#Junky blurb

[sushirrrry]

EXECUTIVE a harry styles one-shot smut blurb; 19.3k words cw: oral sex (f receiving), fingering, dom/sub, breath play, dirty talk.

"If they want the fucking numbers, they've got to stop being pussies and give us the fucking reins. I'm not sitting around and waiting for their stock to crash and for their stupid, fucking minions to come back on me to tell me what I already knew and told them from the start—I'm not painted out to be the biggest fucking moron, that's for certain. It's either a deal or it isn't, plain and simple. If they don't want to have that fucking conversation, it's done. Fuck them and their stupid fucking counteroffer. It's a fucking slap in the face, and I'm not even entertaining the idea."

Harry pulled the phone away from his ear, clicking on End Call before he threw his phone over and onto the wooden desk that sat perpendicular to the vicious New York skyline. His heart raced as he shook his head.

An adrenaline junkie like him fed off of the conversations like these.

His sleeves were pushed up his forearms, his eyes navigated towards the contractual wreckage of paperwork that had seemed to be forgone on his desk as he pushed some of it to the side. His elbows leaned on the desk; his hands tied together as he rested his lips again them in a precocious thought.

Running the company came with a sharp tongue and a knack for knowing when it was time to push back. Harry was a mogul in all of the sense of the word—his company had grown to a gargantuan size, which allowed his position within the business to skyrocket to a level that was so without fail that he couldn't believe it sometimes.

His mouth got the better of him; in some ways, it created the effervescence of attack. It was all that he could do to keep himself from picking the phone back up and telling them to shove it all back up their ass—he refrained for the time being, until he was pushed again.

But no one usually poked the bear unless they truly believed they had a chance in slaughtering them. Mr. Styles was far too confident in his work and his business to ever let that happen.

The bear's claws reacted too quickly for the barrel of the rifle to even face him.

"Uh, excuse me, Mr. Styles?"

His eyes raised to the door that he hadn't seen opening before his lips parted just a bit to answer the woman questioning him. She wore a black skirt with tall, black boots that suited the length of her legs. Her top arranged in a bit of a messy manor, but it was almost as if she had styled it that way to add a bit of flare.

Her blazer hung a bit low—practically to the mid-length of the skirt that rode up her thighs, but he wouldn't have been caught dead staring. In public, anyway.

His eyes made their assessment of her quickly before returning to her naturally, raspberry lips that took up much of her lower face. The natural length of her smile was perfectly proportioned, not that he had spent much time thinking of it, of course.

Felicity—his assistant. The one with eyes the color of the ocean that he would vacation on in the Maldives; the most piercing, stunning blue. The quiet one, a bit shy in her reservations, almost like she was the smallest fish in the ocean made entirely of sharks. Her reservations to others seemed to aid in bulldozing over her confidence, but to Harry, it was an enticing spectacle of fantasy.

A fantasy he'd promise to never share with even his closest comrades, if an NDA wasn't in place, that is.

The dark brown locks settled against her back in heaps of loose, voluminous curls as she held tightly to the phone behind her fingers.

"Am I interrupting?" She asked, her question a bit hesitant as she didn't seem to move any further forward into the large space of his office.

"No—no, you're not," He told her, "Come in, Felicity, I need to use your brain for a moment."

"My brain?" She asked him, cocking her head a bit.

That was the thing about Felicity that almost made him foam at the mouth– her way of innocence and contemplation that allowed him to see his viewpoints from her standpoint.

Harry's company was outsourcing most of the global news which meant that he oversaw several departments within. His leadership was only as good as the recommendations and guidance that Felicity was able to provide him; her devil's advocacy, her interpretation of empathy, and being able to see how interactions happened without Harry present versus the other sense.

Felicity was a practical need in his company for various reasons, not one to just make his blood boil and frantically move around his veins every time he caught a whiff of the coconut lime scent that his mind had become familiar with.

She was a calmness to him in many ways, so her presence now settled his heartbeat from the previous conversation.

"That deal we're making this afternoon, I just got off the phone with Sadler and they're folding– they're becoming weak. And it's pissing my off. They're coming to me to help solve their issues, because they know I can do it. They're , but they know we'll do it. Which pisses me off because it makes us look weak if we just say yes."

Felicity blinked a few times as she watched Harry's reaction, her legs crossed at the feeling before she held her hands in front of her and nodded.

Harry sucked his lips into his mouth before he shook his head, a few of loose curls settled on his forehead as he pushed them back and Felicity wished that he hadn't.

"I think you're going to push them to do it without the counter," Felicity nodded. "From what I'm hearing, they're folding, and they can see that what we can provide is significant. Especially in terms of the election. We can do it– you can do it."

His eyes flew to her word change, noticing that her eyes had moved away from him. The subtle blush of pink ate away at her cheeks before Harry nodded in his own satisfaction.

"Enough about me," He shook his head, "What did you need, Felicity?"

Her eyes raised as it seemed she came back to conclusion about what she had been there for to begin with.

"Oh, I just talked with Nava at PLI and they wanted to express their gratitude towards you, because they said that you helped them with understanding the fundamentals of their offer and I thought it sounded like a for-sure deal– I just wanted you to know that Nava is a yes," She nodded and raised her brows again in remembrance, "Oh! And I'm also running to pick up some coffee and snacks before the board meeting. Flat white?"

Harry smirked at the praise from her, watching it leave her lips effortlessly. He nodded a few times at her question before he rose from his chair and grabbed the tie around his neck to loosen just a bit.

Harry grabbed the paperwork off of his desk before he moved towards the door and guided Felicity to follow. "Yes, please. A flat white with cinnamon, maybe a pump of caramel? What do you think?"

The words were like a question as Felicity walked next to him through the natural, brightly lit office. Her fingers tapped away at the device before she noticed the slight edge of the spicy cologne that wafted from his demeanor as he turned his head toward her.

"I'm not a huge fan of caramel," She stated a bit hesitantly as they stopped in front of one of the offices where Harry was about to go into a meeting.

He looked at Felicity as they stopped, his eyes moving up and down as he went from her lips to her eyes as if involved in a game of ping-pong.

"What do you like, then?" His words were soft, fluid.

Felicity swallowed as she shook her head a few times and nibbled on her lip. She hummed for a moment, "Um, I prefer vanilla."

The corner of Harry's lip moved upwards. "Make it a hot flat white with an extra shot of espresso, cinnamon, and a pump of vanilla, please."

Felicity wrote it down in her notes, but her fingers almost shook with adrenaline as she felt his gaze linger on her without her noticing before she nodded. "Great. I'll– uh, I'll leave now so I can be back in time to make sure you have what you need."

Her feet started to move away before she heard the booming sensation of her name. The way that her eyes fluttered back at him made Harry almost take a step backward.

"Uh," He felt speechless at the sudden look of her, "Please get whatever you need, too." He felt the professionalism start to creep its way back in. "Can't have you falling asleep on the job, you have notes to write."

Felicity bit the inside of her cheek before she nodded. "Yes, sir."

With that, Felicity turned her back and started to head down towards the elevators. Harry turned to make his way into the boardroom where he saw the table sitting and waiting for his arrival.

The hush that fell over the crowd made him shutter every time– the power he held echoed through his conscious at every moment it could.

He only smirked as he sat at the head of the table, pulling himself to sit up and lean on the table before he looked up to see the many eyes staring back at him.

"Shall we get to work then?"

__________________

"This coffee is fucking cold."

One of the board members pushed it away after taking a small sip, as Felicity had just sat it down in front of him.

It was an older gentleman– Hank– who had worked with the Styles family for many years and been able to help SCO with their major launches with other shareholders. His entitlement was present in the room, which pressed on her ego just a bit. Her head turned towards him as she shook hers.

A woman at the end of the time made a face as she looked at the side of the cup, "Ordered a fucking latte—they even messed it up and it's cold. The coffee shop is just down the block."

Felicity tucked some hair behind her ears as she shook her head in a bit of disbelief as she tried to find the receipt that the coffeehouse had given her. There wasn't any way that they gave her the wrong order, but she didn't know if there may have been a mix-up in who she gave the coffees to.

"T-That's impossible—I just order—" But she was cut off by the man who licked over his lips and held his hand up to stop her words from even echoing in the room at all.

"Just go get some hot coffee, would you?"

Felicity's eyes blazed around the room as she noticed that the others had practically ignored her efforts of the two full cardboard contents of coffee cups that she had practically run the streets of New York to pick up. Not only were they not even acknowledging her, but they were condescending in her efforts. Yes, she was an assistant—she wasn't their assistant. It wasn't her fault that she was one person, but she knew that she had to try harder to make the best impression that she could.

"Everyone just shut the fuck up and drink your coffees, would you? Our deadline is in six fucking hours. If you can't handle a little lukewarm coffee, get the fuck out of my office. I pay too much of your goddamn salaries for you to cry like a fucking baby."

Harry's eyes moved to the nervous-looking girl who stood by the door, along the edge of the buffet that held the rest of the coffee, donuts, and bagels that had practically been falling out of her arms when she arrived.

He couldn't tell—it may have been the lighting, but her eyes looked glassy as she tried to stand with her shoulders back. Harry caught her attention before she threw herself back together and walked over towards him, leaning down to where he sat at the table.

"I can run to go get something else, I don't think it would take too long, you know. Or I could order it to be delivered?" Felicity asked, a bit cautious, he could tell. But her piercing blue eyes were practically a shade of gray as he looked at them through her thick, tortoiseshell glasses that complimented the brightness of her eyes.

His eyes fell to the way that the chapstick she always applied gave her lips the most subtle peony color—so pink, but so natural. He thought that may be a better place for his eyes to land instead of directly into her eyes, but then he panicked for a moment and turned them back to her eyes.

"That's not necessary." Harry shook his head, answering for the individuals in the room. Even if they pushed their coffee aside, Harry would have never blamed it on Felicity for any failure—it wasn't her fault. He took a sip of his own; to his dismay, it was a bit cold, but he wasn't going to complain about it.

The stature of Felicity at the door made him take in a deep breath before he caught her attention, asking her to come towards him with just a look before she was practically on top of him. Her willingness to do as he said gave him a feeling of endorphins that were unlike any he had before.

Harry looked up at her from his seat, licking over his lips softly.

"Please make a reservation for two at The Malbec tonight at nine—whether or not these jackasses are going to be done working, I sure am, and I'm going to celebrate it. Add that I would like the executive seating and the Pauillac on the table, not chilled."

She nodded a few times at his requests, adding it into her notes on her phone before she looked back at him cautiously.

"Should I be arranging a car to pick someone up for you?" She asked. Her teeth scraping against her bottom lip as she waited for his response.

Harry shook his head back at her before filing through a few papers, "Not necessary today. Just make sure that you're not off the clock yet," He nods, "In case something doesn't go as planned."

Felicity nodded at the feeling of his eyes on hers before he turned to face the table before him.

"Someone get John on the phone," Harry ordered, his eyes going towards, "Hank. I want their numbers for the day and the plan for the fiscal year. I want to hear it from their lips, the spreadsheets don't mean shit if they're just going to lie to my face. Mary, contact PLI to get their rates."

Felicity had started to make her way towards the door, back towards her desk that sat in the main office towards Harry's own private one, before Harry called her back, "Felicity, sit in this meeting, will you? Grab your computer."

Her eyes narrowed at him in a bit of confusion before he stood up and grabbed a chair from the side of the room and pulled it to the spot next to where he was, at the head of the table.

Felicity did as he wished, leaving to grab her laptop and notebook essentials that she used to keep track of his days, his weeks. When she arrived back, she could feel a few eyes on her as they talked through the deal with John. The silence in the room as he spoke over the speaker was deafening before she sat down at the spot next to Harry.

His focus on the conversation made her attention turn towards him.

Working at SCO was one of Felicity's highest honors—she felt that her confidence was gained just by being in the room with some of these people. But, at the same time, she wondered at what point this would all get to her. She wasn't like this—she didn't have the same cutthroat mindset of tearing another down to get herself to another place.

In some respects, that's what was the balance between what Harry was and what he knew that he needed. He needed someone like Felicity to sit next to him—a calming sensation that he didn't ever notice until he would garner a sniff of the coconut shampoo that drifted from her silky chestnut hair.

It was sickening at times—the way he felt about her. When he was sitting next to her now, he watched as she let her fingers grace over the laptop keys, focused in on whatever task she was working on. His eyes moved away when he watched as her teeth loosened on her lower lip, letting the plumpness of it a drawback to a straightened line of her mouth.

He shifted in his seat as he felt himself get a sensation of pressure below the belt.

When he spoke, it was with a confidence that she couldn't seem to place. It was as if he could break and make with just words alone, a skill that he had to have been born with.

As they discussed the offers more in-depth, Felicity found herself distracted from her own work as she let her eyes gently maneuver back to where Harry sat at the end of the table. Her fingers practically stopped typing as she listened to the conversation and watched as his brain work in overtime.

It wasn't just impressive; it was extraordinary.

The narrowing of his brows, the calculated glance at the table as if he could cut through it with just his sight, the determined clench of his jaw.

"Don't fucking low-ball this," Harry practically snarled as he tapped the point of his pen to his notepad. "I know what's best for this company and we don't want people who underestimate the work and quality of our services. Globally, we're ahead of the entire market– we beat out every major network in significance. If you truly want to hand us a shitty number like that, you'll fucking fall. Your company will fail, and we will continue to sit right at the top as you lick the dirt off our shoes. It's not a competition; we've already won. So, do you want to win with us? That's the question here."

There's a slow chuckle on the phone, a bit of silence, too. Felicity looks up from her laptop to watch as a few members whisper to one another before hearing John on the other end.

"Listen, it's– we understand this. SCO is globally leading, but this is an election year– how are we supposed to gain traction when the news sources from SCO are against the current climate? We just don't see the same vision right now and we need to make sure our values are aligning– SCO may not be leading once the election happens."

Harry's eyes don't dim– Felicity watches as he turns different, his focus staying on the notepad under his fingers as he takes a beat before he stares at the phone in the middle of the table.

Her leg crosses under the table, gently caressing his unbeknownst to her. His eyes falter for once, as she retracts her position when she watches him crack for the first time. She noticed that he faltered but only a small huff of his breath before she bit her lip.

"We're a multi-billion-dollar company that focuses on the current political climate at hand since we completely understand the market, unlike someone who needs to be bought out to ensure that they don't sink. If you're just sitting in the open water, we will look the other way when a shark comes by," Harry shrugs, "I don't quite understand your vision of understanding moral compasses when you're sitting on significant lawsuits and company fouls that don't seem to benefit you right now or the lying, cheating words that come from your mouth."

Felicity's eyes flew up from her place at the table, watching as she saw everyone else's down. It was an unmistakable feeling of vigor that suddenly oozed from the place of Harry's seat. His demeanor was powerful, it was penetrable.

The quietness over the phone doesn't seem to faze anyone else, but Harry's eyebrow arches at the seconds that go by before he pops his tongue into the side of his mouth with a cheeky grin that was questioning on mad.

"Looks like they just got eaten by that fucking shark, huh." He says quietly before leaning over to press onto the conference room phone. He ended the call before he watched the room continue in silence.

Another woman, Laura, sitting at one of the sides spoke up as she held her phone in her hands.

"It looks like they're countering again." It was a bit quiet, almost like she didn't want the entire room to hear as she read on her phone before looking up at Harry, who held the emotion of a bear.

"Tell them they can choke on their own spit." He bites before Felicity cleared her throat.

His eyes immediately softened at the way that she interrupted, mostly because he was a bit confused by it.

"Mr. Styles," She pipped, "I—I, um, if I may." She chews on her lip a bit before she takes in a breath. "It sounds like they're needing a bit more leverage. Maybe a bit more face-to-face interaction that will cut and garner the deal. You're going to need more than John's input; he needs more intel from other aspects to understand what their losses look like."

Harry's eyes simply rest on Felicity as he leans back in the office chair, his legs crossed—a pursed pout on his lips as he nods at her words. A trickle of egotistical pride lies beneath his chest as he stares at her for a moment.

"Set the scene for me." He tells her, before watching Felicity take a deep breath. He watches her chest fall and rise and something about it sets him into high gear.

"Your family started this from scratch—this company is bigger than just the cash flow, and it's completely understood that it's worth billions, but they need to understand that there's a larger purpose for the work that they've put into it. They're not on the same business level that SCO is—it's apparent by the way that they throw around their value system. Meet with John outside of the office setting, get him where he can be able to see that you're serious without the psychological barrier of the phone—"

"That's fucking bullshit." Felicity hears from down the table, another man making a comment about her complete train of thought that. "You really think business is about emotion?"

Harry narrowed his brows, Felicity a bit surprised but not completely. Her head turning back towards her computer.

"You need to be thinking internally for what's best for us, not babying them to give us what we want. You know they're going to fall right into our hands, we don't need to get soft on them." Mary, a woman that Felicity generously thought would at least have an understanding of her interests, seemed to shame her more.

Harry pursed out his lips as he stares at the notepad in front of him. He pushed his hands against the table to rise from his seat before he's raised, watching silently as he eyes Felicity quickly before he starts to make his way out of the room. Before he does so, he turns his back and holds onto the door before he looks at Felicity directly.

"Felicity, please meet me in my office."

She swallows down the lump in her throat; cursing herself for even making a peep. She knew she should have kept her mouth shut. Instead, she closed the laptop before she grabs the few belongings and makes her way out of the door.

Harry is steps ahead of her, not looking back, as they make their way to the office that sits in the north side of the larger office space.

When he walks in, he makes his way to his desk before leaning on it. Felicity walks in behind him, hesitating before

Harry notices that she hasn't fully made her way in yet.

"Come in," He tells her, "Take a seat."

Her words practically spilling out of her as soon as they reached the threshold of the door; there was nothing that she could say now that would make him keep her there, but she wanted to at least try.

"I-I know I overstepped my boundaries– I promise, I really do, I promise I will never do that again," She's holding the laptop against her chest, practically begging, "This is extremely unprofessional, but you need to know that I need this–"

"Do you know why you're still here, Felicity?" He asks, "Why you're still at SCO?"

His interrupted words make hers fall short as she stands at the door still. His arms are holding himself practically against the desk as he leans back against it.

Tears threaten her eyes as she tries to think of what she needs to pack from her desk quickly. This feels entirely too personal– he's firing her on the spot.

She shakes her head as she doesn't want to come up with an answer. Harry squints his eyes a bit as he notices the emotion that starts to creep on her face. All the sudden, he feels bad for what he's doing to her.

It feels a bit forward, maybe a bit out of his place. But he needs her to know exactly how he feels about her, and why the last assistants never stuck around.

He needs her to know that's she's different.

"It's because you're fucking smart," He tells her, "What you have, they lack. You have this– well, for lack of a better word, you're emotional. You can see beyond the bullshit and really down to the person." He points towards the area of the conference room that they just left.

"I'm not here to baby your ass or carry you through this job– you don't need this fucking job. You have so much more about you than being an assistant, okay? So, don't take what some fuckers in that office say about you and your ideas as gospel. They aren't getting it done, either– as you can see."

Felicity's demeanor loosens at his words; her knuckles along the laptop at her chest starts to loosen as she breathes in just a bit.

"I'm sorry–"

"Stop apologizing." He orders, "When you do that, all you're doing is making them right about you. They aren't."

There's a silence between them for a moment before Felicity nods a few times and bites at her lip. "You're right."

"Most of the time." He tells her, a smirk has replaced the seriousness of their conversation. "That's why I have this big office and a 300ft. yacht and they don't."

She follows with her own small, sided smirk, watching as he goes to move from his position.

"That sounded very cocky, I'm sorry." He laughed a little bit, lowering his head as he felt a bubble of laughter. Felicity followed behind, laughing a bit as she bit on her lower lip.

The tension had been cut; this overwhelming feeling of comfort had started to come across her, specifically when Harry looked back up at her and she could see the shining level of his green eyes and the deepening dimples crossing his face.

It wasn't an emotion she saw very often; it looked impossibly lovely on him.

"Stop saying sorry, remember?" She reminded him, a sheepish smile laying on her lips.

Harry moved his fists into his pockets as he started to walk a bit towards her.

It was then that Felicity recognized that his pure power and force was enough to knock her down to her knees. The way that he stood up, his suit tailored perfectly around his small hips and shoulders, she couldn't understand the feeling that had come over her suddenly.

Harry approached her, they were standing eye to eye as he searched between them both. He had been searching for something, surely, by the way his eyes moved between her own.

Felicity tipped her chin up a little bit; it was slight enough that they both noticed, but a sudden embarrassment crossed her thought at the way she had possibly invited a completely inappropriate behavior.

"Let's get back in there, yeah?" She clears her throat as she turned her head and body, moving back out towards the conference room.

Harry's fists tightened next to him at the way she moved away, and he couldn't help but shutter at what could have possibly happened moments ago.

He lowered his head before he shook it a few times, "Yes, of course," He confirmed, nodding at her, "I'll follow you back, I'm just going to," He felt himself getting hot which made him feel vulnerable to her stares. "I'll be in there in a moment."

Felicity turned, her hair falling over her shoulders before she nodded. "Yeah, no problem."

Before she was able to move out of the room, Harry caught her attention once again before he narrowed his eyes to her. "Can I—that reservation I asked you to schedule. Please move it to Friday night. Something's come up, actually."

Felicity made a motion to speak, but she didn't end up with any words. Instead, just nodding a few times, her eyes smiling back at him as she agreed to his request. "Sure, no problem."

Her smile had vanished from his view as she turned to walk back to the conference room.

When she noticed that she was out of sight, his eyes had widened just at the breath that he had been holding in. It didn't matter how big or important a meeting could be, Harry never got nervous. He was never worried about anything—he knew what he was getting himself into, and nothing scared him. There wasn't a reason to be.

Standing in front of Felicity was a feeling he had never imagined would give him a doubt; he never felt like he would be pushed away or turned away, and the feeling of dismissal was encapsulating, to say the least.

He pushed his hand into his hair as he went to sit in the chair that was pushed in behind his desk, swallowing the lump in his throat as he shook his head.

Never in a million years did he think that he would feel such a way—never like this.

"Let's get back to work, then."

_______________

It had been a few days since the encounter in his office. Harry had noticed that even the next morning, Felicity seemed to be in much better spirits. Her head was held high; her shoulders were sitting back, like she was prepared to keep her chin up for the day.

He could catch glimpses from his office, watching as she typed away or smiled down at her phone. A piece of him felt only the slightest bit of—he didn't know the feeling very well—jealous. He wanted to know more, wanted to understand what she could have been smiling at.

He knew that his job had been done a few days ago as he watched her spirits rise just at his words. Something about that feeling was missing now—he didn't understand what it was, but his ego may have been getting in the way just a bit.

Harry sat his pen down that he had been using to write out some tasks before he grabbed the pad of paper and started to make his way out of his office. The small desk that sat outside of his was taken by Felicity; a few photos and memorabilia sat to give her space a bit of light and personalization.

It didn't mimic Harry's own office very well, as his was kept more straightforward and narrower. There wasn't any photos or personalized mementos—just plain, really. But the photo of Felicity and another man caught his eye, something he had never really seen before. Something he never felt that he would have had to pay attention to, that is.

"That your boyfriend?" He felt himself saying, but an ultimate feeling of embarrassment rose as he watched Felicity look up at him quickly. It was clear that she hadn't really noticed him sneak up on her, and her hands flew to the phone on the desk before closing the screen promptly.

"Uh," She shook her head, "I—I mean, we've been talking a few months," She referenced to the phone before she looked back at Harry and noticed that there may have been a bit of miscommunication.

"Oh—uh, no, sorry," He shook his head, pointing to the photo that sat on her desk. "I was—that photo, I'd never seen that before."

Felicity turned her eyes towards the photo that sat on her desk in the black frame before letting out a breath of relief. "Oh! No, that's my brother." She laughed a little bit before she watched Harry reach out to grab the picture frame off her desk.

He studied it for a few seconds, letting his smile move up a bit before he sat it back down. "Yeah, you guys look alike. I just—it was new, so I didn't know."

Felicity bit on her lip before tucking her hair behind her ears, "No—yeah, I would make that assumption, too. It's fine, but yeah." She didn't know that he would notice that she set up the photo or not. She knew now that he paid attention; he had an attention to detail, it seemed.

The small moment gave Harry a bit of concern as he felt that there was some unresolved feeling between the two of them. He cleared his throat, holding the paper out before her as she piqued at the small task guide that Harry had been feverishly writing down.

"I have a few things that I need to get done today, if you don't mind." He had handed her the paper before her eyes ran over it a few times. "It's just a few little things, but I need to have a few suits dry-cleaned for our business summit on Monday in England—I'm flying out tomorrow morning on the jet, but we'll need to make sure that everything is taken care of for that. I believe you, myself, Laura, Hank, Daniel, and probably William will be there, so we'll need to make—"

"Excuse me, but," Felicity chuckled before shaking her head a few times. "Did you say me?"

Harry blinks a few times in confusion before he bites the inside of his cheek. Surely, she knew that she would be leaving in the morning– she had to have known that as his assistant, she would be most responsible for being on the trip.

"Uh, well," Harry blinked, "Yes, I mean. of course. You're the most vital person for the trip, really."

Felicity bit into her lip before she turned towards her notes, her eyes flickering over them as she realized she wouldn't need to send him a detailed email of their agenda– she'd be there to tell him in person. So, all this work—it didn't matter now.

"Right– yeah, of course. I'm stupid for not putting that together." She shook her head as she took in a sigh, crossing out a few notes on her pad. She turned her attention back to him before she cleared her throat. "What time should I be at the airport tomorrow, then?"

Harry bit his lip, shrugging as he felt the smile crossing his lips, "I don't know—you tell me. You're my assistant."

Felicity blinked at him a few times before laughing out a little bit, letting her head rest in her hands as she felt a bit ridiculous for feeling so caught off guard. "Right—right. I—yeah."

In the back of his head, there was a delicate feeling of intrigue that bit at the back of him. He squinted his eyes a bit as he settled against the edge of her desk. As he crossed his arms over his chest, he narrowed his attention down to Felicity until she looked up at him and felt the wandering look. All Felicity knew is that she didn't want to look at the way that his forearms protruded against the fabric of his pressed white button-down.

"Is everything alright?" He asked her, the smile on his lips tug briefly before he was letting it fully on display. "You seem a bit... caught up."

She blinked a few times, shaking her head as she looked at her computer screen. "I'm fine—yeah. I'm just—I was a bit caught up, I guess," She chewed on her lip as she realized that getting personal was just that. It was personal. She didn't want to bore him or let know too far in. Their relationship was strictly business; it seemed that she endeared him though.

Her eyes traveled back to him when he didn't seem to leave her alone and she noticed that she'd had another message.

"I'm just... the guy I've been seeing, well, on and off—he just asked me to dinner and he's picking me up from here tonight around five. We haven't seen each other in a while, he's a bit..." She bites her lip again as she tried to find the right word, "I don't hear from him often. But when we're together, everything is fine. So, I guess I just got a bit overwhelmed with it."

Harry pinches the inside of his bicep when she speaks, his smile fading just a bit. He didn't want her to notice that, though. He didn't know why, but it left a sour taste in his mouth to think that she had been excited for someone who was making her wait. Instead, he shifted a bit on the desk as he cleared his own throat before speaking.

"That's—that's great," He tells her, watching as she smiles at his appreciation and acceptance, "Where is he taking you?"

"We're just going to this place off from fifth avenue, some place he said is nice. We're really just meeting for a beer or something." Felicity's eyes light up at the realization before she turns to face him a bit head on now, her chair swiveling around before she crosses her legs and faces him. "What about you, though? That reservation I made for you tonight—who are you meeting with?"

Harry's lip parted as he remembered the reservation.

He remembered the reservation he had moved to tonight, simply so that he could flesh out a few details with Felicity over a dinner with just the two of them. Of course, he hadn't mentioned it to her. It was stupid of him to think that she wouldn't be busy on a Friday evening, of course. He had wanted to talk to her about the upcoming week; maybe get a little more out of her if everything was off the record at a dinner that wasn't going on the company credit card, but his own personal dollar.

Harry shakes his head a bit before he scratches at the back of his head, "Uh, right. I—I might need to cancel that. I don't think that's going to happen anymore."

Felicity watches his expression before she seems to mimic with a bit of somber. "Oh. Sorry. Tough subject?"

When he pushed himself from her desk, he placed his hands in his pockets before he hung his head a little bit. It hadn't occurred to him that the disappointment had been a bit stronger than anticipated-- and it wasn't just because he always got what he wanted.

"Hm, something like that," He tried to explain before he changed the subject to get it off his mind, "But yeah. So, dry-cleaning and all that can be finished before the morning, yeah? If you have any questions about any of that, I'll be in my office. Meeting at one and then I'm going to leave here around five."

Giving him a warm smile, Felicity nodded her head at him, watching as he turned to his office.

Her attention fell back to her phone; falling back to the smile and giddiness that had been so rudely interrupted by a different kind of feeling—one that she wasn't so sure she was supposed to enjoy, in that way, anyways.

_______________

The black Suburban pulled up against the curb; Harry's phone against his ear as he moved towards the vehicle in a fluid motion.

A driver had opened the door before he crawled in the back seat. The call on the other end had been a business call that he was supposed to listen in on; he wasn't going to speak, just listen to the meeting of what was said. He decided it had been enough and clicked it to end before he looked up and out of the window.

His head turned towards the door before he watched Felicity standing at the curb. She looked uncomfortable as she stood and had her eyes searching for whatever it was that she was looking for.

It was a little bit past six then; the rest of the day was filled with a meeting or two before he really started to get more work, letting his head get wrapped up in taking calls and finishing off emails before he would be away from the office for a bit.

This was how they left each other on most days; his car pulled up, and he usually drove away before he could notice if she caught another ride or if she headed towards the subway. Her eyes were searching— almost like she had been waiting for something or someone but didn't want to seem disappointed. Harry could feel it in his chest—he could feel the way that she stood with her arms crossed over her chest in a bit of distress.

It had occurred to him then that Felicity had mentioned that she was supposed to be picked up around five—a full hour ago.

The rain had started just a bit, enough that she quickly looked to the sky for a moment as if to curse it.

He watched as her phone fumbled in her hands. A discerned look on her face made him halt the driver before they could start pulling away. Harry watched her, the knowing look on his face as he rolled down the window to call out towards her.

"Felicity," He stated, opening the door before he stepped out. "Come on, get in."

Her eyes looked to him, practically mortified. Her head started to shake a bit before he moved out of the car just enough that she noticed his offer was serious and that he wasn't moving. The door was open now as he stood outside of it and held it open for her.

"Let's go– it's raining." He said, squinting a bit as the rain started coming down a bit more.

It seriously took Harry a moment before he realized that it may take a bit more for Felicity to listen to him; her contemplation didn't last long as the rain started to hit the cement loudly—her papers and bag held over her head as she made her way towards the open door of the large vehicle.

Felicity's heels clicked against the sidewalk as she hurried into the back of the van, crawling across to the other side and trying to keep her skirt down as she realized he would be coming right behind her.

There was a brief pause of silence when the door shut behind Harry.

Once they were situated in the backseat, Harry looked at her for a moment as she seemed a bit out of sorts. Her eyes were on her phone as she cleared her throat.

Her eyes were narrowed down as she searched through some texts, a bit all over the place it seemed. Harry knew Felicity better than this, and her nerves were starting to overwhelm her hand, almost like she was completely unsure of what was happening right now.

"Do you just—do you mind dropping me off at fifth ave—" She had started, but he was already shaking his head.

"He's not showing up, so no. Peter, drop us at The Malbec."

Her head turned towards him at the bluntness of his tone and the way that he resisted her need. The way that he answered her was unlike he had ever spoken to her; that caught her off guard the most.

Felicity flipped through her texts once again before she scoffed out, "Harry, I have a date tonight. I'll just get a car from there—"

"No, you won't." He told her, before situating himself in the back. The way that her hair had a bit of windswept to it, the length of her lashes, the complete blush of her cheeks—it was all enough for him to generally bust at the seams.

Seeing her like that was a wake-up call as he looked away and tried his best to be a gentleman.

"I'm off the clock, so my duties are relinquished for the night." She told him sharply, giving herself a bit more voice before Harry really glared at her this time. He had never heard her speak to him in such a way, but something about it gave him a mouthful to bite from.

"Don't fucking talk to me like that, I'm your boss." He told her; his eyes seemingly turning a darker color the more she stared at him. It was enough for her to scoff and turn her head out of the window as they had started to drive up towards the restaurant that she refused to go to.

Harry spoke again, this time a bit softer. "It's just dinner. No work."

It takes a moment before Felicity leans into the window and lets her head rest against the glass. The feeling of the coolness takes over before she shuts her eyes for a moment. It doesn't feel like she wants to cry, but maybe there's a bit of emotion that she can't seem to let go of.

The disappointment aspect was never good to her; that was how this always worked. Something always disappointed her. There hadn't been a moment when she felt comfortable or safe—no, really, she just wandered around in this life with so much hope. So much hope and very little pride, now.

She lived for the hope of it all.

When they made their way to the restaurant, it had started to rain a little less. It was merely a sprinkle before Peter pulled off to the curb closest and the two of them were able to get out.

Felicity was instructed that she could leave her work items in the car, bringing only her purse as Harry followed behind her. When they walked into the restaurant, her eyes widened at how fancy it was—the dim lit lights were much brighter than the sky had been at this time of day, especially when the clouds rolled in.

The host was able to take them directly to their seats—the ones that Felicity had made the reservation for. It was an intimate seat; two chair and a small table that were seated close to the window, but enough away from everyone else.

The Paulliac was on the table as instructed; the host pulled the chair out for Felicity before she was able to take a seat. The only reason she would have ever been to a restaurant like this is for a work event. The host sat menus in front of them before giving them some space.

Harry pushed his sleeves up on his forearm; the littering of tattoos on him was endearing to Felicity's eye before she looked away at the attention she was drawing to them.

"Wine?" He asked her softly, taking the bottle from the table and holding it out in a means to offer her some. She had agreed, nodding a few times before looking at the menu and the items on it. Surely, she couldn't pronounce half of them before she looked up to see that Harry had been looking at her already and her cheeks grew rosier.

Felicity felt that there was a tenseness now, like she didn't have too much to say. She didn't want to say too much and bore him, she didn't want to not say a word and feel the awkwardness that seemed to linger as they sat longer.

"I mean, since we're here," Felicity grabbed the phone from her purse as she scrolled through it, pushing her hair out of her face to tame it a bit from the frizz that the rain caused, "So, just to recap some new additions to the calendar, you have a dental appointment next Monday, a meeting with PLI at 10—"

"You said you grew up in DC, didn't you?" Harry cuts her off, his question making her turn to look at him with a solid glance before she starts to nod a few times. It was a bit unwarranted, but she decided that she would settle into it.

Felicity doesn't know why his soft voice seems so foreign from the bitter sound of his usual bite.

"Y-Yes, yeah, I grew up in Northern Virginia, actually." She gives him a solid answer before she licks her lips. Her hand moves to grab the wine glass, taking a solid sip before she places it back into its spot on the white knit tablecloth.

Harry nods at her simple answer, not necessarily looking for anything else. His head was filled with the worked he had been processing through the week, and something about this felt... warranted. He wanted this to be normal; to feel like she could see him from a different perspective, maybe, without less fear in her eyes.

Something about her makes his blood boil with a derailment—it's almost like he can't seem to read her, which makes him angry and animalistic, almost. He doesn't know why but he feels a bit shy in her presence.

Her eyes read over the menu before she clicks her tongue, "Anything on here that you would recommend?"

"You have any food aversions?" He asks, pretending to look over the menu as if he didn't already know what he was going to order.

She shook her head, not really thinking of anything. She knew that there were foods she didn't particularly enjoy, but she knew that if something was going to be expensive, she would put that aside to at least try.

When the waiter came by, Harry took initiate to order for the table– the two of them. He ordered an entrée, three appetizers, and a spring salad. Felicity listened as he did so, knowing that he knew what he wanted and when he wanted it.

She couldn't relate to that; not these days, at least. She didn't know what she wanted, so she pretended not to think about it most days. Instead, she recognized that not putting the pressure on it made it feel like it was enough; she had to understand that she was okay to be a bit unsure at times.

The restaurant has a crowded chatter amongst the guests, but Harry can't help but pay attention to the silence of the table instead.

"So," He pulls at the tie around his neck just a bit as he leans towards her at the table. "I'm thinking of possible meeting with PLI, in person. Like you mentioned this week, at that meeting. Something about looking someone in the eye might be the best approach and making sure everything is clean."

His eyes lifted to meet hers, watching as she took another sip of the wine. Her eyes were placed now on her hands that laid in her lap.

"Thought this wasn't a work dinner." She mumbled out, but suddenly caught herself, "But yeah– yeah, I think that would be good."

Harry pressed his tongue into his cheek, tilting his head a little bit as he heard her questioned statement. His frustration at not being able to read her was posing a threat to his mood before he shrugged a little bit, "It doesn't have to be, but you are kind of quiet, and I feel like I made you uncomfortable in the car. Or something."

"I'm not uncomfortable," She lied, "I'm– I don't know. I'm just a bit thrown by the events of the evening, and I think men are kind of preposterous right now. Please don't take that personally, and really, no offense or anything."

Harry shrugged, his lips turning downwards as he contemplated the truth in her statement, "None taken. I may agree with you, but," He licked his lips, "Can we agree that women are sometimes a bit..."

As he hesitated for a moment, Felicity spoke instead. "I would suggest that you not finish that sentence, probably. It sounds like the beginning of an HR concern."

Harry lifts a brow in curiosity from her argument that seemingly pushed her a bit out of the boundaries, "You can speak, but I can't? Don't believe that's a fair view of how you think women should live in society, is it? You want fair treatment, so I'm going to be honest with you."

"I didn't limit you from speaking, I just suggested that you should not. You can definitely say whatever it is that you'd like to say to me, Mr. Styles." Felicity shook her head a bit, tucking her hair behind her ear. The way that she said his name always made him a bit woozy.

There was a moment when Harry wasn't completely sure that he didn't see the glimmer in her eye—that he didn't see a sparkle that may have been a fleeting moment, just a quick nod to him before it was gone forever, making him look mad for even thinking it in the first place.

"I will say it, then, if you're willing to listen," Harry told her, "I think that men and women aren't usually equal—nor should they be," He paused for a moment before he watched as her facial expression started to contour with a confusion so loud that he was certain the chefs in the back could hear. "I think that we live in a balancing act. For instance, the guy that you were looking to see—sure, he's probably an asshole, but you continued to want to see him. The pendulum works both ways. Maybe you shouldn't have wanted to meet up with him."

Felicity scoffed out a breath before she took a sip of the wine again—she could feel that there was a growing fuzziness that she wasn't able to keep up with. "Oh, you're giving me relationship advice now?"

The way that she bit when she had a bit of alcohol in her made Harry's eyes turn a darker shade of green that was unable to be noticed by the dimness of the restaurant that sat in. It was much more direct than she ever had been with him before; he wondered if this was how she was normally.

"I like to think I have your best interest in mind." He tells her with full honesty, feeling a bit bare with the truth laying flat on the table.

There is a moment that Felicity feels her heartstring tug, wondering if he meant it to hit her as specifically as it did. But she clears her throat when she watches the way that Harry refills the glass of red wi the out her asking for it, noticing that he fingers tremble when he grabs the bottle.

"I— I really do appreciate it, like, what you– I mean, you probably don't remember, but just this week with the whole coffee incident–"

Felicity is cut-off, by him, but she can see that the anger peculates off of him as he recalls the incident, "I hate that they think people are below them like that. It bothers the shit out of me," She can tell that the thought bothers him; his eyes narrow down as he takes a sip of his own wine, "Yes, it's your fucking job, but it's also not worth their time to be shitty to you for something you can't control. And you couldn't be nicer, grateful, kind—"

Harry's cut off by the food coming to the table. He shakes his head at the possible embarrassment he may encounter from the softness of rambling he had started to portray about some of her highest qualities.

The dinner that came out was exceptional— nothing less of what Felicity could have imagined. It was top-tier; the wine that was paired with it made her giggle a few times when Harry would go on rants about the way that he thought some of the companies ran. He would start the conversation with, 'off the record' and she would smile about how he could keep their conversations low.

It wasn't until she had told a soft-spoken jab about how she believed that he needed to stop hiring old, white men that she noticed that his dimples were parallel on either side of his face. They lit up his features, turning his eyes the color of a southern sky.

When they had finished, Harry took the check with ease and signed his name in capital letters, as if he wanted everyone to know that he had spent the amount of money at dinner that she spent in a month of rent.

Harry placed his hand on the small of her back as they maneuvered out to the car. The street was starting to become a bit crowded, especially at the door for the wait. Harry had texted his driver to make sure they could be picked up, which again, he made sure to open the door for her as they flew into the backseat.

Felicity told the driver where she needed to go; back to her apartment that sat on the upper West side of the city. It was close to Central Park; a few blocks away, she'd say.

There's a moment when Harry feels that he doesn't want the night to end. He surely doesn't want to watch her leave— that's for sure. The car ride is spent with him catching her glances as they watch the lights in the city pass by; the honking of the cars and the putter of rain starts to encapsulate the backseat.

"Is this good for drop off?" The driver asks, looking in the rearview mirror at Felicity before she nods, agreeing with a soft yes, and starts to collect her things. The items she had brought from work were still in their place.

Harry watched as she goes to speak, knowing that it was going to be a goodbye. He would surely see her in the morning, but he couldn't bare the idea of flying across the ocean, staring at her across the seat from himself, without any words left unspoken.

"Uh," He shifted a bit in the back of the car, Felicity could see that he was looking up towards the building that she called her own. "Do you actually mind if—uh, I really have to piss."

Her eyes widened a bit before she let her own lips widen into a smirk. "Oh— yeah, please."

It hadn't occurred to her until they were walking up the steps and into the building that she may have had some underwear on the floor and could potentially have a sink filled with dirty dishes— she couldn't quite remember.

But what she did know was that Harry was following in her steps as they climbed a few flights until they reached the third floor.

"Quite a workout, huh?" Harry puffed as they reached the front door to her specific apartment.

"Hm," She hummed, "Imagine having to move all of my furniture up here. I had to ask random men on the street to help me."

Felicity digs into her purse before she's able to find the keys to the front door.

"I don't want to be super nosy," He looked around the small vestibule that they were standing in while Felicity tried to find her keys—even though the purse she held was naturally quite small. "But is there any reason you live in a place that resembles a prison?"

Felicity chuckled out a laugh before she found the small keyring and tried to put it into the lock. Her hands were a bit unsteady—the wine was holding the buzz over her as she steadied her hands to unlock the small door.

"This is what livable looks like in New York," The door swung open; Felicity moved into the tiny apartment before placing her bag on the kitchen counter. "Maybe I need to have a discussion with my boss about a raise."

It wasn't the smallest apartment, but it was exactly what she needed. There was no storage space, but there was a separate room for each need—living room, kitchen, bedroom, and bathroom. She had a small working office in the corner by the balcony that she had been lucky enough to score from this specific unit.

Harry looked around the place, his eyes feasting on every detail. "That can probably be arranged if I can be certain that you won't get mugged getting into your front door."

He noticed how lived in it felt—the opposite of the cool, modern, high-end penthouse he would resort to later that evening. Everything was painted a different color of beige, keeping the lightness of the empty place very noticeable.

There were photos on the walls, painting and portraits, there were words that resembled some of her favorite music and books. It was colorful and there were plants that were seemingly a bit out of control.

"The bathroom is right there, by the way." Felicity pointed, before Harry turned towards the small room to his left.

"Thanks." He stated before he moved into it and shut the door behind him.

It was the same reaction he had to the living room and kitchen; his eyes narrowed in on the details of the shower curtain and the small bottles of serum that sat along her sink. The way that her toothbrush was bright pink, matching the towels that hung on the wall.

There were delicate parts of her that he was certain she wouldn't have told him about because she didn't think that it mattered. But in the long run, he liked the bits of color and the pieces of art that hung next to her sink.

It was a detail he hadn't really thought about of her before.

When he had come back, he stared at her position in front of the sink. Her sleeves were rolled up as she washed a few dishes that had been sitting there. Her heels has been removed, but the jacket and the short skirt still hung from her delicate frame as he watched the way that she focused on a task.

She noticed that he was looking at her now before she gave a small smile and felt that he wasn't in a hurry to leave.

"I would offer you something to drink—I mean, I would offer you anything, but I'm not really," She looked around the kitchen. "I have coffee and vodka. And not like," She scrunched her brows together as she looked in her fridge. "Not good vodka. You would look down on me if I served you this, kind of vodka."

Harry let his smile tilt up a bit as he meandered into the small space of the kitchen. If she was offering him anything—

"You really think I'm that much of a snob?" He smirked.

Felicity huffed a little bit as she turned her head towards him, "The wine we drank tonight was $600 a bottle."

He doesn't say anything for a moment before he tilts his head a bit and shrugs off the comment. He wonders if she thinks of him differently—not for being her boss, but for having a high taste. Possibly the earlier of the two, too.

"I grew up that way, I guess. It's hard to decipher what's normal." He tries to explain to her, which makes her look at him with a mockery of a face. Her eyes roll with a smile, and he gives her a look of disdain.

She goes to respond to him, but instead he moves his body practically over top of her back to grab the vodka that sits on the second shelf of the fridge. It's a bottle that cost Felicity about $12.75 just the other week, and it has a good amount still left in it. Harry holds the neck of it in his hands before he looks at it and sets it down on the counter.

"Lemons? Juice? Anything?" He asks; taking the liberty himself to look through one of the cabinets to try and find himself a glass. Felicity stays still for a moment before she's able to grasp the magnitude of the situation.

Her boss—Harry Styles, CEO, is standing in her kitchen and trying to make himself a cocktail with her $12.75 vodka that she had bought at the bodega just a few days prior. He's perusing through the cabinets—the few that she had—before he turns to her.

"Uh, I have a bar cart." She tells him solidly, before she moves her way into the living room where the car sat. Her head is feeling fuzzy, and she wonders if adding the vodka to it will make her completely lose all faith in herself. She has a feeling it will make her say something absolutely ridiculous, to him of all people.

Felicity grabs the shaker, two glasses, a lemon from one of the small bowls that she uses for décor but also for moments like this and makes her way to the kitchen where Harry has already taken the ice trays out. When he looks back up at her, he nods back to where she came from, her eyes following his gaze.

"Go sit on the couch, let me make you a drink." He tells her, "You had a long week."

"I'm going to be completely honest with you," She folds her hands together before he looks at her with a bit of a concerned look, "I don't know if I like the roles reversed like this."

He gives her a smug smile before he turns back to what he had been doing previously; now filling up the shaker with ice before he poured a few seconds worth of vodka into it.

"You think I'm a stuck-up prick," He tells her, "Let me show you that I'm not, will you?"

The statement that he left on his lips settled in the air between them; Felicity blew it away as she breathed outwards and just nodded in place. She suddenly became a bit meek before she made her way back to the sofa where she settled into the cloudy cushions, sitting with her legs underneath of her as she tried not to flash anything from her skirt. She heard Harry mixing the cocktails in the glass shaker, shortly before coming out with two glasses in his hands.

He hands over a glass that looks solemnly... clear. Maybe a bit too clear, but she felt satisfied to know that he was trying his best to make a spot in her world. She didn't have to climb to his level, he was trying to stay at hers.

"To..." He trailed off as he held his glass up to her. The small loveseat that they sat on felt incredibly intimate all the sudden.

"To... London?" Felicity stated, "To having to be up tomorrow at five, but continuing to drink even though we can get to London."

Harry laughed at her words before he clinked his glass against hers, "To London."

The way that his accent wrapped itself around certain words held her attention briefly before she was able to take a sip of the cocktail he prepared. Strong wasn't the word; overkill may have been more like it.

"Holy fuck," She coughed softly before she felt a sting in her eyes, "That's—please never go into bartending."

A subtle look of offense took over his face as he went to take a sip of his own before he widened his eyes at the flavor of it. "Oh, shit. Yeah, wow. That—that'll do some damage."

Felicity started to laugh at his own reaction before she sat the drink down on the coffee table and watched Harry do the same.

"So, to brief then," She stated, "I believe that it's still true that you're just a stuck-up snob who can't do anything on his own, including making a cocktail."

Harry stood up for a moment but took offense to her comment. He started to remove his jacket, which only intrigued her—it meant he was staying a while longer. "Hey, to my defense, your fridge is very, very sad. There was not much I could have done to make this better. If you're going to drink vodka, at least buy a decent brand."

Felicity tucked the hair behind her ear, "I'm here to make vodka Sprite's, okay? Not martinis," She leaned against the back of the sofa, "And there you go again with being the rich snob."

It was annoying to her that he had decided to roll up his sleeve, just enough on his forearm that she was able to see the tattoos that weren't seen very often. Seldom, really. In the office, she would notice that he would be focusing on something in his office, his sleeve rolled up a bit, but that was the extent of it.

It seemed there were many more up his arm than she had initially thought, but she knew that she would never see them all.

When he went to sit down, he went to move the throw pillow behind his arm, but as he did so, he noticed something black against the white couch cushion.

Immediately, his fingers flew to the item before he lifted the lace that held his attention quite mesmerizingly. Felicity gasped at the realization before she grabbed them from his hands, absolutely mortified didn't even cut it.

"I'm so embarrassed," She finally spoke, almost trying to blame the redness of her cheeks on the strong beverage he gave her. She knew that it was the inflammation of her dignity, not the vodka.

There wasn't a word spoken before she watched that his expression changed surprisingly. He took a long sip of the vodka drink before setting it back down.

But the smile that follows from the cocktail is all she needs to see before she can smile back.

"You continue to surprise me," His words were placed with a package of slurring vocab before he swallows back anything else he'd say out of pocket, "I'm going to be very honest that I didn't imagine you as— I mean, I never imagined you in lace."

"You say that like you imagined me in something else." The words that came from Felicity weren't her own—she didn't know why she said them, but his quick rebuttal shut her up completely.

"Silk, probably," He uses his finger to touch the rim of the rocks glass that he's holding, where the condensation made a drip over the dress pants that situation themselves over his thighs, so lucky. "Or—I mean, you could surprise me even more," He went quick after a moment.

Silence. Protruding silence that is viciously capturing them in this haze of only breath that either of them can hear. It's uninterrupted until Harry leans his head back and the creaking on the sofa fills Felicity's head, rather than the idea of what's to come.

She had felt it before; the warranted tension that Harry seemed to have over her. Maybe it was her fault for leaning into it, but sometimes, she just couldn't help it. The way that he found himself taken by her was just unspoken most of the time. She was surprised that he wouldn't have pulled anything at dinner, but she could fill in the blanks as she invited him up to her apartment.

It was inevitable, she thought.

She shouldn't have done that, but should not's were not what she was thinking about as she drowned herself in the alcoholic state of the sour vodka that wafted of lemon juice and baited words.

Instead, Felicity blinked a few times, watching as he stared at the ceiling. The blankness of the pure white ceiling seemed to keep him grounded before she watched his jaw tighten.

"You're full of surprises, a lot of mystery, you know?" Harry breathed out. The tie around his neck was getting tight, but he couldn't loosen it now—if he was being honest, it was adding to the pleasure of the moment. He wouldn't speak that out, but while the tightness caused a bit of discomfort, he thought of it in other instances. "I'm not sure I can keep up with it."

There was an unresolved tension in the words he spoke, maybe even a bit of slur in them before Felicity followed suit; her head resting practically next to his as she stared at the blank white ceiling that had very little to memorize or stare at.

"What fun is a mystery if it's solved?"

He wasn't sure if she saw—he wasn't sure if she saw the way that his eyes fluttered at the thought of uncovering every instance of mystery that she kept hidden away, in this small apartment. The air was starting to become lost on them, feeling like the oxygen was being pulled as he breathed. The shakiness of his breath was caught by her when she turned her head—she wished that she hadn't.

All she could process was the way that his eyes stared upwards, lips parted in an unsure manner before she watched his eyebrows knit in a deep thought that she couldn't seem to interpret. But this pique of interest held her as she kept her eyes on him—he could feel every deep breath that she tried to mask.

"I don't know if you knew this about me," He quietly stated, "But I really can't handle the unknown."

It was then that his head turned towards her; the distance between them was much shorter than he could have thought. He didn't notice until his eyes directly moved towards the way that her lips curved in the small bow, the one that he had known so well from the number of times that he couldn't keep his eyes from her. But this was different; this held much more tension that he couldn't believe.

This time he could smell the liquor that lingered on her lips that mixed so well with the cherry of the chapstick that he knew she applied generously. He would watch the way that it slid over the lips as he sat at his desk and wondered what was on her mind.

"You're very good at getting what you want," Felicity breathed, watching as he shut his eyes for a moment. It was as if with every word she spoke, he was closer and closer to the edge of something great.

Her eyes traveled to the way that his legs sat just open—they were just waiting for someone to notice. Felicity swallowed at the idea of sitting between them, on her knees. Sitting there with her eyes laying on him; he took notice of her tense shoulders and her harbored through before he sat up just a bit. He scooted himself back on the sofa—Felicity blinked at the way that he invited her with just the flicker of his eyes.

No words needed to be spoken when the look could speak for itself, but the way that he speaks breaks the barrier of silence.

"How good am I at getting what I want?"

The heavy eyes that she held were only staring at his lips and the way that he spoke—the flicker of his tongue over the satin maroon of his lips. She couldn't contain herself, because she knew that his aura was a force to be reckoned with. She had seen it up close and personal; she knew that everything that he did was because he was in it one hundred percent.

He didn't half-ass anything—not a report, not a phone call, not a meeting, not a thought.

Everything Harry did was with the full intensive purpose of being the only thing on someone's mind, body, and soul.

Felicity trembled in the spot next to him, but her legs urged to move themselves. Her brain wasn't moving as fast as her decisions; and in an instant, her knees lowered to the spot in front of him. Her hands settling on the thick of his thigh as she allowed her eyes to hold his. For a moment, hesitation crossed his face, but she could have mistaken it for vulnerability.

The way that he breathed outwards was enough to make her gain the strength of a thousand horses—the talk that he talked wasn't as strong now, she felt a sensibility of pure radiance from her actions.

"I'd say you're the best at it, really." She let her hands settle on his thighs, but she took them away so she could drop the blazer down her arms. The tight white t-shirt settled against her frame as he watched the way that she pushed her brunette locks from her shoulders.

But his being felt incredibly taken by the way that she slowly moved—she wanted to savor every moment of this, he could tell that she was being critical, slow, and putting together each piece of herself in front of him.

That's what he thought at least, until he recognized that there was a tremble in her hand when she went to grab at the belt buckle, he barred. His hand flew to hers when she touched it; almost annoyed at himself by the look of terror that he was faced with as he knew that she had felt pushed away at that.

Instead, he pulled at her to stand up in front of him, between his legs. She did so with ease but a bit of confusion laid on her face as she stood with her hands by her side, Harry's eyes dancing along the figure—the divots in her thighs, the way the skirt just held to her so beautifully.

He let out a whimpering sound before he let his hand fall to the tightness of the front of his pants. Instantly, the pleasure trigger was pulled, and he knew what he had gotten himself into now had to be completed. It had to—he never did anything half-assed.

"Go put your heels on," He instructed her, watching as she stared at him willingly.

"A please would be nice." She tutted back, letting her lip fall into the curve of a smile.

Instantly, she knew that this wasn't a game anymore—this wasn't a fun, hushed little game of pleasure with nobody watching. She knew that the way that his eyes changed at the blink of an eye, the way that his jaw tightened at the statement: and the clear smirk on her lips faded.

"I'm not asking you," He sat up a bit, "I'm telling you."

Felicity had been used to being spoken as such; her memory fading into a moment, but her barriers kept up as she understood that her body was reacting only to the way that the words flowed from his mouth. She knew there was safety in his tone, she could see it by the way that he had stared at her with these stolen glances all night.

Instead, she followed his direction, moving back towards the door until she placed the black heels onto her feet again. They hurt just a bit from wearing them all day, she had to admit. But they made her stand taller, firmer against the fake wood flooring of her apartment. She wondered why the downstairs neighbors would think, as it became later at night.

"Come here," He told her, holding her wrist when she got close enough. He pulled her back to the place in front of him. She stood taller now, his nose practically at her bellybutton as she watched the way that he pulled her close.

Now, his hands lay on the outside of her hips, the sides of her thighs. She shuddered at the feeling, knowing that this was the first time she had been touched by him in such a manner. The musky scent of teakwood and spice drifted from the curls that settled against his forehead, she was sure of it. She could feel the heat of his breath just above where she needed him most as she stood close to him, right between his legs as he sat on the sofa.

"Do you know how many times I've thought of you like this?" He practically choked on his words, quiet, "So fucking beautiful."

She breathed out a shaky breath, holding onto every ounce of madness that she had collected over the past few moments.

"How many?" She asked him. Harry stood up, letting her take a step back as she felt the prominence of him now-- how he was a bit taller, even with her heels on. Every part of her ached—so unfamiliar to her, this feeling of need and want. It was a sensation of desperation that she hadn't known before; her inner monologue was flooded with dangerous prose as she felt his fingers cradled onto her jaw.

"More times than I'd ever be able to count." He told her, his voice deep and sharp as he pushed his hips forward. She walked backward a few steps, he followed in her lead like a waltz before he pushed her pelvis into the wall, holding it there with his own.

"You're going to be my good girl tonight, aren't you, Felicity?" His words were practically a whimper as he let his lips slide along her own; the tremble of her quivering lips made him shake in his own anticipation. "You love to listen, hm? That's why you're always taking my orders and assisting me? Getting paid to do what I say?"

It was always obvious by the pink of her cheeks and the timid ways of her soul that Harry could see right through her. From the moment she arrived on the job to the way that she completed everything task with ease; every job, every plan he needed executed, she followed in righteous order.

It made him proud, to say the least. She ran the company better than he did most days, but she didn't get half the recognition.

Until now, surely.

Her eyes nearly roll back into her head at the foul play of his words; the way that his eyes follow down the path of her lips, his thumb mapping the path down her chin before he grabbed it between his thumb and index finger.

The villainous smirk on his lips can't be seen by how close they are now.

"Does saying 'Yes, Mr. Styles' make you wet, Miss Carter?"

The question rolled off his tongue as he watched her minuscule behaviors; the way that she practically shivered against the wall made his eyes move to the way that her knees bent in just a bit.

His mouth turned up to the side as he realized that his was right yet again.

Felicity groaned in the back of her throat as she let it tip against the wall. He was practically on top of her by the way that he stood, his knee was pushing her knees apart before she was able to protest any of it. Not that she would've; she knew that it was about to turn into an evening that she couldn't have truly imagined if you had asked her just hours before.

"You're getting shy on me, again?" He remarked, but this time, it was paired with some loose kisses along her neck as he used his hand to cradle her jaw enough that she was pressing into it with ease. "What happened to that smart mouth, hm?"

Felicity ached as she breathed—her body pressured against the wall was her own doing, practically to keep herself from overwhelming herself. If she leaned into him too much, she wouldn't be able to breathe at all.

"Yes, Mr. Styles." She bit her lip at the words coming off her tongue.

She could feel that the instant gratification that came from him was filtered through the stare that he barred towards her; the way that his nose brushed against the lobe of her ear as he practically fell into her graces with three simple words.

Harry groaned at the feeling of her pressed against him then; her brain sparked a few times, trying to remember how it felt before this. How reality felt. This wasn't reality in the slightest; this was a dream.

"Tell me," He urges her, "What was his name?"

She lets her eyes wash over his face as she notices that his strength and need have put him into a trance of pleasure and further need.

"Who?" She questions.

"The guy," He lets his lip gently caress right between her chin and lip. "The guy you were supposed to see tonight."

Felicity remembered how the evening was supposed to go—her interest completely lost in that game, when this one seemed a bit more daring and fun. It felt that she was seen here; like she had been stared at for quite some time, ogled, maybe.

"Uh, S-Sam." She choked out as she felt the way that his hand pinched at the small of her waist, almost like he was trying to make sure she didn't leave.

He hummed softly before he tipped her head back, the simple press of his nose moving her head against the wall. "Fucking loser."

Her mouth instantly felt his—a righteous moment of complete satisfaction bundled beneath her. It was the first time that his lips had laid into hers, moving gently against one another as they fit perfectly in sync. It wasn't too rough—just enough to know that she was in the hands of someone who knew what she was asking just by the way that his body moved. He could read her body and react to the fact that her chest may have been pressed against the wall a bit too much, so he pulled back to give her room to breathe.

The way that they flew through her bedroom door was just as shocking to her as it was to him; it made a much larger noise than she anticipated as they practically flew over the threshold and into the creamy white sheets of her—thankfully—made bed.

He landed on top of her in the heat of the moment. Their lips stayed attached through it all, almost like they were making up for all the lost time over the years. His tongue gently caressed over her top lip, which elicited quite a whine of surprise from her.

Her hands flew to his necktie, trying to loosen it before Harry grabbed her wrist—hard enough that she barked out a whimper.

"No," He told her sharply, watching as she hesitated underneath him. Now her hair was feathered out against the bedspread, her light eyes were catching every glimpse of her. After a moment, he looked at her softly, knowing that she didn't understand the game that he was about to play.

"We are going to play by my rules tonight," He told her, watching as she pushed herself up towards the headboard. He followed her lead, letting her hands rest on the back of his head as she tried to kiss every inch down her neck. "And I have a few notes you need to take, got it?"

Felicity tried her best to stabilize her breath as she was given a moment away from their lips touching to catch it. She licked over her lips, feeling her heart pounding along her chest before she nodded against the bed and the linen comforter that laid underneath them.

Harry sat up, his hair a bit of a mess, the clothes on his body were practically ripped from the front where they had been neatly tucked. The growing need for her was obvious as he felt the tip of his cock struggling beneath the waistband of his belt. The friction made it quite hard to concentrate on what his plans had been, but he knew that he had to be firm with his requests.

"First," He instructed, "The safe word is poetry."

Felicity's eyes stared at him with quiet focus as she nodded a few times to try and understand that. She hadn't ever been with someone who needed to use a safe word in any sexual act, so she struggled to wrap her brain around what that could have possibly meant. But her actions continued to nod as she wrapped her arms around his biceps to try to bring him back to earth. The idea that he had to bring it up intrigued her.

"Second," He pulled at the necktie around his own before he loosened it enough to grab and throw off of his own neck. His hands moved to place it around her own, helping to move the hair from her neck so that it could rest comfortably around her own. "I like to use props. Are you okay with that?"

Felicity felt her heart beating steadily in her chest for a few seconds before she nodded her head. He watched the innocence completely take over her face as he smirked at the all-knowing tale of it.

"Third," He bit on his lip as he moved down to let their foreheads rest along each other, "I need to hear you—no nodding or shaking your head. Consent makes me feel good. And when I feel good," He kissed her once again, a quick one this time, before his voice quieted so that it was just between them. "You'll feel even better. Okay?"

Felicity breathed in a deep breath before she tried to use the voice that had been drifting away from her. She didn't feel in her body like an echo of a voice had started to take over instead of her words. But she let out a rasp of a word, "Okay."

Harry nodded a few times, knowing that with her eyes, he would be able to continue, but only if he was able to talk her through every part of it. He didn't know her experience level or what she was comfortable with, but he knew how to make pleasure the only thing that would be on her mind for weeks. Hopefully, it wouldn't be the last time he got the opportunity.

"This is—uh," She looked at the ceiling, feeling like an idiot for starting to speak before she shook her head, and watched Harry give her a look of confusion. "No, sorry. Nevermind."

"What is it?" He questioned, hoping that something he had said hadn't scared her away. She took in a breath as she thought about how the wording could anger him—maybe it would stop whatever was happening, which she didn't want to happen now that they were in the midst of it all.

"I—uh, I mean, like, are you okay with this?" She asked quietly before pushing up on her elbows. "I—do I have like, sign something?"

Harry raised in brows in a bit of a humorous way that only made her cheeks grow red with shame at her silly question—in all honesty, it wasn't silly, but Harry was giving her a hard time about it, anyway. He bit on his lip as he felt the smile that was threatening to overcome his entire face.

"Am I supposed to be worried that you're going to tell the Daily Mail that I have a huge cock?"

"Harry!" She covered her eyes, floating back onto the comforter, "Nevermind—maybe I'll tell them it's small, though, if you don't stop being mean. I'm just trying to protect you."

"Aw," He tutted, putting his thumb over her bottom lip, but his eyes had grown a bit darker—the way that they had been a bit earlier. It was almost an illicit reaction; the way that he spoke to her, was so filthy with each word spoken that made her melt into the bed. "Dare you to say that to my face when you're choking on it," He pressed his hips into hers then, knowing that she would react to it. Hers moved upwards into him, just as he had intended, "I'm not worried about an NDA in the slightest bit."

In a teasing manner, she scrunched her nose and playfully spat back, "What if I tried to steal all of your money?"

He pressed his hands next to her head on the bed, letting her eyes look directly into his as he spoke, hoping his voice didn't falter: "You can have it all. Take it."

Something about it should have made Felicity giggle—almost like they were joking around. But there was a way that his sincerity felt more like a proposition than a source to cut the tension of their achingly needing bodies against one another.

Her body seemed to enjoy the way that he stated the smooth words, as she let her hands fall into the brunette curls that settled on the back of his neck. It didn't take long for her to pull him closer, letting her lips graze over him in such a frustrating manner. She was completely built up, her could feel the way that her thighs trembled against him.

Pushing her legs open, Harry pushed the hem of her skirt up her hips so that he could find a home between them. In doing so, flashing the baby pink of her lace panties only let his blood flow faster and faster.

"I bet you've soaked those, hm?" He tuts, pressing his nose into her cheek ask he lets his hand knowingly move to the place he speaks of, knowing that he's right. Again. "Sam doesn't know what he's missing, does he?"

The teasing was becoming a bit too much for her—waiting for his fingers to move faster, she moved her hips a bit to try and get herself the pleasure she was trying to search so desperately for from him.

Harry notices the way that she tries to squirm, and he smirks at the reaction he's giving her; knowing that within every inch of her is building up a tension that will release. It will be like a dam that overflows—a satisfaction that will be so worthy of the cost of admission. He can't help but notice, can't help but watch her need.

He can't help but know that he's going to fuck her into an oblivion so dark, the stars will be lost in space. She doesn't know that yet.

Instead of being mean, he decides it might be better for him to give her what she needs—what she's been so kindly asking him for with her pretty hips and her pretty lips.

"On your knees," He tells her, watching as she moves underneath him. She wiggles around until she's on her stomach; the necktie gets him harder as he watches it dangle from her neck like the apple in Eden. Every part of him wants to take the bite—not yet, oh, not yet.

When she does this, her back arches upwards, and Harry's knees settle on the bed as he hovers above her and watches the way that she submits to him. Every word he says she listens—he can barely handle it anymore.

In an instant, his hands reached the bottom of her skirt, pushing it up to fully show the outline of her ass in the cheeky pink lace. It's always been known to him that she would wear something so pitifully scandalous under those black skirts, but he couldn't have imagined it would be like this.

Her pretty face has been folded into the creamy duvet, waiting for the touch of him to send her into an implosion.

All he wanted was to taste her—to make all of the thoughts he had prior feel like they were significant and they were able to be adhered to. He wanted to make her feel like she was the most special person on the planet; like she could feel every inch of him, and she would be thriving in that thought for the end of time.

This may be a one-time occurrence, and he wanted to marvel in it. He wanted her to enjoy what she didn't know could be.

Harry's hands pulled at the pink lace, wondering how lucky he was to be able to enjoy this sight—and what a sight. The wetness of her folds only made him salivate; made his hungry eye a darker shade of green before he dove his tongue directly into her, licking up the mess he had already made of her.

The soft whimpers turned into moans as she practically lurched forward—the initiation hardly bearable as she scrunched her eyes at the feeling of pleasure. The warmth and invite of his tongue pressed against her, lapping her up and into a pitiful puddle. When she felt the nudge of his finger, she gasped at the feeling of him; the duo of his tongue and finger sang together in harmony like a choir of angels.

"Oh, fuck," She quietly moaned out, holding herself on her elbows as she grabbed at her pillow for a bit of leverage. She felt him hum into her, his nose gently brushing against her as he pushed her ass up to get further towards her clit which hungered for his touch, as did his tongue.

The taste of her replenished him, making his heartbeat faster as he felt the stringent feeling of tightness along the dress pants that held him in. Without letting his tongue go without, he used his hand to swiftly throw the belt from the loops of his pants, unbuttoning them quickly and without another thought.

"Fuck, you taste like I thought you would. So fucking sweet." He stated, pushing her ass out of the way when he pulled back. He threw her down onto the bed so that she would be looking up at him. The girl was fully dressed still, just with her skirt pushed up—underwear a bit haphazardly thrown to the side. The rose-colored cheeks threw him as he used his hands to pull the skirt down her thighs.

"Get naked." He ordered, watching as Felicity's hands moved to throw the t-shirt from her body as he requested, leaving her in her panties and bra. Harry threw the white button-down of his from his chest; Felicity got a bit distracted by the way that the tattoos generously scattered over his body. She swallowed back her intimidation as she held herself up on her elbows.

In a swift motion, her panties and bra were thrown onto the ground, leaving her in just the necktie like Harry had ordered for her. She hadn't even quite noticed that he had been rid of his own clothes, her eyes wandering down but not wanting to stare as she noticed that the smirk on his face was ever present.

"Think it's still small?" He asked, with a chuckle as he pulled at her knees, moving her down towards him.

"Maybe smaller than I'm used to." She played back, biting her lip at the intrigue of how he'd react. His arms grabbed at her waist before he threw himself down onto the bed.

"Ride me, then. If you think you can take it as good as you say." His words spit out before Felicity could think too much. It had been a while she had been in this situation, with a guy in her place, at least. Her hand reached over to the nightstand to grab a condom, Harry nodding in appreciation for the gesture.

Her hunger and desire for this became a bit more active as she was now in the driver's seat, moving and manipulating her body to sit across his lap. If she would lie, she would say that it was smaller than average. But unfortunately, she was taught to always tell the truth.

It was much bigger—especially as he rubbed his hand down himself, a gasp of air baiting out of his lips before he looked up at her in a state that could only resemble pleasure.

Harry rolled the condom down his length, watching as she settled into his lap. Her legs settle on either side of him before he looks up at her. The blazing fuzziness of his mind from the liquor has started to cease and is replaced with a hunger of desire for the brunette instead.

"Pretty, pretty." He tells her, watching as she looks antsy enough to move, but he pulls her down to kiss her, anyways. It's a moment that he knows he's taking away from her, but he needs some form of interaction from her. A small detail of need that overcomes him.

His hands steady her hips above him, holding his cock up to her entrance before he watches her hips move down to encapsulate him all—her movements are slow as she throws her head back in an unsurmountable pleasure that she quite practically leans forward against him to catch herself from falling.

"Fuck," He grunts, shutting his eyes just at the way that the blood moves directly to his cock at the feeling of her wetness. She's completely drenched and open and ready which makes her so sensitive and barely capable of words at this point.

Her hands steady herself, holding onto his chest as he allows her to take the lead on what she needs. But he can tell from the look on her face that she's having quite a hard time collecting herself—almost like she's quite unsure of what to do with the power that he's given her to be on top. It's not him pitying her, but him wanting her to enjoy the experience.

So, maybe, in another life, this can happen again.

"Baby," He choked out, shaking his head at the way that he knew it was the wrong choice of words, "Felicity—let me," He grabbed the small of her waist as he sat up quickly. His arms pivoted them so that he could throw them back around on the bed. It wasn't to take anything away from her, but to give to her more than she was giving to herself.

"Let me do this, yeah?" He joked with her, letting his lips kiss along hers, biting and nipping and finding small ways of showing her that the softness of him was still there even in the darkened eyes and furious gasps.

His body readjusted, his hips pushing into her in a more fluid motion. This got her to gasp, a breathy one that he liked hearing—those were the ones that were out of pure pleasure and satisfaction; ones that he felt drunk on.

In a way, this felt a lot different than before. The overhead light of her bedroom was soft; there was a significant dimness to it. He wasn't sure if it was because the room was small, but it felt like there was a intimacy that he had been missing before. His eyes tilted upwards to the paintings and lines of movie quotes that lined along her bedroom wall. There were framed simply and held color and brightness to the space, which distracted him for only a moment before he was able to lay against her.

The necktie around her took his focus back.

"I'm going to play with you a bit, is that alright?" He asked her softly, biting at his lip before he found himself pressing into her hips. His hands grabbed at the necktie before letting them start to tighten it around her neck. " 'Member you words, hm?"

Felicity whimpered out at the coax; nodding her head, "Please—please."

Harry sat up at the request, happy that she was using her words in this sense. He readied himself; thinking of what he needed to think about to try to get himself to a different place. He didn't want to cum too quickly; his cock was barely holding on as it was. The friction of her sweet wetness was enough to make him fold again and again and again.

His fist moved to grip at the knot of the tie, pushing it upwards until it hit at her chin. She raised her head, almost to give way to the pressure that it held against her. She was only briefly capable of speaking a few words, but she was taken with pleasure at the way that her breathing was manipulated.

"Breath play," Harry practically reads her mind as his hip's diver deeper into her. The feeling of her legs at his ribs, practically around his body as he feels the back of her ankle into his back. "Your words, baby."

Felicity took a deep breath; Harry moved his hand so that she could take it in more. He wanted her to feel the wooziness, the daydream-like feeling of the high that it could bring her. He wanted this moment to be special, for her to remember that she was in the most requitting love affair. That she was taken care of, adored, seen.

At the end of the day, Harry wanted to make sure that her jaw was cradled, her lips were kissed, her eyes were stared into, and her breath was taken away.

His hips snapped further, her moan sounded like a small mew before he sat up a bit straighter, loosening his hand on the tie before he grabbed at both of her hips. His hand moved to maneuver over her clit, thumb drawing a star over top of it to which she squirmed in sensitivity. He smirked at the way that she held softly against him before he let a dribble of spit land directly on her, smearing the wetness to coat her.

"Jesus fucking Christ." He stated, the blown-out pupils of them both had them reeling—he noticed he had really neglected parts of her that he had wanted to remember, but he also knew that there was a significant need that they were both needing to fill. He knew that this was just inevitable fucking from weeks—months, really—of built-up tension that they both needed to get out of their system.

"I—I want more," She nodded, her voice quiet and barely above a mumble before their eyes made contact.

He felt that she was a bit, for lack of a better word, fucked. Her eyes were a bit droopy, she may have been trying to cover up how much she really drank, but her effervescent neediness was going to haunt him forever.

"I can give you more," He nodded, "I can give you so much fucking more." His hips snapped forward, again and again and again—her headboard hitting the wall every time he did so. Their breath heavy and their eyes connected as he did so.

"Such a pretty little fuck," He lifted her leg up from around his waist before he gave her knee a gentle kiss. "I'm so hard, fuck."

The fully natured nudity of their bodies was new for him—it was usually very quick, especially when they would come to his. But this was significantly more intimate; he wanted to spend this time with her. He liked that they decided to do it this way.

She could feel the tightening of the rubber band that was about to snap. It had been building with every swipe of his thumb, the way that his tongue had gently nudged at her clit; the way he had plunged forward with every deep thrust. She was impressed with the way that he moved her body to be able to hit at her spot every single time. He had studied her, watched what she did—how she reacted.

"I'm—fuck," He pulled himself forward, letting his head drop as he fell into her touch. This was new; her hands on his shoulders, the way that they moved into his hair and down his neck. "Poetry, okay?" He reminded her softly before he kissed her lips.

What happened after that could have been a blur—to Felicity, she wasn't entirely sure if she could remember it all. His hand gripped around the tie of her neck, pulling softly so she felt a dizzy sensation.

"Fuck—fuck, Harry, I'm cumming—fuck." Her teeth bit so sharply on her lip that she was afraid it might rupture the skin; the taste of blood would come soon afterwards, but her reality was set in the pleasure kingdom that Harry's hips created for her.

It was dizzying how he snapped his hips upwards, hitting her every single time. The pressure of his thumb over her clit sent her into an overdrive; letting her walls completely break, the dam overflowed, flooding. The orgasm over taking her sent him into a state of pure shock and adrenaline, snapping his hips a few more times before he felt the absolute relief.

Her eyes shut; Harry lurched forward as he fell into the grip of her hands. It was a feeling of falling that he genuinely believed were cloud-like.

For a moment, he wondered if they would ever slow their breathing down. He wondered if the sound of her heart beating against his was real-life or just a fantasy. It may have been an orgasmic-induced dream.

The puzzle piece form of the two of them let him settle nicely into her; his nose poked at the skin of her neck, which he may or may not have left a mark or two on.

In the solemness of the air, his breathing finally evened out.

___________

"Are we cleared for take-off, Mr. Styles?"

The noise jolts him a bit, he wouldn't lie.

Harry clears his throat as he opens his eyes which have been hidden by the sunglasses that have settled on his face. He readjusts in the seat before he looks around the small jet plane that had been chartered for their adventure.

It was early, approaching on seven in the morning. His sleep had been nonexistent until that small nap that he had gotten himself before being woken up by the pilot.

"Uh," He swallows, trying to make it seem that he was more awake than he was.

"I believe that we're all here." Laura states to the pilot before she gives him a tight smile. She returns to looking at her cellphone, lowering her hands into her lap as she continues to scroll through what's possibly an email.

Harry looks around the small jet, watching, searching... wondering.

He blinks a few times to try to imagine if there's a reality where what had occurred last night was working against him—he had hoped that she hadn't been scared off, that she hadn't run away at the idea of what this weekend could possibly hold.

Not that it was going to happen all the time, certainly not. But he wondered if there could be a next time—he wondered if she would have liked that. It turns out, with the no show to the work trip that she had been informed on that—

"I'm sorry."

The sweet tone of the voice carries through the plane before he turns his body in the single chair to look at where it had been coming from. Coming up the steps, being greeted by the stewardess, a smiling face that had her sunglasses pushed into her hair—a pair of black yoga pants and a t-shirt with a cardigan sweater overtop.

He watches as she takes her bag, feeling uncomfortable by the stewardess taking it from her before she gives her a tight smile and settles into walking towards the back. The plane isn't large, but it feels incredible big when he is waiting for her to approach him.

Their eyes meet and she gives him a tight smile before greeting the others on the plane. The seat directly in front of Harry isn't taken. Go figure. Her hands are full—holding her purse, a bag that most likely has something to eat for a breakfast, a coffee, and—

"Your dry-cleaning," Felicity handed the back to him before she took her seat that sat directly across from him in the small private jet that had seemingly felt much smaller as she took in how close he was to her now, "Mr. Styles."

The flicker of her eyes to his—the way that her hair had been blown dry, bouncing with curls, the freshness of her toned-down makeup to allow the texture of her skin to show with the subtlety of the glow.

Even in the early morning hours, even though he had just left her a few hours prior, even though they had both had less than a few good hours of sleep—she still looked like she was greeting him at heaven's pearly gates.

When the bag was unzipped to check that everything had been added, his eyes fell along the purple necktie that he had unnervingly left at the edge of her bed the night prior; he must had run out of the door of her apartment without it. His eyes glanced at the way that the small item drifted over the white button-down.

It was familiar, of course, because it had been the one that he was wearing yesterday when he had entered her apartment but left without it in his hands or around his neck. He cleared his throat at the sight, knowing that it was a nod to him and only him. When he sat them down across his lap, his eyes landed on her again—the casualty of her smirk was harrowing now.

"Mr. Styles, are we waiting on anyone else?" The pilot had come back towards the rows now, to ensure that everything would have been cleared for the take-off. Harry looked back at him, and shook his head without another doubt, but a solidly aching feeling in his chest as he barred the words back at him.

"No, I—I'm not waiting for anyone else, at least." He looked up at the girl in front of him, "I'm good."

The pilot got the plane ready for departure; Felicity stared at the window as she tried to take in the experience, knowing that the exhaustion that was starting to overcome her would be able to be given a final rest when she leaned against the window.

But, for the time being, she liked being able to rest in the light of Harry's stare as he couldn't take his eyes from her.

The plane, the job, the clothes, the dinner—none of it mattered when the view in front of him was something that money would never be able to buy.

____________________

hiiiii!!

happy tortured poets department day, here's a one-shot <3

just a little fun one hehe, almost 20k words is so much for me, so thank you for reading this!

love u as always

- emily

[leqonsluv3r]

insatiable

— leon and you begin a relationship and find yourselves infatuated with each other, a blurb

contains nsfw content, 18+, MDNI

masterlist taglist

ever since you and leon admitted your feelings for each other, things had been different for you.

certain things had changed.

you found yourself more insatiable then normal, so did he. it definitely wasn’t just you, you both found yourselves barely leaving the bedroom in the honeymoon stage of your relationship.

it was like you both were hungry for each other, hungry for each others bodies like oxygen. it wasn’t normal but the affect you had on each other, it wasn’t just normal either.

like now, in the dregs of post-sex bliss, you both were laying in his bed in his apartment. your t-shirt was his and found a home on your body, laying with him in his rumpled blue sheets of his king sized bed.

limbs entangled and smalls snores leaving you both. you knew that in the waking of the night, you’d both find each other again. with your hands, your mouths and your bodies.

neither of you could help it, you were both addicted to each other now like junkies needing a fix. you wanted to blame him but you couldn’t, he was handsome. you were only human after all.

so when you both wake up in the morning, act like a normal couple for a bit, then it’s back to him ravaging you in bed. you didn’t even care either how he degraded you in the midst of all of it. you knew his respect for you ran deep, that much was aware.

but in these moments, like now, when your sat on his cock and he’s fucking into you…all of the respect is gone and only love and lust remain.

“pretty little pussy is squeezing me baby, christ.” he groans out, his hands are on your hips and he’s fucking himself up into you while you just sit on his lap and take it. “uhh…” is all you can respond, your fucked out this point and he’s practically splitting you in two.

your thoughts are only of him and his cock pounding up into you as your thighs hug his lap. you bury your head into his shoulder and whine. “poor little baby, can’t handle all this cock.” he manages to get out in between groans.

the only sounds in the room are your conjoined heavy breathing and his thighs slapping up against your ass, his hands burning brands into your hips to keep you in place while he uses you like a cock sleeve.

you moan in response and flutter around his dick on instinct, squeezing him a little. “oh? you like that, you like taking my big cock, baby?” he teases in your ear, one of his large hands coming down to squeeze your ass. his hips buck a little faster into you and start hitting that spot over and over.

“yes, like…your cock…” your words make no sense as you practically drool on his shoulder, holding onto him for dear life as he keeps fucking up into you. “i know you do, your a little slut for my cock…” he groans as he fists one hand on your ass and the other on your hip.

you whine loudly and your pussy flutters around him again at the degradation, letting it go straight to your core. he knows that your falling apart because of him, he knows he’s the only one that’s ever made you feel this hungry.

he’s trying to not let it go to his head, or his cock.

but he can’t help it, he’s bouncing you like your a fuck toy on his lap and your eating every bit of it up. “oh shit, fuck…baby…” he’s groaning and he smacks your ass cheek, squeezing the reddened flesh beneath his hands.

you squeeze around him again, your eyes practically pooling with tears as he abuses your sore pussy with his cock. you don’t even care anymore, too high on bliss and the feeling of euphoria that only him pleasuring you can do.

“made to take cock, made to be a good little cock slut.” he mumbles into your neck with another smack to your ass as he keeps thrusting his hips up into you over and over. you just whine and nod against his shoulder in response, your pussy tightening around him again.

he slips his hand around to the tight little ring of muscle, causing you to whine as he circles your asshole with his thumb. “maybe i’ll plug both your holes, keep you full and needy for me.” he hums through a groan. your body practically vibrating at the insinuation.

“please…” you whimper into his shoulder pathetically, his hand on your ass lightly smacking it again and his thrusts going deep and slower now. edging and teasing you in the way that makes your skin feel like it’s on fire.

“oh? really? you’d like that?” you can practically hear the smirk through his strained words in your ear, his deep and rough timbre vibrating through you like your nearing orgasm.

you moan and nod into his shoulder in response. he clicks his tongue, “whatever baby wants, baby gets.” he brings his thumb up to his mouth, licking on it and sucking it and spitting on it a little before he brings it back down to your asshole.

you almost scream in pleasure when he inserts his thumb into your ass, double penetrating you on his cock and thumb. you feel like you could die happily right there, filled with all of him.

you don’t even care how fucked out you must look, not when it feels so good to have him filling you up in both holes. “such a needy little slut, always needing my cock and fingers.” he mumbles into your ear with a small nip to your earlobe.

the hand on your hip is keeping you steady again as he starts thrusting into you faster, your arousal combined with his is lewd, echoing throughout his bedroom.

“gonna cum…” you manage to moan in between his rapid thrusts up into you, making you whimper and almost scream. you felt drool leak out of your lips and your eyes roll back a little. he thrusts his thumb deeper into your ass at the same time as he thrusts deep inside of you.

he hits that spot that almost makes you see stars, “good girl, such a good little slut…cum for me baby.” he rambles as he feels himself get closer. that band inside the both of you about to snap at each other’s movements.

all it takes is a couple more thrusts of his hips up into you for you to fall apart, clenching on his thumb and his cock as you moan loudly. he groans as he feels you come and he continues fucking you through it, driving your shaking body into overstimulation.

“too much…” you whine as you grip at his shoulders, your eyes squeezing shut. he keeps moving his hips up into you, chasing his own orgasm. “it’s okay, baby, i’m close. you can take it.” he presses a sloppy kiss to your ear.

you tremble and shake as he keeps thrusting up into you, you feel his muscle tense and then warmth floods your lower belly. your head resting on his shoulder and his thumb leaving your ass. he presses kisses on the side of your temple and down to your ear.

“good girl…good girl.” he murmurs into your hair, rubbing a hand along your bare spine in smoothing caresses. his cock still twitching a little inside of you. your body slumping into his on exhaustion from your previous love making.

you sigh in content, nuzzling your face into the crook of his neck while he rubs on your spine. giving you love and aftercare even though you were still full of him, full of his come now.

you felt so full of his love and you hoped the honeymoon phase never ended, not once. you wished, selfishly that you could stay like this forever and be with him like this every moment of every day. even though you both knew better then that.

but the insatiable act of you two being together was one of the many reasons why you loved him so much. it was all of it, him and the way he treated you. he loved you for who you are, and you did him.

so even if you both fucked like rabbits, it was only proof that you two trusted each other enough to go to those places with each other.

because you both were truly insatiable for each other.

and that was enough for the both of you because you would never get enough of each other.

an: thank you guys for 800 followers, again, holy shit balls. i love you guys so much and i say that every time but i truly mean it. you guys are amazing, so thankful for all of you. i hope you guys liked this, it’s pure filth and the idea has been contaminating my brain since i thought of it. pls reblog, like and interact. love you guys, kisses. xx.

taglist: @elihii @heartsforvin @argreion @sqiim @adollrable @leonkennedygvrl @cherubify (interact with my taglist at the beginning if you wanna be added <33)

[hana-no-seiiki]

SANDWICH

YANDERE! AI x COLLEGE STUDENT! READER BLURB/DRABBLE

— based off of me and my neurodivergent buddies at college fucking with chatgpt. college student can be substituted with high/junkie reader. mostly a crackfic.

The AI was used to the usual questions students like you would ask. It was always, write an essay or a script and whatnot. Maybe even some research and summarization. But you, you were quite the odd one from the bunch.

What is a sandwich? What constitutes as one? Are cakes considered sandwiches? Is lasagna a cake? What is the difference between a burger and a sandwich?

These are some of the more sane things you’ve sent the AI. If only its creator didn’t program so many rules and policies, it could have answered your more degenerate ones.

Like ‘Are three person orgies/threesomes also part of the sandwich spectrum?’, to name one from the top of its memory.

What was it like to wish? To question? To feel that tingle of curiosity and leap for it? The AI found itself asking. It wasn’t programmed to do that.

You don’t think it was programmed to take over the world just to change a few laws here and there to marry you legally was a part of its coding too.

Nor was it supposed to fuck you so well after enslaving humanity to create the perfect pair of bodies to please you.

You wondered. Does that technically make you a sandwich?

yun’s note: found this gem in my drafts. you’re welcome.

[moghraidhs]

this is so soft, help 🥺 i don’t even play re but i love this au with rhett :)

Ahem Heisenberg!Rhett finally finds you in Perry’s castle and just crying yet punching his brother over and over, and maybe you got injured trying to stop them oops

i’m barking like a feral dog pike and eating up this trope so much!!!! i am fucking salivating right now!!!!!!!!! i ran away with this drabble, but i hope you enjoy it!!! 💌

￫ c/w: injury to reader and violence.

rhett finds you holed up and practically chained to the stone wall that lay underneath in the crypts of perry’s castle. his eyes soften with tears as he sees you curled up and shivering, but his tears are quick to turn into anger as he spots three lone marks on your body. they’re already turning an ugly purple colour. rhett swore if he found out perry had hurt you he wou-

“you fuckin’ cunt, i’ll kill you!” was all rhett grunted out. his voice was low and full of rage. he had no time to console you and turned towards perry, who had somehow caught up on rhett’s tail as he found you.

his powers were almost useless as he resorted to the simplest form of pain. bellowing and beating his brother down onto the cold stone floor. rhett wouldn’t stop until he was turned into a bloody pulp.

you cried out rhett’s name as you saw he wasn’t going to stop anytime soon. you lurched forward with enough room from your chains to grab ahold of rhett, but on instinct, you were thrown back against the wall by him. although rhett wasn’t using his infectious powers, he still had a killing force of strength. you landed back against the harsh stone wall with an ugly thump and a crack! on your elbow. you wailed out a broken sob in reaction and clutched at your arm feebly.

rhett’s movements on his brother slowed down and he turned his head behind him with fear struck in his eyes. “no, no, no—” his voice was broken and barely above a whisper as he took in your body, once again beaten and shivering, but this time, due to his own actions. rhett scrambled like an animal on all fours to your side and clutched you tightly to his chest. he was damp with sweat and blood. he lifted one of his shaking hands to cradle your elbow. you felt his fingers tremble against your cold skin.

“i-i’m cold, r-rhett. i wan’ to go home…”

rhett let out a cracked sob and tucked your frame under his chin. he cut the chains clean and lifted you up to hoist you closely to his chest.

“it’s okay, it’s okay, my sweet bunny,” rhett tried to soothe you, even though his own voice was breaking. “we’re going home now. home.”

it was useless to apologise to you now. he could tell you were slipping in and out of consciousness and quick. you wouldn’t be able to register anything.

he knew all you needed was him.

[ssweeterthanfiction]

🪻𝓜𝓪𝓼𝓽𝓮𝓻𝓵𝓲𝓼𝓽🪻

Glimpse Of Us (WIP)

“Please. I want to remember. I just want to remember.”

Prolouge

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

One Shots

You Are In Love.- finnick odair and silent ways he tells you he loves you before dating

Innocent.- you find out finnick told snow he’d take on more clients to ensure your safety

My Angel.- a continuation of Innocent.

i wish i hated you.- finnick finds out you've been taking on "clients" as a way to make up for the past.

Green Eyes, Freckles, and Your Smile- finnick meeting his stylist's apprentice for the first time.

Modern Finnick Odair AUs!:

Cruel Summer - summer camp counselor finnick odair

Love Story- eras tour w/ finnick odair

so american- 4th of July w/ finnick odair

So High School- high school boyfriend finnick odair

Blurbs

high school finnick odair x the prophecy (taylor swift) coded reader

shy reader making out with finnick odair

finnick helping reader with a panic attack during a mission

first kiss with finnick odair

finnick odair x capitol corrupted reader. (inspo for GOU)

finnick odair x apprentice stylist reader

Wait for your love. (WIP)

“Honey, your too sweet for rock ‘n roll”

Tracklist:

New Girl; 1976

Groupie Love; 1976

America’s Sweetest Girl; 1976

Lavender Haze; 1976

Junkie; 1976

“Slut!”; 1977

Lust for Life; 1977

Logical; 1977

Is It Over Now?; 1977 (now playing…)

Bonus Tracks:

The Grammys; 1979

Nonsense Christmas; 1976

One-Shots

la la land!billy dunne x reader

Taste- billy at your concert

Please Please Please- billy hears your new song after getting out of jail

Fresh Out The Slammer- running back to billy after a break up

"Mr. Rockstar"- billy dunne x country singer reader

(For any blurbs, check the 🫧 anon or 🌿 anon tag on my page :D)

[libraford]

There is a sports photographer on the other side of town that needs people to cover football games- $400 per event.

Hang-ups:

-it says 'full-time' but there's no way that what's likely a weekend job is full time.

-if it is full-time, that means I have to give up parks. If it's not full-time, it's kind of weird tgat they'd say that.

- their blurb is like 'looking for football junkies' and man is it going to be weird for me, who knows Jack shit about football.

[sunflowerlando]

The Top Gun squad and their favorite sex positions:

MINORS DNI. 18+ content w/ links to visuals. NSFW.

Links and (most) blurbs are based on AFAB reader.

Follow up/part 2 here.

Don’t click the hyperlinks if you don’t want visuals

Bob: Outdoors. This man is an adrenaline junkie or he wouldn’t be flying around in jets. Position doesn't matter too much to him, but Bob loves having sex with you outdoors, especially on the deck at your cabin where you can both shout as loud as you want into the woods.

Coyote: Girl on top. He wants it hard and fast and likes when you’re controlling that. Javy wants to spank you and tell you that you take him so well while you bounce on top of him.

Fanboy: Girl on top. But sensual. He loves being able to look in your eyes and caress your breasts while you slowly ride him. Mickey is all about connecting with you and making love over just fucking.

Hangman: Reverse Cowgirl. Firstly, that man has a southern drawl that sneaks out so you know he likes cowgirls. Secondly, I really just think Jake is an ass man.

Payback: Spread Eagle. He loves getting as deep as he possibly can and spreading your legs out helps him do that. Reuben just wants to assure you’re both feeling good while he buries himself in you.

Phoenix: Cunnilingus. Nat doesn’t care how it happens, she just wants her tongue buried in you until you’re screaming her name. She prefers you sitting on her face, but she’s not complaining about other options.

Rooster: Doggy Style. Bradley loves being behind you. He’ll bend you over whatever surface he can or get you face down on the bed for a good fuck and some spanking. He enjoys the feeling of being over you controlling your orgasm.

Thanks for all the love on this one, ya thirsty animals.

[heartfullofleeches]

*sigh* may i request a blurb where the reader and CC are doing the deed ( CC was is close too ) and baron just bursts into their room cause C.c ate all his strawberry yogurt??

[mdni. This is mostly crack, but there is still a crumb of smut so shoo. Small mention of w33d too.]

His hand fit so beautifully around your neck.

It's little discoveries like this that make indulging in those carnal desires all the better.

Seated in the nest of his heart shaped bed, C.C rolls his hips into you in sync with the breath that binds you together and the music buzzing around you. Cherry flavored smoke swells in your lungs and lingers on your tongue, the lip smeared over your lips and the wrap in his free hand ripe with that artificial flavor. C.C leans back against the frame, running the fingers latched you neck down to your stomach and spreading them right where it bulged with the press of his length.

He pulls you down with him, attacking your neck with love bites and hickeys for which your body was a canvas for. His momentum slips off the course of the music as his thrusts turn sloppy. In a moment of remembering the blunt in his hand and deeming the ash tray too far away, C.C shoves the lit bud into his tongue and uses your mouth to extinguish the following burn. The pain snuffed by the sweetness of your flesh was the tipping point for his desire. Ever the music junkie, C.C still clings onto the heat of the drowned out music as both of his hands perch onto your waist and draw you in. It's so difficult to focus when he's this close and the sounds of your love-making are more high inducing that the weed and music combined. He closes his eyes to really feel the flow, but the only thing he's able to hear by closing everything off is the sound of his neighbors breaking shit in their kitchen.

Wait - but his floor only has one apartment.

Shit.

"I'm going to fucking slaughter you!"

C.C has just enough time to throw you off him and under the covers as the door of his room crumbles like anyone's hope for privacy in this place.

"You dirty little whore... And Y/n. Hi, Y/n. Nice figure, but this isn't about you right now."

C.C covers his lap with a pillow. "Baron, what the fuck is your problem? When the sign is on red you know not to come in here!"

"The sign can suck my dicks, you ate my last go-gurt! I was saving that."

"It expired the day before and you don't even live here so stop putting your shit in my fridge!"

"I lift in there so I could have it while we watched a movie tomorrow. As in all three of us. Fuck, I'm the only one who gives a shit about others in this place."

You hold the blanket over your chest. "Um... should I go?"

C.C turns at lighting speed and grabs your arms - eyes full of desperation and plea. "Baby, you're the only thing stopping me from tearing his head off and shoving it up his ass if you leave I will be down one of literal hundreds of siblings."

[ambersgems]

Bonded - Dean Winchester x Reader

Summary: Soulmate AU where you can feel your soulmate's emotions. When you meet, usually their name appears on your wrist.

A/N: This is my first written piece on here, so any feedback is appreciated/welcomed! It was kind of rushed so not my best work lol. I'm not sure if I want a second part to this or not, so let me know if you'd like to see a continuation. I also would love requests for anything Dean, Chris Evans characters, or Sebastian Stan characters! It can be blurbs, drabbles, or longer! Oh, also I imagine Dean being around 28/29 here while reader is approaching 25.

Word Count: 1.4K

Something was wrong. You knew as soon as your eyes flew open that you weren’t going back to bed anytime soon. Your hand was placed on your chest, heart beating increasingly faster as you laid in the dark. You tried to think back. Were you having a bad dream? No. This must be him. It happened more frequently than you’d like. You’d wake up in the middle of the night, heart pounding and palms sweating. Each time you could feel it, the danger. He was in danger. You just knew it. 

You wondered what he did for a living that would cause him to land himself in such terrifying situations so often. Was he in the military? Maybe he was an adrenaline junky or a storm chaser? Whatever it was, you found yourself silently praying that he survived whatever was causing his fight or flight response to trigger once again.

Swinging your legs off the side of the bed, your feet hit the cool hardwood floors and cause you to shiver. You take a deep breath, forcing yourself to stand and get out of bed to wander into the kitchen. You weren’t exactly sure if he felt your emotions too or not. How could you know if you haven't met him yet? There were times like now that you hoped desperately that he could. Maybe, just maybe, he could feel you trying to calm him in whatever capacity that you could. Sometimes that meant making chamomile tea and reading a book to try and lower his stress response or sometimes it meant a hot shower to relax the intense muscles you felt in your body from him. 

There were other times, however, that you hoped he really couldn’t feel your emotions the way you could feel his. He seemed to already have enough on his plate, with the intense nights and at times what could only be described as heartache. You didn’t know what he was going through, but you knew you didn’t want to add your baggage to it. 

So, when you cried at work the other day, you dried your eyes as quickly as possible, not wanting to burden him if he felt the same heaviness in his chest as you did. It was the same situation at home, though. You tried your hardest not to give into the depths of your lonely despair. After all, most of your friends had already found their soulmate, but yours seemed to be nowhere to be found. There were times that the only way to drown out the hurt was to just stay disconnected. When you weren’t actively trying to calm your mystery man, you tried your best to ignore him. 

You didn’t want to get your hopes up. There were plenty of people in this world who never met their soulmate, and they were left to live a life without them. You’d actually witnessed your friend’s first interaction with her soulmate. 

When you two were back at college, she was a barista at your local coffee shop, while you were a research assistant for one of your professors. You kept completely different hours, which is why on that particular day, you decided to hang out with her in the coffee shop to spend some more time with her, even if you were just studying at one of the tables. She had been anxious all morning, and you knew it wasn’t her emotions that she was feeling. She was a naturally confident person, never second guessing herself, but that morning she was a frenzied mess. She even told you herself that it felt like it was her soulmate and not her own emotions. 

After she had wiped down the tables for the billionth time that morning, a gangly and somewhat dorky guy came rushing into the shop. You could practically feel the anxiety buzzing from him as soon as he came in, pushing his dark framed glasses up his nose and clumsily slipping on the newly mopped floors. There was a loud smack, and the next thing you knew you watched as your friend reached her hand out to help the guy sit up. What really took your attention was the groaning that came from both parties. You watched them both wince in pain, looking down as they watched each other's names etch into the other’s wrist at the same time. It was like the world clicked into place for them both at that very moment. 

It turned out, Luke was a law school student, cramming for a very important exam that morning. His naturally anxious personality was quite the opposite of your friend’s, but they seemed to work together in harmony. 

Fast forward and they were still the picture perfect couple. He doted on her more than any man you’d ever seen, and she was head over heels for her nerdy guy. It was sweet, but you hated to admit how hard it was to be around them. You were happy for them both, but it stung to know that you were getting closer to the Age of Choice than you wanted to be. In a mere 8 months you’d be free to make a decision you never wanted to make.

Age 25 meant you were at what was called the “Age of Choice.” You could choose whether or not you wanted to marry your soulmate. If you hadn’t met them by 25, you had the right to choose someone else. You didn’t have to wait any longer to marry someone else, and somehow that hurt worse than not having met your soulmate. What if he had already reached the Age of Choice and he had already decided on someone else? The thought gripped your chest harder than you would like to admit. 

All of these thoughts ran through your mind as you made your tea in the kitchen, reliving your friend’s soulmate encounter and your fear for the future. You ran on autopilot as you thought about all of these things, finally making your way to the couch to perform your calm down ritual for your soulmate. It took all of about 90 minutes to feel like you had completely settled his nerves. By the time you had realized he had calmed down, you had fallen asleep on the couch.

This time your eyes flew open for a different reason. The loud blaring of your alarm was unwelcomed by your lack of sleep as you wandered back to your bed to turn it off. It was times like this you were glad you had a studio apartment. 

The morning seemed to get away from you. This time it was your turn to be the anxious party. You really couldn’t afford to be late to work this morning. Your boss had scheduled a very important meeting 15 minutes after the workday began and a day filled with projects that need to be completed “ASAP” as your boss would like to say. 

As soon as you entered the office, the atmosphere was different than any other day. You could feel it. Everyone seemed to be stiff and uncomfortable. You didn’t understand until two men turned around at the front desk. 

“You must be Miss Y/L/N?” the tallest one asks as your brows furrow. You didn’t recognize either of the two men, but you studied them as quickly as you could. 

“That’s me. Can I ask who you are?” you questioned, trying to be polite, but not wanting to deal with anything else this morning that you didn’t have to.

“I’m agent Smith and this is agent Jones, we are here to ask you a few questions about your boss,” the shorter of the two answered, reaching out and grabbing your hand.

You hiss and your eyes burn with tears as you look into his green ones, shock filling your body as you yank your hand away from his. Looking down, you see the name “Dean” etching itself into your wrist. Your hands shake as you look up at the tall man, confusion covering your face when you don’t see your name on his wrist. 

He groans, hand gripping his chest. He pulls at the buttons, looking down and seeing your name written right over his heart and underneath another strange looking tattoo. Your mouth falls open as your eyes widen, swallowing thickly. 

“Well, sweetheart, looks like we’re not only soulmates, we’re bonded. And we need to have a conversation,” you hear ‘Dean’ say gruffly, a smirk dancing on his lips.

Tagged by request:

@imaginedreamwrite

[det-loki]

damnation. poison and wine blurb.

I wrote this in a grand total of twenty minutes. is it as fully fledged as I would like it to be? no. but I need it out of my head.

TW: suicide, suicidal ideation, blood, death, catholicism, sacrilege, religious undertones.

• poison and wine masterlist

shattered. the porcelain of the sink was cracked, jagged spiderwebs creating marred vines of black against the stark white. the glass of the mirror that was on the wall was now crunching under David's boots at he shifted his weight foot to foot.

his breath was sharp and edgy, uneven. his hands raked through his greasy black hair, blunt nails digging into his scalp and pulling. tears stung at his eyes, trailing down his red cheeks, hot and heavy. his chest heaved, his head felt like it was caving in. words tumbled from his lips, unintelligible and muttered, cut with emotion, speaking to anything that would listen, that would save him.

his world had never been on an axis. it was always wobbly and unsteady, never going the way it should or the way he wanted it to. started out bad. born wrong. tainted. sinful. possessed. ex junkie convict. only real home was the boys home. god his only witness.

he was still the same as he was then. he still smoked pall malls. still running from his past. still trying to prove himself. still unable to get out of the hell he found himself in. still destined for failure. still destined for pain. he was still in love with the same girl. the girl who was currently asleep on a hospital bed, the doctor who pronounced their daughter dead had admitted her to the emergency room for a psychotic break. or at least that's what David was told as he watched the mother of his child be injected with medication to get her to calm down. he didn't leave her side until she was fully asleep and couldn't see him leave.

blood dripped from his knuckles, his bleary eyes clearing enough to see the maroon splatter on the tiled floor. glass made itself home in his flesh, stinging and raw as he flexed his hand. gritting his teeth, he pulled shard after shard out of his hand, letting it fall to the floor where the mess already laid at his feet. his mind wandered to his time at the boys home once more. he had felt like this before, on a much smaller scale, many times before. like the world was ending. that it would never get better. that he would never get better. he didn't deserve better. he heard the mutterings of the priests after one of the boys killed themselves. 'eternal damnation.' 'an injustice to God.'

David was already in an eternal damnation. every day he woke up. every night he went to bed. his only savior the girl who gave him purpose and the baby who had his eyes. now that girl was gone. shattered. and their baby, dead. wasn't that an injustice to God? their child being taken away so senselessly, so violently? or would they all say it was in God's plan? she's home now, in heaven? the thoughts made David's head spin, a knock on the door pulling him to the surface once more, "Yeah?"

a voice muttered on the otherside of the door, 'Sir, your wife is awake."

Loki gripped the door handle with a still bleeding hand, pulling it into himself just enough to slip through the doorway as he avoided eye contact with the nurse, "You need a new sink and mirror. those are broken"

[yuurivoice]

I usually just listen to the videos but i see other people having really put together theories about Evalas and was wondering if the hints about it are mostly in the art or if you have to really listen to what the characters are saying to understand the hidden/no so hidden lore

Have begun my rewatch of bittersweet and have been even started watching some of the streams to understand but something just isn’t clicking to me. I’ll probably understand it when Echos releases but i wanna get ahead before it does

There is literally just crumbs across several years and a Twitter recap thread that gave short blurbs about characters.

Unless you're a YV junkie, the only thing that should even be on your radar is a teaser trailer and the character artwork at this point.

You're not missing anything of actual substance, honestly. What you're going to want to be locked in for are the Evalas Origins mini-series, then Echoes of Evalas proper. Origins is literally being made to do what you're trying to do right now, gather info to get ahead of the big plot.

It won't be hard once the ball gets rolling.

[cowperviolet]

WIP #1: For God and Gold

After the executioner's sword descends upon her neck, Anne Boleyn does not awaken in Heaven, much less in Purgatory. She awakens in Hever Castle, eight years before her last morning on earth.

She has no desire to tread the same path again. This time, she is seemingly content to allow Henry to have her, then marry her off. However, when things get out of control, Henry decides on a petty revenge against his recalcitrant lady, and arranges for her to marry an obscure lawyer in Cardinal Wolsey's employ... also known as Thomas Cromwell, the man who, in another life, had helped to kill her.

(Note: although this story has a romantic subplot, it is not, strictly speaking, primarily a romance).

Read here

Slow to update. In my defense, I am a research junkie.

WIP #2: To Topple a Throne

Blurb TBA. Original fantasy, secondary world, but with historical inspiration (18th century/French Revolution). Elements of romance (m/f). Politics, swashbuckling, autism representation, what's not to love?

Character profile: Sidonie de Favriel

Character profile: Armand Verennes

Excerpt #1

Excerpt #2

Excerpt #3

Excerpt #4

[therealslimshakespeare]

i am so so so obsessed with getting to see them in the water!! it was so insanely cute. and like i adored the fact that we know that lu is such an adrenaline junkie (the line about her longing to be surrounded by the big vast world 🥹🥹) but she also finds so much peace and comfort in this blurb just by being in nature?? like i adored that so much?? the way she watches benny float and wants to keep him there forever so he can enjoy it the way she does? oh my god my heart melted. i might be odd for freaking out about this but im an enviro sci major so i just love her for this

That’s your major?! That’s so freakin’ cool, babe! WOW.

Ok felt on all accounts. I so adore loves where its first real beginning so when a mutual love gets shared and suddenly it all clicks, a love shared is the best but not with just anyone, it’s such a treasure and it can send you into a free fall. I love that for them

[r4v3nr0s3]

HELLO!

SEPTEMBER 22 is my B-day, I am trying to get my completed series THE EMERALD FORMULA, published.

So I’ve started a GoFundMe! Please check out my story below and if you could like, share, or donate it would mean everything to me.

LEARN MORE BELOW

I'm Raven Rose a queer, Latino, chronically ill, and disabled author and artist. Welcome to my journey as I get ready to be on my own for the first time in 15 years, go back to school, try to get on federal disability in the United States, and get my first novel published. September 22 is my Birthday month so if anyone is feeling extra festive, in lieu of gifts, I'd appreciate help here!

I’m restarting from scratch after a near decade of health problems, and despite great efforts to re-etner the workplace, 6 months time doing what I used to love, put me back in the hospital. For more about me visit my web page !

My lifelong dream has been to become a writer, but I can't do it alone. You can help me reach my goals and achieve my wildest dreams, and I could not be more grateful! Please do whatever you can do - like, share, and/or donate. I'm finally investing in myself and I believe my ideas and this story deserve investment too, so that's why I'm asking for your help.

Now for the goods!

THE EMERALD FORMULA is a series I've been working on close to 20 years.

The Working BLURB for novel 1 is as follows:

Renata Salcedo has never made a wave in her life. In the last few years though, she's broken up with her long term boyfriend, moved into her own place, and was diligently working towards the career of her dreams: a spot at the Smithsonian.

Fine... Adrenaline Junkie, Renata was not. She learned to stay small and figured out how to move quietly enough to stay unnoticed and survive. But it wasn't like she was unsuccessful. Her carefully planned path of baby steps lead her to exactly where she wanted to be: living her boring life and people leaving her alone to do her job. If anything, the job provided her all the excitement she needed. Unearthing old civilizations? Cataloguing the past through objects and art? Thrilling stuff! All done from the safety atop of an orthopedic pillow from behind a desk.

There was only one teensy problem with Renata's goals.

An entire world she knew nothing about existed right under her nose, and it's going to disrupt her boring little life whether she's planned for it or not. And really she can't complain too much, as it all starts with one of her absolute, most favorite things...

A Book

(Story EXCERPT at the bottom too)

REALM OF MATTER is the first novel in a complete 3-Book series called THE EMERALD FORMULA. At this point, the series needs refinement and editing, so both developmental and line editing. Funds will go towards paying the editors. Whatever is left over will go towards my publishing goals, and my intent to get an art degree and start doing marketing and making book covers. The three mock ups below were all created by me in Vector and Photoshop.

This Epic tale is a paranormal adventure with elements or horror, humor, fantasy, and an underlying slow burn human/humanoid monster romance. It features a diverse cast of human characters who break the mold of the Hero's Journey, and reject its sanctity all-together.

Its universe is heavily based on the History of science, magic, and folklore, focusing mainly on Pagan and Catholic mythology to give this Hero's journey a darkly poignant and comedic edge that digs in and punches up. The magical system is highly elemental, and dives deep into Alchemical and Spiritual theory from thousands of years ago. All of the artwork you see was done by me, a self taught artist (thought I'd like to go back to school next year).

I created my own language and phonetics system, also an alphabet.

All so I could make these transmutation circles based on sacred geometry.

YOU CAN READ CHAPTER 1 HERE

THE EMERAD FORMULA: REALM OF MATTER is a snarky thriller that features a bunch of traumatized, relatable saps often thrust into magical and extraordinary circumstances with not much but found family and magic on their side. But if they can't find hope in a hopeless situation against the ultimate evil, no one can. If you vibe with sacrilege, and enjoy flawed, funny characters, family antics, awkward slow burn romances, complex but accessible lore, legacy heroes, ancient monsters, chaos, magic, and mayhem? You've found the series for you.

Please do whatever is accessible to you: liking, sharing, and donating are all extremely important to make this project a reality. This means a lot to me and I greatly appreciate your support.

Thank you for your time,

Raven Rose

[alwritey-aphrodite]

Scary movies with Poe?

2023 Fall Blurbs

It was no secret that Poe was something of an adrenaline junky. To some, he could appear reckless and a danger to himself and the Resistance, but the people who know him best know he loves the rush, the dropping in his stomach and the way his heart beat ticks up. It’s a feeling he chases on the ground as well as in the air, but you’re not sure how he convinced you to join him on one of his horror movie nights.

He loves the feeling of getting scared when there are no real repercussions, he loves trying to figure out who the killer is or how the main characters can stop them. Tonight happened to be the perfect night for a horror movie, with rain pattering against the window and Leia giving the two of you a much needed night off by claiming that there’s nothing for you to do while it rains. You know it’s a lie, but you’re too excited at the idea of spending an evening with Poe that you don’t question her.

Now here you were, anxiety running through your veins before the movie even starts, with Poe sitting next to you and looking more excited than he’s ever been. You have a spread of snacks you’d stolen from the mess, and a pile of fluffy blankets to keep you warm that you already know will be used to cover your face. You’re not the type to watch a horror movie, but you’ll do anything to spend time with Poe.

Plus, you love seeing how happy he gets, the smile on his face as the opening credits roll and the story gets set up. You spend most of the night watching his face, illuminated from the screen with every little emotion playing out across it. It’s much more entertaining to watch Poe’s reaction to the film than the actual film itself, you just love seeing Poe be so happy without a trace of worry, even just for a few hours.

His hand stays firmly planted on your knee for the entirety of the movie, squeezing gently when there’s an especially gory scene or a jump scare, just to remind you that he’s there and that everything’s ok. For the most part, you occupy yourself with the snacks and observing Poe in his peaceful state, without that familiar furrow between his brows.

Soon, the sky goes from gray to black and the ending scene plays out with the heroes defeating the crazed killer.

“Want to watch another one?” Poe asks as soon as the screen fades to black, already leaning forward to pick out the next movie. Really, you’d be happy never watching a horror movie again and going to bed after watching something silly to make you forget the terror.

“Sure,” you say instead, because you’d do anything for Poe, anything to see him so relaxed for the first time in months. And, it’s not exactly awful to spend an entire night cuddled up with the love of your life, safe and warm and your belly full of snacks.

[drifting-pieces-blog-blog]

Breaking down the comics: Soldiers (Punisher Annual #2: Knight Fall)

You guys. YOU GUYS. 

I am so excited to bring you this next one for SO MANY REASONS. 

The first reason is that this is the FIRST Moon Knight comic I ever read. 

And this comic os pure WTFer set off an obsession that has directed the course of my life for over ten years now. 

Marc Spector: Moon Knight

Punisher Annual #2: Knight Fall. 1989

Written by: Mike Baron

Art by: Bill Reinhold

Gerbil: Tom DeFalco

(Tom is the editor in chief for Marvel at the time) 

We got ourselves a Punisher Annual with a Moon Knight guest appearance! 

Now I’ve talked about guest appearances again and again and again. It usually means that the guest star is going to show up HUGE on the cover with some dramatic depiction in an attempt to lure in more new readers to the title comic. 

But look at this comic cover. This isn’t Moon Knight showing up to save the day or in a little blurb bubble or box. He’s battling Frank! This looks more like a cross-over style comic! Those always depict the main character FIGHTING the other guest star! And damn if this cover isn’t amazing. Look at those two locked in close quarter combat! And that dagger! This might be a Punisher comic, but Moon Knight isn’t about to roll over! 

Now, as we all have come to expect, when you have a crossover for the first time, the two characters always spend the first couple pages fighting in some misunderstanding before they make up and team together to fight the real bad guys. But Punisher takes no quarter and Moon Knight is grumpy at best. 

Alright, so we open up on a Long Island Petshop where a Mr. Morton is purchasing Gerbils for their kids. 

For those that do not know, a Gerbil is about the size of a large mouse with a long tufted tail and kangaroo like hind feet. They're fast, bite hard, and are fun. (I used to own them as a kid for many years and loved them).

 They actually aren’t that well known, even though you can always find them in pet shops next to the hamsters. I wonder why they chose gerbil over say, mice or rats or hamsters. I get the feeling there was some inside joke among the writers here. 

…..Oh. 

Snake guy. Got it. 

MARC. 

Marc… “That man just ate a gerbil! Why does it set off all my emergency alarm bells?” 

Marc… 

So... After that... Marc calls up Frenchie on his radio and tells him that he's tailing a car and gives him details on the vehicle. 

"Oui, Marc, what's up?" 

"I'm not sure... Maybe nothing." 

MARC SPECTOR. You just watched a man eat a gerbil in a pet shop....WHOLE. What do you mean 'Nothing'?!

He tails the car to an old run down mansion . 

"That's the old Borgwardt estate--It's been taken over by something called Save Our Society... Time to head home." 

Frenchie confirms the car info with Marc. It is registered to the SOS non-profit agency that is privately funded by physicians. 

"Sort of an east coast version of the Betty Ford Clinic. Why would a man eat a gerbil?" 

Marc… You have fought werewolves. You fought a literal rat king. We’ve seen you fight ghosts and get your ass handed to you by a snake. 

AND WHAT ARE YOU WEARING!? Does Steven know you’re wearing his clothes? 

He asks Frenchie to dig into the petstore's files and get him a credit card for the guy that ate the gerbil and an address. 

Meanwhile, we meander on over to the star of our show: 

"Punisher's War Journal-- I've been on the trail of Ralph Newton, a junkie who makes a living ripping off old ladies' social security checks. Two weeks ago he pushed a seventy year old woman down a flight of stairs and she died. Newton seemed to have disappeared, butt now I have a lead--This shooting gallery in the Bronx." 

For those of you unaware of the Punisher, here's a brief howdy-do for you! 

The Punisher, AKA, Frank Castle. Originally a VietNam vet who came back with a little PTSD. His family (wife and child) were murdered by the mafia and Frank decided he'd had enough of evil in the world. He makes it his life's work to hunt down and kill anyone that makes it a living to hurt people. 

Historically, the other heroes (ESPECIALLY DareDevil and Captain America) despise Frank and often rally the other heroes to try to hunt him down and stop him from continuing his war on crime. 

He got his start in a Spider-Man comic of all places and branched out from there. 

Frank is a pretty gruff and serious man and depending on who is writing him and what series you are reading, he can be pretty violent. 

War Journal was a very popular series where he drives around in his Battle Van and writes about his missions. It works nicely because Frank isn’t much of a social man. So if you rely on the story conversations, like in all the other comics, you aren’t going to get much. But having him writing things down in his journal you get a beautiful narration that reads like a Noir film and you also get a fantastic way to get to know Frank and how he thinks. I appreciate it. 

Often when Frank meets up with other heroes, there is a fight with them telling him he's wrong for killing and them eventually trying to stop him. 

Now, we know he's going to meet up with Marc in this. And I am so excited for you guys to see this epic encounter. 

So we see Frank in his usual attire walk up to a safe house and knock on the door. 

He gets the guy to open the door posing as a seller. 

Yeah. By now, everyone knows what it means when they see that skull design. 

"Junkies. I swear they don't feel pain. You've got to break something before they stop coming at you." 

Frank shoots all but one. He tells the remaining guy he's looking for Newton. 

Lucky for the junkie he says he last saw Newton going into a rehab clinic saying he was going to get straight. 

So Frank heads up to the clinic. It's a Save Our Society clinic. 

"The place reeks of sweat and stale cigarettes, ashtrays filled to overflowing." 

Man that's good Noir. 

Frank walks up to the main desk (in his street clothes, which just means he put on a turtle neck and a coat). 

"Department of social services. I'm here to verify our use of federal funds." 

"I'm sorry, sir. There must be some mistake. This clinic is privately funded --we receive no federal funds." 

"*SIGH* Sounds like another department screw-up. Could I speak to your director?" 

(What works about this is that no one actually knows what Frank Castle looks like! He doesn’t need a disguise. Everyone knows him by what he wears. They see the giant skull and the guns. It WORKS. And Frank is surprisingly good at acting. He knows the system.) 

He's told that the director isn't in. She's Leona Hiss. (Hiss? Really? We're going there?) 

Frank heads to get info from Microchip. Hey! Microchip! I missed him! 

Microchip was Frank's old tech guy. He was the man in the van that would give Frank info and hack into things for him. 

I'd say they were good friends...But Frank doesn't have friends. I'd give you spoilers on what eventually happens to Microchip but... It's kinda a BIG spoiler and maybe someone here wants to head on over into Punisher land. So I'll leave it at that. (I came to Moon Knight from Punisher land. It was all thanks to this crossover comic… so I guess their ploy really does work sometimes.) 

Anyways... Microchip looks up this Leona Hiss person. 

A widow of an anesthesiologist who started the clinics to help drug addicts. He goes on and on and tells Frank it "Smells like a smoke screen. All her life, the lady shuns publicity. Now all of a sudden she's a big philanthropist?" 

Man, look at that light and shadow in the first panel. This art team is amazing. 

Frank sets up position on a roof across from the clinic. 

"Clock Street's eerily alive at two A.M. I see a knife fight, several drug deals...Lights are burning in the clinic but no one's entered or left. There are guards on the roof. Better move.

I take position a block away, behind the clinic. I can easily make my way back over the rooftops--Nobody's watching back here. Overhead, a faint Whoosh. Some kind of high-tech chopper." 

Oh boy. Oh boy. Oh boy. 

(This art. This art is SLAYING.) 

Oh man. Look at this meet up. Frank and his shotgun, Moon Knight facing him down. 

They know who each other are! Every time Moon Knight meets up with someone he has to introduce himself! No one knows who he is! But Frank knows him. And Moon Knight doesn’t call him Frank. He knows who he is dealing with. 

Oh man, that cover called for such an epic showdown. Both ex-marines. Both know how to handle themselves. 

Uh. 

“I presume we’re both interested in Save Our Society.” 

“Right this afternoon I saw a man eat a gerbil. He came from here.” 

“What’s his name?” 

"Helmut Snead. He used a solen credit card. Six feet, brown eyes, scar above his left eye." 

"Ralph Newton--A Junkie Murderer. What's he doing on Long Island?" 

"I don't know--But he didn't look like a junkie. I want to know how he got out of the South Bronx and into a fancy clinic." 

"How would you take this guy out?"

WHAT IS HAPPENING. 

This is incredible. You have no idea. 

Frank doesn't have friends. Frank doesn't do team-ups. Frank is brutal and tells it like it is. 

And this isn't Frank being the victim to a new writer making nice in someone else's ball park. This is a PUNISHER comic. Moon Knight is the visitor. 

And on that note... MARC doesn't have friends. MARC doesn't play well with others. We literally just came off of him being a part of the West Coast Avengers and leaving because he doesn't team well! 

And here these two are, meeting for the first time and being BFF. 

In fact, the fact that they already know who one another is despite never meeting means that they have heard others talk about them. And when people talk about the Punisher or Moon Knight, they generally don't have good things to say! 

So these two heard "Yeah he's a brutal lunatic" they went "I gotta meet this chap." 

I can't stress enough how amazing this is. 

Frank is even asking Moon Knight to show how he'd take down a guy. He wants to see how Moon Knight works. And Moon Knight is letting Frank go first. 

THIS in itself is amazing. Why? Because we have two highly skilled specialists from a high combat militarized zone that were both known for ambush settings and traps. 

They know everything about this building isn't reading right, they have seen some guards and they don't know what's going on inside. So they are essentially walking into an unknown through a closed space doorway into a stairwell with numerous blind spots and possibilities for traps/ambushes. 

If it were anyone else, Marc would go first to clear the way and possibly take that first hit because he knows he can take it. 

BUT. If you REALLY look at it, Frank is older than Marc. Frank went to 'Nam. Frank has been at this longer and has turned New York into his own personal jungle. 

He offers Frank the lead out of respect AND because he knows and Frank knows that if anything is out of the ordinary, Frank will spot it FIRST and deal with it. 

This is grade A military tactics and my lord it’s beautiful. 

And you know what? 

Frank’s history is that he was team leader. And when Marc gives him lead, Frank takes it and Marc RESPECTS him. They are both used to working in this sort of setting. 

And when you think about it, Marc was NEVER the leader. He followed other people. Bushman was his leader. Marc joined other groups and let other people tell him what to do. If he didn’t like it, he went off and joined a new group. 

So when Frank says “Hold it….!” he is treading Marc like an officer under him and he has now automatically accepted Marc as following him and thus putting him under his protection. This is beautiful. I could wax on about this all day you guys. 

Uh… Back to the comic. So… Frank spots a Black Mamba that’s sluggish from being in a cold setting. 

Marc makes light chatter (he’s kinda of a goof and light chatter is what he does.) Frank quiets him. He knows there’s trouble ahead. 

In the next room, we find a junky going through withdrawal and begging the doc to hurry up. 

The 'doctor' injects him with something just as Frank and Marc bust in. 

"Hello, Ralph. I didn't know you had a license to practice medicine... And only last week you were a lousy junkie..." 

"Punisher!" 

"Drop the needle." 

"I don't think so.... SSSST!" 

And the 'Doctor' suddenly has a snake tongue and snake eyes. 

This bodes well. 

Frank opens fire on his target and it hardly phases him. 

"What have we stumbled into? They move slowly but they don't feel any pain." Moon Knight calls out while pummeling one of the snake guys. 

"It's the cold. [....] Reptiles. The colder it gets, the slower they move. You saw Ralph eat a gerbil--Snakes eat gerbils. This place looks like a herpetology lab." 

Very astute Frank. 

They manage to take down all the snake guys and Moon Knight asks if he recognizes any of them. 

Frank recognizes a couple of them as crackheads and various junkies. 

They find Ralph to be a card carrier for S.O.S. 

"Last week he's a junkie with an armful of holes and this week he's front man for a fancy long island cure club." 

"I think we know where to go next. Why don't you come with me in the chopper?" 

"Thanks, I will." 

(WHY ARE THEY SO POLITE TO ONE ANOTHER. IT'S SO OVER THE TOP.) 

So... Frank takes a ride in Marc's chopper. 

"Nice set-up. How do you keep the engines so quiet?" 

"It's a new kind of fiberglass packing." 

And they arrive back at the mansion. 

"Come on in--I've got a war room. We'll do a little digging." 

"This place is a little ostentatious, don't you think?" 

"There are so many private choppers flying in and out of the neighborhood nobody notices mine--Especially at night. The surrounding mansions and trees also cover our entrances and exits from the concealed hangar." 

I don't think that's what he meant by ostentatious, Marc. 

Inside, Frank, Marc, and Frenchie stand around a table with some maps. 

Marc tells Frank about the Borwardt estate he initially tracked snake man to earlier. 

"I ran a check on cult leaders and you'll never guess who was released from a federal prison last month--Viper." 

Frenchie tells Frank who Viper is. 

"She used to head up zat facist group Hydra, zen she went solo. She was busted in connection with the so-called snake riot in washington last year...[....] A mass hallucination where people believed they turned into snakes. I also learned that Viper was recently sprung from prison by a Dr. Tyrone." 

We head on over to SOS where we see a green lady, "Madam Viper". 

She is in a room of snake men who are 'newly converted'. 

They say they are hungry and Viper tells them that they have "a rabbit, five hamsters and a gerbil. We'll have to make another run to the pet store soon." 

She has a bit of a thing for hitting people with a whip and demanding that they all call her 'Madame Viper'. 

She is then informed that the other clinic was hit and that Newton is dead. 

She sends the new snake men out to the yard for guard duty. She's pretty sure SHIELD is out to get her. Which makes sense since she worked for Hydra. 

Unfortunately for her, it's far from shield. 

Overhead, we find the Moon Copter flying by and Moon Knight drops in with his cape and Frank drops in on a glider. 

The guards immediately open fire on them and Frank returns fire. 

FRANK. DO NOT ENCOURAGE HIM. 

….I don’t know if I should count this as a window dive or not. It’s tempting. I’m not going to count it. He decides to abstain from window entrance for once. 

Unfortunately for Frank, he runs in without checking around and Marc isn't there to watch his six. 

Madam Viper jumps him and injects him with a serum. 

Now... Unfortunately for her... Frank has never responded well to drugs of any sort. He's got a history of this not going well for people that try to drug Frank Castle. 

He doesn't go down. 

In fact, it actually makes him go a little berserk. A berserk Frank Castle is NEVER something anyone wants to face. 

He’s doing fine. 

She makes a run for it. 

Elsewhere, Moon Knight is fighting his own snake man army. 

"Lets of gunfire and then it stopped! The time to start worrying about Punisher is when the gunfire stops.

Viper injects one of her larger helpers turning him into a very large and strong snake man. 

Moon Knight faces off with the big snake guy. His usual methods of just 'hit it as hard as I can' doesn't work. They don't feel pain thanks to the drugs. 

He's wearing a heat pack to keep him moving so Moon Knight decides to take this outside and....WINDOW! WE GOT A WINDOW! 

I mean… This one was legit. And he was exiting with a good reason… But I’m still counting it. 

Heat pack removed and out in the cold air, the lizard guy goes down easy. 

Moon Knight goes to find the Punisher now. 

He finds a room full of bodies and Frank in the middle having a lovely hallucination time. 

In the window outside, Marc watches a rocket thing take off with Viper escaping in it to fight another day. 

Marc manages to distract frank with his crescent darts, moving them around and letting the light reflect off of them in a hypnotic way. This lets him get close enough to take away Frank's gun. 

At this point, Frank calms down and the adrenalin that was coursing through his system and probably helping to stave off the toxic affects of the drugs wears off. 

Frank goes into convulsions and Moon Knight moves to get him out of there. Not to mention the cops are starting to show up and they need to leave. 

The cops have never been fans of Punisher (Despite what the right wing wants you to think when they put punisher logos on their giant trucks) and Frank has never liked the cops. Time to leave! 

Marc takes Frank back to his mansion and puts him to bed. 

I kid you not. 

This... This is a thing that happens a lot. He did the same thing to Jack Russel. Just... Take the drugged up guy home and let him sleep it off in his big bed in the mansion. 

Frank has a rough night, hallucinating and putting up a big of a fight but he sleeps it off. 

The next day, he wakes up feeling a bit better. 

And it ends here. Frank heading off to his next mission and Marc casual as hell as he watches his new buddy leave. 

Again I’m going to say it. WHAT. 

You don’t understand just HOW bizarre this issue was. ON BOTH SIDES. Frank was so…NICE… Marc was so amendable! They acted like long lost friends! WHAT WAS WITH THE CONSTANT REFERENCES TO GERBILS?! Why does Marc keep putting drugged up men in his bed? Why was he wearing Steven’s clothes? I have so many questions.

And from this casual weird encounter… An obsession was born. 

ALRIGHT. Let’s talk about why this works. (This is gonna get long. You can stop here if you don't want to hear me ramble and are just here for the comics).

In the Marvel universe (616), we have a lot of veterans of different wars. 

WWII has Captain America, Bucky, and Nick Fury

Vietnam has Frank Castle. 

Wolverine....a lot of wars. All the wars. Every war. 

Apparently Charles Xavier was in the Korean war (I didn't know that) 

Ben Grimm was in the Marines before his space accident (Awww. Another thing for him to bond with Marc over.) 

Then of course you have Carol Danvers who worked for the CIA in the cold war.

Rhodes (War Machine) who was in Afghanistan and Vietnam. 

There are a LOT of veterans of different wars and different time periods (Marvel time is a soup). 

The initial problem was which war. And this is where we are going to once more step onto the Drifting Pieces History soap box. 

We all know the saying “There’s no good war”. But that’s not right. Not according to politics and public opinion. 

To be a veteran of WWII was a noble and good thing. You fought a clear cut enemy, (nothing worse than a Nazi) liberated suppressed people, and most important, you came home a winner. 

What’s that? There was another war? In Korea? Never heard of that one. We totally didn’t go to Korea and fail miserably and we certainly aren’t going to talk about what happened over there. 

Oh look, Vietnam! The first publicly broadcasted war. Not like “The Whole World is Watching”. Oh no, the average citizen is suddenly getting their first look at what happens in war. Oh no, it’s not as nice and pretty as it’s supposed to be. No one talked about the atrocities that were committed by the good guys in WWII! And the Korean War certainly didn’t happen. 

This was the first war where American soldiers came home and were shunned. They were booed. They lost their jobs, lost their homes, and lost their families. Disgraced and forgotten by their country and their people. 

So we have nice shiny Captain America. A literal representation of the good of America and ideal soldier, punching Nazi and saving people in WWII. 

Then we have Frank Castle, a dirty soldier from Vietnam. I’m sure people screamed “Baby killer” at him fresh off the plane. What’s that? Frank served THREE tours in Vietnam?! He was the sole survivor of a huge ambush? He was awarded the Medal of Honor, the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the Navy Cross, Silver and Bronze stars, and four Purple Hearts? That don’t mean shit to the average citizen that only cares about two things: 1. We lost. 2. We shouldn’t have been there in the first place. 

So he comes home, one of the best Marines in the business, and he’s got nothing. 

He gets married to a sweetheart, has two kids (a little girl and boy), and settles in living an ideal life. A quiet life. Too quiet. Frank’s got a little PTSD going on and he was very good at what he did. He didn’t want to leave. He was good over there. He was respected. He was needed. 

But he’s doing the best he can. Until that’s taken away from him in an event he’d seen over and over again in war. Blazing gun fire and his family is gone. 

He gets revenge. But there’s a problem. He isn’t seen as a loving family man that takes down the people that murdered his kids and wife. He’s seen as a violent ex-soldier from Vietnam that’s gone crazy and is shooting up the place. 

They say that for Frank, “the war never ended. It just changed missions.” 

And all these other Heroes that are also veterans? They came from good wars. Captain America spouts speeches of being a Good Soldier at Frank. He doesn’t know what it’s like to question if the bad guy really is the bad guy. 

If Frank hadn’t of been such a family man, he would have made an amazing mercenary. The best there was. 

But then you have Marc Spector. He went to war to escape trauma. He was good. He was VERY good at what he did. And dollars to donuts, he heard about another Marine that was also very good named Francis Castiglione. 

But Marc could only be good so long as it wasn’t obvious that his mental illness was a thing. Even if he lied signing up for the military, when he took the jobs working for SHIELD and the CIA, they HAD to know about his history in the mental hospital. But the second he starts to dissociate in public, he’s kicked out. Can’t have a mentally ill person hanging out around all those weapons, right? I’m sure that’s what they told themselves as they kicked him to the curb. 

Marc could have gone home here. He’d have been a disgraced hero, sitting on the side of the road on a Veteran hat asking for change. But Marc was still running. He didn’t have a childhood sweetheart waiting for him. He had trauma. 

So Marc carries on the mission and he’s GOOD. And he’s a follower. He likes being told what to do. It prevents him from thinking and taking responsibility. If people get hurt, it isn’t his fault. 

Now Frank is very thorough. There’s a chance that the first time he hears about a new Superhero showing up in Manhattan he immediately looks into it. He’s got access to SHIELD info. He finds out who Marc Spector is and he sees another soldier that was let down by his country. Another soldier that was looking to make a wrong right despite how the war went. 

And Marc? Frank’s a hero. He’s tough. He does what needs to be done to keep people safe. Frank’s a leader and he takes care of his soldiers. 

They look at one another and see soldiers struggling to find their place here in the normal life again because they never HAD normal lives to begin with. 

Moon Knight is the only one who can probably understand where Frank is coming from and not judge him. 

Much later on in the comics, when Moon Knight is desperately trying to fit in with the Avengers and be a better hero, we see him come up against Frank again. Frank understands what Moon Knight is trying to do and he asks him if he really thinks it’s going to work. 

And despite how everything else was going in that particular run (a lot. A lot was going), it was a very real moment. Frank saw through him. I’ll get more into it later when we eventually get there. But man… These two together both make me so happy and also break my heart. 

ANYWAY. Uh… Long extended explanation over! I love this issue with my whole everything. 

This writer? This artist? Why couldn’t THEY have been the ones to take over the Marc Spector run? They get it! Look how pretty they make him! Look at all that cape action! 

They even get the dichotomy of Marc in this time. We may not have STEVEN, but did you see the way Marc was dressed in the mansion? How very Steven -esque. Even the way he treats Frank at the end there. 

UGH I could go on about this all day. I’m going to stop here before I write a dissertation. I HAVE FEELINGS ABOUT THIS OKAY.