nothing more than to help.
So after that, you kind of mirrored each other.
The kids always saw you as a try-hard—constantly on repeat, trying to make yourself valid and stand out. You’d grab failure by the throat and wring its neck, determined to make it forget your name. Not because you were attention-seeking; you only wanted to be counted in.
And so the student became the teacher. Suguru began to slip you little nods as if saying he saw you—just like you saw him all those times on his front porch. It’d annoy you at first, what you thought could’ve been pity, but it felt nice to finally be acknowledged by someone.
And so gradually, you looked to him as a spectator, earning silent yeses and nos until you finally worked up the courage to do what you were afraid of most. Ask him to be a friend.
To help you perfect your skills, of course.
But the friendship blossomed like the Spring, and you and Suguru actually grew really close—instantly drawn to each other. Pop-ups to his house were the norm as you had the most advantage out of everyone in the neighborhood by living right across from him. And you both were always brought up by one another’s parents.
Turns out Suguru’s dad was a lot like yours and they got on really well. They’re both funny, kind. But your dad’s a little bit different. He’s got rebellion in his bones, as he often talked about when he told you stories about his youth and take-no-shit hippie days.
“I’m serious, Bug. So, there we were, strapped to the tree. Shackled, really.”
He mimicked the story with his arms in between laughs.
“So, so we’re all chained up, right? And this bulldozer is coming right at our heads, ya? I look over to Stanley,” your even crazier God-father who showered you with gifts every time he visited, “I say, ‘Stanley, toughen up. You look like you’re about to piss yourself.’ And he goes, ‘I’m not scared. I forgot to go before we locked ourselves in.’”
Your dad roared with laughter, wiping the tears from his eyes like he hadn’t told that story a million times. Like he was going around trying to collect little activists. But Suguru almost fell over, leaning into his every word. He was such a shy laugher, always creasing his eyes and dimpling his cheeks when he did. It made your dad feel like the funniest guy alive when Suguru entertained his jokes.
“You were so brave,” and Suguru called your dad by his nickname just like your dad told him to. “I want to be that brave when I’m older.”
Your dad winked at you—you stuck out your tongue. Suguru was a good kid, he thought and reminded him a bit of himself.
Those days, your dad was mostly the same. He didn’t need much and chose to live a quaint and peaceful life. He’d talk your ear off about activism, travel, and stories about your mom who passed when you were born. You never got to “meet” her, but you always felt like you knew exactly who she was. And she was totally different from Suguru’s mom, who you learned was a hard-working corporate baddie. Red bottom heels. Makes sense.
By the end of that first summer, your families were practically joined at the hip. You and Suguru even more so. Outside of house calls and playing games with the rest of the neighborhood, the two of you also made frequent trips to the makeshift pier. Almost everything in your neighborhood and the surrounding area was walkable, including a small, wobbly, probably dangerous dock that sat over the small lake in town. You’d play a little alphabet game you made up on the walk down and constantly challenge him. Only for him to literally beat you at your own game nine times out of ten.
“Angels shop at—” You skipped down the dirt path.
“Blessed boutiques,” Suguru finished, “Beautiful coats—”
“Can clothe their wings. Dashing dolls—”
“Eat every sweet. Forks will find—”
“Giant…giant,” you thought and thought and thought, “Giant—”
“Geese!”’ Suguru tagged you and ran down the dock, deeming you the loser of that round. You strolled down to meet him near the water reflecting the sunset. A pout took up your face. He patted the deck, motioning for you to sit. “You’re gonna miss the fireflies.”
Watching them pop up one by one and glow on the water as the sun went down became a ritual. And one of your favorite memories of summer.
The following school year, you were even more inseparable. And when the end of fifth grade rolled around the year after, you knew it was fate when you found out you’d be attending the same middle school.
You were overjoyed. So was Suguru, but for different reasons. To you, now it was on.
Academics was an area where you had a fair shot at flourishing. You were studious, attentive, and almost the perfect student. And while you didn’t have bad grades, you always felt like you could be better. And you know why. Because everything came naturally to Suguru, of course.
Thank goodness for extracurriculars, though. The two of you didn’t need to do everything together, and you both benefited from the time and separation to do your own thing and discover your own interests. The Newspaper club caught your eye and was more interesting than you thought it would be—the first hobby to make you fall in love with words.
Suguru took an interest in robotics and, surprisingly, Yearbook. He was pretty crafty with a camera and made sure to snap the best photos of you during your events.
But the two of you rarely spoke of school or after-school activities. You never wanted him to know if you were struggling or needed help with anything and tried not to rely on him so much those days, so everything with you was always good.
It had to be.
He was still the competition, after all.
And you had to appear just as flawless.
Instead, you enjoyed late-night phone calls that went way past both of your bedtimes as you grew into middle schoolers. Pretending to be asleep and slipping the phone under your pillow without moving a muscle when your parents checked in was a sport, but it couldn’t be helped. The books you were reading, shows you were watching, and thoughts on what high school would be like were too good not to talk about into the late-night hours—even when your eyelids got too tired to stay open. Falling asleep with your cellphones in hand or occupying a space on your pillows was the norm.
“What’d ya think about the movie?”
“I mean, the book is always better, right? But like,” you sighed happily into the phone, “they made their lives look so…amazing.”
The two of you watched The Great Gatsby 1979 version on DVD at Suguru’s house right after school that day before you had to scurry off to help your dad in the garden. Suguru finished the book a few days ago, and after catching him with it during lunch and poking him enough to get him to spill some of the details, you were sold.
A glamorous romance about a life of luxury and passion?
Say less.
And because you couldn’t resist, you told him you’d finish it in less time than he did.
Suguru thought the movie was pretty true to the book, but man, what a sad story. You, however, were in love with the lifestyle.
“What about Daisy?” he asked.
You pondered Daisy’s decision for half a second before deciding she was a one-off. All her life she had been spoiled, something you were a total stranger to but didn’t make a point to say—only dismissed her frivolous ways and called her a coward. “Just the money and parties would be enough for me,” you said in a daydream. “It’d be too happy to be that shallow.”
Suguru laughed and said that wasn’t the point of the book. “Money can't always buy happiness. She could’ve had love. It was right there.” He sounded so sophisticated when he said it, much too wise and sappy for a 13-year-old.
You sucked your teeth. “That’s easy for you to say.” And you reminded him that he has a nicer house, clothes, car. “And when are y’all getting the Benz back?”
Lately, you and Suguru had been getting picked up by his dad in a major downgrade of a car. It’d been at least two months, and you were missing the feel of luxury against your skin.
The phone went quiet for a second, and Suguru scratched his head. “Uh, we actually don’t have it anymore.”
Your eyes widened as if he'd just told you someone died. Borderline devastation set in like it was your family losing one of its greatest displays of wealth. But Suguru didn’t sound the least bit sad when he told you that his dad referred to the “new car” as a “cash car” because they needed something quick.
And then it clicked, and you realized why you’d been noticing that furniture and things had also been disappearing in his house when you came over. And why he had to switch to the free lunch program you were also on at school. And why his dad mentioned looking for a second job the other day.
Suguru’s family had been hit by the recession.
And that’s how he became your neighbor.
Most of everything Suguru grew up with in his previous family home was placed in storage when they first moved into your neighborhood. His mom thought their stay would be temporary; she had been demoted at work but didn’t think it was a big deal, and things would quickly be back to normal—maybe even come with a promotion if she worked hard enough.
But it wasn’t her skills that was the problem. The economy was in shambles, and her company was running out of money. After two years of hoping for a miracle, she and over 40% of her company were laid off.
They kept all of this from Suguru until only a few weeks ago. He was much too young to understand what it all meant when it first happened—he was just a kid. But now, he was older, smarter, way less naïve. They couldn’t keep lying to him about why the car was away at the shop or why the family heirloom dining table went missing, among other things.
When they told him that he’d have to slow down on his growing book collection and only get one gift for his birthday that year, that’s when he started asking questions—not that either of those things meant much to him. He was more than happy to frequent the school library, and you noticed that he’d been spending a lot more time there than usual during breaks.
What bothered Suguru the most was the looks his parents gave him when they told him everything. Like they were delivering the worst news in the world. Like they were so worried that they’d be disappointing him. Like they should be ashamed.
It hurt him more to know that they felt like they had failed him.
“My dad just looks so tired all of the time now.”
Mr. Geto, who had been a stay-at-home work-from-home employee since before Suguru was born, had to get a part-time job working overnight to help bridge the widening gap between their old and new lifestyle.
Now, Suguru doesn’t get to see him as much except to make breakfast and kiss Suguru goodbye with a sluggish smile on his face before school.
He really missed his dad. And it made you feel like shit for momentarily being a Daisy.
For the rest of the night, you just listened to Suguru tell stories about back home—what his parents were like, the things they used to do, the trips they would take, and the time they spent together. Little memories from a place you’ve never been but could clearly see as he talked through the night.
Never once did Suguru mention missing the things he used to have or wanted now. The people in his life were what he cared about most.
“My dad got a new antenna for the TV to surprise my mom with so she can still watch her favorite channels from back home,” he laughed. “It’s so big. I hadn’t seen one before, so it was kinda funny to look at, but I’m glad it’ll make her happy.”
You solemnly smiled and propped up on your arm. “Do you ever miss home? Like being back there?”
He mentioned that he thought about it sometimes: the plush green grass in his front and backyard that he’d lay in for hours, the much sunnier skies compared to the frequently gray and cloudy ones, and humid air here in your rainy city, the few friends and family members he had to leave behind.
But he liked it here better and surprised the hell out of you by saying so.
Anywhere was better than being here.
Even though his family was going through a hard time, they still managed to get the nicest house in the neighborhood. You could only imagine what his childhood home looked like compared to the one bedroom and living room your dad made into his own space.
You asked why. What could possibly make this place any better than where he came from?
You could hear him shrug through the phone as he lay on his back and stared at the ceiling decorated with glow-in-the-dark stars.
“I don’t know,” he said. “It’s just something about this place.”
You still think about that conversation sometimes.
The end of middle school came in a blaze, and so did puberty.
Suddenly, you became aware that it was time to start caring about what you looked like.
Some nights, you would call it early with Suguru in favor of spending hours on YouTube watching videos and learning how to wear makeup. You put more thought into how you dressed and tried your best to style the little clothes you had into mostly decent outfits.
Every morning, you’d beam when you entered the kitchen to grab breakfast and say goodbye to your dad. He’d try his best not to cry, watching his little Bug grow up before his eyes.
Suguru did some growing, too.
The summer of 7th grade, he got a little taller, and when your final year started, you guys were finally neck and neck. He was beginning to be able to see the top of your head when he lifted his chin, and he would make little jokes about it in his prepubescent boy voice that was starting to crack. You’d push the too-big glasses that he got at the start of middle school up the bridge of his nose and tell him not to get too cocky. This was the tallest he would get, you’d tease. He may have been good at everything, but he’d always be a pip-squeak.
When you weren’t going back and forth with Suguru, you were hanging out with the new gal pals you made at school. Your little trio started spending more time together, window shopping at the mall, attending football games after school, and talking each other’s ears off about anything in between throughout your last year. You couldn’t tell Suguru everything, of course—there are some things that guys will simply never be able to relate to or understand.
And one day, while the three of you sat at lunch together while Suguru was off with his robotics team, one of your gals leaned over the cafeteria table to poke you with a devious smile and ask the age-old question: who do you like in school?
Your brain had the audacity to picture Suguru first.
Your friends squealed watching your face blush beet red, but you turned away and never answered the question—only said that you were more focused on school and extracurriculars to help you in college more than anything else.
But where the hell did that come from?
Suguru was, debatably, your best friend, but that was it.
Not that you needed to convince anyone else of that. Just…yourself?
Before that day, you never really thought of Suguru in that light. He was this quiet, nerdy, prodigy of a boy who was great at everything and gave you another reason to want to be just as good. You secretly looked up to him, if you wanted to call it that, but you certainly didn’t like him.
He was just the boy next door.
The boy next door who was challenging you once again: to push the little hints of affection that had been blossoming aside and dismiss them.
Bury them down, keep your eyes on the prize, and finally be rewarded for your efforts.
To keep up with him, not fall in love with him.
On a rare sunny Saturday, a month and a half before school let out for the summer, the two of you sat on his beloved front porch with the future on your minds.
Suguru picked at the grass growing between the wooden boards. “Thinking about trying something new next year?”
You popped another sugary blackberry from your backyard into your mouth while stretched out on Suguru’s favorite quilt. He couldn’t help but notice how relaxed you looked, drinking up the warm sunbeams on your skin.
“I don’t know,” your arms folded behind your head as you stared at the ceiling, “I love Newspaper, but…I don’t know. I think I wanna branch out.”
You just weren’t sure how yet. You had done some research on the high school you’d both be attending next year and ran down the list looking for something to jump out at you. Something you could really put yourself into. You still loved writing and expressing yourself, but there was nothing else besides repeating Newspaper or trying Yearbook (Sugu’s territory). The rest of your options weren’t ideal, but beggars couldn’t be choosers.
“How about volleyball?”
“Nah.”
“Art club?”
“Mmm-mm.”
He leaned against the wooden railing. “Hmmm, choir?”
You laughed and didn’t even bother to respond to what was clearly a joke.
He sighed and pensively licked the sugar from his fingers before asking if maybe you’d want to do something together.
You looked at him and squinted. “What?” he shrugged.
“You know what.” And he shook his head all innocent-like.
Always innocent that Suguru. Effortlessly wrapping everyone around his finger. Your dad, his teachers. Even your trio mentioned him from time to time about how helpful he was. With all the times he went out of his way to make sure you were okay, even you were starting to let your guard down. Watching him now as his ponytail blew softly in the wind, looking so naïve as to what you meant but still wanting to understand, made you blush sick.
Not having much of a reason to actually be so guarded, you made one up. “You tryna go toe to toe with me, Geto?.”
Your brow cocked, and you used his last name because you knew it’d get to him. He was fully aware that you only say it when you’re serious, and it’s mostly blurted when you guys go at it on Mario Kart.
“Just because I said we should do something together?”
“Yeah, so you can one-up me.”
If there was a hobby or favorite pastime that you really enjoyed and might actually be better than good at, you knew it was best to keep it out of Suguru’s reach. Academic and recreational competitions needed to remain separate if you wanted to keep your sanity.
Suguru took a breath. If there was one thing he didn’t bother competing with you at, it was arguing. He knew you wouldn't back down if he just sat here and tried to convince you; you’d poke a hole in every counter until he simply gave up.
So, instead, he pandered to your inflated ego, chewing his lip before telling the truth. “C’mon, Twin. I promise I won’t. Do it for me.”
His soft purple gaze landed on you, and you got a funny feeling in your stomach that you hadn’t felt before.
He was serious.
He really wanted to be at your side trying something new—exploring together—helping each other find yourselves.
The shy teen who was as quiet as a mouse and yet a beast of a kid wanted to be right there with you. And he wasn’t afraid to say it.
You cleared your throat and averted his gaze. “Fine,” you agreed, but on one condition, “It stays a hobby, no competing.” And it sounded like you were talking to yourself more than him. “But valedictorian? That’s mine.” And you tossed another blackberry into the air and caught it perfectly in your mouth, making Suguru raise his eyebrows.
“That’s a bet,” he said, reaching over to wipe a bit of sugar from the corner of your lips. You swat away his hand and punch his shoulder, but damn him if the gesture didn’t make you feel all weird inside. He faked an “Ow” and rubbed his arm before joining you on the quilt to soak in the sun. You closed your eyes and pretended to float in the breeze whistling through the railing. Even without the hammock, it kind of felt like you were.
“Sooo, what do you wanna do this summer?” And the possibilities felt endless.
Who knew this core memory of each other’s youth, the moment you finally let his fingers inch across the blanket and softly brush yours without pulling back, would be one of your last?
Two weeks before break started, after all of your plans for the summer and the following school year had been planned out, it happened.
To this day, you question the timing of your worst nightmare—just when you thought you were living the dream—coming true.
The Geto’s were moving on up.
For years, Suguru watched his mom grind in corporate America. It wasn’t new to him; she had one of the hardest work ethics he’d ever seen, but it was on a different level after his family moved to your city.
Something in her had changed—the thought of instability.
She knew Suguru was used to not seeing her due to long hours at work, but when it started to affect her husband, when it began to shift the family’s dynamic, she knew she had to figure something out, and fast.
She could sacrifice her time for the family. She couldn’t sacrifice Suguru’s time with his dad.
All these years, Suguru’s family pulled themselves up by their bootstraps while Suguru was lost in the bliss of friendship. Mrs. Geto’s hard work paid off, and she got a promotion—on the opposite end of the country.
The day was bright and sunny when he left, the exact opposite of how you felt watching the beat-up car that had grown on you drive out of the neighborhood.
You looked on from your window because you didn’t want him to see you crying, watching, or caring.
You had been right from the first time you saw him.
And were back to square one.
Alone.
You guys tried to stay in touch, you really did, but being in totally different time zones made keeping up with each other a little harder. New apps for your phones, like Snapchat and Instagram, helped a little, but they didn't compare to the late-night phone calls you missed so much.
At first, Suguru would Snap you about how he was getting on in his new city, neighborhood, and places his family would explore over the summer.
The thought of him being someone’s new boy-next-door made your stomach twist.
When school rolled around, he’d send Snaps and joke about his preppy new uniform that came with a vibrant red tie and over-starched navy pants. His mom got him into a fancy private school because, of course she would, but they were really strict with phones, so you weren't able to talk to him until he got home. By the time he did, the sun had already gone down for you, and you’d be too tired from your own after-school activities to keep your eyes open.
You missed Suguru—even your dad missed him and his family terribly.
You missed him so much that you began to resent him—his new life, fancy school, and new “friends”. Jealousy reared its ugly head, forcing you to put your walls up again.
Another friend, gone, moved on to bigger and better things. Leaving you behind once again.
You had finally found a friend, a real friend, who never made you feel bad—someone you could tell almost all of your secrets to.
Who got whisked away.
Who you’d give anything to see again and go back to the way things were.
Though it’d only been five years, you felt like you’d known him your entire life.
But what you thought was fate, turned out to be folly.
It wasn’t fair.
Sometimes I fall But still, I rise To the skies high above In the clouds my ego Will go where no one knows
Why I am here
And why I try
To defy what I believe What it means to succeed To be won
To be one
To be “the one”
A smoking gun.
“Thank you.”
The cafe filled with snapping fingers as you walked off the stage, heart pounding and a smile plastered on your ducking head.
Look at you now. Performing in cafes, libraries, open-mics, wherever you could be that called for an audience. Still a little shy, but letting it motivate you and pour out on the floor to be soaked up by the listeners. It was an adrenaline rush, finally finding something you knew belonged to you and being damned good at it.
No one was better than you at telling the world how you felt while simultaneously mesmerizing an audience with your soliloquy and speech. Words still had a hold on you; you just figured it was better to say them out loud than keep them written down.
“Good job, Bug.” Your dad handed you a hot cup of tea fresh from the counter with your nickname scribbled in big cursive letters across the cup.
“Dad, please stop calling me that.”
He frowned. “But you’re my little bug.” He threw an arm around you, almost making you spill the hot liquid.
You groaned and protested. “I’m not a kid anymore.” And took a sip too soon, burning the tip of your tongue. You held it in and swallowed, looking around to see if anyone else saw the scorned look on your face.
You thought of 15 as one of your prime years and kept yourself busy to prove it. Just a sophomore in high school, Baby had a new hobby: dominating slam poetry. You had taken over the scene in your city with expansion heavy on your mind.
Though it was hard for your dad to hear, you were right; you weren’t a kid anymore. But you knew he was just proud of you. More than you could ever know. It made him happy to see you had something no one could take from you.
With a tsk, you leaned into his hug. You should be thanking him more. When the idea of doing slam poetry first crossed your mind, you were a hot mess (surprise, surprise) at being confident (BIG surprise)—your stage presence was lacking, to be specific.
On the page, your poems were like water in a desert, but opening your mouth and performing it with your whole chest was…different.
Fixating on your lines and rhythm made you want to pull your hair out. It was hard making sure your words sounded like you and would be understood. You needed to be understood.
You’d practice your performances in front of your dad until you were blue in the face. A show was put on for anyone who would listen. And secretly, you missed Suguru’s presence because he’d be perfect for it.
But you didn’t need him. You were on your way to competing in your first official local competition. All your practice around the city and long hours at home agonizing over your talent for slam poetry built up to that moment—the time to show the world what you had to offer.
Nothing felt better than holding the gold 1st place medallion between your fingers afterward. Regionals came next, and nothing could have validated your talent more than the medals you took home on top of the prize money your dad stashed away for college.
It was time to travel, and Nationals was your next target.
You couldn’t describe the feeling of finally being outside your city. The thought of being beyond the walls of home once felt like a hopeless dream. New cities, new friends, new organizations, and new styles of poetry were within your reach. The exhilarating travel that worried your dad put a thrill in your heart. You wanted to see everything—be heard everywhere. Life was full of opportunity and everything it had to offer.
“So you’re gonna do the group piece and then an individual one, maybe?”
You leaned against the cool bus window as you and your teammates winded down the road to your next hotel. Over the summer, you traveled with your state’s top slam poetry organization to compete in regional cities around the coast. All of this was practice for the Nationals coming up that August before school started. The day was coming faster than you could imagine.
“I don’t know about a solo,” you wondered.
You looked out the window and chewed your bottom lip. Your team lead had been pushing you to do a stand-alone piece for the Nationals for weeks, but you felt far from ready. You were strong in a group, but on your own, looking out into a crowd of people while demanding their attention on an empty stage, the thought made you queasy.
This wasn’t your local library or a small regional contest. Nationals is where you tell the country who you are and why you matter.
“Hey,” a hand rested on your shoulder, calling you back. “You’ve got this. You deserve this.”
And you did deserve it. You’d worked too hard and advanced so far in such a short amount of time. You didn’t think you’d get here so fast, but here you were, on a double-decker bus full of others who were just as talented as you, in a place where you belonged. In a place where you didn’t have to try so hard or look for that slight nod of approval to let you know you were seen.
August was in a hurry to put you on the stage because, before you knew it, it was time to head to California for the Nationals. What better place to begin to live your dreams than in the place where they all come true? Sunny skies, sandy beaches, and the aura of art and performance lingered in the air. It was the complete opposite of where you came from. It felt like home. You could see how Suguru could get easily lost in all.
You always wanted to visit the West Coast and see how he was living.
It’d be so funny to randomly Snap him after all this time and tell him you were so close, but you decided against it.
Cali was HUGE; there’s no way the competition would just happen to be in his city for you to casually bump into him.
Plus, imagine that awkward reunion after a few years of radio silence.
You two could be completely different people now.
He probably wouldn’t even want to see you.
Maybe you didn’t want to see him.
So many great things happened since his family packed up and left. In fact, without Suguru around, you found yourself excelling more naturally at anything and everything than ever before. Comparisons were a thing of the past, and you knew you had something no one else could take away from you.
Except maybe the competitor going on before you at the Nationals.
The audience was loud and clearly approving of his killer performance as they ate him up with whistles and snapping fingers.
Who needed a mic when you had a voice like that?
Easily projecting across the entire venue with every rhythmic pop, beat, and enunciation of his words.
You might have met your match or worse.
For the first time in your poetic career, you thought you just might lose your winning streak.
Anxiety convinced you to head back to the holding area. You just needed to run through the lines of your solo only a few more times.
You’ve got this.
He was nothing.
This was nothing.
You were taking home first place—absolutely positive that success was literally on the tip of your tongue. Until you saw him.
The boy with the raven hair.
Unmistakable and stopping you dead in your tracks as you saw him in the flesh for the first time in 2 years, standing long and tall in the venue.
Not in the audience.
Not as a stagehand.
But in another team’s holding room.
As a competitor.
Your heart plummeted into your ass.
What in the fuck was he doing here???
You swiftly ducked behind the wall leading to your team’s holding area, hand flying to your chest to still the thunderous beating.
Deep breaths, deep breaths. DEEP B R E A T H S.
Suddenly, your mouth was desert dry.
The entire summer, you prepared yourself to keep from slipping up—how you would suppress the urge to call him, think about him, or wonder where he would be when you were here.
You covered all of the bases.
But here he was in a place you least expected.
In a place you now knew you’d dread seeing him the most.
The boy you had become a ghost to was haunting you, but somehow, you knew this would happen.
You only got a quick glance at him before you vanished, but it was enough of a glimpse to notice the chances.
And God, were there changes.
As teenagers do, you both had grown out of your prepubescent bodies and into your young adult ones. And while you thought you looked relatively the same with a few upgrades here and there, Suguru had gone through a full-blown glow-up that set yours on fire.
“Almost ready?”
You nearly jumped out of your skin. Your teammate followed your line of sight and smirked. “Know him?”
You shrugged a bit too nonchalantly and said you thought he looked familiar but didn’t. “Shame,” she rested her shoulder on the wall with a dreamy gaze. “He looks like a dream.”
You turned away before you threw up and realized that you were about to be called up next. The frazzled look on your team lead’s face let you know she’d been looking for you, and you took a synced deep breath when she spotted you. Her hands fell on your shoulders before you went up the stairs to the stage. “You’ve got this.”
I’ve got this. . . . You don’t got this.
Your legs felt like Jell-O walking up the short set of stairs to the black platform in the middle of the stage. You hadn’t been on one this big, in a venue so large, with an audience so vast and eyes in the hundreds. The row of judges sat below you, yet looked so intimidating. Heat engulfed you from the lights above—a literal deer playing the lion in the headlights.
Sight zeroed in on the judges, you avoided the audience. Hoping that he wasn't still there because you knew seeing him WOULD freak you out.
In the silence Between the shattered and oppressed dreams I found, I tore The roar Of my own voice Reclaiming the night
Your lines flowed out of you more naturally than water, eyes closed, unfocused, or hazy as you transformed your surroundings into the scene of your story—the journey from struggle to empowerment—the story of why you deserved to be here. In that moment, there was no one else—not even the judges—just you, the stage, and the song that belonged to you, even if it mattered to no one else.
But it mattered to him.
And you didn’t see him until near the end of your set.
The familiarity of your voice called him to confirm it for himself. To make sure it was you. He couldn’t believe it. You looked so…powerful. Fully fledged in your adulthood, kicking ass and taking names. Fierce and poetic. The same attitude as the girl he grew up with but in its full realization.
Your voice cracked a little when you spotted him, completely awe-struck by you, but you played it off like it was part of your set. Damn the boy who had the same gawking eyes that used to watch the neighborhood kids—quiet and longing. You hoped it wasn’t obvious, but Suguru noticed. He knew. He still had some kind of effect on you. He could tell by how quickly you looked away. You still felt a way about him. He wasn’t just a nobody to you. But given the circumstances, he didn’t know whether to love or hate it by the time he took the stage.
The mic fit snuggly between his fingers. It was rare that someone fully approached it without starting their piece first. You wondered where he was going with this, why he looked a bit tense, why he kept his gaze low—if it could be because of you.
You held your breath and crossed your fingers. Once again, it was time to see him in action under the sweltering stage lights. And in seconds, you saw your gold medal fleeting.
You expected nothing less.
His voice was lined with melody—a sweet, ethereal flow and a melodious string of vocabulary that wrapped you in an envelope and swaddled you like a baby. He sounded so mature. He sounded so much better…than you.
The nerdy boy with too-big glasses and cracking voice had been replaced by a young man who towarded over the audience with a long side-bang and gauges in his ears. The red tie around his neck did look absolutely ridiculous like he said, but the rest of his navy blue uniform was tailored to perfection and fit like a glove.
He looked and sounded like where he came from. Money. But he was more than that. You found yourself hanging onto his every word as you watched from out of sight. He couldn’t see that he made your heart thump, but it was begging to fall out of your chest by the second.
This wasn’t about slam poetry anymore.
Suguru had entered your arena.
Shy, reserved, and knocking the ball out of the park.
Out of over 200 solo acts, you came in 6th. Suguru came in 5th.
And you couldn’t even feel good about it. Because you knew what this meant.
Regionals took over the remainder of your sophomore academic year, but when summer rolled back around, it was time to look Suguru in the face again at almost every out-of-state competition. The West Coast was once a dream—now you dreaded touring the area because you knew he would be there.
Performing.
Waiting to chew you up and spit you out.
Over the final two years of high school, you both spent most of your free time hopping around the nation and directly squaring off with each other.
Growing more apart as you did.
Silent hatred brewed and led the way every time you saw him—unmistakably written on your face.
He chalked it up to the fact that the two of you had changed over the years, and maybe you’d simply outgrown him. But he never thought someone he used to call his best friend could give him a look so cold. With no other choice but to follow your lead, he kept his distance and pretended you weren’t there.
But the way he racked up medal after medal, winning over judges and audiences alike, was loud and clear.
With him, you could only hope for second best. Though out-of-state competitions were just practice, losing to him in any capacity was a constant reminder that what was yours, wasn’t anymore.
If it ever was.
This time, anxiety burned through you instead of helping you.
During junior year, one of the most pivotal moments of your poetic careers, you met face-to-face again at the Nationals. Both of your organizations fought their way to the semifinals, but as you held your breath waiting for the judges to call his team’s name, silence swept both of you when you realized that neither of you made it to the finals.
Again.
By that summer, you were tired, good and tired of inching closer and closer to third place, then second, but never first in out-of-state competitions where Suguru was in the mix.
He was sucking the life out of you, but you couldn’t show it, especially when on stage where you knew he’d have his eyes glued to you.
Then, in August of your senior year, it finally happened; you returned to the Nationals, your final opportunity to win and go international. This time, it was close to your territory, in Georgia.
All bets were off.
The winner was a toss-up.
And what a slap in the face to finally win….and tie with Suguru.
You sulked on the inside the whole ride home while your teammates cheered and celebrated around you. To them, you’d just made history with your organization being the first in your state to go to the continental competition and have a shot at the World Poetry Slam Championship.
To you, your freedom of expression kept escaping you.
You felt yourself starting to mold into something outside of yourself.
Some nights, you lied in bed, unable to sleep hearing Suguru’s rhythmic beats rack through your brain.
Analyzing them.
Judging them.
Mimicking them.
Wanting to be like the best.
Your foundation was shaking.
At least you didn’t have to worry about the continental competition. Winning wasn’t the point; only earning one of the top 10 high scores to be automatically qualified for the WPSC.
It was a dream come true.
But how come it tasted so sour when you stood on that stage, your teammates going absolutely insane in the crowd at the news of you advancing to the international championship, but once again with a score just shy of Suguru’s?
The two of you were declared the best in your country…and you were sulking.
It shouldn’t matter!
You're one of the top 40 poets in the WORLD, babe!
And, for Godsake, a free plane ticket and trip to leave the country was waiting for you with your name on it! Belgian waffles and fountains of chocolate are more than enough reasons to get over yourself and this one-sided beef.
But your dad still got an earful about it.
Weekly chats with him almost always centered around poetry and Suguru ever since you first saw him sophomore year.
The closer the world championship came, the sadder you sounded.
“What if I-”
Your dad stopped you. “Don’t even finish that sentence. What have I always said?”
You hugged the phone to your ear, rolling your suitcase back and forth between your legs in the airport terminal. “Bug,” your dad said after a moment’s silence.
You groaned. “We don’t say ‘what-ifs’. We say ‘what is’.”
“And what’s going to happen.”
You looked over to your team lead, soundly napping in the corner. It was the butt crack of dawn, and both of you had gotten to the airport way too early for your liking to make sure you didn’t miss your flight. Your first international flight. You actually had a passport, like???
So much had gone into getting you here.
Energy. Time. Effort. Trust. Encouragement.
People were rooting for you. They wanted to see you win. You wanted to see you win.
“I’m gonna do my best.”
“Then you’re already a winner, Bug.”
God, your dad was gushy. And God, you loved him for it.
You didn’t feel so bad by the time you watched the sunrise in full bloom through your airplane window.
Pink, orange, and yellow washed over your face, making you feel so small. It wasn’t your first time in the sky, but definitely the most nervous you’d been.
Local papers, blogs, and newsletters featured your name—people knew you now; they had expectations.
A reputation had been made, and now you were in the fight of your life to keep it.
You sighed into your palm with your dad’s words in mind.
David was determined to take Goliath down.
Belgium.was.cold.
Like you hadn’t packed nearly thick enough coats type of cold.
You felt like an idiot.
You were a lyrical genius but couldn’t even put ‘Belgium in December’ and ‘it might be freezing’ together. But the lobby of your quaint little hotel with hot chocolate on tap was warm and inviting.
Your team lead handed you a cup, and you found yourself missing your teammates. They would have loved this and cheering you on at the top of their lungs.
The feeling was lonely—nerve-wracking.
You were in the beautiful country of Germany for a competition, not leisure, so you couldn’t even relish in the fact that you were overseas.
At least the food was good. Nervous eating made you binge until you felt sick the night before the competition, but a quick stroll in the brisk morning air made you feel better.
The bus ride to the venue felt like you were about to hop into a boxing ring. And the gloves were off.
Crossing the threshold into a space full of chosen people was like marveling at the diamonds of top-society. And you were one of them. Your team lead walked by and closed your gaping mouth with a smile. “Chin up, dear.” And disappeared into the crowd.
You'd never met a foreigner before and were thrust into a venue full of different skin tones, accents, languages, and ages. It would’ve been even more overwhelming had it not been for the smell of coffee wafting through the air, reminding you of your last safe space for poetry before you went pro. With half an hour left until the competition, you thought exploring a little wouldn’t be a bad idea.
The venue was dark and moody, perfect for setting the atmosphere and circulating the rising tension in your body. The main stage basked against the background of darkness under a single warm light that cast a circular glow.
Your final destination.
His burial sight.
Suguru was nowhere to be found, but by the looks of the thick crowd shuffling in to fill their seats, it was easy to get lost. You met back with your team lead to run your rhythms a few more times.
“Please don’t say it.” And she laughs, giving you a small nod and shoulder squeeze.
You still hear it in your head. You’ve got this.
But man, were these poets giving you a run for your money.
It was exhilarating and terrifying—a glaring reminder of why you were here among the best.
Translations were available on the screens behind the performers as you ping-ponged between their words and their expressions. Both demanded your attention and the crowd’s.
But so did you and Suguru when you both breezed through the semifinals.
For a second, you thought he hadn’t made it to the venue at all when you looked for him during your performance. But he let you and everyone else know he was in the building when he graced that stage. A hush fell over the space, and even you felt your face go soft while watching him.
He more than deserved that advance, but you weren’t done just yet.
After a brief intermission—the DJ wasn’t playing any games—you turned the corner to line up for the final round when you collided at 100mph with Suguru.
“Fu— oh.” You held your arm as you looked at him—really taking him in.
When he was on stage, you noticed he wasn’t in his usual uniform, but up close, the alternative was definitely a choice. The loose black tee ruffled as he smoothed his bang.
“Sorry.”
He rubbed his shoulder and kept his eyes low. His hands stuffed into his black cargos as he looked away, not wanting to upset you. Or see the look of resentment on your face.
You could tell he knew he made you uncomfortable, but you didn’t know how different he wished things could have been.
Hurt was written all over the face of your childhood best friend, and you never knew Suguru to be upset about anything.
You cleared your throat. “Good luck.”
His head drew back like he’d seen a ghost.
His lips parted.
Then he kind of smiled, leaning against the wall—looking at you for a moment.
You were so grown up and had accomplished so much.
Suguru was fully aware that you hated his guts and was so proud of you—even if you didn’t need him anymore.
He reached out to shake your hand. “Good luck, Twin.”
Your heart thumped—no one had called you that in 4 years—sweet and low from honeyed lips.
Suguru’s hand lingered in your air for a second before you gingerly took it.
Soft and warm.
Just like you remembered but stronger—firmer.
The gloves were off for him, too.
Things were done a bit differently for the final rounds. Instead of holding deliberations for the end of the rounds after everyone had gone, everyone got their votes front and center from five random audience members.
Paddles would fly in the air, displaying the scores to be tallied up and held until the end.
Thank God you could do quick math. Numbers were racking up—bone-chilling talent was on full display.
You were amazed, laughing, shocked. Every set was different from the last.
The crowd fell into a hush when one guy came on stage and laid straight down. Bareback to ground. Then fired off rhythmic jokes that made you laugh at some and ponder the seriousness of others.
Dark humor often has truth in it.
Most sets were in a completely different language yet spoken so beautifully that you dug your nails into your palms to keep from crying. Emotion was universal. And you were feeling a lot of them.
Suguru walking onto the stage snapped you out of it as you watched from the other side of it.
Though you’d just seen him a few minutes ago, this was a completely different light. Something had shifted.
Nice to meet you My name is Suguru Oh really? So is mine! It’s nice to meet you too.
Tell me what you’re like, what do you like to do? Lately, I’m not sure Was hoping for a breakthrough
In a world where masks are sticky and glue I’m lost in a maze with no clear view Doubt will cling like morning dew Caught in the storm of shifting hues
If you didn’t know better, you would’ve thought Suguru was having a mental breakdown.
Your jaw tightened, clothes fidgeting between your fingers.
It was the most unexpected thing you could’ve imagined. And this was just the beginning of the journey through his paradoxical mind.
His ship was sinking. And he was taking you all down with him.
…I wear many faces each one feels new, But none will fit like I want it to Left with a voice that's small and untrue Burying deep I don't know what to do
In this mirror, I’m searching for clues, But this reflection is oddly askew. You scream through the glass, “Stay real and stay true!” But if you’re me, then…who are you?
You could hear a pin drop.
Suguru stopped breathing.
He couldn’t believe that he actually did it. He had never been so vulnerable.
If you thought you knew him and what he was going through before, you were left stunned and corrected.
A few of his scores floated into the air, and though you couldn’t see them all, the few you did were perfect 10s.
It would’ve been hell to go directly after that—thankfully, you had a few more people before you.
Time crept closer and closer to your set—nervous sweats and fidgeting fingers kept you company.
So much for keeping a hobby a hobby, you thought, pacing backstage.
This wasn’t fun for you anymore; it was always supposed to be fun, easy, natural.
But this was no longer just about you.
It never was.
It was about proving anyone who ever doubted wrong.
When the host called your name, you made those 3 minutes on stage feel like your last.
Rain, rain don’t go away, You’re the only one who stays, Cross my heart and hope to die I promise that I will not cry
Build and build and There it goes! All for naught and just for show Hypnotize your guards to grave Leave the trust to fade away
This was your final plea to be heard by the world if you had ever made one.
A letter to those who ever dismissed, ignored, or left you.
Fire and brimstone poured from the pit of your soul—served up on a plate with the audience in mind but Suguru as the guest of honor.
You thought he’d be away in the dressing room or at least within earshot, but no. He stood tall and bright, leaning against the door frame that led out to the hall, backlit by the warm lights that framed his figure, watching.
Listening.
Knowing the poem was partially about him.
You hoped it hurt him as much to hear it as it did for you to write it.
Deep breaths kept your voice steady—he wouldn’t hear it crack this time as you powered through your trembles. Bold and brash. Unleashing your truth.
He saw it in your eyes and unconsciously did the only thing he knew to support you, the beginning of your connection—trust that blossomed into turmoil. The small nod of approval.
Years had passed.
Envy had pushed you to avoid him.
He accepted that you no longer saw him as a friend.
Yet he still wanted to show his support.
And it pissed you off.
…Lo and behold the savior's light Here to take another flight Take me by my desperate hand Lead me how you only can Fragile like a gentle rose I will follow where you go.
Shadows whisper of the known What I am. I am alone...
You walked off stage before you could see your final scores.
Whatever would be was now out of your hands—the relief felt agonizingly sweet.
Your team lead wrapped you in her arms as you silently cried. You didn’t know how long the tears had been building up, but the release was like a dam burst.
Crying on your first international trip to Belgium.
Nice.
A final intermission was left, and the scores were tallied. You guzzled down some water and took a few breaths before meeting the rest of the contestants. Finally, finally, you and Suguru stood side by side again on stage. Your entire history had built up to this moment—ready to declare a winner. Ready to determine whether you finally caught up.
His pinky brushed yours, sending sparks to your belly like that day on his porch.
Head down, you waited for a name to be called.
Any name, every name, would be better than—
“Suguru Geto.”
Naturally rolling off their tongue.
Suguru stiffened beside you like he couldn’t believe it himself as they motioned for him to come forward. In your mind, everything went quiet. You couldn’t feel anything but emptiness in the pit of your stomach. Not even anger.
Before he moved a muscle to claim the spotlight, he turned to you, daring to offer his hand again. But it felt less like a “Job well done!” and more like a pitiful “I’m sorry.” And you had had enough of condolences.
You turned away and left the stage in the midst of the raging applause for Suguru. No one else may have caught the cold shoulder, but to Suguru, it felt like he was trapped in ice. He could leave your life forever now for all you cared.
This was your one, final chance to make things even between you two.
But reality was a bitch.
You couldn’t get away from him quick enough.
Yes, you’ve gotten to travel the country. Yes, you got the opportunity of a lifetime to go overseas just off your hard work alone, but all of that meant nothing if you were only second best.
It was redundant.
What was even the point in trying? You would never be good enough to stand on your own. Always under his shadow, drowning in his wake.
It wasn’t.fucking.fair.
You brushed past your team lead, contestants—anyone trying to tell you how amazing you did. You couldn’t stand being bathed in lies and beelined out the back of the venue.
“Fuck this.” You choked back tears, breath escaping you as you pushed the door open.
The contrast of sharp, cold air whipped your face, making you realize you didn’t grab your jacket, but it was just what you needed to set the gravity of your situation in.
You were nothing.
You bawled your fists.
And foolish for trying.
Hyperventilating.
Look at what you came from. Look at what you get for trying to change that.
Hot, fat tears spilled down your face as you huddled in a corner of the building. You wrapped your arms around your knees, trying to shield the icy winds, but you already felt dead inside. Pathetic and worthless. It was out of your hands to change that.
A voice called after you, belonging to the last person you wanted to see right now. That soft, angelic voice that swooned the world and made your insides boil. Why couldn’t he just get it?? Why couldn’t he stay the fuck away??
You thought you had hidden yourself well by putting a bit of distance between the exit and the corner you tucked into, but he found you in seconds, tears dried on your face, crouching into your knees.
He stood there gaping, completely overwhelmed by the state of you.
For once, he was out of words.
“Well??” It was hoarse and cracking.
“I-I’m—”
“Oh my God, pLEASE fucking save it!” You shook, burying your head into your arms.
It was enough that he got to bask in your pathetic breakdown with front-row seats. He didn’t need to pretend he didn’t enjoy it.
But Suguru was fed up with your bullshit and came looking to tell you about it. The final straw was leaving his extension of sympathy high and dry as you walked off stage. Giving him the ultimate “fuck you” in his moment of congratulations.
He never understood why you hated him—the resentment, what happened, what he’d done. But he was about to make you explain yourself.
“Get up.” Gentleness left his voice.
He came closer and towered over your petite frame, cornering you so you couldn’t run away. “You think I don’t know how much this meant to you?”
When you didn’t answer, he crouched down to your level.
“Hey.”
You buried yourself deeper.
“Hey.”
“Don’t touch me.” You brushed him away, pressing your back into the wall as you stood up, shivering in the wind.
But it felt like you had punched him in the gut.
He had never seen you so bothered before, and the revelation that you were pointing the finger and naming him the culprit made his chest feel tight. It felt worse attempting to bury your heart on your sleeve. But the extent of your scorn was on full display.
After a moment of looking your bitterness in the face, it finally clicked for Suguru.
Why you hated him. Couldn't stand to look at him. Avoided him.
Why you started all of this competitive bullshit in the first place.
The root of it was more painfully obvious to see than the daggers in your eyes. What else could it be?
“You’re jealous.”
And that set you off.
“HA!” It almost hurt to laugh. “Jealous?!”
People could probably hear you inside the venue. But Suguru knew just what to say to get you to talk.
“This whole time, I thought you were upset because I left, but…you’re just jealous.”
You snorted. “You’ve never worked hard a day in your life.”
“What? You don’t think I earned this?”
“Who knows? Mommy buys you everything.”
“Woah,” he held up a hand and laughed, “Is that what this is about?”
Your cheeks burned hot, but you had egg on your face and had just spilled the beans. But fire still raged in your chest.
“You could have had anything else. Anything! Anything in the world, but you just had to take this from me!”
“How was I supposed to know??” he cut you off, “You stopped talking to me.”
You felt a pang and fell silent—flurries of unread texts, unopened Snaps, and missed calls played in both of your minds.
“How was I supposed to know anything? How was I supposed to have anything without making you feel bad?”
“Me?” You scoffed. “Without me, you’d probably still be sitting on that dusty ass porch (you loved that porch), watching everyone go and fucking live life.”
“I was like 7.”
“9.” You rubbed the blooming goosebumps on your arms.
“Whatever, you think I owe you or something? You want a ‘thank you’?”
His tone made you shift, but you puffed up your chest.
“No, I don’t need a thank you." Your eyes narrowed. “I’m just not that impressed.”
Oh?
He scoffed, backing away with a smirk, arms swinging as he looked away then back at you. “You’re full of it.”
“You’re not that talented.”
He cocked his head, raising a brow. You were questioning his talent—clearly emotional and spewing lies—but it was a shot at his reputation nonetheless.
His smirk faltered as he clasped his hands. “You wanna go?” And then he got closer. Your breath caught as he studied your face, his left arm shooting out to frame you, pinning you into the corner.
The heat radiating off his body should have been a comfort in the frosty air, but fuck, you also felt other things that raced your heart and made you hate yourself.
He leaned over you. “How would you like to eat your words? Fried? Or sautéed?”
His eyes bore into yours, daring you to buck up or back down. But just because he finally had the balls to challenge you and take up space didn't mean you were intimidated.
He was the same little boy he'd always been.
And you were quick to remind him.
“Bite me, Get—”
Instead, he kissed, capturing your lips in a way that shot electricity down your spine and stole the breath and shriek right out of your body.
In an instant, you swore your pupils morphed into hearts. For so long, he's wanted to do that—kiss your sweet, supple lips that ramble nonsense and shut you up—bridge the gap between your broken friendship to ask for more, to make all your fire, resistance, and anger melt away...so you could come back to him.
Knees weak, you nearly staggered, scrambling for the walls to keep you up, but was saved by his hand cradling your hip to hold you. Keep you. Protect you. Your heart burst.
You pulled away, eyes heavy. Leaving a sliver of space between your lips to see your heated breaths mingling in the chilly air as he rested his forehead against yours. Softly, you cradled his face in your hand, feeling waves of longing swell through your body—his had already burst. Then you slapped him.
“How’s that for poetry?” And left.
extended angel's note: this story took a TOTALLY different turn from what i originally planned (thanks Mac Miller) but omg it's sO much better and kinda fits into all of the sugu angst i have planned (oh how i love to hurt myself so). this story in particular was supposed to be like all smut and no exposition but um…things happen 😅 sO, all of the low-angst, ‘enemies’ to lovers lives in part 1, with a focus on the resolution in part 2: lovers who give in and chose each other arc while remaining focused on my original goal of making a smut that spotlights and actualizes realistic sex. learning each other, listening, patiently growing, and choosing.
#bluuharem#God is Fair#geto x reader#jujutsu kaisen x reader#jjk x reader#jjk fanfic#jjk poc reader#jjk x y/n#jjk imagines#suguru x you#suguru x y/n#suguru smut#jjk smut#suguru geto x reader#getou suguru x reader#geto x y/n#geto x you#anime fanfic
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kuroo loves thunderstorms.
the first time he tells you this, he's standing just before the threshold of your balcony—the door cracked open but the screen still closed, feeling the wind curl its way around your building.
it's early november and he's wearing a sweater you gifted him last christmas. you bought it two sizes too big and he insisted on wearing it again the moment the weather started to get colder anyway. it's a rich blue and warm and soft enough that you constantly find yourself leaning into him—on the couch, in public, even before your balcony's screen door—sometimes you wonder if he wears it just for that.
between that and the way your cat swirls around his feet, his tail dragging along kuroo's calf, he seems to almost melt into your apartment. your first place post-grad, that weird mix of childhood, college, and new-adult decor muddling the whole of it: a couch that you got at a discount furniture store but fell in love with anyway; stuffed animals your friends send you every birthday; a childhood favorite of a book sitting on an old thrifted coffee table, a dark oak that you wouldn't be able to afford otherwise.
and kuroo. warm, thunderstorm-watching kuroo, whose mug of herbal tea has been long forgotten on one of your homemade coasters.
you're never quite sure what to call him. the man you sleep with some nights; the guy who will always match your halloween costume if you ask; your cat's favorite of your friends; the name your grandmother keeps asking you about every time you call. you know you told you him you loved him once—really loved him—in some drunken college stupor that feels more like watching a movie from across an open-concept's kitchen island than a memory now.
(that's a lie. you know every detail. the rum warm in your throat, being fresh off the high of his birthday. it was the first snow of the season but the rain the next day mingled with it and turned it to muck that ruined your favorite pair of boots. his breath was hot against your cheeks, the stoop of his apartment building a hollowly adored wind tunnel that decorated your instagram—stone chipped away at the corners, moss growing up the sides, a buzzer that only worked if you pressed the button three times. you kissed him like you always have and his nose was cold as it pressed into your cheek. you whispered it to him and he laughed. you didn't text him for three days.)
there's a familiar pull at your tongue now. a burst of lightning briefly illuminates your apartment and is then followed by the crack of thunder.
"you should probably close the door," you say—instead of i love you.
kuroo shrugs, turns back with a lazy smile on his face. "if you say so," he replies, like every word is a game that the two of you play. he swings the door closed and twists the lock shut. he moves in a way you want to describe as "moseying" tonight, like all of his limbs are relaxed four times more than they should be.
"you should stay here tonight," you tell him as he moves to your couch. your cat follows after him, pawing up his leg as he sits down. he jumps up and settles deep into his lap—there's a brief moment where you envy him. "rain and all."
"so you're telling me i brought my umbrella for nothing?" he teases.
you laugh. "you can use it on the balcony."
he has a pair of sweatpants in your top right drawer of your dresser. you reluctantly washed them last week after spilling apricot jam on the third wear. you never choose to dwell on how a pair of sweatpants gets left at your apartment—you can imagine what his answer would be.
kuroo hums, "it's almost like you want me here."
"i don't," you lie, "just figured my apartment had a better storm view with how much you've been lingering." his apartment is about four stories higher, a few blocks down—closer to his work. it has more windows, a larger living room, a leather couch that you can feel sticking to your bare back if you close your eyes.
it's the better view. it gets fog in the early mornings so you can only see the bounce of headlights from the street below. his bedsheets like to twist between your legs at night in a way that pulls them from the mattress, though—so you suppose you always win there.
"it's homey here," he replies, and you feel the smile tugging up at your lips, "smells like spruce." he eyes the candle he bought you on your kitchen counter, lit and melted to the edges. three wicks, because he knows it's your favorite.
the candle, your favorite expensive lamp your professor gifted you last summer, and the range hood are the only lights in your apartment at the moment. kuroo calls them homey, you call them headache-reducing.
he pulls a hand away from your cat to gesture towards you over the back of the couch now. a palm upwards towards the ceiling, fingers outstretched in a subtle beckoning of your own. your tongue curls with that sickly desire as you step towards him, slip your fingers into his as you round the couch, settling into the cushions as his arm slides across your shoulders.
you reach up to play with his fingers—absent-mindedly. you swore you would do better when you graduated, that maybe things would start to fall into place and, for once, you wouldn't find yourself chasing after a man you could have if you would just allow it to happen.
but you don't know how to say i love you on a thursday—because you swear friday will feel right. you don't say it friday because it's too young, a whole weekend ahead of you that you can't mess up. a movie on saturday, brunch on sunday. you don't say it sunday night because you won't see him until wednesday, but then you catch him for happy hour on tuesday. and you don't know how to to say it.
"you know my grandfather loved spruce," kuroo says, and you look over to catch his eye. he's staring out at your coffee table, looking at nothing in particular as he speaks. "he used to whittle—before arthritis and tremors and whatever—but his dad told him that spruce was the hardest to work with. something about how soft it is or the grain or whatever." he shifts with your cat, letting him crawl up his arm onto the back of the couch. his tail falls over kuroo's shoulder, and now you get the curl into him a little more.
he pulls you closer before you really get the chance to move.
"but he always loved spruce. the smell, the needles, the look, all of it, you know? it was just one of those things, so he learned to whittle with it.
"and when he met my grandmother, he started whittling her all these little things. a duck for their first date, a wooden box for her jewelry, eventually toy blocks, when she was pregnant with my dad." kuroo pauses, and for a while, you think you have something stuck in your chest. you thumb traces up his forefinger and he catches your hand, finally moving to look you in the eyes.
"it's nice to come here and remember him sometimes."
there's another burst of lightning and it crackles across the whole sky behind him, dodging in and out of buildings and making the texture of the clouds pop out against the whole open expanse of it all.
his breath is hot against your skin, his ears are tinged with a bit of red and for a moment you consider running to your thermostat to turn it down a few degrees, but then his lips find yours like they always do.
and in the muddle of lips, you don't even think before you whisper an i love you, murmured into his mouth as his nose traces frigid shapes against your own.
you don't have to listen to know he says it back—though you do, listening for the timbre of his voice and feeling the vibrato of it against your throat—but you can smell it, you can hear it, some days, you can taste it.
spruce-scented candles, thunderstorms that make the whole city colder, the burning of rum against the back of your throat.
you think you can feel it: leather that sticks to your skin, hands that only whittled while his grandfather was alive, but are calloused anyway, a sweater that you'd buy him in the right size if he asked.
you tell someone you love them without ever saying the words. you know he drinks three drinks at happy hour and you only have one—he insists on walking you home anyway and he always stays the night.
and you know he never brought an umbrella, that he works from home tomorrow and his laptop is sitting in his backpack next to your door.
you know that he's warm, that he's kissing you, and that he told you he loves you on the thursday evening as a thunderstorm turned into rain and fog.
#hey guys i'm rusty how's it going#hq x reader#kuroo x reader#kuroo tetsurou x reader#haikyuu x reader#x reader#kuroo x you
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Kent ramble incoming ehehe.. gonna be dumping all my nasty old man ideas onto you and neet cause i love how u two write him <33 (if that’s all right, that is)
But ive been thinking ab the farmer going to a free use/glory hole & Kent following her.. she’s trying to get her feelings for Kent out of her system with an anonymous fuck but she ends up getting used by him without her even realizing. He ends up giving himself away while they fuck and he makes sure she can’t do anything but take it while he admonishes her for even thinking about going to anyone else- nobody will be able to fuck her like he can ( ˋ⁻̫ˊ) Ψ
@neetily we're being fed •///• and now my brain has been sparked, whoops, I wrote smth..
Need Kent to dump his cu
Longing for Kent at the Glory Holes</3
Warnings: age gap, implied infidelity, glory holes, cum.. like a lot of it... piv, fingering, cunilingus, daddy talk, choking, general sashiavi nastiness yk how it is
Word Count - 2k
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You knew you were wrong for it. Watching the older man from across the bar, late nights at the saloon, knowing better that you shouldn't- You couldn't! You cannot be thinking about him like this.
Not when you're best friends with his son, always around the house, coming out of Sam’s room for a glass of water when you know Kent would be lounged on the couch - Just to give him a little, nervous wave. It was wrong.. skittering around his home with his family around, catching a greedy glimpse of him any time you could, eyes flicking to him at the dining table after his own wife had invited you to stay for supper.
You shouldn't eye him up like that at the luau, eyes locked on to the heavy drag of his boardshorts, weighted down with the drippings of ocean water. Just below his tummy, soft with age and fit with his lifestyle, happy trail moist and tacky against his skin as it disappears into his bottoms. The fabric runs taught on his hipbones, deliciously low before the show is over and he pulls them up with a hook of his thick finger.
You're embarrassing yourself - Wearing pretty outfits in his presence, that ditzy demeanour truly born up from the bubble of anxiety swirling in your tummy from just being around him! So nervous and stuttery, dolly eyes flicking up to Kent's hardened gaze.. Of course it works, of course he starts cracking, falling for a sweet cutie like you.
But you don't know that- So lost in your worrying, dreamy and sweetly moaning into your knuckles as your cunt squelches around your fingers, milky and gushy insides making a mess on your fingers. Crying for him, mewling out his name unapologetically as you carefully sink yourself down on your new dildo - Silky and velvet silicone, fat in width, kissing yours insides while your vibrator buzzes aggressively against your pert clit in an attempt to soothe the wild stretch.
But soon that's not enough, is it? Such fantasies carried out all alone? You needed more, but you couldn't have him... Right?
You couldn't fool around in town either - Whispers would carry faster than the wind. You needed an out.
The Calico Desert was far enough.. An elusive Casino stands with an underground secret, Red Rooms for pleasure, anonymous glory holes for those who just needed a release with no strings attached. A perfect place for your fantasies, with real partners to play with!
Especially your new mystery man..
With his weighty cock poking through the cut out hole in the wall, struggling to stand tall with the sheer thickness of it, bobbing with arousal. It was pulsey, a thick vein running up the undershaft giving a flex as blood rushed to the rosy pink tip oozing up droplets of milky pre cum, practically dripping like drool, Yoba, it was as if it was crying for you.
He was thick, girth making irony saliva pool under your tongue, swallowing proving pointless at the sight of this cock - Picture perfect for your fantasy, a thick brush of hair on his base and balls, sack hanging heavy surely filled with plenty of thick, ropey cum. Scent the perfect musk, it felt manly- One of the traits that drew you to liking Kent in the first place!
Not like the people you hung out with, those younger males that could be the picture perfect partner for you, save for just how unsure they were about everything. Or those other Bachelors.. A little older and still just as lost- Kent had a bout of maturity attached to him, life seemingly plenty figured out, stable.. And yet you wanted to break it down.
Any guilt that dared to ping in your chest didn't last long. Not with the crane of your partner's hips, forcing the head of his cock to press a wet kiss to your cheek. If only he could see the hearts in your eyes, the dribble of spit that slipped from your tongue as you licked your lips
Soon, his length was down your throat, fat and chubby tip gagging up a sweet gurlgy moan, spitty and slick from your lips, wrapped around his thick length. He played rough with you, a heavy hand coming through the hole opening, thick fingers twirling into your hair for a better grip. Forcing your throat to be a personal toy, a rough face fucking you could only dream about.
You jaw aches, stingy with the stretch of this stranger's girth, tongue sore from rough use- Your eyes roll, bleary and pooled with fat tears, looking up all crossyee at nothing, pretending you were locking eyes with the Military Man that had tugged on your heart. Soft hazels surely hardens with a scrunch of his brow, nose crinkled in hot pleasure.. You blink your tears, letting them roll down your cock filled cheeks.
Your pussy drools, pooling behind the sheeny fabric of your panties, sticky to the touch of your fingers as you rub, easily bleeding through the fabric. Your mind chants his name, over and over like a mantra, 'Kent, Kent, Kent~!' Throwing in dirty-sweet petnames into the mix, Would he let you call him Sir? Mister Military Man so strong and authoritive? Would he groan if you cried out something more? 'Daddy, Daddy! Oh pleaseee Daddy!' Begging on your knees for him, that gentle and sweet family man taking out all those frustrations on your body. You breathe against your mystery man's base, huffy and hyper, desperate to take him all.
It's so much, maybe even too much. The perfect fantasy nearly coming true! Just missing that one main ingredient..
No time to think now though, right? Not when your mystery man groans from behind his gritted teeth, fist tightening in your hair when he busts himself down your throat, a healthy dump of cum squirting rope after rope. It's a wonder you don't choke - more than you already had been - With the thick white paint of his cum load, sputtering from your cheeks with a struggled cough fron yourself. He uses it like lube, hips snapping to fuck himself through it all, long and strong, milking out Every. Last. Drop.
You don't want it to end. Wanna keep the lovely weight of this stranger's cock nestled sweetly on your tongue, wanna pepper Kisses and Kitten licks over his flushed tip, wanna imagine you were pampering your older crush, treating him sweeter than any other could.
Ah but he pulls away, forcing up a pitifully sad whine from your throat, making you swallow thickly, savouring the remnants of that musky milky cum he'd gifted you. You lament in the loss, lips pouted in a little wobble, heart hammering blood to your head, beating with the achy throb of your neglected cunt.
The hand in your hair moves to your cheek, cupped warm, skin rough, a calloused thumb tracing over your swollen, cum stained lips.
"S' your turn. Yeah?" His voice was deep. Rasped and rough with a twinge of an accent, hearty and southern, tainted with a touch of age. Yoba your heart flutters- This was too good to be true!
You dare to peek, watery, doe eyes looking up at this man woth a doll-like look, seeing the outline of his features in the dim light - God your chest pangs, a spike of embarrassment, lust, nervousness, excitement, arousal - His thumb pulls on your bottom lip, dragging the swollen plumpness before he let's it go with a pop.
"S'Get 'outta here." The corner of his mouth barely lifts into a quip of a smirking grin.
"Kent..?" Disbelief gnaws at your tone. He only hums, a short sound of agreeance, kicking his head in the direction of the more intimate rooms with a short lift of his chin.
Ooh he treats you well. Head between your legs, lips smacking at the folds of your pussy, heavy hands planted on your thighs while his battle-worn fingers wrap around, blunt nails digging into your soft and sensitive flesh. He feasts like a starved man, suckling at your supple-sweet wetness, fat lapping licks of his pink tongue, jamming the muscle into your cunt hole before he's back on your clit. You squeal and squeak, fingers tugging at his hair, weaving into desperate fists, grinding your core on his lips and tongue- Yoba he takes it too, works with your movements, following your hips in sweet tandem.
He's rough with your cunt, spitting a fat glob of hot saliva before he laps it up, hazel eyes on you as he does so before they flutter shut with a scrunch of his brow and a shake of his head- Devouring your pussy once again, nose jutting into your clit while his tongue fucks past the ring of your pussy.
You have to be ready for him, yeah? Nice and wet and gushy.. Squirting all over his face before he even thinks about sinking his cock into you.
He makes you lick it off of his lips, tongue cleaning up the mess you left on his chin and cheeks, stealing hot slick and saliva filled kisses in the mix, tongues swirling, catching and suckling against eachother as two deft fingers jam into your waiting cunt.
Your fingers were incomparable to his own, too small to reach into the depths of your sweetness, too weak to curl and finger bang the fuck out of your poor pussy, squelchy and wet despite the messy squirt of your orgasm.
"Eyes on me, Darl'.." Kent orders, voice softer than his actions. Your lips part, jaw dropped in hot pleasure, eyes going into a blurred fuzz, his features disappearing as his fingers curl and curl and curl- Until you're left empty, gasping as fingers smack lovingly on your sticky clit, spiky pain and pleasure jutting up your body.
You're not empty for long though, easily plugged up with the thickness of Kent's cock, slowly sinking into your prepped up pussy just like you always imagined with your silly silicone toy. He kisses you through it, the whines and wobbly frown, a hand coming to rest a supple squeeze on your throat, hushing you as he bottoms out.
"S'okay Darlin'.." He coos roughly, hips beginning to hump a pace, rolling grinds against your public mound. "S'What you wanted, right Dolly? Yeahhh? Pretty lil' fuck doll aren'tcha? Thaaaats right.." All coos and sweet words despite the mean squeeze of his palm on your throat and the quick snapping of his hips.
Yoba, he mounts you. Hooking his free palm under your leg, knee to ear while he pounds at your pussy. Plap, plap, plap, skin on skin, wet and slick from the thin sheen of sweat that dared to wash over your skin and the gush of fluids from your supple cunt.
This was it- this was everything you had ever imagined, your perfectly lewd fantasy finally coming to fruition, taking the Kent's thick married cock, lovingly squeezing at his girth, hearts in your eyes as you choke a choppy babble past the tenseness of his hand on your throat; "Wa..nt need- Lov- Y..ou... please- Da..ddy...~"
It's enough to have Kent groaning deep, once fast fucking hips favouring a hard Roll. Slow. Mean. Snapping. Thrusts. Breath huffed in time with his hips, teeth grit as he speaks.
"Tryana' be my Baby? Hmmm?? Daddy's. Sweet. Lil'. Girl?" Words punctuated with his thrusts, pudgy tip kissing your insides with every snap. It seems to have triggered something in him, hazel eyes blown up, pupils dilated big and black, sweat dripping from his brow. "Daddy's sweet n'- Fuck.. His pretty Dolly, yeah??" You nod, strained against the hand on your throat, his fingers guaring your jaw, movement limited, the most pathetic and eager little nod he'd ever seen.
His hand comes off, planting under your other knee and you're manhandled into a dirty mating press, cock drilling into your poor pussy from above.
You knew you were wrong for it. And you're sure he knows it too. But Yoba be dammed if you ever go back to pitiful, longing looks from across the bar after this.
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