#I've drawn him all day and I'm in a haze

[seredelgi]

No thoughts, head empty, just Luffy's hands and how they might feel inside

artists:

Makitoshi

Nekobayashi

Tacchan

Koushi Rokushiro

K Akagishi

Denim2

[the-universal-sun]

stan putting off regressing when he needed to and having a meltdown with fidds and/or ford helping? ❤️

Hey guys! Sorry it's been a few days. I've been a little sick these past few days, so I've been away from my computer for the most part. But I'm feeling much better now! This takes place in the 80s, an AU where Stan and Fiddleford got Ford back after a couple of years!

There is a scene wherein Stan briefly hits his head with his hands, starting at "When that doesn't work..." and ending at the end of that small paragraph.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

    The sun dipped low on the horizon, painting the sky with hues of pink and orange. In the house, the soft hum of the evening felt insistent, like the ticking of a clock that grew louder with each passing minute. Stan sat in the living room, surrounded by the comforting chaos of his brother’s ramshackle house. The creaking floorboards seemed to echo his thoughts. He could feel that familiar pull, that soft haze and gentle fuzzy feeling tugging at the back of his mind-an urge he’s learned to resist being tempted by. Though there were the reassurances of both Stanford and Fiddleford that there was nothing wrong with him, that how his head gets sometimes is completely okay, that they loved taking care of him. Stan got up and paced the cluttered floor, his mind racing as he tried to drown out the world around him. He felt the familiar tug at his mind—the sensation that he kept trying to ignore all day. All week, really. Doodles lay scattered across the floor, evidence of his battle with the sensations that enveloped him. Every time he absentmindedly started coloring or drawing, he felt a wave of anxiety choke him, leading him to tear the paper into shreds and toss them into the trashcan.

     It's not that Stan doesn't like it, the fuzzy feeling he gets, but it's embarrassing, he's a grown man approaching 30, dammit! He shouldn't be carrying around a stuffed bear, coloring, and playing with blocks while two other grown men flutter around and coo at him! Sometimes when he's in town, he can feel people's eyes on him, like they know what happens-like they're judging him, like he's a freak. He can feel the need crawl around and itch under his skin. But he can't! He needs to prove to himself that he's capable of acting and being an adult! That he is an adult!

     "Stupid! Stupid! Stupid!" Stan chants, frustrated by his own harried thoughts, wanting his mind to calm down and let him be, to escape the fuzzy haze creeping up on him. For all these thoughts to leave his head. He brings his hands up and pulls on his hair, hoping the pain can bring some clarity to his mind. When that doesn't work, he switches to hitting his hand with his palms, muttering "stop it, stop it, stop it..." with each hit until he feels six-fingered hands grab his wrists and pull them down with a-

     "Stanley, stop!" It's Ford who's grabbing his hands, his face drawn. He doesn't look angry, he looks upset-distraught-but not angry. Stan thinks he wants him to be angry, to yell and fight him and treat him like a damn adult. "What are you doing? What's happened?"

     "Nothin' happened. I'm fine." Stan bites out, trying to pull his hands back from his brother's iron grip to no avail. "Let go of me, Stanford. I need-I need to go" He pulls harder, almost wrenching his shoulders out before he feels another pair of hands come up and gently but firmly grasp his shoulders. Why do they have to be so gentle with him? Even when he's acting normal, when they get into arguments or small fights, there's no hitting or punching-nothing beyond the play fighting Ford and Stan will do sometimes. Stan's not used to it, not after violence has been his life for almost a decade.

     "What ya' need to do is calm down and talk to us, Stanley. Let Ford and I help, we're worried about you." He hears Fidds' voice in his ear behind him, his hands on his shoulders. Ford's hands firmly but gently held his wrists. Stan wants too badly to sink into that haze, to let them coddle him and hug and rock him, but he can't. He doesn't even know why anymore, why he hasn't let himself indulge.

     "Well stop worrying about me-I'm a grown-ass man and I can deal with myself." He can see Ford's eyes shift to look behind him, a silent conversation with Fidds. Usually, that would bother him, but right now he just wants to get out from their grasp, go to his room, and hide away from them-and the world-until he can get his head on straight.

     "I think I'm starting to understand what the problem is here. Stanley, it's been approximately 10 days since you've gone down-" that's what they call it when Stan's head gets fuzzy and he acts like a kid-"and after months of the same routine, your mind and body are used to going down at least twice a week. It's safe to say you're just in need of-"

     "No! I'm not in need of anything 'cept you letting go of! Me!" He tries to wrench himself to the side but crashes to his knees with a stilted sob as Fidds' arms wrap around his body from behind just as he makes his move. Why did they have to push this? To have his body so used to these feelings that he now needs it to function? Why did they have to care for him. He doesn't sob, he refuses to say he did. Stan just brings his hands up-Ford let go when Stan made his move-and presses his face into them so hard he can see stars bursting out from the darkness. "I can't do this," he muttered piteously into his hands, his voice warbling and throat feeling thick. " 'M not a kid, I don't need this. I shouldn't need this. I need to grow up." He wants to cry, he wants to go under, he wants Poindexter. Stan just wants to noise in his head to stop. He whines, feeling Ford kneel and bring an arm around him, Fidds laying his head down and Stan's shoulder and nuzzling it, shushing and humming.

     "Stanley...It's alright to feel like you do, and it's alright to feel frustrated by it. You've lived a hard life, and we both know comfort like this was a rarity in our home. But you can be safe here," Ford sits down next to Stan, his knees aching from the kneeling. "Fiddleford and I would never judge you, Lee. We love taking care of you."

     "But why? Why do you like taking care of me when I act like that-like a kid? Why do you care about me?" Stan's voice breaks on his last word, tears bubbling up to the surface and spilling down his cheeks, dripping and staining Stan's sweats.

     "What's not to care about, Stan?" It's Fiddleford who answers this time, Ford seemingly at a loss for words at Stan's questions. "You're such a kind-hearted and warm fella. You care so deeply about your friends and family, I know you'd go to the ends of the earth and then some for 'em. And you're funny as all get out. Real hoot, I'd say. Caring for you is like a breath of fresh air, Stanley. It soothes m' soul. So you can be tiny if you need to, Bubs." Fiddleford's words get a small laugh/scoff out of Stan, the kind words bringing some warmth to his heart. But he looks towards Ford, needing to hear him say something, anything. A confirmation that he does care for Stan. And his words hit like a gut punch.

     "I love you, Stanley. You're my twin, my best friend from birth. You never judged me for my hands, for my curiosities and obsessions. You protected me from bullies and my own thoughts. You came at my darkest hour to help me, even after we were estranged for a decade. You made a life and job for yourself here, you paid off my loans and debt. You brought in F and helped him stop his memory gun usage. Stanley, you worked tirelessly for two years to bring me back after the portal incident. You're my hero, you always have been. And I can't possibly describe how much joy it brings me to see you unwind and relax, to look so happy, to be so happy. I love caring for you, truly, from the bottom of my heart, to be someone you can trust to protect you. I love you." And that does it, Stan's sobbing into his arms, into Ford's arms, his heart feels like it's bursting, and he can feel himself plummet down. His mind calming as his fuzzy haze washes over it, his mind losing the battle as soon as Ford finishes speaking, the confirmation that he is so loved is what he needed, he realized. That he wasn't some weird burden on them when this happens, that he didn't have to be an adult all the time. He hasn't felt this loved in forever and hasn't ever been cared for as he is now.

     He's still sobbing into Ford's arms as he's led up the stairs into his room, a pair of hands changing him into his softest sweater-it's got footballs all over it-and wrapping him up in his Teddy Bear blankie. He blinks and sniffles as he feels cold wetness swipe across his face, Fidds had wet a wash cloth and was wiping the tears from his eyes. Stan smiled at him, giggling when Fidds smiles back with a goofy grin. Sixer helps him lay down in bed and tucks Poindexter in his arms-still cocooned in his blankie-brushing his hair back and away from his forehead, like Ma' used to do when they were really young.

     "There we go, Lee, feeling nice and comfortable and cozy? Is Poindexter tucked in enough?" Fidds asked, coming to sit on the edge of the bed, tucking the quilt under Stan's legs even tighter, knowing how much he liked that feeling. He nods and mumbles, not feeling up to speaking. He just wants to lie there with Poindexter, Sixer, and Fidds and stay in this hazy feeling forever, his body aches now that he's relaxing, he was so tense for days. "That's good. I've gotcha here a book to listen to, is that alright?" That's more than alright to Stan, who just nods and hopes Fidds does the voices for the book, he loves it when they do voices for the people in his books.

     "Here, Lee, let's not chew on your friend's ear. I've got you something better." His brother says, guiding Poindexter's ear out of Stan's mouth. He didn't even realize he was chewing on it. He gives his stuffy an apologetic pat as Ford guides Stan's pacifier into his mouth. It's got a car on it that's made to look like "The Stanley Mobile". It's so cool. Ford made it as a surprise for Stan a few weeks ago. He snuffles behind it, leaning his cocooned and burritoed body into Ford's as he settles down beside him, an arm reaching over and cuddling Stan as close to his body as possible. Stan just snuggles into his shoulder, feeling his breathing and matching it, leaching his brother's warmth and hearing his matching heartbeat.

     "There was once a Velveteen Rabbit, and in the beginning he was really splendid..." Stan just relaxes into his brother's warmth as he finds himself enraptured in Fidds' storytelling. His mind finally calmed and his heart sated and happy.

[saryasy]

tagged by @butchdiaz for a 2024 fic roundup but I'm copying them and adding my edits in there too 🥰 this is the most I've written in a year (and by a huge margin) by virtue of me writing my longest two fics ever back to back. so hopefully next year goes similarly because I already miss writing 😭😭

May:

sounds like forever (5k)

No, he doesn't remember falling. He just remembers looking at his best friend one evening, cooping up a sleeping Christopher into his arms, murmuring ‘I got this’ to a half-asleep Eddie who'd made to carry his own son instead. He'd watched as Buck walked quiet but confident steps to Christopher's room, depositing him in bed with a whispered ‘goodnight’, and thought, in his sleepy haze, I love him.

my very first buddie fic!! wrote it a few days after finishing the show for the first time. was still finding the characters voices but it'll always be special to me

August:

Season of Hope (After the Flood) (58k)

Eddie's summer of missing his son, unrepressing more than just his sexuality, and realizing that somewhere along the way he's fallen in love with his best friend and forgot to fall out of it.

And maybe that's okay.

I genuinely still can't believe this fic exists. and the fact that it does is all thanks to @livingincolorsagain. my longest fic ever yet I wrote it relatively quickly. and I still think back on the writing process fondly. getting to figure out where the story's headed. the chapter titles. all the lovely feedback. it was such a lovely journey even the parts where it fought me lol

September:

slow motion, double vision in rose blush (20k)

Eddie has kissed a man.

Eddie Diaz. His friend. His Eddie. Has kissed a man.

Which is strange because Buck is sure as hell he'd remember kissing Eddie. OR Buck is very normal about his platonic friend's kissing habits.

this one was literally a haze. I had an idea for them watching their first kiss through the screen and absolutely ran with it. I think that one scene in there is 12k on its own which is kinda insane. also only realized after posting that's it's my first published E rated fic

November:

merry christmas please don't call

MY VERY FIRST EDIT. my baby. I'd been thinking about getting into editing for a bit back then. but was way too intimidated to take the first step. then I heard this song on tiktok and was possessed by the ghost of shannon. and here we are

my heart is buried in venice

I still don't know how I made this one in such a short period of time. but also not complaining. loved putting the opening montage together so much

futile devices

I do. love you. yeah

December:

drawn to the blood

okay this is the first idea for an edit I ever had! idk how close I got to what I had in mind. plus it gave me hell. but it's out there now so!

What do you do about a haunted house.. (600)

a little tumblr ficlet I wrote half asleep because I was so happy I finally felt like writing again I couldn't let it slip through my fingers and risk forgetting it in the morning

so you are tired

my last edit of the year!!!! wasn't gonna post it but a told me to lol. initially it was more buddie focused. but the song is so buck I had to make some adjustments. absolutely loved cutting the song as I please lol

not to get too sappy at the end here but getting into this fandom and getting back into creating and getting to create new things and making new friends has been so so fun. thank you so much to everyone who's read and watched and said a nice thing in the tags and comments 💕💕💕💕💕

no pressure tagging @livingincolorsagain @sibylsleaves @buick118 @userbuddie @confessionseddie @chronicowboy

[olderthannetfic]

I've written one fic for a german GTA Roleplay pair that isn't canonically together afaik, and every time someone clicks on it, I think, "Did something happen? Did they confess something? Was there subtle flirting again? SOMEONE TELL ME WHY YOU CLICKED THIS RAREPAIR PLS AAAH!"

I do know I need to calm my tits because the pairing isn't ever going to happen I think (sadly), but still every time, my naivete is like "HELLO I AM IN YOUR FACE ONCE AGAIN WHEEE"...

I published the fic in July and haven't properly watched RP in a while, and it has 130 because someone clicked it today, and I am sitting here wanting to go and watch all kinds of streams to maybe find something that sent the person to read it...

Just a few days ago, I watched a stream where char A called char B his pupil or son, and a few days later, char A said that his subordinates refer to him as "daddy", so now I've started writing again because I mean, how can you resist this beautifully hopeless dynamic? I appear to feel drawn to rarepairs that have no hope and are somewhat sad or tragic because of missed opportunities, and this pairing made me realize lmao.

Thank you for letting me ramble in your inbox. Since I feel like an ass for just rambling at you instead of engaging in conversation properly, may I ask what kinds of dynamics tend to draw you to a ship?

--

Anon who just sent an ask about a german GTA Roleplay pairing here: forgot to add that the worst thing about it is that this fic I wrote in July was sooo badly written. I hadn't written in german and wrote it in an overly-tired haze, and it shows, embarrassingly… Hopefully if I finish the one I'm writing now, it will be less awful and rusty… Getting back into writing is strenuous in such a weird way because you enjoy the process of writing and just emptying the creative juices but get upset at your own current lack of skill because you know your sentences used to sound more fluid and better and not as all-over-the-place as they currently do, and you know it'll take time to get back to that and improve further, but it's so frustrating to not be there immediately.

[saintsenara]

this piece was written for @ladiesofhpfest monthly minis, focusing on andromeda tonks.

grief is a theme which has been prominent in my reading and writing lately, and one aspect of grief which i am particularly drawn to at the minute is the fact that grief can often make the grieving quite unpleasant. the rage of grief, its vindictiveness and petty cruelty, are subjects which i think this fandom often shies away from. after all, nobody likes to think of their faves being horrible in their sorrow.

but i think andromeda makes a good case study for this feeling. i'm always struck in deathly hallows by how there's such a potent undercurrent of anger and disapproval in the way she deals with harry and hagrid. i like the description of her looking haughty - above and beyond the visual comparison it draws between her and bellatrix - and i like her complete lack of interest in doing anything other than talk about tonks and her fear for her.

i've written a lot about how i think someone in andromeda's position would understand the risk which tonks has taken on by joining the order (i'll die on the hill, written about in several of the pieces i did for the fest this summer, that she is aware that bellatrix has convinced voldemort to leave her and ted alone, which then becomes forfeit). and so here i'm thinking about just how furious she'd be when her fear and rage and warnings about that risk were proven to be completely justified - set around dirge without music by edna st. vincent millay. because andromeda does not approve. and she is not resigned.

Spring did not amble into summer that year, as it usually did.

It did not drift with mellow ease from April’s pale into May’s gold, lying idly on the grass in Richmond Park with the cracked-sugar coating on mini eggs on its fingers. It did not wake up one morning and put all its jumpers into storage, then fish them out again three days later when there was still a chill in the morning air. It did not spoon mint sauce onto its Easter lamb and watch as the tendrils of the broad beans curled themselves around their frame.

Death was squatting in her house, disarraying the furniture and stretching the sleeves of her cardigans, a winter’s dirge in his horrible voice and a sepulchral damp trailing in after him whenever he opened the door.

And although she had prided herself for years on her skill as a hostess, she was growing furious with her unwanted guest.

May was a month of rain and of rage.

For all the others - the other mothers in the club she had not asked to join, whose company she loathed, whose losses she refused to comprehend - it seemed that May was a month of silence.

She could picture them, sitting mutely by empty beds, the ephemera of childhood clutched in their white-knuckled hands, as if it will help clear the fog. She could see them searching through the gloom for the glittering past; the memories of summer’s haze which parents cast unthinkingly away, believing that there will never be a time when they will have to beg death to let them remember the way a seven-year-old face looked on a particular May morning.

She could picture them, sitting mutely by the fresh-turned earth of newly-dug graves, spring’s white flowers - apple blossom and yarrow; baby’s breath for their unbreathing babies - laid before headstones slick with the unseasonable squall. She could see them letting the rain mingle with the tears on faces rubbed raw, until the one cannot be distinguished from the other in the drops falling to the earth.

But she could not sit. She could not search or cry.

She could only spit; and snarl and scream until her teeth clashed through the dry and splitting skin of her lower lip and blood pooled in her mouth.

While death laughed at her.

They had never been able to work out where Nymphadora’s talent - the clay suppleness of tendons and bones, the shape-shifting malleability of skin and marrow - had come from.

Ted had been a solid man, substantial in the way that bookshelves are: never rickety; never uneven; smelling of wood polish and leather. He contained a hundred thousand little treasures; he was a source of knowledge, a place of solace on rainy days; a best friend in the aftermath of a lonely childhood.

And she herself was solid, in the way that music is: the tempo can be varied but the notes remain the same. One sister can strike out on her own, but there is a refrain which follows her, the same funeral dirge which lilts in the air after her sisters, letting the careful listener know that these three women are one and the same. No matter what one was pretending.

Nymphadora had none of her father’s solidity. She was an opal: gaudy and colour-changing and brilliant, but with a softness beneath it all. She was fragmentary and fractured. She had wanted her jokes to be laughed at. She had wanted to be taken seriously.

She had wanted to be loved, in all her contradictory, flesh-and-blood glory.

She lay now beside her lukewarm lover in the earth.

She did not speak to her daughter when she visited the graveyard, its pathways washed with rain, a yew sagging against the church’s ancient walls. She did not speak to Ted either, though he mouldered next to his daughter. She did not leave flowers leaning on their headstones. She clenched her fists until her nails pierced the dry and splitting skin of her palms, and blood dripped over her wedding ring to the ground.

She was too angry at them both; at how they had clearly been in cahoots to turn themselves into food for the worms, and leave her pouring tea for death and keeping the radiators blasting. This is how it had always been - Ted’s gentleness turning into permissiveness when it came to Nymphadora throwing herself from the tops of trees or telling old ladies who reprimanded her on her knicker-baring miniskirts to go swivel, and she was forced to become the strict one, the one who disapproved of burping and pot noodles and joining the Aurors.

Neither of them had ever listened, adventure twinkling in their identical eyes and schemes whirring in their swashbuckling minds. They thought her silly - nervous and elegant and a lover of order. In their unkinder moments, they thought her rigid, icy, cruel. She could still picture Nymphadora at the breakfast table - sixteen and sulking over being told off for overindulging at a party and being sick all over the hydrangeas - and how it had felt to know her eyes were raking over her mother’s heart-shaped face for the fragments of Narcissa and Bellatrix that a quiet life in a Muggle suburb could not erase.

But look at that. She was right and they were both dead. And she was furious.

She did not speak to her husband when she returned to the house, where death was laying on the sofa instead of babysitting. There were crumbs on the coffee table, the gingery shards of a whole biscuit now snapped and softening. Like Ted - with his hair the colour of saffron cake and his eyes like spring water - would be in the damp of May’s earth.

As a child, her after-dinner habit had been bridge - a constant torture since Bella would never pay attention long enough for them to have a really good game. As an adult, it was coffee and chocolate liqueurs on the sofa with Ted.

As a widow, it appeared to be screaming.

The morning dawned as grey as all its cousins; May was a month of rain and of rage. Death clattered around the kitchen, leaving eggshells on the floor and teabags staining the worksurface with their tannic drool. The disorder made her skin itch.

She looked at herself in the mirror, her face prickled and pink from a shower which had scalded her. The heat was a comrade; the water was boiled up to a flesh-burning point, her blood was hot enough to eat her marrow, turning her from the inside out into mulch. Somehow it all evened out.

Ted and Nymphadora were competing over who could decompose the quickest, laying in the graveyard and giving thanks for all the damp. It would putrify them all the quicker. Still, how shocked they would be when victory was snatched from them before their sightless eyes. If there was a prize for shattering first, the person they’d left behind would win.

Her day was one of half-drunk coffees and constant movement. She could not sit, there was no way of relaxing with a magazine on the sofa when death was leaving so many crumbs. There was no way of staying in the house when there were so many fragments lurking on shelves and in wardrobes. Ted’s jumpers curled up like newborn kittens in a drawer; his mismatched socks were lined up like limp orphans in the laundry basket.

A hairbrush, entangled with bright pink strands, lay on the stairs. She had told Nymphadora to take it up with her the last time she went to bed. Her daughter hadn’t listened.

She was so angry at her.

[fanterfane]

Who's ready for a 3 in 1 SPECIAL?! Here's a trilateral collab featuring the art and sonas of @taboogemini, Hacsaw, and of course yours truly! Together, we humbly present to ya'll a Hexafusion project. A collab of all of our Artsonas fused! Our artist sonas are Dee (Fanter-Mod), Ashley (AshleySaw), and Rose (TabooRose) respectively.

Featuring some saucy extras drawn by me!~

A little extra of TabooGem and I fused! We're a little full of ourselves apart, but together we're as narcissistic as narsissus!

A little extra of Hacssaw and I fused!! One hypersexual is more than enough, but add a hypersexual goblin and it compounds gobbily!! Can't resist a horny haze like that.

Uncensored: https://www.furaffinity.net/view/53325092/

And finally, the last additional drawing, all 3 of us together. Dahliya!! Smug badass 1/3rd goblin and all around showstopper! She/him got it going ON, and he/she knows it!

I don't know how many of you will notice this, but this is the first time I've ever posted some TF of my self-insert artsona. I've drawn some small personal sketches of myself in various hijinks in the past, but they never saw the light of day. So this is a bit of a leap for me, but it still was a surprising lot of fun to work on! It's very nerve racking to cross this threshold of TFing myself, but I think it will be fine. Naturally, I'm gonna be really restrictive with what projects Fanter-Mod is used in, but I think it'll be fun to draw more wacky TF stuff with my sona! This fusion collab for sure showed me exactly how fun it can be. (Especially the spicy Dashy extra!)

My first ever Hexafusion! I gotta say, it's pretty fun to do these! I'll definitely have to do another sometime in the future. At the very least, I need to get back into drawing fusions!!

[altschmerzes]

🌹the torture fic

It is the great love of my life (there should be a question mark after 'fic' but my keyboard is very broken. It looks really agressive without it, sorry. Love the writi

sdlfkjds thank you!!! i'm so glad you enjoy it and no worries, not aggressive at all <3

here's a (very long sldfkjs as is the trend with clips from this fic) clip from part 2, which i've been working on today! as per usual with this fic, it's under a cut, with specific warnings at the top

(warnings: not much actively going on here, just that this is from right when they're leaving the motel mac was tortured in for two days, so he's in extremely bad shape. he's in a lot of pain, and there are references to what murdoc did to him in part 1, though none graphic or descriptive.)

The injection takes effect quickly once they’re back on the road and the relief is so strong that it makes Mac dizzy. Or maybe he’d been dizzy already and the pain has just eased away enough that he’s able to notice anything aside from that and the cold. He’s tired, too, and it’s hard to stay awake, though more tolerable to do so now that being conscious isn’t an automatic intolerable crush of constant shifting agony. It’s not gone, but it feels survivable at least.

Mac can’t let his eyes close. While the meds had helped the pain, he’s discovered that they haven’t done much at all for the anxiety still singing through his veins like the long, high note of a violin. It’s not particularly logical but Mac can’t help the sense that if he closes his eyes for longer than it takes to blink, he’s going to be right back in that room again, and Murdoc will be waiting. So he remains alert, not even given the choice to rest. Not yet.

Around the edges of all of it - the panic, the thudding of his own heart, the slight haze of the painkiller - Mac can hear Jack talking to him. The voice is unmistakable, though he can’t make out the words. It reminds him of when he’d been pushed past his limits and Murdoc’s voice had faded into a static blur, but with the opposite effect. That had been an insistent, cloying awareness that he was not safe and that Murdoc was ever-present, that there was no getting away from the threat, the promise of further pain and violation.

This, though… This is countless days on some couch or another, too exhausted to keep his eyes open but needing the sound of safety and home around him to remind him that he’s not out in some unfamiliar place surrounded by unfamiliar people. This is getting lost in a puzzle - a literal puzzle or just a complex problem that needs solving - and being guided along by a current that let him think clearly without getting too lost in the weeds. This is the shadow of a nightmare and the thick post-surgical haze and the jittering anxiety of an almost-flashback, calmed and soothed away by a voice he knows, a voice that belonged to a person who would keep Mac safe until his dying breath, and thus proof that whatever was going on, if that voice was calm and even, he didn’t have to worry about it, and everything was going to be okay.

Eyes barely kept open a slit, Mac drifts, slumped in the car’s seat. Jack is closer than he should be from the other side of the back of the car, but Mac isn’t complaining. The looming presence of someone else beside him isn’t as frightening as he might have expected it to be, and the warmth is welcome. Mac finds himself leaning over, drawn to the source of the warmth and safety that he knows even without being able to think clearly. At some point, clearly noticing this, Jack shifts. He slowly and carefully eases an arm up over the back of the seat, letting his hand rest high on Mac’s back, between his aching shoulders and just beneath his bruised neck. Jack puts just enough pressure into the point of contact to ease the burden on Mac’s shoulders and Mac leans into it, soaking in the point of heat and the paradoxical sense of safety.

The awareness that someone is touching him after what’s just happened makes Mac frightened and wistful at the same time. It sends a crawl of fear down his spine at first, calling forth fresh memories he wants desperately to keep stuffed down and locked away, but there is enough fighting against the reminders of his captor that he wants to turn and lean into it more than he wants to rip himself away. The man in the back seat with him is beside him and not in front of or behind him, and there’s still that voice, always that voice reminding Mac that he knows exactly who this person is, and that there’s nowhere he could be farther from harm than here with Jack’s hand on his back.

They continue on their drive to the airstrip, which seems both insanely far away and closer than Mac would’ve guessed for how remote the motel had been. Most of the trip passes by in a blur, aches renewed whenever they hit a rough spot of road. Several times, Jack sends an admonishment to be careful at the driver’s seat, and Mac flinches with every snapped word. They’re just tiny twitches but he knows that Jack notices. The hand on his back responds, a thumb smoothing over his spine in silent apology.

It happens again the next time, though. The car skids very slightly on a patch of ice and Jack hisses, “Watch it,” which is how Mac knows that Jack is having a hard time holding it together himself.

Ordinarily, he would have noticed in about a hundred other ways. Mac should have caught on much sooner, but the mess of his own head is taking up so much of his bandwidth that it takes that obvious of a tell to make its way through.

Another snap up at the front of the car and Mac inhales sharply.

“Sorry, kid,” Jack murmurs, and his voice is tight and strained.

A pang of worry clatters through Mac’s chest, followed by an even stronger wave of guilt. He fumbles with his good hand, trying to reach over. He wants to pat Jack’s knee or his shoulder, but he can’t get his arms to cooperate well enough. They’re tangled in the blanket wrapped tight around him and it hurts too much to try for long, so eventually Mac lets his head tip back and roll to the side instead. His neck throbs at the movement and it nearly tips him into another coughing fit, but it’s not as bad as it would’ve been before the injection, and he needs to get Jack’s attention somehow. Mac’s cheek presses into Jack’s arm where it’s stayed braced against the seat back, and he blinks up at him, determined to make eye contact at least for a few moments.

“Y’ ‘kay?” he asks. It’s hard to get it out but Mac needs to, even though he can hardly hold onto a coherent train of thought. Now that he’s aware of how badly Jack is struggling with this, he has to find some way to check in.

“Am I…” Jack stops before he finishes repeating the question and sighs, short and harsh. This close to Mac’s head, it sounds loud. Mac twitches, almost a flinch, and tries to pull himself up and away.

He wants to apologize, but he can’t get the words out through his raw throat and he’s too mired in exhaustion and pain to make a second attempt. It doesn’t help that he isn’t even sure what he’s apologizing for, and Jack doesn’t usually let him get away with saying he’s sorry without being able to answer that question.

“It’s okay,” Jack is quick to add, the press of his palm strong and warm on Mac’s back. “Hey, it’s alright. Sorry. I’m not upset at you, Mac. It’s okay.” There’s an insistence in the way the fingers of Jack’s hand dig in very slightly, and getting Mac to lay back down is a swift and easy fight.

There they stay for the rest of the drive. Mac still can’t close his eyes for longer than a moment or two, but it’s more than he’d managed before, and he’s almost up to four seconds at a time by the point that the car stops, and Thomas King announces that they’ve arrived.

[laurelsofhighever]

WIP Wednesday

... actually on a Wednesday! And I have stuff to share! Thank you for the tag @effelants 💖

First, from Only A Dream Of Summer, my Maric x OC fic that I'm actively working on. It's a lot of fun to write

Time passed in a haze as the castle waited on Cailan’s recovery, suspended in glorious midsummer, with the first of the season’s swifts darting for insects outside the sickroom window and the hum of bees a constant presence among the rambling roses. Inside, however, the weather was an unwelcome intrusion. The blaze of Solace sunshine left the air thick and humid, baking to the point where a constant supply of ice had to be brought up from the cold room to be applied to the prince’s wrists. Though he still tired easily, he chafed against his confinement, and what little time Maric had to spare from the regular missives of kingdom business his advisors sent him was spent trying to keep him entertained. In some ways, it felt like the first opportunity he had had to be a proper father. Without the bevvy of tutors, retainers, and servants required for a royal upbringing, the simplicity of the joy he found in the hours spent by his son’s side reminded him of his own mother’s indulgence, trying to compensate for the constant danger that had hung over their heads. Life now was a dream compared to the old days of the rebellion; he had worked hard to make it so, scrubbing Orlesian influence from the land and coaxing its people back into prosperity, all in the hope that the kingdom Cailan would one day inherit might never know worse suffering than the bite of a hard winter – and that the day of that inheritance would still be a long way off. Movement in the room roused him from his unexpected slumber into a shadowed twilight scented with jasmine. His shoulders popped as he stretched in his chair and cast a bleary eye about for the source of the disturbance. “I did not mean to wake you, Your Majesty,” Gwawr said. “And I didn’t mean to doze off…” In his hands, a letter crinkled – a response from Loghain, entreating him once again to turn away Florian’s envoy as if the word of a king did not count as final if he was badgered about it enough. “Something troubles you?” the healer asked, as she went through her usual motions to check Cailan’s wellbeing.

Second, from As The World Falls Down, my Prince Alistair AU. I'm still working on it, but since it's going to be so much longer than Summer, it's on a backburner for now, and I've left them on the road:

“Lothering,” Alistair huffed when they finally paused for breath on a bluff overlooking the village. Thin banners of smoke rose from the hunched cluster of buildings in the settlement proper, and from the damp campfires dotted between the mass of grubby tents that spilled out over the southern boundary like flotsam from a shipwreck. “Pretty as a painting.” He shot a sidelong grin to Rosslyn on his left. “I almost didn’t think we’d make it.” “It’s a real sight, isn’t it?” The new, reedy voice came from just off the road, from a small campsite set far enough back into the bushes that any travellers heading north would miss it on the way past. The thin, gaunt man it belonged to stepped out onto the path in front of them. Four others emerged after him, in front and behind to block their path, all in similar states of beggary with weapons drawn. Rosslyn’s own hand reached for her sword at the same moment Alistair stepped closer to guard her flank, the shiver of airalong her spine telling her that Morrigan, too, readied for an attack. She hoped it would not come. Though her shoulder had knitted together far faster than should be expected even with the aid of magical healing, the dull twinges that flared with every movement warned of the permanent damage that could be done if she got in a fight before the muscles fully recovered.   “Let us pass,” she commanded from beneath her hood. At her side, Cuno growled his own threat, the sound a low vibration against her leg.

Tagging forward, if you're so inclined: @ellenembee @asaara-writes @serenpedac @ooachilliaoo @thelionheartedo3 @cleverblackcat

[casspurrjoybell-26]

May to December - Chapter 13 - Part 1

*Warning Adult Content*

Joint Parenting

The next morning had been surreal.

Kyle and woken up with Otis squashed between Chaska and himself.

It had taken him a while to remember why they were in the man's apartment in the first place but when he did remember a sweet feeling of joy overcame him.

He started at the dark-haired man sleeping across from him before looking down at his son's head of dirty blond hair.

He grinned, running a hand through his son's hair as he hummed.

His humming got a rise out of Chaska, the tan-skinned man farrowed his brows before opening them and blinking a few times.

"You're awake?" he said but it was framed more like a question.

Kyle's smile widened as he nodded and reached out to touch the man's face.

"You're awake now as well," he said and Chaska rolled his eyes before looking down at Otis who was still fast asleep.

"He sleeps like a log," Kyle explained and Chaska chuckled, rolling until he was lying on his back and looking up at the bedroom ceiling.

"His mum put him on a strict schedule he gets up at eight on the dot."

"What time is it? What's the day even?" Chaska asked, making Kyle frown a bit as he tried to remember.

"It looks like it's still really early and it's Sunday... I think?" Kyle muttered, his memory equally as hazed.

"I think so too..." Chaska trailed and the room went silent for a bit before the two men burst out laughing.

"Yesterday was a bit draining, wasn't it?" Kyle asked and Chaska hummed, rolling on his side to touch Otis' hair.

"I love him but being with him all day is exhausting," the young man chuckled and Kyle smiled.

He was referring to dealing with the energetic toddler.

The words were mundane but Chaska mentioning that he loved his son made Kyle's heart skipped a bit.

It probably wasn't something too special.

He loved all his other students after all.

At least that's what Kyle assumed.

"Well, you're a lot better with kids than me," Kyle muttered feeling his heartbeat quicken when he realized this was ample time to bring up what he'd been meaning to suggest.

"Chaska," he said in a low tone, changing the mood of the banter.

"I've been wanting to ask if you'd like to help me with Otis."

Kyle's face was growing hot and he was finding a hard time mustering the breath he needed to say the next sentence.

"I know you're busy and that whatever we have right now makes things a little touchy..." Kyle pushed himself to talk, moving to sit up on the bed so that he could look down at Chaska.

The dark-haired man wasn't showing any clear signals or emotions and it was worrying to Kyle.

"But I need help. I'm not the best of dads and I'd like it if someone with actual experience with these things could help me," he finished before letting out a breath he hadn't realized he was holding.

His hands had been drawn into fists at his side and he kept looking over at Chaska for a reaction, anything at all.

Chaska stared at him before turning his gaze to the little boy still fast asleep at the center of the queen-sized bed.

He let out a sigh as he tucked him in and moved to sit up on the bed himself.

"What kind of help?" he asked, staring at Kyle in the eyes again.

The older man shrugged.

"Everything?"

Chaska rose a brow at him before chuckling.

"Everything?"

"I'm being honest," Kyle said as Chaska continued laughing.

"I have a very hard time trying to discipline him without being overly cruel and I'm never sure how to talk with him without feeling like it's too weird and plastic. I-I just need help," he admitted as his shoulder's slouched.

Unlike Chaska who was bare-chested, he was in a tank top.

"You know, until my ex-wife left me, I didn't know how bad at this I was," he went on, feeling his face warm up from coming clean with that.

"I see you interact with Otis and I think, 'I want a relationship like that with him.' It's hard to explain. Just realizing how shit I am at parenting over the past few months has overwhelming but the last two and a half that I've been here haven't been as bad, and I know it's because of you. I see you every day and I copy and learn from you..." Kyle trailed, swallowing the spit that had formed at the back of his mouth.

"So, I'd love it if you'd help me. You're more or less a better dad to him than me already," he added, watching Chaska's face for a reaction.

Chaska let out a small sigh as he gazed at Kyle with a blank look.

He suddenly frowned a bit before looking away and running a hand through his hair.

"If what I just said has made you uncomfortable, you should ignore me," Kyle coughed up, feeling his chest clog up at what he assumed was a rejection.

Chaska shook his head before scooting as far in as he could without hurting Otis.

"It's not that," he muttered, his voice just high enough for Kyle to pick up.

The dark-haired man reached out to touch Kyle's cheek, smiling at him before letting his hand drop to the mattress.

"I'm just a bit worried, that's all," he said, only confusing Kyle more.

"Worried about what?" the words jumped out from Kyle's out.

They slurred and jumbled and Chaska was amused enough to chuckle a bit.

"It's a bit worrying to give a child the impression of a relationship when you're not sure if things will work out, isn't it?" Chaska said.

An uncomfortable silence followed Chaska's words.

Kyle didn't know what to say, and he tried his best to keep himself calm by squeezing his hand into a fist from time to time.

"Yesterday, you said it was okay for us to share a bed even after I said it was a bit like doing mom and dad things in front of Otis," Kyle said, looking over at Chaska.

His blue eyes held the younger man's deep brown ones.

"Did you change your mind over the course of the night?"

Kyle let out a low breath before turning away, deciding that looking at him was too emotionally tasking.

"No, I don't think you still understand," Kyle heard Chaska say.

"I'm worried about what will happen if we ever jump-started a relationship but it didn't work out in the end. What happens with Otis? Wouldn't he hate me if he thought I just decided not to be friends with him again?" Chaska's explanation made Kyle pause for a bit. It made sense.

He was worried about Otis losing a friend.

Even now Chaska was worrying about his son.

"Then we should never break up."

[frozenoj]

Published Reylo Fics Master List

Everyone knows reylos stay winning, and I have no doubt we'll be one of the most published fandoms of all time. List originally posted on twitter (and actually stolen from an anti lmao) but ported over considering... all that.

(Note: I'm mostly just C&P'ing right now, if you know an author has a tumblr and they aren't tagged please lmk thanks! And ofc lmk if I've missed any or as new things get published.)

Ali Hazelwood Cinematic Universe

Three novels, three novellas, and she's just getting started.

Go Hex Yourself by Jessica Clare

When Reggie Johnson answers a job ad, she’s astonished to find that she’s not applying to work at her favorite card game, Spellcraft: The Magicking. Instead, she’s applying to be an actual familiar for an actual witch.

We'd Know By Then by Kirsten Bohling

Meeting your soulmate triggers "the glimpse"—walking out of Dorothy's house in Kansas and into the colorful world of Oz. The problem is, Brighton has ALWAYS seen in color.

For Love and Bylines by Merrin Taylor

When Ava Thompson is offered an undercover investigative role, she jumps at the chance. But posing as a high school senior proves to be more than Ava signed up for when she meets brooding English teacher, Nico Adams.

Almost Perfect by Charlie Mitchell

Recovering from a brain tumour, Ben has lost confidence in sex & relationships. So he gets in touch with Rey, a specialised sex worker, to help him get over his fears.

Soul Searching by E. A. Blevins

Finding your soulmate is like winning the lottery. They're rare and precious and lead to riding off into the sunset.

They're not supposed to be your high school English teacher or carry baggage that can tear you both apart.

The Hurricane Wars by @theaguanzon

A land ravaged by storms and conquerors…

A refuge across the sea that comes at a price…

A volatile alliance between two bitter enemies…

A growing attraction as dangerous as it is irresistible…

Crossroads by Chaney Banett

Ester lives a simple enough life as a waitress at a truck stop diner, plopped in middle-of-nowhere Minnesota. Her days aren’t boring necessarily. It’s just that they’re one all the same.

She doesn't question life very often. She doesn't question anything at all, actually.

…Until the mysterious regular at booth sixteen starts asking.

Hanukkah at the Great Greenwich Ice Creamery by Sharon Ibbotson

Grumpy Cohen orders a coffee when he goes to deliver a present from his mother at the ice creamery. While there he's immediately drawn to River, the Deaf woman who makes the ice cream flavors.

My Roommate is a Vampire by @jeenonamit

Cassie Greenberg's desperate when she finds a too-good-to-be-true apartment in a beautiful Chicago neighborhood. She knows there has to be a catch—only someone with a secret to hide would rent out a room for that price.

Cassie’s sexy new roommate is a vampire. And he has a proposition for her.

The Rockstar’s Omega by Hannah Haze

Layla won a backstage pass to meet her idol, Ash Canon. What will they do when his scent sends her into heat?

(Does anyone know if Hannah's other works also used to be reylo? LMK!)

The Alpha Nextdoor by Dani Doll

It doesn’t matter how hot the alpha next door is. She’s a beta, and that means it’ll never work between them.

Right?

The Exception to the Rule by Christina D. Ambrose

Violet Dawson is spirited, independent, and definitely not your typical Omega. She's determined not to be drawn to the gorgeous Theodore Chamberlin, senior editor and company Alpha asshole.

They are thrust together to plan an event, and all seems to go well until Violet's workspace floods, and they have to share an office.

What will become of them when their close proximity causes Violet to go into heat?

The Most Titillating Tale of Miss Hall & Dr Black by Jenny Michelle

Miss Charlotte Hall, bored & neglected by her Grandfather, has a shameful problem. Desperate, she turns to his physician for help. But she hadn't expected the help to be quite so…manly.

Antique Magic by Kait Disney-Leugers

Brie St. James is in need of a part-time job. She finds it at Spirit Antiques, owned by the handsome and aloof Ezra. But there's more to the shop than meets the eye. Under the layers of patina and dust, a gateway to the magical world and the shop is the crossroads of goods for the magical residents.

To Have & to Hold by Avery Crow

When Clara’s work visa is denied, she figures that’s the end of the road for her. Until her boss offers to marry her.

The idea of going back to cold, gloomy London and the dark past that haunts her is only slightly worse than having to somehow convince her friends and coworkers that her new marriage is authentic, and that there is any sort of love between them.

But Andrew Morrow is full of surprises, and Clara soon finds herself in over her head and pining for a man who is, after all, only doing her a favor.

Kirsten S. Blacketer

Kirsten has a ton of books, like omg a ton! Looks like at least 7 different series/collections? I don't know how many of them were reylo originally (could be all, could be just a few) but check them out.

[parkitaco]

isn't it so pretty to think there was some invisible string tying you to me for either elmax or byler

oooh omg ok i'm gonna cheat and do BOTH bc i've never written elmax before but this song also just has byler written all over it sooo

---

byler version

---

"Why did you ask, anyway?"

Mike blinks, rolling over and rubbing his eyes. "Huh?"

Will is lying on his back in the dark, staring up at the ceiling with a contemplative expression. His eyes flick to Mike's, just briefly, and he smiles a little. "Sorry, were you asleep?"

"I- yeah, it's the middle of the night, of course I was asleep."

"It's not even eleven-thirty."

"You know what I mean." Mike shoves his face into Will's side, flinging an arm across his torso and tugging him closer. "I'm tired. I biked all the way here in the dark."

"Yeah, to see me," Will says, sounding all too pleased with himself. "So here I am. Answer my question."

"Will, it's so late," Mike complains, voice muffled where it's pressed against Will's t-shirt.

"Eleven-thirty, Michael," Will repeats, unimpressed.

Mike groans, removing his face from Will's side in favor of glaring at him. "Okay, William. Why did I ask what?"

"If I wanted to be your friend."

Mike blinks down at him, propping himself up on one arm and watching Will's eyes trace over his face. "You want to know the reason why I asked a question when I was five years old?"

"Hey, you said it was the best thing you'd ever done! Don't act like you don't remember."

Through his groggy haze, Mike can't help but be a little endeared by the annoyed quirk of Will's eyebrows, the smirk resting faintly over his lips and the pillow creases on his skin. He dips down to kiss Will's forehead quickly, brushing a thumb over Will's jaw. "I told you," he murmurs, face hovering right over Will's. "I was all alone. You were alone too, so I just... asked."

"I couldn't have been the only one who was alone, though," Will presses. "Why me?"

Mike remembers that day so clearly. He'd spent the better part of the morning pouting and trying not to cry, secluded to a quiet corner of the classroom and wishing he didn't have to do this, that he could keep playing Uno in his basement with Nancy forever even if she was turning into a bit of a brat, lately, that he could be exempt from the ridiculous notion of hanging out with people his age, or whatever. He also remembers that all of those feelings were, ultimately, bullshit, because in reality, before Will Byers became a part of his life, Mike was terribly lonely.

So recess had come, and he'd decided he might as well take action. He'd scanned the playground, looking for people like him, people that were alone or that were wearing the same color as him or who just looked nice, even. He wasn't trying to be terribly picky. He'd seen at least five other lonely kids, sitting in the dirt or holed up on the slide or playing with their own toys in the corner. None of them seemed right. They were all too loud or too quiet or too annoying or too weird, even if Mike was and still is, in fact, weird.

Then he'd spotted the swings, and the boy on them, and when he'd tried to ration away why he couldn't go up at talk to him, tried to give in to his fear and stay quiet and lonely forever, he'd drawn a blank. He couldn't think of a reason why this boy - this boy in an old yellow t-shirt with a bowl cut like Mike's who was gazing at the clouds like they genuinely interested him - wouldn't be a good person to talk to.

So he'd gone up, and he'd been terrified, but he'd asked. And Will had said yes, and that had been that. Friends forever, or something along those lines, and somewhere in the ten years since Mike had fallen in love with him, and that too had been scary but when he tried to rationalize it, he once again drew a blank because - at the end of the day, it just made sense. Of course he would fall in love with Will. He had no reason not to.

"I... I guess it just made sense," Mike whispers now, meeting Will's eyes in the dark and quiet of his room. "I couldn't think of a reason not to."

Will smiles, brilliant in the night, and traces a finger over Mike's collarbone. "So it wasn't love at first sight, then?" he teases.

"Love at first sight isn't real," Mike says with conviction - his breakup with El had been proof of that. "But there was- a connection, I think. Like there was this- string, a bond or something, that drew me to you, and I chose to follow it. To tie the knot."

He expects Will to, like, laugh or mock his word choice or something, but Will is dead serious when he replies, "I'm glad you did."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah. I don't believe in love at first sight either, but I think that- it's just. Pretty, I guess. To think that there was something there, like you chose to take the first step and then from there on out we were just wrapped up in each other."

Mike grins, dipping down to kiss Will gently, warm and solid against him in the dark. "I'd happily stay wrapped up in you forever," he says softly, resting his forehead against Will's. "Even if you're an asshole who wakes me up in the middle of the night to ask about destiny."

"That is not what I asked I-"

"Will, I'm just teasing you."

Will huffs, breath warm against Mike's face, and Mike can't resist kissing him again, quickly. Will melts into it despite himself, arms around Mike's waist. "String, huh?" he murmurs.

"Sure. Or whatever else you want to call it."

"I like that just fine," Will decides, shoving his face into Mike's neck and relaxing into him, and they drift off to sleep, all wrapped up in each other.

---

elmax version

---

El doesn't know a lot about fate, or God or any premise of inevitability. She understands the concept well enough - Mike won't shut up about it, actually - he and Will tease each other about it when they think no one is listening, about swingsets and choices and unbreakable bonds, and El never really knows what exactly they're referring to but she knows it means that they love each other, and that they feel that this was inevitable.

She's not sure how she feels about that concept - it's fine for them, maybe, because they have this grand love story or whatever (at least according to Will, who rambles to her about Mike an awful lot, even if she kind of enjoys listening just because of the way his face lights up) but after having so many choices stripped away from her as a child, El isn't so sure she loves the idea of some cosmic deity deciding things for her. She'd rather take control of her own narrative.

That being said, she does get the part about being in love, and not wanting to ever conceive of a reality in which she isn't, and in that regard she supposes it's fine.

"Why do you think we became friends?" El asks now, rolling over on her bed and letting her head hang off the end, looking at Max upside-down.

Max glances up from the magazine she's been idly flipping through, a small smirk on her face. "We're not just friends, you know," she says, like she always does, and El scrunches her nose at her.

"You know what I mean," she retorts, which is true - unlike most people, Max always knows what El is trying to get across without having to hear all the words, always smiling and nodding along and supplying a word when El can't think of it, not trying to play dumb like Mike used to or interrupt like Will has a nasty habit of doing, or blink at her hesitantly and vaguely concerned like Joyce, well-meaning as she is, usually does.

Max flips the magazine shut, rising up on her elbows to kiss El's nose from her upside down vantage point, and El giggles. "We became friends because you're an incredible person and I liked you."

El widens her eyes. "We did not used to like each other, though."

"That's because you thought I was trying to steal Mike from you, which is laughable because I think I'd rather die than steal Mike from anyone, and had I been around before all that I would have told you to stop watching so many shitty soap operas."

El frowns. "I like soaps. They are romantic."

"They are, but they also instilled a weird jealousy complex in you that was totally unnecessary, so." Max smiles, tapping El's nose lightly with a finger. "Also, I never had a problem with you. I thought you were, like, ridiculously cool."

"Cool," El echoes, smiling. She likes that word - it feels strange in her mouth, but Max says it like a compliment and Max, as sarcastic and derisive as she can be, never says anything she doesn't mean. "I think you are cool, too."

"Thanks, babe."

Max goes back to her magazine, and El stares at the opposite wall as the blood rushes to her head, contemplating.

"Max?"

"Hmm?"

"Do you believe in fate?"

Max actively considers it for a moment - something she doesn't do for many people - before answering, "I don't know. I believe in connection, I think. Like a- spark, that you can have with someone, that, like, draws you to them, but I think we still have control over what we do with it. Does that make sense?"

El turns it over in her brain, lifting a hand and making the pencils spread across her desk float up into the air and bounce around the room. Max watches with the same vaguely awed look she always does, grinning. El grins back.

"'Spark'?" She asks, tapping one of the pencils against the ceiling. "Like a fire?"

Max laughs, sitting up properly and holding out a hand. El drops a pen into her hand, and she reaches out and begins tracing a pattern over El's exposed shoulder with it. "No, not literally," she says, hair tickling El's neck as she leans closer. "It's just, like. A pull. Like there's a string connecting you, and you can choose to pull them closer with it or just leave it how it is. Or cut it, I guess, but that's kind of bleak." She sits back, admiring her artwork on El's skin, and El cranes her neck to look. She can just barely make out a set of flowers and a small heart doodled there, and she smiles. Max would never claim to be an artist, but she certainly isn't a bad one.

"And you felt that? With me?" she asks, refocusing her gaze on her girlfriend.

"Sure I did," Max says, like it's obvious. "The first time I saw you you were wearing that black getup with the eyeshadow and everything and you looked so cool, and I don't believe in love at first sight or anything but I felt something, you know? And then you totally wrote me off which- hey, don't look at me like that, I didn't say I was mad!- you brushed me off and I was like wow, okay, she can take care of herself, great. And then I decided that I would win you over."

El smirks, flipping around and resting her arms on the edge of the mattress to gaze down at Max properly. "Win me over," she repeats.

"Convince you to love me," Max teases, and El reaches out a hand to brush a strand of hair out of her face.

"You are very easy to love," El murmurs as Max tilts her face to rest against her hand. "You do not think you are, but you say nice things without even trying."

"Yeah, well, 'course I'm nice to you," Max grumbles, kissing the side of El's palm. "I love you."

El grins teasingly. "I love you too. I am glad you did not choose to cut the string."

"Okay, it was a flawed metaphor, I get it-"

---

[reblogging4thewin]

KP's 2022 SPN Year in Review

Soooo much happened in my life in 2022 (well from end 2021 though 2022 really). I am so grateful for the friends both online and off who helped me get through it all 💜. I found myself focusing more on art and editing than writing - but I am really excited to share my Pinefest fic with you all in February!

The #1 creation I'm most proud of this year was my Haze Amv, but I am also blown away by how much my Me and My Broken Heart Amv took off - ending the year with almost 20k views - which is in-sane. Setting and sticking to a regular upload schedule has been motivating and rewarding - I'm excited to post January's video on Thursday too :).

Participating as an artist in a couple of bangs for the first time had me stepping out of my comfort zone and drawing the best human being I've ever drawn to-date.

Aside from making things, I also co-modded the new SPN Bang Bang with my friends @doctorprofessorsong and @you-cant-spell-subtext-without, which went wonderfully well; I"m excited for this year's round!

Last but not least, being an editor and guest for @endofthebookpod has been amazing so far, and I'm excited for the rest of The Winchesters season!

Without further ado, here's a recap of all of the SPN fanworks I made in 2022 (I'll also get my masterlist pages updated to include these):

---

Fic (all G or T rated):

Did You Mean It? - PB Exchange - Cas realizes Dean's been flirting with him, so he confronts him - with some satisfying results. (reblog link)

The Theme is Dean - Dean birthday - Dean gets the themed party he's always wanted. (reblog link)

I'm the One He's Walking to - Valentine's Exchange - Is this a date? (reblog link)

Sleepy Stares - they are just so soft (reblog link)

You Never Let Me Say It Back - a poem by Dean (I am particularly proud of the wordplay in this one) (reblog link)

Regarding Bunnies - Easter; goofy Dean - Cas gets Dean a fluffy surprise, that yes they've discussed before. (reblog link)

Mon Pays Sera Toi - Dean really likes how protective Cas can be - it makes him feel safe, among other things. (reblog link)

Magic - Samwena drabble (tumblr only)

Rendevous - Drowley drabble (tumblr only)

What if Dean kissed Cas in The Trap? (tumblr only; in the tags)

---

Amvs (I'm posting a new one every 5th now - YT channel):

Words Words Words - Dean Winchester - Comedy (YT link)

Squirrel all the Bad Guys Want - Dean Winchester, Drowley - Comedy (YT link)

When You Were Young - Dean Winchester, Destiel - Drama (YT link)

Haze - BAMF Cas, Destiel - Drama (YT link)

Dream Boy - Destiel - fun (YT link)

Me and My Broken Heart - Destiel - Drama (YT link)

The Shipped Gold Standard - Destiel - Drama (YT link)

Don't Let the Light go Out - Destiel - Drama - got (c) blocked on YT, so the Tumblr post has the original audio and the YT version has pitched concert audio that you can kind of hear me in 😳 (YT link)

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Gifs:

LGBTQIA+ SPN Characters

Aang and Cas entrance parallels

That pose from OTHOAP (which I like to think of as honk.jpg)

The totally-not-suggestive way that Cas eyes Dean in 5*02

500 Days of Winchesters - Spn Win / 500 Days of Summer Crossover - Suptober

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Art:

Dean/Cas/Benny drawing for Spn Bang Bang (Benny here is the best human being I've drawn to-date, and the reason I can no longer say that I can't draw people.)

Juliet the Hellhound drawings for Crowley Big Bang

Smoke - Drowley digital drawing - Suptober

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Meta and meta additions:

The Winchesters initial thoughts

The Winchesters John meta (with gifs)

Rowena is Sam's Benny

SPN Witches' immortality and humanity

See #spn meta in the tags for more thoughts too

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Misc nonsense (non-serious ramblings, sketches, ideas):

Do you wanna go/ do you wanna get out of here

Putting on a tie is such a turn-on apparently

I'll just wait here then Destiel and Merthur parallel (I could go with you is also one but yeah)

A silly little amongus/SPN crossover sketch I might come back to and draw for real.

Sarah Blake references from 8*22 Clip Show

Unusual reactions to 'I love you'

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Non-spn stuff:

Sure this is an SPN year in review, but I did make a handful of other things that I thought it'd be weird to leave out.

Soldier Boy Soulja Boy Amv - (YT link)

Dreamling Dream Amv - (YT link)

Merthur She's got Sorcery Amv - (YT link)

Puppet History Can't Touch This Amv - (YT link)

A Solid Foundation - original sapphic horror story (Reddit link)

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Last year's year in review post was more of a 'here's one fave; check out the pages I made that are a complete list.' But since blog subpages are hidden in the app, I figured I'd do a complete list in the post this year instead.

I plan on doing more writing in 2023 - Pinefest is only the beginning.

Happy new year everyone!

Since tumblr tags suck, I used this Tumblr OP finder to help me put this together.

[danses-with-dogmeat]

Ask -- 💣 - MEGATON - NSFW Hancock "I've been thinking about you all day" 👀👀👀💦💦

Ahh, I love this, okay, here it goes!

Some steamy stuff is under the cut!

"There you are." You heard a low growl from the scattered confines of the bedsheets. Through the smoky haze, and the dusky gloom barely managing to shine through the drawn curtains of the Old State House bedroom, you could only just make out the glimmer of Hancock's hooded eyes, and the sheen of his smile as he fixed you with a wanton stare.

"And there you are. Have you even left your bed at all today?"

"Nuh uh, I was waiting for you." He smiled as he scooched over in the bed, one hand gesturing to the free place beside his half-bare form.

Or was he fully bare?

You couldn't quite see through the bedsheets in order to tell. You grinned and let out a thoughtful hmm as you stepped closer to the bed, teasingly sitting on the end of it as you bent over to undo the laces of your boots.

"I've been thinking about you all day." He breathed, and suddenly, his lips were on your neck, ghosting over the sensitive skin as his hands wrapped around your body to grasp at the zipper of your vault suit.

"Didn't you kinda admit you just woke up?" You ask as you turn to face him with a quirked brow.

"Doesn't matter." A rough hand came up to brush over the side of your face as he pressed his lips to your jaw, and then your cheek. "I'm always thinking about you, sunshine. Doesn't matter if I'm awake or not. I've gotta say though..." His lips met yours, wasting no time as he eased his tongue into your mouth, tasting of sweet smoke and berry mentats. He pulled you towards him, twisting until he was on top of you, and you were lying flat against the soft cushions of the bed.

You released a gasp as he pulled away from you, the question of his bareness fully answered as the heat of his skin pressed to your vault suit, as you noticed a distinct hardness prodding the inside of your thigh.

"I've gotta say," He continued, nimble fingers working the sides of your vault suit apart with all the care his eagerness would allow him, "with you, reality's so much sweeter than dreams."

[hobipaint]

Graffiti and Chalk- two

summary: You thought you knew him. You thought him gone. Kim Taehyung was part of you that you had carefully suppressed, keeping his memories to one box near the wall of your mind. That was your fault, though - empty walls demand for art. And who other than your own neighbourhood vandal?

↳ pairing: ex police student turned vandal! taehyung x officer! female reader

↳ genres: angst, fluff

↳ word count: 9.6K

↳ disclaimers: pg15!, vandalism, police officers, criminal past and heavy discussion of it, mentions of character deaths.

one | two

a/n: FINALLY AFTER A MONTH IT'S HERE! This took me really long to write but I'm pretty satisfied with how it turned out : it's my longest work yet, and I feel like it would be among my best as well hehe. a massive thank you to @kookiestarlight because i swear i completed this in the first place because of tasha, @swcetnight who pointed out exactly where I need to elaborate stuff and places in which I was loosing parts of the plot because did I forget the whole storyline while writing this 🤡, @vaekth because this bby is absolutely amazing. she's supported me throughout the process of writing this, thank you so much!! thank you to @taecup-fics for beta reading this at the last minute and pointing out a bunch of grammatical errors because otherwise this would be a mess to read 😭 to everyone who has waited - I'm so sorry that it came this late, I suddenly had a bunch of exams that were announced and had to focus on those. Hopefully this lives up to your expectations!! Enjoy reading :)

Morning often dawns with a feeling of hope. With wistful sights of sunrise. Flowers open up to the golden haze that thaws the frost of the night. Birds roam the skies that had been but mysterious domains in the dark. People wake up with groans about the impending day, hopeful for it to end soon. You hoped for your mornings to always be similar to this- some constants were needed in places where you had cases as bewildering as missing pumpkin plushies piling up in your office. 

Your morning today, though, was much different. Much to your annoyance. 

You held the coffee you had brewed for yourself - another espresso, the universe knows you needed it - and handed one to Taehyung just as the cuckoo perching on the clock shrilly announced that it was eight in the morning. 

"Do you still have no answers for me, Y/N?" Taehyung looked at you. His eyes were sullen - no signs of the cheekiness that had peeked at you last night. Scattered rays fell across his body, highlighting the sunken cheeks, brooding eyes and tight smiles you could now see better in the daylight. 

You sighed- probably for the millionth time this night. "I do not understand your question, Taehyung." 

"You remember it. I've asked you thrice since I saw you again, Y/N. Do you not remember anymore? Do you not care for me? Was our idea of us nothing for you?" He looked at you with a myriad of emotions written all over his face- you looked away, not wanting to see them. 

Sighing, you gathered your thoughts the best you could. "Like I said, Taehyung." You looked at him- looking at the person you once fell in love with. The feeling you felt today, though, was much different. There was a feeling of running towards him, taking him in your arms and remembering who he was to you all over again, but it was overwhelmed by the confusion you felt - should you prioritize a past that wanted answers, or a future that was unsure? For now, you chose none pushing the time to make that decision further ahead. "We were an 'us' for only a few hours. Until you stood me up."

He rolled his eyes."That wasn't intentional, Y/N." 

"And how was I supposed to know that, Taehyung? I thought it was, since you had never told me anything beforehand."

Taehyung's eyebrows bunched together, as if coming to hear the stories that his eyes longed to tell- stories of events that you had never seen and never known. "Would you not hear me out, even once? For the sake of our old love?"

You bristled. "What love, Taehyung?" You got up to stretch your legs out, looking at the patchwork blanket that was stuffed in the corner. You had taken that for your first date with Taehyung, planning to cuddle with him and watch the stars - a date that never happened. "What love? A love where you don't speak to me for weeks, and then vanish for some crime? We were young then, and I got hurt then as it is. There's no need to go over this right now." 

"That was not my fault, Y/N. You know that." Taehyung seemingly sunk back into his chair, eyes downcast. "I had said I loved you. Before I ever went out with you." 

"Like that matters,” you scoffed, “what's the point in reminiscing promises from an old love?"

"At least, hear me out?" He looked up at you with hope sprinkled in the abyss of his eyes. "I don't want you to forget me."

You turned back to your chair, tearing your eyes away from the blanket that was now a pale blue in the sunlight - a few shades lighter than the cerulean colour it would be in the afternoon. "Not now, Taehyung." 

Taehyung sighed, looking at the floor, tension exhaled into the room. He sat silently for a few seconds, the ticking clock announcing each moment clearly to you. "That's fair. It's just.." He looked back at you. "I'm used to thinking of you as the person I loved." He nervously let his eyes pan around the windows, gazing at the sunshine that streamed through the window, before turning back towards your gaze. "I'm sorry if I made you uncomfortable, I'm just really grateful for your presence-" 

"Taehyung." You sharply interrupted him. "Two years ago, when your case was reopened for investigation. Who did that?" 

"They told me that it was a well wisher in the neighbourhood. Another jailor said it was for good behaviour." He shrugged. 

You scoffed aloud, more loudly than you would have liked him to hear. 

He frowned, lips drawn in a tight line in annoyance. "Don't believe me? I'll have you know, Y/N, I was among the most well behaved at prison. Absolutely no tantrums. I even ate the salt-less, disgusting food they'd give there. No crying. Nothing. I can show you later on if you want, I think I have a report stuffed somewhere here," He got up, shuffled towards his bag and checked the last zip, hunting for a report you had never heard of. 

"It was me." 

Taehyung whirled around to face you, unruly hair swinging like the seats of a carousel at a carnival, and raised an eyebrow. "What were you?" 

"I was the one who insisted on opening the case for reinvestigation, the case of your stepfather's assault. Went around collecting evidence, searching for people who knew about your family better, getting their voices recorded, finding about the whole deal to frame you and stuff. Nearly got fired." You shrugged, sipping your espresso and wincing- too bitter. "You're welcome, by the way. The coffee is getting cold." 

"I don't care about the coffee." He moved the cup aside - nearly spilling the liquid, roughly settling back into the seat he had been occupying for the last few hours. "You were the one who asked for re-opening the case?" 

"Just said that." 

He slumped back in his seat, and your eyes took in how he spread himself out on the chair, tiredness lacing his figure. "I didn't know that." 

"Now you do." You said, sipping your coffee and watching Taehyung do the same. 

Taehyung stared blankly at you, and you couldn't fathom what was swirling in those ebony orbs of his. "Why did you do that, Y/N?"

"Honestly," you smile softly at him, "I was expecting a thank you."

"You should have expected questions, Y/N. Why did you help me?" Taehyung's blank expression made way for a confused one, eyebrows furrowing and lips pouting. 

"I did what I had to do as a-" You paused here, unsure of what to say. "As a friend, Taehyung, nothing more. I knew you were innocent-"

"How were you so assured?" He pressed on."I could be a complete 180 from the man I met you as. I could be fake. I could be an impostor. I could-"

"You could do a bunch of things, Taehyung." You stared him straight in the eye, trying to keep your emotions at bay. "But you could never tell a lie." 

Taehyung scoffed. "You sound like one of the wishy-washy pick-me kind of girls in the movie. No, I don't lie, but I could." 

You sighed. As much as you cared for Taehyung, you had never really cared for his argumentative attitude. "I went with the assumption that you were the same person I knew, Taehyung. The one whom I respected and trusted. I acted on that feeling." 

"That wasn't trust, Y/N. It was naivety. You were naive to believe me." Taehyung paused, uncertainty lining his forehead as he spoke. "You shouldn't have trusted me." 

You rolled your eyes- you couldn't understand why he was so desperate to make sure that you remained aloof from him. What had you done to be treated like that? What had he done to force everyone away from him? 

You tried to play off his remaining doubts and frustrations as insecurities he developed while in jail, and moved on."Alright then, you impostor. I was naive to trust you. And even more naive to believe you. Happy? Now shush. I don't want to talk about this." You tried to clear your mind of any doubts you had about Taehyung, but his behaviour, the way he interacted with you - it couldn't help but increase the worry and confusion in your mind.

Taehyung leaned forward to look you in the eye before smiling softly at you - you couldn't understand why. You were going to give him a criminal record, maybe arrest him. You were potentially ruining his life again, and he smiled at you. "If you say so, officer." Taehyung said, settling into the chair - leaving your mind reeling with questions you weren't sure you wanted the answers to. 

You opened the laptop again, wearily. "Let's get back to the questions; the sooner we finish this, the better. Where did you source the paint from?" 

"You mean the graffiti? And chalk?" You nodded. Taehyung sighed."Terminology, Officer, terminology. Make no errors." He raised a finger to wave at you, as if to say no. You rolled your eyes -it seemed that you were the only one concerned about what would happen to him after this, because Taehyung quite clearly was not. "I bought it with the allowance money that was kept for me in the bank- as much as I hated that man, his cards proved to be useful."

You raised an eyebrow, skeptical. "You didn't steal it." 

"No. Took it from my step-father's account. Technically, now mine. Apparently he left everything to his children, and I'm the only one alive that I know of. Maybe he had other children- I wouldn't doubt it for a moment if he had, but that doesn't change my right to his money either." 

"Any other members of your family who had been granted access to that account?" You asked, wanting to make sure that there were no loopholes - you didn't want a future possibility of Taehyung being entangled with the wrong side of the law again. 

He rolled his eyes, leaning further. "Curious little thing, aren't you? Like I'd told you last night, most of them are dead. Mom had died a few months before I was arrested - thanks to my stepfather being an alcoholic and taking everything out on her. Grandmother already had massive health issues - she passed away after two years of me being in jail - they had let me come out for her funeral."

"My siblings - a brother and sister, if you remember - were taken in by a distant relative, and the last time I spoke to them was three years ago. I'm not allowed to contact them because I might end up being a 'bad influence'," he air quoted the words, laughing mirthlessly. "Guess they won't be too delighted to see me again. You probably know about my stepfather - got drunk and passed out. Permanently. But yeah, that's all. I'm pretty much the sole benefactor from that account."

Hearing how nonchalantly he spoke about it, you were forced to maintain a strong face and be professional. You couldn't possibly think of even wanting to comfort him in any way. "So, you were absolutely not stealing."

"Nope. No. Not at all. Want any further repetitions?" 

"That won't be necessary," You said, having typed out the information - tracking his expenditures would also be necessary now, apparently. "Any expenditure you make shall be monitored, now. Be careful."

"Always have been." He chuckled, getting back to spinning the glass on the table. "You know me." 

You ignored him. "Your cards will be tracked, and any loose cash will be checked by us. If we feel that there's any room for suspicion, you will have reason to be monitored." 

An odd silence filled the room while you tapped away at your laptop, filling in more details about the incident. Taehyung would be having a criminal record again, you thought to yourself. It was the only thought that echoed in your mind. It made you feel uneasy in a way, but you swallowed your unease down. There's a promotion to focus on. 

"Taehyung, something has been bugging me since I caught you vandalising." You shifted a little bit, before deciding to spit out the question. "Why did you do it?" You leaned forwards on the table, elbows digging into the wood as you tried to grasp the answers from him. 

Taehyung looked you in the eyes, and then looked away. "I don't know."

"You don't know." You raised your eyebrows, leaning back incredulously. "Taehyung, that's not an answer." 

"I did it because I wanted to. It was fun. I'd see kids in the morning pointing at my graffiti work and they would like it. There would be people claiming it looked good. I felt acknowledged and I just-" He pleaded, unable to continue without pausing to recollect his calm. "I felt like doing it. After years of having questions raised at me for committing a crime I never did, I finally had people talking about the work I did. Even if it was just chalk drawings." 

You exhaled in confusion. The Taehyung you had known - he was never like this. Confident, assured, independent. That was what he seemed to you when you were younger. And now, to see him want to be validated by others who never even cared for him- it felt ridiculous to you. Why was his only way of feeling validated involving something against the law? "Okay, then." 

You went through the complaints that had been registered against him, hand resting against your forehead as you asked him the most commonly asked question. "Why the insignia 'V'?" 

"V for victory?" He made a 'V' sign with his fingers, "I liked to think that I won against the world by rebelling against its sense of black and white. I saw everyone talk about it, and I felt like the same people who had once pointed fingers at me, blaming me for something I hadn't done, were now pointing fingers at something I had done - I felt victorious. I didn't need to show myself and possibly want more than I had already let myself have - this was enough for me." 

You pulled your lips in a tight line, and hummed in response - there were two places that together had put in about twenty complaints, so you had to respond to all of them. You kept reminding yourself that neither did you have the space to feel sorry for him, nor did you have the power to say sorry to him. You simply kept your head turned to the screen, typing in answers to all the complaints. 

Taehyung leaned forward after a few seconds. "What punishment do you think I'll get, Officer?" 

"If the chief is feeling good, maybe you'll get community service, with a fine," You looked up at him. "Or maybe some time in jail." 

"How much time?"

"Maybe a month or two?" 

"Oh." Taehyung slumped back into his seat nonchalantly. "Cool then." 

How was he this calm? You thought to yourself. He might be going to jail. For a second time.

"Yup." You shut the laptop, finally, after hours of typing information and recording it. Sighing, you lifted the porcelain mug once again to absolutely drain it of coffee, your rather loud gulps echoing in the silence of your office. 

Taehyung tapped his fingers on the table- probably some old tune he had learnt before. You remembered that he played the saxophone - from nights of serenading tunes that he had played for you with his beloved instrument. "How long do you think the chief will take to reach here?" 

"A few hours, maybe? I'd expect him around ten, to be honest. Nevertheless, let me check." You quickly called the chief on your phone, hearing his ringtone play some old Korean trot song before it was picked up. 

"Hello, yes, yes, Y/N. I expected your call." A gravely, rather rough voice responded to you- like it hadn't been used for a few hours. "I shall be reaching the office around eleven. Keep Taehyung with you." 

"Yes sir," you said, keeping the phone on your table and turning to Taehyung.  "The chief said he'll be here by eleven." 

Taehyung nodded in acknowledgement. 

"It's nearly eight thirty now." You looked at the cuckoo clock again. "Would you like to freshen up?" 

"Where?" Taehyung asked, eyes widening. "Shouldn't I just be at the office?" 

"Yeah, you should. My place is right here- the back of this office is where I live, so you'll be fine." You look down at his clothes, grease, paint and metal shrapnel all over them. "Besides, you look like you need a change of clothes." 

Taehyung stepped into your house with an air of curiosity, to see how his once classmate was living. His head stooped low to enter through the small door you had, eyes widening in surprise when he found that the hall of your house was larger than he had anticipated. 

The house was quaint, a hall with an old couch which doubled as a bed when needed. There was a table in the middle of the room, too low to be a dining table and too high to be a center table. For coffee, maybe? There were maybe five or six magazines scattered haphazardly over it, covering nearly every inch- except for one corner, where Taehyung spotted a shining acrylic blue. 

You, however, spotted what page you had left a magazine open at. Squeaking, "I'm sorry!" you ran to shut the booklet close, afraid that Taehyung would spot your love for shirtless men. 

Picking up the magazines, you grinned sheepishly at him. "Just a moment! I'll be back, a bit of cleaning to be done, sit right here!" You patted the couch, trying to convince Taehyung. 

Taehyung turned away from the pictures he had been observing- was there one of you both? - and nodded, eyes widening in surprise as he saw how you scuttled away to hide the magazines. He looked around again, taking a feel of your house- it seemed like the old you. There was some patchwork embroidery you had left in a corner, atop what seemed to be a showpiece? Taehyung stepped closer to see it in detail, and was amazed at the way you had managed to drag the red thread over and over the pink fabric to make floral designs. It reminded him of the rose he had been trying to complete the previous night, and he grit his teeth. He shouldn't be thinking about that now. That shouldn't be what he does anymore. No more.

You came back, looking quizzically at him. "Take a seat, Taehyung! It's alright." 

"Uh, yeah." He shuffled over to the couch again. "Did you make that?" 

You looked in the direction his finger pointed to. "Yeah. Tried doing embroidery for stress release purposes." 

Taehyung grinned at you. "Stress release?" He asked, bemused. 

"Yup." You said while making sure that the magazines were well hidden. "The department I wanted to be in was forensics, you know?" Taehyung nodded, he had been privy to most of your discussions about the advances in forensic technology and analysis - even if he didn't understand anything, he knew your love for it. "Well, they didn't allow me. So the whole 'stress' thing began." You walked back to him, making air quotes as you emphasized on stress. "My mother suggested embroidery would take my mind off it. So, that incomplete piece you see there?" Taehyung nodded, concentrating on every word that left your mouth. "That started a few days ago." 

"It looks like it's complete, though- are you really good at it?" Taehyung looked at you again, turning back from the embroidery you were now rising to get. 

"Pretty much? It's easy once you get the hang of it." 

"Ah." Taehyung said, a dull silence settling into the room for a few moments as Taehyung looked around your room.  

"That picture." He pointed, and you turned your head around. The picture he was focusing on was on your mantelpiece, resting happily. The frame had butterflies stuck on its corners, two large and two small. The border was white, now off white, and had pink dots in certain places. It was a picture of fireworks- red, yellow and blue mixing together in a dull sky to breathe life into the picture. And right in the middle, surrounded by this liveliness, were you and Taehyung. Beaming. 

Taehyung turned to, finger still pointing at the picture. "That's our picture, right?" 

You hummed in affirmation. "That's us, freshman party. We had known each other for a few weeks at this time."

"And I had stopped someone from asking you out, right?" Taehyung reminisced. "That was fun." 

You snort. "You had punched him in the face when he asked for my name, Taehyung." 

Taehyung smiled. "I didn't want anyone to harm you, Y/N, and he seemed like he would harm you." He spread out his arms and grinned smugly at you. "In a way, I rescued you. That night." 

And so many other nights, you wanted to say. For all the time you had known Taehyung, he had been fiercely protective of you - for reasons he never truly told you. You didn't question it either, basking in the feeling of being wanted by someone. 

You cleared your throat, hoping to clear your mind as well. "You should go take a shower, Taehyung." Glancing at the clock, you noted the time and motioned towards the washroom. "It's nearly nine. Go take a shower, call for me if you need anything. I'll go get some clothes for you."

Taehyung nodded, rising up slowly to go in the direction you pointed. "Towels are inside," you shouted after him, and he yelled in response to say he understood. In some ways, too many ways, he felt like the Taehyung you once knew. 

You went to your room to pick out some clothes, opening your meager collection to salvage something that would fit Taehyung. Your eyes scanned over your uniforms, jumpsuits, jeans, t-shirts and finally landed on the hoodies- probably the largest collection in your wardrobe. Thankfully, you loved large, loose hoodies. You started pulling them out, holding each one up and imagining Taehyung's proportions in them. 

The red one, with blue paw prints. "Nah. Too tight." 

The black plain one. "That's mine, I'm not sharing that." 

The grey ones- nearly three. You skipped over all of them, not understanding how none of these oversized hoodies would seemingly fit Taehyung. He'd gotten humongous, broad shoulders and everything. 

You picked out a few more, trying to see whether it would be a fit. None worked. 

When you picked up the next one, you could already picture him wearing it. It was the hoodie you had taken from Taehyung during the first year you knew each other. You looked at its loose sleeves, stretchy from you tugging Taehyung behind you with it way back then. The green fabric of the hoodie was slightly pale in a certain spot - you had spilled soda all over him in a fit of anger.

During your forensic chemistry class,  the teacher didn't recognise their mistakes in the procedure (they used the wrong test for detecting the sample, and blamed it on you), and you were pretty miffed the whole day. Taehyung had bought sodas for the two of you, having planned to go stargazing later on. And you, in a terrible mood, flipped him off in a way that had the soda spilling over him. You cried, Taehyung laughed, but the hoodie was still stained. You took it with you later on to clean it - but the stubborn stain never left. You were agonized, Taehyung amused, but the hoodie- it was still stained. Taehyung had laughed it off, telling you to keep it with you for as long as you wanted- he could buy a dozen more hoodies to last him till then. 

When you left to head home that winter break, you had taken the hoodie with you. You had taken it on your date, crying on its sleeves when you were stood up. And when you came back, Taehyung was suddenly a criminal. 

You shook your head to remove the memories of that time, holding the hoodie in your hand and gently caressing its sleeves. So many memories were held in these threads that meshed together to form the fabric of your youth. Good or bad? You didn't want to dwell on that. 

"Y/N? Could I get the clothes now?" Taehyung called from the washroom. You picked up a extra large pair of cotton shorts and a hoodie, and passed it to him without really thinking- you'd done it before when he got drunk at college too, having him come over at your place, shower, change, and practically behave like a couple- at least, that's what you had thought of it then. 

Get it together, Y/N, why are you thinking about that? 

"Thanks!" he shouted again, grasping the clothes with his fingers and whisking them away to the confines of the washroom. 

You gripped at your hair and pinched your cheeks. You couldn't keep thinking about the old Taehyung. You didn't know if it was truly him anymore. 

"Uh, Y/N?" Taehyung stepped out of the washroom, the previously oversized shorts clinging to his thighs for dear life and the hoodie snugly fitting his figure. "I think it's a bit tight, but I'll make do." 

Your eyes widened in horror; Taehyung looked like he was moments away from bursting the shorts. "I'll get you new pants, wait a second. These ones don't fit." 

You turned back to your cupboard, looking for the loosest bottoms you could find. "I think the hoodie still fits though, right?" 

"Yeah." You heard Taehyung right over your shoulder, scaring you. 

"Jeez, when did you get this close to me?" You turned to face him, crossing your arms, looking at his hair which still had droplets sticking to its edges. 

"When did you get this far from me, Y/N?" His eyes bore into yours, sweetly intense eyes gazing at you like it was the first time he saw you. "What happened?" 

You shrugged, not wanting to answer it. You picked up a loose pair of denim jeans that you had found stuffed away at the back of your closet. Pushing it into his hands, you told him to go change. 

Apparently, your instructions fell on deaf ears. "What happened, Y/N? Answer me. Please."

You moved your gaze to his clothes, not wanting to focus on the thoughts that rushed back when you thought of him. What had happened? You moved your hands to your sides, resisting the need to hold him and know him all over again. "The hoodie looks good on you. Would you-" 

"So do our hands." He held yours, snugly fitting his palm- your calloused fingers against his calloused ones, heat burning in the sleeping embers of your palm. His eyes gazed at the joint fingertips almost reverently. "They fit well."

"Taehyung, now is not the time-" You begin, cut off by his frantic breathing.

"When is the time, Y/N? When will I get to live? When will I get to feel like a human? When will I be innocent?"

His hand caressed your palm, touching your forearm, your elbow, your shoulder, and your cheek -leaving a burning trail behind him everywhere he touched. You shivered. "Do you know how long I have wanted you, Y/N? Years. Seven years, now. I have loved you for years. I have wanted you for years. I did all sorts of things to remember you while in jail- kept asking for you, kept calling for you. I didn't want to forget you, Y/N. Not you. I couldn't forget you, no." 

He pressed your palm to his chest, and you could feel a dull thump echo through the clothes, reverberate in your palms. "That fire, Y/N. My passion in the promises I'd made to you. It never went anywhere. I always loved you. I always will. You can't make me leave again, not again. Please, no." 

He held your palm up to his cheeks, not regarding the tears that were streaking your cheeks and his. "You feel me, right? It's me. Taehyung. I am the one you trusted. I'm the same. Trust me again. Please." 

You tried to hold back the tears that threatened to slide down your cheeks, not wanting to pain Taehyung anymore. He held your forehead to his, pressing on the back of your head to meet his - upclose, you could see the redness that clouded the shine that his eyes would normally have. You couldn't hold back your tears anymore, nearly whimpering when you saw how broken he was- sirens swimming in the whirlpool of his eyes, singing songs of misery. "You know me, right? Do you know me? Do you recognize me? Kim Taehyung, police cadet. Your friend. Your classmate. You know me, right?" He asked, nose nearly brushing yours. "Do you know me?"He cried, eyes washing over the fire that ignited behind his pupils. You didn't see a vandal, or a criminal, or a friend. You saw a broken man. 

"Taehyung, oh, Tae," you cried, putting your hands on his shoulders, watching him slink down to the ground as his body trembled and shivered. You wrapped your arms close around his figure, unable to understand his pain but just wanting it to go away. 

You sat like that for a while, coaxing the tears and short whimpers out of him as he held onto your fingers, wanting to remember something he once had: you. 

"I always asked for you, you know that?" Taehyung shivered as he spoke, even if the chills of the weather outside barely seeped into your home. "I always loved you. I don't know why they kept me there for so long, Y/N. I didn't do anything wrong. I don't know why I'm made to feel like this…" he trailed away, tears gathering at his chin as they endlessly flowed down his cheeks. 

You glanced a nervous eye at the clock, wanting to make sure that you get to the station- no matter what happens. The bubbling of water distracted you from the ticking of the clock, and you turned off the stove. Scouring your cabinets for a chamomile tea bag was hard, but you knew you needed it. Taehyung always seemed to calm down with tea - you had used it multiple times before. Times of which you have multiple memories. Times you wish to forget. 

Why did I ever love Taehyung? The question kept echoing in your mind as you leaned on top of the kitchen counter top. Things would have been so much simpler if simply looking at him wasn't so hard. His smile, his behaviour, his tears - it was all but a painful reminder of what you could have been if things had gone different. If only. 

You poured the hot water into the mug you had settled on the kitchen top, watching the water bloom into a serene shade of yellow as you dipped the tea bag into it repeatedly. You prepared one mug, then another, hearing the soft declarations Taehyung kept repeating while he was seated. 

All you had wanted to study was forensic science, and that was simply for one reason: you didn't want to interact with people. 

People are complicated, over emotional beings. and you couldn't help but feel helpless every time you had to encounter a suspect. You would constantly be told by your professors to see them as lawbreakers - but all you tried finding was signs of humanity in them. That even the most vicious killers had scope for reform. That's why you stuck to the subjects you wanted - you were good at finding signs of life, not squashing them. You consistently failed those classes, without any doubt. And today, it seemed like all those classes were laughing at you. 

"Here." You handed the mug to Taehyung, who muttered thanks. He rubbed his hands once or twice on the pants you told him to change into and took a sip from the warm tea. You resisted the urge to reach out and wipe the tears that lined his face, and try and wipe the scars of the past that had scarred him so badly - but you couldn't. You were a mere spectator in the game of his life. You couldn't possibly do anything other than hurt him more. 

"Thank you. For letting me express all of it. I could finally say everything that I wanted to before I was forbidden from speaking about it again." Taehyung tapped against the mug, fingernails resting on ceramic as the sun slowly headed westward. "I'm sorry that I've been such a burden to you, Y/N. I wonder if I can do anything to reduce the pain and confusion I put you through - I doubt I can." He looked at you carefully, though you couldn't tell what he was thinking. "Thank you." 

You let his words echo in the room, preoccupied with your thoughts. It hurt you to see him so broken, and you couldn't help but worry about him. 

"Taehyung, I-" You opened your mouth to respond, watching Taehyung pay attention to every move you made - only to be interrupted by your phone loudly ringing. 

"Sorry, this must be important." You got up to get your phone, watching Taehyung slump in his seat from the edge of your vision. 

"It's the chief," you announced, picking up the phone. 

He got straight to the point. "Come to the station, soon. Bring Taehyung with you." he told, his voice laced with a rather sharp edge- a tone that you had recognized in the years you had worked under him. Things were- most probably- not good. 

You responded with a simple "yes", mind dwelling on the impending result that Taehyung would get. You felt that it would be unlikely that he would be going to jail- at least, you hoped so.

Turning to Taehyung, you tried to hide the fear and shakiness that lined your voice. "Let's go." 

Taehyung sighed, playing with the mug as he rose up. "It's time, isn't it?"

"Good morning, Sir." You greeted the chief as he hurried into the small office, giving Taehyung a glance and then facing you. 

"Morning." He gruffly responded, turning to your laptop. "We found an eyewitness for the vandalism, so we are getting them for the interrogation as well." 

"Another interrogation? We've already done it, sir, and all the information is recorded here. I doubt it will be necessary-"

"Please, Y/N," He calmly said. "Leave the decision about it being necessary to me." 

You stepped back, subconsciously edging closer to Taehyung - a move noticed by the chief as well. 

"Y/N," he began, "I need to speak to you. In private. Step outside for a few moments, please." 

You nodded, briskly walking towards the doors and yanking them open. There was a warm gust of wind that blew across your face, and you turned to face the chief. 

"Y/N," the chief began, before pausing for a moment, "Officer Y/N. I'm going to need you to think clearly now." 

"Yes." You set your features as tightly as you could, not wanting to seem distracted in any way. 

"Do you have any type of bias in this case, perhaps due to your past relation with him?" he looked quizzically at you, as if trying to decipher an enigma scribbled onto your face. 

Your blood chilled, for some reason. Were you having any bias? "No, sir." 

The chief hummed - you couldn't make head or tail of his reaction. He kicked at a pebble before continuing. "From the recordings I heard the previous night in the office, and the way you let him come with you to freshen up a bit, one particular thing has struck me: you were trying to find reasons for Taehyung to be justified as a victim, weren't you?" 

You gulped before responding. "Yes, sir. I believe the culprit committed vandalism as a coping mechanism to get over the hurt caused over the years." 

The chief sighed heavily. "Well then," he said, "I suggest we continue with our investigation, and find a way to make sure the culprit in the matter is stable as well. We can't have repeated cases like these - we have a reputation to uphold for the police as well." 

You nodded stiffly. "Yes, sir." 

The chief sighed again, glancing at the street. "Our witness should be here soon." He turned to you again. "Funnily enough, she volunteered as a witness with CCTV backup to claim that Taehyung had vandalized her shop too. Apparently she heard you arrest him last night - so we have to hear her out." 

The chief turned again to the road, eyes narrowing in hopes of spotting the witness soon. "The investigator whom she contacted has said she is a reliable witness, but I'm going to need to verify her statement nonetheless." He turned back, heading into the office.

You stared at the road that the chief was looking at before - the direction from which the supposedly reliable eyewitness would come, before heading back inside. 

Taehyung was still slumped in his seat, fingers tracing drawings all over the pants you had given him. The chief was shuffling around behind the desk, pulling two spare chairs ahead - one for Taehyung, you presumed, and one for the eyewitness - whoever that would be. 

"Mr. Kim Taehyung," the chief began, "there has been an eyewitness who has offered their testimony - whether it is to defend you, or further establish evidence of you vandalizing public spaces, I'm not yet aware. We shall be interrogating them - and maybe you, as well, now." 

Taehyung rose up from the corner he had settled into, and shuffled into the seat the chief had set for him, wordlessly. 

The door opened to reveal an older lady, dressed in a purple shaded hanbok, hair delicately pulled back into a tight bun and eyes peering around the whole office in curiosity. She found the chief, walking closer to the desk where he was arranging the records. "I'm here as the eyewitness..?"She said, looking at both you and the chief. 

"Ah, yes. I presume you're Ms. Park?" The chief asked, pulling the chair out for her to settle into it. Under the light that shined across her face, you could make out the wrinkles that lined her skin and the greys in her hair - not that that was relevant to what would happen. 

"I saw him vandalize the outside of my store a few days ago," she earnestly began, pulling out pictures that she had taken of the design on her window.  "I'm a florist, you see. His designs are clearly inspired by that, aren't they?" She pushed the pictures in front of your vision, and you could see what she meant - the designs of orchids, hibiscus and asters stared back at you, intricately painted onto the glass windows of the florist's shop. 

She pulled out more pictures. "There's been similar instances all over the neighbourhood- the other florist had a rose, the school received drawings full of children's stories and fairy tales, and had their walls painted with similar stories. In fact, the restaurants around here even said that their menus were drawn onto the streets, right in front of their doorstep." 

The chief looked at the pictures carefully, with you peering at them as well, taking in the detail that Taehyung had while he worked while making each of his works- no, vandalising, you corrected yourself. He raised an eyebrow at the eyewitness, who seemed to shrink into her seat. "What does this bring forward as evidence for or against the culprit? We already know what the crime is, and its details. We just have to determine a punishment- either a hefty fine or jail. Do you have anything that can justify him getting exempted from either?"

Ms. Park looked at you and the chief before turning to Taehyung apologetically, placing a hand on his knee - as if consoling him. "I think that at the end of the day, all he was doing was beautifying the neighbourhood, wasn't he? And most of the residents here don't have a problem with it-" the chief looked at her incredulously- "so please, don't punish him or something. A lot of people appreciate his work in our neighborhood, you know?" 

"But we have been receiving complaints about him since the past few days," the chief said. "Why the sudden change in opinion?"

Ms. Park fidgeted with the hem of her hanbok for a few moments, shaking her head nervously. "Some of us shopkeepers were really bothered by it at first, yes, but we also had some customers come over to inquire about the artwork. It looked professional to them. So we came to an ultimatum : we will let this young man paint and draw for us, on our walls, as much as he wants - as long as it's pretty," she emphasized, one hand patting her chest, "we'll pay him to do it." 

You held back a sob as you saw Taehyung's eyes glimmer - a ray of hope shining in them.His knee bounced up and down- a habit you knew was something he had had since years - and he smiled softly when Ms. Park squeezed his hand. You felt like things were finally going to go well. The chief exhaled roughly before rubbing his forehead, glancing at Ms. Park, who smiled at him in the hope that he would understand her reasoning. 

"The law, honestly, doesn't care about intentions- I don't think I really understand why I should even let him go. Vandalism is a punishable offence, and the perpetrator has been aware of its consequences. Why the sudden feeling to save him?" The chief questioned, eyes steely and tough. 

Ms. Park hesitated for a few moments. "I believe he deserves a second chance." She pulled her chair ahead, the metal ends scraping against the tiles, and pleaded once again. "He was arrested for years for something he hadn't even done - and now, might face a few more months in the same place for simply being artistic. I don't think it deserves punishment."

"That's for the law to decide, not you, madam." The chief sternly said. "I suggest you leave such decisions to us."

The room remained tense and quiet for the next few moments, and your eyes were trained on Taehyung. You noticed the quiver in his hands, the way he shrunk into his chair - as if to hide away from whatever the upcoming decision would be. 

Ms. Park was the first to interrupt the loud silence. "Oh, come on. Let me just pay for the boy's bail." 

The clock chose that moment to loudly announce the next hour: was it eleven? Twelve? You weren't paying attention. You only saw the way Taehyung rose up from his seat - in happiness, you thought - with fists sticking to his sides. "No. I won't accept it." 

You felt the chief look with just as much disbelief as you did. Why was he so hellbent on being a perpetrator when he could be free? 

Ms. Park laughed. "No. I'm not listening to that whole self righteous thing that you probably have," she swatted the air with her hand, as if to push away any explanations Taehyung could give.

"Look, ma'am. I have the money to get a bail, or even pay the fine. I don't want you to pay for me and then hold it above my head like a massive favour you have done for me." Fire blazed in his eyes as he spoke up, rather indignantly. "I can take care of myself." 

"To hell with that attitude," Ms. Park said. "I decided to help you because I didn't want you to suffer once again because of misunderstandings." She pulled Taehyung back to sit on his chair, clasping his hand between her wrinkled ones. "You had to go through so much pain at such a young age - no one deserves that. I was a mere bystander at the time you were arrested, and I regretted it then. I still regret it now." 

She sighed before caressing the back of his hand lovingly, thumb gently pressing on the skin- as if to feel the pain those hands had to go through, and you thought you saw a hint of a tear on his cheeks. "So don't question me for 'saving' you, or something - what you did was perfectly fine for me. I love the way my street looks now, and so do the neighbours. All that really remained was the artist's identity- and now that I know it's you, I don't feel any sort of guilt in justifying what you did." 

You were right. Taehyung was crying. It wasn't silent tears that rained gently down his cheeks, it was a whole thunderstorm. You saw the chief turn away, from the corner of your vision, but you couldn't bring yourself to do the same. He was biting on his bottom lip to hold back any of the sobs or whimpers that came, head lowering to hide the tears. 

Ms. Park simply caressed his hand, over and over, till he calmed down enough to wipe his tears with his free hand. And when he raised his head up, you saw him like a new person. The wound up Taehyung you had met again a few hours ago was slowly vanishing - in his stead, there was a free Taehyung who smiled like the world's burden had been lifted off his shoulders. "Thank you," he murmured. 

The chief sighed again. "I still don't understand how it came to this." 

"Neither do I," Ms. Park laughed. "But it is what it is. We'll pay the fine."

"I'll do it," Taehyung started, only to be shushed by the elder lady. "I want to do it. Let me do it." She turned again to the chief, the bubbly happiness giving way to seriousness. "You can make sure he pays the fine, right? Withdraw the complaints for us too." 

The chief looked at you and nodded, and you got to work - carefully opening the laptop again and making sure that you transferred the report from 'investigation' to 'resolved', and that the complaint was withdrawn. 

The chief, meanwhile, made physical records of it, and informed Taehyung of the fine - which, despite his insistence, Ms. Park paid off, whipping out a cheque she had kept ready, somehow. You added the details to his resolved record as the chief dictated them to you, keeping them for future references - which you hoped would only be needed to prove his innocence in any situation. 

Nearly twenty minutes of details, questioning, and a written assurance from Taehyung that he would be liable to arrest if he continued illegal activities, it was done. Taehyung was free. 

The chief read over the details once again, thoroughly, eyes getting heavier and softer with every document he checked. Once it was all done, filed, and you had stacked the records back in the drawers they were placed in, the chief sagged into the chair, hands clutching the steel arms for support. 

"Thank God," he whispered, eyes closed. "You're fine now." He got up shakily, hands wiping at his eyes to erase any traces of the tears that had possibly leaked out. He walked around the table, reaching for Taehyung - as if beyond the lines of that desk, his duties as an officer stopped and those as a teacher resumed. "Don't you dare do that again, Taehyung. Never again." He held his student by the shoulder tightly, gripping him and shaking him a little - like a parent would scold a kid. "Live a good life, please." 

Taehyung nodded frantically, eyes still wide in disbelief as he ignored the grubby tear streaks on his face. "I will, sir." He had his hands placed politely in front of him, trembling fingers clutching onto the rough denim fabric of the old, loose jeans you had made him wear. 

"Live well," the chief repeated again, thumping Taehyung's shoulder once and then turning around to collect the documents he would need to take with him. He bowed to Ms. Park, who acknowledged him before something at a corner of the small office caught her eye, and turned sharply to you. "Officer Y/N," he began, and you tensed a little bit more. "There was an opening last night in the forensic science department that I got notice of," he said, a smile tugging on the edges of his lips when he saw how your demeanor brightened. "Reach the head office tomorrow in the morning at ten, and I'll give you the details. All the best." 

You hastily held back the sudden smile that threatened to split on your face, smartly saluting your senior before he turned around to leave the office. As he opened the door, you felt a burst of warmth all over your body - the heat of the sunshine rushing into the room. 

Ms. Park walked from her corner to Taehyung, taking his palm between hers and squeezing. "I'm happy that you're free now, Taehyung." She looked carefully at his face - sternness making way for soft concern, and said, "Live wisely. If you need money, or a job to get you started, come to my shop - it's the one you painted with orchids. You remember it, right?" 

Taehyung responded with a rather choked 'yes', nodding his head frantically. He placed his other, trembling hand upon the lady's hands, and solemnly thanked her. 

"That's not needed, I told you." She smiled, before patting his cheek. "You deserve to let yourself live, so use this chance well. Work hard." She turned her head to look through the window behind her, groaning a bit at the sight of the brightly burning sun. "I better leave now - it seems that I'll end up getting a sunburn the nearer to twelve it is." She turned back to Taehyung, smiling softly, and patting his cheek. "Turn up at the shop tomorrow morning, we'll figure something out." 

"Oh, and officer?" she faced you, pointing in the corner where she was standing a few moments before. "I think my grandson had left his plushie over here a few days ago - it's this one, right?" You followed where her hand was pointing, finding a pumpkin plushie left casually on top of a table. "Sungwoo told me he had lost it some time ago, so I just thought it was this one," she laughed awkwardly. 

"I think it is his, he had come yesterday to file a missing complaint for it too," you said, causing Ms. Park to laugh. "He really loves it, doesn't he?" 

"He's not slept well since it went missing. Anyways, I better take it with me, if that's all."

"Just a moment, ma'am," you stopped her hastily. "He'd left a note for the plushie too - I believe Peter?" 

The elderly woman laughed at her grandson's antics, taking the note you offered her and grinning as she read it. "Yes, yes, Peter. I'll take the note with me. Thank you so much for everything, officer."

Thank you, you wish to say - unable to understand how she volunteered to be an eyewitness and defend the one person you cared so much for. Maybe words wouldn't be enough for you to convey how grateful you were to her, so you simply bowed to the woman. 

She took Taehyung's hand again, gently pressing on the back of his hand. "Your mother used to help me out in the shop, you know." Taehyung nodded, and she smiled. "Your hands are like hers. Delicate, yet strong. You can craft beauty with this hand, Taehyung." She squeezed his hand, smiling. "Don't just let that beauty slip away from you." 

She patted his hand again, before turning to you and smiling, and heading out. The sunlight bounced off her gray hair to shine on Taehyung as you looked at him - even with a tired expression, he looked more alive than you had seen him in the last few hours. 

"I'm free," he said, saying it aloud and letting himself feel the sensation for a few moments. 

He turned to you, watching the way your eyes told him that you understood everything you wanted to tell him - even the things he himself didn't understand. "I'm free, Y/N," he repeated, carefully examining his wrists that were once bound with handcuffs - no. There were no restraints there. 

His eyes panned around the room. There was no investigator who questioned him about why he simply couldn't admit his crime. No one who made fun of him for seeking comfort in his art - even if it was illegal. "I'm really free," he murmured again.

Taehyung leaped towards you, pulling you close and holding you tight, as if unable to believe that you were there with him: and that he was here with you for as long as he wanted to be. You let your arms circle around his neck, one curling through the hair at his nape and pulling him further into your embrace, and the other spread out over his back - trying to remind yourself that yes, he was here, with you. 

"Thank you," you felt him murmur into your shoulder. 

"For what?"

"Just being here. With me." He sighed, further tightening the hands that rested around your waist. "After so many unfamiliar faces over the years, seeing yours feels like a reward of sorts for behaving well." 

You laughed at him, slapping his back light heartedly. "Don't talk like you did anything wrong all those years ago. It's not good." You let your hands pane across the expanse of his skin, feeling him cling on to you as you tried to calm him down. "I'm happy for you, Tae." 

He held you like that, for a few more moments - like you were slowly pulling him back into what could be his new normal life. Waking up every day in a room that doesn't have steel bars as a door. Not having to crash at the old house that had haunted him for years. Not having to hide his face in the fear that someone would taunt him for his past. Actually doing something that made him feel happy, confident, and alive. 

"I'm happy too," he murmured into your shoulder. You hummed as he looked beyond your frame to see the streets outside the window - seeing how they were illuminated in daylight. How animatedly people were talking about what their plans for the day were. A kid kept hopping on a chalk drawing of hopscotch he had drawn on the footpath, clutching onto a plushie that oddly seemed like a pumpkin. Someone walked around their stall, setting things up for the day. 

You pulled him away from your grip to look at him again - not wanting to forget any part of him in any way. "I still care for you as much as I did all those years ago, you know." You put your hands on his biceps, just as you used to do when you had to knock sense into your friend. "You better not hide anything from me now." 

"I have no intentions of," he grinned. "Thank you very much." 

You giggled, a feeling you hadn't felt in years fluttering around your stomach like butterflies. 

"About us," Taehyung began, holding your hands in his, "You know that I love you, right?" You felt yourself tense up, and probably Taehyung did too, as he squeezed your hands. "I'm not in any hurry. I want to take some time to understand myself and what I want to do before I think of anything with you. But when I'm settled, and I'm someone I can be proud of, I want to come back to you. Be with you forever." He let go of your hands to hold your cheeks, smiling as he saw your big eyes peer at him. "You'll let me, right?" 

Your eyes softened. "Of course, Taehyung."

"Tae." He corrected you, coming closer to press a kiss on your forehead. 

You smiled when he moved back, glancing down at all of him and laughing. "For beginners, how about we get you clothes to change into?" 

He looked down at his clothes, laughing with you. "Let's go, then?" 

You nodded at him, pulling him out of the office, and locking it securely before turning to a widely grinning Taehyung. "I have a feeling I'm going to love the daytime. It's just so positive, and nice, don't you think? Really warm all over." 

"You're just saying that because you lived like a night owl," you laughed at him, watching his eyes sparkle in the sunshine. 

"Yeah, that wasn't the best way to live, was it?" He clicked his tongue and frowned. "Guess I better start living well now. To new beginnings, then, Officer!!" He grinned and poked your forehead. 

You watched Taehyung skip over the pebbles that were lined outside the office, walking freely on the streets, feeling the dread that you had let build up in your heart for so long slowly drain out of you. "Wait for me!" You screamed behind him, running to catch up to him. To new beginnings, you thought. 

a/n: hopefully, this piece of writing was worth your time 😊 thank you so much for reading graffiti and chalk!! I'd love to hear any feedback you have. Feel free to send it in as a comment, reblog, or as an ask! love, hazel 💞

taglist: @taejinnies (the torture is over bahaha), @xiaokoo, @thedarkwinterrose, @shatzkrinslinzki

masterlist

[seacottons]

— christmas with ateez

notes: fluff, mildly suggestive dialogue.

— park seonghwa

"But it's not fair! I gave you your present early!"

The male merely spun around, ignoring your whines as he adjusted the flickering lights over the fireplace. The wood crackled merrily in the fire and casted a brilliant orange glow onto the man's chiseled face.

"Yes, and I love it, but I never agreed that I'll give you your present early," he spoke as he jabbed the wood with the poker stick, sending bursts of sparks in the air, "Just be patient, love. Only a few more days."

"Okay, but," you grumbled as you sat crossed leg onto the couch, arms crossed and lukewarm coffee long forgotten on the table, "It still isn't fair."

With a sigh, your lover stands up to walk into the bedroom, before towering over you with a palm sized gift box. Taking the cover off, he dipped his hand inside, "Alright, fine. Since you won't stop acting like a baby, I guess it's only fair if I return the favor. You're going to love this," your eyes grew wide in anticipation as he simpered mostly to himself. He drew out his empty hand, only to shoot you a heart with his index finger and thumb. You guffawed momentarily, jaw dropping and heart sinking. Disappointment washed over you as he nearly doubled over with laughter.

"Park Seonghwa! You're not funny!"

You attempted to push his chest away with your fuzzy sock-clad feet, only for him to settle down in between your legs, hand propping his face up as he gazes at you in amusement. A mischievous glint sparkled in his orbs, one that you matched with a subtle glare.

"I was going to save this for Christmas, but you're so stubborn and insistent," reaching back, he pulled out a tiny, blue velvet box, hands working it open to reveal a ring, its brilliant, prismatic colors beaming against your shocked face as it caught the bright lights overhead, "I take it you know what this is for, right? I've been thinking about this for a while now, really, and I wanted to wait for the perfect opportunity to ask you, will you marry me?" His face fell instantly as tears streamed down your face, his brows knitting in worry as you broke down and wrapped your arms around his throat, nearly cutting off his air supply and circulation as you nodded aggressively against the column of his neck, voice hoarse and weak from the onslaught of overwhelming emotions, "Oh, you're such a big baby. My big baby."

— kim hongjoong

The sound of spools and scissors clattering down onto the floor snapped you out of your train of thought.

"This is too hard," Hongjoong flops down onto the floor of the living room, a whine escaping his throat, "I give up. I can't make an ugly sweater!"

Numerous colors of thread, ribbons, felt, and pom-poms littered the floor. The sound of snipping pierced the silence, and you smiled as you finally cut out the shape of a snowman. "You're just too much of a perfectionist, baby," you smile as you reach down to fluff his hair, "It's not supposed to look good. That's the point."

"But I can't help it," he whined as he rolled over so that his head rests in your lap, "It needs to look good! Even if it is supposed to be ugly. It still should look decent."

Rolling your eyes playfully, you lean down to place a peck against the tip of his scrunched nose, "Relax, Joongie. Just have fun with it."

You munched on gingersnap biscuits as you amusedly watched him as he fringed the edge of a red ribbon for the cuffs of his sweater. His brows furrowed in concentration as he added more stitches and pieces of fabric scraps onto the emerald-green article of clothing. An hour passed and you grew tired, hands trembling while readjusting the thread on the spool. Hongjoong was still going at it, stubborn hands picking and taking away at decorations he had already added onto his sweater.

"Stop, it looks great like that," you nudged him playfully, a yawn escaping your mouth as you leaned your head against his side, "Hurry up and finish, Joong. I'm sleepy."

He contemplates momentarily, hesitant hands outstretched over his sweater on the floor. Dropping his hands in his lap, he glanced at you for a split second, hands reaching to brush the hair out of your face as your head nodded with drowsiness, "Alright. I'll take your word for it, baby. Now let's get you into bed before you sleep on the floor again."

— jeong yunho

"Come on! The last store is closing in thirty minutes!"

The snow crunched beneath your boots as you pulled along your best friend through the numerous window shops. Lilac and blue shadows danced along the snow-covered sidewalk as shoppers briskly walked about in droves to shop for holiday gifts. Twinkling lights hung along eaves of the buildings, lampposts, as well as the bare trees in town. A variety of holiday songs can be heard throughout every turn, each shop displaying sparkling wreaths and flashing lights to beckon customers in.

Giant candy canes flanked the streets, leading to a monstrous sized evergreen tree in the center of town. Yunho's cheeks and nose flushed red from the cold, and despite trembling in his boots from the onslaught of sharp flurries beating against his face, he takes one look at your beaming expression and is instantly filled with a strange warmth that not even a crackling fireplace can provide.

He'll admit, maybe today wasn't the best day to get dragged by his best friend to go window shopping for all your mutual friends, but his soft spot for you prevented him from disagreeing. While you rambled on and on about how it would be cute to buy Jongho a muscly teddy bear and Mingi a sparkly crown, his mind drifted to when you stopped at a particular store and suddenly ceased your talking to gaze open-mouthed at a large snow globe filled with iridescent glitter, sparkling snowmen, and penguins. The afternoon sky was flecked with shining amber and pink clouds that illuminated your sparkly eyes, and the smell of cinnamon tea and roasting chestnuts filled the town's air.

He smiled to himself, already mentally preparing the gift wrap color and ribbon. Hopefully, this year his wrapping skills will improve. Maybe he'll just let Seonghwa help him out.

"Yunho, are you even paying attention to me!?"

— kang yeosang

You woke up to an unusually bright light, brows furrowing and eyes scrunching shut. Peeking your head over your lover's sleeping frame you noted the piles of snow gathering against the window you decorated with silly, little window clings last night. Frost stretched into arabesque patterns on the glass window panes, the crystals glistening gold in the morning sunlight.

The second your foot grazed the icy tiles of your bedroom, you opted to remain in bed and steal some of Yeosang's body heat. Lifting his limp arm, you tucked yourself into his hold, face buried against his chest. The shift in movement stirred him from his slumber, and he sat up bleary-eyed and confused.

Peering down at your frame silently, he settled back against the bed, tugging you closer and placing multiple pecks onto the crown of your head. Mornings like these were your favorite. You loved to cling onto your lover like second skin as the two of you slept soundlessly. He was always so, so warm and soft, and his embrace always felt like home.

The extra hours of sleep felt like mere minutes, and by the time you peeled your eyes open for the second time, Yeosang was no longer in the center of the bed spooning you. Sitting up with a deep inhale, you grimaced at the glistening snow outside, the icy wind howling and sending tuffs of ice scattering about. The sound of padded footsteps caught your attention, and you were suddenly overwhelmed with the scent of cocoa.

Yeosang stood in the doorway with an unamused expression, two steaming mugs of hot chocolate in hand and chocolate stains on his beige, fleece sweater, "Oh good, you're awake. You slept like a rock while I nearly set the kitchen on fire."

"What did you do.." you mumbled, fists reaching up to rub at your eyes, "Should I even ask?"

You're suddenly aware of the faint smell of something burnt in the air and the thin haze of smoke lingering throughout your apartment.

"Don't worry," he mused as he handed you the red mug of hot chocolate, your eyes instantly drawn to the dollop of cream and marshmallows floating on the surface. He settled onto the bed beside you, leaning in to give you a chocolate-stained kiss, "We needed a new microwave anyway."

— choi san

"See, your shower wasn't that bad," you cooed gently as you swaddled your boyfriend's cat, Byeol, in a fluffy blanket, carrying her out to the living room. You bumped into a hard chest, Byeol instantly taking the opportunity to dive out of your arms to scurry away. Snapping your head up, you were met with a smirking, cardigan-clad San who leaned against the doorframe.

You dropped your gaze to the dangling mistletoe in his hands, scoffing playfully at the sight. Throughout your entire apartment, mistletoes hung from every doorframe and corner with San's stubborn insistence. Leaning forward, you cupped his dimpled cheeks bringing him in closer to slot your lips against his own in a chaste kiss.

"I told you, you don't need a mistletoe to ask me for a kiss," you murmured against his mouth as he placed numerous pecks onto your glossed lips. Pulling you taut against his chest, he burrows his head into the crook of your neck, and you feel his lips twitch up into a knowing smile.

"But I've been getting more kisses thanks to all the mistletoes," he laughed against your skin, arms coiling tightly around your frame, his hands fondling your rear, "Even more than Byeol. So, I think I might just keep them hung up even after-"

The sound of glass shattering startled him, his frame jolting up instantly, eyes wide as saucers.

"That better not be my new snow globe."

Peeling himself from your hold, San scrambled to the bedroom, the sounds of his cries reverberating throughout the apartment. Reaching down to pick up the forgotten mistletoe, you laugh as he scolded Byeol, who in return dashed out of the room without a care in the world.

San stood in the doorway with a broken snow globe in hand, a pout eminent on his features, "I'm giving Byeol coal for Christmas," he spat angrily as you walked over to him, eyes rolling and hands working on unbuttoning the cardigan he had on to continue what he had previously started, "I knew she should've been on Santa's naughty list."

He suddenly ceases his rant, peering at you with a questioning gaze.

You raised your arm high in the air, and the mass of green dangled in front of San's curious face. His eyes flickered from the mistletoe to your face repeatedly, before his crestfallen expression morphs into one of mischief, "And you are most definitely on San's naughty list."

— song mingi

Mingi lets out a loud shriek as the roof of his gingerbread house topples over into a mess of frosting and gummy treats. Peeking over from your side of the table, you nearly laugh at the sight of him apologizing to the fallen gummy bears smeared with excess frosting, "Ming-Ming, try adding more frosting! It'll help."

"This is a lot harder than it looks!" he complained as he delicately squeezed a line of vanilla icing onto the edges of the cookie, "I nearly killed the gummy bear family. My hands are just too big and clumsy-"

He squeezed his eyes shut as he once again placed the remaining piece of gingerbread cookie onto the house, one eye peeking open to stare in awe at the stabilized cookie house. His eyes glimmered with joy, mouth stretching wide into a contagious grin as he silently points at his creation in fear that his voice will send it crashing down for a second time that night.

Mingi's gingerbread house was cute, you'll give him that. Smears of frosting stained the sides and the roof, and excess frosting dripped from the seams connecting all the pieces together. His hands scrambled to pick out the first of his decorations.

"Let's see," he hummed in satisfaction, "Baby, help me out. Peppermint candies or gum drops for the wreath on the door?"

"I don't think your gummy bear family will approve of their kind being used as a wreath," you giggled, your sock-clad feet intertwining between his legs underneath the table as you reached into the bowl of treats to plop a few in your mouth, "Pass me the red icing, please."

"You're absolutely right," he says in a matter of factly, eyes wide and curious as he squeezes dollops of icing onto the sides of the gingerbread house, "The gum drops will be the flowers around the house. Y'know, just like Spongebob's house?"

When he wasn't met with a reply, he peers up curiously, mouth dropping instantly with a loud gasp, "No! Stop! Don't eat the gingerbread men! I need those!"

— jung wooyoung

Crouching down, you admired the way the frost glistened in the sunlight, your fingers reaching forward to trace the arabesque patterns on the tree trunks and leaves. A flying mass of white flung over your head and onto the tree bark, another hitting you square on your bum. A high-pitched scream rung out almost immediately from your throat, your frame stumbling onto the snow littered ground.

You whipped your head back at the source of laughter from behind you, and your eyes instantly squint in aggravation at the cackling male behind you. Wisps of ebony locks peek out from his red beanie, framing his amused face and cheeky grin. He trudged towards the snowmen you two built ( the same one with the goofy, crooked smile he insisted looked like you ) and struck a pose on one leg, arms stretched high to form a heart as he winked at you, his long, lilac shadow stretching onto the expanse of soft snow.

"Baby, haven't I taught you to never turn your back on your enem-" He startled as a tiny golf-sized snowball slammed and crumbled onto his nose. Brushing off the snow and clenching his jaw, he then released a huff through his nose and whined, boot-clad feet stomping into the snow, "Ah! I was being cute for you! Don't ruin my moment!"

His nose grew considerably more flushed from the impact of snow, and he drew back, threatened, when you stomped your way towards him, a sheepish smile finding its way onto his features. Attempting to assert dominance, he cleared his throat, eyes smoldering as he leaned in close towards your face with a faint smirk, "It's okay to be a sore loser, you know?" Reaching down, he pats your bum free of the remaining snow, snickering to himself when you slap his hands away, before releasing a loud cry of surprise when you push him back to land on the smaller of the two snowmen.

"No!" he whined instantly, "Baby! You made me crush your twin." He scrambled up to assess the damage as you cackled beside him, his eyes practically slits as he pulled you in by your scarf, "That's what you're going to look like too, after I'm done with you."

— choi jongho

This year, your boyfriend disagreed to all your attempts to buy a faux tree for your living room, and instead flaunted his strength as he single-handedly chopped one down and dragged it to his car. The pungent smell of cedar was overwhelming in your tiny apartment, but you thought it was well worth the trip to see Jongho so proud and satisfied with himself for doing all the hard work with no aid.

He carefully stood on a stool as he wrapped golden tinsel around the tree, his brows furrowed on concentration, "Tell me if it's crooked, baby," he crouched down as he reached the end, hand outstretched in a silent gesture for the scissors. You placed the box of hand painted ornaments and ribbons down, hands reaching in to grab at a few, only to be stopped by Jongho, "No, no. It's okay, I can do it. Don't worry, love."

"But I want to-"

"Ssh," he places a finger to your pouting lips and stops your futile attempt to persuade him, "Let Macho Jongho do all of the work, princess."

Crossing your arms with a roll of your eyes, you watched him tie multiple bows of ribbon along the edges of the tree. Jongho always regarded you like delicate glass, never allowing you to do any tiresome work if he was around. In the beginning, it was quite endearing, but moments like these you wanted to pull on his ear and demand him to accept your help. Besides, decorating the Christmas tree was the highlight of the entire holiday.

A muffled cuss caught your attention, and you perked your head up to gaze at the frustrated male across the room. You watched as he struggled with the fairy lights, the thin metal coiling around his arms and fingers, "Babe," he called out in defeat, "I need help."

"I thought you'd never ask."

[one-boring-person]

Quite Some Trick.

Dwayne (The Lost Boys) x reader

Warnings: light injuries

Context: this is based off a post that @lostbetweenvampiresandmusic reblogged a few days ago, as well as being a sort of request thing for @browneyes528 , seeing as they mentioned that they would like to see a Dwayne fic about his skating, so here you go!

A/N: I did some research for this, because I'm not the most knowledgeable when it comes to skating terms and that, so I hope it's not too inaccurate.💛💛

Masterlist.

Exhilaration courses through me as I kick off the platform, allowing the skateboard below me to roll onto the sloped surface as I lean with it, keeping my balance as much as possible, gritting my teeth as I try to make myself as aerodynamic as I can in the process. My speed picks up at a high rate as the wheels carry me down the smooth decline, air rushing around me, my hair blowing out behind me from under my helmet as I hit the trough of the half-pipe, transitioning easily into another vert up the other side, my body titlting backwards as the board carries my legs upwards, though I quickly correct myself, triumph flooding me as I pop off the top. Once in the air, I grab the board in one hand and twist, managing to force myself round as the blood rushes to my head, gritting my teeth as I realise I'm too close to the deck to pull it off completely. In a split second, I've righted myself in time to hit the vert again, absorbing the impact by bending my knees a little, feeling a little disappointed as I control the descent, and corresponding ascent again, briefly grabbing the board as I lift off the top again, not getting enough air to do anything properly, before returning to the pipe again, halting on the opposite deck.

Chewing my lip, I try to catch my breath, leaning my skateboard against my leg as I lean back against the railing, waiting my turn again as the other skaters move up into line, a guy on skates taking my place at the front. In my head, I evaluate the trick and where it went wrong, knowing it's all down to height and velocity, deciding on what to do next time round, pulling my gloves on further as I make it known I'm in line. As I wait, I look around the skatepark, marvelling at some of the other tricks being pulled off everywhere, wincing as I see someone bail out of a 180 and land on their back, the impact looking painful despite that fact that they instantly stand and get back on their board. Oddly, I find my eyes drawn to them, their long dark hair unkempt as they skate back up to a deck a little way away, the skater turning so that I can see his face.

Somehow, his dark eyes find mine, an eyebrow raising as I feel my jaw drop: he's stunning. His skin is a warmer tanned colour, his toned chest bare beneath the leather jacket he's wearing, his muscles tensing whenever he pushes off, my eyes following his every movement. He's a very proficient skater, despite his fall a couple of minutes ago, the tricks he's pulling off putting some of the veteran skaters around here to shame in their fluidity, the sight of him skating around the skatepark mesmerising to watch, so much so that I nearly miss my turn.

Rolling my shoulders, I tear my eyes away from the dark-haired skater, balancing on my board briefly as I eye the half-pipe ahead of me, trying to spot any snakes or other lines. Upon finding none, I kick off, being sure to give myself as much power as I can as I speed down the slope, crouching slightly. This time round, I move with the board as it enters the climb, giving myself much more air when I pop off the top, allowing me time to grab the board and completely invert myself I start to drop again. Using my momentum, I pull the board around, my body righting itself again in time to hit the ramp again, triumph and pride flaring up in me as I realise I've just pulled off the trick I've been working on for hours. Unfortunately, this means I'm too distracted to notice I've gone over the top of the opposite side, the board flying away from my feet as I fall backwards, brief dread replacing the triumph as I allow myself to crash back to earth. Pain erupts in my back as I connect, harshly, with the concrete, my helmet and elbow pads cracking violently against the hard surface before I lie still, not trusting myself to get up, even though I know I should move, aware that I'm obstructing another skater.

In my haze, I barely register that someone is offering me their hand until they lean down slightly, face coming into view - the brunette from earlier. Eyes widening in embarrassment, I shoot him a small, grateful smile and take his proffered hands allowing him to pull me to my feet again, catching me when I stumble forwards a bit, still a little disorientated, my face bright red as I search for my board, only to find it lying few metres away, beside the skater's one.

"Thank you." I mumble out, picking my way over to my board, still mortified that he saw me fall like that, especially after finally managing to pull off a 360.

"No problem. That was quite some trick you just did." He compliments, smiling at me as he follows, checking me over for any serious injuries; thankfully there are none, but my cocyx and back will be sore for days maybe weeks, though my pride will recover much more quickly, especially after remembering that my saviour fell earlier on.

"You think so?" I question, surprised at his words.

"Yeah, it looked really smooth. You done it before?" He confirms, offering his hand again after a second, this time for me to shake, "I'm Dwayne by the way."

Gingerly, I take it, his skin icy underneath my bare fingertips, the frigidity seeping in through the fabric of my gloves.

"I'm (Y/n), nice to meet you. That was my first time actually managing to get the full way round. I messed up the ending, though, so it wasn't that much of a success."

"Ah, well, these things take practice. I can help you out if you want?" He offers, lifting an eyebrow in questioning.

"Are you sure? I'm nowhere near as good as you, I'd just be annoying to have around." I muse, recalling the elegant ease in which he skates, as if he's had decades of practice, even though he only looks twenty or younger.

"Of course! I wouldn't offer if I didn't mean it. And I've seen you skate, you're not half as bad as you make yourself out to be." He confirms, smiling at me as we seat ourselves on the edge of one of the sections of the large bowl, having checked for other skaters before doing so.

"You think so?"

"I do."

"Well, thank you, I guess. I'll take you up on the offer, if you don't mind. I've been trying to get that trick for months." I agree, smiling back at him, realising I'm enjoying his company.

"I look forward to it, but first I think you should rest a bit, especially after your fall." Dwayne advises, gesturing to the rapidly forming bruises on my elbows.

"Yeah, I guess I should." I agree, inspecting the ugly purple marks, "Wanna get something to eat? I think I'm done here for today."

"Sure, let's go." The brunette accepts, climbing to his feet before helping me up again, the two of us swiftly skating from the skatepark. My pace is slower than normal, but I manage to keep up with the taller skater anyhow, the two if us continuing to talk as we go, pulling up in front of a stall selling food just a little way away from the Boardwalk. We order some chips and water, heading over to the wall separating the beach and the pavement in order to sit and eat, the two of us content to just chew our food in companipnable silence. As we finish, we start up the conversation again.

"So how long have you been skating for?" Dwayne inquires, looking over at me curiously.

"A few years now. My parents never really liked the idea of me doing it, so it took some time to convince them." I inform him, picking at the hem of my shorts a little.

"Why?"

"Well, they thought I should do a "real" sport, you know? Apparently skating is not good enough for them."

"They should watch you sometime, they'd change their minds immediately." Dwayne shrugs, my eyes straying to his bare chest as I notice his toned muscles moving under the tanned skin.

"I doubt I could get them anywhere near a skateboard, let alone a skatepark." I chuckle bitterly, sighing in frustration at the thought of my parents and their old-fashioned views, "How about you? How long have you been skating?"

Oddly, he looks a little hesitant to reply, seemingly considering his answer in his head before giving it.

"Since I first laid eyes on a board, I guess. I fell in love with the idea." He finally says, running a finger over the line of his board with a proud smile on his face, "I've had this board ever since I started."

"You've never broken a board?! How?!" I exclaim, recalling the three times I've snapped a board in half after going over a ramp too quickly, or by trying to skate down a flight of steps.

"I don't known I guess I'm just too careful." He laughs, looking over at me again.

Behind us, a few shouts of his name draw our attention, the skater's shoulders visibly sagging as he spots someone in the crowd, my own eyes swiftly finding them.

"You know them?" I ask him carefully, wary of offending him or his group of biker friends, the platinum blonde clearly eyeing me up from across the Boardwalk.

"Yeah, they're my brothers. I've gotta go, but I'll see you at the skatepark again tomorrow? At eight?" He affirms, looking slightly frustrated.

"Sure, I'll be there. It was nice meeting you, Dwayne."

'It was nice meeting you, too." He responds, smiling at me as he gets up, skating away from me with a quick goodbye, a small feeling of excitement rising in me at the thought of seeing him again. Before he leaves earshot, however, I call out his name, making him turn around.

"Thanks for not laughing at me when I fell!" I shout to him, grinning at the brunette.

"Only an idiot would!" He responds, waving once more as he returns to his brothers.

Twisting back around, I continue to smile to myself as I go over the last hour or so, glad to have made a new friend, even if I did gain an injury in the process.