#THIS IS LITERALLY A MASTERPIECE LEIGH

[pizzaapeteer]

OKAY BESTIE IM HERE AND IM EXCITED TO REREAD BUT BEHOLD THIS ABOUT TO BE THR LONGEST REBLOG OF MY LIFE because every single sentence you have merged together is pure perfection!!! I wanna highlight the whole fic to through it in here cuz I just adored every single fucking word that came from your mind to create such a damn masterpiece!!! I wanna kiss your whole brain 🥹😽💛PLS EVERYONE READ THIS

It rarely felt like he could tear someone to shreds with trembling, bare hands and the dull bite of blunt nails. Ripping at them until they peeled apart, ribbon by ribbon, until there was nothing left but a miserable pile of blood-soaked skin and massacred entrails.

God your fucking descriptions have me screaming Leigh it’s so beautiful and poetic and real.

all those lessons his brother gave him, the extensive hours of learning how to compartmentalise and switch off and to not get emotional, be wiped from his brain like they had never even existed.

The small hint of Tom and Mattheo's relationship here, that they both learnt how to shut themselves out and not feel. they're so bloody alike and it hurts me so much to see that had to act like they're feelings didn't matter! 😭😭

The tradition since sixteen eeeeh my heart!!! Also I 100% feel like Mattheo has the biggest, sweet tooth ever

when you'd ultimately ended up following him with the intention of dragging them both out because you couldn't stand the thought of your best friend, or either of them really, getting manipulated by fear and undeserved loyalty into being weapons. Into becoming the monsters they had always wrongly believed, somewhere wretched and wounded deep down, that they already were

AHHHH PLEASE MY FUCKING HEART OMG, the reader following them into war only to try and SAVE THEM i adore this whole thing and want another 14k backstory on just their relationship during the war and after school!!!!!

Him not being able to say no! Ugh such a Matty move - your too pretty eyes to ever want to be responsible for making them dull. your eyes flickered just beyond his shoulder and it was lights out. The light metaphors of your spark omg

The one who reduced his angel of a best friend into a mere shadow - an empty husk cleaved in two. 😭😭😭😭this line is beautiful!

He remembered the weight of your grief hitting him like it was his own.

I absolutely love this line sm, its so powerful and just shows how fucking in love he is with you not to mention empathic ughhhhh

He pretended not to notice - to be deep in thought before he snapped his fingers and grinned. “I've got it - what about the cleaner? You never hear about anyone fucking them” “Well for starters, the cleaner is a dude.” “Even better” “He’s like seventy, Matty.” “Everybody loves a cougar - ouch!”

IM DYING PLEASE I LOVE HIM 🤭🤭🤭🤭

He had felt something expand in his chest then - a swell of warmth that had made him swallow hard. He hadn’t managed to make you angry, his attempt at getting you to work through that part of your break up had failed but the end result was undeniably better. You were smiling

PLEASE OMG WHY ID HE SO CUTE HE SUCH A LITTLE SOFTIE INSIDE

Like he’d taken a shot of pure adrenaline or liquidised sunshine. Still OBSESSED with this line. its giving she's like a shot of expresso and that is you to mattheo!!!!

Instead he croaked softly into your hair. "It's not pathetic to be weak when you need to be. Take as long as you need, I've got you."

MY POOR HEART, 😭☹️ also the fact Mattheo who would have had such a fucked-up childhood and been taught that weakness is a disease is telling her this makes me so happy

“C’mere.” He told you lowly, voice slightly rough with his anger despite how he tried to gentle it for you. awwww i love grumpy man against everyone sweet gentle giant for his girl *BANGING MY FIST ON THE TABLE* 😫

THE KISSS SCENE AHHHHH SHUT UP SHUT UP

And oh fuck, he was burning, his whole body going up like kindling and he couldn't care less if there was nothing left of him but ash afterwards. HELLO THE POETICNESS

THE ARM OVER THE SHOULDER, the “hello Steven” I’m giggling THE HEAD TILT !!!!

And if that quiet, lethal tone had been directed at Mattheo, he’d have seriously considered just fucking running for the hills - you were terrifying when somebody had the misfortune of pissing you off, a fact that had always made Tom proud and scared the other boys half to death- but he wasn't the one in danger this time and fuck, he could barely contain his delight. Amusement forcing him to bury his face into your hair when an undeniably shit-eating grin bloomed across his face. HEHHE hes so cute stop it!

HHEHEEH please not mattheo being scared of her (tottally helped inspire me for my next fic heheh) and Tom being proud stop their relationship with reader melts my heart this trio!!!

FUCK YOU STEVEN 😤😤😤😤

AHHHH I LOVE THE WAY YOU WROTE THIS SCENE LIKE HOW HES JUST SEEING ABSOLUTE RED AND RAGE AND BLACKS OUT.

There was the faint ghost of a metallic tang in his mouth, an invisible crimson film on his bone-white teeth, like Mattheo knew exactly how Steven’s blood would taste and feel if he sank them down right then and ripped his fucking throat out.

Nothing but the ferociously compulsive chant of, make him bleed, make him bleed, make him bleed.

AND THEN HER PUNCHING HER EX INSTEAD I LOVE HER SHE IS MY IDOL

when you lent forward and whispered something that Mattheo couldn’t hear but whatever it was, it made your ex gulp and nod frantically. It was so stupidly attractive and he could barely regain control of his features that had glazed over in a ravenous, unrepentant want before you rose and turned back to him, the movement lazy with self-satisfaction.

STOP I LOVED THIS PART HES SO PROUD OF HIS GIRL

THE PICK UP TO THE COUNTER EEEEEH IM FLUSTERED

“Just sweeping you off your feet, princess.” He winked and you snorted before rolling your eyes - muttering jesus, you’re such an idiot as he hunted for the first-aid kit under the kitchen sink.

“Now be a good girl and be quiet whilst I wrap this - you're being too distracting.” The way something ached and pulsed in his stomach as his mind flooded with all the other ways he could make you flush if something as simple as calling you good girl was enough to have that perfect brain of yours emptied.

“MISTELTOE” Nailed it. PLEASE again i love him, this made me die with laughter

I wanted it with you. With you. He inhaled sharply, a small noise slipping from his throat that he couldn’t stop if he tried. Those words were spinning around inside his skull like it was a carousel, all bright flashing lights and the swell of tinkling music - drowning out every other thought until it was the only one he had left. EEEEH THE CONFESSION

You huffed out a soft laugh, a lovely, almost giddy thing that made it feel like there were flowers blooming in all those hollowed out spaces between his ribs, decorating the soft vines that breached through all of his organs to join them. Suffocating him in the best way with just how much he was in love with you. “Me neither, but it's okay, we both know now.”

ahhhhhhhh omg again im live for your writing and the descriptions you use. flowers blooming in his hollowed out spaces, suffocating him in the best way with just how much he was in love with you LEIGH IM DECEASED 🫠😭

As you moaned, breathless and needy, into his mouth and he felt like you had brought down heaven and placed it in his arms. for the first time in his life, Mattheo knew what it felt like to be so full of light it could burst from him.

SHUT UPPPPP

In the end they didn’t make it. They bounced off a door frame and there was a curse hidden beneath more laughter before he muttered fuck it and laid you down right there in the hallway.

Please this made me giggling so much and the need to just fuck on the floor, god their rabid animals why is that so sexy

He watched you watch him, eyes darker than he'd ever seen them, as he lowered his mouth and pressed a gentle kiss to your clit. It made you jolt, made you whimper prettily, and Mattheo's grin was downright wicked as he murmured. “Oh, you liked that didn't you?”

😫😫😫😫🫠 FUCK! FUCK!

He reached for you without another thought, his hand leaving the unyielding grip it had on your thigh to snatch up yours, entwining both your fingers before he squeezed. Silently telling you, use me - anchor yourself to me - it’s okay, I’ve got you.

no but entwining hands during sex is so wholesome and romantic i wanna scream (thats all im doing throughout this fic just screaming)

all his lost pieces suddenly slotting into place, like you were a part of his soul he wasn’t aware he was missing until you were finally joined once more.

AND THEN THEIR SOULS ARE ENTERTIWNING!!! imma bout to faint 🥹🥹🥹🥹🥹

“Show me.” Mattheo asked roughly, more than a little desperate because you were so tight around him and he was so fucking close. Stomach quivering and flooding with golden heat. “Show me how you've touched yourself all those times you thought about this, how you made yourself come thinking about me.” Quick to grasp his hand and drag it down to where he was fucking up into you, to the place where you were soaked and aching.

That here in your arms he didn't feel like he was less and he was no longer afraid of being a disappointment to you. Not when you refused to make him feel like he had to destroy himself to match expectations created by someone else, like he fell short just by being him and not them. He had always been enough in your eyes and he didn’t know how he had ever managed to deny loving you when it had been right in front of his face the whole time. You made him glow.

ARE YOU FREAKING KIDDING ME!!! (im reacting like i havent read this before lmfao) BUT BUT THE ENDING IS ABSOULTELY PERFECT AHHHH SQUEALING THE LIGHT METAPHORES I ADORE THEM SM AND I ADORE YOU!! 🤍🫂🤍

'TILL WE TURN TO BONE | Mattheo Riddle x F!Reader

Summary: An unwanted reunion with your cheating ex forces Mattheo and you, his best friend, to confront your feelings for each other. [14.7K]

Warnings: 18+, soft smut, oral (fem receiving), piv, cheating ex, rough breakup, minor violence, insecurities, slightly feral, protective mattheo but he's soft as fuck with you 🖤

A/N: i'm back with another re-write of old fics, but this one absolutely took on a life of its own and turned into this chunky beast

He was not sure what came over him.

Mattheo had, of course, always been known for a terrible lack of impulse control, for the rapid flare of his anger that followed more often than not, but it was rarely ever like this.

It rarely felt like he could tear someone to shreds with trembling, bare hands and the dull bite of blunt nails. Ripping at them until they peeled apart, ribbon by ribbon, until there was nothing left but a miserable pile of blood soaked skin and massacred entrails.

There was simply just something that made him irrationally protective over you - something that blossomed from deep within his soul to coil tight around the stuttering flesh of his heart like tendrils of ivy.

And it didn't matter how much he denied it. The many different ways he thought of to try and explain to himself, to the friends you both shared, to absolutely everyone.

We’re just friends.

It always found a way to spectacularly burst out of him, to make his head spin like a top and all those lessons his brother gave him, the extensive hours of learning how to compartmentalise and switch off and to not get emotional, be wiped from his brain like they had never even existed.

Because it was you.

And if there was anything Mattheo absolutely loathed with every wretched fibre of his being - it was when somebody hurt you.

**

It all started when they were at honeydukes.

When they were stocking up on chocolate and sweets before buying firewhiskey afterwards because it was Friday, and they’ve had this tradition they’ve refused to let go of since they were sixteen. Films and takeout - snacks and booze - everything you need at the end of a stressful as fuck week.

You were in sweats and one of Mattheo’s old jumpers - one he once couldn’t find no matter how hard he had looked until you revealed you’d stolen it. Kept it as close as you'd so desperately wished to keep him when he’d followed Tom into the wrong side of their father's war.

Something to remember him by had you lost him for good, whether to death or to darkness.

He had been all but devastated when you'd told him - when you'd ultimately ended up following him with the intention of dragging them both out because you couldn't stand the thought of your best friend, or either of them really, getting manipulated by fear and undeserved loyalty into being weapons.

Into becoming the monsters they had always wrongly believed, somewhere wretched and wounded deep down, that they already were.

It had caused a seed of something aching and unruly to take root in his chest that still bloomed to life whenever he remembered, whenever he saw you in the worn material all these years later.

Because you glowed like this.

When you were both safe and alive after almost selling your souls to ensure it, when you wore that jumper and still looked at him with so much heartbreakingly lovely affection despite the reminder of all the terrible choices he had made along the way to here.

To you being happy and utterly at ease, trying to see just how many sweets he'd let you pile onto the already looming mountain in the basket hooked over his arm before he finally told you enough was enough.

Embarrassingly they hadn't discovered that final amount yet - he was still that bad at saying no to you after so many years. That undeniably suckered in by the sparkle of your grin and your too pretty eyes to ever want to be responsible for making them dull.

But then they did anyway.

One minute you were babbling about inventing a new snack for them to try and then your eyes flickered just beyond his shoulder and it was lights out. Your voice stolen from your throat and your glow diminished like a burning star swallowed up by the wide open maw of the ocean.

His brow furrowed and he was turning before you could stop him - expression instantly morphing to something dangerous - a dark, deadly shade of calm where the only hint of the gathering storm within him was an almost missable twitch of his jaw.

Because it was your ex.

The one you wouldn’t allow Mattheo to kill, slowly, painfully, despite everything he did. The one who reduced his angel of a best friend into a mere shadow - an empty husk cleaved in two.

He remembered the weight of your grief hitting him like it was his own, the way you couldn’t sleep and couldn’t eat and your eyes seemed in a permanent state of glassy red whilst you stared numbly at the walls of your bedroom.

He had felt lost, scared to smother you yet equally terrified of making you feel abandoned if he tried to keep his distance and in the end he had simply thought fuck it.

If you had wanted to be left alone you would have told him to leave and until that happened he had resolved himself to becoming a permanent presence at your side, dropping bags of your favourite food beside you for when you had the energy to pick through them and then slipping in the bed to curl himself around you.

Hoping if he held you tightly enough he could meld those shattered pieces of your heart back together.

You had murmured one day, voice smeared with sadness and a sense of self-loathing that had made Mattheo feel like his heart had been violently slammed against the bones of his ribs, leaving the muscle aching and bruised.

“You must think I’m pathetic.”

He had frowned, carefully turning you in his arms and dropping his chin so he could look into your eyes when he asked. “Why would I think that?”

You refused to meet his gaze however, seemingly far more interested in the old, worn fabric of his t-shirt beneath your fingertips.

“Look at me, Matty.” You had huffed, annoyed. “I’m supposed to be the best of the best, a member of the team of aurors who strike fear into dark wizards and witches everywhere, but instead I’m a fucking mess over a break up - unable to function like a normal human being just because I caught the man I thought I might marry sticking his dick in his assistant.”

He’d winced at the reminder, the memory of your devastated voice, hitching with rattled sobs, when you’d called him straight after.

Drawing back to study you then, he could still see the ghost of that raw agony, the echo of it present in your downturned lips and the bone-deep weariness lurking in your eyes. But there was also more - the stirrings of white-hot rage lurking beneath your pupils that you refused to allow to break the surface.

He'd knew you were attempting to skip over the uglier stages of your healing. Preferring to feel nothing because you have this tendency of turning your anger inward and letting it fester rather than deliver it at the feet of where it belongs.

It pissed him off to see you doing it then and so he’d switched tactics and prayed it wouldn’t backfire horrifically.

“Hey, anyone would be just as upset if they were in your position.” He shrugged casually. “I mean c’mon, an assistant? The lack of originality or imagination is just insulting.”

Mattheo felt you go deathly still - a statue in the circle of his arms - and held his breath.

“That’s what you think I should be upset about? The fact he wasn’t more imaginative about who he cheated on me with?” You questioned, incredulous.

At least you hadn’t straight up punched or hexed him.

“Not just that obviously but he could of at least been less of a stereotypical dick and fucked the head of department or something.”

“Mhm, because sleeping with the boss isn’t cliche at all?”

You were finally looking at him by then, using his chest as leverage to hover yourself above him with brows pinched like you were trying to figure out what the hell was wrong with him.

He pretended not to notice - to be deep in thought before he snapped his fingers and grinned.

“I've got it - what about the cleaner? You never hear about anyone fucking them”

“Well for starters, the cleaner is a dude.”

“Even better.”

“He’s like seventy, Matty.”

“Everybody loves a cougar - ouch!”

He jerked as you pinched his hip, arms binding tighter around your body out of reflex and causing the weak press of yours keeping you above him to buckle. His chuckle had died in his throat as you’d fallen back into him, every inch of you pressed together and your nose brushing his whilst you’d regarded him.

He had felt something expand in his chest then - a swell of warmth that had made him swallow hard. He hadn’t managed to make you angry, his attempt at getting you to work through that part of your break up had failed but the end result was undeniably better.

You were smiling.

Not a full blown grin or anything close, it was subtle - just a faint curve of your lips but it was enough to make Mattheo practically giddy, like he’d taken a shot of pure adrenaline or liquidised sunshine.

He’d be lying if he said he hadn’t missed your smile.

“I know what you’re trying to do.” You’d chastised him half-heartedly . “Arsehole.”

Mattheo huffed a soft laugh. “You love me anyway.”

He felt your fingertips at his jaw - a fleeting, hesitant touch that had him sucking in sharp breath as your gaze swirled warm.

"Yeah, I do."

A tension had bloomed between them in the following silence, his eyes searching yours before subconsciously dropping to your mouth. He breathed and you moved with him, sunk deep into his chest with his trembling exhale as your head dipped lower until he felt like he could taste you on his tongue.

It would have only taken the slightest movement to kiss you - a small lift of his chin to seal his lips over yours and drink you down the way he'd secretly wished to for years. But he couldn't.

It would be wrong when you were in so much pain, your judgement clouded, even if it was what you thought you wanted.

He could kiss you and you'd regret it - you'd be mortified no doubt, either blaming yourself for using him to make yourself feel better or resent him for taking advantage of you in such a vulnerable state. And he couldn't bear the thought of either.

“C’mere.” He murmured instead. The tips of his fingers trailing over the swell of your cheek before they cupped the back of your head to tuck you back into him. He wondered if you could feel his pulse where your mouth skimmed his skin, if the wild thrum against your lips gave away how easily you could affect him without truly even trying.

The air was still heavy - still swollen thick with want and longing and the confusion he could feel in the trembling drum of your fingers over his heart.

Mattheo wanted to kick himself, he hadn't wanted to be another person who made you doubt yourself and you never would if you knew just how desperately he was clenching his jaw to stop himself from spewing his fucking feelings everywhere.

To stop himself saying, "If you want me to kiss you I will - I'll kiss you until I can't fucking breathe, until my damn lungs burst - just not when you're grieving for another guy. Come to me in a month, several months - a year. I'll wait and I'll kiss you until you can't remember any other name but mine."

Instead he croaked softly into your hair. "It's not pathetic to be weak when you need to be. Take as long as you need, I've got you."

**

You healed eventually.

You suffered and you overcame it - cried yourself dry before deciding one day that enough was enough and you bloomed once more. A wildflower sprouting from the rotting corpse of your ruined relationship.

There wasn't any mention of what had nearly happened between you and Mattheo, and he was okay with it.

He'd dealt with the fact you were probably just seeking comfort - that you didn't feel the same - because at the end of the day having you in his life as his best friend and nothing more was infinitely better than living without you.

And as long as you were happy, as long as he kept getting to see that glow in your eyes and the dazzling beam of your smile then Mattheo was happy too.

But now you weren’t.

You were looking at the boy who had once upon a time taken your happiness and cruelly obliterated it and he could see you crumbling that little bit. The ghosts of that old pain and humiliation coming back to twist the loveliness of your features into something shadowed. Haunted.

He reached out to touch your hand, drawing soft lines from your wrist to the tips of your fingers before he tangled them together.

Whether it was to steady you or lead you away he wasn't sure.

He wouldn't get the chance to decide because all of a sudden that voice was splitting through the air. Your name yelled across the brightly-coloured shop in such a way that it instantly felt like a grater being thrust over Mattheo’s nerves.

You blanched. Fingers tightening around his as your eyes darted from over his shoulder again and then back to his in horror.

"Oh shit - what the fuck do I do? He's coming over."

"Break his nose?"

"I'm serious, Matt."

"Oh, well in that case then a well-aimed crucio should work wonders."

"Mattheo!"

It was the panic lacing your voice that did it - that made him lose any real humour and rationality whilst his eyes flickered between your rapidly approaching ex and the insecurity bleeding through every move you made.

You were trying to smooth over your hastily shoved up hair, picking nervously at the way your clothes hung, and it took everything in Mattheo to not slap your free hand away. To not snap at you to stop it because he couldn't understand why you didn't see how soul-wrenchingly gorgeous you were no matter how you dressed.

He glared at your ex again - close enough now that Mattheo got the perfect view of him realising just exactly who you were standing with as his expression curdled.

Good.

Let it stick in his side like a cursed blade that Mattheo was still a permanent fixture alongside you, let it scrape against bone and nick at his shrivelled excuse of a heart that he had failed spectacularly in trying to drive a wedge between the two of you - something you had never seemed to realise but Mattheo had sniffed out immediately.

He watched the way the other boy's eyes narrowed at your hand in his, something disturbingly possessive lurking in those pale, soulless depths and Mattheo could have snarled at the sight. Teeth bared like the feral beast you sometimes liked to joke he was.

Not that he gave a damn if that was how he appeared, he'd gladly appear every bit the monster if it meant that this waste of oxygen stopped believing he had any right to look at you in that way - or any kind of way ever again.

“C’mere.” He told you lowly, voice slightly rough with his anger despite how he tried to gentle it for you, and his heart dove into a maddening pace at how easily you slipped closer and into his arms regardless. The way you happily let him tug you into his chest like you craved the closeness as he always did.

You blinked up at him and all that fury, that volatile energy crackling in his veins, almost bled out of him completely when the trust in your eyes made his breath catch. His lungs sputtering at the absolute look of faith that no matter what, Mattheo wouldn't let a single damn thing hurt you whilst he stood there breathing.

But then you were murmuring his name, soft as whisper, and he swallowed hard as his eyes drifted to your lips. His hand leaving yours to brush permanently bruised knuckles along your jaw.

“You’re so fucking beautiful.” He sighed, desperately trying to ignore the fierce ache in his chest when your eyes widened - lashes fluttering in surprise. “I won’t stand here and let him make you doubt yourself, not again, not when he’s the one who fucked up by letting someone as incredible as you go. Let me show him what he’s missing.”

And then he pressed his mouth to yours.

It was chaste at first, innocent, a barely-there touch to test the waters in case he was crossing an irredeemable line and you decided to shove him away, disgusted.

You didn't.

You returned it almost immediately. Soft lips moving gently beneath his own, a hesitant exploration that had Mattheo kiss drunk far too easily and seeking without thought to deepen it. The gentle nudge of his tongue made you gasp into his mouth, made your fingers scrape up his chest and around the back of neck to twist into his hair and press him closer.

And oh fuck, he was burning, his whole body going up like kindling and he couldn't care less if there was nothing left of him but ash afterwards. There was a broken sort of noise that echoed in his ears and he dazedly realised it had come from him just before your tongue brushed against his and he forgot everything.

How could he remember anything when there was no room left between them, Mattheo gathering you in his arms until he had you utterly sealed to him. The heat of you searing him despite the many layers and even then there was a part of him that craved you closer, like if he could crack himself open and let you crawl inside, he would.

He’d give you everything he could as long as you kept kissing him like that, your pretty soft mouth sounds swirling in his ears as it became something more hungered.

If he wasn’t careful he’d end up lost to you completely.

Maybe he already was, because it wasn’t until he heard an obnoxious voice pipe up right next to them that he realised just how utterly consumed he’d allowed himself to become.

“Am I interrupting something?”

You tensed and he kissed you once, twice more. Sweet brushes over swollen lips that kept your attention solely on him even as his mouth finally parted from yours achingly slow. His thumb trailed a path to your mouth where he rubbed at the spit-slick shine left there and grinned golden with pride as you shuddered with hooded eyes under the new attention.

“Ahem.”

It seemed your ex was still as arrogant and impatient as ever and it only made Mattheo’s grin morph into an insufferably satisfied smirk when he watched a flood of deep-seething irritation burst behind your pupils.

He turned then before you could say anything, slinging an arm around your shoulders to tuck you tight against his side - an unnecessary display after the show you’d both put on but he was positive it was worth it when the vein in your ex’s forehead seemed dangerously close to rupturing.

“Hello, Steven” Mattheo drawled, his voice dropping to something dark and silken, head tilting as his mocking stare glided over the man before him. “Did no one ever teach you it's rude to interrupt? I was under the impression that your irritating family valued manners and kissing the arse of their betters above all else. Daddy must be so disappointed that all that money he threw at the ministry to get you a job was a total waste if you can't even remember something so simple.”

For a moment he thought Steven would back off, abandon whatever stunt he was trying to pull by approaching you when he heard the venom in Mattheo’s tone, the shade of threat lingering just beneath the feigned calm, and shifted warily.

But apparently he had either forgotten the kind of person Mattheo could be, the kind of person that you could be, or he had deluded himself into thinking nothing would happen to him in such a public space.

Because he decided to ignore the blatant hostility radiating towards him with nothing more than a dismissive scoff, a disgusted glance barely thrown at Mattheo before he focused on you.

“Hardly. Unlike Riddle here, who's still in the same position he was when he started despite his families ‘influence’, I've actually just been promoted.” He replied smugly, condescension rife in his tone as he added. “You're looking at the new head of the department of magical transportation.”

You snorted at that and Mattheo felt the corner of his lips twitch despite his irritation at your ex’s jab, his pathetic attempt at a display of power. He felt the laugh bubble in his chest and surge up his throat where he caught it and refused to let it slip free when you muttered a less than impressed ‘how riveting’.

“What about you?” Steven asked, and when he made a move as if he was about to step towards you, Mattheo's response was immediate. The shift of his body to tuck in you tighter and put more of himself in the way, making your ex stop in his tracks.

Huffing, “have you finally chosen something more suitable for a career than running around after criminals? You look better than you did when we were together, always coming home filthy and bruised.”

He felt you flinch against him like the words had knocked an old wound, like they had sharp nails that picked and dug at a scab until it was torn open and bleeding once more.

This was not the first time, Mattheo guessed, that you had taken a hit from this boy who was supposed to love you about your career, your occasionally roughed up appearance after a particularly hard day. And Mattheo was suddenly livid.

Rage had begun to spit in his belly, it snapped in his veins and scorched at the chambers of his heart that were full of every aspect of you that had ever been or would be. It made his breath still, every single part of his being tensing until it seemed like raw fury would burst him apart at the seams.

But then your hand was on his stomach like you knew, like you knew without a warm, grounding touch that the boy you were already holding so sweetly would violently crack and explode if he did not have that extra part of you connected to him.

He felt himself deflate as that hand slid slowly upwards, as it reached for that space above his heart and covered it lightly, tenderly. Fingertips tapping once, twice, a third and fourth time, in a quiet, steady rhythm for his galloping heart to follow.

And all the while you let the rest of your attention land where Steven remained, glaring at your hand on Mattheo's chest as if repulsed by the sight. Your own stare was flinty, cold and unyielding, as you chose to ignore the slight and simply responded,

“Thanks. But maybe don’t let Elvie hear you say that or has she come to her senses after finding you hanging out the back of someone else too?”

And if that quiet, lethal tone had been directed at Mattheo, he’d have seriously considered just fucking running for the hills - you were terrifying when somebody had the misfortune of pissing you off, a fact that had always made Tom proud and scared the other boys half to death- but he wasn't the one in danger this time and fuck, he could barely contain his delight.

Amusement forcing him to bury his face into your hair when an undeniably shit-eating grin bloomed across his face.

Steven, however, only tutted at you.

Annoyance briefly flashing through the haughty look on his face like he couldn't fathom how you were still not over it before he chastised. “Not this again. I told you that was just a one time thing - that I was just stressed with work and she was there. You didn’t have to make it into such a big deal.”

Mattheo stiffened, smile gone and head snapping in Steven's direction like a hound who had just scented blood. “A big deal?” He echoed, incensed, just as you straightened to your full height and your once mild expression shifted to something flat - a touch too calm.

“We were talking about a future together.” Your voice was blunt, deadpan and brittle, the laugh that followed somehow worse. “Buying a house and getting married, what kind of reaction did you expect when I found you fucking your assistant.”

“I expected you to understand that I had needs and you hadn’t been there. I was under a lot of stress and you were always too busy with ‘your boys’.”

Wait a fucking minute.

Him and the others had barely seen you at all before the break up. The day you returned and found out about the cheating you had just spent the week with them but that had been the first visit in months - Mattheo calling you half frantic because Tom’s nightmares had returned and his once apathetic brother had spiralled hard.

You had dropped everything to come running and it must have bothered the selfish, insecure, pathetic excuse of a wizard in front of you that much that he’d immediately done the worst thing he could just to spite you.

The realisation bred a whole new brand of anger, the sheer vehemence of it smashing against the walls of Mattheo’s skull, screaming through his chest to rattle the bones of his rib cage whilst he fought breathlessly to lock it down.

You, on the other hand, looked suddenly ill - stricken as your train of thought clearly followed the same path that his own had stumbled down only seconds before.

“I barely saw them.” You whispered before a snarl twisted your lovely features into something murderous. “I barely saw them because you always complained that I spent too much time with them and not enough with you. Because you accused me of being too close and having feelings for them.”

Steven pursed his lips at that, arching a cool brow as he gestured at where you were still snug beneath Mattheo’s arm - your own snaked around his waist in what he knew was an effort to ground yourself and not the incriminating evidence of romantic intimacy that your ex thought it was.

“Well it seems like I was right after all, doesn’t it?”

Oh, Mattheo was done.

He'd had suspicions that Steven hadn’t liked him, that he hadn’t approved of your friendship.

But to hear that he hadn’t liked you being friends with any of them, that he effectively did his best to keep you away from the boys who were your family whilst accusing you of potentially being the unfaithful one, made Mattheo so unbelievably delirious with rage that he almost couldn’t breathe from the force of it.

“You’re a piece of shit” He seethed, ignoring your warning murmur of his name as he dropped his arm from your shoulders and took a menacing step forward.

He watched the slight widening of Steven's eyes in panic before he attempted to cover his weakness with a pitiful scoff, uselessly trying to make himself look more intimidating when faced with Mattheo’s broad frame.

“Who do you think y-” Steven hissed but in a blur Mattheo surged forward, shoving the other boy into the shelves behind him with such force that the jars of sweets rattled and tilted, threatening to fall around them whilst he pinned him with both hands fisted in his collar.

“You’re a fucking piece of shit.” He reiterated harshly, voice rough, darkened with all the violence that had been steadily unlatching inside him. “She has always been too good for you. You knew it, we knew it, the only one who didn't realise was her and that’s why you were so fucking desperate to keep her away from us. Because you knew she would have figured it out a hell of a lot sooner with us right by her side.”

“I wanted her away from your miserable pining.” Steven spat and he froze. Shock, like a punch to the face, momentarily making him loosen his grip and your ex took quick advantage, shoving forward with what seemed to be all of his strength and knocking Mattheo a few steps back in your direction.

He laughed cruelly as he took in Mattheo’s expression awash with surprise, a spiteful gleam in his eyes.

“What? You didn’t think that I knew you were in love with her? How could I not with the way you constantly trailed after her like an adoring puppy.” He sneered and Mattheo’s stomach dropped when he heard your sharp intake of breath. “Tell me, how does it feel to have someone else's scraps? Though I guess you’re used to that now aren’t you - always second behind your brother in school and your parent's favour, so why should it be surprising that the girl you wanted didn’t want you first either.”

There was the faint ghost of a metallic tang in his mouth, an invisible crimson film on his bone-white teeth, like Mattheo knew exactly how Steven’s blood would taste and feel if he sank them down right then and ripped his fucking throat out.

The thought drowned out everything else in his head, muddling it all and clouding his vision in a veil of red until there was nothing left. Nothing but the ferociously compulsive chant of, make him bleed, make him bleed, make him bleed.

And when everything came swimming back through that familiar fog of darkness he hadn’t even realised he had lost it so violently until he was suddenly face to face with you.

Until Steven was back to being sprawled against the vivid green shelving and you were wedged between his quaking frame and Mattheo’s heaving one.

His sudden burst of wrath was still a wild, unruly thing - still tearing around inside his head, a vicious, incandescent roaring that you had stopped him from repeatedly smashing his fist into your ex’s face until his skin swelled an ugly bluish purple and split. Until the snap of bone was enough to satisfy his hunger for retribution.

But you were there and your hand was clasped around the fist Mattheo had unknowingly reeled back. The other one had smoothed out from its stern grip on his bicep to sweep up, up, up until you were cupping his jaw and brushing your thumb over his cheek.

And once you saw you had gained his attention you drew his forehead lovingly to yours, voice calm, devastatingly gentle, as you told him. “Matty don’t listen to him okay, listen to me, he’s not worth it. Everything you ever said about him was right and he’s not worth it. I refuse to let you get arrested because of a worthless piece of shit like him.”

You gripped his chin, pressing the softest kiss to his mouth without the slightest hesitation and his heart spasmed. “Let’s just go home, yeah? I don’t want to waste any more time on him. Not when I just want to be with you.”

The last part was a whisper, an intimacy for him alone, and every part of him melted with it. Like it was a balm to the raw edges of all that howling rage that you seemed to only ever be capable of providing.

“Okay.” He answered simply, hoarsely, and you beamed as he tugged the hand still wrapped around his raised fist to his mouth and planted a ridiculously sweet kiss to your knuckles before stepping back and pulling you with him.

He began to lead you away, ignoring the way other customers weren't even hiding that they'd been watching, their jars of sweets held in limp, uninterested hands as they whispered excitedly between themselves.

Instead, he turned slightly one last time to call over his shoulder to your ex. “I would say see you around, but I’d rather avada myself before that happens.”

“Fuck you, Riddle.” Steven spat back, vindictive in his humiliation. “You’re pathetic, she’s using you and you're so desperate for someone to love you that you can’t even fucking see it. She’ll chew you up and spit you back out and you’ll probably still be begging her to let you fuck her, you sad wast-”

You slammed your fist into his nose before he could finish and his insults shattered into a high pitched wail of agony that echoed through the sweetshop.

Mattheo hadn’t even seen you move - couldn’t even remember feeling you tug your hand from his, you had been that fast. A vengeful crash of lightning cased in bone and flesh, striking before anyone else had time to blink.

He watched you with his mouth agape as you shook your hand out - flexing your fingers with a look of dark, fleeting curiosity at the blood sprayed across your skin before your gaze swung back to the boy whining on the ground at your feet.

You stalked closer and he cowered - pride swelling in Mattheo’s chest at the power radiating from every inch of you.

He admired it as you dropped smoothly into a crouch, as the venom Steven prepared to weakly spit withered and died on his tongue when you lent forward and whispered something that Mattheo couldn’t hear but whatever it was, it made your ex gulp and nod frantically.

It was so stupidly attractive and he could barely regain control of his features that had glazed over in a ravenous, unrepentant want before you rose and turned back to him, the movement lazy with self-satisfaction.

“Ready to go?” You grinned.

Salazar help him, he was so fucking in love with you.

Mattheo’s face fell then.

If you had heard what your ex had said and believed him, then you knew it too.

Fuck.

**

The journey home was tense.

Did you know? Was he supposed to ask or did he wait to see if you mentioned anything?

He tried studying you out of the corner of his eye as he walked, the fading sun and the flickering of the streetlights coming to life, illuminating the lovely planes of your face but little else.

No hint of what you were feeling - if you had any feelings at all towards what you had possibly overheard.

Even watching you now he felt at a loss - like a code he’d always been able to decipher had all of a sudden switched up on him and he didn’t even know where to start cracking it again.

You moved around his kitchen easily, pulling out bowls and glasses for whatever you could scavenge together to make up for the fact you'd had to leave everything behind that you’d picked out at Honeydukes.

There was a domesticity to the way you were so comfortable in his space, like you belonged there, like it had always been your own as much as it was his and it made something golden fizz through Mattheo's veins at how right it felt.

His attention drifting whilst he revelled in the warmth of it and he didn’t realise you were talking to him until you were stepping close to wave a hand in his face.

“Earth to Matty.” You laughed and he blinked, startled, before offering a sheepish grin that soon fell in concern as he gently grabbed your wrist.

A noise of discontent rose in his throat whilst he inspected your hand. “You’re hurt, you should have told me.” He accused softly and before you could shrug it off he was letting go just to drop his hands to your waist - lifting you on to the dark, glossy countertop with a shameless grin at your surprised yelp of his name.

“Just sweeping you off your feet, princess.” He winked and you snorted before rolling your eyes - muttering jesus, you’re such an idiot as he hunted for the first-aid kit under the kitchen sink.

“Haven’t you played the knight in shining armour enough for one night.” You teased, watching him playfully when he returned to dump a small box on the counter before slotting himself between your thighs. “Seriously Matt, it’s just a few scrapes, I’ll live.”

“Not if you get an infection, now stay still.” He grumbled - pulling out wipes, antiseptic cream and a roll of bandage before picking up your hand to inspect the damage again. “You got him good.”

A small, cheeky smile graced your mouth at his praise, proud and utterly captivating. “Yeah well, serves him right for thinking he can say shit about you.”

It took everything in him to bite back a wicked grin at that, hiding his elation as he used his teeth to tear open a wipe - using the distraction of tending to your hand to ignore your gaze on him - the way his body was reacting to your proximity now that he knew what it felt like to have you pressed into him. Kissing him.

“Remind me why you aren't healing this with magic?”

“Punishment.”

“For what?” You demanded petulantly, offence flaring in your gaze before the little bright burst of pain from the wipe mellowed it back out to something slightly pathetic.

Something so endearing that Mattheo didn't know whether to laugh or to lay down a flurry of apologetic kisses just shy of the stinging cut.

Instead, he tilted his head up and shot you an amused glance as he tossed the wipe and grabbed the cream, taking greater effort than before to dab it gently over your broken skin. “You know the rules, Rocky. You fight outside of work and you have to heal up like a muggle so you think twice before doing it again.”

“Those are the rules for you.” You huffed back at him, a half hearted scowl on your face that he definitely wanted to kiss until it melted into a pretty, satisfied grin beneath his lips. Fuck, he was pathetic. “You're the one who can't go a day without punching someone, you psycho, this was a one time thing.”

“So you think it should be one rule for one and not for others - that's not very lawfully fair of you. Are you sure you should be an auror?”

Your head fell back in exasperation. “I hate you.” You muttered, but it was too fond, too drenched in affection for Mattheo to react any other way besides chuckling warmly.

“No you don't.” He smirked, voice devilish, taunting, as his eyes rose to meet yours briefly once more. “Now be a good girl and be quiet whilst I wrap this - you're being too distracting.”

Silence followed.

Just like he'd asked for because you were too busy staring down at him in surprise. The moment lasting a little too long to be ignored as you blinked, lips parted ever so slightly, and he hated the blazing heat that rushed through his entire body at the realisation he had made you flustered.

The way something ached and pulsed in his stomach as his mind flooded with all the other ways he could make you flush if something as simple as calling you good girl was enough to have that perfect brain of yours emptied. That whip-sharp tongue falling silent.

Salazar help him, how was he supposed to concentrate like this?

He bit down on a groan and attempted to force the thoughts from the head, refusing to pay attention to anything other than the texture of the bandage as he rolled it out in his hands, as he cut off the amount he needed and distractedly took your hand back into his own.

He felt like he was having trouble breathing properly, his blood refusing to cool no matter how much he willed it, your closeness to him not helping when all he could see in his mind was the way something had flashed in your eyes, quicker than even he could decipher, and how he was almost desperate to know what it was.

His heart would not stay at a normal pace and as it stuttered and beat itself violently against the cage of his ribs, he wondered if it was possible to die from something like this. From the desire and longing trapped and blistering beneath his skin, a wicked hot thing that was trying to burn him from the inside out.

Matty?” You asked quietly and it took everything in him not to jump, not to flush guiltily as he made a quiet noise of acknowledgement, a rumbled hmm in his throat before he glanced up at you curiously beneath the dark fan of his lashes when the silence stretched on and you didn’t continue.

You were chewing your lip - a hesitant look on your face - and there was barely a chance for him to swallow down the excruciating urge he felt to gently tug it free with hid thumb, to soothe away the rawness with soft touches and his mouth pressed to yours.

Barely a chance for his stomach to drop as his frazzled mind finally registered fuck, this is it, when you suddenly blurted. “Why did you kiss me?”

Because I couldn’t stand to see you breaking all over again when you’ve come so far.

Because you deserved to make your shithead ex feel as insignificant as he made you feel.

Because you needed my help and I’d give my fucking soul if it mean’t you never had to doubt yourself that way again.

He ran each reason through his mind and just as quickly discarded every one. They were too revealing - those truths that he weighed on the tip of his tongue too heavily threaded with another.

I love you.

So instead he shoved it all back, his nervous gaze dropping back to where he was looping the bandage tightly around your hand whilst he scrambled to come up with something that wouldn't make you too suspicious.

“Mistletoe.”

Nailed it.

“Mistletoe?” You echoed, the choked off noise of barely-restrained laughter colouring your tone.

So much for avoiding suspicion, but maybe he could still work with this.

“Mhm, saw it and had a moment of divine inspiration. You're welcome.”

“Matty, it's February.”

He shrugged, a smirk tugging at his lips as he carefully tied off the bandage. “Maybe they forgot about it, not everyone has the decorations down practically a day later like you, weirdo.”

“Yeah because you make me put them up in November, Mattheo.” You shot back.

And then there was silence - a heartbeat moment where they just stared at each other, all soft, warm smiles and breathy laughter and when did you get so close, because Mattheo was sure as hell when this conversation started you weren’t right there.

Not right where he could see every individual fleck of colour in your eyes and the way your lashes fluttered as his breath fanned over your lips.

He wanted to resist but there wasn’t a damn thing he could do to stop himself.

It was like you were staring right through him and he was helpless but to spill everything - to peel back his skin and crack apart his ribs to let you take a peek at the mess of his heart just so he could sate that unsatisfied gleam of curiosity you held.

“I hate him.” He declared with such sudden vehemence that it had your eyebrows raising and your lips parting in surprise. “I hate that he hurt you and I couldn’t do a damn thing to stop it. I hate that he made you feel like you were worthless and I hate that he can make you doubt yourself even after all this time because you are fucking incredible and an absolute saint and lets be honest we’d all probably be dead or at least significantly more traumatised without you.”

A small chuckle slipped past your lips then, watery and thin, and the sight of your trembling smile and glistening eyes made him ache - made him yearn to wrap his arms around you and cradle you flush against his chest.

Instead he took your face into the warm cup of his hands and swept his thumbs in tender strokes over the swell of your cheeks, resisting every cell in his body that was screaming at him all the while to kiss you there and then until you were both breathless.

“Do you know what I think I hate the most?” He whispered, shuddering slightly as your fingers trailed gently up his arms to rest around his wrists. “That he had everything. Everything I ever wanted and he threw it away like it was nothing. I could kill him for that alone.”

You sucked in a breath and he forced himself to hold your searching gaze whilst his heart threatened to erupt. “Matt,” You eventually croaked, eyes troubled and brows knit into a soft frown. “I know today has been a lot, but please, don’t say anything you don’t really mean.”

"When have I ever?"

You hummed a half-hearted acknowledgement, still unsure. “Are you trying to tell me that you- that what Steven said? Was that true?”

He had to tell you.

He'd gotten this far, gotten to experience this semblance of relief blossoming in his gut because he’d coveted these feelings for so long and despite the fact he knew it was going to hurt catastrophically in the end, it also felt so fucking good to finally be honest with you.

And maybe it was wishful thinking but if he just got it out for you to tell him that you didn't feel the same then he could maybe find a way to not make things weird and move the fuck on.

“Before I answer that.” He coughed, clearing his throat, mouth suddenly dry as bone. Fuck, this was terrifying. “I need you to know that I’m not expecting anything from you. I know you don’t feel the same and it’s okay - I’m okay with it. I don’t want to lose you so if I get it out in the open, we can work past it and nothing has to change.”

“Matty.” You murmured, before one of your hands leaves his to cradle his jaw.

His eyes fluttered closed.

Now or never.

“I love you.” It punched out of him, powerful like so many of Mattheo’s emotions had always been. A blunt force, or too much, as some people had told him and he couldn't help but be petrified that after it all you might be one of them.

“I’ve loved you since we were kids, I just never realised.” He continued, rooted in place despite every fibre of his being telling him to bolt, because the words just kept coming. Jumbled and tumbling, near frantic to make you understand.

“At least not until you were with Steven and I saw all the ways I would treat you better if it was me being allowed to love you and not him. And then it hit me just how much I wanted it to be me, I was just too scared to do anything about it. I’m sorry.”

When he finally fell silent he didn't dare move or even look at you for the first moment, nor the one that followed. You had seen Mattheo in just about every state there was to see a person, but never, until right then, had he ever felt so vulnerable. Cracked open and so completely and irrevocably at someone else's mercy as his emotions bled from him to stain you both.

It was the brush of you against him that startled him back to life. The tender caress of your fingers over his cheek, nose nudging his, that gathered the little courage he had left to open his eyes again, to face the aftermath and look at you.

At the way your lips were clamped together in a trembling press, eyes shining and pained.

And for a sickeningly horrifying moment he thought that he had upset you so badly that you were about to cry, that his feelings were so wholly unwanted that he was hurting you, breaking your heart by having them and ruining everything you had been to each other before he had opened his mouth.

Numbly, he let his hands fall away from your face before taking a step back when a heavy wave of nausea rocked into him.

But then your expression changed, it morphed into something mystified - a touch incredulous.

“And you think that I don’t feel the same?” You questioned. Nose scrunching in confusion and your voice, merlin, your voice, it was so quiet, so full of disbelief that it felt impossible, despite how desperately he tried, to not fold all of his hope into it.

You didn't give him a chance to answer, not that he could have in any distinguishable capacity. Not with his heart lodged somewhere up in his throat.

“You think that I haven't loved you from the moment you came crashing into my life?” You shook your head, the words cracking on your tongue, flooded with emotion as the confession bubbled up out of you and all Mattheo could do was blink - stunned. “You think that I haven't imagined kissing you a thousand times over and not just to get back at some bloody ex?”

“For salazar’s sake, Mattheo, I practically followed you everywhere. School, the war, and now here. Did it never occur to you that I only started dating Steven because in all that time, you never seemed interested in me like that? I thought you didn't love me like I loved you, and so I tried to move on, but I never wanted all the forever stuff with him. Not at first anyway. I always wanted it with you.”

I wanted it with you.

With you.

With you.

With you.

He inhaled sharply, a small noise slipping from his throat that he couldn’t stop if he tried. Those words were spinning around inside his skull like it was a carousel, all bright flashing lights and the swell of tinkling music - drowning out every other thought until it was the only one he had left.

“I - I didn’t –” He stammered, a little bewildered, and your expression melted into something so sweet and understanding that it broke his heart to think he'd ever doubted you.

You reached for him then and he all but stumbled back to you in his desperation to meld himself against you. To bury his face in the crook of your neck and nudge his shaking hands beneath your jumper so he could curve them around your bare sides, seeking out the warmth of you to ground himself because he felt like he'd been totally unmoored.

You huffed out a soft laugh, a lovely, almost giddy thing that made it feel like there were flowers blooming in all those hollowed out spaces between his ribs, decorating the soft vines that breached through all of his organs to join them. Suffocating him in the best way with just how much he was in love with you. “Me neither, but it's okay, we both know now.”

It was almost too much, after all Mattheo had always been utterly unused to to the act of loving and being loved out in the open. No masks or repression or insecurities with needle-sharp claws dug into his brain to hold him back.

It almost felt overwhelming in its rawness, like a violent kind of vulnerability, and yet he couldn't force himself to hide the embarrassingly stupid grin that tugged at his lips at that, lashes fluttering as he sighed at the gentle pass of your hand over his curls before humming a choked, but coy, “Do we?”

“Uh huh.”

“Are you sure?” He teased softly, something sparking in his chest when he felt the way you shivered beneath his hands as he drew a line with his nose up to your jaw. “Because I don't think you actually said whatever it is we're both supposed to know.”

Your cheek rubbed against his with the mild shake of your head that followed then, breath hitching on a chuckle, a knowing little sound that told him you were on to him immediately.

Yet still, you indulged him, as you always had.

A hand clutched at his shoulder whilst the other slipped from his hair to dip beneath the collar of his hoodie, fingers toying with the clasp of his necklace as you asked, voice full of faux confusion. “Didn't I? I could have swore I did.”

“Nope.” He told you quietly, forlornly, his tone heavy with mourning though the smile he held when he slid his nose over your cheek so he could graze it against yours was anything but. “You asked if I'd thought about it which I don't think is quite the same, do you?”

Your eyes shone, lips twitching into the loveliest grin that Mattheo had ever seen. “I think you're impossible.” You whispered and he wondered if it was possible for his heart to lurch out of his chest, for it to dive through his bones and his skin and straight into yours, because it sure as hell felt like it wanted to when you added. “But not wrong, at least not about this.”

“I'm never wrong.” He rasped and when your hand found its way to his jaw, thumb trailing sweetly back and forth against his too flushed skin, he leaned into the touch like he was starving for it.

His entire body almost swaying into yours with how gone he was for the way you were looking at him, how your fingers touched his face like he was something precious as you cupped his cheeks.

“More like, eighty five percent of the time?”

“You wound me.”

“I love you.” You corrected him cheekily, gaze twinkling when his eyes widened and god, he must have looked as dazed, as utterly dumbstruck, as he felt because you laughed. A bright burst that made his heart swell and his cheeks tinge pink. “I love you, Mattheo Riddle, I always have and I'll continue to do so long after we've both turned to bone.”

And then you kissed him.

You kissed him and he drowned in it - lost to the pure radiance that glowed in his veins and the tender heat of your mouth crushed to his. The hand that threaded itself through the curls at the nape of his neck, tangling within and dragging him closer.

His touch fled from your hip and the ladder of your ribs to cradle your cheeks, gently tilting your face up to his own as he did so and it all burned so fucking sweet that if anyone was to ask Mattheo to pinpoint the exact moment he fell to ruin, he would be incapable of providing such an answer.

He could only tell them that he had.

That he was magnificently lost to you as the kiss deepened and you unravelled him with each brush of your lips against his. As you moaned, breathless and needy, into his mouth and he felt like you had brought down heaven and placed it in his arms. Pressed it into his skin until, for the first time in his life, Mattheo knew what it felt like to be so full of light it could burst from him.

He could do this forever he decided - he could die with an appeased soul despite the atrocities of his past when he had the salvation of your devotion. The fire of your hunger burning away all those ugly, dark parts of him until he shone.

You shivered when he wound an arm around you, wrenching you firmly against the solid press of his body as you clung to him and his name poured from your lips like a prayer. An offering.

A softly gasped, “Mattheo.” that dripped golden pleasure down his spine.

And he must have made a noise - some wrecked, low sounding thing in the back of his throat - because you pulled away just a fraction, eyes flickering over his face. Drinking down his hungered expression, his blown-out gaze that slipped from your own to your mouth before he dragged it slowly, heatedly, back up again.

“Do you want me?” You whispered, your hand sweeping over his side and to the bottom of his back, dipping beneath the layers of his hoodie and shirt to splay across flushed skin.

He could barely focus, his forehead falling to yours as he shivered beneath the gentle stroke of your fingers. He felt the touch like it was inside him - like they had sunk through flesh, tissue and bone to fist around his heart.

Merlin.

“Of course I do.” He rasped.

“Then show me, please.”

He sucked in a breath before surging forward to kiss you then, his lips crashing against yours like the world would spin off its axis if he didn’t have his mouth on you.

It was nothing like the kisses he had ever given before, raw desire making his head spin, making him a little clumsy, messy, but it still had your breath catching in your throat.

It had your body melting into his and your hands flying to clutch at the slopes of his shoulders as your surprise dissolved into something hungrier, the sensation of his mouth moving over yours dragging you into delirium with him.

He was gripped with a singular, overwhelming urgency to devour you entirely - the need possessing him until there was nothing else but you and the feel of your mouth under his - and it took a herculean type of strength to remove himself the centimetre it took to ask huskily against your lips. “Are you sure that’s what you want?”

You sighed sweetly into him, the hand in his hair drawing him back so you could kiss him again, a little more demanding before your lips slipped to the corner of his mouth, his chin, his jaw, sliding down his throat to suck a bruise at the skin before dropping a sweet kiss over the mark that made his lungs stutter.

It had a groan tearing through Mattheo’s chest when you pressed yourself against him so he could feel the way your chest heaved - the way you were trembling for him. “I want you to make me yours, Matty.” You breathed. “Just like I always have been.”

And salazar help him, how could he ever refuse you.

So he hauled you forward off the counter and into his arms. His mouth recaptured yours and he let you part his lips, let you flick your tongue, quick and dirty, against his own and lick the needy groan from his mouth as he stumbled. Attempting to navigate you both to the sofa that he swore was suddenly a million fucking miles away whilst you laughed into the kiss.

In the end, you didn’t make it.

They bounced off a door frame and there was a curse hidden beneath more laughter before he muttered fuck it and laid you down right there in the hallway.

Your back hit the floor and immediately he was stretching himself over you - caging you in - his hips nestled into the cradle of your own in a filthy, slow grind that had you panting against his mouth. A keening noise sounding in the back of your throat that made Mattheo’s head go fuzzy.

He pulled back an inch then and stared - tried to brand this image in his brain because god, it was doing something indescribable to him.

Because it was you, gazing back at him with eyes darker than he'd ever seen them, hungry and wanting. Lips kiss-bruised and parted as you sucked in a sharp breath when he rolled his hips and caught you just right. Looking so fucking sinful that it had him swallowing down a choked moan.

Mattheo was almost embarrassed by just how close the sight drove him. There was a swell of something unforgivingly hot behind his ribs, searing in his stomach and his veins, all liquid gold and white flame, and he couldn’t resist re-capturing your mouth in a kiss that echoed just how helplessly he was affected by it all.

“You’re so fucking beautiful.” He whispered into it, voice lovesick and bleeding awe, painting your mouth with a sparkling grin that knocked him flat, made his heart flip behind his ribs, as he pressed each word to your lips. “More beautiful than anyone or anything I’ve ever seen.”

“Mattheo.” You breathed, a little choked, eyes shining, and he had to drop his head before he could get too entranced, before the way you were looking at him had every little thought and feeling he had surpressed for years bubbling up from his chest and out of his mouth.

Instead, he began pressing featherlight kisses along your jaw, down your throat , gently scraping his teeth along the curve as your fingers caught in the fabric at his shoulders.

He travelled reverently down your body, worshipful hands ghosting down your sides until they reached the hem of your (his) jumper and with a quick glance and a tender smile at your nod of approval, he was lifting it up and over your head, throwing it somewhere to be forgotten entirely.

Mattheo made a greedy noise of appreciation at the sight before him. As his gaze, followed by the almost sacred touch of his trembling hands, discovered the warm, silken skin of your belly, then your ribs and finally your lace covered chest.

You shook beneath him, exhaling a shuddering breath when he bent to kiss your stomach, the droop of his curls tickling softly at your flesh before you carded gentle, adoring fingers through them.

They tightened into a fist as he dragged his tongue from your belly button to the edge of your bra, tugging at the strands just a little meanly enough to make his hips lurch and his molten gaze snap to yours.

“Salazar, Mattheo, stop dragging it out and just take the damn thing off, are you trying to make me explode?” You huffed and he chuckled. A rough, throaty sound as he nudged his nose along the swell of your tit, his mouth hovering just shy of touching whilst he glanced up at you with a smug grin.

“Of course not, princess.” He teased, bleeding self-satisfaction and half-drunk on your need. “Not yet anyway.”

Then his mouth closed over your nipple and whatever witty comeback he could see brewing on your tongue cracked into a choked moan as you arched into him, your thighs tightening as he flicked and pinched at the other with deft fingers.

He swirled his tongue over the wet lace before ripping it down to taste your bare skin, teased the stiffening bud between his teeth whilst he worked the bra from your body and tossed it aside without a glance.

And when he’d drunk his fill of your soft little sighs, the shaking of your body in anticipation, he finally slipped down. Trailing hot, open mouthed kisses over your ribs - your stomach - the patch of skin above your waistband until you were tilting your hips up in a silent plea.

Like he would even consider refusing you, like he ever could.

He curled his fingers around soft fabric and drew it down, slow and careful, past your thighs and your calves until he was curving a gentle hand around your ankle to slip your sweats and your underwear off entirely.

It tore the air from his chest, having you utterly bare before him, enough so that for a moment he did nothing but press his face into the softness your leg and breathed you in, refilling his lungs with you.

You were so warm against him that he couldn't resist moving closer, kissing his way up the inside of your leg until he was between your thighs once more. Broad shoulders wedging them apart and his hands stroking over the sides.

He watched you watch him, eyes darker than he'd ever seen them, as he lowered his mouth and pressed a gentle kiss to your clit.

It made you jolt, made you whimper prettily, and Mattheo's grin was downright wicked as he murmured. “Oh, you liked that didn't you?”

He did it again, a little messier, his tongue barely just grazing you before he stopped and your head thumped back against the floor. “Matty–please.”

“Ah, ah, you’ve got to look at me when you ask for something, princess.” He taunted, soft with it as his fingers swept over your hips. “C'mon, let me see those pretty eyes, yeah?”

You obliged and the shiver that overtook him was less from the late-winter chill that still clung to the bare bones of his flat and more from the fire that snapped in your gaze as you stared down at him.

It was glorious, the war between begging him for more or demanding it of him that played unguarded across your features, the adrenaline rush that came with the knowledge only he inspired such indecision.

You didn't beg for anybody and when Mattheo saw that you realised he knew that, his grin turning smug as he waited, your eyes flared.

“Just because I love you doesn't mean I won’t– oh my god.”

He chose then to bury his face between your thighs, dragging his tongue in a slow, firm stroke over your cunt until your whole body arched with it - your palm slamming to the floor beside you as you wheezed. “Fuck–Mattheo.”

His eyes snapped up to watch you, raking over your pleasure-drunk expression, the raw vulnerability of it nearly enough to make Mattheo lose his damn head before the movements of your hand caught his attention.

You were skating it over the carpet, fingers flexing, clawing, attempting to twist into the coarse fibres in an effort to ground yourself and failing as he swirled his tongue over your clit.

He reached for you without another thought, his hand leaving the unyielding grip it had on your thigh to snatch up yours, entwining both your fingers before he squeezed. Silently telling you, use me - anchor yourself to me - it’s okay, I’ve got you.

The first flick of his tongue after that made your head fall back. The second had you twisting your fingers in the silk of his curls. His lips sealing themselves over your clit before he sucked hard had you tugging at him enough that Mattheo whined into you, fingers digging into the meat of your arse to press you to him tighter, his hips rocking against the floor whilst you bucked into the searing heat of his mouth, utterly uninhibited.

The sight of it was maddening, it was divine.

He was torn between never wanting to leave the space between your legs and pulling back to fully appreciate you writhing beneath him. Letting all the praise that was crashing through his head come spilling out so he could see the way you'd go liquid, pretty eyes glazed over, as your thighs quaked.

There was sweat beading at your hairline as he made a mess of you - glistening along the column of your throat, the valley between your gorgeous tits. He watched the way your free hand left his hair to trail the softest path to one of them and squeezed, felt the way your body reacted to both sensations when he pushed two fingers inside you and curled them nice and deep.

You were feverish under him, mewling and arching as he picked up the pace and Mattheo almost lost it at the state of you, trying his hardest to not embarrass himself when every crook of his fingers had you flexing your hips into his hand, fucking yourself on him.

It made your voice turn thread-bare when you whimpered that you couldn't take much more, that you were ‘so fucking close’ and ‘please–Matty–don't stop’.

He went to flame then. To desperation and insanity and all burning, searing need to devour you whole and drink you down until he either drowned or you had nothing left to give.

“I won't baby–fuck, that's it,” Mattheo groaned, sounding equally as wrecked as you looked. “Let go for me. Let me hear how it feels– that's it, good girl.”

And just like you begged him to, he didn't stop until your entire being shook beneath him with a choked cry and you clenched unforgivingly tight around his fingers. He didn't stop when the call of his name cracked and broke as your voice gave out whilst he licked you through the violent crest of your orgasm until it's dying breaths and your body fell slack against the floor.

He didn't stop until you jerked in his hold, gasping and pleading, your fingers eventually releasing their tense grip in his hair to slip down to his chin, tilting it. Away from your glistening cunt as he was made to look up at you.

“Are you trying to kill me?” You laughed weakly, stunned gaze roving over every inch of him as you tried to catch your breath, and he wondered if he looked as undone as he felt before you. Wild haired and panting. On his stomach with his eyes dazed and face coated with you.

“I'm sorry,” he rasped, not bothering to even try and appear like he was very sorry at all, “but it's not my fault you taste better than I dreamed you would.”

Your eyes glazed a little at that, a dopey little smile playing at your mouth with it, and he laughed softly when you released his hand to pass it over your sweat-damp hair with a breathlessly murmured ‘fuck’.

He nuzzled at your thighs as satisfaction rolled through his chest, pressing gentle kisses to the still trembling skin as he soothed his hands over your legs - your belly - massaging your sides until you made a playful grab for them and brought them to your lips, eyes shining down at him at the way his lashes fluttered and his expression turned smitten before you tugged at him.

He climbed back up your body with a grin, a shining, pleased thing that he was sure probably took up nearly half of his face and you huffed a quiet laugh when he nudged his nose against yours. His mouth surrendering once more to yours in a syrup sweet kiss that burned deeper, more feverish, the longer it lasted.

“You’re adorable sometimes, you know that?” You smiled when he eventually drew back, eyes bright and twinkling with mirth whilst your fingers skimmed his jaw.

He snorted. “Sure, that’s the word you’re gonna use for someone who just made you c-” He teased, cheeks dimpling as his grin widened when you quickly covered his mouth with your fingers and jokingly warned.

“Don't ruin the moment, Mattheo.”

He laughed and kissed you insead. He couldn't stop, couldn't stop touching you, couldn't feed the ache fast enough that came with needing to do it more than he already was.

He choked as you rolled your hips into his own, as he finally allowed himself to fully acknowledge the pleasure sparking in his veins whilst it gathered intensity. Letting the thick outline of his cock slide against you until you were groaning into each other's mouths. Hands knotted in his hair and pearl-white teeth grazing the plush of his lip when you drew back to murmur.

“I want you–I've wanted you for so long, fuck, Matty, you have no idea.”

He did. He’d wanted you for just as long, if not longer.

But still, hearing it sent a shock through him - ripped a low, guttural moan straight from his lungs that was followed by a heat-soaked curse that you took from him just as readily as you had everything else he'd given so far.

He didn't even blink before asking. “Can you say that again?”

You licked your lips and grinned, breath stuttering as he continued to move against you, fingers snatching at your jaw so you couldn't take your eyes of him. “I need you inside me or I'm gonna lose my mind, it's all I've thought about for months–the way you'd feel– how you'd fuck me– oh god.”

Another desperate noise. “Fucking hell. Again. Please.”

He didn't try to stop you when you reached for his clothes, rising to sit back on his haunches so you could follow and strip him of his hoodie, his shirt. His hand curling around the back of your neck to drag you into to him, mouths connecting the instant they were both over his head in a kiss that was all tongue and teeth, a little messy, touched with desperation. Frantic.

You flattened your palms to his chest, sweeping them out and then down, exploring the expanse of flushed skin, the muscles of his chest and his stomach that twitched beneath your touch. The hunger behind every slow, drawn out trace making his heart rattle behind his ribs.

He shivered when your mouth trailed over his jaw, when he felt teasing nips marking his throat before there was an open mouthed kiss pressed over the scar on his chest.

A soft clink of metal echoed in the room as your hands drifted to his belt, your fingertips slipping over the leather whilst you pulled it free from the loops of his jeans before it fell to the floor with a quiet thud.

And then you were pushing his jeans down just far enough until he was able to hastily kick them off. His heart in his mouth as he knelt before you, utterly naked apart from the shadows that slanted over his skin.

He felt a flicker - the ghosts of that insecurity of not being enough passing over his face before he could blow it away like a cobweb- and prayed that you wouldn't notice. That you wouldn't mistake his hesitation for something else and even consider it to be directed at you.

But instead it seemed that you understood. Your hands found his jaw and you drew him into a kiss that ached. A lovely, bruising thing that had him melting into you, any insecurities fleeing so fucking far away that he could barely remember what they felt like.

You held him as tightly as you could and hummed in delight against his lips when he did the same and crushed you to his chest, the sound of it morphing into something needy as his cock throbbed, hot and smearing wetness against your belly.

“I want you, Mattheo, I don't know how else to explain it, just that I need you so badly it hurts– it's hurt from the moment I realised exactly what you mean to me and I don't think it'll ever stop no matter how much I might have you.”

Mattheo swallowed hard, throat bobbing.

You would be the death of him, he was sure of it. His hands shook, fingers grasping at your cheeks in an attempt to hide it, and there was this unfathomable feeling of love swelling inside him so brilliantly that he could barely contain it as he peppered your face with sweet, breathless kisses.

"You can have me whenever you want,” he pressed the words into your skin, the glowing warmth of your cheeks as he pushed you back, murmuring the next ones over and over until he hovered over you once more, “I’m yours.”

You went soft for him in the cage of his arms at that. Stripped down to your barest bones in the face of his raw emotion and it made his heart flutter and thump all too fast behind his ribs when your voice trembled on a sigh his name, so sweet and lovely, as his forehead dipped to meet yours.

“Hi.” He breathed, voice dropping low, his smile achingly soft.

Your lips quirked, nose slipping against his when you whispered back a tender, “hi.”

In the dimly lit space of his flat and with soft carpet at your back, you drew him closer, kissed him like you wished the two of you could fuse together and touched him as he fought to commit it all to memory. The way he felt - burning with each and every stroke of your hand, each part of him alight as you murmured beautiful affections against his mouth - at the intimacy of it all.

The image of you that he was sure not even death could take from him when it eventually came - eyes bright as jewels, lips marked with his kisses, all pretty, soft skin that gleamed under the weak stream of light the evening had yet to swallow.

You looked like something ethereal, something otherworldly and untouchable, and the privilege he felt in being the one to see you that way, to contribute to the way you were a gorgeous mess, felt like something holy.

“I love you.” He choked.

His words coming out jumbled and almost broken, followed by a hiss slipping sharply through his teeth when you finally guided him into you. A low noise caught in his throat and eyes screwed shut as he slid inside you inch by inch until his hips met yours.

He felt like he was on fire, the warmth that had been blooming in his gut morphing into something violent and unimaginable that had his body tensing as he struggled not to finish before he’d even started. Head falling against your shoulder just before he felt your lips brush against his temple, parting on a rushed exhale.

“I love you too,” you moaned, voice strangled. “Oh, god, Mattheo–”

At least, it seemed that you were in just as bad shape as he was. He’d probably say something similar if he could remember how to speak.

But his mind had splintered. Shattered apart to fragments and the only thing he could focus on was the way you were surrounding him- all slick, tight heat and the overwhelming sensation that burst through his chest of all his lost pieces suddenly slotting into place, like you were a part of his soul he wasn’t aware he was missing until you were finally joined once more.

“Shit, I'm sorry– just give me a minute.” He stuttered, voice hoarse and eyes blown wide, endlessly dark when he peered down at you. Half determined, half pleading. “I want to make it good for you, you just feel so–merlin, you feel too fucking good.”

He moved carefully only moments after that, unable to resist. An oozing honey pace that only made him moan when you kissed him, a filthy sound that would have stunned him had he not been so out of his mind.

He could only stare at you like you were pure magic taken form - no ancient bloodline or cursed objects needed for whatever it was running through your veins - as you threaded your fingers through his hair and whispered. Breath hitching. “It's okay– it's already so fucking– oh– so good, just let go. I want to feel it.”

It made his desperation threaten to win over. Head spinning as he dragged himself back out of you before surging back in, hitching your leg high up at his waist so he could do it again and again and again. Each thrust knocking you further up the floor and pulling a strangled noise from the back of your throat that he quickly stole with greedy lips moulded over your own.

It started slow, deliberate and devastating, and then turned faster. Needier and unrestrained. The sound of panting breaths and skin on skin rising in the otherwise silence. Open mouthed kisses that were forced to come to an end because all the oxygen felt like it had fled both of your lungs, punched out every time you met the frantic rolling of his hips.

Mattheo had never felt anything like it and it was dangerously close to annihilating him completely.

There were wicked bolts of something animalistic, a feral rush of desire, threatening to send him spiralling and you gasped in surprise, hands clenching tight at his arms, when he pulled out and reared back to kneel before you. Desperate hands shoving your knees against your chest before he buried himself back inside you again.

It changed the angle that he speared into you with and with the next thrust that came you were sobbing for him, seizing up like he’d plunged into the heart of your pleasure and pierced it - letting it flow out to the farthest reaches of you until you were curling into the solid press of him against you. Fingers scraping down his arms and back arching like a bow.

“Mattheo,” you whimpered and fuck, you sounded just as overwhelmed by it as he felt. Shaking in his arms as the heat wrapping around you both grew and grew. “Oh–god–”

It made him choke on his tongue, eyes rolling back at the way you were clenching around him as his thrusts became deeper, greedier. His cock harder than it had ever been whilst you made a mess of his stomach and his thighs and Mattheo couldn’t get enough.

He was so close to losing his mind, so close to devouring you entirely and begging you to ruin him because every sound you made, every sweet little uh,uh,uh that tumbled past your lips was unlocking something wild tucked deep inside him that he was helpless to rein back. That had him babbling praise, incoherent words that dripped down on you like scalding hot honey.

“So good for me– so fucking perfect– just look at you, fuck, you're beautiful.”

And then he was folding himself over you to latch his mouth to your nipple. Relishing the way you jerked as he flicked his tongue, scraping his teeth across the peak until you mewled before trailing a path of fire up to your collar bones and then higher again to the tender skin of your throat. Sucking a kiss there that had you keening and shone like a bruise when he drew back to meet your burning stare.

“Show me.” Mattheo asked roughly, more than a little desperate because you were so tight around him and he was so fucking close. Stomach quivering and flooding with golden heat. “Show me how you've touched yourself all those times you thought about this, how you made yourself come thinking about me.”

You nodded slowly as if dazed by the request, lips parted and eyes gleaming dark. But you were quick to comply. Quick to grasp his hand and drag it down to where he was fucking up into you, to the place where you were soaked and aching.

And once you were there, you pressed his fingers against you and manipulated them to draw quick, messy circles over your clit that had you throwing your head back with a loud cry of his name whilst he watched, lust drunk and in awe.

“Shit, shit shit.” Each word that bubbled its way up your throat was ragged, edging on breathless as you writhed. “Mattheo, oh my god, I’m gonna–”

He surged up before you could finish, his other hand tearing away from your leg to tangle itself in your hair so he could drag your mouth to his and kiss you as you came. Holding you fiercely in place and groaning against your lips, swallowing down your own noises whilst your cunt fluttered around him, convulsing over and over until his movements grew frantic and messy. Warmth pulsing brightly in his groin and his stomach and his too tight chest.

“That’s it, fuck–” He grunted into your mouth, lungs heaving. “Cum for me, baby– make a fucking mess of me–”

It was too much - he was bordering on delirious, wound so tight that any moment it felt like he’d explode. Burst apart like confetti.

It took every ounce of strength he had to stave off his own release so he could extend yours by letting the frantic rhythm of his snapping thrusts morph into a slow, intense grind that stole the breath from your chest and made it feel like he was melding himself to your body.

Like you were burying into each other so deep that you would never truly be able to remove the imprint of the other afterwards.

There was a flash of pain from your nails scratching down his scalp and across the broad sweep of his shoulders, teeth scoring the softness of his bottom lip whilst shudders wracked your frame and it startled him, the low, starving noise it drew from his mouth.

Knocked him flat when you drew the stinging flesh into your mouth, flicking your tongue against the marks you had left behind, and began to press your hips into his that little bit faster despite the way he could feel the muscles of your thighs trembling around his waist.

And when you cupped his cheeks, eyes burning with a wicked hunger whilst you whispered against his mouth, Mattheo was utterly lost.

“C’mon Matty, let go,” you encouraged him, voice wrecked. Desperate. “Want you to cum– want you to fill me up–make me yours–”

He fell apart for you then, crashed into bliss with his arms wound achingly tight around you and let it wrench him open as his hips stuttered and then came to an almost stop, twitching desperately and fused unyieldingly to your own. His vision going dark and your name like a prayer that he gasped into your skin over and over.

And when it all eventually calmed, the crashing of his heart beating against his ribs and your chaotic breaths, the exhaustion had him collapsing into you. Both of you tangling in a heap of slack limbs on the floor before he managed to lift himself on weak arms to the sound of your startled laugh.

The way you were looking up at him when he raised his head was making his chest ache, filling his lungs up with an adoring kind of wonder, the kind that created sunshine and sprouted wildflowers in even the darkest parts of him.

It made it impossible for him not to ask. “Can I kiss you?”

And if he thought that you would laugh at him considering everything that had just happened, that only moments ago he’d been buried inside you, then he was delighted to be proven wrong. Because you were beaming at him the second the question rushed past his lips, eyes sparkling in the near dark of the small, narrow hallway.

“Of course you can.”

So he kissed you like he’d always craved to but never dared to hope for, slipping his fingers through the messy tangle of your hair to cradle your head whilst his lips pressed sweetly and almost shy against your own.

It unfurled like it held its own magic, the type that could stop time and make him feel like he was floating, tingles rushing all through his body until he was lightheaded and needed to draw back before he lost his breath to the irresistible pull of it all.

He never wanted to leave this moment. There was a contentment settling in his bones that he’d never experienced before and you, you were glowing again.

It radiated from you and he wondered if he had been painted in its loveliness the same way, if his happiness was as blatant to you as yours had always been to him.

If the adoring way you were looking at him counted for anything then he thought that it was.

“You're incredible.” He murmured, snaking his arm to rest as a pillow under your head and curling the other around your waist. Folding you into him. You wound your own around his neck in return and smiled, fingers dragging softly through his hair and slipping down his face. A reverent touch.

“You’re pretty amazing yourself, Mattheo.”

He melted at that, pressed little butterfly kisses to your cheeks and your nose and your hair until his throat no longer ached with how tight it had become.

He wanted to say that he felt it, when his voice no longer seemed like it would crack.

That here in your arms he didn't feel like he was less and he was no longer afraid of being a disappointment to you. Not when you refused to make him feel like he had to destroy himself to match expectations created by someone else, like he fell short just by being him and not them.

He had always been enough in your eyes and he didn’t know how he had ever managed to deny loving you when it had been right in front of his face the whole time.

You made him glow.

And he would love you for it long after he had turned to bone.

[lusinzak]

In Grishaverse, the best and most amazing character development clearly visible is Leigh Bardugo herself. None of her works is bad, but for me, The Ruin and Rising was far better than The Shadow and Bone. I don't even need to talk about Six of Crows, and the fact that somehow Crooked Kingdom is much more loved.

Outside Grishaverse Ninth House is a masterpiece. It's literally magical.

She improves, and that makes her THE BEST.

[meyhew]

What are the top 5 books you've ever read

a place for us; fatima farheen mirza. quite literally the best most insane most tearjerking book centered around a family. like i'm not kidding i was SOBBING at the most innocuous lines. it's so delicately and carefully written i cannot recommend it enough to literally every single person

transcendent kingdom; yaa gyasi. again... family dynamics, specifically mother/daughter, sister/brother. fathers and their absence. the characterization in this is insaneeeee i was so impressed by the writing. not usually a fan of how a lot of people write about science vs religion but it's done so beautifully in this i was obsessed.

sharp objects; gillian flynn. smth smth violence among women smth smth a daughter is always her mother's wound smth smth we're all trapped in the cycle. reading this made me feel certifiably insane miss flynn is a genius

the invisible life of addie larue; v.e. schwab. this one... the loneliness in this... the search for identity, the ache to belong to be known to be remembered... the grief of always being forgotten... foul. people have mixed opinions abt this and yeah to each their own but also i sort of vehemently disagree with a lot of them. this book is a masterpiece. and i say that as someone with a deep rooted hatred for the french

six of crows; leigh bardugo. do i even need to explain this. like i am who i am of course i love this. whats not to love abt a bunch of criminally insane misfits breaking into a highly protected govt facility and kidnapping a valuable prisoner

[smokeybrandreviews]

Winds Over Neo-Tokyo

I just read that Taika Waititi's live action remake of Akira is still in the works and, f*ck, if I'm upset about it. his cat is the absolute wrong choice fr this film. And i say film because he wants to remake the anime classic, not re-adapt he manga it’s based on. This sh*t is devastating because Waititi doesn’t have the chops to deliver on the entire vision that is Akira. Mans doesn’t make epics. He makes cute little character dramas, wrapped in clever humor. That’s fine for, say, a There film or Jojo Rabbit but Akira? Bro, there is nothing “fun” about Akira. It’s an existential hellscape masquerading as a nihilistic, dystopian, nightmare. Nothing Taika has ever made, makes me believe he can deliver on such heady material. That said, there are several directors that i think could and i wanted to highlight them here.

Denis Villeneuve

I think, aesthetically, Deni is the best choice for this sh*t. He’d bring the spirit of  Katsuhiro Otomo’s masterpiece, but gift us a more epic and cinematic visual presentation. He’d do what he did with Blade Runner, i think, and give us something very special. That said, mans is busy finishing up the best Dune adaption to date so i get why he’s not tied to this picture. Such a goddamn shame, that.

Alex Garland

Ex Machina and Annihilation. That’s it. That’s the pitch. If I'm objective and not completely up Denis’ ass because of how goddamn gorgeous his films are, it’s Alex Garland. This man has proven he can do Cyberpunk with Ex Machina and delivered some uniquely grotesque body horror with Annihilation. he less said about Men the better but, even in that weirdly pretentious train wreck, you can see the potential to deliver on the existential trauma everyone suffers from in Neo Tokyo.

Robert Rodriguez

Book of Boba Fett aside, Rodriguez delivered Alita: Battle Angel and nailed that sh*t perfectly. Alita is, arguably, the best anime adaption we have o date and that was all thanks to Rodriguez respecting the source materiel. I think he could deliver a very solid, very faithful, Akira adaption, though, he wouldn’t be my top pick.

Neill Blomkamp

I don’t understand how this dude wasn’t the first one called for this project. I mean, have you seen his catalog? Elysium, alone, nails the emotional tone necessary to bring Tetsuo’s journey to the big screen and dude’s sci-fi sensibilities are unassailable. District 9. Chappie. Everything out of Oats Studios. He’d do Neo Tokyo mad justice. Blomkamp is the obvious choice and he didn’t get a meeting? Really?

Leigh Whannell

Leigh is probably the best fit for his film in terms of experience , availability, and budget. This man has worked wonders with nothing and all of his films feel tactile, like they use way more practical effects than they actually do. Plus, his background in horror will go along a way to delivering that Tetsuo meltdown in the Olympic Arena at the climax. If you’re not convinced, go watch Upgrade and tell me this man can’t deliver a fantastic Akira adaptions for pennies on the dollar of what it will take Taika.

Chad Stahelski

The other half of the brain trust that gave us John Wick, Stahelski has proven himself to be one of the best action directors in the business. I think that level of creativity lends itself to he stylized nature of an anime adaption but, specifically, Akira. Some of the brilliant set pieces he dreamed up in the John Wick series go a long way to lending confidence in his ability to capture the gritty, urban, feel of the Cyberpunk genre.

Michael B. Jordan

And the dark horse entry bringing up the rear! Jordan is a card-carrying weeb and he can actual direct his ass off. Creed III is dope as f*ck and that scrap at the end was brilliant. Mans literally said, out loud, he took from anime like Megalobox, Naruto, Hajime No Ippo, and Dragon Ball Z to make that happen. What that says to me is he knows his sh*t, that he would treat this adaption seriously and give us something a fan would want to see.

If i had my pick, i think Garland or Blomkamp should be directing this production. They definitely have the chops in terms of experience and vision to give us something really special. It’s insane to me that f*cking Taika Waititi is the guy in charge of bringing one of the most influential films, not just an anime classic, to live action. The same f*cking guy who sh*t the bed with Thor IV. The same f*cking guy who played a fat, brown, imaginary Hitler. Like, this man makes quirky comedies and you want him to helm the entire production to one of the bleakest films ever made? Really? I’m not trying to say Waititi is bad at his job because he isn’t. I love Jojo Rabbit. I love Thor: Ragnarok. I love What We Do in the Shadows and Reservation Dogs. None of this sh*t screams Akira to me. Dude’s out of his depth with that material and I'm terrified he’s going to make it some goofy, juvenile, chuckle-fest when it’s not supposed to be at all. Now, if we're talking a Bartkira adaption, Waititi might just be perfect for that...

[smokeybrand]

Winds Over Neo-Tokyo

I just read that Taika Waititi's live action remake of Akira is still in the works and, f*ck, if I'm upset about it. his cat is the absolute wrong choice fr this film. And i say film because he wants to remake the anime classic, not re-adapt he manga it’s based on. This sh*t is devastating because Waititi doesn’t have the chops to deliver on the entire vision that is Akira. Mans doesn’t make epics. He makes cute little character dramas, wrapped in clever humor. That’s fine for, say, a There film or Jojo Rabbit but Akira? Bro, there is nothing “fun” about Akira. It’s an existential hellscape masquerading as a nihilistic, dystopian, nightmare. Nothing Taika has ever made, makes me believe he can deliver on such heady material. That said, there are several directors that i think could and i wanted to highlight them here.

Denis Villeneuve

I think, aesthetically, Deni is the best choice for this sh*t. He’d bring the spirit of  Katsuhiro Otomo’s masterpiece, but gift us a more epic and cinematic visual presentation. He’d do what he did with Blade Runner, i think, and give us something very special. That said, mans is busy finishing up the best Dune adaption to date so i get why he’s not tied to this picture. Such a goddamn shame, that.

Alex Garland

Ex Machina and Annihilation. That’s it. That’s the pitch. If I'm objective and not completely up Denis’ ass because of how goddamn gorgeous his films are, it’s Alex Garland. This man has proven he can do Cyberpunk with Ex Machina and delivered some uniquely grotesque body horror with Annihilation. he less said about Men the better but, even in that weirdly pretentious train wreck, you can see the potential to deliver on the existential trauma everyone suffers from in Neo Tokyo.

Robert Rodriguez

Book of Boba Fett aside, Rodriguez delivered Alita: Battle Angel and nailed that sh*t perfectly. Alita is, arguably, the best anime adaption we have o date and that was all thanks to Rodriguez respecting the source materiel. I think he could deliver a very solid, very faithful, Akira adaption, though, he wouldn’t be my top pick.

Neill Blomkamp

I don’t understand how this dude wasn’t the first one called for this project. I mean, have you seen his catalog? Elysium, alone, nails the emotional tone necessary to bring Tetsuo’s journey to the big screen and dude’s sci-fi sensibilities are unassailable. District 9. Chappie. Everything out of Oats Studios. He’d do Neo Tokyo mad justice. Blomkamp is the obvious choice and he didn’t get a meeting? Really?

Leigh Whannell

Leigh is probably the best fit for his film in terms of experience , availability, and budget. This man has worked wonders with nothing and all of his films feel tactile, like they use way more practical effects than they actually do. Plus, his background in horror will go along a way to delivering that Tetsuo meltdown in the Olympic Arena at the climax. If you’re not convinced, go watch Upgrade and tell me this man can’t deliver a fantastic Akira adaptions for pennies on the dollar of what it will take Taika.

Chad Stahelski

The other half of the brain trust that gave us John Wick, Stahelski has proven himself to be one of the best action directors in the business. I think that level of creativity lends itself to he stylized nature of an anime adaption but, specifically, Akira. Some of the brilliant set pieces he dreamed up in the John Wick series go a long way to lending confidence in his ability to capture the gritty, urban, feel of the Cyberpunk genre.

Michael B. Jordan

And the dark horse entry bringing up the rear! Jordan is a card-carrying weeb and he can actual direct his ass off. Creed III is dope as f*ck and that scrap at the end was brilliant. Mans literally said, out loud, he took from anime like Megalobox, Naruto, Hajime No Ippo, and Dragon Ball Z to make that happen. What that says to me is he knows his sh*t, that he would treat this adaption seriously and give us something a fan would want to see.

If i had my pick, i think Garland or Blomkamp should be directing this production. They definitely have the chops in terms of experience and vision to give us something really special. It’s insane to me that f*cking Taika Waititi is the guy in charge of bringing one of the most influential films, not just an anime classic, to live action. The same f*cking guy who sh*t the bed with Thor IV. The same f*cking guy who played a fat, brown, imaginary Hitler. Like, this man makes quirky comedies and you want him to helm the entire production to one of the bleakest films ever made? Really? I’m not trying to say Waititi is bad at his job because he isn’t. I love Jojo Rabbit. I love Thor: Ragnarok. I love What We Do in the Shadows and Reservation Dogs. None of this sh*t screams Akira to me. Dude’s out of his depth with that material and I'm terrified he’s going to make it some goofy, juvenile, chuckle-fest when it’s not supposed to be at all. Now, if we're talking a Bartkira adaption, Waititi might just be perfect for that...

[tapedsleeves]

Tagged by the lovely @tapejob a;lsfkj thank you

what book are you currently reading? - I’m not reading anything currently, but that’s because I just finished a couple of books - I recently finished Holly Black’s Wicked King & Queen of Nothing, and also Leigh Bardugo’s Hell Bent.

favourite movie you saw in theatres this past year? - I didn’t go to any theatres this year :( but I did see a couple of movies that I really enjoyed - Glass Onion as so so good and Weird: the Al Yankovic story was a masterpiece. 

what do you usually wear? - jeans & a t-shirt or a short sleeved button down. Think “was a goth in high school but is now too lazy to keep it up and also kind of butch and wearing mushroom patterned button-down with the top buttons undone.”

how tall are you? - 5'8”

what's your star sign & do you share a birthday with a celebrity or historical event? - libra! uh. jeff goldblum

do you go by your name or a nickname? - technically i go by my nickname - Casey is not my real name but literally everyone calls me it unless they don’t know me that well (read: have only read my work email address)

did you grow up to become what you wanted to be as a child? - this is gonna be dark, but when I was a kid, I really didn't imagine myself as anything, and as a teen, i thought “i’ll be dead before 25″ so. uh. no?

are you in a relationship? if not, who is your crush if you have one? i’m in a relationship with two lovely people :) don’t tell them i have a crush :’)

what is something you're good at vs something you're bad at? - uhhhh i’m really bad at bowling. my high score is 42. that’s all time, by the way. 42. I’m pretty good at uh... remembering song lyrics.

dogs or cats? - cats :3

if you draw/write/create in any way, what's your favourite picture/line/etc. from something you created in the last year? - this is from my current WIP:

Running after Max feels more like he did when he was a kid, running after Mike or a soccer ball. Running towards a tangible goal, rather than just because it’s ‘healthy.’ Max feels like a goal he wants to achieve, a mountain to climb, just to enjoy the view.

what is something you would like to create content for? - prob shoresy

what's something you're currently obsessed with? - hockey, of course, but i’m also rewatchign Haven with a friend and it’s got a pretty intense grip on my brain. There’s also the “come to papa” video.

what's something you were excited about this past year that turned out to be disappointing? student loan forgiveness

what's a hidden talent of yours? - I’m really good at untangling things

are you religious? - not really

what's something you wish to have at the moment? a nap

tagging anyone who wants to!

[reminiscingtonight]

Hi! Just to start off, I love your stuff! The angst hits like no other and they're always written so well! I have two questions for you. I was wondering which one of your own works is your favorite? Also do you mind sharing some of your favorite fics from other authors too?

Hello! Thank you for the nice words 🥰. Alrighty, let's see...

1). I feel like choosing a favorite out of all my works is like choosing a favorite child 😅 BUT that being said, my favorite one would either be Wrong One or Misunderstandings. Both were just super fun to write and were lowkey a lil batshit crazy (bonus point, they aren't angsty).

2). For fic recommendations:

If you couldn't tell by most of my rb's, I love @vancityfire13's works. My favorite one of her's is her "When The Deal Goes Down" series. It's written so beautifully and she captures the building relationship between Nat and the reader so well. The series isn't done yet but I'd still highly recommend you check it out.

Then we also have @peabrain112's "Healing of a Broken Heart" series. This one is also still in the process of being written but BOY does it pack a punch. I'd suggest you prep some tissues while reading the rollercoaster of emotions these fics will bring you on.

While I'm on the angst train, I might as well recommend @twilight-99-tm's "August" and @missmonsters2's "Last The Night." Both of these are tied for my #1 fav angst fic spot. Both of them had me sobbing from start to finish. The only thing I can say is the reader should have found a moment to 🔪🤖 (all of our problems would’ve been solved if we had just done that 😅).

And ofc I can't forget @somewhatgreatexpectations's "Love Me (Or Let Me Go)" series. A literal masterpiece. The push and pull between Leigh, Wanda, and the reader was magnificent. And bonus: there's two endings so you can choose which one you want to end up with.

Some honorable mentions include @abimess and @helloalycia, where all of their fics are so good that I can't choose any one favorite fic, so I'll let you peruse through their masterlists yourself.

[cristalconnors]

BEST PICTURE

THE NOMINEES ARE...

5. BLOODY NOSE, EMPTY POCKETS, dir. Bill Ross IV, Turner Ross. prod. Michael Gottwald, Bill Ross IV, Turner Ross, Chere Theriot

A rousing documentary experiment that knows life is often just a series of disappointments, and that on the off chance that you find a lifeline and stumble into a circumstantial, highly-dysfunctional found family, that that’s not likely to last. And like the cake says, “this place sucked, anyways.” So, let’s keep dancing.

4. THE INVISIBLE MAN, dir. Leigh Whannell. prod. Jason Blum, Kylie du Fresne

Brilliantly uses a horror framework to explore the burden of proof that survivors of domestic violence face when coming forward, but even outside of this context it is an entirely engrossing feat of genre filmmaking, expertly building tension and crafting scares out of literally nothing, even finding time to engage with pop culture iconography of the 1933 original in unexpected, inventive ways. More studio efforts that are this ambitious, please.

3. LOVERS ROCK, dir. Steve McQueen. Prod. Michael Elliott, Steve McQueen, Anita Overland, Tracey Scoffield, David Tanner

Understands and distills the thrilling possibility (and danger) of a night out with friends, the magic of good music, and the release of the dance floor in a way that precious few other films do. Buzzes with life.

2. BACURAU, dir. Juliano Dornelles, Kleber Mendonça Filho. Prod. Saïd Ben Saïd, Emilie Lesclaux, Michel Merkt

A stunning amalgam of all the possibilities of film as a medium distilled into an unruly, captivating caper that seamlessly weaves in and out of disparate tones and genres while remaining remarkably clear headed in its intentions without spelling them out for you. A rousing, political masterpiece. 

AND THE WINNER IS...

1. I’M THINKING OF ENDING THINGS, dir. Charlie Kaufman. prod. Stefanie Azpiazu, Anthony Bregman, Charlie Kaufman, Robert Salerno

A movie I’m not sure I could recommend to anyone. It’s austere, narratively convoluted, and relentlessly dark. The casual viewer will almost certainly find themselves lost, and those that are attentive and picking up on the (impeccably placed) clues will piece together a deeply upsetting story of alienation, self-deprecation, and suicidal ideation.

The film is an oozing wound, a profoundly vulnerable confrontation with Charlie Kaufman’s notorious reputation for writing women that are fantasies, self-indulgent projections of a deeply lonely man’s idealizations of womanhood and tacitly acknowledges that the criticism is more than fair and attempts to atone for it, casting himself as “Jud” from Oklahoma!, the insecure, misogynist brute who thinks women are his for the taking and has to die. But he’s also accomplishing this by crafting the film as a kind of horror movie from the perspective of the manic pixie dream girl, an archetype he undoubtedly helped create, as she struggles to make sense of the impossible incongruities of the role being assigned to her.

But then the movie also somehow finds time to be an intertextual comment on the ways we engage with works of art, the sometimes unhealthy ideas we glean from them, and how there’s nothing original left to be said, so instead we performatively regurgitate other texts to say what we can't, to show how cultured and smart we are, to signal our worth.

All this is to say nothing of the way the film masterfully depicts the grotesque horrors of aging, the illusion of time, the sensation of feeling ugly, the ongoing repercussions of childhood trauma, and countless other themes that I simply haven’t got the time to get into.

I’m Thinking of Ending Things is a punishingly bleak film, yes, but it’s also a deeply empathetic one. Watching it makes you want to tap the next sullen, downcast person you see on the shoulder and ask “is everything okay?”

[smoothoperador]

interests tag!

I was tagged by @lxncelot​, thank you so much for the tag! this sounds like a lot of fun and I loved reading your answers.

𝐌𝐔𝐒𝐈𝐂

fave genre? rock in its broadest definition (so like, anything ranging from hard rock to pop rock to alternative ballads). I also listen to a lot of pop!

fave artist? all time low! but ~historically~ I’ve always been very into 5 seconds of summer (less so now, though I still listen to their older stuff) and twenty one pilots. as for solo artists, my favorite is probably rosalía though I also enjoy halsey. i was your, how do you call it? local 2015 emo kid. just look at my top albums of 2017 - outrageous.

fave song? my go-to answer for this is she will be loved by maroon 5 because I am 💫a softie💫. I think nowadays it’s my favorite song more so out of habit and nostalgia than for the actual song, but it still means the world to me.

most listened song recently? according to spotify, dinero by trinidad cardona. tiktok has won this one, folks 😞 according to last.fm, el tango de roxanne from moulin rouge (broadway version). which I find much more likely, but you never know.

song currently stuck in your head? none! though I’m listening to the piano version of once upon a december that’s on my desktop music player on here, so I’ll inevitably get it stuck in my head later.

5 fave lyrics? I have a note on my phone for that lol

“You’re dripping like a saturated sunrise / You’re spilling like an overflowing sink / You’re ripped at every edge but you’re a masterpiece / and now you’re tearing through the pages and the ink.” Halsey, Colors

“Begin with bullet, now add fire to the proof / But I’m still not sure if fear’s a rival or close relative to truth.” twenty one pilots, Bandito

“Fools said I, you do not know silence like a cancer grows / heed my words that I might teach you, take my arms that I might reach you / but my words like silent raindrops fell / and echoed in the wells of silence.” Simon & Garfunkel, The Sound of Silence and generally the entirety of that song because how beautifully is it, seriously?

“How can I sleep at night, there’s a war inside my head / I found a lion hidden right beneath my bed / I will not hide myself from the tears that you have shed / ‘Cause I am a lion and you are dead.” Hollywood Undead, Lion and, once again, the entirety of that song

“I am not afraid to keep on living / I am not afraid to walk this world alone.” My Chemical Romance, Famous Last Words because I think that is the simplest yet hardest and most powerful thing you could ever say

radio or your own playlist | solo artists or bands | pop or indie | louder or silent volume I slow or fast songs | music video or lyrics video | speakers or headset | riding a bus in silence or while listening to music | driving in silence or with radio on

𝐁𝐎𝐎𝐊𝐒

fave genre? historical fiction, with fantasy as a close second (historical fantasy? you ask, to which I answer YES A HUNDRED TIMES YES.)

fave writer? if we’re counting classics and deceased authors, Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, without a doubt. if we only mean contemporary writers, then Leigh Bardugo.

fave book? Wind, Sand and Stars by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry (Terre des Hommes being its original title). a lot of books have marked my soul, but this once was more than that - it bathed my every bone in the dawn’s first light and sent singing magic spiraling down beneath my flesh. it’s entirely subjective, because it’s not a literal gift from God of a book, but... it meant a lot to me.

fave book series? the Six of Crows duology by Leigh Bardugo, and The Illuminae Files by Jay Kristoff and Amie Kaufman

comfort book? harry potter and the prisoner of azkaban... yes I AM nine years old

perfect book to read on a rainy day? something atmospheric, preferably spooky with some gothic elements! I’ve been wanting to read Mexican Gothic by Silvia Moreno-Garcia forever and I feel like it would work well with that ambience. also, Ninth House by Leigh Bardugo, which I have on my shelves but haven’t read yet! saving all of these for october so I can really get in the mood.

fave characters? disgusting of you to ask, but Nina Zenik & Matthias Helvar from SoC, Remus Lupin & Sirius Black from HP, Leo Valdez & Hazel Levesque from PJO.

5 quotes from your fave book that you know by heart?

suddenly I can only remember bits from assigned readings for school and I hate myself

“I solemnly swear that I am up to no good.” Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban

“To the glistening eastern sea, I give you Queen Lucy the Valiant. To the great western woods, King Edmund the Just. To the radiant southern sun, Queen Susan the Gentle. And to the clear northern skies, I give you King Peter the Magnificent. Once a king or queen of Narnia, always a king or queen of Narnia.” The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe

“You aren’t a flower, you’re every blossom in the world blooming at once. You’re a tidal wave. You’re a stampede. You’re overwhelming.” && “Curse you and all your Saints,” he said to no one at all, then realized he was smiling. Crooked Kingdom

“Many years later, as he faced the firing squad, Colonel Aureliano Buendía was to remember that distant afternoon when his father took him to discover ice.” One Hundred Years of Solitude

and the entire two-page death scene of this one character in Joseph Kessel’s The Crew that I had to read in 9th and 11th grade for lit class and I had to write a commentary on that death scene, an assignment I keep on me at all times in a folder and it’s genuinely the death scene that made me the most upset in my entire life but it’s written so magnificently it’s a literal apotheosis and I won’t give you all of it but it ends with “And into tender death the captain entered living still” and I haven’t been the same since the day I read that

hardcover or paperback | buy or rent | standalone novels or book series | ebook or physical copy | reading at night or during the day | reading at home or in nature | listening to music while reading or reading in silence | reading in order or reading the ending first | reliable or unreliable narrator | realism or fantasy | one or multiple POVS | judging by the covers or by the summary | rereading or reading just once

𝐌𝐎𝐕𝐈𝐄𝐒 & 𝐓𝐕 𝐒𝐇𝐎𝐖𝐒

fave tv/movie genre? honestly I dabble with pretty much anything? I’d say my favorites are period dramas and thrillers, but I can pretty much watch anything. i used to love dystopias and science-fiction so much, but that was a... dark age of my life.

fave movie? I cannot choose to save my life, and I’ve seen very few movies, but I typically say Coco, Dunkirk, or Prisoner of Azkaban. Also really love Jurassic Park <3

comfort movie? every single Disney classic ever but particularly Peter Pan, Sleeping Beauty, and Tangled; PoA, obviously; Jurassic Park and Raiders of the Lost Ark; The Princess Bride (which btw I might have gasped out loud reading your tags, Olive, lol).

most rewatched tv show? I don’t even watch tv shows all the way through in the first place, so rewatching them,,,,, probably Los Misterios de Laura tbfh it was this Spanish murder mystery show that I used to watch religiously when I was a kid, and then they sold the TV rights to some American channel and that was my first heartbreak. that one episode where they investigated this murder in this supposedly haunted boarding school? could not sleep for days after watching it lol

5 fave characters? it’s difficult not to repeat characters I’ve already mentioned in the books category because many shows I know are adaptations, but... alina starkov from shadow and bone, eleanor crain from the haunting of hill house, sansa stark & jaime lannister from game of thrones, and christian from moulin rouge.

tv shows or movie | short seasons (8-13 episodes) or full seasons (22 episodes or more) | one episode a week orbinging | one season or multiple seasons | one part or saga | half hour or one hour long episodes | subtitles on or off | rewatching or watching just once | downloads or watches online

thank you so much for the tag, I loved this! no pressure tags: @maybanksslut​, @vostokovasmelina​, @noesapphic​, @murswrites​, @eveenstar​ @softeninglooks​ + anyone who wants to do it!

[lizziestudieshistory]

Books of 2021 - March

I had a very strange reading month in March, I read more than I usually do when studying but then fell into a reading slump in the last 10 days or so... It was all a certain book's fault!

The Burning God - R.F. Kuang (Poppy War #3)

I've already got a post somewhere explaining how I felt about The Burning God. I had a wonderful(? feels like the wrong word but I'm sticking with it) time with this series, in a morbid kind of way. It was highly worth the read and The Poppy War is one of the best debut fantasy stories I've read to date! I was slightly disappointed in some of the elements (the Trifecta still spring to mind, I was expecting so much more...) but it was a great series. Highly recommended if you haven't given them a go.

Shadow and Bone/Grisha Trilogy - Leigh Bardugo (This includes all three books, plus the Demon in the Woods)

I read this entire series back to back in the space of about 10 days... I haven't read a series this fast since I was in high school! And I LOVED it! The Grisha Trilogy is a stereotypical YA as you can get - it's clichéd, tropey, and predictable. However, I still had a fantastic time reading them, much to my surprise.

Unfortunately, I loathed Mal (don't kill me), he was one of the most toxic "heroes" I've met in YA fantasy and I'm not over the infuriating conclusion with him and Alina (if Alina had to have a partner she should have married Nikolai, come on! Roguish pirate AND a dashing prince in one man!) I'm genuinely angry that the message Bardugo gave young girls with the conclusion to Alina and Mal's relationship arc was 'sacrifice everything, including your identity, to be play housewife with a boy with such a fragile ego he ignored you for an entire book'.

I really hope the TV series removes some of his controlling and manipulative behaviour - and yes I can stomach it with the Darkling because HE IS THE VILLAIN and not framed as the paragon of virtue Mal is... I did very much like the Darkling as a hot villain, and I'm looking forward to seeing my childhood crush, Ben Barnes, do him justice ;) Seriously though, the Darkling was the most interesting character in the series, maybe tied with Nikolai, and I'm sad we didn't see more of him in the second and third books.

The Hatmakers - Tamzin Merchant

I ADORED this book! I was expecting to enjoy it but not love it, however, I fell in love. This is a debut middle grade novel set in an alternate version of 18th century London. We follow Cordelia Hatmaker, the youngest Hatmaker, attempt to find her father after he's lost at sea. The Hatmakers are an old family of magic users who make hats to effect people's mood and behaviour.

This book was so heartwarming - it was fun, sweet, and enchanting to read. I wasn't sure of Merchant's writing style at first, it was a bit too much! She's very lyrical in her style, for a children's author, and I thought it was going to grate. But it fits the tone of her world and characters so well I didn't notice it after the first few chapters. It's honestly beautifully written. Characters were great, the plot was predictable but hilarious (I'm not the target audience so that's fine), and the world was well realised, if small. Overall, it was a wonderful novel and I'd highly recommend it to everyone - I enjoyed it as much as I did Nevermoor!

There's also the BEST tiny side story about a couple of young fops who want hats to help them duel! Absolutely AMAZING and I hope they turn up in the second book!

A Thousand Splendid Suns - Khaled Hosseini

Here is where the month fell down for me and I fell into a slump... So A Thousand Splendid Suns is the story of two women in Afghanistan during the late 20th century. We see the Russian occupation and the rise of the Taliban through their eyes, as well as the devastating effects the almost constant warfare had on Kabul and their lives. However, this is more the background to exploring these women's lives, starting with Mariam as a child in the 1950s and following her life after she's married off by her father to Rasheed. We also follow Laila, who's literally the girl next door, and how their lives intersect during the course of the novel. It is a powerful story about the strength of women, the bonds they form, and the consequences the attitudes of men have on their lives.

So I'm conflicted about this book, on the one hand I can very much see its merit. It's a beautifully written, engaging, and thought provoking novel. It's one of those reads that stick with you and you mull over for weeks afterwards. It makes you think and I am glad I've read it.

On the other hand, I HATED every second I was reading it. On top of the general misery you'd expect (given the description above), this book discusses domestic violence, marital rape, forced child abandonment, miscarriages, imprisonment, etc. You name it, it'll be here. I could see the reason for this but it made for such a miserable reading experience that I could barely keep myself going at times. I seriously considered DNFing it at the end of part 2 and the only reason I didn't is because it's my book club book.

It's one of those reads that are immensely powerful and worth while, they open your eyes and make you think. However, it's reading experience is so miserable it's hard to see whether it was actually worth it while you'rein the book. I would say give it a go if you're interested because it really is a masterpiece and beautifully achieves what it set out to do. But please do go into it having done your research and aware of the trigger warnings.

On the Currently Reading Stack

Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo

Technically on the pile, if we're dating this to 31st March. Although as of writing this (3rd April) I've finished this. I had fun but still don't like heist stories... Great characters though!

The Way of Kings by Brandon Sanderson

I'm dipping in and out of this, as it's my 5th time reading it... I will finish it eventually but don't hold your breath because I'm only picking it up when I'm REALLY in the mood for Sanderson or feeling slumpy.

The Return of the King - J.R.R. Tolkien

Another long term read, I'm slowly finishing off my annotation reread of the Lord of the Rings. Very much enjoying this read but I'm taking it slowly so I can do my annotations justice.

Bleak House - Charles Dickens

Still going, it's just an enormous and slow book... I'm going to try and finish it in April but this isn't a promise...

[sturmmhond]

the way some people are comparing soc duology to SJM’s books.

SoC is a masterpiece. They are both in different spectrums. I might be a little biased but literally

Kaz loves Inej, wants to keep her in Ketterdam but doesn’t and gives her agency because he doesn’t want to her to feel tied to any one. Even though they love each other, they are willing to let each other go.

Matthias: predicted against Grisha but learned to unhate after realising what he was taught was wrong

Wylan: dyslexic, good at science and mathematics, overall a good person, gay for Jesper and is a good person overall, some typical Councilman’s kid who was raised with more privileges than an average Kerch person and still did not complain after he ran away

Jesper: flirts with no shame but no one shames him for it

Nina: a plus size character, who’s proud of her body and sexuality. Overall, a confident person

I could list more but I don’t want to turn this into a whole ass essay

What LB writes is completely different than what SJM writes. Leigh is not afraid to write about the flaws and imperfections of her characters, she’s not afraid of giving them the ending they deserve, even if that means a certain death. SJM risks nothing, the characters revolve around sex and physical attractiveness, there’s a lack of representation for POC and LGBTQ, even if has written about them, it’s poorly written and all the main characters has to survive...no one dies.

[cloudseeker14]

ITS BOOK REVIEW TIME BESTIES

So I read a lot of books during my school vacation and I’m going to review them since my vacation has ended and school started today.

BOOK #1 SIX OF CROWS BY LEIGH BARDUGO (First book from Six of Crows duology) -

Ok so I LOVED this book. It had an amazing plot and pacing. I really admire how Leigh Bardugo made the characters neither good nor bad, but somewhere in the between. The world she made in her story is not black or white, but in shades of grey.

I enjoyed the action in this book a lot, especially in the last chapters where they were breaking out from the ice court.

And the tension between Kaz and Inej was really executed well. I was rooting for them the whole series. I seriously fawned over how the author expressed Kaz's inner thought and emotions.

And the backstory and dialogues between Matthias and Nina was so engaging.

I loved how we as the readers got perspectives from different characters because that showed different sides of the story.

When I saw Kaz‘s back story I literally cried. It was just so freaking sad how greed ended up ruining the life Kaz could have had.

My favourite character was Kaz since I found him really engaging and I loved the way he came up with ideas for his criminal activities.

However, when I first started the book, understanding all the new terms and places was a bit hard for me, but that didn’t affect my experience at all.

This story and the whole duology had diverse characters which I was so happy to see.

I also really enjoyed Inej’s character. She was strong and invincible as the Wraith, but a long time ago she was a scared little girl who had gone through a lot in the Menagarie, which still haunted her.

Inej was a breath of fresh air for me because usually when authors try to write female characters to make them empowering, they end up making the characters as “im not like other girls“ and literal Mary Sues with no weaknesses or basic character development.

Inej had her own demons she fought with, she had different sides to her, she was not afraid to protect herself but she was scared of her time at the Menagarie and missed her parents a lot. All these emotions made Inej feel human and real.

I really enjoyed the other characters to, but if I wrote about them this would become way to long. Overall, I loved the characters, action, place setting and plot.

I would give the book a rating of 5/5 stars, it deserves it.

BOOK #2 THE CROOKED KINGDOM BY LEIGH BARDUGO (Book 2 of the Six of Crows Duology) -

So first of all, THIS BOOK MADE ME CRY SO MUCH. LIKE BESTIE LET ME BREATH WITHOUT BURSTING INTO TEARS.

Second of all, I’m still not over the character death. This author broke my heart.

Third of all, this book was written so well and the writing was just immaculate besties.

So, The Crooked Kingdom had a lot of angst. Like a lot. It dove into the back stories of our characters and it left me crying looking like the ugly version of shrek.

The writing was so beautiful that I had to put down my book for a few minutes for my brain to process this masterpiece.

The way Leigh Bardugo wrote about the relationship between Inej and Kaz was literally perfect. I’m going to show you all a few quotes about these two from the book itself so you can understand what I mean.

~ “I would come for you.” He said and when he saw the wary look she shot at him, he said it again “I would come for you. If I couldn’t walk, I’d crawl to you, and no matter how broken we were, we’d fight our way out together - knives drawn, pistols blazing. Because that’s what we do. We never stop fighting. ~

~She smiled then, her cheeks red, her cheeks scattered with some kind of dust. It was a smile he thought he might die to earn again.~

HELP HOW DOES THIS AUTHOR WRITE EVERYTHING IN SUCH A PRETTY WAY.

There's also a gay ship between Jespar and Wylan (such cinnamon rolls) which was represented really nicely.

The characters backstories was written so well. They were all so unique and filled with emotions and really explained how the characters ended up becoming who they were. These backstories literally made me sob the whole day.

Leigh Bardugo, I would sue you for emotional distress if I had the money.

Leigh Bardugo explored each of the traumas of the characters and as someone with certain traumas, I felt that she wrote about such a sensitive topic in an appropriate manner.

As for the ending it made me smile and cry at the same time and I don't know if I can forgive Leigh Bardugo for the sudden character death she pulled of.

I would rate this book a 1000000000000000000000/5 stars. It was that good.

Would I sell my soul for another book in the six of crows series? Hell yes.

BOOK #3 A DARKER SHADE OF MAGIC BY VE. SCHWAB

The plot of this book was nice. I enjoyed how Ve. Schwab portrayed magic as both a dangerous and wondrous thing.

I liked the concept of the various worlds she had going on. However, these various worlds were only of London and I would have preferred if it explored various other places to.

There could have been more diversity between the characters though. It didn't bother me that much, but I would have enjoyed that.

The main character Kell was likeable. I enjoyed reading his emotions and inner thoughts, like how he felt he was just a tool for the royals and seeing his inner turmoil with the mistake he felt he was making.

The Dane Twins (basically the villains) were so coldhearted which was cool and they gave me a bi panic from the way I imagined them lol.

However I had an issue with one character called Lila. I liked that she had a thirst for adventure and felt trapped in a small little word. But she always gave of the vibes of "I'm not like other girls" which was a little bit annoying. Lila looked at other women as a bunch of idiots who fawned and threw themselves at men. Now I understand this story took place in the 1800's but even then there were women working in factories and as nurses. Not all were just nobel women looking for suitors.

Ve. Schwab could have instead made Lila despise patriarchy and capitalism, how the rich rolled in lavishes while trampling the poor who struggled in the streets. It really sucked seeing a woman tear down other women.

So I would give this book a 3.5/5 stars.

--

Ok so I did read more books during my vacation, I'll post that as a part 2 cuz I'm to lazy and sleepy to type anymore.

Anyways I hope y'all enjoyed this besties, I'll try to post part 2 as soon as possible. Bye and I hope y'all have an amazing day/night.

[judeswhore]

LEIGH

Omg

First of all i haven’t spoken to you in ages(its literally been one day I need to calm down) i was working all day yesterday and then came home and then went to watch spider man

BESTIE

IT WAS INSANE

it was literally every dream ive ever had in life come true (this might sound like exaggeration but NO IT WAS)

I loved it so much but that’s all im gonna say because people havent watched yet BUT OH MY GOD

okay im done

How are you??

Also i love that you’re counting down the days tills leeds “248” BYE😭

HI BFF I MISSED U HRU I HOPE UR DOING OKAY

yes yes yes the movie omfg still not over it and i don’t think i ever will be it’s a MASTERPIECE

AND IKKKK ITS AGES AWAY BUT I CANT HELP IT

[w-ngs]

jan21

hello 2021! you did not get off on a good start. let’s try and be a little better, okay?

i didn’t read much this month (and probably won’t be for a long while because of school), but it was a wild month. well, you’ll see.

***

crooked kingdom, leigh bardugo — oh my god???? i completely forgot that i read this before i left for school and almost didn’t include it in my monthly wrap-up????? how dare i forget this masterpiece.

it was great. i loved it. i think overall, i preferred 6oc because heist stories are my guilty pleasure. but romance-wise... let’s just say kaz and inej have made it to my top 10 ships. but also i read through this so fast because i had to finish it before i left that half the story is kinda just not in my brain lololol

the most intriguing part of the entire story was the anti-wraith. her character kind of came out of nowhere, and i’m not really sure she had much of a purpose than being someone who could physically match inej. i guess she was also anti in the sense that she had no respect, just ruthlessness, which is the opposite of inej and what she stands for. but i don’t know if the anti-wraith was significant enough of a character to really be considered a foil.

i don’t really give spoiler warnings because hardly anyone reads these other than myself lolol but big spoiler ahead. skip the next paragraph if you don’t want to know. cuz i accidentally spoiled it for myself before reading and i kinda ruined it for myself lmfao.

poor matthias. he was there, and then he was gone. i feel terrible for nina. they were finally on the same page, and then he had to act all saint-like and trigger some idiot into killing him. and matthias finally came to terms with what he’d been taught and what he was trying to teach himself (#charactergrowth), so he wrapped things up neatly for himself before the bye-bye. but nina, she finally got her guy on her side and they were supposed to change the world together. sigh.

and of course, we got kaz. he’s my favorite. how could he not be, with his trauma and desire to overcome it but not letting it define him and still maintaining that evil genius act he’s so good at. it definitely hit harder in this story, the extent of his trauma. it made him more real, too. both sides of him coexist, and one could not exist without the other. he’s crazy, in nearly all senses of the word. also crazy in love, the mfing idiot. ugh, i love vulnerable kaz. i love what inej brings out in him, how she knows just how hard to push without driving him over the edge. also i saw a tiktok (this app is gonna come up a lot more in the next few reviews fsjdsdfkjdf) with a photo of them kissing with a towel between their mouths because he can’t touch her but he desperately wants to and what a perfect solution is that their... bathroom scene had me holding my breath. or at least taking very shallow breaths. it was intense. so intimate, i felt like i shouldn’t even have been there. ugh, the cute little babies. uwuwuwuwuwu

one last note. leigh bardugo is a very good writer, plot and characters and all. everything flowed much more smoothly in this book, and once again i was impressed by the detail provided. you go girl. i can’t wait to see the tv series development.

a 10/10.

***

the shadows between us, tricia levenseller — literally what did i read lmaooo. this is my first tiktok book recommendation. and it. was. boring. boring characters that didn’t make much sense. boring plot. i skimmed it after the first 50 pages cause it was so boring. that’s it bye.

a 3/10.

***

manacled, senlinyu — um. wow. i literally......... even hours after finishing it my brain is still ridiculously scrambled. edit: it’s about a month later and sometimes random scenes and images still pop in my head for no reason and then i feel all twisted inside again. i love it.

so, this is not a published book but a dramione fanfiction on ao3. i don’t read fanfics that often anymore, mainly because i’d rather read other things, not because i don’t like them. but i found this one because a tiktok that showed the illustrations in the story and i was so blown away by the fact someone would illustrate an entire fanfic that i just had to read it. and i have no regrets. it’s kinda long and a biiit wordy for me at times but holy shit that hit like a mother trucker. and i haven’t read dramione in ages, not since... years. so this really hit different.

the illustrations are beautiful. they’re what dragged me into the story in the first place, so, of course they are. but i’d literally spend minutes looking at every detail in amazement at how perfectly the emotions were captured and the lighting casting the perfect shadows and just… everything. i know nothing about drawing but my eyes were truly blessed.

i think integrating the handmaid’s tale with the hp world was ingenious. i would never have expected that. and wow. the relationship between the two, it’s…….. i can barely put it in words in my mind, and it’s even harder to articulate on paper. complex, but at the same time not, simply the desire for the other to stay alive. timeless. destructive. their only defense from the harsh reality of their situation. desperation at its most desperate, their one and only survival method. depressing. it’s so depressing. i was so sad, the angst almost too much at times.

the flashbacks were insanely intense. and i thought the handmaid section was bad. it was awful to read. i could hardly bear it, it was so dark at times i didn’t know how either of them got through it all. i mean, they barely did. the near-death scares, the constant need to create a blank slate within yourself in order to not overwhelm yourself with crushing emotions… wartime sometimes has a tendency to sound romantic, but theirs wasn’t anything near romantic, and i appreciate that the author chose to be very real about it.

at the beginning, and in the middle when we went through the flashbacks, i was afraid the love would be toxic. and, well, it kind of was at some points. but in a time like that and a situation like theirs, it would be hard to not have a toxic relationship. i was glad that in the end theirs was a good love, the kind that sustained and kept them alive and got them through until the very end, because it was what they needed from each other. and, of course, my favorite part of it all was draco’s ceaseless possessiveness that only seemed to grow, never fade. i love simpy men.

they deserve each other. i was afraid at the end they wouldn’t, that one of them would die—that draco would die because hermione basically did once already for him, so he would have to “return the favor”—also she was pregnant so there was no way she’d be the one to die—idk many theories. but at the end i’m so glad they both ended up alive. after everything, they deserved it.

i did nothing for two days straight but read this book. except eat. and barely sleep. and i have no regrets.

a 9/10.

***

bloodlines, richelle mead — dang. i used to be obsessed with vampire academy when i was in middle school. i even watched the terrible movie that released because of it. and now i can’t believe i really thought that was peak literature lmfaooooo

i remember adrian being such a funny and interesting character that i picked up bloodlines to see if it was gonna be as good as i remembered it was. i was disappointed. it was just... well let’s just say there wasn’t enough to get me invested in the characters as i used to be. i think what it was is that adrian’s characterization was so weak. he wasn’t as ~quirky~ as i remembered him to be haha. the plot was also way too slow-paced, and a little too easy to guess. maybe if i was 12 again i’d be going crazy over it like i used to. but i’m not a pre-teen anymore and my brain craves stuff along the lines of manacled—destruction, death, angst that wants me to pull my own heart out to stop it from hurting.

a 5/10.

[tempestaurora]

End of the year book ask 1, 2 and 3?

1. How many books did you read this year?

so far 78, but i plan to get it up to 80 by the end of the year!

2. Did you reread anything? What?

ooh yes, so i reread the extraordinary web-comic-multi-media-masterpiece that is 17776: What football will look like in the future by Jon Bois. hIGHkey recommend, by the way. Also, Check, Please! by Ngozi Ukazu, the plays 4.48 Psychosis by Sarah Kane and Constellations by Nick Payne. Also some assorted Runaways volumes but I don’t know exactly which ones - probably from 2017. And the incredible Six of Crows duology by Leigh Bardugo.

3. What were your top five books of the year?

oh this is HARD. i’m gonna sidestep the graphic novels and comics i read this year because i wouldn’t say any particular one was better than a novel i’d read (special mention does go to Check, Please! however because that story fills my heart with joy.)

5. The Queen’s Gambit, Walter Tevis

Adapted into the Netflix show of the same name, just an honestly excellent story. I usually don’t like books that are this old, but I really enjoyed Beth as a character and her journey is just so interesting from beginning to end

4. The Honey Bus, Meredith May

I adored this. I read it during the summer; it’s a memoir about May growing up as a young girl with her grandfather, a beekeeper. It’s all about Queen bees and family and I cried.

3. The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes, Suzanne Collins

I remember just loving it, honestly? Such an excellent prequel for an incredible series. I don’t think Suzanne Collins puts a foot wrong.

2. In the Dream House, Carmen Maria Machado

Another memoir about a queer woman’s abusive relationship. Each chapter is told in the style of a different literary technique.

1. The Martian, Andy Weir

I watched the movie for the first time last week and literally finished this book yesterday, so maybe the timeline is why I’m so hyped on it, but I adored every minute of it. When deciding the order of these books, it really came down to which one I stayed up until 2am to read, and it was this one. Funny, heart breaking, honest. It’s a story about the compassion of humanity above all else and I really, really loved it!

send me a number from the end of the year book asks

[zorostan]

hello!! karaoke and story time

karaoke - already answered

story time - 3 books that have affected you and how?

the lightning thief - rick wrote a masterpiece and when I first read it and met clarisse, my heart literally got bigger (clarisse deserved better 😔✊)

the book thief - the first book that ever made me cry. I read it a long time ago but I still remember the impact that the story had on me, at a time when I was discovering how lucky I am for the privilege of being safe and free in a world where so many people are hunted and murdered just for being who they are.

six of crows - Leigh is AMAZING! she introduced me to the fantasy niche and I am forever grateful. the world building, the representativity, the complexity of her characters... I love her so much

(Also soc is where my husband and soulmate kaz brekker was first introduced, everybody says thank you)