#THE UH SAGE GREEN

[sinning-23]

Bikinis On Top (OPLA Bikini Headcannons)

Seeing their bbygrl in a bikini opla headcannons

THis gets a lil RISQUE soooo 18+

Hey youguys i know its been a while lol I've been s swamped with work and Enjoy this in honor of hot girl summer approaching lmao I promise I'm getting back into eh groove of writing!

alos pls excuse spelling errors yall know me lmao

Luffy

-It’s hot and his shirts are open 9 times out of 10 so

-He was a bit stunned to see you with one of Nami's bikini tops adorning your chest with a nice pair of jean shorts.

-Boobs boobs boobs boobs boobs

-He's really trying to act normal but you can always tell when those big brown eyes start shifting from your face to your chest. And he always has that goofy grin on his face

-Strongly believe he's the type to impulsively bite them. lmao like literally grab two handfuls and CHOMP.

-He always was more of a boobs guy.

Zoro

-"Where's the rest of your shirt."

-He’s got his eyes skillfully flickering from your chest to your eyes then to you collar bone and again.

-“You don’t like me showing them off?” You question, slipping past him with a smile

-the funny thing is, you’re not talking about your boobs. You’re talking about the bites and hickeys he skillfully placed along them

-crazy how near the end of the day, the only thing the crew can seem to find as a trace of you is the discarded bikini top

Sanji

-He helped you tie it this morning when the sun had first been shining to brightly into your room, heating both of you up.

-personally, Sanji likes it when you wear the full piece, the straps of your bottoms just barely peaking out from the low-rise jeans you've got on.

-He also is one to pull your strings when you're also so the top just falls down to reveal the girls

-Is the type to lift you up out of the pool and set you up to sit on the steps like the goddess you are and just admire.

Usopp

-matching swimsuit set matching swimsuit set matching swimsuit set

-He always likes seeing you in a nice brown or sage green two-piece.

-won't say anything but wow when he sees you and smiles.

-Keep it polite but just know his hugs from behind will always end with him pulling at your bottom straps and letting them snap against your skin.

"USOPP!" You yelp, narrowing your brows at him while you massage the spot.

"Ok ok, i'm sorry mommas" He chuckles, pressing a kiss to the affected area, his large hands massaging the flesh of your thighs.

Nami

-Strictly a bikini gf and wifebeater+swim trunks gf duo lmao

-This can go either way actually. If she feels like a bikini kinda day it's gonna be a bright orange or a pure white with a sunhat and a nice flowy cover-up

-A she can't and won't make it easy for you to keep your hands off her,

-If YOU are in the bikini and she's in the swim trunks she REFUSES to keep her hands off you. She knows her girl looks good asf.

-Expect to have your ass smacked.

Shanks

-Is definitely keeping you on his lap while everyone else is splashing around. It was a pretty chill day and everyone decided hey why not go for a swim

"Can I please get in the water Shanks?" You sigh, pulling the strings of his swim trunks as he smiles and gives a quick "Nuh-uh"

-"Your ass looks too good. Just stay here a little longer hm?" he asks, squeezing your thighs, pressing kisses to your shoulder.

-He doesn't waste time taking you somewhere secluded to pull those bottoms to the side, somehow loving the way your ass looks in those bottoms every time he thrusts

Mihawk

-He personally likes it when you wear one of that cute pinup like 50's monokinis? And some wedges with a bandana. UGH he's gonna be right there with you avoiding the sun under the umbrella (that pale ass skin lmao)

-Will 100% lather you in sunscreen and just paper your shoulder with kisses.

-He's not taking you to eh pool he's taking you to the beach and you're just sitting together, enjoying one another company

-"I'm fucking you within an inch of your life after this." H admits in monotone, skin already starting to darken in a tan

-"Yes splendid." You reply still resting, enjoying the faint heat of the sun.

Buggy

-HAHAAAAAA this man will tear it off and then feel bad and get you another one...just to tear that off too

-is a sucker for the bikinis with anything on the boobs lmao he thinks they look like targets

-I like to think that ocean water is the only thing like that is an issue lmao so it is safe to say he's in the pool every summer, roughhousing with you and the rest of his crew

-I mean just a bunch of fucking kids lmao, macro polo, chicken fight, pretending to be a shark, you name it

-accidentally caused a nip slip tho and yelled for everyone to look away while shielding his girl.

[tpwrtrmnky]

visibility

[ID: A three-panel "Pills that make you green" comic. People represented by crudely drawn stick figures.

Panel 1: A crimson person with a triangular body, a cyan person with a round body and a magenta person with a rectangular body are standing out in the street. A small creature is chasing another creature, orange, which has a tail and cat ears. In the background there is a lime green person wearing a magenta tail and ears, as well as a couple holding hands, one of them wearing a sage green shirt. There is a wanted poster with an image of a moss green person wearing a bandana.

Crimson: "yeah I'm glad we're seeing more chromatically diverse stories get the spotlight" Cyan: "it's cool I mean a lot of people don't even know about any chromatic-variant people other than green" Magenta: "yeah it's about time that green people stopped hogging the spotlight. They're so privileged."

Panel 2: Zoom in on crimson, cyan and magenta's faces Crimson: "Uh, I don't know about saying it's a privilege to be visible like that" Cyan: "I mean have you seen how vicious people are being towards green people, especially lately?" Magenta: "oh right"

Panel 3: Cut to the three standing in front of the wanted poster, showing Moss Green Person wearing a black bandana. It reads: "Wanted. If you have any information regarding the whereabouts of the terrorist known only as "moss green", contact corporate authorities immediately. They are to be considered extremely dangerous." Crimson: "Like I don't think this person's getting much from visibility right now" Cyan: "Yeah after the pride incident they've been everywhere" Crimson: "They're making up so much weird shit about them, like saying they killed someone and turned them into a couch" Cyan: "Oh yeah I heard they fought five guys on top of a jet in flight" Magenta: "What are they hoping to get out of lying to make them sound cool"

End ID.]

Start - Previous - Next

[yeyinde]

STRAW HOUSE, STRAW DOG

Baby Trap + Soap x Fem!Reader : or, Johnny finds a wife in the woods and decides to take her home.

18+ | DEAD DOVE, DO NOT EAT: noncon, kidnapping, breeding/baby trapping. somnophilia. implied stalking. obsessive behaviour. forced reliance/dependency. non-con drug use (implied). vulnerable character (injured reader) being preyed upon by an opportunistic scavenger.

Somehow, getting hurt in the remote wilderness of Nahanni National Park without any immediate rescue is the least of your worries when a rugged man shows up and claims he's going to help. Out here, you've been told your biggest fear should be bears, steep canyons, and a swift death with fangs and claws.

But maybe you should have been more concerned about strange men with crowlike smiles and blistering eyes.

ADDITIONAL TAGS: descriptions of injury. implied head trauma. bearded Soap. smut. this is my love letter to NWT and a what not to do in a national park.

BABY TRAP MASTER LIST | AO3 LINK

It happens in an instant. 

The trek up the fjord narrows suddenly. Chossy growing slick from rainfall the night prior. You pace yourself, stepping carefully on the wobbling slate, testing its resilience before you take another step. Climbing higher. Higher.

There's a storm brewing in the distance. Its burgeoning pace grows rapidly, nipping at your heels as cool winds whistle through the steep valley below.

The park wardens at the visitors centre warned you about it when you set out into the rugged wilderness of Nahanni this morning. Brows pinched, wary, when you'd come to them—all alone—and signed your name on the barren ledger collecting dust on the counter. A fact that drew your attention when you flipped through the empty pages. 

Don't get too many visitors around here, the man murmured, eyes cresting in apprehension at your question. Not the most isolated or remote, no. That's probably higher up. Quttinirpaaq, maybe? Heard from some buddies up there that they had no visitors last year. We do pretty well. About one thousand a year? Usually filmmakers and the like. Adventurous types. Gets kinda lonely up here. Ain't no Banff, that's for sure.

They added that the weather was unpredictable this time of year. All year, really. Nahanni is known for sudden swells and white-outs, for weather that can turn in an instant, going from calm to cataclysmic within seconds. 

(“Storms,” the man huffs, and you think the sigh was meant to be a laugh. One that falls flat when he takes in your hiking boots (too big, but the sales lady at the sporting goods warehouse assured you it was fine, that you would grow into them), and your cheap Lululemon knock-off tights. Your flimsy rucksack. The tinge of green around your ears; the stench of an overeager novice. “And, uh, it’s urban legends.”)

Valley of the Headless Men, he intones, squinting up at you when you ask about them. Adding: be careful out there when you turn to leave.

Dauntless, you still set out into the park, determined to at least make it to your campground before it set in. But the majesty surrounding you on all sides distracted you from your pace. Eyes caught on the Xanadu of an untempered wilderness slowing your trek to a crawl as you took in the steep, rolling batholiths reaching high into the aether, their sides sloping down in a dizzying, vertiginous drop to a lush valley below of scheele’s green below. It all looked so perfectly symmetrical from the high point in the valley where you stood, breathing in the scents that perfumed the air. With the rugged mountains cupped around a winding white line where the river sawed through. 

A lone moose grazed at the bottom of a rolling fell. The sight of her stopping you in your tracks long enough that the plume of darkened clouds—all a terrifying burnt sage—had time to catch up to you, crackling overhead as thunder rumbled through the canyons. 

Your campground is at the top of this ravine. Three nights spent inside a cabin with nothing but yourself and several paperbacks for company. Into the Wild amongst them—a morbid parting gift from a friend on what not to do—and its inspirational predecessor, On the Road. 

You won't read it. You never do. But it sits, a humourous paperweight, in your rucksack as you clamber up the ravine. An anchoring comfort. A piece of home. Something that reminds you you're not completely alone even though you are. 

The book, your friends, and the encroaching loneliness that you feel prickling behind your eyes, all weigh on your mind. Spooling out before you in loose, loop threads. You follow them eagerly, glad for something to abate the unnatural silence, and—

A sound.

It comes from the left, hidden in the thick tangle of furze. A click. It shatters through the eerie quiet of the sprawling boscage. An animal, maybe. Hopefully. 

It must be, you think, heart hammering thunderously in your chest. There's a sinking feeling in the pit of your stomach. You hold your breath. Eyes glued on the thatch of green shrubs lining the base of the dense forest. 

Nothing happens. You blink, shifting on your feet—

A red line pierces through the gap between the leaves, aimed straight at your ankle. It's thin, diaphanous. Slips over the scraggy rock like liquid.

It's so out of place here that it takes you a second to familiarise yourself with its unexpected presence. A laser—

An explosive boom fills the ravine the moment the thought connects. A rifle. Aimed right at you. It happens fast. The world turning over itself, spinning right off its axis. You fall against the ledge in a crumpled, heavy heap, legs so close to dangling off the precipice. 

Gravity is a choking weight on your sternum, pushing you down, down, toward the jagged, rocky shoreline. A fall like that—

You curl into yourself instinctively. 

“Ah, shite—” is all you hear amid the roar in your ears. “Y’alright? ah didnae see ye thare—”

In your tear-stained periphery, a man appears. He stands into the glare of the waning sun, limned in a halo of gold. There's a pinch between his dark, thick brows. A steep ravine.  He's ragged. Wild. Tuffs of black hair hang loose past his ears and nape, curling slightly at the ends. It blends, almost seamlessly, into his thick, scraggly beard. He pushes a hand through the top, grabbing a fistful in his palm.

“Easn't expecting anybody oot 'ere. Nae this far intae th' woods.”

He seems to be speaking to himself more so than he's talking to you. There's anger writ in the fine lines of his face, but this ire isn't turned toward you. It's inward. Self-admonishment. His eyes darken when they flicker down to your ankle, as if reminding you of the hurt there when you'd been so focused on how out of place his accent is in the Northwest Territories.

The ache in your ankle brings you crashing back into reality. The pain seems to vibrate from within your marrow, riveting up your bones. 

You chance a glance—

You swallow down the drum of panic. A trick of the light. It must be. 

A dream. A nightmare. 

But the man appears. His hand falls onto your knee, holding you steady. 

“Ah will hae tae put oan a tourniquet. Will hurt a lot, doe.” 

Absently, you nod. Keep nodding. Can't stop. 

There's a hole cut through your ankle. Tore thro' yer Achilles, he's saying, words water in your ears. He instructs you to wiggle your toes.

"Ah know it hurts, but just dae it fer me, okay?"

You do. You—

Nausea buds in your guts, churning your stomach. The apple you ate earlier is choked out into the bushes dotting along the ravine. Insides purging themselves, replacing everything—food, water, coffee from earlier, bile—until nothing but shaky panic remains. It tastes like iron in the back of your throat. 

“Ah know, doe,” he's saying, fingers knotting into your slick hiking trousers. Lululemon knockoffs from an outdoor warehouse in the city. A pocket knife follows, and cuts a seamless line inches below your hip. 

Sad tae see ‘em go, he murmurs, accent thickening around the words. Saturating them in a drawl that's too liquid for your unpractised ears to catch. He makes a mournful sound when he slides the blade down your leg, adds, “hugged yer arse like a dream, doe.”

Another trick. The mountains do funny things to sound, you know. It must be all in your head. All—

“Don't worry,” he's shushing you now as he peels the fabric off your legs, groaning low in his throat. “Ah have ye. Ah will take care o'ye, tae, doe. Bonny thing, aren't ye? a' alone. Nae anymore, doe. Jus' me 'n' ye now. Jus' us —”

You always thought you'd have your wits about you in a traumatic situation. Be able to think clearly, rationally. Make appropriate decisions that befit the situation unfolding. Life saving ones. Practical. 

To gear up for this trip, you watched survival videos on YouTube. How to make a fire. How to make drinking water. How to build a shelter. Tips on weathering down for a sudden storm. Tucked it all inside your head, and thought, I got this. 

Had to, really, because everything you've read about Nahanni says it's unpredictable. Calm weather, gorgeous views one moment, and then a sudden deluge the next. Snow falling quicker than you keep up with. Animals blend in seamlessly with the landscape. Slips, falls. It's so easy to get lost, someone wrote. 

But as he uses the scrap of your trousers to wrap around the wound on your broken, mangled ankle, you realise all that planning was for nothing. This was one of those moments when you discovered just how much you bit off. That panic made you mute, made you freeze up. 

The pain is almost secondary to the surge of adrenaline. Fear.

You need to go home. You tell him this, slowly. Muttered through numb lips. 

There's something almost like pity in his eyes when he glances up at you. 

There was a mix-up, he says, slowly. Cautiously. You got yourself turned around in the opposite direction. There's no campground on the fjord above. All the lodges and cabins are in the opposite direction. 

Y'got lost, he tells you. Turned the wrong way out. Ye'r in th' backcountry.

“I'll go back,” you press, urgent. Insistent. Panic is acidic in your throat. Corrosive. It burns when you swallow. “Please, just tell me which way to go, and I’ll—”

"Cannae dae tha'."

“Why?”

“Storm,” he points in the distance where a plume of cloud gathers. So dark, they're almost black. Ominous. “Gonnae skelp solid. Na choice but tae git oot."

“I don't have anywhere to go—”

He rakes his hand through his hair. “Ah kin take ye tae mines. Git a cabin in th' woods. Juist ootdoors o' Nahanni Butte.” 

“No, I—”

His hand squeezes tight around your ankle. The pain makes itself known in a visceral, awful throb that travels up your leg, curdling at the base of your spine. Wrong, wrong. Something is wrong. Your body is trying to reject the agony. The breaking of your bone. It's foreign, it doesn't belong. But there's nowhere for it to go. 

Pain pulses in tandem with your heartbeat. 

You don't realise you're screaming until you hear the echoes of it rebound against the limestone walls. And then there's a whisper in your ear. You feel the scratch of his beard against your cheek.

"Shush, bonnie. Cannae let ye go oot oan yer own. Gonnae take ye home, yeah?"

Home. Home. You nod furiously, and it's only when the scraggly black curls covering his chin and jaw catch on damp skin do you realise you're crying. 

He leans away from you, arm stretching toward the rucksack behind him. 

The rifle leans against it. You feel sick all over again. 

“Drink this,” he says, unscrewing the cap. “It'll make ye feel better.” 

He presses the lip to your mouth, a hand slipping over the back of your head, tilting your chin up. “Drink,” he says again, and it's firmer this time. A command. “Ah promise ye'll feel better, doe.” 

It tastes bitter. You swallow it down. Keep swallowing.

“Good,” he rasps, hand sliding down the length of your spine until it rests against your lower back. “Keep drinkin’, sweet thing.”

It pools in your belly, sloshing uncomfortably when you move, but it washes the bitterness from between your teeth. You keep drinking. Swallowing it down. You know you shouldn't, that you might get sick again, but it's a distraction from the mess that is your ankle—bloody, twisted, mangled—

Nausea swells. You choke it down until you can breathe without feeling as though you were going to be sick again. 

“You'll be okay,” he's saying, moving around you with a practised efficiency for something so broad. It's almost graceful. Agile. 

He patches you up as much as he can with the supplies he has, but you refuse to look again at your ankle. It's broken, that much is clear. You can feel your bones grinding, sliding against each other. The sensation is horrific. Wrong. You turn your head to the ledge you were standing on just to distract yourself from the agony of it all. 

You're surprised you're not crying. Screaming. The urge is there, just beneath the surface. But for some odd, unfathomable reason you find you can't. Your chest feels heavy. Lungs sluggish. Slow. 

It must be an adrenaline crash, you think. Why else would you feel so tired, so exhausted. 

“I'm—” you start, but you feel dizzy. “‘m—”

“Shush, doe.” He mutters, and it sounds far away. Garbled. “You need yer rest. Had a traumatic accident. But don't worry. Ye can trust me. A wouldnae let anythin' ill happen tae ye ever again."

“Yeah,” you breathe, nodding. Nodding. You can't stop, can't—

“Lay back. Git some rest. A'm almost done, 'n' then ah will hae ye back home in no time—”

You come to on a groggy whimper, head buried in the messy locks curtained over his nape. There's a soft, pulsing thud in the back of your head when you try to lift it up. It feels heavier than it should. Leadened. You groan again, fighting against the currents dragging you back down to those soporific depths—

Your head is a slurried marsh. Thoughts ephemeral, broken. Fragmented. They slip through your fingers when you reach for them, diaphanous wisps you can't seem to catch. 

“Don't worry, doe—” your world quivers when he speaks. Words vibrating through your chest, catching on the heavy rails of your ribs. The seismic vibrations rumble in your ear, coming to life as a mere echo in your head. “Ah will keep ye safe.”

It's comforting. A raft in squall, something to cling to as the waves make futile attempts to drag you under. Your arms, dangling loosely over his shoulders, sluggishly flatten to his chest, linking over his chest. 

He grunts at your touch, palms slick on your skin. 

“Thank you,” you slur, words thick in your throat. Sluggish. “Thank you for helpin’ me. Fer savin’ me—”

Your body shakes when he trembles. With your forehead against his nape, you hear his thick swallow. The air ghosting out of his lungs in a soundless whisper. 

His hands flex around the backs of your knees. Squeezing tight. The man doesn't say anything for a moment. In the silence, the pursuing somnolence catches up to you. It digs heavy fingers into your eyes, dragging you back down into the sticky, thick tar. 

Sleep finds you in an instant. 

You try to read his words in the quiver of your bones when he speaks. Make sense of the tremble reverberating through the hollow gaps, tangling in the pulpy mess. 

But there's a mistranslation somewhere. A missing decibel. A forgotten wavelength.

It almost sounds like he says—

“Wouldn't leave mah wife alone in th' woods like tha’.”

How funny, you think, and hide a giggle into the hardened ridge of his shoulder blade. 

Cognisance is a transient flicker.

You're not sure how long he matches through the thicket with you on his back, navigating the unending chaparral with an ease that feels innate rather than practised. You stare down at the ground, world hazy around the edges, and think, suddenly, intrusively, that you ought to remember the steps. Every left, every right. 

You get to seven lefts, three rights—a small ravine, a flattened coppice; a gnarled spruce sat alone in a valley of lush green and clumps of topaz podzol—before your eyes are too heavy to keep open. They slip shut. And you think, only for a moment. Just a second, I just need to rest my eyes, and then come to at the sound of a groggy engine growling to life. 

The world morphs from a dense forest intercut with sheer cliffs looming, indomitable, in the grey distance, to the faded beige felt covering the ceiling of an old truck. 

Your blink is a slow crawl, lashes weighed down by anchors dredging over the seafloor. Gritty, raw. It hurts, now, to hold them open. A furious throb jabs at your temple. It aches like a bruise. But it's nothing compared to the nauseating agony that floods your core each time your foot is jostled. Nerves being lit aflame in an endless throe of pain unlike you'd ever experienced before. 

Your mouth feels sealed when you go to speak. Lips glued together. Sluggishly, you squeeze your tongue through the crack between your teeth, licking along the seam. 

A plastic bottle appears in your periphery, nozzle tipped toward your mouth. A hand curls around the body of it. Fingers overlapping. It looks small in this big hand. Tiny. Long wisps of black hair cover their ruddy knuckles, spreading in a dense crop up their forearm, growing thicker at the wrist. 

Their skin is pale, tinged slightly pink. Even through the brume, the lambent light of the sun catches on their skin. Illuminating small scars, cuts. Little scratches from the snagging furze. 

Their hand shakes. The dark veins that branch off from the white-capped peaks of their bent knuckles pulse under the thin skin when they move. 

“Drink, hen,” he murmurs, bringing the bottle to the jut of your lower lip. “Ye’ll need it.” 

A plastic bottle is an odd choice to bring into the backcountry, but as you peer through the translucent skin, you find the water inside is cloudy. Chalky. 

“Donnae worry—” he gives the bottle another shake, disturbing the sediment congealing at the bottom. “It's electrolytes, ken. Nothing fishy.”

Your teeth ache from the cold when he slips the rim between your lips, prying them apart. With your head already tilted back in the seat, the water slips in. A slow trickle. He feeds it to you, humming in appeasement when you swallow. 

“Tha’s a good girl.” 

It carves a jagged tunnel through the murk in your head. The praise slipping in, liquid, until it coats your burgeoning trepidation in a sudden swell of endorphins. With their unpractised, gauche hands, they paint a mockery of Sargent in the gaps of your synapses, stuffing the spaces between with oversaturated hues of teal, white, yellow, orange, and pink. 

Carnation, Lily, Lily, Rose. 

But despite the shoddily crafted pastiche, it works. 

Your eyes flutter, bones growing heavier, heavier, as they're forced to carry the weight of your liquified flesh. This molten heat in your chest turns your insides into putty.  

Water dribbles down your chin. He sees it and coos.

“Ah, doe. Right mess ye are now. Ah will hae ye home in no time. Git ye a' cleaned up."

The idea of home melts you further. You sigh in the seat, soft and drawn out, and shake your head slowly when he wriggles the bottle in front of you again. 

“Get some rest, doe,” his hand falls, heavy and warm, on your thigh. Thumb stroking along the curve of your leg, fingers curling into the seam, digging deep. Resting there. 

It's too high to be appropriate. You know this. Went through lesson upon lesson in school of bad touches and what's considered friendly, polite. But when you try to open your mouth to say something about it, you catch the spread of his palm over your flesh. Wide, broad. Masculine. It catches in your throat, and gets tangled in the mush at the base. 

It should be fine, you think, dizzy over the way his hand swallows you whole. He saved you, after all. 

But it burrows. Digs deep. Some sense of wrongness permeates out from the firm grasp he has on you. It feels possessive. The sort of thing you might expect between people who are intimate with each other. A couple. You've known him for—

Hours, maybe? 

Most of it was spent in a pain-induced hypnagogia. 

It curdles in your stomach. Rotten, spoiled milk. 

But—

He saved you. 

You'll choke yourself on it if you keep thinking about it. So, you don't. You push it down. Cover it beneath the sediment, and bury it deep. 

He's just a man. 

Kind. Helpful. 

As you dig a hole for this unease, he keeps his hand fixed on your thigh. The other is pressed against the steering wheel, the ball of his palm under the curve at the top of the wheel. Relaxed. Easy. You try to adopt his nonchalant disposition and glance out at the blurry world around you. 

You feel exhausted. Unsettled. The sort of fatigue that comes with a raging fever. There's sand in your mouth. Your throat is dry. 

You don't ask for water. 

In the lull, he pitches the truck forward with a grave rumble. The silence is broken by the crunch of vegetation and gravel beneath the wheels as he ploughs forward. 

There are public roads to get to Nahanni. The floatplane you entered into the park on was chartered by Parks Canada. And yet—

He commandeers the truck around a flatbed of rock and dirt. Muskeg dots the tops in some places, and he veers expertly to avoid them. 

It's less of a traditional road and more so a forged desire path. You know the highway has to be close by, the link between Fort Liard and Fort Simpson, but as you peer out the window, the world around you looks overgrown. Wild. Alien. 

Sloping hills in lush green stretch out into the distance, meeting with the dense montane forests dotted along the stretch of land. The grassy coppice under his wheels is matted down, and interspersed with clumps of brown, wet muskeg and crushed slate. 

Over the grey peaks of the mountains in the distance, a thick, black cloud looms. The sky turns gunmetal, almost indistinguishable from the monoliths jutting beneath them. 

At some points, he takes his hand off your thigh to navigate winding turns better, but it always ends up back on you. And always a little higher than it was before. 

Your mouth is filled with lead. Tongue thick, malleable. Tensile like mercury. You can't speak. So you just ignore it. Dig your crown into the headrest, and breathe in the woodsy scent of him. Laurel, tree moss. Coumarin. Rotting pine. Sweet acacia. It tickles the back of your throat. Sticks there, glued in the syrupy mess. 

You'd hoped it would get easier to ignore, but it stays there, a constant weight, even as the world outside fades into a hazy twilight. 

In the hush of the cabin, he squeezes your thigh. “Cannae wait tae get ye home, doe.”

Against the staggering backdrop of a black, jagged mountain, a doe stands in the talus. Her fawn fur and tuffs of white spots stick out against the charcoal-coloured cliffs, and you watch, some distance away, as she bends down to fossick through the scree in search of food. 

With the looming clouds of gunmetal and ash gathering around the craggy peaks, her presence here feels dangerously out of place. Jarring. She shouldn't be here. She doesn't belong. 

But the beauty of this moment is breathtaking. Mesmerising. You stare in muted horror, awe, as she grazes in the rubble, slender neck bent in a graceful arch. The sloping handle of fine china. Her wet, black eyes are so open, so kind. Puddles of ignorance, naïvety, as she flicks her tongue out against the desolate rock, a fruitless search for grass in which to mull on. 

Thunder crackles over the snow-capped ridges. Her ears flicker, but she doesn't run. You should warn her. Scare her away. But you can't move. Can't speak. You're a mute spectator, a piece of dross on the ground watching the approaching calamity without a mouth. Horror churns. You want so badly to tell the doe to run—

An impossibility, you know. It's much too late for her to do anything at all. 

Around the doe’s leg is a shackle. 

Your skin rips, tears, as you force your jaws apart, blood pooling in your mouth. If you can make a sound, she’ll—

A boom echoes through the canyon's cradle. 

The scream gurgles in the back of your throat. 

Agony rips through your leg—

—you wake with a gasp. 

Sputtering, choking on the saliva pooled in your mouth. It tastes bitter, brackish. You feel something gritty between your teeth. It sticks to the backs, granular specks that dissolve, sour and chalky, on your tongue when you run it along the ridges of your gums.

You swallow it down, grimacing at the acidic taste. 

“Awake, aye?” His voice chips through the dense fog. You blink the haze away, glancing sideways at him through bleary, heavy eyes. 

His profile is lit by the harsh glare of high noon. The sharp jut of his ball cap. The curve of his nose set in the thick bushel of his scraggly beard and moustache. His broad chest concealed most of the view from the driver's side window. The lax bridge of his arm, knuckles loosely curled around the steering wheel.

He tilts his head toward you. “How're ye feelin’?”

Sluggish. Awful. There's sand in your eyes. Cotton in your head. You feel like you've been left out in the hot sun all day. Dizzy and sunburnt. Feverish. Heatsick. Your throat is dry, but you don't ask for water. You don't answer him at all. Can't. Your tongue is laden. Lips numb. 

It takes you a moment to reorient yourself, squinting through the glare of the sun—

That reels you back. Breaks through the fog. 

You know that the concept of day and night in the summer is different here. Twenty hours of daylight with twilight lasting all night. But even with the skewed perception of time and the heavy molasses thickening around the edges of your cognisance, you know that something is wrong. 

When you left the park, it was close to five in the evening. It should be twilight, not—

Your gaze lists sluggishly to the clock on the dashboard. Through the haze, the unmistakable gleam of one-fifteen stares back at you. 

It was the right time last night. 

“Wha—?”

You're not sure what you're asking. It's not even really a word, but a garbled sound. A noise of distress, confusion, in the back of your throat. 

He seems to understand it all the same. 

“Park had a bad storm,” he answers, pitch far too light for the severity of your situation, of what you're feeling. It makes you frown, sharp and sudden. “Washed through th’ river. Where ye were—well. Wouldnae ‘ave made it out, ye see. Would’ve gotten all torn up in th’ storm—”

You read that storms in Nahanni are vicious, sudden. Weather can turn in an instant, going from moderate to devastating in a blink. But—

What he's saying doesn't make sense. You remember bits, pieces, from earlier. He said you got turned around. Wandered too far off the trail, lost in the deep wilderness of Nahanni’s sprawling valley. 

“Where are we?”

“Nearly home.”

You push the wave of nausea down. “I need to go to a hospital.”

“Can't dae tha't'.”

“Why not?”

He doesn't answer for a beat, eyes fixed on the dirt path. Unblinking. 

Finally, he mutters: “had tae leave th' park oan th' opposite side when th' storm came in. No roads take us tae town.”

“I have—” you're not sure where your bag is. You hope he had the wherewithal to snatch it up after you fell. Hope. “I have a satellite phone. I can just call—”

“Sorry, hen. Yer bag flew off th' ledge. Ah coudnae grab it 'n' ye. Ah dinnae hae a phone oot 'ere. Never needed one—”

Hopeless. Hopeless. 

“How—how could you survive out here without one?”

“Nahanni Butte is a few hours awa'. Go intae town when th’ winter road is open. Inaccessible now. Th’ rivers flooded it. Cannae cross it. Can hunt, 'n' ah hae everything a'm needin' oot here.”

“So…” the reality of your situation is beginning to dawn on you. Helpless. Hopeless. “I'm stuck here until—winter?”

“Ah hae a friend flying oot fae Yellowknife. Comes tae drop off supplies 'n' th' lik'. He'll be 'ere in two months—”

“Two months?” This whole situation feels impossible. Wrong. You're so close to people—Fort Liard, Nahanni Butte, Fort Simpson. How could you be stuck here for two months? The idea of it is absurd. “You're not—you can't be serious.”

“Aye. I am.” 

There's a pinch between his brow. You wonder if it's meant to convey the severity of the situation, but as it grows deeper, deeper, you have the sudden sense that it's not an emotional decree of his sincerity. That it's, instead, a sudden twist of anger. 

It scares you. 

“I want to go home.” You mean for it to be forceful, but it comes out in a whimper. 

The man nods. The punch in his brow lessens. “Aye, me tae.” 

“Where are you from?” You pry, needing the distraction from the endless trawl of green and slate and permafrost enclosing in on you. “You're not from around here, are you?” At the gentle raise of his brows, you add, hurried, rushed: “you just. Have an accent, and I—”

“Fae Scotland,” he answers, and there's a quick grin on his face. Roguish. Charming. The sight of it has your start thudding in an uneasy gallop. “Edinburgh."

“Oh. Far from home.”

“Aye—” the grin fades, twisting into something ugly. “Had an—accident,” he spits the word out, brows pinching once more. Anger is writ in the hard clench of his muscles, his jaw. His knuckles blanche around the steering wheel, and you think you should have just kept your mouth shut. “Sent me here.”

There's a multitude of questions you want to ask. Vying for the top is the most obvious—why did this happen? why isn't he letting you go?—but what comes out instead is, “why?”

Just that. Nothing else. 

“Military.” 

He adds nothing, either. 

“Military?”

A nod. “Go’ hurt. Had rehab. Sent me here tae clear ma heid, and well—” his eyes flicker to you. You can't read his expression. “Got a fresh mission, dinnae I?”

“You don't—”

“I cannae leave ye. Both oo' us are stuck 'ere 'til someone comes tae pick us up, 'n' take us home.” 

The idea that somehow he's just as trapped as you are hasn't occurred. Why would it when he has a rifle, a truck, freedom—

But what good is all of that when you're landlocked in a place known for winter roads. Permafrost. The forced shift in perspective doesn't quell the anxiety roiling in your guts, but it lessens it. Somewhat. 

“Two months?”

He nods. “Aye.”

“And you have no cellphone? No satellite?”

“Ye can check it—” he makes a flippant motion toward the glove box in front of you. “Deader than ever.”

You hesitate only briefly. Long enough to level him with a searching look that yields no results before you reach for the compartment, gingerly pulling it open, and—

Sometimes, things get overlooked by their surroundings. Swallowed in the vacuum. Blending seamlessly into the muddle, the commotion. 

This isn't like that. 

It sits on top of a manila folder. Sleek black and cold silver. You're not terribly well-versed in guns—the extent of your knowledge stemming mostly from formulaic crime shows aired late at night; CSI, NCIS, Criminal Minds—but you recognise this one instantly. Some sort of handgun. Police issued, you think. It's bigger than you'd expected. Looks heavier, too. 

Your heart stutters. The air galloping out of your lungs in a stammering rush. 

He makes a noise, soft and nonchalant, as if keeping handguns in the glove box of his old, burnt orange truck is perfectly normal. 

“Fer protection,” he mumbles. You catch the jerk of his chin in your periphery. “Forgot I had it in here. Been usin’ th’ rifle fer huntin’ mostly. Or th’ shotgun.”

Three guns. You swallow. “Why—” your voice comes out in a brittle whisper. You clear your throat. “Why, um, why do you need three?”

“Not fae around here, are ye?” He echoes your words with a wry twist of his mouth, eyes slanting in the sunlight. “Tha’,” he takes his hand off your thigh to jab his finger at the handgun. “Is fer wolverines.” His index finger falls, his thumb juts out. He jerks it over his shoulder. “Tha’ is fer huntin’. The shotgun back home is fer bears.” 

You try to move out of the way when his hand falls back to your thigh, but the pain radiating up your leg immobilizes you. There's not much you can do in this situation but endure.

Military. Wounded in action. Three guns. Touchy. 

You're not sure what to think. It would be easier if you couldn't. 

“What do you hunt?” You ask instead, glancing out the window to the barren landscape rolling out around you. There doesn't seem to be much in the jagged hills, and towering mountains. 

“Gettin’ hungry? Donnae worry, doe. Go’ tha’ pesky hare I was tryin’ tae shoot oan th' ledge fer dinner tonight.” 

It's not much of a comfort. The idea of being injured—by accident, he claims—to such an extent over a rabbit makes you feel a little sick. 

“That's it?”

“I can make a mean steak oot o' anythin'. Stews fer tougher meat. Fish—whitefish, arctic grayling, and lake trout. Learned how tae make a nasty fishfry from th’ locals in Nahanni Butte. Bannock, too. Got berries ‘round ma cabin. Caribou, Moose. Taste better in tacos or burgers. Mountain goat, Dall’s sheep. Been eatin’ better ‘ere than ah did at home.”

“And you're—just allowed to hunt them?” The website advised about a permit through some special outfit needed to hunt when you requested your pass into the park. Said that only aboriginals were allowed to do so. “You're not—”

“Aye,” he cuts you off with a small nod. “No huntin’ in th’ park. But. We're nae in th' park anymore.”

“Where are we?” You ask again, firmer this time. 

“I told ye. Nearly home.”

“And where is home?” 

The way he sucks his teeth makes you recoil slightly. Wet. Irritated. As if he's tired of this conversation already. 

“Close.”

You don't let his flat tone deter you. “Are we—are we still in the Northwest Territories?”

“Thereabouts.” 

It's not an answer. It doesn't reassure you in the slightest. 

You open your mouth to say so, words curling on your tongue when he jerks his chin toward the handgun, brow furrowed. 

“Thought ye wanted tae check oan th' satellite phone.”

His tone is severe. A growl curdling the ends, pitching it down, down. Displeasure, irritation, blooms in the gnarled petals of witch hazel when he narrows them into slits. 

You swallow, wrenching your gaze from the storm brewing over fields of wheat, and set your jaw. Masking your fear for annoyance. Confidence. 

But your hand shakes when you reach for the black box shoved into the corner. Palms slick with sweat. You try not to touch the gun, doing your best to curve around it. It feels—

Real. 

A real gun. In the real world. In a place you came to get away for a weekend, experience something you'd never had before. Freedom. Reliance on nobody but yourself. And now—

Somewhere in the Northwest Territories. Injured. Locked inside of a truck with a man who wavers between warmth—an unending heat, a furnace; a beacon of light—and severity like a swinging pendulum. You feel safe with him. You commit every turn to memory. He's in the military. He's going to take care of you. You think he's lying to you. He'll—

He'll let you go. 

You're sick. You're paranoid. You're taking all of your grievances out on this poor man who is just as trapped as you are, turning him into a monster for no reason at all. At the end of this, when he drops you off at the airport in Yellowknife, you'll have to grovel on your knees for his forgiveness. Sorry I thought you were a bad man. 

It could be worse, you suppose. He hasn't done anything untoward to you—touching your thigh like he's owed the right aside—and you shove it down. A problem to deal with later even though the suspicion tucks itself into your head, folded up against your skull. Metastatic. It eats all of his expressions, turning them over and over again for hidden clues. 

If he does something, you'll run. 

You'll—

“Almost there,” he murmurs, and you hear the rasp of exhaustion glued to the hinge of his jaw. You wonder how long he's been driving for. And why didn't he just go back to Nahanni Butte. Flooded he said. Too deep into the park. Never would have made it. 

If that's the truth, you suppose you should thank him. 

It sits in the back of your throat. You swallow around it, reaching for the phone instead. 

There's a small thread of hope in your chest that it'll work. That he's wrong, doesn't know how to work it, and all you have to do is press a button and it'll crackle to life. Freedom within reach. 

But when you press down on the button, the phone doesn't even whimper. Broke, as he said. Dead. 

“Can you—can you charge it?”

“Tried. Must’ve blown somethin’ inside. Fried it.” 

His words are a prison sentence carrying a punishment of two months. You knew this, of course. He said so himself. But the reality of it breaking over you is different from blind belief. The realisation of your predicament is a jagged knife cutting through tissue, letting corrosive panic entrench you as it spills out. 

This is the sort of thing you’d only read about. Novels, and biographies. Memoirs. Movies. An extraordinary event that could never happen to you. Never. 

And you're aware of it. Optimism bias. The not-me fallacy. But everything in your life thus far had been so unequivocally mundane that the possibility of it not happening seemed to eclipse any chance of it occurring at all. 

The crux of the bias, you suppose. Though it does little to stem the disbelief surrounding it all. Even when you told your friends, and your family, that you were going on this trip, the most mordant of them said you'd get eaten by a bear or end up lost in the wilderness. 

Injured, unable to walk, and stuck with a man you only marginally know (trust) seems like the plot of a lifetime movie. 

But—

Two months. 

You're sure in the meantime, someone will notice your absence. Raise the alarm. Call the police. They'll launch an investigation, and come searching for you. It's just a waiting game. 

And—

(You glance at the man once more, his profile limned in a halo of gold. The rim of his hat casts shadows over his face, eyes concealed in the thickening tenebrous that enshrouds him down to his broad chest, dense with corded muscles. Athletic. Trim. Big.)

—staying alive. 

Survival. 

If only for just two months. 

But the facts are cold, unforgiving. You are alone with a man you don't know. A man with three guns. Military. His experience in this wilderness vastly eclipses your own. 

He's fine. Fine. Touchy, sure. But he hasn't asked for anything. 

—his hand is on your thigh—

You'll be okay. 

It hurts to swallow. “Thank you,” you murmur, hoping the conciliatory lilt eats the panic you feel. “For saving me.” 

His gaze darts to you so sharply that the truck veers slightly to the left, tires crunching over thick beds of furze that line the forged road. The action is sudden—surprised, maybe, by your reedy gratitude. A deviation from the demeanour he'd shown you so far—calm friendliness. Affability. It jars you. Scares you. You grip the seat cushion tight in your fists as he mutters something sharp you can't discern under his breath. 

It only takes him only seconds to correct, rippling his hand away from you to commandeer the truck back into the centre of the beaten path. Even keeled now. Almost as if nothing amiss had happened at all. 

But it's undeniable. Congeals in the air, tense and unignorable. A vacuum that siphons the breath from your lungs. It sits in the whites of his knuckles, arsenic bones jutting from thin, rough skin, demanding to be seen; the terse set to his shoulders. To the grind of his jaw as he clenches his teeth. 

You take him in with bated breath, swallowing whole each microcosm that buds to the surface of his demeanour. Wary. Watchful. Squeezing the satellite phone tight in your hands. But he doesn't meet your wide-eyed stare, choosing instead to keep his gaze fixed on the dirt road. Knuckles popping, brows furrowed. Silent. 

But it's heavy. Oppressive. The same unrelenting chill as outside. You fight back a shiver in the blooming cold, wishing you'd packed more than just a pair of hiking tights (in tatters, now) and a thermal windbreaker for the trip. 

The hum of the engine, and the cracking of rock and muskeg crushed under the wheel, are the only noise that fills the cabin. You stifle your breath. Hold it in your throat. Skewer your eyes to the landscape yawning out around you. The deep, thickening sense of unease grows in the pit of your stomach. Metastasizing. 

Outside is a sprawling taiga forest. Emaciated spruce, balsam fir, jut out from the muskeg, dusted in a sparse layer of sphagnum. You can almost hear the trickle of a stream. The dirt road is wet under the tires now. A creek must be close by. A river. Flat River. South Nahanni. Further out might be Slave River. The Liard. Little Buffalo. Great Slave Lake, even. 

Narrowing it down seems impossible when nearly the entire south corridor of the Northwest Territories is wet marsh and snaking bodies of water. 

It both worries and reassures you at the same time. Getting to Nahanni alone was a challenge. With most of the surrounding area limited to a few year-round highways, there are not many places he could go without reaching dead-ends or winter roads closed for the season, inaccessible in the warmer summer months as the snow melts. 

Though—these highways arch as high as they can. From Yellowknife to Tuktoyaktuk, right on the coast of the Arctic Ocean. 

But he hasn't driven on any stretch of highway since you woke up. The road is unpaved, wild. You're confident you're still south, but the exact location eludes you. Northwest Territories. Yukon. Northern Alberta. It's overwhelming. Daunting. 

You try to commit the geography to memory. Sifting through an endless trawl of nothing to find something familiar. A mountain range. A sign. Anything. Anything—

“Ye mean tha’?”

The sound of his voice draws your attention, raspy. Hoarse from disuse. 

He swallows. There's something raw in his expression, fractured. Yearning, you think. For something. What that something is, however, you can't place. 

It stays on as he slowly slides his tongue out, licking over the bristles of hair covering his lip. 

You offer a shallow nod, unsure why this matters to him suddenly. 

“Yeah, I'd be—” 

You pause, words turning to smoke in your throat. Uninjured, is the first thought. Without him, your leg wouldn't be—

Whatever it is. Ankle broken. Achilles torn. A gunshot wound clean through tendon and tissue. 

But at the same time—

All turned around, he said. Lost. He was hunting, too. You must have somehow wandered outside of the park limits. Must have because the sound of a rifle would have drawn attention from nearby wardens. They'd have come to investigate. 

You swallow down the bloom of unbridled panic. The aftertaste is bitter in your mouth. The thought of being outside of the borders, all on your own—

“I’d be dead if it wasn't for you.” 

The hush that falls is immediate. Your own mortality dangling by a thin thread. Happenstance keeping you alive. 

He clears his throat again. Your fingers tighten around the metal until it hurts. 

“Names Johnny.” He twists in his seat, facing you. “Johnny MacTavish.” 

It's a bit late for introductions, but you take it in all the same. Johnny. Johnny.

(saviour—)

His eyes grow wide when you slowly, haltingly, breathe yours out. Letting it sit in the air where it dissolves into the silence, the weight of it somehow more damning than being alone in the woods. There's power in a name. In knowing it. Military. You're not sure why it matters, but it does. 

You fight another shiver when he says it back after a beat, much too fond, adoring, for the sparse companionship you've barely begun to build. 

“I'll keep ye safe,” he says your name again, accent curling in between the bridges of each letter. There's a heat in his eyes; pyretic. A sickness. “Don't hae tae worry aboot anything.” 

He turns back slowly, angling the wheel around a sudden bend in the thicket. The path is clearer here, looking more like an established dirt road than a sparse coppice. It twists upward, cutting a meandering line through a dense cropping of spruce. The canopy above—as thick as it is—curls over the road, enclosing it in a bed of conifers branching overhead. Concealing it from view. 

The sight fills you with a new bloom of unease. How quickly the wild swallows you whole, shielding you from prying eyes, prickles against the nape of your neck, dripping like hot oil down your spine. 

“Where are we?” It comes out in a whisper. 

He makes a noise in the back of his throat. In your periphery, you see him lift his hand off the wheel, but sit, paralyzed, when he brings it down to your thigh, giving what attempts to be a pacifying squeeze. 

“Home,” he answers, making the turn. 

A log cabin comes into view. It’s situated at the end of the clearing, covered by the same dense tangle of trees as the path. The forest seems to bend around the single-storey home, enclosing in a cradled embrace of intermixing wry jack pine, bold tamarack, dark spruce, and white birch. Trembling aspen peaks above the heads of the other trees, hiding the smoked black spruce roof from view above. 

It might look homey under different circumstances, but the thick, stripped logs—made of varnished white spruce—jutting out half-crescents to form the walls seem brooding. Claustrophobic. It's small—just a storey and a half. A camper's cabin not meant for longtime use. It wears its age in wood rot and peeling varnish. The scent of wet wood clings to the air when he rolls the window down, coming to a stop a few paces away from the single step leading to the porch. 

Firewood stacked high to the awning on both sides of the blue door, encased in metal to keep it dry. Moss-covered concrete foundations lift the house off of the ground, keeping it from melting the permafrost below. The remains of a snuffed, charred campfire is perched to the left of the winding path leading to the door. Felled lumber lays on its side, the top whittled down onto a seat. A wooden rack leans against a tree close by. The hide of an animal is stretched taut across the panels. Leather-making materials sit in a bucket beside it. 

A metal box—bear-proof, you're sure—is half-buried in the soil. Storage, perhaps, for the unusable remains of the animals he hunts. 

It's fairly standard for a cabin up north, you think. But something about this place makes you feel anxious. Trapped. You can't see anything at all through the dense cluster of trees, but you can hear the sound of running water. A river, maybe. A stream. It splashes against the rock, the current too quick for you to even think about swimming in it. 

It only adds to your unease. 

“This is home,” he says, jerking his chin toward the house. 

Home is a cabin nestled somewhere in the unorganised wilderness of the Northwest Territories. Nahanni National Park is several hours in another direction. Too few communities exist on highway seven for you to even stumble onto them—

Assuming, of course, that you could walk there to begin with.

The lingering pain in your ankle, the heavy bandage wrapped around it—it's an immediate certainty that you can't walk. Broken, you know, from the glimpse you'd taken before. Milkwhite against raspberry red—

You don't think about that. 

You don't think about much at all. 

“Right.” You murmur. This place is the furthest thing from home you could imagine. 

He moves in your periphery, reaching for you. You jerk back, driven by instincts. The need for distance, space—

The jostling of your foot makes you hiss in pain, and he offers a conciliatory hum. 

“Ye’ll be alright, bonnie. Lets jus’ get ye inside now.” 

The inside is made of varnished wood. A mix of black and white spruce. It's cosy, you suppose. 

It opens up to a living room immediately upon walking in the door. A mat sits under your feet. A small closet to the right with the door slightly ajar. Along the length of the left wall is a doorway spilling into a small kitchen. From your vantage point, you make out a sink, and then another door to the right. 

Along the back wall beside the arching doorway is a brick fireplace. Soft fur is spread out on the ground in front of it. An old, weathered couch is pushed against the left wall, a shawl tossed over the back. 

There's no television. A stack of books and magazines sit above the couch—used more for an end table than entertainment, you note, spotting the glass of water resting on the pile. A pack of cigarettes beside it. An ashtray on the floor. Bottles of beer sit on the small table shoved under the window. One of the chairs is covered in clothes. 

It's lived in, you note, but lifeless. 

There are no pictures on the wall. No personal artefacts littered around. It's—

Perfunctory. 

He comes home, shucks his boots off by the front door, and drinks warm beer on the couch until he falls asleep. An inference, of course; but as he carries you further into the house (his insistence—ye cannae walk oan tha’, doe, stop bein’ stubborn and lemme carry ye), your notion gains credence. It's sparse. Threadbare. 

There's a single plate in the sink. The old stove, separated from the sink by a small countertop, is covered in a layer of dust. A fridge is pushed against the back wall. 

The door you glimpsed in the kitchen leads to the washroom. It's tight. A shower, a sink, a toilet. No windows. A towel is hung over the curtain rail, still damp from his shower before. A single mat covers most of the tiled floor below. A tube of toothpaste sits in the porcelain basin of the sink. 

Beside the washroom is the master bedroom. The bed is unmade. An untouched glass of water is left on the end table beside a worn leather book and a bible. 

An open closet sits across from the bed. The window is open. The breeze flutters the old, jaundiced curtain. 

He gives you his room and says he'll take the couch. Under normal circumstances, you might have fought it. Insisted that he sleep in his bed. You're a guest. You couldn't put him out like that. But the door has a lock. 

“Thank you,” you murmur, and he seems to tremble at your words before nodding. 

“O' coorse.” 

Johnny places you on the bed before he sets to work rebandaging your ankle. You're all too aware of the fact that you need to know. You need to see what you're dealing with, and how bad the damage is, but the pain that cuts through you when he rests your ankle—as gingerly as he can—on top of an extra pillow makes you yowl in agony. 

It's vicious. Whitehot. The pain rattles through your bones. 

He shushes you as he unwraps the clumsy brace he put on in the park, murmuring incomprehensible things under his breath that you think must be Gaelic. Words of comfort, perhaps. 

You feel none of it except an uneasy dread pooling in the empty pit of your stomach. 

“How bad is it?”

He hums, brow pinching tight. “Th' hare took most o' th' damage,” he says, eyes tracing along the congealing blood on your ankle. Dark cherry red. You swallow down a gag. “Tore yer achilles, though. Clean. Doesn't seem tae be any fragments. Broke your ankle, though. But,” he taps your calf, just above the bend of your foot. It doesn’t hurt. “It’s a clean break. Maybe just a fracture. Shuid heal up in no time.”

“And what about infections?”

“Got some stuff oan hand if that happens,” he leans back, and gives you a wink. It feels out of place considering the severity of your predicament. Garish, almost. “But ah was a good nurse. Patched ye up nicely.” 

You don't ask anything else, and silence trickles in as he refocuses his attention back to cleaning your wound and redressing it. The bed is soft under you. Giving. You lean back, staring up at the log ceiling, and will yourself not to think at all. Each slight jostle of the wet cloth running along your ankle feels like fire licking at your skin. If you had anything at all in your belly left, you might have thrown it up on the side of the bed. 

This pain is consuming. Persistent. 

Your fingers knot into the soft blankets below, gripping tight until your knuckles ache. A futile attempt to exchange this pain for a lesser one. Something you can ignore, forget. 

Through the open window, you can hear the playful caws of a raven searching for food. You want it to distract you, to pull you away from the sickening sensation of your ankle separating from the heel, but it doesn't.

All you can think about is the fresh pain. Your flesh ripped apart. Torn achilles, he'd said. You feel it as he moves, washing away the dried blood, the viscera. The break in your tibia. It's a nauseating feeling. Visceral. It screams at you that something is wrong, reverberating through your bones. 

The raven caws again. 

“Gonnae ‘ave tae stitch yer heel up.” 

You make a sound—a pathetic whimper choked in the back of your throat. 

“Fine,” you rasp, tensing. “Just—”

Get it over with. 

Johnny seems to understand, offering a consolatory pat on your shin. “Ye'll be fine. Ah know what am doin’.”

You glance back at him, avoiding whatever is happening below his elbows. Refusing to look. 

He reaches up, fingers stained pink with your blood, and pulls the ballcap off his head, shaking the matted hair loose. His hair is thick, curling at the ends. Dark brown. Soft. You take in his expression, him, as he works, using it to churn your thoughts away from the prickling sensation of him pressing your torn skin back together, readying it for the needle. 

He's intense, focused, as he works. Eyes lidded to half-mast. Long lashes fanning out over the dark circles beneath his eyelids. Bruises that speak of long, sleepless nights. The empty bottles of beer and the full ashtray within arm's reach make a little more sense as you see the extent of his fatigue. 

It doesn't concern you. You rip your gaze away from the thin, twisting rivers of red that snake through the jaundiced whites of his eyes; the possibility of his vulnerability notches something inside your chest you don't want to think about. Can't. 

Your saviour, you think again, veering sharply on the edge of too cruel—

“Might pinch a bit, doe,” he mutters low, soft. His thick, even brows pull together at the centre. You feel the prick of the needle pushing through your skin—

Down his brows. The oblique curve of his nose. Bottled to a point. The thick bed of hair beneath his nostrils. Thin, pink lips jutting from the thatch of black bristles. The wisps curl down the slope of his neck, thinning at the hollow below before thickening back into a dense crop on the scant patch of his skin visible from his unbuttoned shirt. 

Another prick—

A thin, gold chain loops around his neck. Tucked against his sternum is a Latin cross. It's plain. Traditional. Solid gold, maybe. But not purely for decoration. Where the arms meet the body, the surface is smoothed down. Worn. In the reflection, you can see the thin, circular lines of a fingerprint. 

The bible on his dresser makes sense. You glance over at it, taking in the folds and creases on the leather cover. Aged and well-loved. Used. Pages are dog-eared. Waterlogged. Scotch tape holds the spine together. 

The Holy Bible gleams in faded gold lettering. Douay–Rheims is etched into the surface. 

The sight of a worn-down book and thumbed cross shouldn't relax you, but it does. A good ol’ boy, then. You turn back to him, eyes caught on the gleaming gold flush against tanned skin. It's tight to his sternum. Hung delicately around his neck. 

Seeing it now feels a touch voyeuristic. It wasn't intentionally bared to you. Wasn't offered up willingly for you to gawk at, mind looping around thou shalt not kill and do unto others as you yourself would want done unto you, and finding comfort in the ordered morality of its symbolism—however fickle that could end up being. 

You know a man is not as moral as his religion demands of him, but he looks devout. 

A good Catholic boy. 

Still—

You peel your gaze away from his chest as the thread slides through. The sensation is uncomfortable. Ticklish. Forcing your attention back to him, well above the neckline. His nose. Nostrils flaring when your knee jerks. His hands close over your shin. Mouth parting slightly just to say, keep still, doe. Donnae want tae hurt ye. 

His hair is slightly greasy near his scalp. Sweat from earlier dampens his locks, flattening it tongue head. It's longer at the top compared to the sides. An odd, asymmetrical hairstyle that doesn't feel like an aesthetic choice at all. Maybe he had a mullet. Or—

You see it when he tilts his head down, chin angled toward your foot. 

A scar stretches from his temple back, thinning the hair that lines his scalp on the right. The flesh is jagged, uneven. Cratered. It forms a ravine. The canyon walls clumped scar tissue. The nullah in the centre is all pink and raw. 

You think of a shooting star. Meteor showers in the indigo sky. 

You think of his words from earlier—ah know what am doin’—and the depth of his medical knowledge. It stands out now. You suppose he would, wouldn't he?

The thought has shame dripping down your spine like hot, slick oil. Burning. Tarry. You remember what he said in the truck about being wounded in action, the misery in his words, the anger, and choke yourself on the regret that swarms your throat. 

He looks up, then, catching whatever awful amalgamation of self-hatred, shame, and regret makes of your expression, and the words—sorry, I'm so sorry—tear through your throat until it's bloody and raw. Pulp. Unspeakable, now. 

It dampens his brow, but there's no embarrassment in his eyes when he holds them to yours. Nothing except an intense, dizzying sense of curiosity. Of—

Intrigue. 

It doesn't have a place here, and the sight of it is sobering. 

Why is he looking at you like that when you're gawking at his injury? Confusion knots deep. Uncertainty coiling around your ribcage. Maybe he didn't notice. Doesn't care. 

Is too used to it to worry about whatever conclusions you might draw from the jagged skin barely knitted back together. But his eyes flash. Understanding edging out the unfathomable greed lurking in hazel plains, nestled, restive, in the shade that falls over the sloping boscage. 

You almost miss the shadow when it appears. Wrought with Leashed ghosts. Tempered anger. Wild, frenetic. The chains holding it at bay tremble. Shake—

And then it's gone.

Dissolve back into passive cordiality. All ire stayed behind a wall. 

You want to apologize, but the words are ash in your throat. Unspeakable. Johnny doesn't address it. He dips his head down once more, silently refocusing his attention to your ankle, and offering no explanation for the scar on his head. 

You don't ask. Don't pry. It's not your place. But your eyes are still glued to it. 

It's a horrific injury. Survival from such a terrible wound seems like an impossibility. A gunshot, you're sure. Seeing the small chasm carved into skin, narrowly missing his eye socket, fills you with a blistering sense of pity for this man, and you quietly, quickly, peel your eyes away from the jagged surface, letting your gaze run across the room. A meagre sense of privacy, you're sure, but it lets you breathe a little easier when you can't see the way his temple split apart to make room for a bullet—

“Had a mohawk,” he says. “They cut it off when this happened.” 

A mohawk. The asymmetry of his hair makes sense now, and you can almost picture it as you stare at him. The edges shorn, the top long. Unruly. His hair has a slight curl to the ends, but is mostly straight for the first few inches. 

As wild as he looks now—untamed, rugged; the thick tangle of uncharted wilderness—the mohawk must have made him roguish. Boorish. With his broad shoulders, thick biceps, and piercing blue eyes, the mohawk would have added to the playful appeal. Boyishly charming with his cropped hair and puckish grin. The draw of a bad boy, a vandal. 

But as you try and shape this around him, you catch the strain in his shoulders. The terse set to his jaw. 

“You don't have to talk about it if you don't want to.”

“Was shot.” 

It's said without a preamble as if he was waiting for you to ask. But the words are spat out like they're something foul in his mouth; like he's ridding the taste of it between his teeth. The anger, the aggression cows you slightly, but you offer a small, warbling smile you hope is conciliatory. Apologetic. 

“I'm sorry,” you offer around a stuttering exhale. You can't imagine what that must be like. Shot in the head. The idea is unthinkable. Improbable. And yet, the evidence slashes across his temple; a meteor shower carved into his flesh. 

He lifts his chin, staring down at you from the bridge of his nose. “Wasnae yer fault, doe.” 

“I know, I just—” 

Johnny gives a nod in response, ending the bubble of words and apologies building up behind your teeth. It is what it is, he mutters when you blink at him, flummoxed. This sort of reveal seems like it should necessitate a bigger conversation, a deeper one. Questions buoy to the surface—from prying (how did it happen, how did you survive) to intrusive (what did it feel like, does it hurt still)—but you trample them until they sit, a building mass lodged in your throat. 

He seems content, then, to continue with what he was doing, and says nothing more about it. And it's not your place to pry. To chisel into his trauma. 

You let it pass. Let it moulder. 

The raven caws once more. You lean back in his bed, staring through the fluttering curtains, mind reeling at this discovery. 

Stupidly, you feel more at ease in his presence. As if this show of vulnerability somehow negated the distress of your predicament, and the infeasible nature of how you ended up here, in his home. Gazing through the thick canopy of green to the golden sky above. A whole world away from your home. Broken. Injured. But the cross, the thumbed-through bible, and his human fragility seem to curl along the vicious dread curling inside your guts, soothing over the distrust with gentle, sweeping brushes. 

Quelling a frightened child after a nightmare. 

How strange, you think, but let yourself relax in his presence all the same, breathing in the scent of stale smoke, sweat. Coumarin. Tree moss. Fresh pine. It smells like the valley. Soft, waning detergent. Masculine. 

You pretend you're watching for the raven as you sneak small glances at him. Taking in everything with a new perspective. The broadness of his shoulders. The thickness of his waist. There's power in his arms, in his thighs. Sculpted musculature, honed and refined. Despite the thickness of his fingers, he has a delicate touch. Deft and sure, as if he's used to working his bulk around small parts. 

He's unkempt. The ballcap hid most of his dishevelled state, but he's not sloven. It reminds you of the outdoorsy explorers. The hikers you met on your trip out. Roughhewn and unconcerned about their overgrown beards and their tousled hair. 

There's something potently masculine about it, and you can't deny that even with the garish wound on his head, all mangled scar tissue, he's handsome. Rougish. The scar elevating it somehow—a testament, perhaps, to his resiliency. 

He catches your stare on the next glance, holding it as he leans back with a quirk of his lips. It's not quite the grins he aimed at you before, but the shadow of it lingers. 

“Now,” he utters, the severity in his tone makes you flinch. Sobering quickly under the weight of his solemnity. “Th' bad part.”

“Bad part?” You echo, confused. “What could be worse than that?”

He taps two fingers against your swollen ankle, urging you to look. You swallow and force yourself to glance at where he rests his fingers. 

With your split heel stitched up and wrapped in bandages, the sight of your leg doesn't make you want to curl into the fetal position and cry. But it's still horrifying to look at. 

A mass half the side of a baseball juts out from your skin. 

“Ankles dislocated,” he murmurs, sliding his fingers over the mound. “Gotta pop it back into place.” 

“That's not—” you shake your head. “That's impossible.” 

“S’okay, doe. I gotcha.”

“That's not the point. That's not—”

“Look,” his pitch lowers dangerously, firm now. “Gotta do it or you'll have problems later on. Much worse than a bit o’pain.”

“But—”

He inhales sharply. “Can't let it go, doe. Gotta fix it.”

You understand the logic in that. Leaving a dislocated ankle will undoubtedly cause problems later on. But—

“Will it hurt?” 

Your fear quiets the irritation brewing in steeled hazel. “Aye. I won't lie tae ye, doe. It will hurt.” 

You swallow around a whimper. 

“But,” he leans over, his hand sliding over your cheek. Cradling your face in the palm of his hand. “I'll do mah best tae be quick. Ah won't hurt ye, doe.” 

It must be the way he carries himself that puts you at ease, so assured in his abilities; confident in what he can do without any sense of grandiosity. 

“Fine.” The word is juttered out of your chest. “Just—”

His thumb catches the tears that spill over your lashline, swiping them away with a tenderness that makes you shiver. 

“Ah’ll be quick.”

He reaches into his pocket and pulls out two chalky white pills. Tylenol, he mutters, catching the furrow of your brow. It abates the unease somewhat, and you let him drop the pills into the flat of your palm, rolling them over with your thumb as he grabs the water on the end table. They're circular with a slit down the middle. 

“It'll take the pain away.” He says, holding the water up to you. “Ready?” It's uttered so severely, so seriously, that your breath hitches in your lungs. Mirth blooming between your teeth. 

“As I'll ever be,” you rasp out before popping the pills into your mouth, cradling them on your tongue protectively as you reach for the glass he holds out. They're bitter. 

You wash it down with a mouthful of stale water before leaning back on the bed, letting the scent of his sheets wash over you once more. 

Outside, the raven trills. 

The pain of popping your ankle back into place leaves you a weeping mess in his sheets, but Johnny doesn't seem to mind the shuddering sobs. He pets down your back, shushing you quietly under his breath as he mutters something in Gaelic that you're sure is meant to be soothing. 

“Ye’ll be fine,” he says, tracing figure-eights down your spine until the Tylenol kicks in, and the agony tapers off into an aching throb. “Jus’ breathe. Ah’ll get ye somethin' tae eat.”

He leaves soon after. You let the numbed, drowsiness of the pain medication lull you into a doze, listening to Johnny move in the kitchen. The squealing slide of unvarnished wood rubbing against old metal. The thud of a knife. The scent of hot oil. Muttered curses. A playful raven's caw. 

You're not sure how long you slip in and out of this dreamless state, but Johnny appears in the doorway, arms crossed over his chest as he leans against the frame. He watches you with hooded eyes, a small, secretive smile tugging on his lips.

Blearily, you yawn, somehow still exhausted despite how long you slept between yesterday evening and today. Trauma, you suppose, and say nothing at all about it when he helps you sit up in the bed. 

Dinner consists of leftover bannock—the fried dough soft in your mouth, the flavour buttery; smokey—and hare stew. He pulls a chair from the living room into the bedroom, eating on the edge of the bed with you. 

He's sloppy about it. Slurps all the meat and potatoes out of the bowl before sopping chunks of bannock into the gravy, shoveling it into his mouth with a grunt. It dribbles down his chin, and dirties his beard. This slovenly display might have churned your stomach before, but you're just as ravenous. 

And it's good. 

The bread leaves grease stains on your fingers, but the toes on your uninjured foot curl when you bite into the crispy surface, teeth sinking into the pillowy dough below. 

“This is bannock, you said?” You ask, dabbing the napkin he offered with a wink when you finish. At his nod, you continue. “It's good.”

“Aye,” he grunts around a mouthful. “S’the best. Make it every mornin’ so ah go’ fresh bannock tae go.” He swipes the back of his hand over his mouth, slurring out: “s’good wit’ jam.” 

“Did the locals teach you how to make it?”

He nods. “Scottish dish, originally. Made wit’ oats. Drier, too. But—fuck. S’good—nae. Better like this. Ol’ couple taught me when ah first came. Paler ‘n’ shite, they said. ‘n didnae ken a fuckin' thing about surviving oot ‘ere. Big man, Jim, taught me ‘ow tae hunt. Where tae fish. An’ ‘ow to cook it. Made this cabin, aye. He, ah, and his son. Offered ‘er up tae me when they realised ah didnae come wit’ shite all but a bad attitude.” 

“That was nice of them.”

“Most folk up ‘ere are. Quiet, ken? People take care’a ‘emselves, most. Take care’a others, too.” 

You mull over his words as he leans back in the chair with a satisfied groan, legs spread wide. His hands folded over his belly. The picture of ease. Contentment. This freedom of motion makes you slightly envious. 

“An’ wha’ about ye?” His eyes are lidded, leonine, and fixed on you. The intensity is always on the side of too much. Too dizzying. Consuming. 

You stamp it down, running your thumb along the inseam of his gingham throw. “What about me?”

“Why’d ye come here?”

His question throws you off balance. “It’s a pretty park,” you offer with a shallow laugh. “Who wouldn't come here?”

“Lots of pretty parks. Why this one?”

“Dunno. It was—”

“‘ave ye ever been tae any other parks? Anything like this?”

“I hiked a bit, and, um—”

He sucks out a piece of meat from between his teeth. “A bit, aye?” 

“Yeah. A bit. Why—”

“Ye came all the way here fer what? A pretty park? With no experience at all? And alone?”

The shift in his posture reads as angry, irate. You blink, bewildered by this sudden change. 

“Well. It was supposed to be an experience.”

“An experience, aye? Survival skills of a lemming.” 

It's derisive, cutting. You bristle through the sting of humiliation, grappling through the slurry of fatigue to cobble together some form of defence against this lambasting of your—admittedly—ill-thought adventure, but he's already moving on. Fingers tapping an off-rhythm beat against his belly as he levels you with a sober look. More serious than you'd ever seen him before. 

“An’ yer family? They just let ye come here oan yer own?”

The mention of your family makes guilt well to the surface, buoying above the indignant anger at his mocking words. Cowed, you shrug. 

“Sure.” 

Something cracks in the severe mein he carries; fracturing through the blatant disapproval. Cutting it like a knife. 

He sighs through his nose before reaching up and scrubbing his hands over his face. “Shite. Ye really needed me, aye?” 

You blink at the odd choice of words, brows drawing together in a tight knot. It's indefensible, of course. In many ways, he's right. If he hadn't found you—

Well. 

You temper that thought before it forms. You're too out of it, spatially unaware and unmoored, to let yourself fall into an existential pit of despair when you know you won't be able to climb out. Thinking of your assured doom out there, all because of a misstep somewhere along the path, makes dread bloom in the pit of your stomach. Nauseous, roiling. It froths over the basin, ready to spill over and drag you under. 

Swallowing around the surge of panic—mortality a fickle thing in a place like this—you offer a despondent shrug in response. Unable to scrape together any sense of a defence that won't make you sound childish and idiotic. 

You ready yourself for more mockery, having become the very thing the park rangers tried to warn you about when you showed, alone, in hiking boots much too big for you. 

But then he's shifting, expression clearing. The anger folded back behind a quick grin. 

“Pretty here, isn't it?” 

You're not sure what to make of his mercurial temperament; emotions cascading by, quicksilver and sudden. The flashes of anger, intensity, curiosity, and this, all happening within such a short period. It's overwhelming. 

It unsettles you. But—

“Yeah,” you mutter, unable to stem the awe from leaking through. 

The change in conversation is freeing. Sometimes it's just easier to let sleeping dogs lie, and that's exactly what you do. Tucking his odd behaviour behind a plexiglass of indifference, pretending it wasn't there, lurking just out of sight. Something to unravel later, when your heart wasn't on the verge of buckling under the strain of your anxiety. When your chest didn't feel like it was slowly being crushed. Your stomach is all twisted up in knots too tight to untie with your bare hands. 

It's easy to let yourself heave through jittering lungs, and pretend you couldn't feel the rot festering on the sides of them. Eating holes through delicate tissue. 

The majesty of this place hasn't quite worn off, and you use that as an excuse to drift. To close the doors on the overwhelming deluge of hysteria creeping up on you. 

You still think of the jutting fjords instead. The steep ravines, the moose in the distance—her colours sharp against the green backdrop—and let the untempered sense of reverence split you down the middle. 

It comes out in a flood, then—as if you've been biting back the words this whole time. 

You tell him about the valley. The waterfall. The white river. The marmot you saw poking its head out. No bears, you sigh; the forlorn lilt to your tone seeped with a touch of relief, an aspect he pokes at with a crooked smirk until you huff, rolling your eyes to the ceiling at his gentle ribbing. Huffily, you admit that as much as you want to see a bear, you're not quite ready to face them in the wild. 

Lots’a bears ‘round ‘ere, he taunts, rolling his knees out further as he sinks deeper into the chair. 

He dodges your next question of where, exactly, is here with a silky grin and a need tae know rolling off his lips before they tug downward in a sudden frown. 

You must be acclimating to the strange ebb and flow of his emotions because the lour grimace on his face doesn't deter you as much as it did moments ago. You pick up the slack when the conversation lulls, telling him about the places you've been and how they compare to Nahanni.

“They just—don’t.” 

It's hard to encapsulate the scale of it all into simple words; digestible pieces someone else can swallow. The park isn't too far from Yellowknife, and yet it feels like a world on its own. The remoteness, the vastitude of it all, is hard to describe, but Johnny seems to understand. 

He listens with a slight quirk to his lips. A smile you'd almost call fond. He gets it, you know. The words you can't say. The ones that feel too lacklustre when you do. 

“That really why ye came?” 

You hesitate for a moment, looping a loose thread around your finger. Contemplating. Mulling it over. You've never told anyone the reason for the trip outside of a new experience for yourself. Testing your mettle. But with Johnny—

There's a sense of kinship, you find. An understanding. 

“It seemed so—” he waits for you to find the words. “Lonely, I guess.” 

“Lonely,” the way he says the word is ruminative. Rolling it around between his teeth; testing the weight of it. “Ah suppose it is.”

“You don't think so?”

“It's—” he pauses, eyes listing to the side as he mulls over what he wants to convey. 

He does this sometimes, you think. Gets lost. Loses himself. Retreats inward. You can't help but wonder if this is a manifestation of his trauma—a head injury such as this would be classified as a traumatic brain injury, wouldn't it? You're not well-versed in this area, and it feels a little mean, cruel, to have this thought, but it blooms as his eyes fog over. As he struggles, almost, to find the words he wants to say, to give voice to what he feels, thinks. 

“Lonely, aye,” he grinds out after a beat, but he looks frustrated about it, and glares down at his lap, silently fuming. Annoyed. “Big.”

The word is ripped out from between his teeth, and you nod, hastily, to both quell the looming anger brimming in the terse set to his shoulders and to let him know you understand. Can read between the lines—if only just. 

“Is that why you came?” 

The shrug he offers is noncommittal but you can see the tension pooling in his brow despite your efforts to quash it. “Couldnae go home after this—” he lifts his hand, tapping his fingers against the scar tissue on his temple. “Wasn't safe. Had tae give up everything after. Maw. Da. Sisters. Cannae ever see them again.”

It doesn't make sense. None of it does. The innate understanding between you is shattered by the impossibility of this moment, and his half-formed words. What you gave up seems paltry in comparison to what he's confessing to. His family. His whole family—

“Might see them one day. Once that fuckin' prick is in th' ground, but 'til then—” he shrugs again, easy. As if the look on his face wasn't cataclysmic in its anger. It's rage. Sorrow. Hatred. You flinch back as if the blackhole of these awful emotions will eat you alive. 

Johnny sees it, and reaches for you, making soothing noises under his breath as his hand wraps around your thigh. “Ah, doe, don’t worry. He wilnae find us—” 

You're not sure what to say to that, but the grip he has on you is firm. Unyielding. There's a scowl etching over his lips, as if the mere thought of such a thing fills him with disgust, fury, and you shake your head slowly. 

“I'm not—I’m not worried.” You don't know how to tell him that this phantom prick from his past isn't what made you reel back, but the intensity of his wrath. The sudden infliction of his ire. So you don't. You give in with what you hope is a conciliatory smile. “I, uh, I trust you.”

It's loose. Shaky. Your conviction wanes around the edges, falling flat and hollow when it trembles out. If Johnny notices the brittleness around it, he doesn't show it. If anything, he seems to take it as a sudden gospel. 

“D’ye—” There's a crack in his voice. He swallows, then. Adam's apple bobbing harshly against the skin of his throat. You wonder if you've upset him. Angered him. But he's leaning down, eyes widening. Feverish. Blue lagoons. “Ye trust me.”

It's not a question, but he poses it as such. You nod slowly and unsure. 

Johnny ducks his head, then. Lifts one hand to rub at the bristles around his chin and upper lip. Lost in thought, maybe—

It's when he reaches around, scrubbing at the nape of his neck, do you see the flush peeking out from beneath the thick bed of hair covering his cheeks. The sight is jarring. Unexpected. 

You're not sure what to make of it. Of this strange reaction. But it passes almost as quickly as it started. The red is replaced by a wide, blinding grin. He squeezes your thigh. 

“Hah, doe. Ye really know what tae say tae cheer me up—”

You haven't said anything at all, but this, too, goes unacknowledged. And before you can even try to draw attention to it, he breathes in deeply as he sits up in the chair. 

“Ye finished?” He motions to the bowl and plate on the bed. You nod. “Alright. Ah'll put ‘em away. Get ye some tea.”

“Oh, I'm fine—”

“Nah, hen. Tea is good for ye. Will help ye heal.” 

He leaves without another word, carrying away your dirty dishes. The unfinished conversation lingers in the air around you, but beneath the loose strands of everything unsaid, you feel something tangle inside your chest as you replay his words in the back of your head. 

All alone in Nahanni, unable to see his family. You're sure the prick he's referring to is the one who gave him that horrific scar, nearly taking his life. 

Somewhere in the loop, a knot of pity begins to take shape. 

Johnny brings you Labrador tea—a speciality he learned how to make from Ethel and Jim, the couple from Wrigley who took him in. It's good. It tastes sweet, earthy. Honey and pine. You sip at it as he grabs sleep clothes from his dresser, watching him with a muted sense of listlessness. 

You can't imagine the next sixty days that loom before you. Restlessness, claustrophobia—it coalesces into this strange, itchy feeling that sits, uncomfortably, atop your chest; an increasing pressure. You wish you could pick it off like a loose scab. Dig your nail under the hard clot and tug—

Peel it all off until just silken new skin remains. 

Johnny looks antsy when you finish the tea. Eyes bright. Wide. 

As you contemplate the surrealism of your predicament over Labrador tea, he grins like a shark and tells you he only has one toothbrush. 

“Dinnae mind sharin’, doe,” he offers, too jovial, eager, for the notion of lending his toothbrush to a stranger he met less than twenty-four hours ago. Ah ‘ave good hygiene, he adds, as if that might make this any better. 

Putting away the disgust, the idea of sharing a toothbrush feels much too intimate to you. Something befitting a long-term partner, or kin, before a man you know only the bare bones of. 

But like most things lately, what choice do you have? 

Johnny grins brightly at your acquiescence. All teeth. He hands you an old sweater—his favourite football team, he adds with a wink when you blink at it—and then moves toward you with a wicked gleam in his eyes you try to pretend is just overeager hospitality. 

“Wait—” you start, jerking back instinctively as he looms over the bed. “What are you doing?”

A dip forms between his brows, and he cocks his head quizzically at you. “What're ye talkin’ ‘bout, doe? Need'tae brush yer teeth, don't ye?” 

“I—I can walk—”

He snorts. “Oan yer broken ankle? Will only hurt yerself more.” 

Despite the truth in this statement, the flippancy in his voice stings. Prickles under your skin. Your loss of mobility, of being wholly dependent on another person, is a bitter thing to try and swallow. Especially when you're here for the literal antithesis of it. To be free. Self-reliant. 

Not needing anyone at all except the grit in your bones and the determination to see things through. 

Having all of that ripped into pieces in front of you, by a man who says it with such nonchalant disregard—as if your efforts were meaningless, insubstantial for what it got it—is humiliating. 

You can't remember the last time you needed someone for something so simple as walking to the washroom to brush your teeth, to wash up. The loss of this minute freedom makes you want to cry; to break down. Rage. Break things with your bare hands just to show the world you still can. To fight against these shackles locking around your ankles, and run—

Johnny's hand falls on your knee, thumb brushing the torn edge of your tights, grazing the skin beneath the loose threads with each pass. 

“Don't worry. Ah'll take care 'o ye.” 

That's the problem, you think, chest burning. This awful feeling inside is churning. Frothingly acidic, corrosive. You don't want him to. You don't want to need this man at all. Ever. For anything. 

But—

“Thanks,” you choke out. It tastes like iron. Like defeat. 

He carries you to the washroom, cooing the whole time about how ye ‘ave nothin’ tae be embarrassed ‘bout while you blister from mortification, from shame. 

You came here to be self-reliant. To grind your mettle against the wilderness and come out on the other side victorious and better for it. But what you've accomplished so far is getting lost, getting hurt, imposing on a man you barely know—

One who has to sit down on the ledge of the bathtub with you cradled in his lap like a child, injured foot elevated on the lid of the toilet seat. He cups his hand under your mouth as you scrub at your teeth, trying to catch any of the foam from the toothpaste that spills from your mouth. 

It's mortifying. 

You've never felt so vulnerable in your whole life. 

“Sorry,” you choke out around the brush—his brush—as he slowly commanders the weight of you around enough to spit in the sink. 

He waves you off with a noise. “S’alright, doe. Ye can lean oan me all ye like.” 

So he says. But you feel the rapid inhales behind you. The soft pants spilling from his lips, lungs expanding, broadening his chest into your back. Exertion, you think, slightly cowed and humiliated. Desperately trying to hold some of your weight on your uninjured foot. 

“Nah, ah,” he breathes, arm slinking around your middle, tugging you firmly into his lap. “Ye jus’ worry about gettin’ ready tae go tae bed now. Ah got ye.”

He soothes his palm up and down the length of your arm as you finish up in a fruitless effort to calm your nerves, but it doesn't work. Can't. Because you know what's coming next. 

“Can I, um—” your tongue is thick in your mouth. “I need to use the washroom to–to, uh, washup, and stuff—”

His thigh jerks beneath you. When he speaks, his voice is rougher than normal. “Okay.”

But he stays where he is. 

“I think I can do it on my own—”

“And if ye step oan yer leg?” He tuts, arm tightening around you. “Only gonnae hurt yerself more, doe.”

“I'll be careful, but I really have to—” 

“S’okay,” he coos. “S’only me.” 

That's the problem, you think wildly. Hysterical. That's the whole problem, isn't it? 

“No, you don't understand. I need to, um, go.” He makes another noise, soft. Agreeable. Fuck. “I need to pee.” 

It comes out in a hiss. Feral, like a cat. Embarrassment turns you into more animal than man. 

Again, he hums. “I know, doe. Donnae worry, ah’ll hold yer leg.”

“Can't I just keep it, um, on the ledge?” 

“No, no. If ye put weight oan it, doe, ye’ll be in serious trouble. Dislocated. Broken. Jesus, ye cuid slip the bone out of place—”

No. No.

The idea of him holding your ankle as you piss is beyond any measure of shame you've ever felt before. You like your privacy. Crave it, sometimes. You don't think you've ever done this in front of someone since you were a child. 

You need—

A moment.

Time. A pause. 

But he doesn't give you a chance. 

Johnny's other arm loops under your knees, and with a small huff he stands, holding you aloft with an arm anchored across your belly. It's quick. Mercilessly so. He steps back and lifts his foot to toe the lid off the toilet seat, unbothered by the loud clang it makes when it hits the tank. 

“There we go,” he mutters, and sounds almost breathless for it. “Let's get ye ready.” 

It should be awkward. Clumsy. But he moves with a surprising agility that belies the firmness of his muscles, the bulk. He lets your uninjured leg drop to the floor, murmuring for you to put some weight on it as he cradles your shin in his hands, careful not to let your foot move more than it needs to. 

The strange dance ends with him holding your shin in his hands, stretching your thighs out more than they'd ever been before. An image that might have been comical under different circumstances but just makes you flounder at the suggestiveness of the pose. Added, in large part, by the firm hold he has on you. There's not an ounce of give. No threat of falling. 

You gasp when he moves, shuffling backwards to pivot you around until the back of your shin meets the cold porcelain. 

“Alright now, doe,” he motions toward the seat as he slowly bends down to a crouch on the floor, your foot still held in his grasp. 

You follow him down until you meet the seat, trying to avoid his gaze as you clumsily paw at your tattered pants, slipping the down your thighs in a hurry. Your panties follow after a moment of hesitation. 

When his breath catches, you say nothing at all. Pointedly avoid whatever face he might be making as you stare, fixed, at the panels on the wall behind his head. Wallpaper. Probably moisture-resistant. It's peeling in some places. Decades ago, it might have been a soft canary yellow. 

His breathing is shallow. You ball your hands into fists and press the flat of your knuckles against your thighs. 

It's hard to focus when you can feel the scorching heat of his body bleeding into your leg, your knee. Close enough that all he has to do is bend down a little more, and his face would be pressed against your thighs. 

There's no room, no privacy. 

You close your eyes and pretend you can't hear how his breath seems to fill the entirety of the small washroom, ghosting over your skin. Virginia Falls comes to mind—a roaring rush of water—but even in the solitude of your mind, you can't ignore the way his stare drills through your skin. 

You swallow. You can't do it. Can't do this. 

“Can you—” back off, go away. Stop breathing so heavily because you might get the wrong idea, like this whole thing excites him somehow—

His voice is rough when he speaks. Ragged. “Cannae ah what, doe?”

“Turn the tap on? I can't—I can't concentrate.”

“S’only me, bonnie girl,” he murmurs, but does what you ask. Leaning over you, broad torso swallowing you up entirely under his bulk. You can feel the soft give of his belly on your knee as he presses it into you, but it only lasts a second before you meet a wall of solid muscle beneath. He braces a warm, rough palm on your naked thigh, leaning in as he reaches over to the sink above. 

It's barely a fraction of his weight but the drag of it makes you blink in surprise. His skin is burning. Redhot. 

Opening your eyes brings you close to his chest, nose only a hair away from the tanned skin stretched over his collarbones. The metal chain gleams in the flushed light hanging overhead, sitting in a golden contrast to his sunkissed flesh. Its reflection casts beads of glittering lambency over the slope of his neck. 

Pretty, you think, watching as it coruscates in a mesmerising dance each time he moves. 

The faucet turns with a metallic squeak, breaking you from your reverie. Water gurgles up from the pipes, spitting into the basin with a hiss. You pull back, twisting your head to the side as heat floods your chest. 

“Thanks,” you mutter, unable to meet his stare.

His fingers tighten around your flesh. His voice is raw when he mumbles, “anytime.” 

The trickling rush of water reverberates around the room, and it's easy to close your eyes and pretend you're alone.

So that's exactly what you do. 

His palm grows slick on your skin. Damp. But you ignore it, focusing on nothing but the urgency of getting this over with as quickly as you can. It works, marginally—

(Johnny makes another noise in the back of his throat. 

That, too, you ignore.)

“Finished?” His voice is thick, wet. You nod slowly, peeking out from the sliver between your lashes to paw at the wall for the toilet paper roll. “Here, ah’ll help ye out of fer pants—”

Your head feels heavy. Limbs laden. The embarrassment crushes you into a fine powder; malleable, putty. You let Johnny take the lead after. Let him slip your tattered tights down your thighs, and say nothing at all when too much of his palm glides along your skin as he pulls. Needlessly, of course, when just two fingers would do. 

But it's fine. Fine. Maybe he's never taken off tights before. Maybe the material is too thin and he's worried about it catching on the scrapes over your knees, the bandage wrapped up to mid-calf. 

Your shirt, too. When he slips his fingers under the hem, splaying them wide over your belly before dragging them up until it bunches around his wrist. Tugging, tugging. Hands gliding over your skin, fitting along the contours of your body.

He keeps one hand moulded to your neck, fingers brushing your jaw, as he gingerly pulls the shirt over your head. The ragged pants in your ear, the soft groans when you slip into his old shirt—

It's exertion, really. Must be. He's tired from holding you up the whole time you brushed your teeth, washed your face in the sink. It's all fine. He's being gentle. Doesn't want to hurt you.

He's just being nice. 

(And when you notice that your panties are missing from the pile of dirty clothes he shoves into the corner behind the door, that, too, you ignore.)

Exhaustion takes you soon after Johnny tucks you into bed, dragging you under once again. He tells you he'll be on the couch. To holler if you need anything. Sluggishly, you nod. Thank him when he places a glass of water on the bedside table for you. 

(Bite your tongue when he brushes his fingers over your cheek as he bids you goodnight.)

Through the gossamer of sleep, you can hear the floorboards creak in the doorway, but when you look, there's nothing there. Just an empty kitchen. The soft flicker of the fireplace smouldering in the living room. 

Nothing, you think. It's nothing at all—

There's a weight on your chest. 

Warm, searing. It dampens your skin where it sits, heavy, on your breast, cold air ghosting along the sweat building up each time it moves. 

You stir. The pressure takes shape. A hand. A man's hand. Rough, calloused, and hot. In his palm, he holds your breast, thumb brushing along the curve of it. Sliding, sliding—

You come awake with a gasp. 

There's a twinge in your ankle when you move, and the pain grounds you, silences you. His thumb twitches on your nipple, but he, too, stills. Quietens. An impasse. 

And you suppose this would be where you'd scream. Rage. Slap him across the face, rip his hand off your breast. Curse at him for being a creep, and a pervert, and nasty, disgusting man because there's nothing at all that could justify the reason for why the shirt he gave you to wear to bed is tucked up over your chest. The bruising press of something hard digging into your hip negates any excuse he might try to give. This is unmistakable. You should scream, cry, and—

Leave. 

This is what glues your lips together. Keeps you from moving at all, from making a sound. Where would you go? How would you even get there to begin with? 

It's this—the uncertainty, your vulnerability—that paralyzes you. Keeps you still, silent, as his hands brush over your skin, touching, fondling. His palms are rough, calloused. Pyretic. He squeezes, kneading your flesh in his sweat-slicked hand like he's owed the right to touch you. Like he's allowed. 

He pants against your temple, breath warm, humid on your skin. Heaves like a dog in your ear, grunting low as he ruts his hips into your side, smearing something hot, tacky across your skin. Something you try not to think about, to inch away from. But he catches you quick, and stops your meagre protests before they form. 

His thumb and forefinger close over your pebbled nipple, pinching softly at your budded flesh. The shock of pleasure is unwanted. Awful. It churns your stomach, and you fight the urge to weep—

He leans up, ragged exhales growing heavier as he moves until milk-warmed breath shudders over your bare breasts. His excitement throbs against your hip. You swallow down around the sudden wave of disgust, the sickness knotting itself together in your belly. It devours the lingering pity you'd felt earlier. The safety, the comfort, that brimmed inside of you for him. 

(bleeding heart—

he gorges himself on it.)

Stay still, you think. And maybe he'll go away. 

But he doesn't. Of course, he doesn't. 

Johnny leans down, mouth closes over your nipple. It's all searing heat. Wet, soft. A sudden jolt of pleasure shoots down your spine when he sucks in tandem with the soft, rolling pinches he doles out on your tiger nipple, and you hate your treacherous body a little bit more for it. For how good it makes you feel when he flicks his tongue over your hardened peek, laving it sloppily. Messily. Drooling all over you—the big fucking dog—

You wonder how long he's been doing this. Touching you in your sleep. The thought sits like hot oil in your guts; sloshing against the soft lining of your stomach until it aches. Burns. You blame it on that when he grunts against your breast, the vibrations send a shiver down your spine. Have to, don't you? Because the alternative is to admit that you're slick, soft between your thighs already; folds soaked, inner thigh damp. Wet. Blame it on him, and the burden in your chest eases when you feel the stirrings of desire, lust, thicken in your lower belly. Bodily reaction becomes your clutch, your lifeline when he lays his upper body against you, the weight, the heft, of his bulk forcing the air from your lungs. 

Johnny lifts his head suddenly, eyes drilling into yours before you can feign sleep to avoid looking at him. You don't want this. Your body thrums with reluctance, with fear, but you can't drag your gaze away from him. The rapturous look in his eyes, burning in the low simmer of a never-ending twilight, is paralyzing. Electric. You can't remember a time in your life when another person has ever looked at you with such raw want. Desire. Need. It's covetous. Ugly. Marbled with heady streams of hunger, of awe, as if he's not sure whether or not he wants to eat you alive or savour you for aeons. Taking bites, nibbles, when this urge becomes too burdensome to bear; when the ravenous chasm in his guts threatens to devour itself, bones and all, like a man-made black hole. Under this heavy, unrelenting stare you wither. Submit. Your head rolls until your cheek is pressed against the pillow, neck bared. Offered up to him. 

(anything, you think, to run away from the naked want on his face. because with his mouth slack, lips slick, glistening with spit, he looks predatory like this. animal. bathed in gloam and flushed a deep roseate.)

He props himself up on his elbow, watching you. Feasting. Your quiet submission makes him moan; hips juttering at the slow reveal of your vulnerable neck. A paroxysm. As if he just can't help himself to hump against you like a beast in rut. 

He swallows. You watch his throat work from the corner of your eye, Adam's apple bobbing up and down, up and down—

Then:

He lifts himself up higher, angling his body until it's bracketed over you. Sliding between your legs until your slit is pressed against the coarse hair that covers his thighs. He keeps his elbow propped on the pillow, sliding up, up, until his forearm comes to rest beside your face. It boxes you in completely under his weight, and the position forces your legs to spread open to accommodate him. Not given up freely, of course; but your compliance in this is inessential, it seems. He moulds you how he likes, mindful of your injured ankle the whole time. A kindness that makes something molten thicken in your throat, stifling the scream that claws its way up your esophagus. 

You try not to stare when he clambers over you, chest bare against yours. Hips chiselling a gorge between your thighs wide enough for him to fit. To press his fattened length on the insides of your sticky thighs; groins drawing together. Your legs slung loosely around his tapered waist. A dreadful pastiche of lovemaking. Intimacy. 

But even as a mockery—bastardised as it is—it’s embarrassing how easily you open up for him. Legs falling, spreading further apart. Hot, sticky at the apex of your thighs. Wanting. 

Blame it on sleep, on this endless hypnagogia you've been feeling since he leaned over you on the cliff edge, and said, pretty thing, aren't ye? All alone. No’ anymore, doe. Jus’ me an’ ye, now. Jus’ us—

You swallow, fighting the urge to cry. Blinking rapidly against the tears that pebble against your lashline, but you're helpless to stop the flood even though the levee doesn't break, doesn't spill over. It just sits, a sorrowful lagoon with nowhere to go. 

In your attempt to hold back the deluge, you let your gaze wander away from the piercing blue that drills into your face—seemingly unbothered by the tears in your eyes, the ones that clot over your irises, stinging and hot—and stare down at his broad chest. A mistake, maybe, because you catch sight of the gold cross dangling around his neck. Like a pendulum, it swings. The motion is mesmerising. Hypnotic. 

It distracts you for a moment. Or maybe you've just grown accustomed to his touch, to the heat of his hand on your skin. Whatever the reason, it's enough to pull you away from the feverish trail his fingers leave as they make a steady drag downward. It's only when they dance over your belly button do you realise the muted tickle is Johnny, and by then—

“Shush, s’alright, doe,” he's cooing, warm breath ghosting over the plains of your face. It might be comforting if he didn't rest his weight on his elbow, freeing his other hand just to bring it over your mouth, thumb brushing under your eye. A warning maybe. Don't scream. “Ah go’ ye. Ah’ll make ye feel so good—”

There's a fever in his eyes. Wildfires spreading through the yawning boscage, burning everything in sight. The heat is hot enough to char bone; to blacken meat into a dessicated husk. Eating away at everything in its path. 

You know, almost immediately, that Johnny's beyond reason. Or, rather—

He's gone, turned inward; delusional enough to think that this is something he has to do. 

You'd seen all the warnings of the kindling fire before. Something you'd decided to ignore even as the hunger in his eyes surged; as the shape of it morphed into a frothing devotion that felt ill-fitting for two strangers stuck together like this. 

Stupidly, you thought you could outrun it. That he was a good man beneath it all, and wouldn't succumb to touching you in your sleep, to lulling you into a false sense of security—

Except. He hadn't, had he? 

He'd been blunt about it all since the beginning. My wife—

How silly, you thought. 

But the humour fades when he teases over your hips, resting his palm over your mound, middle finger perched above your clit. Just holding. Touching. The possessiveness of the action is unmistakable, unignorable. 

It shouldn't send a shiver down your spine when you'd rather he didn't touch you at all, but it does. There's something about him, you think. Electric. A lightning storm. It crackles in the air around you, humming low in the atmosphere; this unavoidable surge, natural phenomenon. Maybe that's what he is. 

More storm than man. A force you can't outrun, but can only endure—

His eyes flash when he slides his fingers further down your slit and finds your skin soft, hot. Drenched. When he groans your name out, it sounds like a prayer. An orison. 

“So wet, doe,” he's heaving out in a whisper, eyes nearly rolling back into his head as his touch grows bolder, more insistent. As if the softness of your flesh, the wetness that sticks to your inner thighs, is all the consent he needs. “So fuckin’ wet fer me, aye? Been waitin’ fer this, haven't ye?” 

You want to shake your head no but it's futile. He drops his head to look down the chasm between your bodies, watching his hand slide along your skin. Legs spread around his waist, inviting. He curses foul under his breath when he sees how wet his fingers are from just a touch, words mangled in the back of his throat. They sound less coherent as he roams your body, parting your folds and stroking through the slick spilling out of you, dragging it up to your clit. 

His voice is closer now. Lips bruising against the shell of your ear. Butchered English. Gaelic. An amalgamation of low whines, and rasping grunts. He sounds more animal than man. A booming thundercloud groaning above you, as if touching you is enough to please him, too. Siphoning it from your body as he presses his fingers against your clit, circling, stroking. 

It’s good. So good. And that's the problem, you think. It's easy to give in like this when he pets your pussy like the feeling of your fluttering heat on his hand is enough to make him cum. No one has ever touched you like they were starving for it. Needed it as badly as you did. 

The sensation is almost too much. The notion of it getting tangled in the back of your head, looping around the part of you still screaming to run. To go home. To push him away. 

(your arms are laden. your tongue is a puddle of mercury in your mouth—)

But just as the pleasure blooming in your belly raises with each pass of his thumb, he pulls away. Slides down, down—

Circles your hole with the tips of his slick fingers, petting with the same desperation he showed your clit until he deems you soft enough for him. He slowly sinks his finger inside of you to the knuckle, stretching your walls around him as he moans into your ear about how good ye feel around him, all tight. Hot. So fuckin' wet, do. So wet fer me—

He pulls out just as slowly, shushing the soft gasp you make when the ridge of his palm catches on your clit. 

“Ah told ye, didnae ah? Ah’ll take care’a ye.”

He presses two fingers inside of you as he peppers kisses over your cheek, cooing low about how badly you need him. Only him. 

Johnny fucks you slowly on two fingers. Gently. Deeply. Sliding into the last knuckle, petting against your slick walls, like he's owed the privilege and not touching you in your sleep.  

He brings you to the edge, takes you right there, and—

Pulls away. His fingers slide down as your hips flit, lifting to make them catch on your clit again. It's embarrassing how badly you want him to touch you. Shameful. 

He leans up and catches your mouth in a messy kiss. It's all tongue, wet, no finesse. The wild, unkempt tangle of hair abrades your skin, rubbing it raw as he devours you. Scoops out your tongue with his own, enticing it into his mouth. His teeth close on the thick of it, lips pursing. Sucking on the tip. 

His kisses are doglike and obscene. Leaves drool dribbling down your chin, soaking into your neck. He can't seem to decide what he wants to do, so he tries to do it all. Everything. Biting your lips, trying to choke you on his tongue. Slurping up the taste of you until his mouth is stained with it. Beard matted down, drenched. 

Despite it all, he's a good kisser. His pace is fast, breakneck. You can't keep up, but you try. Struggling along as he seems hellbent on eating you alive. But it's sporadic. He pauses just long enough to settle into an easy rhythm that makes you arch into it, silently begging for more as he fucks you on his fingers. Nips your tongue as he slides in a third, swallowing the gasp you let out, savouring your moans between his teeth. 

Johnny ruins you with just a kiss. Leaves you panting, unmoored. Mouth slack, open wide for him to do what he pleases because the taste of him is divine. 

“C’mon,” he urges, spreading his fingers inside of your cunt until you keen, whining his name. “Suck my tongue, bonnie.” 

It's disgusting. You do it, anyway. 

Your quiet acquiescence makes him moan, hips rutting against you. The hard press of his cock into your skin is bruising. It aches. Your inner thighs are tacky with your slick and the smears of pre-cum he leaves behind as he humps against you. 

He sounds mournful when he pulls away, mouth messy with spit, and whispers, “fuck, wish ah could taste ye again, doe—” You don't know what he means until his eyes drop down to his hand, working insistently between your thighs. 

Your stomach drops. Plummets. You thought this started when he was touching your chest, when you woke up to his hand on your breast—

“Ye didnae wake when ah did it before,” he says, as if sounding mournful, sad, over the fact that you didn't wake up to him eating your pussy while you were asleep, was normal. “Must’a had too much tea—”

You wish, so suddenly, so viciously, that he'd stop talking. You can't hear this. Can't bear to listen to him confess to all the needling worries that bloomed in the back of your head, ones you stamped down with a heavy foot and a potent sense of guilt, shame, for condemning a man who was just trying to help. 

It makes you want to cry. 

“Oh, doe, don't cry—” he coos the words out, contrite and conciliatory, but you can feel the way his cock twitches against your thigh. The unmistakable heat mushrooming in his eyes as the sight of tears streaming down your face. 

He seems to take it as misery over not feeling his mouth on your cunt, a plaintive assertion he whispers into your ear (poor thing, jus’ wannae feel ma mouth on you, aye? wannae feel me lick yer sweet pussy again?), and decides to rectify your sorrow by kissing his way down your body. 

His fingers slip out when he moves, resting them on your knee as he kneels back on his haunches. 

You spare a glance toward him, nervous with trepidation, and—

This whole time, his cock had been this phantom sensation against your skin, bruising and hot. Leaving wet smears over your thighs. Hidden from view. But like this, it's the first thing you see as it hangs, heavy and thick, from between his thighs. 

The sight is—

Something. 

You don't want to think about the heat in your belly. The nervous flit of your heartbeat. 

A pearlescent strand dribbles down the weeping, slick head, dropping to the sheets below. The shaft of his cock is similarly drenched, smeared with what seems like a copious amount of precum. It gathers at the base, a startling contrast of thick, black hair and globs of milky white. 

Something about it makes you recoil. Almost instinctively, primal. 

Your flinch just makes his cock twitch, spitting more out. 

The motion seems to unveil more of it to you, adding to the growing unease you feel because his cock is the furthest thing from pretty. 

It's flushed a daunting vermillion and purpling like a bruise around the engorged glands. Thickening at the base. Streaked with dark veins that run the length of it, like rivers intersecting and jutting up from his skin. Blotches of red, pink, purple, and peach make up the colouring of it. Marbled like a black eye. A busted lip. 

It bobs when he moves. Ugly, garish. You don't want it anywhere near you—

But Johnny’s wet hand on your knee keeps you from moving. Holds you in place as he bends down, resting on elbow to bring his face as close to your pussy as he can get. 

Johnny stares—unabashedly—at your bare cunt when he finally settles between your thighs, widening them further to fit the broad stretch of his shoulders. Eyes lit with a heady greed, a hunger, that knocks the air from your lungs. 

“Missed ma mouth, didnae ye?” 

For a moment, you think he's talking to you. Confusion colours the panic you feel, dampening the dread down until it's flattened by sheer bewilderment when you realise his eyes haven't left your slit. 

“Such a bonnie girl,” he purrs, breath ghosting over your cunt. “Been so lonely without me, aye? Poor thing.”

It heats you up from the inside out. The mesmerised, almost unfettered look of pure adoration shaded alongside the raw want on his face twists a sense of desire inside of you. Has anyone looked at you with such naked need on their face? As if the idea of not having a taste was somehow the most agonising thing they could experience? The way Johnny looks at you is enough to make you ache. And with anyone else, having him address your pussy instead of you would be awkward, humiliating, but somehow, him doing it makes you burn white-hot. Makes you want—

“Johnny,” you whisper, paper-thin, and his head shoots up, brows inching high on his brow. You're acutely aware that this is the first thing you've said since this started. Since you woke up to him groping you, touching you, in your sleep. And it's his name. Johnny. 

Not no, don't. Stop. Please. Just—

“Johnny.”

It's not consent. You're not sure you're fully capable of doing so right now, if ever. But it's the closest you think you could come to saying yes. Admitting that you want his mouth on you, even though the situation leading up to this still makes something ugly and awful twist in your guts, is as much as you can give. He seems to see this. To know. 

But Johnny takes it between his teeth as an unequivocal yes despite that, groaning low in his throat, midnight eyes rolling back into his head. The hands on you tremble. Shake. 

He breathes in deeply through his nose, the sound whistling as a great plume of air is forced through small channels, filling his lungs. Perfuming them with the heady scent of you, of sex, clotting in the air. 

“Fuck, doe. Gonnae give ye what ye need.” 

And then he bends his head, eyes lidded still, half rolled, and without any preamble, glues his lips to your drenched slit, forcing it between your soft folds. 

The first touch of his tongue is molten. Soft, tensile, he laves it over the whole of your slit from the sensitive skin beneath your hole, to the crest of your clit. Digs his tongue in, swirling it over and under your folds leaving no part of you untouched. Feasting. Devouring. 

It makes you mewl. Your back arches off the sheets, ankle throbbing in a heady, pulsing pain at the sudden movement, adding to the shrill whine in your voice. 

He notices, and pets your knee once before sliding his bicep under your leg, looping his hand around to secure your thigh in the crook of his below. Locked in tight. Immoveable. The other he pushes down with the flat of his palm, until your joints ache from the stretch. Your knee is almost flush with the mattress. Widening you further for his searing, eager mouth. 

If his kisses are dogish—wet, messy; sloppy with drool—then the way he eats your cunt is foul. Slobbering down his chin, slurping up the mess he makes with a series of chewed-off moans and muffled whines. He paws at you as if he was denied the pleasure of drink for aeons, feasting like a man half-delirious and starved. There's no finesse. No skill to speak of. Just a desperate man lapping at you like a beast. Worshipping you. 

He nuzzles his chin and cheeks against your cunt, drenching himself until his beard is matted to his skin. The feeling of his coarse hair grazing your sensitive flesh is overwhelming. Too much. Too ticklish. But—

It feels good. 

The contrast of his fleshy tongue rolling over your clit, and the rough brush of his hair when he nuzzles you with the point of his chin, cooing softly about how pretty this little pussy is, getting him all wet, is cataclysmic. The heat floods your belly, and you clench around nothing. Achingly empty. Moaning at the feeling of him bringing you right there, right to the brink, with nothing by the hair on his cheek. It's unreal. Inescapable. Your head drops, mouth lax, open wide as you pant and whimper through the madness of Johnny MacTavish trying to find a way to suck your clit and fuck you with his tongue at the same time. An impossible goal, you know, but he doesn't seem to care about logic or reason with his head buried between your thighs, mouth never leaving you once. He merely nods his head up and down, refusing to pull away.

It's divine. It's worship. It's—

He pushes two of his fingers inside of you, lapping at your taut rim to stem the sting of his sudden intrusion, and you think, for a moment, that you see Nirvana behind your eyelids. 

It's embarrassingly how quickly he brings to you the brink, slurping messily as he drills his fingers into your hole, petting against your walls in a mockery of what he'll do to you once he's had his fill. Satiated his hunger with the taste of your pussy. 

Something he can't seem to get enough of.

Your thighs draw together, crushing him between your legs. Arching into his mouth, nearly smothering him as you rut clumsily against his face, moaning at the rough scrape of his beard against your skin. You're not normally so aggressive, but he loses himself in it, eyes rolling as he grabs your hips and pulls you closer to his wanting mouth, encouraging you to use his tongue, his lips, to meet your end as you see fit. Riding his face as much as you can with your leg locked tight between his shoulder and bicep. 

And it's in between his loud grunts, his whines—almost caterwauling into your slit—where you shatter. The sound of his pleasure, the feeling of his mouth on you—it’s all too much. You break when he sucks your clit into his mouth, keening in the back of his throat as he works another finger into you. It feels good. Too good. 

Johnny works you through it. Lets you take, and take as your muscles spasm with the force of your release. Fingers digging into his shoulders, fisting the sheets. He moans along with you, eagerly lapping at your cunt until you whine, begging him to stop. You've had enough. Can't take anymore—

He only pulls away when you melt into the sheets, shuddering with the aftershocks bubbling through your body. Leaning back on his haunches once more, the hair around his mouth slick and wet. The evidence of your pleasure dripping down his chin, droplets still clinging to his beard.

He crawls over you once more, eyes boring into yours. Pits of coal. An endless black hole.

In this strange space, liminal, you lose yourself. Shed pieces of who you were before when he slots his hips between your thighs, cock heavy in his hand, and presses it to your slit. 

This is happening. He's going to fuck you. 

You wish the thought didn't make your knees fall apart a little wider for him. Make your hips flit, lifting slightly into the air. Eager. Hungry for it. For him.

It's loneliness, you think. Desperation. 

Madness is addictive. It feeds itself and infects those around it. Noxious. An all-consuming black hole that eats, and eats. It must have bitten you, too. Dug infectious teeth into your skin, severing flesh to imbed its jowls in your marrow. Clinging. Poisoning you from the inside out. 

There's no other reason for why you reach for him, hands sliding over his sweat-slicked skin as he falls into the open brackets of your arms, grunting when the head of his cock catches on your rim. He's a wall of heat. Firm muscles. Your nails dig into the thick cords of his shoulders just to feel the reluctant give of his skin. 

Nothing about this man is soft. His waist, his thighs, his chest, his arms, the hard ridge of his cock. It's all unyielding muscle. Burning. Searing into your skin when it drags against his. 

“Gonnae fuck ye, doe,” he whispers, words pitching low. Damp wood, felled timber. Rough. You shiver from the heat of it. The warning, the plea; both extremes coalescing together to make truism more potent. Weighty. “Gonnae fuck this pretty pussy, and yer gonnae beg me fer it.” 

Despite the surety in assertion, he doesn't wait for you to plead with him to split you apart, taking the initiative instead to sink the head of his cock into you. The stretch stings already, and only his glands have sunk in, a fact he grunts into your ear as he drives forward another inch. Another—

You don't think you've ever been this unmoored before. Rendered this docile. A mere domicile for him to burrow inside of; to carve a home from the sanctum of your walls wrapped tight around him. And carve he does. Splitting you apart as he grunts with the efforting of forcing his cock into you, feeding it further with blunt jerks of his hips, his hands feverish on your skin. Sweat slicked already even though he's barely halfway inside of you. 

“Feels so good,” he slurs into your ear, face pinching. Twisting up as pleasure blooms over his brow. “So fuckin’ good, doe, fuck—”

It does. Beyond the blunt pressure of him forcing his cock inside of you, the sting of the stretch, there's an intense, dizzying pleasure in the fullness you feel. In the press of him notching against something inside that makes heat bloom in your belly, turns your bones liquid. It might be the previous climax rendering you oversensitive, but the feeling of him splitting you apart is euphoric. 

It's aided by the moans he lets out as you take more and more of him, as if the sound of his pleasure is funnelled into yours. By the look on his face, eyes widened, feverish, as he darts his gaze between your face and your pussy, unable to decide if he wants to watch his cock disappear into you or watch your face, pinched up in pleasure, in flickering pain, as you take him fully. 

This sort of bliss, this pleasure, is addicting. Narrowed down to the sharp nudge of his cock grazing places inside of you that light your nerves on fire, burn through your synapses until your thoughts are muddled, mush. No coherency, no logic—just the fat length of him bludgeoning into your walls; the tap of his heavy, full sack slapping against your ass as he finally, finally, roots deep.

He must feel it, too. This strange, overwhelming pleasure loops around your lower belly, twisting itself into knots because when he pushes the last few inches inside of you, he nearly collapses on top of you, his whole body shuddering. Trembling. Presses his damp face to your cheek, matted, slick hair tickling your skin, and groans from deep within his chest at the feeling of you wrapped around him. The noise shivers through you. His pleasure is enough to make you clench down, tightening up around him. Already on the verge and all he did was slide his cock inside of you. 

A fact he seems to luxuriate in, huffing shakily into your ear as he quenches himself on the soft, fluttering pulses of your walls around him. Content to grind his hips into yours in shallow gyrations that make your eyes roll into the back of your head. The tension in your belly coiling tighter and tighter, the pleasure ameliorating the shame you'd felt before, burning it into cinders. 

As long as he keeps his cock inside of you, as long as he keeps pushing the blunt head into that spot that makes your vision whiteout, you think could cum just like this. Right now—

He doesn't. 

Johnny lifts himself off of your chest, elbow coming to rest beside your head, taking the brunt of his weight. His eyes are bright, burning. He stares down at you, and the look of sheer adoration on his face is daunting, overwhelming. It threatens to eat you alive. Devour you whole. Pure rapture. Devotion. 

You flush, face stinging with embarrassment. Prickling with unease. No one has ever stared at you like this, so hungrily, and the fact that it's him makes your head spin. Looping endlessly in circles of disbelief and fear. 

He might be omnipotent, you think, with the way his lips tug sharply downward, brow bunching together as if he can hear your thoughts, taste your disquiet in the air. 

Johnny rolls his hips back slowly, inching out of you with a hum until just the tip remains. The loss has your hands scrambling down his chest, fingers tangling in the coarse, drenched hairs at the soft incline of his belly. The other sliding around the thick breadth of his ribs, nails digging into the slick skin covering his spine. Pressing. Biting. 

More, you don't say. Please. 

The knot in his brow dissipates. Eases into something almost playful, impish. 

“Want ma cock, doe?” He whispers it waggishly, like a cloy secret, and you pretend the tease in his voice doesn't make your heart lurch in your chest. “Didnae anyone teach ye some manners? Gotta ask politely.” 

You won't. You won't. 

Your reluctance makes him sigh. The chain around his neck swinging when he moves. His hips pull back, and he reaches down with his free hand, and grabs his cock, pulling it out of you, and sliding it against your slit. The head bumps into your clit, and you nearly choke on the gasp that's ripped from your chest. The pleasure is too much, too—

He pulls away, denying you the euphoria of release. 

“No, no, please,” you babble, resolve crumbling into ash. “Please, Johnny, please—”

“That’s more like it,” he coos, and lets his cock dip back inside of your fluttering hole, rim stretched taut around him once more. The sting is lessened now, but still there as the thick glands force you open for him. “Sound so pretty when yer desperate for ma cock.” 

He leans down, catching your mouth in another sloppy kiss as he slams his cock back inside of you hard enough to bruise. To make you see stars. Cockhead bludgeoning into your cervix in a dizzying amalgamation of pleasure and pain that makes you whine, the whimper snatched up between his teeth as he burrows them into your lip with an echoing groan. 

He fucks you hard, working his cock into you at a maddening pace. Bestial, now. All animal. The tenderness from before dissolves into an choppy desperation. An eagerness to seek his own end as you fall to pieces beneath him, shaking from the force of taking him over and over again, each piston, each hard thrust driving the thoughts from your head until all you have left is sensation. An absence of everything except the way he feels above you, inside of you. 

Sweat builds up along your hairline, gathers at the base of your spine, and soaks the sheets below. You feel liquid under him. A ragdoll for him to sink his jowls into, to toss around as he likes. 

Johnny is all sensation and a cacophony of sound. 

He ruts into you clumsily, groaning in your ear. Moaning out how good you feel around him. Pretty pussy made just for him. 

“Oh, fuck, doe—” he moans, arching into the next thrust. Drool dribbles down his chin when he curves his spine, dropping his forehead onto your temple. “Feels so good. Feels like my cock is meltin’ instead ye—”

The lewd squelch of his cock pistoning into you seems to echo through the room, louder somehow than the ragged moans that spill from his mouth. 

“Been so long,” he shudders against you, rooting his cock deep. Burying himself inside of you as his cockhead bullies into your cervix. The flash of pain is whitehot, blinding, but the bloom of pleasure eats it whole before it can pollute the puddle of bliss pooling in your belly. “Been savin’ it all jus’ fer ye—”

His hand slides from your hip, burrowing between your bodies as rubs at your clit. It feels so good that it nips sharply into pain, into agony. Too much, too much—

But he doesn't relent. Fingers toying, circling your clit in time with each jarring thrust, tightening the coil inside of you until it whines from the tension, the pressure—

It snaps when he growls into your ear—cum fer me, doe; wannae feel this pussy squeezin’ ma cock—and releases in a flood, a deluge of molten heat. Back arching, toes curling. You're barely cognisant of the ache in your injured foot, the throbbing pain. It's swallowed by the surge of endorphins roaring through you, ringing in your ears. Blotting everything out except the way you pulse around the thick of him still lodged deep inside of you. 

You barely have time to come down before he starts again, forcing you to take him as he thrusts in harder than before, mindlessly seeking his own end as you gush around him, nails raking across his flesh. 

He's babbling above you, spitting words into your ear about how he's going to take care of you. All of you. Take you back to Scotland with him so you can raise your children—

It slices through the haze, ripping a hole through the fog clouding your mind. 

“No,” you whimper, devastation flooding your chest alongside the vicious pleasure still rolling around inside of you. “No, please—”

Children, he breathes like you hadn't spoken at all. Lots. Lots of them. Brothers and sisters. Two, maybe three, of each. But he's not picky, bonnie, he'll take whatever you give him. And keep fucking you over and over again until he gets what he wants. A whole family to raise. To surround himself with. Been lonely, you think he says. Needed something to keep him busy. 

You don't want this. Can't. But he doesn't stop, doesn't relent. He breathes life into the picture he paints with the soft flutter of your cunt clenching tight around him at words, once again betrayed by your own body. 

Despite the nausea that bleeds to the surface at his words, your eyes roll back into your head once more, driven mad with the thunderous pleasure that rips through you as he forces every last inch of his cock into you. 

Johnny grinds his hips against yours, moaning, loud and untethered, muscles jerking, twitching, as he cums deep inside of you. 

The aftershocks of his pleasure make him tremble, body spasming as he drives himself tight against the seal of your womb. A new heat grows inside of you as Johnny slumps against you, panting in your ear. 

“Ah’ll be so good tae ya,” he promises in a rasping growl, shoving his head into the crook of your neck. Gyves close around you as he nuzzles his mouth into your flesh, licking at the sweat that beads on your skin. 

“All mine. All fuckin’ mine—” The confessional is tainted with the sickness that leaks from the craggy hole chiselled into the side of his head. Obsessive devotion hewing ruinous dogma into the fibrils of your head. Tenderised, softened, by the blunt, unyielding touch of his hand. A slurry that this polluted notion slips inside, tainting your resolve until it's thickened into his whim. His wants. 

You sob into his chest as he wraps you up in his arms, shackled against the man who carved a place inside of you just wide enough for himself to fit. Who spat poison in the hollow crevasses, and called it absolution. Love. 

All you can do is heave through corrupted lungs as he smothers you under the weight of his madness. 

“No’ gonnae let anyone touch ye. Ah'll kill anyone who tries to tae take ye away from me, doe—”

The conviction in his tone is bound in steel. In feverish blue. 

“Ah’ll take care’a ye,” he rasps, voice thick in his throat. “Donnae worry about a thing, doe.”

“Will you let me go?”

He doesn't answer at first. Just digs his nose into your hairline, breathing in deep until the wide breadth of his chest expands across your back. Mulling it over, maybe. Coming up with an excuse for his behaviour. Something to negotiate with on reasons why you shouldn't call the police the moment he does. 

And for a moment, a startling, terrible moment, there's hope. The assurance wells on your tongue. Some unfathomable amalgamation of please and i’ll never tell. Maybe you were going to tell him he was an honest man who did something bad. That there was still good within him. All of those hideous clichès bubble up through the cracks—

But it's all dashed when his hand drops down from its perch beneath your bare breasts, sliding over your skin until it curls possessively over your lower belly. 

He breathes out and the hope inside you is snuffed under the gale of delusion, his obsession. “Why would ah do a thing like that?” He prompts, and the genuine confusion in his voice makes you shiver, as if the idea of it is so outlandish, so absurd, it negates everything he'd done to get to this point. You feel hollow. But not—

Not empty. 

As if he hears the thought thundering in the ruins of your mind, he presses a tender kiss to your temple that you think is meant to be soothing. Shushing you softly when you begin to shake. “After it took me this long to find ye, doe. Am no’ lettin’ ye go fer the world, ken. Yer mine. All mine.”

And then he closes his jowls around your throat. 

Time feels artificial here. 

You wake up several hours later, groggy and disoriented, but the sun doesn't seem like it moved from where it was perched last night at all. Fixed in place. Lost in some strange, eternal twilight zone where the sun is a warden, watching you tirelessly through the window. 

Cardboard cutout hung amongst the stars.

Your ankle aches horribly—an agonising throb. You must have turned in your sleep, jostled it. You're further away from the spot you were last night, too. Rolled over in your sleep, maybe. The burn brings tears to your eyes that you swallow down with a groan. 

As you awkwardly settle your leg in a way that hurts slightly less than it did before, you let cognisance slip back in to keep your mind off of the horrible ache that tremors through your bones. Your neck. 

Between your thighs—

It's then that you hear Johnny. 

He's whistling in the kitchen. You peer out through the crack in the door, catching the broad expanse of his naked back as he works over the stove. Flexing. Muscles bunching. He hums a tune you can't recognise as he scrapes the spatula over the cast iron pan. 

His grey sweats sit low on his hips. The divots above the hem—dimples of Apollo, you recall—are stark against the hollow ravine of his spine. You can't help but stare. Gawk. Limned in the soft light of the morning sun that spills through the open window, he looks almost ethereal. Unreal. Like something out of a magazine and not the middle of nowhere in Canada where the sun doesn't set this time of year. 

He feels surreal. A man too good to be true. All sculpted musculature that looks like it could just as well be handmade by an amalgamation of both David’s by Michelangelo and Gian Lorenzo Bernini. All sharp, angled lines; beautiful in their fluidity. 

It's unfair, you think suddenly. To be stuck with a man you feel nauseous thinking about but can’t seem to take your eyes off of. Some paradoxical madness. Retribution for a time in a past life where you swindled fate and got away unscathed. All of your karmic sins pile down on top of you as the events last night flicker past, drenched in seafoam. Ghosts linger in the cracks; in memories. 

The phantom weight of something slung over your waist, knotted tight between your breasts. Scorching heat glued to your spine. A heavy hand cradling your lower belly. Words whispered into your nape—

He turns, then. Catches your eye like he knew it was there the whole time. Stands there like the picture of ease, of a satiated man puttering around a small space while his sweetheart lounged in the bed, lazing the day away. 

Like this wasn’t illegal. Immoral. He treats you like a lover even though you’d only met less than a day ago—

And already his cum was drying on your inner thighs, thick and sticky. His madness pooling in your head, words uttered into your ear about this cabin he has back home, back in Scotland. He’ll take you there, he said. It’s time he came home, he thinks. His head is on straight again, and he finally feels like he can breathe without shattering into a million pieces—

(He put your hands on his head last night, palm cradling the ugly scar on his temple, and whispered, fervent and insane, ye keep ma head together, doe. Ye make me feel whole again—)

Knows a man, he told you. A good bloke who’d help him get you home, too. 

His smile is bright. Blinding.

“Mornin’, doe. Ah made breakfast.” 

[dotster001]

Meeting Their Future Kids With You

Summary: Vil/Idia/Crewel/Crowley/Malleus/Rook x gn! Reader. A child suddenly appears. And it seems to have a connection to you? Requested by @stygianoir

A/N: It's in my pinned post, and I've mentioned this in a couple posts, but if this is the first of my stuff you've read, I view NRC as an actual college, so reader here is 18+. If it makes you more comfy, imagine it as grad school age.

CW: spreading my asexual Malleus agenda, especially now that I've been spoiled for the fact that the dragon lays an egg and all it needs is love to hatch. ASEXUAL MALLEUS CAN NOW BE CANON Y'ALL!!!! Anyways...his kid is the only one with physical descriptors, so do with that what you will 😅

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Something was wrong. There was a presence at Ramshackle that shouldn't be there. Could it be? Could someone be trying to steal you from him? No! He had only just started courting you! It wasn't fair. 

He poofed into your sitting room and froze. 

You were snuggling what looked like…a small version of him?

You looked up and your jaw dropped.

"Wait, I thought this was you!" You looked back down at the kid who giggled and made grabby hands at Malleus.

"Daddy!"

Ah! Yes, he understood now. Draconia genes were strong. This child clearly was barely old enough to even hold a human form, it was not out of the realm of possibility that it had accidentally used a time travel spell. Perhaps that was even the child's unique magic.

He walked over to the child in your arms, scooped it up, and gave it a soft kiss between the two tiny horns emerging from their head.

"It's wonderful to see you, but it's time to go home, little one."

The child nodded sagely and vanished in a puff of green smoke. You looked at him in complete confusion, but he simply laughed, repeating his kiss, but this time to your forehead.

He knew you were his soulmate.

He knew with a single glance. The familiarity the twin girls before him held in their gazes, the way they carried themselves, the hats on their heads. Everything screamed his influence.

And though that didn't make any sense, Rook knew his eye and his instincts were never wrong.

But there was something about the girls that was distinctly…..

"Rook! Hi- aw shit, please tell me you didn't kidnap some kids!"

So distinctly you.

The two girls shared what, to anyone but Rook, would seem like an unsettling smile as you approached the silent scene.

"Non non, they are just passing through, oui, petites fleur's?"

"Oui," they said simultaneously, grinning at you, their eyes taking in your every facial twitch.

"Uh, okay? Relatives of yours?"

"One could say that."

All three of them laughed, leaving you confused and a little frightened.

It was a normal day like any other. Searching for Epel who had once again fled his lessons.

And he had found him in the worst possible place. A mud pile with an already very muddy teenage girl.

Epel splashed the girl with a childish giggle, and she laughed hysterically.

"Papa was right, you were crazy!" She giggled making a mud ball and throwing it at him.

He dodged and it hit Vil.

"Ah shit," she whispered under her breath. But after a second of reflection, she grinned. "Wait, why am I scared? You're not the boss of me."

Vil glared, and she suddenly looked apologetic again.

Both Epel and the girl stared at the ground, completely avoiding eye contact.

"What school are you from?" Vil snapped at the girl.

She snickered but said nothing.

"Who do I report you to?"

She laughed louder. "Nah, I don't have to tell you shit."

"Language," he snapped, and tears filled her eyes.

"It was all uncle Epel's fault. I told him I didn't want to play in the mud, but he made me do it!"

"You absolute rat!" Epel shouted, picking up some mud and preparing to throw it.

Vil cast a quick spell, freezing both of you in place. He stormed over and snatched each of your wrists, preparing to storm off with the two trouble makers in tow, when he saw the shimmering gold bracelet on your wrist. Engraved on it was L/N-Schoenheit.

He stared for a moment, then groaned.

"Epel, remind me to never let you around my future child."

"He's my godfather," the girl grinned impishly, and Vil felt a part of himself die.

"Excuse me, I'm looking for my dad. You look like you could be related to him."

Idia knew he shouldn't have left his room today. All he wanted was a snack, and to maybe see you if you happened to not be in a class right now, and now this extroverted teenager was asking about his dad.

What the absolute fuck?

He quickly pulled out his ipad, typing something about how anyone related to him wasn't worth finding, when the twerp yanked the iPad out of his hands.

"Nevermind, I figured it out," the kid snorted. "Hi dad!"

Idia started stuttering. Not only was this twerp an extroverted teen who stole his iPad, he was also insane.

"Nah, nah, not today, not today…" Idia started muttering under his breath.

The kid rolled his eyes.  

"Forgot about this part. Guess they really did change you for the better," he started typing something on his watch, and a hologram popped up, showing the kid, you, and Idia…? Your and Idia's faces were a bit more lined than they were right now but….it was definitely you.

He stared at the hologram, his hair turning a bright red. 

"Oh! Hey Idia!" Your voice called from behind him.

He turned and waved to you shyly, then turned back to the teen. But he was gone.

And the damn boy stole his iPad.

If his hair wasn't already dyed, those two freshmen would have given him gray hair by now.

Once again, they'd made a potion explode in his classroom. And once again, the fallout would be a pain to clean up.

Where you had once sat was a small child. A small child who was looking at him expectantly.

"Well?" She asked.

At first he had assumed this small child was your child form. But no. She looked nothing like you. Though, she did have a similar glint in her eye.

"Who are you?" He asked softly, not wishing to scare the child with the rage that was building up inside him. He'd told you again and again that your friends were trouble, and now look where it got you.

Wait. Where exactly were you?

Before the girl could speak, a red smoke filled the room, and a him with a few more wrinkles appeared, dragging you by the wrist. Your face was covered in a vicious pout.

"I already told them," future Crewel said, eying the freshmen with a vicious glare. "No need to repeat it."

He opened his arms in front of the little girl, a warm smile taking over his features, as the girl climbed into his arms, snuggling into him. He pointed at you and the freshman one more time, said, "Behave." And vanished into red smoke.

Present day Crewel pinched the bridge of his nose, and pointed at you.

"He already said it," you snapped,punching Ace in the shoulder for good measure.

"Morning dad."

"Morning," Crowley muttered tiredly as he sipped his coffee.

Then he choked on it. There should be no one in his office right now. And there should be no one calling him dad.

He looked over and saw a kid who was somewhere between the age of 10 and 13 sorting through his stack of paperwork.

"Pardon me, but do you mind explaining what you're doing?"

The kid looked up and raised a brow in confusion.

"Um, morning paperwork?" He laughed nervously. "Wait did you forget that….uh, nevermind, I'll just go then."

The kid hastily made the papers into a pile, grabbed a backpack, and started to hustle out of the office. Only to be stopped when he bumped into you as you were storming into the office.

"Crowley! You promised you'd fix my goddamn roof!"

"Dad said I wasn't grounded anymore!"

Both of you shouted over the top of each other, and then stared in confusion.

The kid sprinted out of the office, knocking you over in the process.

Dire, meanwhile, released a delighted giggle, his face feeling warm as he grinned at you with a lovesick grin. Only to be annoyed as you brought up your roof again.

"If you excuse me, I have other things to attend to. I assure you that child will only cause trouble."

He ran out of his own office, no intention of actually finding his future son, only intending to hide from you.

Too bad you could always see through him, and were right on his tail.

[lokiswifeduh]

Long Night

Pairings - Roommate!tfatws!Bucky x Fem!Roommate!Reader

Summary - You've been stood up twice in a row now. Bucky is tired of seeing you disappointed. So he takes you on a date.

Warnings - angst, being stood up, angry/annoyed bucky

Notes - I'm horrible at summaries, I know!! This happened to me a couple days ago, wishing I had a Bucky to take me on a date in Brooklyn right about now! Not proofread so lmk if there are any mistakes! Thank you for reading loves!!

WC - 1,750

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"Whatcha gettin' ready for, doll?" Bucky leaned on your bedroom doorframe, watching you straighten your hair in the mirror on top of your dresser.

"I have a date." You smiled, not noticing the slight drop in Bucky's smile.

"Oh, with anyone I know?"

You shook your head. "His name's Nash. Someone Sam set me up with," You explained. "He's supposed to pick me up in twenty minutes."

Bucky internally rolled his eyes. The guys Sam hung around with were nice, yes. However, he never got the guts to take you out on the date you deserved. A date with him.

"Are you sure you want him picking you up?" Bucky asked, making you look back in confusion. "I mean you don't know him that well... You could meet him there or uh, I'll drop you off." You let out a small laugh, "Yeah Buck, I'll just have my male roommate drop me off at a date, that'll go over well."

Bucky shrugged. He walked away from your bedroom to grab a beer from the fridge before sitting on the couch. He turned on whatever channel didn't require him to use the remote too much before slouching into the cushions.

Twenty minutes passed by when you slipped out of your bedroom, shutting the door behind you.

"Wow, doll. You.." Bucky's eyes widened slightly, "You look great."

You grinned, looking down at your outfit. It was basic but it was the most comfortable yet fashionable outfit you had. Black flared leggings with a sage green sweater and some white sneakers. It was simple yet appropriate for a late-night-diner date.

And to top it all off your makeup had cooperated for once. Both eyebrows looked like twins and not sisters. Your highlight was perfect, shimmering, but not too much. And you had the perfect lipgloss that made your lips look sunkissed. Perfect.

"He should be here any minute!" You sprayed some perfume, your favorite vanilla scent, and went to sit in the armchair across from the couch.

Bucky hummed, keeping his eyes on the Tv, taking another sip of beer.

However, twenty more minutes went by and Nash hadn't texted you, hadn't called, and hadn't shown up. Bucky was starting to feel bad and you could tell by the pity looks he kept throwing your way.

"He uhm," Bucky cleared his throat, "Maybe he hit traffic. You know, with it being New York and everything." You nodded, trying to hold onto at least a small bit of hope. "Yeah, traffic." But then another forty minutes went by and he still hadn't even texted.

And then another hour.

And another hour.

By the time Bucky finally turned off the Tv it was three and a half hours since the time Nash was supposed to come pick you up.

You were still sitting in the armchair, having dozed off with a couple tears streaked down your face. Ruining your once-perfect makeup.

Bucky sighed, silently cursing Sam even though he knew it wasn't his fault.

"Alright, doll," Bucky whispered, placing his metal arm behind your back, and lifting your legs with his right. You groaned awake, holding your phone in your palm as you wiped your cheek. "What time is it?" Your eyes shoot open, "Did he show up?" Bucky placed you in your bed, handing you one of his t-shirts you had stolen a while ago. "No, doll. I'm sorry." You stripped your shirt off to change as Bucky went into your bathroom, grabbing a couple of makeup wipes.

"Here." He softly spoke, hating your distraught and disappointed expression.

You wiped your makeup off, shedding a couple more tears in the process. The tears dripped from your cheek to the grey henley Bucky had given you. "It's okay. Maybe he was just busy." Bucky wanted to roll his eyes. He wanted to tell you that any respectful man, any gentleman wouldn't have done what Nash did to you. But he kept his mouth shut, opting to hum in your favor, and threw the makeup wipes in the trash when your face was completely bare.

"Goodnight, Doll." He placed a kiss on the crown of your head as you hummed in response. "Goodnight, Buck."

---

A couple days later, you finally got a text back from Nash.

"Bucky I was right!!" You came sliding into the kitchen, your socks making it easy to ice-skate on the smooth wood floor.

Bucky chuckled at your ability to skid so gracefully without falling. He had tried it once but vowed to never do it again after he slid into the dining room table. You would never let him live it down.

"Right about what, doll?" Bucky flipped the pancake, adding some vanilla to the dough.

"About Nash! He actually was busy!" Bucky quirked an eyebrow. Wondering why he had waited this long to text you back. Six days to be exact. "Did he say with what?" Bucky turned back to making breakfast.

"He said he got busy with work, and that something at work pissed him off so he didn't wanna see me while he was upset." You explained what Nash had told you.

Bucky had never wanted to hit someone in the face so hard.

Well, actually that wasn't true. But he did want to sock Nash in the face for standing you up and giving you a half-ass excuse days later.

"I mean that explains things, yeah..." Your brows furrowed at Bucky's flat tone. "Do you not believe it?" Bucky sighed, pulling the milk and eggs from the fridge as you sat on the countertop. "It's not that I don't believe it, it's just that it kinda seems like he forgot and or didn't wanna see you so he made up an excuse a little less than a week later to not seem like a dick." You nodded, taking in the information. Bucky couldn't sense your reaction quite yet, seeing how you were just staring at the ground with your hands in your lap, swinging your legs in the air.

"I mean, I'm seeing him tonight. If everything goes well after then I'll know it really was true."

"You're seeing him again?" You nod, "But this time I'm meeting him at the fourth corner Bakery. And I'm meeting him earlier this time, around noon."

Bucky looked over at the clock, seeing it was already 10:45. "Well you better go get ready," He said almost reluctantly, "Breakfast will be done before you need to leave."

You smiled, hopping off the countertop as you gave Bucky a quick kiss on the cheek. "Thanks, Buck. You're the best!"

He smiled, but then remembered he's only making you breakfast before you go on a date with a guy who's already stood you up once. Rolling his eyes, he scrambled the eyes, listening to your music in the other room.

---

You had already left for your date three hours ago when Bucky decided to go over to see Sam. His excuse was wanting to discuss the next mission they were due to go on in a week. But he just didn't want to sit at home all day, thinking about how you were on a date with another guy.

However, before he could reach Sam's he had to pass by the bakery where you were meeting Nash.

Yet when he looked through the window, there you were, sitting all alone at a table for two, eating a piece of cheesecake. No Nash in sight.

An internal war started in Bucky's mind. Should he go in and see if you were okay? Or should he believe Nash was in the bathroom and you were just sitting by yourself for a minute or two?

But then he noticed the solemn look on your face. The way your fork poked at the half-eaten cake. And that was your favorite kind. Bucky mumbled a soft curse, opening the door to the bakery and making his way over to you.

Without words, he sat down, his gloved hand resting on the table in front of your plate. You kept your head down, not quite looking at Bucky but knowing he was there.

"He didn't show, again." You mumbled. If Bucky didn't have super soldier hearing he doubted he could've heard what you had said.

"I know, doll. I'm sorry." You finally looked up, tears in your eyes which made Bucky's heart clench. "Why me, Buck? Why am I the one who's alone?" Bucky stayed silent, knowing you needed to vent.

"Am I unlovable? Is that what it is? Why does every single one of my friends get to find the one? Get to fall in love, get married, and have kids and I'm the one without someone?!" Your outburst made some other customers look over in concern.

You groaned, resting your head on your hand and hiding your face from the rest of the bakery. "I- uh, I'm not sure, doll. But I know one thing.. you're not unlovable. You just haven't found the one who wants to take the effort to show you how effortless you are to love."

You looked up at Bucky, fresh tears gleaming in your eyes. You had never seen him look so vulnerable before. He usually grumped his way through emotions. But not with you, not anymore.

He gave you a sad smile, clearing his throat before he stood, "Y'know what, doll. Let's go." He held out his hand. You looked around, "Where are we going?" Bucky took your palm in his gloved hand, "It's a surprise." You laughed, before standing and throwing the rest of your soggy cheesecake away. "You know how I feel about surprises." "Okay, I'll give you a hint." Bucky opened the door for you, making sure to walk on the side of the road with the bustling cars and traffic. Bucky called a taxi, opening the door for you. "You're about to have the best date of your life." You stared at him in awe before laughing and climbing in the taxi. Bucky's knees barely fit as he scooted in next to you. The driver asked where to go as Bucky licked his lips, "Brooklyn, please." You smiled, "Brooklyn?"

Bucky nodded, throwing an arm around your shoulder. "I may be old but I still know some good spots to take my best girl on a date." A blush rose to your cheeks as you looked over to him. "Your best girl?" Bucky nodded, picking up your hand with his metal one before leaving a soft kiss on your knuckles. "Always and forever, doll."

---

masterlist

[flamingpudding]

Fictober23 Prompt: 3 - "Okay, show me."

Fandom: DPxDC

Rating: G

Warnings: -

"So… first time getting kidnapped?"

Tim blinked at the teen that was tied to a wall right across from him. He marveled for a a moment at how similar the two looked and even thought that he could see how the other teen could have gotten mistakenly kidnapped in his place. Though if they had already kidnapped him then why did they end up kidnapping him again?

"No, getting kidnapped kinda comes with the name and status." Tim finally answered and the other kid nodded sagely as if he understood. "Usually they are a little more incompetent."

He moved his wrists a little causing the strange silver bracelets they had slapped on his wired before chaining him to the wall so that they would cause a rattling noise, making the other teen look at them with a raised eyebrow.

"So first time getting kidnapped by the GIW then."

"GIW?"

"Guys in White, or well Ghost Investigation Ward, a government organization." The other teen explained with a shrug. "Usually they are incompetent. Aside from a couple of burns from getting shot, this is the first time they actually managed to chain me in a while. Normally they would have messed up by now but it's interesting that they even manage to nap you too."

Now Tim raised an eyebrow. That was news to him. To think there was a governmental organization that was actively abducting civilians for who knows what. Damn, he could see how B would not be happy once he told them about that.

"Sorry btw." Tim blinked up at the other teen in confusion, who chuckled in return. "They probably kidnapped you thinking you were my double or something. We look similar enough for them to think that."

"Wait…" Tim's eyes widened in realization. "They kidnapped me because I look like you? Not the other way around?"

"Uh yeah, why would I be kidnapped because of you?"

"Tim Drake-Wayne. Does that ring a bell?" Tim huffed only to watch how the other teen furrowed his eyebrows as if deep in thoughts before shrugging.

"In fact no it doesn't. But I don't keep up with high society, it helps pissing of the fruitloop whenever he drags me to 'meet important people' and I actively call them false names no matter how often he introduces them."

Tim's eye twitched. While that is fun, this was also the first time he met someone who hadn't heard of his name before in some way or form. In the end just let out a sigh.

"So what now? We wait to get rescued or will they release us after some time?" Well he had already tipped off his family, so it was probably only a matter of time until one of his siblings burst in to play knight in shining armor. He just hoped it wasn't Jason again, or he wouldn't shut up about having saved him for another month.

"Oh we can wait, but they won't release us. It's probably better if we get out on our own."

"Really? And how do you plan for us to get out of the handcuffs?" Well Tim did have a lock pin hidden in his jacket and some small sized tools stuffed into the sole of his shoes but with his hands chained above his head it was a little difficult to get them. But his feet were not chained so with just a bit of body twisting he could-

"Oh the handcuffs are no problem. They can be easily removed by overloading them."

"Overloading?" Tim arched an eyebrow, now the cuffs did not look like your normal brand he can admit that but how was the other going to do that unless he had some secret electric tool stored on him.

"Yea, overloading. It's pretty simple. These look like the same Brant they tried to cuff me with a year ago. It's funny how they look like they haven't learned a single thing in all these years."

"Really now?" Tim stared at the other teen unimpressed. "Okay, show me. How are you going to overload them with no tools around?"

"Easy." The other teen smirked at him and Tim's eyes widen as he saw the others hands emitting a green light before the cuffs on his wrist sparked and then fell off. Okay, noted the other teen was a Meta.

"My name is Danny by the way." Danny grinned as he rubbed his wrists before getting up and walking over to Tim to do the same to his cuffs. Tim rubbed his his own wirsts, carefully examining them for any time of injury only to look up just in time to watch Danny reach into his own chest. With wide eyes he watched Danny sticking out his tongue while one of his hands was going through his body as if he was looking for something.

"Aha! I knew I stuck them in my body somewhere for a situation like this!" Okay there was so much to unpack from this sentence alone but before Tim could even ask a single question Danny pulled out a lockpick set from his chest and proceeded to pick at their cell door.

"I have so many questions." Tim muttered, still watching the other teen.

"Well I can probably answer some of them once we are out of here. It's the least I can do after you get kidnapped because of me." Danny grinned as the lock he was working on clicked and he swung the door open. "Wanna talk over some coffee? You look like you need some."

"This is definitely not what I expected when I said 'show me'." Tim muttered once more walking passed Danny out of their cell, eager to leave this place.

"Yea well that the more civilian friendly things I can do." Danny followed with a grin. "Though I do have some other tricks I could have used too."

"You talk like a hero." Tim thought aloud, eyeing the teen and how they were holding themselves. Nothing about this teen screamed innocent civilian anymore, well aside from the obvious Meta abilities. He also marbled about the fact that they basically just walked out of the warehouse they had been holding. Huh looked like these GIW guys were really as incompetent as Danny had mentioned earlier.

"Yea, well I am a retired Hero." Great now Tim got more to look into in regards to Danny. Oh that reminded him, he probably should tell his family that he was no longer kidnapped… but that could probably wait until after he got his coffee with Danny. What was the worst that could happen? Red Hood storming an empty building. Oh well, it would be a good exercise for his brother then.

[m1d-45]

i love your sagau/imposter au fics so much (esp kazuha’s),, do you think nahida would be able to sense if the creator isnt an imposter because of her having access to Irminsul and being able to see if there are records of them? anyways okok so uh hear me out, maybe the creator tries to seek safety in sumeru while they’re being hunted? sorry if this is a lengthy ask ekwjkwm anyways thanks for reading, ur amazing !

sandy refuge

word count: 3.4k

-> warnings: spoilers for the final sumeru archon quest

-> gn reader (you/yours)

taglist: @samarill || @thenyxsky || @valeriele3 || @shizunxie || @boba-is-a-soup || @yuus3n || @esthelily || @turningfrogsgay || @cupandtea24 || @genshin-impacts-me || @chaoticfivesworld || @raaawwwr

< masterlist >

sumeru was a deadly nation.

liyue was guarded by the adepti, and inazuma’s storms tore the sea around the archipelago to shreds, but sumeru…

sumeru, the land of wisdom, headed by academics and led by scholars and sages. the nation split in two, lush forests barely a stones throw from barren deserts, believers of two (three?) separate gods walking side by side through the city. for a nation so divided, it was rare to get everybody to agree on something, every decision inevitably and invariably leaving some group of people unsatisfied.

and yet, there they were, united under one flag. eremites and the matra, the beige robes of the desert dwellers shifting in the wind besides the glittering armor of the akademiya’s soldiers, spears and swords aligned towards the same target.

it would be beautiful, if only you weren’t the one they rallied against.

you didn’t know how long you had been running when you managed to work your way past the wall, nor how long you had managed to stumble across sand dunes before finding your current oasis.

literally. trees swayed around a large pool of clear water, thick grass cushioning your knees as you barely hesitated before cupping some in your hands and drinking. it was blessedly cool, and you were tempted to swim in it and let it soothe the continuous heat from the desert sun. sadly, you didn’t have a spare set of clothes, and you weren’t keen on stripping when the matra could storm the place at any moment.

or the eremites. or the corp of thirty. or literally anybody else, since you’ve apparently been declared public enemy number one.

you splashed some water on your face and over your head, goosebumps rising where a drop raced beneath the collar of your shirt. how water was so cold when the sand was so hot, you didn’t know, but you weren’t going to complain.

after drinking a few more handfuls of the water, you finally looked around. there was a large spire of stone next to the oasis, flanked by large trees, with a thankfully abandoned hilichurl hut beside it.

you try not to think about how an archer would have had an easy shot as you were drinking.

at the base of a few of the trees is something green, and you remember the nuts that grew in the desert. you were too wary of the henna berries and the cacti they grew on to try and eat those, but you distinctly remember these being used in a few recipes.

all you could do was hope they were edible raw.

you stood—your vision blurred, the ground tilting, but you ignored it—and walked around the oasis, inspecting the green and hoping it wasn’t a fungus.

good news, it wasn’t. bad news, it was the husk of one of the nuts, hollow without any of the fruit inside. fresh, by the looks of it, the green leaves squishing instead of crumbling when you kicked at them.

great.

you sat on the curved trunk of one of the trees, holding up a hand to shade your eyes as you looked up. you could see another nut, hanging off the top of a tree, but.. the bark of the trees were smooth, and any of your athletic abilities were worn away by exhaustion and malnutrition.

you let your head drop and tried not to focus on your hunger, instead inspecting the mix of sand and grass beneath your feet. sand and grass. all of sumeru, represented right at your feet. hot, slippery sand, and cool, spiky grass. the desert and the forest, two wildly different ecosystems, and yet… both drove you out.

you tried not to cry, to push away the helplessness of the situation, but you couldn’t. what had you done, you wondered, for your very face to cause such an uproar? for two separate groups of people, divided in location, name, and faith to ally in their shared hatred of you? if somebody asked you what the millelith, matra, and eremites had in common about six months ago, you couldn’t have answered. you’d have thought about it, maybe, but drawn a blank outside of ‘defenders.’

but what were they defending? and how were you a threat?

when the first tear fell, so did something else.

you jumped at the dense thud, digging your nails—overgrown, bitten at, broken—into the bark as you searched for the source of the noise.

a large fruit had fallen, the one you were eyeing earlier by the looks of it. it sat atop the empty husk of another, magically fallen from the tree by seemingly nothing.

you weren’t going to complain.

you slid off the tree, reaching for the nut, grabbing the stem and pulling, but dropped it just as fast. a fungus was standing just behind it, large orange eyes looking up at you.

you were frozen. would it attack you? was it trying to eat? did they even need to? could you get sick from fungus spores? even if you couldn��t, getting hurt wasn’t worth the meal…

the fungus tilted to one side, then the other, bumping the large fruit towards you.

it… was giving it back?

you stared, but the fungus didn’t move. when you carefully tugged at the nut, slowly drawing it closer so you could properly pick it up, it didn’t move. it just watched you, the rim of its cap slightly falling into its eyes.

you sat back on the tree, pulling it into your lap. the outer leaves were coarse, softening as you pulled away the many layers. there was a high chance some of the inner leaves were edible, but you didn’t want to take chances. the fruit itself was a pale green, easily tearing under your fingers. it was soft, with the barest edge of sweetness that had you prying up more. it wouldn’t make for a full meal, but it was certainly far better than nothing.

you checked on the fungus every once in a while, but it just stood there. by your guess, it was the floating anemo kind, but where was its group? fungi rarely appeared alone, and part of you felt bad.

(felt bad. for a fungus. you’re in dirty, torn clothes and on the run for your life, and you still find the empathy for a fungus. at least you knew your morals were still intact.)

you offered a piece of the nut to the fungus, but it didn’t react. instead it turned, floating into the air and drifting away.

…alright.

you try to eat the fruit slowly, as to not make yourself sick, taking breaks to sip more water from the lake to dim the sweetness. you didn’t know how long the fruit would stay good now that you’d opened it, but you were trying to enjoy it. its not as if you were overflowing with excess, and you likely couldn’t linger here long. you don’t even know why you resorted to the desert anyway.. between cyno, the ruins, scorpions, the primal constructs.. to say it was dangerous was an understatement. even if you made it to the far west, the pari were there, and you didn’t think they would take too kindly to you. fontaine wouldn’t be much better, provided you somehow crossed the sea around it…

nowhere was safe. you supposed that was the point, that nobody would give you refuge, but it still hurt. you didn’t think you’d ever land in this situation when you first downloaded the game..

whatever. you’re not going to go down that path for the nth time. you hold the remains of the nut in one arm as you stand, picking off chunks as you walk toward the hilichurl hut. with any luck there would be something useful inside, or at least be a safe place to rest temporarily.

the camp looks like it’s been clear recently, which is both good and bad. good, because neither hilichurls nor patrols should come by here for a bit, but bad because it lowers your chances of finding anything useful. there’s no arrowheads or vegetables, not even embers in the fire pit, all the supply boxes long since broken.

at least it’s shelter. at least you had food today, and (hopefully) clean water. small wins, small wins…

you gather your strength and begin to drag all the rubble into the hut, using what was left of their training dummies to make a hollow pile. hopefully it would just look like trash to anyone walking by, and could maybe keep you warm. the scraps of furs littered over the camp were matted with something you didn’t want to think about, so this was your best bet.

man, you missed your bed.

you returned to the oasis for more water, scrubbing off some of the dirt from your arms and face. you wouldn’t be clean for long, what with the dirt floor you’d picked as your shelter, but it felt nice. a topical fix for a bone deep wound.

you didn’t try to clean your clothes, eyeing the sun dipping in the sky. having wet clothes wouldn’t help at night, even if it might feel good. perhaps tomorrow? yes, tomorrow. tomorrow you could scrub at your shirt—*blood doesn’t clean easily without soap*—and try to undo some of the knots in your hair, maybe even use leaves and some of the scraps of twine around the camp to bring some water with you.

tomorrow. you got this. surely.

(just ignore the fact that you don’t know where in the desert you are. or how easy it would be to get lost, or dehydrate. nope. this is a perfectly fine and normal situation that you have an okay amount of control over. you got this. you have to.)

you return to the hut, retrieving the other half of your fruit and taking it with you into your pitiful shelter. at least you didn’t have to worry about rain…

it was only slightly cramped beneath the pile of junk, but you had enough room for you and your food. you laid there for a long time, occasionally peeling off pieces to eat. you didn’t know how much was left, and you didn’t think about it, distracting yourself by thinking about tomorrow. if you were clever with some sticks you could fashion some wider soles for your shoes to get more grip on the sand, or maybe a hat to keep from burning… but there was water and food to worry about, but the area along the wall was certainly dangerous, but it might be worth it if it meant you lived a little longer…

you fell asleep at some point, the faint sweetness of your dinner lingering on your tongue.

normally, waking up to someone barely a foot from your person would be unsettling. in your situation, it was terrifying.

you immediately pushed yourself back, crawling backwards away from nahida. she was kneeling, seeming surprised at your actions. you almost wondered how she was out here, and in your survey of the area, it clicked.

you weren’t in the hut anymore. you’d missed it in your fear, but you were lying on grass, in a small meadow. you didn’t pay too much attention to it though, putting a hand to your chest to try and calm your heart.

“just a dream,” you breathed, and nahida’s expression fell. not into anger, more.. sadness?

“i’m sorry if i startled you.” her voice was soft, but flat, motions stiff as she stood up and dusted off her dress.

what a weird dream. first you’re lucid, then she’s here… maybe it was wishful thinking. maybe your brain had finally had enough.

“it’s fine,” you said, taking another look around the field. tall trees arched high above you, the bushes and ferns between them reminding you of the rainforest. in the center were three chairs, with various plates laid out on the table between them. you stood, automatically wiping for any grass caught on you, only to find that you were actually wearing clean clothes again—one of your favorite outfits, actually.

you mostly ignored nahida as you walked to the table, looking over the various dishes. you recognized a few as sumeru recipes, but not all of them, deciding to pick at a bowl of fruit instead. you’re not sure how dreams work here—you haven’t had many since coming to teyvat—but it feels safer to stick with a food you’ve actually tried before.

(you ignore the nut from the oasis. calculated risk.)

“i hope they’re to your liking?” nahida’s voice is hesitant as she comes to your side, sitting in one of the chairs. you don’t do the same.

“i’m surprised i remember so many of these,” you say instead, looking over the sheer variety of food laid out. your subconscious has done well.. almost a bit too well.

“eat. you need the energy.”

“i’ll just miss them in the morning, and it’s not like they’ll give me any actual nutrition.”

“…please, my god.”

your head whips to her in an instant, the fruit falling from your hand as if it was poison. it could be, considering everything.

even after all these months, you’d let your guard down. in front of the one god who had control over dreams, you ate of her food and showed that you were weak.

nahida raises her hands, and you have half a mind to grab a knife off the table. it wouldn’t do anything, but it would make you feel better. “it’s just me. there’s nobody else in this dream.”

you should have known better. “leave me alone.”

“i mean you no harm, i only-“

you put your hands over your ears and close your eyes, trying to make yourself wake up. you pictured the walls of the hut, of your makeshift shelter and the leaves of last night’s dinner. you pretend you can’t hear her voice, that the only sound is the whisper of the wind.

if only you’d remembered her powers quicker, or perhaps discovered yours sooner.

you don’t know how long it took you to break free from the dream, or if you managed to break it at all. you just knew that you woke up to the sounds of talking from outside your hut, the words were faint but still discernible from the wind. two voices, one soft and one rough, picking their way around the oasis.

you didn’t dare try to run, instead shifting some of the wood in your pile to cover the entrance. where could you even go if they found you? west was dangerous, east was deadly, north led you into either a sandstorm or a dead-end sea, and south was entirely uncharted, and that was assuming you even made it that far.

they came closer, and you reached for one of the smaller planks in your small shelter. it was still about the length of your forearm, and though the rest of the stack shifted, you felt a bit safer. maybe you could hide in a cave for a while until they left? no, that would mean you’d have to get enough of a lead to lose them, and you doubted you could run that fast.

“-abandoned.” there was a sound like a rock kicked against the side of the hut, covering the sound of your breath as you recognized the voice. “you sure this is the right place?”

wanderer.

“i’m certain, i saw it myself.”

and nahida. she probably tapped into your mind to see where you were trying to wake up to… it would be clever if your life wasn’t on the line.

footsteps drew ever closer, and it was getting hard to judge the distance. the hut was empty save for your little scrap pile, but how close was too close? could you even have a chance with wanderer’s skill? not to mention the dendro archon…

maybe you were doomed from the start. there was no good ending for you, just a constant delay of the fate that you dodged when you first set foot on this planet.

how long has it been? how much time have you borrowed? teyvat had ghosts, would you become one? would you return to earth? did your earth even exist anymore? this was not the time for this debate…

a shadow moved, and nahida’s voice was far closer than it was before. “divine one?”

you bit your cheek as to not laugh. ‘divine one.’ she already had a god, the one that had ordered this mess to begin with. the first person you ran into, ironically, who had on sight declared you a criminal. you didn’t want to be associated with that person at all, thank you. did she think that you thought you were the god? you wouldn’t be hiding if you did.

“buer. you’re talking to a pile of sticks.”

“i’m aware.” her voice grew quieter, like she’d turned around. “but we need to be patient.”

“there’s an easier way to do this, you know.”

“after all that’s happened? there’s no easy solution to this.”

“that’s not what i…” he sighed. “can i show you something?”

“what is it?”

the air hissed, your pile broken by a blade of wind down the middle. the anemo curved around you, acting as a shield as the wood splintered and flew. you quickly pushed yourself up, sitting against the wall and looking between the two of them. nahida looked terrified, and the shock on wanderer’s face is comical. looks like he didn’t expect you to actually be in there.

he removed his hat from his head, quickly dropping to one knee, nahida doing the same barely a moment after. “my god.. i apologize for my haste.”

pardon?

nahida lifted her head, meeting your eyes with a hand to her chest. “and i’m sorry for invading your dream earlier. i just wanted to find you, and when i noticed you were in sumeru..”

wanderer is too prideful to apologize to anybody he doesn’t absolutely need to, even for a plan.. jut what’s going on here?

you fix your attention on nahida and hope she’s not a good liar. “don’t you already have a god you follow?”

nahida flinched, looking away. “that… was a mistake. i should have trusted my instincts, and for that i’m sorry. i had no idea that my silence would lead to this…”

either she’s a really convincing actor, or she means it. given the severity of the situation, you don’t want to assume.

“if it helps…” wanderer’s hands tighten on his hat, and he bows his head further. “my anemo protected you. even if i did mean to cause harm, that is more than enough proof of your identity.”

“…so i’m supposed to believe you? just like that?”

nahida shook her head. “i understand your apprehension. it’s hard to trust someone after everyone else has betrayed you, and i don’t expect you to come with me to the sanctuary right away. aaru village is close by, though, and i was hoping you would be willing to go there..?”

some part of you still thinks it’s a trick, that there would be a swarm of matra waiting for you. but honestly… running is tiring, and nahida is kind. you want to believe her, even if it does end up going poorly. what else do you have to lose, really?

you drop your poor excuse for a weapon, briefly checking your hands for splinters before standing up. you kick aside the remains of your dinner and dust yourself off, walking forward. “alright. i’ll go with you.”

nahida beams.

[yuri-is-online]

When you're in a "trying to take care of yuu" competition but your opponent is ace trappola

Nah but fr the amount of voice lines of him being like: "I can't date anyone right now, I need to take care of you!" Uh sir???

LISTEEEEEEEEN ACE IS SUCH AN UNDERRATED CHARACTER. AND ACEYUU IS SUCH A SLEPT ON SHIP IN FAVOR OF THAT OTHER ONE IN NA YOU PEOPLE NEED TO WAKE UP ACE IS MORE LOYAL THAN ANYONE ELSE IN THE CAAAAAAAAAAAAST

*i am escorted from the premises*

People don't like him and think he's rude and don't get me wrong he is but... did we read the same words? Because Ace is there for Yuu when he can be. He fucking took the trip from the Queendom of Roses to Sage's Island because he thought Yuu was in trouble, he punches Riddle for insulting Yuu, he sees Yuu get a bit unsteady at Lili's going away part and IMMEDIATELY starts making the good bye rounds to get them out of there. That last one is such a big deal to me, if you have social anxiety a partner who knows when your battery is up and helps get you out of there is such a green flag you don't even know. Double so if they think your sick and need rest. He's a good friend and people need to stop hating on him because I will have a stroke if I see another "replaced" au where Ace decides to hate Yuu. Ace Trappola would not fucking do that. If you are in a competition with Ace Trappola to see who will take better care of Yuu? It isn't a competition unless your name is Deuce Spade.

>"I can't date anyone right now, I need to take care of you!" As a ship I really like aceyuu where Ace knows how he feels but is deliberately ignoring it. He has some "experience" dating so I think he doesn't fully understand that a relationship can be (scratch that should be) something involves a solid friendship. I have said it before and I will say it again, Ace friendzones himself. He makes his attraction to Yuu a joke because that's safer for him than the alternative. But he's not great at it, "three things cannot be hidden: coughing, poverty, and love." Ace's heart isn't on his sleeve, it's on his face. He blushes, flounders, and flusters but it's just so obvious that when Yuu is ready all they need to do is ask.

[agustdiv1ne]

.𖥔 ݁ ˖12:43 a.m. (m) — choi yeonjun

genre: smսt (minors/ageless blogs dni), angst for flavor, fluff, friends to lovers, alcohol consumption (so somewhat tipsy sex warning!!), this has more plot and is much longer than i initially expected but it is still very self-indulgent LOL

wc: 2.9k

“you should talk to him.” 

the sound of beomgyu's voice a concerningly close distance from your ear causes you to flinch, a bit of the drink in your hand sloshing over the side of the can and onto the already sticky floor. tearing your eyes away from yeonjun, you meet beomgyu's half-lidded gaze; he's drunk, painfully so — and a drunk beomgyu means a considerably more irritating beomgyu.

“why are you over here?” you say, waving your drink around the dark corner of the living room that you staked claim on earlier in the night after chaewon had bailed on you. “shouldn’t you be, like, making out with someone by now?”

“well, you looked miserable, so i decided to be a good friend ‘n come check on you first,” he grins, stumbling when he tries to lean closer and bar you from staring at the man across the room. with a huff, you shove him away and help situate himself against the wall next to you.

“my hero,” you deadpan, blocking out whatever half-baked words beomgyu spews out next in favor of watching yeonjun, your lips pursing as he laughs along with the group of guys surrounding him.

you must admit, he looks...amazing tonight. a light grey tank top allows you a perfect view of his muscle-thickened arms. loose-fitting jeans lay low on his hips, and you catch a peak of his toned stomach and the band of his boxers when he lifts a hand to high-five someone. the self-assured smirk on his lips has not left since you first spotted him. it's almost infuriating; you wonder how he seems so okay, uncaring, after what happened, while your life has all but fallen apart without his presence. you never knew how losing a close friend — okay, a close friend who you have not-so-platonic feelings for — could be so harrowing. until now. the urge to cry and run away battles with the gnawing impulse to stomp up to him and yell straight into his stupid fucking face. you bite the inside of your cheek.

the boy next to you flicks your forehead. “quit staring like a creep and go to talk to him.”

“um, no. i’m pretty sure he hates me now,” you reply, finally looking over at him. “we haven’t talked since last week.”

“since the incident,” beomgyu adds, nodding sagely, before he takes another large swig of the suspiciously bright green liquid in his cup. slouching further against the wall, you shoot him a scalding glare. in response, he simply laughs, the sound squeaky and borderline grating, as leans his head against your shoulder. 

it's quiet between the two of you for a few minutes, in which you stare at the small dents that have appeared on the can in your hand due to your unrelenting grip. you can feel the effects of the two drinks you have consumed beginning to kick in: your mind is a little less cluttered, your muscles releasing their built-up tension as warmth flows through your veins. you're still acutely aware of your surroundings — you are not as far-gone as beomgyu, that's for sure — but your situation does feel slightly less dire now that a bit of alcohol flows through your system.

“uh oh,” beomgyu mumbles over the music, leaning up to bring his mouth closer to your ear. “look who’s comin’ over.” glancing up, you find the very person you would rather not speak to making a beeline straight towards the two of you. the carefree expression he sported prior is long gone, replaced with furrowed brows and downturned lips. 

you sober up immediately. panicking, you shove beomgyu off of you, ignoring the quiet “oof!” he emits as collides with the wall. he scoffs. “what’re you doin’?”

“leaving,” you mutter, ignoring the slight blur to your vision as you push through the crowd toward the dimly lit hallway that you know contains a bathroom. 

without even turning around, you can tell that yeonjun is hot on your trail. you pray that the bathroom is unoccupied — and when you reach it, you luckily find that it is. slipping past the door as quickly as you can, aiming to slam the door and lock it, but a foot shoves it way past the jamb before you can fully execute your plan. you curse under your breath as yeonjun shoves his way inside, clicking the door shut behind him.

for a moment, you and him stare wordlessly at each other. in this light, you are able to see the light flush across his cheekbones from the alcohol, the dark roots of his hair that have grown out since you helped him dye it a couple weeks ago. being confronted by him in this manner makes both your heart ache and your blood boil.

“why are you here?” you spit, breaking the suffocating silence. his blank expression does not falter despite your venom-drenched tone. instead, he crosses his arms in front of him, his biceps bulging, and props himself against the wall across the counter that you presently lean on. 

“why was beomgyu so close to you?” he does not answer your question, rather asks one of his own, a slight slur to his words. red tinges the edge of your vision at his blatant disregard of your query. it’s none of his business, not after what he did. 

“i don’t think that really concerns you,” you decide to say. “why the fuck do you care, anyway?”

“you know why,” he prods, and the dull ache in your chest grows thorns, puncturing your lungs. your nails dig into your palms in an attempt to ground yourself. he seems to notice. 

“no, actually i don’t, yeonjun.” yeonjun. it’s his name, but it is scathing coming from your lips. jjun, jjunie, anything but yeonjun. please. “please, enlighten me as to why you care if my friend is touching me.”

“because i want it to be me instead.”

the dam holding your feelings back explodes.

“you want it to be you, huh?” you laugh humorlessly. “you kiss me, eat me out, fall asleep next to me, then what? throw our it all in the trash? act like i don’t exist? real fucking funny, yeonjun. what a great way to treat one of your closest friends.”

he gapes at you, silent, while you wait for him to say something, anything. taking his lack of response as your cue to leave, you reach for the doorknob, only for his hand to envelop yours. his warm chest collides with your cheek, and his arms wrap around your waist. he buries his nose into the crown of your head.

“i’m sorry,” you hear him murmur, his arms curling around you tighter, and you can’t find it within yourself to break away from his grip. “i was so fucking terrified that you thought that what happened last night was a mistake. that i would lose you forever, i,” his breath stutters in his chest. you feel it against your skin. “i don’t want to lose you. you mean too much to me for that to happen.” 

you push away from his chest, finding nothing but sincerity shining in his umber eyes. “why couldn’t you have just talked to me?” your next sentence tumbles out of your mouth before you can stop yourself. “don’t you know how long i’ve loved you?”

the gape of his mouth makes your heart race. you feel as if you have confessed something that you should not have. and yet you push forward. “yes, love. how could i ever possibly think that that was a mistake when it’s always ever been you?”

it takes him a few seconds to process your words, and you watch as his expression morphs from confused, to shocked, to...wait, is he smiling?

“can i kiss you?” he asks. the air vacates you lungs at the hopeful quirk of his lips. your resolve breaks and you allow a small nod. that’s all it takes for him to surge forward and his lips to envelope yours. it feels intrinsically different from the kisses you shared last week — no longer fueled by drunken lust and raging hormones, no teeth knocking against each other, and no sense of urgency. slow, soft, he takes his time in savoring the way you taste of your favorite lip balm mixed with the seltzer you had finished off before you tried to escape from him. gentle hands rub soothing circles against your waist while you pull him closer by wrapping your arms around his neck. 

he pulls away. “i love you.” kiss. “i love you.” kiss. “i love you.”

the movement of your lips against each other grows increasingly aggressive as you continue. needy, wanting to feel each and every contour, savor every breath each other emits. he breaks away again to kiss down your neck. when you whine, the energy in the room shifts. silently, he urges you up onto the counter, your legs dangling off the edge as he slips his body between your thighs. he finds your lips once more. his hands rest upon your hips, squeezing every so often. this time, you're the one to stop him with a gentle push to his chest.

“wait,” you say as he whines and tries to pull you in again. your fingers splay across his broad chest. you nearly gulp at the sight before you’re shaking the thought away. “you’ve been drinking. i don’t want—”

“baby, i’m fine,” he interrupts. your heart flutters at the pet name. “i wanted to be able to talk to you tonight, so i had, maybe, three drinks? i’m tipsy at most — do i seem drunk? do you feel drunk? we can stop.”

“well, no, you don’t. and i drank less than you,” you admit. “i’d like to keep going...i’m just worried, um, after last time. i don’t want this to be another fluke.” your voice grows incredibly smaller as you speak, trailing off at the very end as you realize how stupid you must sound.

“baby, look at me,” he says, cupping your face. there’s a little haze in his gaze, but the sincerity in his pupils is as clear as day. you know that you look the exact same. “this will never, and i mean never, happen again. you’re mine, and i am yours. if you think i was attached to your hip before, you’re never gonna get rid of me now.”

you giggle at his joking tone, your body the lightest it’s been all night, and you reach down to guide his hands to your thighs. “then make me feel good, jjunie.”

his goofy smile turns sharp at the edges at your words, his fingers digging into your flesh as he leans down to nip and suck at the skin of your neck, your collarbones, his lips trailing down to the valley of your breasts. hands slide underneath your shirt, and you tug at his hair as he slips it off of you, making quick work of your bra. he guides the straps down your arms and off completely, leaving you bare from the waist up. he stares in awe, capturing your hands before you can cover yourself.

“so fucking pretty,” he mumbles, pressing a gentle peck against your wrist. “wanna make you feel good forever.”

“that’s a long time— oh, fuck!” you cut yourself off when his plush lips wrap around one of your nipples, playing with the bud as it pebbles beneath his tongue. he hums, and shockwaves travel straight down to your core. he switches to the other tit, his thumb circling the one that he left. 

“jjun,” you moan despite his unrelenting ministrations to your breasts. “fuck me, please.”

he stands up at his full height, peering down at your desperate, needy expression with slight amusement. “yeah? you want my cock?” 

“so bad,” you whisper, kiss bruised lips smeared with lipstick and spit. “please?”

he groans. “you drive me crazy.” 

he falls to his knees in front of you, helping you remove your shorts and panties. a shaky exhale falls from his mouth when he sees just how soaked you are. a finger slides through your folds, collecting your wetness before bringing to his tongue. he visibly shudders.

“know you want me to fuck you, but i need to taste you first,” he mumbles, more to himself than to you before he dives in with an enthusiasm that is akin to whenever he dances, lips wrapping around your clit and sucking, hands holding open your thighs as you whimper and try to close them around his head. he’s desperate to make you cum, to bring you a level of pleasure that you’ve never experienced before. it doesn’t take you long to fall over the edge, but he does not let up until you begin to push his head away from your center.

“okay, okay,” he laughs as he stands again, taking his tank top off in the process. you gape at the sight, the hard planes of his chest, his defined biceps. it makes you wonder just how strong he is, how he could throw you around and have his way with you — another time. another time.

you reach down to palm him through his jeans, eliciting a whine from him. unbuttoning and unzipping, he helps your shove both his jeans and boxers down until his pretty, pink-tipped cock slaps against his abdomen, achingly hard and sensitive. your fingers immediately wrap around it and begin to stroke up and down, thumb collecting the precum that has collected at the tip. he bucks in your hand once before he's grabbing your hand.

condom?” he asks, and you shake your head, telling him about your birth control. he makes sure with you once again before he leans in to kiss you again, the head of his cock sliding through your folds, sliding against your throbbing clit. finally — finally — he lines up with your soaked entrance. “ready, love?”

humming, you roll your hips forward, and he hisses out a quiet "so impatient," before his hips slowly push forward, stretching your walls as you adjust to the intrusion. both of you moan at the feeling, hands flying everywhere to feel each other. he takes it slow at first, the rolling of his hips into you rhythmic and gentle — but you crave more, need him to fuck you like he means it, to take all that you're giving him and returning just as much to you.

“faster, harder, jjunie,” you pant against his lips. “wanna feel you deeper.”

“god, fuck,” he curses, your dirty words spurring him on. “don’t fuckin’, ngh, talk like that. gonna make me cum.”

his gaze grows hazy as he thrusts into you, your own eyes glazed over, both of you overwhelmed by the sensation of your walls snugly wrapped around him and him stretching you so perfectly. the pretty flush that was once contained to his cheeks has spread out across the rest of his face and down his neck, locks of his dusty rose-orange hair sticking to his forehead. you cup his cheeks and bring your foreheads together. he watches as your eyes roll back into your head after a certain thrust, so he angles his hips to press into that spot again. and again. and again. your cute little whines and moans of his name motivate him to maintain that pace.

“yeah? right there?” he queries, already knowing the answer. “so fucking cute, baby. this pussy was made for me, hm? all mine?”

“a-all yours!” you parrot, the words feeding into your dizzy state. the tendrils of an orgasm begin to wrap around you, your legs beginning to quake. you reach down to play with your clit. desperation laces your next words. “gonna cum, jjunie! please make me cum!”

he's groaning at the sight of you falling apart when your second high of the night hits. a string of curses tumbles from his mouth as his thrusts grow sloppy, his hips slapping hard against the inside of your thighs. he thrusts once, twice more before he spills inside you with a high-pitched whine, burying his head in the junction between your neck and shoulder as he holds you close to him.

“my baby,” he whispers tenderly with a quick peck to your lips when you finally come down. you chase his lips for a longer one, and he concedes easily to your silent demand. you’re smiling like fools at each other as you pull away. “never gonna let you go.”

“my jjunie,” you coo back, holding his face between your palms. you lean in to capture his lips again when a knock startles both of you. you scramble for your crumpled clothes on the floor — until you realize exactly who it is on the other side.

“are the two of you done fucking?” beomgyu’s distinct voice calls. “i need to puke.”

“way to ruin the moment,” yeonjun grumbles, and you chuckle, wiping off the stray lipstick on your face before you’re turning to him, legs still a bit shaky.

“i guess we should help him?” you say.

squeezing your waist, he pulls you closer with a sly grin. “nah, he can manage. i have my lovely little girlfriend to take care of.”

masterlist

© to agustdiv1ne. do not copy, repost, steal, and/or translate.

[lxnarphase]

Now you got me on a whole gay train😔

Imagine Toji jerking off at night to the thought of his roomie in lingerie and going online to buy some but the male ones are expensive asf😭 I feel like over time the man would become so desperate that he straight up learns how to sew and makes a custom set just for the reader because he's freaky like that!!! Him not daring to rip the clothes off of reader because "this shit took a lotta time n' work" so he delicately slides it off before funking their brains out!!!😭

MMMM YES YES OK BUT IMAGINE !!! toji not being able to find a place to get some for men, BUT BEING LIKE 'who cares if its supposed to be for women, they look better on him anyways'

and it just MAGICALLY appears in your room one day and you can't help but be a bit flustered and excited to try it on...and of course, toji 'accidentally' walks in on you looking in the mirror, all flustered and cute and dolled up

the way the sage green set looked on you, sheer thigh highs squeezed your legs, the way that pretty bralette with all the little butterflies and flowers on it...but he couldn't stop his jaw from dropping at seeing how hard you were in those tiny little panties, your dick barely able to stay inside the fabric.

"t-toji, they're, uh...t' small," you say, giving a shy little pout, clearly embarrassed about the way you were so exposed. but toji??? toji doesn't CARE, he's pushing you onto the bed, shushing you as he pushes your thighs up to your chest and sucking at your tip through the thin, lacy fabric of the panties

I CANT TAKE THIS ANYMOREEE

[hollythius]

IT’S A SYMBOL OF OUR FRIENDSHIP! | secret relationship headcannons

featuring | alhaitam, kaveh, tighnari, childe

prompt | as secret lovers, your favorite pastime is buying incognito matching items for you and your partner. but after so many grandiose, lovingly picked items start to alert your friends— well, what do you say?

tldr | i love secret relationship tropes 🫶 especially when it’s by choice and not necessity. reader is gn, i tried to be funny (it didn’t work), help i cant write any of these characters, uhh enjoy!! reblogs help btw! this got way off topic, uhhhh i’m having fun with these hehe

ALHAITAM — matching rings

the great sage was rarely fond of people, and even rarer was when he purposefully went out of his way to do something for another person. thus, after you had gotten over the initial shock of his confession— wham! he had pulled you aside to hand you a box that held matching rings. you almost fainted, the insanity of your precious haitham not understanding the implications of such jewelry threw you for a loop. however, you accepted it as a sort of promise ring, the silver band wrapped with green, vine-like markings. kaveh was the first to notice. “what’s that you’ve got there?” he smirked. his pointer finger directed at alhaitam’s middle finger where the ring rested. “oh, and what’s this? y/n has one too? oh my!” and alhaitam, sweet, red faced alhaitam, simply said, “it’s a gesture of our friendship!” you shook your head, smiling. kaveh laughed. you knew he was starting to suspect you anyway.

KAVEH — matching earrings

having your boyfriend’s roommate intrude on the two of you was rare, but that didn’t mean it didn’t happen. you were beginning to think it was on purpose— alhaitam was smart, and it wouldn’t take a genius to realize your relationship. (especially with how affectionate kaveh was sometimes) “y/n, help me put them in,” kaveh whines. “hold on, kaveh. here,” you finished putting your own earrings in, before coming over to kaveh. you press a kiss to his temple, which leads to him kissing your wrist— soon the earrings are left forgotten on the vanity and your collective priority is to kiss each other to death. these ministrations hold your attention so tightly that you don’t hear the knock at the door. or the ‘i’m coming in’ from alhaitham. well, he was bound to find out one way or another.

TIGHNARI — matching bracelets

tighnari’s tongue stuck out a little when he was focused— a cute habit of his that you had yet to comment on. now, he was focused on latching a clasp on a bracelet he had bought you. on his wrist was a matching one: gold and green with incredible luster. he was struggling. “need help, nari?” you ask, giggling. “no. m’fine.” he was certainly not fine, with how long it was taking him. “you’re so cute,” you say softly, tighnari looking up at you annoyed. “and?” you laugh again, the clasp on your bracelet still not closed. you kiss the top of his head, chuckling. “i think you need some help, hon.”

CHILDE — matching scarves

the chilly weather of snezhnaya warranted thick coats, long bottoms, and heavy boots. hats or earmuffs were common, but scarves were practically a staple fashion item. they could be worn multiple ways, styled impeccably, and still keep you warm. so when childe gifted you a red scarf that perfectly matched his own, you melted. “is this for me?” you whispered, childe chuckling at the awe in your tone. “uh-huh. look, it matches mine! and red’s a common color here, so it doesn’t look suspicious,” he said. but the real test would be when he was out in public. the red on his face could easily be explained away as from the cold, but you knew that the rosy tint was him blushing. you buried your face in your own scarf, embarrassed. childe just thought it made you look cuter.

[chilschuck]

HAVE YOUR CAKE (AND EAT IT TOO).

꒰ warnings: ꒱ none! sfw + typical fluffy goodness.

꒰ wc: ꒱ 2.3k

✦ happy birthday, chil!!! this is a little rushed because i wanted it out right at midnight, but i hope it turned out alright!! tumblr ate the post as i tried to save it, so lets hope it posts this time! if anything seems out of place or ooc, i’m so sorry, it’s currently late and i just wanted to write some cuteness for him and you guys!!! enjoy!!! <3333

The countdown leading up to this day had you filled with nervous excitement.

Not only was it Chilchuck’s birthday, but the day you decided you’d try to relay just how you felt about him all this time. With sweaty palms you looked at yourself in the mirror, dressed up for his surprise get-together you and the rest of the party had planned. Secretly, you hoped he wouldn’t catch on so fast that it was truly mostly your idea that had started this.

Inhaling one last breath and letting it pass through your chest, you dusted off your outfit you considered the nicest one you had. In a perfect box with sage green wrapping paper, his gift from you sat beautifully on your bed. Putting all the finishing touches on it you could, a ribbon cascades off the top along with a sweet note card with his name in curly letters. A part of you worried it was a bit too much, but for him, you’d find you’d always go above and beyond.

Turning to hold it in your hands, you considered the contents for a moment. Inside was a new pair of gloves you had sewn for him in the coming weeks, along with a favorite ale of his you had managed to purchase for him. It was simple, much more so than the intricate packaging, but you hoped he’d be pleased.

The half-foot had told you his birthday reluctantly, but now that you knew, you made sure you’d never forget. Whether writing it in your notes or pinning a paper on your calendar, there was no way you were going to let it pass by. He deserved so much more than he gave himself, and you made it your duty to ensure he was happy.

In a few minutes everyone would begin showing up, and to keep yourself busy you set the little table in your dining room with all the food you had prepared. Everything you had taken into account from your time adventuring with him, which consisted of his favorites or even things he’s mentioned liking in passing. Slowly but surely you had managed to get him to open up a little, which was a feat you pride yourself on. Because of this, you felt you were closer than you were before. Now it was time to really tie everything together with that metaphorical bow.

A knock at the door had your heart beating excitedly in your chest, and after yelling out a quick, “Coming!” you made your way to open it.

Except… It wasn’t at all who you were expecting. Suddenly you were face to face with the guest of the hour, who had a furrowed brow of concern on his face.

“Everything okay? Marcille told me to come quickly because you needed help with something.” Chilchuck spoke, studying your appearance for a moment. “Uh, did I interrupt something?”

You were going to kill her. Already picturing her mischievous expression at trying to make something happen like out of her romance novels, you gave a brisk sigh.

“Not at all, quite the opposite, actually…” With quick hands you cracked the door, before peeking out the other side. “Can you… Close your eyes and come in?”

Chilchuck looked even more perplexed at your request, before letting out a sound of confusion. Ever trusting you, he put a hand over his eyes and reached his other one out to you to guide him in. So far so good.

“This didn’t turn out how I exactly pictured it, but…” You began, leading him to the dining room where you had decorated for the supposed party that now only contained the two of you. “You can look now.”

As he removed his hand, you jumped beside him in your spot, shouting cheerfully. “Happy Birthday, Chil!”

His eyes widened, taking in the scene in front of him. A table full of food, seemingly his favorites, as well as fresh flowers from your garden. Even streamers were put up around the wall, along with a bottle of wine you only busted out for special occasions.

“Huh? You did all this for me?” Chilchuck muttered, turning to catch your eyes. That sparkle in them, the same one they always had, caused his stomach to erupt with butterflies. Especially with the way you were smiling at him right now.

“Of course I did, you think I’d let you celebrate your birthday cooped up at home?” Your voice was soft, but held true with intent to make this a night worth remembering for him. Chilchuck gave a light laugh, scratching the back of his head for a moment. You really were too good to him.

The half-foot went to study the foods you had set out, before spotting the cake placed sweetly in the middle. It wasn’t very big, about as big as the pan you usually baked with, but even so… Chilchuck swallowed.

“I know you’re not too big on sweets, but you can’t have a birthday without cake, right?” Your voice met his ears, words playful yet with a hint of something he couldn’t quite place. All of this was making him lose his voice, even more so unable to word his feelings than usual.

“It’s great…” He muttered, before turning to you. In his eyes a spark of vulnerability made itself known, and you hoped you weren’t just mistaken.

“I can’t believe you did all this. I feel spoiled.” Chilchuck reached for a cup, sheepish and eager to hide his burning cheeks behind something. All of this matched with your current outfit was making him feel a little weak.

You waved your hands, moving to grab the bottle of wine. “It’s nothing! You deserve stuff like this. Also, there were supposed to be others but I’m guessing they had other plans.” Trailing off, you grumbled the last part to yourself. The wine filled his glass easily, a sight he was always happy to take in.

Along with you. Chilchuck had to busy himself with a drink before he focused too hard on how good your outfit looked tonight, how you did your hair, the way you kept smiling at him… Clearing his throat, he tried to find something to say to fill the silence.

Before he could speak though, you perked up and went to reach for something behind the table. “Oh! I almost forgot, I got you a little something, too.”

He felt like he was going to melt into the floor. All of this to celebrate just another day for him? Sure, he would treat himself a little, but this… It was like you wanted him to dwell too hard on those feelings he’s been keeping at bay.

Setting down his glass, Chilchuck reached out to take the box from you, gaze taking in just how beautifully it was wrapped. Even the bow on top was so much like something you’d do, down to the note with his name written so nicely on it.

“You really didn’t have to.” Your name left him softly, eyes flitting back up to yours. You waved your hands at him again, before giving him that grin that always made him feel hazy.

“I know, but I wanted to. Now open it, I’ve been waiting so long for this.” The laughter that followed was so sweet, and Chilchuck had to distract himself with the ribbon on his gift.

Pulling it gently, he let it fall to his feet in a small pile. Picking at the folds in the paper, he tried to be as careful as he could with it. You noticed this, unable to hold back the giggle that erupted from your throat. “You don’t have to be like that, it’s meant to be ripped.”

Chilchuck ripped into it this time, barking out, “I know that!” Before he could say anything else, he lifted the lid of the box.

Quick to explain your gift, you interrupted his thoughts. “The gloves were something I made to help with your new business and all. The ale was just… A bonus.” Watching him pick up the gloves and study them, you added, “I hope they’re okay.”

He couldn’t even begin to word how he felt at that moment. Not only did you do all of this for him, but you made him a gift and remembered even more about him? You might as well have taken his heart right out of his chest and ran off with it. Gently, he gave a small smile at your words. “It’s more than okay! I still can’t believe all of this. I’m not sure what to say.”

“You don’t have to say anything! I’m just glad it’s okay. Here, want me to get you a slice of cake or anything?” Your eagerness to make him happy had his heart race a bit, and Chilchuck couldn’t help but let out a content sigh as he turned the gloves over in his hands. Setting them down back into the box, he met your eyes.

“You’ve done too much. As expected, since I told you and all.” Chilchuck joked, watching as you cut into the baked good you worked so hard on. His hands took the plate from you, the flowery green icing hiding the wedges of chocolate underneath. Taking his fork, he took off a piece from the corner and studied it. “I should’ve known you would’ve gone above and beyond.”

Huffing playfully, you turned to cut yourself a slice of your own. “I spent all that time getting it out of you, and you think I’d just forget?” Taking a bite, you hummed, mulling over the flavor in your mind. “Hm, could’ve turned out a little sweeter, but I guess that’s a good thing, huh?”

Chilchuck brought his own fork to his lips, curious to taste some of your baking again. At no surprise at all, it turned out really light and fluffy, the icing pairing well with the tenderness of the cake. “It’s good. I like how rich it is,” He spoke up through his taste test. You beamed at him, that same smile that made him feel like he had been staring a little too long at the sun.

“I’m glad I was able to do this for you. Sorry it wasn’t very climactic of a surprise.” Chilchuck shook his head at your words, taking another piece of cake on his fork. His next sentence died in his throat at the look on your face, pausing to wait for you to finish.

“In a way, I’m kind of glad it ended up like this. There’s something I wanted to tell you ever since we stopped adventuring.” Setting your plate down for a moment, you bit your lip. Once sure you had his full attention, you continued.

And of course you had his full attention. You always did, and there was no contest for it when it came to you. Yet, the nervousness in his gut made an appearance despite how hard he tried to ignore it.

For some reason, the words never left you. Instead, your eyes were fixed on something on his face. He could practically hear the gears whirring to life in your head.

“Sorry, you’ve got… Right there, hang on.” Your touch, gentle enough to make him nearly jump out of his skin if he was not so tightly wound, trailed along his bottom lip. In the corner of his mouth was a bit of icing, which had somehow made a place there without him noticing. There was a thick tension in the air as you wiped it with your thumb, tongue darting out to wet your own lips.

His mind must be playing tricks on him, as the cake in his hand was suddenly not the sweetest sight in the room. Instead, he felt conflicted thoughts about whether or not he wanted to let you continue your work, or have you stop what you were doing and just kiss him stupid.

Before he could decide on which he preferred more, you leaned in to place a kiss right at that spot, so soft and tender that he barely could register it happened at all. Pulling away, you looked at him through your lashes, a rosy glow on your cheeks.

“What I wanted to say, was—“

Suddenly he was no longer interested in the plate in his hand or the words you were going to speak. Setting down his plate with haste, he pulled you in and slotted his lips against yours. With a vigor he didn’t know he still possessed, he kissed you with need.

This was a better result than you had imagined, reaching for his cheeks to hold him even closer to you. Pulling away only to hurriedly meet his lips again, you both fought off that need for air as much as you could. The taste of buttercream icing and the richness of chocolate was so addicting as you felt him nibble at your bottom lip, allowing him to kiss you even deeper in that moment.

Finally pulling away, you both tried to calm your panting with the realization of what just happened. Before you lost your bravery again, you sputtered out, “I’ve fallen for you.”

Chilchuck couldn’t help but let out an airily laugh for a moment, your words a mirror of his own feelings. With every ounce of strength he could muster, he replied, “I’d hope so after a kiss like that.”

Now you were giggling, your nerves subsiding for a moment at his teasing expression. “Yeah, yeah. Happy birthday, smartass.”

“For the record,” Chilchuck muttered before taking his plate back, an idea forming in his mind. “I… Feel the same. But maybe we should do that again. Just, you know—“

Your hands made home on his cheeks again before pulling him back in for another heated kiss, the cake being forgotten just for another moment.

It was so addicting, the way you let him have his cake and eat it, too.

— banners by @/cafekitsune!! <33

[onepiecepetalfanfics089]

Enchanted~..

Chapter 1

Yandere! Strawhats + more x witch Fem! Reader 🎀

__________________________________________

Almost every flower has its way to protect itself..some are poisonous if you even dare to touch them in the wrong places at all while others have thorns or just smell so bad that people don’t care about it’s beauty.

These are all ways that beautiful flowers protect themselves..

In a way, you were like a flower. Delicate, graceful and beautiful. You had your thorns though, ways to defend yourself greatly. Your stare could melt someone’s heart yet, if you wanted the opposite to happen to them you could also do the opposite with ease.

When will you be like the flowers in one of your many gardens?

When will you realize that such beauty could cause immense pain to come?

Just at the end of that thought, you heard the sound of a ship docking close to your island.

__________________________________________

You also heard…a group of people?..they sure were loud..there was shouting..but It sounded happy! Wait that wasn’t good was it?..you haven’t had visitors since…well a long time so maybe it was good? You were always taught to NEVER speak to strangers..especially not pirates..you hoped they weren’t pirates!..

As the sound of the people who you assumed had never been on a island before because they were undeniably loud got closer you could feel your heart pounding with a mix of different emotions such as excitement, nervousness and most of all, curiosity. If Mother Eve found out you were taking to strangers you would be a dead girl!

There was just something about these people though..you haven’t even met them and yet feel so..drawn to them. It was like a string that was tugging you nonstop to a place it knew you weren’t supposed to go to!

Taking a deep breath, you slowly made your way through the forest and to the outside of it where the noise grew louder and louder. Crouching behind a bush you peeked through the sage green leaves that only you knew could make a very good potion to turn someone into a frog, just for good measure!

The first thing you saw made you squint your eyes, there was a boy in a straw hat. He seemed unusually happy with a toothy grin that shined bright than the sun. He wore a velvet colored vest with golden buttons on it and denim shorts with a pair of sandals. He kept jumping around, holding his hat that a red ribbon around it. He seemed so..excited about everything it made you want to smile and laugh along with him. You wondered, what was it like just Jumping in the sand without a care in the world?

“Yeah!! We’ve finally docked on an island!! Can y’a believe it Nami?!”

“Uh yeah I can, the map led us here because I’m the navigator remember?”

A girl with orange hair that reminded you of a beautiful Merigold you saw the other day said with a raised eyebrow, checking a weird looking bracelet that a globe on it and some arrows in it like it was a watch.

“Oi! Sanji!! I see some fruit over there and a bird I think! Let’s eat it!!”

You then saw another man, he had a suit on for some reason, tilting your head you saw that he was smoking a ‘cigarette’..Mother Eve always told you they were extremely horrible for your health. Observing the man even more you noticed his shiny blond hair and his swirly eyebrows that you didn’t know how to feel about.

Wait..what fruit was he talking about?.. you then thought to yourself, eyebrows furrowed. Now shifting your gaze over to the fruit the boy was referring to your eyes widened, that fruit was extremely poisonous and if eaten and could cause immediate death!

Chewing on your bottom lip you gave a soft sigh. Out of all the fruits why did they have to pick that one?..maybe you can just sneak over there and cast a spell to turn it into a safer fruit..yeah!..that’d be fine! They won’t even notice you!

Just be quiet as a mouse..quiet as a-

SNAP

As you were standing up you stepped on a twig!

Oh come on!! Seriously Y/N?!

Immediately the chatter went quiet. Your heart pounded as you felt all eyes on the bush you were currently hiding in.

Looks like hiding in a bush full of sage, twigs and crunchy leaves wasn’t such a good idea after all.. oh boy you were really in for it now weren’t you? A tall, green haired man with three swords and a rather serious expression on his face started to come closer and closer to your hiding spot. He was clutching the hilt of one of his swords and had a skeptical yet serious look on his face, slowly creeping closer…

Thump-thump..

Thump-thump..

Thump-thump..

Thinking fast, you quickly gathered a pile of leaves and plucked a handful of the sage from the bush you were currently hiding in, mixing them together, you uttered the spell you needed and there a frog slowly appeared from the pile you just saw. Before the frog could even begin to do a ‘ribbit’ or hop you threw it out of the bushes and in front of everyone, making it seem like the frog that was just born into this world not even five minutes ago, was hiding in the bushes, not you.

There was a moment of silence, looking around to see their reactions you held your breath. They all then smiled and laughed, some letting out a chuckle while the green haired swordsman just let out a sigh, his eyes fluttering closed faintly before he smirked and turned around to go back to his friends.

Just then you spotted something large behind them. Was that a..ship?..you’ve only seen ships in pictures and books. You marveled at the size and the cute lamb in front. The skull with the straw hat on the flag was even cute too-

Wait!

Something then clicked in your brain.

A ship with a skull…a jolly roger…

Pirates! They were pirates..pirates were dangerous..you sighed softly and then stared at the boy with the straw hat.

His smile..his laugh..he looked safe..! A little dumb but safe..

Tapping your chin you began to ponder..it wouldn’t hurt to just maybe ‘accidentally�� run into them..maybe even introduce yourself and get some answers..that wouldn’t hurt at all!..right?

Silently giggling to yourself you slowly slipped away from your hiding place and summoned a beautiful vine to pull you up to the trees.

.

.

.

.

.

Your hair flowed majestically as you swing vines and tree’s like the earth was your very own. Summoning then to lend you help and then leaving them there to grow with others.

So many mix of emotions were brewing up inside of you like whenever you made a sacred potion..excitement, nerves but most of all you felt..uneasy..? From the moment you saw the group of visitors you just felt as if there was something..off about their presence.

Maybe it was just you being paranoid..yeah!

What harm could they really do how bad could this honestly be?

Thoughts were racing through your mind but just as you were about to snap out of it and focus, your body came to a complete halt.

Large, wide eyes stared back into your own. The pair blinked multiple times and so did yours, after a few minutes your cheeks began to flush in embarrassment, trying to leave. As soon as you took one step back though, you felt a hand in your ankle to pull you back. Did it just…stretch to get to your ankle?! You’d never seen anything like THIS before..

“Hey! Where ya goin’?!”

The voice who you recognized to be the one you saw earlier, with the straw hat said, tilting his head and giving a confused frown while tilting his head a bit.

You had to admit that he was kind of cute in a way..black hair, tan skin, puppy dog eyes and that smile that drawled you in like poison..it screamed optimism,adventure…just enjoying life. Something you utterly craved.

Lips parting slightly, you cleared your throat to talk with some bit of confidence you could muster up.

“Oh uhm..nowhere. Who are you people? What are you doing on this island?” You then asked him, becoming somewhat serious as thorns surrounded where you stood to show him that you would not let him hurt this place, the place you held dear.

Surprisingly his eyes sparkled by your power, his jaw seem to drop in amazement as he looked around frantically with a grin. “Woah!! How’d you do that?!”

You felt shocked, was this boy, the one who could stretch his body or even do more for all you know, complimenting you on your power?! His eyes stared into yours again, he was grinning and it seemed like his eyes were clouded with some peculiar type of emotion..you just didn’t know what yet.

Maybe it was interest? Curiosity? It felt like a guessing game. For some reason you desperately wanted to know what was going on in this boys head..what was he thinking about exactly?

Tilting your head you then spoke in a soft voice “..you’re not here to harm or destroy this place are you?..” you asked while stepping another step closer, you expected him to take a step back for personal space, but he stayed where he was. hat grin never getting wiped off of his face.

“Nah! This place is cool!!”

He said with a shrug, talking in a soft voice too. One that reassured you he was safe. These people..were safe..

Right..?

You were now walking with this boy they called ‘luffy’ in the forest to go meet the others, he seemed to warm up to you quickly, blabbering on about his crew and how they were very grateful to dock on an island after ‘sooo long!’

The wind then suddenly blew and he put his hand instinctively on his hat to hold it down from blowing away. Tilting your head you gave a smile while staring up at him in curiosity.

“Why is that hat so important to you?”

“Someone very important gave it to me!” He replied before you could even blink. Now turning to you, you could feel him stare deeply into your eyes again.

“What’s your name anyway?” He then asked with his grin remaining. Why was he smiling so much..? You wondered. Wait no, how could he smile so much, he just met you! Was he already smitten?!

“Y/N..! The reason why I asked you on your motives was because I’ve lived here my whole life you know..” shrugging, you grew a plant that was actually safe to eat this time and handed it to him. He most gladly took it.

With a mouthful he happily said, “hey thanks!!”

You smiled and thought for a moment, just like he did a moment ago, you halted walking for a minute to turn to him.

“Do you want to see something cool..Luffy..?”

He blinked and finished his fruit quickly, grinning even bigger now.

“Yeah sure!!”

…

Adrenaline rushed through you as you flew through the air, hearing you luffy behind you cheer just as loud as you did. Living on an island for most of your life had its perks you know, it allowed your imagination to run wild!

Which was why you and luffy here were currently flying through the air above the trees on a dragon you made completely out of dry leaves, sage and Cat’s Claw! You held onto the dragons horns while it operated like a roller coaster and flew gracefully like the wind.

Though, luffy’s hands slowly creeping up to your hips and holding onto them almost possessively caught your attention, you just played it off though, grinning up at him. It was probably something normal anyway!..

Finally, you felt him wrap his arms around your waist completely and jump off of the dragon! Was this boy mad?!

“GUM-GUM: BALLOON!!!!” He shouted in the air as his body increased two times its size to give you a safe landing, to say you were absolutely shocked was definitely an understatement..he was just as lively as you thought!!

He laughed as your hair fell in your face and got in the way of seeing properly, you couldn’t help but grin and laugh with him as you adjusted your hair so it wasn’t sticking up like you just got struck by lightning.

“That dragon was amazing!!” He said cheerfully,returning back to his regular form and helping you up. “That landing was amazing!!” You said with a soft giggle.

“Um..Luffy who is this..?” A voice then asked, turning your head, you saw it was the girl with the orange hair, Nami if you remember correctly.

Blinking a few times, you noticed that every last one of his crew members were staring at you with their interest clearly piqued. Smiling widely at them, you introduced yourself just as you would’ve done in your original plan.

“My name is Y/N! I have lived on this island for years..and I’m a witch who’s just looking for adventure!” You would say while giving a bow with another small laugh. Just from that little fun ride you had, it had gotten you so shook up and full of energy!

Luffy unexpectedly, gave you a pat on the back which you smiled at. “Isn’t she great?! Hey maybe we can fly three dragons next time!! And their all rainbow!”

“Oooh!!”

A beautiful woman with black hair and the perfect tan let out a chuckle while putting her face in her feminine hand. “They get along quite well dont they?” She said, her voice smoother than chocolate. Now looking at the two women of the crew you’d never seen such beauty! But that little wholesome moment wouldn’t last long as you felt someone gently take your hand.

“Huh?” You Said while blinking and looking down to see who or what just took your hand.

“Oh Mademoiselle~! Your beauty is simply too much! Mother Nature surely has blessed me today for letting me see such an angel! I’m ready to live on this island for you my love! Just to see you every morning~!!!”

The man with the cigarette said in a high pitched voice, he was crouched down on one knee with hearts literally for eyes! your eyes widened quite a bit as you were definitely not expecting that seeing how he acted with Luffy when you first saw him, his blond hair that shined bright than the sun was still so captivating to you..not to mention he was rather handsome…

Should you charm him back?..it was only polite right?..

“Oh my how dashing..” you started while taking his hand with your free one, crouching down on knee just like he did.

“This island barely gets visitors at all but when we do..they really aren’t as handsome as you..if you were stuck by my side I would feel no need to search for any adventure because I’d have you~!” You said, giving him a wink and growing a rose out of if the ground, handing it to him.

Before his eyes even could take notice of it however his nose started to bleed…a lot! So much that it threw him back physically, making him land on his back and gaze up at the sky in shock.

“S-She..she..”

He stuttered out as you smiled, suddenly everyone burst into laughter and you couldn’t help but grin widely.

Yeah these people were definitely safe!! You were sure of it…

For the next half hour, you spent it with the visitors who came by your island. They seemed to like you very much so because they couldn’t keep their eyes off you! Robin was asking so many questions about the plants and herbs you used here, and you answered gladly! Sanji on the other hand kept flirting with you and charming you the best he could, making you smoothies from the fruit nearby (that were completely safe of course.)

Luffy was also bombarding you with questions but about your powers and spells, he told everyone about the dragon you made and you showed them your magic of course with a smile. You even turned Luffy into a mouse for fun! The boy with a long nose named usopp enjoyed that one the most he just couldn’t stop laughing about it!

You also told them stories about your encounters in the island and how you became the witch you are today, of course you had to mention Mother Eve when you were telling that one.

“She’s kind of the reason I haven’t set out yet..she keeps saying that ‘I’m not ready’ but I’m as ready as can be am I not?” You laughed softly with a sigh, putting a flower crown you made on the little reindeer’s, Choppers head.

The crew nodded their heads at you, they seemed to go a bit quiet like they were pondering something greatly..exchanging looks a few times..that just be a pirate thing right?..

Right?

It was now finally sun down and the sound of the fire the green haired swordsman known as ‘zoro’ (who could be a bit intimidating sometimes..)made illuminated everyone’s faces, casting a beautiful orange light in the front, and darkness in the back.

Letting out a soft sigh you closed your eyes,making a nice flower bed for you rest on while gazing up at the stars. Then all of a sudden..

“Hey Y/N?..”

Luffy’s voice caught your attention. You turned your head over to him with a smile.

“Yeah?”

With everyone now looking at you, they all had a somewhat big smile on their face. Zoro though stared at you rather intently..

That grin that could light up a room appeared again as luffy got closer to you placing his hat in your face rather abruptly, you took it and put it on your head with a confused expression.

“Join my crew!!!” He said loudly, staring into your eyes which made you feel there was only one answer optional…

To Be Continued~…

Omg this took so long!! That’s why I’m posting this late lol- but omg I’m so excited for this story!!!! I love it already and I hope you guys do too!! Please let me know! I’m so excited for her to meet new characters and show off her moves even more! I hope you guys are excited too! I don’t wanna make this too long because I’ve been writing nothing but announcements lately, so without further a do I have nothing else to say..for now! Until next time my lovely petals!!❤️❤️💕🌸

[soombee]

ଳ⋆｡˚𖦹 caught in the current of you — 05 , 𝓲 𝓯𝔀 𝔂𝓱𝓾 𝓱𝓮𝓪𝓿𝔂

warnings ! lowk slight angst + ummm slighty freaky

wordcount , 2291 / 2.2k (sorryLOL)

u r pink, leehan is green (for thoughts)

11:30 am — your house

leehan shot you a quick text and leaned back in his seat, idly scrolling through his phone until the front door swung open

he stepped out of the car as you peeked out, waving him over. your hair was a bit messy, and you were still your pajamas—a cropped long-sleeve top and matching short shorts with little teddy bears printed on it

“omg hi,” she greeted, holding the door open for him, “sorry, i’m still in pjs, come quick it’s cold”

leehan closes the front door, letting the warmth of the heater cover his frosted skin

“i need a second opinion,” you clarified, leading him towards your room

leehan looked around, noticing the soft sage green that matched her personality perfectly

he noticed your bean bag and crashed on it, the walls are adorned with a mix of posters, photos, and decorations, adding a personal touch

“so,” turning toward him, “what do i wear?”

leehan glanced at your pajamas, then at the outfits on the bed, “i mean u could just go like that,” he joked, a small smirk tugging at his lips

you raised an eyebrow, crossing your arms. “SERIOUSLY, sangwon’s almost there!! we’re gonna be lateee!”

“i’m serious, it’s cute,” he said, shrugging casually “but if u insist, let’s see”

“Hello. DID I HEAR HIM CORRECTLY???.!.?” your eyes wide open, “omg. He’s so. Freaking Oblivious. AHAHHHHHAHAHAHHH!!!”

he got up from the bean bag and walked over to your bed, picking up a fitted white tee

“what about this?” he holds it up to your body, “looks nice on you”

you nodded, picking at your own hands as you try your best not to squeal in front of him, “mmm alright, what about my jeans?”

leehan grabbed the washed jeans that were folded neatly and held them against the crop top

“omg wait, i’m literally so goated at this wtf” he nods his head in disbelief, “it matches ur proportions perfectly, you’re welcome”

you laughed at his praise “don’t get too ahead of urself buddy… it’s literally just a basic tee w baggy jeans”

“always hating for what?” he chuckles, setting the clothes down

you scoff, heading towards the bathroom, “let me get changed real quick”

leehan nodded, stuffing his hands in his pockets as he glanced around your room and his eyes landed on your bed side table, a polaroid of you and your friends at some social event. his eyes lingered on you,

“cute..” — leehan

when you returned, dressed in the outfit he picked, he blinked at LEAST 10 times, he was caught a little off guard. the cropped shirt hugged your figure just right,

“what’s this feeling…?” he could hear his heart beat, “whatever.. must be cus it’s my first time in a girls room.. yeah.. sure..”

“so?” you asked, doing a little spin

“uh..” he paused, trying to find the right words as he looks you up and down, “i— uh, you’re welcome, is all i can say”

“your ego is too high for your own good, hannie” you grab your bag from the dining room table and head towards the door, not noticing your nickname slip up “let’s gooo”

he looks down at you, getting a strange feeling in his stomach, “haha, let’s go” he fixes his hair

“damn it’s getting hot in here.” he smirks

12:38 pm — almost there (sorry not sorry sangwon)

the drive was quiet at first, considering you two just stared getting to know each other, there was only the low hum of the music playing in the background.

leehan, was always one to fill silences, started rambling about some new fish he saw at the aquarium the other day..

“it was huge, yn. like, i thought it was going to jump out the glass and bite me or something!!” he said, his eyes lighting up as he gestured wildly with one hand

you chuckled at his words, nodding along, though your mind wasn’t on the fish. you were too busy noticing the small things about him—

you noticed how his fingers tapped against the steering wheel in time with the beat, how his side profile looked unfairly perfect in the sunlight streaming through the rolled down window, how his beauty marks were spread perfectly across his face… oh how lovely he was!!

“how can someone be so perfect?!” you flash a soft smile, feeling your heart beating out of your chest, thank god for the loud freeway & background music..

when you two finally arrived, leehan was quick to jump out and jog around the car to open your door

you blinked at him as he held it open with a small bow, smirking like it was the most natural thing in the world

“you didn’t have to do that,” you mumbled, putting away your makeup as you finish touching your blush up (u didn’t even have to do that with leehan there hehe #NaturalBlush)

“i know,” he replied easily, like it was no big deal, how oblivious of him!!

you tried to ignore the way your chest tightened at the gesture. he was like this with everyone, wasn’t he? always kind, always thoughtful, right..?

as you two walked down the sidewalk towards the café, you found yourself hyper-aware of your surroundings—the crunch of leaves underfoot, the faint chill in the air, and most of all, the proximity between you and leehan. your arms swung lightly at your sides, occasionally brushing against each other

his fingers grazed yours, so brief it could’ve been nothing, but it felt like everything to you. you froze for a fraction of a second, your heart skipping a beat, but he didn’t seem to notice. he kept walking, completely unfazed, rambling about some band Sangwon had recommended to him last week

“how is he this oblivious?!” your cheeks heating up as you stared down at your shoes. so obviously distracted by the phantom feeling of his hand brushing yours that you barely heard what he was saying

“yn?” he stopped in his tracks to check up on you

you blinked, looking up, “h-huh what??”

he gave you a curious look, tilting his head slightly, “u good? u look…uhh..troubled?”

“uh, yeah! totes fine!!” you say quickly, tucking a strand of hair behind your ear and giving him a little smile

“hm” leehan squinted at you, not believing you one bit

for a moment, you let herself hope—just for a moment—that maybe he had felt it too.

but then, as the day went on, you watched him being his usual self, holding doors open for strangers, offering a smile to anyone and everyone, and you realized it was just him,

you weren’t so special, he was just nice to everyone!

you can’t believe you thought you might’ve been special to him —maybe those smiles meant something extra when he gave them to you?

but now, as the day went on and you watched him be just as sweet to sangwon— well, maybe even sweeter— but you realized it wasn’t the case

your heart sank a little, becoming a lot quieter, not really in the mood to laugh along with their jokes anymore

sangwon, who was surprisingly observant, noticed almost immediately. when your huzz wandered off to grab drinks, he nudged you

“what’s up with you”

“nothing” you lied, continuing to scroll on your phone

he rolled his eyes, “you’re so annoying, you’ve been weird all day.” he scoffed, “does it have to do with him?”

you silence was enough to answer his suspicions, how’s his dumbass so emotionally aware.

sangwon sighed, glancing over at where leehan was fiddling with a vending machine, “look, he’s dumb. like, reaaalllyyy dumb.. he probably doesn’t even realize he’s making you feel this way”

“i’m fine,” you muttered, voice cracking slightly. you don’t even know why you cared so much!! it’s not like you two were ever anything?!

sangwon stared at your frown for a moment before clicking his teeth,

“what’s up w him…”

by the time leehan returned, you noticed sangwon had a smirk on his face

“yo, hasn’t she been kind of quiet today?” sangwon said casually, sipping his drink

leehan frowned, his eyes flicking to your figure, “really? are you okay?”

you forced a small laugh, “fine, just tired”

he didn’t seem convinced, spending the rest of the day trying to cheer you up. he tried everything, telling you the most ridiculous stories, made faces that would have embarrassed anyone else just to make you smile — even just a little bit

6:49 pm — leehan’s car

by the time he was driving you home, the sadness that had been weighing on your chest had mostly lifted, thanks to his silly little self

“thank you for today,” you said softly as he pulled up to the driveway

“anytime,” he replied, looking at your face intently

you tried to play it off, shifting your weight slightly, but the way his eyes studied you made it impossible to move naturally

“fuck.” lub-dub , lub-dub

“FUCKCKCKCKKK” your heart screams

leehan wasnt saying anything else, just looking. his expression was calm, unreadable, but there was something about the way he wasnt blinking—like he couldn’t, like he didn’t want to miss a single detail

“what?” you asked, your voice quieter than you intended

“nothing,” he said, eyes refusing to waver

your heart thudded against your ribs, your skin heating under the intensity of it all. you forced yourself to glance away, breaking the invisible thread pulling you toward him. but even when you weren’t looking, you could feel it—his eyes lingering on you, the weight of his silence, the strange electricity hanging between you two

“youre staring,” you said, trying to sound nonchalant

“am i?” he smirked, as though he hadnt even realized. but the slight shift in his posture betrayed him—his fingers flexed against his jeans, and he took the smallest step back, like he was trying to compose himself?

“yes, yes you are,” you muttered with a nervous heart, still avoiding his gaze

“didnt mean to” his voice softened, and when you glanced back at him, you noticed how his jaw tightened, like he was holding himself back. he looked away quickly, messing with his hair in that casual way he always did when he was nervous, but his fingers gripped the fabric of his shirt like it was the only thing grounding him

“holy shit he’s so.”

it was silent for a moment, the kind of silence that made your skin tingle. you were certain he was just zoning out, that his obliviousness was working overtime today. after all, he was leehan—the guy who never seemed to notice how much you cared

even though you just met the guy.

but what you didn’t see was the way his chest rose and fell unevenly as he tried to look anywhere but at you.. how he swallowed hard to push down the lump in his throat.. how he wanted nothing more than to close the distance between you but stopped himself every. single. time.

because in leehan’s mind, you didnt feel the same. you couldnt, not when you were so effortlessly you, and he was just… him.

how you never returned his subtle glances in chemistry. how you never listen to the songs he writes for you. how you never noticed him.

“next time…”

“lets go,” you said finally, breaking the moment as you grabbed your bag

“right,” he said, clearing his throat as he turned toward the door. but his hand twitched at his side, and for a fleeting second, he almost reached out to you. almost.

instead, he held the door open, waiting as you walked past, his gaze fixed firmly on the floor now

you didnt notice the way his knuckles turned white as he gripped the car door or the way his lips pressed into a thin line to keep from saying the one thing he wanted most

and as you brushed past him, your shoulders accidentally bumping, you felt a spark, faint but impossible to ignore

“thank you,” you mumbled, brushing your hair behind your ear as you hurried toward the front door

“anytime,” he said again, his voice quieter this time, almost like a promise he wasnt sure he was allowed to keep

but then, in the corner of your eyes, you noticed the packages stacked outside the door—big, heavy furniture boxes that you completely forgotten were supposed to arrive today

“uuuugghhhhhh,” already dreading the idea of dragging them inside

“hm? whats wrong?”

“nothign, just…those” you motioned towards the boxes

leehan followed your gaze, “oh, let me help”

“nonono, you dont have to—”

“too late,” cutting you off, racing you towards the front door

you worked together to carry the boxes inside, though you struggled with yours almost immediately….. #weak

before you could protest for the nth time, leehan reached over to help, his hand brushing yours as he took over the box for you

something suddenly knocking the air out of you. you glanced at him, cheeks burning but he didn’t seem to notice at first

he looked up, catching the flustered expression in your eyes

“wait are you blushing?” he asked, his voice tinged with amusement

“what? no!!!” you defended, punching him slightly, “you wish.”

“yes i do.”

he grinned, and then—he giggled. actually giggled. it was soft and boyish, the kind of sound that sent anyone’s heart into overdrive

“riiighhhttt,” he teased, “must be the heat or something!!”

you glared at him, the effect was ruined by your reddish cheeks, “just shut up and carry the box”

leehan’s laughter followed you into the house, and even after he left, the sound lingered, echoing in your mind long into the night

maybe sangwon actually put u on… hm.. nah

i giggled writing the last part hehehehehehe , user writemyeyes isn’t leehan beeteedubs

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taglist (open) ! @saintriots @yourmyst4r @sftsohee @httpenhoon @alisonyus @astrae4 @lynnimini @enhacolor @mari3s @voikiraz @yveol @sol3chu

[xcherryerim]

Si tú me quisieras

(If you loved me)

Mike schmidt x Gn!reader | wc: 2.2k

“Si tú me quisieras, el amor que quisieras lo tendrías conmigo. No soy cursilera, pero si me quisieras, sería todo distinto” — Si tú me quisieras by Nia Vanie & Adrian Bello

Warning: Friends to lovers | Sappy | angst and fluff (?) | mentions of sex | fighting | a bit of aggressive Mike

notes: it seems like I love writing sappy stuff for Mike at 1-4 am. I didn’t really revise this so sorry if there is many mistakes or repeated words ✨ Also the lyrics in this story is the same as the one from the intro (and yes. Mike knows spanish here)

Summary: As time goes by, it becomes increasingly difficult for Mike not to hide the secrets that are troubling him. He has had enough and decides to reveal his feelings to you, his best friend.

You caught sight of Mike wearing the same shade of sage green shirt you were wearing. With a deep breath, you called out to him, "No, no! Change, please. That's too much of a coincidence!”

Mike sighed heavily, slamming the car door shut behind him. His eyes narrowed, frustration etched onto his face. "Can you give me a break? This is the only clean shirt I have left!"

Reluctantly, you let out a frustrated groan. It wasn't about the shirt or the coincidences; it was about how deeply it affected you every time he wore that particular color. But you knew pushing him further wouldn't solve anything. So instead, you relented, "Fine, fine."

Why does it matter anyway?" he asked, increasing the volume of the radio in an attempt to cover up his unease.

Your fingers tightened around the steering wheel as you tried to explain your concern. "Because people are going to think we're a couple,"

Mike couldn't help but feel a pang of disappointment. He had been hoping that today would be the day when you finally noticed him in the way he wanted you to. But here he was.

“But like, we aren’t so it doesn't matter, does it?”

“I guess.” You shrugged.

You started to suggest what movie to watch at the end of the day. A little tradition you guys did after running errands together, but Mike was staring at the street, drowning in his thoughts. Did you hate the idea of dating him that much?

“No hay nada que pueda hacer que me veas, y eso me duele tanto. Y aunque tú no me quieras como yo te quiero yo te seguiré amando.” / “There's nothing I can do to make you look at me, and that breaks me. Even if you don’t love me like I love you, I'll still adore you.”

"Isn't this the song that you like, Mike?" you asked, a small smile forming on your lips.

Mike's response was quiet and subdued. "Uh, yeah."

He didn't like the song, not really. He related to it, to every verse, word, and beat. It was a reflection of his feelings, a mirror to his unspoken thoughts and emotions. The lyrics echoed through the car, resonating with both of you in different ways.

“Dicen que de amor nadie se muere, pero si este dolor es la alternativa, prefiero la muerte” / “They say no one dies out of love, but if this pain is the alternative, I rather die.”

Mike sat silently next to you, the strum of guitar strings and the singer's melodic voice echoing throughout the car. A wave of disappointment washed over him, making the atmosphere in the vehicle almost suffocating. You could sense his discomfort, but you pressed on, trying to stay focused on the road ahead.

“Te estoy amando aunque no te diga nada. Estoy guardando este secreto para mí en el fondo de mi alma. Si tú me quisieras, no perdería ni un minuto más. Me entregaría con sinceridad, si te quedas conmigo.” / “I'm loving you even if I keep quiet. I’m keeping this secret in the depths of my soul. If you loved me, I wouldn't lose another minute more. I’ll sincerely give myself to you, if you stay with me.”

…

Feeling the need to intervene, Mike quickly stepped in to assist an elderly woman who was struggling to reach for a specific medicine. "Oh, let me help with that," he said, his voice filled with genuine kindness. As he handed her the item she needed, a warm smile spread across his lips, and you couldn't help but feel proud of his compassionate nature.

The woman thanked him graciously, her eyes twinkling with gratitude. "Thank you, sweetheart," she said, her gaze shifting between you both. "You two look like a nice couple. It reminds me of when my late husband and I used to go shopping together."

A sudden flush crept up your cheeks as the weight of her words settled upon the both of you. You knew it wasn't intentional, but the implication made your heart race faster than it should. Swallowing hard, you felt the need to clarify things.

"We're not a couple," you quickly replied, your voice tinged with slight awkwardness. The heat from your blush radiated outward, an audible confession of your true feelings.

Mike smiled gently at you, his eyes dancing with a mix of mirth and sadness. "Definitely not a couple," he affirmed, a hint of longing lurking beneath the surface.

As he turned to face you, he couldn't help but notice the defensive posture you took, your arms firmly crossed over your chest. Was there pain in your eyes? No, it couldn't be. He pushed the thought aside, choosing to focus on the present moment.

"Well, you seem pretty insulted by that," he remarked casually, attempting to shift the topic away from the elephant in the room.

You raised an eyebrow, feigning offense. “What? I’m not good enough for you?” Your words were laced with humor, but the underlying emotion was undeniable. There was a yearning, a desire for something more.

Mike sighed, rubbing the back of his neck as he shook his head. "We are not having this conversation again," he stated firmly. Today, he simply couldn't muster the energy for the friendly flirtation that had become a routine between the two of you.

The innocent, fun activity of grocery shopping quickly transformed into something far more uncomfortable between the two of you. The mood had shifted dramatically, leaving behind a heavy silence that seemed to grow more oppressive with every passing second.

Mike could no longer mask his emotions – his face bore the unmistakable signs of anger, complete with furrowed eyebrows and heavy breathing. His movements became more forceful as he tossed items into the cart, each action an expression of the tumultuous emotions churning within him.

Unable to bear the tension any longer, you hesitantly asked, "Are you alright?" The question hung in the air, seemingly adding fuel to the fire. The guilt you felt for asking it gnawed at your insides, knowing that you might have only exacerbated the situation.

Mike glared at you, his dark eyes flashing with hurt and resentment. At that moment, he couldn't bring himself to answer your question.

As you tried to find a way to bridge the gap, you couldn't help but wonder if this was truly the last straw in maintaining the delicate balance of your friendship. For years, the two of you had shared laughter, tears, and dreams, but now you stood on the precipice of something unfamiliar and uncertain.

…

To lighten the mood, you attempted a weak joke, "Where else, boss?" but it fell flat in the wake of the tension between the two of you.

Mike provided a terse response, focusing on giving directions to Walmart without acknowledging your attempt at humor. "I need to get a few things for Abby, she's doing a project for school," he said, buckling his seatbelt.

Attempting to ignore the growing discord, you asked, "Oh, are there any close by?" and started the car, navigating the streets according to the directions Mike had given you. However, your nerves got the better of you, and you found yourself missing turns and getting lost.

Each error only served to fuel the fire. Mike's frustration grew with every misstep, a slow burn that threatened to consume the both of you. And then, finally, it boiled over. "Left, I said fucking left!" he shouted, his voice cracking with the strain of holding back his emotions.

"My fucking god. Can you drive?"

Stung by his harsh words, you couldn't help but retaliate. "What the hell is your problem? Why are you suddenly acting like a bitch?" Angry tears pricked at your eyes, the frustration of the day taking its toll on your composure.

His eyes locked onto yours, the transit stretching on as he struggled to find the right words. Finally, he snapped, "Because you're terrible at driving!" It was a feeble excuse, an attempt to deflect from the real issue that loomed between you.

Your heart sank as you demanded answers, pleading with him to reveal the truth. "I'm not stupid, Mike. Tell me what is it!"

Mike's jaw clenched tightly, his mind racing as he tried to find the words to articulate his thoughts. But the harder he tried, the more elusive the truth seemed to become. The weight of the question pressed down upon him, threatening to crush the fragile foundation of their friendship.

Finally, he posed the question that hung between him like a cloud. "Do you hate the idea of being with me?" His heart pounded in your chest, waiting for your response, fear and hope to battle within him.

"What? Am I disgusting to you? Is it because I don't have a set job? Why?"

The weight of those words hung heavily between you, the car falling silent except for the hum of the engine. In that moment, everything felt on the line – your friendship, your future, and the truth that had been bubbling under the surface for so long.

"I never said that," you responded, your voice shaking with hurt and confusion. You grasped for some semblance of control amidst the chaos of your emotions.

"Well, you don't have to!" Mike declared, his voice wavering. Years of unspoken feelings finally burst forth, spilling out in a torrent of raw honesty. "We've avoided this for years. We're not friends!" The accusation hung in the air.

Mike recounted memories that flooded your minds, moments shared between the two of you that transcended the boundaries of friendship. "Holding hands at IKEA? Almost kissing? Showering together and almost having shower sex?"

With a bitter laugh, Mike snarled, "Friends, my balls. We're more than that, and we've been avoiding the truth for too long. It's time to face it."

"I just didn't know you liked me..." you reply, your voice barely above a whisper. The weight of the truth bore down on you, and you couldn't help but feel a sense of relief mixed with the overwhelming emotions that threatened to consume you.

Mike's eyes softened, and for a moment, the tension between you seemed to dissipate. "I've liked you for a long time," he admitted, his voice barely above a whisper. "But I was scared to say anything, scared of losing you as a friend."

The car fell silent once more, the hum of the engine the only sound that broke the heavy silence. At that moment, the two of you sat there, grappling with the new reality that had been laid bare between you. The path forward was uncertain, but one thing was clear – the friendship you had cherished for so long has now changed.

Mike sighed deeply, attempting to gather his thoughts and steady his escalating emotions. "I understand if you don't want to ever see me again," he murmured, his tone filled with a combination of regret and resignation. Despite the turmoil, he reached out and gripped your hand tightly, a silent plea for understanding.

"But, if that is the case," he continued, his voice catching in his throat, "at least let me kiss you... for the first and last time." The request hung in the air, heavy with the implication of finality.

You felt your body tremble at his words, a mix of excitement and fear coursing through you. The prospect of sharing this intimate moment with Mike, the one person you'd always cared for, both thrilled and terrified you.

"I don't want to die without knowing what it feels like to kiss you," he said, his voice filled with a mix of longing and desperation. The weight of the moment bore down on both of you, the unspoken emotions finally giving voice.

"And you won't have to," you whispered, desperation mingling with determination in your voice. Without another word, you leaned in, closing the distance between you until your lips met his in a searing kiss that echoed the years of longing that had built up between you.

Mike hesitated for only a moment before responding, his arms wrapping around you as the passion of the moment took hold. The weight of the past years melted away, replaced by the intensity of the present. For once, the uncertainty that had plagued your friendship was gone, replaced instead by the electric connection that had always been there, hiding just beneath the surface.

As the kiss lingered, you began to realize that this was not the end, but the beginning of a new chapter for you both. The path forward may be fraught with uncertainty, but you were ready to face it together, finally embracing the love that had grown between you.

Fin, Hope you enjoyed! I just wanted to write more than smut 😪

[rax-writes]

I went looking for trouble… and boy, I found her.

Xavier Thorpe x Reader

warnings:  reader is a member of the Frump family (Morticia’s twin’s daughter) but no physical description is given, SMUT (MINORS DNI), slightly dom!Xavier, blood kink, unprotected sex, public sex / slight exhibitionism (but no one is around), brief choking, oral and fingering (f!receiving), p in v sex, porn with a bit of plot

Being the daughter of a pastel-loving, effervescent flower child such as Ophelia Frump was exhausting. Truth be told, she was a good mother – always doing her best to indulge in your macabre interests, or phoning her twin sister for some assistance in such endeavors – but the disconnect born from your polar opposite demeanors was ever-present.

After an incident in kindergarten that left you banned from all the local schools, you were homeschooled by private tutors. (Oh, how proud your Uncle Gomez and Aunt Morticia were – and oh, how horrified your mother was.) You had always dreamed of attending Nevermore Academy like your aunt and uncle, and being around other “outcasts,” but being that you somehow managed to always return from summers at their house even kookier and creepier than before, your mother feared what a stay at such a place would do to you. However, upon hearing that your dear cousin Wednesday would be attending the school, you had the leverage to work up some fake tears and a compelling argument to your mother about how it would benefit the poor girl to have a familiar face there with her, and off to Nevermore you went.

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

“Uh, Wednesday…?” Enid began, momentarily ignoring her breakfast to stare over her roommate’s shoulder with furrowed brows. “Do you happen to have a family member coming to visit?”

“Why do you ask?”

“Because a goth version of Stevie Nicks with the same creepy, calculating look as you just walked in.”

Wednesday’s eyes widened a fraction, and she breathed your name in realization as she turned in her seat to lock eyes with you from across the Quad. Considering the bright, elated smile that crossed your face as Wednesday rushed to greet you, Enid noted then that you must be a bit more in the realm of “normal” than your pigtail-wearing family member. Although, Enid doubted that anyone in Wednesday’s family could truly be considered as such.

Determined to ensure that you got a positive perspective on Nevermore, being that Wednesday would undoubtedly give a grim depiction of the school, Enid insisted on joining the two of you for the introductory tour. Enid delighted in the way you smiled at her jokes, and even told a few jokes and anecdotes of your own, some of which even brought the faintest of smiles to Wednesday’s face. By the time the group returned to the Quad, it was lunchtime, and there were twice as many students as before.

In the midst of Enid’s thorough explanation of all the trouble Wednesday had already gotten herself into in less than a fortnight at Nevermore, the conversation was interrupted.

“Hey, Enid, have you seen – woah.”

The stunned whisper marked the abrupt end of the sentence of the young man who had jogged over to your table as you turned to face him. He just stared at you with wide, sage green eyes that seemed to look straight into your soul. And you stared right back, taking in the deep emerald hue of his irises, how pretty his lips looked, the light brown hair that brushed against his shoulders.

“Whenever you two are done mentally undressing one another, I would suggest introducing yourselves.”

Wednesday’s deadpan interruption of the tense silence caused him to look away, and shake his head as though to clear his mind, which brought a smirk to your face. He found you just as attractive as you found him. How delightful.

“Uh, sorry. I’m Xavier Thorpe,” he stated, reaching out to shake your hand. You did the same, but he then appeared confused. “Frump? I thought you’d be an Addams, judging from how similar you seem to Wednesday.”

“She’s a cousin from my mother’s side. Her mother is my Aunt Ophelia, the white sheep of the family,” Wednesday explained.

“Don’t you mean ‘black sheep’?” Xavier inquired.

“No,” you and Wednesday both replied in unison.

“My mother is exceptionally fond of… color,” you explained, saying the word as though it were something morally reprehensible. “She decorates with the most abrasive array of bright, colorful maximalism you can possibly imagine. Wednesday visited once, and went into anaphylactic shock the moment she walked in the door. She spent three days in the hospital.”

“It was deeply unpleasant,” the grayscale girl added earnestly, then shuddered as one typically does after seeing a repulsive insect.

“Ah,” Xavier said with a chuckle. “Well, it’s nice to meet you. Hopefully you’re more fond of Nevermore than your cousin, and hopefully we’ll be friends.”

A devilish smile spread across your lips. “We’re not going to be friends.”

From anyone else, it would have sounded insulting. But the way you said it sounded more like a promise, and fuck, did it thrill Xavier.

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

Naturally, you were right.

Which is how you found yourself desecrating the perfectly manicured lawn in the Nevermore gardens, Xavier’s head between your thighs, his soft hair tied back as his hands, mouth, and tongue caused you to see stars despite the cloudy night sky.

Although the arms keeping you propped up was weak, it was worth fighting the ache in your biceps to see him devour you. He did it so ravenously, yet with so much intention; always mindful of which motions brought out the shrillest whines or sharpest gasps, and doing them repeatedly, until you were a panting, whimpering mess.

When Xavier could tell you were getting close, from how ragged your breathing was and the incoherent muttering of “gods, please, please, Xavier, please,” he spared a glance at you to take in the positively wrecked look on your face. The way his emerald eyes bore into yours, just as they had the very first time you met him – you were a goner. You bit your lip so hard you tasted the familiar metallic taste of blood, to avoid waking the entire castle with your cries of pleasure.

The groan that left Xavier at the taste of you sent vibrations through your overstimulated flesh, causing you to jerk violently, and he then took pity on you and leaned back on his heels with a wicked grin. Seeing him leaning back like that, smirking as he unbuckled his belt, was truly a sight you never wanted to forget.

“God, I love that you’re always so pretty and put-together, and everything you do or say is so poised and perfect – but every single time I get my hands on you, I get to see this fucked-out version of you,” Xavier mused, shoving his pants and boxers down past his knees as you stared at his pretty cock with glassy, hungry eyes. He leaned down then, caging you in with his arms, before one hand reached up to grab your jaw – a bit forcefully, just the way he knew you liked it. “All for me. All mine. Isn’t that right, baby?”

“Yes,” you breathed, eyes fluttering shut at the feeling of his tip at your entrance. “All yours, my darling.”

“Good girl,” Xavier replied with a grin, before releasing your jaw to guide himself into you. He eased himself in slowly, allowing you to feel every inch of him, but once he was all the way inside, he drew his hips back, then thrust himself in again, fast and hard. Thankfully, he had the foresight to clamp his free hand over your mouth, muffling the loud, obscene moan that tumbled from your lips.

The psychic set an unrelenting pace, having been too turned on while eating you out to take his time with you. He had become far too addicted to getting you off to be selfish about it, though. So, in stark contrast to the fast pace of his hips slamming into yours, he slowly trailed his hand down from your mouth to your throat, giving it a firm squeeze and earning a moan from you, before continuing the descent until his arm wound itself around your lower back. Xavier used it to prop up your hips just a bit – enough to hit that particular spot deep inside you that had you biting your lip again, the taste of blood momentarily flooding your senses again.

As you wrapped your legs around him and hooked your high heel-clad ankles behind his back – knowing full well how much he adored that – he groaned, low in his throat, and leaned down to capture your lips in a kiss, not minding that they were covered in crimson. When Xavier broke the kiss, and you saw your blood coating his plump lips, the burning intensity in his eyes, all while his cock hit your sweet spot again and again and again – your orgasm hit you like a freight train, and you came with a soft, breathless cry of his name and your sharp black nails raking down his back.

“Oh, fuck,” Xavier moaned, low and gravely, immediately following suit, and the sensation of his release filling you up was nearly enough to make you come again.

The arm under your back released you to help Xavier prop himself up, and he was a vision. Eyes closed, brows slightly furrowed, lips still tinted red with the blood from the cuts on your lips, and a thin sheen of sweat across his forehead, neck, and chest as he basked in the afterglow, still buried inside of you.

Unable to resist, you simultaneously squeezed his cock with your lower muscles and gingerly raked your nails along his sides. Xavier shuddered from over-sensitivity and pulled out of you with a hiss, unable to handle the feeling. He leveled you with a glare, only to be met with a sinister smile.

“You’re evil.”

“Thank you.”

Xavier chuckled breathlessly, before standing to quickly fix his boxers, pants, and belt. He then grabbed the hoodie he’d worn to your rendezvous, and kneeled in front of you to tidy you up with it. Always the gentleman, you thought with another smile as he balled the hoodie up to hide the mess from anyone you may encounter on the walk back, then extended his hand to you. He hoisted you up off the ground without much effort, and as you both moved to fix your dress, you noticed in unison that your legs were still shaking from your orgasm.

Xavier merely held up his hands in surrender and said nothing as he reached down to grab his t-shirt, but that shit-eating grin was still on his pretty lips – along with the blood.

The two of you locked eyes, and just as Xavier smiled and opened his mouth to make an undoubtedly cocky, smart-ass comment, you held up a finger and warned, “Silence, or I’ll hex you.”

“Oh, but my love, you’ve already bewitched me,” Xavier said dramatically, holding a hand over his heart to further his theatrics.

“Mhmm,” you replied dryly, although you failed to fully hide your smile. “How about you just put your shirt on and walk me back to my room, Shakespeare. I’ve got a potion to brew.”

“I would also advise you to wipe your mouth. You look more like a vampire than a psychic at the moment.”

He appeared confused, but did as you bade him, and the implication of your words dawned on him as he saw the blood on the back of his hand. Evidently, in his lust-fueled haze, he hadn’t even realized he was kissing your bloody lips. Then, a lightbulb visibly went off in his mind.

“Wait, you liked that, didn’t you?” he asked, stunned. He had seemingly pieced together that you finished right after he kissed you and you saw the blood on his lips.

“Indeed.”

As you so often did, you somewhat expected him to shun you – to be appalled or horrified by you, as most typically were, for some reason or another. It was a very common experience for members of your family.

But, as always, he did nothing of the sort. He was entirely unphased. In fact, the corner of his lips turned up slightly, and Xavier merely replied, “Noted. Just promise you won’t dump me for a vamp. Since, you know, they’ve usually got blood on them, and it’s more of a rare occurrence for me.”

“You have my word,” you responded with a warm smile.

Xavier draped his arm over your shoulders, and the two of you began walking back to the academy, leaving the newly-christened gardens behind you.

“Have I told you how much I love those contraceptive potions of yours?” Xavier mused, with a happy sigh only a man who’d just finished inside a woman could produce.

“Every time we have intercourse, yes.”

“Hm…. Have I told you how much I love you?”

“Also yes, but I never tire of hearing that one.”

“Good, because I love you.”

“And I love you, Xavier.”

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

➼ this fic could be considered a part two