#PLEASE I'M LITERALLY OBSESSED WITH SORRY /J

[terrifying-acceptance]

So, in Phil's live stream where he watched s2e2 (We Started An Illegal Food Truck) He said that the chapter had a catchphrase and that Charlie said it a lot in the episode. That got me thinking, is there gonna be reoccurring stuff in s3 too? I think so

In s3e1 Tommy said "Up" to a few things. The "Chicken UP" bit is a prime example. I thought it was just a dumb bit at first but i noticed that he says "Sorry UP" a little before the chicken part. It's not a lot of evidence but i think that he has an "UP" thing in s3.

I said "He" has an "UP" catchphrase, not "They." Why? because they all say that Tommy saying "Sorry UP" was weird. If it was a group catchphrase, they would have gone along with it, BUT THEY DIDN'T! I think that in s3 either only Tommy has a catchphrase, or they all have catchphrases. That's just a little something i'm thinking about tho, not too sure about it

That's that, right? WRONG! There's MORE weird shit in s3e1! Well, weirder that Sorry's normal weird

In the subtitles, there are certain words with spaces in them for no reason! In both instances, the subtitles are for Tommy. There could be something there but idk

ALSO! In every case where someone has said the word "Sorry" it has been capitalized in the subtitles. It's a reference to the channel and i think it's a nice detail. There is ONE (1) exception to this rule, and it's at the end of s3e1 by Charlie

LOWER CASE! IT'S FUCKING LOWER CASE! WHY THE HELL IS IT LOWER CASE???

I'm almost 100% sure that these mean nothing but i want an excuse to be crazy about my hyperfixation, ok? PLUS it could mean something soooo

[alotofrandomfangirling]

Roronoa Zoro NSFW Alphabet (Netflix live action)

Warnings: smut 🫠 and cursing (18+ / minors dni)

A/n: i can't stop writing for this man please help okay so i had a bunch of smut headcanons for live action Zoro so i thought it would be better to fit them in a NSFW Alphabet ajdlajakaj it's the first time i write any kind of smut so please forgive me for any mistakes 😅 (i also didn't check the grammar because i was too embarassed to copy and paste it on google translate lmao sorry about that too ajskajskaj) female reader is adult and everything is consensual 🙏🏻 i hope you like it!!

A = Aftercare (what they’re like after sex)

Zoro is very gentle after sex, he likes to hold you close and kiss your forehead as you both fall asleep together.

B = Body part (their favorite body part of theirs and also their partner’s)

He is a boob guy. He loves your boobs, staring at, squeezing and sucking on them. He also likes kissing the valley between them.

And for himself he likes his chest and arms. He is super proud of how much you love to roam your hands on his chest and arms to feel his strong muscles.

C = Cum (anything to do with cum, basically)

He licks every drop of your cum when he makes you climax with his tongue on your pussy (we know he has strong teeth, so i'm guessing his tongue works well too 👀). And it's freaking hot when he wipes his mouth after that and goes kiss you with the same hunger he showed before.

D = Dirty secret (pretty self explanatory, a dirty secret of theirs)

He loves when you nibble on his ear.

You've recently gotten obsessed with the three earrings on his left ear and you want to suck on them all the time. He acts annoyed when you do it, but deep down he loves it, it makes him feel all tingly inside.

E = Experience (how experienced are they? do they know what they’re doing?)

Zoro wasn't very experienced when you met, but, after all this time together, you've done it so many times that now he already knows by heart the exact spots he has to hit to take you to complete bliss.

F = Favorite position (this goes without saying)

He loves when you're on top of him. Watching your beautiful face from below, your boobs moving up and down, grabbing your ass... it's like poetry for him.

G = Goofy (are they more serious in the moment? are they humorous? etc.)

Well, Zoro doesn't smile much in his normal activities, so the same applies to while having sex ajskajakaj he's usually more serious cause he takes being with you and pleasing you very seriously.

H = Hair (how well groomed are they? does the carpet match the drapes? etc.)

Well, he's nearly a pirate so don't expect much ajdkajskaj but if you ask him he'll take care of it, cause he will honestly do anything for you.

I = Intimacy (how are they during the moment? the romantic aspect)

It may be surprising, but he is so romantic. The thing is your relationship is very based on love and trust, so sex for you is really an intimate moment for you to share your deepest feelings with each other. He makes sure to show you how much he loves you by taking care of you and pleasing you the best way he can.

J = Jack off (masturbation headcanon)

He jerks off thinking about fucking you from behind with you wearing a mini skirt Nami had lent you one day. Zoro was never the same after he saw you in that lmaooo the sight stuck to his mind so he often remembers it 👀

K = Kink (one or more of their kinks)

Okay so hear me out: Zoro with a praise kink. Boy's had a rough past, so he appreciates every little act of kindness you do for him. He loves when you praise him and whisper sweet things in his ear, for how good he is or how nice he is doing. You can literally feel how much he enjoys that.

L = Location (favorite places to do the do)

Your shared room at the Going Merry. The rush of having to be silent so that the other straw hats won't hear you turns him on even more.

M = Motivation (what turns them on, gets them going)

Your voice. He loves listening to you moaning and telling him how good he makes you feel, it's like music to his ears.

(In fact, anytime you're feeling mischievous and want to mess with his mind, you just use that sweet voice that you know will drive him crazy)

N = No (something they wouldn’t do, turn offs)

Degradation. Or hurting. Not at all. You were the best thing that ever happened to Zoro and he made sure to let you know that, so he wasn't going to call you names or any of that. Sex was also a very intimate and special moment between you two so he enjoyed you both exchanging only nice stuff.

O = Oral (preference in giving or receiving, skill, etc.)

He loves a good blowjob. Hell, he loves how good your mouth feels on his dick.

You love to see how he melts under your touch while you're sucking him off. He looks so pleased and makes such pretty noises moaning your name you want to keep going just to keep listening to that.

P = Pace (are they fast and rough? slow and sensual? etc.)

It depends. Zoro usually takes his time in pleasing both of you. But when he's a bit frustrated or angry and wants to release himself, he gets a bit rough, but never hurting you.

Q = Quickie (their opinions on quickies, how often, etc.)

He prefers the real thing, but whenever one of you is feeling needy, sure, he'll do quickies.

R = Risk (are they game to experiment? do they take risks? etc.)

Zoro is a simple man: he gets to fuck you, he is happy. So usually risking and trying new things only happens when the idea comes from you (and you sure have good ideas very often *wink wink*).

S = Stamina (how many rounds can they go for? how long do they last?)

Several rounds. Your man's stamina is on point ajdkajskaj

T = Toys (do they own toys? do they use them? on a partner or themselves?)

Zoro doesn't really like toys. He says just the both of you are enough to "feel really good". i mean are there even sex toys in the op universe i'll be in debt in this one ajskajakja

U = Unfair (how much they like to tease)

He likes to go straight to the point so he doesn't tease much, except when he wants you to beg for it so he can hear that sweet sex voice of yours that he loves so much.

V = Volume (how loud they are, what sounds they make, etc.)

He's not very loud, but he grunts a lot (and it's delicious for you to hear). He also frequently lets slip curse words in your ear when he's fucking you because he can't take all the pleasure.

W = Wild card (a random headcanon for the character)

That time you were at Kaya's and he showed up wearing that suit? You could barely concentrate on dinner for how aroused you were seeing him in those clothes. He looked so. freaking. hot.

The second dinner was over and everyone went to sleep you pushed him to your bedroom and had him take his pants off so you could ride him like there was no tomorrow (suit still on of course cause you liked it ajdkajskaj).

X = X-ray (let’s see what’s going on under those clothes)

Let's just say those jokes about his fourth sword are actually true.

Y = Yearning (how high is their sex drive?)

Zoro is horny for you all the time lol of course he understands there's a right time for everything but whenever he has the chance he wants to be with you.

Z = Zzz (how quickly they fall asleep afterwards)

It doesn't take much for him to fall asleep. He'll do the job, feel good and then fall asleep for how tired he feels (but not before kissing your forehead and praising you for all that you did together 😉).

Template

[fluffytriceratops]

I am DESPERATE for some 2k3 Donatello dating headcanons, literally give me anything PLEASE I AM OBSESSED

𝐃𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐇𝐞𝐚𝐝𝐜𝐚𝐧𝐧𝐨𝐧𝐬 - 𝐃𝐨𝐧𝐚𝐭𝐞𝐥𝐥𝐨 [𝟐𝟎𝟎𝟑]

notes: i gotchu bestie. <3 lemme know if you guys want these for the other 2k3 turts as well! :D also sorry for taking literal ages to get this request done for you! thank you sm for requesting i hope you have a wonderful day/night! <3

warnings: brief nsfw mentions, mature language, 

tags: @thelaundrybitch @turtle-babe83 @leosgirl82 @rheawritesforfun @s-s-ironnie @post-apocalyptic-daydream @mysticboombox @drowninghell @lec743 @raphielover  @raphslovemuffin80 @squirrelfurs @bibiz82 @pheradream-15 @kikithedreamerwriter @m1dnyt3-w0lf @scholastic-dragon @moonsua1 [if i've forgotten anyone i'm so sorry please comment or dm me and let me know and i'll add you right away so i don't forget in the future!]

(if you would like to be tagged in my future tmnt x reader related work, feel free to let me know and i'll happily add you!)

i love you all sm! i'm sending all the virtual hugs and well wishes to you!! <33

---

- as usual, 2003 donnie has an obsession with coffee. so if you get this mans some coffee expect an INSTANT marriage proposal. [honestly what ver of donnie doesn't have a coffee addiction?] 

- likes to do your hair. it's calming to him and helps him think. hes watched a lot of youtube videos and stuff for it, so he knows what he's doing too. he likes to try new styles n stuff on you. everyone knows when he's particularily stressed or can't seem to figure something out because you seem to have a new hairsyle everyday until he's fixed whatever it is that's bugging him, 

- will also handmake beads and stuff to put in your hair. <3 

- makes jewelry for you, esp out of silverware and other things. it always turns out so beautifully. 

- late night drives. donnie has insomnia and his brain works a lot during the night/evening. so expect to hang out a lot with him during this time. driving at night at new york is super pretty and peaceful too. esp when it's just the two of you. [so long as you don't mind the hectic city hehe-]

- cuddling with him while he works. includes sleeping on him/in his lab when he works really late into the night. he'll later carry you to bed. 

- painting on his shell/body for funzies. and if he does the same to you don't expect it to look too great because 2k3 donnie can't draw for shit. 

- donnie will gift you homemade cards with stick figures on the cover cuz again he cant draw but he knows you'll adore it no matter what just because he made it. plus you think its funny as hell and he adores your laugh. 

- hes actually really good at photography. and he has loads of pictures of you. you two go out and take pictures together sometimes. it's always a lot of fun. and they always turn out great. 

- late night talking sessions are a normal for you. 

- donatello tries his best to get you to sleep at a decent time, but sometimes you'll refuse if he isn't coming to bed with you just to get him to go to sleep earlier. he'll probably lay with you for a while, unable to actually sleep. maybe he'll read or listen to music to help pass the time. sometimes he will also sneak back out of bed once you've fallen asleep, and when you catch him you give him a good talking to. 

- he really needs to take better care of himself. he's always putting those he cares for above himself. so you're always there to make sure he's okay and that he's doing what he needs to do to be happy and healthy. 

- you guys hardly ever fight. donnie isn't one to argue with you. he's a very gentle and kind soul. he rarely raises his voice. (but when he does you find it hot as FUCK- lets be honest--) 

- fix it felix. always fixes things for you, even if you dont ask it of him. if he's at your place and notices something needs to be fixed he'll just do it for you. even if you insist he doesn't have to, he will anyway because he loves you. it brings him joy. and honestly, you should just let him because it probably stresses him out a little thinking about how your door isn't closing properly or your car sounds funny or your light keeps flickering- 

- you like to prank him on occassion, this includes the whole "i filled my tank with the special gas-" or "i let them put premium air in my tires and they gave me a really good deal". it freaks and stresses him out, at least in the moment hehe. its very funny but keep in mind he'll get you back. 

- him reading to you sfghfdgkjhdfg (id die please-) esp if you have trouble sleeping or something. 

- coffee dates are a must. even if you dont drink coffee. 

- donnie napping curled up on your chest/on top of you. you tracing the grooves of his shell. you've learned he finds this very comforting and it helps him fall asleep. 

- hes a definite switch- lmao.

- very gentle and understanding. he's like your personal diary or therapist and you're the same for him. 

[butchdiaz]

ask for essays on tommy's nerves have essays on tommy's nerves delivered directly to your doorstep!!! sorry in advance for the length and incoherency of this ask because lou's acting choices genuinely make me feel deranged, we are so lucky to have him.

exhibit a: the hand on the chin when buck opens the door. he's thought about this so carefully you can tell from the moment he enters the scene. and i don't even mean the kiss. i don't think tommy knew that was going to happen until approx. five seconds before it did. but he wants to get this conversation right.

exhibit b: the fucking breathlessness when he says "we can talk" (yes we're still not even in the loft yet). like that is the breathlessness of a man seeing whom he assumes is his emotionally unavailable big boy crush and realising he's going to have to smooth things over between him and the man most likely making him unavailable to tommy. (it's also just tommy seeing big beefy tank buckley and getting a little flustered methinks)

exhibit c (moving actually into the loft now): obsessed, deeply deeply obsessed with the way buck removes the obstacle of the kitchen island between them and tommy immediately crosses his arms over his chest like he's trying to put it back between them subtly because he still doesn't think he's allowed to Want.

exhibit d: the way he literally cannot look at buck as buck starts moving in closer quite literally makes me want to rip my hair out. like baby, you're allowed to look i promise, i swear.

exhibit e: the breakout of the laugh to full seriousness as he commits to the "i'm renowned for my fake mouth static" is so special to me because. i have done that. i have committed to a bit that was perhaps a bit too revealing/suggestive with my heart pounding as a way of testing the waters. and then the relieved amusement of his "cmon hey" when buck plays into it.

exhibit f: the way tommy looks at buck when buck's giving his little "threw in with us no hesitation" speech is so. that man is ANCHORING his eyes to buck's eyes. he's still not allowed to look, he is being respectful, he is overcompensating, he is FIGHTING for his life.

exhibit g: his tiny little smile when buck mentions the tour. you wanted to see me? 🥺

exhibit h: the fucking recoil when buck says he wanted to get to know him. the disbelief. the oh. the maybe i can have this.

exhibit i: the slow drop of his smile the more time buck spends mentioning eddie (which btw why is that line so long fuck off buck stand up!!) thinking oh never mind.

exhibit j: "i could teach you" with that bashful little shrug of his shoulders. i could teach you if you'd let me.

exhibit k: the realisation that sinks in after buck says about flying lessons. he wants to spend time with me, he's moving closer. oh shit, i'm allowed, i'm allowed, i'm allowed. the seriousness. the i have to make him understand i want him. the first time he lets his eyes drop to buck's lips.

exhibit l: my attention? one last check. one last check just to make sure. i can want this, i can want him.

exhibit m: his little kind of glassy-eyed smile between "i did maim my best friend" and "my sister". he is not listening to a word buck says. he is making a decision. a terrifying decision, but he's already made it.

exhibit n (typed through tears lol): the way he squeezes his eyes shut as he pulls away. buck is opening his but tommy squeezes his shut harder. he doesn't want to see the disgust on buck's face. he's bracing for rejection. he's hoping, hoping, hoping.

exhibit o: the breathlessness of "like that?" please tell me that was okay, please tell me that's allowed, please please please. the clench of his jaw as he waits for buck's answer, the slight nod like he's confirming something to himself.

exhibit p: the smile when it sinks in that buck wants this. the smile before the immediate "so that was okay?" just needing that verbal confirmation for buck, yeah, but also for himself.

and then for me it's the complete shift in tommy's demeanour after buck confirms it's okay. he goes from this quiet, hesitant, reserved tommy to this confident, flirty, little bit sensual tommy the moment he's allowed. cross town traffic 🫦 came in a car this time 😏. it's just such a wild switch up but it makes so much sense because the nerves have gone. he's allowed to want. (jesus got halfway through the alphabet sorry)

SAMI IM GONNA SCREAM BRB TIME TO WATCH THIS SCENE SIDE BY SIDE W UR ANALYSIS THIS IS SO FUCKING GOOD !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[lovebugism]

forgive me for what is likely a basic ass request but... steve has a crush on eddie's best friend? smut optional but encouraged :) (love, j.d. aka mypoisonedvine)

✶ ┄ LOVE YOU, ON PURPOSE (i)

part one | part two

summary: steve harrington took extra care to avoid the local freaks of hawkins. having shared custody of a fourteen-year-old forced him into a bitter friendship with one, he's steadfast in his refusal to befriend the other. that is, until you start working at the groove beside family video. steve claims he only fell for you because you tripped him. (17k)

pairing: steve harrington / eddie's bff!reader

tags: strangers to friends to lovers, mutual pining, protective eddie, canon divergence TW swearing, bullying, some smooching, talks of insecurities, reader is doubtful of steve's intentions because steve used to be a dick &lt;3

a/n: this request has been sitting in my inbox for ages. ages, i tell you! i wrote the outline the day it was sent in and ended up turning the blurb request into a full on 30k+ word fic. i'm sorry for the wait j.d. (and to everyone else who's been waiting patiently for me to put this out). i quite literally put my heart, soul, pussy, and so, so many hours into this. please enjoy! feedback is always appreciated! xoxo

˗ˋˏ ♡ ˎˊ˗

Something happens and I'm head over heels.

It would be a total disservice to call you Eddie’s best friend.

It wouldn’t even feel right to call you his platonic soulmate or his sister from another dimension. Not when the two of you are essentially an extension of the same human being. It’s a twin flame on steroids — your mirrored souls make the rest of Hawkins believe in some sort of higher power. There’s no way it wasn’t destiny that placed the two of you together at exactly the right place, at exactly the right time.

Your entwined spirits could’ve been a beautiful thing.

It’s too bad you’re both total fucking freaks.

Unfortunately, being a couple of metalheads who spend their free time creating fantastical worlds in silly little board games hasn’t become cool yet — for some sad, strange reason. It leaves you and Eddie as the town’s token social pariahs. The kind of misfits you only spot when you care enough to look — laughing too loudly at the lunch table or sharing a cigarette in the alleyway between school buildings.

The kind of weirdos who get your attention without trying. The kind that people only look at when they need something to make fun of.

With that being said, everything Steve knew about you came from the people that hated you.

Tommy Hagan said that you and Eddie had been fucking since the seventh grade, that the two of you had gotten close between blowjobs and fingerbangs in the old chemistry classroom. No one’s quite sure where it came from, but they believed him without thinking twice. You and Eddie tried to squash the rumor for years before leaning into it full throttle.

“And these are the freaks,” Tommy announced when he approached your lunch table. He was giving Billy Hargrove a grand tour of the high school, or rather the shithole, and detoured like you and Eddie were some kind of sideshow attraction. Him and his goons ogled at you like zoo animals.

Steve idled some feet away, not as interested in the bit as the rest of them. He was even less interested in entertaining the new kid on the block thateveryone else seemed to be obsessed with.

“Hey, Tommy...” Eddie sing-songed through a mouthful of PB&J. You’d given him the other half of your sandwich, because you always give him the other half of your sandwich. “Hope you’re not comin’ back to ask for a handy again. I already turned you down, remember?”

A dumb grin took over the boy’s freckled face. He crossed his arms over his chest and leaned over to the California boy. “I wouldn’t get too close to them. Don’t know where their hands have been, you know? If I had to guess, I think Punchy got Munson’s rocks off in the janitor’s closet before lunch period.”

Neither of you were particularly fazed by the laughter that erupted all at once and threatened to swallow you whole. Instead, you smiled with bits of grape jelly smeared on your chin. “I bet you think about it a lot, don’t you, Tommy?”

You really lived up to the nickname. Punchy. You weren’t entirely sure where it came from — your fierce temper, perhaps, or maybe your intense personality. Either way, it suited you.

Vicki Carmichael once said that you bit a guy on a date one time. Barry Jenkins, a tennis douchebag who thought the world revolved around him because his dad owned a string of local laundromats. He took you on a date in his mom’s Impala and assumed making out in the backseat gave him free rein to stick his hand up your skirt.

The asshole sported a red mark on his neck the next day.

When people asked you about it, you smiled with all your teeth in place of any real answer.

Carol Perkins loved to comment on the state of your wardrobe, telling anyone who would listen about the time she caught you rifling through the $1 bargain bins outside the thrift store. She liked to joke that you were stealing from them. “Because she can’t even afford a couple measly dollars. It’s kinda sad, honestly. I feel a little bad for her,” you overheard her saying once.

You were smoking a cigarette in the stall and watching through the crack of it while her and her friends touched up their lip gloss. 

“Wait, really?” Tina wondered, stopping mid-swipe of mascara through her long lashes to gape at the girl beside her. Because, god forbid, they don’t have someone to make fun of.

Carol snapped bright pink bubblegum between her teeth. She looked offended, almost — manicured brows furrowed and shiny lips snarled — like the idea of her taking pity on you was insulting. “No,” she snapped in response.

You’re pretty sure it’s the only rumor about you that’s got any bit of truth to it. Or any rumor of hers, really. The thrift store was great and all, but you firmly believe that your best pieces come remanufactured straight from Eddie Munson’s closet.

So it isn’t any wonder why the two of you seem to dress so similarly — all leather jackets and distressed jeans and hand-me-down t-shirts that are either too big or too small. The both of you take little care in your appearance, wearing only what you feel good in. And sometimes that means wild hair and baggy clothes that swallow you whole.

To make it worse, you and Eddie even talk the same. You’re both loud and brash and have very little awareness of personal space. You aren’t scared to make a scene or use your voice when you think it’s being stifled. And when you love someone, they know it, because you won’t leave them the hell alone.

These are all the things that Steve hated about Eddie. So he hasn’t quite figured out why he’s so damn in love with you. 

But he is. 

Quite dreadfully so. 

Head over heels and stumbling since the day he met you for a second time.

It was the spring of 1986 and The Groove had just opened up. Steve had heard murmurings of a record shop taking over the empty outlet adjacent to Family Video but had no idea it would nearly run them out of business. The shiny, new music store attracted all of their usual customers. People were more excited to buy new cassettes than rent movies they’d seen a thousand times already.

Steve didn’t mind, though. He liked it best when the store was empty. But all of his friends — a closeted lesbian, a basket case, and a couple of fourteen-year-olds — seemed to have the same affliction that was plaguing the rest of the town. 

He tried not to be offended when Robin said she was going to spend her break next door and not with him in the closet-sized break room. 

He failed.

Robin spent her half-hour and then some meeting you. She returned forty-five minutes later with a blushing face and a bleeding heart. Suddenly, there were two people in Steve’s life that couldn’t seem to shut up about you. As much as it annoyed him, he let her gush about you anyway, because that’s what best friends do, after all.

But Steve knew you once upon a time. Or he thought he did.

You were a loudmouthed metalhead who wore all black to blend in to Eddie’s shadow. You created fictional characters because it was easier than making friends with real people. You were strange and awkward and mean and gauche — the total opposite of this heavenly, mystical creature Robin was making you out to be.

But then it became this whole… thing.

With Robin and Eddie constantly talking over him about you, the rest of the kids were as confused as Steve was. And as they so often tend to do, the group decided to take matters into their own hands and make the short trek to meet you formally. Steve figured that their answer would be final. When those teenagers hate you, you know it. He learned that the hard way

They’re gone for a little over an hour and come back with a thousand stories and various tapes they say you gave to them for free.

Lucas has got a new Beastie Boys cassette and a proud smile on his face as he recounts the promise you’d made him about catching his next basketball game. “And she said she really liked my ranger,” he brags less than humbly, telling the older teens about how you’d heard stories about his track record in Hellfire campaigns. There’s a sudden suaveness to his voice as he bounces his brows up and down at them.

Max scrunches her face in disgust. She clutches a Kate Bush tape close to her chest, like it’s a prized possession she never wants to let go of. She rolls her eyes at her boyfriend (or maybe ex-boyfriend, but Steve can never keep up these days) and makes her own conversation with Robin. The two girls are the only ones with more than half a brain cell between them, or so they claim.

The redhead tells her that she plans on bringing her broken skateboard over to your store soon. She says the thing’s been wobbly for days, and Robin nods along like she knows all about it. “Well, apparently, she has some tools and knows how to fix it. Said the trucks just needed to be reinforced or some shit, I don’t know, I’m just glad it’s getting fixed.”

“Wait, why didn’t you tell me?” Steve asks her, confusion contorting his words along with his features. He crosses his arms and leans against the counter. “I could’ve fixed it.”

“You don’t know anything about skateboards,” Max monotones.

“Okay, but you don’t even know this girl! She’s a total stranger, Max. That’s dangerous.”

She rolls her eyes. “She’s nice, Steve. Way nicer than you—”

That makes him scoff.

“—And you’d know that if you got to know her.”

It’s Dustin’s turn to gush about you next. His opinion, for a reason Steve has never been able to place, arguably means the most to him. And the kid is just absolutely fucking beaming about you. He holds a Star Wars orchestral vinyl in his hand —  the brand new one he’s been talking about for weeks but couldn’t afford. 

He talks of the collection of DnD figurines you were painting behind the counter and the promise you made to make one for his bard come the next campaign. 

Dustin gazes at Steve, wide-eyed and nodding like he’s as amazed by the revelation as Steve is.  “She’s cool, Steve. Like… really cool.” 

The boy thought that Robin just had a crush, that Eddie was just being Eddie and overdramatizing all of his stories about you. But you’re everything they said you’d be and then some. The kind of stranger you meet that takes your breath away, that makes you sad in the understanding that you’ll never see them again. Dustin is grateful you don’t have to be a stranger anymore.

You sounded… nice. More than nice. They painted you out to be a fucking angel, the way you took care of a bunch of kids you barely knew for the better part of an hour. You weren’t the freak everyone made you out to be all that time ago.

They talk a great deal about your looks, too. Dustin, mostly. Lucas had received a glare and a half-hearted punch on the arm from Max when he said how pretty you were — even though she ultimately agreed with him. The curly-headed boy uses too big words to describe the renaissance painting you are, all heavenly morose and beautifully strange.

“Hey,” Eddie scolds from the sidelines, mostly playful. “That’s my sister you’re talking about. Bring it down a few notches, ‘kay?”

Steve is silent for the rest of the day after that. He’s not pouting about it like Robin keeps saying he is, just reserved in his reminiscence. 

He can’t tell if he’s intrigued or annoyed. They talk about you the way people used to talk about King Steve — with a borderline obsession for someone they don’t really know. And deep down, he knows he’s just jealous. Jealous that no one talks about him that way anymore. Jealous that none of the kids have ever talked about him that way.

It leaves him skeptical and wanting to see the real thing for himself.

Steve opts to meet you on his lunch break the next day with a tight chest and sweaty palms, like a part of him knew it was going to change the trajectory of his life for the foreseeable future.

The door dings with his arrival. The record store smells like earth and nostalgia, a bit like flipping through the pages of an old book. Vinyls sit in rows and in towers that rise to the ceilings. Colorful cassettes, of which there are thousands, have nooks and crannies of their own. Posters decorate the walls along with various patterned records — there’s hardly a blank spot in the entire store.

And when Steve sees you for the first time, he only sees the back of you.

You’re in all black, just like he imagined you’d be. A sliver of skin at your midriff is showing from where your too small shirt has ridden up your torso. And your hair is as wild as ever, though a little longer than he remembers. You’ve haphazardly pinned back the ornery strings with a sparkly pin, but it doesn’t do much to tame them.

A breeze of warm wistfulness washes over him at the sight of you. A reminder of a life that used to be his, that you were a part of only passively.

It’s your smile that does him in. Maybe because you’ve never looked at him with it. As far as Steve’s concerned, no one’s ever smiled at him the way you do, and you barely even know him. You hadn’t seen him in over a year and if you shared any words in the past, it wasn’t anything more than snarky one-liners. But here you are, looking at him with sunshine anyway.

“Hi,” you beam with the warmest grin he’s ever seen, swiveling in your chair to face him. “Welcome in.”

He’s too stunned by the sight of you to respond. He just stands in the doorway, all wide-eyed and gaping, like he’s the first to see an angel on earth. And it’s strange because you’re far from perfect. 

You’re blousy and a little disheveled, like you’d been running late that morning. The lack of makeup allows your imperfections to shine through in a way that makes you somehow more alluring. And you’ve got paint splattered like freckles on your cheeks, the culprit being the figurines you’re painting behind the counter. If you know you’re dotted with shades of red, blue, and green, you don’t show it.

“Can I help you find anything?” you ask him, still kind even though he’s acting like a fucking weirdo. That’s supposed to be your thing, not his.

Steve grasps for something to say but comes up short. His lips part and then close again in an embarrassing pattern that resembles a fish out of water. It makes sense, though; it’s a bit how you’ve made him feel just now.

When he realizes he can’t make out anything intelligible, he shakes his head. “Uh… nope.”

He’s leaving before he even realizes he’s leaving. The door dings again and he’s on the other side of it, long legs carrying him the short distance to Family Video at record speed. 

He swings and slams the egress shut in quick succession, as though the ghost of you had been chasing him. He leans against the glass pane and exhales a heaving sigh, eyes squeezing shut as he recoils at what he’d just done.

He always knew that King Steve had died some time ago, but this was a new low.

Robin watches from the front counter with wide eyes. “…Did you forget something?”

Steve sighs a big, hopeless sigh, then peeks his eyes open. “My dignity.”

“She’s cute, right?” she asks, already knowing the answer. Her brows bounce in time with the smirk on her painted lips.

“Yeah, she’s cute,” he answers, all mad because it’s obvious. “She’s fucking— she’s beautiful.”

“Aw. Look at you,” she sing-songs and tilts her head to her shoulder. “I think your heart grew three sizes today, Stevie.”

˗ˋˏ ♡ ˎˊ˗

I never find out 'til I'm head over heels.

Steve, all caught up in his boyish misery, has no idea that he’s enraptured you in a similar way.

You hadn’t cared very much for the guy in high school. You didn’t really know him then, and you didn’t particularly want to. King Steve was rich. King Steve was pretty — too pretty. King Steve got attention from pretty cheerleaders and overaggressive douchebags alike.

King Steve didn’t need any affection from the local freakshow.

But, by some strange turn of events, he’d managed to make nice with your best friend. 

The way Eddie talks about Steve, his words always dripping with a distant venom, it sounds like they still hate each other. Maybe they do. Or maybe he just doesn’t want to admit that they hang out far too often not to be friends.

If you were still in school, you probably would’ve judged him for it. Being friends with the boy whose buddies made your life hell certainly warranted some degree of ridicule. But now, having graduated and trying to move on from it all, you can’t find it in yourself to. 

High school might as well have been a lifetime now. There’s no use in holding onto old ghosts.

If Eddie could let that shit go, so could you.

He drops by after school to keep you company like he always does when he doesn’t have a campaign to prep for. It’s his favorite pastime, perhaps a close second to Dungeons and Dragons. He gets to hang out with his best friend and swim in an ocean of music while he does it. As far as freaks go, Eddie Munson considers himself the luckiest.

He likes to hear you talk about everything new you’ve gotten in while he rifles through the old stuff that isn’t selling as well. You happily let him take what he wants for free. And what he doesn’t take, he doesn’t pay for either, because you cheat the system with your employee discount and then wipe the record from inventory. Just to be safe.

“I love having a criminal for a best friend,” he jokes every time, without fail.

Eddie stays by your side until the sun sets. He parts only to flip the sign at the door to closingfor you, then plops himself back on the counter again. His legs hang off the side of it, sneakers occasionally thudding against the wood when he kicks them back and forth too hard. He scans the back of an old Lynyrd Skynyrd vinyl and bobs his head to the rhythmic bass as the song fills the empty store. He’ll take this one home, he decides.

You keep on painting like you have been all day, breaking only to assist customers or stretch your aching spine. The forest dragon had been far more work than you expected — made of pretty purple leaves instead of scales and blowing blush-colored flowers instead of fire. The little piece of clay has resulted in a day of back-breaking work. 

You’ll be damned if Eddie’s next campaign isn’t the most stellar looking one yet.

Focusing on that makes it easier not to bring up Steve. 

You want to. You just don’t know how. 

Eddie’s friends were Eddie’s, and you don’t get involved where it doesn’t concern you. Besides, you did sort of give him shit for hanging out with The Hair way back when. The last thing you want is him taking the piss out of you about it.  

You don’t want to sound like you care too much. Even more, you don’t want it to be obvious that you’ve been thinking about the boy all day — making yourself sick as you stew in what could’ve run him out like he did.

“Saw your friend today,” you remark, feigning a sort of absentmindedness, as you swipe your brush along the petals of your dragon. “King Steve.”

“Oh, you met him?” Eddie wonders, more intrigued by your words than you expected he’d be. He says it like you didn’t already know the guy — like this new Steve was a totally different person you needed to be reacquainted with to really know.

“I wouldn’t say met him exactly. He just, like, popped in for half a second and ran out.”

With your back facing him, you don’t see the shit-eating grin that pulls at the corners of his mouth. 

Eddie was waiting for Steve to crack and finally see you. He knew he’d bite after the way the kids had talked about you — Dustin, especially. Because even though he claims he doesn’t have favorites, he’s got a very obvious soft spot for the boy. And he knew Steve would like you because everyone likes you. When they’re not clouded by judgment and high school hierarchies, at least. 

He’s still got no idea how a guy that trips all over himself at the sight of a pretty girl could’ve ruled Hawkins once upon a time.

“Fucking idiot,” Eddie laughs to himself, already gearing up for the shit he was going to give Steve the next time he saw him. 

But you see the boy before Eddie does. Steve comes back the next day, an hour or more after opening, less frazzled than the day before. The nearly twenty-four hours he had to prepare himself for the angel he was going to see allowed him not to make a total fool of himself when he stepped into the store again.

And you wouldn’t say it out loud — hell, it’s not even something you want to admit to yourself — but you’d been hoping he’d stop by again. 

You thought Robin would come by and drag him with her, or that Dustin and his friends would come around before Steve dropped them all home. Frankly, you didn’t really care what brought him back. You just wanted to see him again.

Steve’s different than the boy he used to be. Enough that it was obvious from a measly thirty-second interaction. He used to be a charmer who could talk his way out of anything. Not to you, of course, he wouldn’t have been caught dead talking to you. But then he stops by out of nowhere, in rare form, stumbling all over himself and looking like he didn’t recognize you at all.

You’re still trying to figure out if that was a good thing or not.

He’s mystified you in a way he probably isn’t used to. Most girls like the hair and the arms — the super buff, super strong arms that fit so nicely in his uniform — or the fact that he’s got money and a reputation that precedes him. But you’ve never given a shit about any of that. 

You’re more enchanted by the way nothing could even begin to conceal the soft, shy boy that King Steve had apparently turned into.

The door chimes above his head when he enters. The scent of earthy nostalgia is already familiar to him — lavender, sage, and something deeper. Steve considers it progress when he plants himself a few feet away from the door this time. If he runs out again, he’ll have to make an embarrassingly longer escape.

You turn away from your nearly finished figurine to greet the new customer. The practiced smile unconsciously widens at the sight of him. “Hi!”

“Hey,” he smiles with a curt nod. He regrets the half-wave he gives you the second his hand shoots up.

“You gonna run off on me again?” you tease and swivel in your chair to face him completely.

You’re wearing a Hellfire shirt that’s just slightly too big for you. It probably belonged to Eddie before it belonged to you. And you wear a corset-looking thing over top of it, a sheer number with a lace embroidery and a ribbon that’s tied in a bow at your belly. It doesn’t cinch you in the slightest, though, more for decoration than practicality.

“No that was… I just—” Steve huffs out a laugh as he tries and fails to come up with an excuse. He figures anything is better than the truth — that he saw how pretty you were and his brain forgot how to work because he’s the lamest person on the planet. 

So he chucks a thumb over his shoulder and fibs. “I left something back at Family Video. Had to run back.”

“It’s okay. I was just teasing,” you assure. “Uh— Are you looking for anything specific?”

“No. Not really. Just… new records to add to my collection, you know?”

“Oh, you collect vinyls?”

He doesn’t realize that’s what he’s just said until you repeat the words back to him. 

He’s kind of just talking out of his ass and hoping something sticks. That line does, apparently, because you’re beaming at him instantly. He’s scared to say no because then you’ll stop smiling. And he can’t have that.

“Yep,” he answers with a nod. The stack of records collecting dust in his den has to count for something, right?

He can’t find it in himself to regret his little white lie when it has you lighting up like a christmas tree. 

You toss your paintbrush down when you rush from behind the counter to meet him. You seem to have forgotten that you’d just dipped the thing in purple paint. The thing splatters shades of lilac all over the limestone bench. And, in your haste, you nearly smack yourself with the leaden slab as you raise it to pass by.

Steve’s eyes widen when you narrowly dodge the weighty thing — then jumps, startled by the dense thwap that echoes through the small store when it slams back down again. He’s almost worried that it might’ve busted the hinge. 

You cower at the loud sound but move on with a commendable finesse, too focused on him to care about anything else.

“That’s so cool! I’ve always wanted to collect, but records are so expensive, it’s crazy,” you ramble as you walk up to him, totally unthinking in the way you grab his forearm and usher him to the back of the store. 

Your sheer black skirt swishes at your ankles as you walk. The dainty fabric is patterned with sparkly stars and crescent moons. He notices you wear a pair of dark shorts underneath for modesty. Steve tries his best not to stare at your ass. He almost succeeds.

“We actually just got in a couple of Dio records — The Holy Diver, you know, the one that just came out. I’m pretty sure there’s only, like, a couple thousand of these things in the whole world — which is totally fucking bonkers if you think about it,” you explain in one breath, laughing, before stopping abruptly in your tracks. Steve nearly runs into you when you turn around to face him. 

You laugh again, a sadder one, this time at yourself, as you bring your palm to your forehead. “Sorry. I don’t— I don’t even know if you like Dio. I mean, of course, you don’t, right? I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have… rambled like that.”

You’d just been so excited and Steve had just been so different that you forgot who you were talking to. Hawkins High Royalty, Prom King, Biggest Flirt and Life of the Party in the yearbook. 

As far as you’re concerned, Eddie Munson is your only friend. He’s the only person in the whole world you can be yourself around and never get self-conscious about any of it. 

But sometimes you have moments like this one with a total stranger. Moments where you lose yourself in the conversation and your own jumbled thoughts. Moments where you talk and talk and talk until something thumps you on the head and you realize how annoying you’re being. This time, it’s the musky smell of his cologne that knocks you back to Ms. Click’s history class. The crisp breeze of bitter nostalgia makes you shiver.

Steve can see the way you get so suddenly aware of yourself and how the cognizance of the moment makes you writhe. He tries to bat away the lingering insecurities with a smile. 

“Love ‘em,” he responds with a nod. He raises his brows and scoffs, grins and crosses his arms over his chest. “I mean, Dio? God, they’re like… top ten bands of all time, at least. Maybe even five.”

That isn’t totally true. He doesn’t know much about the band to have an opinion, but he’s pretty sure he might’ve said he hated them once. That was only because Eddie wouldn’t stop talking about them, though. Steve could learn to like them, if it means so much to you.

That’s exactly how he justifies spending $60 on four records. 

He tells himself that he’ll listen to them and think of you, that it’ll be a solid conversation starter the next time he sees you. 

You had a whole damn rack dedicated to all your favorite bands — “I put it together myself,” you’d bragged with a proud smile. S it’s a wonder Steve didn’t walk out with the entire damn store. Because you just kept on smiling and talking, so happy to have someone to care about what you had to say, and he ate up every second of it.

He’ll have to work overtime to keep his pockets from hurting, but it’ll be worth it. Because he’ll get to keep talking to you and indulging in all the things you seem to love more than life itself.

You’re still rambling as you ring him up. Steve notices you haven’t stopped yourself like you did before. His lack of dismissal has made you more comfortable, it seems. He likes that.

“I think we’re also gonna get a couple cases of Def Leppard cassettes tomorrow, which is super sick. I think I might have to start collecting, honestly. Tapes are whole lot cheaper than records, you know,” you tell him as you scan and bag all his vinyls. “And it’s also, like, a fucking stellar album. I don’t think I’ve stopped listening to Photograph since it came out.”

“Photograph. Right. Love that one,” Steve nods with a kind smile as he props his elbows on the counter. He doesn’t particularly care that he’s not entirely sure what you’re talking about, or that he’s never actually heard the song. He’s starting to realize you could talk for hours and he wouldn’t get bored.

“Oh, is that your favorite too? Eddie’s more of a Foolin’ kinda guy.”

Despite the fact that he’s never heard the song or this album in his life, he nods anyway. 

He sort of spent the first eighteen years of his life faking just about everything — it kind of came with being the King of Hawkins High. It’s a talent that hasn’t yet left him, it seems, lying through his teeth to impress people. It’s almost become a second nature to him.

“Foolin’s good, yeah, but I think Photograph is obviously better.”

“Obviously, right!” you exclaim with a sunshine-coated laugh. “That’s exactly what I told him! But he’s way too hard-headed to be wrong about anything, so…”

“Well, I’d like to put it on the record that I firmly agree with you,” Steve replies so smoothly that his tongue must be dripping with honey. It’s so easy for him to fall into King Steve mode — when he isn’t forgetting how to speak and running off, that is.

You’ve learned a lot Steve in the past half hour. He likes metal, but leans more toward rock. Particularly all the metal and rock that you like. He hasn’t once had a differing opinion than you, besides telling you he heard Eddie playing a Metallica song once that he didn’t particularly care for. The second you tell him it’s one of your favorites, he backtracks instantly, blaming the Munson boy for being too sloshed to play it properly.

And you don’t miss the way he’s looking at you just now either, with his chin toward his chest as he peers up at you with warm amber eyes. He’s the charmer that he always was. It makes you remember, again, just who you’re talking to.

“We have a lot in common, King Steve,” you lilt with a playful grin.

He deflates at the use of the old nickname. You see the light in his eyes flicker for a just moment before he’s ducking his gaze away from you completely. He tries to brush it off with a laugh. “Yeah, I’m not— I’m not really King Steve anymore…”

“No?”

“Nope. Just… Just Steve these days.”

When he looks back at you, he finds you nodding at him, almost in approval. 

Most people are upset to find that he’s changed so much. They hate that he’s no longer the recklessly stupid dumbass they used to get drunk with. 

Not you, though.

“Cool,” you mumble, smiling softly, as you hand him his bag and receipt.

“Uh, I’d love to, you know, come take a look at those tapes when you get ‘em in,” he says as he walks backward towards the door, finally making the brash offer he’s been thinking about this whole time. “Maybe I can bring lunch and we can—”

“Well, Hellfire’s been doing campaigns during lunch recently. And Gareth’s out sick, so I’ve been subbing for him, you know, so…” you interject awkwardly, shifting your weight on your feet. You hate to turn him down, but Eddie might just kill you if he has to get a substitute for the substitute.

“Oh…” he nods, softly puckering his plump pink lips that you can’t seem to stop staring at.

“But I don’t think they’re coming in until late, anyway,” you add quickly. “So, you can stop by at closing, if you want?”

“No, yeah, that’s cool. So cool,” he replies, a little more flustered than he’d been just moments before. He’s just happy that your rejection wasn’t a total refusal.

You try to bite back the wide grin threatening to take over your mouth. “Okay… I’ll catch you later, then, Just Steve.”

“See you,” he waves right before startling himself when he backs into the basket of clearance tapes sitting just beside the door. He barely catches the thing before it tips over completely. He flashes you a shaking smile afterward and finds you covering your mouth with your hand while you try not to laugh too loudly. 

He wishes you’d just went ahead and laughed at him. He wouldn’t have even cared that you were laughing at him, if it meant he got to see you smile.

And even though he’d just gotten done making the biggest fool of himself, he walks back to work feeling like the coolest man alive. There’s a foreign strut in his step that hadn’t been there before he saw you. It doesn’t leave him when he realizes he’s gone slightly over his break and that Keith is manning the counter in his absence.

The man mumbles a monotoned goodbye to the customer he’d just checked out.

She turns around and Steve realizes he recognizes this girl — Mindy or Mandy or maybe Monica — from Mr. Kaminsky’s class way back when. She did all of his homework for him before and after letting him fuck her on her twin-sized bed in her all pink room.  That’s when Steve was conquering girls like they were Mount Everest, way before Nancy, when King was a title he wore with pride. 

But he’s still so stuck in his head with thoughts of you that he doesn’t even see Mindy-Mandy-Monica or the flirtatious wave she throws his way.

“You’re ten minutes late,” Keith scolds, with his dead tone and his deader eyes.

Steve only shrugs, uncaring if it came out of his paycheck because — “I just got a date with the hottest woman on the planet,” he boasts with a puffed out chest and too smug smile.

It doesn’t lessen Keith’s anger, just diverts it. Because he knows exactly who he’s talking about. And so does Robin, as she pops her head out from behind the man from where she sits at the computer. “No way,” they chorus in disbelief at his words.

Steve nods. “Yes way.”

“Eddie’s gonna kill you,” Robin remarks with the shake of her head. 

He knows she’s right. He just doesn’t care. 

Eddie’s always been protective of you. Everyone knows that. But the two of them were friends now — or somewhat good-natured acquaintances, at the very least. He would’ve been mad about a year or more ago, if King Steve had decided to suddenly woo his best friend. 

But it’s different now. He’s different now. Eddie knows how much everything’s changed, it’s just a question of if he’s willing to rehash old wounds.

It’s a good thing Steve knows how to take a punch.

˗ˋˏ ♡ ˎˊ˗

Don't take my heart, don't break my heart.

Steve finds you again the next day less happy than he’s gotten used to.

The record store is dim and the red sign at the entrance has been flipped to closed, but the door is left unlocked — for him. The warm scent is a distinct contrast to the frigid spring night, a cozy high hemp and lavender, but your absence is noticeable and terribly heavy. 

Steve lingers in the doorway, his shadow looming like a giant before him from the moonlight streaming in from outside. 

He calls for you in the emptiness.

“Uh… Punchy?”

He’s relieved when you answer. The “back here!” you shout to him is muffled and far away. He follows the sound of your voice, filled suddenly with a childlike consolation. 

The yellow fairy lights dangling over his head guide him through the aisles of cassettes and closer to you. Through a cluttered backroom, Steve finds you standing just outside an opened door — left ajar, for him.

The smile you flash when you see him is as dim as the closed-down store. It lacks all the sunshine you usually look at him with, shades of stormy gray rather than the usual yellows. 

A look of concern flashes across his features — furrowed brows and inquisitive twinkling eyes — as you take a drag from the lit cigarette caught between your pointer and middle finger. You muster your best grin, but it flickers like a shoddy radio signal. 

“Punchy, huh?” you tease.

Steve’s brows pinch together as confusion floods his features. It takes him a moment to realize what he’d said and the nickname he’d used — and he doesn’t want to be dramatic or anything, but he kinda wants to die. It’s embarrassing, he thinks, to hold on to an old high school monicker. And, fuck, if you hate it half as bad as he hates being called king, he deserves a slap to the face right about now.

You laugh instead of ball your first. He’s able to smile meekly in relief. “Oh. Shit. Sorry, I… I don’t think I even realized it came out.”

“No, it’s okay,” you assure when you see him getting all apologetic. “Eddie still calls me that all the time, so… Old habits die hard, I guess.”

Steve tries to move on, but it’s hard to when you’re so obviously gloomy. He hates how reserved you’ve gone in your quiet, not talking up a storm like you had been the last time he saw you. Now you’re just… a storm. It’s a little like sitting next to a rumbling rain cloud.

The rumbling rain cloud beside him takes a drag of her cigarette.

“You okay?” he asks and sounds like he really cares.

You didn’t think King Steve was capable of caring about anything other than his hair, but he looks down at you like he can feel every blue bolt of your doom and gloom. He makes you feel seen in the void of your sadness despite all the years you spent being invisible to him.

“Uh, yeah. It’s just the tapes. They didn’t come in,” you answer with a shrug. Smokes leaves your mouth and lingers in white clouds in the air. “So I’m a little bummed.”

“Oh…” is all Steve says and his pink mouth forms a too pretty ‘o’ shape that you can’t draw your gaze from.

The following silence makes you momentarily cautious. Insecurity runs cold over you because no sane person gets this about upset over a broken promise of a couple cassettes. It’s stupid, you know it is, but you were really looking forward to them. It’s like promising a kid the most metal present ever and then snatching it out of their bare hands.

Now, over the course of a couple hours, you’ve managed to convince yourself you won’t remember happiness until you get those stupid tapes.

“Sorry,” you apologize to him for a reason he can’t place. You shift your weight on your feet and peer at him from beneath your lashes. “I know you were looking forward to them, too.”

You extend your hand and offer him the cigarette between your fingers like it’s an olive branch. He takes it from you with a distant smile, then opts to laze against the brick wall like you are. He stays a respectful distance on the other side of the entryway. 

“It’s okay. They’ll come. If I’m being honest, you know, I was kinda more excited to see you.”

His admission is brazen and a tad bit brash, even for a certified ex-douchebag. It lacks all of the usual honey-coated flirtation that usually tints his tone when he’s talking to a pretty girl. Because he wasn’t trying to make you swoon — though he certainly wouldn’t have minded if you had. This wasn’t some romantic advance, just a proclamation of his own personal truth.

A flash of shock contorts your features. “Really?”

“Of course,” he answers, breathing out a laugh that exits along with the smoke in his lungs. “I love talking to you. You’re… You’re cool, you know? S— Super cool.”

His face screws up at his stuttering, and he shakes his head at how the words sound leaving his mouth. His cheeks glow cherry red beneath an orange street lamp. 

“Super cool, huh?” you repeat with a giggle that’s bright enough to illuminate the velvet night. “I don’t think anyone’s ever called me that before.”

Steve scoffs when he passes the cigarette back to you. Because, lately, that’s all he’s been hearing about you. From Eddie, from Robin, from Dustin — every good thing a person could say about someone else, they all say about you. 

He’s starting to understand why.

Because you’re sweet. Like, pure sugar poured on the tip of his tongue kind of sweet. You’re bright like sunshine and soft like summer rain. You’re a shot of pure espresso for a boy who thought his life was at a dead end. He’s not entirely sure how he ever could’ve thought you were some deep, dark, devil-worshipping freak.

“I don’t believe that,” he dismisses with the shake of his head.

You breathe out a sharp exhale and a puff of nicotine-coated smoke. “I’ve been the town pariah since I was eleven, Steve. Everyone thinks I’m some kinda delinquent who’s in a cult because I play a dumb board game. So, no. No one’s ever thought I was cool before.”

“Still?” Steve wonders with a twisted face. “You graduated, like, a year ago. Are... Are people really still on your ass about that?”

“A little,” you answer with a shrug, trying your best not to look as affected by it all as you feel.

Steve feels his chest swell with the fiery urge to protect you. The same one he gets when Dustin tells him about the assholes at school that are bothering him. He wants to defend you from the same sort of assholes that he used to be. The impulse is borderline primal, rooted somewhere deep and far within himself, because god knows he’s got a terrible track record when it comes to winning fights.

“Shit, Punchy… I’m— I’m sorry.”

You sputter out a laugh at the apology, louder when you realize he’s using the nickname again.

He can’t relate to any of this. The trials and tribulations of being persona non grata everywhere you went were certainly lost on him. Steve might’ve lost his touch somewhere down the road, but he’ll always be crown royalty — the kind of guy you think fondly of when your wonderyears are long gone. But you? You’re lucky if people don’t cross to the other side of the street when they spot you coming.

Perhaps that’s why his words warm you so much. Because, despite all that, he’s trying to make you feel better anyway.

You give him a tender smile and a dwindling cigarette. 

“It’s okay. I mean, it’s whatever, you know? I think it’s because I still hang out with Eddie all the time. Like, people see us and remember what fucking freaks we used to be,” you say with a laugh, then start to ramble without thinking. “We saw Tommy Hagan at Melvald’s the other day, and he looked at us like we caused him severe PTSD or something, like, he looked terrified. I honestly felt a little bad.”

Steve smiles, wide-eyed, equal parts intrigued and unsettled by the reminiscent glimmer in your eye and the daunting giggle that spills from your lips.

“But I wouldn’t leave Eddie, you know?” you blurt, suddenly serious, like you’ve taken offense at the very thought. “Not even if it meant people stopped being so mean. ‘Cause I love him and everything… Even though he’s a pain in the ass.”

“Oh, he’s a total pain in the ass,” Steve agrees and flicks the butt of the cig between his fingers. “He loves you too, though. I can tell. The asshole never shuts up about you.”

“He talks about me?” you ask, voice fragile and pitched higher than normal.

Steve doesn’t like the way you say it. He hates how you look at him even more, with a scrunched up face and eyes that flicker with embers of shock. Like you don’t believe it, like you think yourself unworthy of it.

“You’re all he talks about,” the boy assures, feeling so suddenly brave and wanting to make you feel brave too. He hands the cigarette back to you. “I don’t blame him. If I were him, I’d never shut up about you either.”

The contorted look of confusion on your face untwists itself, and your features fall flat with disbelief. A smile pulls slow at your mouth. Your eyes glitter an orange gold beneath the streetlight. They flit over to the boy beside you just long enough to take the stick from him.

“Steve Harrington…” you lilt, almost scoldingly so.

It makes him smile. “What?”

“Stop flirting with me.”

“Well, that’s very presumptuous of you,” he retorts playfully. “Who’s to say I was flirting?”

“So you weren’t then?”

“Maybe a little,” he shrugs with a knowing, practiced smirk. “Can you blame me?”

You don’t seem impressed by his not-so-subtle attempt at flirting, and he isn’t at all used to that. The bravado and the puppy dog eyes are his one-two punch — any other time, he’d have a phone number tucked safely in his pocket by now. But you’re not biting.

“I’m so not your type,” you dismiss with the shake of your head.

“Yeah?” he challenges, shoving himself off the brick wall with his shoulder and making the short trek over to you. He plants himself next to you, leans with one sneaker crossed over the other, and smiles with a playful twinkle in his eye. “And what’s my type?”

“Nancy Wheeler,” you answer without missing a beat. “Pretty girls.”

“Well, I think you’re very pretty—”

“Not like her,” you interject with a foreign firmness that Steve hasn’t seen from you until now. You’re still smiling at him, though, still kind but looking like you don’t believe him. Like you think this must be some kind of sick joke that he’s taking too far.

You can entertain Steve. You like Steve. Mostly because he’s totally different from the douchebag you remember him being — the douchebag you were expecting him to be. 

You find that he’s terribly clumsy and not overtly good with words. He says dumb jokes that don’t come out right and smiles in relief when they make you laugh anyway. He’s soft like peach fuzz or a fluffy cloud, mushy like warm chocolatey gooey goodness, and not at all like you remember him.

But then he does this. He morphs into something else, changes shape right in front of you. He smiles at you with little of his dumbassery behind it — all smirks and faux longing gazes with the intent of making you swoon at his feet. He grins down at you and all you see is the teenage boy who would’ve never looked at you that way four years ago. Hell, not even one. 

It reminds you of who he is, who he used to be, and who you are now. 

You haven’t changed so much since high school. You’ve matured a little, sure, but there was never an asshole exterior that you felt the need to outgrow. You’re still loud at times, unaware and ignorant of the world around you. You still play lightsabers outside Eddie’s trailer in between lengthy Dungeons and Dragons campaigns. You still pretend like the lingering glares from all the people you used to know don’t bother you. 

They do, though. They always have.

You look at Steve and you see this butterfly — someone made of rainbow colors and mostly mature. He’s growing, and you’re stuck in the same cocoon you’ve been wrapped in since freshman year, still fumbling around and trying to figure out where you fit.

He’ll always be the pretty butterfly he always was, with his pretty little iridescent wings that catch the light and all the attention. He’ll feed off the applause he gets while you’re sitting on the sidelines. The girl who’s destined to stay bundled in her cocoon forever only hears all of his praise — never watches, never receives.

“You and I are completely different people, Steve Harrington,” you declare with a grin that tells him you’ve already made up your mind.

The boy doesn’t get it, though, why you seem so upset by the idea. Him and Robin were completely different people. Him and Dustin were, too. The two people he adored — tolerated — most in the entire world weren’t a single thing like him, and it was better that way.

You don’t seem to share a similar philosophy, though. You take a drag from your mostly gone cigarette and mourn what could have been; if only he had been the town freak or you had been born the pretty girl next door.

“That doesn’t have to be such a bad thing—”

He’s abruptly cut off by the sound of muffled rock music and the bright yellow headlights of Eddie Munson’s van. The two of you shield your eyes when he whips into the desolate parking lot and parks in front of you. The sudden intrusion feels like being blinding like the sun after you’ve found such comfort within each other in the dead of night.

The stifled Def Leppard song — or maybe Poison, Steve can never quite tell the difference — is brought to a sharp halt when the engine shuts off. The headlights dim. The metallic slam of the driver’s side door sounds so much louder in the darkness.

Eddie rounds the front of his van and eyes the two of you rather suspiciously. The boy inhales deeply, puffing out his chest and splaying his hands on his hips. “…What’s going on here?” he squints at you.

You give him a terribly manufactured sunshine smile and bat your lashes his way, like you’re pretending to be un-innocent. “Nothing…” you sing-song.

Eddie rolls his eyes at you, then turns his attention to Steve. They’re not really strangers anymore, but he still feels the need to treat him like an outsider anyway.

“Harrington,” he says in the place of any real greeting. “Don’t you have other shit to do? Like, I don’t know, a shift as the mannequin at the GAP or something?”

Steve can’t find it in himself to get self-conscious about his fitted-sweatshirt, khaki-slack combo when the insult comes from a guy in a decade-old leather jacket, unwashed t-shirt, and ripped jeans.

“Very funny,” the brunette monotones. 

“I’ll see you around, yeah?” you ask when you turn and walk backwards towards Eddie, like there’s a gravitational pull dragging you to him.

You say it to be polite mostly, but you’re hoping for an affirmative — a promise that you’ll have another night like this one, where he sees you just to be seeing you. Hell, you’ll even take a nod if that’s all he’ll give you. And when he does, he gives you a tiny smile that almost makes you trip over yourself.

Fuck, you think to yourself, like your brain is talking to your heart. We just agreed not to do that.

Before you get in the van, you walk by Eddie and bring your cigarette up to his mouth. You coax the stick between his lips with your pointer and middle finger, opting to let him take the last couple of hits because he never turns down a free smoke.

The passenger door shuts once you’re tucked into the seat of it. The sound it makes punctuates your absence. Steve feels all of its emptiness.

He eyes Eddie from the distance, immediately noticing the darkened skepticism dancing in his dark eyes. 

The boy’s always felt the need to protect you. When the entire town got spooked about stories of some satanic panic and started treating you like monsters, he wanted to shield you from the boogeyman everyone turned into. 

Steve wasn’t one of them, the bad men. But Eddie loves you and it’s made him doubtful.

“It’s not what it looks like,” Steve feels the need to say, as though he’d been caught with his pants down and not just sharing an innocent cigarette with a friend.

Eddie takes the final few puffs of it and exhales rather dramatically, lips pursing to blow it in his direction though it’s too far away to hit him. The boy throws the filter to the concrete and extinguishes the ashes with the toe of his dirty sneakers. 

He waits until the white smoke has fully dissipated to speak.

“Damn right, it isn’t.”

That’s all he says. He doesn’t even look at Steve when he says it, or when he rounds the van and hops into the driver’s seat next to you. Steve squints when the too bright headlights come alive again in time with the roaring engine and dated rock music. His tires screech when he speeds out of the back parking lot. 

The tin can he drives nearly tips over when he turns too sharply onto Main Street.

Steve doesn’t get a chance to get a good look at you before you’re gone completely. It makes him all boyishly upset, knowing the hours without you will be most agonizing, but the empty feeling is eclipsed by the warm relief of not getting clock cleaned by Eddie Munson.

Damn right, it isn’t. Four words. That’s all he gets. But they’re daunting and coated with a lingering foreboding that feels almost like a threat.

So, by all accounts, Steve probably should’ve known there was no way Munson was ever going to back down that easily.

Eddie comes back the next day, a thundering storm cloud of the boy he usually is, head wild with curly hair and a million thoughts. 

The door dings far too gently for such an aggressive arrival. Metal bangs against metal as the handle collides with the window pane. He stomps to the counter in several quick strides, dark eyes darting around the half-empty store — obviously searching for something.

Robin, manning the front counter, is entirely unable to be threatened by him. The all black, chunky metal rings, and crazy hair stopped being so intimidating when she found out you called him Eddie Spaghetti. Now, it’s all she can think about when she sees him. 

Even as he stands ahead of her, obviously upset, all she sees is a very cartoonishly angry Eddie Spaghetti, and it takes everything in her not to laugh.

“Where’s Steve?” the boy finally wonders when he realizes the boy’s not in the front.

“Uh, he’s in the back, I think. Why?”

Eddie doesn’t humor her with an answer. He just storms past the counter and makes a b-line for the break room.

Robin watches him over her shoulder. “You’re not supposed to go back there!” she half-heartedly shouts, but makes no further effort to stop him from doing so.

He finds Steve working beneath the dim yellow light of the back room. There’s a warmed-up container of leftovers on the small round table on one side of the room and a stack of unorganized tapes on the counter on the other. Steve multitasks between both and hums something summery under his breath — The Beach Boys, maybe.

He’s too distracted to notice Eddie’s abrupt appearance. It’s the subtle click of the shut door that gets his attention.

Steve’s confused at first. His head snaps over his shoulder like a ghost must’ve closed the door on him. He realizes that it’s just Eddie, and he’s so innocently relieved that it’s almost humorous, then confused all over again. His brows pinch together and through the chicken tender jutting out his check, he mumbles: “You’re not supposed to be back here—”

“Yeah, I got that part,” Eddie interrupts in a monotone.

He swallows. It’s as thick as the tension that settles between the two of them, made heavier by the lengthy silence. He crosses his arms over his chest, stands up a little straighter, and bares his neck when he lifts his chin. “I want you to leave her alone.”

Steve scoffs and chews through his mouthful. “Leave who alone?”

“You know exactly who I’m talking about,” Eddie squints with an unusual sort of seriousness. “I don’t want you messing around with her anymore, man. I’m, fucking— I’m so fucking serious right now.”

The clarification makes Steve laugh. He shakes his head and goes back to piling the myriad of tapes into organized stacks on the counter. “We were just talking, Eddie. I don’t need the lecture, okay?”

“We both know it’s never just talking with you.”

“What? Are you in love with her or something?” he retorts, trying to make a joke of it.

Eddie, for the first time in his life, isn’t amused. “Oh, god, get over yourself, dude. I know what kinda guy you are, alright? I’m not gonna let you hurt her.”

His words hit Steve like a pot of boiling water. It prickles his skin, leaving blisters and burning red blotches in its wake. He’s all but on fire with his anger, less offended by the accusation than by the person it comes from.

Steve and Eddie aren’t friends by any means. They’re just two guys with shared custody of a bunch of teenagers, bonded in their want to keep them all safe. But through their lighthearted animosity, is a sort of understanding: neither of them are the assholes the entire town claims them to be. Eddie isn’t apart of some satanic cult. Steve isn’t a douchebag that uses women as accessories. And that’s just a silent agreement they’ve both come to on their own terms. 

But now here they are, talking like it’s 1984 all over again and they’re strangers who hate each other’s guts.

“No. I’m not gonna hurt her. Because we’re just friends, Eddie.”

The boy just shakes his head. He scrunches his nose like he’s wincing, then laughs — a big, dramatic laugh that fills the tiny break room. He begins to pace, waving an accusatory ringed finger Steve’s way. “No, see… That’s the thing. I don’t think King Steve is capable of being ‘just friends’ with a pretty girl.”

Steve rolls his eyes with a heavy huff. He comes to the conclusion that Eddie’s just projecting and that there’s no use in arguing his case. He shoves a black VHS tape into its designated sleeve and slots it in with the rest of them, muttering under his breath, “I’m not King Steve anymore…”

“What?”

“I said, I’m not King Steve anymore!” he yells, a bit louder than he intended to.

He drives a tape onto the pile with an unexpected aggression. It hits the wall with a resounding thud. His arms flail wildly at his sides when he turns to face Eddie again. “God, you guys act like people can’t change! I’m not the asshole I used to be, alright? Jeez…”

Eddie exhales sharply through his nose in the place of any real reply. Deep down, he knows all that. He knows it’s all true because he would’ve never befriended him otherwise. Steve Harrington — the king, the rich kid, the douchebag — turned out to be a pretty damn good guy. 

And maybe if Eddie didn’t love you so much, he’d be able to wrap his head around all that.

But does. So he can’t.

He saw you two together the night before, sharing a cigarette behind The Groove — albeit a little too close for his liking — and suddenly, it was junior year all over again.

You’re stressed out about the ACT and college acceptance rates, none of your clothes quite fit you, and you’re trying out bold things with your makeup that don’t quite fit you either. You grin wildly up at Eddie through the vibrant lipstick smeared on your lips, laughing at his half-hearted attempt to cheer you up. 

And Steve is a senior, standing on the other side of the hallway — with his pretty clothes and prettier hair — and he lets all of his friends laugh at you. They make fun of your un-styled hair and the way your shirt makes your boobs look, and Steve doesn’t find any of it particularly funny but he lets them mock you anyway.

Eddie sees you together and forgets about the man Steve is now. All he sees is a boy who never stuck up for you, for either of you, who let his best friends make your lives hell because his reputation mattered more.

And it wasn’t like it was his job to defend you, because it wasn’t. Not really. It’s just that you would’ve done it for him, if the roles were reversed. Eddie, too. Neither of you would’ve let a lamb be led to the slaughter quite like that. It was the Hellfire motto, after all — to protect the little sheep from the creeping wolves.

That’s where the difference lies. It’s where the mistrust settles deep and where the root of all of Eddie’s worries lingers.

But Steve has done more to prove himself than Eddie likes to give him credit for. 

He takes care of a bunch of kids like it’s his job. He runs Robin to and from school most days out of the week, on time each morning — which, for a guy who showed up late every day for four years, was definitely saying something. He even comes to Eddie’s shows when he’s not too busy working the graveyard shift, never minding that he sticks out in his collared shirt and slacks — a pretty boy amidst a crowd of freaks.

Fuck. Steve Harrington was a pretty alright dude.

But you’re better than alright. You’re better than good. Better than perfect. 

If you got your heart broken, Eddie thinks he’d feel all of it times a thousand.

Steve’s been through his own kind of heartbreak, though. He’s slapped a bandaid over his own bleeding heart, and it’s made him soft. The good kind of soft — the kind where he sees a bug on its back and has to flip it over because it hurts too much to let it suffer. Eddie knows he’ll be that kind to you. Kinder, even.

“Yeah, you better hope so, Harrington,” the boy concludes with a slow nod of his wild head. He steals a chicken tender from the styrofoam box it sits in, like it’s some kind of power move, and waves it at him like a condemnatory point. “I hear you do anything — anything — to her… And your ass is grass.”

Eddie takes a hearty bite from the strip, then tosses it back into the container again. He spins on the ragged heel of his sneaker and stalks out of the break room, punctuating his absence with the slam of the door. The ancient thing gets lodged and doesn’t quite shut all the way, so he has to double back and shut it fully.

Steve is left dumbfounded, in more ways than one.

“…He just ate my chicken,” he mumbles to himself with a frown settled deep between his brows. But there’s a lingering tension in Eddie’s storming out — a tangible fog within his words that settles something heavy in the Family Video breakroom that doubles as storage. 

It feels almost like a blessing.

˗ˋˏ ♡ ˎˊ˗

Won't escape my attention...

The more time you spend with Steve, the more confident you get. 

You visit him at work more often, caring less and less about bothering anybody when you realize they all wanted you there. You let yourself ramble in front of him, too, not stopping yourself nearly as often as you used to. Steve guesses you started to believe him somewhere around the millionth time he promised he liked hearing you talk.

You turn to glitter in his presence, becoming more unapologetically yourself and glowing with it — with all the things that used to make you insecure, things that King Steve would’ve made fun of you for some time ago. Everything you were scared made you too different, is why he liked you in the first place.

And Steve gets to watch it all play out right before his eyes. You inch slowly out of the protective shell you’ve built around yourself and bloom like springtime flowers. He’s grateful he gets to witness it, even more that you feel comfortable enough to do it all in front of him.

You’re hardly as timid as you usually are when you saunter into Family Video. Rather than tiptoeing in and apologizing for intruding, you burst through the front door with a beam and a high-pitched squeal. You’re as bright as every star in the galaxy combined; even dressed head-to-toe in black, you’re more blinding than the sun. 

Eddie’s leather jacket, either stolen or unenthusiastically lent from the boy himself, swallows your upper half. You wear a piece of Metallica merchandise beneath it. The thing is cut up to your ribcage. The jagged edges in the fabric, likely from a dull pair of kitchen scissors, tells him the chop was intentional.

A leather skirt clings effortlessly onto you, revealing the pudge of your stomach and the curves of your hips. The thing is donned with two spiked belts and several chains hanging loosely at your waist.

Steve is dozing at the counter with his chin propped on his first when you walk in. He’s half-asleep until he sees you. The shot of espresso that walks in makes him instantly forget how tired he is.

“Guess what?” you ask with wide, sparkling eyes as you skip to the counter with your hands behind your back.

Steve always hated that question. Usually, it came from Dustin or Robin — or, god forbid, both of them — followed by a “No, seriously. Guess.” It left him with no choice but to humor them until they ultimately caved and told him something he couldn’t have guessed in a million years.

He isn’t so annoyed now, though. In fact, he smiles. “What?” he replies.

You pull your bottom lip between your teeth, as though in a futile attempt to conceal the wide grin on your face, and take your hands from behind your back. You flash him the cassette tape you hold in the palm of them, a blue and yellow thing with the angled Def Leppard logo printed on the cover.

“No way!” Steve finds himself exclaiming like he’s the number one fan of the rock and roll band. He isn’t; never has been, really. But he is a fan of you. All of his excitement, all of his bright and shining smiles — they’re all for you.

“They came in last night— when I was off, of course— and I opened this morning and there was a whole damn tower of these tapes! I’m the one who does the tape towers, okay? Plus, I’ve been doggin’ my manager for weeks about the things, so I can’t believe they came in and no one told me, you know?”

Steve gets lost in your rambling right along with you, nodding because he never wants you to stop talking. His twinkling gaze follows you back and forth as you pace in front of the counter. You gesticulate wildly with your hands, nearly elbowing a customer when they get too close to the line of fire.

“And she was all like ‘I can’t control when they come in,’ And I was like ‘well, you can’t control when I come in either, I’ll be taking a long lunch now, thank you’—” you recount, albeit at a slightly louder volume that shocks anyone who doesn’t know you. People shoot you lingering side eyes from over the aisles.

Steve doesn’t care. He’s even happier that you don’t seem to either. You feel comfortable enough with him now to stop caring about the rest. When you stop yourself, you do it because you’ve said everything you need to say, not because you feel like you’ve annoyed him in some way. 

“Anyway,” you conclude with a sigh. “I wanted to run it to you personally because, besides Eddie, you’re the only person I know who cares as much as I do.”

You smile sweetly at him, peering at him through your lashes, so suddenly timid — no longer the boisterous girl lighting up the whole room. Steve notices that you do that a lot, go from loud and sunny to shy and glimmering. Eddie does it too, sometimes, but it’s not nearly as cute.

“My wallet’s in my locker,” he tells you when you hand him the tape. He cocks his thumb over his shoulder with his free hand. “Let me go grab it. I’ll be, like, two seconds—”

You reach over the counter and take him by the arm, wrapping chipped maroon nails around the crook of his elbow to keep him from straying too far. Shock coats his features at the suddenness of your touch and the way it makes him buzz.

You scoff. “Are you serious? I’m not gonna make you pay, you weirdo.”

“No?”

“Of course not! It’s a gift.”

“Well, gee, Punchy. Considered me flattered,” he concedes with a faltering smile.

You laugh at his half-hearted attempt to be charming.

He rests his crossed arms on the counter and leans over the top of it in an effort to be the slightest bit closer to you. He gazes up at you with honey eyes and raised brows and a big, dumb smile. “And, you know, flattery... it goes a long way with me.”

You arch an un-manicured brow at him. “Does it, now?”

“Yep. So much so, I’m willing to break a few rules and let you pick out a couple of movies. On the house.”

It’s dumb and it’s sweet and so terribly innocent. He wants to give you so much than that but he’s got about eighteen dollars to his name, so all he can do is offer you a few measly VHS tapes. It has you beaming like he just offered you the world.

“Steve Harrington,” you scold playfully. “I didn’t know you were so naughty.”

He falters. His resolve slips and, for no more than half a second, his brain forgets how to work. 

He’s not quite sure how you manage to do that to him all the damn time. You make his brain shortcircuit and his belly quiver and his vision swim. He’s known you for a while now, long enough that the lovesickness should’ve well worn off.

Steve’s worried that there’s no cure for you, that he’s in it for the long haul now — upset stomachs, heart palpitations, and all.

“Well, I’m full of surprises,” he shrugs and sways on his feet. “What’s your poison, Punchy? Molly Ringwald? Robert Downey Jr.? The John Hughes type?”

You can tell he’s joking. You squint over at him and rest your elbows on the counter top your face-to-face. 

The wintergreen mint on his breath makes your head swim. 

Your rouge-tined lips are so close he can taste them — he wants to, desperately so. 

You don’t miss the way his gaze flits to your mouth, lingering there for no longer than a blink.

“Try Night of the Living Dead,” you challenge. 

“That is so dreadfully on brand for you,” he manages to reply without much stuttering. He’s surprised he’s able to get any words out at all, with the way his heart feels like it’s about to beat out of his chest.

“I’m nothing if not predictable.”

Steve doesn’t respond as he leaves the counter to get what you asked for. Silence is easier than saying that you’re the most surprising thing he’s ever met in his life.

When he returns, he brings the entire film franchise with him. All three movies are stacked in his arms and he scans the backs of them, hoping Keith won’t notice that they’re being rented free of charge.

“Have you ever seen them?” you wonder.

He shakes his head. “No. I saw one of them at a drive-in a long time ago, but I wasn’t exactly paying attention, if you know what I mean—” he answers with a soft laugh, quick to cut himself off. It was supposed to be a dumb joke, but both of you know what he was insinuating and it makes everything awkward. 

Robin would’ve slapped him on the back of the head if she were around to hear it. 

He would’ve deserved it.

“Well, you missed out,” you scold, not quite meeting his gaze. “They’re actually pretty good.”

“I’ll try and watch ‘em sometime then.”

“Tonight?” you offer suddenly.

Steve furrows his brows. “…Huh?”

“I mean, like— I don’t know… I thought maybe we could watch them tonight,” you stammer with your eyes turned down toward the counter, where you draw invisible patterns onto the granite with the tip of your finger. “Like, together… if you want.”

Steve is momentarily speechless. He’s spent weeks plotting how he was going to ask you out. It would come to him in waves. He’d feel like he’d concocted the most perfect, foolproof plan right before realizing there was no way in hell he could ever go through with it — all in the same fleeting thought. 

But here you are, biting the bullet for the both of you. 

He’s grateful. He thinks he’s dreaming.

“That sounds…” Steve trails off with the mindless nod of his head. “Yeah. No. Totally. That sounds… really cool.”

A wide smile pulls at the edges of your lips. You purse your mouth to the side in attempts to conceal it. “Cool,” you murmur all cool-ly, like his affirmation isn’t heaven to your ears.

“Uh, not to sound like a total douchebag or whatever, but my dad— he’s got this theater room and everything, and my parents are almost never home,” Steve rambles as he puts all three movies into a paper bag. Then his eyes go wide and his face glows cherry red. “Not like that! I didn’t mean it like— That sounded really weird… I’m sorry—”

You giggle at him, at the way he can pretend to be so suave, and then reveal all the marshmallow fluff he tries to keep hidden a moment later. “It’s okay, Steve. I got what you meant.”

He writes his address on a yellow sticky note with the Family Video logo printed in green at the very top. His handwriting is boyish and sloppy, the sign of a boy who never did care much about school. Some letters are connected, others far apart; some written too big, while others are too small. You find it endearing, but Steve knows it’s just because his hand was shaking something fierce.

He leaves his number written at the very bottom. Just for good measure.

“No funny business, alright, Harrington?” you joke, waving a ringed finger at him as you walk backward out of the store, heading back to your own job.

Steve bites back a smile. Once upon a time, he was all funny business. No girl was ever going to invite King Steve over and not expect some heavy petting. And he wants so badly to kiss you — fuck, he wants to kiss you all the time — but the want to spend innocent time with you eclipses all of those boyish feelings.

He yearns to be close to you. Like magnets. Or a moon and the ocean’s tide.

“No funny business,” he promises.

˗ˋˏ ♡ ˎˊ˗

You keep your distance with a system of touch.

It isn’t until you arrive at the front gates of the Harrington home you realize you’ve never been in the suburbs of Hawkins before.

You grew up on the very outskirts of town, where there were more trees than people or houses. The block was half rundown already and horribly secluded. The only interesting thing about it was the winding trail through the woods that led to the anterior of Forest Hills trailer park.

That’s where you spent the bulk of your time, practically living with Eddie and Wayne in their one-bedroom trailer, until you felt guilty enough to go back home for a day or two. Your parents would inevitably remind you why you ran off in the first place, and then the cycle would start all over again.

It was all just far enough away from Hawkins that you could pretend like the town’s bullshit didn’t exist. The freak from the wrong side of the tracks didn’t belong on Maple Street or Fairview Road or Laurel Avenue. That was for people who could afford new shoes every school year, who could go clothes shopping and not feel guilty about cutting into their food money, who were set up with trust funds before they were even born.

But here you are now, on Fairview Road, seven o’clock sharp, and standing in front of the biggest house you’d ever seen. 

You ring the doorbell and flinch when it’s louder than expected. The chime is light and jaunty. You wonder if it’s been programmed for the change in season.

Steve answers no more than a couple seconds later. He swings both French doors open, arms spreading wide like the smile on his face.

He’s traded in his slacks for comfier jeans and his vest for a form-fitting sweatshirt he’s bunched at the elbows. You realize, then, that you’ve never seen him without the forest green Family Video jacket. It makes him look naked, almost, like a totally different person — no longer the dork who works a measly nine-to-five with his best friend and visits the freak next door on the off chance his manager won’t dock his pay for it.

The vest had humbled him to a certain extent. Now he just looks cool. Like the boy people would either praise or avoid like the plague, for fear of getting in King Steve’s path — just a little bit more mature looking now, with his chiseled jaw and scruffy chin.

It makes you feel a little stupid from where you stand on the porch ahead of him, wearing the same thing he’d seen you in earlier that day. He’s got no idea you spent the past couple of hours agonizing over what to wear. For the sake of not seeming crazy overzealous, you opted not to dress up. Now you’re scared he thinks you just didn’t care enough to.

But you do care. So goddamn much that’s it scary. 

You never had to worry about what you wore or what you looked like before you left the house, about what you had too much of and what you lacked. Now, it’s all you can think about.

If Steve notices anything at all, he doesn’t show it. He just keeps on smiling at you, too happy to see you to care about what you’re wearing. He’s just glad that you showed up.

Truth be told, he had a six-pack and Robin’s number on speed dial on the off chance you canceled on him. He was preparing himself to wallow in self-pity and spend the rest of the night ranting to his best friend about the bleeding heart he had for you. Because, as far as he was concerned, you were far too good to be true. 

You were beautiful and funny and kind and perfect. You treat him like you’ve known him for years, like he didn’t spend so many of them avoiding you in attempts to keep some measly title that didn’t mean shit. You were too perfect. Sometimes, Steve gets scared that he just made you up.

But whether you’re a dream come true or the real thing, you’re standing on his front porch anyway, with a smile and a bottle of grocery store wine. 

He saves the beer in his fridge and the wallowing for another day. 

Steve escorts you through his lavish living room and to the downstairs area that’s got a movie screen hanging on the walls and a couple of leather couches sitting in front of it. The coffee table in front of them holds a myriad of glass bowls — popcorn, various candies, and more popcorn.

“You planning on throwin’ a party down here, Harrington?” you tease with a soft chuckle, trying to conceal how your heart’s about to burst at the mere sight of it all.

“Well, I just— I didn’t know what you liked, and I didn’t— I wanted to make sure you had something to eat, you know,” the boy stammers out. He brings the palm of his hand to rub at the back of his neck. “So I just… I got… everything.”

“It’s a good thing a like everything then, huh?” you smile at him as you pluck a Red Vine from its dedicated bowl. You rip off an inch or two with your teeth and then talk as you chew: “I hope you’re prepared for all of this shit get eaten, Harrington. I can get quite ravenous.”

Steve nods to himself and tries not to smile too big. “Sounds entertaining… Maybe I’ll just watch you instead of the movie.”

It was supposed to be a joke. 

But then you settled down next to him on the couch, keeping a respectful distance but sharing the same fuzzy blanket, and he has to physically force himself to drag his gaze away from you. 

He was right about what he said before, you were far more entertaining than the black and white film projected ahead of him — grabbing handfuls of popcorn at a time and quoting the movie through the mouthful. 

It’s a tad bit barbaric, the faintest bit off-putting, and otherworldly levels of endearing. It leaves him virtually unable to take his eyes off of you. 

He didn’t think you could get more beautiful, but you keep on proving him wrong. 

He’s starting to realize he doesn’t know shit.

You’re slowly coming to the same understanding.

You’ve heard stories about Steve. Usually from gossiping cheerleaders standing in circles at their lockers or whispering in the back of a classroom. Doomed as the freak and all but banished from the inner society of Hawkins High, you became an observer. You were so invisible that people sometimes didn’t realize they were talking right over you, sharing secrets they wouldn’t want someone else to get a hold of. 

But apparently you were the exception. Because you weren’t a someone to them.

They talked about how kind he was, how well endowed, how they were meant to go on some stupid date but missed their reservation because Steve got a little too handsy beforehand, and how they spent the rest of the night with their hands shoved down each other’s pants at Lover’s Lake. 

You were seeing, firsthand, how much he’d changed. How he made his promise of no funny business and how he was sticking to it — no teasing you about the whole thing with a knowing smirk and flirtatious honey eyes, no urging to close this distance between you, no tiny touches on your arm or thigh in the hopes of heavier petting.

He spends the entirety of the first movie perfectly respectful. Just like you’d asked him to be. 

And it was nice, knowing that you weren’t wasting your evening with some asshole who was only spending time with you in the hopes of you putting out later. But it leaves you the faintest bit empty. Hungry. You long for his touch like a missed meal. Starving and feeling it all.

It’s not even heavy petting you want, you just want to feel him next to you — to press yourself into his side and to warm yourself with him like a blanket. 

But you weren’t a pretty cheerleader or a girl dripping in expensive clothes and daddy’s money. You were the weirdo, the freak, the loudmouth nerd, Punchy — all names you wore proudly, like lit-up signs or steel armor. 

Until now. 

Now you think if you weren’t Punchy, if were you someone different, then maybe he’d want to touch you more.

The first hour and thirty-seven minutes of your favorite movie are strangely agonizing. 

Your hands itch with the desire to touch the boy next to you, and they busy themselves with the bowls of candy and savory junk food splayed out on the table in front of you. It’s mindless more than it is anything. You’re absentminded binging does nothing more than half-distract you from the thoughts raging rivers in your skull.

You don’t even realize you’re doing it until your hand falls into an empty bowl of popcorn and finds nothing but kernels at the bottom of it. 

It makes Steve laugh, thinking you were just too into the movie to notice — having no idea it was him taking up all your brain power. 

He leaves to fix more snacks for you while you slip the second VHS into the movie player. He returns with a bowl of freshly popped popcorn and two beers after the wine bottle has been sufficiently emptied. When he plops down next to you again, it’s in the same spot he’d been sitting in all night — a couple of excruciating inches away.

Under the guise of sharing the popcorn in his lap, you make the too bold decision to slither in at his side. It’s innocent at first — your thighs just barely graze and your elbows bump when you dip your hands into the bowl. And it’s still innocent some thirty minutes later, when you find yourself resting your head on his shoulder with your legs curled up behind you.

Steve tenses when he feels your temple pressed against him, but only for a moment before he relaxes again. It makes him all suddenly warm and self-aware of every movement he makes. He tries not to breathe too heavy or shift too often, for fear it might jostle you too much. He doesn’t want to stop feeling you against him like this, even if it’s got his skin prickling with a searing form of anxiety.

“Don’t tell me you’re falling asleep,” he jokes.

“Of course not. It’s way too riveting,” you scoff, even though he can feel you cuddling further into him. Your cheek rubs against the soft cotton of his sweatshirt when you look up at him. He turns his head to peer down at you and his nose nearly grazes your forehead. 

He finds you with a certain glint in your eye. It’s borderline playful, like it so often is, but coated with a sweetness that drips over him like honey. “You like it so far?” you wonder.

“Yeah,” the boy nods quickly. He couldn’t tell you what had happened the past two-and-a-half films, but he could tell you how your jaw tenses when you chew and how your smile curls just before you laugh out loud and how your eyes widen every time you quote the movie. “It’s really good. I like it.”

You beam at him before turning back to the projector again. You shift to get more comfortable against him. “Good.” 

By the third movie, you’re somehow even closer.

Truth be told, Day of the Dead wasn’t your favorite in the trilogy, so it left your mind wandering to far off places — namely, the pretty boy sitting beside you. He goes to put the tape into the projector, feeling immediately cold without pressing into his side, and when he returns he tries his best not to beg you to cuddle against him again.

“My shoulder’s gettin’ real cold over here,” he tries to joke. 

You see right through his beckoning, though. It makes you happy to know he wants it just as much as you do. 

“Just say you wanna be next to me, Harrington,” you tease like you aren’t happily obliging him. You snuggle into his shoulder and rest your head against him while your arms curl around his bicep.

“I wanna be next to you,” he repeats, a playful smile on his lips though his gaze softens with sincerity. “Is that so bad?”

You shake your head against him in reply. Suddenly as mushy as the boy beside you, you turn to look up at him. “Not unless it’s bad that I wanna be next to you, too…”

“Nah. It’s not bad,” he assures in something short of a whisper. “Guess I’m just glad I’m not the only one that’s so far gone.”

He doesn’t elaborate on what he means by that. He doesn’t have to.

Perhaps it’s the admission that this boy is so far gone for you that gives you a sudden burst of confidence. Maybe it’s the comforting feeling of being seen, of knowing you’re no longer alone in your similar far gone-ness. Each feels like rays of sunshine to your skin and has you pressing your lips to his wanting ones without much thought. 

The plump pink of his mouth are magnets for yours. They meet and lock together with little effort, almost destined to do it. It’s a soft, meager, and lingering little peck that sucks you both in a little too easily. It’s hard to pull away from him, but when you do, your lips click in protest.

Then there’s a look, then a deafening silence that says more words than either of you were capable of forming in that moment. His amber eyes dart between both of yours, asking a question without saying a goddamn thing. One that you answer with your own softening gaze. 

And it’s almost better than the kiss itself, the swirling feeling in the pits of your stomach, the knowing of what’s about to happen.

A silent plea and a blink later and his lips are on yours again. 

It’s an awkward mess of yearning mouths and tangled limbs as the both of you fight to find purchase on one another. Your fingers knot in the collar of his sweatshirt, pulling him impossibly closer, while his grip the bare skin of your waist from where your shirt had ridden up. His touch makes you buzz, like a static shock or a bolt of lightning.

Steve makes several observations when he feels you melt into him like honey on toast. He notices how you press yourself into him, like you won’t be satisfied until you’ve swallowed him whole, and how it has you kissing him like you’re scared he’ll pull away — like you’ll open your eyes and he won’t be real. 

You’re as domineering against his mouth as you are in real life, still as all-consuming and overpowering as the girl he’s gotten so familiar with.

He doesn’t realize how you’ve settled so intently on top of him until his back meets the pillowy cushion of the leather couch. You don’t either, until he exhales a sharp gasp against your cupid’s bow. Then you part from him, for the first time in several minutes, breathing in the oxygen your lungs had just begun to scream for. 

Steve finds you with kiss-bitten lips and glassy eyes that look upon him with a softness that he didn’t know existed until now. He smirks with his own swollen and pinker mouth like he isn’t glowing red beneath you. 

“I thought you said no funny business,” he manages to tease through bated breaths.

You don’t bother to make up excuses for yourself. You’re already on top of him, all over him — you’ve already kissed him like you would’ve died if you hadn’t. Now, you’re straddling him, caging him between your legs and under your torso. You’ve settled on top of him with a comforting weightiness, like you’re building a home in the familiarity you’ve sought in him.

“I lied,” you mutter with a lazy shrug. A sly smile pulls slowly at your lips until you’re all but beaming sunbeams down at him. He revels in your warmth. “’S not my fault you’re so damn cute.”

It’s easier to blame it on him for all the reasons you’re attached to him like a magnet to his metal, your moth to his flame. You part his lips with your mouth, rut your tongue against his own, reveling in the foreign familiarity of it all, and then blame him for the way you can’t seem to stop any of it.

Steve doesn’t seem to mind, though. The way his hands find purchase on your hips, petting the warmed skin there and sometimes squeezing to pull you further down onto him, tells you that he has a similar yearning to melt with you. He lets you kiss him all slow, allows you to taste all of him, and doesn’t rush you in your process. It’s comforting, tender. Free.

He’s not used to being on his back like this. Usually, he’s the one taking control. It’s his mouth that does all the work. So, it’s strange to be under you and to have you above him. But it’s more pleasant in an even stranger way not to be rushed — not to have to do all the work. His mouth opens so obediently for you and finds an effortless rhythm with your lips and your tongue. 

It’s the easiest thing he’s ever done in his life, kissing you. 

He delights in every ounce of the warmth and unfamiliarity you press to his mouth, and tries to shove down feelings of unworthiness that simmer in his chest while you do so.

You don’t part until your mouths are numb and tingling with it. 

Your lips are more vibrant in their color, aflame and swollen from being so ardently kissed and sucked and bitten. Neither of you mind making out like a couple of teenagers. It’s comforting to know that things won’t go further than a couple soft touches on burning skin. It was never supposed to be anything more than that, anyway. It was just about being close to each other.

You’ve almost succeeded in your effort to melt into the boy beneath you, when you hear the distant sound of a door opening and closing again. Muffled voices follow — unknown to you but obviously familiar to him. 

You part from him without thinking, like you’re a couple of kids again who’ll get in trouble if your parents ever found out what you were doing down here. Steve groans at the loss of you and in annoyance at the sound of his parents. His heavy eyes fall shut and his head leans back to the couch cushions as he fights to swallow down all of his anger.

His parents never really come around these days. They’ve got a bigger home in the city, closer to his dad’s work, and they choose to stay there most days of the week — month. 

They used to make excuses for why they left their only son behind. It’s five minutes from your dad’s firm. There’s more opportunity for your mom’s real estate business. Oh, don’t be so selfish, Steven, you’ll finally have the place to yourself. It’s a win-win for all of us.

Steve didn’t want their excuses. It was actually easier with them gone. 

But they come around every now and again, whenever it’s most convenient for them, and treat their arrival like something that needs to be celebrated. Like they aren’t supposed to be with their child in the fucking first place. And they somehow manage to pick the most inconvenient times for him, like they know he’s in a bind and want to see him struggle to get out of it.

Usually, it’s when he’s in between paychecks — when they want to take him out to some fancy dinner he could barely afford anyway, but especially when he’s hardly making it until payday. Now, it’s when he’s got the prettiest girl he’s ever seen on top of him, and he’s all hot and half-hard. Steve doesn’t want to let them ruin the moment, as good as they are at it.

“It’s okay. They won’t come in here,” he assures when he feels you tense at the unexpected company. “My mom will go to the bedroom and my dad will go to his office. We’re good, I promise.”

You figure he’s right. The voices grow more and more distant. Heeled shoes click up and up the stairs while heavy stomps head the opposite way. But you’ve already been so woefully knocked out of your stupor that you’re scared it’s too late.

Your lips are numb and the credits are rolling and you’re on top of this beautiful boy and you have no idea how you got there.

It’s almost frightening, the way Steve had consumed you mind, body, and soul by just existing next to you. You become dreadfully hyperaware of the whole thing — of who you are, who he is, and what you’re doing. You lose all your softness and turn to ice, hardening and shrinking back into yourself.

“I should—” you start before clearing your throat when the words come out heavier than expected. “I should head out anyway.”

“Oh,” is all Steve can say. “Right.”

You stare down at him, chest still pressed against his, nose nearly touching the tip of his own. “I just— I have to open tomorrow and everything, so—”

“No. Yeah. Yeah, I— I get it.”

You make tricky work of untangling yourselves.

His legs twist with yours when you both try to rise from the couch at the same time. Then your ring gets stuck in the fabric of his shirt, but not before his belt buckle gets somehow caught in yours. It’s like fate is protesting the imminent parting, but neither of you are paying attention to the signs.

He walks you to your car and chuckles under his breath as you scurry to the front door. 

You’re not-so-distantly terrified of running into his parents. They probably wouldn’t mind that he’s sneaking around with a girl, surely that they’re used to, but you’re almost certain they’re not used to girls like you. Girls with wild hair and leather skirts and chunky boots and too bold makeup. 

You’re not the girl next door. You’re the girl parents warn their sons about. “Leave that girl alone,” they say. “She’s nothing but trouble.”

You tell him all of this on the short trek to your half-broken-down car when you catch him laughing at you about the whole thing. You say it in jest, lighthearted and trying to make a joke of it. But there’s an underlying melancholia to your tone that reveals every truth you’re trying to evade.

“They don’t care enough about me to give a shit about a girl I’m with, I promise,” he confesses with a laugh that sounds more like a sad scoff than anything else. His chocolate eyes turn gold beneath the yellow street light. He smirks at you. “Besides, I don’t know if I told you this or not, but my middle name is actually trouble, so… I think we might be a match made in heaven.”

You roll your eyes at his attempts to flirt with you, though his lack of finesse makes you smile. “You’re an idiot, Steve Actually Trouble Harrington.”

“You really know how to say goodbye, don’t ya?” he grins when you reach the curb where your tin can car sits. 

“Yeah, I’m pro,” you shrug with a teasing glint in your eye, then you beam. “I’ll see you around, ‘kay?”

“Totally,” he nods, suddenly forlorn at having to leave you like he hadn’t just spent the past four hours with you.

Themetallic click of your car door opening sounds much louder in the emptiness of the suburbs. You glance at the boy right before you sink into the driver’s seat, feeling your heart swell with something short of yearning — anticipation. 

You weren’t actually a professional at saying goodbye, you find, because you’re realizing how hard it is to leave him.

“Steve!” he hears you shout from across the lawn when he’s halfway up the drive. 

He turns around, expecting to hear you tease him some more or tell him you were having car troubles. Neither would’ve shocked him. You’ve got a smart mouth and a shittier car. But you keep on surprising him, all but launching yourself into him before kissing him harder than he’s ever been kissed before.

Steve tenses against you at first, then relaxes again in record time. He sighs in the comfort of having your body pressed so intently into his and your arms wrapped around his neck to pull him somehow closer. 

You feel the breath of his exhale fan against your cupid’s bow. It makes you smile, and he feels the expression contort against his lips. His hands rise to the widest part of your hips without thinking. It’s all muscle memory now.

And even though he’s spent the better part of an hour kissing you, this one is so obviously different. This wasn’t just to pass the time. This was more than just to feel him — it was to tell him something. He hears every word you don’t say, but rather press like a stamp to his mouth.

He’s breathless when you pull away. You meet his flushed face with a mischievous grin.

“What was that for?” he wonders breathlessly, but doesn’t waver with his hold on you. He quickly notices that yours doesn’t either.

You shrug in response. “‘Cause you’re pretty.”

“Yeah, well…” he tries to play off like he’s not blushing like crazy. “You’re pretty too.”

Your beam ebbs into a teasing, tightlipped smirk. “Stop flirting with me, Steve Harrington.”

You shove him away with a rougher hand than you realize before you walk away from him. Steve rubs at the ache in his chest with the palm of his hand.

Your playful teasing and your lingering kiss is the only thing Steve has to remember you by when you turn on your chunky heeled boot and head off down the driveway again. He’s frozen, mesmerized by the sight of you and reeling at how you manage to drive him crazy without trying.

Your eyes find him again just before you duck into your car, and you see him still looking at you — mouth agape and eyes wide like you’re some kind of rare find. You figure you must be, in some way. Girls like you aren’t supposed to like guys like him. Vice Versa. Tale as old as time.

The boy stays locked in his stupor until the sprinkles whir on. The spurts of freezing cold water spray all over him and his pretty hair and expensive sweatshirt and his vintage jeans. “Shit!” you hear him swear as he rushes for cover on his front porch. 

He’s quickly soaked and freezing cold, but he smiles anyway when he hears the sound of your giggling behind him. It’s as animated as your personality and spills from your mouth like so many rays of sunshine, just a little too loud for the quiet midnight suburbs. 

It’s perfect, he realizes. You’re perfect. 

[cannibalovers]

Hannibal song of the day : song no. 5

a bit about the song:

"Breezeblocks"(released in 2012) is song by alt-J, written by Thom Sonny Green, Gwilym Sainsbury, Gus Unger-Hamilton & Joe Newman(the whole group), most likely their most popular song. It starts off mellow and quiet guitar, interchanging between build ups and drops with synthesisers and a lot of deep bass, drums and other percussion instruments till the end of the song, which ends with an arrangement of overlapping vocals, like a choir. It fits genres like indie rock, indie pop, art rock and folktronica. The song itself tells a story of two lovers, where one of them wants to leave the relationship, feeling unsafe and unfulfilled but the other is obsessive and deranged and so in love that they don't let the other leave, the desire and love being so strong that they dare to hurt their lover and themselves just to make them stay. There can be another meaning to the song when taking the music video into the account(that the group themselves said is kind of different but managed to fit the vibe), which is filmed in reverse, presenting a narrative where a man kills a woman(maybe an ex or smth) who was most likely keeping his wife hostage. Since the chain of events is presented in reverse, it looks as if the man is the abusive lover trying to kill his wife, although by the end we find out he was actually defending his wife and killed the woman that kidnapped his wife, sending a message to not judge a book by its cover - don't assume and judge until you know the full story. It also references a book "Where the Wild Things Are" by Maurice Sendak, talking about a young boy who misbehaved badly at home and got scolded for it. His hostile and intense emotions sent him to an imaginary jungle with creatures called "The Wild Things". In this world, he feels appreciated and powerful as the wild things make him a king, but as soon as he realises the responsibilities a king has are hard, he wants to leave and go back home, to his loving mother who took care of him and coudl depend on, but the creatures don't want him to leave, threatening cannibalism (woah i wonder why I am writing this), saying "Oh, please don’t go! We’ll eat you whole! We love you so!". The band thought of it as a very powerful image and referenced these words in the song. In the end, the boy does manage to get away, unlike the lover of this song.

yeah sorry for the long intro to the song um. i've loved this song for years I swear I could listen to it forever so.

overall the song creates such a chilling mix between aggression and affection it's just so fucking insane and well. very hannigram. I think that was expected. Tbh i feel like it's prob known to fannibals, i made a post once asking ppl for song recommendations for hannibal and this song has shown up a few times and honestly? it fits them SO. WELL. especially when you think about the whole mizumono episode. The music video reminded me of mizumono a lot... so I'll be basing this on that episode a lot...

Pardon me for the pain i'm gonna provide today<3

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

Verse 1

"She may contain the urge to run away But hold her down with soggy clothes and breezeblocks"

The girl doesn't want to be in the relationship with the man anymore, maybe recognizing that he is not in a good state of mind or she just believes they're not fit for each other anymore, whichever it is, she is contemplating getting out of the relationship, which she feels trapped in, or the man feels like he's scaring her away, hence her "running away"; He doesn't like this, being way too attached for her, he can't just let her run away after the comfort she brought him and the strong emotions he developed towards her, so he decided to weigh her down (literally) by drowning her with breezeblocks. Metaphorically, Breezeblocks are blocks used for building houses and are supposed to represent foundation here, so perhaps he has been making her stay by guilt tripping her about everything that they have built together and the fact that she can't just "leave behind" the trust, support, stability and safety that they have gained from each other - the foundation of their relationship. After she wasn't giving her idea of leaving up, he decided to actually weight her down with their foundation in forms of breezeblocks. In my eyes, the soggy clothes could also have a little bit of meaning, soggy clothes being quite uncomfortable and probably clinging to her(just like he does) - perhaps they're soggy from the times he was guilt tripping her, perhaps tears were shed and her clothes getting soggy just represent the manipulation and fakeness of them, or the severity of the situation and how long it has been going on and how this has affected her (made her feel heavy at heart and uncomfortable)

I think these lyrics summarise THE monologue in Mizumono and hannigram's plans quite perfectly. Will wanting to run away (from hannibal unfortunately...) and as Hannibal realised his plan of betrayal, reacted very aggressively by literally gutting him (sogging his clothes with blood ig) and breaking down the foundation they have built, more or so with words, but also the knife he uses. At this point I have no idea if its a linoleum knife (knife used for building, houses, rugs and FOUNDATIONS OF A BUILDING.) or a kerambit or smth else but I'll stick to the linoleum here(also check out this post about his choice for the knife, it drives me fucking insane) and say that this is how Hannibal tears down the foundation they have built together. Not only does he gut him, he talks to Will about how betrayed he feels that he was planning to leave him, after letting Will see him, after building this foundation of trust and support for each other. Hannibal was there, understanding Will and offering support and stability and he saw that Will could provide it for him back, which he chose to do only to get closer to him to betray him and take away his happiness (Will...) and stable, carefully crafted life he had. Will was something very important to Hannibal, a person that changed him and made him feel love for once, and then he lied about accepting him. He can't handle losing Will so he would make him stay and tear him down, hurt him, if that's what it would take.

"Cetirizine, your fever’s gripped me again Never kisses, all you ever send are fullstops (La la la la)"

Citrizine is a medicine used for fevers, suggesting the man is so obsessed with her that she makes him ill and stressed (overheated and overwhelmed and overthinking, hence the fever) and he needs medicine. She is constantly rejecting him, rejecting his affections and never giving any to him but instead stopping him, although it can also allude to texts, her not ending them with "xx" (kisses) but with full stops, being quite cold and distant with him.

well first, for the show it can allude to how Hannibal literally gave Will a fever and the amount of aspirin Will took cuz of that if we take this literally, but that mean the roles would have to switch so, instead in my eyes I think of how bothered and overwhelmed Will probably made Hannibal feel the more interested and obsessive he got over Will. I can't imagine how many times this man probably thought of him everyday and overthought stuff (jesus seriously hes obsessed) and how ill and diseased (although alive) Hannibal probably felt (maybe diseased and ill after he knew Will's plan...); the affections the girl is rejecting from her lover could represent how distant Will was with Hannibal at first.

"Do you know where the wild things go? They go along to take your honey (La la la la)"

This is a reference from the book "Where the Wild Things Are". The band suggested that the lyrics are about jealousy, the protagonist being jealous of other people who are catching his lovers attention instead of him, maybe this is a conversation between them about this concern, telling his lover that those people are bad and will use her and leave her(take away her honey); Maybe he's trying to convince her that he would never do that - although he technically is, eating away at whatever support and love(the honey) she has to offer for him.

I feel like this presents why Hannibal decided to isolate Will in the first place, taking away everything from him (or at least how he wants Will to see it, as we know that he was just trying to make his plan come true and return some of the things Will cared about so much). He saw everything that Will had interest in (Alana, Abigail, although he kept her for Will, Margot's child etc) as a threat to his plan of having Will all to himself and so he took them away - because he believed that they were both bad for Will but also because they were not in Hannibal's best interest. Also doesn't he like kill Will's wife in season 3 idk yet dont tell me

"Break down, now weep, build up breakfast Now let’s eat, my love, my love, love, love (La la la la)"

This probably references the many fights the couple had and protagonist's method of trying to make it up to her by trying to get back into a loving, normal routine, forgetting the fights, doing things such as letting her sleep it off and making a breakfast, starting the day over - The breakfast being his love for her. This is most likely to say that acts of service for her would be his love language and he would feel loved if she accepted his services, as well as offerings(his love) he makes for her.

for Hannibal:

do i like. have to explain this one

first of all lets be real cooking and making ppl commit accidental cannibalism is his love language (even better when they are aware of it and accept it knowingly so u dont have to make them commit accidental cannibalism to feel like u're normal for enjoying it and ure not a monster and God didn't punish u by making u eat ur own sister and enjoy it and that they accept and understand u for this and are def not doing it as a manipulation tactic to get u closer to them... that's not smth Will would do to Hannibal wdym)

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

Chorus

"Muscle to muscle and toe to toe The fear has gripped me, but here I go My heart sinks as I jump up Your hand grips hand as my eyes shut And I, ah-ah-ah-ah"

The chorus seems to depict the the physical fight going between the two lovers. The protagonist doesn't seem to be in his right mind as he says that even though the fear tried to stop him, he has lost control and is now hurting his loved one (or himself) - His fear of rejection making him not handle this situation well and taking the last leap of faith to "save" the relationship by physically forcing her into it. The harm can either be to himself or her, maybe threatenening suicide and her gripping his hand to stop him, or him hitting her and her trying to deflect his hand with her own.

For Hannibal, it's literally,,gutting Will. Or any physical fight or holding each other at gun point or any murder attempt they had. In mizumono, Hannibal is visibly heartbroken by Will's decisions, maybe regretting the choices hes about to take. Maybe for once he felt some fear hurting another person, the person being Will, but he pushes through it, knowing it had to be done, to show Will how he made him feel. The physical contact in this chorus could represent the hug that they shared (the most heartbreaking hug in tv history). His feelings seem to contrast with the violence in that scene so much it makes me so fucking depressed

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

Verse 2

"[...}She bruises, coughs, she splutters pistol shots Hold her down with soggy clothes and breezeblocks"

The words have a violent imagery to them, maybe to show the lover fighting back and still not agreeing to stay, maybe even trying to hurt him, her words feeling like pistol shots to him, or it could represent her drowning, trying to catch a breath. If that's what is happening, then he tries to remind himself of his point and to not help her, because she will run away - it's better to hold her down and make her stay.

Will's most common weapons is a gun or his hands and words, so i guess it fits his image quite well(not to mention the amounts of time he held Hannibal at gun point lol). These clearly never seemed to have affected Hannibal (until the last supper) and he continues through with his plan of taking everything away from Will, showing what he has lost by not staying by Hannibal's side.

"She’s morphine, queen of my vaccine My love, my love, love, love (La la la la)"

The protagonist compares her to morphine, a drug used to help with pain - clearly he is very dependent on her and uses her for emotional stability and support, losing that would make him insecure and breakdown, he can't lose her after the vulnerability he shared with her. This also fits with the expression "Love is a drug", which to him, her love is clearly like a drug, he has become obsessed, needing her love all the time, addicted to her, suggesting the intensity of emotions she makes him feel and just how obsessed he is - that's why he can't let her go.

The contrast between the dark, violent and destructive comparisons he makes of her, ignoring those destructive feelings and calling her his "love" really deepens the juxtaposition between aggression and affection the song potrays and shows just how blind the protagonist is.

I feel like this fits Hannibal's feelings about Will quite well, considering how obsessed he is with him, to the point of destruction and isolating him to have him all to himself (and also the fact that my man was CRYING after putting Will in prison, missing their therapy sessions. LIKE BITCH). He really puts Will high up on a pedestal, suggesting just how important and addictive Will is to him and how dependent he has become on Will after opening up to him, maybe even feeling like Will numbs his pain and loneliness of never being accepted for who he actually was.

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

Verse 3

"[...]Germolene, disinfect the scene, my love, my love, love, love But please don't go, I love you so, my lovely"

This is the aftermath of the protagonist killing his lover. He realises that he killed her, getting an anticeptic(clearly unprepared for this and panicking, using some at-home antiseptic instead of something proper) to disinfect the scene off of his DNA. The realisation quickly hits him of what he has done, making him spiral into a breakdown as he realises that his actions didn't make her stay, they made her dead forever.

Hannibal clearly doesn't disinfect the scene in mizumono, he doesn't even wear his plastic suit or use the cloth that he always uses to not leave finger prints, there was no point in hiding anything anymore, Will helped FBI see through him, although we do see him "cleansing" himself off of the events by walking in the rain and trying to "comfort" Will, telling him to "wade into the quiet of the stream". I don't think these specific lyric apply to the situation much disinfection-wise, although it can represent Hannibal's state of mind, especially after realising everything he has done and the regret that came with it(does he feel guilty tho? i have no idea but the begging and love confessions in this line def represent his obsession and love for Will which left him very heartbroken after everything that was done)

also could represent Will........ him wanting to turn back, if he could only reverse time, undo the events so Abigail lives and everyone else lives..............ouch

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

Refrain

"Please don't go, please don't go I love you so, I love you so Please don't go, please don't go I love you so, I love you so Please break my heart (Hey!) Please don't go, please don't go I love you so, I love you so Please don't go, please don't go I love you so, I love you so Please break my heart[...]"

the most beautiful part of the song in my opinion tbh. The layers, the build up, the overlapping vocals, it's all just so overwhelming and emotional and vulnerable.

the protagonist spirals, realising what he has done but not wanting it to be true, he's not ready yet to let go of his lover, slowly, he's losing self control and giving into his violent desires, he threatens cannibalism if she goes away(she can't really do anything my dude...) as he frantically confessse to her that he loves her. He just loves her so much and needs her so much, the desire is so strong that he will consume her if it means that she stays right beside him(or inside him), craving that impossible closeness, it's a way to forever remain with a loved one. This whole refrain is just so incredibly contradicting and depressing and desparate its insane

now, it's no secret that Hannibal doesn't want to let Will go and even consume him. He wants him to live but at the same time he wants to taste him, devour him. To love is to consume, but to consume is to devour and transform in reusable energy. He wants him as close as possible and for Will to accept his desires and give himself up, let him be his - but clearly that's not what Will wanted (yet).

...This one is so straightfoward especially considering Hannibal that I don't even know what to say really. The song itself just says it all perfectly.

in conclusion they are fucking insane for this and breezeblocks is the ultimate hannigram (specifically mizumono) song. 11/10

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

additional notes:

was so excited for this one but i actually wrote less than i thought wow but maybe thats also cuz most of the song repeats. or im tired

idk if its cuz i literally dont know how to explain cannibalism as a metaphor of love or why but. at the same time the song just describes pretty well on its own

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

my playlist

hope you enjoyed and thanks for reading<3

[a-scary-lack-of-common-sense]

[busts the door down] Hey guys, I'm back

SAY HELLO TO MY NEW BLORBO: ENGIE-MED

- If Frankenstein had a lovechild with Inspector Gadget

- A master at mechanical body horror

- Slight (read: BIG) obsession with body "upgrades" and enhancements via machinery. This man is constantly asking others if they would like him to replace their legs with rocket boosters- please say yes, it would be so cool and totally not potentially ruin your legs permanently, pretty please with a cherry on top? Please?

- His primary/favorite lab rat for his experiments is actually not Heavy (sorry heavymed shippers, I have failed you 😔) but his own body.

- [slaps roof of Engie-med] this bad boy can fit so much fucking metal

- Filled to the brim with mechanical implants and "upgrades". All of his organs are now metal replacements. A particularly strong magnet would probably stick to him.

- He watched Robocop once when he was a kid and hasn't been the same since /j

- His right arm is the most DECKED OUT with his experiments out of the rest of his body. There's like 50 tools stuffed in there like, it's like the arm equivalent to a batman utility belt at this point. Anything you need at any moment is probably hidden somewhere in there. Need some scissors? Oh yeah sure, let him just [pops one out of his arm]

- They’re retractable, dw

- Because of the overwhelming number of times he has shoved something that shouldn't go inside a human body into his right arm, he is now a proud owner of the most fucked up arm known to the history of mankind.

- fuck up #1: his arm has been broken and reset (badly) so many times that it's just permanently crooked now

- fuck up #2: his right hand fingertips are literally starting to "die" (i.e. turning black; completely numb. He can't figure wtf is going on and neither can Medi-scout)

- Pain tolerance who? This man doesnt tolerate pain he obliterates it, he is numb to pain.

- THANKFULLY his left arm has less stuff going on so it can actually function as a normal human arm, but it has retractable needles and screwdrivers that can pop out from his fingertips. Because this is Medic we're talking about. Of course he would.

- The index finger is the only finger without a retractable needle because it's a goddamn GUN. He can shoot BULLETS from it, may God have mercy on whoever is on the receiving end of his finger guns

- The only one on the team other than Medi-scout that knows how to use the medigun because he sometimes borrows it for his experiments.

- A very competent and skilled engineer actually, he just focuses all that skill into all the wrong places, such as his arm.

- Mostly uses titanium (lightest, durable, and not that magnetic)

- My man is HEAVY (and expensive). He probably weighs a ton

- Metal detectors love him <3

- Perpetually slightly worried eyebrows

- Nervous/excited energy is through the roof with this man (acts like he drank 10 cans of bonk and is on the verge of a nervous meltdown)

- "aheh"

[littlesislovesyou]

Mhmmmm you're my innocent little girl. You'd never touch your needy lil cunny to such naughty things without my knowledge...You're my sweet angel. You'd never be tempted by such dirty temptation. ; p

Well I feel that in many ways 😭 size or the length of the response doesn't matter too much to me. More so the effort you put into responding and how I can literally sense what you're feeling. The passion, arousal and more from you when you respond. That's what I want. Don't ever feel bad for not writing as much as me. I'm cursed in that regard LMAOO I'll always put the work in if it's for you. 🤭🔪

Well you're doing a good job of making me more obsessed and ferally for you...fuck hehe.

Oooh I'll keep that in mind for next time then...blindfolding you and then taking you into our play date area and dropping you off and giving you time to run...but I'll know I'll catch you and when I do. I'm going to thoroughly rape your young, tight lil pussy while you cry and make my cock harder as you beg me to stop and not to cum inside as I blindfold you and use your holes mercilessly as I mount and breed you in the grass~ Feral animals returned to their natural habitat... 🖤

And fuuuuckkk please keep talking to me just like that. With the confidence that you could tempt me away from a wife. That I wouldn't be able to resist owning a fuckpet like you and making you all mine. Cheating and sinning in the worst ways imaginable. Maybe even making it more taboo and fauxcest heavy

Even more so I can never get enough of you... sucking my balls dry until my wife walks in and she's appalled and you introduce yourself with my cum all over your face and your makeup running as my sibling as you continue to pump me and mock her for not taking better care of me. And how siblings know each other inside out and how you'll do better than my pathetic wife ever could and you get me to agree in a heartbeat with your superior tits squeezing my cock together as you lick the tip and make me cum again. She'll walk out enraged and ashamed but unable to go beyond the front door. Laying down and crying as she listens to me fucking my sibling harder and better than I ever did her. 😭

You're so much better than my wife baby 🥵

Goood girl trust me you'll always be on my mind if you did filthy shit like that while I was with the wife. I'd never be able to get you out of head. Always nice to me, flirting and letting me push my cock against your hips when no ones watching and begging me to fuck your brains out at night... all of that running through my mind when I fuck her senselessly. She thinks it's for her but she has no fucking clue who this tribute is for~

I wish I could show you her face when I did...I bet it'd make you so fucking wet at the damage you'd have done. <3

Hehe I am 💓🫣 also I’m sorry it took me so long to see this, I completely passed out<3 I hope you had a good night though, bet you were thinking about using my holes<333

And always;’) I’m so sweet and innocent💓💓💓☺️ I would never touch myself without permission from you first;’)

Ugh it’s so unfortunate that you can’t feel how absolutely soaked I get from your asks 👀💓 you’ve ruined a few pairs of my panties already<333

And that’s exactly what I was thinking for that, just breeding me like a wild animal all feral, in the grass, taking exactly what you want and need from me<3 especially if I’m blindfolded, I won’t get very far, I’ll be too scared, having too much adrenaline rush through me<3 and my heart will probably stop when you finally catch me🥺🥺🥺 I’ll be a whimpering crying mess, you could overpower me easily I’m sure💕

🖤☺️ oh don’t worry I won’t stop, I know I could tempt you, I’m sure I wouldn’t even have to try very hard, I could have you wrapped around my finger in no time, I feel like all I’d have to do is wear a low cut top and bend over in front of you💕 or maybe a short dress and no panties?;’)

God she would be so appalled but I’d only be doing what’s natural and helping my bro out, just makes it even better than you’re married and still can’t even resist your slutty younger sibling💕💕💕 bonus points if we took each others virginity when we were both younger<3333

Ah 💓🫣 you’re so lucky I don’t know who you are, I’d be doing that rn if I could💓💓 sending you pictures I don’t post here just for you;’)

Is it weird I’ve imagined you helping me make content? Maybe you’ll take the pictures and the videos for me, helping me look sexy and attractive all the while you’re throbbing in your pants<333

;’) just knowing I can tempt you away from your wife is enough<3 some random internet slut filling up every corner of your brain, making you throb and touching herself to the dirty things you send<333 you better fuck her hard when you’re thinking about me 🥰💓

Also I never think your asks are too much, never think that because I absolutely love them💕 I sit and wait for them sometimes they’re probably starting to be my favorite part of the day<3 just hearing what all dirty things you’re into today, what is on your mind right now💕💕 I like imagining you’re just at work, head filled with all these dirty fantasies and thoughts about me<3333

I really do hope you had a nice night<3 I’m sorry I fell asleep before you were able to send another!🥺🖤

[twsthottakes]

is it wrong to say that there's something mentally wrong with rollo/fellow/henrik (there's probably only two people in the whole fandom that like his bigback ass though) simps/likers/etc?

like it isn't just that i hate the characters (i do) but there's a point at which you have to step back and realize that you're obsessed with a character who attempted ethnic cleansing and is based on a sex offender/a human trafficker/a colonizer who tried to enslave someone.

i'm sorry but there's 22 characters in the main cast plus some for staff, grim, and any normal event characters, can't you just choose one of them to be obsessed over instead of the characters who would be in jail if they were real?

and i get that twst is dark, it's a game that explores themes of being morally gray (since it is about villains), but i really don't think the actions of even the overblotters compare to what rollo, fellow, and henrik did. you can't compare a 17-year-old who was strict and almost tyrannical with his dorm due to family trauma to a 50+ year-old who tried to enslave the prince of a marginalized group just because he didn't like the group. you can't compare a 17-year-old who scammed people because he wanted power to prove the people who traumatized him into thinking he was useless and couldn't do anything right to a probably 27-33-year-old who doesn't have very much magic and was denied a lot of opportunities and decided that fucking HUMAN TRAFFICKING was the best course of action. you can't compare an 18-year-old who wanted to destroy the world that had hurt him and rebuild it so he and the brother he lost could finally have a life that wasn't predetermined and be appreciated for his skills to an 18-year-old who lost his brother and just started absolutely hating magic and everything associated with it, thus attempting ethnic cleansing and generally acting very bigoted. you cannot compare these teens, who have very good EXPLANATIONS (not excuses) for their wrongdoings to these (mostly) adults who commit literal crimes for either no reason or reasons that don't really provide a good explanation.

think of it this way, would you support someone in real life who tried to commit ethnic cleansing and was extremely bigoted because he lost his brother? would you support a king who tried to enslave an unborn baby prince from a kingdom he's at odds with and try to colonize their land and people just because he didn't like them in real life? would you support a human trafficker who did it because he "didn't have anything else to turn to" (he did though, just become an accountant or some shit) in real life?

if you answered no to these questions, yet still like/simp for/etc rollo, fellow, or henrik, you probably have a "fiction doesn't affect reality" mindset. that, if you didn't know, is mostly proshipper logic, which loops back to my main point.

anyway, all of this is not to say that all rollo, fellow, or henrik likers are the absolute scum of the earth. you can get attached to characters for a multitude of reasons, and those people could have gotten attached to those characters due to trauma. if someone is traumatized and latches onto any of these characters, i do not truly blame them. sometimes, latching onto a character is someone's only option for coping (this is not me supporting the proship for coping reasons is good rhetoric, nor is it me saying these people are absolutely innocent victims. i have latched onto characters who are bad people in the past in the worst times of my life, and i am not proud of it. i am understanding people here, not excusing people.).

but, as a rule of thumb, if you like/simp for/support/whatever else any of these characters, and for the fact of the matter, any character like them, please take a step back. look at what you're doing and saying. think about the reasons you're doing this stuff, and how good it really is. then, get help. no matter what the reason is for your enjoyment of that character (besides stuff like "i just think theyre pretty" or not knowing about their actions) you do need help in some form. after, distance yourself from the character. don't allow yourself to fall back into that pattern again. finally, on any social medias you mentioned them on, state you don't enjoy that character anymore, maybe include details on why if you're comfortable doing so, and remove them from your social media.

in conclusion, since this became much, much longer than i imagined, if someone likes rollo, fellow, or henrik, they need to take a step back and seek help. there is obviously something mentally wrong with them.

...

Not gonna lie, the way people demonize the Leech twins like they're Satan Yandereson while woobifying these fuckers always baffled me.

The guy that tried to engulf the entire world in parasitic plants? The human trafficker? Really? The thirty year old human trafficker really isn't the best person to simp for, in my humble opinion. Trust me, Jade and Floyd are way less satanic or irredeemable or whatever than this.

And honestly, let's look at the reasons people like these characters. A. They're hot. B. Their backstory C. Their archetype or whatever like Rollo being Tsundere for Malleus or some shit.

Honestly, in my opinion a lot of the times it's not necessarily that they need help but that they completely overlook the actual personality of the character they're simping for. Like, yeah, it can be fun to simp, but... The twst terrorist hate crimer, the human trafficker, and the guy that wants to enslave a child are quite possibly some of the worst picks.

I see it kind of like simping for Vox from Hazbin vs simping for Valentino. Like, yeah, you could say they're both villains... but do you really like the rapist? Is that really who you want to pick?

[seraphirism]

Hello, 🐈‍⬛anon is here!!

Sadly, I don't have really an opportunity and mental strength to give akuneko enough time, work's taking a lot from me☹️I still didn't even read the Butler's Wedding Party, I'm so far from the fresh events, gosh... I guess I'll have to force myself to catch up otherwise I'm scared that I won't be able to do so and the game will be closed by the time I'll have enough time (sorry for the dark thought I just was scarred by how Senjuushi was closed TWICE and I didn't had enough time to at least read the main story😭)

Anyway, I'm really hyped up for the Sanrio Collab Halloween!! Very interested to know what happened that sanrio pookies suddenly came to the world of our butler pookies (is it bc the third ultimate bbgirl of this title Bellen woke up?/j)

hii, 🐈‍⬛–anon (*^▽^*)!! hope you’ve been doing well!

I totally get it. since the summer event (the cruise one) i haven’t been too active as well 😭 i just login from at least once in two-days so i can collect enough gems (the ones needed to unlock memories of the butlers in the album).

and I’d say many of the events are filler content with lore dropped in small bits. they’re not extremely connected so you wouldn’t be missing out on much if you read the recent events for now and leave the previous ones.

god, don’t scare me, 🐈‍⬛–anon 😱 aknk won’t end it’s services ✨ it’s doing very well (like its always on top 15 or above in rankings) so it should be very unlikely (devs, please don’t think about it 🙏)

you played senjyushi too?! I played it as well \(//∇//)\, not the older one but the Rhodoknight one that ended its services this year. it put me in such a slump when it ended its services. i knew it wasn’t doing the best (it was literally 31 in ranking 😭) but god i loved it too much.

i started playing it a month after the new game launched. what got me into it was Snider 😔💖

I have gotten obsessed with fictional characters from time to time (quite a few i can name) but very few can hold a candle to how i liked Snider ✨ (i read his entire affection story from the older game and my obsession became deeper.)

i literally had every single card of his besides his Halloween card (the purple themed one) + his first anniversary card. i didn’t spent a dime on the game but I grinded hard enough to have all his cards, unlock all event stories of his + anything with him. plus, of course besides Snider, i loved UK’s faction, Kathariste and France’s faction a lot 💞!

I didn’t get to read the last few updates of the main story either 😭 i read till the introduction of the third part of the main story right before the bomb dropped for Like-two—and then they announced EOS and it made me so depressed. Senjyushi R was the reason i tried to learn japanese—it was my favourite game. before senjyushi, afterl!fe had also ended its services so senjyushi was another blow to me.

but I’m glad it’s getting a switch release! better something than nothing! as much as i regret the fact that the story will end and i won’t ever get see Mark, Like-two, Jitte, George, Snider, Enfield and so many more characters again with new content again, I’ll have to satiate myself with what i have 😔

i literally started akuneko because i didn’t have another game to obsess over after senjyushi. i also left akuneko two years ago because i wasn’t able to focus on senjyushi with akuneko 😭 it’s my rebound partner.

back to akuneko, I’m excited as well for the collab! I’ll read the event story in the weekend if i can make time. silent hill 2 remake was released too so I also want to play that (or at least watch the play through 🌫️)

you know, you’ve stated the best reason for sanrio pookies coming into the aknk world—it’s the awakening of the ultimate baby-girl, Bellen. I’m not accepting the reason the writers will choose in the event story—the actual reason in my heart will always be the awakening of Bellen 💞

[devflamme]

BRUTUS.

Summary: Simply, young Nicholas Scratch fucking around and finding out.” (that's literally what I wrote on the google doc.)

Warnings: Religious themes, child abuse, talks about parenting, Agatha being fucked up, literal murder and then resurrection, violence, the normal™

Word count: 1,6k+

Note: I wrote this purely based on a leak from the Agatha series that will release next year. This is not canon, never will be, if it ever is canon, I want credits for it /J. Also based on the song Brutus by The Buttress, as I am obsessed with this song for so many years now. By the way, I haven't started reading the comics yet, I only know Nicholas Scratch by what I've read on his wiki and Agatha's. Another thing: English is not my first language, if you see any typos, please tell me and I'll fix it!

On AO3: 🔮

The boy could feel his mother's eyes on him. Piercing through him, hurting his feelings, hurting his heart — his little boy, going through her things like a little rascal. Has she not educated him enough? She was gripping his ear scoldingly, her long and curly black hair swishing around his forehead while all the things the little boy could see and hear was her blue eyes, shining with that purple aura he always were afraid of, and her voice - booming through his ears and making him cry and whimper like a lost puppy.

"I'm sorry, mother! I'm sorry!" He would scream. He would wail. He would plead.

"You're not sorry. Nicholas, you're not sorry." She would grit through her teeth, her smile scary and making little Nicholas Scratch shiver in fear. His mother was strict, the strictest of them all, while mama was so loving. Mama was sweet. He was a mama's boy, as mother would call him. The biggest mama's boy — pathetic and weak, as Rio would just defend him for anything wrong he did when he looked at her with those big eyes and pathetic pout. He wasn't strong enough. He never will be strong enough in Agatha Harkness' eyes. "Why did you touch that damned book? What's wrong with your head?"

"I was curious, mother!" Nicholas wailed, tears going down his face in angry streaks. Agatha was carrying him through the wood cabin, towards Rio, who was at the basement mixing up potions. Another weakling. Too much interested in potions and nature to be strong and able; the Darkhold used to whisper to Agatha about how her wife was pathetic. About how her son was pathetic. "I was just curious. The book... The book was calling out to me... I h-heard my name..."

Agatha stops in her tracks, almost dropping the boy down to the hardwood floor. She looks at Nicholas, who was still crying profusely, his face red and face puffy, some snot in his nose. "What? What did you say?"

No. That shouldn't be possible. He wasn't- He couldn't. He was her son, obviously — But... How? How could he be worthy? At such a young age?

"I heard my name... I thought you or m-mama were calling me... So I searched for you." Nicholas answers, his voice small and broken, hiccuping through his sentences. Nicholas dries his tears with the back of his chubby hand, looking up at his mother and looking for some softness in her eyes. He didn't find any. "I went into the- The library. I thought- I thought you were there. But it was only that book you told me n-not to read... I only touched it once! I'm sorry, mother!"

"We can't have that. I told you to not touch it. I told you to not even look at it." Agatha rasps out, her eyes closed and her breath uneven, as if she was controlling herself to not do anything she would regret afterwards. She felt like God, when Adam and Eve ate the forbidden fruit from Heaven. "Why did you disobey me?"

"I'm sorry! Please, mother, forgive me." Nicholas whispers, gripping Agatha's dark robes and hugging Agatha, his tears staining Agatha's linen clothes. She looks down at Nicholas, her eyes shining with her purple magic, but she could also feel another thing. Darkness. The darkness from the Darkhold's magic — the thing holding her from committing one of the biggest mistakes in her life.

"Nicholas, can you come with me? I want to show a place to you."

Therefore the Lord God sent him forth from the garden of Eden, to till the ground from whence he was taken.

Agatha didn't want this.

She didn't want to be a mother - that was Rio's dream, not hers. Her dream was to get even more powerful, to find ways to decipher that one damned book, and to just conquer everything. She didn't have time for this. For a child.

The first time she saw Nicholas, she knew he wasn't going to be the best kid. The most intelligent. The most powerful. He was just a normal kid, with his eyes green and curious like Rio's, his curls rebellious like Agatha's, and his chubby hands that loved to play with the wet dirt in the forest next to the family's cabin. He was, most of all, curious and nosy. Nicholas loved to snoop on Agatha's things, to watch while Rio brewed her potions and made her rituals in the cabin's basement — he wanted to learn, but he wasn't going to learn anything. Agatha created a futile heir, so futile that she didn't want her surname, Harkness, powerful and almighty, to be related to that child. Nicholas Scratch it is — only a scratch of what Agatha wanted him to be.

As they went into the dark forest, hand in hand, Agatha was growing tired of hearing Nicholas' sobs, pained as Agatha squeezed his tiny hands in hers, her own boney and scarred and most of all, corrupted. Corrupted by the very thing that was convincing her to do that — to sacrifice her own... creation. Her own vessel. To get stronger. To finally achieve what she wanted.

Power.

"M-mother, where are we going?"

Agatha didn't answer. She threw Nicholas on the wet grass, next to a big boulder that was covered in mud and moss. She flicked her wrist, taking out the Darkhold of the pocket dimension she created to store it in. As Agatha pulled the Darkhold, in a cloud of dark purple and black magic, Nicholas started to cry louder, his weeping making the birds on the trees fly away to somewhere they knew they wouldn't be hurt by the monster in the woods.

O mihi potestatem. Propitius esto, et intende conatus meos ut hoc tibi do.

Agatha would whisper, her eyes closed and sparkling purple through her eyelids. She lifts her wrist, her whole body sparkling purple, the noise and Nicholas' pained screams echoing by the until now silent forest. She looks down at the body in front of her, now lifeless and cold, dry and dead — just like that one damned day in 1693, where she looked down at the dead bodies of her coven members and coven leader. She couldn't call Evanora her mother - a mother wouldn't do what she did with Agatha. Her own daughter. Her own blood.

No mother would.

Brutus betrayed him.

Brutus killed him.

Brutus sacrificed him.

As he got up and looked around, he saw a forest covered by snow and darkness. How much time passed, he couldn't say. He didn't know what date it was — and yet, he knew exactly where to go. With his body full of hatred, Nicholas Scratch got up, feet weak and unsure, as he got used to the bigger body he now had. He was now an adult — what his mother's magic did to him, he didn't know. Only thing he noticed was now he had an adult body and the mind of a troubled kid who wanted nothing but to avenge what was done to him many, many years ago.

His hair was long just like his mother's. Curly and unruly, getting past his lower back in a mess of black and some white strands — he was literally a portrait of the one who betrayed him. Nicholas had nothing in common with his mama, the one that really loved him for what he was; only the troubled green in his eyes that contrasted with the weak green from the leaves that were not covered by the thick snow. Nicholas couldn't even feel the cold, piercing through his body. He was blind. Blind by hatred, sadness and by the desire of revenge.

As he marched through the forest, his feet unsure, he pulled strands and strands of his hair, hissing through his teeth. He didn't want this. He wanted to rip every part of his body that reminded him of Agatha Harkness. He could cut his head off, then give it to some wild bear to eat, together with his own body and skin and meat and soul.

Do not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather, be afraid of the One who can destroy both soul and body in hell.

He ripped a tuft of hair from his head, looking at it being held by his trembling hand. Nicholas growls, throwing the tuft out in the woods and running — running in bare feet as he gets out of the woods. He could see an old cabin, full of moss and broken, the wood chopped and glass shattered. His family's old cabin.

Nicholas runs even faster, getting to the door and just throwing his body against it, the door falling on the other side of the cabin in a loud thud. He gets up from the floor, looking around in an exasperated manner, his eyes crazed and twitching. The state of the cabin was chaotic — things on the floor, dust in the air. He could still smell the darkness and electricity from Agatha's magic, contrasting with the familiar scent from Rio's magic, calming and misty. He knew that the magic that stayed in the cabin wasn't recent - if it was recent, there would be the magic aura mixing together, purple and green. There was nothing.

"Mama?" Nicholas rasps out, his voice gravelly and throaty. He walks through the cabin, going straight to the stairs that went to the bewitched basement below him. He jumps to the last step, his feet almost failing and throwing him to the ground as he holds himself on the wall. Nicholas enters the basement, the basement looking even messier than the rest of the cabin. Nicholas could see some dried blood stains on the walls - that made him almost puke, thinking about what Agatha did to Rio.

Mama can't be dead. She can't. She can't. She can't. She can't. Nicholas would chant, his hands holding his own head while he walked around the basement, looking for anything that could be proof that Rio was okay. Anything.

Nicholas screamed his mother's name, hatred dripping from his tongue, his voice echoing through the walls.

© devflamme.

[brokeaesthetic]

I bet yall( There's literally no yalI l have like 0 followers.)won't believe this, but I've got a new mf im obsessed with..... guess who???? it's tangerine from bullet train, bitch im literally sick🤪!!!. It's every couple of months with me I swear!!!! I'm such a lil weird ass freak in a good way of course. Like you all know that clip of Britney Broski, where she's fighting herself for being weird (here it is) https://youtu.be/o-uBYfodkDc?si=J-MZtcPSNXRDAJJO literally me. I'm such a weird ass freak in a bad way😮‍💨😕. "And then you get this picture, AND THEN I TAKE IT TO MY PENT HOUSE AND FREAK IT". Sorry, but does anyone else feel crazy guilt when they're reading these fan fictions abt characters, And then you're simping, and then you realize that this is actually a real person with a family. It literally makes me sick and wants to stop everything I'm doing. But alas, I'm a weird ass freak😈😛😉. I need to seek fuckin help. But anyway, aaron taylor johnson is so bbg( I absolutely despise that term, but I feel like it's fitting). And I wish him nothing but success on his acting journey and career path. By the way, yall please, please, please, please please check this video out on YouTube. I watched it literally yesterday, and I can't stop rewatching it. This is to all the Aaron Taylor Johnson girlys watch this video NOW. https://youtu.be/sQNJC1i4eDU?si=YxtLRlkBJe1-7JRa Also, I'm so sorry to all the writers whose notifs I've blown up, But yes, I have stalked your page. And yes, I have read every single one of your fan fictions about tangerine. Typing that out actually made me sick, and I needed to really start to re-evaluate myself. But this is really nothing new. I've gone through this like a million(3) times. Anyway, I'm here yet again to complain about the amount of fan fictions about this character.( I say this as if I haven't scoured the deep dark depth of tumblr to read every single fantic I can about him.) I'm such a flipping weirdo fr hashtag I need to do better and punch in the side of my head. By the way, I also wanted to add that like every time I make one of these post and I go to whatever tag to read more fanfics about whatever characters. I just cringe whenever I see my post, like I cringe extremely hard. But you know, I have Tumblr for a reason, and I want to vent so what better place right. And I just want to give a thank you to all the writers who have been fulfilling the deep dark hole that is my new obsession. Wishing you all nothing but luck and happiness. Thank you for reading my rant, autism diagnosis coming in soon🤗💋. Later when I come back to this post I will be so utterly humiliated I will delete it, so please enjoy reading, What might be one of the most humiliating things? I will ever put on the internet.🤳🏽👋🏽.

[ginnsbaker]

Hi J!!!

I’m reblogging your answer to my ask - it’s now one of my favorite Tumblr interactions. I am so flattered by your response! BTW, i’m posting another ask since my reply was too long for a comment lol

Re: Scenes from a Mariage

Yes, please, do check it out! Some say it pales in comparison to the original Swedish TV series, but it is still an absolute ride. It’s one of my favorites. As if life isn’t challenging enough - I love angst in all my media consumption lol

But in retrospect, I think it’s more in line with ILGOSS than in If I Bleed. Nevertheless, it still highlights those extremely flawed love interests with a chilling and heart-wrenching dissociative state who hide behind 10-foot concrete walls. It’s amazing. Please let me know what you think of it once you’ve watched it!

Re: Mirror Image & Confrontation Scene

I actually do come from a homophobic and religious Filo family - so my past relationships were doomed from the start, allowing me to feel all this heartbreak I read and watch about. But as you know, us Filo daughters might bend but never break! So life is a lot better now that I'm grown 🤍

Also, The Prophecy by TS is the eldest daughter's anthem. 🙋🏻‍♀️

Re: Matt & Confrontation Scene

I actually haven't finished Sorry for Your Loss yet. I know in some of the chapters of If I Bleed, Leigh wonders if she pushed Matt to the cheating.

But I wonder if Leigh sometimes feels that if she had accepted more love from her partner and had allowed herself to be loved the way people wanted to love her, would Matt have felt safe enough to confide his darkest fears and sadness to her. Knowing that he has made enough contribution to their relationship and he can ask for something in return.

I know that's not a healthy way of looking at a relationship. But I think no matter how perfect two people are for each other, there are still some vulnerabilities or needs that we hold back because we feel we are undeserving of that much attention. I wonder how that would play into y/n's and Leigh's relationship

P.S.

If you’re familiar with the “Graduated from the Oscar Isaac and Jessica Chastain School of Promotion” meme, it was from their press tour of Scenes from a Marriage 🤣

Good evening, O!

Ohhh! I remember seeing gifs of Jessica and Oscar in events, with Oscar sensually kissing her arm O_O so that's the movie they made together!

Yeah, I'll definitely let you know when I see the film :) I hope I'll have some time this weekend.

Oh yeah, mine are homophobic too, but that's because of their beliefs. I was literally raised in a Christian household, was very active in church activities and ministries since I was twelve, so it came as a shock to them when I came out. I really do hope it gets better for us. I'm embarrassed to admit that I haven't listen to album #2 of TTPD as much as the first one... so I haven't listened to The Prophecy O_O The thing is, I haven't moved on from the first compilation and I'm so obsessed with Guilty as Sin :))

I'll probably file away my thoughts on Leigh and Matt in the actual series for later. I'll bring it up next week :)

P.S. I had to google that, so no :P

[hammerhead-jpg]

Born to "Hiiiiii :3" forced to "What's up" (about me post)

About me page I'm so nervooouussd

I very much wanted to post things for fun and figured I would do it on Tumblr since it seems like a chill place where likes and follows don't matter and also my friends and family (which I'm not out to yet) follow me on every single social media and I do not want them stalking me when I post about who knows what

That being said, I do not come from the golden age of Tumblr or any age really but I do watch Strange Æons religiously so I'm not completely clueless ig, but if I break some sort of unspoken rule it wasn't me

All that unnecessary text aside, hi, my name is Kristian (although that name is not set in stone because I'm indecisive just trans things am I right) and I go by Kris, but you can also call me Hammerhead or Moonshine/Moon

I am a digital artist and have been drawing for like forever and my dream is to one day turn the story I'm currently working on into a visual novel/webcomic

(edit:) I'm sorry if I don't reblog a ton of posts, I know some people view not reposting posts as rude but it's just that I'm not used to being on social media that has a repost feature so I don't have the reflex to repost things

I'm queer and also transmasc <3

(also edit:) sorry if I don't respond to your comments complementing my art, it's just that I get nervous/don't know what to respond with, I assure you the complements are very appreciated and people who like/comment on/reblog my art have a special place in my heart

(also also edit) you can tag me in "tag x people" and tag chains and stuff but I probably won't continue the chain as I probably don't have enough people I would comfortably tag and even in that "would comfortably tag" group I am probably still too shy to tag them, and one or more of those people in that group are usually the ones that tagged me in the first place so it's not really like I could tag the person that tagged me in the tag chain??? Is anything I'm saying making sense???

My current fixations/ the fandoms I'm in are:

Redacted Audio (proud Cutie, Vega n Christian apologist RAAAAHHHHH 🦅🦅🦅🦅🦅🦅/j)(also proud Lasko stan and 7eleven trio shipper)

Bungou stray dogs (biggest Sigma stan)

MHA (although I'm kind of out of it, I'm mostly just silently keeping up with the manga but I am still kinda obsessed with mha ocs) (if you hate mha ocs or really any fan ocs DNI because I have like 40 of them) (no I am not a 30 yr. old woman shipping her self insert with Bakugo leave me alone)

Don't hug me I'm scared (not rlly in the fandom)

Chainsaw man (not rlly in the fandom)

Fear and Hunger aka Funger and Gunger (I can't say I'm really in the fandom and can't say I'm that involved into the game it's too big brain for me so I just observe it from afar and laugh at the memes)

DNI lists are kinda useless but racism, sexism, abelism, homophobia, transphobia, xenophobia ect is not tolerated here but also like if you're one of those people who are really ticked off when they see a minor talking about NSFW stuff and act all wise sage I suggest you DNI because I assure you your rambling and skull emojis are not going to prevent me from developing hypersexuality, you are like 11 years late to that my friend (or if you're just uncomfortable hearing a minor talk about nsfw that's cool too)

And also fuck off if you think sexualizing minors (fictional or not) is okay

This is a xenopronouns/neopronouns, xenogender, furry, therian safe space, I really don't judge

I think this goes without saying but cringe culture is dead, if you get pissy about things being cringy please don't come to the person who's internet alias is literally a Penelope Scott song, other alias is a reference to a gay ship from my hero academia and the person who named themselves "Kristian" because they thought that naming themselves (the atheist) a name that means "God's follower" was hilarious, but again this is tumblr so I expect most people here are cringelords

Anyways, fuck you Adam you can go suck my long horse weewee, Moon x supremacy always

Also if I tell anyone to kts I was just joking PLEASE

[grailfinders]

Fate & Phantasms TDoV special!

we're getting a little too close to 1000 followers for my liking, so it's time to celebrate the Transgender Day of Visibility! /j

sadly we don't have the time to create a whole new build for a famous historical transgender person, but we still have time to do a roundup of all the trans people already in fate, whether through their historical source or in fate itself. we're also including any servant who intentionally doesn't care about the gender binary in here, because its our list and we'll do as we'll please. we're also not including genderbends on being genderbent alone, or else we'd be here all day.

so, if you want to get a trans D&D party together for the Transgender Day of Vengeance, check out some of the options below!

Artoria Pendragon: we're including her not because she's a genderbend, but because she spent her entire life laboring under a gender role that slowly crushed her physically and mentally. Big mood, as the kids say.

Chevalier d'Eon: obviously putting modern labels of sexuality on historical figures is a fraught game at the best of times, but we can definitely say that the historical d'Eon was intersex, and chose to present as female towards the end of her life, so whatever she was it definitely wasn't cisgender.

Cú Chulainn: Cu isn't explicitly transgender in either his source nor in Fate, but it's not that hard to get a trans interpretation from the Ulster Cycle, what with its emphasis on how small and beardless Cu is, plus how he was immune to that curse Medb used to give all the men of Ulster birthing pains. plus this is our list so fuck it, we stan.

Sir Francis Drake: now admittedly this is our shakiest logic yet, but hear me out- her bio explicitly says that her crew sees calling her a woman as "rude" to her. there's a lot of ways to read into that, and this is one of them.

Jack the Ripper: ...can you reject the gender you were assigned at birth if you were never born? still, this one's just a numbers game- at least one of those abortions would've been assigned male, right? also, a screaming amalgam of the dead back for vengeance is great energy to bring to the party.

Mordred Pendragon: their gender? knight.

SHIKI, Shiki, and Shiki: being multiple people does wild things to gender. problematic fave tbf

Astolfo: Astolfo.

Hundred Personas: again, this one's a numbers game. ...do they still count as trans if they have their own bodies now? also, give them the male tag lasengle. you cowards.

Minamoto-no-Raikou: we're not including this one just because she's a genderbend, but because she's spent her whole life under the burden of a gender role she never wanted. also I've met plenty of tranfemmes who are just as obsessed about motherhood and want that exact kind of body.

Leonardo da Vinci: nonbinary queen, we stan

Enkidu: literally genderfluid, I can respect a good pun.

Prince Nezha: does not give a shit about their gender. good for them, best beep-boop.

Sieg: the yggdmillenia family didn't bother giving their mana batteries genders, so Sieg's canonically intersex! he's also a fucking great looper, if you got him you should level him.

Shi Huangdi: at some point the first emperor of china kind of forgot gender existed. god I wish that was me.

Kama: they can transform, Lasengle. you said so yourself. give them a male skin, you cowards

Sima Yi & Reines: ...I mean, I hear people call being trans like, "having a man's soul in a woman's body", and that's literally this.. does this count? I don't know, but the important thing is it's raising the question.

Maou Nobu: I've met them and they're trans, that's good enough proof for me.

Caeneus: ditto.

Van Gogh, Nemo, and Taira-no-Kagekiyo: I'm sorry for lumping these three together, but they're all right next to each other and they're all just "being multiple people does weird things to your gender" again.

Kiichi Hogen: see Kama.

[padfootastic]

Hey there ! I missed seeing your posts so I am glad you’re back : ) so last week I reread where you go, i'm going (because there's no me without you) and like I just love it so so much because the main character energy they exude is truly awesome, I mean it’s just so perfect. Also when Sirius took his shirt off so the attention was shifted from James 🥹 was adorable because they’re just always there for each other. I love this fic so much that I reread it so frequently (not just this one tbh I love all your other works too so thank you so much for writing them ) I just wanted to ask you do you have anymore tattoo related head canons ? Also sorry it turned so long

omg hi anon 🥺🥺 thank u so, so much!!! that fic is so dear to me bc i wrote it in one stretch in the notes app of my phone and just. it’s everything i love about j & s and fanfiction, i think. and dude, main character energy is so right??? like just casually reforming extremely advanced magic for no reason other than to fuck around???

(also please never apologise for the length of anything, i am the queen of rambling for no reason here so if anything, it should be saying sorry for making y’all go thru all mt word vomit lol)

as for tattoo related headcanons, hmmm, so. there’s this fic about harry & sirius & tattoos postwar, where each chapter just has more tattoo content lol it has pretty much most of my hcs in some form or the other. what else, hm.

- james’ first tattoo is for sirius, always. he wasn’t really interested in it but he wanted it to get thru sirius’ thick skull that he’s family, always will be, and if he had to mutilate his own skin to prove it, so he will. of course, after that he realised he actually quite liked it so he just. never stopped.

- i mention this in the fic but james is very proper, buttoned up, perfect pureblood heir types & doesn’t have any visible tattoos. (have u seen that ig trend where these super ripped, tattooed dudes do that thing where they’re all well dressed in the beginning and when the beat drops, they’re set against a light backdrop, shirtless, showing off an impressive collection of badass tattoos? that is james potter coded)

- sirius is def the kind of person who’s get inked without a second thought. he loves the pain, the little rush of adrenaline, the feeling of being alive that comes with it. he also gets a tattoo from every single country he travels to, without fail, as a way to preserve memories.

- these dorks def have a marauder tattoo that they get inked on a dare or sumn. surprisingly (or not), remus was the one most hesitant and who had to be pushed into it. peter, of course, was the most eager

- magical tattoos!!! just. so many of them. that’s the tweet. (again, this is in the other fic, but i’m kinda obsessed with runic tattoos that can double as conduits for magic? and j & s doing it on each other, at risk of actual, literal combustion and not caring about it bc they have the invincibility of teenage boyhood)