#So they begrudgingly give it to him since it was his name

[pastelsugar6w6]

Tiny little itty bitty Tyelpë (literally still swaddled and toothless) learning to speak. He says atya and ammë which is fine and good and understandable but then the race is ON for which uncle's name he says first. Tyelko is so assured that bby will say his name first because he is Curvo's favorite brother so it stands to reason he'd be Tyelpë's favorite uncle. He's willing to bet money on it and Curvo also puts his bet in with Tyelpë saying Tyelko's name first. Ambarussa bet on each other respectively. No one is allowed to bet on Nelyo because babies love Nelyo but he puts his money on Káno. Káno bets on himself.

The next name Tyelpë (kinda) says is "Yoyo" (Moryo)

[rubyarerosies]

lowkeyartist!sukuna who makes videos in his room to post on his instagram. Most of it is just him making new tunes that would most definitely be sampled by an artist sooner or later, while some are covers.

But I think what people mostly know him for is the different lady - or ladies - they see in the background sleeping in his bed. His name on twitter grows hectic whenever they see the girls in the back in some of his videos, slamming and dragging his name. Regardless, he stays radio silent on it.

It’s not until a song that had used one of his vids for a sample went popular and he begrudgingly goes live on instagram for his first Q&A due to popular demand. The questions flood in when his fans realise it’s not bullshit and he actually is there to talk with them.

And, like true Sukuna signature, there’s a mystery lady in his sheets behind him. The live notices immediately when he shifts a little to the edge giving them a glimpse of you, almost like he wants them to see.

“Does it wobble? Don’t make me end this live,” he says sternly, trying to subtly read questions that aren’t about you behind him in the chat. He finds it funny how the whole internet has been in an uproar this past year due to your constant impulse on making your hair look different every other month - different girls, like he’d ever, the thought makes him scoff.

“Why do you bring over so many girls? what do you mean? It’s just one,” he teases, his head turning over his shoulder to peek at you - yep, still sleeping.

His taunts to the questions have everyone on edge, and you’re just peacefully in dreamland. His scowl deepens when he sees many people question his honesty on the last answer, so he finally breaks and he reveals the long awaited truth.

“It’s just one girl because it’s my fiancé, we’ve been together since I started this shit,” he leans back in his chair, relief flowing through his veins now that everyone knows, “why does she look different all the time? My girl’s just impulsive.”

[corkinavoid]

DPxDC Police Officer Wes

"Excuse me, sorry, Mr. Batman, sir!"

That's definitely not a voice he knows. Bruce halts in his steps, aborting his usual retreat into the shadows, and turns back around. Commissioner Gordon, who was still in the process of wrapping up his small talk with Tim - the term 'grumpy banter' would describe their conversation more accurately at this point, but Bruce knows better than to argue with the two over semantics - also turns around, pausing in the middle of the sentence.

A ginger haired boy, wide-eyed and obviously either nervous, starstruck, or both, is staring at him from a few feet behind the Commissioner. Bruce can see a few more faces peeking from behind the half-opened door to the roof, all of them filled with anticipation. He knows two of them: detectives that work directly under Gordon, Isaiah Vasquez, and Tasha Kuznets. The third one, a black man in his forties, also looks vaguely familiar, but Bruce can't recall a name.

Yet, he knows absolutely nothing about the ginger, who hasn't blinked once since Bruce noticed him and is now biting on his lips. But he is wearing a police uniform, so, possibly, a new hire?

"Weston, get out," Jim sighs, waving a shooing hand at the boy with a look of barely concealed exasperation on his face. Definitely a new hire, then. That's the level of annoyance he reserves only for the overachieving rookies that he begrudgingly likes but never admits to.

"I-" newly named Weston starts but cuts himself off. Then, he takes a deep breath and straightens up, "Just one question, sir!"

"Weston, I swear to God," Commissioner pinches the bridge of his nose, lifting his glasses up a bit. But Tim tilts his head to the side, looking in the ginger's direction and raising his eyebrows. His domino mask hides it, but Bruce knows his menagerie of kids well enough to see that he is at least a bit curious about the boy. So he turns back around fully and inclines his head, giving Weston his attention. He doesn't mind talking with those rare few members of GCPD that Gordon likes.

Weston perks up like a very eager dog at the sight of a treat. In the contrast lighting of the BatSignal, his hair looks like it's on fire.

"If you don't mind, was the 'Smiling case' relevant to Joker in any sense?" The boy asks, loud and clear - maybe even too loud - with his unblinking gaze still glued to Bruce. Like he is afraid that if he closes his eyes for a moment, Gotham's vigilantes are going to disappear without a trace.

It's not a question Bruce expected, to be honest. The 'Smiling case' was closed just a few days ago, Gordon was still not done with the paperwork, as far as Oracle's records went. A murder of three, where all victims had some badly drawn clown makeup on them - post-mortem makeup, as it turned out, the murderer tried to deceive the investigation by trying to cover it up as Joker's doing. Only, he didn't do a good job at it, all the Bats were way too familiar with the Mad Clown's signature style. Not to mention that Joker was still securely sealed in his Arkham cell.

Bruce turns to look at Red Robin. He was the one working on the case, so Bruce gives him the choice of answering or not. Tim jerks his shoulder, looks the ginger boy up and down, and then shakes his head.

"Aside from a poor attempt at leading the investigation in the wrong direction, no, it wasn't," Tim shrugs, "The guy isn't even a Gothamite, he knew of Joker only from the rumors and media. And the clown faces were a makeshift cover-up."

Weston visibly deflates at the answer. Bruce watches in a slight amusement as Tasha nudges the other officer, one he doesn't remember the name of, in the shoulder, and stage-whispers, "Pay up." The older man huffs and disappears behind the door, followed by Isaiah.

"Thank you, Mr. Red Robin," Wesley nods politely and takes a step back, his eyes darting to Gordon. Tim snorts a laugh but doesn't correct him. Commissioner, though, gives the boy a long, dreadful sigh.

"Is that all, officer Weston?" He asks, not even bothering to hide his 'tired dad' voice.

The ginger nods again, "Yes, Commissioner Gordon."

"Then get out of my sight before I make all your shifts double," Jim commands, and Weston nearly runs back to the door with a speed that makes Bruce involuntarily think of speedsters. Must be the red hair.

Tim turns to look at the Commissioner right as the door to the roof slams shut behind both Weston and Kuznets.

"Who is he?"

Bruce is also a bit curious now. New recruits in the GCPD are nothing out of the ordinary, but Jim seems to know this one personally, and Kuznets, who is one of his trusted detectives, seems to also like the officer.

Gordon briefly huffs and stuffs his hands in the pockets of his coat. It's quite chilly today; Bruce makes a mental note to switch everyone to their more insulated suits. Scarecrow is currently out on the loose. It won't do any good if any of the Bats went down with a cold.

"Wesley Weston, fresh out of the Academy," Commissioner sighs, but, somehow, Bruce gets the impression it's not a sound of simple exasperation over a new officer eager to prove himself. Jim proves his assumptions by looking around the shoulder to make sure the door to the roof is still closed, and continuing, "Born and raised in the middle of nowhere, Illinois, but GCPD was his first choice. He explained it as having a few friends living in the city, which, unfortunately, proved to be right."

Bruce frowns and grunts, alarm bells ringing in his mind. Deliberately choosing to work in Gotham despite not being from here can be caused by many reasons, and nearly none of them are good reasons.

"Unfortunately?" Tim inquires suspiciously, also with a slight frown, but Jim waves them both off.

"No, he's got nothing to do with any of the criminals. It was the first thing I checked when he mentioned 'friends'. If anything, he's quite on the opposite; he'd make a great detective one day, what with his countless conspiracy theories, determination and the insane urge to dig up every single detail known to mankind," he laughs a bit, and Bruce notices a slight, teasing twinkle to the Commissioner's eyes behind his glasses. "On his second day here, the boy went and plain told me he knows that Batman is Bruce Wayne and that he's saying that because he knows I know and he is aware we're working together."

The alarm bells in Bruce's mind turn into sirens. They never discussed the matters of Bats' real identities with Gordon - Bruce had his suspicions that the man knew it and simply kept his status quo. In all fairness, James Gordon didn't make it to Gotham's Commissioner by sheer dumb luck, so all the Bats kind of expected him to figure it out one day.

But Jim knowing who's behind the cowl is one thing. A new, out of town officer is quite another.

"What did you answer?" Tim asks with an easy smile, but Bruce sees the barely noticeable tension in his shoulders.

Gordon nearly grins, "I didn't believe him, which turned out to be exactly what he expected. He also told me of some kind of a familial curse - he called it 'Cassandra's curse', I believe you're aware of what it means. And then, when I naturally expressed my doubts, proceeded to show it in action. Believe me, it works. Sometimes, it even works too well," the man looks to the side with an amused huff, "That's why officer Weston is strictly prohibited from voicing his opinions on any of the ongoing cases outloud. Detective Kuznets almost missed some critical evidence because of his input once."

Cassandra's curse, Bruce has heard of that saying before. Granted, he never thought it could be a real thing, and he is not intending on starting now, not before he investigates the matter thoroughly. But he does trust Jim - years and years of working together would do that to people - so he simply nods in understanding, leaving the matter of supernatural aside for now.

"What about his friends?" Red Robin asks again, and that causes Gordon to wince momentarily.

"That, I believe, was the cause of his performance just now. One of his friends runs an occult shop, and the other one loves to hang around our forensic scientists and coroners occasionally," the man waves their immediate frowns off again, "I don't go into the morgue often, but I heard he's good at finding out the causes of death by a few looks at the body. And they run a lot of bets between them three," Jim shrugs nonchalantly, "The last one was about the 'Smiling case', I take it."

"Any reason to worry about them?" Bruce can't help but ask. It's not unusual for people to be weird in this city, and running an occult shop and hanging out with pathologists are not exactly reasons to go through background checks when they've got much more pressing issues on their plate. Namely, Scarecrow: it's been more than a week since his escape, but none of the Bats have heard anything about him yet. Oracle is already busy enough with that and the current uprise of gang activity in the Narrows, there's no point in piling even more work on her shoulders just because of some gossip that rubs Bruce the wrong way.

Gordon, thankfully, doesn't take his question lightly and pauses, scratching his chin.

"No," he finally concludes after some thought, "They are a bit strange for non-Gothamites, I'll say that, but in terms of this city? They are no stranger than my neighbors from upstairs." Gordon doesn't tell them to leave it alone, Bruce notices. However, it's probably not because of any doubts he has; the Bats just have a habit of tripplechecking everything anyways, and who would know that better than Jim Gordon?

A quick glance to Tim proves Bruce's thoughts. Red Robin, despite the mask, looks thoughtful. How many cases is he already working on, seven? Bruce makes another mental note to ask Alfred to cut his caffeine intake. It might be a bit hypocritical of him, what with his own plans to send a few messages to JLD about the 'Cassandra's curse', but Bruce excuses himself as the adult in the family.

Commissioner Gordon clears his throat.

"Do you want me to turn around so you can make your mysterious escape, or-" he starts, but both vigilantes are already gone by the time he finishes, "-or not, okay."

[libbybee]

IN THE HEAT OF YEARNING — SA

◜pairing: astarion ⨯ fem!reader ◜rating: MDNI 18+ ┊ wc: 6K ◜cw: mentions of astarion's past, dependence, masturbation [M], anorgasmia [M], piv, cock riding, creampie.

▹ summary. after cazador's defeat, astarion faces something he thought lost to time; his heat. the unfamiliar sensation of longing and freedom makes him torn between the instinct to dominate and the desire to surrender to you.

A/N. english isn't my native language, sorry if there are grammar mistakes.

AO3 ┊ MASTERLIST ┊ PLAYLIST

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It had been weeks, perhaps months, since you helped him put an end to his master, Cazador. Even now, Astarion wasn’t sure how to feel or what to do.

The sensation of freedom hit him like a tornado tearing through his life, leaving him adrift and uncertain. Even the pronunciation of the words caught on his tongue, clinging to his throat whenever he tried to voice a trace of what he felt.

Declaring himself “unchained” sounded jarring to his ears, but, fortunately, there you were to help him adjust to these unfamiliar emotions that weighed on his shoulders. With everything that freedom entailed. Everything.

He hadn’t told you about this… personal problem of his. Truthfully, he couldn’t bring himself to do it, ashamed of what you might think or say if you found out.

After so many failed attempts, he stopped considering it altogether, only cursing himself for not telling you sooner.

Astarion knew it was foolish to feel so ashamed, especially considering the kind of person you were and how much better you treated him than the nightmares of his past—the loneliness that had surrounded him since he had begrudgingly accepted the curse of immortality. But, gods, just thinking about it made his throat tighten painfully and his hands tremble with cold sweat.

He tried his hardest to confess to you on those unique occasions you shared in private, when there was no one else around to overhear, but every time, he backed down.

Now, feeling this unbearable urge, he was determined not to say a word. Nothing in hell would make him… except his very self.

His lips whimpered pathetically, your name slipping through gasps muffled against the fabric of your panties. His eyelids squeezed shut, his other hand massaging the head of his cock tightly enough to hurt, desperately trying to mimic the sensation of your warm walls wrapped around him. Only to fail miserably.

His vampirism had awakened this cursed heat, a condition he loathed to the very core of his damned nature, yet he couldn’t prevent or fight against it. He had spent decades quelling his desires in solitude, without anyone to ease the craving when he needed it most.

The self-pity of it swelled his skin, feeling himself become so… damned “sweetly necessitous” and so lovesick for anyone who crossed his path in those times when he was still delivering prey to his master. But now he had you. And gods, you were going to be a problem. The faint traces of your arousal on the crushed fabric pressed to his nose were enough to drive him mad; you smelt so, so irresistibly good…

Fleeting memories of the first time he bit you flashed through his mind in a haze of desperation to reach his orgasm. The sweetness of your blood, like rich port wine on his tongue, was the finest thing he’d experienced in his entire existence.

He was quite clear just how thoroughly you’d unravelled his self-reliance. This inefficiency blazed brighter than ever in his mind each time he found himself dependent on you, and you weren’t there for him, just like now. Craving you in a way he hadn’t needed anyone in lifetimes.

The sheer sensation of having your naked body pressed up against his while he buried himself balls deep inside you. The feeling of the perfect, welcoming warmth from that exquisite pussy of yours, gripping him as if he were the most vital thing in your life… He’d give anything to feel you like that right now, having you to ease his agonising heat until his pain and loneliness were fully sated. But these thoughts only sent his urgency skyrocketing higher than ever.

The side of your shared bed still held your intoxicating scent. Pressing your panties to his sharp nose reminded him of how tightly your walls would clench around him every time he thrust in and out of your perfect cunt as he fucked it exactly how he knew to so well. An intense desperation took hold of him, slamming his clenched fist into his quivering pelvis to fuck his hand with a ferocity that echoed how he would fuck you again if you were here. By now, thick beads of his precum trickled from his swollen tip, sliding down his pale, agile fingers.

His silky white curls clung to his sweat-dampened forehead and nape, his teeth gritting in nothing but frustration at his inability to reach that elusive release. Each time he came close, the peak seemed to slip away, taunting him from just out of reach. But he couldn’t fully blame himself, because deep down, he knew he didn’t want to cum like this.

It wasn’t just the release he craved; it was you. Without you here, everything felt hollow; his touch was a pitiful substitute for the real thing. He wanted nothing more than to cum inside you, to hear the sweet, melodic sounds of your moans and gasps as his warm semen filled you, seeping out around the edges of his cock as he stayed buried deep within. He longed to watch you bask after your climax, knowing you were utterly his in that moment, both bound in bliss.

The fantasy gripped him, vivid and fierce—an impossible hope to leave something lasting within you, to fill you until he could almost imagine creating life together, even though he knew his cursed being would never allow such a thing. Yet the thought alone, however unattainable, only drove his need further, intensifying his urge to fuck you completely, as if every part of him belonged to you, even in ways that fate had denied him.

He tried once more to focus, though his body trembled atop the sheets with sheer need. He closed his eyes and fantasised about your pussy all reddened and swollen for him, glistening in your rich juices and so deliciously wet that you’d be dampening the sheets beneath you.

A deep flush spread from his cheeks to the very tips of his sensitive ears as he realised just how utterly charmed he was by you and how his mind overflowed with visions of you and only you. He could see it all so vividly: your gorgeous, tempting pussy, the soft contours of your breasts that fit his hands as though crafted just for him and his carnal lust, your lips swollen from his endless kisses, and your eyes glazed, pupils blown wide with pleasure.

Every detail of you was etched into his mind—an addicting vision he couldn't escape. You were the star of every lustful scene that played out in his imagination, the embodiment of his most desperate fantasies.

Astarion could almost feel the anxious pulse of your clit, just begging for his mouth and tongue. The thought of his lips grazing that sensitive bundle, tormenting it to the point of agony, filled his mind, and he could hardly help but drool. He could practically taste you, the luscious, toxicant sweetness of your arousal filling him as he’d lavish every inch of your cunt with his mouth, sucking and licking with ravenous need until you were drenched.

He let out a low, frustrated growl, swirling his closed fist just around his incarnate tip in a futile attempt to force his climax. But his mind betrayed him, flooding with vivid images of your sweaty body and the insatiable pussy he yearned so badly. However, he was pretty clear: nothing could replace you. Not his hand, not the fantasies that had become a poor substitute; nothing could come close to the reality he wanted.

In his mind, he saw you beneath him, legs spread-eagled, your lips calling his name in whispered moans that grew louder with each thrust. He could nearly feel your breath against his ear, filling him with the sweet sound of your whimpers, each one more desperate than the last. His hand felt pitifully inadequate compared to being buried deep inside you, his body pressed down against yours as he consumed every last piece of you.

He was completely lost, so absorbed that he didn't even hear the soft creak of the door or the faint shuffle of your footsteps.

In the quiet shadows of your bedroom, he trembled with the wrenching pain, torn between hunger and exasperation. His voice whispered out, barely audible, “My love… I need you.”

Astarion’s breathing came in ragged gasps as he chased a release that refused to reach him. Tightening his hand to increase his movement speed, he became almost frantic, as though sheer desperation could fill the emptiness of not having you. His head tipped back, eyes squeezing shut as he let out a strangled moan against your panties, your lovely name slipping from his lips like a mantra.

You’d woken in the night, drowsily reaching for him only to find the other side of the bed empty, letting your hand land on cool sheets instead of his skin. Concerned and bleary-eyed, you went looking for him, thinking that perhaps a nightmare had drawn him away.

But nothing could have prepared you for the sight before you.

In the dim light spilling from the cracked curtains of a window, his silhouette trembled, his hips bucking desperately into his hand as if he couldn’t stand another second of the ache inside him. His cheeks were flushed with a feverish red, and his lips parted to release soft, breathless whimpers. His grip on himself was almost punishing, fingers digging into his flesh as he stroked with an almost frenzied pace, trying to force himself to the relief he sought but clearly struggling.

You inched closer, entranced by the sight of his body arching and tensing, brow knit in frustration as he let out quiet, ragged curses under his breath. His voice, thick with desperation, cracked as he whispered your name as if the mere thought of you was both a balm and a torment. He was so lost, so utterly engrossed in his aching need, that he didn’t notice your presence.

Unable to resist, you let out a quiet voice calling his name while opening the door, just loud enough to break through his veil.

He snapped open his eyes; his red irises gleamed in the darkness as he finally became aware he wasn’t alone. Astarion froze, lips parting in shock as his gaze met yours, the flush in his cheeks deepening as he felt instantly embarrassed with your underwear under his nose. The rich fabric of his Victorian shirt clung to his chest, slightly askew from his restless movements.

“I was… I wasn’t expecting you…” He managed to speak with a low, rough voice, as if pulled straight from the depths of his body. He relaxed slightly in an attempt to regain his composure, though his cock gave a subtle, instinctual thump against his stomach as he failed to suppress his arousal. Then he swallowed hard, the exposed skin at his throat glistening in the dim light from his sweat, his expression a blur of yearning and bashfulness.

You took another step closer to your old bed. The intensity of his state made your breath quicken as you took in every detail of his parted lips, the flush trailing to his ears, the slight tremor in his fingers as he tried to maintain them steady…

“Come here…” He reached out, inviting you. His eyes gleamed with want, and, at that moment, he felt himself wholly yours to possess and do whatever you wanted, but you didn't know just yet.

“Couldn’t sleep, Astarion?” You asked with both curiosity and… somewhat understanding.

Astarion let out a sigh while a soft smile tugged at his lips. “It seems I have… trouble finding satisfaction without you, my dear.” He lowered the fabric of your underwear from his face to leave it on the nightstand, his eyes never leaving yours, although his vulnerable yet unabashedly captivated emotions.

His delicate fabric slightly loosened at the collar and sleeves, a bit untied, his hair tousled… This image of him awakened something inside you, drawing you deeper into his charming and cuddly spell.

You reached for his hand, marvelling at how adorable he looked at this moment. With a serene smile, you settled beside him on the bed, the mattress dipping under your weight as you sat close enough to feel his body almost touching yours.

Astarion let out a long, shaky breath, his body finally relaxing as he leaned into you, his forehead coming to rest on your shoulder. He was warm, and you could feel the faint tremor in his body as if something had unravelled his entire being. 

Then he let out a low, breathless giggle; the sound tinged with relief and a hint of humour. “You’re toying with me…” He murmured softly against your skin before placing a kiss on it with a touch of playful reproach. “Leaving me here all night… suffering by myself.” His words were light, but you could feel the weight behind them, the hollowness he rarely showed.

As his head rested heavily against your shoulder, Astarion’s fingers tangled in your hair, gently gripping it as if securing himself to you. His touch was both eager and tender as he instinctively snuggled closer to encircle your waist, seeking solace in your embrace. It was a stark contrast to that usually composed and confident vampire you knew, making him appear almost childlike as if he were looking for comfort after a nightmare.

You wrapped your arms around him, pulling him closer against you. The way he nestled into you made your soul melt in affection, but a flicker of concern crept into your mind as you wondered what had haunted him in the quiet solitude of the night. His sigh was soft, barely audible, and his grip on your hair tightened as if he feared losing you.

“What’s wrong, Astarion?” You asked softly while caressing his arm gently. “Why didn’t you wake me?”

He furrowed his brow slightly, the weakness in his demeanour becoming more pronounced. “I suppose… I thought I could manage. But it seems I could not.”

Before continuing, he took a deep breath to steel himself. “There’s something I haven’t told you… something I’ve been trying to suppress.” As he spoke, his eyes peered at your face, a mixture of uncertainty and yearning reflected in their blackness. The playful humour that often danced in his gaze was gone, replaced by a rawness that tugged at your heartstrings.

You searched his eyes to urge him to continue while your thoughts were already wondering what it could be. “What is it?”

Astarion swallowed hard, his brow furrowing as he wrestled with his emotions. “I… I’m in my heat…” He finally confessed. “After everything that happened with Cazador, I thought I could control it and push it away. But it’s relentless. This… need; it’s too much, and I’ve been fighting it alone for so long.”

You instinctively pulled him closer, the warmth of your body against his providing a gentle anchor in the storm of his turmoil. Feeling a surge of empathy, you cupped his cheek, your thumb brushing softly over his cheek, hoping to erase any sense of his silly shame. “Astarion… You are not alone any more. I’m here… with you.”

He leaned into your touch, a faint shudder passing through him as he let out a soft sigh, the tension in his shoulders easing slightly for your words. “I didn’t want to burden you with this, darling…”

“You could never be a burden to me, silly.”

A liberating glint passed through his eyes before they narrowed slightly, his expression gentling as he leaned his cheek into the warmth of your hand. “So tell me, my darling… what are you going to do with me now?” He asked sweetly, smiling with some curiosity, as though he were either coaxing you forward… or daring you to finish what he’d started.

You held his gaze for a few seconds longer before letting your eyes drop to his hard, aching length.

You slowly pull out of his embrace to rise from the bed, then with unhurried motions, you slip your fingers beneath the waistband of your pyjama trousers and your panties, sliding them down your legs. The fabric fell to the floor, quickly joined by your bra, leaving you bare before him. The chilly winter air grazed your skin, causing a shiver to dance along your back and harden your nipples instantly.

“I’m going to take care of you…” You saw how his eyes roamed over every inch of you with his usual intense, hungry gaze, caressing your body as though it were a precious treasure he could finally hold.

Astarion’s gaze returned to yours with a warm, wide smile, brimming with adoration and desire. “You’re…breathtaking…” He murmured, almost as though speaking the words out loud might shatter the moment.

Your heart swelled at the sight of him, so open, so vulnerable, and so utterly yours. You settled back onto the bed beside him, leaning close as you placed a soft, reassuring kiss against his cheek. Letting your hand drift from his thigh to his lap to wrap your fingers around his cock, feeling the hardness of it, respond immediately to your gentle touch by throbbing excitedly. You began to slowly stroke him, keeping a slow yet steady rhythm.

He moaned softly, his head fell back, and his eyes closed while a subtle shudder ran through him. His fingers instinctively clung to your arm; the look of pure need etched from his face only spurred you on. Your strokes grow firmer as each pass of your hand drew a new, delicious sound from his delicate lips. During that, you leaned closer to let your warm breath graze his neck before you started to spread soft kisses along it.

His usual composure had crumbled, giving way to a raw, unrestrained need—a desperation born of decades of unsatisfied feelings and the maddening ache of his heat. He tried so hard to find satisfaction, but nothing had ever been enough since he met you. Only you could soothe this torment and bring him the relief he required.

You pulled back slightly from his neck, meeting his eyes as you paused your attentions to gently nudge him onto the bed. He didn’t resist at all, allowing you to do whatever you wanted with him and looking at you with sparkling impatience across his darkened pupils.

You ran your hands along his thighs one more time, fingertips tracing over every taut line and curve, savouring the feel of his skin. As you settled on the mattress to straddle his hips, you leaned forward, pressing a soft kiss to his stomach, your lips grazing over the fabric stretched over his torso. Your hands travelled up, resting on his chest, where you could feel his muscles tense beneath his clothing. With a teasing smile, you left a gentle trail of kisses along his uncovered chest, up to his collarbone, and finally brushing your lips along his jaw.

His hands locked to your thighs, his breaths warm as he relaxed in your presence. He allowed himself to be vulnerable before you, and it was unlike anything you had seen in him before. He looked as though he might beg at any moment, desperate and undone. His fingers trembled slightly as he held you tighter, sliding his hands up to grip your hips.

“Is this what you want?” You asked, although you already knew the answer well, just to savour this moment, having him so needy for you.

His Adam's apple bobbed as he swallowed, his answer slipping out almost without thought. “Yes.” His voice was harsh, barely holding together as he looked up at you in admiration like he could hardly believe he was so close to the release that he’d been yearning for.

Astarion moved his hands from your hips to your waist, guiding you down as he suppressed a desperate groan, his head tipping back into your pillow, still infused with your intoxicating scent. “My darling…” He purred, calling out to you. “I need you, please…” The words spilt from him with urgency, though his seductive edge persevered. His hands gripped your hips again, uncertain where to grab, only knowing he wanted every part of you. “Pretty please…”

At the same time, your other hand slipped lower, cradling his sac and massaging softly in rhythm with each stroke. His sighs came faster, a soft groan escaping him as your fingers trailed along his sensitive skin.

The transformation in him was almost endearing, watching his pride melt in the face of his heat. You couldn’t help but smile, your cheeks warming as he let slip those velvety, magical words.

Reaching down, you let your fingers brush over the base of his cock, feeling the rigid heat of his arousal. You spit into your palm and took his hardened cock to slick him out, stroking him slowly up and down. You weren’t entirely wet yet, and you wanted this moment to be as perfect as possible for him.

You moved your focus to his swollen, pulsing glans now, slick with precum that had trickled down his length. You continued stroking with both hands now, smoothing the warm fluid mixed with your saliva to make sure he was well lubricated. Finally, positioning yourself, you let the head of his cock rub your clit and your entrance.

You closed your eyes, savouring the sensation until you heard him release a strangled moan, his fingers digging into the skin of your hips as if holding you could somehow ease his ache. Reopening your eyes, you saw his flushed cheeks and closed eyelids, and you felt captured by his vulnerability. Your heart pounded against your chest at seeing him so… exposed to you.

Although you were keenly aware of his need and, in a way, his impatience to bury himself inside you, you couldn’t deny that you wanted to draw out this special moment as long as possible.

Finally, you let the head of his cock kiss your entrance, beginning to lower your hips as you felt the delicious stretch of your slit as it let him through and of your interior accommodating him. You felt yourself tighten instinctively around his thick length, your walls gripping him as he slid deeper within.

Once he was fully seated within you until his tip was pushing against your cervix, you began to rise and fall slowly. Rolling your hips slightly forward and back, you felt the rigidity in his cock and every vein deliciously caressing your walls. His grip tightened as he released sweet, breathy sighs with each massage you gave his cock with your cavity, his eyes fixed on you, utterly enraptured as he felt himself dissolve beneath you.

“Just you…” His voice trembled with a tone you haven't heard from him. “I’ve needed this… needed you… for so long. I tried to resist… gods, I tried… but nothing, nothing else could…” His words trailed off in an involuntary moan as his pelvis lifted instinctively to feel every inch of your insides squeeze his painfully swollen cock.

A satisfied moan escaped your lips as you watched him giving in to pleasure, his expression lost in bliss. Spurred by his urge, you began to move with more eagerness, riding him harder and faster, your pelvis colliding with his in a wild rhythm. Every thrust sent jolts of pleasure through you both as your hips moved in perfect sync.

Bracing your hands on his chest, you leaned down to capture his lips, and he responded with a yearning whimper, returning the kiss with impatience. “I’ve never seen you like this, Astarion.” You murmured against his lips, admiring the flush across his cheeks. “It’s… adorable.”

He let out a soft, breathless laugh, though his voice was thick with longing. “I’m yours, my love…” He confessed in a low tone, holding your gaze with an unusual intensity, his eyes shining. “With you… I can’t help but lose myself…”

His hands slid up to grip your waist, attempting to guide at least your intensity and reclaim a hint of control, but you took his hands in yours. Sliding them over your torso to your breasts, letting him grab them and feel the softness of them. "Love, let me…” He raised his hips once more to penetrate you deeper. His need to bury himself inside you almost agonisingly, each motion making his tip hit your sensitive G-spot and coax gasps from your lips as he struck it with raw precision, just as your cervix.

You threw your head back, a strangled whimper escaping as the blend of pleasure and faint pain sent shocks through your womb.

“Astarion…” You called after recovering your breath just enough to let your lips brush his ear. One hand tangled into his silky hair while the other traced his chest, your fingers skimming over the fabric of his shirt. “Let me… I want to make you feel good, my love…" You whispered, letting your breath ghost over the sensitive skin of his neck, feeling him shiver beneath you because of how responsive he was to your closeness.

Astarion’s throat caught at the sensation of your warm lips on his neck from your sudden smooch, his fingers tightening around your breasts. A sly smile played on his lips, though his usual sharp wit softened because of his heat.

“Oh, my darling…” He rasped with his tone both a plea and a command as his fingers slid down to your hips, anchoring you closer. “You already do make me feel good… so exquisitely good.” His lips found the spot behind your ear to press a kiss against it. Descending to the curve of your jaw, and then lower, tracing a path full of delicate, heated kisses down to your neck.

Then he pulled you, rolling you onto the mattress in a sudden but gentle motion. His body hovered over yours as he took a moment to drink in the sight of you beneath him. “But I think it’s time I return the favour.” His voice dipped into a low growl, his thumb smoothing against your cheek as he cradled it. “Let’s see just how well I can repay you, love…” He whispered before diving to your lips with a ferocity that left no doubt of his intentions.

Every single touch and lingering kiss was a deliberate act of his devotion, focusing entirely on bringing you to the same heights of pleasure he so desperately craved.

Your lips crashed against his with a passion that mirrored his, a burning hunger in every kiss. You tangled your fingers into his silken, white hair to hold him close, refusing to let an inch of space between you. Your other hand gripped the fabric of his shirt in his waist, tugging it firmly, wanting nothing more than to feel his skin against yours.

Before drawing you into his embrace, he positioned his cock at your entrance to enter back inside you, joining his hips firmly against yours with a delicious thrust that made your clit kiss his bare pelvis. A guttural groan escaped his mouth as he responded eagerly to your touch, his hands wrapping around your waist and pulling you close. Each of his movements quickened, his hips surging forward with growing intensity, each thrust driving you both toward a shared frenzy. Impulsively, he broke the kiss to trail his lips along your neck, leaving a searing path of devouring kisses and grazing your skin with his fangs, sending a subtle shiver through you.

“Gods, you're… intoxicating.” He whimpered roughly between kisses. His hands slid to your hips, gripping you rigidly to guide your body in time with his as he fucked you. His lips stayed on your neck, savouring every moan you gave him, lost in the sensation of your bodies moving together with an urgency that none of you could contain.

Astarion’s hand grabbed firmly at your nape, his fingers threading through your hair as he held your head in place against his shoulder. Positioned snugly between your legs, his thighs lifted yours, angling you so that every inch of his cock entered your pussy, leaving no space unfilled.

He bobbed his hips forward with a ferocious, exhausting pace that drove him impossibly deeper into your cunt, his mouth returning in trailing hot kisses all over your skin. His grip on your nape tightened with each surge of his pelvis against yours, anchoring himself in the intensity of it, feeling how your walls massaged and vibrated around his cock. His other hand gripped your waist, drawing you closer to him as if he wanted to merge your bodies completely.

The rhythm had become urgent and desperate, his mouth leaving feverish kisses along your neck and shoulder as his pace grew erratic, driven by the overwhelming, raw desire consuming him. His hand tightened around your waist, pulling you more tightly as his thrusts grew harsher.

The fire in your body was exactly like his, a blazing need that surged with every stroke. Your hand slipped down to your swollen clit, fingers stroking it in synchrony with his pleasurable thrusts. Your actions only seemed to drive him further; a primal growl escaped his lips as his hips snapped forward with a force that stole your respiration.

“Look at you… so eager for more…” Astarion purred, his tone rasping and dripping with lust. His crimson eyes roamed down your body, pausing at the place where your fingers moved against yourself. He observed entranced how your fingers stroked your entire clitoris, slick and needy while meeting each of his thrusts. The sight seemed to inflame him, his pupils dilating as he devoured the scene before him. A wicked grin curled on his lips. “You’re utterly delicious… I can hardly resist the urge to devour you whole.”

His voice was thick with desire, and how his crimson eyes darkened further made your heart race. You could see the pure hunger burning within him, igniting an answering fire deep in your lower belly. As you continued to stimulate your clit, the tension grew unbearable, stretched so taut that one more push, one more touch, was all it would take to send you both over the edge.

He dipped his head, his breath hot against your skin. “I need to hear every delicious sound you make, every gasp and moan.” He murmured, the rasp in his voice thickening with each thrust.

As if in response, you moaned louder, the heat pooling between your legs intensifying as you clung to him. The urgency in his movements grew, his thrusts becoming a frantic tempo, pounding into you with a force that sent waves of ecstasy crashing inside your entire pussy. You could feel him nearing his peak, the way his cock hardened impossibly harder inside you, leaving copious amounts of precum between your walls. The quickening pace of his breath and the tightening grip on your hips only made it more evident.

“My love…” He purred, his voice a seductive growl that resonated deep within your pussy. “I want to feel you cum around me…”

“Please…” You pleaded in a whisper, not fully sure of what you were pleading.

Astarion surged forward, claiming you with a fervour that stole the breath from your lungs. Every thrust felt overwhelming, as though he were trying to mark you as his own, to leave a lasting imprint on your body and soul. Your bodies moved in perfect harmony, a primal dance that sent shockwaves through you both, pushing you closer to the precipice of bliss.

As the words sunk in, you felt your walls tighten further around his cock. The intensity of the moment was overwhelming, and the delicious pressure built higher and higher, threatening to spill over.

“Together…” You gasped, feeling the edge draw nearer. “I—” His lips crashed against yours in a fierce kiss, drowning out your words as his tongue rapidly tangled with yours. The world around you faded, leaving only the two of you entwined in this frenzied embrace. And then, as if replying to your unspoken plea, the dam broke.

Your climax hit you like a storm, pulsing through your core and leaving you spent as your arms tightened around him and your hips moved to fuck his cock as well. Astarion let out a shuddering moan that broke the kiss, his grip almost bruising you as he reached his own release, his body trembling and spasming as yours with the intensity of it. You felt his warm cum exploding inside you, each release sending a delicious sensation up your womb and cervix, prolonging the endless pleasure crashing through you. His hands held you against him as you both rode out ecstasy, lost in the shared, heady sensation of being completely intertwined as he kept buried inside you.

You clung to him, surrendering to the exquisite moment, feeling utterly consumed by the heat and the connection that bound you together. The aftermath left you gasping for air with your heart racing, both of you lost in the afterglow of passion.

As the lingering waves of your climax subsided after a while in each other's arms, you gazed at Astarion, a playful smile tugging at your lips. His tousled hair fell charmingly over his forehead, and a layer of sweat glistened on his skin, making him look beautiful and irresistibly enchanting.

“You know…” You started softly with a glimmer in your eyes, “You look absolutely adorable like this, all consumed by your heat.” Your heart fluttered as you watched his brows knit together in playful disbelief.

“Adorable?” One of his eyebrows went up. “I assure you, my dear, that’s the last thing on my mind right now.”

“Oh, come on!” You replied, laughter bubbling up like the sweetest melody for his ears. “Just look at you! You’ve never looked more charming—practically irresistible!”

He warmly chuckled, a rich sound that filled the air with joy. “My dear, I was merely indulging in what is quite natural for me. Thank you.”

You feigned a dramatic gasp, placing a hand over your heart in mock shock. “Darling! Just admit it! What an honour it is to see you in such a cute light! Who knew a fierce vampire could also be a cuddly little beast?”

Astarion rolled his eyes, but the smile that tugged at his lips was an undeniable admission of his enjoyment. “Cuddly? Now you’re pushing it, sweetie.”

“Maybe.” You said, leaning closer to him as your eyes sparkled while you batted your eyelashes playfully. “But honestly, there was something so sweet about you right now. You were so lost in the moment, like watching a passionate artist at work.”

He leaned back slightly, crossing his arms with an exaggerated huff, his attempt to maintain composure failing delightfully. “I suppose I must allow you this little delusion, but do not mistake my passion for cuteness.”

“Whatever you say, my fierce little vampire.” You joked, inching even closer. “But I stand by my word. You’re absolutely adorable.”

With a soft, fluttering laugh, you reached up to plant a gentle kiss on his lips. The moment felt electric, charged with love and affection. Astarion’s lips curled against yours before reciprocating your kiss, and for a fleeting second, the heat of passion intertwined with the sweetness of the moment, turning the surrounding air into something truly magical.

As you pulled back, you found him looking at you, a soft smile gracing his features that melted your heart. “You’re insufferable, you know that?” He murmured in a playful voice mixed with exasperation and fondness.

“Only for you.” You replied, a mischievous grin spreading across your face. “And I think you love it. A reason more to the list for being with me!”

“Don’t say it too loud.” He replied, the playful glint in his eyes betraying his bravado.

You laughed, his presence enveloping you as you revelled in the playful banter, your hearts intertwining in the sweetest ways. At that moment, every worry faded, leaving only the bliss of shared affection, laughter, and the delightful intimacy of you two.

‎

[chuluoyi]

MARRIED ON PURPOSE

- gojo satoru x reader

"for one, i can show you incredible things!" jujutsu, madness, heaven, sin. the strongest sorcerer is sure to show you all of that during the whole duration of your six-month marriage contract.

genre/warnings: marriage of convenience, enemies to lovers, crack, fluff, slight satosugu angst/comfort, kamo!reader, very suggestive. gojo clan is portrayed as very traditional, meanwhile kamo clan is rather unpleasant here

note: the unholy amount of times i've edited this story *sigh* but okay i must drop it here or else i'm going to keep editing it and losing my mind. despite my misgivings and all, i really had fun writing this and i hope you enjoy it! wc. 5k !

a part of 1K MILESTONE EVENT

general masterlist

Some would say... marrying Gojo Satoru would be living the dream.

“Don't look that sour now, wife.”

“…sigh.”

A playful nudge at your side, a lighthearted voice— “You're going to make them question our veeery happy marriage, you know… We don't want that now, do we?”

But to you, it was more like nightmare dressed in a daydream.

It was peak comedy because why would you put marrying Gojo Satoru in your life plans? He was incorrigible, a child trapped in a man's body, and there was also the very fact that you hate him. His only redeeming trait was being born in the esteemed Gojo clan, and now held the title of the strongest.

You know you must have accumulated karma, but out of everything else, why must you end up in this predicament?

Hailing from the great clans of jujutsu society, both of you know well that marriage is the essence to make the clan greater. And when it involves the big three clans, its importance amplifies even further.

It was just that you two were too rebellious to follow it through, for one reason or another. Everyone knows Gojo Satoru was faithless to any woman, and you were not exactly thrilled with the idea of marriage as a whole.

He was the one who came to you, proposing this insane idea of a temporary marriage.

"Look at it this way," Satoru said with a wry grin, contrasting your puzzled frown on that fateful afternoon. "It's either me or Zen'in Naoya for you, isn't it? It's so clear which is the better man."

That was what grated you the most. You would be damned if you married the misogynist.

"What do you get from this arrangement, really?" you questioned begrudgingly.

His name would give you security, stop the harassment from your clan, and maybe even a better life, but you didn't quite get what he'd get from the offer he willingly extended to you.

Satoru flippantly shrugged. "Nah, you are not exactly my type, but you're still far better than the boring puppet my family have considered to be my wife."

"Who?"

"Don't remember her name. All she goes on about is that she'll be the good wife and mother of my child. Ew."

Seven hells. You scowled. Gojo Satoru and his penchant for chasing the thrill. Boring women would kill him before an actual curse would.

"And hey, for one," he shot you a smirk, visibly smug. "I can show you incredible things!"

"That's not the point! Gojo, do you even realize—" your voice rose, pulsating with righteous fury, "—how serious all of this is? My life, your life! We're going to be stuck—together!"

"Six months," he blurted, tilting his head slightly. His sunglasses slipped down just enough for you to catch a glimpse of his sparkling eyes. "It's enough time to work through our shits, and by then if you have enough, we're through."

At that time, it seemed feasible. Both of you tolerating each other to avoid a much worse match.

. . .

BACK TO PRESENT—barely a week ever since you were paraded around as his wife, now you and Satoru were stiffly poised in the studio in your formal garbs, capturing your official wedding photos.

At that time, it seemed feasible, but now, it felt like a chore, as you realized that conversing with him either spiked your blood pressure so much that you wouldn't even be surprised if you ended up with hypertension or completely sapped your energy that you were left exhausted.

"Come on, show a smiiile," Satoru said in a sing-song voice, gesturing toward the camera as it flashed for the pictures. You were beyond appalled, shooting a glare in his direction.

"I am smiling, Gojo."

"Liar. You're pouting, wifey~"

Sigh… this really is going to be one hella of a ride, huh?

MONTH ONE, and you found out that Gojo Satoru is apparently as mad as people made him out to be.

"You've got to be kidding me!" you fumed, right after he hauled you into one of the rooms in his grand, traditional estate. Your glare pierced through him, a blood vessel ready to burst. "We never agreed on ‘consummating’ the marriage!"

You wrote him a goddamn contract. And the three conditions of this chaotic marriage are: one, it would only last six months; two, no personal feelings involved; and three, nothing borderline disturbing.

And this, you concluded, was the height of what could be called as disturbing.

"We will not," Satoru replied with a hint of disdain, grimacing, as if the notion didn't sit well with him either. The audacity! "We're just going to make it as if we are—"

"And why?! Why should I do that?!"

"Why else? Because my old fart believes that we indeed haven't done so."

"Then it's your fault? For failing to convince him? Why turn it into my problem!"

"Because, dear wife," he drawled, his tone taunting on the final note. "Now we're on the same page, in case you have forgotten."

Great clans and their hollow expectations spare no one, not even Gojo Satoru. They place importance in the most banal things, such as the continuity of sacred bloodlines and such.

The only alternative wasn't appealing either. Should you be found out that you married only to divorce... sigh, you didn't even want to know how big of a scandal it would be. One thing was certain: your clan would chop you to shreds.

You really had no choice, huh?

"Five minutes," you warned, glaring at him. "Make it loud. Make it so that no one wouldn't question this anymore."

Oh and sure he would. As Satoru pulled that shit-eating grin, you were in for another ride. You waited out until several maids were nearby, left the wooden door ajar, and began the show—

His hands wrapped around your waist—the feeling was peculiar, but you ignored it—and you let him pull you near that open door. He snuggled his face on your neck—his hair tickling you in the process, but you ignored that peculiarity again—as he started making suggestive noises. "Mm, you're so pretty, darling."

You could hear those maids gasp in surprise. And to add the flavor, you faked a moan.

This is... kinda fun? A twisted part of you suddenly found satisfaction in fooling the maids. A smile tugged at your lips as you shoved him away, and Satoru eyed you in surprise and irritation.

"Husband, you're... insatiable," you worded languidly, and he immediately caught on your act, grinning. "Anyone can walk by, you know."

"Oh? But that's the point." Satoru's bright blue eyes twinkled with utter mischief, and even you couldn't deny the exhilarating rush. "I want them to know."

And suddenly you got this very brilliant idea. You swiftly moved past him and sent the books and trinkets on his desk flying to the floor, causing questionable noises.

"Oh my!" a girlish voice exclaimed.

"The master! And the lady!"

Satoru shook his head, thoroughly entertained. And you rolled your eyes. Those nosy maids would finally have enough now, and this charade would end—

"What's happening here?"

The old fart. Both you and Satoru grunted in unison. You really thought you would leave it up to the maids to spread the word, but then you were taken by surprise when he wrapped his hands around you and flung the door open, slamming you against it—and damn it hurt!—offering everyone a front-row seat to your charade.

The maids squealed. His grandfather raised a righteous, demanding eyebrow. You wanted to scream.

"Hey, gramps," he greeted jovially, breathless, his grip on you tightening and you felt heat radiating from his palm. "Ah, sorry, opened it by accident—the wife here is feisty, you see."

Your veins felt ready to burst. Was this a part of his plan all along? How would you show your face before your grandfather-in-law now that he had seen this... atrocity?!

"So, yeah, we'll resume our business!" Satoru, the idiot, said it as if it was the most normal thing in the world. "See ya!"

With that the door slammed shut, but oh no, it was not the end.

"Mmmph!?" you protested, unintentionally loud and eyes widening in alarm when Satoru muffled your mouth with his hand.

The rotten bastard! You found it nearly impossible to breathe, shooting daggers at him. "Mmmrgh! Mmmrrgh!"

"Oh... so that boy really does it huh," you heard the elder mutter in thoughtful manner from outside—and you were in disbelief at how trusting he was—before rounding the stunned maids and barked, "What are all you doing here? Go!"

You nearly sagged with relief when Satoru loosened his grip slightly, allowing you to breathe, as his meddlesome grandpa finally stalked away. Done. This horrible act was over! But wait, why did he still had his hand on your mouth?

"That went splendidly!" he snickered, appearing rather pleased with what had unfolded. "Now, if only we work together like this more often—"

This is… my life now, you lamented the reality. The feeling of his calloused hand on you made you feel things, honestly speaking, but another emotion—and impulse—currently overpowered that.

Seething with resentment, you fiercely chomped down on his hand hard, causing him to swear and pull his hand out of you.

"You—you devil! You bit me!"

"Serves you right!"

Okay, he was bad. He was insufferable. But to be frank, sometimes it wasn't all chaos.

And what's more, by MONTH TWO, you realized that being married to Gojo Satoru also comes with several perks.

"Miss, please, you're trespassing—"

You looked at the police with the haughtiest look you could muster, unamused. "Don't you know who I am?"

"No, but it shouldn't—"

"I'm that man's wife," you declared regally, motioning towards a certain tall shuttlecock a few meters away. "Is that not clear enough for you?"

For one, no one can look down on you anymore, because should they try, you have the power to raise your chin high and declare yourself as the wife of the infamous sorcerer. The very moment you did, that nosy police stopped yapping, and let you through.

The cursed boy, Yuta and his classmate had just been trapped inside a barrier a curse user pulled down, and you were assigned to look into this case by the headquarters. As much as it boggled you—because certainly, the strongest sorcerer was enough to investigate this—you still had to do your job.

“What is this?” you asked Satoru, who was observing something far beyond what your measly ordinary eyes could see. “What happened here?”

He turned to you, all with bandaged eyes. “Hmm? Oh, you’re here too?”

“Don't act surprised. Answer my question, Gojo.”

"You’re too uptight, wifey," Satoru's lips curved upwards playfully. He had taken to addressing you with pet names as of late, if anything, only to get a rise out of you. "Isn't it the time for you to start calling me by my given name?"

You let out a weary exhale, exasperated. "I'm serious, did you find anything? Who is behind this?"

"Nah, nothing for you to worry about," Satoru waved his hand dismissively, grinning. "More importantly! Let's head back and have dinner! My treat!"

You weren't that oblivious. You noticed things too.

"What do you want tonight? Sukiyaki? Sushi?" he hummed nonchalantly. "Or shabu-shabu?"

You gave him the stink eye. "Is that all you think about? Food?"

"As a responsible husband, it's my duty to feed my wife, no?"

"News flash: temporary wife."

"But still my wife, regardless. I overheard you earlier. Being Mrs. Gojo is convenient, yeah?"

You ignored how a part of your jolted at the emphasis he placed on that word, grunting. "Nah, it's meh."

Call it a feeling or hypothesis. It was similar to how he treated his students. He always said the dumbest things, but it actually served to make them feel at ease.

Then it occurred to you, could this be actually his attempt to change the subject?

"You can't cheat your way out of this." You shot him a pointed look. "You know something. Tell me."

"Hmmm? And what would I get in return?"

"Don't make this difficult. I'm on this assignment too!"

"Nah, if you call me by my name, I might consider it."

Hah. You should really read a parenting book one of these days. Taking on your husband was more or less the same as facing a kid.

"Satoru," you tested, the name rolling out of your lips far easier than you thought. Somehow, using his given name felt like some sort of a leap of faith.

He stopped right in his tracks, turning to you. His glossy lips quirked into a meaningful smile, and you felt funny.

"Wasn't that difficult, was it?" he winked, and you covered the strange heat creeping onto your face by rolling your eyes and huffed.

Needless to say, he still didn't tell you even a clue. You finally gave up, thinking that if he insisted on not disclosing it, then so be it. You trusted him on this, even as he turned your help away, and you hated admitting it, because, well…

You’d trust him with your life. He knows how to handle this better than anyone.

Being a a woman in Kamo clan is, in fact, not any better than in Zen'in—you're regarded more as a commodity than a human being.

"When will you bear the child of the bearer of Six Eyes?" in your father's eyes, you were but a tool to tie the Gojo at his hip, and your worth probably wasn't even twice of Noritoshi's. You had known he would ask this when he summoned you to Kamo ancestral home, and you weren't that naive—you had asked Satoru to join you too. But your father had insisted him to stay at the foyer, while he dragged you into his chamber.

Just because you had seen it coming didn’t mean you liked it. "Is that all? Do you really make me come here just to ask me that?"

And what came next was like a crack of thunder.

"How insolent!"

You shuddered, hating how his voice still had control over you. You wanted to stay deviant, but you couldn't keep yourself from shaking. You thought you would have to endure this shit just like you did before, until—

"Now, now... That's my wife you're talking to. I'd watch your words, if I were you."

You had never whipped your head so fast.

There stood Gojo Satoru, your husband, in all his glory. He was smiling but it was clear that he was displeased, evident from his cutting remark, and most notably, how he had unveiled his striking cerulean eyes for all to see. Truth to be told, you didn't expect him to barge in here at all.

"Gojo-sama," your father bowed his head, displaying utter respect towards him, contrasting the blatant disrespect he showed towards you just now. Satoru paid him no heed, as took big strides towards you and seized your arm, prompting you to rise to your feet.

"What is this? Why are you yelling at her?" His voice lacked its usual hint of amusement or teasing, sending a chill down your spine.

"Gojo-sama, I apologize for my tone towards my daughter earlier. I was just trying to educate—"

“My wife. She is my wife now, and it would do you better to remember that,” Satoru asserted firmly, putting emphasis in the way he addressed you, his gaze hardening. "She is an adult. There's nothing left for you to educate her." Pausing, he added, "And the way I saw it, you were just unnecessarily rude."

"Gojo-sama, there were just certain things in our clan that—"

"Please, don't call on us again," Satoru interjected decisively with a light yet firm voice. You could swear your heart was somersaulting at the sight of him staring down your natural enemy. "I'm sure you're aware, but your daughter bears my name now, and she will get the respect she is due. I will have a word with anyone who fails to treat her accordingly."

Somehow or another, Satoru whisked you away from that hellhole, your hand tightly clasped in his. Your relieved sigh didn't go unnoticed by him, as he looked back to you.

"Have you gone soft?" he teased, eyeing you with a playful snort. "Did you forget who your husband is? You've got nothing to fear. Not even him."

"Thank you," you murmured. Your heart was still pounding and your mind blanked, rendering you unable to engage in your usual banters.

His clear blue eyes widened a touch, blinking at your display of vulnerability, Then, he wore the most innocent expression, even sporting a silly smirk—the hardness from earlier gone. "I was really cool, huh? Totally made you swoon I bet."

And in MONTH THREE, you realized, as he laced his fingers with yours, as his laughter filled the air, as calmness swelled on your chest, and as you loudly snorted at his remark, that—

You felt warm, so warm, in fact, and maybe—

"Pfft, you wish."

—maybe... being with him isn't so bad after all.

MONTH FOUR, and you finally found out that it was Geto Suguru.

Everyone knew that your husband and the criminal used to be the best of friends. You saw them during your high school days, and heck, you used to think that Geto was the better man.

You could only imagine what he must feel.

. . .

When he got back to your shared house after the whole ordeal—after he ended his best friend with his own hands, Satoru honestly didn't expect that you would be waiting for him.

"You okay?" you asked him, brows furrowed in concern. It was probably one of the very few times you had displayed emotions other than contempt towards him.

It felt strange because he was used to your jabs, and he was not sure what sort of expression he should pull now, because truthfully, now he felt empty. Blank. All he comprehended was that he had killed Suguru, that he was gone, and that was something he must do.

It would be just like any other day if hadn't just committed a murder. On someone he held dear.

"Of course, who do you think I am?" Satoru swiftly replied, sounding smug—or at least tried to. "I'm the strongest. I’m unscat—"

"No, not that." You frowned, meeting his gaze squarely. "After everything."

Satoru struggled to choose how he should react, partly because most of his energy had gone after walking Yuta back and reassuring him earlier, and by default, the two of you should be hellbent on hating each other and wishing for this contract to end soon.

"Aww, are you worried about me?" he quipped with a touch of sarcasm just because he had to, to show you that it wasn't enough to ruffle him.

Because he is still the strongest, even when alone. Especially when he is alone.

You let out a sigh, looking away. "Can't I?"

"Whoa, that's sweet of—"

"Don't fool yourself," you stated in straight-laced manner, meeting his gaze with a composed expression. "You're not okay. You might be Gojo Satoru, but no one will be after doing what you just did."

You might be Gojo Satoru, but no one will be after doing what you just did.

Despite himself, his smile fell, and his chest burns. What is this? Were you sympathizing with him?

Does that mean that you don't see him as the entity... that was the strongest?

Before now, Satoru remembered you as the most uncooperative Kyoto girl he had ever met. Your first meeting in high school sealed your fate as the two of you could hardly get along. You didn't mince words, you didn't take shit from anyone else—heck, sometimes when he thought of you, what came up to mind was an impenetrable diamond.

Which was why he chose you. You were someone he could trust. You were pretty in the eyes and certainly wouldn't bore him either. His reasons were purely based on logic. And after four months with you, Satoru came to a conclusion that you indeed fulfilled all his expectations, if not more.

And he felt comfortable, or dare he say, secure even. He felt like he had gained a friend, who could see past his bravado and wouldn't judge him for it.

"You're..." you sighed, casting a sympathetic glance at him, your forehead slightly creased. At that moment, Satoru couldn't help but think you were incredibly endearing, fretting over him. "...an idiot."

"Heh." I really am, aren't I?

"I never knew him well..." you chose your words carefully, hesitant. "Did you try to convince him, before this?"

He barked a bitter laugh. "I did, we even made a scene in front of freaking KFC," he remarked with a scoff. "He didn't listen to me, until the very end."

You wanted to tell him “You have done everything you could” but the words faltered on your tongue. You couldn't bring yourself to say it when you saw the faint quiver of his lips, the slump of his shoulders—the very sight of a boy grieving the loss of his friend.

Your heart pricked too, somehow, seeing that expression on him. And you once again realized that your silly, exalted husband was just as human as anyone else who made him think he wasn’t.

"And you know what he said in the end?" Satoru's tone was flippant, as if asking the most normal thing around, but carried a trace of grief, evident in the slight drop in his tone if you squinted. "He said he didn't regret it, not even a bit."

"I'm sorry," was all you could manage.

Satoru's smile was lopsided. Now that he had finally accepted it, something inside him finally bleeds, and it freaking hurts. The pain gripped his chest like a swirling inferno.

But then, you boldly clasped his hand in yours, gently tracing soothing circles on its back.

"What?" he peered at you, feeling a ghost of a smile forming.

"Consider this emotional support."

And he chuckled softly. Despite the lingering ache, despite the gloom he was sure he would carry for the rest of his life, he felt the pain was more bearable with you by his side, somewhat.

How?

You blamed it on the alcohol, because it was MONTH FIVE and you were kissing Gojo Satoru, daringly.

"We shouldn't be doing this," you rasped between kisses, breathless, as your own sinful hands plucked the buttons off his shirt. The intoxication might have played a part, but the intense heat coursing through you made it hard to think straight.

Satoru crashed his lips against yours again, consumed by blind lust. "Yeah, we shouldn't," he replied in a rush. His breath was hot as he trailed his lips down your jaw and neck next, savoring the softness of your skin.

You two had attended a banquet for the elite, and you were unbelievably beautiful. Standing by his side as his wife, you drew admiring glances, with everyone marveling at what a remarkable couple you made. The Gojo heir who was born with the legendary Limitless and the Kamo heiress, as lovely as her clan's name was powerful.

His deft hands roamed the curves of your body, exploring every inch of you. The warmth of his hands tickled something inside you as you closed your eyes to sink into this very moment. Next you knew, his bare body was against yours and you were stripped out of your evening dress.

Lust flickered in his honored eyes, as he took in the sight of you in your undergarments.

"You're really pretty, you know," he whispered. The intensity with which his eyes scanned your form made you nearly squirm. "Shame we don't always get along."

"You're one to talk," you retorted, a hint of exasperation in your tone, as you willed all other thoughts away. Thoughts like what comes after this. Thoughts like—

Is it heaven or sin, if you feel both at once?

His thumb tenderly caressed your plush lips, a hint of a smirk on his beautiful face.

He has long been thinking about your body. He was but a man, after all. He just didn't expect that you wanted this too.

There was always this tension, only this time, neither of you could hold it back anymore. Perhaps it was impulse—hell, most certainly it is, but there was another thing, something more that even Gojo Satoru still didn't dare to say out loud.

"Eager, are we?" he taunted when you leaned in, yearning for the touch of his lips on yours again.

You huffed. “Shut up and kiss me.”

A rush of heat flooded your cheeks at the slip of those words. You were about to rectify it, taken aback by your own boldness, but then he drew you close, silencing any further protest with a gentle hush—

"Too late, sweetheart," his husky voice entered your ears, lips curling into the most wicked smile, and you were in a trance. And Satoru was once again convinced, that choosing you as his wife was the rightest thing there was.

If the two of you went with this, then there would be consequences. Things would become more complicated, harder to sort out.

But, he decided, as he captured your lips in another heated kiss, everything else can wait.

MONTH SIX, and you were dreading the day of your divorce.

You brought this upon yourself. Whenever you reminisced about that night, you wanted to smack yourself in the face and bang your head against the nearest wall.

This marriage has a time limit. And you were doing it out of convenience in the first place.

You weren't supposed to… goddammit—fall in love with him.

But what's done is done, there is no going back in time. Awkward exchanges and lingering stares had been gnawing at your insides these days, and you were sure Satoru too must have noticed them too. You two used to be more relaxed with each other, and he'd even flirt with you, but weeks ever since that night of drunken passion, you almost reverted back to your high school personas—ignoring each other.

This was tough. You didn't like this. And more than that, you were faced with a more pressuring matter...

Gojo Satoru, with everything he possessed, could have had any woman he wanted. This arrangement with you was temporary in the first place, soon he would forget you and flit to the next woman.

The thought made your heart ache, because you had involuntarily gave your heart away to him. Siiigh… What a predicament you put yourself into, huh?

With just a month left together, maybe you should just make the best of it.

. . .

If you thought that things were any better with Satoru, then you were sorely wrong because he too, was debating with himself often nowadays.

Days spent with you were fun and fulfilling. You irked expression somehow had made its mark in his heart. You were pretty, fit to be by his side publicly and preferably, behind the closed doors. With you, he didn't feel the need to carry this facade of being strong—he could be a clown tripping over his own trap and you would amuse him with your deadpan expression.

And ever since that night, he was constantly reminded by how soft your skin was against his. It almost drove him crazy now that he was deprived of it.

How was it the last month already? He wasn't ready to let you go yet.

When he got back home later after his class ended and found you in the dinner table setting the food, all he could muster was, "Hey. Haven't eaten?"

You whirled around to face him in surprise. "Oh... you're back. Just about to. Want to join me?"

Of course he would. And yet as the two of you sat down, it was so painfully awkward Satoru felt like he was dying inside.

Why couldn't he pull off a smart line or two? Where did his suaveness go? He was smoother than this, surely, with his colorful history. One night of passion was supposed to enhance the relationship, not to derail it. What happened to you both?

The salt was near his side when you reached to grab it and bumped into his hand. "Uh-oh."

Turning towards you, he found your spooked expression and your adorable eyes widening in surprise. "S-sorry..."

It was just freaking salt! Salt! Why on earth were you apologizing?!

Enough, he thought. This utter madness of being jumpy with each other. He'd start from his side.

Does he want you to keep being his wife even after all this ends? Yes.

Why? All reasons already listed above.

Does this mean he likes you? Apparently and supposedly, yes. Because if it isn't then he doesn't know what this funny feeling driving him mad is.

With that sorted out, then he only had one more thing to confirm. He put down his spoon and crossed his arms together. "Tell me the truth. Do you like living with me?"

His question obviously took you by surprise. "Huh? What brought this on?"

"Just give me an answer."

"You're so pushy," you grumbled, lips pursed, and he felt like you were finally back to your usual dynamics somewhat. Good.

"Sooo, the verdict? Do you enjoy being with me or not?"

Because to him, it was a resounding yes and more.

Ignoring the warmth that surged to your cheeks, you rolled your eyes. "Surprisingly, not bad, yeah," you admitted, mustering the courage to meet his gaze. "You're annoying, an idiot, a bit crazy—"

"Hey!"

"—but eventually you're still... manageable," you added, feeling your face truly start to sizzle. But covered it up by looking down and playing with your fingers as you still had more to go on. "What I want to say is... I'm glad that I agreed to this—with you—because I can’t imagine it with anyone else."

An unfamiliar tingling emotion rushed to his chest as his face too started to heat up, letting your words sink in. Is he blushing? Oh God. He sure is. And so did he feel hella giddy.

Then it’s sealed.

Suddenly he procured a piece of paper from his work uniform and showed it to you. You first saw his lazily scrawled signature before it dawned on you.

The contract. You almost forgot that you made him sign that looming piece of paper. You were almost dismayed, thinking that he would end this right then and there, but then—

“Well, then… I suppose we no longer need this.”

Riiip~

Your eyes nearly popped out of their sockets when Gojo Satoru tore out your contract right in front of your face, the most brilliant of his devilish grin adorned his handsome face, as he took off his blindfold to see you far clearly than ever. Heavens, you are cute, he thought.

“Soooo~ seems like you’re stuck with me from now on!”

You gaped, awestruck at the blatant meaning of it all, feeling how your heartbeat started to pick up the pace, when he pulled the rag out of your feet once more by tilting his head to the side, looking at you with a winning smile.

“Let’s start over! What did they say again? Ah, yeah. Here’s to the first day of our lives!”

[hxlxnaaa]

𝐰𝐢𝐬𝐡𝐟𝐮𝐥 𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐤𝐢𝐧𝐠

★ 𝐬𝐲𝐧𝐨𝐩𝐬𝐢𝐬: in order to get a creepy coworker off your back, you begrudgingly let sylus play the part of your fake boyfriend. unfortunately, your emotions and pride quickly spiral out of control.

★ 𝐜𝐡𝐚𝐫𝐚𝐜𝐭𝐞𝐫: sylus

★ 𝐜𝐰/𝐭𝐚𝐠𝐬: first person pov, enemies to lovers, fake dating, part 1 out of 2, angst, some swearing

★ 𝐰𝐜: 5k

★ 𝐚/𝐧: i had HELLA writers block while writing this, so if it seems chaotic and rushed that's why. i really wanted to scrap this but i spent so long on it i would be disappointed if i did. this is part one out of two, and i promise to get part two out super soon! it should be a lot better than this one *sob*

“Is that a new necklace?”

I grimace, the annoying twerp’s voice sounding like nails on a chalkboard.

“No, Nicholas, it's the one I always wear.” I press my lips into a tight line, staring at the papers in front of me. After everything I’ve tried, I don’t know how he hasn’t caught on with how absolutely, utterly disinterested I am.

Nicholas was a recent graduate from the academy, starting his first year here at the Association. At first he seemed sweet, like an infatuated kid, but it quickly worsened and now I have to deal with harassment every day at work.

He’d do anything and everything to spark a conversation, trying to work any attention out of me despite all my efforts of ignoring him. I tried to be nice originally, letting him down easily whenever he’d pay me compliments and ask me out to lunch.

That didn’t work.

He became more persistent, and I resorted to either giving him the silent treatment or being straight up rude. Throwing him off my back seemed like an impossible task, and I was convinced I had developed some sort of parasite that was bound to me until I retired.

“Ah, I’ve never noticed…” Nicholas sat himself in front of me, and I could feel his stare on my face.

Don’t look up, don’t look up, don’t look up.

“Hey guys!”

Thank God.

Forcing a smile at Tara’s cheerfulness, Nicholas paid her a nod, clearly unsettled with her interruption. She came up behind me, wrapping her arms around my shoulders. If there was anyone who was capable of putting a wedge in between me and my borderline stalker, it was Tara.

“Are you excited for the Hunter’s Ball? I can't believe it’s already coming up…” She sighed dreamily behind me, resting her cheek on the top of my head. While the Hunter’s Ball wasn’t my favorite event, it was typically a good time.

Well, at least before Nicholas came along.

I couldn’t imagine how it would go this year, him crawling six feet up my ass as I try to shake him off the whole night. It’s bad enough I have to deal with him sober, I can’t even imagine how much more unbearable he’d become with drinks in his system. This was the one night of the year the Association actually shows their appreciation for their employees, and I’d be damned if I couldn’t enjoy myself.

“It’s always nice we get a plus one,” Tara mentions, “I can't wait to see who everyone brings." She nudges my shoulder with her arm, laughing.

The look in Nicholas’ eyes told me everything he was about to say. I could practically hear the words come out of his mouth before he even spoke them-

“Yeah, I’m gonna bring my boyfriend.” I spoke before thinking, the words an act of desperation. Nicholas’ eyes widened and Tara’s arms flew from my body, as she whipped herself to stand in front of me.

Oh no, why would I say that- Why did I say that?!

“Your… what!” She started grasping at my hands, questions flying out of her mouth before I couldn’t even process half of them, “Since when? What’s his name? Where’d you meet him? Do you have any pictures?”

I knew I had gotten myself into trouble, I didn’t even have the slightest clue as to who I could possibly feign to be my boyfriend; but the look on Nicholas’ face told me I needed to keep up whatever I was doing, because it was working.

I smiled innocently, “We’ve been keeping it on the down low, things are still pretty new. I was planning to hard launch us at the Ball.” Chuckling nervously, I was convinced nobody was believing a word I was saying.

“Ohmygosh Mystery Man! I’m so excited!” Tara continued to blabber on, trying to pull any detail she could out of me. I made eye contact with Nicholas and thought about how soon the Ball was - only a week away.

Letting out a sigh of relief because of my believable lie, the feeling soon faded and was replaced with chest crushing stress. I had no boyfriend, and no plan; I was going to have to think fast.

-

Laying in my bed that night, I scoured my brain for any potential suitor. I thought maybe Zayne, a cardiac surgeon and childhood best friend. He’d be perfect, all my coworkers would be so pleased, but a cow would have to jump over the moon before he’d even think about complying. Maybe Xavier’s friend Jeremiah? A sweet florist…No, Xavier would never let me do that.

I flipped onto my stomach, screaming into my pillow. Smushing my face into the fabric, I silently prayed I’d suffocate and be free from this mess I’d webbed myself into.

Before I could pass out and be put out of my misery, my phone started to ring.

Not even looking at the caller id, I picked it up and answered with a disgruntled, “Hello?”

“You never sound pleased to hear from me, Kitten.”

I screamed into the pillow again, Sylus being the complete utter last person I wanted to hear from right now.

He chuckled over the line, “Actually, I think that might be the unhappiest I’ve heard you.”

“What do you want?”

“Can I not just call to talk? I’ve had a rough day and wanted to hear your voice.”

I let out a forced laugh, “You’ve had a rough day? YOU’VE had a rough day? You will not believe the day I had then.”

His voice softened, “Talk to me about it then.”

While I most definitely realized my day couldn’t be comparable to his, as he was essentially a mob boss running the N109 Zone, venting about my problems felt nice. As much as I couldn’t stand Sylus, with his incessant arrogance and backhanded flattery, he was easy to talk to sometimes.

Sometimes.

“I don’t even know how I got myself into this situation. Well, I do know, I just didn’t mean to!” I groaned, throwing my face into my hands.

He sits in silence for a minute, and I can hear the soft playing of one of his records in the background. It’s annoying how he feels the need to call and bother me, with a side of music, to wind down at night.

“When is it?” He finally asks, and I hear shuffling.

“Next Saturday, so…” I can practically see the clock ticking down, “Shit, a week from today.”

“What time?”

“9- Sylus, why?”

“I’ll be there at 8:30 then.” There’s mirth in his voice and my face goes pale, “Sylus, no, don’t you dare. It cannot be you, just let me borrow one of your men or something.”

Sylus lets out a low laugh, “Now why would I do that when I could just be your date?”

“Not date,” I cut him off, “fake boyfriend.”

“Of course, fake boyfriend.” He clucked his tongue, “Why would I let someone else be your fake boyfriend?”

“I don’t know, maybe the fact that you’re the big bad Onychinus boss?” Pressing a finger to my temple to ease the headache that he was becoming, I started to pace my floor. “You’re stepping into enemy territory at this event, there’s no way I’ll be able to save your ass if you get found out, let alone what will happen to me and my place at the Association.”

“I’ve already met some of your coworkers before, remember? It’s best if it's me instead of some stranger, and trust me sweetie, they won’t know.”

My coworkers did take a liking to him when they met during one of our outings, Sylus just had this charisma about him that sucked everyone in; the mysterious fruit vendor Skye who was absolutely horrid at karaoke. He stole their hearts quickly, and I’m lucky if they don’t ask me at least once a week how he’s doing. Sylus was just magnetic like that, even if you tried your damndest to hate him, there’s just something about his demeanor that’s magic.

He has a point here, and it’s killing me to admit he’s right.

“Fine,” I snap, “but absolutely no funny business.”

“I’m not sure what you could possibly mean by that, Kitten.” Sylus lets out a low laugh that makes me want to punch my phone, “I’ll be there at 8:30.”

Before I can respond, he quickly hangs up. I’m left sitting on my bed with racing thoughts of everything that could possibly go wrong. Was bringing Sylus really worth getting this creep off my back? Well, if there was anyone who could scare him off, it would be the leader of Onychinus. Worst case scenario, I have Sylus pull a gun out on him.

I shake my head, trying to clear my stupid thoughts.

I sent him a picture of the invitation, which included the dress code. I wasn’t too worried about him making a fool out of me, just the overwhelming anxiety of bringing a top criminal as my date to a work event where we quite literally are attempting to hunt this exact man down.

Trying to trust Sylus isn’t the easily discoverable type, I make a miserable attempt to put my mind to rest, and get some sleep.

-

The next week following my abrupt news of a boyfriend was hell. Not to my surprise, word was quickly spread through the Association, and I was constantly being flooded with questions and endless pressure to just ‘give them a name!’. I even had Xavier at my desk with questions one morning, and he was always the type to steer away from work related gossip.

Not to mention Sylus himself was being utterly insufferable. He was taking this far too seriously, sending lunch and flowers to my work with paper love notes attached. It was bringing on more attention at work, and every time I told him to stop, he’d just send more extravagant bouquets that cluttered my desk and made the surrounding area smell like a funeral.

At one point, I woke up to a box in the mail. Inside was a black velvet dress, a ruby necklace, and heels. Sending him an angry text about how I have my own clothes, he just responded by transferring 200 dollars into my bank account saying, ‘Get your nails done too. Match the outfit.’

By Saturday night, I was almost ready for everyone to meet Sylus, just so people would stop with the ‘fake boyfriend trivia’ while I’m on the clock, and his annoying attempts at romantic gestures.

The night of, at 8:30 on the dot, I heard a knock at my door.

On the other side was a well dressed Sylus; I think it was the first time I had ever seen him done up so nicely. He wasn’t ever one to slack on his looks, but in his black pinstripe suit and red tie that matched my gifted necklace, I had to take a second. Even though he made me constantly want to take my gun and replicate the time I shot him, I could never deny he’s hot. His arguably perfect looks just adds to the hatred.

He looked me up and down, smirking. The dress he had gotten me was backless and stopped at my ankles, with a slit up to my thigh that had me worried that with one wrong move I’d flash all my coworkers. Opening his mouth to I’m sure to make a snide comment, I cut him off.

“I have to put on my shoes and that necklace, but then I’m ready.” I walked over to the coffee table and grabbed the ruby piece that was gifted, struggling with the clasp thanks to the nails I was practically forced to get.

“Here.” Coming up behind me, Sylus took the necklace from my hands. Brushing my hair out of the way, I felt his fingers against my neck as he secured the jewelry with ease. I turned around to face him, and he smiled down at me.

He gestured to the couch, “Sit.”

His one word commands were starting to get on my nerves. “What?” I glared at him.

Grabbing my shoulder and softly pushing me back, I tumbled onto the couch. Sylus snickered, “I said sit, Kitten.”

Getting on his knees, he picked up my ankle, slipping the heel onto my foot.

“I could’ve done this myself.” Scoffing, I averted my eyes to anywhere that wasn’t Sylus on his knees in front of me.

“I’m sure you could with those nails, sweetie.” He hooked the straps around my ankle, and I felt my skin burn red where his fingers danced. It was definitely red with anger.

For sure.

Standing when he was done, Sylus reached a hand out to me. Narrowing my eyes at his hand, I ignored the help. To my dismay, I stood up too fast in heels and lost a bit of my balance. Sylus caught my waist and gave me a smug smile, pulling me into him. “You look absolutely beautiful tonight, my love.”

I grimaced, pulling away from his grasp and heading to the door. “Oh, do not do that. No more of that.”

“We have to get into character, I’m just being prepared.”

“Be in character when we’re there. Not here.”

“I have to get into the mindset.” Sylus creeped closer to me, and I stepped back. At this point, I was essentially pinned in between him and the door. “After all, I have to practice so I can impress everybody.” He leaned down, his breath fanning against the side of my neck.

“Right.” I rolled my eyes, opening the door behind me and taking a backwards step out. Sylus stumbled at the sudden movement, and I smirked at his loss of composure. “Let’s go, we’ll be late.”

-

When we arrived, I felt my heart begin to race. All the mental preparation I had done for this exact night fled my mind as soon as Sylus put the car into park. My worry was not of showing off my new fancy fake boyfriend, it was the fact that I was bringing my new fancy fake boyfriend into an arena that was hunting him. Over the past week I’ve tried telling myself he’s not easily discoverable, I mean, if he was, the Association would’ve had him tracked down by now. However, knowing my luck, I was preparing for the worst.

Sylus gently placed his hand on my thigh, attempting to give me a reassuring smile, “It’ll be okay, Kitten. Just follow my lead.”

We’re fucked.

He walked around, opening the door for me. His car was clearly the nicest and most expensive out of all the guests tonight, and I knew if anybody saw I’d never hear the end of it.

When we were nearing the entrance, I sighed, shoving down my pride and grabbing Sylus’ arm, wrapping myself sweetly around his bicep. I watched his lips curve upward into a smug smile, and I suppressed the urge to throw myself off and take my heel to his-

“Invitation please.” Sylus handed the men working the door the two slips of paper, and I begrudgingly walked in clinging to his arm.

‘Playing the character’, I thought.

The venue the Ball was being held at was extravagant, with a high, golden ceiling, and golden marble floors.

It was filled to the brim with people that worked for the Association, plus their guests. I winced at the sheer amount of people, automatically going into defense mode due to the overwhelming fact that we were outnumbered.

“Smile, sweetie.” Letting go of his arm, Sylus took his pointer finger and thumb, lightly pulling the corners of my mouth upward.

I nipped at his finger, and he poked my nose as a warning.

I heard someone shriek my name, and I whipped around to see Tara quickly approaching. “Oh wow, you’re beautiful!” She wrapped me up in a tight hug, rocking me side to side. Letting go of me just as fast, Tara gasped when she saw Sylus.

“Skye! Oh my gosh it’s you, how sweet!” She fawned over us, and he smiled kindly at her, “You look lovely tonight, Tara.” If he kept up the nice talk, I was going to put my head through one of the walls.

“Here, come with me. Some of us already have a table together!”

Tara dragged us over to a table where a few of my most nagging coworkers stood around talking. Introducing him to the ones who had never met him, I groaned internally, ready for the torment of questions to begin.

“So,” Tara dropped the first bomb, “how long have you two been a thing?” I know this has been weighing on her worse than me all week.

“About a month now.” Sylus answered with ease. I tried to suppress a shocked look on my face, because I was planning on doing all the talking; but that continued, them rapid firing questions and Sylus answering all of them as if he had this all thought out. I mean, shit, he was convincing me.

“I have to know how this happened!” One of them said, and Sylus tucked my hair behind my ear, pretending to recall the moment.

“I had feelings for her for a while,” He said, smiling down at me, “and it got to a point where I couldn’t take it anymore. It was spur of the moment, but I showed up at her door in the middle of the night and had to ask her if she felt the same.”

Damn. He was good.

All the girls squealed, “That's so romantic!”

I placed my hand on Sylus’ chest, batting my eyelashes up at him, “I’m gonna go get a drink, d’you want anything?” He grabbed my hand, matching my energy, and kissing my knuckles, “No, sweetie, that’s quite alright. I’ll stay here and entertain your friends.”

All of them cooed at the sight, probably thinking we were so lovesick for each other it hurt. Well, it did hurt, this whole thing was a pain in my ass I needed to be over.

I grabbed a glass of wine from the drink table, the group out of sight. Sighing, I resisted the urge to down the glass all at once. While I was uncomfortable, I couldn’t deny everything was going well. Everyone was pleased, so I tried to relax.

“That's a pretty necklace,” I heard from behind me, “is it new?”

Nevermind.

Turning around, there stood Nicholas. His eyelids drooped, and he reeked of wine.

“What did you say?” I asked, looking around for the quickest exit route.

“I said I liked your necklace. Is it new?”

God, does this twerp have any other material?

“Yes, it is.” A low voice said, and I felt an arm wrap around my waist. My head shot up to meet Sylus in the eyes; I guess my face was screaming, ‘Help me!’, because he gave my side a soft squeeze of reassurance.

“Oh.” Was all Nicholas replied, shooting his eyes back and forth between Sylus and I. In his head, I imagined the pieces clicking together. ‘This is it,’ I thought, ‘finally he’ll leave me alone!’

“This song is nice… Would you care to dance?” There were no thoughts behind his eyes. This guy was genuinely dense. I could’ve sworn my jaw dropped at his stupidity, and Sylus chuckled next to me.

“So sorry, but tonight she’s mine.” Swiftly sweeping me away, Nicholas and my glass of wine were quickly left behind.

“Why don’t you dance with me instead, sweetie?” Sylus said, leading me to the open floor where people were dancing to the soft classical music.

Sylus put my hand on his shoulder, intertwining my other hand with his. Placing his hand on my lower back, he pulled me in closer to him.

“Look at me.”

His eyes stared into mine, and there was something behind them I couldn’t quite place my finger on. We started slowly ballroom dancing in our own little spot on the floor, a bit away from everyone else. As much as I wanted to strangle this man, I could relax a little in his arms. He just felt safe sometimes.

Sometimes.

“You’re doing good tonight.” Sylus said, still looking into my eyes.

“Thanks.” I started playing with the hair on the nape of his neck, “So where do we go from here?”

He raised a brow, “What do you mean?”

“You know what I mean.”

“I really don’t think I do, Kitten.”

“How am I going to tell my coworkers that we ‘broke up’ right after this? They’ll be suspicious.”

“We could keep doing this for a while.” Sylus shrugged, smirking.

Groaning, I slammed my head on his shoulder, “Tonight was bad enough, I can’t do this for any longer.”

“Do you have a better idea?”

He was right. I didn’t have a better idea.

-

So we did just that.

I was going to give it two months. Then, it would say we were together for three months total, which looked like a completely reasonable time to test run a relationship and then call it quits.

At first, I was completely miserable. I already couldn’t stand Sylus as a friend, how could I stand him as my ‘boyfriend’? After that night at the Ball, to my dismay, he completely won everybody over. It made me feel like I had to put more effort into faking all of this.

The extravagant gifts sent to my work started getting sent to my place too. I told him he didn’t have to send them to me outside of work, let alone at all, but he always insisted so he could “stay in character”.

Whether it was convincing me to let him take me out to fancy places, like dinner or a show, it was always just to keep him ‘in character’. I think he just liked using that excuse so I would be forced to hang out with him and not be able to deny or complain about it.

Though, after a bit, it became easy to slip into a groove.

I started to not mind the talk about Sylus; everything started to become bearable, and dare I say it, kind of fun.

We had played with the claw machines once, and he won a white cat plushie. Jokingly, I had told him it looks exactly like him, and snapped a picture of the cat next to his face to prove a point.

I made that photo my wallpaper, to make things more realistic. It freaked me out for a while whenever I’d open my phone, but I came to like it after a while. Sylus looked kind of cute in the photo, his expression mocking the plushies. He looked kind, warm, a soft look on his face you didn’t see on him often. The more I saw the photo, the more it made me smile.

I began looking forward to his calls, his texts. He’d call me to say good morning, or tell me goodnight, even if he was in the middle of a meeting. The ‘fake dates’ became less uncomfortable as I grew more accustomed to the situation we had put ourselves into. The roles we were playing came easier and easier with time.

Which was causing a problem.

It wasn’t hard to notice the way my body would flush when he touched me, or how my once strong demeanor around him would start to falter. Words and actions of his that would be fast to anger me, quickly changed into something else.

I was starting to care about him. How annoying.

There was one day when Sylus decided he was going to pick me up from work. “Your coworkers will think it's cute.” He had said, and who was I to deny a free ride home.

He showed up on his bike in his leather jacket, in all his badass glory. Leaning against the bike, he stood up straight and smiled at me when I came outside. As time had gone on, Sylus was slowly becoming less hard and uncaring towards me. He began treating me like I was fragile, always so gentle with me. Him getting into character I suppose.

Sylus held his hand out towards me, and when I took it, he pulled me into his chest. I squealed, laughing at the sudden gesture.

“They’re looking,” He said, glancing at a few of my coworkers still inside, watching us intensely, “Kiss me.”

I choked, “What?”

He grabbed my chin, tilting it up slightly. He cocked his head to the side a bit, almost as if to ask, ‘is this okay?’.

Nodding my head yes, Sylus smirked before leaning down and pressing his lips against mine. For how aggressive he can be as the leader of Onychinus, the kiss was unusually soft. I had imagined kissing him, for all of this, and I never expected him to be the type to be so kind and gentle.

My blood was rushing in my ears and I thought I was going to melt under his hands. I didn’t realize just how bad I subconsciously wanted this until it was happening, and I wanted more. I wanted to kiss him so hard I could steal the air from his lungs, I wanted to grip his shirt so tightly my knuckles turned white because I could finally have him.

When he pulled away, and kissed the corner of my eye, I knew I was fucked.

I didn’t just care about him, I wanted him. I wanted Sylus to be mine, I wanted this to be real, I wanted-

No, I couldn’t want anything.

It would never work. Our lives were too different, we were too different, everything would be doomed from the start. He was a faraway dream that would never come true. He could never be what I wanted.

I always wanted security, someone stable and safe. Sylus could never give me that.

So why do I want him so badly?

-

It was my friend's birthday party.

I had invited Sylus, because what had originally been a fake relationship to get a creep coworker off my back, spread like a wildfire to a fake relationship that was now known by all my friends.

I only invited him because I knew it would be strange if I showed up without him.

After he kissed me, and my feelings became a living hell to deal with, I started to pull back; started to psych myself out mentally, constantly spending time just trying to convince myself how bad we would be for each other. Trying to will myself to hate him again, go back to where I was two months ago. When Sylus was a nuisance, an annoying pest.

I don’t even really think he noticed. Or if he did, I couldn’t tell.

When we got to the party, the music and laughter could be heard from outside, a drastic change from the almost silent car ride. Sylus tried to make conversation, and I shut him down almost every time.

We walked in, and my friends all greeted him with easy familiarity. They gave him hugs, pats on the back, and he was welcomed effortlessly.

I stood a distance away as he laughed with my friends, and my chest began to hurt. Guilt, dread, I felt doomed. He wasn’t meant to be here, he was never meant to be here. Sylus doesn’t belong with my friends. Sylus doesn’t belong with me.

None of this is real. All of this is one little lie that spun into a web of something so much bigger, and I’m stuck in it.

He looks happy with them, happy with my friends. Happy in my space, with my people. How could he? He’s an intruder, he knows it.

I knew tonight was the night I was done. This couldn’t go on any longer. No more playing house with Sylus, no more pretending. We’re adults, and this whole thing was so childish, and it ends now.

I stepped outside, sitting on the back patio. The night air was cold, and I wasn’t sure if it was the sharp air of my distress that was making my lungs constrict.

“There you are.”

I didn’t turn around to meet the voice, just kept staring into the trees ahead.

Sylus stood beside me, running his fingers through the top of my hair. I relished the feeling, ‘one last time, it’s okay’.

He didn’t ask any questions, didn’t ask why I was out here, if I was okay. I was happy for that, it could give me another reason to be mad at him. To hate him again. To try and rile up all my old feelings, stir old bitterness.

“I want to go home.” I finally said, breaking the silence.

We got in the car, this time he didn’t try to speak. His face was hard again, the soft look long gone. I think, in a way, he knew too. He knows this is for the better.

I said goodbye, told him goodnight before he left. Told him to drive safely.

It had been two months, that’s what I gave him. It was time for it to be over anyways. I changed my wallpaper, changed his name back. I didn’t care if I had to deal with Nicholas at my job anymore, anything was better than the gutted feeling I got from every interaction with Sylus. Nothing was worth that.

The next day, it was radio silence. For the first time in two months, there was nothing. No good morning, no texts throughout the day, no calls to tell me goodnight; and that just continued. For days. Silence.

I had perfected the speech I was going to tell my coworkers, “We gave it our best, but it just wasn’t going to work out between us.” It was reassurance for them, and myself.

It just wasn’t going to work out between us.

(divider by cafekitsune)

[flawssy-227]

The Babysitter | Joel Miller x F!reader

hello :) first time writing/posting a pic in actual years (first time on this blog also). hope you enjoy. please leave some feed back!

pairing: Joel Miller x fem!reader, no outbreak au! Sarah lives! slight age gap

summary: you baby sit for Joel and the two of you can't keep your hands off each other

warnings: slight age gap, dirty talk, babysitter kink, innocence kink, corruption kink, m!receiving oral, mentions of dicks... I think that's all

word count: 1.9

rating 18+

The sun had long faded in Austin, the only light in the Miller’s living room was coming from the floor lamp and the television, which was on but turned down low so you wouldn’t disturb Sarah. You had just put her to bed at Joel’s request. A short text sent to you earlier, knowing that you’d be babysitting a little longer than normal on Tuesday night.

Gonna be a late one. Sorry princess.

You’d simply given him a ‘thumbs up’, not really minding hanging out with your favorite 8 year old. Your afternoon had been wildly enjoyable with Sarah–she was way too mature for her age and it was probably inappropriate how much you considered her a friend, but whatever, you’ve had a stressful couple of weeks and she was one of the only bright spots. Well, her, and her incredibly attractive father that you sometimes hook up with.

Things with you and Joel were… how should you put it? Complicated? 

You had started babysitting for Joel and Sarah during the first semester of your Master’s program at University of Texas, just a little over a year ago. You and Sarah fell into an easy routine–you would pick her up from school, help her with her homework, and give her some of the feminine energy she was surely missing with only having Joel and her Uncle Tommy around. And you really enjoyed it. You were never one for little kids, and at her age, you were certain she would be annoying as hell to deal with, but nope, Sarah Miller was intelligent and inquisitive, albeit a little headstrong. You admired her, and really respected Joel for doing his best practically on his own.

You and Joel also fell into an easy routine. One night of staying late and sharing beers led to you face down and ass up on his couch and having one of the best orgasms of your life. You both promised each other you would quit, not wanting to complicate anything since you and Sarah had such a close bond, but you quickly broke that promise, again and again and again.

After a few months of hooking up a couple nights a week, Joel told you he was seeing someone–Tess, an age appropriate mom from Sarah’s class and he wanted to pump the brakes on whatever it was the two of you were doing. You acquiesced, begrudgingly, but it was only a few weeks later that Joel said things didn’t work out and you ended up back in his bed, on his couch, and bent over the kitchen counter.

It wasn’t serious between the two of you. You had a lot going on with wrapping up the last semester of your Public Policy Master’s, and he was busy building his business and raising his daughter. But that doesn’t mean you would be opposed to something a little more serious developing. In fact, you were pretty sure you were in love with Joel. But he definitely didn’t need to know that.

You must’ve been completely zoned out as you didn’t hear Joel’s old pickup truck pull into his driveway before he entered his living room and called your name.

“Hey princess,” he said, that deep Texas drawl that made your insides melt flowing easily from his pouty lips. “How’s Sarah?”

“Perfect, as always.” You glanced up from the couch shooting a smile his way.

God, he loved your smile.

“She helped me make dinner and then we did her homework. I deep conditioned her hair, too,” you added. “You know, you gotta take her to a salon once in a while, Joel. You know, one that knows about black hair?” You had been bugging him that the 15-in-1 monstrosity he calls shampoo he and Tommy use would not work on Sarah’s curls.

Joel smirks to himself, absolutely loving the way you care about his daughter. “I’m workin’ on it, darlin’.”

A comfortable silence hits the room and Joel goes to his fridge to grab two beers. Your gaze is back on the TV, some old episode of Law & Order playing that barely has your attention.

“Where’s Tommy?” you ask, reaching for the beer without looking at him.

“Had a date.”

“Tommy Miller has a date? Now that is surprising.” You giggle as you take a sip of your beer. Joel tracks the way your throat looks as you swallow.

He takes his time to take in what you’re wearing. A sweater that tapers around your waist perfectly and a short black skirt. You look sexy, effortless. Joel realizes you always do. Like everything you wear is custom just for you.

“Is this how you dress for work, darlin’?” He lets his large fingers play with the edge of your skirt, barely grazing over your skin. “Kinda slutty,” he adds, smirking at your surprised face.

You school your features quickly and he knows he’s screwed by the sickeningly sweet smile that graces your face. You quickly place your beer on the coffee table in front of the couch and turn to face Joel. “Me? Slutty? No, Mr. Miller, I’m a good girl.”

Joel eyes you from head to toe so slowly that you feel little bursts of heat crawling over your skin. He frowns at you playfully, groaning exaggeratedly as he takes another draw from his beer. “Don’t know about that, princess. Good girls don’t wear slutty little skirts like this to work.” His hand slides up your skirt and grazes over the damp slit of your underwear before he tugs them down your legs. The low whistle he lets out sends a chill down your spine. 

“And good girls definitely don’t wear tiny little panties like this to work.” He brings your thong to his nose, lewdly taking a deep inhale that only makes your wetness grow greater. “Dirty girl,” he sighs out. “Trying to seduce your boss?”

You moan at the sight of him, it was so debauched, so dirty, but it only made you more eager to fall into whatever role play this was. 

“No, Mr. Miller, I would never try to seduce you. I promise I’m a good girl,” you plead. You watch as he absentmindedly toys with your damp thong, running his other hand over his growing bulge. You get an idea that’s going to drive Joel wild.

“Can I show you, Mr. Miller?” you ask, earning a quirked brow from Joel. “Can I show you just how good of a girl I am?”

Joel groans at how easily you fell into this dynamic tonight, not necessarily what he had planned when he came home. He spreads his legs and pats his thighs, “Yeah baby, show me how good you can be.”

You eagerly hop off the couch, taking a throw pillow with you and placing it on the ground and kneeling on it in between his legs. You let your hands rub across the tops of his thighs and give him a wide eyed look that he would almost call innocent if he didn’t know you better. You reach for the zipper of his jeans, grazing your fingers over his bulge before you pull his hard cock out and sigh dreamily. Joel definitely had the best looking dick you’ve ever seen.

Growing impatient at your slow pace, Joel grabs the back of your head and you instinctively stick your tongue out to lick at his tip. You groan at the heady taste of precum on the bulbous head. You slowly start to jerk him off, keeping your mouth only at his tip to tease him.

“You gonna show me how good little babysitter’s suck cock, princess?” he peers down at you, watching how your eyes flutter closed at his words. 

You let out a needy whine. “Yes, Mr. Miller.”

You inhale deeply, making debauched eye contact with Joel before you take as much of him as you can down your throat. Joel was big–thick and long in a way that your friends swore you were exaggerating. You’ve taught yourself how to take him down your throat, proud that you were able to go from taking a meager 4 inches of him when you first started hooking up, to now being able to brush against his trimmed hair at the base.

You can taste the sweat from his work day on your tongue as you start to move up and down. Your cheeks hollow out to make a suction and drool is pooling from your mouth. You’re trying not to gag, but the sheer size of Joel makes it damn near impossible. He looks down at you, eyes filled with something a little more than lust as he watches you swallow his cock further into your throat. Spit bubbles are pooling at the side of your mouth and your eyes are glassy with unshed tears. He shuts his eyes tight trying to stave off his orgasm–wanting to enjoy you just a little while longer. You release him with a pop and jerk him off as you start sucking his balls.

“Are you enjoying yourself, Mr. Miller?” you ask teasingly, voice already sounding a little hoarse from the exertion.

He looks back down at you, willing himself not to cum. He hums and nods the best he can, scared words will be too much for him.

You shift on your knees, readjusting as you gear yourself up to take him again. Joel thrusts slightly into your mouth, fitting perfectly and you moan around him, the vibrations making him twitch in the back of your throat. You push him deeper into your throat and Joel places his hand on the back of your head in a way that’s less forceful, and more caring. Like he’s just reassuring you that he’s there. He’s making little grunts and moans and you can’t help but drool a mix of your spit and his precum down onto his balls.

You look up at him and see his brown eyes softly looking back down at you. Way too sweet for what you’re doing.

You’re getting sloppier and sloppier, veering towards cock drunk as Joel tells you he’s about to cum.

“Where d’ya want me, baby,” he slurs, in his own fucked out state.

You can’t let up now with Joel being so close to finishing. You bare down, deep throating him to a point that nearly makes you gag, but you will yourself to power through it. Joel starts to thrust into your warm, wet mouth before he moans a little too loud and spills his cum down your throat. 

He’s so deep you barely taste him, only letting yourself up when you feel him relax underneath you.

You both catch your breaths for a moment and after a while, Joel pulls you up from your underarms and sets you over his lap. You almost forgot you weren’t wearing any underwear as your now soaking heat is pressed over his wet cock. Even soft it’s firm and thick. 

“Fuck, baby,” he breathes heavily. Brown eyes looking down into yours before he kisses you sloppily, tasting himself on your tongue.

You smile appreciatively, dropping your head to his shoulder and smelling the remnants of his cologne from earlier in the day. You’re insanely horny now but happy nonetheless that you made him this fucked out, feeling a surge of confidence at the thought.

“So,” you start, your smile breaking the warm silence between you two, “am I a good girl?”

Joel laughs, rubbing absent minded circles on your back. He thinks he loves you. “Yeah, princess, you’re the best damn girl around.”

**if you made it this far please leave a like, comment, reblog or a dm with some feedback! I want to get back into writing so this was just me dusting off the cobwebs... ty :)

Read more of their story

[reginalusus]

Just a sketch that I was too tired to finish... And since it's Father's Day I'm just gonna dump a bunch of my more silly (mostly) headcanons about their dynamic below, teehee.

General - They argue. A lot. About anything. Jason is the instigator. Harvey is almost always correct. - There has been a karaoke battle at some point. - They smoke far too much and smoke breaks are common occurrences during anti-hero outings. They are no longer mere breaks; they are rituals. - One of the only things they are comfortable openly bonding over is their alleged hatred of Bruce - and weapons. - Actually work very well together in combat. Jason's accurate, hard-hitting martial arts expertise and agility compliment Harvey's more elegant and violent approach. Gotham's scumbags are cooked. - They were both slain by Gotham, and reborn. They are now both living their second life - neither want to admit to each other that they find comfort that they're not alone in this. - They will take any opportunity to bring up each other's past interactions; the two-toned car, the two-story building fiasco, the kidnapping, anything. - Jason's biological father is the root cause of their most explosive, brutal fights. Both of them, however, are exhausted and have other shit to worry about, so they avoid this topic as best as they can.

Jason's POV - Teases Harvey about twos, duality and doubles to distract from the horrors. - When angry, will call Harvey 'Apollo' to piss him off. Sometimes it's 'Ex-District Attorney', with emphasis on the 'Ex'. - He doesn't like it very much when Harvey attempts to get close/connect with him; relationships are transactional. At least that's how Jason views them. - Hates being passenger in Harvey's car because he doesn't get any say over the radio. - He does view Harvey as a parental figure, or something like it, but he's conflicted. - Actually appreciates it when Harvey helps him through PTSD episodes. - Sadly, he isn't very good at helping Harvey through dissociation/depressive episodes yet. He sort of stands there like the man emoji. - Will randomly come out with courtroom related lines when Harvey does something bad, like: "Your honour, my client would like to plead Gemini," or "Your honour, in my client's defence, he didn't know the safety lock was off." - Makes jokes about Harvey's thugs all wanting to have 'a night' with Harvey. - Absolutely refuses to call Harvey "dad", even jokingly. He will have sightseen everything in Hell before that happens. - But at the same time he cries out for a father figure, one that is proud of him, that loves him. He secretly loves it when Harvey pats his shoulder or gives an approving nod.

Harvey's POV - Will make jokes about Jason being alive again to distract from the horrors. - When angry, calls Jason 'Robin' or 'Pup' (name of a baby bat) to piss him off. - Tries to bond with Jason - he *wants* to - but he's a big dumbass about it. - Does not understand Jason's music taste and doesn't have any desire to. - Views Jason as the child he never had the chance to have. In a sense, that makes him quite protective of Jason, but he hides this. He tries desperately not to be like his own father. - Is quite good at understanding Jason's emotions; he knows how to deal with his attacks and does, begrudgingly, use tips he learned from his previous therapists. - Doesn't wish to burden Jason with his own episodes. Unfortunately it's not always possible to hide them. - Just as Jason tortures him with puns, Harvey will do it right back. He'll come out with things like, "We only put up with you because you were the SECOND Robin," or "How would you like to die a second time?" - He will stand and stare awkwardly when Jason brings (sneaks) lovers back to the hideout. But he minds his business. - May have accidentally called Jason his son a few times. Or his "kid". But not to Jason directly, only in his talks between himself and Two-Face. - He likes seeing Jason happy. So many kids and young people are let down by Gotham's corruption and he'll be damned if Jason becomes a victim of it (again).

[featherandferns]

colour in the lines (fic)

jj maybank x fem!reader | enemies-to-lovers, tutor!reader concept set around season 1 era (no gold hunt) | not yet proofread so apologies!

content warning: dr*g use (weed, drinking); references to s3x; unique family dynamics

word count: 20k. (she's a slow-burner, but it's worth it)

blurb: When Mr Sunn hires you as JJ Maybank's tutor for the summer break, neither of you have high hopes for success. But as the lessons stretch on, maybe JJ isn't as much of an asshole as you thought, and maybe you aren't as much of a brown nose as he assumed.

The Arrangement 

“You ain’t serious.”

“As the plague,” Mr Sunn nods. 

JJ groans and tosses his head back. He’s lounging in the wooden chair as if it’s a comfortable Lay-Z-Boy. “Mr Sunn, can we just admit to each other right here and now that me getting a diploma ain’t ever gonna happen?”

Mr Sunn’s eyebrow quirks. He clasps his hands together atop of his desk. “You might be willing to give up on your education but I’m not. And until the day comes around that I am, you’re going to have tutoring.”

JJ stares begrudgingly at Mr Sunn like a sulking child. Tutoring? Come on, man. It felt as laughable and as useless as gifting a paralysed person a treadmill. 

“When’s this tutoring gonna be?” JJ reluctantly asks. 

“Every week on a Wednesday.”

“In September?”

“Starting next week.”

“Next week?” JJ gapes. Mr Sunn nods. “Mr Sunn, next week is the start of summer vacation. I ain’t gonna be educating myself during summer vacation. I think that’s actually against one of the human rights or something.”

“It isn’t. Maybe you’d know that if you actually attended class,” Mr Sunn remarks, almost smug. JJ rolls his eyes and mutters under his breath. 

“Summer vacation?”

“If you stop your moaning and bitching, you’d hear more about the conditions of it.”

“Oh, goody. Please do tell.”

There’s a warning in the look Mr Sunn shoots JJ that has him rolling his eyes again. Glancing off out the window, he sighs. The football field is devoid of life save for the birds pecking at the grass. There’s no bustling in the halls, no students in the classrooms. JJ was the lingering student on Friday after school, subject to the conversation with Mr Sunn per request at the end of class. It had been almost thirty minutes; the start of the discussion had been a delightful monologue delivered about JJ’s failing grades and concerning marks. That had followed into this downright hideous discussion of tutoring. 

“I’ve assigned a student who’s more than happy to give you tutoring. Like I said before, every Wednesday at one in the afternoon - unless exceptional circumstances occur.”

“Like me not wanting to get outta bed?”

“Like being in the hospital for a traumatic brain injury,” Mr Sunn corrects with a levelled look. JJ scoffs. Close enough, in his head. “She’ll tell me if you’ve attended the session, and if you stayed for the full time allocated–”

“--Wait, she? Who the hell–” Another pointed look that has JJ clearing his throat. “Who the heck is this tutor?”

Mr Sunn glances down at the papers laid out in front of him (many of which are evidence of JJ’s poor grades). “A Miss L/N.”

JJ’s brows furrow as he flicks through his mental rolodex of classmates at his school. The last name rattles around his brain until he finally finds a picture. His face falls. “Y/N?”

Mr Sunn nods. “She’s a stellar student.”

“She’s a brown-nosing bore.”

“Don’t think comments like that are very necessary, Maybank,” Mr Sunn warns. JJ doesn’t much care. 

JJ used to be in the same class as you last year but you had been in the background of JJ’s life since kindergarten. Kildare was a small county. Nearly every classmate traced back to the beginning of childhood. New students were rare and most seemingly went to Kook academy. He hadn’t interacted with you much, if at all, but he could place you pretty well. You always abided by the dress code; always attended class; always handed in your homework on time; always stuck up your hand in class; always got the answers right; and always aced the exams. You were on some of the nerd teams at school - chess and mathletes - and JJ was certain he’d seen you in the marching band at a football game he was dragged to a few years back. A textbook goody-two-shoe know-it-all: that’s what you were. The only defining story that JJ had of you was from Pope, who held a half-joking, half-serious grudge against you following a loss at a spelling bee in middle school. You’d won and JJ wondered if it was Pope’s villain origin story. The word ‘chromotosis’ was still a tender spot (and one JJ liked to poke from time to time). 

JJ laughs humourlessly, becoming increasingly annoyed with the situation. “Mr Sunn, you can’t be serious! I’d rather have you just tutor me instead!” 

“Well, I’m going to enjoy my summer vacation after spending the year teaching your classmates.”

JJ doesn’t let the omission of ‘you’ from his sentence bother him too much. It was valid. JJ was a failing student. He attended school fleetingly. Homework was nothing more than a theoretical concept in his world and tests were his mortal enemy. The letter ‘F’ had become a best friend, with ‘D’ and ‘C’ close companions. Learning didn’t come easy to him, not in the way it did for John B and Kiara, and especially not in the way it was for Pope. Everything took him longer. Reading, writing, equations, retaining information. It didn’t help that most of it didn’t interest him, either. Besides, JJ found it hard to sit still for long in the classroom. He got fidgety and restless. The outside world called to him through the window: the song of the waves, the tweeting in the trees. JJ was good with practical things like handiwork and mechanics. That was the profession he’d venture into more than likely, so what was the point in breaking his back over a pointless high school degree? 

Sighing, JJ rakes his fingers through his unruly hair. “Look, Mr Sunn, I’m gonna level with ya. I don’t think there’s much point in me getting a degree. I don’t give a crap about history or English or maths or any of that bullshit. And I don’t need it, a’right? I mean, you gotta know that, surely?” Before Mr Sunn can answer, JJ’s leaning in and digging through the papers. He retrieves one of his report cards and points at Mechanics. “Look! See! I’m pretty decent at stuff like that! Why can’t I just drop the rest and focus on that and be done with it?”

Mr Sunn sighs and smiles sympathetically at JJ. He takes the report card back and talks as he straightens out the papers. “I wish I could do that for you, JJ, but the state requires you to take all the core classes to graduate with a diploma. It might not mean much to you now, but trust me when I say that you’ll open so many more doors in your life if you apply yourself and finish school.”

There’s an unfamiliar sincerity in Mr Sunn’s words when he tells JJ, “You might not think you can do it, but I know you can. With some extra help, you can graduate, JJ.”

JJ holds Mr Sunn’s gaze for a long moment. Swallowing, JJ is disbelieving of the next words that leave his mouth in a resigned sigh. “Fine. I’ll do it.”

The First Lesson 

Your pencil taps rhythmically on the table as you glance at the clock on the wall for the eleventh time. Ten minutes late. Sighing, annoyed, you pick up your phone and text your best friend, Esme. 

Huffing out another breath, you return the phone to the table and busy yourself with reviewing the resources you’d brought. 

When Mr Sunn offered you the summer part-time job of tutoring, you thought - frankly -that it would be a piece of piss. Give some lessons to some snotty little stressed out middle schooler and earn fifteen bucks every Wednesday? Where do I sign? But that fantasy was soon broken. Instead of an innocent child struggling with algebra homework, it was JJ Maybank. JJ’s reputation preceded him like Jay Gatsby. He was a prolific class skipper. When he did attend, it was usually to disturb the lesson with childish jokes until he wound up in the principal’s office and, most likely, detention. He spent quizzes blowing raspberries, tapping his pencil and gazing out the window. Teachers stopped bothering to ask him if he finished his homework. Outside of that, you knew him to be a womanizer, a petty thief, and an adrenaline junky. The only notable interaction you had with JJ had left a bad taste in your mouth. You tried to forget about it, pushing it into the back of your mind, but the name always brought back the memory of that one day in class. That one passing remark that changed your opinion of JJ in a split-second. Following all of that, fifteen dollars - whilst still enough to have you agree to tutoring - did not feel like an even trade for dulling your brain cells for one hour in his company. 

Good news was that he wasn’t going to show, it seemed. Silver linings. Bad news? No JJ - no payout. 

As your eyes glance over the textbook photocopy to ensure it didn’t cut any information off, the door to Mr Sunn’s classroom swings open. You startle and look up, half expecting to see the security guard asking you what the hell you’re doing here. Instead, your eyes land on JJ Maybank. He’s talking as he walks over to the table you’ve claimed. 

“You would not believe how good the weather is out there today, holy shit,” he rambles as he pulls out the chair opposite you. “It’s fucking golden, Goddamn.”

You’re unsure what to say. Instead, you watch as JJ sighs and relaxes in his seat. One of his arms is tossed over the back of it; his legs manspread comfortably. Hair pressed under a beige cap, scruffy on the lip, his t-shirt and shorts are appropriate for the scorching weather outside. His combat boots that you’d noted when he walked over, not so much. 

Seemingly at your silence, he quirks a brow. “So? We gonna get started, or?”

“You’re late,” you say, annoyed at his urgency. “Ten minutes late. Actually-” A quick glance at the clock. “-eleven minutes late.”

JJ shrugs. “I was hungry. Had to stop by in-n-out.”

“You went to in-n-out?” 

His brows raise. “Did you want something from there? Didn’t peg you much as the, uh…fast food type.”

You’re not sure what he means by that but you imagine something unfriendly. Rolling your eyes, you level him with a glare. “You were eleven minutes late to our lesson because you stopped at an in-n-out?”

“Yep. So, what we starting with?” Before you can even formulate your next sentence, JJ’s interrupting you. “Actually, can I just– D’you mind if we wrap this up early today? Maybe do a half-session or something?”

“A half session?”

“Mhn,” he nods. JJ grins as he says, “the swells today at the beach are insane. It’s perfect surf weather. I gotta get a piece.”

Anger bubbles in your throat. Exhaling sharply through your nose, you grit your teeth. “Well, since you were eleven minutes late to the start of the lesson, we gotta make up for lost time. ‘Sides, Mr Sunn said that you had to attend the whole hour.”

“Yeah, but, like…He ain’t here, is he? So…” JJ leans forward on the table, closing down the space between the two of you. His biceps push against the sleeves of his short sleeve top when he rocks his weight forward and you’re quick to avert your eyes back to his face. There’s a boyish charm shining through his smirk. His eyes are half hooded as he scans your face and figure. You shift and square your shoulders, sitting back in your seat, trying to reclaim the gap. “What’d you say you do me a solid and tell a little white lie ‘bout it, huh? No harm in that, right?”

Oh. You see what’s happening. JJ thinks you’re just another one of the girls bewitched by his beauty. That all he has to do is bat his pretty eyes and flash you that gorgeous smile and you’ll fall at his feet and do as he asks. 

You try to bite back your smirk as best as possible when you lean forward. You leave the smallest gap between you, forearms almost touching, and you get a thrill at the flash of surprise in his eyes. 

“Listen, blue eyes. I get paid for the hour and, unlucky for you, I don’t enjoy lying to people. So here’s what gonna happen. We’re going to sit here and do the full one-hour session, making sure we don’t lose those lovely eleven minutes. Sound good?”

JJ’s smile falls quickly. He grits his teeth and clenches his jaw. You sweeten the deal with an overly sugary smile before returning to how you were sat before. 

“We’re starting with biology.”

JJ slowly unfurls himself to retain into his seat. You dig out one of the worksheets and slide it across the table to him. 

“What’d you remember from this semester?”

JJ sighs as if he’s bored and slowly raises his hands to count on his fingers. He takes his time as he recounts, in a dull tone of voice, “monkeys masturbate and…that’s about it.”

Rolling your eyes, irritated, you look down at your twinning worksheet. You push your glasses up the bridge of your nose when they slip down. “Right, okay, starting from square one then. If you look at the first paragraph, give it a quick read and then I’m gonna ask you some questions about it, ‘kay?”

JJ doesn’t say anything but grunts. It’s hard to restrain from rolling your eyes a third time. When a substantial amount of time has passed, you glance to see if he’s still reading. JJ sits, head rocked back, arms folded across his chest, eyes closed. You see red. 

“Done reading?” you manage out. He doesn’t open his eyes when he hums ‘yes’. “Okay then…” You look down at the questions you’d prepared and take a sigh before reading out the first one. “The powerhouse of the cell is called the…” 

JJ doesn’t say anything. Clearing your throat to prompt him, he cracks open an eye, observes you leisurely, and then closes it again. “Heart.”

“The Mitochondria.” 

“Right, yeah, that’s what I meant. Same thing.”

Your teeth grate against each other. Another cooling breath and you read the second, third, fourth questions. Each answer given by JJ raises your blood pressure by another degree. This is going to be a fucking pain in your ass. At the forty minute mark, you’re repeating the mantra ‘think of the money, think of the money, think of the money’ like a religious prayer in your mind. JJ has managed to make an almost impressive amount of crude jokes about cell anatomy, gave some brain-cell killing answers to pretty basic biology questions, and yawned enough times to have a doctor concerned for his well being. You’re relieved when your eyes find the clock reads that an hour has passed. 

“Right, well. That’s everything for today.”

“Oh, damn. I was just getting into it, too,” JJ sardonically says. You glare at him. He stands and stretches, his shirt riding up as he extends his arms above his head. He fixes his cap as he asks, “same time next week, then?”

“One in the afternoon.”

“Can’t wait,” he mutters. He wanders to the door, giving a fleeting ‘see ya’ as he slips out the classroom. You’re amazed the door doesn’t burst into flames with the heat of your stare. 

The First Complaint

The sun bathes JJ in blisteringly warm rays of daylight. He revels in it like a gecko in the desert. Arms tucked underneath his head, he lounges on the front of the boat. Sunglasses sit on his face, eyes closed behind them, and a toothpick sticks out from his lips. The water laps at the boat, rocking it gently from side to side. An old-school R&B song hums out the speaker near the cooler. 

“I’m telling y’all, the fishing out there is crazy. Worth the trip, for sure,” John B tells the Pogues. He’s probably where JJ last saw him; stood by the end of the boat, shirtless in his swim shorts like Pope and JJ, fishing. 

“I’m down. Could go next week,” Kiara says. She’s probably scrolling on her ipod to cue the next song. 

“My dad’s got me working shifts but I can do Wednesday,” Pope adds, likely reading. 

JJ blows a raspberry. “Wednesday is a no-go.”

“Why not?”

“I got class.”

He can hear the shared confusion in the silence. He props himself up on an elbow, jutting his sunglasses down the bridge of his nose enough to scan over his friends. They’re all exactly where he pictured them, staring at him blankly. 

“Class?” Pope finally asks. 

“Yeah. I’ve got tutoring.”

John B barks out a laugh and Kiara rolls her eyes, looking back to her ipod. “Yeah right,” she mutters. 

“Dude, I’m so serious right now,” JJ loudly defends, throwing his arm out. 

“The day you get tutoring is the day hell freezes over,” Pope declares. 

JJ shrugs. “Alright, then it’s frozen, cause I am.”

“How’d they get you to go? Gag and bind you?” John B sniggers, making the others laugh. 

“Hilarious. Thank you for caring about my education, assholes,” JJ grumbles. He isn’t actually offended. It tracks that the Pogues think he’s bullshitting. It isn’t as if JJ has valued books and pop quizzes at any stage in his life. Returning to his previous position, he grins as he says, “you’re not gonna guess who’s my tutor.”

“Mr Sunn?”

“Nope. He did allocate her, though.”

“Least we know it’s a she,” Kiara says. “Helps with the guessing.”

“Well, go on. Guess.”

“Just tell us,” Pope sighs, in no mood for games. JJ’s grin grows. 

“Your mortal enemy.”

John B and Kiara let out a gasp and snigger. JJ glances through his sunglasses to make out Pope’s face. In his disbelief, JJ nods. “Yep.”

“She still as brainy as she was then?”

“More,” JJ mutters. His memory flicks back to yesterday; the way your glasses slipped down your nose just slightly when you leant forward on the table. The shimmering of your eyes as they glared at him. The sneer on your lips. You clearly think rather highly of yourself. It had been pretty entertaining seeing how far he could push. He’s impressed that you didn’t lunge at him before the session was up; he was certain you’d come pretty close several times. Sighing, JJ sits back up on his arms and looks to his friends. “We’re going to that kegger tonight, right?”

“We could,” John B shrugs. “Not doing much else.”

“It’s Touron season,” JJ grins boyishly, making Kie roll her eyes. 

“You guys are gross.”

“Come on! Just trying to get little Pope’s dick wet for a change,” JJ lies, getting up and smacking a hand reassuringly on Pope’s shoulder. He’s shrugged off, making him snigger. 

“My dick is perfectly fine as it is, thank you,” Pope mutters, looking back down at his book. Rolling his eyes, JJ retrieves a beer from the cooler. 

“Whatever man. Lemme know when you want to learn how to get girls.”

“Yeah. JJ’s a scholar now, afterall,” John B jokes. At the heckling laughter of his friends, JJ rolls his eyes mirthfully and goes back to enjoying his summer break. 

The Second Lesson

You’re not sure why you’re surprised that JJ is late yet again to his lesson. This time you’ve found better ways to entertain yourself than clock watching. Sending memes back and forth with Esme and doomscrolling Instagram was working well to keep you from counting the minutes wasted in the empty classroom. You can hear people outside, playing in the fields, chattering on the streets as they walk to and from their summer day plans. There’s an itch under your skin to leave and make the most of the beautiful weather. It feels a shame to spend your time cooped up in a dusty classroom, making anagrams out of the history posters lining the walls. But the posters make you think of Mr Sunn, reminding you of the promise you’d made to him before the vacation started. 

“You’ll be paid for the tutoring and your trouble. But I’m trusting you to be honest. I don’t want to be paying out for an hour spent on Call of Duty or whatever it is you do in your spare time.”

“Definitely not Call of Duty.”

“Either way: if Maybank doesn’t show, then I need you to be honest with me. I’m trusting you.”

“I promise, Mr Sunn. You can put your faith in me.”

Your phone begins to ring. Picking up, you don’t have the chance to say ‘hi’ before Esme is talking. 

“What a fucking loser.”

“I mean, he has my number. He could at least message to say he’s running late,” you complain. 

“He could at least bother showing up on time,” Esme corrects, making you laugh. “He’s probably not even doing anything anyway.”

“I honestly don’t give a shit what he’s doing. Just wish I had a heads-up if he’s not going to show so I can actually do something with my day,” you sigh, rubbing at your forehead. “Mom’s got another night shift tonight and I hate leaving Leo alone all day.”

“I thought he was going to that summer day-camp thingy? The scholarship deal didn’t get cancelled, did it?” Esme worries. 

“He’s not going anymore. Not because of the scholarship - that’s still fine. Just…” Your voice trails off, heart tugging at the memory of his crestfallen face, muddled with confusion when you had to tell him he wasn’t going to be going back. 

“The usual stuff?” Esme guesses. She’d known you for almost six years now; she knew Leo for just as long. She shared that same protectiveness for him. 

“Yep.”

“Kids are shitheads.”

You bark out a laugh. “You can’t say that about children, Esme.”

The two of you laugh quietly. You sigh and fiddle with the corner of one of the worksheets. Just as you’re about to tell her that you’ll leave in the next five minutes, the door pushes open. “I gotta go, Esme.”

“Wait - did he actually show up?” 

“Yep.”

“Holy shit, someone call the media,” she mutters. You give a sheltered laugh, eyes scanning over a sunglass-donning JJ. “Alright, message me after. Love ya.”

“Talk soon,” you hum before the line clicks off. Placing your phone down on the table, you watch as JJ shuffles into the room lethargically. He’s dressed similarly to last week: combat boots, shorts, t-shirt. The cap this week is red, equally as well-worn as the beige. The sunglasses are new though. “You seem lively.”

“Not so loud, please,” JJ groans, bringing a hand up to his forehead as if nursing a headache. He collapses into the chair opposite you with a grunt. A silence lingers between the two of you. JJ is so still you half question if he’s passed out. Eventually, he shifts enough to tug his sunglasses down, revealing a slither of his eyeline. He’s looking at you. 

“You gonna start with the lesson, then?”

“You gonna stay awake for it?” you ask in return. He pushes the sunglasses back up. 

“No promises.”

“You’re hungover,” you observe. JJ makes a ding-ding-ding noise under breath. The momentary peacefulness that came from your quick phone call with Esme is soon dissipating. “You’re hungover despite knowing that we had tutoring today?”

“I don’t know what ‘despite’ means, a’right? Can we make a ban on big words when my brain feels like it’s gonna explode?”

“Might need you to define big words. Have a feeling most words qualify as that with you,” you mutter. JJ scoffs. 

“Get off your high horse, brown noser. Just cause you’ve read a few books don’t mean you know everything.”

“As opposed to you?” you quip back. 

JJ snuggles in his seat, folding his arms over his chest in an echo of his posture last week. “Just start with the schooling, huh? Thought you needed to report back to Daddy Sunn that you’ve done your duties.”

Your nose turns up at the nickname. Not bothering to argue, you dig through the worksheets and hesitate in passing one across the table to him. Your eyes scan over his figure. His carelessness in his appearance; his indifference to this generous opportunity he’s been given; his dismissiveness of your valuable donation of time. It irritates you. A lot. 

“You don’t realise how fortunate you are, do you?” you snap. 

JJ visibly stuns at your tone. He doesn’t hurry his movements as he sits straighter in his seat, turning to face you, sliding his sunglasses off his face. His eyebrows rise, bloodshot eyes zeroing in on you. “What was that, brown nose?”

“You have no idea how fortunate you are to be here right now,” you repeat, holding your ground. You clear your throat and correct your glasses on your nose. “Mr Sunn put a lot of effort into organising these sessions. Letting us have access to the building out of hours. Access to all these resources. He put a lot of faith into you. He genuinely believed that you’d give enough of a crap to at least try tutoring. But instead you stroll in her like the sun shines out of your ass and you’re God’s gift to earth and waste everybody’s time.”

JJ watches you after your outburst. His eyes flit over your face, taking in every inch of your disgruntled expression, and his lips twitch downwardly. Leaning forward on the table, he raises a finger to point in your face. 

“You don’t know shit about my fortune,” he remarks darkly, in a tone that you’ve never once heard from him. He’s unrecognisable as he warns you, “you stay in your lane and I’ll stay in mine, a’right? I ain’t needing you preaching on your soapbox about how good I got shit when you ain’t know anything about anything. So either get on with teaching, or I’ll get on up and out that door.”

It’s unnerving, JJ’s demeanour and tone. It’s unnerving but it isn’t enough to make you back down. Narrowing your eyes, you sit proud and tall, hands clasped politely atop of the table. 

“Be my guest. The door is behind you, in case you’re too drunk to find it.”

JJ’s chair pushes back from the force he gets up with. He mutters under breath curses and cusses as he makes his way to the door. Your voice is polite and cheery as you call, “One o’clock next Wednesday.”

The door slams closed. Another successful tutoring session. Another migraine to go home with. 

The First Check-In 

“JJ! Answer your damn phone!” John B hollers from the bathroom. 

JJ jogs through the Chateau in search of the cell. It’s the third call he’s missed. It isn’t on purpose: he can’t find where he put the damn thing. It’s as if it’s fallen into a pocket of the universe that ceases to exist. Digging through the couch cushions of the pull-out, JJ’s fingers finally make contact with the buzzing device. 

“Aha!” he cheers, pulling out. He swipes to answer, tumbling back on the sofa-bed. It must have fallen down there when he was fooling around with some Touron he met at the kegger last night. “Yo.”

“Maybank.”

JJ’s eyes press shut and his mood significantly drops. “Sup, Mr Sunn.”

“Not much, not much. Just calling to check in on how the tutoring is going?”

“How’s it going?”

Terrible. It’s awful. JJ has never known a bigger waste of time. He’s learnt a total of zero things from the hour and ten minutes spent in your company, apart from the fact that you’re the most aggravating girl he has ever met. You might be the first female that JJ hasn’t enjoyed spending time with. Rather impressive, actually. 

“Yeah, yeah, it’s great,” JJ lies easily. He rubs at the sleep in his eyes as he continues, “learning a ton, feeling really smart. Gaining all that knowledge, y’know?”

“Really?”

“Yup.”

“That’s interesting. Cause your tutor couldn’t agree less.”

JJ grits his teeth. Of course, you’re a rat as well as a shrew. You just seem to cover all areas of dislike in JJ’s books, it’s as if you’ve read all of JJ’s least favourite things. 

“Oh really? What’d she say?”

“That you’re not engaging with the work. The last session was cut short too, apparently,” Mr Sunn recalls, disapproval dripping from every word. 

“Yeah, well, you see, there was those exceptional circumstances you were talking about for that one, Mr S,” JJ half-arsedly defends. 

“Really? A traumatic brain injury?” Mr Sunn checks, unconvinced. 

“Yeah, yeah. A really brutal one, too,” JJ says, wincing at the memory of the banging headache he was awarded for going a bit too hard at the kegger the night before. 

Mr Sunn’s sigh cuts deep. It’s parental. That sentiment of ‘I’m not angry, just disappointed’ is translated through the exhale, and JJ hates how much of an effect it has on him. JJ liked Mr Sunn: all of the Pogues did. He was a good teacher and cool guy. As annoying as your preaching was, JJ was reluctant to admit there was some truth to some of the things you said. Mr Sunn did believe in JJ. God knows why or what for, but he had put all of this together to purely benefit the blonde haired boy. Maybe you were somewhat right in him taking that for granted. Maybe. 

“Look, JJ, if you’re not gonna take this seriously then we might as well call it off now,” Mr Sunn hedges.

“No, no, wait, look, Mr Sunn…I’m gonna level with you…” JJ takes a sigh and braces himself. “I haven’t been taking it seriously but I will now. I’ll start, y’know…Trying. Like, actually trying.”

“Yeah?” 

“Yeah,” JJ reassures. “Just gimme one more chance, yeah?”

Mr Sunn hesitates before sighing once more. “Alright. Fine. One more chance.”

“Thanks, Mr S,” JJ says. He’s surprised with himself for willingly signing on for more of your boring-ass lessons, but something in his gut tells him this is the right call. “I won’t let you down.”

“Alright, Maybank. You got one more chance. Wednesday, one o’clock. Don’t be late.”

“I won’t be,” JJ promises. As the phone call ends, JJ makes a secret deal with himself to give the tutoring a real chance. To give himself a real chance. 

The Third Lesson 

The feeling of your heart pounding in your throat is uncomfortable, to say the least. There’s a thin sheen of sweat on your forehead as you race around the house. In your head, you’re mentally juggling a million and one thoughts. Need to do this, need to do that. The checklist spans over several thoughts and derails every line of logic. It doesn’t help that it feels like Satan's asshole in the house right now. It is so hot. You think you might have seen something on Instagram claiming it was the hottest day of the year. Your family home is noisy with the sound of life: the washing machine and dryer are both on, rattling loudly in the utility room; the blender is going for your mom’s protein shake; the television and radio are both on and Leo refuses to turn either off. Overstimulating children’s cartoons bellow out into the stuffy living room. 

You’re standing in the bedroom, packing your bag frantically with school supplies for the tutoring session that’s near approaching. A holler of your name from downstairs has you groaning. At first, you try to ignore it, but it only gets louder and louder, until Leo is practically screeching for you. Your mom starts to call for you, too, beckoning you to go to him from her bedroom. With a frustrated huff, you ditch your mess of belongings on your bed and rush out of your room. 

“I’m going, mom!” you loudly tell her as you hurry down the stairs. 

Leo is sitting on the living room floor, a broken mechanical car in his hand. He holds it up to you, pouting, as he demands, “fix it, sissy! Fix it!”

“Leo, I really don’t have time to fix it,” you sigh tiredly, leaning down to take it from him. You inspect the damage and shake your head, “can’t you play with something else until I get home?”

“Fix it! Sissy! Fix it!” Leo continues to command. His eyes well with tears and his lip begins to tremble, and you know the signs of one of his episodes well. Overwhelmed, you sit down on the sofa and try your best to remedy the toy. It’s useless. It requires some sort of tool to get everything back together and functioning. Leo comes over and tugs on your t-shirt as you work, murmuring ‘sissy, fix it. Fix it, sissy,’ 

“I’m trying, Leo. Sissy is trying,” you mumble. You feel your own lip tremble and tears starting to form, and you internally curse yourself and will them away. You never cry in front of Leo. It’s your duty to keep him protected; to shelter him from the stresses that come along with your life. It isn’t his fault that things are different with him. But the more you try and fix the toy, and the louder the washing machine and dryer and blender become, and the hotter the room gets, and the more insistent Leo’s tugging and pulling becomes, the harder it is to hold back your brimming emotions. 

Leo begins to cry and you curse under breath. You place the toy on the coffee table and get down on your knees. 

“Leo, honey. Don’t cry. I will fix it, okay? Sissy will fix it. I just need a bit more time, m’kay?”

“Fix it, fix it, fix it,” he wails. His small hands ball into fists and he pummels the sides of his head, and your heart lurches. Your hands scramble to gently cup his own, ceasing the action as much as possible. 

“Don’t do that, baby. Please don’t do that.”

“Fix it, sissy,” he sobs.

“I will, I will,” you promise. Anything, you think. I’d do anything for you. You’re relieved when he lets you pull him into an embrace. You let him cry and smack his hands against your back. Emotions are big in his tiny body. They overwhelm him. It isn’t his fault. You press a kiss to his cheek, hoping you can somehow communicate that thought to him. When he’s settled, you give him one more squeeze before pulling away. Taking the toy from the coffee table, you tell him, “I’ll have it fixed by the time I get back home, m’kay?”

“Sissy fix it later,” Leo sniffles, nodding. Your smile is brimming and bright as you nod encouragingly. 

“Yes, yes. Sissy fix it later,” you reassure. Your eyes dart to the grandfather clock that stands in the hallway. Shit. “I really need to go, Leo. You need anything, you tell mom, yeah? Wake her up only if you need to, though.”

Leo nods. 

You jog through the house, scrambling up the stairs. The toy is shoved into your tote bag alongside the rest of the supplies, and then you’re racing down the stairs. The blender is finally finished; pouring it into a glass, you’re hurrying back to your mom’s room and leaving it on her bedside table. She’d finished a 32 hour shift at the hospital about two hours ago. Asleep, buried in the bedsheets, you lean down and press a kiss to her forehead. 

“See ya later, mom. Love ya,” you mumble softly. Closing the door gently behind you, you return downstairs to find Leo peacefully playing with a stuffed animal. Thank God. As you unlock the front door, you relay your usual farewell: “there’s carrot sticks and bell pepper sticks in the tub on the coffee table. Wake mom if it’s an emergency. Don’t touch the fireplace. Sissy will be back soon!”

Leo’s farewell is cut short by the closing front door. The pulsing heat slows you down as you speed walk to the high school. Children playing soccer and couples sharing picnics and surfer bros and girls loading up cars and vans and trucks blur into pictures of fantasies that you wish you could indulge in as you make your way down the streets. Finally, finally, you arrive at the high school. The air con is as relieving as heroin as you rush down the isolated corridors. JJ’s head whips to the opening door when you make it to the classroom. 

“Wow. You did show up.”

Your eyes squeeze shut with suppressed emotion as you bee-line to your chair. JJ doesn’t lose the opportunity to lecture, though. You suppose you have it coming from how much grief you’ve given him from being tardy. 

“I mean, you’d think that you’d at least practice what you preach. After all the shit you gave me for being late and you’re nearly twenty minutes over. Even I’m not that bad,” JJ goads. “Could at least take it seriously, y’know? Ain’t Mr Sunn putting all his hopes and dreams on you or some shit?”

Your hands freeze in your tote bag, midway through unpacking yourself. Tears rush to your eyes and you panic, pressing them shut, begging for them to go away. Crying in front of somebody was one thing. Crying in front of JJ Maybank was another. Your teeth sink into your lower lip to keep it still. The tightness in your throat keeps growing, with that horrible lump and scratchy dryness. Come on, get it together. 

“Hello?” JJ asks impatiently. “You gonna do something or…?”

That’s the breaking point. 

The tears fall in fat, ugly drops as a shaky sob rattles out of you. And then it’s as if the floodgates have opened. You can only imagine the horrified look on JJ’s face as you sit and cry in an empty history classroom. You cry, and cry, and cry. When you’re not crying, you’re gasping for air, sniffing back the snot, wiping aggressively at your nose and your eyes and your cheeks. Every attempt to slow the sorrow seems to bring about a new wave of waterworks. Until, finally, it seems to ease up. 

“God, I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” you mutter, taking off your glasses and wiping furiously at your face. It’s red hot, mostly from embarrassment, and you blink up at the ceiling. “Shit, sorry. I don’t know why…Sorry.”

When you brave a look at JJ, you’re surprised to see no look of horror or humour. Instead, he’s frowning. He looks sympathetic, even. You can’t bare that expression. It feels as though people have looked at you like that for most of your life. Wiping at your wet cheeks, you take in a deep breath. With a violent sniffle, you return your glasses to your face, damp fingers trembling as they flick through the papers. 

“Where, uh…Where should we start?”

JJ mumbles your name. 

“Maybe Biology?”

He repeats it, slightly louder. You can’t stomach looking at him. 

“Or History?”

It’s with a stern voice, JJ has your attention. He holds your gaze unapologetically. Then, he’s glancing down at the papers in your hands, out the window to the spotless summer, and back at you. He nods, a decision apparently made, and gets to his feet. 

“A’right, come on,” he says. You blink at him. 

“Huh?”

“Come on, get up. We’re getting outta here.”

“What are you…JJ, no, you have a lesson. I need to teach you about…”

“Teach me it in the car,” JJ tells you, not waiting for you to finish your thought. He’s walking around the table into new territory. His extended hand is like an olive branch. You eye it as if it might be laced with arsenic. But when you look up at his face, the smile on his face is new. It’s friendly. Reassuring, even. Your still quivering hand out stretches to land in his. His palm is warm and slightly clammy. He helps you up from your seat. You shrug your tote bag up your shoulder and JJ releases your hand to gather up your papers. Holding them out, you return them to your bag, and then you’re blindly following JJ out of the classroom and down the corridors. 

His black shorts look like swim shorts. They end around the mid-thigh. His shirt is sticking to his back with a thin veil of sweat. It’s sweltering in Kildare County. You’re surprised by how attractive you find it. In your frantic fragility, you hadn’t realised JJ wasn’t wearing a cap. Instead, his blonde hair sat atop of his head, longer strands hanging slightly over his forehead. You think that’s the first time that you let yourself admit how attractive JJ Maybank is. 

“Where are we going?” you ask, picking up the pace to walk beside him. 

“The beach.”

“Why?” 

“Because,” JJ says, pushing open the door and holding it for you to step through, “it is officially the hottest day of summer,” the two of you make your way down the stairs, “you just had some weird, psycho freak-out,” you follow JJ to a brown, banged-up campervan, “and nature is the best healer.”

You can’t argue with much of anything he’s said, so you don’t. Instead, you walk around to the passenger side and climb into the van. It smells of seasalt, men’s cologne and remnants of cannabis. There’s empty beer cans at your feet that you kick out of the way. Crumpled up in-n-out paper stuffed into the wings of the door. JJ sighs as he drops into the driver’s seat. You watch as he brushes his hair from his face, fingers running easily through the locks. He turns the key in the ignition and his silver rings glint in the sunlight. The van rumbles to life, vibrating the seat, and JJ puts it in gear. 

“Wind down the window, would ya?” he asks, meeting your gaze. You nod and do as he asks. JJ does the same on his side, and then he’s putting the van into reverse, and soon enough you’re on an impromptu road trip with JJ Maybank. 

It’s difficult not to look at him. He’s so different from the guy you’ve been trying to tutor for the past two weeks. He’s also different from the image you’d built in your head of him. Some suave, ladykiller. Cruel, phony, dismissive. In the bright glow of sunlight, he’s rather gorgeous. His arm is propped on the window ledge. The wind brushes at his hair. His fingers tap on the steering wheel rhythmically with the beat of whatever song is playing from the stereo. Scared to get caught staring, you turn and watch the view out the window. JJ was right: you needed this. It’s hard to find excuses to relax and have fun when your mom and Leo need you so badly at home. Any time spent just for you without any benefit behind it feels selfish. But this was like a ‘get out of jail free’ card. An excuse dressed up in combat boots and dreamy muscles. 

There’s no conversation made as the two of you drive. It isn’t uncomfortable, though. It feels strangely natural, sitting side-by-side in shared silence. When the shoreline comes into view, you’re weirdly disappointed that the journey is over so soon. JJ parks and gets out with a ‘come on’ that has you following. You linger and look around as JJ digs about in the back of the van. He’s proud as punch when he emerges with two cans of seltzer and a towel (you don’t want to know the last time it was washed, if ever). The waves sound delicious in their susurrus against the sand as the two of you walk through the sand dunes. It was fairly busy: people surfing, others lounging with music playing from speakers, children playing volleyball. Girls lay on their fronts and backs, reading, tanning, relaxing. Guys bob their heads to the music and watch people dip in and out of the waves on their boards, nodding in approval. Seabirds call out afar and crickets chirp in the reeds. You feel like you’ve taken your first breath of fresh air in years. 

“Here seems good, huh?” JJ says, slowing near a more secluded patch of beach. You nod. He lays out the towel horizontally, leaving space for you to both sit side by side. JJ smells like sunscreen and cologne and a touch of sweat. The crisp cracking of cans opens the conversation. “Cheers.”

Your can tinks against his. You have a sip. It’s tangy and refreshing as you swallow. Toeing off your trainers and socks, you sink your feet into the hot grains of sand. JJ copies. The two of you lean back and lounge. 

“So,” JJ says. The two of you turn to look at one another. “You feeling okay?”

Laughing, you shake your head and have another sip of your drink. JJ grins. Looking out to the water, you sigh as you reply, “I was just overwhelmed. Sorry ‘bout the…y’know…”

“Snot?”

You laugh, facing him again. “Yeah. And the tears.”

“I was a little freaked out, I’m not gonna lie,” JJ tells you mirthfully, making you laugh more. 

“Mhm. Same here.” The two of you sit in a jovial lull for a moment until you feel the need to clarify, “I promise that isn’t a usual occurrence.”

Laughing, JJ nods. “Yeah, well, did seem out of character. Used to you giving me hell for…Well, shit, for anything.”

“You make it pretty easy to do that, in my defense,” you grin. JJ cringes, rocking his head as if to say ‘is that true?’ “Mr Sunn said something ‘bout you wanting to take the tutoring more seriously?”

“Damn, news travels fast here,” JJ mutters, making you smile. 

“For the record: you were right.”

“That’s rare.”

“I bet,” you snigger. JJ shoves your shoulder and you giggle. “But, you were. I didn’t have any right making any assumptions about your life. Your fortune, as you said.”

“Nah, don’t take it personally,” JJ says, dropping his head slightly. He swings his can between two fingers. “I’m a dick when I’m hungover.”

“You hungover all the time then or…?”

“Damn, mama! I’m tryn’a make amends here!”

The two of you share a laugh. It sinks away like footprints on sand. Nodding your head, you hold his gaze as you smile. 

“Well, we could start fresh.”

“I’m down.”

“Hey - to new beginnings,” you announce, holding up your can. JJ smiles at you, nods, and clinks his can against yours. The two of you have a drink. A kid races across the beach in front of you, chasing a stray soccer ball. “Can’t remember the last time I came to the beach.”

“Really? I go all the time,” JJ replies. 

“My parents used to take us on picnics here every Sunday,” you say, smiling to yourself. You watch the little boy return to his sister. She takes the ball from him and they continue their game. The smile changes. “We stopped going after my brother was born, though.”

“How come?”

You swallow. Remembering yourself, you blink out of your thoughts and flash JJ a smile. “Just new routines, I guess.”

Nodding, JJ digs about in his pocket as he talks, “me and my friends surf a lot so we’re at the beach most of the time, really. John B lives right near the marsh though so sometimes we just go out on the boat, y’know?”

You watch as he retrieves a small metal tin. He opens it to reveal a joint and lighter. Instinctively, your eyebrows raise slightly. His eyes flash to yours and he falters. “D’you mind?”

“No, no, uh…Go for it,” you say, gesturing lamely to his blunt. He doesn’t hesitate as he brings it to his lips, guarding the flame for the breeze with a cup of his hand. The smell is fruity and poignant when he takes a few starting drags. You watch the ash building on the end as if mesmerised by fire, like you’re some kind of cave person. Then you realise JJ’s offering it to you. “Oh, um…I’m good. Thanks, though.”

JJ takes another hit. “You smoke before?” You give him a look of ‘what do you think?’ JJ coughs out his vapour with a laugh. “You wanna try?”

“Um…” You hesitate, eyeing up the joint. “I don’t know. What’s it feel like?”

“Depends,” JJ replies. “Usually makes you feel relaxed. Less aware of yourself. Loosens up your shoulders, calms you down, that kind of thing. Can make you laugh too. Hungry. Talkative. Pope on weed - Jesus Christ - you should see him. It’s like he took speed or something. He won’t shut the hell up, for once.”

You smile, having a vague memory of Pope. You went head to head with him at a spelling bee back in Middle School. He always seemed like a nice guy. Intelligent, too; he definitely gave you a run for your money that day. 

“Can you have a bad trip?” you wonder, curious. JJ shrugs. 

“Sometimes. I’ve only had a couple. Mostly depends on what state of mind you’re in before you take it, or if it’s a bad batch. Smoking’s the best way to start, though. You stop smoking and it’s out of your system a faster than if you have an edible. With an edible, you’re in it for the ride, y’know?”

“Hm,” you hum in deliberation. 

“It’s safe. I mean, it’s legal in a bunch of places now,” JJ reassures. 

Snorting, you say, “that means nothing! Cigarettes are legal too, don’t stop them from giving you cancer.”

Rolling his eyes, amused, JJ replies, “can you just not overthink everything for one second? Look, I ain’t gonna pressure you into anything, but I think it could help. Especially if you’re feeling a bit overwhelmed, like you said.”

He doesn’t press it any further and you don’t ask more questions. The two of you sit for a couple minutes before you find yourself reaching out to take the joint. JJ’s happy to oblige. You bring it to your lips, heart beating nervously in your chest, and you hesitate. Looking at him, you ask, “how’d I do this, again?”

“Just bring it up and inhale,” he says, mimicking for you. “Try and hold it in for a bit and then exhale. Don’t freak if you cough. Most people do, first time.”

Murmuring an ‘okay’, you swallow your anxieties before following JJ’s instructions. The air gets caught in your lungs and throat and you splutter out a cough. JJ laughs lightly as you do and you flip him off, smiling despite your hacking. Once it’s passed, you take a few more drags, getting better with every attempt. 

“Now what?” You ask, handing it back. “Should I feel something?”

Laughing, JJ leans back on his elbows. “Relax. You’ll start to feel it in a minute. Might need a few more hits.”

“Alright,” you say. You shadow his posture. A thought occurs that has you giggling. JJ quirks a brow, curious. “Sorry, sorry, it’s just…I’ve only ever had, like, one glass of wine at Christmas and Thanksgiving. Just a bit new.”

“Aw, man, don’t say that,” JJ groans, tossing his head back. “That makes it sound like I corrupted your ass or some shit.”

Sniggering, you can’t help but glance at him and tease, “maybe you did.”

The look JJ returns hits somewhere new inside of you. 

Turning to your bag, you dig for your bottle of water. Leo’s toy car tumbles out onto the sand. “Shit,” you mutter, picking up and dusting off the grains. 

“What’s that?” JJ asks. 

You turn and show him the broken car. He takes it from you and studies it as you tell him, “it’s my little brother’s. He was asking me to fix it but I don’t even know where to start with that kind of thing. It’s meant to move, see?”

JJ nods, looking at the motor you point to. He turns it over in his hands, inspects some parts, before announcing, “I can fix this.”

“What?”

“Yeah, yeah, it’s pretty simple, really. Just need to fix this part here,” he points at somewhere on the car, “and then change out the batteries, glue a few things, and should be good as new.”

“For real?”

“Sure,” JJ shrugs. He smiles at you. His eyes are blue, decorated with green flecks. You smile back. A fuzzy feeling builds in your chest. Your eyes dart down to his lips. They probably taste like seltzer and cannabis. He probably tastes like seltzer and cannabis. 

A scream has you both jumping, drawing your attention away from JJ. You look across the beach to find a kid screeching with laughter, screaming as their dad chases them through the wake of the water. You smile. In your peripheral, you see JJ smiling too. Maybe you had him wrong. Maybe the two of you can actually get along. Perhaps even be friends, of sorts. 

As the rest of the day stretches on, you and JJ pass stories and tell jokes. You churn up hilarious theories and stories about fellow beach goers as you smoke your way through his joint. The weed takes effect after a few minutes of smoking, like promised, and you get the giggles over something JJ says. You like his laugh. It’s bright and youthful, yet still somehow raspy. He gets rather philosophical when he’s high. Starts spewing ideas about the universe and fate and plans. That opens up a path to talk about daydreams and castles in the air. Fantasies of lives with high grossing jobs and Kook-sized homes and vacations every month. As the hours pass by and the topics come and go, you find yourself free from thoughts of studying and cleaning and cooking and caring for others outside of yourself. You find yourself present and in the moment for maybe the first time ever. That to say, when JJ eventually drives you home, the sun finally beginning to set, your heart deflates with the thought that the day is almost over. That you’re going to have to get out of the car and say goodbye to him, even if it’s for a week. 

The Sixth Lesson

JJ never thought that the day might come when he enjoys school. However, whenever Wednesday rolls around, this wave of energy washes over him, putting some pep in his steps like he’s in a Saturday special. Mr Sunn’s classroom had become this sanctuary; this garden of Eden that only you and JJ knew about. You had this way of explaining things that made it click for JJ. It was if you were a translator, taking complex terms and working them into analogies that fit into JJ’s head. You showed him tricks to keep notes which saved his paper from becoming a  stressful, confusing mess of scribbles. You recognised his need for taking breaks, splitting up sessions with stories, taking the chance to show him memes that your friend Esme had sent you. There was a sweetness to you, underneath the bossy, business-like exterior JJ was first met with. And with that sweetness came JJ’s sudden realisation that you’re really fucking beautiful. 

He’s not sure why he didn’t notice it at first. Maybe he did, but he didn’t want to acknowledge it. He was too busy cursing you for taking up his summer vacation. But now that’s noticed, he can’t unsee it. It’s like watching a movie and realising your favourite actor is in it; they take all the attention. And you took most of JJ’s, during your tutor sessions. He’d steal glances when he was reading through worksheets or filling pop quizzes. Snippets of your head bent forward, reading, your glasses slowly slipping down your nose until you push them back up. Glasses suited you. Framed your cherub face. Your laugh was melodic; tuneful like you were singing. But your lips might have been JJ’s favourite thing about you. You’d gnaw at them, chewing on them when you concentrated. You’d pamper them with lip gloss and balm, making them taste like strawberry or raspberry or cherry cola. A flavour JJ dreamt of licking off. On the downside, it made his already ADHD-ridden mind even harder to concentrate on the work. 

“You done?”

“Hm?”

“You finished with the quiz?” you ask, nodding down to his papers. You’d caught him looking at you and assumed he was finished. 

“Almost,” JJ says, glancing back at his answers to remind himself where he was. “Kinda stuck on this one though.”

“Which one?” you wonder, leaning across the table to have a look. JJ points at it and does his best to look at your face and not your cleavage as you read the question. But he has to steal a glance. Fuck. You smell fucking delectable. In a truly desperate and pathetic strain of thought, he considers asking what perfume you wear so he could spray his pillows with it. Jesus Christ, get a grip. It’s terrifying, the hold you have on him by doing so little. It’s like you have a voodoo doll stashed in your tote bag; potions that you drip into his water. It’s the only explanation. JJ Maybank has never been pussy whipped for a pussy that he hasn’t even seen. I guess you really do learn stuff at school. 

“Okay, so,” you say, sitting back in your seat.  You push your glasses up your nose: it’s adorable. “You remember learning about adaptation, right? Like how animals change themselves–”

“--to fit in with their environment and survive, yeah,” JJ finishes, surprising himself with how easily he plucks that knowledge from his memory. Your smile is beautiful, full of pride. 

“Right. Exactly. So, if you think about a camel - like the question says, yeah? - and where they live, why would they need to store water in their humps?”

JJ looks down at the paper and reviews the picture of the camel. “They live in the desert,” he thinks aloud, watching you nod in her peripheral vision, “so there’s not much water. So they need to store water so they don’t become…thirsty?”

“Another word for thirsty?”

“Dehydrated?”

“Yes!” you grin. “Yes, that’s it.”

JJ laughs despite himself, shaking his head as he writes the answer down. “Never thought there’d be a day when I’m actually decent at school but here we are.”

“Well, never thought there’d be a day when I smoke a joint,” you counter teasingly. JJ flashes you his smile. “Alright, come on. We got ten more minutes. Finish the quiz.”

“Yeah, yeah, I’m on it, brown nose,” JJ mutters, sniggering when you flip him off. He fills in another answer before stealing another glance. You’re reading. Focusing intently on the page, knees brought up near your chest, book resting on the back of your thighs. “How’s the book?”

You look at him, visibly debate telling him to focus on his work, before answering. “It’s good. It’s the third in the series.”

“What’s it about?”

“It’s a fantasy. The usual stuff: witches and elves and stuff like that. Dragons, sometimes.”

“Fancy,” JJ mumbles, returning his attention to the paper. “Read something out-loud from it.”

You don’t say anything. Frowning, JJ’s eyes dart up to you. You’re staring at the page, clearly not reading. He starts to smirk, bemused. “What? Why don’t you read something?”

“It’s just, uh…Pretty boring, y’know?”

“Mhm,” JJ hums, unconvinced. He waits until you’re distracted before he quickly swipes the book from out of your hands. You shriek, jumping out of your seat. 

“Give it back, JJ! Give it!”

“Come on! Just wanna see what you’re reading!” 

“No!” you screech, chasing after him. The two of you perform some sort of dance around the tables of the classroom, white walls bright in the sunlight streaming through the wall of windows. JJ steps up onto one of the cabinets and holds the book high above his head, open on the page so he can read. You helplessly hop up and down below him, trying to swipe it from him. Through his laughter, it takes a moment to stop shaking and focus on the words. JJ begins to read. Then his eyebrows raise so high he’s surprised they don’t fly off his forehead. 

“Holy shit!” he sniggers. 

“JJ! Give me the book now, Goddamnit,” you demand, returning to the version he knew of you from week one. 

He loses control a little when he comes, his grunts deep and unusually rough, his grip viselike, and she feels his orgasm course through her as if it were her own. She sucks him gently through the end of it, and when she looks up at him she’s wet and swollen and she feels empty, trembling, a messy lump on the floor. 

“Open your mouth,” he rasps. 

She blinks up at him, confused. He cups her cheek. 

“I want you to open your mouth and show me.”

She complies, and the sound he makes, possessive and hungry and pleased at last, travels through her like a wave. He massages the back of her neck while she swallows, his thumb caressing her jaw, and when she smiles up–

The book is suddenly ripped from JJ’s hands. He’s in hysterics, doubling over, grabbing at his knees. 

“Holy shit! That’s insane, I had no idea people wrote shit like that,” he manages out through gasps of air. But when he looks at you, his humour quickly fizzles out. You’re closing the book, eyes downcast, visibly upset. “Hey, shit, I was just messing around, okay? I didn’t mean to–”

You turn and walk back to your bag, shoving the book inside of it. JJ jumps down and follows, grabbing your wrist to get your attention. You reluctantly look up at him. Tears tease your waterline. Shit. 

“Hey,” he says, voice soft, “I’m sorry. I was just messing ‘round. I just didn’t think books had stuff like that in them.”

“Yeah, well, they do,” you say, tugging your arm free and crossing them over your chest. “Didn’t have to be a douchebag ‘bout it.”

“That’s fair,” JJ hums, nodding. “M’sorry. Is it, uh…Is it good? Y’know? Book-porn?”

That has your lips quirking upwards. He smiles too. Rolling your eyes, you mumble, “it’s pretty good, yeah.”

“Yeah? I mean, seems pretty detailed,” JJ remarks, recalling the paragraph he read. You laugh quietly, shrugging. 

“It is. That’s what girls like ‘bout it, y’know? It’s more focused on the girl. About her…y’know, pleasure and stuff.”

JJ hums, thinking. It seems like more work to him than just putting on porn or even finding someone to hook up with, but considering what he’s learnt about you, it makes sense that you prefer it. As the two of you return to your respective seats, and JJ returns to his quiz, his mind can’t help but wander. Did you have a boyfriend? A girlfriend? Did you hook-up with people whenever you felt like it, like he did, or were you a one-person kind of girl? Were you a virgin? JJ warily lets his eyes wash over you. You’ve given up on reading and are now scribbling on some print-out, probably preparing next week’s class. Your head is propped up in one hand, the end of the pencil pressed against your lips. His eyes trail down your face, over your chest, lingering. It was hard to get a read on you. He felt like you were either one of two extremes: a virgin, perhaps never been kissed, or a hardcore freak. He wasn’t sure which he liked more. Probably both. Either. Any. If JJ had his chance with you though…Holy shit. He wouldn’t let you out of bed for hours. He’d show you things you didn’t know, make you feel things that you’d only ever read about and daydreamed in the darkness of your bedroom. He’d have you screaming, close to tears, desperate to come again and again and–

“That’s time.”

JJ quickly focuses on the page, reads the last question, and ticks a random box. Clearing his throat, washing his thoughts away down the gutter, he sits back in his seat. You take the test from him and read over it. JJ watches you nervously, teeth nibbling at his lips, as you start to mark. For the first time in his life, he cares about this quiz. It isn’t a mock exam, doesn’t hold any real weight, but he’d like some proof that maybe he’s worth a shit. Maybe his brain isn’t a complete waste of space in his skull. Maybe, just maybe, JJ might be smart. 

“Jury’s in,” you say, a mischievous glint in your eyes. You hold the paper back out to him, face down, and JJ eyes it nervously. “Go on.”

Sighing, he takes it and flips it over. His eyes quickly scan over the ticks and cross before honing in on the numbers outlined in a neat red circle. His lips part. “Eight out of ten?”

“Yep.”

“Eight out of ten?” he checks, meeting your eyes. 

“Well, if you want to be really harsh with yourself, it’s more like 7.5 because I gave you that hint with the adaptation-camel thing, but everything else was all you,” you smile, nodding. 

JJ can’t help but laugh in disbelief. He feels like he just passed his SATs. And if it wasn’t for you, he wouldn’t have gotten hardly one answer right. He wouldn’t have even tried. As if reading his mind, you gently remark, “you’re smarter than you think, JJ. Just gotta believe in yourself.”

“That’s the corniest shit you’ve ever said,” JJ snorts. But the look he gives you speaks volumes. Speaks of his thanks. You smile back, pretty like a magnolia in May, and JJ is petrified by the way his heart yearns. 

The First Warning 

“Whose turn is it?”

“Who’d you think?”

“Girl, she’s barely looked away from her phone.”

“Yo!”

Fingers snap in front of your face. You jump then frown at Esme. “The hell was that for?”

“It’s your turn, dipshit,” she playful replies, rolling her eyes. 

“Oh. Sorry,” you mutter, turning off your phone. You ditch it beside you on the sofa and lean forward, grabbing the dice. They clatter against the vinyl board, bouncing over colourful squares and claimed buildings. “Alright, seven.” 

As you move your counter around the Monopoly board, your phone buzzes with another message. Eyes drifting over to the screen, your lips instinctively twitch when you read JJ’s name. Esme narrows her eyes at you in suspicion and, quick as a cat, grabs for your phone. 

“Esme! Give it!”

“Who are you texting so much?” she wonders. Lily and Palma giggle, scooching in to gather around the screen. You roll your eyes. These were your closest friends, you didn’t much mind if they found out - which they were bound to, considering Esme knew your passcode. Her voice isn’t particularly happy when she asks, “JJ?”

Rolling your eyes, you take your phone back and scan over the messages. 

“Oh no.”

You look over the top of your phone and meet Esme’s eyes. You know that look. “Esme, it’s not like that.”

“You like him.”

“Esme–”

“You have a crush on JJ Maybank,” she announces. Lily and Palma gasp like they’re in a courtroom drama. 

Shaking your head, you laugh as you say, “can you not use the word ‘crush’? Makes us sound like we’re in junior high.”

“Girl, this is serious,” Esme warns, shifting on the sofa so she’s facing you head on. “This is JJ Maybank we’re talking about here. Need I remind you who he is?”

“Fuckboy?” Lily offers. 

“Asshole,” Palma chimes in. 

“How about surprisingly nice person who is also really freaking hot?” you give as a rebuttal. 

“Are we forgetting what he did to you?” Esme wonders, genuinely alarmed by your change of tune. “I mean, not more than a month ago he was enemy number one and now, what? You’re sending him cute little dad-jokes?”

“He’s not like what I thought, a’right? He’s actually pretty sweet,” you meekly reply. 

“Wait, what did he do to you?” Lily asks, frowning. 

You roll your eyes. “Literally nothing.”

“Nothing? You cried in the bathroom stalls for, like, twenty minutes!”

“It was ten minutes, and that was over a year ago,” you argue. “Jesus, you’re acting like he skinned my cat or something.”

“Hello!” Palma interrupts, throwing up her arms. Her cornrows sway off her shoulders as she asks, “are either of you going to tell me and Lily what he did?”

Sighing, you force yourself back to English class last year. 

“I’ve got to say, guys. Not your finest hour,” the teacher, Mrs Halls, remarks as she paces the aisles of the classroom. You chew nervously on your lower lip. You’d spent hours studying for this test; even pulled an all nighter just to cram in as much content as possible. You’ve read Romeo and Juliet enough times to recount almost every line. Recited the sonnets in your sleep as if you’d written them yourself. 

As she makes her way between the desks, your foot thrums against the vinyl flooring. To your left, she delivers a quiz paper onto a desk. JJ Maybank’s desk. He was hardly ever in class. Sometimes he’d get up and leave halfway through and not bother coming back. You’d never shared a word. 

“Poor work, Mr Maybank. I want you to see me after class,” Mrs Halls berates. JJ tugs off his cap and runs his fingers through his hair, huffing, rocking back in his seat. 

Then, your test sheet is returned to you. “Nice job. Top of the class - as always,” Mrs Halls tells you proudly, finishing with a wink. You smile, relieved, satisfied, and look back down at the neat A+ staring up at you. But your joy is short lived. JJ snorts, scoffs more like, and you glance over at him. 

“Fuckin’ virgin.”

The girl behind him overhears, as does the boy in front, and they both snigger underbreath. Your face burns hot and your eyes dart back down to your paper, head hanging with shame. Tears sting your eyes and you try desperately not to let them fall. And they don’t, at least not until you’re out of class and in the bathrooms with Esme. 

Lily and Palma’s sympathy is palpable. You roll your eyes. “Look, who cares? He was probably pissed with himself and took it out on someone else.”

“Oh, yeah, so I really want you to catch feelings for a guy like that - y’know, now that you’ve put it that way,” Esme sardonically replies. 

Sighing, you reach out and meddle with your game token. “I’m not stupid, okay? I don’t like JJ like that. There’s no point. So, you don’t gotta worry ‘bout anything.”

Guys like JJ Maybank did not go out with girls like you. It was as simple as the alphabet. The maths was easy: he was a commitment-phobe, heartthrob with a craving for adrenaline and adventure; and you were a rule-abiding, goody-two-shoes with an affinity for a good book and cup of tea. Hell, you’d smoked your first joint for the first time a few weeks ago and had your first casual drink outside of a holiday celebration. Skipping class was practically a religion to JJ whereas just the thought made you feel sick. The two of you were opposites, and whilst it might be true for magnets, the world of romance was quite a different story. It may attract, but that doesn’t mean it’s viable. 

But despite the logic, you knew you were lying. You had fallen for him, hard and fast. How could you not? He was funny and charming and attractive. He had a tenderness that he hid beneath the surface, like a tortoise cocooned in a shell. There was a sweetness to JJ, the kind that made the memory of his cruel remark feel false. But Esme’s disapproval and your own insecurity were poignant. You don’t text JJ back for the rest of the night. 

The Ninth Lesson

Since that day on the beach, you have never been late for another tutoring session. Now that JJ had made friends with you, if either of you were running late, you’d send a text message and the whole thing would be put to rest. That to say, when you were late to the session by an entire hour, JJ knew something must be wrong. You hadn’t replied to a single message he’d sent. Forgetting things was not your style, especially your tutoring sessions with JJ. He hadn’t outright asked, but something told the blonde haired boy that you enjoyed his company as much as he enjoyed yours. He wasn’t blind. He’d seen you taking peaks at him during the lessons the same way he did with you. As arrogant as he could be with his looks, JJ knew you weren’t like the others girls who fell at his feet. You were complex, contradicting, and chemical. 

The debate to go to your house is brief in JJ’s head. He’s given you several rides home after tutoring. The drive was always something he looked forward to, as well. You had a similar taste in music and the conversation flowed like a fresh water spring. It’s starting to feel second nature when JJ takes a left onto your street. You don’t live in Figure Eight but it’s a nicer area than where JJ resides. Somewhat of a middle ground, your neighbourhood is something of a suburban dreamscape. Children play in the streets and some front lawns even have sprinklers, when the drought isn’t around. 

JJ parks outside your door and sighs, checking his appearance in the rearview mirror. He fixes his hair under his cap and checks his teeth. God knows when that started becoming a habit. Then he’s hopping out the Twinkie and wandering up to your front door, hands in pockets. He raps gently on the red painted wood and waits patiently. He glances up and down the street and rocks on his heels. The door swings open and JJ turns, jumping into his introduction before he has a chance to see who it is. 

“Hey, I was wonderin’–” When he comes face to face with nothing, his head tilts down to find a little boy looking up at him. JJ’s breath catches in his throat. The child’s face is disfigured. It isn’t ugly and it isn’t horrifying in any way, but it is enough to notice. Enough to have a person take pause. JJ tries not to stare at the strange patching of skin and the protrusions of flesh. Instead, he ducks down so they’re more level at the eye. “Hey little buddy. Your sister home?”

He’s visibly nervous. “My sissy?”

“Yeah. Your sissy home?”

“Mhm,” he nods. He glances behind him, down the hallway, then back to JJ. “Are you her boyfriend?”

JJ eyes widen slightly. “Oh, uh, nah, little dude. Just someone she’s helping out.”

“Oh.”

“Hey, could you do me a solid, little man, and go get her for me?” JJ wonders. The little boy studies him for a moment. His eyes don’t seem to focus, one tracking a little slower than the other. JJ waits patiently. 

“Why aren’t you her boyfriend?”

“Well, that’s a pretty long story,” JJ chuckles, rubbing the back of his neck. 

“Are you a surfer?” With that, the little boy points at JJ’s t-shirt. It’s one of his graphic tees from a local surf shop in town. Grinning, JJ nods. 

“Yeah, I sure am. Are you a surfer?”

“Sissy won’t let me,” he replies through mumbled words. He rubs at his arm, one hand still holding tight to the door handle. “Says it’s dangerous.”

“It can be,” JJ replies. “Pretty dope though. I bet you’d make a cool surfer.”

“Leo, I’ve told you before to pick up your toys when you’re finished playing!” Your voice comes from some far room in the house. JJ glances over (what must be) Leo’s shoulder to spot you walking into frame. You look pretty frazzled, clearly working through some sort of mental checklist. “Leo?”

“Here, sissy,” Leo calls back. Your head turns and you notice your brother first, then the open door, and then JJ. Visibly startled, your lips part. Hurrying over, you lay a protective hand on your brother’s head, taking the door in your hand. 

“JJ. What are you doing here?”

“You, uh, didn’t come to the school so I wanted to check you were a’right,” JJ explains, raising back to his full height. “Little dude here said you were home so…”

“Sissy,” Leo says, tugging on your t-shirt. You glance down at him and this smile comes over your face that reminds JJ of a warm blanket. “Is this your boyfriend?”

“Oh, uh,” you’re flustered, glancing quickly at JJ before returning your focus to your brother. “No, honey. This is just, uh, a friend that I’ve been tutoring.”

“Oh,” Leo says. He tugs at your shirt again. “Sissy?”

“Yes, Leo,” you say with undying patience. 

“You should ask him to be your boyfriend,” Leo tells you. The two of you manage to hold back your laughs. 

“Really? Why’s that?”

“He’s a surfer. Said I could be a surfer too,” Leo says. 

“Oh did he now?” you wonder, looking up at JJ. He smiles apologetically. Oops. Shaking your head, you recall what JJ said prior to Leo’s interruption. “Wait, what’d you mean I wasn’t at school? Class isn’t ‘til one.”

“Yeah…It’s nearly three in the afternoon, now.”

Alarmed, you grab at your phone and groan. It’s dead. JJ shows you his. Your horror is borderline hilarious. “Shit, I’m so sorry, I don’t even…God, I just lost track of time. Um…Come in, actually. Come in.”

You and Leo make space for JJ to walk through the doorway. He closes it behind him. Leo grabs quickly at JJ’s shirt and pulls him with surprising strength through the hallway and into the living room. 

“Look, look!” Leo exclaims, grabbing at any and all toys in sight. One is familiar to JJ when he takes it in his hand. It’s the toy car he fixed for him. His eyes drift to yours to find you watching everything unfold with a strange expression on your face. Something tells JJ that this is a little overwhelming for you. He’s amicable when he places the car back down on the floor. 

“Listen, little dude, those are some sick-ass toys. But I really need to start this lesson with your sister, huh? Maybe we could play some other time?”

“Teach me to surf,” Leo seemingly demands. Your face falls. 

“Leo, honey, we’re not learning to surf today,” you gently say. 

Leo looks between yourself and JJ and his face begins to contort. His lips tremble and your eyes slant with concern. His fists clench at his sides and he stamps his feet. 

“Teach me to surf! Teach me to surf! I want to surf!” Leo shouts. His hands begin to thump against the sides of his head and you rush over, dropping to your knees. 

“JJ, can you wait in the kitchen please?” 

JJ does as he’s asked, quickly leaving the room, overhearing your pleading with your little brother. Through the muffled door, he can follow some of the conversation despite his trying not to. He occupies himself by looking at pictures on the wall and on the fridge. A drawing that Leo must have done - of him on a surfboard - and a picture of you and him from Christmas. You look sweet like cinnamon in your reindeer pyjamas. There’s an impressive collection of report cards and certificates and rewards, all addressed to you. A framed photo on the wall has JJ taking pause. The man in the frame is striking in similarity to you. He’s dressed in army formals, staring stoically ahead before a grey background. The ones around it are more casual. A family vacation. You in the marching band (so he was right, you did used to do that). The infamous spelling bee victory. 

“How ‘bout this: tomorrow, me and you go to the beach together, huh? Sound fair?” your voice creeps through the walls. 

“Sissy take me to the beach tomorrow?” 

“Yes. Sissy take you to the beach tomorrow,” you say. The relief is evident in your voice. JJ cracks the kitchen door open, sensing an end to the conversation. “How ‘bout you tidy up your toys whilst I hang out with my friend, hm? Sound fair?”

“M’kay.”

“Gimme a hug.”

JJ catches your embrace through the crack of the half-closed door. He smiles to himself. He’s never seen this version of you. It’s like you’ve transformed into a different person. When you reappear in the hallway, closing the door behind you, it’s as if you struggle to meet JJ’s eyes. 

“Come on, we can study upstairs,” you say, leading the way. 

Your bedroom is not how JJ imagined it. Parts of it are - the Jellycats and the candles and the motivational quotes on the wall - but he’s startled by how little possessions you have. There’s not a lot of books, like he was expecting, and your bed is simple with a duvet and two pillows. Your desk is a mess: papers and pens and highlighters and sticky notes. JJ closes the door behind him as you clear some clothes off your bed. 

“Sorry I forgot,” you say as you clean. “I had to sort out Leo’s dinner and he’s decided that he doesn’t like pizza now, he only likes dinosaur nuggets. And they have to be dinosaur shaped, or else all hell breaks loose. And then the laundry needed doing cause my mom needs her scrubs and–”

You stand upright and sigh, bringing your hands to your face. If JJ wasn’t in your family home, he’d offer you a joint. Instead, he stands and waits, unsure whether he should hug you or not. You haven’t crossed that line yet, although somehow standing in your bedroom feels miles more intimate. Another steadying breath and you’re pulling your hands from your face, fixing your glasses. 

“Thanks, by the way.”

“For what?” JJ frowns. 

“Y’know. For being nice to Leo,” you reply, gesturing to your door. 

JJ’s frown deepens. “Course. Why wouldn’t I be?”

“Just sometimes people can be…” You shake your head, drop onto your bed, and sigh loudly. “Assholes. They can be real assholes. Kids especially. Which, fair enough, they’re kids, but come on.”

JJ chuckles quietly. He sits beside you on your bed, sinking into the plush comforter. “He’s a cool kid. And I honestly don’t mind teaching him to surf. Might be cool to have a little apprentice.”

You laugh at that, smiling at him. “A little protege?” 

“Sure,” JJ shrugs, not fully knowing what that word means. He wants to tell you how pretty you look right now, despite being a little flustered from rushing around. You’re clearly busy. Busy in a way JJ didn’t know about and could never relate to. The question catches in his throat. It doesn’t feel appropriate to ask but it’s hard to keep it at bay for long. “Can I ask…What…What is it?”

You take a small breath before replying, looking down at your hands. “It’s a few things, really. Doctors aren’t even sure they can give it one name. He’s neurodivergent, so he likes routine and familiarity. Emotions are pretty big for him. They can be hard to manage. He’s getting better at compromise, though, which is nice. Uh…There’s also something developmental there. He’s nine, but he acts more like he’s seven, and his language is more at that stage too. He’s smart though. Really bright. The kids at school aren’t always so nice so sometimes I give him lessons, to help, y’know, bridge those gaps.”

JJ listens intently, nodding. Rolling your shoulders back, you let out a relieved sigh. He wonders if you’ve ever spoken to someone about this stuff before. If you have someone to lean on, vent to. He imagines Esme might fill that role to some degree. 

“The physical stuff…That’s because of a gene. Well, two genes, that my mom and dad both had, and it was luck of the draw. In another life, in another world, I would look like him. He had a shitton of surgery when he was little so he could breathe better, talk better, look better. Some helped home with mobility too. His tongue, uh…was too big for his mouth? They had to sort of…reduce it? It was a rough few years. Mom had to pick up extra shifts to get better health insurance and help cover the bills. My dad was in the forces and he’s deployed a lot. He is right now, in fact. I guess I learnt how to grow up fast.”

You laugh despite yourself, shaking your head, and meet JJ’s eyes. “I feel like I’m five different people. Sometimes more. I have to be the sister, and the daughter, and the mom, at times. I have to be the best friend and the star student. And then, I have to be the teenager. Even though most of the time I feel like a mini adult, trying to keep everything in order. I don’t know, maybe that’s why I’m so neurotic. Shit, I’m probably a psyche major’s dream case study.”

JJ laughs along with you but the words hang heavy in the air and in his heart. He could relate, though, to some of it. “I get it.”

“You don’t have to say that,” you solemnly reply, smiling sadly. 

JJ shakes his head. “No, I really get it. A bit, anyway. Having to grow up fast. Being different people.”

It feels empty to leave it at that, like faux empathy to defuse an awkward situation. Sighing, JJ’s fingers meddle with a stray thread on your duvet cover. “My dad’s in and out of trouble a lot. Jailtime and stuff, y’know? I learnt pretty fast that if I didn’t wanna go hungry, I gotta fend for myself more. Started working. Started stealing. Just had to survive, right?”

You nod sadly. ‘I’m sorry’ falls silently from your lips as you offer him a smile, and JJ’s heart drops down through his ribcage, into his stomach, because nobody has ever looked at him like that before. Looked at him as if they can see right through him. Through the facade and into his soul, into his mind. Look at him like they understand him. It’s terrifying. JJ’s throat feels tight and dry and his brain feels full. Butterflies tickle at his intestines as his eyes slowly, slowly, fall to your lips. It feels like a temptation when your tongue darts out to wet them, your teeth rolling over your lower lip, and he wonders what lip balm you’re wearing today. He wonders what you’ll taste like. 

JJ isn’t sure which one of you begins to move first, but soon enough, he can feel your breath on his lips. When his mouth presses to yours, his eyes sink shut and his heart nearly explodes from how fast it’s beating. Your fingers slip over the top of his hand as if holding him in place, keeping him close. JJ’s head tilts and so does yours, and you deepen the kiss. You taste like cherry cola. Cherry cola and lemonade. You sigh against him and one of JJ’s hands comes up to your cheek, fingers tracing the soft skin before cupping your jaw, guiding your movements with his. Your own hand creeps further up his hand, along his arm, until it’s looping over his shoulder, keeping him near. It’s sighs and hums and pure, simple pleasure as the two of you make-out. It’s never like this. Never this patient, exploring, wading through the waters, finding out what little move makes the other person react. The brush of teeth on lower lips, the shadow of tongues dancing against one another. JJ’s used to fast and fiery, rushing to get to the next part. This, right here, feels like JJ could kiss you forever and never once grow tired. 

The two of you are so consumed in one another that neither hears your mothers voice down the hall. It isn’t until a floorboard creaks just outside your door that you’re springing away from him, wide eyed. JJ’s still in a daze when the door swings open. You wipe your mouth with the back of your hand and JJ strategically sits so his crotch isn’t in view. 

“Honey have you–” Your mom’s words die on her tongue. JJ musters up some courage to look over to the doorway to find a blank expression on her face. “You’re not one of my kids.”

“No, uh, mom this is the guy I was telling you about. The guy that I’m tutoring, I mean,” you stumble through your words, gesturing to JJ. He gives a nod and tense smile. 

“Hiya, ma’am.”

“Ugh, don’t call me ma’am when I’m not on duty,” your mom groans, rubbing tiredly at her forehead. You chuckle and JJ realises it’s a joke, faking a laugh of his own. Then her eyes narrow as she looks between the two of you. “Tutoring, huh?”

“Yeah, uh, your daughter’s been helping me get my grades up over the summer. Mr Sunn hired her, actually. It’s all legit,” JJ reels off. Her eyebrows raise. 

“Okay, well…Sure. If you say so,” she says. She doesn’t sound particularly convinced. Her eyes train back onto you. “What I was gonna ask was, did you wash my scrubs?”

“Yeah. They’re in the dryer right now. Should be good to go in an hour.”

“Perfect,” she sighs, relieved. “Oh, and Leo?”

“He’s had his dinner. I had to run to the shops cause I thought he liked the unicorn shaped nuggets but it’s actually the dinosaur shaped ones, and we didn’t have any of those.”

“Nuggets? I thought he liked pizza. Thought he hated nuggets?”

“No, no, he’s done a complete one-eighty. Decided yesterday that nuggets are the new meaning of life; pizza is out,” you explain with a too-cheery laugh. 

“You said you bought some? How much were they?” Your mom worries, but you brush her off. She rubs at her head and laughs self-deprecating. “Jeez, some mom I am, huh? Can’t even remember what my own kids like to eat.”

Before you can say anything, she’s plastering on a smile and reaching for the door handle. It seems as though she just woke up from a nap. “Alright, well, I’m gonna get ready for work. You kids, uh, have fun…studying.”

“Thanks mom,” you smile, nodding. 

She begins to close the door, but lingers when it’s a crack open. “And use protection.”

“Mom!” The door slams shut. Groaning, mortified, you drop your head in your hands. “Sorry ‘bout her.”

“She seems nice,” JJ chuckles. Shaking your head, you look up at him. 

“Don’t indulge her,” you say jokingly. The smiles linger on your faces as you look at one another. JJ wants to kiss you again. He’s not sure if he’s supposed to be able to think about anything else now that he knows what you taste like. Those fantasies are back, the ones he shoved down in a box, and he wants to fulfill all of them. But you’re back to your usual ways: duty-focused. Getting to your feet, you slap your hands together. “Alright! Lesson time! Let’s start with…Romeo and Juliet.”

“Are you going to the kegger on Friday?” JJ asks out of the blue. 

You look over to him from your desk, where you’re flitting through the impressive stack of papers. “Kegger? What kegger?”

“This kegger on Friday. Meant to be a good one. Down at the boneyard.”

“I don’t know,” you mumble, turning back to the papers. “I’ve never been to one before. Wouldn’t even know what to do.”

“Come find me and I can show you,” is JJ’s suave reply. You snigger, rolling your eyes. “I mean it. It’d do you good to get to wear the ‘teenager’ hat or whatever you called it.”

Sighing, you venture back to him with the worksheets for the day in your hands. “Maybe. How’s that?”

“Good enough for now,” JJ relents. Before JJ can try and make a move, you’re thrusting papers into his hands. He groans, disappointed, and you only pretend not to care. 

“Okay, so: Romeo and Juliet. We all know what a shitshow that was…”

The First Kegger 

“I feel ridiculous.”

“You look it.” You toss a Jellycat at Esme’s head. “Hey!”

“That’s not very supportive of you,” you mutter, glancing at the mirror. You fiddle with the hem of the skirt and try to shimmy it further down your legs. It feels ridiculously short and revealing. God help you if you drop anything, there’s no way in hell you can bend over to pick it up. 

“Why’d I be supportive of this? You’re going to a kegger purely to appease the patriarchal nightmare that is JJ Maybank.”

“You don’t have to use his full name every time, y’know?” You reply, choosing to ignore her complaint. 

“Girl, this ain’t you.”

“It might be me. I can go to keggers.”

“Sure, okay, go to keggers - that don’t mean you have to cosplay as somebody else,” Esme sighs. She gets up from the bed and walks over to you. Her fingers meddle with the straps of the rather skimpy top you’re wearing. You’ll spend the whole night crossing your arms to try and cover your chest. Meeting your gaze, she sighs once more and takes a step back. “Look, if you really think this thing with JJ Maybank has legs then at least be yourself. I thought we agreed that as feminist women we wouldn’t conform to society’s brainwashing of what an attractive, ideal woman is.”

“You’re giving me a headache,” you mutter. But as you glance back in the mirror, you can’t help but agree. This isn’t you. The skirt, the top: it feels unnatural. Wordlessly, you walk over to your dresser and dig about through the drawers. The outfit that replaces the ‘hot-girl starter kit’ eases your anxiety in a second. An adorable skort and crochet style cropped sweater that sits pretty over a tank top. Yes, that’s more like it. Esme seems to agree, as she nods approvingly from the bed where she’s taken purchase once again. The reflection you’re met with smiles back at you. But then the thought of actually going to the kegger makes reality weigh heavy. “I don’t know…Maybe I shouldn’t go.”

“You look cute. It might be fun, you never know,” Esme shrugs. 

Sighing, you flop down on your bed beside her and stare up at the ceiling. The glow-in-the-dark stars you pasted there when you were thirteen have lost their shine, but they still have a dull illuminessence that feels like safety. “What if I’ve got this all wrong?”

“Didn’t you say he kissed you? How could you get that wrong?”

“I don’t know, I just…What if he’s doing it to mess with me?”

Esme thinks for a moment then groans. She sits up and huffs. “I can’t believe I’m actually going to defend this douchebag but,” she mutters, before meeting your eyes, “I think he might really be into you. And if you’re going to let some silly self-loathing stop you from being happy, then that’s pretty depressing. And sad. And pathetic.”

“Thank you,” you deadpan. She grins. You give a small smile back. “You’re right. But you know what would make this miles better?”

Realisation dawns upon her and her reaction would make it seem liek you asked her to go bungee jumping with you. Esme’s head begins to shake as yours begins to nod. “No. Nope. No way.”

“Yes! Come on, we can go together! Solidarity in numbers and all that!”

“I would do anything for you, but wingmanning you at a social event that reinforces incorrect assumptions that excessive alcohol consumption is synonymous with being cool is–”

You plaster a hand over her mouth. Glaring, you say, “shut up and get changed, will you?”

She stares at you as if challenging you to break, but you don’t. Rolling her eyes, Esme pushes your hand off her mouth and begrudgingly gets up and off the bed. Mutters and complaints fall from her mouth as she rifles through your clothes. ‘You’re lucky you’re my best friend’ is the most common. 

After the time spent debating whether or not to attend, changing outfits, and convincing Esme to join you, the two of you walk up to the kegger almost three hours in. It’s bustling and boisterous. Groups of friends are scattered across the beach and the dunes. People sit on the driftwood and chat animatedly. Boys wrestle and jeer at one another near a makeshift bonfire. Girls gossip and giggle amongst themselves as they catch eyes with classmates across the way. Tourons huddle nervously together and try their best to appear at ease and at home in the boneyard. The Kooks tend to keep their distance from the Pogues, a strange invisible divide drawn in the sand. Keggers and coolers are stacked up beside some speakers, with R&B and hip-hop music thumping out across the seashore. It’s nearly completely dark outside, save for a thin line of navy just above the shoreline. The bonfire works well in illuminating the sand with a warm, orange glow. 

“Holy shit,” Esme mutters. You snort. This was a first for the both of you. “This already blows.”

“The music’s pretty decent, at least,” you comment as the two of you weave through gaggles of teenagers. It seems you’re both naturally gravitating towards the keg to grab a drink. Red solo cups are stacked precariously beside the beverages and you grab one each. As Esme chatters and fills up your cups, your eyes scan the beach in search of a certain blonde haired boy. You’d texted JJ before leaving but had yet to get a response. Glancing down at your phone to double-check, you notice that the service is appalling, and sigh, pocketing the device again. 

“You found him yet?”

“Nope. Holy crap, can you believe how busy it is?”

“Look out!” someone shouts. With that, you and Esme stumble back as two guys tumble in front of you onto the sand, wrestling. Esme rolls her eyes and mutters into her cup, ‘imbeciles’ before taking a sip. Your fingers nervously press into the plastic over and over as you scan the beach over and over. It’s so busy and in the darkness, it’s hard to make out faces. Everybody looks the same (save for the Kooks, who are dressed in designer threads). You and Esme find yourselves in what feels like a safe spot on the beach. Sitting on an old tree trunk, you sip at your beers and people-watch whilst discussing the gossip you knew of your classmates. It’s nice to have her company; you’d have no idea how you would have coped if you had come on your own. Checking your phone once more, there’s still no text from JJ. Just as you’re about to recommend leaving - already an hour in - Esme is suggesting to get a refill and give it a bit more time. You’d made the journey and the effort, after all. 

Approaching the keg, you vaguely recognise the boy refilling his cup. Smiling, you call out, “Pope!” and watch as he startles and turns around. His smile is amicable.

“Hey! Uh…YN, right?”

“That’s the one,” you smile. The alcohol gives you a boost of social confidence, what with your tolerance so low. “You remember Esme, right?”

“How could I forget? Mathlete reigning champion,” Pope smiles at a rather smug Esme. 

“Hey, you wouldn’t happen to know where JJ is, would you?” Esme asks on your behalf. Your face burns hot at the directness of her question. 

Pope doesn’t seem to be phased, however. He looks around as he says, “he is here somewhere. I’ve been hanging with Kie though so I lost track of him. He’ll show up.”

Esme gives you a nudge and you roll your eyes, smiling into your cup to try and hide your glee. He’s here. 

“JJ says you’ve been tutoring him at Mr Sunn’s request?” Pope asks you. You nod. 

“Yep. Once a week for over a month now.”

“Honestly, you deserve a medal for that. I gave up trying a long time ago,” Pope remarks joshingly. 

“He’s actually doing pretty great. I think it’s making a difference.”

The rest of the conversation stretches on with Pope. You start to exchange stories from the chess team and Mathletes and Model UN and, eventually, the Spelling Bee tale comes up. Unaware of the secret vendetta Pope held against you following your victory, it’s fair to see you have a good laugh when it’s revealed. The three of you become more giddy and familiar as the conversation continues and you wonder why you and Pope had never hung over before, when you seemingly have so much in common. When Esme wanders off to go find somewhere to pee, you and Pope sit side-by-side on some driftwood and discuss the latest fantasy book you both happened to be reading. 

“I gotta say, I did not see Eldmore and Scarlett getting together,” Pope tells you. You scoff, gaping at him. 

“How could you not!? He was practically falling at her feet in the second book!” 

“I don’t know, I just thought he had more chemistry with Mistress Londar.”

You consider this as you take another sip of your drink. You’re three beers in now and can certainly feel its effects; probably best to quit while you’re ahead. “I guess. Mistress Londar is in too deep with the alliance, though. I think it would have been too much of a conflict.”

“Maybe. Still. That one chapter when Eldmore and Scarlett…y’know…do it,” Pope’s voice trails off and the memory has you laughing. Smiling brightly at him, you’re far too excited to have the opportunity to mention JJ. 

“That was the chapter I was reading when JJ stole the book from me. I think it might have scarred him for life,” you snigger. 

Pope laughs, shaking his head. “The stuff he gets up to? I doubt it.”

As the laughter dies down, Pope goes to take another drink only to find his cup empty. Smiling apologetically, he rises to his feet. “I’m gonna get a refill. It was nice talking to you though. See you ‘round?”

“Sure,” you smile, nodding. With that, Pope walks away. You stay put for a moment, considering what to do. The interaction with Pope had distracted you from your search for JJ. Upon checking your phone, you realise you’d been conversing for over an hour. Oops. Esme had also vanished. You better go look for her. Getting back up, you ditch your cup and walk around the boneyard. You thought it would have started to die down with how late it was getting but, if anything, it seems busier than ever. The alcohol has your head slightly fuzzy and you concentrate on not tripping over. You’re not drunk - not by a long shot - but it’s probably best not to have any more for the night. Pulling out your phone, you try texting Esme despite the poor cell service: Where are you? When you look back up and glance around the beach, your heart stutters. 

There’s JJ, as gorgeous as ever, stood talking to some random girl. He’s leaning against an abandoned, rusted watch tower, nursing a red solo cup, and staring at her as she talks. He seems to be listening rather intently to the story she’s telling, nodding his head, as her hands move as she speaks. When her fingers brush against his forearm, you suddenly feel very sick. And then, he laughs. 

The tears kick in with the embarrassment and disappointment. How could you be so stupid? Of course he doesn’t want to be with you. Of course he isn’t going to change. Of course he’d want somebody else. 

A hand on your back has you jumping and spinning around. Esme. You sigh in relief. She frowns at your expression, spotting the tears in your eyes. 

“What’s wrong? What happened?”

You shake your head and grab her hand. “Let’s just go. I wanna leave.”

“Hey, what–” Her voice trails off and you know she must have spotted JJ. You remain with your back to the interaction and try tugging on Esme’s arm to prompt her to move, but her feet are welded into the sand. “That filthy, slimy little toad of a man, I swear to God–”

“Esme, please,” you beg. Your voice cracks and gives you away. She meets your gaze. You shake your head desperately and a tear falls. “Please, I just want to leave.”

Huffing, she takes one last look at JJ talking to the girl before reluctantly appeasing you. The two of you walk down the beach, hands interlocked, and you sniffle pathetically as you try to wash the image from your mind. Why would he invite you just to get with somebody else? Why would he kiss you if he didn’t want anything? Why would he do this to you? Why? Why? Why? 

Your mind jumps back to that day in the classroom. The sneer in his voice when he muttered those two words. The sniggers from the classmates that felt like elephants trampling on your chest. The shame and the embarrassment that overcame you. You were so convinced that he was a different person. That you’d merely caught him on an off day and you didn’t know him, not truly. The day at your house was so special: it felt like finding gold in the attic. Nobody had ever seen your life up close apart from Esme. Not even Lily or Palma. Nobody had ever met your brother apart from Esme, either. Had heard your fears and anxieties and seen your exhaustion not once, but twice. You’d trusted him. You let him into your home and gave him a snapshot of your life and you thought he understood. But you must have thought wrong. 

Esme doesn’t try to spark a conversation as the two of you walk back to your house. She gives you a long, lingering hug at your front door before bidding you goodnight. Slipping into the house, you keep your footsteps light and your cries quiet as you make your way up the stairs. Your mom’s bedroom door is shut and you can hear her snoring through the walls. Leo’s bedroom door is open by a crack and you wipe your tears and sneak inside. He’s lying in his bed, bundled up in his dinosaur bed sheets, cuddling his stuffy. He looks so peaceful like this. So safe from other children’s whispers and other parent’s horrified stares. So safe from the world and its cruelty. The cruelty that you were exposed to tonight. Ducking down beside him, you brush your hand lightly over his hair and press a kiss to his forehead. Climbing into bed has never felt like such a relief before now. 

The Final Lesson 

You haven’t texted JJ since the kegger on Friday. His message he sent last night went without a response but JJ’s sure you read it. He was clarifying that the lesson was still on for today, in the usual spot in school. At your lack of response, JJ simply assumed that it was routine as always, and packed up his backpack for his lesson. He isn’t sure how to explain it, but when JJ passes through the threshold of the building, something feels off. It’s as if the air is thick like molasses, study and heavy, pushing against his throat. A bizarre feeling of unease washes over him with every step he takes. The classroom door is shut and JJ pushes it open, finding you sat at the desk. Your head is down and you’re reading something laid out in front of you. There’s less paperwork than usual stacked by your side. You don’t look up or smile at him as JJ walks in. You don’t even acknowledge that he’s there. JJ suddenly feels nauseous. What the hell is going on? 

“Hey,” he says, unsure, as he walks over to the table. The glance you give him is brief. 

“Hey,” you mumble. 

Frowning, JJ takes his seat. You’re focusing pretty hard on whatever it is before you. JJ takes a long inhale and waits. Eventually, you clear your throat and push over the paper. 

“This is, uh, your scoresheet from all our lessons. Y’know, so you have physical proof of what we covered and how you performed in the different quizzes.”

JJ’s frown deepens with your words. He slowly takes the paper from you and scans over it. 

“You can give it to Mr Sunn if you like, but I’ve already emailed him a copy so he has it. He’s aware that you’ve attended every session, save for the one in week two, but–”

“Wait, what the hell is going on?” JJ interrupts. His heart is starting to beat faster, his anxiety building, because this sounds an awful lot like goodbye. “Are the lessons done?”

When you meet JJ’s eyes, he hardly recognises you. You haven’t looked at him with that level of nonchalance since the early weeks. Pushing up your glasses, you say, “yes, the lessons are done.”

JJ blinks at you and waits for you to drop the act. He waits for you to make a joke and tease him like always. He waits to see your expression melt with that smile that he likes to think is saved just for him. But instead, you just look at him. It pisses him off. 

“The fuck d'you mean ‘the lessons are done’?”

“JJ–”

“You never told me that we were finishing the lessons. I mean, shit, I just walk in here and suddenly it’s over? I don’t understand!”

“We’ve covered all the content that you need to cover before the next semester starts–”

“--Bullshit we have!”

“JJ!”

“No, no, I don’t know what the hell is going on,” JJ argues loudly, “but you’re fucking with me.”

“JJ, please,” you plead. It’s the first crack in your icy exterior. Your lip quivers as you try and steady yourself. There’s little power behind your voice as you say, “please don’t make this harder than it has to be.”

JJ’s heart squeezes and he rubs at it through his t-shirt. He feels like you’ve just shoved him off a cliff and he’s falling and falling and falling, and you’re just standing there and watching it happen. It doesn’t make any sense. It’s as if you’ve both been reading the same book and then you’ve skipped ahead three chapters. He tries to calm himself down, taking a few slow, shaky breaths. His eyes press shut and in the darkness behind his lids, he sees your face, moments before he kissed you. Shaking his head, he opens his eyes and looks at you. 

“You could at least give me a reason.”

You’re visibly uncomfortable. Swallowing, you look down at the papers before you and meddle with the corner of one until it starts to split. JJ utters your name and you sigh, squeezing your eyes shut. 

“I don’t know why you’re making a big deal of this. It’s not like it means anything to you,” you tell him quietly. JJ’s brows furrow. 

“What're talking about?”

Sighing once more, you lift your head and meet JJ’s gaze. There’s a sadness behind your eyes that he’s never seen before. “I saw you at the kegger.”

JJ’s frown deepens as his brows tug closer together. “Huh?”

“The kegger, JJ, I saw you there,” you say, firmer. Shaking your head, you busy your hands with anything and everything as you ramble. “You have every right to get with whoever you want to get with and mack on any girl you like, but you could at least, y’know, clarify before doing it. I was just confused. It felt like a sick joke or somethin’ and I really hope that you wouldn’t be that cruel but…But it just confused me and I don’t think I can compartmentalise this dynamic if that's the case...”

JJ’s shaking his head frantically. He holds up his hands in mock surrender as if trying to ease traffic. “Woah, woah, slow down, you lost me. What d’you mean you ‘saw’ me?”

“With that girl, JJ.” Your voice is thick with despondency. “I saw you at the old watchtower talking to her and…I don’t know…”

Oh. 

JJ isn’t a genius at most things, romance being one of them, but he had a sense for when things were deeper than a fling. He knew his own emotionality enough to recognise when he liked someone, even if he was reluctant to admit it. It didn’t take a scientist or therapist and even a mere scholar to read you right now. The way you’re looking anywhere but him; the way your hands are practically tearing the paperwork, that seemed to follow you like a shadow, into shreds; the way you’re so desolate and so vulnerable in your words, strategically saying so much without saying anything at all. It’s like how you taught him during Romeo and Juliet: ‘you have to read between the lines’. 

“You’ve got it all wrong,” JJ says, suddenly calm. 

“JJ, you don’t have to–”

“I was looking for you all night,” he interrupts. You seem unwilling to accept this, sighing and shaking your head, refusing to meet his gaze. “I was. I swear it. I was looking for you the whole night and then, when I found you, you were talking to Pope.”

That has you taking pause. Your fingers finally cease their relentless vandalism. JJ sees your eyes flicker over to him warily. He takes the gap to continue. 

“You were talking for an hour. Maybe more. And you were laughing and…And I’m not an idiot, a’right? I know that you and Pope have a million more things in common, and that he’s actually got a hope in hell of making something out of himself. You’re both smart. It’s probably fucking fate. And I’m not gonna stand in the way of that, a’right? I ain’t gonna stop two people from being happy and shit just because I like you too. It ain’t fair. Pope’s a good guy. He’d be good to you.”

The hopeful part of JJ’s psyche is leaning heavily on your pure look of confusion. JJ’s face feels burning red from his clunky confession. But he perseveres and takes another quick breath, preparing himself to talk up his best friend, but as JJ’s lips part, you’re talking. 

“I don’t like Pope.” The two of you stare at one another. The table has never felt so wide. Shaking your head, you repeat, “I don’t like Pope. Not like that, anyway. We just have a few things in common and started talking about that book I was reading, and lost track of time and– I had no idea you even saw that.”

“Yeah, well…I did…so,” JJ mutters. 

“JJ, I was looking for you all night, too,” you tell him. The smile on your face is solemn when you say, “and when I found you, you were talking to that girl. And…she’s beautiful, JJ. She seemed really nice and, of course, you’re welcome to–”

“--Didn’t you hear what I said?” JJ can’t help but cut in. You frown slightly. JJ doesn’t mean to laugh when he repeats, “I like you. Like really like you. Like holy shit what the fuck am I supposed to do like you. Like you’re all I can think about sort of like you. It’s fucking terrifying and pathetic and I know that there isn’t a chance in hell but–”

“--You like me?” you whisper. JJ laughs softly, almost under breath, and shrugs. He feels stripped off his confidence; bare without his boyish façade. This was real, genuine, organic. This was honest. 

“Course. Why else would have I invited you to that damn kegger in the first place? I mean, shit, I full-on kissed you. Thought it was pretty obvious,” he says, his voice trailing off. 

“I…I just thought…” 

You’re in disbelief, it seems, and it makes JJ’s heart want to bleed. It’s as if you can’t fathom the fact that somebody might have an interest in you. Someone might want to care for you like you do for so many others; to be the one who helps look after your brother; who helps you study for your exams despite the fact that you’ll inevitably ace them either way; who helps you remember how to relax and let loose and just be. JJ wants to be that person. He wants to be the one that you can cry to and the one who makes you laugh. He wants to be the guy that you spend your mornings sleeping in with and your nights wide awake. He wants to make you smile and scream and moan and– All of it. JJ wants it all. 

“That girl was my cousin. Well, step-half-cousin– It’s get confusing, a’right? The point is:” He takes a sharp breath before laying his hands palm down on the table. He’s determined to hold your gaze when he says, “I don’t want anybody else - not one person - but you.”

JJ’s patience has never been more impressive as he waits for you to process what he’s said. He can practically see each word working its way through that beautiful brain of yours. As the meaning sinks in, your smile finally begins to show like the first sunrise after winter. Brilliant and full of promise and hope. No more dark days, no more cold nights, no more dull mornings. Just sunshine - through and through. 

“I want you too,” you confess. 

His heart feels like it’s about to bust out of his chest. JJ’s not sure he’s ever smiled so hard in his life. There’s a faint worry that his skin might split from how wide his grin is. But he can’t help it. This is better than any high he’s ever had. It’s euphoric because you want him too. Despite all his misgivings, all his stupidity, all his hopelessness: you want him. And not just the version that he might be able to become, but the version he is now.

“Come over here right now,” JJ demands in a breathlessly chuckle. 

The giggle that falls from your lips is adorable as you get up from your seat. JJ’s laughing too as he pushes his chair back to make space for you. You drop down onto his lap with a laugh and JJ tastes them on his tongue when he kisses you. It feels like coming home as your hands lace into his hair, pulling him nearer. The graze of your tongue against his, sensually tasting him the same way he does you, has him quietly moaning. The moment he takes your lip between his teeth, you’re whining, and it’s as sweet as syrup. His hands run down and along your thigh, fingers digging into the flesh just enough to remind himself that you’re real, this is real, and you want him too. 

“You’re fuckin’ perfect,” JJ murmurs against your mouth. Your sheltered moan drives him on; JJ kisses you with new fever. The scratch of your nails against his scalp is orgasmic in itself. It’s never been like this: never has something so simple made JJ feel like he’s been brought to his knees. Pulling away, JJ stares up at you, panting lightly, and waits for you to open your eyes. Pupils blown wide, you look like an angel, the sun casting yellow behind your back. His fingers slowly lift until he’s taking the frame of your glasses in grip and easing them from your face. JJ’s never seen you without your glasses on; not up close. His lips quirk at the edges. “I think I like you more with them on.”

“Shut up,” you mutter, rolling your eyes, smiling despite your words. He makes sure not to be careless when he puts them on the table. His hands cup your face, fingers brushing over your soft skin, fuzzy like peach lining, and you lean into his touch, gazing into his eyes, and JJ thinks this. This is what true happiness is. 

“What?” you ask, voice barely louder than a whisper. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothin’,” JJ smiles, losing his nerve. Nobody’s ever looked at him like that. You look at JJ like he’s somebody. “Just happy s’all.”

Your lips are slightly damp when you tilt your head enough to press a kiss to the pad of his thumb. JJ’s breath catches in his throat from the tender action. He’s serious about this. Serious about you. He’s as serious as the plague. 

“Same here,” you murmur, leaning back down as if to meet his lips. Before they reunite, you let one last thing slip. “M’happy too, blue eyes.”

taglist: @mayanneaa | @stevesstranger | @thisismysafeescape | @nooneshallfindme | @pastelbabygirl19 | @araunahj | @lmaowhatt | @raineshua | @darlingchronicles | @jjsfavgirl

[g1rld1ary]

our names in the paper - footballer!james potter x fem!sports journalist!reader

wc: 11,151

cw: swearing, fade to black but suggestive moments?, smoking, slut-shaming, kissing

info: r and james are about 24, set in 2007ish solely for the romcom vibes. james is the equivalent of like David Beckham in his prime, all pics are for vibes only, not reflective of r's appearance etc

me: i've been working on this for soooo long i am so happy it's finally done!! if u couldn't tell it's very inspired by early 2000s romcoms and i am honestly so proud of it so praying it doesn't flop LOL

════ ⋆★⋆ ════

"James, James! Over here! What's the defence strategy this season?"

If you had to hear James' name one more time you might scream. Unfortunately, you were locked in a room with nothing but that. Worse, you were part of the problem.

"Mister Potter, what do you think about your striker's goal-to-game ratio falling rapidly this season?" You called, begrudgingly hoping for a moment of the soccer star's attention. Fortunately (or unfortunately), his glittering eyes settled on you, singling you out from the room of hungry journalists.

"I think that you miss one hundred per cent of the shots you don't take," He said, smirk turning to something challenging, "And as long as my team is training and working together, I'm not gonna cry over a bit of spilt milk or missed goals. And, as far as I'm concerned we're still winning games, aren't we?" You rolled your eyes, scribbling down his answer nonetheless.

You continued the catfight of trying to get answers for your newest article, keeping the balance of vying for James' attention and showing him you didn't care for him personally, unlike the other journalists you were pushing against. The conference room was full of men and women who wanted to be James or be with him. Aside from the professional questions, there were certainly several invitations to the pub thrown around, and you were sure you saw one woman try and give him her cellphone number. You rolled your eyes again at that, James was nothing to fawn over.

He might be a big shot now, but you'd known him almost all your life. The two of you had gone to school together and had bickered through every interaction since then. James had always wanted to be a football star, and you a journalist. You'd never believed in him and vice versa, both of you taking every opportunity to tease the other or cut each other down. Maybe it was just clashing personalities, two people too ambitious to be friends. The rivalry had lasted past school, and unfortunately, the two of you often crossed paths in your respective careers.

The press conference wrapped up soon after your question, and you ended up lingering in the room trying to finish your notes. James was still over at his podium next to his coach, drinking out of a plastic water bottle and arduously texting on his flip phone. Seeing you hovering by the door he called your last name, sauntering up behind you. You rolled your eyes and braced yourself for the encounter.

"Potter." You smiled curtly, moving to leave.

"You don't have to call me 'Mr Potter' during the conferences, you know. James is perfectly fine, everyone else calls me that."

"Just trying to stay professional," You said through gritted teeth, aware his coach and a few others were still around you. It could cost you your job to snap at him.

"Was it professional when I was your first kiss?" He stepped closer and you instinctively stepped back, feeling the plaster wall graze your back through your work blazer.

"It was spin the bottle and we were twelve, it's ancient history. And do you mind? I know you're some kind of god around here but I have a reputation to uphold," You whispered, glancing around anxiously. James laughed at your distress which only annoyed you further. Maybe he could get away with anything, but you had to fight for your place in your field as a female sports journalist, you couldn't afford to take it lightly.

You couldn't help the physical reaction to being trapped between James and the wall though, your breathing shallow and quick, face tilted up slightly to look at him. You felt a bit like prey, caught in the predator's territory and resigned to imminent death.

"Let her go, will you? She's just doing her job," Remus Lupin said, entering the conference room with his nose crinkled from the smell. You couldn't blame him, sweaty players and hungry journalists didn't make any kind of utopia together.

"I wasn't doing anything!" James cried, hands up in surrender, "Come on love, I was just giving you the scoop, right?"

"First of all, if you were giving me 'the scoop' right now I'd certainly be accused of sleeping to the top by all the blokes waiting out there," You gestured to the group of other reporters still lingering in the hall waiting for any scraps of information, "And secondly, I work for the bloody Sunday People, not the BBC. I honestly think they'd rather I just write about your 'dashing good looks' or a drug scandal than your games," You complained, falling back into the ease of conversation now that Remus was there. He'd been at school with the both of you, growing up to be a physiotherapist, but was always much more palatable than James.

Both men laughed at your plight.

"If you ever need a more detailed look at my dashing good looks just ask, sweetheart. I'd be glad to show you, you know, for your articles." You rolled your eyes at James' attempt to be charming, snapping your notebook shut.

"Alright, I think that's my cue to go," You said curtly, smoothing out your work trousers. "Remus, I'll return Dracula next time I see you; I'm almost finished." You remembered you'd had his novel for quite a while, sparing him a smile on the way out.

"You lend her books?" James asked incredulously, hazel eyes curiously following your figure down the hall. Remus just shrugged, patting James on the shoulder and attending to his actual job, checking up on the players after the match.

James was still hung up on the fact when he returned to the apartment he shared with Remus and Sirius, flabbergasted as he hung his coat on the rack.

"Since when are you two close enough to be sharing books?" He cried as he paced through the kitchen, "Have we not all been in agreement that she is stubborn and hard-headed and annoying and has been since school?"

"No," Remus shook his head, "You decided that, and I daresay she feels the same about you. I've always rather liked her."

James was unexpectedly dumbfounded at the realisation that you weren’t the common enemy he thought you were. Even Sirius didn’t seem to dislike you, always stopping for a chat when you were around the stadium and giving you extra comments with a flirty wink.

James didn’t need to think about you for another few weeks; his team hadn’t played one week and you’d been assigned other matches for the others — he read your very amusing pieces on lawn bowls and chess-boxing, partly because he knew you’d hate the assignment.

You were blissfully apart until one Saturday night. You were out with your friends and a few coworkers and James was out with his. He’d started in the local pub while you were at a fancy cocktail restaurant for Lily’s bachelorette party, however, your groups crossed paths in the depths of a nightclub.

Maybe you were getting too old for them, waking up with sore backs and knees after nights of dancing, but it didn’t mean you wouldn’t give it a red hot go. And with a few cocktails in your system, nobody could convince you it wasn’t a good idea.

You'd been shaking what your mother gave you for the better part of an hour before it was your turn to get another round, telling the girls you'd be back before stumbling through a sea of sweaty bodies.

Some gross man who was definitely too old for you obstructed your path, grabbing your arms to make you dance with him. Your face crinkled in disgust of its own accord, trying to wiggle yourself free. He continued to encroach on your space, forcing you around despite your persistence. Finally, a man's hands landed on his shoulders, yanking him away and subsequently freeing you from his grasp. The momentum sent you tumbling in your strappy heels, right into something warm and solid. You cringed, having been there before. You turned slowly to meet your unwitting saviour, huffing when you realised it was James.

"Oh, fuck off," You grumbled, mostly to yourself, producing a quick apology to not seem totally impolite.

"Alright?" Sirius asked, revealing himself as the one who'd gotten you away from the creep. You shrugged, fixing your hair.

"Been better," You told him, preparing to leave before seemingly their whole team had surrounded you, all greeting you loudly. You weakly waved at them, feeling dreadfully underdressed and professional. You were used to seeing them in the stadium and press conferences where you were much more modestly dressed. The strapless mini dress wasn't giving you the same layer of protection.

"Right," You said when there didn't seem to be any more productive conversation happening, "I'm off to the bar then."

"Let me buy you a drink, to make up for the freak," One of the players, Frank, said. You smiled but shook your head.

"I'm buying for several, it wouldn't be fair. It's Lily's bachelorette." You directed the last sentence to those who knew her, the football and journalism professions having considerable overlap due to events and the never-ending scandals and interviews. James covered his face in mock-devastation.

"Not Lily! Have I missed my chance forever?" He moaned, earning some shoves from the rest of the group. You and Lily had been friends since uni, and you'd introduced her to the boys at one of the terrible house parties you'd endured over your three years studying. James had developed a thing for her right away (no one knew how much of it was serious and how much was for comedic value) and had been loudly pining for her ever since, despite her long-term relationship with Dirk Cresswell, an economist who worked in the building down the block from your office.

"I think you missed your chance the first time," You retorted with a snort, a little drunk to have any ferocity in your tone. You both made a face at each other, ignoring the laughter of those around you. You dismissed the group and danced away, shaking your arse over to the bar.

A few rounds later and you were not in your best shape. The girls had been absolute menaces, feeding you shots and deceiving colourful cocktails that actually held like seven standards in them, and you were certainly feeling the effects. You excused yourself from the group to find a loo, bile rising in your throat as you pushed past dancers, not even sparing a comment for James as you saw him.

That confused both James and his friends, becoming used to your insistent teasing over the years. He exchanged a look with Sirius, following you through the crowd and to the bathrooms.

He figured something was wrong when you burst into the gender-neutral bathrooms, not bothering to lock the door behind you. James and Sirius silently fought about who was going to follow you in and check on you; James found you insufferable, Sirius had severe emetophobia and would probably throw up himself if he had to be close to you vomiting. James rolled his eyes, it was his responsibility. Sirius clapped him on the back gratefully, leaving him to return to the others. James sighed, reciting some affirmations before he cracked the door open, calling out to you.

When you responded with a disgusting wretch, James slipped inside, gagging a little as he saw you leant over the toilet bowl, bare knees on the grimy tile floor.

"Alright?" He asked for lack of anything better, unsurprised when you replied with another gag.

"I feel ill," You said pathetically, head hung low in the bowl which James knew you would resent tomorrow. He laughed quietly, getting closer to you.

"No shit, idiot," His tone was light as he began to rub your back softly, making sure your hair was away from your mouth. You vomited a few more times, your body reacting in violent hurls as James tried to be both soothing and as far away as possible.

When your stomach was finally empty you slumped against the toilet, cheek pressed against the cool porcelain.

"Woah," James pulled you up to a sitting position, "That cannot be good for your skin. Let's get you home, okay?" You nodded petulantly, letting yourself be led out through the club, James telling Lily he'd make sure you got home (and congratulated her on the upcoming wedding).

"Can we get some gum or something? My throat tastes like vom." James looked down at you from where you were lodged into his side, legs shaky as you wobbled down the street. He sighed and steered you in the direction of a convenience store, picking out strawberry gum for you since it tasted better than mint, your words. Good you thought when he paid for it, the football star can shell out 2 pounds, makes more than you anyhow.

You chewed happily, stumbling down the pavement as James held onto you, keeping you upright.

"You're so muscly," You said, somewhat in a drunken haze.

"Thank you?" James laughed, patting you softly on the forearm he was holding. To be fair, you weren't quite sure if it was a compliment either. Your words were admittedly oddly nice but your tone made it confusing, drunk thoughts not completely translating to sober dynamics.

You meandered for a few oddly peaceful minutes, neither of you starting an argument or picking a fight. It was a nice break from normal, the two of you even sharing some peaceful small talk -- discussing a movie you'd both seen recently.

Of course, nothing good lasts.

"James!" A voice yelled from the other side of the street, a short man with mousy mannerisms. James groaned beside you.

"Peter Pettigrew," He whispered to you, trying to pull you along faster, "We used to be mates but turns out he was just using me to get team secrets out into the papers." You whipped your head around to look at him. Oh! You knew Pettigrew, unsurprising given you both reported on essentially the same topics, but he had a bad name even in your circles. He was closer to a paparazzi than a journalist, going for the cheap stories and ad hominem approaches rather than searching for any meaningful insights. Simply put, in an already sleazy career, Peter Pettigrew was the bottom of the barrel.

"Later, mate. I'm in the middle of something right now." James put his arm around your shoulder, better shielding you as he tried to make a getaway. The telltale flash of a camera reflected off the grey pavement, making both you and James whip your heads around to face Peter, looking hardly ashamed of himself. After a moment of shock, you both covered your faces, stumbling down the street as fast as you could manage. The damage was already done.

Suddenly you didn't feel as drunk, navigating the cobblestone streets with unanticipated nimbleness. James might've had the athlete's advantage but you were on home turf, leading him through local shortcuts and to the front door of your apartment building.

On the journey over you'd attracted a few more photographers all fiending for a scandalous picture of James, a small mob forming as you tried to punch in the door code despite your shaking hands. James was right behind you, front pressed to your back, holding his Adidas windbreaker out in a position to shield your face from the prying eyes.

You slammed the door shut, the nosy questions and camera clicks immediately muffled. James let out a long sigh, running a hand through his already tousled hair. Neither of you spoke for a while, processing what had happened.

"Make yourself at home then." You cringed as you surveyed the state of your flat; clothes flung over chairs and dishes still in the sink. Your only option for living alone was cramming all your stuff into what was essentially a shoebox, so any amount of mess made the place look chaotic.

"Nice place," James said and you immediately rolled your eyes, snatching up a stray bra strewn across an armchair. "No, I mean it! It's cozy. Very you." He gestured up at the colourful, mismatched glassware in a kitchen cabinet and the beaded curtain separating your bedroom. You blushed slightly; you didn't often take men home, your flat staying a girly paradise just for you.

You put on the kettle, comforted by the familiar sounds of water beginning to boil. James sat awkwardly on an armchair near the window, anxiously peeking out from behind the curtain every few minutes. His reactions told you the paparazzi were still loitering outside.

James took his tea gratefully, surprisingly still agreeable despite all the terrible things that had happened in the course of a few hours.

"Do you have a back exit or something? Somewhere I can slip out and get home?" You shook your head with a grimace.

"Only the fire exit, but that still goes out near the front. Otherwise we're surrounded by other buildings."

"You must be exhausted after everything. Head off to bed, I'll wait until the gits outside fuck off then lock the door behind me. We don't have to ever mention this again if you don't want." The orange lamp light made James' eyes look unfairly soft, highlighting the golden flecks amongst the brown. You steeled your nerve and shook your head.

"I'm not that bad of a host," You tried to joke, "Besides, don't you have training tomorrow? You're already up later than I'm sure you intended to be. I couldn't live with myself if I ruined England's star player by making him stay up all night, you take my bed and go to sleep." You were both very carefully trying to keep things light, not wanting to spend any more of the night miserable and fighting.

"Well, I'm not taking your bed, that's just impolite. I'll take the couch, if you're being so generous as to let me stay." He had a cheeky smile on his lips as he said it, both of you dancing around the fact that in any other circumstance James wouldn't have been allowed within fifteen feet of your flat.

"That couch? No way." You pointed at the teensy vintage sofa sitting in front of the boxy television. It had space for maybe two and a half arses to sit on it, maybe horizontally extended legs if you were short-ish, but there was no way the goliath James Potter was getting any decent sleep on it. "You take the bed. I'll survive the couch tonight."

"Don't be stupid, I can't sleep in your bed. If not the couch I'll take the floor."

"Speaking from a purely medical standpoint, I haven't cleaned these floors recently enough for it to be safe to have your face in such close proximity. Take the bed, Potter."

You bickered for a few long minutes, both of you trying to outdo each other's respect as host and guest, respectively. You didn't miss the irony that even when you and James were getting along you were fighting.

"I'm not letting you go without, that's final." You turned away to go fetch a pillow for your night on the couch when James said something you never ever thought you'd hear from him.

"Then sleep with me."

"Excuse me?" You all but shrieked, immediately cringing as you thought about your poor neighbours.

"Look, it's basically morning, we're both shattered and I'm sure your bed is much comfier than whatever alternative you're planning. We can even go full pillow-wall if it'll make you feel better." You stared at him for several moments, lips actually agape. Never in your life did you think James Potter would be asking you to share a bed with him, and never in your life did you think you'd be considering it.

"Fine."

Twenty minutes later and you were both ready for bed. You'd found James an old pair of an ex-boyfriend's long abandoned pyjamas, stuffed in a bottom drawer. They were slightly too small to accommodate all his muscles, the t-shirt sitting a few inches above the pants' waistband, giving him a very '90s crop top and exposing his happy trail.

You were almost definitely more embarrassed than James. You were in a similarly aged pair of pyjamas, a cartoon of Spongebob over your chest. You couldn't tell if you'd prefer to be in the lame pair that you were wearing or a cute pair -- no, it would probably look like you were trying too hard. Which you weren't. You didn't care about looking cute in front of James Potter, why would you?

He was already in bed when you'd returned from your skincare routine, face fresh and moisturised, and though you knew he was going to be there, nothing could have prepared you for the sight of James Potter in your bed. Tucked up to the chin under your frilly floral grandma sheets, he looked the picture of cozy.

"Don't bloody touch me, I mean it. I want to feel alone in my own bed," You snapped, sliding under the covers, pulling the doona similarly high up to your chin. You turned over to the centre of the bed to find James already on his side looking at you. You let it be for a moment, surprisingly enjoying the sleepover vibes you'd created.

"Okay this is weird now, the pillow's going up." You slammed a long decorative cushion in between the both of you, secretly smiling at the sleepy giggle James let out.

The first time you awoke it was hazy, still early in the morning with golden sunbeams streaming through your curtains. Warmth enveloped you, keeping you cozy despite the winter morning outside. You shifted to burrow deeper into your blankets when a groan came from behind you, startling you more awake as you recognised the feeling of muscular arms wrapped around your middle. It suddenly all came back to you, James walking you home, the paparazzi, you making an absolute fool of yourself. However, James was a portable heat source and extremely comfortable so you let yourself ignore everything that had led up to it, allowing yourself another few hours of blissful sleep.

The second time you woke up James was gone. That wasn't surprising given he definitely had early morning training, but you would reluctantly admit that it was a little lonelier in your bed than it usually was.

You didn't leave the house for the rest of the day, finally cleaning your apartment after much too long. Turns out all you needed was to be embarrassed in front of a guest to get you motivated.

Monday morning you weren't hungover anymore, but you were mourning the weekend that had passed much too quickly. Still, things were running smoothly enough; you didn't miss the tube and had snagged a seat, and your makeup was looking absolutely grand. You were absolutely thriving.

That was, until you crossed the threshold of the Sunday People offices and the jerks from the politics columns started bothering you, as if a Monday morning wasn't punishment enough.

"Meet anyone nice over the weekend, sweetheart?" One crowed from his desk chair, looking positively dickhead-ish in his too-small button-up.

"Or still on the clock maybe? We know you're always hunting for a good story." The combination of both remarks confused you, but you strutted past them with a quick glare in their general direction, your clicking heels producing enough attitude that you didn't need to say anything.

As you approached your own desk area, you had the distinct and uncomfortable feeling that everyone was looking at you. You couldn't think of why, but subtly wiped the edge of your lips in case it was foolishly smudged lipstick.

You even swore you heard one of the royal writers -- an awful woman maybe twenty years older than you -- say something about your 'promiscuity' and 'unprofessionalism'. You didn't know where it was coming from. You weren't friends by any means but you usually just stayed out of each other's way, you didn't throw around insults at your workplace. You glanced down at your outfit but nothing seemed especially revealing, the same button-up and pencil skirt you always wore if you weren't doing field work.

You were really starting to wonder why everyone was looking at you when even Lily was sending you pitiful glances. You had just made up your mind to say something about it when your boss came striding towards you, anger emanating in a way which only middle-aged men can do.

"What is this?" He slammed a Daily Mail tabloid down on your desk. The office was dead silent. You looked down at it, wholly confused as to what it could be -- your last article was approved without any troubles.

THE 'INSIDE' SCOOP? POTTER GETS COZY WITH REPORTER ON NIGHT OUT

And there, right under the brazen headline, was the stupid picture that Peter Pettigrew took. The two of you out on the street, you tucked into James' side with his arm around you. Your face wasn't totally visible, but anyone who already knew you would recognise the figure and fashion.

You could feel your face drop as you read the article, a barrage of slut-shamey insults and reports of how intimate you and James were out on the streets of London -- all entirely false, of course. When you'd finished reading the piece the whole office was staring at you, waiting to see how you'd react.

"It's a lie," You said quietly, trying to stop your hands from shaking as they rested on your lap. There was a pregnant pause as your boss processed what you were saying, clearly confused. None of your coworkers dared to speak.

"Bullshit," He replied, face blooming red as he decided you weren't being truthful. "That's you and that's James, there's no denying that. The whole bloody country will be able to see you two getting cozy on the street. How do you reckon this reflects on me, having your name and workplace published alongside your completely unprofessional affair?"

"I understand that it looks bad, but it's not what you think at all. J- uh, Potter was just helping me get home after a chance encounter because I wasn't feeling well, then he hid at my place because of all the paparazzi. Nothing happened." It was a weak explanation, even you could tell, even though it was completely true.

The arseholes over in Politics were already sniggering to themselves and you wished you could have ripped them a new one. Instead, you were cowering underneath your brutish boss.

"It's your word against Pettigrew's, and only one of you's been printed. You've been publicly humiliated and we're getting bad press for it."

Your boss had left you with the threatening promise that the issue would be brought up with your superiors and the whispered opinions of every single person you worked with. You choked out an excuse to get out of the office, taking the lift up to the rooftop to cry.

You had peace for a few minutes, getting the most embarrassing of the sobs out alone.

"Did you actually sleep with him?" If it was anyone else you probably would have snapped, yelling at them for being so insensitive. Marlene said it with such earnest curiosity and sympathy that you turned to face her instead. You were met with her and Lily, your very best friends who you were feeling especially lucky to work with at that moment.

"No!" You told them the full story, about getting sick at the club, James just being polite and walking you home, and Peter Pettigrew's terrible betrayal. Both women listened attentively, taking it all in.

"I thought you hated Potter," Lily said finally, "How'd it get that far in the first place? Usually you'd have ditched him in the first five minutes of being in his presence."

"I don't hate him." You studied your hands intently, observing the peeling red nail polish you should have reapplied yesterday. "I think he's annoying and obnoxious and I've always hated that he's never believed I could be a serious writer, but I don't hate him. He has his moments. Besides, why would I waste energy on hating Potter when I could hate Pettigrew with all my heart?"

"What a snake," Marlene spat, lighting a cigarette as she got comfy next to you. You and Lily both nodded. Peter was not only now a backstabber, but he'd been becoming increasingly insufferable over the years you'd all been writing.

He started out quite nice and was in your periphery of friends in the same way Remus and even James were, but as he'd gotten the job at his shitty tabloid magazine he'd become downright intolerable, always twisting what you'd said both in official articles and when gossiping with other friends. You had all had enough a few years ago and stopped inviting him places. Clearly, he'd held onto the grudge.

At his own work, James was facing the same rumours, though not nearly to the same peril. As he rocked up to his home pitch for the morning training session he was received with catcalls and high fives which made him nervous. No one was ever that happy to be working out on a Monday morning.

"Thought you hated her, mate."

"Maybe all she needed was a good shag to get the stick out of her arse."

"Woah! Can we take it back a few steps and not talk about women that way?" James sent a look over to one of his teammates.

"Sorry bud," He held his hands up in surrender, "Thought you wouldn't mind since you're always moaning about her." James' eyebrows knit together as he tried to piece together what the men were talking about, finally giving up and asking for a plain explanation.

He was met with a copy of Peter's article, outlining the flirty touches and 'electric chemistry' the two of you shared. Scanning it quickly James felt his face screwing up in disgust. Never mind that it obviously wasn't true, what a disgusting violation of privacy. He'd only recently launched into the spotlight, working his way up into the Premier League and then team captain in the last few years. He still didn't know how to handle the fame, especially invasive press like this.

His first priority was setting the ruth straight for his team, explaining exactly what happened and outlining strict instructions not to bring it up the next time they saw you.

"This is going to be a lot worse for her than me," He said, ending the conversation there.

He was correct. Rumours only spiralled from Peter's article. You'd stupidly created Google Alerts for your name; as a journalist, it made sense to keep track of where your writing was being shared. One day of this nonsense and you had all alerts silenced, not wanting to ever visit the internet ever again.

Apparently, this alleged affair was the most interesting thing young British people had ever experienced. The football star and the sports journalist. As you packed up to leave at the end of the day you were feeling sick to your stomach, already overwhelmed by the attention you never wanted on you.

Your face blanched as you approached the dizzying glass windows, a mass of reporters swarming the door. You didn't have to think hard to know they were waiting for you. You retreated to the restroom where they couldn't see you to rearrange your exit appearance. Pulling your coat tight against you and scarf up to cover the bottom half of your face, you plugged your iPod nano in to appear busy (and touched up your eye makeup for the inevitable photos that would make it back into the news cycle).

Physically and emotionally prepared you braved the crowd again, moving through with a polite but firm shove, making yourself a path down to the tube. You only snapped at one particularly rude paparazzi, giving him an instruction of where to 'stick it' as you hopped down the stairs to your station.

You ate a haphazard dinner by your computer, obsessively clicking through the various articles (and now personal blog posts) that had mentioned you. Every link made you feel worse about yourself.

The articles themselves were bad, most of them degrading you and congratulating James. Some had even produced old school photos of the both of you, even a few from your uni days when James was just starting out professionally and you were attending similar parties.

The articles were one thing, at least they usually had to be somewhat impartial. The blog posts by James' fangirls were downright cruel, calling you a slag based on a singular photograph and dragging your name through the mud.

You were drawn from your doom-scrolling by your cellphone ringing, Britney ringtone at least drawing a smile from you.

"Hello?"

"Get off the internet," Sirius Black said from the other end of the line.

"How'd you know?" You exited the webpage dutifully, already feeling the weight of the world's ugly words lifting from your shoulders.

"I figured. First time being written about isn't easy."

"It's certainly making me grateful I've never been so bitchy in my articles," You produced a hollow laugh, "I don't know how people can say these things about someone they've never met."

"That's why we like you," He said, "Mostly, at least. You stick to the sport and not our personal lives."

"Don't inflate my ego, Black, it's just because I don't like you guys," You joked, your mood already blooming back to somewhat more chipper.

"That's what I've been telling him!" You heard Remus call from further away, probably the other side of their living room. Sirius made an offended noise.

"Is Potter there?" You changed the topic, swirling your mouse around the window aimlessly, too afraid to check your work or personal notifications.

"He's out right now, calling someone official -- a publicist or lawyer friend. He's tearing his hair out about this, he feels awful for you." Both men explained, bickering about who exactly he was talking to.

"Yeah, I'm noticing only one of us is getting called a slut." You rolled your eyes even though they couldn't see you, balancing your cell between your shoulder and ear as you made a cup of tea. Sirius' barking laughter crackled through the speaker.

"Don't worry about it, love, everyone knows The Daily Mail is full of shite. Besides, I got that all the time."

"Yeah, in school! Not when you have a grown-up job to save face at!" Sirius conceded, apologising lightly. You shrugged him off; he was not the target of your anger at all.

"James'll be back soon, do you want to stay on the phone?" Remus asked and you answered without hesitation.

"No. I don't want to talk to him right now. We'll just find something to fight about, it's not worth it."

"He wants to make things better," Sirius offered, "He feels terrible."

"Maybe when I'm not so angry at the world." You left them with the offered compromise, hanging up to pity yourself for a few more hours before bed.

You didn't end up being fired over the incident, your bosses couldn't find a good reason to cite, but everyone in the office knew you were on thin ice. Most weren't afraid to highlight that fact. You were really starting to hate the Politics guys.

You just tried to keep your head down, diving into your articles and trying to keep in the higher-ups good graces. Amidst the drama though you'd been taken off all football coverage for the time being, banished to the irrelevant 'sports' you never even knew existed.

The week had taken you out of London to cover bizarre rural events like cheese rolling and bog snorkelling; not uninteresting but a big change of pace to the Premier League drama you were used to.

It did take your mind off of James and the media shitstorm for a day or two though. Being in a small town was much preferable to London, at least for the moment. The paparazzi weren't going to make the drive to find you for a single day when there were plenty more interesting figures to find in the city.

Plus, you were meeting the most interesting people. Though it was no Premier League final, everyone around was so wholly invested and excited by the competition that you couldn't help feeling the same, despite your initial hesitation.

Throughout the day it was just you, your notepad, your camera and the few thousand people who came to participate and observe. You'd already met and interviewed the woman who made the cheese, the previous year's winner and you were waiting impatiently to see who'd prevail now.

The paper was paying for you to stay overnight so you could chronicle the post-event celebrations, and you'd never been so glad to be working late. The key players in the day, organisers and competitors had all convened in the town's old pub, basically heaving under the weight of you all.

You held up your beer with the others despite hating the taste, grateful to be included in their toast to the day. You laughed as you tried to down it quickly, wanting the taste out of your mouth as soon as possible without refusing such a kind gift. Holding the pint up in the air victoriously you accepted the cheers of those around you, including the lovely middle-aged lady who made the ceremonial cheese and the man only a year or two older than you who'd won earlier.

"Finally letting your hair down!" He laughed and you smiled back, trying to remember his name. A glance down at your notepad said Drew. "Can I get you another?" You hoped he didn't notice your eyes widen, not expecting attention like that, not when you were allegedly working no less. You opened your mouth to agree when someone else answered for you.

"She doesn't like beer, thinks it tastes like piss." You whipped your neck around at the familiar voice, mouth dropping open at the sight of James Potter.

"What the hell are you doing here?" You asked, jovial politeness abandoned.

"You didn't remember that my family comes to watch every year?"

"Respectfully, why the fuck would I remember something like that?" You snapped, moving to leave and follow the much nicer Drew to the bar. James grabbed your hand lightly, stopping you from leaving.

"Wait, can we talk please?" You just looked at him for a long time, considering how much patience you had after a full day of work, then shrugged half-heartedly.

He led you outside and away from the crowd, both of you letting out a huff as you noticed the change in temperature.

"I liked your story on the bog snorkelling -- interesting stuff," James broke the awkward silence and you rolled your eyes aggressively.

"As if you read my pieces."

"I do!" He insisted, silently refusing the cigarette you offered. "I've read all your pieces, honest."

"But... huh? You're the one who always said I'd be a shit writer, I've spent years trying to get the negative internal James out of my head! You absolute dickhead!" You shoved his chest, turning back towards the door to return inside.

"Are you thick? I only said that because I fancied you!"

James' words rang heavy in the air, the street otherwise silent. You stared straight ahead of you for a moment, his words settling on top of you as you focused on the orange street lamp.

This whole time, this whole time, you'd been fighting the image you believed James had of you, striving to be better, never being satisfied, for nothing. This whole time you and James had been bickering and trading insults for nothing? And all his flirting... James' annoying charm and ironic compliments and innuendo-filled teasing were all genuine, after all this time? Suddenly your whole world had turned on its axis.

"What do you mean you said it because you fancied me? That is not normal!" You whirled around, accusatory finger pointed his way.

"I don't know! I thought I was supposed to! It wasn't cool to be a sap!" James argued back, running a hand through his already tousled curls.

"Jesus Christ," You muttered, "So what, you thought all my arguing back was just flirting?" James' silence told you all you needed to know.

"Come on, don't act like you didn't like it a little bit! As I recall you were always up for the fight, weren't you? You never avoided me or ignored me. Let's face it, you enjoyed it as much as I did." He stepped closer to you, breath visible in the cool air.

"I didn't enjoy it, what the hell are you talking about? Why would I enjoy trading schoolyard insults with some arrogant, idiotic football player who discredited the one thing I wanted most in my life?" Suddenly you were inches apart, heat emanating from both of you as you fought.

"Like you never said I was stupid for wanting to be a footballer? Face it, love, you're just as bad as me."

And suddenly, despite all your better judgement and every bit of sense in your head, you were kissing him. You didn't know exactly how it had happened, and if anyone were to ever ask you you would absolutely pin the blame on James but there you were, out in the middle of the street without a care in the world.

Every one of your senses was on fire, the smell of his cologne, the taste of his lips, the feeling of his soft curls under your fingers. Everything about James felt like he was made for you, like all the years of you revolving around each other, playing off the other's insult was just a lead-up, preparation for the very moment you kissed for the first time.

James' arms around you were warm, strong from years of working out and protective like a weighted blanket. One hand wrapped around your midsection and the other firmly on your neck you felt wholly surrounded by him, isolated in your own bubble of James.

It was probably a bad idea, but you weren't overly concerned with addressing that fact in any rush. It didn't come as you tilted your head to bring him even closer, it didn't come as you said hurried goodbyes in the pub and collected your coat, it didn't even come as you closed the door to your hotel room, undoing the buttons to James' shirt like they had a personal vendetta against you.

The admittance only came as you lay entangled with him, faces millimetres apart.

"Was that a bad idea?" You asked, genuine self-consciousness mixing with pragmatic anxiety.

"I mean, I quite enjoyed myself, love. Did you not?" James' cheeky smile made you snort out a giggle but you sobered up quickly, hitting him lightly on his toned chest.

"Don't turn this into a joke!" You ordered, "Have we just fucked everything up?" James just looked at you for a minute, taking in the sincerity in your voice and the depth of your eyes.

"Of course we haven't," He assured you. "Do you like me?"

"But--"

"Ah! Do you like me?" He reiterated and you paused, nodding shyly. "See? You like me and I like you. We'll figure everything else out. Start slow; baby steps."

"Baby steps," You agreed, sharing his smile. It really only hit you how much you actually liked James once you'd said it, finally noticing how he might've been looking at you the whole time.

You sent James off early in the morning, both of you needing to make it back to London quickly. You had to get your article written up and James had training. Thankfully there was no awkwardness in your goodbye; James had to rush to meet his parents to drive back by car and you had a train to catch. The only moment of hesitance came as you said goodbye, waving at each other with a giggle as James hopped down the steps. He hesitated halfway, turning to look at you with the glint of mischief in his eye that you'd become very well acquainted with.

In a moment he was at the top of the steps again, swooping in to steal another kiss. You rolled your eyes to hide an embarrassing smile, pushing him back in the direction he came.

"Haven't you got somewhere to be?" You asked, tucking a strand of hair behind your ear. James mimed twisting a knife in his chest but continued down the stairs nonetheless, giving you one last smile before he turned a corner and disappeared from your sight. You sighed like a schoolgirl then laughed at yourself, packing the last of your things to get home.

As you sat on the train, green landscapes passed you through the window and you felt your cell phone buzz from the minuscule pocket of your work trousers.

thinking of u :P <3

You grinned, looking out at the scenery so the people around you wouldn't be able to figure out your embarrassing secret. You felt like a teenage girl again, blushing over a text from the guy you had a crush on.

Everything turned to shit in a matter of hours after returning to London.

First, James' publicist made his statement. It wasn't necessarily terrible, but it really had no regard for you. No statement declaring you both on good terms, no coming to your defence or asking for the press to respect you. James looked like the hero saving a stupid drunk girl, and you still looked desperate for the most popular footballer in the country. You were decently sure it wasn't James' fault, but it did significantly dampen your lovesick giddiness.

The office was half-empty when you arrived, kitten heels clicking against the ground. You said a quick hello to Lily, still dutifully typing away at her computer. You followed her lead, exporting your notes to your desktop computer, formatting the piece and going through edits to have it ready for the next paper.

The sun was setting, sending orange and pink streaks through the sky when the door to your boss' office slammed open, echoing above the cubicles.

"You kissed him?" He yelled and you paled, knowing exactly what he was talking about but not how he knew. That problem was solved when he slammed the magazine down in front of you, no doubt just delivered by the skittery young receptionist running back to the elevator.

FACT OR FICTION? POTTER AND REPORTER CAUGHT SNOGGING AMIDST PUBLIC DENIAL

Fuck. That could not be worse.

The whole piece was essentially dragging your name through the absolute mud now that they had the confirmation there was something going on between you and James. The whole world thought you were sleeping to the top, or for the best scoop, and everyone hated you for it.

You looked up at your boss, words dying on your tongue.

"Please tell me that's not you," He said, grasping at the thinning hair on his head. You couldn't deny it.

"I..." You trailed off, searching for anything you could say to make it better. "I didn't mean to. And I'm being completely honest when I say that the first article was all bullshit. Things have... happened since then." You were already on the verge of tears. Even on an optimistic day, you couldn't have denied that this was utterly shit.

"Jesus." Your boss muttered, beginning to pace. "Look, I like you, you know? You do good work and you're never outta line, but I reckon the higher-ups are gonna be done with you. They wanted you out over the first article but I convinced them it was all speculation. This is proof and makes us all look bad that you're sleeping with someone you interview every other bloody week. Look, I'll do what I can in damage control, but I'd be bringing your stuff home tonight. I'm sorry."

How could he have just left you with that absolute bombshell? Effectively firing you, just like that? The tears had made their way up to your waterline, sitting there mocking you as you refused to let them fall. You submitted your piece and shut off your laptop, angrily stuffing your sparse personal decorations into your shoulder bag to get the fuck out of the building as fast as possible.

The paparazzi were waiting again, of course, like that was what you really needed. You pushed past them, making sure to land an extra hard stomp on Peter's foot, lips twitching into the beginnings of a smile as you heard him curse.

You sat on the tube, staring intently at your feet and trying desperately to think of anything but your current situation. You'd already been approached by someone who'd coughed out "Skank," which really hadn't done anything for your sour mood. All you wanted was to crawl into your bed and never emerge.

You wandered down the street between the metro station and your flat, hands shoved deep in your coat pockets.

"Hey!" Someone called and you glanced over on instinct, senses drawn by the interruption of an otherwise quiet evening. "You're the girl who kissed James Potter, yeah?" It was a girl still in her school uniform, probably sixteen or seventeen. You thought through your options quickly and shrugged.

"Yeah, I guess."

"Wicked. How was it?" She asked, chewing on pink gum. There was an aura about her that you liked, not judgemental like everyone else you'd met. If you were still in school you thought you might've been friends with her.

"Pretty good, I'd do it again." A cheeky almost-joke between the two of you, ironic given the shit that it had caused for you.

"We were talking about it at school. Pretty shit how they've treated you. Like they all wouldn't jump at a chance to get close to 'im." You liked the way that she didn't get any closer. Just the two of you standing face to face, divided by the empty road.

"Exactly what I've been saying," You agreed, tucking your hair behind your ears.

"If it was the other way around, if you were the famous one, James would be getting congratulated for getting with you, not ridiculed by the mindless gossip columns. All my friends think it's utter bullshit, stopped buyin' 'em and everything." You could have kissed her if that wasn't tremendously creepy. In five minutes, this schoolgirl had vindicated everything you'd been saying for the past week in a way no one else had.

"Thank you," You said, with more sincerity than you probably should have had for a complete stranger. The girl just shrugged with a smile, nodding before continuing down the street, the sound of her leather school shoes growing quieter with every step.

You felt it in your whole body every time you thought of the interaction for the next few hours, warmth spreading through your chest as you were reminded there were still good people around.

Your other reminder of that fact came with the sound of your buzzer, the laughing of Lily and Marlene echoing off the stone of your building. As you let them in curiously they presented armfuls of takeout, the smell of Chinese food immediately floating through your flat.

Lily took the responsibility of setting out the food while Marlene took control of your little television, flipping between channels until she found a suitable romcom starting.

You didn't speak about what had happened, no one mentioned James Potter or the bloody Sunday People. Yet, there was an air of tenderness that let you know the girls knew exactly what was happening and how you were feeling about it.

Still, there was something bothering you. You couldn't give it a name immediately, only a tugging in your stomach while the girls were entertaining you, but persistent nonetheless.

It wasn't until you were all crammed into your bed, the other two peacefully asleep, that you could identify the sensation. It was an overwhelming desire, a need to write that you hadn't felt in ages. It was the same feeling that had pushed you to be a journalist in the first place, an inspiration you typically only felt watching a magical soccer final.

You crept out of your bedroom, switching on your computer at the kitchen table, squinting at the aggressive blue light. And when a blank Word document appeared before you, you started writing. Obsessively, feverishly, words poured out of you at a rate that hadn't happened since you'd started at Sunday People.

The words of the school girl fresh in your mind, you started an article vastly different from your usual kind. Instead of strategies and highlights you dissected your own experience of the past week, saying everything you hadn't let yourself unload to the paparazzi outside your office (though with fewer curse words than they would have received). It could have been minutes or hours that you were writing and you wouldn't have noticed, eyes glued on the screen in front of you.

You didn't realise you'd fallen asleep until Lily woke you gently with a hand on your shoulder, offering a steaming mug of tea. It was light outside, the world already up and awake. You were glad it was a weekend as the girls didn't need to rush off to work, cooking a simple breakfast for you all to share.

"What've you written?" Marlene asked, the second part of her sentence unnecessary: since you don't have a job to write for. You shrugged, taking a bite of some eggs.

"Just something I had to get off my chest. Might see if I can sell it to someone to tide me over 'til I figure out what I'm doing with my life."

"Can we read?" You made a 'go ahead' gesture, the computer already open to the screen.

A WOMAN'S UNWILLING WEEK IN THE PUBLIC EYE:

How a woman always loses.

You sat in mild discomfort as Lily and Marlene read your piece in silence, anxiously awaiting their reactions. They weren't what you were expecting.

When they turned back to face you, Lily had tears in her eyes, red tones brought out in her skin. Even Marlene looked uncharacteristically moved, not at all the reaction you were expecting. Firstly, it was completely unedited so you suspected it was somewhat of a mess from your midnight haze. Secondly, it was more of a vent than anything, getting your hatred for invasive paparazzi off your chest. You thought you'd all laugh about it then move on with your days.

"Lils, what's wrong?" You didn't mean to laugh, it was more out of surprise than anything else.

"It's just, it's so raw and real. It's so unfair," She sniffled, wiping her eyes with the sleeves of her sweater.

"Jesus, you don't have to cry," You said lightly, "I'm fine! I hated that bloody place anyway."

"That's not the point," Marlene pointed out, "And Lily's right, this is really confronting stuff. It's great."

"Thanks," You mumbled, studying a lamp for something to do.

"Can we talk about James?" Your head snapped back to look at her.

"What about him?"

"Clearly there's been some... developments in your relationship, which we don't have to talk about--"

"Yet," Marlene interrupted.

"The point is that it looks like there's feelings involved now. What are you doing about them? Because if you publish that, it's putting everything out there, and even I can't tell how you feel about James right now," Lily finished.

"I don't want to talk to him," You said quickly, "I know it's not his fault but I can't think about him without getting mad. It's like I wrote; he ends up fine while I lose my job over one kiss."

"Understandable," Marlene nodded, "But if I know James at all, he'll be going crazy every minute that you ignore him."

You had much to consider when the girls left. The state of your career, your feelings for James, everything felt too big and overwhelming to make any decisions about. So, you took a nap.

The rest of your weekend was spent sending your then-edited article to as many newspapers and blogs as you could and hiding out in your flat, dodging James' calls.

Unfortunately, you liked him. You'd figured out that much. More unfortunately, he hadn't done anything to help you out in all this mess, benefiting from the press in a way that only England's favourite footballer could.

On Monday morning your piece was published. Not the biggest or most reputable newspaper, if your name hadn't still been trending it probably would have gone largely noticed. Instead, it blew up.

It had mixed reviews, of course, a tell-all so blatantly feminist would always attract its haters, but you were floored by the support it was receiving. Women were validating your experiences in a way you hadn't expected even a few days ago. It made you not so scared to leave the house anymore.

On Tuesday morning, Remus called you. You had the thought that it might have been James calling to grovel on Remus' phone, but you thought it was a smart enough idea you'd indulge anyway. If it was Sirius you wouldn't have picked up.

Instead, it was actually Remus.

"Come to the media room this afternoon," He said, evidently not wasting time with pleasantries.

"What?" You asked, caught off-guard.

"Just do it. Two o'clock."

"Remus, you know I don't have a job anymore, right?"

"Come off it, you know anyone on the team would let you in. You've got quite a name for yourself," He chanced a joke and you rolled your eyes.

"What, whore?" You retorted, only a little worried it would be true.

"I'm hanging up," Was all he said before the line went dead. You huffed, snapping your phone closed with all the attitude of a spoiled private schoolgirl.

Yet, at two o'clock you were standing in front of the media room at James' team's stadium, questioning all of your life choices.

The room seemingly went silent when you entered, dozens of pairs of eyes staring you down as you nervously stuck to the wall. You felt the derogatory, leering stares from all the sleazy men who'd been accusing you of sleeping with players since you first started in the field. It made you want to drop dead.

James made his way to the lectern up the front of the room with a cough, quieting down the chaos.

"Afternoon, everyone. I'm sure you're all wondering why I've called you here, I've got some things I'd like to address.

"As you all well know, I've been a frequent face in the papers lately, and not for my brilliant playing as it usually is. I recently got followed down a street after a night out looking after an old friend who happened to be a colleague of yours. Now I know that my godly good looks lead you to believe that I don't feel the same as all of you, but I do. And I'd like you all to consider how you'd feel if a man with a camera followed you all the way home after you'd been out for a night with your friends and a few cheeky drinks. It's pretty invasive if you can't imagine.

"Now, all this press hasn't really affected me. However, my dear friend has been subject to misogynistic articles, slut-shaming and harassment all because we were seen out together and a few hateful words from someone I used to consider a mate." You had no idea where this was going, but you were absolutely fascinated. James was more well-spoken, more mature and solemn than you'd ever seen him, though he still had his audience in the palm of his hand with his casual jokes. It was a masterclass in public speaking.

"If you haven't read any of my friend's pieces I would highly recommend them; she's got a brilliant voice and I personally read everything she publishes. However, I'm not here to talk about her work; I'd actually like to talk about her if you all don't mind."

What the hell was happening?

"In the midst of all these articles over the last week, I know you've all seen various pictures of us, including from secondary school. A few come to my mind, our graduation picture is a highlight, but I'd really like to talk about this one." James brandished a printed-out photo you recognised instantly.

"This photo was taken when we were twelve or thirteen years old at someone's party. That night, as you tend to do when you're young and bored, we played spin the bottle and ended up being each other's first kiss. I'm sure you're all wondering why I'm telling this story now, and it's because ever since that night as I have recently realised, almost a decade later, I have been embarrassingly, stupidly in love with her."

Your life wasn't real, it absolutely could not be.

"And though I've done some incredibly dumb things over the years, somehow she's managed to like me back -- at least a little. So I'm setting the record straight right now, she is not 'sleeping to the top' or trying to get a secret scoop out of me because I'm the one who's been chasing after her for twelve years.

"I know I've been rambling on for far too long so I'll wrap it up here, but I just wanted to end this little conference with a warning that if I see any more disgusting, hateful articles about her, you won't be getting another comment from me again. So nice to see you all!"

The room started to trickle out but you were stuck to your spot against the wall, frozen in absolute shock. You hardly even noticed the dirty looks you got from some of the people you'd been working alongside for years.

You spotted James in another corner, drinking out of a plastic water bottle and messing with his hair. A nervous tell.

The room was almost completely empty when you approached him, heels muffled by the carpeted floor.

"Hey stranger," You said softly, feeling way out of your depth. He turned in an instant, smile lighting up his face then melting away as it was replaced with an insecure frown.

"Was that okay? I didn't want to embarrass you but I wanted to step up and do something and protect you and--"

"Have you really loved me since we were twelve?" You cut him off bluntly.

"Every day since, as I've figured out," He agreed with a slight nod, glasses slipping down his nose slightly.

"What about all the flirting with Lily? The other girls over the years?"

"So obviously fake. Distractions. It's never been anyone but you, love."

You could only stare at him for a moment, your whole world shifting beneath your feet. James' face became increasingly worried, brow furrowing more the longer you remained unresponsive.

"If you don't feel the same that's totally alright, I still stand by what I did and I don't want you being harassed for--"

You'd always thought that cutting someone off with a kiss was ridiculously cheesy, reserved for shitty Hallmark movies with grown-up child actors who never got their big break. Turns out though, when you realise that your girlish crush on the star footballer has actually been a complicated love of twelve years, you don't really want to waste any more time.

When you woke up on Wednesday morning with James next to you, body heat keeping you cozy, you were convinced you had to be dreaming. When you eventually got up to check your emails and start your day the hypothesis was only solidified by the impossible email waiting in your inbox.

The fucking BBC wanted to hire you as a football commentator and sports writer. Your dream job at your dream company. If you let out an embarrassing squeal then that was none of your business.

You were still convinced you were hallucinating the whole thing until James came in with his biggest smile and that look in his eyes that told you he probably had a hand in getting your name on the BBC desks.

Even a few weeks ago you would have been mad at him, assuming it was mocking or he had ulterior motives. But it wasn't a few weeks ago anymore, and James Potter's whole, endless heart belonged to you. You weren't letting that go anytime soon.

[temiizpalace]

☆┆MY LAST NAME BELONGS TO YOU!

SUMMARY: writing your name out, with his last name!

CHARACTERS: basketball club + azul and leona

GENRE: fluff

WARNINGS: reader is referred to as [mc] – not really a warning, just kinda cringe – mentions of pursuing marriage in floyd and azuls part

ROMANTIC, RELATIONSHIP IS UP TO READER

reader is g/n, reader is yuu

♥️┆ACE TRAPPOLA

“man, this stinks..”

ace whispered under his breath as professor trein droned on with the lesson. he was struggling to keep his eyes open. as much as he wanted to just fall asleep in the middle of the lesson, he really really didn’t want to add to his homework pile.

that’s just more precious hours of his day wasted. all the repetitive sounds were oddly enough lulling him to sleep. the grating sounds of grim snoring, the weird twang noise deuces rubber band was making, and the sounds of pencils writing against paper.

“hey deucy, make sure not to fall asleep.” he whispered to ace, as if he wasn’t about to do the same. deuce gives him a look, about to open his mouth before trein had looked in their direction. ending their banter immediately.

to keep himself awake, ace started doodling in his notebook. not in the corner as most would, no he began doodling on a brand new sheet of paper. curious as to what you were doing, it seems you were notetaking at first.

but getting a closer look, you were doing the same as him. doodling in the notebook, barely paying attention to the lesson. he snickered, deep down grateful that he wasn’t the only one not paying attention.

‘hah. look at that idiot, not paying attention. they’d have to work twice as hard without magic. hehe.’ ace thought, shifting his attention to staring at you. though he was focused on you, his hands still mindlessly doodled across the page. completely unaware of what he was writing.

deuce glances over his shoulder, eyes widening at what he managed to read. “ace?! i.. i never would’ve thought this was your level of dedication..” deuce says to ace, confusing the boy. “eh? deuce what are you talking about—“

ace looks at the paper. his handwriting was messy since he wasn’t paying attention but it was certainly legible.

[MC] TRAPPOLA

he shuts the notebook hastily, emitting a loud thud noise to echo in the classroom. all eyes were on him. including yours. he whistles as if nothing happened, face flushed a light pink color. trein grunts, and continues on with the lesson.

🦁┆LEONA KINGSCHOLAR

“how’d i get stuck here..”

leona mumbles, sitting at his desk in what felt like forever. his plans to skip were officially ruined as you dragged him to his classroom before he could make it to the botanical garden. usually he’d just brush off anybody getting in his way of a good nap, but you looked so persistent in getting him here.

so begrudgingly, he took his seat in class with a huff as the professor continued his lesson. does he regret it? sort of. you looked satisfied and proud when he listened to you, so he’ll oblige for now. he can just ask for a reward later as a thanks for his compliance. he’s mentally making a list of things you could do for him..

joining him for his afternoon nap, fetching him lunch, coming to a spelldrive club practice, the list goes on. his blissful thoughts were then interrupted as the professor placed a paper worksheet in front of him. a worksheet? those are barely ever given out to students..

“kingscholar, this is a sheet of things you must catch up on as a result of your frequent absences. surely you can finish this by the end of the week since you seem to have much free time.” the professor spoke, handing him a pencil and leaving him off to writing.

“haah.. I shouldn’t have listened to that damn herbivore.” he sighs, slouching in his seat and reviewing the sheet in front of him. ‘i already know all this..’ leona thinks, stretching his arms out getting ready to nap. the least he could do is write out his name and do the rest when he feels like it. instead of his name, it was something else entirely.

[MC] KINGSCHOLAR

his ears drop down, his eyes widened, and his cheeks got darker. he followed his first instinct and crumbled the worksheet, ensuring nobody could read what he had just written. the professor glares at him and makes his way over to his seat. “mr. kingscholar.. i hope you know that’d be a rather large part of your grade. we wouldn’t want you to be held back another, would we?”

“tch..” leona scoffs, trying to look away from any of the attention he was receiving. the class ends as soon as it has started, thankfully with no more incidents. leona was just glad nobody has seen what he has written and that he can escape this situation as quickly as possible.. or so he thought.

“roi du leon!” an all too familiar face calls out.

oh no.

🐙┆AZUL ASHENGROTTO

azul sat in his office, filing through the contracts he had made in the past month. many let their minds wander when sitting at a desk for 2 hours or so, and azul is no exception.

eventually growing bored and tired of looking through the deals he made, he took out a notepad and simply wrote out his thoughts. at first he thought this was a dumb idea, but his mother insisted he try it and it has been working ever since.

his mind always felt at ease once the notebook was pulled out. but today felt a little different. he was happy, but today he felt more excited than anything.

he had a dumb lovestruck smile on his face, lightly giggling as he wrote. what on earth? his face was flushed and warm, but he didn’t mind it one bit.

[MC] ASHENGROTTO

he would’ve never thought something so simple would’ve gotten him so worked up. it was just your name and his surname. what was so special?

that’s what he would’ve thought in the past. now, he began to imagine a future of you and him in the coral sea.. a house together.. you meeting his mother.. his stepfather.. it made him feel all giddy. like a schoolgirl if you will.

his love fantasies were inevitably cut short as he heard a knock on the door. “ne, azul. shrimpy is here to see ya.”

panicked that you and floyd might see his notes, he hurriedly opened his drawer and slams it shut. the thud can be heard on the other side of the door, confusing you. “a-ahem.. come in!”

as he saw you, his fantasies began to boot back up. a wedding.. dates at mostro lounge.. it sounded like paradise. every fiber of his being was fighting the primal urge to make you a sign a contract. a contract in which you’d agree to be his life partner. forever, and ever.

🦈┆FLOYD LEECH

not feeling like attending classes, floyd skipped out on the lesson. he knows he’d get scolded by azul later, but if he doesn’t feel like going he don’t wanna.

since you were in classes, the teachers had pushed him out before he even got to you. even despite his protests! floyd complains at the closed door, trying to open it back up.

“eh? why can’t i just take shrimpy and go? lessons are borin’ anyway.” he complains, causing you to hide your head from all the eyes staring at you. all this attention pointed more at you than at floyd..

“leech.. that’s quite enough. go back to your class and come back for this.. “shrimpy” later. interrupting a lesson is NOT what a mage of the future should be doing.” the teacher retorts, now ignoring floyd and his remarks.

“tch.” getting tired of trying to pull you out, floyd retreats to his room in octavinelle. he flopped onto his bed, a pen in hand and a notebook in front of him. jade said drawing is a good time killer or whatever, so he’ll do just that. in all honesty, it won’t take long for him to get bored of this activity and look for something else.

floyd being floyd, just wrote or drew whatever first came to mind. there were tiny drawings of shrimps all over the page. an occasional eel to be seen next to it. he laughed and smiled looking at the page before him. “ehe.. there are shrimpys all over this paper—!”

he writes out another thought that came to his mind. it wasn’t a shrimp drawing, neither was it an eel. the handwriting was slightly shaking being on an uneven and unstable surface, but you can tell what it says.

[MC] LEECH

[MC]? ohhh, that’s your name! leech? that’s his last name! he didn’t truly process what he had wrote, but he knew the implications of it. you being a leech.. to change your last name..

you typically marry a person of interest.. and that person of interest typically inherits the others last name..

hey! person of interest is you! you’re his person of interest! just wait shrimpy! you better save that ring finger just for him!

and 5 minutes later he gets bored, tosses the notebook to the side and goes back to terrorize your classroom again.

🐍┆JAMIL VIPER

jamil sat in the scarabia lounge, finally finishing up dinner for the day. kalim was held up in club activities, and basketball practice has been cancelled due to the fact over half of the members were injured thanks to floyd and aces negligence.

this was a rare moment where he actually had time to himself. nobody to interrupt him in his peaceful state of mind. jamil walked over to his room, locking the door behind him and laying flat onto his bed.

he stares up at the ceiling, unsure what to do with this free time. homework? no he already did it all. check up on kalim? no, why would he ruin his moment of peace like that. check up on you? …

what a ridiculous idea. he doesn’t have time for that. well he does but.. ugh. having time to himself isn’t as relaxing as he made it out to be. especially considering he never had a moment to himself in forever.

jamil figured to keep himself occupied, he can make a bucket list. many people make bucket lists, surely this’ll help him plan his future, right? he grabs a pen and a sheet of paper and began to brainstorm.

obviously seeing the world is one of them. that’s something he wanted to do for as long as he could remember. his mind blanks. so far, his only desire was to travel. far far away from kalim. a thought occurred in his mind.

“..they have to be putting a spell on me or something.” jamil mutters, massaging his temple. he tried wiping the thought clean from his mind, but there was no luck. it annoyed him that such a simple thought was enough to leave him flustered.

[MC] VIPER

he wrote it onto a separate sheet of paper. examining it with a slight smirk. his cheeks were tinted a slightly darker shade, signs of him blushing. “their name doesn’t go well with my surname. what a shame.”

he’s lying. hearing your name with his last is like music to his ears, as much as he’d hate to admit it. surely enough he rips the paper into shreds and tosses it into a nearby trashbin, going out on a walk to clear his clouded mind.

you must’ve put a spell on him. he shouldn’t be having such fantasies of you and him traveling the world together.

A/N: this kinda sucks but it’s better than nothing lmao

date published: 1/6/23

© temiizpalce — don’t steal or copy my work!

[lcvclywon]

in sickness and in health

back to masterlist

synopsis After a long fight with Jay you find yourself giving him the silent treatment. Leaving you curled up alone sick in your room, with your only comfort being the instant tteokbokki you had microwaved for yourself earlier. However it seems Jay knew where to be and what to say at exactly the right times.

warnings: mentions of food, mentions of sickness, mentions of kissing, pet names (honey), slight angst, I made YN as the 6th member of lesserafim so that the whole same building thing made sense so...js roll with it pls 😁, also not proof read!, slight fighting

genre ⋅˚₊‧ ୨୧ ‧₊˚ ⋅ hurt to comfort

pairings: idol!jay x idol!reader, established relationship

wc ୭ ˚. ᵎᵎ around 1.14k

thoughts frm yuya 💭 i know i said i was gonna go on a hiatus but i needed a serotonin boost from writing after doing a horrendous maths paper.... so semi hiatus i guess ^^ anywaysss this drabble has been rotting in the back of my mind for a while soo here u are, i'm a huge huge HUGE sucker for hurt to comfort tropes so >,<

A week. It had been a week since you and Jay had a massive argument causing the two of you to give each other the silent treatment for god knows how long. However, as if the world was out to get you, the next morning after the fight you had been plagued with a sickness that you couldn’t quite pin down, all you knew was it left you bedridden until Friday. 

Due to said sickness, you obviously couldn’t join your group for schedules and barely entered the building for dance practice. You hoped Jay would at least notice your absence, send a message asking where you were or something. But to your dismay, radio silence.

“Who cares about some stupid guy anyways…” Grumbling under your breath you reached for your chopsticks to skewer another rice cake from your measly plate of instant tteokbokki and shovel it down your throat. Maybe excessive spice you couldn’t handle and soft pillowy rice cakes could solve all your problems. 

Ding dong! Weird, you didn’t think the members would be back this early? 

Begrudgingly ripping the covers off and placing your bowl back on your table, you went to the door. Hair still an oily mess from not showering properly and clothes stuck to your body from sweat, you clearly weren’t in pristine condition to be meeting anyone. Please don’t be a delivery man, please don’t be a delivery man.

However, after opening the door, you found yourself standing in front of the one person you’d been longing for the whole week. Park Jongseong. Your gaze softened slightly and a small smile crept onto your lips, but then you remembered that you were still mad at him. Fighting the urge to embrace him and cry out for his name, you plastered on a stoic expression of indifference. 

“What are you doing here.” 

“Chaewon told me you were sick,” he said before entering into your dorm, not bothering to wait for you to let him in.

Making his way over to the kitchen he placed a white takeaway bag onto the counter before emptying its contents onto the table: a warm bowl of your favourite porridge and a cup of tea from your favourite cafe. 

“What’s this?” positioning yourself in front of Jay, you scanned the table to see the numerous small boxes of side dishes sprawled across. 

“Porridge, it’s good for you when you’re sick.” he replied before shooting his head over to the remnants of your tteokbokki “Honey why are you eating tteokbokki, you’re sick you shouldn’t be eating instant food.” he scolded before reaching over throw your lukewarm leftovers in the trash.

“It’s not that bad…” you mumbled whilst picking at the side dishes “And why do you suddenly care, thought you weren’t talking to me” Scoffing you shot him a dirty glare. 

“Correction, you weren’t talking to me; I thought you needed some space, as you usually do after a fight.” well he wasn’t wrong, you did express to him that after arguments you wanted some time to cool down by yourself, “and also, I’m not ‘suddenly’ just caring YN. Who do you think Yunjin got all those drinks, medicines, and snacks from.” 

Oh… so she didn’t buy them herself. Your gaze reached his eyes as you felt your heart soften slightly, “Okay, well you could’ve sent me a text or something. You could’ve come here and given it to me yourself, why today out of all days do you decide to come huh?” meeting your glossy eyes, Jay could tell how hurt you were over his actions. He couldn’t deny that it pained him to see you this upset. 

“Okay look, I’m sorry. I wanted to come over, but Sakura said whatever you caught was contagious and that you isolated yourself to make sure you got nobody else sick. As I mentioned earlier, you told me you liked to have time to cool down after fighting, but it was stupid of me not to even try to text you. Today it all just-” Jay stopped his rambling, catching his breath before sighing out, “I just really missed you YN” 

That was all the confirmation you needed to run into his arms and hug him so tight he didn’t even think about leaving again. Jay was quick to reciprocate, arms wrapping around you to engulf you into his warm embrace, head buried into the crook of your neck whispering sweet nothings. 

Breaking away from the embrace and tilting your head up you were graced with a warm and familiar smile painted across Jay’s face; a smile you so badly missed the entire week. 

“Don’t ever do that again.” you said with a pout 

“Promise I won't honey,” his hands reached to cup your face before adding, “Only if you promise to stop eating that stuff when you’re sick.” 

“Hey, it’s yummy! I can’t help it that I can’t cook soup or anything, tteokbokki has never failed me.” 

“Guess I’ll have to keep bringing you food then.” he replied with a smirk

“Well, I could use a personal delivery man.” giggling you reached up to mirror his actions, cupping his face with your warm hands. 

“Oh really, would a delivery man do this?” and with that he pressed a playful peck onto your lips; soft and gentle, something you missed dearly. 

“Jay!” you exclaimed, “You can’t do that, you’ll get sick!” 

“So. What.” he said between pecks, peppering your face with kisses as you giggled and placed your hands on his chest to try and push him away. Pulling away he looked into your eyes with a warm and gentle gaze, smiling softly before leaning in to give you a proper kiss. Feeling the worry of your sickness transferring to him vanish, you melted into the kiss whilst wrapping your arms around his neck. In response, his hand found its way to the small of your back while the other reached up to cup the back of your neck. It always astonished you how easily he could pull you into his orbit, almost made you forget about the soreness of your body and the fever plaguing you. 

Retreating back he giggled at your pouting face. “I’d love to continue, but I wouldn’t want the food I bought you to get cold” intertwining your fingers with his, he led you over to a chair before sitting you down. “Let’s eat okay?” he muttered before taking his spot right next to yours, hand still intertwined with your fingers. His other hand however reached over to spoon you some porridge, moving the utensil closer to your mouth. 

You happily bent forward to enjoy the bite he crafted for you, an all too familiar sensation bubbling up within you—a warmth you could only describe as, home. Jay felt like home. And you hoped he would for the rest of your lives.

perm taglist ♡ (send an ask to be added!) @floweryang

[marikosfragrance]

BLUE LOCK X READER

"Can he pass the "Orange peel" test?"

Characters : Isagi Yoichi, Itoshi Sae, Karasu Tabito, Bachira Meguru

Content : A scenario in which you ask them for an orange and ask them to peel it for you— seeing how willing they are to do acts of services.

Disclaimer : Some of you readers may be sensitive, so prepare yourself for things you might not expect like harshness in some characters

SET : I set the scenario where you and the (character) have dated for 2 years, but kaiser is not healed. Sae might come off as cold, rin might seem detached or some other traits that you might deem as a red flag. So read at your own accord, taking this warning into consideration. I won't add a description of what type of personality reader is for everyone to feel welcome.

Note : I am glad ya'll enjoyed the previous scenarios, now let us explore more. Take it into consideration that when you guys send me requests or asks, you can freely set the setting to however you'd like, if you'd like it if it is set into a time where kaiser is healed, or sae and rin have opened up, which might take ages if done slowly. Or when isagi haven't met you so he isn't in love with you, and so on and so forth with other characters. Now enjoy.

Isagi Yoichi - he would

I am sure it doesn't come off as much of a surprise if someone like Isagi would do this act of affection. For him, it might even be natural— his way of showcasing how much he cares for you. If this was set at a time where you just started dating, he would feel flustered and might even mess up a bit, but for Isagi, this act would be a symbolism of how he is willing to do anything to minimize your workload as well as please you.

Yoy two are spending some time on the couch, intitially planning to watch tv, and not let any interruptions occur. However, you had a different plan in mind. Isagi was invested in the movie and glances at you from time to time to check your reactions. Until you asked for an orange, which draws his eyes to you— away from the tv now. You repeated your request as it sinks into his mind. He chuckles lightly— an apology exiting his mouth, from how he didnt hear you the first time.

You asked for an orange and he wouldn't even question it, just thinking you might be tired as he makes his way to the kitchen. After grabbing an orange, he walks towards you then stretches his hand out to give it to you, you didn't reach out for it and instead asked him to peel it. Isagi might feel confused at first but would happily do it, seeing this as a sign of affection rather than a workload.

(Isagi's part is short, because he does it no hesitation and no complaints)

Itoshi Sae - he would begrudgingly do it

The fact that you were able to handle him for 2 years, much less get into a relationship means he can see you in his future, or you managed to really convince him that you won't get in the way of his plans and goals. Which is amazing in its own way— since it might've took you years to get him convinced. So you might already be aware that he won't give in to such pointless acts of affection. But you tried it anyway, since he isn't really always present, so why not make the most of it?

You two were just sitting on his couch. Yes— his couch. You never brought up the idea of living together since Sae seems to really like his space. And even if he secretly wanted to, you can't see him telling you about it or bringing up the idea. You are watching TV, eyes darting to whatever he is working on— eyes meeting some soccer data stuff on his laptop which is rested on his lap. You waited for a while, and there he goes. Sae places his laptop on the center table as his body relaxes, leaning more on the back of the couch— looking at whatever you were watching.

You called out his name, followed by your requests— an orange. You can see him squinting his eyes a little at your odd request, since normally you would get it yourself, but with a sigh, he stands up and heads to the kitchen. He grabs an orange and goes back to you sitting on the couch, looking at him with anticipating eyes— the upcoming second request reluctantly but successfully leaving your mouth. "Can you peel it for me?" You ask.

"Why can't you peel it yourself?" Sae questions you. Despite him intentionally trying to not sound mean, he genuinely wants to know why— his question coming from a place of pure confusion rather than a harsh reply. You might just sigh to yourself, feeling upset and grab the orange to peel it yourself till he raises his hand— keeping you from taking the orange away. And with a big sigh, he decides to sit down and peel it. But the situation is confusing for him; why couldn't you peel it yourself? He questions himself. In the end, he peels it but instead of it coming from a place of care, his decision to peel it comes from a place of "obligation". He felt the need to peel it, since he sees it as something he "needs" to do rather than "want" to do.

(It would be a surprise that he would peel his orange for you. If he never was your boyfriend, he wouldn't see the need to do it, nor the care)

Karasu Tabito - he would

For Karasu, doing something as peeling an orange might be a natural thing for him, he sees it both as something he needs and also wants to do. How he would do stuff for his partner is a sign of genuine care and affection, rather than pure obligation.

The room was quite dark. The curtains closed— the only source of light is emitted from the tv. Both you and Karasu are having a movie night, and the atmosphere was peaceful and quiet. You didn't want bother him with this, but you wanted to try it out on him; though you have a rough idea of how he might respond.

You asked for an orange, and he looks at you with his eyebrows raised, and no question— he stands up and goes to the kitchen to grab one for you. You looked at him with a smile, perhaps already knowing this is how he'd respond. And he sits back on the couch, handing it to you. He notices your silence, and has an idea on what would come next. And thus, he pulled back his outstretched hand, already peeling the orange before you could open your mouth and ask which surprised you. After he peeled it, he gave it to you as if it was the most normal thing to do, and at that moment you are reminded of why you chose to be with him— eating the orange with a small smile.

(I feel like if you really mattered to him so much, he would literally read your mind. He is smart after all, he can read body languages)

Bachira Meguru - he would be more than happy to

For Bachira, this act of peeling an orange for someone is a natural act of love. He would see it as a natural thing to do and he'd do it, no complaints. If he hands you the orange, he might even ask you if you want him to peel it, wanting to please you with acts of services.

You could be spending some time together in the living room, watching a movie. Bachira would feel more excited about spending time with you rather than the Movie. Might even let you pick the movie, and if you want him to watch something in particular, he would watch and comment on each scenes, would gladly let you talk too and explain to him about stuff regarding the movie. He would switch from looking at the movie, then to you, then the movie then to you, having fun with the feeling of watching something with another person, which is quite different to what he is usually used to.

Now if you asked him for an orange, he would no doubt say "okay!" And immediately do your request. He wouldn't see it as something to complain about, but rather it is something that he wants to do for you since to him, you are special. It wouldn't take long for the orange to arrive, and he gives it to you, and to your surprise, he would even ask to peel it for you.

It makes you smile how you don't need to voice out your needs since he already does the things you want him to do without needing you to voice it out.

( I see Bachira as one of those types that will feel the need to make themselves feel needed by their partner in some way, especially if he views his partner as someone he doesn't deserve, or a person that cures him of his loneliness)

__________________________________

Hope everyone enjoys this scenario! Had fun making it, but had a hard time a little bit from portraying their characters while still staying true to their personalities.

[tetzoro]

☽◯☾ - SMOKIN' ACES

꒰ synopsis ꒱ : The ASL brothers know how to throw a good party and tonight was no different.

꒰ content ꒱ : MDNI. portgas d. ace x f!reader ; dubcon as they are high, descriptive weed use, shotgunning, surprise voyeur alert (someone might be listening...), unprotected sex, dry humping, use of pet names (baby, good girl), impact play if you squint — WC : 3.4k

⭑ 𓂃 ꒰ Full Moon ! ꒱ — Kinktober Masterlist

The basement was a cozy little spot that only the members of the house and certain special guests could be privy to. During the notorious parties, it was a safe haven, a place of refuge- Somewhere to get some air, get away from the noise, and regroup with the people who meant most to you.

It was full of little touches from over the years. A series of disjointed chairs and faded couches all in a circle with a busted coffee table in the center that either had a bong or hookah on it, ready for community use. 

Always playing chill music, full of wondrous paintings and vibrant murals that various friends have done — it was the clubhouse of all clubhouses and all run by the ASL boys themselves; Ace, Sabo, and Luffy.

The first member, the self-proclaimed founding member, is currently sitting next to you with a triumphant smile on his face, grinding up some weed. After the exhausting day at the beach, everyone has decided to go out to the bar instead of staying in for the night.

A part of you had wanted to go with them and maybe do a couple of shots and make out with someone for a little while. A night where your head was as fizzy as a champagne bottle and maybe you could get your mind off of a certain someone.

But then Ace had given you the look.

That look with those big brown puppy eyes of his that never failed to have you cater to his every whim — annoyingly so. 

So you find yourself here, in the still smoke-filled air basement that was full of character from a group of the rowdy young adults you’ve come to know so well next to the man you’ve been pining over since the day you met him.

“I can't believe you dressed up like the dude from Magic Mike.” You flick his cowboy hat up, knocking it back and giving it a slightly disheveled look.

“Not just any dude, I'm dressed as Dallas.” Ace shakes his head, focused on rolling another joint in his favorite strawberry-printed rolling paper for the two of you to share. The one you had earlier burned out with the group and Ace had promised you another if you agreed to stay behind with him

“You just wanted an excuse to be shirtless.” Not that you were really complaining.

“First of all, I'm not shirtless.” Ace patted the unbuttoned vest that loosely hung over his taut frame. “Second of all, I did it for the hat that you so rudely hurt.”

“My apologies then.” The sarcasm drips from your tone and Ace casts you a sidelong glance, sticking his tongue out at you before using it to lick the joint.

“At least I was creative.” He says, his dark eyes trailing along your body. Even though he’s clearly appraising the outfit and not you, a chill runs down your spine. “Weren’t you a cat last year too?”

“Shut up, you know that Luffy ruined the angel wings I was going to wear.” Ace hands you the joint in surrender, motioning for you to go first as he fishes the lighter out from between the couch cushions. 

You put it in your mouth, lips wrapping around the filter as the sparks fly. It illuminates the small space in front of you and casts a soft glow over Ace's freckled face. 

Suddenly, he felt a little too close. You take in the way he carefully lights it for you, his tongue peeking out as he focuses on the task at hand. As soon as the flame catches the paper, his eyes flicker up to yours.

You inhale, begrudgingly taking in some of the smoke of the wrap before it cherries at the end, an influx of weed hitting your lungs harsher than you intended.

“Easy now.” Ace tries to stifle his laugh as you cough a little, your head still reeling from the close proximity. He takes the joint from your fingers, gently brushing his against yours before taking a hit himself.

Ever the show-off, the smoke barely leaves his lips before he begins to inhale it through his nose. He smirks at you as he does it, effortlessly inhaling the thick flume of smoke.

“You’re so lame for gatekeeping that trick by the way.” You huff at the man across from you, taking the joint back from him to continue your sesh. 

“I gotta have something to impress you, right?” Ace leans back on the couch a little more, eyes growing hazy and red as he watches you. His tattooed arm dangles off the back of the couch while you try not to take what he says to heart. But he looks back at you, head tilting a little so he peeks at you from under his hat. “But I suppose I can teach you something else.”

“Yeah? And what’s that?” Taking another hit, you let the smoke rush through your lungs and let it saturate every bit while it screams in protest the longer you hold onto it. Ace shifts ahead, leaning in so he’s closer to you and spreading his legs so his thigh brushes against yours. 

“You really wanna know?” His warm breath caresses your ear as he speaks, his nose barely nudging the lobe. The sudden seductive shift in his voice throws you off your axis and plummets you into his gravitational pull.

“Yes.” The approval slips out of your mouth with the rest of the smoke. 

Ace moves his face so it's in front of yours, his eyes scanning your features as he takes a hit. You’re not even sure when he grabbed the joint but you don’t question it. not when his fingers cup your jaw so sweetly.

“What’re you—“ The question dies out as he shakes his head. Everything feels tingly but the way he’s cusping your face makes it ten times worse, setting your skin on fire as your face heats up.

Carefully, he tilts your head toward him before he leans in. Your breath hitches as his lips brush against yours, his fingers pulling on your jaw so your mouth opens a little more.

With a direct softness you’ve never gotten from him, he blows the smoke out from his mouth and into yours. The weed coats your taste buds before his tongue slips into your mouth to steal it all away. His eagerness rivals the hit in a silent contest of who can take your breath away more.

Ace's hand doesn’t move from your face and he uses it to his advantage to kiss you further. If you thought your mind was fuzzy before, it was absolute static now as your twirls swirl together.

He grins against your lips, humming approvingly as you begin to kiss him back. But it was over far too soon and it takes everything in you not to chase his fleeting lips.

“So?” He smirks and pulls away from you, taking another hit as you try to catch your breath.

“What the hell was that?” Your thigh was still pressing against his but you couldn’t find it in you to move. Part of you longed to push further, to lean into him and melt into his searing touch. But your mind was still trying to play catch up from what just happened.

“Shotgunning.” He blows the smoke out straight into the air and your heart pangs with a strange jealousy. “Did you like it?”

“Yes.” You bite your lip. Maybe a little too much. You pause, tasting the words on your tongue before you utter them. “I wanna try it again.”

Ace sucks in his breath, the smoke plummeting to his lungs as he takes in your wish. Coughing slightly, he sits up straighter on the couch and tries to gather himself.

“Yeah?” The gravely rasp in his voice swirls with the underlying desire and draws you in further. 

There’s no going back now.

“Yeah,” You nod slowly. Neither of you bat an eye as you slide into his lap, accidentally rolling your hips against his lap as you do. Ace lets out a choked groan of your name, shifting underneath you. “Ready?”

Galaxies bloom in his eyes as they light up, eagerly tilting his head up in anticipation. The joint sits on your lips before you take the hit, watching him under you as he looks up at you from beneath his dark lashes. Desire pools in your abdomen and before you can think about what you want, your lips meet once again.

It’s a blur between tongues as the smoke fizzles out. You’re not even sure if you did it right, but then again, it wasn’t really your main objective.

The joint disappears from your fingers and you can feel Ace shift to ash it out on the side table. Unburdened, his arms wrap around you and his hands splay across your back, pulling you closer to him and deepening the kiss.

Your lungs beg for reprieve but the taste of Ace’s sweet tongue is too addicting to let up. But he shows mercy and pulls away, suffering from the same affliction. 

Everything felt fuzzy around the edges, your brain fully saturated in something syrupy sweet that had your hips involuntarily moving again as soon as your foreheads pressed together.

The faint aroma of sea salt still wove itself in the tangled curls of Ace’s hair, filling your senses despite all the smoke that currently clung to the thick air. 

“Ace.” You gasp softly, the faint outline of his hardening cock coming to life right between your thighs. 

“Yeah? You feel that?” To further his point, he pushes his hips up against your overheating core. “Feel what you do to me?”

“Yes.” With every slow grind of your hips, you can feel him growing harder beneath you. The friction was rolling over your body like a wave hitting the shore, but it was fleeting. “I want more.”

“Can you handle more?” The smirk that dangles off his face has you wanting to roll your eyes but you relent. The craving for him was too much, threatening to boil over and fully consume you.

“I can.” You nod, lips hovering over his. “I want to try.”

Ace closes the distance, unable to curb his own carnal urges that run rampant in his body. The way your lips mesh together, tasting like weed and strawberry-flavored chapstick becomes something he knows he’ll get addicted to. 

Your fingers dance along his chest, teasing under the vest before landing on the buckle of his belt. All the while he reaches up your skirt, tugging on your panties and dragging them down your legs.

The rest is a blur of motion, but the messy way his lips move with yours is vivid. It’s almost jarring how much you can taste him, how much his grunts of approval seep into your skin and run through your veins

You pull back at an absolute loss for breath, panting against his mouth as his tongue pokes out to trace your parted lips. The bottom half of your clothes are gone and his are haphazardly halfway down his thigh. 

Ace's hand grips the base of his cock as you hover over it, pumping it and squeezing his tip as it leaks with pearly drops of precum. 

“You're gonna be a good girl and take it all for me?” His knuckles brush along your soaked slit, running along it back and forth, absolutely mesmerized as he waits for your answer.

“Yes, I'll be good.” The words are nothing more than a breath of air, your lungs squeezing in protest. 

“Fuck, you’re so wet for me.” His tip prods your entrance, both of you throbbing as the last thread of self-control burns like a stick of dynamite. The slow, sparkling crawl of anticipation before everything explodes, lighting each other aflame in a whirlwind of desire. “You turn into such a little slut when you’re high, don’t you?”

“Ace.” You whine, watching the slow spread of his signature boyish grin take up his face. Warm palms rest on your hips, fingers gripping into your skin as he soaks up the absolute need in your voice. 

“What?” He chuckles lowly, his voice still raspy from the smoke. “All I'm saying is that — ohh shit…“

The rest of his sentence melts into a groan as you slowly lower yourself onto his cock.

“That’s it.” He groaned, his palms sliding to rest on your thighs to help guide you. It takes everything in him not to push you all the way down, letting you take your time as you adjust during your descent.

Everything stands still as he finally bottoms out, filling you up and stretching you out in ways no one has ever done before. The pressure is insurmountable yet it brings you a wave of pleasure that has your body singing for more.

“Holy fuck, you feel like heaven.” Ace practically moans at the way your silky walls clamp around him. His fingers move once again to grip your hips in a bruising hold, stilling himself from spilling into you immediately.

“Of course, you talk a lot during sex.” You let out a scoffed chuckle, clutching onto his shoulders as you spread your legs a little more and letting him sink in even deeper. 

“Aw, complaining already?” He gives you a lazy grin, slowly grinding his hips up against you. The steady throb of his cock melts your brain more than the weed did, the residual high becoming overshadowed by the man under you. “Or let me guess, you just can’t take a compliment?”

“Shut up.” You huff, rocking your hips before raising yourself back up. His cock partially slides out of you and glistens with your essence, coating it completely. Ace's eyes zero in on it, drinking in the sight before you ease back down.

“Fuck.” Ace's head hangs off the back of the couch as he gazes at you through half-lidded eyes. The hat he was wearing falls behind him, completely forgotten. His palms glide along your sides, sliding them up and down before cupping your ass and trying to speed up your movements. “Please, you gotta move faster.”

“Do I?” The gravity of the situation sets in, albeit a little delayed — blame it on the weed. But he was completely at your mercy. The pleading look in his eyes speaks volumes despite the cocky words he so rapidly fires off. You lean down, lips brushing against his ear. “Let me guess, can’t handle it?”

Ace's attention snaps back to you, almost fully alert now. The fog from earlier clears from his head as the words he uttered earlier echo from your pretty little mouth. A new challenge fires off inside of him and he was never one to back down from a fight, no matter the position. With a wicked grin, he thrusts his hips heavenward.

“Oh, I can handle it alright.” He murmurs, rubbing the plushness of your ass before giving it a subtle smack. Your body jolts and your chests crash together, almost every part of you is touching him.

The ever-steady rhythm of your heart spins on its axis, thrown off by the rapid beating that sets in syncopation and you can’t find it in you to care. Not when everything you’ve ever wanted is finally clicking into place.

Your bodies move in a euphoric sync, the ebb and flow of the melody you two orchestrate fills the room in a symphony of bliss. You were drowning into Ace’s very essence and in return, he did the same.

“Shit, baby.” Ace groans at the almost lazy pace. Each delicious drag of his cock had your eyes rolling back to your head. Anytime he twitched inside of you was like another jolt of pleasure — knowing that he was getting just as much enjoyment out of this as you was driving you faster to your end. “I've wanted this for so long.”

“What?” You’re completely breathless now. The confession takes away the last shred of oxygen and rips it out of your lungs. The languid roll of your hips doesn't stop though; your mind, heart, and body all chasing what you want in different ways. “Really?”

“God, yeah.” Ace's fingers slid under your shirt as he grabbed your bra-covered chest. “We need to take this off.”

Impressively, his pace doesn’t falter as he rocks up into you while his hand glides to your back and unhooks your bra. It only takes a few seconds for your chest to become completely bare and his head to find its home in the valley of your breasts.

His tongue trails everywhere. Your body burns under it, relief only pooling in the spot between your thighs and wherever he decides to lick away the flames. It cools you off, the words he said earlier filtering back into your mind as the smoke clears.

“I've wanted this too.” You gasp, bouncing a little quicker to prove how much you’ve needed this — him. Ace groans, teeth grazing the swell of your breast before sucking your nipple into his mouth to muffle the noise. “You feel so good, Ace.”

The candy-sweet praise has his head popping back up from where his tongue was swirling around your pert bud and looks at you, eyes trailing over your blissed-out face and the hearts that swirled in your eyes. 

“Come here.” Ace roughly grabs you by your ass, leaning further back into the couch as you tumble on him. He couldn’t hold back anymore, fucking up into you without abandon.

“A-Ace!” You gasp, trying to squirm away a little but the hold he had you in was too tight.

“Take it for me, baby. You said you would.” He moans. Both of your impending highs are heightened by the weed you inhaled only minutes ago. Pleasure rips through your body, sending it into tremors as your thighs shake. “Let go f’me.”

Your high washes over you immediately, body locking up as Ace continues to pound into you and chase his own release.

And it’s beautiful when he reaches it.

He comes with a choked moan of your name, his body tensing up and his fingers digging into your skin. His cock pulses before he completely empties himself into your greedy cunt with sporadic, shallow thrusts.

Both of you slump against each other, melting into the couch as your mind floats down from the clouds and into his warm embrace.

You pull back a little to admire his freckled face and can’t help but unleash the giggle that bubbles from your chest. It was contagious, as joy often is when you’re around him, and he can’t help but mirror you.

The two of you giggling in each other's arms under the shoddy string lights in the basement that has grown to mean so much to you — even more so now. 

The distinct squeak of the floorboard by the basement door sounds off, snapping you both back into reality.

“I thought we were the only ones here.” You sit up, hastily reaching for your clothes and throwing them on. Ace lifts his hips and slides his back on before kissing you on the top of your head and getting up. “Ace–“

“Stay here.” He turns around the corner and out of sight as he starts to go up the stairs. After a few steps in, the door opens and you straighten up. “Oh, it’s you. You little fucking perv.”

The sound of Ace’s boisterous laughter sounds off as two pairs of legs start coming back down. Every nerve is set on fire, anxiety ripping into your chest at the thought of seeing the person who had been listening in on you and Ace fucking.

But the familiar sight of blonde hair snuffs all the worries away, the dastardly pair smiling at you with devious intent.

“I had to pick up so I couldn’t make it to the bar tonight,” Sabo said with a grin, holding up the bag of weed he must’ve scored. “Must be my lucky day.” 

“Must be.” Ace scoffs, making his way back to you. He plops back down into his spot next to you, immediately mouthing at your neck before his voice curls around your ear. You don ’t break eye contact with Sabo as he stalks closer, placing the bag on the table before taking off his gloves. “What do you say, baby? Wanna let him smoke us up and show him exactly what happened down here?”

tags: @bontensh0e @autumnstuffs

[lightseoul]

cw. worker!reader, prohero!katsuki, aged-up (25), cussing (bkg-typical), not many warnings needed for this one chat

words. 1.3k (i had to split it so that the chapter wouldn't be a whole ass novel. also for pacing purposes :0)

masterlist | part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4, part 5, part 6, part 8, part 9

Your eyes lazily trail the movement of the colleague you speak to at most twice a year as they give a presentation up front, the words they’re uttering slowly turning into a slew of blah blah blah, proper name, place name, backstory like in that TikTok you saw before falling into a fitted sleep the night prior.

Without you noticing, November has finally rolled around, and with it came one of the most important meetings involving Bakugou, Kirishima, and the agency’s department heads aimed at preparing the leaders for the year-end processes and reports.

The very meeting that you find yourself barely getting through at this exact moment.

Tanaka, the said colleague, seems like he’s explaining a pie graph about Dynamight, Red Riot, and their sidekicks’ stats, you think.

You shake your head in an attempt to bring your attention back to what’s in front of you, but your efforts appear to have been in vain as your mind, once again, drifts to the past, and you find yourself mulling over what Mina said two weeks ago.

It’s something that hasn’t left your mind since then, trailing behind you like a damned poltergeist who doesn’t know when to let up.

And as much as you’d hate to admit it, it’s caused considerable confusion on your part, and you don’t like how it may have inadvertently affected how you act around Bakugou, too.

You’re more fidgety, now, and you’ve since beaten your record of how fast you get flustered and stuttery around the man. Although if he’s noticed this humiliating, inexplicable change in your behavior, he isn’t showing it.

At least, not by much.

His gazes have been lingering for a beat too long whenever you stammered your response instead of doing so calmly like you usually do…

“Hey.”

You sit up in sudden attention, dizziness instantly hitting you from having been violently pulled from your reverie. You look at Bakugou, who’s staring you down from the end of the table, and scan the area around him, only to realize that everybody has apparently left, leaving the two of you alone in the conference room.

“Wha—”

“You weren’t listening, were you?”

You feel yourself flush in embarrassment. Guilty.

He shakes his head in what you think is disapproval, stacking the documents in front of him in a neat pile. You take that as a cue to follow suit, gathering your folders in front of you and hurriedly standing up to beeline out of the room.

The last thing you need is for these glass doors to magically lock you in, too.

But you don’t even get to reach the doorway, ass barely lifted a breadth away from your cushy office chair when he speaks up.

“I overheard you in the breakroom.”

You freeze in your tracks, lifting your eyes to meet his. “What?”

“Earlier this morning. You said—” he pauses, eyes shifting to your rear, “Sit back down, dumbass. Your knees are gonna kill you if you keep this up.”

You’re about to retort with a comeback when it dawns on you that the guy has a point, so you begrudgingly take a seat.

“As I said,” he shoots you a pointed look, “I overheard you saying you didn’t have plans for next week.”

“Next week?”

“Thanksgiving.”

“Oh, yeah,” you absentmindedly scratch your right cheek. “My family will be on vacation and all my close friends have plans with their relatives.”

One of his eyebrows raises in question, “And you won’t be tagging along?”

You shrug, “I don’t want to impose on my friends, and being with my family on a holiday isn’t exactly the most relaxing experience.”

Bakugou merely hums in response, seeming as if he’s pondering something in his head. Unable to sustain his gaze, you opt for looking around the room instead, suddenly finding the plain, gray ceiling wildly interesting.

A few moments pass before you decide that yes, this silence is going to kill you if you don’t get the fuck out now.

You lift yourself from your chair, “Well, I should get go—”

“Come over.”

As if you’re in a slapstick comedy, you, once again, freeze. “W-what?”

He clears his throat, “C-come over, to my parents’. For thanksgiving.”

You stare at each other for what feels like an eternity before his eyes gravitate toward your rear again, only this time you plop back down before he can order you to reseat yourself.

“I’m afraid I don’t follow…”

He sighs like he’s teaching you basic ass mathematics and you’re not getting it. “The old hag has been begging me to let them meet you ever since, you know…”

The news of you two “dating” broke out. Right.

You mentally slap yourself for forgetting Bakugou had parents who would eventually also catch wind of your silly little dating scandal.

At the thought of meeting the people who raised Bakugou, your throat suddenly feels a bit too dry. “I’m not sure that’s a good idea,” you manage to get out.

It’s one thing to go and pretend to be Bakugou’s girlfriend in front of the man’s fucking parents, it’s another to do so in this state that you’ve been in ever since that get-together with his friend group. You don’t exactly know why, but you’ve been fundamentally reconfigured since that fated night, and whatever the fuck is causing it, you’re sure won’t mix well with being in the same room as Bakugou’s parents. That, on top of having to act all lovey-dovey with their son around them.

You’re about to defend your case as to why they should just scrap the idea entirely when Bakugou responds.

“It’s either that or she visits us here in the agency.”

Your jaw drops, “Is that a threat?”

He draws his lips in a thin line, shaking his head. “It’s an ultimatum.”

“That’s more or less the same thing,” you counter.

“My mom likes to play with the shitty technicalities,” he retaliates, tone abrasive as ever.

You can only gawk at the guy as he shifts in his seat rather quite uncomfortably.

Is he seriously going along with his mom’s wishes now?

What happened to the ever-notorious Bakugou who just goes for what he wants without minding everyone else?

You study the man for a beat, weighing your options in your head. It’s obvious, which of the two is the wiser option. It’s a matter of going for where there are fewer pairs of eyes watching you and Bakugou’s every movement. But the real question is, why do you have to choose in the first place?

“I don’t understand,” you start, “Why can’t you just tell your mom that we’re not ready to do the whole ‘meet the parents’ thing yet?”

“Why don’t you be on the receiving end of her fucking nagging, hah?” he snaps, voice defensive and loud enough to make you jump.

“Okay, okay,” you immediately concede, tone placating, not willing for this to escalate into a fight. The last thing you need is for somebody in the building to overhear you, think you’re having a lovers’ quarrel or whatever the fuck they call it, and run to the media to gush all about it.

You’ve had enough media exposure to last you for a lifetime, thank you very much.

Chancing one last glance at your boss, you find him staring a hole into the pile of papers directly in front of him, a prominent scowl etched on his face.

His mom’s nagging must be weighing him down more than you thought.

As you study the visibly bothered man, you’re acutely aware of all the fight evaporating from your body, and you eventually find yourself slouching in your seat in what you reluctantly identify as defeat.

“…What’s your parents’ address?”

“Don’t bother,” he almost instantly replies. “I’ll pick you up.”

tagging. @kitthepurplepotato @katsukis1wife @brunnetteiwik @bunnysaursushii @beab19 @yawnzzzzzzzz @cholios @kashee-h @iluv-ace @lovra974 @chelbyisbord @k0z3me @meeeepsworld @asura-rose @dragonscribble @moonz33 @citrustsuki @deadhands69 @lemuhr @rosemarygalaxy @iluv-ace @eyesforbkg @carpe000diem @shushbruv @matchat3a @ttalgi @bakunianadecorazon @the2ndl @keiscwsz @onlyisaa @aizawa19

˖⁺‧₊ as always, reblogs, replies, and tags are appreciated <3 they make such a huge difference! have a lovely day ( ˘ ³˘)

[fangisms]

Hi would u be able to do a Theo not x fem reader where they are enemies and the reader is a cat animagus and he finds us somewhere in our cat form and takes us with him and is like cuddling the cat and everyone knows it’s us and finds it funny

cat and mouse

A/N: thinking about this DEEPLY giggling and kicking my feet WITH DETERMINATION. (gif creds: @thickdickgrayson)

Pairings: Theodore Nott x Fem!Animagus!Reader

Summary: Theo finds a stray cat in the library. Turns out that stray cat is his sworn enemy.

Warnings: fluff, enemies to lovers, cat animagus, cursing, banter, pet names (kitten, micina, kittycat)

Meow?

Theo whips his head around at the noise. And there he sees a cat sat poised and proper at the center of the potions aisle of the library. Why is there a cat sat at the center of the potions aisle of the library. The cat tilts its head.

“Shh... We’re in a library,” he huffs, flipping through the first few pages of a book with a deep blue cover. He turns on his heel and heads for the small desk pushed up against the wall. The cat slinks after him, leaping from the floor to the chair to the desk.

“Pest,” Theo says. “You know, if you’re choosing to sit there, you’ll have to share with my books.”

The cat sits.

“Have it your way.”

Theo tries not to pay any more mind to the stray as he studies the reactivity of unicorn blood. Luckily, the cat doesn’t move much so it’s not very hard for him to stay focused. It only sinks into itself as it settles, lying on the table. He rolls his eyes and gives in to the cat’s wicked tactics, drawing the tips of his fingers between the little thing’s ears. It begins to purr.

“You’re not so bad. In fact, I’ve had much worse study partners. I’d take you over Matty any day.”

Deciding the cat has foiled his every attempt at retaining information, Theo packs up, reshelves the book, and heads for the library doors.

Meow.

“No, little pest, I can’t take you with me. I’ve already got enough vermin to take care of.”

But her big, dumb eyes twinkle up at him and suddenly he can’t refuse.

“Oh, whatever,” as he holds the door open for her to happily trot through.

She follows him coyly into the great hall, hopping up into the space he usually occupies at mealtime. He stares incredulously at the cat who responds with a jeer: meow. So that’s how it’s going to be. Give an inch and these damn things take a mile.

Pansy leans into Mattheo’s side, whispering, “Isn’t that—?”

“Yes, dear Pansy. Yes, it is,” he chuckles while bringing his cup to his lips. Theo grumbles, trying his best to shoo his new pet out of his spot before finally, begrudgingly, opting to share. What he doesn’t expect is when she curls into his lap after he sits beside her.

He sighs then, scratching its back and fixing himself a plate. He’s a little puzzled as to why the seat directly across from him is vacant, though. That’s usually where you taunt him from every meal. But lately, you’ve been absent.

“Have either of you seen—”

“Nope!” Pansy chuffs through a grin, “not since the last time you asked. Anyway, aren’t you two sworn to be mortal enemies or something?”

Mattheo clears his throat, eyes flicking from the cat in Theo’s lap to its adoring new owner. “Pansy’s right, Theo. You mention her an awful lot for someone who claims to hate her with the fire of a million suns,” he teases, suddenly turning his attention and cocking a brow, “Ohhh, I get it; you love her.”

“No,” Theo huffs petulantly, “She’s my potions partner, and I seem to be doing all the work on our group project.”

“Oh,” Matty rolls his eyes, “your potions partner. Right.”

“Shut up.”

Theo spends the rest of the night up in the dormitories. His cat friend had refused to climb the stairs, and Theo found the kindness in his heart to carry her up the stairs. He has to admit he melted a little when she started purring against his chest halfway to the door.

She finds herself a comfortable spot on his bed, settling contentedly in a ball beside his books and papers.

“Some study partner you are,” he says. He can’t help but amuse her, occasionally taking study breaks to scratch her chin and wonder how long she’d stick around for.

Except, in the morning, he’s a little confused to find a human girl in his bed. In fact, she’s the one human girl he’s known to dislike more than any other. What kind of cruel trick is this. Had Matty really put all that effort into sneaking his enemy into his bed. Matty doesn’t even show up for class half the time.

You stir and stretch your arms above your head, eyes flicking open to an unfamiliar setting. This surely isn’t the girl’s dormitory. So where are you.

“You?” a voice accuses from just above you. Theo sits up, and you startle, teetering off the edge of the bed with a thud.

“Fuck,” you huff, scrambling to your feet and straightening your robes with a frightened look on your face. “Right. I’ll see you… around!”

You’re out the door before he can call after you. Would he even call after you? You’re not sure, but you’re also not going to stick around and find out.

Theo’s heart races in his chest. He’s about to call after you, but he’s too flustered to get the words out so he hurls himself backward on the bed with a sigh.

…

A week trudges by without a sign of you. Honestly, he’s more worried you haven’t been attending meals. And he no longer sees you on weekend group outings. He almost misses your targetted quips. And your laugh. Even if it was at him.

He knows you’re alive, though. A packet had slipped underneath the door as he was getting ready for bed one night. The worksheet had both your names on it; it detailed the instructions to the potions assignment. In your handwriting. But it was worthless without you here to help him in person. He thinks himself crazy, catching glimpses of cat tails around corners or paws pouncing between tree branches.

But he thinks, he can’t be crazy staring at the cat perched still beneath one of the benches in the quad. So he sits and bends down to nudge your cat cheek with the pad of his finger.

“Here, kitty kitty,” he hums. Your eyes blink open, staring at him blankly before pacing out from under the bench and hopping up next to him with a determined stretch. He doesn’t believe his eyes when the docile cat he’s been hunting for the last week transforms into you.

You shrug, not daring to look in his eyes for fear of admitting defeat. “You found me.”

“I’ve missed you, micina,” he teases. Though, maybe there’s a grain of truth in his taunt. But you only roll your eyes.

“Don’t be weird, Nott.”

He scoffs. “Okay, you don’t like me, but you laid on my lap, cuddle with me, spent hours just hanging around me… It’s very confusing.”

“Yeah. So?” You cross your arms over your chest.

“Yeah. So… why?”

You sigh, “just because I think you’re obnoxious doesn’t mean… I don’t like you—”

“Oh, no?”

“Shh, I’m trying to explain!” But it’s hard when you’re both on the verge of laughing at your shared hypocrisy. “We’re… I mean I didn’t think you liked me either! What’s your excuse?”

“You’re changing the subject, kittycat.”

You groan, now turning to face him with all the determination of a militia.

“We’re meant to be rivals, you know. We’re the same blood status, the same house, we have the same damned friend group, and no matter how hard I try, you still manage to get slightly higher marks than me!”

“I know,” he teases.

“So… I wanted to see what you were doing differently.”

“So you slept in my bed?”

“I had a change of plans!” you squeak, shrugging when he chuckles under his breath.

“Which was?”

“Well…” You shake your head, realzing it sounds a little silly under his scrutiny like this. “Maybe if I distracted you, you’d do poorly on your OWLs.”

He snickers.

“But we got the same score so…” you groan, “we cuddled for nothing.” He sets his hand gently on your knee, and for once, you can’t tell if he’s messing with you or not.

“Nothing? Really?”

He leans in closer, and now you’re sure he’s trying to distract you. You press your hand to his chest and he watches your eyes widen with amusement.

“No! No, it’s your turn. I’d like you to hear your reason since you’ve already proven yourself to be better than me and any reason you give is going to be a load of bull—”

“You talk too much.” He says it with a smug expression, looking down on you while leaning back into his palms.

“That’s not”—you squint at him, just knowing he’s taking the piss—“I barely talk to you at all. In fact, I only do so when I’m forced!”

“No, you misunderstand me,” he hums, expression softening as his voice lowers, suddenly becoming a much more private conversation, “You talk too much to everyone but me.”

Your jaw goes slack, and he smiles a little, knowing the way both of your hearts race when you look in his eyes.

“Oh.”

“Yes, oh,” he teases, nudging your arm and shifting closer, “Come on, micina mia, you didn’t really think I hated you. It’s all talk. I mean, you can be annoyingly pretty at times, and I hate it when you ignore me, but I could never hate you. Not now that I know your little secret… kitten.”

He’s surprised when you laugh, grabbing his arm to steady yourself.

“Theo, I think everyone knows my little secret but you,” you say, grinning at him in pure delight at his disbelief.

“You’re joking!”

“No!”

“Those bastards,” he huffs, thinking of Matty and Pansy whispering and giggling in the great hall. You stand and brush off your robe, and he follows hurriedly, hovering next to you.

“More cuddling?” he teases, and you turn to him with a smile.

“Got a thing for cats, Nott?”

“No, no,”—He matches your grin and leans in to gently peck your cheek—“Just a thing for you.”

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