#SORRY FOR HOW MUCH I TALK IN CAPS

[causenessus]

MY LOVLINESS <33333333333333 HELLO HELLO good morning evening or afternoon!! i hope you’ve eaten today(MAKE SURE YOU EAT) and i hope your day has been good!! i’m always manifesting a good day for you because you deserve it !! amongst other good good things <3333333333 I MISSED YOU SO MUCH LIKE my whole day i was like I NEED TO REMEMBER TO SHARE THIS WITH NESS like you’re always on my mind like that <33333 right now i’m eating instant pho(which is so funny because my mom is making pho rn but it won’t be ready until tomorrow sooooo…)(SUBSTITUTE!!) ALSO LITERALLY MICROSLEEPING AND WAKING UP IS SO FUNNY BECAUSE LIKE!! one moment it’s 7pm then it’s 7:15 THEN ITS LIKE 9PM AND IM LIKE WHAT?? literally when i woke up this morning my phone was on 30% and i had like keyboard spammed a bit in my response like i did NOT remember passing out so it was so so funny LOL

WE DEFINITELY WORKED IN PARALLELS BECAUSE TODAY AT WORK IT WAS ACTUALLY A GOOD DAY!! which meant you were there in spirit making my work day better <333333333333 my brother came to work and he gave me some snacks which i very much needed and appreciated and i had my favourite manger on duty too! and it felt like such a short and fast day because it was like kind of busy(everyone was back to school shopping so a lot of kids and parents!!) BUT the like thing i was bothered by was how many CRYING KIDS THERE WERE like i don’t know what was in the air but every kid was crying in the store i kid you not!! i wanted to pull my hair out JUST a little bit but overall it was still an okay work day!! and since it’s sunday and we close early IT MADE IT A LITTLE BETTER!! like coming outside and the sky still being bright is always a win! ALSO I GET WHAT YOU MEAN BY THE BREATHING THING DONT WORRY!! like being on autopilots is so weird like especially at work but sometimes it’s scary because ill be doing things so fast and then when i mess up i kind of pause and im like… what… what was i doing??? LMAO IDK IF THATS UNIVERSAL OR IF THATS JUST ME BUT!! literally my brain is just static tv and i’m just MOVING until someone is like “mango anon!” and i’m like OH HI?? like i love out of body experiences idk i think they’re funny LOL ALSO UR COWORKER SEEING YOU GROW UP IS SO CUTE <33333333333 like a lot of my coworkers are moms so they’re all very motherly and lovely it’s so endearing like i love my coworkers so much so i really don’t want to quit but like I NEED TO THINK OF MYSELF !! i have until wednesday i think to decide because then the new work schedule comes out right but THATS SO SOON SO IDK!! IDK IM SCARED!! but i will 100% update you on that if i do decide to quit or i might just take a break and come back during winter time so i can help out but WE’LL SEE! i’ll definitely talk to my manager about it though!!

YES THE GOODBYE MESSAGE LIKE I WISH I COULD SEND IT(i mean i could but it’s basically what you said! like here’s the intro ill copy and paste it)

“Hi team, good morning. I’m pretty sure by now. You might have heard the news that I have decided to resign my position as your store manager. I am sorry that I didn’t have a chance to say bye to many of you. YAP YAP YAP YAP”

(by the way we did NOT HEAR THE NEWS LIKE THIS WAS NEWS FOR EVERYONE!!)

like it just came out of nowhere and i was literally like OH OKAY!! because this was when i was literally thinking of quitting THEN SHE SENDS THAT AND IM LIKE oh!!! oohhhhh!! okay! AND PLS YOUR SISTERS BF SENDING YOU THAT MESSAGE??? LIKE ITS KIND OF ENDEARING THAT HE DID BUT the fact that you heard it from HER BF before HER was actually crazy like RANDOM BIG NEWS OUT OF NOWHERE IS SO FUNNY BECAUSE IM ALWAYS LIKE …. what happened to hello!.. how are you!.. how’s you day! like nope right to the case like if my brothers girlfriend ever sent me that i think i would literally like have a disconnected moment like i would just STARE at the message before properly processing it like…. wdym… WDYM?? WHY IS MY BROTHER RADIO SILENT RN???

OH MY GOD COLD KISSES MENTION??? I LOVE LOVE LOVED COLD KISSES SO MUCH I LOVE KENMA I LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVEE AHHH cold kisses was so great like ALSO I DIDNT KNOW YOU WROTE BINARY STARS?? like i didn’t see it on your page until you brought it up again just recently and i was like WHAT!! so you bet i will 100% read it when i have the time because i literally love your writing so much like i wanna eat it and absorb it into my soul because reading it isn’t enough, i need to FULLY absorb it into me!! AND UR SO RIGHT!! i don’t blame him for totally being distracted by your smaus because me too! sometimes i’ll be sitting down then i remember a certain part of one of your smaus and i go back and read it LOL like LOVE NOTES<3333333333333 LOVE NOTES I MISS U <33333333333333333333 ALSO PLS FIGHT HIM OR TELL HIM TO GET OFF MY BACK!!! i unfortunately can not do 20 things at once as much as i wish to!! like i couldn’t even argue back when he was like “wait you aren’t done your main task?” like i was trying to be polite so i was literally like “no im sorry i’ve been busy doing the other stuff” and he was literally like “make sure you finish before you clock out!” LIKE REALLY??? REALLY???? OH NO I WAS JUST PLANNING ON NOT DOING MY JOB!!! like i wanted to scream because im just a girl and maybe stop making me do your side missions!! also i find it so cute how we’re starting to share words or kind of text mannerisms?(if that makes sense) LIKE WE ARE LITERALLY ONE NESS!! WE ARE ONE!!! SOULMATES FOREVER I TELL YOU !!!!

also the way i can totally imagine your manager LOL WITH THE HAIRCUT AND THE CAR WITH THE DUCKS?? AND YES I REMEMBER THE BLACK CORAL THING THAT WAS CRAZY! your manager sounds so unserious like WDYM A POUND OF COCAINE?? like he’s so silly i agree we should have more silly managers like i have my male manager, a silly manager, my fav manager aka the girl manager i was talking about AND THE STORE MANAGER THAT JUST QUIT(still literally FLABBERGASTED BY THIS) ALSO UR CLOSING LIKE UMM PROCEDURES(?)ARE SO DIFFERENT FROM MINE! because we literally just all clean together like there’s not really a department separation? but we do have like a home section but everyone kind of like does their own thing right like the manager will send some people to one section of the store and other sections and stuff like that but overall we all kind of close together if that makes sense??? ALSO YOU SWEEPING THE ENTIRE STORE??? absolutely NO WAY like i was paid to stand here and help little customers NOT SWEEP THE WHOLE STORE?? me personally i would’ve helped you because there’s no way LIKE IDK WE HAVE CLEANERS TO DO THAT AT MY STORE BUT THATS STILL CRAZY! like wdym sweep the ENTIRE STORE?? BY MYSELF??? like i would cry but i hope you were okay! also not being able to take your 15 i would RIOT and i would give myself an extra 15 minute break on my next shift because there’s no way… and to the manager that yelled at you for being on your phone I WILL BITE U !!! NOT LOVINGLY I WILL BARK BARK BARK LIKE HOW DARE SHE?? the nerve after MAKING YOU MISS YOUR BREAK AND SWEEP THE WHOLE STORE?? i’m absolutely FUMING FOR YOU RIGHT NOW!!(also i did find it funny but funny in a way where i’m like THAT ACTUALLY HAPPENED?? LIKE THATS CRAZY) if i ever had to miss my break like that i would literally make it EVERYONES problem like i will be a total maniac about it like “ugh i couldn’t take MY 15 MINUTE BREAK” (like its just 15 min but 15 MINUTES IS 15 MINUTES OF MUCH NEEDED ME TIME!!!)

ALSO PLS I DO NOT WISH CLOTHING RETAIL ON U!! like i’m not saying it’s terrible but i feel like clothing retail workers get disrespected A LOT and like customers are not very mindful and I DONT WISH THAT ON U!! U DESERVE NOTHING BUT THE BEST!! also that manager that made you cry??? i hope he knows i’ve casted a hex on him and that he will not know peace…. i will personally make sure he doesn’t know peace …… i’m coming out for him(not lovingly) and not the compromise LMAOOO like no it’s not a scheduling problem it’s a HIM problem !! also i think i will just like write a letter like hey sorry im quitting because i can’t prioritize work anymore and YAP YAP YAP ty for teaching me how to do clothing stuff and YAP YAP YAP AND UR SO RIGHT!! god knew we’d be too powerful together so he put us in different countries because otherwise?? WE COULD BUILD HOUSES!! RUN A RESTAURANT BY OURSELVES!! TAKE OVER THE WORLD EVEN!! anything is possible with u LIKE WE’D BE TOO POWERFUL!!

WE ARE DIFFERENT TWO PEAS IN A POD BECAUSE WHENEVER YOURE LIKE “i’m sorry idk if that made sense” i’m always like IT DOES!! I GET YOU!! U DONT HAVE TO WORRY!! like we are on the same wavelength we are one in two we are soulmates twin flames lovers and everything in between

NESS UR LITERALLY THE SWEEST LIKE IDK IT FEELS SO ENDEARING THAT YOU THINK OF ME LIKE TELL ME WHY IM KICKING MY FEET AND GIGGLING RN !! i love hearing work drama because it’s so crazy like i have so many old work stories that i swear they sound fake BUT ITS REAL LIKE literally the most random things happen at work and maybe that’s why i like staying like maybe i need that extra drama in my life you know!! AND STOP NESS STOP STOP YOU SAVING YOUR DAY FOR ME?? FOR ME HHHH AHHHHHH i’m gonna give you a big fat kiss like i’m AHHHHH IM SO SOFT AND SQUISHY RN!! you’re making me smile like if people see me smiling at my phone like no it’s not a MAN it’s NESS THE LOVE OF MY LIFE MY EVERYTHING!!! ness i love you like my life is yours i genuinely like every words of endearment will be dedicated to you for the rest of my life like i would catch a grenade bruno mars style for you like STOP IM SORRY I CANT GET OVER THIS AHHH ur so sweet i will bite ur cheek lovingly and give you my heart and soul and body and mind and anything you want <333333333333 just say the word and ill do it for you <3333333333333333 also i will keep in mind the requests thing because that’s so cute like i’m IM SO SQUISHY RN I LOVE YOU SO MUCH AHHH AHHHHHHHHH

ALSO UR RIGHT MEN DONT DESERVE MY POLITENESS!! like i lost my customer service voice a LONG time ago because i can not deal with these customers anymore!! because some of them just don’t deserve it like im not gonna gentle parent you and be like “no sir! i’m sorry that the government made you pay for bags but that’s not my fault! would you like to express how you’re feeling and we can talk it out?” LIKE NO I DO NOT CARE LIKE IM SORRY OUR BAGS ARS 50 CENTS BUT THATS LIFE BUDDY!!! NOT MY FAULT!! like he’s acting like i was sitting with the damn president and making that decision with him like he’s acting like i was like “yes mister president we should get rid of plastic bags and make the customers pay for reusable bags” LIKE IM SORRY MAN I WAS NOT THERE !! u think i like asking you to pay 50 cents for a bag? NO!! but i don’t want to lose my job unfortunately!! but i think i will be quitting which is very bittersweet and sad but we’ll see!! maybe ill try out just working 9-5 every saturday and see how it goes… BUT WHO KNOWS!! my managers are silly so maybe they’ll say yes or no but ill update you on that!!

also omg the cinnamon almond butter i found online is $20 SHIPPING FEE??? AND THE JAR ITSELF IS $17 LIKE THATS CRAZY! the jar itself costs more than what i make in an hour and you want me to pay $20??? FOR SHIPPING?? at this point i will make it myself OR I WILL MEET NESS AND SHARE THE CINNAMON ALMOND BUTTER WITH BAGELS <3333333 we can eat it together like a cute little picnic and talk about how terrible work is <3333333333333333333

ALSO I DECIDED I WILL MAKE A BURNER ACCOUNT FOR YOU !! just because my account right now is so messy like i’ve reblogged a bunch of things from like old fandoms so you’ll scroll and you’ll see like gravity falls, fnaf, fairy tail like LOL A BUNCH OF MESSY THINGS but also just so you have a way to reach out to me and like also i miss you a bunch throughout the day so maybe ill just be like “missing u hours !!!” and also if you ever wanna tell me anything somewhat personal(like the bday thing WHICH IM SO SO SO SO SORRY ABOUT LIKE I GENUINELY CANT EVEN EXPRESS HOW SORRY I AM FOR BRINGING IT UP but ill expand on this more later)(AGAIN IM SO SO SORRY LIKE I FELT SO BAD AND I HHHHH) then ill be there!! BUT I LOVE OUR DYNAMIC TOO LIKE this is literally me sending you LOVE NOTES everyday!!

OMG SCORPIOS AND CANCERS ARE COMPATIBLE?? STOP IT BECAUSE WE ARE LITERALLY MEANT TO BE NESS LIKE EVEN THE STARS SAY SO!! also ness im so sorry like im genuinely so sorry for bringing it up I HAD NO IDEA HHHH I DIDNT THINK ABOUT IT AND IM SO SORRY LIKE I DONT THINK YOURE A LIAR AND YOUR REASONING MAKES TOTAL SENSE but i’m still so sorry like oh my god i felt so bad when i read that like im gonna send you a bit birthday cake and presents right now :((( and a big sorry cake like I FEEL SO BAD AND IK YOULL TELL ME NOT TO FEEL BAD AND TO NOT FEEL GUILTY BUT I DO IM SORRY(if i ever bring up something you’re uncomfortable with please please please don’t feel obligated to answer like i will not mind!! id rather you be comfortable than feel like you have to admit something you don’t want to)(you’re my number one priority so please please don’t ever feel forced to say things!!)it definitely wasn’t upsetting to find out i’m so sorry i was just more concerned that i missed your birthday and i didn’t say happy birthday </3333 i literally love love love you so much please don’t say sorry </3 you’re okay!! i’ll literally give you the biggest hug ever im so sorry and everything is okay you’re okay and you’re doing fine!! <33333333333333333333333

AND OMG I KNEW THE SUNA AND ATSUMU LOSER THING WAS YOU!! i’ve been your guardian angel since day one <3333333 your guard dog and everything! i remember seeing it and i was like if 2020 haikyuu fandom finds this they would grill this poor girl so im going to send in something to make sure she knows i have her back!! ONE MAN ARMY I TELL YOU!! i will literally stand in the frontlines for you and protect you against the suna smoking headcanon-ers(?) like I HAVE YOUR BACK FOREVER AND ALWAYS!! i remember also i kept checking your blog to make sure no one was sending in hate like i was on GUARD because i was like i will literally defend this girl with my life if i see her starting to get hate (i loved you from day one it was love at first sight) AND I WILL PROTECT YOU IN PHAS SO DONT WORRY!! you can stay in the van and watch the cameras while i set everything up!! you can just sit and look pretty and ill enter in the house for you <33333333333

YES THE RANDOM INTERMISSIONS ILL DO THAT NOW TO REMIND YOU TO DRINK WATER !! MYSELF INCLUDED!! because sometimes i forget to drink water since like i don’t get thirsty sometimes but i realize that i haven’t drank that much water… SO ALWAYS REMEMBER TO DRINK WATER!!!

ness im literally on a plane rn flying to the states for you like I WILL BE YOUR SOUND PERSON!! your director sounds kind of mean i hope you don’t have that same stress and everything goes smooth sailing for you </33333 unfortunately idk what a thespian conference is? i don’t think my country does that or maybe just my high school LOL but i hope your stage manager duties goes well because you deserve the best!! and if your director says something to you then i will appear right behind him and kick him unlovingly!! but i know you can do it and YOULL DO A GOOD JOB!! IM ROUTING FOR YOU AND IK YOULL DO WELL!! don’t stress to much and remember that at the end of the day, it’s just tech and you’re more important than the show <333333333333333 please prioritize yourself and make sure you’re eating and drinking lots of water!!

I TOTALLY AGREE WITH YOU ON THE KIDS THING!! there will definitely be the annoying menaces but then you find the absolute sweethearts and they just <33333333 like motherly instincts coming in quick because i just want to protect them!! like i wish i adopted a tech theatre kid so i could protect them from the director but unfortunately all of them were so annoying so FREE FOR ALL!! DONT WORRY ABOUT TYPOS BECAUSE I PROBABLY MAKE TYPOS TOO BUT DW!! like i stopped proofreading these so i just wrote and hope for the best and im glad that i get my point across enough LOL BUT SOMETIMES I IMAGINE LIKE “i wonder if ness reads these and thinks im crazy…” AND I WOULDNT BLAME YOU!! you could never do anything wrong and even if you HYPOTHETICALLY DO it would turn a blind eye because i know ness can’t do anything wrong!! AND THE NIGHTMARE WOULD SCARE ME TOO OH MY GOD having tech theatre nightmares are so real because i literally had a nightmare before like during high school where i totally messed up my cues and just started free balling the motherboard and it was a MESS!! it was definitely pre show anxiety since this was like the night before the show or like close to the show (i’m not too sure i don’t remember it was a WHILE AGO) but omg i’m so proud of your kids like THEY DID IT WITH YOUR GUIDANCE <333333333 UR ALREADY DOING SO WELL AS STAGE MANAGER!!!

OMG US COPARENTING YOUR THEATRE CHILD <3333333333 me mango anon being not a step father but a father that STEPPED UP!! us literally being the cast of some tech theatre sitcom LOL WE WOULD TOTALLY BE LIKE HIGHSCHOOL MUSICAL!! and i totally get going back like i would probably go back too (i think i said this already) but the drama i live for!! like i love just sitting back and observing it all like it’ll literally be like keeping up with the kardashians(i’ve never watched that before)(or any reality tv show to be honest)

AND YES BEHIND THE SCREEN IM LITERALLY SUNA RINTAROU!!! NESS UR SO CUTE LIKE THE CUTEST I LOVE YOU SO MUCH LIKE i will be your suna rintarou <3333333333333333333 we are meant to be like i was meant to live during this era in this lifetime in this universe because i can’t imagine me without you now like you’re part of my life forever and always now <3333333 i can’t imagine myself without you and ill literally do anything for you

I MISS YOU SO MUCH LIKE ILL LITERALLY CURSE WORK FOR TAKING UP MY TIME AWAY FROM YOU <////////3 i’ll be your suna forever, whatever you want ness ill do it for you <333333333 literally the love of my life is you like YOU ARE THE LOVE OF MY LIFE!! don’t overwork yourself pretty i will pay for your ticket <333333333333333333333 i literally love love love you I CANT WAIT TO HEAR ABOUT YOUR DAY AND WHAT YOUVE HAD TO EAT !! you mentioned cooking on monday so lmk how that goes!! make sure to eat and take care of yourself I LOVE YOU TONS HAVE A GOOD MORNING EVENING OR NIGHT!! xoxoxoxo

MANGO ANON I LOVE YOU SO MUCH <3 HELLO I MISSED YOU SO MUCH!!!! AND UNFORTUNATELY THE LAST TIME I ATE WAS AT LIKE 7 AM (it's 5 pm 💀) I'M SORRY FOR GIVE ME I DID MY CLEANING RAMPAGE AND LOST TRACK OF TIME BUT DW I'M DRINKING MY SILLY LITTLE ICED TEA LEMONADE DRINK AND I BROUGHT ALMOND BUTTER TOAST WITH MYSELF TO THE LIBRARY!!! SO I WILL EAT THAT NOW DO NOT WORRY!! THANK YOU SO MUCH AND MAKE SURE YOU EAT AS WELL!!! (and this is so funny bc i was about be like!! AND U SHOULD TELL ME WHAT U EAT!! BC I FEEL LIKE U HAVEN'T TOLD ME IN A BIT!! and then you said instant pho SO WE WERE ALREADY ON THE SAME WAVE LENGTH and omg pho is so good!! lowkey may have to go out to get pho soon bc that sounds so good now </33 AND YOUR MOM IS MAKING PHO???? THAT'S SO COOL I HOPE IT TURNS OUT GOOD!!! and dw everytime i accidentally fall asleep i'm always hitting a key so i'll wake up and it's just a bunch of j's 😭😭😭

AND AA I'M SO GLAD YOUR DAY AT WORK WAS GOOD!! I THINK MINE WAS TOO,, LIKE IT WAS A LITTLE BUSY (and basically at my job like i have to do the production [actually framing things] AND take orders whenever people come in wanting to frame something but I SUCK and HATE TAKING ORDERS) and people kept coming in wanting to frame things but like i'm usually a closer and never have to deal with people wanting to make an order so after the second order i was DONE i was like "please no one else come in i cannot look at this tape measure and figure out which 16th of an inch ur child's first grade art falls on again" so like?? the WORK wasn't good but it definitely went by quickly!! and we close earlier on sundays too SO IT WAS SUPER FAST!! AND I TOTALLY GET THE AUTOPILOT AND DOING THINGS FAST TOO I REMEMBER I WAS DOING A FRAME ONCE AND WAS SO FOCUSED I DIDN'T SEE A CUSTOMER WAITING FOR ME and this is like a middle aged man but he was literally like "oh dw!! i didn't say anything bc i didn't want to bother you when you were LOCKED IN" and i was like "did u just say locked in to me??? who r u???" LMAO idk that was the only thought going thru my head during that interaction i was NOT expecting that BUT I'M GLAD YOUR DAY WAS GOOD AND THAT YOU HAD A GOOD MANAGER ON DUTY AND EVERYTHING!!!

(i just full on dropped my toast container and hit the table in this silent library btw. not a w moment for ness.) ANYWAY DEF KEEP ME UPDATED ON IF YOU QUIT OR STAY!! IK THERE'S LIKE PROS AND CONS TO BOTH SIDES AND IT'S A DIFFICULT CHOICE AND I WILL SUPPORT YOU EITHER WAY!! <33

AND YOUR STORE MANAGER'S GOODBYE MESSAGE 😭😭😭 "i'm sure you've heard the news by now" WHEN NO ONE KNEW IS SO FUNNY AND THE WAY IMMEDIATELY AFTERWARDS SHE WAS LIKE "i'm sorry i didn't have the chance to say goodbye to most of you" i just KNOW that woman left asap like she was running out of that store LMAO 😭

AND YEAH LIKE MY SISTER'S BF IS SUPER SWEET I'M GLAD THEY'RE BACK TOGETHER AND EVERYTHING <3 BUT I WAS DEF SHOCKED WHEN I SAW THAT TEXT IN MY NOTIFS OUT OF NOWHERE WITH LIKE NO OTHER CONTEXT OR MESSAGE 😭

YES COLD KISSES!!! COLD KISSES WAS SO FUN TO WRITE OMG <3 AND PLEASE i can't stop you...but like i would not reccomend reading binary stars....that was my first smau and it was NOT good (there's definitely like an oikawa curse that a few of us haikyuu smau writers have realized...like writing for oikawa as the love interest just NEVER GOES WELL idk what it is about him but 😔😔😔) so there WAS THAT on top of it being my first smau AND someone was like lowkey rb all those chapters and saying things yk like "they fr just need to confess omfg" and ik like!! it was probably lighthearted!! (maybe) but it was very pressuring so literally i cut that smau super short WHICH I'M GLAD I DID but like the entire experience of writing that smau was NOT good AND another bonus thing bc u know him now but like....that was heavily based off of my dynamic with regina george kin man (i love that we call them that) bc UNFORTUNATELY... I DID LIKE HIM FOR A BIT 😔 and we had a very strange dynamic until i finally opened my eyes and realized he was not a good person LMAO SO LIKE THAT'S WHY I NEVER TALK ABOUT BINARY STARS BC I'M NOT PROUD OF THAT SMAU BUT OFC I CAN'T STOP YOU!! 😭 AND I TOTALLY GET WHAT U MEAN MANGO ANON!! WE ARE ONE <33 AND I LOVE YOU SO MUCH!!! I WILL TOTALLY BEAT UP UR MANAGER OR JUST START SPAMMING HIM WITH SMAU LINKS BC HE NEEDS A CHANGE OF HEART!!!

AND YEAH ALL OF MY MANAGERS ARE LIKE SUPER SPECIAL 😭😭 IDK MY WORK LOWKEY IS SO SKETCHY AND BAD YESTERDAY ALL OF MY COWORKERS AND ME WERE SITTING IN THE BREAK ROOM WAITING FOR OUR MANAGER TO GET THERE SO WE COULD CLOCK OUT AND WE ENDED UP JUST COMPLAINING AND VENTING ABOUT OUR WORKPLACE (i could not tell u how terrified i was talking in there i was like "???????? what if they have secret cameras in here!! what if we all get fired after this!!" and then we were just talking bc like one of my coworkers has been there for seven years and was telling us about how like she started out at like $18 or something and then over the years it's gone BACK DOWN TO MINIMUM WAGE despite all of her credentials and like time with the company which is CRAZY and then she was talking to me and she was like "and ur a framer. so ur getting paid more than minimum wage, right?" (and my other coworker agreed with that statement) but then i was like ".....no....they're paying me minimum wage....and also never put me in the system as a framer....and also made me start framing when i was still 17.....so...." IT'S PRETTY SKETCHY IDK 😭 AND LIKE I THINK EVERYONE ELSE WORKS TOGETHER?? IT'S JUST BC THE FRAMING DEPARTMENT IS COMPLETELY SEPERATE FROM EVERYTHING ELSE WE HAVE DIFFERENT DUTIES IG BUT YES THANK YOU FOR SUPPORTING ME ABOUT SWEEPING THE FLOORS!! I LITERALLY HATE IT BUT NOW HAVE SO MUCH RESPECT FOR THE PEOPLE WHO HAVE TO DO IT EVERY NIGHT </33

AND UR SO RIGHT!!! WE ARE LITERALLY TOO POWERFUL OF A DUO LIKE LITERALLY CAN YOU IMAGINE IF WE HAD DONE TECH TOGETHER?? WE'D LITERALLY BE BREAKING LIKE WORLD RECORDS FOR HAVING THE FIRST FUNCTIONING THEATRE DEPARTMENT (BC WE'RE SUCH A COOL DUO AND KNOW HOW TO DO EVERYTHING LIKE IF WE WERE TOGETHER EVERYTHING WOULD'VE BEEN FINE YK </33 NOT AS MUCH TRAUMA MAYBE!!) AND BEING THE COOLEST DUO EVER!! but god said no why would i do that </3 BUT PLEASE YEAH WHEN I CAME BACK TO WORK AT THIS RESTAURAUNT AS A HOSTESS LIKE THEY WANTED ME TO WORK FRIDAYS AND SATURDAYS BUT IF I WORKED FRIDAYS I'D BE WORKING WITH THE MANAGER THAT MADE ME CRY SO I WAS LIKE "ummm no thanks!! i'll just stick with saturdays <3" (ALSO an entirely other thing let me rant about this lady OMG FIRST OF ALL no offense everyone is beautiful BUT SHE LITERALLY GOT LIKE EYE LINER TATTOOS SO SHE NEVER HAS TO DO HER EYELINER BUT FIRST OF ALL IT JUST MAKES HER LOOK SCARY BC LIKE IT'S NOT CUTESY OO LOOK AT THIS WING OR ANYTHING IT'S JUST FULL ON LIKE ALMOST EMO EYELINER YK AND ALSO??? YOU GOT A NEEDLE THAT CLOSE TO YOUR EYE???? NO THANK YOU OMG. OKAY SECOND THING I'M SURE A LOT OF RESTAURANTS LIKE OLIVE GARDEN USUALLY DO LIKE SECTIONS FOR THEIR SERVERS YK?? BUT AT MY RESTAURAUNT I STARTED OUT DOING ROTATIONS [i feel like i've explained this to u before i'm sorry] AND IT'S NOT REALLY IMPORTANT JUST KNOW THEY'RE DIFFERENT AND MY SERVERS LIKE ROTATIONS MORE AND SO DO I BUT THIS MANAGER WOULD ALWAYS FORCE ME TO DO SECTIONS WHEN I WORKED WITH HER [and spoke in a way that was always objectifyig and dehumanizing the servers which i HATED. she'd be like "well if we do sections then they have no choice but to make sure their tables are clean so that they can be sat again. if they don't have any more tables in their section, that's their fault. skip them." BUT LIKE??? I'M THERE TO HELP THEM CLEAN THEIR TABLES THEY'RE ALREADY DEALING WITH SO MUCH AND??? THEY DON'T CONTROL WHEN TABLES LEAVES LIKE U CAN'T BLAME THEM IF A TABLE STAYS FOR HOURS. AND LASTLY bc i work there with my mom!! this manager was always scared i was like biased towards her and would constantly PURPOSELY give her bad tables or one time she had a regular come in but like three other of my mother's regulars came in so my manager was literally like "no. you can't have her [my mom] be your server. why don't you try having another server for once?" SO LIKE I HATE HER SM okay sorry i'm done!!!)

AND AAA MANGO ANON I LOVE YOU SO MUCH!!! YES I SAVE ALL MY DAYS AND DRAMAS FOR YOU BECAUSE I LOVE TLAKING TO *YOU*!!!!!!! YOU ARE SO SO SWEET I AM GIVING U A KISS BACK <3333 YOU ARE THE LOVE OF MY LIFE!!!

BUT OMG THE STUPID 50 CENT BAG THING 😭😭😭 I'M SO GLAD SOMEONE GETS THAT BC I DON'T THINK EVERY PLACE DOES THAT BUT I'M ALWAYS FIGHTING WITH THAT TOO AND IDK IF I'VE EVER SHARED THIS STORY ON HERE BEFORE BUT WHEN THEY FIRST STARTED ENFORCING THAT AND MY SISTER'S BF DIDN'T KNOW HE WAS SO MAD HE LITERALLY JUST TOOK A SUPERMARKET BASKET he was like "ur making me pay 50 cents for a plastic bag?? THEN I'M TAKING UR BASKET TAKE THAT" BUT AS U SHOULD!! LOSING YOUR CUSTOMER VOICE!! LIKE IF THEY DON'T RESPECT YOU THEN YOU SHOULDN'T HAVE TO RESPECT THEM!! did that guy think you were going to give you the bag for free?? like, "oh i'm so sorry you are so right mr. karen. it is so stupid that u have to pay 50 cents for this bag idek why we started doing that!! here just the take the bag!!" LIKE BRO WHAT WERE YOU SUPPOSED TO DO ABOUT IT AND IT'S NOT LIKE YOU'RE THE ONLY STORE THAT DOES THAT 😭😭😭

AND YES IDK WHY ALMOND BUTTER IS SO EXPENSIVE!!! DEFINITELY DON'T PAY THAT MUCH FOR SHIPPING OR EVEN JUST THE JAR 😭😭 DW!! I WILL SHIP YOU ALMOND BUTTER FROM MY STATE!!! YOU CAN HAVE IT FOR FREE AND MAYBE I'LL JUST LIKE SHIP MYSELF WITH THE ALMOND BUTTER AND THEN ALL OF OUR PROBLEMS WILL BE SOLVED!!!

and omg FAIRY TAIL WAS MY LIFE AS A KID i will not ever be reverting to that era of my life!!! but DW AT ALL LIKE THE WAY I HAVE RESTARTED THIS BLOG THREE SEPERATE TIMES DON'T EVEN WORRY BUT YOUR BURNER ACCOUNT IS SO SO CUTE <33 AND DON'T WORRY ABOUT THE BDAY THING AT ALL!! LIKE I DIDN'T HAVE TO SAY ALL THAT AND I FELT SO BAD TOO BUT LIKE I THINK I MAKE IT MORE DRAMATIC THAN IT REALLY WAS LIKE I WAS MAKING A BIG DEAL ABOUT IT BUT YOU WERE SUPER CHILL ABOUT IT AND I APPRECIATE IT SM!!! BUT I ABOSLUTELY LOVE YOUR BURNER ACCOUNT TOO AND WILL VERY FREQUENTLY BE SENDING YOU "missing u hours </3 dms!!!" ily mango anon!! i'm giving u another big fat kiss rn mwah <3

YES THE STARS SAY SO!!!!!! WE ARE LITERALLY MEANT TO BE (and bc i'm writing this while we're also dming) LITERALLY WE JUST NEED TO MOVE IN TOGETHER!! LIKE MANGO ANON AND NESS MEET UP NOW!! WE WERE ALWAYS MEANT TO BE </33 AND DON'T BE SORRY ABOUT IT AT ALL!! AGAIN IK I DIDN'T LIKE I HAVE TO SAY ANYTHING OR SAY ALL THAT BUT I JUST WANTED TO LIKE BE AS HONEST AS POSSIBLE AND I TOTALLY TRUST YOU AND DID NOT MIND TALKING ABOUT IT AT ALL!! THANK YOU FOR BEING SO UNDERSTANDING LIKE THAT'S ALL I COULD'VE ASKED FOR AND I LOVE YOU SO MUCH AND NEVER FEEL PRESSURED TO TELL ME ANYTHING AT ALL AND YOU'RE ALSO MY NUMBER ONE PRIORITY!!! <33

I'M CRYING THAT YOU WERE THERE TO PROTECT ME FROM DAY ONE OMG 😭😭😭😭 I'M LITERALLY SO IN LOVE WITH YOU!!! THAT LITERALLY MADE ME START KICKING MY FEET WHEN YOU WERE TALKING ABOUT CHECKING MY BLOG TO MAKE SURE NO ONE WAS SENDING IN HATE PLEASE </33 I AM LITERALLY SO HONORED I LOVE YOU SO MUCH MANGO ANON!!! THANK YOU FOR ALWAYS BEING THERE TO SUPPORT ME <33

random intermission!! do not worry i have finished my toast after that embarrassing moment where i dropped it </3 and then some guy who was wearing WAY too much axe spray came up to me and was like "hey can i have this chair?" (the extra one on the other side of the table i'm at) and i was like "oh ofc!! 😃😃😃" AS YOU READ THIS TAKE THIS AS ANOTHER BREAK TO DRINK WATER!! AND I ALSO WILL THANK YOU LOVE <333

THANK YOU MANGO ANON!! PLEASE BE MY SOUND PERSON </3 AND YEAH THEY'RE BOTH A LITTLE CRAZY AND MEAN AND LIKE THEY ARE MISOGYNISTIC HET WHITE MEN SO I DON'T THINK I COULD EXPECT ANYTHING MORE FROM THEM (one of them's usually pretty nice <3 except that one time he made me cry) BUT IT DEFINITELY ISN'T LIKE AMAZING WORKING WITH THEM BUT I WILL GET THROUGH IT THANK YOU!! i will tell you all about it once my duties start up!! (the day is slowly approaching and i am NOT ready at ALL)

LMAOO I LAUGHED SO HARD ABOUT YOUR NIGHTMARE WHERE YOU STARTED FREE BALLING THE MOTHERBOARD 😭😭 it's not funny i totally get it (i am once again trying to hold myself back from always talking in caps SORRY) and i've had SO many of those nightmares too (i'll tell u about them sometime LMAO) but like bc i've literally done that in person before and had nightmares like that i laughed 😭😭😭 AND I TOTALLY GET IT like when i was actually in high school?? yeah there was one kid i loved she was super sweet!! but she was an actor and i didn't really interact with them much and everyone else was SO annoying LIKE I GET U so i also didn't really adopt anyone!! BUT YES NOW I HAVE KIDS AND I'M SO PROUD OF THEM <33 I'M VISITING AGAIN TOMORROW BC I WANT TO SEE MY CHILD LMAO 😭

YOU'RE THE FATHER THAT STEPPED UP LMAO YES FR!!!! JUST ANOTHER WAY WE ARE THE MOST ICONIC DUO!! LOOK AT US COPARENTING TOO OMG <3 AND YES YOU ARE MY IRL SUNA RINTAROU!! I'M ALSO SO SO SO SO GLAD YOU'RE IN MY LIFE I HAVE NO IDEA WHAT I'D BE DOING RN WITHOUT YOU I'M SO SO HAPPY TO KNOW YOU AND TALK TO YOU ALWAYS!!! <33333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333

YOU ARE THE LOVE OF MY LIFE!! PLEASE TAKE CARE OF YOURSELF AS WELL AND DON'T OVER WORK YOURSELF!!! AND IF YOU WANT DEFINITELY PLS LET ME KNOW HOW YOUR OUTING WITH YOUR COWORKERS WENT NEXT TIME!!! let me rq drop my skater boy and purple heart boy lore AND THEN I'LL BE DONE!!

okay SKATER BOY so sophomore year he was in a tech class with me and actually the year before i had had a class with him but we never talked but i thought he was kind of good looking (BROTHER EUGHHHHH I'M SORRY I REGRET ALL MY CHOICES AND THE FACT THAT I HAVE TO SAY THAT BC I DO NOT KNOW WHAT WAS GOING THRU MY HEAD AT THAT TIME) but ANYWAY the short and long of it is i left school for a month during that year for mental health reasons but he was like worried about me!! so we kept in contact and when i came back to school he stuck close to like make sure i was doing good!! and i was still in a bad place and making bad decisions!! like i think one time i walked with him to his house without telling anyone (bc i was mad at the world LMAO) and that was just the worst night of my life like we didn't do anything yk LMAO 😭 but OKAY NVM UGH I DON'T WANT TO TALK ABOUT IT SORRY MAYBE IN DMS IF YOU'RE CURIOUS I'LL TELL YOU BUT ANYWAY LIKE BAD MEMORIES BAD TIME FOR ME and he was a skater boy!! and a crazy man who did drugs and then when we were getting close he was like "i've stopped doing drugs for you!!" and then like right before winter break started ghosting me and started doing drugs again so then i was like "okay ig you don't like me so i'm dipping!!" (sorry we're all over the place rn but bacially so like before winter break yk we're all close and cutesy and everyone was like "OH HE DEF LIKES YOU" but then he ghosted me so...) AND ANYWAY so second semester rolls around we're back from winter break we're not talking BUT HE'S IN MY TECH CLASS AGAIN 🙄🙄 but i was one of those kids that got adopted by like all the seniors and so within that tech class we usually make like construction groups yk and so i wasn't in his group BC I WANTED TO STAY FAR FROM HIM AND I WAS WITH MY BESTIES INSTEAD!! (best tech group of my life i tell u mango anon. the only thing that could've beat them would've been working with u <3) BUT ANYWAY so one day he like randomly started talking to me again or would purposely say hi to me so i'd say hi whtvr back or something BC I NO LONGER CARE and then i think he texts me an apology for how he acted and wanted to know if we could be friends again and i think i was still in a bad place so i was suddenly like "allow me to put on my rose tinted glasses so i can block out the red flags bae let's do this" BUT NOT REALLY (sorry i don't remember my thoughts back then anymore) BUT ALL I KNOW (i think i said yes bc i felt bad? or was like "yeah we can be FRIENDS again but that's all) OKAY ALL I REMEMBER IS THEN ONE DAY HE TEXTS ME AND HERE'S THE BREAKDOWN

skater boy: i like you

me (unsure of what to freaking do so i decide to take the let's be a stupid and oblivious y/n route!!): i like you too!

(which i mean as "i like you as a friend"

skater boy: oh thank god i've been so scared to tell you

me: oh

I LITERALLY SAID OH. I SAID OH MANGO ANON BC I DIDN'T KNOW WHAT ELSE TO SAY AND HE DIDN'T GET THE HINT. HE KEPT YAPPING ABOUT HOW HE DITCHED ME DURING WINTER BREAK BC HE LIKED ME BACK THEN BUT DIDN'T WANT TO SAY ANYTHING (WHICH ALL MY FRIENDS SAID SOUNDED LIKE BS BC WHY WOULD YOU STOP TALKING TO SOMEONE YOU LIKE AND WAIT MONTHS TO TALK TO THEM AGAIN BUT WHATEVER) so like nothing happened from there LMAO we never talked about it again he left me a bag with fake flowers and rings from florida on my doorstep during the summer (very weird and made me uncomfortable. i had no idea what to say) and i had a friend tell me to "✨ take a chance at love ✨" BUT LIKE THAT WAS NOT LOVE BRO THAT WAS TOXICITY AT ITS FINEST AND SO ANYWAY THE REASON I AM TELLING YOU ALL THIS BESIDES BC IT'S FUN DRAMA AND I LOVE TELLING YOU EVERYTHING IS IT'S ALSO A GIANT REASON WHY I WILL NEVER WRITE SUNA AS A SKATER BOY OR ANYTHING HAVING TO DO WITH DRUGS (and mainly why i don't write about drugs anyway bc THAT MAN TRAUMATIZED ME OMG) bc it will always remind me of skater boy™ 😭😭😭😭

OKAY PURPLE HEART MAN!! JUST A SILLY THEATRE STORY I THOUGHT OF WHILE DOING LAUNDRY YESTERDAY AND I WANTED TO TELL YOU LMAO but anyway so i think this was actually also my sophomore year how silly!!!!! that was such a wild year for everyone ig but ANYWAY so my theatre was doing this one play and it was like a farce and a fixed set and only like six actors but anyway OUR MAIN LEAD WAS JUST LIKE BEING HEXED OR SOMETHING so man literally got a concussion bc there was this one bit where he dove into the audience and had to be carried off by a stretcher by techies as a bit but one night at rehearsal one of the techies tripped over a rock so he fell and bonked his head (WHICH ALSO RANDOMLY REMINDS YOU ALSO DURING THIS SHOW WE LITERALLY HAD A TOXIC FREON LEAK IN THE BOY'S DRESSING ROOM AND SOMEONE WENT MOMENTARILY BLIND) AND he like twisted his ankle i think!! another time he dove off the stage?? and then another actor accidentally stomped on his toe and that got injured too LMAO SO HE WAS REALLY GOING THROUGH IT AND ALMOST DIDN'T MAKE IT TO THE LAST SHOW BC HE WAS IN SUCH BAD CONDITION (if i remember correctly on like our second show day immediately after the show he went to the er??? and also when we were striking the set and tearing down posters one of them tore in a way that like yk some of the paper was left on the wall and it LITERALLY SPELLED OUT 'DIE' IDK WHY THIS SHOW WAS SO CURSED) and so at the end of the play he was awarded a purple heart as a joke bc that's what they give people who serve in the army yk 😭😭 if they were injured during their service

SORRY THAT'S ALL AND SORRY FOR THE LONG YAP!!! I HOPE THIS MAKES YOU LAUGH A LITTLE BIT THOUGH AND THAT YOU ARE DOING WELL!! I LOVE YOU SO MUCH MANGO ANON!! TELL ME ABOUT YOUR DAY AND YOUR OUTING WITH YOUR COWORKERS AND WHAT YOU ATE AND MAKE SURE TO EAT AND DRINK ENOUGH WATER I LOVE YOU SM!!! <33

[ineffectualbookseller]

The way Azirphale is underestimated and practically infantalized by heaven is so closely tied to his femininity and I think we should talk about it more because I just want to shout about how relatable the way he's treated in his workplace is as a woman working in a traditionally male field

It's in all the little niggling comments from your boss about personal things that hold no bearing on your work

and the assumption that what you're doing must be simple if it was assigned to you

your work is trivialized

and you get these the placating smiles when you're told plans and proposals are rejected and passed over

or when your complaints are dismissed

and you get more of the same from upper management

it all feels so frustrating and draining but you're at work so all you can do is take a breathe put on that mask and move on with your day

It is all so deteimental to your emotional well being and textually, so much of this is tied to Aziraphale's softness, his gayness - his femininity

The thing about working in an environment and gives you this feeling - of being simultaneously destrought watching your belief in yourself get chipped away but also just so irate becuase you know you don't deserve it - is how it builds. It sinks under your skin and feeds into this indignant dejection until you can have a moment of release - but Azirphale doesn't get to bitch about it over drinks with friends, he doesn't get a lunch break where he can go for a walk and listen to an angry scandi death metal playlist, he doesn't even get the chance to cry about it in the bathroom for 5 minutes before confronting it again

(And I talked a little bit about it in the tags of this beautiful photoset but this all comes into play whenever Crowley dismisses his plans or calls him an idiot. These are purely emotional reactions; I really don't think Crowley means much by it - he respects Aziraphale's opinion and genuinely thinks he's brilliant - but Crowley is so quick to use this terminology when Aziraphale is making a decision Crowley thinks is wrong and he doesn't know how much this hurts Aziraphale. Just like Aziraphale doesn't understand the true impact the Fall had on Crowley, Crowley doesn't understand the ways heaven has been tearing away at Aziraphale's self worth)

Aziraphale has been facing this constant drip of denigration since before the beginning of time and has never released the pressure valve. At this point, he's a bomb waiting to go off

[cospinol]

TODAY’S EPISODE!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Koku you amethyst time!!!!!!!! 🥰🥰🥰🥰🥰🥰🥰🥰🥰🥰 And it’s apparently the moment that the show’s staff have been waiting for just as eagerly as I have because it’s the best looking episode not just of this season but maybe… of the entire series since its inception…????!! I genuinely can’t think of another one that has Multiple dedicated cuts of detailed action in a row like the sequence from kyou kai snapping on the mountain road to the encounter between shin and kyou kai + rai do and koku’ou at kan ki’s camp, and certainly not one anywhere near as good looking, it’s such a treat…!!!!!!!

[quick aside, before I forget I want to add that rai do is addressing shin as ‘obocchan’ in the last cap above :DDD truly the gift that keeps on giving]

And anyways that’s without even touching on how good this sequence would be regardless of looks because it’s still Amethyst Plot time 🥰❤️💞❣️💓💍💘 Bi hei giving in to peer pressure in just the kind of moment of weakness that you can’t actually detest him for (of course you would want to believe him when he tells you it wasn’t a civilian village..), kyou kai absolutely fucking snapping, the cool head ten maintains between trying to hold shin back and immediately pivoting the hi shin unit to a defensive formation for the real possibility that shin and kyou kai actually start pvp against the kan ki army , and of course shin and kan ki putting their cards on the table :)))))

^ my favourite panel of him ever now animated!!!!!!! 🥰🥰🥰🥰🥰 and my favourite moment in the exchange between them, shin’s is still yet to come (I think all his talk in this week’s episode about kan ki not being equipped to handle sei’s dream of unification *is* sweet and sincere but it’s also dumb and that’s why kan ki is able to refute him so easily; the point that really matters and where his moral stance becomes unassailable, for me, is in the fact that it���s all for hyou’s sake. there’s no counter-argument about what you may or may not be turning a blind eye to there, it’s the mandate made absolute and incorruptible instead…) but this is maybe my favourite line of kan ki’s ever… he’s just following through on the promise he made you; these are the rules you agreed to play by! 🥰🥰🥰 i don’t even need to go into the premium emycore aspect of ever part of this sequence lol, the indulgence of it all…

also I was pleasantly surprised to see that they preserved just about all all of the gore from the scenes covered in this week’s scenes; there are some minor changes (the zhao soldiers kan ki is having the saki clan interrogate early in the episode are shown a little less mutilated than they are in the manga, and there’s no nudity) but they really are minor which bodes pretty well for the saki clan artworks coming up soon :~) I think there’s a chance we might not see that scene until the week after next since next episode’s primary focus will of course be Bi Hei And The Hi Shin Unit as per the ep title, but i’m so curious to see what they do with it since the anime has *always* omitted saki and saki-adjacent activities in the past. but I won’t get ahead of myself when we still have all of bi hei’s crisis to savour first :D

also, in shin’s speech telling kan ki off, we got a little additional visual of ran dou from sanyou campaign! always on the lookout for scenes from s1-2 appearing in flashback in the current art style <3

and i really had forgotten what he looked like lol even though this is another scene I absolutely adore for similar reasons to the one in the camp in this episode - though there’s no mou ten around to step in and defend shin this time, of course… :)

[blujayonthewing]

once again thinkin about revisiting the idea of putting together a satyr ren faire outfit now that I know how to sew and make props and stuff, and while it will inevitably be nyssa inspired now that I have a specific satyr oc to draw inspiration from, it can't be a full cosplay of her specifically cause she's an herbivore and when I go to the ren faire eating a turkey leg is half the point

[spaceratprodigy]

the tiny metronome in my brain aggressively ticking back and forth between wanting to make cap and max fluff or cap and max angst

[emmaspolaroid]

god I have so much work to do but all I’ve done today is doodle my rarepair

[whateveriwant]

might I request how tf 141 tries to turn you on maybe? Sorry kind of a weird request you don’t have to do it if you don’t want to ;-;

Not a weird request at all, anon! Hope you enjoy! 18+ only, GN!Reader

Price

Three words: full body massage

That man loves to get his hands on you, and it doesn’t even have to be sexual in nature, honestly. Any opportunity to touch you, to caress you, to help ease the tension from your body, he’ll gladly take it (and if afterwards you’ll let him ease himself into you, well, that’s just an added bonus 😉)

He might use special rollers or electric massagers sometimes, but mostly he just sticks to those big, strong hands of his

He'll start by slicking up his palms with some oil, warming it up before he applies it to your skin

Beginning with your shoulders, he’ll slowly work his way down your body, paying special attention to the areas you need most targeted

Aside from those tender spots, he’ll also be sure to focus on a few of your more erogenous zones, namely your thighs and your ass (he's an ass man for sure)

By the time he's finished, you're all supple and pliant before him, but there’s something else too – a sort of warm, fluttery feeling in your gut

Luckily, he knows just the remedy for that sensation. And oh! Would you look at that? You're already in his favorite position: prone

Ghost

We all know he tends to be a man of few words, and this applies to every environment he finds himself in

…At least, every environment outside the bedroom, that is

Because when he's in the mood, you best hold on tight to your pants if you don't want them flying off from how he talks to you (but, I guess, your pants coming off is his end goal anyway)

You'll just be going about your day, minding your business, when you'll get a call from him while he’s “busy” at work

He'll start off casual at first, inquiring about your day, your plans for the night, etc., but it won't take long for the conversation to steer to the real reason for his call: to describe the way he's going to fuck you when he gets home

He'll go into excruciating, toe curling detail about all the things he's going to do to you; just how good he’s going to fuck you until you forget your own name

I hope you're not in public when you take his call, otherwise you better have the poker face of a lifetime if you don't want to make a scene in front of several dozens of witnesses

Gaz

He's a big romantic at heart, so rather than just going straight for the bedroom, he'll slowly work his way up to it over the course of the evening

First, he'll treat you to a nice dinner – either by cooking it himself or by taking you to that fancy restaurant you love but think is much too expensive for every day dining

Beneath dimmed, romantic lighting, together you'll share a delicious meal, a glass or two of wine, and of course a tasty dessert to cap it all off

The conversation will be light and pleasant (nothing unbecoming whatsoever), but while he might not outright voice the plans he has for you later in the night, that look he keeps giving you from across the table speaks volumes

When you’ve finished your meal and gradually made your way back home/to the bedroom, even then he still isn't done buttering you up just yet

He'll put on some slow music, maybe light a couple candles to really set the mood, even draw you both a bath if you're feeling up to it

Once he does finally take you to bed, it'll be a seamless transition from an evening overflowing with desire and passion

Soap

‘Subtlety’ is not really a word in his vocabulary, so most of the time when he's horny, he's just turning to you and asking if you want to fuck

However, sometimes when you need a little more build up than that, he has a few tried and true methods he knows will work you up

He'll change so that he’s walking around your flat wearing a pair of gray sweatpants. Wearing only a pair of gray sweatpants, mind you

Whilst wearing said sweatpants, he'll proceed to stretch and flex around you, showing off all those muscles he knows you love, as well as highlighting a few other assets he knows drives you crazy (i.e. bulge printtttt 😍)

He'll then get really touchy with you, starting innocent at first – brushing an eyelash from your cheek, straightening the neck of your shirt – before he gets more and more brazen with his petting

And when he's real close like that, leaning right into your ear, he’ll mutter soft praises to you: telling you how beautiful you look, how good you smell, how soft your skin is where he’s touching just there

By the time he finally goes to ask if you want to have sex, he doesn't even get the words out before you're jumping him like a wild animal. All according to plan…

[reonaissance]

⟡ ──⠀ loving bites.

⟡ ⠀ blue lock.

⟡ ⠀ summary. :: their reaction, when you bite them out of the blue. ⟡ ⠀ pairing(s). :: Itoshi Rin, Itoshi Sae, Bachira Meguru, Isagi Yoichi, Chigiri Hyoma, Nagi Seishiro, Mikage Reo x gn!Reader ⟡ ⠀ warnings. :: sfw, fluff, comedy ⟡ ⠀ word count. :: —

⟡ ⠀ Itoshi Rin

-> he would look at you with a judgy look and mind his own business afterwards.

-> he ignores it until he feels your teeth sinking in his upper arm again.

-> he does not need to ask what you wanted to achieve with biting him out of the blue, his glare speaks enough for itself.

-> when you explain him, it was a love bite but in a non-sexual way, showing him you love him, he would not understand, why you wound like to bite him rather than just say the words 'I love you' or to show it in other ways.

-> but he would get used to it after some time.

-> he would simply accept his fate of being bitten and maybe bite you back once to let you see how it feels.

-> but be prepared to be ignored afterwards and to never ever talk about it again.

⟡ ⠀ Itoshi Sae

-> like rin, he would give you a judgy look but ten times worse.

-> he would GLARE at you like you brought up the law to make football illegal.

-> and he wouldn’t say anything until you give him an explanation.

-> and this dude bites you back SO hard, you stop doing it out of fear, he might bite a piece of your flesh out the next time.

-> and it helps for like two or three months before you try again with light bites.

-> he bites you back again, this time a little lighter, but still hard enough to scare you to not do it for a while.

-> it would go on like that for a while until he accepts his fate of getting bitten no matter what he does against it. just don’t bite too hard to leave marks.

⟡ ⠀ Bachira Meguru

-> this dude would bite you back in an instant.

-> no hesitation, head empty, he would bite you back in your shoulder with a little too much force, making you squeak. but he didn’t mean to hurt you.

-> he would kiss the spot afterwards to say sorry.

-> I can also Imagine him biting you out of the blue too (basically the exact same thing what you did).

-> And with that the nom war starts.

-> the one who bites the other more often throughout the day wins and can decide what you do in the evening or the next day.

-> I can see all the bite marks on the shoulders of both of you from when you bit the other a little to hard.

-> it almost looks like an aggressive cat bit you from head to toe.

-> the bites seem just a little too big for a cat. But no one asks further. And no one speculates who it was because a short glimpse at him is enough to know who it was. and they simply shut up.

⟡ ⠀ Isagi Yoichi

-> he would be a little worried and would ask you if everything is alright.

-> maybe you’re hungry, maybe he’s sitting on something you’ve been searching the whole time and you need it and he doesn’t even know.

-> he’s just worried and wants the best for you.

-> after you gave him an explanation that it’s a way of showing your love to him, he calms down.

-> he thinks it’s cute. It remembers him of a cat. He saw many cats on the internet biting their owner lightly as a way of showing their love.

-> a little extravagant, but still cute.

-> when he has the courage, he bites you back now and then. Not often though.

-> he just doesn’t want to hurt you.

⟡ ⠀ Chigiri Hyoma

-> head empty, no thought, he just noms you back.

-> of course he knows what you want to tell him and what a nom is, he knows and follows all the trends.

-> like bachira, he would make a challenge out of it, watching who can bite the other more often throughout the day.

-> he would even record it occasionally, edit all the clips in one smooth video like all those shelving videos and upload it on TikTok (with your consent of course).

-> the people in the comments would freak out at how cute they think it is (the comment section is full of caps and crying emojis).

⟡ ⠀ Nagi Seishiro

-> he's too lazy to even acknowledge it.

-> but when he does, he would sink his teeth softly in the flesh of your shoulder after he finished his round or paused his game.

-> but forget bringing him to mom you again. it’s likely for him to not do it again because it’s a hassle for him to open up his mouth .

⟡ ⠀ Mikage Reo

-> reo would have an all lovey dovey look on his face with hearts in his eyes.

-> this boy loves everything you do. he's obsessed with every bit of you.

-> you don't need to explain, he understands the meaning of it. he watched enough cat videos doing it.

-> he is so nice and would return the gesture with a light nom in your upper arm. you don’t even feel his teeth sinking in your flesh.

-> he can’t stand it, when you get hurt, especially if he’s the one who hurt you.

-> after you started it, he’s continuing with it. not making a war out of it, but every now and then, when nobody else’s around, he noms you.

-> he would stand behind you, warping his arms around your waist and then sink his teeth in you shoulder or upper arm.

──⠀ lovs monologue

reupload time! I also changed some parts. just some minor things except for nagis part.

© lovingluxury | @/cafekitsune’s dividers

[himbosandhardwear]

Eddie has a bad habit of picking at his skin when he's nervous. Not, like, shy nervous or stage fright nervous, but the real kind of nervous, not-sure-I’m-gonna-survive-this kind of nervous. Like while he was alone in the boat house, he'd shredded every one of his cuticles. That time Hopper caught him behind The Hawk, very obviously selling his wares, he'd bitten his lips bloody.

Tonight he's picking a scab off his knee. It's practically healed already, so it won't bleed, he just needs to feel something on his body come loose before he does.

“You good, dude?” Steve asks, so in tune to Eddie's nervous disposition. Such a good guy. What a friend.

Eddie lets his head hit his knee caps with a thunk.

“Yup.”

Steve snorts. “You don't look good. I mean… You know what I mean.”

He smiles, tilting his head to look at Steve, always happy to give him a hard time.

“Oh, absolutely. You think I look good, don't cha, Stevie?”

He gets a couch pillow to the face for that, but they're both laughing so he doesn't think he's crossed the line yet.

Yet, yet, yet.

“Seriously, what's up with you? You've been quiet. It makes me want to call the squad.”

“Har har,” Eddie mumbles, but he does uncurl himself, sitting back against the couch again. “I'm trying to work up the nerve to ask for advice but it's-” Christ, he doesn't even want to admit to being embarrassed, that's how embarrassed he is.

“It's what?” Steve asks, the picture of earnest encouragement. “You can talk to me about anything, man, we're, like, bonded in blood or whatever.”

“Right. Yeah. Except this has the potential to get real awkward, real quick, and I'm not sure we're at that level of friendship yet.”

“Well,” he drawls, “if you ask me whatever it is that's got you all flustered I'm sure that will level us up. Right?”

“I'm not flustered.” God damn his red fucking face. Steve just laughs at him. “It's just, I don't have anyone else to ask about this. Jonathan probably doesn't have this particular problem, cause he's got- Uh. Sorry.” Steve waves it away, so Eddie goes on. “The kids are too young and the band guys don't understand what we went through-”

“Eddie, just spit it out.”

“Fuck! Okay, fine! You asked for it.” He takes a giant breath, steels his spine and just says it. “The Trauma is affecting my ability to get laid and I don't know how to fix it. Every time I get close to it I freak out and have to bail.”

There. All out now.

He looks over at Steve, and it's so much worse than being laughed at or pitied. He just looks sad.

He shakes it off quickly, hair barely moving, Eddie notes. He finds Steve's hair routine both endearing and ridiculous.

“Yeah. Okay. That's super common, just so you know,” Steve assures him first. “Robin says it's all connected, your mind and your body, so trauma can, like, get trapped in weird places like that. I can't play baseball anymore. Cause the memory of beating demodogs to death.”

“As you do,” Eddie quips.

“Right. But your thing. Uh. Yeah, it took some time before I could relax enough to even attempt getting laid, let alone actually do it.”

“So?” Eddie drawls, waiting. “How did you get over it?”

Something is off. Steve's not known for being skiddish about sex, but his hesitation and his inability to look Eddie in the eye is setting off alarms.

“Hey, if this is too weird for you-”

“No, I'm good, it's fine. Just, I'm the only person you have to talk to about this, so I'm gonna try to be helpful but, uh,” he scratches at the back of his head awkwardly, “in all honesty, I haven't been laid since before Vecna either. Way before. So. Yeah. Not sure I should be giving out advice on anything.”

That's crazy. Like actually crazy. He can't even compute Steve Harrington not absolutely dripping in women. He must have some look on his face because Steve gives a dry sort of laugh, self deprecating, and leans back against the couch with him.

“Weren't you on a date with Brenda Mulligan the night- Vecna’s first attack?”

Steve shoots him a look. “Y- Yeah, but that didn't go anywhere. We weren't, like, compatible or whatever.”

Oh, yeah, it was weird that Eddie knew that at all, let alone remembered it nine months later. “That's too bad,” he replies lamely.

“Yep.”

He feels terrible for dragging down the whole night, it would've been better if he'd just kept his mouth shut. But that's never been his strong suit, as evidenced by him blurting out, “If the hottest guy in Hawkins can't find a suitable date, what fucking chance do I have.”

Steve snaps, “Don't say that. What the fuck?”

Great, now he's gone and made it weird. Good job calling your straight friend hot, you fuckin’ dipshit.

They sit in the awkward silence, out of things to say or out of useful things to say. Either way it's them breathing, the clock ticking, and the M.A.S.H. rerun playing softly in the background.

Steve clears his throat. “Whatever, let's get back to the point. You don't have to tell me if you don't want but…what do you think the specific reason is for your…issue?”

He thinks about it. Has been thinking about it, for a while now. “My dick still works, if that's what you're wondering.”

Steve chuckles, high and surprised. “Good for you.”

“Yeah. It's more like, I can't get out of my head. I start worrying about my scars, explaining them if someone asked. I think about how even though I don't want anything long-term, I wouldn't be able to do long-term anyway, because I'm a fucking mess. If it's really bad, I'll get flashes of Chrissy or Patrick's bones snapping, as a little soundtrack to the fun shit happening outside my head.”

Steve looks sad again. Maybe it is pity but it looks more turned inward, like he's dealing with his own shit more than Eddie’s.

“You hooking up with strangers then?”

Eddie blinks at Steve. “Well…duh. Right? Not like I have guys lined up around the block here in Hawkins.”

Steve is full blown scowling at the TV. It's weird.

“What if-”

Eddie waits but Steve doesn't finish his thought.

“What if…what?” He prompts, giving a little nudge with his foot.

He's still avoiding eye contact, not even turning his head to look in Eddie's direction.

In a soft voice, almost too quiet to hear, he says, “What if we helped each other out?”

He must've heard that wrong. Or he's misunderstanding.

“What?”

“What if we help each other out? Like, a mutually beneficial arrangement.”

That can't be right. No fucking way. It's a test. Like as soon as Eddie agrees, Steve yells ‘Aha! I knew you wanted to molest me! Goodbye forever!’ and runs out the door.

“What, exactly, do you mean? Like, what are you getting out of it?”

Steve finally looks over. “Well, I would think that was obvious. If you're willing.”

Eddie's legs are starting to go numb.

“Okay, so I blow you and you blow me, except when you're doing it I have to watch you take it like you're being force fed liver and onions at Grandma's house?”

Steve slowly shakes his head no.

“Oh, okay, so you're going to blow me and enjoy it,” he snaps sarcasticaly.

Steve nods once.

“You want to blow me?”

“Mmhmm,” he hums without moving a muscle.

“Since when!” Eddie brings his octave down from the upper atmosphere. “Since when, Harrington? This is insane behavior. Should I call the squad for you? I'm serious. I'll do it.”

“You don't have to say yes. I was just offering.” He says it like Eddie isn't one green flag away from stomping on the gas.

He starts nervously laughing, which makes Steve flinch unfortunately, but he can't stop.

“It's cool, just forget I said anything.” He moves like he's about to get up and leave, which is fucking insane because it's his living room. Eddie stops him with a tight grip around the bicep.

“Don't you dare. If you're even remotely serious, we have to have a much longer conversation. Sit.”

Steve drops like a sack of bricks. Which is…something.

“Right. First off, this is uncommon behavior in a straight friend. Is there something you'd like to tell me, so I don't think you've been body snatched?”

He pinches at the top of his nose, like Eddie is inconveniencing him greatly. Too bad.

“I'm probably bisexual.”

“Probably?” Eddie asks with a raised eyebrow.

“I'm an inexperienced bisexual,” he amends through clenched teeth.

“Good. Great. Happy to hear it.” His heart may explode from his torso à la Ridley Scott's Alien but sure. “Second on the agenda, what do you mean help each other out? What's on the table? Mutual handjobs and then we never talk about it again?”

“No,” Steve answers immediately. That's good. “I'm open to…whatever you're open to.”

“Steve.” He has to clear his throat. “You dont even know what you're agreeing to.”

“I trust you.”

Fuuuuuck.

“Okay, right, uh, let's circle back to that later. Third thing, what, uh, what is your level of commitment with this?”

He just stares at Eddie, all doe eyed. It shouldn't work, Eddie fucking invented that look. It's gotten him out of more scrapes than he can count. Now it's being used against him but to what end? Does Steve want to get bundled up in a blanket and tucked into bed? Because Eddie can make that happen for him.

“Whatever you want, I guess,” he finally says. “I mean, like I said earlier, friends who help each other out. Casual. I'm not interested in looking for Mrs Harrington anymore and you're having a problem relaxing around guys who don't understand what you went through.” He makes a gesture like ‘Ta da.’

He's not wrong. It makes sense. But…

“Fourth thing. Is this just an experiment for you? Cause I'm all for you exploring your sexuality but, historically speaking, friends are a bad place to start.” AKA ‘it will break my fucking heart if you decide you're not that into it and it's because it's me.’

“Eddie. Look.” He gets more comfortable, facing Eddie straight on finally. “What you're going to provide is practical knowledge on what has only been theoretical up to this point, but the theory has already been well established.” He taps his head. “Understand?”

A smug confidence melts Eddie into the couch. “You liiike me,” he sings. “You think about me naaaked. You wanna-”

Steve lands on him, lacking any elegance or grace, and nearly caves their skulls in with his Jay Garrick approach to kissing. Eddie doesn't say a fucking word. He does wonder at the fucking majesty that is making out sober. What a revelation. Steve keeps making these tiny, almost wounded noises, to the point where Eddie tries to back up and do a check in but Steve doesn't let him, he chases him down and latches back onto Eddie's bottom lip like he's Hannibal Lector. It's stupid hot.

Everything is going great until Steve lets out a sound that legitimately has Eddie worried he's upset about something.

He pulls back and asks, “Are you okay?”

“Oh fuck, I'm sorry. I just can't, I can't believe I got this fucking far. You're so hot I'm losing my fucking mind.”

“Me?” Eddie snaps. “Dude, you're out of your mind.” He pokes Steve in his meaty chest. “Literal. Prom. King.”

“Fucking stupid high school shit, are you kidding me?” He sits up, straddling Eddie's hips, which is boner enhancing to say the least; he's got Steve's thighs in his grasp immediately. “You don't get it, I'm gone on you. I've got it bad, man. I was playing it cool earlier-”

“At no point tonight were you in any way playing it cool.”

“-but, fuck it, guess I'm ruining it, cause I can't be cool about this. I don't want casual. I don't even want to date you,” and before Eddie can even worry about that, he says, “I wanna skip straight to boyfriends, man. I know you said you didn't want long term with anyone but-”

Eddie interrupts again, this time by pulling Steve back down horizontal and kissing him like he just bravely declared himself as all in.

If this is a pod-person, well, that's a problem for Tomorrow Eddie. Tonight Eddie just landed Steve Harrington as a boyfriend.

[xxblairexxss]

A fresh start

Pairing : Charles Leclerc x singlemom!reader

Theme : Angst, fluff

Word count : 4.2k

Part 2

Requested!

In which Charles had a crush on the new member of the team without knowing he was already a good friend of her toddler.

It gets a little heavy near the end so heads up! Not proofread!

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"There seems to be a problem with the downforce. It kind of eats the tyre quite a lot."

Charles felt a touch on his hip while he was too busy listening to the engineers. Looking down, he saw a small kid patting on his leg, while the other hand seemed to be offering him something. "Hey, are you giving this to me?" He asked, pulling the headset from his ear as he crouched down.

"Yeah! My mom always gives me candy whenever I am stressed with my homework. You can—oh." The little kid fumbled with the wrapping paper that was securely wrapped around the lollipop. "I can’t take the plastic off for you. Sorry…"

"Oh, it’s okay. Let me help you." Charles twiddled with the wrapper as it went loose before he pulled it off. "There! Oh, for me? Are you sure?"

"No stress! Bye bye!" The toddler waved and sprinted off, leaving Charles with the strawberry lollipop in his hand.

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"Any idea who she is?" Charles nudged Joris and tipped his chin towards the girl who was across the room.

"She’s part of the communication executive." Joris took a quick glance and went back to his phone.

"I have never seen her before." His eyes were latched on the girl, seeing the way she talked with her hands, nodding and smiling at whatever the other girl was talking about.

"She just joined the team."

"What’s her name?" Charles nudged Joris again, causing him to heave a sigh and stand up.

"Y/N!" Joris called out.

"Joris! What the fuck?" Charles slapped his friend’s leg and looked away. The phone in his hand seemed to be looking much more interesting, though it wasn’t even turned on. While his fingers were dancing and tapping on any random buttons on his phone, his ears were listening to the conversation—well, more like listening to her voice. It was weird how he had never seen her before, but Joris seemed to be getting along with her very well.

"That was Y/N." Joris gave a smile, stealing a peep from Charles’s phone, and laughed when he saw it was on camera, capturing Charles’s face from an angle below. "Nice picture, by the way. Is that why you couldn���t stop looking at it when she was here?"

"Very unnecessary, Joris. You could have just told me her name." He threw his cap on and stood up to leave the room.

"I thought you wanted to get to know her." Joris exclaimed, seeing his best friend walking away.

"I can figure that one myself!"

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"Charlie!"

"Hey, Adam! Give me a five!" He bent down as the little one hopped and touched their hands together. This has been his fourth time seeing him, and every single time, his visit would get longer and longer. The first time he met the kid, he just dropped by to give him candy and walked away. This time, he came by with candy and shared a few little jokes and games.

"Do you always wander around the paddock alone? Your dad never gets mad." He ripped the top off the candy and handed it to the kid.

"No, mommy won’t be mad if I just stay around the red garage. Oh! Sour!" His face scrunched up, making the driver cackle.

"Oh? You’re with your mom? Dang, this is sour." He made a face and shivered as the sourness hit.

"Yeah, I’m with mommy! Daddy is…" He looked down, his bottom lips jutting out. Charles knew right away it wasn’t something light if this was the reaction coming from a 4-year-old kid, so he cut the topic short.

"You don’t have anything sweet in there? I’m not a fan of sour candy."

Adam patted his pockets and shook his head. "No more candy! I stole that from mommy. Shh, she didn’t know." He put his pointy finger on his lips and giggled.

"Your secret is safe with me, buddy. I have to go. See you around, Adam!" Charles stood up and gave the little one a pat on the head before he went to get Andrea for his short meeting before the press conference.

"This will be your..." 

Charles was slapped with what felt like a brick when it was just a file of papers, but the sting was unexpected, causing him to lean back as he covered one side of his face with his hand.

"Oh! I’m so sorry! Are you okay? Did I just slap you?"

Chuckling, he shook his head and pressed his palm on his eyes—the ones that just got slapped on. "No, no. Well, yes, I’m okay. Are you–"  Her beauty from up close astounded him, erasing all vocabularies in his head as he went blank. "You are beautiful," he muttered.

"Sorry?"

"Oh? Oh, nothing. Y/N, right?" He offered a handshake with the widest grin. "I’m Charles."

"Everyone knows who you are, Charles." You laughed, accepting the handshake. "How do you know my name? I never properly introduced myself."

"Oh, Joris told me." He answered, his eyes still on her, making him look like a fool without realising it.

"Do you have anything else to say? Because I need to." She pointed the other way. "I need to head there."

He pulled himself back to his senses and stepped aside. "Oh, sorry about that. I’m not going to hold you any longer."

"Sorry about that. Good luck in the qualifying round!"

"Oh, wait! Is this yours?" He crouched down and took the sour candies on his feet. The same one he got from the kid

"Oh, yeah! Must have slipped off my hand. Thank you!"

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"Mommy, look!"

You took the paper that he handed to you and cackled at the drawing. "What is this, sweetheart?"

"Guess, mommy! Look, I drew the moustache too." He pointed at the little lines, wearing the proudest smile.

"A moustache? Is that a cat?"

"Yes! Like the one we used to have!" He started collecting all of his marker pens and coloured pencils, placing them in his small pencil case as he saw you start packing your stuff. "Are we going back already?"

"Yeah, mommy’s all done with my work, so we can head back early. Should we go on a little date and get ice cream?" Shutting down your laptop, you placed them in the case when Adam seemed to be rushing to go somewhere with his little backpack. "Where are you going?"

"Mommy, wait! I haven’t met Charlie!"

"What even is Charlie?" You muttered, picking up the missing marker pens he had missed for rushing.

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"Hey, munchkin! I was waiting for you." Charles grinned and offered his hand for a high five. "Where have you been?"

"Oh! I’m going back already. Wait!" He sneaked his little hand into his pocket and frowned when he couldn’t find the thing he was looking for. Charles then saw him pull his arms off his small backpack and sneak his little hand inside the small compartment. "This is for you!"

"You are going home? Why?" Taking the small Mars bar from the little one, he kept it in his hand as he helped him put on his backpack again.

"Mommy’s done with her work early today, so I’m going out on a date!"

Charles grabbed his little arm before he could sprint away. "You? You are going out on a date? Wait, with who?"

"Adam!"

The driver’s facial expression went blank as he heard the voice. The little arm in his hand slipped off as he saw the little one run and hug the legs of the woman he has been dying to talk to over the past couple of months.

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"Mommy!"

You ruffled his hair as he crashed into you. "Have you met your Charlie?" Bending down, you squeezed his chubby cheeks as you took his hand in yours.

"Yes! That’s Charlie!" He exclaimed, pointing at someone.

You saw Charles still crouching down with a Mars bar in his hand. He was already looking at you as you laid your eyes on him. He looked surprised and stunned, as he didn’t seem to catch the smile you gave.

"He's—he’s yours? Adam, is your kid?" He queried, taking steps closer.

"Yeah, he’s my son. Wait–" Looking down, you cupped his little cheek. "Adam, Charlie, is Charles? Is this the friend you have been giving your candy away to?"

"Yes!" he squealed.

You thought he had been making friends with a cat or any other person, but not with an actual driver, because who would have thought he would have the most time in the world to be friends with a 4-year-old kid? "I’m so sorry if he had been bothering you. I truly had no idea about that.”

"It’s okay, Y/N. I got free candies." He showed the Mars bar he had in his hand, making you chuckle.

"I am going out on a date with mommy. Do you want to come?"

His words became a mumble as you quickly covered his mouth. "Charlie is busy, Adam." Tilting your head back and facing the driver, you asked the little one to wave before walking away. "I’ll get going now. Say bye, Adam."

"Bye, Charlie!"

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"What’s with that smile?" Joris peeked his head to look at the little kid, who kept looking back every now and then to wave his little hand at the driver.

"Nothing." Charles ripped off the Mars bar in his hand and took a bite of it, cocking his brow at Joris, who seemed to have more questions. "What?"

"Nothing." He mimicked Charles’s expression and moved away before he could get hit in the head.

"You didn’t tell me she had a kid." Charles blurted.

"I thought you wanted to figure it out yourself. Why? Does it change anything?"

"What do you mean?" He queried, taking another bite from the chocolate bar.

"Does it change your little crush on her now that you know she has a kid?"

"No, not at all. I like her even more now." He chuckled and did a double take on his friend. "Wait, how do you know I have a crush on her?"

"Because you aren’t being too discreet about it. I bet Adam knew it too. Give me that." Joris snatched the chocolate bar from the driver’s hand and took the last bite. "You shouldn’t eat too much sweet for your diet, you know."

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"Adam, I need your help." The sound of music in the room was cut off when the driver finally spoke what had been in his head for weeks. Charles was lying down on the couch in his driver room with his little friend, while the little one was too busy colouring the dinosaur from his book.

"More candy?" He asked, switching to a different colour pencil from his case.

"No, not candy. I wanted to ask your mom on a date." He put his phone away and sat up, looking at the little one full of anticipation.

"No."

"Wait, what? Why?" Charles stood up and took a seat by Adam’s side. He casually started participating in the colouring activity as he took a blue pencil and started filling in the tail section of the dinosaur. "I thought we were friends?"

"Mommy only goes on a date with me."

"She might want to go on a date with me." He assured him, helping him change to a different coloured pencil.

"I don’t want mommy to cry again, so, no. I need to go now!" He stood up and packed his colourful stuff inside his little backpack with the help of the driver.

"I won’t make her cry, Adam." Charles handed him his colouring book as the toddler stood up to leave.

"That’s what Daddy used to say too. Bye bye, Charlie!"

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"Charlie hurt?" 

"Yes, sweetheart. He crashed today, so you shouldn’t bug him, okay? Just stay here." You pinched his little cheek before handing him his iPad. "Not too long. Turn it off when mommy says so, alright?"

Adam did listen to you and stayed in the break room while you sorted out a few things before race day tomorrow. There wasn’t any meeting until the next hour, so you got to do your work while listening to your kid watch Coco ten times this weekend.

Until you heard a knock on the door,

"Hi. Uhm, I’m looking for Adam." Your eyes widened as the driver peeked his head inside the room.

"Charlie!" He put his iPad to the side and hopped off the couch to run straight into Charles’s arms.

"Why didn’t you come to see me?"

"Mommy said I shouldn’t bug you. Are you okay?" You chuckled when he cupped the driver’s cheeks with his small hands.

"Yeah, I’m okay. Wait, actually, not really."

To that, Adam gasped and covered his mouth with his hands. "Oh, no! You need candy?"

"Come here." Charles pulled your son to the end of the room, so you were no longer able to eavesdrop on the conversation.

You saw those two start whispering something, giggling, and laughing while you were left out. "Bye Charlie!" He waved as the driver trod, leaving the break room.

"Bye, munchkin. See you, Y/N. You look beautiful in a ponytail, by the way."

You were taken back by the sudden compliment, and your hand went to stroke your hair now that he mentioned it. "But I always have my hair tied?"

"Yeah, that’s what I meant." He gave a wink before walking away, leaving you and your toddler, who seemed to find the whole situation funny.

"What did he tell you?" You tried to pry into their business, acting casual by going back to your work.

"It’s a secret!" He winked, which looked more like a face scrunch as he went back on his iPad, making you frown in confusion.

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"Go! Open the door!"

"I can’t. Give me a second."

"Why?"

"I’m nervous, buddy."

"I’ll open it for you!"

"No, no!"

You were staying in the break room, playing with your phone while your little one stayed outside, watching an army of people in the paddock celebrate the drivers on the podium. He had promised to stay just outside the room so you wouldn’t have to worry about him being in the crowd, but minutes later, you kept hearing whispers right outside the door. You weren’t sure who the owner of the other one was, but you were so sure one of them belonged to your son.

"Mommy?" 

"The door is not locked, love. Just come in." You replied and went back to your phone, expecting him to walk in, but he didn’t.

"Go, Charlie!”

"Is there anything wrong?" Placing the phone away, you pushed the door open and saw that your toddler kept on pushing the driver towards your door. "Charles? Do you need anything?"

"Y/N. Actually–"

"Charlie wants to ask you out on a date!" Adam cut in.

The words made you flabbergasted. That was impossible. Why would he ask you out on a date when every woman he met on a daily basis dressed up way better and had better body shape than you?

And they were single. While you were a divorcee, you even had a kid.

"Stop joking around, Adam. Leave Charlie alone, okay?" Adam hid behind the driver as you tried to grab his arm, giggling while hugging Charles’s legs.

"Would you go out on a date with me?"

You gave a dry smile and shook your head right away. "Sorry, Charles. I have a kid, remember? Who’s going to take care of him if I—“

"Joris will play with me! Right, Charlie?" He pulled on the Ferrari’s shirt, chuckling as he felt Charles’s hand on his neck.

"Joris agreed to take care of Adam for one night. They are best friends." Charles assured.

"I can’t, Charles. I’m so sorry."

He followed you inside while Adam stayed outside to find Joris. "But why?" You ignored him. "Y/N, why?"

"I should be asking you that. Why me? I don’t get it. I have a kid, Charles." You took your phone and started taking your laptop bag.

"And what’s wrong with that?"

"Nothing’s wrong, but you have all those hot girls ready for you to ask them out. I am way out of your league, Charles." 

He held your arm to stop you from walking out of the room. "I got Adam’s permission, and I promised him that I was going to take you out. Please give me a chance."

"How did you get his permission?"

You saw him awkwardly smile as he scratched the back of his neck. "He promised me his permission if I ended up in the top 5 this weekend."

Laughing, you rolled your eyes at how ridiculous the deal was.

"Is that a yes?" He tilted his head, having a little faith in how the tension in the room seemed to die down.

"Fine. Just one date."

To that, he bit his lips and threw up a fist. "Yes! You’ll be in Maranello next weekend, yeah? I’ll pick up."

"Sure, I’ll send you the address."

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"Be nice to Joris, alright?"

"Mommy looks very pretty!" He placed both of his palms on your cheeks and gave you a kiss before hugging you by the neck. "Have fun with Charlie! Let me know if he makes you cry, and I’ll." He showed you his little fist. "I’ll hit him!"

Giggling, you kiss him back on his cheek. "I thought you said he was nice."

"Yeah, Charlie is very nice. That’s why I let him take mommy out on a date." He ran towards the main door as Joris helped put his sneakers on. "Bye mommy!"

Back then, when he was born, you always worried if you were able to raise him all on your own. If you could take on both responsibilities as his mother and father figure at a young age, You were grateful enough, as he had grown up to be a very gentle and cheerful kid, despite what he had witnessed occasionally whenever your ex-husband paid a visit. He was never a good dad. He never wanted to be one. Adam barely called him dad. He never knew what it felt like to have a dad, but he would always reassure you that he was glad enough to have the perfect mom. Though you tried to keep your marriage problems between you and your ex-husband, Adam was smart enough to figure out what his dad was like. Whenever your ex-husband came by, you would always get bruises on your body. Maybe that was why your little one grew up to be very protective of you, despite his age.

Charles had told you he was a few minutes away, so you weren’t expecting to see your former spouse when you opened the door.

"Where are you going?" He pushed the door and walked inside as if he had any right to do so.

"It’s none of your business. Please leave."

"It’s my house. Where’s Adam? And why are you all dressed up?" He scanned you up and down, smirking as if you looked humorous.

"Leave, please."

"Come on, baby. I haven’t seen you for months. I have missed you."

You pressed your lips into a thin line, feeling the tears well up in your eyes. Whenever you were home, he would always come by to ask for sex. He would beat you up if you ever resisted any of his attempts, but you would rather get beaten than be in the same bed with him again. You were just glad Adam wasn’t here to witness it all again. "Leave me alone!" You yelled, pushing him off from pinning your body against the wall.

"You fucking bitc—who’s that?" His hand, which was about to hit you in the face, came to an abrupt stop when the doorbell rang.

"It’s no one." The doorbell rang again.

"Go and open the door. It’s fucking annoying." He pushed you on your head, making you jerk forward towards the door.

You wiped on your tears that rolled down your cheeks before twisting the lock as you were greeted by Charles, with his dimples that went shallow as soon as he saw you.

"Y/N? Are you crying?"

You let out a sob and tilted your face away from the tears that rolled down your cheeks again. "I’m sorry, I can’t make it today."

"What’s wrong? Did something happen?" He gently tilted your face and felt his stomach drop when he saw your broken expression. "What happened, Y/N?"

"I–" You sobbed again.

"She wants you to leave, kid."

Charles pushed the door wider as he walked in and stood in front of you. "Who are you?"

"I’m her husband."

You felt his hand on your arm as he pulled you closer; his gaze was still locked on the older guy.

Charles let out a chuckle, seeing how absurd this whole situation was. "So, you are the ex-husband. Well, I don’t think it was me who wasn’t supposed to be in here."

"Kid, this is my house, and that bitch that you are touching is mine." He snarled.

"Don’t call me that. And she’s not yours." Charles furrowed at the man, feeling your hand gripping his arm.

"Ah, so she’s yours now? Did you claim her yet?"

"She’s not mine. She’s no one's possession because she’s not a fucking item. You should leave." His teeth were clenched as his gaze pierced the man. "Leave before I call the cops on you."

"I’ll get going first, baby. See you when this motherfucker is gone, yeah?" You flinched when you felt his cold skin on your cheek.

"Don’t fucking touch her." Charles yanked his hand away and locked the door after the older man was gone, leaving you and him alone.

"Did he hurt you?" Charles cupped on your face, heaving a sigh of relief when there wasn’t anything serious as you shook your head at his question.

Charles wanted to ask a lot of questions, but you were still shaken up by the whole thing, so he grabbed you by your hand as both of you settled down on the couch.

"You can leave, Charles. I’m sorry for ruining your night."

"It wasn’t your fault, Y/N. And who said the date was ruined? Adam told me you love pizza, so are you up for a pizza night?" He found himself grinning when he saw that little smile on your beautiful face.

It was supposed to be a romantic dinner date; instead, you were sitting on the couch with a box of pizza while watching a Disney movie. Charles had to pick out the pineapple on every slice of pizza and vocally judged you on your preference because there was no way he could eat a pizza with a pineapple together.

But it was a very fun night. It was enough to make you completely forget what had happened earlier, but enough to not make the day all about that.

"Y/N, can I ask something?" He picked out another pineapple, trying so hard not to make a disgusted face, which made you laugh.

"Is this about what happened?" You confirmed.

"Yeah, but if you don’t feel comfortable answering, then it’s fine." Charles took a bite of his now pineapple-free pizza.

"No, it’s okay. You can ask." You collected the pineapple he picked off and ate it on its own.

"How long?"

"How long has it been since he did that? It was on and off. If he got a new girlfriend, he would stop coming by for a couple of months." You saw the look he had on you, and it made you feel sad at how bad your life has turned out to be.

"You didn’t report to the police?"

"I did, but I never got any further updates. I even tried to move away, but he always managed to find me back. Which is why I’m always happy whenever I have to travel for work. That way, he won’t be able to ruin my life, and Adam could live his life as a child without having to worry about me." You looked away as you started to clean up the empty box as an excuse so you wouldn’t have to look at his face any longer or you would be crying again.

"I’ll see what I can do. It’s about time for the authority to take action about this. I promise I’ll help you."

"Thank you, Charles. I owe you a lot. I really don’t know how to pay you back." You beamed and dipped your hand in the small box.

"You still owe me a proper date?"

"Fine, make it the second date. Do you want candy?" You handed him one as you popped one in your mouth.

"Ah!" Charles blurted it out, making you jump. "How could I miss this?" He took the sour candy and burst out laughing. It was the same candy that he had been getting from Adam way before he found out he was related to you. "Adam had been stealing your sour candies all this time to share them with me."

"Really?" You laughed along, connecting the dots as to why your candy seemed to be way less than it should have been.

"Guess I love sour candies now." He threw one into his mouth and shivered at the sourness.

✧.* general tag list! @i83andrew @cltrlne @karmabyfernando @ohthemisssery @ru-kru @tastebaldwin @f1obessed @love4lando @shinrjj @ietss @leclerc13 @darleneslane @buckybarnessweetheart @xcinnamongirl @boiohboii @formula1mount @judespoision

If your usernames were crossed, meaning I can’t tag you! Let me know if you would like to be removed or to be added to the tag list! Or if I missed anyone!

[satangcrush]

pact marks pt 2

✦ CAST: lucifer, mammon, levi ✦ SUMMARY: brothers’ reaction to you hiding your pact marks (reader has hair covering the back of their neck for lucifer) ✦ WC: 2.3k-ish

[PART 1] | [PART 2] | [PART 3] | MASTERLIST

══════════════════

Lucifer

Will mention it in passing to find out more about why the pact mark is gone but will not interrogate further. Instead, it keeps him up in bed wondering why you weren’t wearing the mark with pride LOL

.

The clear sound of someone clearing their throat caught your attention as you paused in your note-taking to glance up at the culprit who broke the silence in the library. The towering figure above you makes for a dashing picture although you weren’t sure why he was hanging around you when there was a perfectly good chair opposite you that he could take a seat in.

“Can I help you…?” You trailed off as you started racking your brain for any misconduct that you might have done in the past week that he was posing as an intimidating shadow above you. Either way, it was always a safe bet to apologise first.

“I’m sorry.” You blurted out, nervousness making your heart beat a little faster. This should be enough, right? This time, you can see his expression morph into one of confusion and a hint of…frustration. 

His breath escaped with a sigh, “Why is it that whenever I come to talk, you always apologise first?” The mirth in his voice obvious as he pulled out the chair beside you to take a seat.

Oh okay, he was sitting beside you. Great, maybe you did do something wrong that you simply couldn’t recall at the moment. Or maybe, Satan and Belphie tattled on you about the prank you had helped out with last week.

He cleared his throat again, folding his hands pristinely on the table. “I just wanted to check up on you. How are you doing?” You paused in your movement, ink blotting on the sheet of paper as you pondered fervently for an appropriate reply.

“What’s up with the artificial pleasantries?” You asked warily, not sure what to make of his behaviour. You leveled him with an even stare, as you tried to decipher his thoughts.

He stared at you, noting your defensive position, with your shoulders to your ears and the way you gripped your writing utensil tightly, “Are you a masochist? Do you like my scolding that much?” He stared at you with a deadpan expression, leaning forward to flick your forehead gently.

“Relax.” He demanded, uncurling your fingers to wring your pen away as he placed the cap back to its rightful position. You continued to look at him doubtfully, leaning back in your chair as you hummed a tune that you had picked up from Levi’s anime.

(You had an idea why he was seeking you out now.)

You wore an inquisitive smile, angling your head in the way you knew Lucifer liked. “I feel like you have a question for me?” You deliberately drawled out the end of your sentence, bringing your legs up to tuck it under your chin. With his piercing stare, he met your eyes, bright crimson eyes flashing as he snorted, “Do I?”

“Well if you don’t, I’ll go back to my studies then.” You proceeded to reach out for your pen in Lucifer’s grasp, smiling when a gloved hand enclosed it further away from you, holding it high above his head. 

“Fine.” He huffed, finally dropping all pretenses. “I heard that the shady sorcerer taught you something new.”

You nodded in return, not providing any further explanation. If he wanted to know any other details, he would need to learn how to put his big boy pants on and ask you with words instead. 

He continued to look pointedly at you, his feet tapping an incessant rhythm on the carpeted floor. When he realised he wasn’t going to get any other information from you, he continued, ”He taught you how to cover up the pact marks, correct?”

“Yes, he indeed taught me how to cover these up,” You motioned to the back of your neck, moving your hair out of the way so he could get a better view as you rotated in your seat. “See, it’s not there.” You said triumphantly, turning back to face him.

He had a complicated expression on his face, a dark scowl planted on his lip. “Lucifer?” You called out, a teasing remark already at the tip of your tongue but before you could let it slip, he abruptly stood up to excuse himself, saying that he had to finish some work.

You sat there, bewildered. For a second, you actually contemplated standing up to chase after him but then against your better judgement, you decided not to.

‘Well, he can work through those feelings by himself before coming back to you.’ You pondered before turning back to your notes and noticing the mess left behind. Damn it, you would need to rewrite your notes seeing as the ink had seeped through... as well as getting a new pen as Lucifer had left with it.

══════════════════

Mammon

Out of everyone, he would be the loudest at making it known that he disliked you not showing the pact.

.

“HUH?! Where did it go?!” A hand shot out and grabbed onto your wrist, making you stretch out your arms as you hurled forward in the hallway and into the chest of someone.

“Wha-” Putting your hands on his chest, you pushed back the assailant and instead met the worried expression on the Avatar of Greed’s face, “Mammon?” With a hesitant voice, you tried to tug your hand away from his scrutinising eyes.

“Arghhh… The mark! I don’t believe it! Where did the mark go?!” The panicked voice of Mammon resounded in your ears, a shrill symphony that rang throughout your head. He proceeded to grab onto your shoulder, spinning you around so many times as if an answer would apparate in thin air if he did it enough times.

You were starting to feel dizzy, the unmistakable taste of bile forcing its way up your throat. In the serene recesses of your mind, you wondered if you should just puke on Mammon and call it a day. Unfortunately, you knew that Lucifer would still make you clean up the mess and you just weren’t in the mood for it.

‘Then, there’s only one way left.’ You thought to yourself, sending a silent apology along Mammon’s way.

“Stay!” As Mammon got flung to the ground, you also ended up shooting for the ground as his arms were around you. You closed your eyes tightly to brace yourself for the impact, comforting yourself with the thought that you could just blame Mammon if you ended up with any injuries.

A yelp escaped you as you grabbed onto his shirt , as one of his hand rises up to latch on the back of your head as he tried to cushion your fall. With a poorly concealed grimace, you sat up rubbing your head with one hand while the other hand found its bearings below you… which was surprisingly soft and pillowy? 

“H-hey… Are ya’ done feeling me up?! I’m ‘bout to suffocate here! Get off!” With your face burning, you quickly stood up, dusting yourself off before you offered a hand out for Mammon to grab.

He looked at the offered hand suspiciously, eyes thinning as he stared at a particular spot on your ring finger… Oh, right. Your pact mark. Right. Darn, you had hoped that none of them noticed so that you wouldn’t need to explain yourself.

“Oh, I learned how to conceal the pact marks. See?” You raised your head, finger pointing to the column of your neck, where it once laid the mark of the Avatar of Sloth. Mammon remained silent for a second, hands furling and unfolding by his side. “Well, I don’t care that ya hid the rest of the pact marks, but you can’t hide mine! No way!”

You looked at him, amused by his spluttering. “...And why’s that?” 

“Why do ya’ even need to ask? You’re my human! You should be wearing my mark…” He grumbled under his breath, voice turning into a mutter towards the end.

“Well, I’m going to keep the pact marks hidden for now so that I get used to it. Also, I feel like I get too much attention when the pact marks are out on display.” You complained, mouth warping into a sulk as you remembered how the lesser demons almost broke their neck while trying to get a glimpse at your pact marks. Your eyebrows furrowed as you crossed your legs to sit down when it seemed that Mammon wasn’t going to get his butt off the floor.

“But-”

“No buts. This is my decision, Mammon.” You shushed him gently, pushing him down to lay on his back as you hovered over him, blocking the lights from the hallway out from his eyes. Once satisfied that he wasn’t going to argue, you laid down beside him as he instinctively spread out his arm to let you lay on it.

“Now shut up and just lay down with me for a minute.”

══════════════════

Levi

First, he will start with his yucky otaku tantrum. He will just cautiously mention it once while you guys are gaming and then when you give an answer, he will go like, “ofc u don't want the mark of a yucky gross otaku” even though you are indulging in the same interest as him rn… like okay guess we are both yucky otakus tgt! 

.

You know the word had gotten out that you had learnt to conceal your pact marks so you were pleasantly surprised that Levi hadn’t actually questioned you about it yet. It could be because of the fact that his pact mark was usually hidden so it’s not as obvious as the other demon brothers or honestly, you knew it was because he was too shy.

Thus, you had decided to wear a comfy pair of shorts today for your gaming session with Levi, the fabric shorter than what you would choose to opt for on a normal day of relaxation. You shrugged as you headed to the kitchen, maybe you were a sadist but you really wanted to see Levi’s reaction.

“Levi, I’m here,” You announced your presence while kicking the door open to his room, carrying snacks that you had gotten earlier. The back of Levi’s tousled head greeted you and you observed that he had already set down your usual blanket in your spot, though he seemed to be currently engrossed in his game.

An evil idea brewed in your head and immediately, you dropped the snacks you were carrying and snuck behind Levi to cover his eyes with your hands, “Guess who?” You leaned closer, nudging his headphones out of the way so you could blow hot air in his ear. 

Levi sprung back with a loud shriek, hands flying up to grab at yours, which you reluctantly set down at his insistence. “Surprise?” You chuckled smugly and knelt down beside him to grab your own pair of headphones lying on the blanket. After wearing them, you sat back down not noticing the lack of silence from Levi as you continued chattering. 

Having been struck speechless from your audacity, Levi was now too distracted by the flash of skin visible from your shorts riding up. He startled, noticing the smooth skin where his mark used to occupy, and felt the familiar glimmer of envy brewing in the pit of his stomach, clawing its way up and making itself home in the heart of his throat. He finally snapped out of his head when you paused in your speech, clearly waiting for an answer from him.

As you entertained yourself while setting up the multiplayer game that Levi had set out, you couldn’t help but notice the furrow in his eyebrows and his clenched fist around his controller. You shifted your weight from side to side, watching as his gaze followed the movement of your shorts.

Bingo.

“Do you like my shorts that much?” Your lips widened into a cheshire-like grin.

Levi almost puked out blood. Beads of sweat started making themselves apparent on his forehead as he scrambled for a defense; having mixed feelings at your accusation of him sounding like a pervert. 

Was it really an wrongful accusation when he liked seeing your skin, just not without his mark on it?

“No, I mean yes! I was just staring because the mark is gone--" Ah… he definitely had just messed up. He just had to go and say it. He just had to go and say what he was thinking in his head. Levi slowly turned his attention, dragging his eyes up from your unblemished skin only to meet a broad smirk plastered on your face. The smile was so big and aggravating that he wanted to take his controller and throw it at your head.

“Why didn’t you continue?” The impish smirk on your face made Levi want to punt you into the next century so that he could peacefully crawl into a hole and die, “I wanted to hear you confess that you couldn’t keep your eyes away from my thigh too, Levi-chan.”

He thinks that he could probably die of embarrassment now. First, he professed that he liked your shorts, and now you probably think that he was some weirdo, wanting to see his mark on you, like some kind of branding cattle.

The sound of your laughter rang in his ears as he covered his face with his arms, dropping his controller to the ground. “Urgh, I hate you.” He said melodramatically, shoulders slumped even as you tried to tug his hands away from his face.

“Aw, baby. Don’t be sad, I won’t conceal the mark during our gaming session ‘kay?” You cooed, tone infuriatingly playful. Successful in your attempt to push his hands down, you peppered the Avatar of Envy with kisses and dragged him over so that you could properly embrace him. 

Levi knew he was still red-faced so he buried his face into the crook of your neck, arms wrapping around your waist as you continued coddling him. “Don’t tease me like that again,” He muttered despondently, a frown staying on his face. A small laugh escaped as you replied with a half-hearted affirmation while ruffling his hair.

Honestly, he already knew that you wouldn’t hold up your end of your bargain but how could he possibly be angry when all of your attention is focused on him?

…Huh. Maybe he was a masochist, after all.

══════════════════

a/n▸ here are my hcs on the placement of the pact marks:Luci - back of neck leading to your spine, because he wants u to THINK.Mammon - around ring finger on ur dominant hand bc u always use that hand to payLevi - around right thigh because his tail always curls there and it just feels special to himalso, im positive theres no mention of pact mark in the OG story so im very curious as to how this idea became so prevalent in the community

[runa-falls]

I saw that you think Miguel is a thigh man 😩 can I request him x reader who's thighs clap when they run or so some type of activities. I got that problem sadly 😵‍💫😮‍💨

yes, of course!! i love talking ab our thigh fucker ;^)

cw: body insecurities, thigh chafing (yeouch), fluffy reassurances, small bit of smut (OK IM SORRY 😳 i didn't see that coming [yes i did.]), just oral and uh, a bit of marking, not proof read!!

---

you've never enjoyed prolonged physical activity: running, swimming, biking, etc, because you hated the way your thighs would slide against each other; uncomfortably chafing your skin and making noticeable sounds.

so when miguel proposed a hike for your weekly date, you were hesitant to agree. unfortunately, he's very good at persuading you...

that's how you found yourself on a narrow trial shrouded with trees, taking slow, cautious steps as you attempt to keep your thighs from touching as much as usual.

of course, it only helped so much. your inner thighs were still chafing and getting sore, but you try to conceal your pain as much as possible, too embarrassed to mention anything to miguel.

though your boyfriend is the most loving and accepting man you've ever met, you still haven't told him of your insecurity. you're afraid that once you mention something to him, he'll notice your thighs even more.

miguel is pacing himself, making sure to slow down with you so he doesn't leave you behind (he does this hike all the time). he adjusts his baseball cap, making sure his wild curls are smooshed down as he watches you walk toward him.

you look beautiful today. you always look beautiful. but there's something about see you in this condition that make him twitch in his shorts.

he loves the way your chest heaves as you take deep breaths, your tits pressing desperately against the thin fabric. how droplets of sweat roll over the contours of your cleavage, outlining what he wants to see the most. and how your leggings look like they were painted on, completely revealing the overwhelming softness of your thighs and how they press so sweetly together.

he can barely take his eyes off of you.

but he can't help but notice how odd you're acting too.

he's perplexed as to why you're taking such big steps and moving like you'd rather be anywhere but there, with him. why your face is tense, yet completely blank at the same time.

there's clearly something wrong, but you've been silent this whole hike.

"baby, you doing alright?" you seem to be lost in your thoughts as you stare down at your dirt-scuffed sneakers, you don't even notice he's stopped in front of you. he calls out to you again, "babe?"

"hm?" you look up, pausing your unnatural movements to give your legs a rest, "oh, yeah...i'm fine" you attempt a smile, but even you can tell it looks fake and performative. his eyes bloom with concern as he notices how your legs are shaking under you.

"what's going on, sweetheart? are you hurt?"

"no...it's just," you look away, still apprehensive to mention anything.

he pushes, hand reaching for yours, "just what?"

"i-my thighs are chafing..." you say softly, looking back at him. he's frowning. "b-but i can keep going!" you start walking again, willing yourself to continue even though it hurts.

"baby, wait," he stops you, "don't hurt yourself. i didn't realize you were having trouble this whole time."

you shrug, "it's ok, i'm used to it."

"sweetheart, come here." he has his back turned towards you, coaxing you over to him. "get on."

"get on?"

"i'll carry you back to the car."

"no! you don't have to--"

"i want to." he interrupts, "then when we get home, we'll take a nice bath and get you all patched up."

"what about the rest of the trail?"

"we can just get our work out in at home..."

---

you sigh as warm water washes over the inflamed skin of your inner thighs. it stings sharply, but the pain feels oddly satisfying, especially as miguel thoroughly lathers shampoo in your hair.

"feel better?"

you hum, eyes closing as his fingers attentively massage your scalp.

"why didn't you tell me that you were hurting earlier?"

"i dunno, it just wasn't that big of a deal, mig."

"it was. you were barely able to sit without your hands between your thighs."

you snort, "i thought you liked it when i do that."

you yelp when you feel him tug sharply at your hair. "you know what i meant." he growled, clearly unhappy you're trying to avoid the subject.

"it's embarrassing."

"what's embarrassing?" his hands start to cup water onto your head, washing the suds from your hair until you're squeaky clean.

"my thighs." his movements stop suddenly.

"what about them?"

"they're...too big."

"too big?" he genuinely sounds baffled, almost scoffing in disbelief.

"yeah, they're always touching and they make this...clapping sound when i do certain physical movements..."

"so?"

"so?" you turn your head to look at him, questioning eyes meeting his scarlet stare. his red irises are mere slivers with how blown out his pupils are, heavy with lust.

"yeah, so what?"

"so...i don't like them." you voice is small as you look at him shyly, cheeks blooming with heat under the stringiness of your wet hair.

"well i love them."

---

miguel presses gentle and sweet kisses over your tender skin, relieving all the pain from your chafed inner thighs with just a touch of his lips. your legs are hooked over his shoulders as he makes his way up your body.

the prominent shape of his fangs press against his top lip as his sharp maroon stare fixes right at the apex of your thighs. you can tell he's holding himself back by the way his fingers grip bruises into the tops of your legs.

"baby, you have no idea," he takes a deep breath, eyes closed as his nose nuzzles at your inner thigh, "how fucking perfect you are."

"mig, please!"

he smiles cloyingly, letting you watch his fangs retract before he dips his head closer to your center. he wouldn't want to hurt you...

he locks eyes with you when he experimentally slips his tongue through your soaking lips, only giving you enough attention to keep you buzzing. he's delicately laving against you, feeling you tense and pant under him as he slowly builds up your pleasure.

a haze of lust instantly clouds over his darkened eyes and you watch as he gets lost in the taste of you. he pushes in deeper, tongue fucking you, slurping and sucking, while spilling muffled groans over your pulsing cunt as your thighs begin to tighten around him.

he flicks over your aching clit, drinking in your whimpers, moans, and cries as he teases you, pulling back every so often until you bury your hand into his curls and force him down onto you.

you're nearly suffocating him with your thighs when he start suckling you into his mouth, muscles trembling against him as you grow closer to the edge, and he loves it.

his silky lips and slick tongue push you straight off the edge. you hold on to him as your body writhes with white hot pleasure, hand in his hair and thighs around his head. you can barely hear the muffled groans he makes from how lost in ecstasy you are.

but he groans, and grunts, and then freezes.

"did i just..." he unwraps your legs from around him and sits up, tugging his briefs down in disbelief. your bleary eyes open, eyes glazed and unfocused from the intensity of your orgasm. "shit."

you look down and are graced with a beautiful mess that drips from his cock and the black fabric of his boxers.

you can't help the amused smile that spreads over your lips, "you need some help cleaning that up?"

[midatwrtr]

Turn back time

LE SSERAFIM Sakura x Male Reader

6.6k words

Tags: Fluff & Smut

It was a chilly night of spring when you met Sakura. You were coming home from a late shift and she was sitting in front of your apartment. Your boss decided to abuse his position again by forcing you to work overtime, using some loophole in your contract as an excuse. You didn’t recognize her at first in the dark, she simply looked like a drunk teenager.

You could have ignored her, walked right past her, and everything would have been alright, but somehow, you didn’t. 

“Hey, are you okay?” you asked her, walking closer. She was wearing a pleaded shirt and jeans, while she used a black cap and black mask to cover her face. You made sure not to get too close, she was still a stranger, who knew what she had under her shirt. 

“Mh? What?” she replied with a surprisingly clear voice.

“Oh, I was just checking if you were okay,” you said carefully. “I mean, you’re sitting here alone, in the middle of nowhere…”

“You’re right, it doesn’t look very good, doesn’t it?”

“Yeah,” you answered. “So? Did you drink or something?”

“Oh, no, I didn’t have anything,” she said, mortified. “I was just having…” she sighed. “A bad day. That’s all.”

"Do you want to talk about it?" you asked, the words coming out almost instinctively. You weren't particularly interested, but you understood that she needed someone that listened to her. It was more about offering her a chance to vent than satisfying your own curiosity.

The girl stared at you for a second, dumbfounded.

“I don’t have anything to do tonight anyways,” you added in case she felt guilty.

She thought about it for a second. It was a bit personal but after all, it wasn’t a bad idea. She didn’t even know your name and you didn’t know hers. For all she knew, you were a stranger she could have met on the internet behind an actor’s photo. What were the chances that she’d meet you again? 

“Well…” she started. You crouched down and sat next to her. You could see the moon peaking through the darkened clouds.

“You know, it’s been a rough day,” she said. “It seems like no matter what I do, people always have something to say.”

“Mh, I’m sorry to hear that. Sometimes it does feel like that.”

“Exactly,” she sighed deeply and then she straightened her back. “You know, it’s just so frustrating!” she growled, tensing her hands. “I’ve been doing this for years, and still, there’s always someone saying I’m not doing it right. It’s like they don’t even see how hard I work!”

“That sounds really tough,” you agreed. “People can be so quick to judge.”

“Exactly! They don't see the long hours I put in, the constant pressure to be perfect. They just hear one thing they don't like and suddenly they're experts, telling me how I should do things differently. It's infuriating!

"And the worst part is, sometimes it's not even constructive criticism. It's just mean like they're trying to tear me down. Why do they do that? Can't they see I'm just trying to do what I love? I don't understand why people feel the need to be so harsh!"

“It's tough when people don't see the effort and passion you put into it," you agreed. “But I bet there are still people that love what you do.”

“You’re right, it’s not all that bad. My friends are really supportive and always have been. They remind me why I started this in the first place and keep me grounded.”

“That’s great to hear. It makes a huge difference having people with you.”

“Yes. They're the ones who always believed in me, even when I doubted myself. It's like they see something in me that I sometimes forget” The girl sighed happily. “They're amazing. They are always close to me and help me when it gets too much.”

“It sounds like your friends do a good job of helping you focus on the right things. It's like having a personal cheering squad.”

The girls laughed. “That’s exactly what they are.”

Then she sighed deeply, her demeanor changing. "You know, as supportive as my friends are, I sometimes feel like I'm becoming a burden to them. They're always there for me, listening to my complaints and trying to cheer me up, but I worry I'm dragging them down."

"I doubt they see it that way. Friends are there for the good and the bad times."

"I know, but I can't help but feel guilty. like, how much can they take before they get tired of it?"

"It's natural to feel that way, but real friends don't see you as a burden. They care about you and want to support you, no matter what,” you said. “The important thing is that you’re still working hard. If they see your efforts, they will help you.”

"I hope so,” she said, her voice wavering. “They've never said anything to make me think otherwise, but sometimes I just feel so... needy, I guess. Like, I should be able to handle this on my own and not rely on them so much."

"It sounds like you're being too hard on yourself. Everyone needs support sometimes, and it doesn't make you a burden. It makes you human."

She nodded slowly. “I guess you’re right.”

"If they're there for you now, you've probably been there for them before. It's okay to lean on them. When something happens, you’ll return the favor,” you said. “For example, my friend helped me finish the project. So I bought him a really cool shirt, it was like this Pokemon-themed thing with Charmander and stuff, right? Because he liked Pokemon,” you paused. “But it was two sizes too small.”

The girl giggled. Her laughter bubbled up, bright and infectious.

“God, he looked ridiculous. But it’s alright. He was trying to lose weight anyways, it will motivate him.”

“Yeah, I am sure you did him a favor,” she said joyfully.

“That’s what I am saying!”

The girl recollected herself. "Thanks. I guess I just needed to hear that. It's hard to remember that sometimes, especially when I'm feeling overwhelmed."

You got up, patting your pants off to get rid of the dirt. “Do you want me to help you go back home? It’s kinda late now.”

The girl hesitated for a second. She didn’t know how to answer that question.

“Do you live far away? Do you want me to call a cab?”

“No, it’s not that…” her voice trailed off.

You listened to her silence for a second and understood. “You don’t want to go home, right? How about you stay here for the night? I have a guest room.”

“Well, I don’t want to disturb you…”

“It’s fine, don’t worry about it, it will be just tonight.”

She was a bit hesitant, she didn’t want to impose herself but you were sincere and she accepted the offer. You walked to your apartment, modest and minimal. You didn’t need a lot to live comfortably and you were at the job most of the time anyway.

When she took off her cap and mask, you realized who she was. You chose not to say anything. You didn’t want to scare her away. 

“Are you allergic to anything—?” you asked, you stopped just a moment before saying her name.

“Sakura,” she added. “No, I’m not allergic to anything.”

You quickly made her feel at home, showing her around and offering her a spot at the kitchen table while you prepared a simple meal.

As you cooked, you continued their conversation. She opened up about her life as a singer, and the passion she had for music. You already knew most of it but you wanted to hear it from her, it was much more interesting.

You listened attentively, sharing your own experience at work. It became a healing experience for you. You ate together, enjoying the meal and continuing to talk. You learned about her love for mangas, and how much she played videogames. You were a gamer as well, that’s where most of your money went and why your house was so bare. 

“If I could turn back time…” Sakura said, in the middle of your conversation about her idol life. “I wonder if I’d choose to be an idol again. Maybe I should have become a soloist.”

“Grass is always greener on the other side” you replied. “I’m sure once you’re old, you’ll look back at it and think it was a great experience.”

“I hope so.”

When it got late, you offered her the guest room, fortunately, you kept it clean. She accepted and you said goodnight.

Sakura didn’t feel like a celebrity. You felt like you met a good friend and you wanted to keep it that way. In the morning, you prepared her breakfast and bid her goodbye. You didn’t expect her to come back and neither did she. It was supposed to be a one time thing, to get her mind off.

But a week later, she knocked at the door and you were happy to welcome her.

It started with small exchanges—it was a bit more embarrassing now that you were both conscious of each other. Sakura would sometimes bring her books and discuss them with you, or you would turn on the TV and watch animes together. 

As the days turned into weeks, the conversations grew longer. You talked about her past, your past, your problems. It was a safe space for the both of you, where you could be honest with eachother. Sakura found herself looking forward to these moments with you, your presence becoming a familiar comfort in her life. It became a routine.

Her eyes sparkled everytime she spoke with you and you would always listen to her. You loved the way she spoke with such passion. 

But one day, you had to leave. 

It was your boss again. “I made some arrangements with this company, it’s a big opportunity, you have to leave tomorrow. I already scheduled the flight.” You couldn’t refuse and you didn’t have Sakura’s phone number either. You left in the early morning and didn’t hear from Sakura since.

A week later, you finally came back home. You close the door of your friend’s car and thank him. You take a deep breath, finally the air of your town, you missed it. Taking the stairs, you reach your floor and there she was, standing weakly in front of your door, Sakura.

“Oh my god, Sakura! What are you doing here!” you exclaim.

“You—! You’re back! You asshole why didn’t you say anything!” Sakura rushes to your arms and hugs you tightly. “God, I thought something happened to you! I thought the loansharks kidnapped you.”

“It was just a work trip,” you say. “And sorry I didn’t say anything, I didn’t have your number.”

“Oh. Well, I’ll give it to you right now,” she hurries you. You take out your phone and add her digits. 

“Is that your stage outfit?” you ask her.

“Yeah, I rushed here. I didn’t really feel like changing, I wanted to see you,” she says. Her sentence shocks you. You couldn’t shake off the feeling that there was more to it. You thought about all the little things—how she always seemed to know you were having a rough day, how she always came to you first to vent about her troubles.

You smiled but were worried. It wasn’t like you hadn’t thought about Sakura in that way before. You did plenty of times, but there was always some reason not to pursue it.

“But you didn’t even know that I’d be here,” you comment.

“I felt it.”

“You have a sixth sense, don’t you?” you laugh as you open the door for her.

With a quickly made dinner, you have time to catch up with Sakura. She had a lot to talk about, not only about her members but also all the other idols she met during the shows. She had a lot to vent about, people aren’t as nice as they look.

Sakura offers to clean up the rest of the dinner, which isn’t a lot since you have already cleaned most of the dishes, and in the meantime, you go and take a shower. Cleaning up the remnants of your hastily prepared dinner, Sakura tosses the scraps into the trash bin before wiping the table. Once everything is tidy again, she heads towards the bathroom to take off her makeup.

However, while passing by the bedroom, she finds you lying sprawled across the bed, fast asleep. An odd mix of emotions courses through her veins—it is a combination of fondness and happiness. You look so cute carelessly snoozing with that sleepy face of yours. She wants to join you, to touch you. She wants to do what she sees in the shows, to hold your hand, hug you while you sleep, and kiss you.

Sakura isn’t sure if her feelings are right, especially after everything that has happened to her. She knows to trust you, but to love you? Is she allowed such a luxury? Her mind tells her to steer clear, to not get mixed up in such a troublesome relationship, but she is stubborn.

Her back shivers. Sakura can’t tear her gaze away from your sleeping face. Your soft breaths are like music to her ears, soothing and comforting.

Then you wake up. You look at Sakura through your tired eyes and smile. “Oh, sorry. I fell asleep, didn’t I?” you say, laughing, and Sakura exchanges a smile. “Say, aren’t you tired, Kkura?”

“Mh,” she hums. “A little bit. But you must be—” she trails off, unable to finish her sentence.

“Then join me,” you say, interrupting her. She opens her eyes a little wider as she values your offer. She could find countless reasons not to, but instead, she settles for a place beside you. She awkwardly lies down on the bed, slightly curling her legs and resting her arms close to herself. Her eyes never leave yours, watching your welcoming smile.

“I really missed you, Sakura,” you say. You laugh from the embarrassment, clenching your eyes. “I got so used to your presence that I keep going back to my bags thinking I left something at home.” You pause to take a breath. “I guess it was you.”

Sakura is surprised. She listens to you silently, feeling that warm sensation inside her chest slowly expanding to the rest of her body. “I missed you too,” she confesses.

“The bulgogi at the cafeteria just doesn’t taste the same, you know?” You laugh. Feeling the mattress dip beside her, Sakura becomes aware of your presence. The wave of heat coursing through her veins makes her heart race wildly. Carefully unfolding her legs, she slides closer to you, nestling herself against your warmth, finally accepting your invite. Sakura catches her breath as your arm slips around her waist, pulling her even closer.

“This feels nice,” she says, and you giggle. It is a gentle embrace, completely different from the coldness that she had to endure for the week you were away. She simply lies there, letting the familiar scent of you envelop her, calming her frayed nerves.

“Don’t you want to change into some more comfortable clothes?” you ask Sakura.

“Mh? You don’t want to see me in it?” Sakura replies in a light tone. “You don’t like it?” she teases you.

You keep brushing her soft blonde hair. “No, it’s not that. I think you could be more comfortable in something else… but I don’t mind it at all. Besides,” you swallow your saliva, “it looks really good on you.”

“Oh? How good?” she coos, moving her hair away from the red top. You remember your reaction from earlier: how you choke at the sight of her tight top hugging her pearly white chest, how her toned midriff peeks from her gray pleated skirt, and how all the blood leaves your head. But you can’t say it, of course, and settle for a “Very good.”

“Come on, be more specific!” Sakura whines in annoyance.

“Ten out of ten!”

“You always say that,” she says.

“Because it’s true,” you retort.

“You know what I mean…” she says with a softer tone, looking at you with her typical puppy eyes. There you go. She plays with your feelings again. What are you supposed to feel? Your mind is a mess. She is so adorable, yet so hot.

You sigh. “Well…” you start. “I think you’re terribly hot. You make my head spin every time I see you. And today, you are unbelievable.”

Sakura clings to you tighter, taking refuge in your chest. Her breath comes in short, needy gasps; who knew words could be so piercing? She knows she wants you to say it, but she doesn’t know how it’d feel like.

Shifting ever so slightly, she presses her lower body against yours, finding comfort in her arousal.

“When you say it like that…” Sakura whispers. “Is it too much?”

“Too much for me to handle, that’s for sure.”

Sakura rubs herself against you, her hips moving slowly, riding your thigh. She starts moaning, low groans choked in her throat. She grows more desperate. Your words were turning her on. She wants you to see more of her, she wants your eyes planted on her body, she wants more. Sakura knew this was going to be a mistake, that she should stop before crossing the line, but she couldn’t resist anymore.

“Mh,... is that all?” She asks you once more.

“I have nothing nice to say, believe me,” you admit and Sakura understood perfectly. You finally notice her movements on her leg and you are just as aroused as her. At the same time, you are worried if her intentions were truly honest and if she wasn’t being carried away by the heat of the moment. You knew how impulsive Sakura was.

Swallowing hard, Sakura meets your gaze, refusing to look away. She could see the concern etched on your face, the worry mirrored in her eyes. For a brief moment, she contemplates pushing you away… and then she decides against it. Her hips don’t stop rubbing against you. She keeps holding you. Sakura wanted to know what you felt and what she felt.

Closing the remaining distance between you two, she captures your lips in a firm resolute kiss. 

Caught in the heat of her excitement, you couldn’t do anything else but kiss her back. Moaning against your lips, Sakura loses herself in the feeling of your lips. Rolling on top of you, her arms around your neck, she keps kissing you deeper and deeper. Her skin was warm and smooth beneath your fingers, a stark contrast to the rough texture of your own.

Pulling away slightly, she looks into your eyes. She could see her own pure raw desire reflected back in your eyes. Without hesitation, she guides your hand between her thighs. “Are you sure, Sakura?” you ask one last time.

“I am.” You could feel the moistness around her shorts. She invites you into her panties, into herself. Your fingers trace lazy circles around her swollen clit. She grips your shoulders tightly as the pleasure scatters through her legs. 

Arching her back, Sakura gasps as your fingers effortlessly slipped inside her wet folds. Her muscles tensed and relaxed, spasms of pleasure, drawing you deeper. 

Sakura lets out a high-pitched whine. “Mh!” You hit a sensitive spot inside of her. Waves of pure bliss ripple throughout her body. Her grip on your shoulders tightens painfully as you continue to finger her pussy.

Sakura’s mind spirals out of control leaving her breathless moans. 

“Can I see it?” you ask softly. Painting heavily, Sakura glances down for a moment at her spread legs, catching the sight of your fingers buried inside of her. She shudders at the sight of the messiness of her juices. They coated your hand, dripping down to your wrist and forearm.

She forces herself to meet your eyes to nod quietly. You quickly take of her shorts and underwear and take a good look of her wet lips. Gasping at the cool air, Sakura stared at you with worry as she was revealing her most intimate parts to you. She finds herself even more aroused than before.

With both hands at either side of her vagina, you part her slightly. You look at the droplets of wetness leaving her hole, sliding down her pink flesh, the warm scent invading your nostrils. You take a moment to observe how her muscles twitched but you couldn’t resist any longer. You open your mouth and dip your tongue inside of her.

“I love how you taste, Sakura,” you muffle. “You’re just as good as I imagined.”

Your words make her moan harder. Every finger of lower body tighten at the new sensation. You lick her slowly, spreading your tongue out on her pussy, licking from the bottom to the top, pausing on her clit. You send waves of pleasure to her head, making it difficult for her to remain still. Her legs clamp around your head. Her soft thighs just make it more enjoyable.

You eat her with voracity, making your head up and down. Sakura helps you by stretching her lips further apart with her hands, giving you full access to every inch of her folds. Her walls clench around your tongue, contracting involuntarily. 

You stop for a moment to swallow the liquids piled on your tongue. Sakura can’t wait a single second. “Please continue,” she pleads.

“You want it that bad?” you say with satisfaction.

“Yes,” she admits. “Please, eat me out.” “I will,” you conclude and go back to her pussy. This time, you wrap your lips on her clit and start sucking it softly. You don’t give her time to adjust as your fingers enter her at the same time, fingering her helpless hole. 

Sakura goes crazy. She begs for release. “Ah! Fuck! Don’t stop!” Her fingers dig into your shoulders, leaving bruises all around your back. Lewd wet noises sloppily resonate through your mouth. Moaning your name nonstop, she is pushed more and more to the edge. The orgasm approaches rapidly. With a feral growl, she explodes, wracked by wave after wave of ecstatic pleasure.

Arching her back, she clutches your head, pulling you deeper inside her. Thick liquid drips from her swollen pussy, thick cum flow right into your mouth. Breathless and spent, she collapses back onto the pillows, utterly exhausted but satisfied.

You continue by softly eating up her remaining cum. Watching in disbelief as you eagerly lap up the sticky remnants of their passion, Sakura's breath hitches in her throat. 

“I didn’t know you could do that,” you said and laughed.

“I didn’t know I could do that either,” she repeated, giggling and covering her blushed face. 

Panting heavily, Sakura lays still sprawled across the bed, her body still pulsing with residual with the residual kickback of the orgasm. When you nuzzle your face against her exposed stomach, she moans softly, arching her back invitingly. Her leg itch, the shivers discend to her core. "Mmm…" she murmurs, begging you to continue.

Her fingers brush through your hair. You leave small pecks and smooches on her tone midriff, trailing your lips along the grooves of her abs. Your hands hold her hips, lifting her arched body closer to your face. Her heart swells with tenderness, she’s grateful, you truly care for her and want to make her happy. 

Your head further ascends along her body, stopping at the hem of her top. You look up to her, to her flushed cheeks and clouded eyes, panting heavily. “Can I see them?” you ask her.

She nods, “Yes…” Sakura then sits up to take of her top. It’s a bit complicated, she raises her arms and slowly pulls it off. When she takes of her last layer, you hold your breath. The tube bra finally slips off and her breasts fall down. They are beautiful.

Though not as big as they looked under the clothes, the shape was a lot more inviting. They were slightly saggy, drooping to either sides, with rounded nipples and beautiful pink nipples. There was a mole right on her left breast that you had never noticed. 

You look at her eyes just to be sure and gently grope her breasts. She lets out a small moan, bringing her hands back to open her chest to you. Blushing deeply, Sakura looks down your eager expression, her heart racing. She’s surprised at how excited you were and it made her even more aroused.

“Do you really like them that much even if they’re small?” she asked.

“They are perfect, Sakura,” you said. “And they could’ve been 100 different shapes but I’d still love them, because they are yours.”

Sakura smiled and locked her arms around your back. She's grown accustomed to your touch now and she couldn’t be happier. Her nipples harden beneath your fingers and she struggles to keep her composure. "It’s okay, keep going..." she whispers, her voice barely audible above the rapid beat of her heart.

Leaning in closer, she captures your lips in a heated kiss but you don’t stop fondling her soft breasts. She falls back to the bed and her boobs fall to the sides. Your hands collect them back up and you continue to play with her mounds.

Her body trembles as you continue to knead and tease her sensitive breast, alternating between gentle strokes and firmer pinches. Sakura bites down on her lip, but she doesn’t hide her moans, you love them. 

She had never felt so exposed yet so safe before. She wanted your hands to explore every inch of your body, she wanted you to know every part of her. And now she wanted to see you as well.

“Are you going to take off your clothes?” she asks.

“Oh, yeah,” you answered, only now realizing she was the only one naked. You made it quick, not wanting to make her wait too long. You were a bit embarrassed to show her your body, especially since it wasn’t nearly as toned as hers. However, if Sakura didn’t care than neither should you.

You were also worried about your size. Your hands were both covering your crotch, the head of your penis peeking between your fingers.

Sakura flashed a seductive smile and got closer to you. “Are you really going to hide that pretty cock of yours?” she asks you. Her hand grab your fingers and she peels off your hands. She licks her lips and palms your balls, holding your cock out right on her right hand. She silently looks at it for a second, looking at how hard it was, standing so tall just for her. That’s what she loved. You were hard for her.

And she was wet for you.

“Sit down,” she told you and you obliged, keeping your legs open. With her hand still under your balls, she raised your cock higher, giving her full access to the whole length. And then she was blowing you. With a hand at the base, she wraps your head with her wet mouth, beginning to move her head in slow, circular motions. Her eyes stare right back at you, with her sunken lips, looking for your approval.

Your flushed face is enough for Sakura. She increases the pace of her actions, sucking harder and faster on your rock hard penis. The muscles in her mouth stretch as she takes you deeper than ever before, her cheeks hollowing out with each passing thrust. A thin stream of saliva drips down from the corner of her mouth, mixing with your precum and forming a sticky trail along her jawline. 

She tries her best but she couldn’t take you into her throat. The pleasure was still enough for you to roll back your eyes. Continuing with her sucking and bobbing, the mix of fluids foamed up to a frothy white substance, sloppily falling down her mouth, to her hands, to your crotch.

Feeling you pulling her head down, thrusting your penis roughly into her throat, Sakura gasps for air. Her gag reflex kicks in momentarily, causing her to gag and choke briefly, but she quickly regains control, continuing to work her mouth. 

It could have been only a couple minutes but you couldn’t last any longer. It all came so fast, you couldn’t even warn Sakura that you were already filling her mouth with cum. Your release startled her, she opened her eyes and jolted back, letting the cum spill out to her hands. 

You continued letting out a couple more splurts before you could stop, however you were still twitching maniacally. “Oh my god, sorry Sakura,” you said.

“Oh, don’t worry about it,” she laughed it off. “That’s exactly the reaction that I wanted. Now let me taste this…”

Sakura scooped up all the semen that had escaped her mouth and poured it back inside. With a slurp, the last strings of cum left her palms. She gulped it down and showed you her empty mouth. She let out a satisfied giggle, watching your dumbfounded face. 

“Well, look like that got you hard again, huh?” Sakura said watching your penis coming back to life. “You’re so naughty.”

“You’re the one that just—look at what you just did,” you retorted.

“You’re right…” she agreed. “So? What are you gonna do no? Are you gonna put it in?”

“Do you want to?” you asked.

“I do.”

“Then I’ll do it.”

Sakura laid down on the bed, taking your place. You looked at her, her hair sprawled on the white sheets, her pearly white skin covered in her shiny sweat, her perfectly round breasts drooping down her chest, her creamy thighs. She looked like an angel. You couldn’t believe that you were going to do it with her.

You weren’t the only one. Sakura didn’t want anyone else but you, she’s been thinking about you this whole time and this was going to be the seal of her love.

Sakura opened her legs and let you get closer. With her hand, she helped guiding yourself inside. You sank in with ease. You were forced to blink rapidly and grit your teeth at the new sensation. It was incredibly tight, completely wet, and burning hot.

Your penis stretched her open. She moaned and contorted her face as her vagina opened up to you. Her hand gripped down your forearm with all her might.

“God…” she sighed.

“Are you okay, Sakura?” you asked worryingly. “Does it hurt? We can stop if you want.”

“No, no, it’s not that, we can keep going,” she said. “I just have to get used to it. It’s a bit uncomfortable, that’s all.”

She breathed deeply and pulled on your shoulder, “Please, slowly.” 

“Alright,” you said. You contracted all of your muscles to be as slow as possible, as gentle as you could. You let yourself sink, a millimeter at a time, being extremely careful not to let out any sudden movement. Sakura’s face relaxed as you went in, she stared blankly, giving all her attention to the feeling between her legs.

“Okay, like that… alright, that’s it,” she let you know. “I’m good now. I think.”

“Tell me what to do,” you said.

“Try thrusting it a bit,” she said. You nodded and guided your hips back before slowly thrusting your penis back inside. 

“Oh…” Sakura moaned. She didn’t look in pain, you were glad. “Yep, that’s good. That’s really good. You can keep going.”

You nodded again and started thrusting at a regular pace, still slow. 

Sakura flips around, grabbing the pillow in front of her. You plunge yourself back inside and using your whole weight, you stretch her to the point of bulging her belly. 

Gripping the sheets tightly, Sakura cries out in both pain and ecstasy as you brutally claim her pussy. Her vagina accepts you, stretching wide to accommodate your whole length. Each forceful thrust sends waves of pleasure rippling through her body. 

Her moans become more and more primal. She cries out in ecstasy, muffling the screams into her pillow.

Unable to contain your growing hunger, you move relentlessly at the roughest pace possible, trying to satisfy your lust. Your movements become increasingly frantic, punctuated by your grunts. Every brutal thrust fills her to the brim, making her feel used and ravaged. The bed shakes violently beneath you as your passion escalates, leaving the once pristine linens drenched in sweat and other fluids.

Despite the intensity of your assault, Sakura doesn't fight it—she loves it.

The new pace costs you a lot. After a minute, you’re tired and way closer than before. You breath heavily, slowing down to give the both of you a rest. Sakura is panting and couldn’t even keep her head up.

“Sorry, Sakura, could you turn around another time?” you asked between your heavy breaths.

“Sure…” she replies weakly. “It will be better for me too.”

You groan quietly as you slide back into her. The rest of her body is stretched out on the bed, she’s way too tired to do anything else. You grab her hips and raise them in a prone stance so you can go deeper. It works, she immediately tightens around you so intensely that you feel like you might climax instantly. Her hands clutch the edge of the bed, her moans are free and loud as her face is no longer buried in the cushions. It's clear that she's on the brink of orgasm, and you continue to thrust into her as hard as possible.

You lean forward to place kisses on her neck and shoulder, your body pressing on top of hers as you slow down the pace to a grind. You want her to feel loved and worshipped. She tries to look up at you but the pleasure is so immense that she can only focus on your blurry silhouette. Sakura is so lightheaded that she her words sound drunk and splurred. 

“I—I’m gonna cum,” she says. “Please I want you to cum too!”

A few more thrusts before the dam breaks, her squirt flooding your bed as she moans your name much louder than before.

“I love you!” she screams.

You don’t stop thrusting however as you are also very close to reaching your orgasm. Wrap your hands around her small waist and you can feel her toned abs contracting and relaxing as the spasms of her orgasm keep milking you. Her squirt floods the grooves of her abs, pooling into a shiny mess. 

“I’m really gonna cum now,” you says. “I’m gonna cover you in cum!”

“Do it, please!”

“Fuck!” There was no way you were going to last any millisecond longer and with one final thrust, you spill everything you have been saving on her abs. Ribbons after ribbons of thick sperm cover her tummy, her breasts and some even get to her face.

Sakura lays there, exhausted. She wipes the cum of her abs, playing with it, looking at how the strings of thick cum stretch between her fingers. “It’s really warm,” she comments, with satisfaction. “I made you cum a lot, huh?”

“I thought I was going to pass out,” you admit.

She laughs.“Me too.”

You inhale for a moment. “Let me get you some towels.” You get off the bed and walk to the closet. Only then you notice how sore your legs truly were and you have to hold the door to stand up. You grab a couple from the stack of towels and hand them to Sakura.

“Here you go,” you say and help her stand up. Sakura takes them and slowly wipes her whole body. You could feel some of the remaining blood feeding into your penis but you were too tired to do anything else. So you sat down on the bed, besides her.

“You got work tomorrow?” you asked Sakura.

“No, nothing.”

“That’s good,” you say. “Otherwise the others would have scolded me. I can’t imagine what Yunjin would do to me.”

Sakura lets out a breathy laugh, amused but weary. Her shoulders shake gently, and her eyes though tired, sparkled. “Don’t worry, I wouldn’t tell her.”

“Thanks,” you said and gave her a smile. “Let’s get cleaned up now.”

The two of you sluggishly move around the bathroom. Sakura must have gotten used to feeling tired after all the dance practices but emotional exhaustion was something else. It wasn’t just the sore muscles, she was exhausted from the ecstasy. 

She splashes cool water on her face, and quickly takes off her makeup. You brush your teeth with your eyes half-closed, the toothbrush moving lazily. You exchange tired smiles through the mirror, knowing you are the reason for the other’s tiredness. 

Once done, you shuffle back to the bedroom and drop on the bed.

Sat beside you, disheveled and natural, Sakura looked unreal. Bathed by the pool of the moonlight, she only sat still, but your heart couldn’t stop pounding. She was your world.

You took a deep breath when you remembered her words earlier. “I love you.” That’s what she said. “I love you.” Sure, you were in the heat of the moment, the adrenaline was pumping harder than anything else and she probably didn’t even mean it. Maybe it was a “I love how you make me feel.” Maybe it was just another way to praise you. But what if it wasn’t?

You had to know. “By the way…” you start. You gulp down. “Did you say ‘I love you’ before?”

Realizing what she said, Sakura’s face pales slightly. For some reason, she felt scared, and she wanted to cover her face. “Oh, I—I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to say that. I mean, I do care about you, but—”

With your heart pounding, you interrupt her. You try to talk to her as gently as possible. “Sakura, wait. Did you mean it? Because if you did, it’s okay.”

Sakura hesitates, she can’t look at your eyes, then nods. “Yeah, I did mean it. I’ve been trying to keep it to myself, but… After this week,” she sighs with frustration. She couldn’t believe what she was saying right now. “Fuck, I just couldn’t stop thinking about you. I just never had the courage to say it. I don’t want to lose you, I care about you too much.”

Your eyes soften as she talked. “Sakura, I feel the same way. Every time we’re together, I feel so happy, so alive. I didn’t want to say it either, because of the whole situation we got going on. But now that you said it… I won’t hide it.”

Tears well up in Sakura’s eyes, she’s relieved. So relieved. “Really? You feel that way too?”

Sakura stands up and jumps to hug you. You almost fall but you catch yourself with a foot. Her face is against yours, cheek to cheek, you can feel her tears run down your skin. “You have no idea how happy this makes me!”

You sat hand in hand, letting Sakura calm down as she wiped her tears. “You know that time that I told you I wanted to turn back time?”

“Yeah, it was the first time we met.”

“Mh, I thought about it and I wouldn’t change anything. Because I’ve got to meet you.”

You laugh. “God, how did I get so lucky to have you, Sakura. I love you!”

“I love you too!”

THE END

Written, 13 July 2024 - 18 July 2024

[heartthrobin]

the hate game (1)

oliver wood x female!reader

wc: 13.3k

warnings: enemies to lovers, so damn much pining, set in poa, timeline is a bit wonky, limited use of y/n, super grumpy!oliver, oliver's scottish accent (it's a warning in itself), alcohol consumption, super! duper! cheesy! (sorry not sorry)

an: just survived the worst two weeks of my life, but the fic is finally here! this fic was originally a full 50 chapter fic i had planned for wattpad like three years ago but i found my draft for it recently and decided it needed a revival. so enjoy it, and don't forget to comment and repost to support your favourite writers :)

summary: the only thing more grating than Oliver's foul moods and his permanent scowl, has to be the fact that he's so damn pretty. you fucking hate him for it.

part two/final part

Movies, as is their premise, glamourise plenty of things - high school, politics, tiny Greek islands - but none more than the classic sucker-punch.

The teeth-crunching, blood-spitting moment where skin meets skin in a satisfying thump that sends an unsuspecting victim to the floor. Music plays and the hero grins, grabbing the girl round the waist: dipping low to kiss her.

What’s consistently (conveniently) left out is how bloody painful it is to be on the sending end of that fist.

The first, and only, time you’d ever punched someone was in second year.

It had seemed like a great idea in the moment, quickly succeeded by the mind-numbing pain that shot up your arm where knuckle met face.

You’d aimed for his jaw, but as it turns out: in addition to painful, punching someone wasn’t a particularly accurate sport for a beginner and your slippery skin found a round-tipped nose instead.

A collective gasp and a month’s worth of detention waited for you on the other side of your act of rage.

And sure, while afternoons in Snape’s classroom every Friday sucked: it was all worth it.

Every purple knuckle that throbbed with the slightest brush, the points lost to Hufflepuff, the pages and pages of Hogwarts Does Not Condon Physical Violence you’d been forced to write was worth seeing the trickle of blood running down from Oliver Wood’s nose.

To see that smug fucking look wiped clean from his face. To watch how he doubled over in pain, grappling onto his friend for balance.

“Tyler fancying you? Any bloke would rather snog a goblin.”

His little comment had earned him a broken nose.

It had been the start of a five year long feud.

It’s the reason - now - why the ground is racing up to meet you, the nose of your broomstick pressed down towards it and wind whipping so hard against your face it draws tears. You knock into the ground, catching yourself on wobbly legs. A few feet away, Oliver Wood has done the same.

He’s marching towards you with the same ferocity that’s curdling in your chest:

“Tha’s blatching and you know it!” His accent is ringing, thick and blistering with heat like it always is when he talks to you. At you, rather.

The accusation is crystal clear, and loud despite the echoing din of the quidditch stands above. From the field where you're parked, you can hear the chatter and the cheers and the boos all conglomerating into a fuzzy uproar.

There’s still twelve brooms floating in the air, spewing irritated shouts from players in both yellow and red:

Just let it go, Wood!

Come on, Cap, can we just finish the match please!

You promptly ignore them. Oliver follows suit.

“What?” You scoff, face hot as a kettle on a lit stove. “As if Laurel and Hardy haven’t been elbowing my girls all game!”

It goes without saying that you’re referring to Gryffindor’s red-head twin-set of beaters.

“Bullshit.” He seethes, it’s purposefully quiet enough that McGonagall’s approaching figure doesn’t pick it up.

She, unlike yourself, is less patient and knobby vein-webbed hands come out to knock you both against your chests: widening the gap to a safe enough distance between the opposing captains.

“You two are exhausting.” And she sounds it too. Her glasses tremble at the edge of her nose, sun shining down on her aged face. "If one more match this season is interrupted because you two can't control your tempers, you will both be stripped of captainship and you will not fly until you graduate. Do I make myself perfectly clear?"

But Oliver isn't looking at her. His eyes are focused on yours over her cloaked shoulder.

He's taking the predictable route of not replying first.

"Crystal clear, Professor." You resign to speaking first, skewing a grin at his anger-sewn face.

It’s another long boring moment before he cuts his gaze from yours, kicks up a patch of grass and grits through his teeth.

“Yes, professor.”

As can be imagined, things between you and Oliver Wood have been tense since the day he’d hobbled up to the hospital wing with a palm over his face and blood dripping down over his already red tie.

But with age, came ferocity, and what started as passing glares in the corridor melted into anger-drowned faces and sharp words flung with intent to scar.

Things got infinitely worse when you were elected captain of the Hufflepuff quidditch team in the same year Oliver was made captain for Gryffindor. It stoked the already sizzling embers that made moments around him warm and stuffy and hard to breathe.

The murky history swirled with what should be friendly competition, instead frothing into a bubbling pot of annoyed teammates and exasperated teachers and more sessions of detention than you would have ever had if you'd never met the son of a bitch that is Oliver Wood.

It's what puts you in situations like the ones you find yourself in the middle of before you even know how you got yourself there.

"You two," Professor Burbage had never held you in particularly high favour. It was just your luck that Oliver received the same courtesy. "One more word out of either of you and I will be seeing both of you this afternoon for detention in my classroom."

It was even unluckier that she'd sat you two barely three wizards away from one another and one fly-away comment had blown out into another heat-filled exchange. It always does.

"But professor--" you try.

"Right then. I'll see you both at five o' clock."

Oliver sighs, hands running up over his head between chestnut locks: "Fucking perfect. Thanks, big-mouth."

"Would you like to make it two days, Mr Wood?"

He huffs like an angry dog, tightening the grip on his writing-feather but says nothing else.

The end of the lesson doesn't come soon enough and when it does, Oliver is first out of his seat. You're grateful for it.

Cherry bumps you in the shoulder where she throws her bag over it. "You just can't help yourself, can you?"

You grin, despite the sunken feeling hollowing your chest with the acknowledgment that you're gonna be spending yet another afternoon at the mercy of an under-paid staff member alongside the hothead that was the Gryffindor captain.

"Come on, that wasn't my fault and you know it."

Her tight red curls dance when she shakes her head. They match her blood red tie. "Somehow it never is."

To your dismay, but not surprise, Enzo shares Cherry's views when he waltzes into step beside you in the corridor between Muggle Studies and Divination. His arm drapes over your shoulders and his tall frame shakes when he laughs.

"You know," his voice is thick and gravelly. "You two are gonna have to fuck it out eventually."

You roll your eyes, shoving him off you with a chuckle. The sentiment isn't anything new. "Oh, shut up."

The day folds blurrily between classes and lunch and greenhouse visits that by the time you look up it's just about five o clock.

Burbage's office door stares down at you.

The corridor is ghostly all the way behind you and it's emptiness means it's easy to make out Oliver's heavy footsteps down the stone floor. They're not slow, in an arrogant strut, neither quick like he has somewhere to be.

He trudges. Like the weight of the world is strapping him to invisible pins in the floor. It's easy to figure that your existence doesn't lighten his load any.

You don't turn. He simply falls into place beside you, keeping a good foot distance between your tightened shoulders.

The door opens.

Charity Burbage is insufferable in the way that she forces you and Oliver to sit almost on top of each other behind a scratched up desk where she can watch you under the curtain of her ratty blond hair.

You inch the chair dramatically away from Oliver's.

She's set a stack of pages by him and a wet stamp. "Stamp these and sign the date."

Additionally, she's dropped a stack of envelopes under your nose. "Tuck and seal. When you're done, you can leave."

You eye the papers. There must be hundreds.

To Whom It May Concern,

Hogwarts would like to remind all parents and guardians that the third-years will require prior permission before being allowed to visit the nearby village of Hogsmeade--

You jump when Oliver's elbow knocks yours (more violently than what was really necessary). He holds the first page out to you silently, face dripping with impatience.

When you take the page, his thumb brushes yours.

The paper is delicate in your fingers where you fold it. You tuck and seal, and by the time you've set it aside Oliver is offering the next page to you again.

His thumb brushes yours for a second time.

You find that it does for every letter that's passed on.

It's hard not to watch him out the corner of your eye. Oliver has this dark brown, nearly black, hair that's thick and almost too long and untamed all over. It's matched by bushy eyebrows and speckled freckles over the bridge of his nose.

If you didn't hate him as much as you did, you might think he was pretty. You might think that anyway.

Time stretches until the sun is setting the classroom afire with golden light and it's boredom that causes it, or possibly a desire to hear his voice at such tight quarters, but you speak.

"You know," it's soft enough that Burbage doesn't look up from her Witch Weekly magazine. "Even if - in some act of God - Scotland qualifies for the semi-finals, Luxembourg is gonna flatten them. I mean, think about it unemotionally, Wood: they have Luca Schmit as seeker. It's really a no brainer--"

"Are y’really just stupid or are you purposefully trynna start another argument?" His gaze flickers up to eye Burbage's desk warily, she still doesn't react.

Maybe it's both. After all, the subject of the Quidditch World Cup had been what put you both there in the first place.

You shrug, unfazed by his scathing remark.

"I'm just trying to make conversation."

"Well don't."

His hand brushes yours again.

-

Every second Friday, generally at the tail-end of lunch, Hooch's grey barn owl swoops low over your head and drops a smaller-than-average white envelope right into your mashed potatoes. Cherry yelps in surprise every time.

Then you watch the bird drop the same over the Gryffindor, Slytherin and Ravenclaw tables.

Good afternoon,

Reminder of Captain's meeting this afternoon in my office. Six o' clock, don't be late.

Regards,

Madam Hooch.

The letter says the same thing it has since you became captain and it's a wonder you still take the effort to break the seal on the envelope.

But come six o' clock, you're traipsing towards the west end of the castle. Lavender streaks caress the sky under the last impression of sunlight through the ornate stone arch of the corridor windows and an autumn chill creeps up your arms where your sweater isn't thick enough.

Hooch's office is in a quiet alcove, nearly impossible to find if you didn't know where to look, and the lamps are lit. Beyond the door, you can hear voices: you grin.

The door creaks noisily where you push it open. Inside it's cramped and cluttered with shelves of quidditch equipment - broken brooms, punctured quaffles and loose kits draping every open surface - but it's warm and smells like leather and is maybe your favourite little room in the whole castle.

The quidditch legend herself, Rolanda Hooch, has her legs kicked up on her desk and the boys are standing ahead of it locked in animated chatter.

She's laughing at something they said, and smiles when you enter.

"Sorry I'm late, coach."

It's nothing new and she waves you in with a smile. "Come in, poppet."

"Merlin," Marcus' shoulder finds yours and the force of the bump nearly sends you off your feet. "You'd be late to your own funeral hey, Puffers?"

You laugh, shoving him back with as much force as you can muster against the giant brute that is Slytherin captain Marcus Flint. It barely nudges him but he barks out a laugh, rough like tractor tires over crumbly concrete.

"I'm worth the wait." You quip back, leaning around Marcus to wink at Roger Davies. "Isn't that right, Rodger?"

He flirts back, "Always, sweetheart."

Roger is the antithesis of Marcus: all pale skin, blue eyes and short blonde hair. Easy on the eyes.

Oliver lingers just behind him, the tallest of the captains. You catch his eye, face slipping into something more serious, and nod. "Hey, Wood."

He nods in return, curt like how a ministry wizard's might be.

"Right," Hooch sits up straight in her high-back chair. "There are just a couple things we need to get through tonight, we won't be long."

The dynamic between the captains would be easy, if not for Oliver.

You're the only girl and that made for tough beginnings. Marcus is naturally brash and brutish, but - as you found - easy to impress with a couple showy tricks on the broom. A single promise to show him how to pull off a Woollongong Shimmy had him eating out your hand: the favour of a couple Slytherins was generally hard to buy and invaluable to a plushy Hufflepuff such as yourself.

Roger popped out the womb with a wink at the nurse. Impeccably charming and impossibly negotiable. Beyond being slightly dim, it was hard to say a bad thing about the Ravenclaw captain

On the other hand, Oliver was … well, Oliver.

Hooch tapped the sharp end of a writing feather rhythmically at a spot on her desk, eyes roving her clipboard.

"Next week we're doing a clean up of the supply room down by the pitch. I've set you each up on days, the whole team needs to be down to help unless they're excused by a teacher: I want a written letter."

She offers a piece of parchment without looking up.

"As you all know, it's the Slytherin versus Ravenclaw game next week."

You bump your elbow to Marcus'. He looks down and grins a mouthful of crooked teeth before turning to Roger. "Ready, pretty boy?"

Roger rolls crystal blue eyes, but he's smiling too. "Bring it on, tough-shit."

"Oy," Hooch interrupts them with a cool sigh, "The last thing, you all submitted your autumn practice requests for the pitch: Roger, Marcus, you have the days you want--"

They nod. Your shoulders stiffen.

"--Oliver, Y/n. You both want Wednesday afternoons. Monday afternoon is open, I'll let you two decide between each other who is gonna move their practice. I want a decision before tomorrow night."

Marcus is sniggering under his breath. The edges of your mouth sink into a frown, of course he wants the same day as me.

You can feel the heat of Oliver's eyes on the side of your face. You don't indulge him, keeping your gaze settled on Hooch's face.

"We'll figure it out, coach."

"Unlikely." Roger's quip is barely a whisper but you catch it.

"Alright." Hooch doesn't. "You're dismissed, go get some dinner kids."

The office door bounces back off the stone wall where Marcus tosses it carelessly open, echoing all the way down the empty corridor.

Frosty air chases over your face and the boys start down towards the Great Hall. Roger is complaining about a potions essay he hasn't started and Marcus is shrugging him off with a suggestion that includes something along the vein of blackmailing a sixth year into doing it for him but you can't focus long enough to follow.

"Oliver." Irritation is prickling at the surface of your skin. It flares into an almost rash when he stops walking, glancing over his shoulder with an unconcerned expression. "Who's giving Wednesday up?"

His arms fold against his chest. You're working extremely hard not to look down where his biceps stretch the seams on his Hogwarts jumper. "Well, you obviously."

Marcus barks another laugh, he calls down the corridor: "We'll see you kids at dinner."

"Yeah, don't kill each other! It's only practice!"

You huff in disbelief, unconcerned with the running commentary.

"Uh," you mirror Oliver by folding your own arms. "no it's not. Come on, we can negotiate like civil people can't we?"

Thick caterpillar eyebrows disappear beyond the overgrowth hiding his forehead. "Negotiate? I'm the one who wasted three hours of my life in detention last week thanks to your big fat mouth. Wednesday is mine."

"That was a joint effort, twat." You can feel where your throat is flush with rising anger. It wires your jaw tight. "Are you really so bloody difficult that we can't even come to a simple agreement?"

"Difficult?" His arms have shifted from his chest to perch against his hips. "Just because I'm not giving you what you want? Cry me a fucking river, darling. Sorry Puffers, but I'm not your precious Marcus or Roger. I'm not gonna fold just cause you bat yer pretty little eyelashes at me."

Pretty?

You blink in surprise. It's brushed quickly aside for more pressing matters. Your hands scrunch into fists at your side:

"Well. I'm not giving it up. I want Wednesday."

"Neither am I."

"Fuck you."

"In your dreams."

-

Oliver collapses loudly into the open spot at the Gryffindor dining table. His callousness knocks Archie's goblet of pumpkin juice across the shiny wooden surface between dishes of sausages and peas and roast potatoes.

"Bloody hell, what's got you in a mood?" He's patting down the table with a serviette, transforming it into a orange lump under his palm.

Shaking his head, as if it would joggle the thought of you loose, Oliver stabs a chicken drumstick from the top of a nearby pile with his fork. He doesn't respond.

"Wait, let me guess." Archie presses the elbows of his red jumper into the still wet surface beside his plate. "Something to do with your little Hufflepuff sweetheart?"

Oliver grunted around a mouthful, looking annoyed. "Not mine and not a sweetheart. A fucking brat."

Archie seems to find something funny, leaning back on the bench with a haughty laugh. "Right. What she do this time?"

"Wants the pitch the same day as me for practice." He's mumbling around a mouthful of chicken, tipping forward to shove a spoon teetering with peas alongside it. "Refuses to give in, despite the fact that she put me in detention last week with Burbage."

Shifting to the edge of his seat, Archie leans around Oliver's frame to find your figure across the Hall at the yellow-lined table. He nods, seemingly finding you. "Yeah, she don't look too happy either."

"I don't care."

Oliver is trying very hard not to give into the itch to look back.

"Whatever," Archie's gaze finds his again. "in better news ... I spoke to the twins just before dinner. They're still on for tomorrow."

He's twitching in his seat, eyebrows dancing and grinning around his words like a kid who's found a matchbox.

Right. The twins.

Specifically, Daisy and Delilah Dawson: two Ravenclaw sisters a year below Oliver.

They're peng, Archie had reasoned, you need a little fling to get your mind off quidditch. You're too strung up, mate.

And sure, they were, but Oliver had more important things to do than gallivant across Hogsmeade attached to the hip of some sixth year who just wants to earn her I Kissed The Quidditch Captain! badge.

He'd groaned and whined and glowered at the prospect. Was it petulant? Naturally, but spending five sickles on subpar hot chocolate and making false conversation with some Ravenclaw was a waste of precious time in Oliver's humble opinion.

His priorities are, as they've always been, crystal clear in his mind.

1. Win Gryffindor the Quidditch Cup 2. Refer to point (1)

There was little wiggle room for the introduction of girls into any spot on that list.

You're the only one who came almost close to the tight list. Only because if there had to be a third priority, "shove winning the cup in Hufflepuff's face" might just crack it. He thought about you significantly more than any other girl in the castle and maybe that might mean something if he thought about too long about it, but fortunately, he refused to.

Regardless, Archie was adamant and more than a little pathetic when he mentioned that Daisy only agreed to see him if he had a date for Delilah. It was all settled very quickly.

And it's in this show of loyalty to his dearest friend that Oliver finds himself walking the cobblestone path down into Hogsmeade on a crisp Saturday morning.

The little village is bustling with students - it normally is - and the crowd has him knocking shoulders with Delilah who's walking in step beside him.

He's uncomfortable to find that she's staring dreamily up at the underside of his jaw.

On Oliver's other side: Archie is talking Daisy's ear off, making another pitiful attempt at holding her hand. He doesn't quite manage it and Oliver can't tell whether it's because she genuinely doesn't notice or she just can't be arsed.

"So," Delilah's voice is light and sweet. Delicate. "You mentioned that you take Arithmancy? I've heard it's tough."

Oliver nods airily. "Yeah ... yeah, it's difficult."

He tightens his jacket closer over his frame. The wind is whipping between their bodies and he thinks that maybe she didn't hear him over it's howling if her confused expression is anything to go by. He finds he's not bothered enough to repeat it.

The entrance of Madam Puddifoot's comes into view at the end of the walkway.

Oliver’s relieved. It's freezing out here and maybe he'll be more in the mood for flirtatious conversation once he's gotten some food in his stomach (Archie had insisted they skip breakfast: we have to order something to eat, so we can sit longer).

There's a jingle of a bell overhead when Archie pushes the door open, standing awkwardly aside to let the ladies in first.

Inside the shop, it's more than busy: powdery blue walls barely visible beyond the sea of Hogwarts couples crammed around tiny circle tables and waiters in red uniform knocking the back of their chairs with wobbling trays.

There's music coming from ... somewhere, it sounds like The Weird Sisters and at the sound, Oliver can't imagine how this morning could possibly go any worse.

Oh wait, yes he can.

You could be sitting at a table right by the door across a too-small-table knocking knees with some Slytherin prick. Like you are right there right now.

Delilah tugs on his wrist, it's gentle and he almost doesn't feel where he's being lead between tables towards an open booth across the room. He falls unceremoniously down against the torn leather, eyes never leaving your table.

You haven't noticed his presence, he knows because your lips are stretching around a giggle he can't hear but can already imagine. You don't smile around him, that's for sure.

Oliver's stomach is frothing and bubbling and he's trying really hard to tune back in where Archie's knocking a menu into his hand.

Of course you're there. To ruin his mood and his day, because you're just bloody perfect at it.

"So, am I seeing you girls at the Quidditch match on Saturday?" Archie's voice carries somewhere over his head.

Delilah laughs. Or maybe it's Daisy, Oliver doesn't look.

"Maybe," she says, "Depends if Oliver's gonna be there. You're gonna be there, right?"

He feels a hand nudge at his forearm. Definitely Delilah.

His gaze floats back over the table to offer a fraction of eye contact, he nods. "Oh, uh ... yeah. Sure, definitely."

Archie saves him by speaking again and your table finds Oliver's attention just in time for him to watch the boy sitting across from you swipe away a smudge of hot chocolate over your cheek. You smile, looking bashful and a little bit flushed.

A suffocating, searing heat rushes from the soles of Oliver's feet up between his every organ and over every tendril of hair on his head. His jaw tightens.

Of course he recognises the pratt across you.

Ryo Yoshida.

Every girl in the castle's wet dream, if the rumours he's heard are anything to go by. With his fucking sleek black hair and his Japanese accent that had witches flocking to him in the dozens.

He doesn't wonder why you're here with him.

Oliver is a proud man, but even he could admit that you're beautiful. Albeit reluctantly.

With your wide wet eyes that make him a little sick in a way that turns his stomach warm and the way you do your hair and those fucking dangly earrings that clink when you loose your cool on him.

That's without even mentioning the sound of your laugh - the one he only ever overhears - and your legs in the school uniform skirt and the way you look when you're diving on your broom under the light of a sunny day.

Alright, maybe he couldn't admit to all of it ... but you were okay.

Okay enough to crack a date with Ryo Yoshida or any other schmuck in the castle if you wanted.

"Anything good to eat here, Oliver?"

He pretends he doesn't hear her at first, but the kick at his shin under the table is harder to ignore.

Archie is glaring at him across the table. Dude, don't fuck this up for me.

Oliver's eyes find Delilah. She's scooted up close under his elbow and, to be fair to the poor girl, she was pretty too. Red lipstick smeared across her smiling lips, painted nails edging closer to his arm and perfectly styled hair sitting over her shoulder.

He nods, reaching for the menu: "Yeah. Actually, last time I had the Merlin Meal and it was pretty good."

She perks up, cherry red smile widening at his reply. "Oh, I thought that looked good!"

Training his eyes on the menu, Oliver wills himself not to look back at you. You're already souring his mood and you haven't even said a bloody word.

It's just what you do. What you do to him: infuriating him with the threat of an argument around any and every corner.

The waiter comes by and Oliver finds himself generous enough to gift Delilah with an arm draped over the back of her seat. She giggles and he pretends he doesn't notice when she mouths something that looked suspiciously like 'he's so hot' to her sister across the table.

Archie seems pleased too. Daisy has granted him, finally, her hand and his arm bends at an awkward angle to maintain the grip in hers under the table. He's positively beaming.

But despite Oliver’s best efforts to stay engaged, he still catches himself - only when it's too late - and his eyes are already glued to watching the way your jeans are hugging your thighs where you shift in your seat.

Your table is sat by the door. The chime of the bell calls for his gaze every time it tolls and every time he finds you let off a violent shiver in your seat as the autumn crisp rolls over your shoulders.

The door shuts again and you still.

Oliver can feel where the tips of his ears are burning red and his bones are itching: Ryo’s black suede coat is hanging over the back of his chair.

You’re still talking - hands rubbing together, fighting for warmth - he’s leaned over with his chin in palm to listen and his jacket sits unused behind his shoulders while you fucking shiver in the breeze.

It’s pathetic, really. He’s not sure whether he’s referring to himself or you: but Oliver is still looking and you’re still shaking like a leaf and he’s halfway to flipping tables to get to you and just give you his own fucking coat so you’ll stop shaking and stop annoying him—

“Oliver was just telling me about wanting to join the Hogwarts Choir.” He turns again to find Archie waiting with an expectant face, it's laced in a little bit of smugness: caught you. "Weren't you, mate?"

When he looks back you’re gone.

There's a short pile of sickles abandoned on the table and he hopes that Ryo at least had the good sense to pay for your drink after forcing you to sit in the freezing cold.

He shakes the thought off. Who cares.

In fact, he hopes you catch a cold.

-

The day passes like swimming through molasses: slow and sticky and exhausting.

It's nearly seven when Oliver presses a sympathy kiss into Delilah's cheek - Daisy allows for no such thing from Archie - and the two sisters skip off down the west wing corridor with a wiggle of their fingers over their shoulders at the boys.

"I think that went well." Archie's grinning, hands on his hip and glasses edging down his brown nose.

It's the first thing that genuinely brings a jolt of life out of Oliver all day. He teeters back on his heels, hands gripping his stomach where he laughs. Laughs like a madman.

"I think you need to get yer fucking head checked, mate."

The tail end of his outburst is simmering down, now barely a breathy chuckle, when a voice washes over him from down the other end of the corridor. "Wood!"

He'd recognise that voice anywhere. From the dead of sleep or the depth of the ocean.

He's slow when he turns on his heel, the remnants of his smile dripping all the way off the edge of his jaw until he's nearly frowning.

You're jogging, scarf bouncing at your shoulder with the movement, and coming to a stop right under his chin.

"What?"

There's a sharp edge to his tone - there always is - but he really hopes you haven't noticed how the syllable wobbled at the end. Now that you're right beneath his frame and not across the room, it's harder to ignore the lashes kissing at the corner of your eyes. You're wearing lip gloss and he knows it's for Ryo.

His stomach is churning and your face is twisting into something he is struggling to recognise.

"I--" your hands wring, eyes flickering behind to where Archie's watching curiously (you wave awkwardly). "You ... you can have Wednesday."

It's not what Oliver is anticipating. He almost takes a full step back in surprise.

"Why?"

Your eyes roll in a comfortably familiar way, "Because Hooch wants an answer tonight and one of us had to be the bigger person."

His brow tightens, eyes roving down the stitching of your sweater. It's cute. He's quiet.

"You not gonna argue?" You throw your words quickly, snatching them back before he can answer: "Perfect. I'll send her an owl before bed."

You're marching back down the corridor before he has chance to say anything else and he's watching your retreating figure with the hope - that he’s not gonna address - you’re not going to cozy up somewhere in the Slytherin dorm room.

“Well.” Archie’s running a hand over his thick black curls. “That was unexpected.”

Oliver huffs. “It’s been a weird day.”

-

An uneasy air has settled over Hogwarts.

It came in like a storm front, drifting in on the wind that dropped the article at the door of the castle. 

The same copy of The Daily Prophet has been doing the rounds between dormitories and class rooms all week: Sirius Black, Azkaban’s most infamous prisoner and recent escapee, has been sighted in Dufftown by an astute Muggle, The Daily Prophet reports. 

Dufftown. A barely twenty minute ride by carriage from Hogwarts bridge. 

It’s got the castle on edge, it’s got you on edge. Creeping around the castle like Sirius Black is gonna jump out from around any corner. 

Dumbledore stationing dementors at the edges of the castle was the tipping point for the cold drip of trickling fear in your chest that's become easy to ignore in daylight - when Cherry and Enzo are flittering around you between classes - but in moments like these, like now, when you’re on the tail end of a quidditch practice, grow like a poisonous black vine up around every nerve in your body. A Monday night, the team’s kit weighing heavy in your arms - broomstick tucked precariously in the bend of one elbow - and following the siren call of the dormitory showers. 

You’d promised the team you’d get them to the house elves before the upcoming match on Saturday. The match against Gryffindor. 

But for tonight, they’re gonna live in a pile at the end of your bed. 

You’re exhausted: calves burning, sweat sticking loose hairs to your forehead and probably smelling like wet socks and broomstick polish. 

The touch of night is suffocating the flicker of the corridor lamps. It’s long past the recently set curfew and you know that if McGonagall finds you out you’re likely in deep enough trouble to get you off Saturday’s match roster. 

Despite the prospect, you don’t dwell on it. You find you’re more worried about escaped Azkaban convicts: the echo of your own footsteps setting you further on edge. 

You’ve craned your neck over your shoulder enough times to form a knot there. Each time you’re relieved to find that Sirius Black hasn’t crept up behind you. 

Suddenly, the squeak of your boots against the stone floor are un-alone. 

Someone is marching and right in your direction. Your heart bangs wildly on the inside of your ribcage - blood turning to an icy slurry in your veins, but you don’t move. 

The corner is sharp when the figure turns into the corridor you stand and the scream is halfway out your throat when your eyes find his face. 

Absent is the matted black hair and sunken eyes you’re anticipating. Instead, warm brown rings reflect the fire of the lit torches. 

Your broomstick clutters to the floor, warm relief flooding down to your fingertips. “Fucking hell, Wood.” 

He looks just as surprised as you. Only for a moment, though, before his gaze is tightening in annoyance again. 

“I thought you were Sirius Black.“ 

“Well that’s stupid isn’t it.” 

You huff, shifting the weight of the team’s robes precariously between your arms: squatting to try scoop up your broomstick off the floor again. You’re halfway successful when it clatters loudly back against the stone floor. 

“What are you even doin’ out here so late? You know curfew is passed, don’t you?” His voice curls with something that might be mistaken for concern if you didn’t know who you were talking to. 

“I could ask you the same thing.” 

You’re reaching down again. A robe on the top of the pile slips off, landing beside the broomstick. 

“Aye right. Whatever, goodnight.” 

He’s brushing past you. 

In a movement neither of you anticipated, driven by the fear shooting up your spine again, your hand finds his wrist. “Wait—“ 

Oliver freezes: eyes dropping to where you’re connected. You rip your hand back, as if scalded. 

“I …” the words mash and wrestle at the back of your throat. “Could …”

You glance down the darkened corridor awaiting you in the journey back to your dorm before meeting his face again. It’s unreadable. 

His brow scrunches. “Yes?"

"Could you want me to walk my common room?” 

Embarrassment sears at your cheeks. On a normal day, you’d sooner go dancing naked under the Whomping Willow before asking Oliver Wood a favour but that was before the image of Sirius Black swum behind your eyes everywhere you looked. 

Oliver would be fairly useless if faced with the criminal, naturally, but at least you wouldn’t die alone. 

“Please?” Your voice is quiet and you think it’s the gentlest word you’ve ever said to him. 

There’s a long stretch of quiet. His eyes flicker between your face and the broomstick on the floor. It’s quickly stretching past the blurring boundaries of an appropriate time for consideration. 

You’re practically melting in embarrassment now, electing to make the decision for him. 

“Never mind.” You squat again, successful this time in sticking the broomstick back under your arm. The dropped robe is more difficult but you manage to replace it. “Forget I asked.” 

Oliver’s moving before you’re stood straight up again. He’s reaching for your broomstick, you instinctively yank it back but he sticks you with a firm look and his thumb is unexpectedly soft where it caresses over your knuckle wrapped around the handle. 

Your grip loosens and he perches the broomstick over his shoulder with ease. He surprises you again by taking half the load of laundry in your arms into his own. 

“C’mon, before someone catches us out here. I’m not doing any more detention because of you.” 

He’s already three feet ahead when blood rushes down to your legs, prompting them to chase after his figure. The movement is easier, lightened by Oliver’s surprise act of kindness. 

You fall into step beside him, half-tempted to comment on his willingness to share your burden, but knowing him, one wrong word and he’d dump it all back into your arms. 

It’s quiet. 

You don’t make a move to talk and Oliver doesn’t look your way. It dawns on you that Gryffindor dormitory is in the other direction and you’re still deciding whether to feel guilty or flattered over the fact when Oliver speaks. 

“Why’re you out here alone?” 

You look, met with the side of his face: it’s still like he hadn’t said anything at all. There’s a tugging instinct to snap at him. 

Why do you care? 

But his tone is perceptibly gentle enough that you think maybe, just this once, it won’t end in an argument. You test the tepid waters. 

“Uh …” your head knocks sideways, tilted as you speak. “I let the team come up early while I sorted the quaffles in the sports closet by the pitch. Didn’t want them walking up in the dark.” 

You’re tempted to mention that it was his team last week that left it in such a mess. You don’t. 

"And now you’re walking in the dark yourself? Smart move, princess."

Your breath hitches. 

It’s not the first time he’s called you that. Princess. A couple times over the years, usually in the heat of a spiraling argument, but never so benign. While still ungentle, the tone is soft enough that it rings in your ears.

You choose not to succumb to the antagonization of his reply. Humming, you shrug. "Rather me than them."

His eyes flicker, almost barely, to the high apple of your cheek. You notice in the corner of your eye how his jaw twitches, like he wants to say something. 

He seemingly decides otherwise because he focuses his eyes ahead of him and stays silent. 

The overhanging ceiling art is sloping down, air going sticky with the scents of the kitchen the further you go: it’s the trademark of the approaching Hufflepuff common room. 

Another two turns and it will be the end of your little journey with Oliver Wood.

"‘M surprised Ryo didn’t walk you up."

You're more surprised than you've been since finding him, eyes widening in confusion. He grants you another look out the side of his eye.

"How do you know about that?"

Oliver shrugs, shifting your broomstick to the other shoulder.

"The whole world saw your little date down at Madam Puddifoot's the other day."

Of course. Word travels faster through seventh year than a new Firebolt.

"Yeah. Well." You hum. "That's not gonna be happening again anytime soon.” 

It had all been good and well. The rush of having Ryo Yoshida, Hogwart's most eligible bachelor, ask you out and - to be fair - the date had been fine. Ryo was funny and made good conversation but nothing near thrilling enough to daydream over and you'd allowed yourself to brush over a couple red flags because of it, until Cherry came bursting into your dormitory less than a day after your date relaying how he'd caught her between classes to ask her out to the same spot.

"Why's that?"

You're confused now, why Oliver cares or how he'd become curious enough to actually ask. You're even more confused as to why you decide to answer him. You shrug, "He asked Cherry out the very next day. She said no, obviously, but that was enough to let the whole thing go."

You expect him to say something malicious, quip something spiteful about What you did you think would happen? You're nowhere near in his league.

He doesn't.

"He's an idiot."

Not for the first time in the last five minutes, you're not sure what to say. You think this is the longest a conversation has gone without an argument. You sigh, "Yeah."

The stack-up of barrels comes into view. You dig into you the deep pocket on the inside of your robe, emerging with your wand.

Oliver stops, eyes flickering between the barrels and his shining black boots.

You step ahead, tapping the barrels in the rhythm that's become second-nature and the entryway opens.

Turning to him, you offer out an arm and he sets the robes back into your hands. The awkwardness is stifling. He leans forward, tucking the broomstick under your arm, hand wavering to make sure it doesn't fall again. The gesture makes the hold in your knees wobbly.

He nods. "Right. Goodnight."

You nod back, so quickly that you hear your earrings jingle. "Yeah, g'night."

Oliver turns, marching back the way you came and you watch him: biting your bottom lip so hard you're half expecting to draw blood.

"Thank you!" It leaps from your mouth before you have you moment to let it marinate on your tongue. You wince immediately.

He pauses, turning halfway on his heel. He smiles, it's not wide enough for teeth, but definitely wide enough to have your heart falling through your stomach. He nods again and then he's gone.

-

Saturday arrives gloomy and dripping.

It makes for good quidditch conditions, but the chill in the air is still hard to ignore when you step out into mushy grass under stadium lights. The roar of the crowd nearly deafens you, but it'll only take a couple minutes in the air for it to burn down to a soft hum.

In the middle of the stadium floor: Hooch is standing with a whistle to her lips, her figure blurred by the drizzle. Oliver stands beside her, and behind you, your team is clambering onto their brooms and rising into the air with the freshly washed kit over their backs.

You go to walk, but the icy glance Oliver is sending your way convinces you into a jog. He's always impatient before a game, itchy, antsy.

"On time as usual." Hooch hums when you land beside her.

"Got the whole bloody school waiting on her." Oliver mutters but Hooch shrugs him off, pulling the game coin out from inside her robes.

"Perfect." She positions it so we can see, "Gryffindor?"

Oliver straightens out, chest swelling: "Heads."

Hooch nods and before you can suck in another breath, the coin is in the air. She catches it with a skilled hand, flipping and revealing it to the set of captains.

"Hufflepuff, first ball!" She shouts loud enough that the floating players can hear. They nod, some groaning.

The coach turns back on the captains, "I want a fair game kids, no fighting."

"Me and Ollie? Fight?" You smile, "Never, coach."

Oliver rolls his eyes. "Yes, coach."

Suddenly you're above the pitch, sucking in breaths of wet air and struck with that familiar feeling like you could conquer the world on just your broomstick.

The quaffle flies and you stoop to catch it, twisting around Alicia Spinnet to snatch the ball before she's even noticed you're there.

Rain pelts on heads and the game goes on.

Oliver is shouting like a madman from his place in front of the goals behind you - you’ve long learnt to drown it out. He does it half to annoy his own team and half to distract yours. 

You're spinning, flying, swooping and - as you predicted - the crowd has become a distant call, a blurring sight of yellow and red.

An hour passes and the game is already halfway into the next when there's a rise in the crowd. It's not the normal yells and whoops and hollers, but you still don't look up: you're calling over to Jane and Wyatt, your beaters.

“Get between the twins, and stay there!” 

Below, Harry Potter and your own seeker, Cedric Diggory, are flying in circles around each other. The call of Cedric's name is on the tip of your tongue when there’s another ripple of sound off the crowd and this one draws your eyes. It’s there for a second before you find the army of figures descending on the pitch. 

Your breath catches in your throat, freezing solid so you can’t swallow. 

The dementors are even more ghostly this close. You'd never seen so many.

A darkness is permeating the air, the sight of the supporters in the stand dissipating into black. They’re floating in from every corner, drifting at a pace that’s too fast for you to make a move in any direction. 

There’s a scream and your gaze finds the body falling through the sky: it’s Harry.

The ground is racing up to meet him and adrenaline drives your hand to tip your broom, to chase after his quickly disappearing shape when a blurry figure blocks your way. 

Someone yells your name but you don’t hear it. 

You’d never imagined examining a dementor, much less this up close, but even if you had: nothing your imagination could conjure up would ever come close to the harrowing darkness of its empty eye-sockets. 

Its silhouette spreads over every corner of your vision, black like night and blocking the view of the sky. Your nose is so close you could tip forward and meet it's silken cloak.

A cold washes over your body like you've never felt, like you're freezing over: ice creeping up your fingertips, shoulders and face.

Your brain looses all grip on thought, replaced with a seeping dread. It barely acknowledges where a scabbed, decomposing hand is reaching out to you.

Charcoal fingertips brush your cheek when you're tugged back, all the way off your broomstick.

There's not even a last coherent thought to panic when you're engulfed in a warm chest, a hand stabilising around your waist onto a new broomstick. It dips and the green grass is reaching up to you.

The new heat engulfs you through to your bones. You grasp blindly for the expanse of a thick veined neck, wrapping yourself around him.

Digging your face into his shoulder, it takes one glance at the scarlet robes to know who it is. Oliver's panting, one hand holding you against him while the other steers the broomstick down to the floor.

You're trembling, no thought occupying any space beyond Oliver, Oliver, Oliver, Oliver--

"What the bloody hell were you thinking?"

The voice is distant, said against your temple but echoing as if from the end of a long corridor. You don't register where hot tears are wetting your cheeks, erupting over your face without being called.

His words prompt you closer: a tight arm furling over his shoulders and wrapping around him like a vine around an old tree.

"O-Oliver ..."

The hand over your waist tightens. "Sh ... it's fine. You're fine."

The broomstick lands shakily, Oliver's boots squelching into muddy grass. You barely realise you're back on ground when another hand is tugging you off, but you cling tighter to the sweaty red neck: shaking your wet face against his well-pressed robes.

"C'mon, princess ..." His calloused hands pry you from him, gently like you're a piece of china sitting on the very edge of a high shelf. "It's Pomfrey, she's gonna look after you."

You think you feel a kiss press into your hairline before you're being scooped up into a new set of arms. Madam Pomfrey is warm too, smelling like antiseptic and maple syrup.

There's another swell of noise erupting from the supporters above and you're being lead away.

Oliver watches your figure, slumped against the school nurse until you've disappeared into the medical tent.

His heart is going wild, slamming against the walls of his ribcage. Beside him his hands are shaking and he's sucking in thick gulps of air, he finds it still isn't enough oxygen.

There's another splatter where Angelina has landed a few feet behind him. She's panting too, tugging on the edge of his robes and pointing up into the sky.

"Wood!" She's frantic, "They won, Cedric caught the snitch!"

His mouth is dry when he swallows. Rain catches in his eye when he looks up, half the Hufflepuff team is no longer in the sky and the Gryffindors are all on their way down.

"I ..." feeling is returning to his fingertips, "is ... where's Harry?"

Angelina points in the direction of the medical tent. Above, the pitch is engulfed in a bright white light and Oliver catches the wispy end of a shining phoenix chasing between disappearing Dementors. It's a patronus. Dumbledore's, Oliver figures somewhere in his muddy brain.

"Is everyone else okay?"

Angelina nods. Her eyes flicker to the medical tent then back at him. "Is she?"

The image returns to him: the mass of darkness engulfing your figure in the sky. The terror that ripped through him like he was being torn apart from the inside, the whistle of the wind that stung over his ears and how it blocked out his mutterings of please, please, please--

He shakes his head. "She's too tough for her own good. She'll ... she'll be fine."

But it comes out like he's trying to convince himself more than Angelina.

-

Oliver doesn't see you for a few days.

Two, to be exact, and his skin itches the entire time. A deep itch, like it's coming from his bones.

It's only on Monday evening at dinner, with the Hufflepuff table whooping, that you come strolling back into the light of his eyes.

Your head is down, flushed with all the attention, and when you sit, kids are rising from their seats to tackle you into side hugs. He can tell you're embarrassed but he can't gather himself enough to care: the warm rush of relief flooding his stomach so much so that if he dared open his mouth it would all come rushing out.

You look fine. All limbs attached and smiling, it settles him.

He doesn't snap at Archie when he knocks his shoulder with a "you're staring" and his dinner suddenly looks more appetising when he peels his eyes off your figure down to his plate. He finds that he doesn't care as much as he usually does where Enzo's lanky arm is strung over your shoulder.

The week passes in a flurry.

While you share several classes, Oliver doesn't share a single word with you. It's hard not to notice that you're working very hard not to interact with him.

In Muggle Studies, you arrive late and keep your nose tucked deep into the pages of a textbook he knows you couldn't care less about. You're up and out of the classroom before he's even zipped up his bag. It's the same in Potions and Arithmacy.

While going days without talking to each other is not unusual, this time he can tell it’s on purpose. He pretends that he doesn't care.

The rain has cleared and when Friday arrives the sunset is red and orange and purple, granting Oliver with a rare enchanting view out his bedroom window where it's setting behind the East tower.

It's in this quiet, peaceful moment that Archie comes bouncing in with some news of a party happening in the Ravenclaw dormitory.

He's indifferent but Archie is nothing if not convincing.

"Come on, dude. You're literally a hermit crab." He sighs, falling back against his own poster bed across Oliver's. "There will be girls."

"There's girls everywhere, Arch."

His eyebrows wiggle, "And alcohol."

It takes a bit more pestering and the Weasley twins rushing in after him with the same news (and a far less patient approach) to get him up off his bed.

He digs in his cupboard for the last pair of clean jeans and a somewhat suitable purple jumper, tugging them on with a grumble, before he's being dragged by both arms - a twin on each side - across the castle to the West tower wherein resides the Ravenclaw population.

The common room is bustling with seventh years, he recognises them from all houses, and a table set up to the side with some trays of food. He's barely made himself comfortable when Katie Bell is shoving a red solo cup into his hand:

"It's Angelina's brew." She informs him.

He can believe that. The liquid is strong, burning down his throat followed by the barely there after-taste of pumpkin juice. Oliver downs the whole thing in one go.

The music swells louder and he's three cups of Angelina's concoction deep when you come tumbling through the entrance portal.

You're drunk yourself, he can tell by the way you're giggling and half leaning on Cherry Stretton. Bumping through people, not passing without leaning back to apologise to them tipsily, you head straight into the arms of Angelina and Alicia Spinnet. They smile in surprise, engulfing you in their arms.

Despite his and your long-held rivalry, it had done nothing to stop the rest of his team from sweetening up to you. The twins called you their favourite yellow tie at regular intervals and the girls found you nothing less than endearing. Oliver could lie and say he hated it.

Instead, he wrestles his way to where Katie is situated with more to drink, filling his cup and downing it.

-

The room is twisting in a flurry of colours and faces and it's the lightest you've felt in almost a week. You giggle against Enzo, his dreads tucked safely back in a bun while Cedric sets a Dragon-Barrel Brandy shot on fire and hands it carefully over.

Enzo's head knocks back, slipping the burning liquid down his throat with a wince. There's a cheer at his accomplishment, and suddenly Cedric's knocking your elbow: "you're next, Cap!"

After the match-gone-wrong, Madam Pomfrey had held you down in the infirmary until Monday morning. You were fed copious amounts of chocolate - in the form of bars and drinks and cakes and ice creams. By Saturday night you were - surely a couple kilograms heavier - and feeling fine, but Pomfrey was nothing if not paranoid:

"That was no light ordeal you went through, dear. I'm not letting you out of my sight until I'm happy with you."

In all honesty, you'd prefer if the whole school forgot it ever happened.

If Pomfrey didn't fret and your friends didn't come by every meal time and your team stopped sending you get better! letters and nobody mentioned it ever again.

More than anyone, you wished Oliver would forget. The ordeal, or maybe just you as a person.

You'd made a stupid decision under the heat of stadium lights and the influence of racing adrenaline, trying to chase for Harry, and he'd made a stupider decision coming to save you from yourself.

When it got quiet in the infirmary past dusk and Harry's shadowy figure was long since snoring in the bed across yours, you could feel Oliver's touch. Could feel it's strong hold wrapped around your waist and the voice against you the back of your neck and the lips at your temple.

You never reminisced long: for with his touch came the writhing, scalding fear burrowing a hole in your chest.

He could tease you, he will tease you.

Oliver had saved you from the clutches of a dementor moments from your soul being sucked out your body and you'd cried in his chest the whole time, refused to let him go in front of the whole school. It was a mortification you would never live down. And if Oliver decided he was going to use it against you, even once, you were sure you'd melt into the floor in shame.

It's what's made the Firewhiskey and Lemon squash concoction Cherry had handed you back in her room so easy to toss back. It stung and steam rose out your mouth where you'd panted for air. There was another ... and another, they went down the same.

The walk across the castle to reach the Ravenclaw Tower had been wobbly and you'd laughed with your friends loud enough to wake up the whole castle you're sure, but it dissolved the fear that clung to your bones. The fear that he was here, lingering between the people in the crowded blue common room.

Now the liquor is fading. Numbing to a dull buzz and you decline Cedric's offer at a burning shot, thinking about how proud you'll be of yourself when you wake up tomorrow morning in bed rather than wrapped around a toilet seat and hauling up guts into the bowl.

The party, not unlike yourself, is dimming.

Students are crawling away into all corners, each with their own excuse. I have a potions essay to do or No, dude, I'm too drunk for this or Flint wants us down at the pitch for drills at eight tomorrow morning, I gotta head to bed.

The crowd, though thinning, is beginning to clump into respective circles across the room. You glance annoyed at the fireplace where the flames crack merrily. Even with your short skirt and thin satin top, the heat of the common room is stifling.

Enzo is on his fourth burning shot, it's lost it's appeal to the crowd but he seems undeterred, knocking Cedric in the shoulder with the empty shot glass motioning: another! You yawn, playing mindlessly with the ruffled sleeve of your shirt.

"Oh no," A harsh tug at your hand draws you from the lure of sleep that's fogging your mind. "The night is young, no yawning!"

Cherry has your wrist in her grip, Enzo's in the other. He blinks blearily down at his friends.

"Huh?"

"Come on," Cherry's brown eyes roll far back in her head. "Fred says they're starting Seven Minutes In Heaven. Let's go join--"

"Seven minutes--?" you laugh between words, "Cher, are you mad?"

She whines, pouting like a kicked dog. "It'll be fun. Besides, when last did you have a good fucking snog? Too long, I say!"

Somehow, you're not only convinced across the room into a spot onto the floor in a circle of a couple others, but a drink has ended up in your hand and its contents quickly down your gullet.

For the nerves, you assure yourself.

Before you know it, Angelina - who's conveniently settled beside you - is topping up your plastic cup with a nearly empty bottle of Daisyroot Draught. "This is the good stuff. Katie stashed it in, her sister works at a brewery."

You smile nervously, nod, and take a tentative sip. The pre-existing buzz in your head convinces you it's not so bad.

In the circle is a couple Gryffindors you recognise, some giggling Slytherin girls, a Ravenclaw you can't name and three members of your quidditch team. There's an open spot on the side you don't take note of.

That is until Archie Kumar is steering a grumpy, visibly drunk Oliver Wood into the open place and collapsing beside him.

Your breath catches in your throat, heart sinking into your stomach like a stone. You're halfway off the floor, suddenly desperate for the loo, when Cherry - on your left side - drags you back down to the floor.

Maybe it's Katie's sister's brew, but you tumble too easily back onto your bum.

"Relax. Just don't look at him, okay?"

You suck in another breath, eyes trained on the white moon outline sewn into the rug. "Yeah ... okay."

It doesn't hold long and when you find the Gryffindor captain again, his gaze is trained on your face. It's stone cold. You gasp quietly and look away.

"Right!" George Weasley is on his feet, setting an empty Firewhisky bottle into the centre. "Who's first?"

Alicia shuffles forward on her knees, the first of the group to move, and the bottle goes spinning. It lands on the Ravenclaw boy. He grins and she does too: Fred wolf-whistles when they stand.

The "heaven" in question is a tall oak cabinet leaning against the back wall of the common room. The pair disappear into its depths and conversation rises again as the circle waits.

You sip your drink in large gulps, trying to hold conversation with Angelina against Oliver's hot gaze that's burning a hole through the side of your face. It's difficult: the Gryffindor girl is so drunk that she's talking with her eyes closed.

Seven minutes later, there's a chorus of "time's up!", Alicia and the boy emerge another ten seconds later. They're rearranging their clothes and Alicia is as scarlet as her quidditch robes. The boy is grinning like the cat who caught the canary. You're suddenly struck with the violent urge to throw up.

The game goes on like that, round after round. Lee Jordan and Jane Emmet (your beater), Katie and Wyatt (your other beater), Cherry and a pretty Slytherin girl you don't know - she's especially chuffed when she returns, red lipstick smeared over her chin.

You're working very hard not to look at Oliver, much less think about him, but it's proving difficult. Every time the bottle takes its spin, your stomach churns.

It had occurred to you during the time that Alicia and that boy were in the closet that there was a very real chance that Oliver could be called up when one of those pretty Slytherins take their turn at the bottle. The thought had made you down the last of your drink and immediately want to vomit it all back up into your cup.

The image of their slender arms curling around his criminally wide-set shoulders, Oliver pushing them back against the inside wall of the grand closet. Would he make noise? Would he sigh or groan against their lips or whisper something about how beautiful they looked tonight in their ears--

"Ollie, you're up mate."

You can't remember who said it, but the words stripped your gaze off Angelina and straight into the pooling brown eyes you'd been avoiding all week long.

He sighed, grumbling under his breath and only with a less-than-gentle nudge from Archie, did he lean up on thighs that flexed unfairly -- bloody hell, stop it! -- and wrap his hand over the neck of the bottle: it went spinning.

The only sound you could hear was the twist of the glass against the woven rug and the hum of your own blood rushing past your ears. It stopped.

"No fucking ways." Enzo cracked from two people down.

A hand landed on your shoulder, shaking you half off your arse: Angelina. "You're up, babe! Go!"

The bottle was pointing irrefutably at your little spot in the circle.

Oliver's face was as white as you'd ever seen it when you dared look up.

"I-I'm not going in with him--" It was the first thing that came to your mind and went spluttering out your mouth.

George was laughing so hard that he'd fallen all the way onto his back. The roar of the group was ear-splitting.

"There's no ways I'm going in with her!"

"Let's end this feud once and for all," Katie bellowed over their heads. "Captain versus captain!"

You're being knocked from all sides, hands crawling under your arms and lifting you off the floor. Across the circle, Oliver is experiencing the same and before you know it: the wooden doors of the cabinet are creaking open.

"Go on!" Lee's finger is piercing your side.

Oliver is beside you but you won't look. You take one last look over your shoulder at Cherry back on the floor, she does nothing but offer a sympathetic shrug and mouths "sorry, dear".

Your hand reaches before Oliver's, flinging the door open with maybe a little too much force. It bangs against the wall behind it.

"Let's get this over with." You mumble, only half concerned that he heard you.

You slouch climbing in, the top is low and the space is even more cramped than what you assumed. To your surprise, Oliver is stepping in after you. He takes his turn at slamming the door, shutting it this time.

It's dark inside, but not enough that you can't see. Light is peaking in through the cracks and he's leaned back against the opposite wall to you.

In the narrow space, your legs are twisting around each other to stand: his one knee situated between yours. In the dimness, he folds his arms and you notice for the first time the jumper he's wearing. The purple one, you recognise it as the one he's had for years. Time has taken its toll where the jumper is clinging to life around his frame, Oliver having grown at least three times wider while the jumper has remained the same size.

"Go on, Wood, give her a kiss!"

The voice is unrecognisable but it knocks your tongue back into your mouth where you'd been ogling at his torso.

His arms are folded, proffering you with a glare that could cut through steel. He makes no visible sign that he'd heard the shout at all. You mirror him, folding your own arms.

"I'm not kissing you."

His head cocks. "Oh, so you're talking to me now?"

You suck in a sharp breath. It's not the response you're anticipating. "What?"

"So we're playing dumb?" He leans just a fraction closer. You can smell the linger of alcohol on his breath, but it doesn't work hard enough to drown out the smell of peppermint that follows him around. "Doesn't suit you, princess."

"I'm not playing anything. I don't know what you're talking about." You double down. It's probably not sustainable but the heat of his body almost against yours and the thrum of liquor in your blood makes the decision for you.

"Y've been avoiding me all week."

"I haven't"

"You're a bad liar."

You swallow hard. Embarrassment is rising again, making your head spin. Oliver's chest is puffed up in anger, you can tell because you've had five years to learn the look like the back of your hand. Except, now - as it has been for a longer time than you care to admit - it's harder to focus on the waves of fury reflecting off of him when his face is just so ... beautiful. Nose scrunched and lips pulled tight into a grimace.

It's what makes you change tactics, you think.

"So what if I was? Why does it matter?"

His arms unfold, eyes rolling so far that his head knocks back against the wood of the cupboard.

"Why?" you press, "Did you miss me, Wood?"

"Maybe I did."

He's looking at you again. For what feels like the hundredth time just tonight, your breath escapes you in a rush and your lungs struggle to grasp back at it. Your face softens without meaning to.

You blink at him.

"You did?" It's a whisper.

His arms are still folded but something clement passes like a shadow over his features.

"No."

His face betrays his words, eyes soft and lip daring to curl up at the edge.

The air in the tight space goes cold. Or maybe it's your blood. It's more likely the look on Oliver's face: like he hasn't just turned your organs to slush. You're all the way sober now.

"I'm not kissing you." You repeat dumbly, but it's gentle.

Merlin, you want to kiss him so fucking badly.

"You mentioned." He's almost, almost, smiling. It's gentle too.

The space between you falls quiet. You're suddenly overly focused on the brush of his knee between yours. His swirling brown eyes catch on the split of light creeping in past the hinge on the door.

It stays like that until your voice creeps nervously out. "I was embarrassed. Am, I am embarrassed."

A thick brow tightens in confusion. "Why?"

You huff, almost annoyed. Your eyes train on a dark spot by your intertwined feet. "Come on, Wood."

"What, about the match?" The alcohol thickens his accent.

Your silence seems to answer his question. The apples of your cheeks are warming again.

"What was I supposed to do, leave you to have you bloody soul sucked out yer body?" His voice is rising, "No, princess, I'm not apologising for that."

It's an outpour that you're not expecting. Oliver's clearly in the mood to shock and surprise tonight.

Your lips tighten around the words that are all fighting for the spot at the tip of your tongue. Silence reigns while they argue, he's still watching you with exasperation set into the lines of his face.

"Princess." You settle.

His expression twists again. "What?"

"You always call me that. Why?" It's a question that you buried long ago. But his proximity, in conjunction with the night you've had, unearths it.

It's his turn to look surprised. He grumbles some indiscernable Scottish blabber before-- "It's because y'are a princess. Spoilt and bratty. Always gets her way."

There's no malice to his response, you find. It draws a chuckle from the depths of your chest.

"Aye, right." You mimic his accent and his quip, one he's used many times at you.

He laughs. It's not a sound you hear often and it's setting your whole nervous system alight like a tangled bunch of christmas lights. His whole body's shaking with it, head resting back against the wood again, and you really do think you might grab him and kiss him -- when the door flies open again: seeping his whole body in yellow light.

Alicia's standing at the opening, grin wide as night is wide and clearly expectant on catching you with your tongues down each other's throats.

If she'd given you another three seconds she just might have.

"Oh." She slumps in disappointment, looking back over her shoulder and shaking her head to the expectant crowd. They groan collectively. "Well, love birds, your time is up."

You'd almost forgotten where you were. Oliver clears his throat, the ghost of his laugh impossible to find on his face, and clambers over your legs out into the common room again. He doesn't pass without brushing his hand over yours.

-

It's nearly three in the morning when Enzo finally lets up.

His long legs are sprawled across the midnight blue couch in the middle of the common room. Fiona, a lovely Ravenclaw girl you'd met just tonight, shrugs at you: "Don't stress it. He can crash here tonight."

The party is long since dead. Seven Minutes In Heaven had looped another three rounds before everyone had gotten their chance in the dusty cupboard and began to grumble in boredom.

You'd avoided Oliver's eyes the whole time again, sure that if you looked he'd be able to read the fondness on your face.

It wasn't long after that the last of the students dissolved in the direction of their respective bedrooms. With your dear friend in good hands with the Ravenclaws, you loop your arm with Cherry - knocking against her side towards the portal.

You've barely pushed it ajar when she breaks off you, "Hold on, I need to get my Transfig notes from Jacob!"

"Cher, it's three in the morning?"

Alcohol is directing her legs in the opposite direction clumsily, "I'll wake him. If I fail another quiz, Mcgee's gonna have my arse."

She's gone before she catches your call: "I'll find you outside!"

The portal creaks where you shove it open again. The corridor is dimly lit and colder than the common room and a shiver chases up your exposed legs.

"Bloody hell." You run a hand over your forearms.

It's quiet too, and empty besides the Gryffindor captain leaning against the stone wall closest to the entrance you've just emerged from.

"Merlin," your eyes find his. "Not you again."

The flush over your cheeks is warding off the chill.

Oliver shrugs. "Me again."

An awkward silence permeates. Against better judgement, you shuffle forward, leaning against the wall beside him. He doesn't react, arms folded and staring into the inky abyss of the corridor leading out to the rest of the castle.

"Why're you out here?" You ask, tucking your hands between your back and the wall.

"Archie." He huffs out, voice wrapped in annoyance. "He's in there with Penelope. I gave him ten minutes."

Ah, Penelope Clearwater. She'd joined the game in the last round. A good thing too because Oliver's friend was looking more crestfallen as the bottle spun again and again, surpassing him each time. Penelope had taken the last turn, ending up with her hair in every direction and Archie's spectacles leaning half off his face when they emerged from the cupboard.

"You?"

The eddy of average conversation is strange, but you find you like it.

"Cherry." You hum. "Something about quiz notes."

He drops his head back against the wall.

"That what they calling it now?"

It startles you, head tilting to stare up at the side of his face with a grin: "oh, Wood’s got jokes now? I didn’t know it was possible for you to make a joke."

His eyes flutter shut, a twinkle of laughter bubbling out of his frame. Tucking his head down to his chest, he shrugs against his own light chuckle. "I have them. I just don’t share them with you."

You giggle back at him. "Right. Well then you better stop smiling there, someone might walk past and think we’re friends."

He shakes his head, the sound of his snicker fading but leaving behind the imprint of a smile. "Nobody’s gonna think that."

You lean back again, eyes drifting over the low ceiling. Quiet falls again - not uncomfortable - and you let it linger for a moment. A thought tugs on a loose string in your mind, not a new one, but one you’ve carefully buried over time.

It comes falling out your mouth. "You ever think about how it might be ... if things were different?"

The question grants you a look out the side of his eye. "Different?"

"Y’know," you shrug, the very last remains of alcohol are ebbing and unsureness is replacing where it stood. "If we … we had—"

"If you hadn’t suckered me in the bloody nose?" His words are unexpectedly fond.

You laugh at him, "If you hadn’t deserved to be suckered in the bloody nose."

He draws in a long breath, not answering. It prompts you.

"We could have been friends." You whisper, more to your chest than to him really.

But he hears it. "We would never be friends."

It stings sharper than it should. Your shoulders go stiff and the corners of your eyes sting inexplicably, turning the corridor blurry. A dying fire revives in your chest, blistering the cave, reminding you why Oliver Wood has been nothing but a stake in your side since you were thirteen years old.

"Of course. How stupid of me, for a minute I forgot what an absolute arsehole you are." You push off the wall, intent in going to dig out Cherry from the depths of the Ravenclaw dormitory. "Goodnight, Wood."

An arm wraps around your waist, not unlike it'd done a week ago in the air of the quidditch pitch, lurching you into him until you're pressed back against the cool stone of the corridor wall.

Oliver looms over you, crouched so that your nose bumps against his. "Don't sulk, princess."

It all happens at once: his hands grab onto the fat of your hips, digging in there like he really does hate you, and lips crash against yours like maybe he doesn't at all.

He stays there, unmoving for a second that feels a year long.

Where the inside of your brain had been buzzing with runaway threads of thought, ribbons streaking out in all directions: they disappear in a sizzling light. Oliver Wood is kissing me.

You melt against him, tipping up onto your toes and latch onto muscled shoulders. He seemingly takes that as his cue, pressing you closer against his body with his arm - lifting you half off the wall.

He tastes like the remnants of Firewhisky and pumpkin juice, the flavour setting every nerve ending in your body on fire. Lips soft but persistent while his hands grip onto you like you'd dissolve into dust if he didn't.

It's aggressive, but familiar in that way. Oliver is nothing if not hot-blooded and his touch, darting between your hips and your face is turning you tipsy again.

"If you want a friend," It's muffled when he speaks, punctuating his words with hot wet kisses, "go be friends with Ryo."

It's only in this moment, with his desperation mirroring in the glimpses of sugar brown irises you catch where he's fluttering his eyes over your face, that it dawns on you.

"Jealous much?"

He growls lowly and it makes you giggle against him, your hands slithering up into the hairs at the base of his neck. Oliver shakes his head against you, still huffing in disbelief.

"Shut up." It's accent-heavy and bleeds a hole through the bottom of your stomach. "You're such a fucking brat."

"And you're a fucking prick."

He huffs lowly, you press harder to him: solidifying the sentiment. Somehow the bickering makes it all sweeter, like you're dissolving cotton candy against your tongue where his swoops over it.

You'd just about forgotten where you were when a creak echoes down the corridor. Halfway to ignoring it in favour of Oliver's touch, your situation dawns on you in the same moment it does him.

Like you'd both licked the end of a live wire, you and Oliver jolt back a foot, hands diving to your respective sides.

Cherry is standing against the light of the common room behind her, a lanky Archie parked beside her. Their eyes are wide and Cherry's hand is against her jaw in shock.

"Oh my god." She mumbles against it.

Blood is rushing to your face and out the corner of your eye, Oliver is running a hand over the hair that's sticking in all directions from the influence of your fingers.

Cherry is laughing breathily, eyes still wide and white in surprise. "Oh my god."

Archie's eyes are flickering between you and Oliver.

"Sorry to interrupt." He says, a smirk curling onto his features.

It jumpstarts your entire system. You step forward, grabbing Cherry by the arm.

"Well," you nod at Archie and at Oliver, not daring to meet his eyes, "goodnight then."

You march with fervour, half-dragging her in the direction of the Hufflepuff common room until your figure disappears behind the next corridor.

Oliver stands with his hands hanging at his side dumbly. He swipes a finger of his bottom lip, still tasting the strawberry lip gloss you'd left there.

"Can't say I didn't see this coming, mate." A hand claps over his shoulder.

He groans, running both hands over his face, and Archie shakes him lightly.

"So ... how was it?"

With another groan, Oliver shoves Archie's hand off of him. "Bloody hell, Arch."

Archie throws his head of curly black hair back, laughing so loud it bounces off the wall. "That good, huh?"

(part two/final part)

-

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[firewasabeast]

prompt: tommy's dad shows up at the 118 out of nowhere

heads up: Tommy's dad is a homophobic asshole here, and he acts as such. Also contains references to past child abuse (hit with a belt, and knocking a kid)

Bobby was in the middle of cooking dinner with Buck, the rest of the team hanging out on the sofa, when the newest probie, Jones, came walking up the stairs. “Uh, Cap? There's a man here who wanted to talk to you.”

The man followed closely behind Jones, who went right back downstairs to continue with whatever he had been up to.

Bobby wiped his hands off on a towel before walking over to the man. “I'm Captain Nash- Bobby,” he introduced, shaking the man's hand. “How can I help you?”

“Good to meet you, Bobby,” the man replied. His shake was firm, almost aggressive. “I'm actually here looking for my kid. Haven't heard from him in a while and last he told me, he was workin' here.”

As much as Buck was trying not to be obviously nosy, he couldn't help but keep glancing over at the guy. He looked so familiar, but Buck couldn't quite place him. When the man caught Buck's eyes, he quickly looked away and grabbed a nearby can, pretending to fiddle with it.

“I'll help how I can. What's his name?”

“Thomas Kinard. I'm his father, Richard.”

The can Buck was holding dropped onto the counter with a loud thud. Everyone's head whipped in his direction.

“S- Sorry. It, um, it slipped from my, uh, my hand.”

“Uh,” Bobby turned back to Richard, “I'm sorry Mr. Kinard, but Tommy hasn't worked here in about seven and a half years.”

“Figures.” Richard shook his head. “Damn kids'll screw you over every chance they get, won't they?”

Buck hurried over to introduce himself before Bobby could even manage a response.

“Mr. Kinard, hi,” he started, wiping his hand on his pants before reaching out for a shake. “I'm Buck. Evan, um, Evan Buckley. You can call me Evan, or Buck, whichever.”

Richard stared at him in a way that Buck wasn't exactly sure what he was thinking. “Buck's a strong name. I like strong names. We'll go with Buck.”

Buck nodded. “Sure. That- That's fine.”

“So, Buck, did you work with Tom before he left here?”

That's when it hit Buck. If this man didn't even know where Tommy worked, he definitely didn't know Buck was his boyfriend. He could feel himself begin to sweat. Could sense everyone's eyes on him. “Um, no, I- I mean, yes. I work with him, um, sometimes, but not- we didn't work together h- here. So, no.”

Richard snickered. “Cat got your tongue, Kiddo?”

“Why don't you go get your phone, Buck?” Bobby suggested. “Let Tommy know his dad is here.”

“Huh? Oh, um, yes. Yeah, I'll do that.” Buck hoped and prayed to God in that moment that Richard didn't notice the phone in his pocket.

“And while Buck does that, you can have a seat.” Bobby led him over to the table, where the rest of the team was now making their way over. “Once Tommy gets here we'll have lunch.”

*****

Buck skipped every other step as he went downstairs, hurrying outside to call Tommy.

He answered on the third ring. “Hey, Evan. What's up? Everything okay?”

They may have the same job, but it didn't stop them from worrying about one another when they were on shift.

“Hey! Everything's fine, but c- can you come down to the station?”

“You miss me that much?” Tommy joked. “You're off in like four hours, Babe.”

“No, I know. I mean, yes, I miss you, but no that's not why I need you here.”

“What's going on, Evan?” He sounded worried again.

“Your... Tommy, your dad came in looking for you. He's, um, he's waiting here.”

The silence lasted so long that Buck glanced at his phone to see if the call had dropped. “Are you there, Tommy?”

Finally, Buck heard the sounds of Tommy shuffling around. “I'm on my way,” he answered. Any lingering happiness in his voice was long gone. “And Evan?”

“Yeah?”

“I'm sorry.”

“Sorry?” Buck asked. “Why're you-”

Tommy hung up before Buck could get out the question. He sighed, put the phone in his pocket, and headed back upstairs.

“-it looks like the damn United Nations in here.”

Buck's eyes met Eddie's. It was clear he'd walked in on the middle of a conversation that shouldn't be happening.

Eddie shook his head at Buck. A silent don't ask.

Buck sat down quietly, his leg shaking with nerves and his stomach filled with knots. Tommy wasn't even there, but he already felt terrible for him as Richard happily went into a very depressing story about Tommy crying after a girl kissed him when he was twelve years old.

*****

Tommy steeled himself before walking up the stairs at the station. It took everything he had in him to not turn around and go right back home.

He couldn't do that though. Couldn't leave his father with Evan, or anyone else up there. They didn't deserve that.

“Tom had half the girls in the school chasing after him, askin' him to prom, and he still went with the most unattractive looking thing you'd ever seen.”

“Missy was not unattractive, Dad,” Tommy said from the top of the staircase. Everyone turned in his direction. “She was sweet and my best friend at the time.”

“Girl had braces twice the size of her face.”

Richard made no effort to stand and greet his son, not that Tommy expected him to.

Tommy was met with apprehensive hello's from the team, and a look of nervous concern from Evan.

“Come sit with us,” Bobby said, motioning to the seat beside Buck. “We were about to eat when your dad came in, so I figured we could have lunch together.”

“Thanks, Bobby.”

Tommy sat down stiffly, avoiding any physical contact with Evan. Not that Evan was trying anything either. He kept his hands firmly planted on his thighs.

“What are you doing here, Dad?” Tommy was purposefully avoiding eye contact with everyone else in the room. Maybe if he tried hard enough, they'd all disappear and not have to witness whatever was inevitably about to occur.

“Figured seven years was long enough to go by without seeing ya. Thought I'd stop by and see what you'd been up to.”

Bobby finished setting out the food and everyone began to pass around the dishes and fill up their plates.

“You know you could've come by my house, Dad.”

“Lost your address. You know I'm no good with computers. Plus, thought it'd be nice to see you in action.”

“Oh, well, I'm off for the next two days so... no action.”

“Where are you at now?”

“Harbor Station. I'm a pilot there, but I work ground ops sometimes too.”

“Back to flying, huh?” Richard sounded genuinely impressed. “Good. That's good. Got you a girl yet?”

The spoon Chimney had in his hand dropped loudly onto his plate as Buck choked on the bite of food in his mouth.

“Sorry,” Chimney muttered as Buck coughed.

He grabbed his water and took a couple sips. “Sorry. Sorry, uh, wrong pipe,” he explained, clearing his throat.

Tommy sighed. “Nope. No girl.”

“Well, soon. You're a good lookin' man. Get yourself out there, they'll come running.”

“Running so hard they injure their best friend,” Eddie mumbled, earning him a kick under the table from Hen.

Richard didn't seem to hear the comment, but Chimney spoke up anyway. “So, Mr. Kinard, what do you do?”

“Nothing now, but I did twenty years in the Marines, oil rigging after that. Retired about seven years now.”

“Tough work.” Hen regretted her words the second Richard puffed his chest at them.

“That's right. I always drilled into Tommy's head the importance of hard work.”

"More like knocked it in,” Tommy muttered.

The room quieted.

Richard took a sip of his drink, then opted for a subject change. “Shame I can't see where you're working now, Tom. Guess you were so busy talking about that other thing you failed to mention you were somewhere else.”

“That other thing?” Tommy repeated. “You mean me telling you I was gay and you laughing in my face? Is that the other thing you're talking about?”

“Well, it was all a load of crap, wasn't it? Just another way to disrespect your old man.” Richard looked around the room as he laughed, apparently not paying any attention to the fact that he was the only one laughing. “That was always Tom for ya. Shootin' off his mouth, causing trouble. I told him one day he'd take it too far.”

“Telling you he was gay was him taking it too far?” Hen wasn't even trying to hide the disgust on her face. Richard was too busy being an ass to notice.

“I just knew it wasn't true. He comes to my house all serious, sayin' he's got something he's gotta tell me. I thought maybe he was going back into the army, the reserves or something. Then he tells me he's a queer. I know the world is changing and all that crap, but I also know my son, and that's not my son.”

Tommy felt on the verge of tears now. He hadn't taken more than a couple bites of food, using his fork to swirl the rice and the peas. He wished more than anything he could make himself smaller. So small no one could see him. He was embarrassed and ashamed that all these people he cared about, all these people who were starting to really get to know him for all that he was, were now seeing the disgrace that was his father. That's all they'd be able to see when they looked at him, especially Evan.

Evan who somehow always looked at Tommy like he'd hung the moon and stars. Evan, who made Tommy feel so undeservingly cared for. Who had just swapped I love you's with Tommy a few weeks ago... Now, this is what he'd see. This is what he'd think about. And who could love that?

“Or maybe you just don't know your son.”

Tommy's head shot up and over at the sound of Evan's voice. He sounded angry. He looked angry. Tommy was pretty sure if he could shoot fire, the whole place would be up in flames right now.

“Excuse me?” Richard glared. “Who the hell are you to tell me whether or not I know my son?”

Before Buck even had a chance to make up some lie, Tommy was reaching over and taking his hand, squeezing tight. “He's my boyfriend,” he said.

Richard huffed out a laugh.

This time, he noticed that no one else was laughing. “You screwin' with me?”

“No. Just like I wasn't screwin' with you seven years ago, I'm not now.”

The way Richard shook his head made Tommy feel like he was seven years old again, about to get the belt for bringing a turtle in the house. “My buddy Vic told me his daughter saw you with some guy on Facebook. Called him an ass and an idiot and you're telling me he was right?”

“Is that why you really came here? To harass me and Evan?”

“I never looked at the picture!” Richard replied, his voice rising. “And I had no clue you weren't here anymore. I came here to see you, to get the truth.”

“Well, you got it.”

“That the real reason you quit the army then? So you could be a sissy?”

Tommy's eyes widened, the question catching him off guard. Out of all the ways this conversation could have gone, he didn't expect it to pivot that way. “You've got to be kidding me. Dad, I did not quit the army, I was discharged.”

“And the reasoning never really made sense to me, son, I gotta tell ya-”

“Well it doesn't have to make sense to you, it made sense to the military-”

“-because no son of mine would go crazy in the army. Absolutely ridiculous to-”

“-which is why I got to leave, and I did not go crazy I had a brief-”

“-make up some sort of excuse like that and think it would fly-”

“Okay! Okay!” Buck yelled over them, motioning for them to stop. “I think you proved whatever point you were trying to make, Richard. Let it go.”

Tommy quieted, but Richard couldn't hold his tongue.

“What?” he provoked. “That's what you said it was, didn't you? After some mission gone wrong, you didn't sleep for like a week or something. Went cuckoo so they let you leave? S'what you told me.”

“Okay,” Bobby spoke up, his voice deep and commanding. “Richard, I think you've been here long enough. You should go.”

“If my kid wants me gone he can tell me himself.”

Through his shame, Tommy managed to glare over at his dad. “I never wanted you here in the first place.” He was shaking, his heart racing, but his voice remained steady. He was grateful for that.

An eerie silence weighed heavily around the table. The two men stared each other down until Richard finally tossed his napkin onto the table and stood up, his chair screeching with the motion. “Don't have anything here for me anyway.”

That was Richard. Always had to get in the final word.

Once his dad had descended the staircase, Tommy released a deep breath. “Well, that was fun,” he said shakily, trying for a smile.

He couldn't quite seem to make one appear.

He couldn't look anyone in the eyes either. The silence was driving him insane. He knew they had to be watching him with pity.

His eyes were burning, his lip was trembling. He was so close to falling apart.

He really didn't want anyone see him, but he also knew he was too shaky to stand. He opted for planting his elbows on the table and rested his head in his hands.

After a few quiet seconds, Tommy could hear everyone scooting out of their chairs.

A hand rested on his shoulder, giving it a brief squeeze. “Take your time up here,” Bobby said. “Don't worry if you hear the alarm.”

“You've got family with us, Man,” Eddie said as he passed by, giving Tommy a pat on the back.

Chimney was next with a, “Love ya, Bud.”

“Whatever you need,” Hen added as she passed by, “we've got you.”

The gentle touches and words of affirmation as each person went by was what broke him. He pressed his palms hard against his eyes as his shoulders began to shake.

There was another hand on him now. Rubbing his back in gentle, slow circles.

Evan.

“I'm here, Babe,” he said softly. “I'm here.”

The sob that escaped him at Evan's words sounded more like a whine. Tommy was sure he'd never heard himself make that noise before, but now he couldn't stop it.

Evan pulled him in, wrapping his arms around him tight. Tommy hid his face in the crook of Buck's neck, his hands loosely grabbing at Buck's waist as he continued to cry.

They stayed like that for minutes. Evan continued rubbing his back, holding him, letting him get out all the feelings he'd been holding in for years.

“I'm so sorry, Evan,” Tommy whimpered once he was able to find his voice.

Evan held him tighter. “You have nothing to be sorry for.”

“I didn't...” his breath hitched. “That could've been me. That was... was almost me.”

“No,” Evan disagreed. “No, you're nothing like him.” He turned his head to press a kiss into Tommy's hair. “Can you look at me?”

Reluctantly, Tommy lifted his head and pulled back just enough to look Evan in the eyes.

He sniffed, his breathing starting to come back to normal. He was sure his face was puffy and red. He knew a stray tear or two was still falling too.

Evan reached up and wiped the tears away, his thumbs continuing to brush over Tommy's cheeks so he could keep his attention. “You are not and have never been that man. You understand me?”

“Evan.”

“No, I mean it, Tommy. You think Chimney and Hen would ever give him a chance?” He shook his head. “No way in hell.”

Tommy bit at his lip. “This is so stupid,” he said with a wet laugh. “Crying because my dad was mean to me, like I'm some baby or something.”

Evan ran his hands down Tommy's arms until he intertwined their hands on his lap. “Not stupid. Very reasonable, actually. Quite possibly an under-reaction.” He brought one of Tommy's hands up to his mouth and gave it a kiss. “There's only a few hours of my shift left. I'm sure Bobby wouldn't mind if I left a little early. I can drive you to your place, we'll relax with a movie. Sound good?”

Tommy knew he should say no. Knew he should tell Evan that he was a big boy and could handle a few hours alone until Evan got off work. Instead, what came out of his mouth was, “Are you sure?”

“I'm sure.”

“What about my car?”

Evan shrugged. “We'll pick it up tomorrow.”

“Okay... Okay, yeah. I probably shouldn't be driving anyway.”

After wiping away another tear, Evan leaned in and pressed his lips against Tommy's in one of the softest, yet most loving kisses Tommy had ever felt in his life.

“I love you, Tommy.”

“I love you, Evan.”

“And Eddie's right, you know? Everyone here, including me of course,” he smiled, “we're your family. You know that right?”

Tommy nodded. “Yeah. Yeah, I know.”

[luveline]

𝐩𝐚𝐩𝐞𝐫 𝐟𝐥𝐨𝐰𝐞𝐫𝐬 | 𝐦𝐢𝐠𝐮𝐞𝐥 𝐨’𝐡𝐚𝐫𝐚

you comfort miguel when he lashes out after a memory —a ficlet featuring begrudgingly lovesick miguel and a flirty spider-girl. pre across the spider-verse but contains spoilers. requested here. fem!reader, 1.5k

cw implied ptsd and accidental rough handling

˚ʚ♡ɞ˚

Miguel can feel your heart-eyes on him. You're sitting behind him on the floor in his office, or, as you've fondly nick-named it this week, The Control Room, humming and making little origami flowers. 

So far you've made five, promising him without prompting a multi-coloured bouquet. He doesn't know why you've stopped (or why you started), but he doesn't have to turn around to confirm it. He can tell. You're shameless either way, proven when you say, "Hey, handsome?" 

He sighs with more annoyance than he feels. "What?"

"How'd you know I was talking to you?" you ask, with a laugh he loves and hates at once. Loves, because it's a really nice sound, and hates, because he knows how this goes. "I could've been talking to Margo." 

"She is handsome," Lyla chimes in. 

"Very much," you agree. 

Margo, alias Spider-Byte, looks up from her tablet screen to flash a smile. "Thanks, guys." 

"What did you want, then?" Miguel asks.

He's surrounded by girls who live to annoy him —they all laugh as though they know something he doesn't, and when he turns to glare at them they laugh more. Lyla zips out of his eyeline, disappearing from view with a sympathetic, "He's dumber than he looks." 

"Hurtful," Miguel says, turning back to his screen. "Why do I bother?" 

You stand up with your bundle of paper flowers crinkling in your hands and approach him. You're of normal height, while Miguel is of 'ridiculous' height (your word choice), and so you have trouble looking him in the eye when you stand close. You have more trouble keeping your distance, craning your neck all the way up with your rubber capped shoes to his spidersuit ones. 

"Can you lean down a bit, please?" you ask. 

Margo laughs, “Oh, here we go.”

Miguel has trouble saying no to you. And by trouble, he means he finds it impossible, and he hasn't done it in a while. He leans down very slightly, worried you're going to try and kiss him in front of the others. He's kissed you already (which he hates himself for, what a stupid thing to do) (but was a good kiss, as things go, your lips soft under his, his ardency undulating in the face of your little gasping sound when he'd bitten your lip, when he'd grasped at your side like you were slipping through his fingers), and you've kissed him. But never in front of other people.

Which isn't to say they don't know. Everyone definitely knows. They're just too scared or too kind to say. Or, like Lyla or Margo, they find it funny. 

Now in reach, you lift an origami flower to his ear and attempt to prop it there. He has a flash of a memory, a small hand by his face, the summer sun on his neck, and he can't deal with it. He grabs your wrist and pushes it away from him. 

Your eyes widen. You're not unused to his bad moods, but Miguel doesn't grab.

You look back, and he thinks it's because you're scared, and he wishes he could take it back straight away, but you're looking for Margo and Lyla. When you see they aren't there, you take his face into your empty hand and ask, "What's wrong?" 

Miguel doesn't answer. He doesn't know what to say. Sorry would be a good start, but his mouth is dry. He frowns down at you.

"I didn't mean to overstep," you say, uncharacteristically serious. 

"I didn't mean to grab you," he says. 

"I know. It wasn't so aggressive, anyways. I'm genetically enhanced, you know?" Your smile creases the delicate skin at the corners of your eyes. "I'll make you something else. A fan, for the heat, or a jumping frog." 

You turn and take a step away. Again, Miguel reaches for you, but when he takes your wrist this time it's with the kindness you deserve.

"I'm sorry, cariño," he says. 

He’s embarrassed for having pushed you away, even if he couldn’t control himself. All you were trying to do no doubt was make him happy. It's usually your main prerogative besides winding him up, and he can't find any ill will in a paper flower. 

"Cariño," you quote in a murmur. It doesn't take a second for you to return to your smiley, loving self. "That's definitely something nice." 

"It's affectionate." He doesn't explain more than that. 

You force your hand into his, twirling inward like a half-hearted dance. "I can tell," you say giddily, dropping your cheek into his chest. 

He rubs the back of your hand. Sorry, sorry, it says, each pass of his thumb against your skin. 

"Miguel," you say, in the lilting cadence of a girl with a favour to ask, "now you've ragged me around–" 

"Not what happened–" 

"–I was thinking maybe I could do something to you." You smile cheekily around your words. 

He sweeps his gaze across the office to make sure there's no one here with you both, or about to be. Complicated you may be, but Miguel knows you well. Better than he should. He spent a long time denying his feelings for you, aggrieved and guilty, and a longer amount of time resenting you for being so damned enchanting. Which wasn't your fault in reality —you're a weird creature, and you can be a little off-putting; it's Miguel's problem alone that he wants you as badly as he does. To feel your neat, teasing smirk under his lips. To have the line of your jaw against his hand as you whisper flirtation or laugh at your own awful jokes. 

To take your hip into his grasp and squeeze. 

There have been times where Miguel wanted to press you up against a wall and kiss you into silence, quieten your taunting teasing with a bite to match his bark. And there have been times where he wanted to rub the tense line between your shoulders, having caught you in a vulnerable moment, and promise that things will be better. 

He isn't making any more promises, not in this life, but he thinks that someone like you, who tries too hard to make people happy and sometimes wears two masks at once deserves to do whatever it is they want to do to people like him.

"Okay," he says quietly. His voice is rough as hewn stone. 

You have a pocket full of paper stars that crunch as you lean in. "I'm gonna kiss you, if you promise not not to freak out. Is that cool?" 

Okay, you deserve some softness, but Miguel would rather lead. Your hand falls to his chest, and his hands find your face. His fingers behind your ears, his thumbs aligned with your smile, he squeezes your cheeks in his hold gently, tilting your chin up, and up. The column of your throat is bared and begging to be scandalised. He can imagine it, the bruising his lips would leave behind like crescent moons and the pinprick crimson stars from his needling fangs if he were to only press down. 

"We'll compromise. I'll kiss you, and you'll let me apologise again." 

"I don't need you to say sorry again," you say softly. 

"Then I won't say it." 

The implication has heat rising to your cheeks. Your hand grabs uselessly at his suit as you close your eyes, and Miguel knows his cue. He leans down and kisses you, tender but a little rough, your lips soft and warm and eager as he encourages your head to one side. It feels like you try to say something but you don't move back, and so he doesn't either, kissing and kissing and kissing until he's sure he'll remember how it feel tonight, hours from now, when he's staring at a screen wishing you were haunting his office rather than in a doze in the girl's dormitory. 

"Miguel," you say, practically into his mouth. This time he pulls away, and you take a small step back so you don't have to crane your neck. "I, uh…" 

Miguel wipes the sheen from your bottom lip, not not listening but certainly not giving his full attention. He's hoping you'll let him kiss you again.

"I'm sorry if I made you uncomfortable with the flower," you say. 

His eyes lifted to yours. "It's not that. It's not you. Don't waste any time thinking about it, okay?" 

He pinches your chin between his forefinger and his thumb. You hold his eyes for a moment. 

"I don't really think," you say bashfully, wrapping your arms around his waist and giving him a hug he doesn't have time to reciprocate. 

"You think," he says, blinking as you retreat from him completely, waltzing back to your origami station on the floor. Your hips don't sway, but there's a movement to them he tracks. 

"About you, handsome? All the time." 

Miguel groans and turns back to his screens. Lyla appears silently, and sticks a finger into her mouth in a mock gag. 

"That's in poor taste," he says. 

"I would like to hand in my resignation." 

"You can't resign, Lyla. You're a hologram." 

She pushes her heart-shaped sunglasses up her nose and blinks out of view, refusing to speak to Miguel for the rest of the day outside of official Society business, and even then she's cranky. You fill the void of conversation with a mixture of nonsensical and merited suggestions, and by the time you leave for the night, his desk is decorated by a rainbow menagerie of paper animals, each one made with care. 

˚ʚ♡ɞ˚

thank you for reading I hope you enjoyed! please consider reblogging if you have the time! <;3 if you have a request of this pairing or other miguel fics and want to share, im eager to see them!

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