#This is mostly just because I want to be able to look back at what I was interested in pre game announcement and see how much of it

[bkgexe]

the defiance of a life spent almost in touch

geto x reader ✾ 15.7k ✾ part one of two ✾ ao3 link

info! (canon au, haibara lives and geto never defects.) Your cursed technique allows you to read people—to see into their minds—when you touch them. It's not pleasant, but to jujutsu society, it's useful. Which means you end up in close proximity to Geto Suguru, who you've been avoiding for nearly a decade since seeing just how frightening it is inside his head. Though it's something you vowed never to repeat, it seems that there are powerful people vested in having you read him once again. ✾ tw! reader is scared of geto, typical jjk gore/violence, geto is. mentally unwell. like he didn't defect but he's Wrong ✾ notes! part two should be out end of january!!!

When the jujutsu higher-ups ask you for help, they always send Kento, because you have a hard time saying no to him. 

To his credit, he always looks sorry. You have the number of every other sorcerer you know blocked. He still comes in person because he knows the blow will be softer if you can complain to him after. He drives you to the appointed location, a small town on the border of Yamanashi Prefecture. The ride is mostly silent. When the car stops in front of a small, traditional house, Kento sighs deep, a sound you got so well acquainted with in high school that you can still conjure it in your mind on command. 

A familiar look: why are you doing this. Another: you can say no.

“You know why I have to,” you say.

The sigh again. “Fair enough.”

You left jujutsu society for a few reasons.

The first: your cursed technique is useless in a fight. You had to rely on strength and agility alone, which got you to Grade B—but you saw what happened to Haibara. The higher-ups send lower grade sorcerers out as a test, a toe in the water. They misjudged the grades of so many curses that at a certain point, you started to suspect that they were making it all up. That they had no way to accurately measure the strength of a curse until it had drawn a sorcerer’s blood. You didn’t want to be a body in a hospital bed, cut so deep through the middle that you had claw marks on the inside of your spine.

Haibara lived, but not without consequences.

The second: three men wait inside the house you’ve been called to. The window that alerted the higher-ups, a non-sorcerer passed out on the ground—and him. Geto smiles warmly when he sees you. You used to like his smiles before you saw the inside of his head. Now all you see is fox teeth hidden behind a stretched mouth.

Though your cursed technique isn’t useful in a fight, it’s still useful. Skin-to-skin contact allows you a look into another person’s mind. Just flashes, and nothing specific, but it’s helpful when the only witnesses you have are comatose or otherwise indisposed. You’re allowed a normal life for these few visitations. The higher-ups don’t bother you anymore. Even Gojo stopped asking you to come back and teach somewhere along the line, distracted by things more (or less, knowing him) important than your existence.

Geto never tried. You can at least respect him for that.

He explains to you that six people have been found in the same state as the man in front of you. It’s not a normal coma—something is smothering their soul, stretching it far from their body. As if they’re standing on the sidewalk across the street from themselves, watching the inside of their head through a lit window in the middle of the night. You’d forgotten what Geto’s voice sounded like, all friendly tones and half-hidden condescension.

When you touch the unconscious man, you don’t see anything at first, which is odd. His wrist is clammy and cold, his whole body covered in sweat. You briefly wonder if his soul is so disconnected that you won’t be able to read him.

And then, memories:            noodles in warm broth,          a pair of leather shoes           with buckles,                    a live wire at the power plant,          what it would feel like          to put your hands on it?,          to feel electricity for the first time in so long?,          to take something into you                                                                  r body that was never supposed to be there?,          hands wrapped around spark-soaked copper—

Outside, you throw up behind a camellia bush. Bile burns your throat, the roof of your mouth. The flowers smell of putrid rot when you know they shouldn’t. Cold air digs needles into your cheeks, so you’re stinging inside and out. Kento hadn’t given you enough notice for you to skip breakfast, but the higher-ups hadn’t given him any notice that they’d need you.

People are predisposed to show you either wants or memories. Never both, for reasons beyond your understanding. Memories are worse than wants. They burrow deeper, which makes them harder to expel.

Instinct tells you the hand is coming before it connects, and you dodge contact—Geto at your shoulder, asking if you’re alright. He doesn’t miss that you flinch away from him. “I’d have brought a bucket inside if I knew,” he tells you. His face says: I’m sorry for overlooking this detail. He’s very good at lying with it.

“It’s at the power plant,” you say. “Whatever’s causing this.”

“Do you want to read any of the others before you go?” The question feels cruel. His face says it isn’t.

You shake your head and leave without a word. 

Kento drops you off at your building and you thank him. You could invite him up easily. The two of you have known each other for so long, have experienced so much together, that being with him feels natural. It’s possible to turn off your brain around him, to touch him and only experience the smallest flashes of memory. 

You thank him and say good night.

It would be selfish. You would give anything to be the kind of person that could be a good partner to him. He’s an easy man to love, which is exactly why you can never love him. You’re difficult, a puzzle that comes with a sizable warning.

When you fall asleep in your cramped apartment, you see soup and silver buckles, live wires and burning flesh.

✾

An unknown number calls when you’re at work. You pick up because it breaks the monotony of clicking around account records and absorbing none of the numbers on the screen.

“Are you busy?” the person on the line asks, and you realize you never blocked Geto’s number because you never had it in the first place.

You tell him you’re not, even though you have a project deadline this week. If you sit in this closet-turned-office for five more minutes you’re going to explode all over the walls. You're not sure why you entertain him—why you didn't just hang up the second you heard his voice. There's something about him that compels you. A terrible, morbid curiosity that sometimes, when you're not looking directly at him, overrides your fear.

He meets you at the same house as last time, but today there’s no window. Just you and him. Kento didn’t drive you. For some odd reason, you thought there’d be someone else here, as if jujutsu society at large should know that you always need a buffer when it comes to Geto. A witness. And you realize that despite the curiosity, despite the compulsion, you should never have entertained this man on the phone for more than ten seconds. You shouldn't be here. You keep your keys spiked between your fingers, as if you’d ever be able to stop one of the most powerful sorcerers alive from doing whatever he wanted with you.

“I didn’t find anything at the power plant,” he says, leading you down a wooded path behind the house. You emerge onto a dirt road on the other side, a near-identical house sitting before you, its sloping, tiled roof dripping with excess morning rain. “Have you had lunch?”

You shake your head. He smiles with his hidden fox teeth.

The man you read this time is just as feverish as the other, but his wrist is hot. This isn’t relevant to reading a person, but you notice these things because you touch people so infrequently. Each time you do it’s a research experience, notes taken inside your head, recorded to compare against other studies you’ve done over the years.

The memories are instant:  rough hands that have hardened from years of manual labor, watching baseball with the other construction workers after projects done in town,                     your daughter           moving to Tokyo for college, radishes that she used to grow in the backyard that she boiled and roasted every day after harvest, and           who          will you eat them with now? and who          will grow them? and who          will you make your hands rough for?  you don’t like baseball.

Pulling away from the man’s mind is like extracting yourself from honey in the process of crystallizing. His consciousness clings to you as you leave, trying its best to suck you back in. You’re the only company it’s had in a while.

“I didn’t get anything,” you say, and your voice is rough. Your throat burns even though you didn’t throw up. 

Geto sits in one of the two plastic folding chairs in the house’s main room. He plays with the piece of his hair that’s loose from his bun, twirling it between slim fingers. You haven’t seen him in a jujutsu tech uniform since high school, though you’re pretty sure Gojo still wears one daily. Geto’s always in crisp white or black button-downs, slacks, expensive oxfords. Maybe playing dress-up makes him feel less like a sorcerer and more like a human.

“I can try again,” you say, and you’re not sure why. It’s for this suffering man, you think, even though your savior complex was left behind with the jujutsu world. 

“You don’t have to,” Geto says, dropping the strand of hair and leaning forward. His language is careful. He’s not telling you no. The way he watches you, elbows on his knees, hands clasped in the middle, makes you feel like you’re being tested.

You try again. This time:  getting your wedding ring engraved,          sitting on the porch in late spring sipping on plum wine,          nearly crying when you see your daughter playing with                     the girls that have caused the town so much misfortune,          the relief when            they ’re finally gone,          the relief when your daughter brings new best friends home and          their eyes          aren’t shadowed and sharp and too old for their sockets—

Retching is your second-least favorite thing, right behind actually vomiting. Your body rejects the images you’ve seen, trying to empty your stomach before the memories can begin to digest.

You tell Geto what you saw. 

His question: “Does he remember what happened to the girls?”

“If he does, I didn’t see it,” you say. When Geto is silent, you tell him, “I can’t do it again. I can’t.”

After a tense, quiet moment, he smiles at you. You still feel nauseous, but you can’t tell if it’s because of your cursed technique or because of the bone-deep malaise that spreads into your skin like a balm when he looks at you—when you’re reminded of what you once saw lurking in the corners of his mind. “Of course,” he says. “Let’s get you home.”

✾

Kento meets you at your usual coffee shop a few weeks later. Your throat no longer feels raw every time you swallow. He has a drink waiting for you when you get there—(describing Kento as punctual would be doing the man a disservice)—and it’s your favorite, with all the little add-ons that you get too nervous to ask for at risk of being a burden to the already overworked baristas. You’re positive he tipped heavy after putting in your order.

He asks you what you think about the murder mystery you’ve both been reading. You tell him about your job, the monotony, the fantasies of exploding. He tells you about jujutsu business, even though he’s not supposed to. This has never stopped him in the past and won’t ever stop him in the future.

“The higher-ups are pleased with your work,” he tells you. He doesn’t sound pleased.

“Kento.” A warning.

He hmms at you as if actually considering your warning before speaking his mind. “Having a foot in either world is difficult. It’s impossible to keep your balance.”

Your drink suddenly disgusts you. You taste bile. The cup is hot between your hands as you roll it back and forth with your palms. “Are you saying I should come back to Jujutsu Tech?”

“I’m saying that if you want to leave entirely, you should.”

You consider this: a normal life, surrounded by normal people, with a normal job and normal friends and a normal partner, maybe, if you’re lucky. The higher-ups would never let this happen. If you wrong them, they make sure to wrong you back. “You know why I can’t.”

“I’d take care of it. You wouldn’t be bothered by anyone.” He speaks with such confidence that you could almost believe him.

You tell him you’ll think about it. The coffee stings your palms. A terrible feeling sits in your throat like a weathered rock.

There’s something other than the threat of retaliation that stops you from pulling the trigger—from fully leaving the world you grew up in, as Kento once did. Maybe you’re not as brave as him. Maybe you can’t reconcile how quickly he ended up going back. Or maybe you just feel so inextricably tied to the world in which you were raised that you need to have it in your life somehow, even if it’s in brief, unpleasant flashes of memory and want.

“You can make your decisions for yourself,” he says. He’s not disappointed with you, you’re sure—just worried. The same way you often worry about him. “They’re pleased. Geto found the curse and exorcised it the same day thanks to you. I can see why the higher-ups don’t want to let you go.”

The stone in your throat grows edges, forgets its weathering. His name always unnerves you, but Kento’s words unnerve you more. “He exorcised it—the same day we drove out there?”

Kento nods, sips his tea. “He can be vicious.”

A tremor begins in your fingers and lodges deep in your elbows, your shoulders, your very soul. “He didn’t need me to read another victim?”

Kento’s a smart man. His eyes narrow. “Not to my knowledge. Or anyone else’s.”

You wave off his concern (suspicion, really, but you love to downplay these things), and your coffee is finished, and you really should be going, anyway. “He didn’t do anything,” you lie, standing and folding your coat over your arm. “He called and asked me to come back out, but I said no.”

It’s easy to see that Kento doesn’t believe you, but he doesn’t press you either. He knows that if you tell him half-truths, once you have all of your feelings together, you’ll tell him everything. He’s done the same, and you’ve given him the grace he’s currently allowing you. He puts up with a lot—but that’s the nature of living the lives into which you both were born.

“Thank you for the coffee,” you say.

“You’ll call me soon?”

“You’re on speed dial,” you tell him—and it’s true. His contact is the only one in your phone that’s favorited.

Kento smiles—something you rarely see. You wish it didn’t call to mind the shine of fox teeth.

✾

How you ended up coming into contact with the wants of Geto Suguru: he showed up at Ieiri’s dorm with his ribs visible through his uniform.

You remember very specific things from that day. The heavy knock, the thud of him collapsing, blood soaking the tatami floors. Shockingly white bone beneath torn skin and muscle, his ink-black hair coming undone, silk-soft and slipping across your fingers as you dragged him inside. Ieiri’s hands were shaking. She smelled like cigarette smoke and metal. Pressure here, she told you, ripping away the remains of Geto’s jacket, and when you touched him everything was skin-muscle-bone-blood and: bodies.  bodies of people that have wronged you. people that haven’t.  their blood thick beneath your fingernails          like orange peel.  how easy it is to snuff out each life. to take from them what they have forgotten to value.                      you could kill more.                      you could kill everyone. 

When you pulled away from Geto, his skin was knitting together beneath Ieiri’s shaking hands—hands you knew well, her black nail polish chipped around the edges because she bit at her nails when she was somewhere she couldn’t smoke. His ribs faded from view, and then muscle, and then his skin was pink and shiny, scar-new, as if whoever had done this to him had simply taken a paint brush to his bare chest and drawn a bold X. 

Blood was underneath your fingernails. Orange peel. It’s all you remember about the aftermath. Getting back to your room and locking yourself in the washroom were voided from your memory. Your head was all bodies. All bone. An undeniable feeling of righteousness, completely sure that they hadn’t deserved what you’d taken from them. And on top of that, the most frightening thing: relief that they were dead. 

You washed your hands so much that the skin was raw, peeling, but you still couldn’t get your fingernails clean.

✾

You ignore his calls.

The frequency with which you receive them makes you uneasy. You don’t have his number saved. The first few digits become a bad omen.

In school, he and Gojo had a reputation for toying with people. Mostly women, mostly in a romantic sense. The difference between the two is that Gojo was easy to understand—a spoiled boy-prince that liked the attention. He wanted girls to fawn after him, to beg for more when he finally graced them with a kiss, to cry when he dropped them.

Geto always seemed worse, somehow. He would date girls and leave them behind like candy wrappers, charming them into giving him a taste and only revealing his true appetite when his prize had reached the inescapable vicinity of his jaws. 

It’s more insidious than simply liking attention. He liked power. Having control over someone.

Whatever he’s doing now is insidious in nature, too. You can feel it. So you ignore his calls and keep working the days away until you can’t ignore him, because he shows up at your office with the confidence of someone supposed to be there, hands in his pockets, leaning against the frame of your door.

You jump so hard that your bones creak, almost louder than the creaking plastic of your poor hand-me-down rolling chair.

“Your instincts are a little dull,” he says. “I thought you would’ve heard me coming.”

Standing up feels necessary. You don’t want to feel smaller than him, even though he towers in your doorway. “I’m not supposed to be bothered by sorcerers without advance notice.” 

He smiles. “I tried calling.”

Your heart is pounding like a rabbit at the foot of a wolf, partly torn to shreds but conscious enough to experience the abject terror of what comes next. “Who let you up here?”

“I was hoping you might be willing to humor me without advance notice.”

“I’m calling security.”

“I need your help,” he says.

“Like you needed my help last time?”

He sits with that for a moment. “Is it a crime to be curious about you? What you’re capable of?”

“You lied to me,” you reiterate. “You didn’t need me to read that man. And, what—it was so you could see more of my technique?”

“Yes,” he says plainly, as if it's a perfectly sane response.

“Why didn’t you just ask?”

He chuckles, the sound rich and deep and calm, as if you’re having a nice conversation between old friends. “Are you saying you’d have responded well if I just asked?”

You remain silent, staring at the sticky notes on your monitor with reminders and deadlines written in blue pen. Tanaka account today. Get stapler back from Yoishi!!!! You both know his question is rhetorical.

He crosses his arms, taps his long fingers against his bicep. Is it impatience, you wonder, or his inability to sit still for too long? His face belies nothing. “Would you read me if I asked?”

Your veins feel too tight, constricting muscle. It must be a leading question—he’s suspicious of your aversion to him, maybe. The exterior he’s built is charming and handsome and kind. That’s probably how he got to your office. You wouldn’t be surprised if the receptionist saw a handsome face and caved immediately. It’s not his fault you see through it. If you could go back and revoke your touch, remove the bodies from your memory, you would. But you can’t, and the things in his mind scare you. It’s part of what made you leave. The idea of working with a man like that, who held such terrors in his head, was incomprehensible to you. It still is. You would always be thinking about the ease with which you could become one of those bodies.

When you read people who project to you in wants, it’s usually easier. Makes you feel less sick. But not him. He wanted those people dead, whoever they were. He wanted blood on his hands. He was thinking, concretely, that he could have killed them all. That they deserved it.

The relief was the worst part. Seeing all those people dead, and the resounding thought that outshone everything else: finally. 

He steps forward, hand extended slightly. “If I—”

“No. Just—don’t,” you say, and you stumble a little as your legs hit your chair and push it, rattling, against the wall. Your office has never been this small. You never want to be inside his head again. You'd do anything to get him out of your space. “Tell me what you need my help with and we can go.”

He doesn’t look pleased. It seems people in your life are operating on a theme. Still, his hand retreats, and he smiles, slouches a little, as if to make himself smaller. Less intimidating. “Thank you.”

As you leave your office, you give him a wide berth, though you could swear his body goes taut, as if suppressing the urge to touch you.

The Ueno Zoo is closed during operating hours. This hasn’t happened in the entire time you’ve lived in Tokyo. The woman at the gate is a window—the look she gives Geto is one of recognition, respect. He and Gojo are the most well-respected sorcerers currently active, though you believe entirely that Kento is much more deserving of respect than they are. The window lets the both of you inside without a word.

Geto leads you to the vivarium, just to the right of the gate. It’s a beautiful glass building, the windows fogged with humidity to keep its plant and animal residents comfortable. You haven’t been to the zoo in a long time, but when you used to come with family and friends, you always visited the vivarium before you left. The air was heavy and hot, birdsong piped in through speakers, echoing off the glass walls like prism-dispersed light. Every animal inside moved slowly, heavily, and if you listened closely enough, you could hear the soft slide of scales against stone, the heavy thud of a taloned foot into packed dirt. A haven for living in calm and peace.

Inside, it’s chaos.

Display cases are smashed, plants and trees are torn up from the roots, stone walls have been dismantled and crushed. In the center of the rubble, the strewn dirt and bundled roots: jaws. Alligator jaws, crocodile jaws, all long and horrible teeth, and when you look closer—the jaws of snakes, fanged and dripping venom, and others from what you can only assume would be turtles, small and rounded. 

The skin remains perfectly intact on every jaw. Muscle, bone, blood. You see bodies. You see limbs. You remember: finally.

“Don’t look at that,” Geto says from beside you. “Look at me.”

With a deep breath, you do—though looking at him does nothing to dispel the unrest in your stomach, the pit in your chest. 

“Good.” He’s not smiling anymore. You wonder if he’s decided to drop his disguise or if the orphaned jaws are more horrifying than the wants he carries like stones. “Come this way.”

He leads you away from the viscera, into a small office next to the stairs. A man sits in the single chair, staring into the security monitors on the desk in front of him. His gaze is absent, hollow. His hands clasp and unclasp on his lap. Blood is spattered across his face and the front of his cheery yellow jumpsuit.

“He’s been like this since I got here,” Geto tells you. “I need you to read him.”

Ieiri used to tell you that if humans come into contact with curses and live, you have to monitor them closely for cardiogenic shock—stress and fear mounting to such a peak that the heart can’t handle the pressure. It’s not a peaceful death. “He needs to go to a hospital.”

“I’ll take him after.”

“How long has he been in shock?”

“Read him first,” he says, more curt than you’ve ever heard.

This is the thing lurking under the surface. The wolf peeking through the mouth of the sheepskin. It sits in him waiting to be called forth. You’ve seen it already—it’s no surprise to you that it lives in him still. It is, however, a surprise that he let his facade slip so badly.

He smiles, fox teeth a little sharper than usual. “Please.”

You put your hand on the side of the man’s neck, the only skin available to you. Touching people’s faces horrifies you. Such an intimate thing tarnished by the images that flood your brain. 

Memories on a loop:  guttural screeching,          death cries that couldn’t be conjured by a human mind,          and from the ceiling,          from the ceiling          the jaws                     falling, falling,                                          falling,  blood everywhere          and on you and you can taste it          ???          in your mouth          ???           on your tongue          ???            metal and rot,          and there is something discarding these jaws from the bodies of animals          it eats                    while clinging to the vivarium’s rafters something ???        when you met your wife you knew you were going to propose to her in the zoo in the vivarium because of the beautiful glass the beautiful plants she loves plants something           there is something          there is          something you cannot see          some          thing          ???

This time, Geto has a trash can waiting for you. You’ve gotten very good at gathering your hair up with one hand at a moment’s notice. He puts the trash next to the desk when you’re done, and you tell him everything useful that you gathered on the curse. Everything else, you keep to yourself. You’ve gotten very good at that too.

You wipe your mouth with the back of your wrist. The bile tastes more like copper than usual. “Is that everything?”

He holds his hand out to you and you hide your flinch poorly. “Gum?”

The foil-wrapped stick shimmers green, held between his fingers like a cigarette. You stare at it for a beat too long. It’s your favorite brand, spearmint flavored. 

“It won’t bite,” he says. He tilts his head to the side, eyes crinkling with mirth. As if you weren’t tasting blood just a moment ago. When you still don’t take the gum, he laughs softly and it reminds you of high school. His laughter has always been a little mean, as if it gets harder for him to hide his true nature when amused. It reminds you of a housecat playing with a bug. “I won’t either.”

A funny thing for someone with such sharp teeth to claim.

You take the gum from him, careful to grab the very end so there’s no chance of your fingers brushing his. “Thanks.”

He smiles and nods as if he’s done you a favor. You appreciate the gum, but you’d appreciate him ceasing contact with you more. “I’ll see you soon,” he tells you.

“Get him help, Geto.” 

He smiles wide in response.

✾

You lost your virginity to Kento during your graduating year at Jujutsu Tech.

Haibara was recovering, still in the hospital for the third consecutive month. He had to learn how to walk again, the implants in his spine acclimating to him at the same rate that he was acclimating to them. You and Kento were the only two students in your year that made it to graduation. The two of you felt like celebrating but when you began drinking, you realized it was more commiseration than anything celebratory.

“Do you always see things?” Kento asked. He never drank—saw it as beneath him—so when he did, he was a lightweight. “When you touch people?”

“Yeah,” you said. The both of you sat against the headboard of your bed, passing a bottle of gin back and forth—the only thing you could find in Yaga’s campus stash. It stopped tasting like liquor twenty minutes prior. “I can make it quieter. But I really have to focus. Like—I couldn’t make it quiet now, I don’t think.”

Kento turned towards you and said, “Try.”

And always, you would protest when people suggested this. It was like a party trick to people that didn’t have to deal with the fallout. They all wanted to know what you saw in their mind, whether it was wants or memories that jumped to the forefront, what their subconscious decided was important enough to broadcast.

You didn’t believe at all that Kento was asking for those reasons. It’s why you touched him.

Wedging the bottle between Kento’s thigh and yours, you turned towards him and reached for his face. This, for some reason, was your first instinct. His skin was soft, a little dry. His mouth was set in a nervous slant. 

And you got a few things from him: finishing your favorite book for the third time, going to the beach with your mother, finding out how cold the sea was. Memories, unfortunately. The feelings behind them.

But what you felt was mostly your own. 

You pushed his bangs back from his face, and you couldn’t take your eyes from the slant of his lips, and suddenly you were in Kento’s lap, kissing him, and he was kissing you back, hands on your hips, groaning softly into your mouth.

The gin tumbled off the bed and spilled all over your floor. Your dorm would smell like liquor for weeks. 

It was awkward the way a first time should be for teenagers, misplaced limbs and kisses with knocking teeth. You both tried to take care of each other the best you could while shit-faced and entirely inexperienced. You hadn’t kissed anyone before then—you hadn’t touched someone’s face since you were little. 

You’d been scared. He figured out how to make that okay. 

✾

Gojo is in your office when you come into work, reclining in your chair with his feet up on your desk. He peers at you over his glasses, eyes like jeweled robin eggs. “Running kinda late, huh?”

“I don’t have to be here until nine,” you tell him. “It’s eight forty-five.”

“Semantics.”

“You’re in my office.” You don’t even have the good grace to make it sound like a question—just an admonishment.

“Or is it syntax?”

“Can you please get out?”

“Can’t you pretend you’re happy I’m here?” He pouts, taking his feet from your desk. “I won’t even ask you to do anything. I basically just came here to say hey.”

“That would certainly be a first.” You walk behind your desk and shoo him away from your computer, waking it from its slumber. An orange post-it note on the top of your monitor reminds you that tax reports are due TODAY!!!!!!, and you try to prepare yourself for a grueling eight-to-twelve hours of tax filing, depending on how smoothly things go. Gojo Satoru showing up at your office before you is not your definition of smooth. “You said hey. Why are you still here?”

Gojo slowly spins in your chair, pushing himself in circles lazily with one long leg. Avoids looking at you. “You’ve been working with Suguru a lot lately.”

“Twice.” You open up the tiny K-Cup machine you have on your desk and start preparing the world’s smallest cup of coffee. Three times, technically, but you still don’t know what to make of the second time he called you out to Yamanashi Prefecture. When he lied to you. “That hardly constitutes a lot.”

“Enough that it got back to me.” He slows the chair, then starts spinning the other way. “You got any idea why he’s taken an interest?”

Your tiny mug clatters against the K-Cup machine. Geto is probably miles from here, dealing with important jujutsu business, but your heart beats like a prey animal nonetheless, the way it often does under his gaze.“I don’t think he’s taken an interest.”

“As much as I’d love to be flattering you, that’s not what I mean.” He stops the chair entirely, body directed at you. “You’ve been useful.”

There’s nothing you hate more than being talked about like a tool. Your coffee finishes brewing and you take a sip before you really should. It burns your lips. You lean against your desk and look at Gojo, trying to read anything from his face, his body language. As always, you glean nothing. Though you see Geto as the more insidious of the two, you’re keenly aware that Gojo is just as good at pretending. 

“I’ve been useful,” you repeat. “So what?”

“You don’t think you’ve been pretty unnecessary for the missions you’ve been asked to help with?” Though his glasses are on, it's as if you can sense the intensity of his gaze through the darkened lenses. “Suguru could’ve found and exorcised either of those curses easy. I could’ve done it even easier.”

Every meeting with Gojo requires a mandatory ego-stroking period. You decide to get it over with quickly. “Yes, you’re both very strong. What’s your point?”

“Do you know what happened that night?” he asks, taking off his glasses—and this is what really instills a fear in you that something terrible is about to happen. A full view of eyes like glittering sapphires. There’s no question what night he’s talking about. 

You don’t like thinking about that time in general. You don’t like thinking about Geto’s ribs. You don’t like thinking about the bodies. “A non-sorcerer tried to stop the merger. You guys… neutralized him.”

His gaze clouds for a moment. You’re aware that Gojo carries his burdens, despite his unbearable ego. He’s somewhere else, seeing things that you have the good fortune of never having to see. You briefly wonder whether you’d read memories or wants from him. You’re content with not knowing. “Don’t play coy,” he tells you. “You’re smarter than that.”

“You killed him.”

“I killed him.”

Gojo’s account of the day you read Geto: both he and his best friend so narrowly avoided death that they still remember its taste.

A mercenary whittled down Gojo’s endurance and attacked just as they were delivering Amanai Riko to Tengen for their merger. Gojo stayed back to deal with things. Geto escorted Amanai. Gojo was slit from throat to hip with a blade so sharp he didn’t feel the pain until his blood was already varnishing the floor. Geto was carved apart by that same blade, left alive only because of the curses he stored and their indeterminable state upon his death. Amanai, quick on her feet, made it to Tengen. The merger was successful. Things settled down and another Star Plasma Vessel wouldn’t have to be found for a long, long time.

Gojo shows you the scar on his forehead, shiny rib-white, usually hidden by his hair or his blindfold. Being so close to death changed him, he tells you—he fully understood the limits of his cursed energy and what it could do.

It changed Geto too.

“I’m not telling you all this for nothing,” he says, a disarming smile appearing on his face so suddenly after a serious conversation that the speed makes you nauseous. “I just have one tiny favor to ask you.”

It’s long into the day. The details took a while to get through. Your lunch hour is coming up and your appetite is nonexistent and tax forms sit unfiled on your desk. Gojo asking for a favor is always bad news. You can taste vomit and you wish you had a piece of gum or alternatively that you were born an entirely different person. “I don’t want any trouble—”

“No trouble. Promise.” He lifts his right hand, pinkie out, grinning—as if it’s funny that you, specifically, can’t touch him. “I just want you to read him for me.”

Your heart slams into the base of your throat. “That’s… You know that’s not a small ask.”

He drops his hand, shrugs. “C’mon—look, it’ll give you an excuse to get close to him.”

“Why would I want that?” you ask.

“As if I didn’t clock your embarrassing crush on him in high school.”

“Excuse me?”

“Excused. It won’t even be bad,” he says. “I only need you to read him one time, probably.”

“Why?”

“Just curious.”

“Gojo.”

Weighing the cost of telling you a half-truth versus keeping you in the dark seems to take a toll on him, his smile turning brittle at its corners. You think he knows that you won’t do anything for him without more information. Not that you’d read Geto ever, at all—but Gojo hasn’t always been good at believing people when they say never. Hesitantly, he tells you, “Something happened.”

“Like what?”

“I don’t know, something,” he says, finally a little exasperated. “I wouldn’t be asking if I already had answers.”

There are things he’s not telling you, very obviously. He’s minimizing. Jujutsu sorcerers are good at that. And he and Geto are best friends, two people so closely intertwined that they could count as one. “Why can’t you just ask him?”

For the first time in your acquaintance with him, Gojo is silent.

“He doesn’t know you’re asking me to do this,” you say. It would be a question if you weren’t already so sure.

“Oh, no, he’d kill me if he knew I was here.”

“I’ll call him and tell him to come get you.”

“I’d like to see you follow through on that.” He grins, peeks at you over his glasses. “Bet you won’t.”

Geto answers on the first ring, your name spoken in question.

“Your dog’s in my office. Come pick him up.”

He does.

Gojo could easily leave before Geto arrives, but he doesn’t even try. He sits in your chair, still reclined, surely doing immeasurable damage to the hydraulics. Asking him about his motives would be wasted breath—he’ll never tell you something he doesn’t want to, regardless of how much you wheedle him. He’ll enjoy the wheedling, though, and you don’t want to give him the ego boost of being begged. 

Instead, you shoo him out of the way of your desk and start working on submitting the tax forms, leaning awkwardly over your computer. Gojo hums and your back aches, and you refuse to be curious about this entire situation because it’s none of your business. This is what you do now. Taxes and filing.

Geto arrives at your office once again without needing your permission to come up. You wonder who’s working reception.

“Sorry about him,” Geto says, leaning in your doorway. His hair is loose, strands falling softly against his face. You forget how tall he is sometimes. How handsome. It makes your stomach turn. “Badly trained.”

“I think the fault is more the owner’s than the dog’s,” you say.

He shrugs. “If you tried training the dog in question, maybe your opinion would change.”

“Can you guys stop talking about me like I’m not here?” Gojo asks.

Geto grabs him by the back of the collar. “Walk’s over. Time to go home.” He smiles at you over his shoulder as he leaves, his hair so inky black that it almost blends into his dark dress shirt. You remember how it felt sliding through your fingers years ago. Even though you never touched his wound, you think you can remember the texture of his ribs.

You consider Gojo’s proposition long after you’ve submitted the tax forms, after you’ve arrived home late once again, after you stare out your bedroom window into the night sky and see nothing but storm-cloud gray. 

You expect Geto to be the kind of person to keep secrets. It shouldn’t worry you. But keeping secrets from the one person he views as an equal makes you uneasy. The bodies are in your head. You wonder how close you are to finally. When you sleep, it’s fitful, and you wake in the night to the feeling of silk-soft hair running through your fingers, falling so quickly that it’s impossible to grasp.

✾

Kento is antsy when he comes over for dinner. It wouldn’t bother you if he didn’t also happen to be the calmest man you know. He keeps bouncing his leg as he sits at the little two-top table in your kitchen, drumming his fingers incessantly on the tiled surface. He’s not wearing his glasses—and he usually watches your cooking like a hawk, just in case you make a grievous mistake—but instead holds them in his hand, twirling them back and forth. 

The one-sided conversation you have with him is unbearable. Did you have a nice day? Mmmhmm. No crazy assignments? Just the usual. Should I use soy sauce or sesame oil? Oil. My favorite author is doing a book signing next month. Do you want to go with me? Sure. Is something up? Not at all.

Eventually, you’ve had enough. “I’m going to burn the cabbage.”

He glances over at the pan you’re wielding. “It looks fine.”

“I’m going to do it on purpose and I’m going to make you eat it,” you say, pointing your spatula in his direction so he’s positive that it’s him who’ll have to eat the ruined meal. “I’ll spoon-feed it to you.”

Kento is bewildered by this, his eyebrows raised very slightly—shock has always been a micro-expression for him. “I’m sorry. I’ve been a little absent.”

“More than a little.” You stir the cabbage again. “You know I don’t want to pry.”

He nods. The space you offer each other is a give-and-take. If neither of you are ready to speak about something, there’s usually no pressure to do so. 

But this time is different. You’re worried that the strange things happening around you are begging to connect, veins folding over each other to become arteries, blood flowing into your life and staining the foundations. You need to tell him about everything that's happened over the past few weeks. But first, you need to ask. “Does this have something to do with Geto?”

His leg stops bouncing. His fingers quiet against the tabletop. “So you know.”

You tell him everything. Being called out to the village again, going to the vivarium, the jaws. Gojo showing up unannounced, though that's the most usual thing out of everything that's happened. “He asked me to read Geto,” you say. “There are secrets being kept.”

You told Kento about the bodies only once. The two of you had just recently graduated. You shared a studio apartment in Tokyo for three months before your Jujutsu Tech paychecks started coming in. In his arms, you saw memories of a kind-hearted blonde woman, the scent of coffee and pastries, the cool chill of the air in the mountains of Denmark, and you had to pull away from him, trying not to gag and failing.

When you returned from the bathroom, teeth minty-fresh and tongue burning, he apologized so earnestly. As if he had done anything other than hold you close and thread his fingers through yours. 

It was then you began to understand that you could never be his, though the realization didn’t settle in for a while. You told him not to apologize. You told him that nothing was his fault. And then for some reason, you told him about the bodies and the orange peel and the finally and he asked if he could comfort you and you had to say no because you didn’t want to throw up again. From then on, he was wary of Geto. Maybe not as much as you—though that’s understandable.

Knowing what’s going on in his head is one thing. Experiencing it is another.

Kento sighs, familiar. He joins you in the kitchen, in the heat that radiates from the stove. The cabbage is burning slightly even though you never meant to follow through on your threat. Your attention has been elsewhere. “Let me,” he murmurs, and his hand brushes yours as he takes the spatula from you: fresh bread from the bakery at the end of the block,          long nights at the office alone,          a deep hatred of the word ergonomic—  He begins to peel the burning cabbage from the bottom of the pan. “He’s been quiet lately.”

“Isn’t he usually?” You remember Geto being reserved, but then again, maybe that’s only because your memories of him are often in the context of Gojo.

“He can be.” Kento takes the pan to the trash and scrapes off the burnt cabbage, then returns to where you wait for him, leaning against your counter. He opens the top drawer next to the stove and pulls out the menu of the Indian restaurant nearby that you both like. “He’s exorcising Special Grade curses that he shouldn’t even attempt to take on by himself, no matter how strong he is. There are days where he’s cleared missions back-to-back without stopping to sleep.”

“You think he’s focused on work because something’s wrong.”

“Yes,” Kento says, and chews on the thought for a moment. “I don’t like it when he’s focused like this. He gets… obsessive.”

“Him and Gojo were always odd, though,” you say. Minimizing whatever is happening with Geto feels crucial. You’ve never seen Kento this worried.

He hums. “In different ways, perhaps. Gojo’s obsessive nature is more self-centered. But Geto—when he’s consumed by something, it’s like nothing else matters. He’d raze the world to ash if it meant doing what he felt needed doing.”

“Should I be worried?” you ask.

You should. You already know this.

Another sigh. He can’t quite look you in the eyes. You both think: bodies. You both think: finally . “Biryani for you?” he asks. “Or do you want something different this time?”

“Biryani’s fine.”

“Great,” he says, proceeding to order your food. And you don’t talk about it again that night.

✾

You’ve been a regular at the same coffee shop for nearly half a decade. The times you come in vary, depending on work or your weekend plans. You know the regulars and have seen thousands of faces pass through the cozy little building. Not once have you seen Geto here.

Yet he’s at the back of the line when you arrive, smiling pleasantly when he sees you walk through the door. Almost as if his arrival was timed.

If he hadn’t already seen you, you would’ve left. Even as you step into line behind him, you still consider it: bolting out the door and down the street, sprinting your way home as if he’d catch you if you stopped running. He stares at you expectantly while you think about your escape. It puts a shiver deep into your bones, his handsome face and kind eyes and warm smile, all tactics granted by genetics and lifted straight out of a manual on inviting body language. Instead of doing what your instincts tell you is right, you say, “Hi.”

“It's good to see you.” His smile widens, Cheshire in nature despite not showing teeth. “I didn’t know anyone else knew about this place.”

You almost tell him you live close by, but then think better of it. “It’s Kento’s favorite.”

“Of course,” he says. “Haibara took me here a few years ago.”

Yu is kind to a fault. Neither you or Kento have ever talked to him about what you saw in Geto’s head—mostly because you're scared to tell too many people, but also because of the blind respect Yu has for Geto. As if he's a story-book hero that could never do anything wrong. You care about Yu too much to disappoint him with the truth.

“I’ve gotten the same thing here for a long time,” Geto tells you. He gazes up at the menu, such concentration on his face, pulling at the strand of hair loose from his bun for a moment before turning back to you. You remember what Kento said about him not sleeping. His obsessiveness. Nearly imperceptible purple smudges lurk under his eyes. “Would you like to try something new with me?”

You can’t decide if you say yes out of sick curiosity or the fear of what would happen if you said no. Geto pays for both of your drinks—you insist that he shouldn’t, enough times in a row that it’s rude and very obviously makes the cashier uncomfortable, but his insistence wins out.

Waiting at the drink counter with him is torture. You hate when people buy things for you because it makes you feel like you owe them something. For Geto, it’s time. He paid for your presence, at least for however long it takes the baristas to make your drinks. He asks you about your work. You tell him about the books you’ve been balancing, hoping to bore him. Instead he asks more questions about how you like your office, whether your coworkers are nice, if your boss is treating you well.

“Are you looking for a new job?” You fail to keep vitriol from lacing the underside of your words. “We’re not hiring.”

If Geto is bothered by your attitude, he doesn’t let on. He even seems a touch amused. “I enjoy what I’m doing now, but thanks for keeping me in the loop.”

The barista calls out Geto��s name, and he grabs your drink first, hands it to you. You ordered a cappuccino with a syrup that you’ve been curious about but have never tried. The coffee smells amazing even at arm's length, creamy and strong and a little like cinnamon. 

“Thanks.” You slowly turn to leave. “I should be—”

“Wait,” he says, reaching towards you.

You flinch so hard that a slim stream of coffee shoots from the lid’s mouthpiece, burning hot when it lands on your hand. Geto never makes contact, but his arm is still outstretched, as if waiting for you to calm down so he can go through with touching you. You think of Gojo’s request, of the cases where Geto has asked for your help but hasn’t needed it. Yu might have shown him this coffee shop however long ago, but why is he here now? Why have you never seen him here before if he’s a regular?

“Get away from me,” you snap, stern and quiet enough that your words lace themselves underneath the shop’s easy-listening music. 

He does, hands raised and palms open, proclaiming innocence. Slowly, he lowers them. The barista calls his name again, his coffee still waiting on the counter.

“If you ever make me read you against my will,” you tell him, “I will never forgive you.”

Your forgiveness probably means little to him, but it’s the only thing you can threaten. You don’t know him well enough to understand what he holds dear—but you remember respect being important to him when you were at school. Respect and forgiveness.

“I wouldn’t,” he says. “Never.”

You thank him for the coffee again in lieu of a goodbye. The air outside stings against your face, your neck, the spots on your skin where the coffee burned you, steamed milk already drying to film. You’ll wash your hands when you get home. And you’ll wash them again. And again. Eventually they’ll feel clean enough.

✾

Yu calls you at 3:06 in the morning. “They’re dead because of me,” he tells you, and then he’s crying and you’re already walking down the block, heading toward his apartment in your pajamas and large winter coat.

After his injury, Yu wasn’t sent on more dangerous missions for a long time. Even when he was healed fully, despite the nasty scar that twisted and puckered the width of his chest, the higher-ups didn’t think he would be psychologically ready to take on anything too stressful.

They were right. One of the few things you’ve agreed with them about. Yu had always been the most hopeful out of all of you, the most caring. But he was also the most sensitive. Getting so close to death did nothing but make that worse. 

He’s on the couch when you get there, using your key to let yourself in. You and Kento were given copies at the housewarming party, which had consisted of four bottles of peach soju, the three of you, and Ieiri for a few hours before she was called back to the school. His eyes are red and puffy, and he’s curled into himself, laying on his side. It looks like he’s been crying for the entire evening. The worn leather of the seat is darkened beneath his face.

You’re by his side immediately, brushing hair back from his face, wiping stray tears from his cheeks: i wish i’d known i should have !!!          known how did                                         how did i not know how i wish i “Hey, it’s okay. I'm here,” you say, trying a little more pointedly to keep your fingers off his scalp. The thing he wants, simply: to have done better. “Can you tell me what happened?”

“I messed up,” he says, and you’ve never heard him sound so defeated. Even during his recovery he sounded less broken than this. “I don’t—I don’t know how I didn’t see it.” 

At seventeen, you and your classmates began to receive solo assignments. Yu always got the easier ones—still recovering from his injury, both physically and mentally. He tells you about a mission he had almost forgotten: a curse terrorizing a village on the outskirts of Yamanashi Prefecture. The curse was easily exorcized, easily forgotten—what Yu remembered well were the whispers that came after. They called him a devil, named him unnatural, said that he could see things no one else could because he was damned. Just like the two little girls that lived in the village, their late mother’s otherness somewhere in the same vein.

He thought nothing of it. He would get rid of the curse, and the village would go back to normal. Yes, they were skeptical and untrusting of anything that could be perceived as even slightly supernatural, but most non-sorcerers were. Sometimes you had to protect people that would never thank you—that could never comprehend the things you’d given up to offer said protection. Whatever oddities they attributed to other people would fade away once the curse was gone, and the village would go back to normal. Everyone would trust everyone again.

The bodies of the girls had been exhumed during a construction project aiming to bring affordable housing to prefectures outside of Tokyo. The Hasaba twins, Nanako and Mimiko, reported truant by their school over a decade ago. Their mother wasn’t alive to receive the report. Their father hadn’t been there from the beginning. The town didn’t report them missing—they knew exactly where the girls were. From the remains, bones weak and brittle, authorities determined that they died of malnutrition.

“I could’ve helped them.” Yu’s lip trembles and he bites it so hard that you see the skin around his mouth turn bone-white. “They might have been alive then. If I paid more attention, I just—how could they have done that? How can anyone justify that?”

You don’t know. How does anyone justify anything? How many times do you have to tell yourself you’re doing the right thing before you believe it? You wonder if the inhabitants of that village let out a breath when the sisters had finally passed—whether they, too, had a moment of finally.

Yu cries for a little longer and you hold him carefully. It’s all you can do. You’d call Kento if you didn’t know that Yu would be mortified to cry in front of someone he views as his superior at work, despite their friendship. After a while, he pulls his phone out and opens up a message chain. A groupchat for Jujutsu Tech staff. Ieiri’s text, attached to the official posting from the higher-ups: zen’in clan are holding a service for the girls on sunday. gakuganji wants us there to pay respects so everyone better show up. In the report, there are photos of each of the girls, from Picture Day at their school, judging by the uniforms—and you recognize them. 

You’ve seen these girls inside a man’s memories. A man that you read for Geto. 

Your heart beats so hard that you’re sure Yu can feel it through your shirt, through your skin. When you’ve reassured him as much as possible that he couldn’t possibly be at fault, when he promises you that he’ll be able to sleep without the feeling of guilt crushing him under its heavy heel, you head further into the city instead of back towards home.

The apartment building you come to is sleek, flashy, piercing the night sky like a blade. The doorman lets you in—you’ve been here before. On business only, and never of your own volition. You take the elevator to the top floor and slam your fist against the hallway’s only door, choosing to ignore the shiny golden doorbell and the even shinier knocker. After a few moments of you hitting the wood so hard that it feels like the meat of your palm is going to split, the door opens. 

A terribly annoying grin greets you. “I would’ve invited you up if you called me.”

“Why,” you say, trying your best to be calm, “do you want me to read him?”

Gojo’s expression flickers. A moment, a fleeting instant of concern. He’s without glasses or blindfold—you must have woken him up. It’s probably nearing five in the morning. The first trains will start running soon. “Hello, business,” he says. “I’ve got to admit, I’d hoped I was talking to pleasure.”

“It has to do with the girls, doesn’t it?”

“I don’t ask Suguru about what girls he’s seeing—”

“I saw them, Gojo,” you say.

This shuts him up.

“I read someone who knew them.” You’re not sure why, but it feels necessary to not tell him that you read the man because Geto asked you to. “He didn’t like them playing with his daughter because they were different.”

He stands, silent and contemplating, eyes pearlescent and glowing in the soft shadow that precedes sunrise. 

There’s a terrible phantom that lurks between your ribs, a sticky feeling that slimes along your bones. You think of Geto’s sudden reappearance in your life, you think of Gojo’s intimidating request, you think finally, finally, finally. “Did he kill them?”

His eyes snap to yours, fluorescent, flaring—you had forgotten that the hottest part of a flame is blue. “No.” 

He’s so serious that your heart rate picks up, your body going into fight-or-flight at the coldness of that single word. “Gojo—”

“He wouldn’t.” 

“Okay—it’s okay. I believe you.” You don’t, but you’ll say anything to remove the hardness from his eyes, his tone—the same hardness as when he sat in your office and told you not to sugarcoat things. I killed him. “Then why do you want me to read him?”

“I told you,” he says, and his voice is back to normal but his eyes are nowhere close. “I’m just curious.”

Your hand darts forward on instinct. You want to know what’s inside his head so bad that you can’t control yourself—until you remember exactly who you’re trying to touch and exactly what his power is. Forget being untouchable—he could physically destroy you. He could snap your arm like a matchstick. He could pull at the broken end until the limb splits completely. You step back, but the movement was too obvious to have been anything else.

He grins again. Holds his hand out. “Wanna touch?”

“Good night, Gojo.”

He watches as you get in the elevator, as you press the button for the lobby, as the doors slide shut. All the while, eyes burning.

✾

You’re at a run-down warehouse in Roppongi with a cursed weapon in your hand when you wonder where your life went wrong. Kento called you half an hour ago—cornered, bleeding, his cleaver knocked out of his grip. “I wouldn’t have called you,” he said, “but no one else is picking up.”

It didn’t matter. If he needed you, you would be there. That had been the case for the better part of a decade. 

The warehouse was a storage facility for flour and corn, most likely. The floor is covered in rancid mold. Your knife—Sound Eater, the cursed tool you’d conveniently forgotten to return to the armory when you left Jujutsu Tech—is familiar in your palm. Its handle is worn to the shape of you. 

You feel comfortable like this. More comfortable than at your job filing accounts, at your apartment reading or watching some awful reality TV show. It’s because this is how you grew up, you think. You’re remembering the person you were for twenty years before you became someone else.

At the far end of the warehouse, a stone staircase leads to the basement—where Kento is. Where the curse is. You can sense it, the same feeling as being watched. A specter’s ghostly nails tracing the ridge of your spine. 

The basement smells mustier than the warehouse. A single light blinks ahead, allowing you flashes of the series of hallways that lead deeper into the warehouse’s underground storage. The floor is wet, and the viscous liquid that coats the stone soaks through the soles of your shoes. Your socks stick coldly to your feet. You listen to your weapon to see if you can locate the curse, its energy responding to the curse’s with vibrations and muted shrieks that sing through your bones unpleasantly. The curse seems to be everywhere, spread through the basement like an even layer of butter. 

You find Kento’s cleaver before you find him. It’s deep in the tunnel system—you’ve already been walking for two or three minutes, and there’s been no sign that anyone else is down here with you.

Taking his weapon as a sign that you’re close, you even your breathing, measure your steps—stealth training from long ago functioning like a ghost limb, sending signals through your body despite not having been used for years.

You enter a large antechamber—some sort of production facility—and though it’s quiet, you hear breathing from behind a burnt-out piece of machinery. Slowly, you approach, Sound Eater singing against your skin. This is not the cursed tool’s energy responding to a curse. It can only be Kento. Your heart still beats violently against your ribs, bruising bone.

His shoulder is a mess. Dress shirt torn, blood adorning the fabric and the shiny plastic buttons, face haggard—he’s in pain, and the sight sends you back to your youth as quick as a fist to the face. Group missions, Kento’s injuries, your injuries, the way you started always wearing black because it hid bloodstains most effectively.

You’re at his side quickly, a hand gingerly against his shoulder, checking for damage. He groans. His shoulder is dislocated, but he already knows this. “Help me get it back in,” he tells you. His shirt is still intact enough that you won’t have to touch his skin, which is good. You can’t risk being weakened right now.

Shoulders always relocate with a sickening crack, as if a bone that had been broken is being rebroken and set. A badly healed bone is a liability, Ieiri has told you. Dislocation is easier to fix. You feel a little less sick when the sight of distended skin and incorrectly puzzled bone is straightened out, set right. 

“Details,” you demand.

“A semi-first grade, four-legged,” he says, taking his cleaver from you. “It’s using whatever’s on the floor—sticks you in place. Its left flank is injured.”

The one question that Kento doesn’t seem to be able to answer: where is it?

Sound Eater answers that question for you in the span of seconds, buzzing against your palm, shocks working their way down your fingers. You nod your head towards the north entrance to the production facility, where your weapon is attempting to drag you. Once it gets close enough to a curse, its energy begins to magnetize. The stronger the curse, the stronger the magnetization. You try to ignore the way your hands shake with effort to keep Sound Eater in place.

Kento is up, breathing labored. You hate this for him—that he feels like it’s his duty to deal with this, that his purpose is nothing more than being a jujutsu sorcerer. That knowing what it feels like to exorcise a curse makes it nearly impossible to want to do anything else.

You understand. This is the most alive you’ve felt in years.

In the abridged sign that you and he used to employ during group missions, he tells you, Go right. Distract.

You dart into the clearing, the curse’s eyes immediately finding you from across the large room. They’re yellow, the familiar color of bile, and they shine out from its gray body, the blob-like consistency of a snail on top of four muscled legs, identical to those of a wolf. 

Which means it’s fast.

Your shoulder takes the brunt of the pressure as you roll out of the way of the curse’s first strike. It crosses ground more quickly than you can comprehend. When you right yourself, you can see just how grotesque the creature really is. Its mouth is a wide wound stuffed with teeth. Its eyes are scared, childlike. In its twisted voice, it says hello hello hello? hello who's there hello? and Sound Killer wants to taste its skin.

As it readies its weight on its back legs to strike again, Kento comes down from above, his cleaver hitting the back of the curse’s neck with intense force—almost 7:3. You hear a crack, a hiss, but the curse backs up, head still attached to its body by a thread.

The floor is suddenly very cold. It radiates up through your feet, spiking into your calves, your thighs. You try to move and fail. Sound Eater begs you to let it get closer to its target. 

You’re not sure if the curse can only freeze one person at a time. Kento tries to move forward to strike again and his body jerks and stills, glued to its vulnerable position. The curse readies itself again to strike, its head knitting itself back onto its body. Its wound-mouth opens wide, ready for an offering. 

Sound Eater whistles as you lift it to shoulder-level, as you aim to throw it into the curse’s open mouth before it consumes Kento. 

It’s stupid, Gojo once told you, to lose your weapon on the field if your cursed technique is useless. You got very good at throwing weapons with dead aim, taking out curses with a single slice, Sound Eater a perfect match for you because of its draw to the cores of such curses. Part of you got good at this to spite him. You’ll continue to spite him, even now.

The curse lunges. Sound Eater slices through air. An echoing click fills the chamber as the cursed tool hits tooth, cracking bone but doing no more. The curse halts its attack, scared yellow eyes focused on you now.

And your cursed tool lays beneath its feet, glittering under a layer of pungent slime. You briefly try to appreciate the irony of the situation: if you hadn’t left the jujutsu world, you wouldn’t be as rusty as you are now, and maybe you would have lived. 

Your feet are unlocked so suddenly that you fall to your knees, slime coating your pants, your legs, your hands as you push yourself back up. The curse lies inert in between you and Kento—clearly breathing, but nowhere near conscious. Asleep.

It’s like you can sense him before he speaks, your blood chilling in its well-traveled arteries.

“I’m glad you’re both okay,” he says. Grins without teeth. The same way Gojo grins—confident and so hopelessly self-impressed. There’s a curse beside him, one that he controls, its energy definitely potent but not malicious towards you. It’s familiar, in a way—eyes that crackle with electricity, sparking skin, long claws. You’ve seen it before, but not personally. Geto’s gaze flits between you and Sound Eater on the ground next to the downed curse. “Did Nanami call you out of retirement? Or were you just having a little fun?”

Kento says Geto’s name—a warning. He’s injured, hurting. He doesn’t have patience for games.

“It doesn’t matter why I’m here,” you say, offering Kento help to stand. His body is a heavy weight that pulls at your shoulder, activating muscles you haven’t used since right after high school. “Ieiri still runs the clinic at school, right?”

“Of course,” Geto responds, all fox teeth. He points at the unconscious curse. “First, though.”

You’ve never seen Geto absorb a curse before. You know some details about the process, mostly from Kento and Yu telling you stories about happenings in the field, but you’d never actually witnessed it. It amazes you how the body curls up into such a compact ball of shadow, how it can be contained within the walls of Geto’s cursed energy. The expression he makes while he consumes it is familiar to you. You know that strain, that effort put into controlling every single muscle in your face, veins in the neck straining hard against skin. They must taste awful. You think about the gum he offered you at the vivarium—wonder if he carries it for purposes you hadn’t considered until now. 

He dismisses the other curse with a small movement of his hand, and the energy in the room evens out so quickly that your head feels full of falling sand. Sound Eater goes quiet, and you collect it from beneath a viscous layer of filth. “We should go,” Geto says, gesturing to one of the entrances to the production facility. Knowing him, he probably has the entire compound mapped out in his head. 

“Did you call a car?” you ask.

“I already have one waiting. Figured we might need a quick exit.”

You nod. He still unnerves you, but you’re not entirely without manners. “Thank you.”

He looks at you for a moment longer than you’re comfortable with. Everything seems calculated in his eyes. He never simply sees things—he analyzes them. “My pleasure,” he says. You can't read his tone because he always keeps it even, friendly. But you’re sure that there’s something to read in those words that you can’t quite see right now. “Shall we?”

Despite the way you feel about him, you allow enough tentative trust for him to lead you out of the darkness and back into the sun.

✾

He insists on escorting you home from the school.

There are company cars you could’ve requested rides from—the higher-ups at least owe you a free ride home for everything you’ve done today—but you don’t want to take anything from them that they haven’t already offered. They can be tricky about which of their favors require repayment.

This leaves you and Geto on the last train of the night, alone. He stands despite the long rows of empty seats, leaning back against the Do Not Lean On Doors sign, arms crossed. There’s not even a hint of him trying to hide that he’s watching you intently.

On any other day, you would stand, unwilling to give him any advantage—but you’re exhausted. You need a shower so badly. Layers of slime have dried on you and you feel more disgusting than you ever knew was possible. You sit opposite him, leaning back in the uncomfortable plasticky chair. Meeting his eyes feels foolish. Taking your attention off of him feels even more foolish. Staring at his shoes is a happy medium.

The car rolls steady across its tracks, its wheels whistling slightly when the train reaches top speed between stations. 

“Do you ever see things you don’t want to?” he asks after a three-stop stretch of silence.

All the time. It seems you’ll always be stuck in this cycle of attempting normalcy only to be tasked with experiencing the unpleasant wants and memories of people you don’t know. You’re not going to tell him that, though. Him asking you questions makes you queasy. Your knees feel weak even though you’re sitting down. “Doesn’t everyone?”

“You’re very good at avoiding my questions.”

“You don’t make it hard.”

The train rolls on, and on, and on.

He hooks his arm around the closest stanchion pole, then leans in your direction. The strand of hair that hangs loose against his face sways alongside the train's ebbs and flows. Blinding brightness from the overhead LEDs paint his face in baroque shadows. He could be a devil, or a killer, or simply a man. “Does it scare you?”

Many things about this situation scare you. You ask him to clarify.

“When you read people. I’m sure you’ve seen some… unsavory things.” You think: bodies. You think: blood and muscle and sinew and bone. “It would make sense if those things scared you.”

“They don’t,” you lie. 

He considers you for a long moment, seeming to lean even farther forward, and the idea of him getting closer pierces your stomach like a nail. But the train once again sways on its tracks and his body follows, leaning back on his heels and removing himself from what could have almost been your space. “I always wondered what it was you saw.”

“What do you mean?” you ask. You know what he means.

He smiles, almost condescending—an expression that says come now, are we really going to play this game? The way he says your name in response, so pleasant and even-keeled, makes you feel like a cold stone. Prey trapped in a small space with its most vicious predator. You go so still your blood stops flowing.

Until now, you’d never been sure whether he actually knew that you’d read him. You’re positive he doesn’t want anyone to know what’s inside his head. He paints an image of himself over what he really is, but it’s a faulty veneer. Apply enough pressure and it’ll fracture in all the little places that hold the worst rotted of the flesh beneath.

You know he would do anything to keep this image of himself spotless, whole. You’re sure of it. “Kento will know something’s wrong if I don’t talk to him in the next few days.”

His brows draw low over his dark eyes—first in confusion, and then in a sort of amused incredulity. “You think I’m going to kill you.”

“I think you want to.”

The lights flash in the car as it passes under a tunnel. “What is it that defines a good person?”

“...why are you asking me?”

He grins, and your stomach constricts. “Good and bad are large concepts in a small world. They touch and overlap in more places than any of us could ever anticipate. But we’re supposed to fit neatly into one or the other.”

You don’t respond. You’re too focused on the stretch of his lips.

“So what defines a good person?”

“The things they’ve done,” you say, more to get him to stop asking you questions than anything.

“I don’t remember doing anything particularly harmful to you,” he says—and here it is. What he really wants from you. “It can’t be my actions. So is it my desires that define me as a bad person in your eyes, or my memories?”

Your stomach constricts tighter. Painfully. You’re still four stops away from the one by your apartment. “Geto.”

“It has to be one or the other. Those are the two categories that you can read, right?”

“It was a long time ago.”

“Ten years,” he says. “And you can barely look me in the eye.”

You try, as if you could prove him wrong, but you can’t maintain eye contact with him for more than a moment before you feel a terrible coldness in your gut.

“I’d always wondered if you read me that night, but I was never sure.” He wraps his loose strand of hair around a long finger, then unwraps it. Repeats these movements like a question and answer, like a catechism. “Not until I saw you again.”

“The second time you called me out to the village—you were lying to me.”

“We’ve established that.”

“You put that man in a coma,” you say. "You absorbed the curse that was at the power plant."

He nods, face calm, as if altering someone’s state of being is a normal thing to do. “But I woke him up right after you left and he was unharmed. I paid him for his time.”

“Why?”

“I needed to know what it was that scared you. The situation itself…” he says, holding out one hand flat—and then the other, his hands mimicking the sides of a scale, the second option heavier than the first. “Or me.”

“I’d have told you that if you asked,” you say, and you would have. No point in keeping it from him. “You didn’t have to lie. That was underhanded.”

“I think reading me without my consent counts as underhanded.”

Bone, muscle, blood, sinew. Bone-white beneath his uniform. And the blood, the blood, the blood, orange-peel thick. “I didn’t want to. You don’t understand, you were—I could see your ribs. It was—we didn’t think—”

“I understand,” he says.

“I know you do,” you concede. Because he was there for it all. He experienced it all. He woke up when he was healed and immediately went to search for the body of his best friend, not knowing that Gojo had already woken himself up from the brink of death. “I wish it happened differently.”

“Doesn’t everyone?” he asks, parroting your response from earlier.

Maybe they do. Maybe things could have gone much differently—worse, even. You could know more than his wants. You could have seen them realized.

“What did you see?” he asks, careful. Quiet. There's a weight to his voice you're unfamiliar with. It sounds like more than passing curiosity.

It’s what makes you answer honestly. “Blood. Bodies.” Finally. “Relief.”

“Which of those scared you the most?”

You look at him, jaw tight, because he knows which one it was.

“And that makes me a bad person?” he asks.

“I never said you were a bad person.”

“You just thought it.”

You have. You’ve thought it every day since seeing his true desires. You’re not sure that you’re a good person either, but your hidden wants will never be as gruesome as his. “It’s not that simple.”

“Of course it’s not.” Again, he smiles—but there’s something brittle to it. Gojo, in your office when you pushed too hard. A mask beginning to crack.

The train stills, doors opening. You're still a few stops away from home. No one gets on, no one gets off. It's just you and Geto on the car, filling its silence with more than words.

“If I asked you to read me now,” he asks, “would you?”

Your head jerks up, and you look past him, at the closing doors, at the windows of the train car. The whistling starts again, the train gaining speed. You’re between stops. There’s no exit. “No.”

“It could be different than last time.”

“You don’t know that,” you say, but what you really want to tell him is that it won’t be.

“What if it is?” he asks. “Maybe you have the wrong idea of me.”

You don’t think that’s the case. You’re not going to tell him this.

“I was angry. Hurt. I thought Satoru had just been murdered.” He says these things like easy facts. His tone takes the emotion out of them entirely, as if those factors didn’t contribute to what you’re sure is massive unresolved trauma. “I thought I was going to die.”

“You didn’t.”

“No,” he says—and here you get a flash of something deeper, again unfamiliar. Because he won’t look at you, even though he’s the kind of person that always makes eye contact. He leans back, distancing himself. “Have you ever experienced that? A moment where you know you’re going to die?”

“I haven’t.”

His lips twist into a muted frown. He looks young, the way he used to in high school. He stares out of the darkened window at nothing. At the walls of the underground tunnels. At blackness, pure and complete. The bags under his eyes are more prominent. Because of the lighting, maybe. “You think a lot of things. You realize a lot of things. And none of it is particularly fair.”

This has to be manipulation. He’s good at that. He always has been. But—something about this moment feels vulnerable, and you’ve never known Geto to be vulnerable. Not with anyone. Even on the brink of death, even just recovered, his chest still terribly scarred—there was nothing. He smiled at you and Ieiri before he left, that fox-teeth smile you hate so much. I’ll be back shortly, he told the two of you, as if his blood wasn’t coating the bottom of your shoes, staining the skin of your knees, clotting underneath your fingernails.

You’ve read people for long enough that you’re sure: this moment is different. “Why do you want me to read you?” you ask, so quiet that your voice is nearly swallowed by the sound of the train wheels scrolling across their metal track.

“Because I want to know,” he says, his voice a little hoarse at its core, “what you see.”

You shouldn’t. You’re too kind. Kento tells you this often. 

You shouldn’t.

When you put your hand out, palm up, Geto places his fingers atop yours so gently—a breeze of a touch. And then: bodies. bodies. bodies.           bodies. bodies. bodies. bodies. bodies. bodies. bodies. bodies. suguru          should we kill these guys ? bodies. bodies.           bodies. bodies. it could’ve been different i could’ve been different bodies. bodies.                     bodies. bodies. bodies. bodies. we could do it together          no. i could do it alone bodies. bodies. bodies— You vomit onto the floor of the train.

Geto is on his knees in front of you, clear of the mess, and your fingers are tangled in his shirt, fists bunching the material at each shoulder. You want to let go so badly but you can’t—you’re heaving, sobbing, your forehead pressed against your fist, tears running hot onto the back of your hand. 

It’s just so bad. It’s so terrible. He wants this to happen. He feels like people deserve this. You never should have let him convince you to read him. You shouldn’t have been drawn in by the vulnerability. Not when—not when it’s that in his head, still, a decade later. 

You can’t stop heaving, nearly retching. You can’t stop pulling in breaths too quickly, not deep enough. Your forehead is flush against his shoulder now, and your tears are staining his shirt, and you can’t let go. You’re paralyzed.

He holds you while you cry. Only touches your back, your arms. Not your hair or face or hands. You couldn’t handle it again. You couldn’t handle it again but you can’t move right now.

As you quiet, as your breaths turn slow, heavier, you realize he’s been speaking to you. Maybe the whole time—you’re not sure. Quiet reassurance. It’s okay, you’re okay. Breathe.

You don’t feel okay. You feel more sick than you ever have. “Why would you want that?” you ask, and your words blend into tears. Into panic. 

He’s quiet, one large hand smoothing down your back over and over, as if reassuring you that you’re safe. Safe in the arms of someone with that many bodies in his head. He sighs, tired, and his breath makes your hair flutter, caresses the curve of your ear.

The shock of fear to your system from realizing just how close he is gives you the strength to pull away—to sit back in the seat again, untwine your fingers from his shirt. It’s creased on each shoulder from your vice grip. There’s vomit on the floor of the train to the right of him. He’s on both knees in front of you, hands in his lap now that you’ve freed yourself from his grasp.

Was it real? The vulnerability? The hoarseness to his voice when he told you that he wanted to know what you would see?

“I’m sorry,” he says.

“Why would you want that?” you repeat.

He sighs again. Sits back on his heels, begins running his hand through his hair before remembering it’s tied up. He just leaves his hand on the top of his head, fingers curling inwards until he’s gripping his hair, and you wonder if it feels the same as it did on the night you read him for the first time. “I don’t know,” he tells you.

The train stops again. The voice says something you don't hear. You can't get up. “That’s not true.”

The doors close and there's the whistling once again, the darkness that surrounds the both of you, the speed you can just hardly feel. “Why did you decide to quit being a sorcerer?” he asks.

You don’t want to tell him. “There were a lot of reasons.”

“How is it fair?” He drops his hand. His hair is disheveled, just like his shirt. He looks so un-put together that he hardly resembles the Geto you’ve always had an image of in your head. “So many of us die. So many of us have injuries that take years to really heal. And it’s their fault. Humans.”

“You’re human.”

“I’m a sorcerer.”

“They’re not mutually exclusive.”

“I’m the one that has to deal with the consequences of their actions,” he says, as if that means something. As if that puts him in a different group from them entirely.

“So you want to kill them?”

“No,” he says, quick—because that’s what he’s supposed to say, you think. Then he quiets for a moment and seems to actually consider your question. “No. But—I do think about it.”

You both sit with the admission. Though the train car is empty, you feel cloistered, walls too tight around you.

“It makes me worry that I’m not a good person anymore,” he tells you.

“Did you want me to read you so you could decide whether you’re good or not?”

“I wanted you to read me because when I heard about those little girls that died, Satoru had to talk me down from going to that village and killing everyone.”

The conductor comes on the speakers, announcing the last few stops. It's both shocking and reassuring to have another person so close. You can't believe this conversation is happening in such close proximity to a person that couldn't even begin to understand the nature of its contents. Strangely enough, the admission quiets some of the fear inside you. Because you can understand it, on some level. Those girls were sorcerers. They were also nine.

“I had to see if there was anything inside me that didn’t want to do it,” he says. “Because—if there’s not—”

“I don’t see everything,” you tell him. There's more you could say, but you've never been comfortable revealing the true extent of what you can do. You've been a tool for long enough that you know being more effective begets more use. “I don’t think you should use me as a metric.”

“It’s obvious that what you saw wasn’t very good.”

“They starved to death,” you say. “I’d be angry too.”

And you're not angry, you realize. Not in the way that he is. Two little girls were starved to death for being somewhat different, and you can't get yourself to feel more than disgust. More than frustration. Parts of you have been quelled over time—being a jujutsu sorcerer necessitates this. You can't get angry over everything because everything is unjust, and everything is unfair, and eventually it'll all build up. Maybe into what Geto is experiencing now. If you hadn't desensitized yourself like this, maybe you would have bodies in your head.

It's unlikely. Not to the extent he does. But it's not like you're a stranger to violence.

“Maybe I’m not a good person because I’m not angry the way that you are,” you say.

“I don't think that's true,” he says, smiling, a little slight and a little sad.

It's the only time since you'd read him at the edge of death that you don't see fox teeth—but the smile is still not entirely kind. His words don't speak of reassurance. Perhaps a sort of envy. You're familiar with want. Uncomfortably so. You recognize it even when you try not to. Maybe he wants to feel the way you do. Less angry. Or maybe he does truly see you as good, in a certain context, and he wants to be there on that level with you.

“The first time I ingested a curse," he tells you, “I was so sick I couldn’t stand. I didn’t realize how awful it would taste. There’s nothing I could compare it to. After it was done, I threw up until my stomach was empty, and then kept going. The stomach acid burned my throat so badly that I had to go to the hospital. I was still young.”

You stay still and quiet. You don't want to relate to him so you try not to.

“And sometimes I wonder—would any non-sorcerer ever understand that? Could they?”

You try not to, and you fail at it. “Will you show me?”

He looks at you in askance. You don't tell people that you can do this. Only Kento knows. It's not something you should allow Geto. Not when he scares you the way he does.

“The first time,” you say, because despite knowing you shouldn't do this, it's that sick curiosity again that pushes you forward. And maybe something else—a want. A need to relate. To be sure that someone else has known what you've felt your entire life. “If you really concentrate on the memory—I want to see it.”

To show you, he touches your face: it’s so dark and i’m scared. and mom said to come home soon. but i saw this thing and i want to see if i can beat it                     no. i’m lying to you. there is a way i want this memory to go. i am a good child and i want to go home to my mother but i am so curious.           i am so curious i am so curious. i want to see what that thing looks like when i kill it. i know i can. i know i am different. i scare my mother and father and they still love me very much because it is so dark and i am so scared and i am just a child.           but i am not scared. i follow the thing into dense trees that shadow the park. i play here with my friends. i kill it.           i don’t know how i know what to do but i do and                     !!! oh                               !!! god                     !!! oh god                                                   please.                                                   please.                                                   please. don’t make me do it again don’t make me do it again don’t make me do it again i want to go home i want to see my mother i do i’m sorry it hurts it hurts oh god           oh  i want to be good. i’m sorry. i want to be good. i’m sorry. i want to be sorry. i’m           god. 

The way you come out of a reading is usually like a free-fall without a parachute. One second you’re tumbling through the air, and the next you’ve been abruptly stopped. Being shown something is different. Kento would show you his childhood when you asked, moments with his family, bad parts of missions that he didn't want to voice but still wanted to share. It’s a little easier to stomach.

Usually. 

His hand lingers near your face, resting on your shoulder. He’s so close to you and he smells like very expensive cologne and you suddenly see how tired he is. His smile hides more than you thought it did. Maybe more than you had been looking for.

“Do you have a final verdict?” he asks. “Or should I decide for myself?”

There’s a predilection in him, you think. He’s predisposed to anger, the self-righteous kind. So is every other sorcerer you’ve ever met. And yet it’s different with him—more complex. Something else is very wrong with him. Deeply.

“I don’t like it when people touch my face.”

“I can keep that in mind.”

“I want you to apologize.”

“Of course,” he says, gentle. Was his voice always this gentle? Or is it because of all he’s shared with you on this train? “I’m sorry.”

The doors of the train open and a tinny voice announces that you’ve reached the last stop of the night. You missed your station a long time ago. You’ll have to pay for a cab. “I don’t think you’re a bad person,” you tell him. “But I'm afraid of you.”

He nods. Sits back on his heels again. “Will you be okay getting home?”

“Yes,” you say. “Thank you.”

You make it home just after one in the morning and lay in your bed with your clothes on and you don’t sleep. You don’t sleep at all.

i will link part two here when it is posted!

[mythicmanuscripts]

all ive been able to think about lately is a dream i had the other night. sub aemond and casual nudity +/ naked cuddles. i just ge the feeling that its something that hed be into. maybe not at first but once hes comfortable and feels safe enough with you hed actually grow to really enjoy it. like when hes alone with you in your shared room and know no one will disturb you two he just locks the door and quickly wriggles out of his clothes and of course you join him too. like theres just something so relaxing and natural about it and he likes to share that with you

Brilliant thought anon, absolutely brilliant!!! After I just posted that ask about Aemond slowly getting comfortable, I think this sort of thing is the perfect continuation of what would happen once he reaches that comfort level.

While none of this is explicit, there's definitely implied sexual behaviour and since it's a lot about nakedness, to be safe I'm gonna put it under a cut. Enjoy!!

I think this starts as something that only happened after sex, mostly because Aemond prefers not to have sex very late at night? Sure, he'll do it happily if the mood arises, but in general he'd rather have sex earlier in the evening and spend the rest of the night in bed with you before going to sleep.

He grows to love the post sex hours? He's always heard most men just lay down immediately and fall asleep, but not him. There's a certain level of connection and comfortability with you that he only seems to get after sex? Once he's been that vulnerable, he finds that he's not shy about his body, not worried about having your eyes on him or trying to seem a certain way.

His favourite is when you two can get ready for bed together after sex, and absolutely no servants are called. He's more than capable of heating the water by the fire and pouring it into the bath, in fact he finds that he enjoys the task, even enjoys feeling your eyes on him from the bed while he does it. You bath together then, trade kisses and wash each other and then climb back into bed together, or sit on an armchair together, sometimes you curl up on the windowsill, sharing a blanket and watching the stars.

(The servants know better than to ask how come there's bath water to drain in the morning when no one was called to draw it the night before.)

As you get more comfortable and grow closer, Aemond one night admits how much he loves those hours. Maybe it's the night before one of you are set to leave for a few days, and he tells you how he thinks he'll miss that the most. You agree.

Doing it without sex takes a bit longer. The first night it happens that way is after Aemond gets into a fight with his mother. He comes storming into your shared chambers and all but chases out the poor servant trying to gather the laundry. You nearly tell him off for such rudeness, but then you get a proper look at him and you realise how stressed he seems.

You pull him into bed and ask what's wrong. Even though he's talking about it, he doesn't seem to be settling in the same way he normally would? He's still tense, flinching if you touch him without warning.

You decide to ask if he'd like to have a bath, because you can see that he's clearly upset and needs to calm. He shakes his head, not wanting to draw it or have a servant do it, and he most certainly won't let you do it.

You're stuck then, unsure of how to help him. You think of how calm he is those nights, of how comfortable.

And so, mostly on a whim, you get up from bed and remove your clothes. Poor Aemond has absolutely no idea what's going on and starts stuttering about how he's not in the mood. You tell him that you know that, but you'd like to be closer to him all the same.

He's confused, but he removes his clothes too and gets back into bed. He's stiff and tense for the ten seconds it takes you to shuffle closer and wrap an arm around him. From the moment you do that, he all but melts against you. You can actually feel how he sags, letting you take his weight, nuzzling his nose against your collarbone. You can feel the flutter of his lashes as he clothes his eyes.

He lays there for a while with you in silence, just breathing and focusing on the feel of your hand stroking his back and arm. When he does eventually start speaking, his voice as the same soft, almost slow quality that you usually only hear after sex. He tells you what happened then, listens to your counsel and then draws a bath for you both.

Even though you thought it might work, you're still shocked at just how well it worked, and especially at how comfortable yet non-sexual it was?

After that, it becomes commonplace. You start having to tell servants they may not enter your chambers without permission, even if they had been sent with a message for one of you, they must always knock and wait. Aemond absolutely adores how safe his shared chambers feel, how clear it is that the space belongs to you and aemond alone.

He so looks forward to it now, loves how warm and safe it feels.

Interestingly, he won't do it alone? Often you enter your chambers after him and find him reading or writing alone with his clothes on but then once he sees you he'll motion you over and gently push your clothes down your body. It's like he can't be comfortable naked when he's alone, but the moment you arrive he craves that vulnerability.

[unfriendlies]

if you remember. garam rolled his eyes and let out a long quiet breath as if to say of course he remembered. though he couldn't exactly recall what the two talked about, if they really even talked at all, but he could remember what happened. to an extent, anyways. his demeanor shifted drastically once angel told him how he knew garam had a hardon. he felt the blood rush from his head, a sort of panicked numbness settling in his hands as he gripped as tightly as he could onto the blanket that still left his legs concealed. he felt it, angel actually felt his dick pressing against him. this was so embarrassing, definitely not how garam imagined the first contact would go. but at least he hadn't tried to push further, he had the common sense at the time to do his best to hide the fact. "i must have fallen asleep after that, too. when i've been drinking, don't ever let me go past just kissing... okay?" he was really worried, mostly about the fact that he wasn't sure he'd be able to stop if angel had given him any sort of leeway. he'd never been the type to keep going or push for more when somebody denied him but knowing the feelings between them were mutual, he feared that, being drunk, he would forget about what angel has been through and pressure him into going further. garam also... just really did not want their first time to happen while he was under the influence. he wanted to be able to remember every single second of it, he wanted to enjoy every feeling instead of those feelings being controlled by alcohol. when angel began talking about their fight last night, all garam wanted was to pull away from him but he feared that angel would think it was an act done out of rejection when that was far from the true reason. garam felt so guilty for what he'd said, ashamed of the accusations he made. the smaller man just sat there, his grip on angel's hand tightening for a moment before his whole body relaxed. it was good to hear that angel was seeking professional help for what he'd been through, garam would have felt worse knowing that angel was suffering in silence, by himself. he knew he wasn't very good with dealing with his emotions, he often jumped into things too quickly and latched on to anybody that showed an interest in him. that's partially why they were both in the predicament they were in, because garam lived with rose colored glasses permanently attached to his face. he didn't want to see the obvious red flags, he chose to believe there was good in everybody. "it was my fault," he admitted, turning his body to face angel. "i said things that i knew would hurt you because i was... i was jealous. you kissed somebody else and i saw, i didn't like it. i kept bringing darius up because i do want to be friends with him, too, so you don't feel like you have to choose between us. i wasn't lying but that wasn't the only reason." garam looked away from angel, obviously ashamed of himself at this point. "you deserve someone so much better than me, someone who actually sees you and who picks you first, someone who doesn't use you. i've brought you so much trouble and i hate myself for it. i'm afraid of what might happen to you if you do choose me." garam continued, looking back to angel once again. "he went to my apartment after he hit me, i knew that he'd go there so that's why i came here instead of going back home. i'm sure he got mad that i wasn't answering, he has a key so he probably just let himself right in. it looked like a bomb exploded in there when i went to grab my things. he knows i'm here, you really aren't safe as long as i'm with you." he didn't even want to think about what could happen if axel managed to get inside while they were home, while they were sleeping, or showering. completely vulnerable. "i should have brought my bat with me."

At the mention of his drinking, Angel averted his eyes. He didn’t want to tell the man he had gotten sick. That watching him leave was the hardest thing of that night. He didn’t want to explain those couple of hours. Then he would have to lie. He couldn’t tell Garam his ex was there, not knowing how he would react. Things finally seem to be working out for them. Watching Garam spiral was hilarious to Angel. His grin turned into full-on laughing until he saw how serious Garam’s face was. “No, no, you didn’t do anything like that.” He cleared his throat, trying to stop his giggles. “We kissed more than once, if you remember. The last kiss, I pulled you against me. I could feel it twitching until you pulled away”, Angel admitted, leaning closer to Garam so their faces were inches apart. He soon noticed that Garam was serious. He truly thought he did something. Angel felt his smile would have hinted. However, the man was going through a lot. Angel wanted to be understanding. He tried once more to use his humor to calm his best friend. Angel smiled and pinched the man’s cheek, “I’m not mad. Would you stop, I’m okay. You didn’t do anything to cross any lines. You were adorable last night, if I’m being honest with you. After our kiss, I fell asleep. I can only assume you did as well,” the taller man said, the distance between them once more. Letting out a deep sigh, he tucked his wild strands behind the ears. “Since we are on the topic. You apologized to me last night. And I think I owed you a proper apology.” Angel was looking away from Garam now. Still sitting on the edge of the bed. Lowering his leg to turn his back, he was nervous. As confident as he thought himself to be, saying how he truly felt was difficult. Being the friend was his comfort space. Angel took a deep breath and pushed himself off the bed. He quickly walked over to sit right beside Garam and took his hand before he lost his nerve. “The things I said to you weren’t fair. My anger should be placed elsewhere. I really care for you, Garam. And yes. I did drink last night…” Angel paused as he tried to decide how much he should tell. “I drank too much and got sick. Most of it was out of my system by the time you got home.” part of that was the truth. “I don’t know what I can handle or what I can’t. I’m not even sure about what I want. But what I am sure about is you, Garam. My promise is the same as yours. I promise to take good care of you. But please be patient with me. If I pull away, please try and understand it’s not you. I’m seeing someone about what happened.” Angel admitted as he watched Garam’s face. He was rambling, worried that if he stopped talking, he might lose his nerve. “We meet once a week. I want you to know that I’m trying to be okay. Not just for me. But for us. That kiss showed me that our feelings aren’t just fillers for what’s going on. This is real.” the taller man squeezed his best friend’s hands, hoping he didn’t put his foot in his mouth. He didn’t want any fights between them again. If his little speech went well, they would be on their way to eat pancakes in no time.

[rosiarie]

2025 intentions

this year was a blur for me. i've died and been reborn more times than i can count. in all, 2024 was a year of change. i learned so many things, fell in love for the first time, and i've changed as a person. i was my most happiest and the most sad i've been. what i've learned is that time waits for no one, and in the time that i am alive, i want to live a life i am proud of. to be pure in the face of adversity is a strength i wish to keep. <3

here are my intentions for 2025:

quotidian:

wake up early - my earliest class next quarter is a 12 am, so i want to wake up early enough to eat breakfast at the dining commons and before the bathrooms are cleaned - around 9:10 am - to get ready for the day. i've noticed that my best days are the days i wake up early, wear a well-planned outfit, pack my bag diligently, and eat breakfast. i feel like i haven't wasted the day.

eat 3 meals a day - i struggled with eating breakfast as a first year my first quarter since i had a 10 am and breakfast closes at 11 am, so i skipped my breakfast every day. i only ate breakfast four or three times! counting weekends too. this is clearly unhealthy, and i noticed it took a toll on my health, sleeping schedule, and academic life.

sleep before 12 pm - my sleeping habits have been soso unhealthy and doom scrolling has just worsened it. i will allow myself the pleasure of still doom scrolling some nights, but i will not allow myself to sleep late anymore. it is very unhealthy, and it wrecks the rest of your next day, too.

journal daily - journaling daily was never one of those things i cared for. i've always cared about journaling, but i've always prioritized journaling as a weekly chore. i want to start journaling every night, at least three sentences, about something that stood out to me about the day. un petit souvenir à souvenir. i always journal in a narrative sense (i can make a post more on this!) rather than a "what i did today" which i am so glad i do because it makes reading back so much more fun!

read every other day - i've (so far.. there's still a few more days of 2024!) read 19 books in 2024, which to some may be a grand lot, but i have read so much more in the past! i do enjoy reading so much, but it feels more like a hobby now than a habit (which it used to be). i used to enjoy reading in the sense of just immersion, and i would pick any random story i was curious about. nowadays, i seem to find myself reading only one genre, which i want to change. in 2025, i plan to read more nonfiction texts and other genres; books that'll teach me things as well as novels for pleasure.

gym 4x a week - it's true what they say, physical exercise 100% helps boost serotonin levels and health in general! going to the gym more will help my mood, sleep, and confidence. i want to work on my body before summer, and look as good as i feel. i believe in myself to gain the body i want!

less partying - as a college freshman, you are kind of pressured to go out and party (mostly by your own fomo than from other people). it's what you think you're supposed to like. but i've come to my own conclusion that though partying can be fun, it's not something that i want to continue to do every friday. being hungover on saturday, not being able to do any work, and cramming all of sunday evening has been damaging to both my health and grades. i want to set my intentions of going out better, maybe once or twice a month when i know i can relax or genuinely want to. even if i feel like "i've earned it", if i don't really want to experience the side effects, i won't. that also makes partying during special occasions like halloweekend, st. fratty's day, and sorority/frat mixers to name a few more fun !

less entertaining things not meant for you - as a college freshman, i've had countless guys coming up to me, dming me, and asking me out. i either refrain from dming them back or softly reject them. but with some, i have talked to a little or gone on a date or two. though it's good practice, honestly, it was a waste of time. like any girl, i would love to have a caring and intelligent bf, but it isn't something i want to actively seek. my education and self-improvement have to be at the forefront of my mind, and i'm taking men out of the picture. until i meet the right man who meets all my qualifications, no matter how good-looking or charming a guy is, if his intentions aren't pure and his presence is not bringing actual value into my life, i'm not entertaining it no longer.

academic:

start early on new material before class - there was a girl in one of my classes last quarter that told me she would review the chapter before our prof went over it in class. i told myself, i'm going to do that now! but i never did. she understood the concepts soo well in that class, and i want to implement this trick to help me next quarter too!

pack my bag the night before - i'm always missing my hand cream or a water bottle in my bag when i pack it before class. doing this saves sm time and is much more efficient than running out of your door late!!

study everyday - no more cramming - i've always been a procrastinator and crammer. i fooled myself into thinking studying the few days before helped better, but honestly, that only helped my short-term memory retention skills. long-term understanding > short-term memory. i mainly want to study economics daily, but also languages, such as retaining french (non-native but fluent) and learning chinese (beginner!).

more study dates - now this can get a little iffy because sometimes studying with friends leads to being distracted from your work. but personally, i've spent my first quarter as a college freshman studying mostly with myself. i regret this so much because it is so fun when you do study with friends [that know when to lock in]. eating afterwards, getting a sweet treat, chatting a little, are all ways to keep yourself sane while studying.

anyways,

that's all for today. let me know what kind of posts you guys are interested in from me. this is my first "real" tumblr blog post, so pls be nice lol ! i would love to hear from you guys :) i will probably post 2-3x a week.

remember that you are protected. no weapon formed against you shall prosper. bisous!

[burlesqueabsurdist]

Supposedly Trench coat mafia “member” AMA on reddit

Suspected to possibly Eric Dutro 

Eric Dutro yearbook photo 1997

I can not confirm or deny if it is Eric Dutro, nor do I feel the need to.

I can also not confirm if it's authentic.

Q=QUESTIONER

A=ANSWER (FROM OP)

(Number)= A number of the questioner to identify differences in who's asking.

_________________________________________

“I am a former member of the Trench Coat Mafia. Ask me Anything.”

Q(1):

How strange is it getting older? Does high school even feel like it really happened?

A:

It’s really weird. I doubt I’ve peaked as a person yet but it still kinda feels like my glory days are behind me.

It feels normal whenever I think about normal stuff, but whenever i remember that I’m part of a lore surrounding one of the most infamous schools in America, I kinda start to dissociate.

Q(2):

Do you know about or follow r/columbine ?

A:

I’m subscribed to the sub on my main account, and I follow it, but I never comment on anything because

1. I don’t want people to dig up info on my from my personal account and

2. I doubt anyone would believe me without me doing a whole lot of explaining, which I’m doing here. I cross posted this post there and it should be approved by the mods soon, so who knows? Maybe I’ll start to be able to inform people better.

Q(2):

I had crossposted this post to that sub a few minutes ago and it’s showing up, but would be nicer to see it posted from you. If yours shows up I will delete my cross-post’

A:

Thanks.

Q(3):

Did you really call yourselves the trench coat mafia? Were you there on the day of the shooting? What happened from your perspective if you were? What were Dylan and Eric like?

A:

According to our “mythos” some guy older than us wore a trench coat to school one day and a few people started copying him. One day some kid sarcastically asked them if they were a “Trench Coat Mafia” and the name stuck. So yes, to answer that question.

Nope. Skipping class to smoke weed and watch TV like a bunch of kids were doing that day.

This is the big one. Dylan was a real intimidating looking guy on the outside, but didn’t seem that threatening if you actually talked to him. The guy radiated intelligence and I believed for some time that he was some kind of savant due to his problem solving ability. He would literally be one of the last people I expected to go postal like that. Eric, on the other hand, was just a standard guy. Real talkative and charismatic. Lots of girls liked him even though he wasn’t anywhere near the top of the social hierarchy and I’m sure he was aware of it. I remember another guy in TCM telling me that brooks brown had reported him to the police because he threatened to kill his entire family or something but I didn’t believe it because brooks sort of had a reputation as a compulsive liar. After the shooting though, I realized there were probably signs of narcissism or a god complex that I just didn’t pick up.

Q(3):

Thanks for answering. This is fascinating to me, I got very involved in this case a few years back. Did you ever know the shooters family or home life? I’m mostly interested in Eric, as his parents did not speak out or anything after the incident. Did any of your friends get injured in the shooting

   You’re welcome.

Never met the Harris’s or Dylan’s dad but I did meet Dylan’s mom a couple of times. I would seriously consider her one of the nicest ladies I ever met. I still feel terrible for her getting blamed for the shooting because it truly wasn’t her fault Dylan turned out the way he did.

I had a few acquaintances get hurt, no real friends, although I assume due to how closely knit our friend group was they would’ve been aiming for them.

Q(4):

 How was the situation with weed at Columbine? Did only certain groups smoked or did everyone and how easy was it to get?

A:

Weed was very easy to get, lots of people would literally sell inside the school (myself included). As for how many people were smoking weed regularly, I wanna say maybe 20% of the entire student population during the time I went to school there.

Q(4):

Thank you for taking the time to anwser, i had a few more questions regarding this topic if you would like to anwser them. Do you still smoke weed? What was the usual place where everyone would smoke? Did most people just smoked joints or bongs? And what did the other students think of the people who smoked weed?

Thanks in advance

A:

Yes

Wherever we could but usually a house (preferably without parents

Joints were easier to conceal but bongs still popped up from time to time.

The stoners were pretty much ignored by everyone else. I do remember when we got into a fight with the jocks once they teamed up with us and we whipped them. But otherwise, it was a pretty standard clique.

Q(4):

Thanks for the reply ! One more question about the group photo of the trenchcoat mafia, why are Dylan and Eric not on the picture?

A:

 They weren’t official “members” but they still hung out with us.

Q(2):

Do you still stay in touch with Sue K?

A:

I’ve seen her in passing once, but I just nodded to her. If I see her again I might strike up a conversation.

Q(5):

Are you still known as the "Kid that used to be part of the same group as the Columbine shooters" there in Littleton?

A:

Yes, but people hardly ever talk about it.

Q(6):

Do you think Chris Morris or anyone else knew it was gonna happen? He always seemed particularly suspicious to me. I assume that E&D asked him to participate and he said no and didn't believe they actually would do it. It would be crazy to me if nobody was told of the plans beforehand in a manner like that

A:

Fuck yes. Chris and some of the other guys were acting all weird starting in February, and a person who shall remain unnamed tried to get me to make pipe bombs under the pretense that they were going to "Blow stumps out of the ground". I refused, obviously.

I maintain to this day that some members of the TCM helped them plan the shooting and gather materials based on their behavior over those last couple months and how they were talking about some "event". If they were actually in the school? I don't know. I'm open to this theory based on what i know, and if anyone wants to give me some info or theories or whatever i might be able to link some stuff together. I know Pat Mcduffee tried telling me about how there were more people involved but i didn't really listen to him because i was still grieving Eric and Dylan.

Edit: I just remembered that Chris's mom was a cop. Really makes you think.

Q(7):

Do you believe the “Basement Tapes” were really destroyed? or know anything about the basement tapes?

A:

Honestly, I think Jeffco is just saying they were destroyed to get everyone off their back. I have no idea why they won’t release them, as the “copycat” excuse is complete bullshit because they made no effort to censor Eric’s webpages that literally had working instructions to build pipe bombs in them.

I hope someone is able to leak them or has a copy laying around somewhere, because they need to be released. I never saw them, but I repeatedly asked to and was denied several times.

Q(8):

Do you still live in the area?

A:

Around there, yes.

Q(9):

Did you all did activities like practicing with guns, or only some of you ?

I already met young and older people who dresses in black, but just hang out, without messing with others.

Black Trench coats where a trend in the 80's and 90's.

Did you regularly dress in black, or just wear the coats as school ?

Black clothing and trench coats still are stigmatized these days.

Note: I do care about the victims, not just the fashion stuff.

A:

Only some of us would. There were lots of members that couldn’t handle any violence. The go to location was a place over in Douglas county on a mountain, which is where Eric and Dylan filmed the “rampart range” video. I can actually point out a tree I shot with a sawn off in the first 30 seconds. Also, I assume they both got the pipe bomb idea from us, considering we would make those and ignite them out in the mountains and Chris was the first one to tell them that.

Regularly. Some of us didn’t actually wear all black along with our trench coats. I remember one guy would sometimes wear a tie-dye shirt under it. I doubt it was really about the color and more of just the way we wanted to be seen. I could’ve probably worn a brown one and been accepted.

Q(10):

what do you think about the “condoners” of the shooting?

edit: if i was unclear, i mean like the tumblr fangirls and edgy potential school shooters

A:

I can understand it, as it probably comes from a place of thinking they could fix them or prevent them from doing what they did. However, I doubt that if they were actually there at columbine as high school students they would’ve of even cared about them. Where I draw the line, though, is when you start to believe they were innocent or what they did was a good thing. It’s fine to be interested and research something, but it’s not okay to glorify or condone something like that.

Q(11):

 DELETED COMMENT

A:

Yes. Bullying culture at columbine was fucking awful and it had to have played a part in the shooting. Jocks once tossed a cup of horse shit on them and threw tampons soaked in ketchup at them. Brooks brown got hit in the head with a baseball bat by some jocks in a truck. They would literally try to set people clothes on fire.

And the big thing was, the school administration wouldn’t do shit about. I’m sorry, but at that time, CHS staff wouldn’t do shit if you were being bullied unless parents involved and made a scene. There was a case of a jock stalking some girl and her having to get a restraining order, and the school still tried to get him a football scholarship. I apologize for getting angry, but it still enrages me to this day the amount of bullshit that the kids the teachers liked got away with.

Q(12):

I got to watch Frank Deangelis speak at a conference several months ago. He's a very compelling speaker. What's your opinion of him, especially given the culture at Columbine at the time of the shooting?

Thanks for doing this!! I'm a school shooting witness/survivor and know just how hard it can be to speak up about.

A:

He’s obviously a changed man since the years before the shooting, and having 12 kids and a teacher die in the school you’re responsible for will do that.

I respect him for making that vow to stay as the principal all these years but It doesn’t take away from his inaction towards bullying beforehand.

Q(13):

Was bullying really bad at Columbine? Did you ever see Eric or Dylan get bullied? Did you ever see them bully anyone?

Did you know any of the victims or anyone who was injured?

Do you remember anything specific about them? Not in general, I mean like a time you hung out with them, a conversation you had with them, etc? Anything that really sticks out after the massacre?

What was Eric and Dylan’s friendship like? Did either seem to be influenced by or copy the other?

A:

Already answered that somewhere else.

Already answered. A couple of acquaintances.

Eric actually told a bunch of people his plans to bomb the school but I didn’t take it seriously. I might elaborate in an extra comment because I’m not in a really comfortable position to be making super long comments right now. As for Dylan, a couple of months before the massacre, I remember he asked me what i thought happened after we died while listening to Siamese Dream in his car. I replied that I assumed we just found some sort of peace and got to hang out with a bunch of other dead people and just chill. He told me that he hopes that it’s some kind of beautiful trip across the universe that you get to take with the people you love.

They just seemed like best friends. I thought it was kinda weird that they had so many differences yet were so close with each other, but I guess they hand their plans for a rampage tying them together.

Q(14):

At the time, did you expect Eric and Dylan to amass such a huge following like they have today?

What were you thinking when Sol Pais flew up to the Denver area and bought a shotgun a few days before the 20th anniversary, causing schools across the area to shut down?

A:

No. Didn’t even think they would be household names.

I felt bad for her. No one in the right state of mind buys a shotgun and threatens to shoot up a school for no reason.

Q(15):

Are you still friends with the other Trench Coat Mafia members ? What music did you guys listen to?

A:

The whole group dissolved after the shooting and I heavily distanced myself after I started to believe that they knew more about the massacre than they were letting on. I still know a handful of guys who were associates but a huge chunk of the actual TCM just fell off the map after 4/20.

There wasn’t a standard musical genre for the group. Vaguely, most of the members like industrial music and nu metal. Dylan liked NIN, and the chemical brothers. Eric like Rammstein and KMFDM. Eric liked some NIN songs but didn’t find them enthralling enough for him. Dylan was more open to different musical genres and I let him borrow one of my Slowdive CD’s once. I can go more in depth in music if you want me to

Q(15):

What do you mean exactly when you say " I started to believe that they knew more about the massacre than they were letting on." ?

I read about them listening to all those bands, except for Slowdive, interesting ! I thought they only liked industrial music.

Thanks for taking the time to answer x

A:

  When I get home I’ll make an in depth answer but let’s just say some very fishy shit was going  on with the TCM and it’s affiliates in the months leading up to the shooting.

Q(16):

Do you have any clue if they were into Aphex Twin?

A:

Funnily enough, i tried to turn Eric on to more electronic music by giving him selected ambient works and music has the right to children by boards of canada but he said it was too boring.

Q(17):

I can see how he wouldn't be the type to like these things. But I always thought he would be someone who would like "Come to Daddy".

Q(18):

When did you first find out it was those two doing the shooting and what was your initial reaction?

A:

Basically, i got called by one of my friends who told me to turn on the fucking news because "some shit just went down". I switched it on, and lo and behold, reporters everywhere, cops, and people running out of the school, and a reporter said there was a shooting at columbine. i initially believed that Eric could've been involved, but i seriously didn't expect to see Dylan's yearbook photo show up when they started to talk about suspects. As for my reaction, well, let's just say it wasn't pleasant. I woke my mom up after i screamed out "FUCK!" and dropped my glass of apple juice.

Q(19):

Thank you for the AMA. It is nice to hear your level headed analysis.

Have you seen the movie Elephant by Gus Van Sant? Do you think it's an accurate portrayal?

Also, why do you think the boys ended up in the library? Didn't they want to kill jocks?

A:

Elephant was good but you need to keep in mind that it strays heavily from the actual events leading up to shooting and the shooting itself.

Absolutely no idea. That question still bugs me to this day.

Q(20):

DELETED COMMENT

A:

Yes.

If I thought they were serious, at that time in my life the idea would have been slightly appealing but I probably wouldn’t have aided them.

Q(21):

  Obviously the Trench Coat Mafia wasn't the scary thing people said it was but how did you guys feel about it being portrayed as this marauding gang that was full of goth kids. How true/untrue was that and how did you and other members feel getting raked over the coals in the media shortly after the shooting?

What kind of music (specific bands if possible) did you like in High School? I always thought it was crazy that Brooks Brown was a Juggalo back then.

How are you holding up now? Obviously you have no real reason to feel remorse or guilt in any way but it feels like every year we have another shooting where the shooter idolized Eric & Dylan, is it weird that so many people idolize two of your old friends and they became folk anti-heroes in a way?

(If no other question you'd wanna answer please answer this one) If you could go back to a point in time before that day with Eric and/or Dylan, what would you say to them?

A:

It didn't really matter because as soon as the media said that Eric and Dylan were members of TCM the whole group just fell apart. Some people were angry, some people were sad, some people just stayed silent. I personally felt mad, not because they were slandering us, but because they basically put a target on our heads. A guy i knew got picked up by cops for wearing a trench coat. Jocks were talking about revenge, and nobody could wear black for two weeks after 4/20 for fear of being attacked.

NIN, Korn, Aphex twin, Tool, Deftones, KMFDM, Smashing Pumpkins, Slowdive, My Bloody Valentine, Alice in Chains, Boards of Canada, Radiohead, Marilyn Manson, Pigface, SPK, Throbbing Gristle. Lots of stuff.

As good as one can after all I've been through.

As Marilyn Manson said, I wouldn't of said anything. I'd of listened. Because maybe if we all listened things wouldn't of turned out the way they did.

Q(22):

How did you sleep the night after the shooting?

A:

I didn't sleep for two days after finding out it was Eric and Dylan. Eventually i stole some ambien from my parent's medicine cabinet, but i wouldn't say that i felt well rested after waking back up.

Q(22):

Very understandable. I wouldn't have been able to sleep either. Wish you best of luck.

Q(23):

Thank you for doing this. Could answer some questions people have:

Do you recall anything that could have given you a hint or anything that could have tipped someone off?

How are you doing now? Hope all is well.

A:

As I’ve said before, Eric wasn’t very fucking inconspicuous about wanting to do some shit. He told pretty much everyone who knew him that he was planning to do something to CHS, but as far as I know, everyone played it off because they thought he was joking and because it was a different time period where stuff like that wasn’t taken as seriously. In this day and time kids can make “don’t come to school tomorrow” jokes and get fucking arrested.

Q(23):

Thanks for responding.

Q(24):

Did being part of TCM have any sort of impact on your life as you grew up due to the affiliation? Also how’ve you been doing? I can’t imagine it was easy growing up knowing what people you knew did.

A:

Yes. If employers search up my name (not giving that shit out) they find a TCM group picture from the yearbook. I can't work serious jobs and several of my friends have no idea of my background or how i was friends with two of the most infamous human beings alive. It's a pretty heavy burden to bear, but i manage.

Q(24):

Yes. If employers search up my name (not giving that shit out) they find a TCM group picture from the yearbook. I can't work serious jobs and several of my friends have no idea of my background or how i was friends with two of the most infamous human beings alive. It's a pretty heavy burden to bear, but i manage

Q (15):

I guess you know that already but you have the legal rights to get search results linked to your name (that you think threaten your privacy) deleted from the Internet.

A:

Are you serious? I’ll definitely look into that if it’s true.

Q(15):

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right_to_be_forgotten

Removing the TCM photo and its caption will be tricky of course but you shouldn't let your full name appear anywhere linked to the massacre if it gets in the way of you getting a job.

A:

Thank you! I had no idea about this. I might have to head over to r/legaladvice soon.

Q(25):

  DELETED COMMENT

A:

Disappointment and sadness towards the shooter and the victims, anger towards the media and pharmaceutical companies.

Q(26):

how much different do you think your life would be if it never happened? how did the school/community cope afterwards? did you personally know any of the victims?

A:

 I might have a decent job, and I wouldn’t have as much weight on my shoulders.

We didn’t have school for weeks afterward, I just stopped going for the rest of the year, and according to friends when school went back in the only thing people did was just talk and vent to each other. I guess that’s how everyone recovers. Just talk and vent.

Some of my acquaintances were injured, and few people i knew in passing were killed.

Q(27):

How would you feel about some sort of columbine movie? Obviously it would be made with respect and include accurate info about the shooting, victims, and the perpetrators.

A:

It would be nice. Might draw more awareness to mental health and hopefully provide an unbiased picture of both Eric and Dylan’s behavior before and during the massacre.

Also, Trent Reznor should do the soundtrack but I doubt he would due to the shit he got from the media after the shooting.

Q(15):

Were you friends with Eric Veik ?

A:

Yes. Not much I can say except he was pretty smart and people started saying he helped plan it afterwards. I don’t believe it based on how much the shooting fucked him up.

Q(28)(referring to question above):

Or if not, what do you think about that guy?!

A:

I feel bad for him.

Q(29):

DELETED COMMENT

A:

Yes. It’s good, but she needs to understand that dylan wasn’t as innocent as she thinks.

Q(30):

I was wondering if you had any close friendships/relationships with any of the kids that were killed?

A:

No close relationships although some people I would consider acquaintances were hurt.

Q(31):

i’m curious about Eric and Dylan’s behavior around animals. Had you ever witnessed either of them interact with animals? Did you have a sense of the type of relationship, if any, they had with their family pets? Are you aware of either of them exhibiting any negative behaviors directed toward animals, including wildlife?

A:

I actually have a story for this one.

We had been detonating pipe bombs out in the mountains, and I came up with the idea to tape one of the bombs to a tree to test the damage. We did that, and when it detonated it blew a chunk out of the tree and knocked out some baby birds. We all believed that if we touched them, their mom would abandon them, so we decide just to put them out of their misery. I stomped some, Eric stomped some, and Dylan stomped some.

Eric stomped them quickly and seemed very nonchalant about it. Dylan, however, said that he was just putting them out of their misery, and said he felt better for some reason after stomping them.

I believe that was the defining moment in my friendship with them, and foreshadowed their actions at columbine. Eric was silent, and was almost machinelike in the way he stomped them. Dylan actually vocalized to the birds by saying “this is only going to hurt for a little bit” before stomping them. It chills me to my very core that I saw a part of the people they would later become out there in the mountains.

Q(32):

Were Eric and Dylan good bowlers?

A:

Pretty standard as far as my knowledge of bowling goes.

_______________________________________________________________________________________________

LINK TO THE AMA: https://www.reddit.com/r/casualiama/comments/fom8or/i_am_a_former_member_of_the_trench_coat_mafia_ask/

(THIS IS NOT EVERYTHING ON THE AMA, BESIDES COMMENTS LIKE  “answered this already” AND OR UNIMPORTANT UNANSWERED QUESTIONS)

Be respectful

xx

[that-weird-thing-in-the-woods]

~{Heyyy so I know I haven’t really been active lately but I’ll try to get back to stuff but in the meantime have…whatever the fuck this is}~

•Snow•

When John Constantine woke up that morning he already had a bad feeling about…something

Ok he didn’t really have a thing to have a bad feeling about so far the day has been uneventful (which is odd considering it’s HIM) so John really didn’t know what was going on to make him so unsettled

But just in case (oh gods he’s starting to sound like the bats) he checked all of the protective runes on the house of mystery than checked every room for anything that all but when nothing turned up he just thought he was being paranoid

And while trying to calm himself down on the couch he heard something from behind him so he looked and when he did he saw

The Bloody Fucking Door

It was on the floor and a Being with white hair and that’s all he could really see from the hood covering their face and a mask with some of their hair coming out from under the hood kicked it the door down but before John could do anything the being grabbed him and throw him through the portal that was not there a second ago 

What has John’s life come to at this point he thought before he passed out with a cold feeling on his back and the blurry figure walking through the same portal

John wakes up to poking in his face and the sound of two pre-teens arguing

“Are you sure this is the right guy, he looks like a alcoholic” says a younger girl voice coming from his right side and probably the hand that’s poking him

“Yes, I’m sure this is the right guy he was in the magic house and he has the trench-coat” replied a boy around the same age as the girl and coming from his left side

That’s when John opens his eyes and are met with the faces of two pre-teens

~{ And that’s about it }~

•-—••••••••••••••••—-•

•Explanation•

Danny (With de-aged Dani and Dan who have been renamed Dawn and Dusk for plot purposes) had to dip from his home dimension but not the reasons you may think so

Vlad was being his usual asshole self and with Maddie shutting down any and all attempts at getting a date (I HC that he’s obsession is family because he was left alone in the hospital with a secondary obsession on control because he couldn’t do anything about he’s condition or help himself, but it’s still not a excuse to be a creep) so he was holding on by a thread at this point now to get off topic of this for a sec

Meanwhile Dani~Dawn and Dan~Dusk had to de-aged and Danny was taking care of them with a little bit of help from his parents when remembered they have children (Somewhat good Fenton parents! That’s rare in this Fandom) and a very busy Jazz has she is dealing with college stuff and everything is chill

Until Vlad’s obsession starts to change from dating Maddie and keeping Danny as his son to just keeping Danny but in the way Ra and Slade are and of course Danny is creeped TF out and starts to get ready to dip and somehow this gets back to Vlad and that’s what makes him go off the deep end and he starts to go after Danny

And in the fight to leave Jazz, The Fentons, Sam, Tucker all get got by Vlad and Danny gets injured but he is able to go through the portal and destroy it from his side with Dawn and Dusk with him

And they end up in Danny’s Lair and this leads us to now

•Explanation Done•

•—-••••••••••••••••—-•

•Outfits•

John Constantine-

Nothing really changes it’s basically the same as always

Danny-

Dusk-

Plus

( For his coat, Dawn and Dusk have to wear warmer clothes because they have a Wind and Water Core instead of just Danny’s ice core and they HATE IT )

Dawn-And her coat

•Ending•

~{And that’s it! I left this mostly unfinished so if anyone wants to take this I’m fine with it as long as you tag me so I can read! Anyway that’s about it see you gremlins soon byeeee}~

[dreamsofbroflovski]

Dude, I just— I made a Tumblr account to follow you JANDKSND and ask for a request 🤧🤧

Can we have some of Kyley-B x reader? 😵‍💫 I would like to read a cliché of the innocent girl and the bad boy who incites her to do illicit things (with smut, of course). 🙏🙏🙏🙏

Heeeeeyaaaaaa my first request! ❤️

I am so so so so sorry for taking so long to get to it. Really need to make my writing more speedy and efficient.

Hope you liked it, and once again, really damn sorry 😭😭😭

Also, a belated merry christmas/happy holidays to everyone!

Kyley-B x Reader - trinitrotoluene

Also available on ao3!

Summary: An innocent librarian's whole views on the world - as well as her guts - are rearranged when she takes into the equation South Park's resident New Jersey asshole. And she wouldn't have it any other way.

Warnings: Explicit Language, Explicit Sexual Content (everyone involved is above the age of consent), Penis In Vagina Sex, Vaginal Fingering, Semi-Public Sex, Doggy Style Position

A/N: Gods was this one hard. I never imagined writing Kyley-B would be this hard. Props to everyone who has managed thus far, because this guy wrestled against me in my mind for the whole 14 pages of the Google Docs and even now that I'm posting it I'm not sure I actually won.

I tried my hardest to put together what an adult version of Jersey Kyle would be if he really donned the mantle. Hope I did him justice.

The story of how my life changed forever was rooted in New Jersey, but happened nowhere near there.

When I applied to work at the South Park Public Library, I thought it would be an easy task. Library work in a small secluded town, in a day and age where people mostly forgot about physical books due to the convenience of Kindles or their own phones? How hard can it be? Turns out, very. The place greatly suffered from a lack of useful employees, so I ended up doing a lot of extra work that had nothing to do with what I was hired for, with no extra pay, when the salary was already not that stellar to begin with. Not a great headstart for a fresh-out-of-college English major such as myself, but it was this or the 7/11.

Days like that one kind of made the whole thing worth it, though. Summer weekends in the middle of July, when all the students were on vacation and people lacked the urge to read in favor of other activities, and the only people that would actually visit the library would be soft-spoken loners who just craved the social connection but at the same time didn’t want to chase it. In those days, I was able to just sit back on my chair at the reception counter and take full advantage of the amount of books around me, reading to my heart’s content for almost a full eight hours and getting paid for it.

Such a situation is how I found myself at that particular moment. Curled up as well as I could get in my tiny office chair, my shoes forgotten under the desk in favor of the comfort of being barefoot, yet another book in my hands that wasn’t part of my enormous ‘To Read’ list. It was all cruising up to be another quiet and peaceful day, just a few check outs and some small talk.

Except it wasn’t.

I heard the sizzling of a dynamite’s wick before seeing a full blown atomic bomb. Loud squeaky sounds of sneaker soles trudging across the hardwood, strings of profanities being spewed with each step, followed by the shocked gasps of some of the people seated nearby and their hurried movement as they got out of the way in every direction. Noise like this would usually have me kindly remind its emitter of the setting around them and beg for more silence, but as I raised my eyes from my book, I knew it would be of no use.

Already in front of the counter was one of the most obnoxious-looking men I had ever seen. His blazing curly red hair was slicked back with an obscene amount of gel on it, to the point where it made me wonder if it just started to stay that way after his showers. I couldn’t see him from the waist down, but he was wearing a loose fit wife beater, showing off the muscles of his arms in all their ‘glory’. A golden chain dangled around his neck, clearly fake, the paint already chipped in places where its links connected. His tanned skin already looked out of place in the cold town in the middle of the mountains, where its citizens were mostly pale due to never seeing enough sun to actually get a tan to begin with - but this man was just a few shades away from orange, painfully artificial, he’d stand out like a sore thumb no matter where he was.

“That’s right, you better fucking go, bitch!” The loud addition to my peaceful workplace called out angrily, looking over his shoulder, finishing up his threats on the last bypasser he could before turning his face forward again, which finally let me take a good look at his features. There I saw which had to be the only real thing about him - intense olive eyes that glinted with a fire unknown to me, pure passion and energy, the type that could either burn someone to the ground or keep them warm and safe in the winters. Right now, however, they could set the entire library ablaze by sheer feral glares alone.

I hurriedly scrambled to adjust my position in my seat and rested my book to the side of my computer. “Good afternoon and welcome to the South Park Public Library, restrooms are at the end of the first corridor to the left,” my explanation was kind and gentle, accompanied by a gesture of my hand in the general direction I spoke of.

“I don’t wanna know about no fuckin’ toilet,” the man spat, as if me merely opening my mouth to say something that was of no use to him was enough to make him angry beyond measure, “I’m here to return this.”

With an unneeded display of strength that made all the other items in the counter shake slightly, he slammed a book on it in front of me, his hand staying splayed on top of the cover, allowing me to see that his fingers were fully decked out in fake gold rings in the same fashion of his chain.

Even without seeing the full thing, I recognized that book immediately. My eyes widened. If I was to be honest, I didn’t even imagine the guy in front of me was capable of reading to begin with - and the book he brought was such difficult literature, even I struggled with it at first, so to imagine he deliberately checked that one out and allegedly read it to completion flabbergasted me.

I forced myself to blink and reel back from my shock before continuing the interaction. Get it together, I told myself mentally. My mother told me all the time to never judge a book by its cover - even if that defeated the whole purpose of book cover graphic designers to begin with -, and this was what I was doing right now; letting my prejudices get in the way of what could be a healthy interaction with a fellow bookworm.

Lightly, I placed my hands on the sides of the book and pulled it slowly towards me, letting it slide under his palm, which I avoided touching altogether lest it make him more angry. “Of course, sir,” I managed to assemble a gentle smile on my lips, trying my best to not let my previous thoughts show up on my face.

“Don’t call me sir, I’m not that old,” this complaint was slightly less persistent, but I was still not about to test his limits on it.

“Of course… Mister,” the word in that context sounded way too weird to me, but it was better than the two alternatives of either insisting on ‘sir’ or just not calling him by any title at all, “I’m just gonna need your library card, if you have it on you right now…”

His hand left the counter to retrieve something in his pocket, before swiftly passing to me a tiny rectangular piece of plastic - his library card, the old design of them at that, which meant he had it for quite a while now. My eyes narrowed as I scanned it, my brain multitasking with my fingers typing his card number on the database, and I found myself repeating the information out loud. “Alright, let’s see… Kyle Br-”

“Kyley-B,” his correction came harsh and immediate, stopping me from saying even one more letter of his government name, “And don’t you dare forget it.”

I really hadn’t. It wasn’t like I didn’t know his name, everyone knew it well - he was an infamous face in town. Originally from New Jersey and carrying with him every single terrible stereotype about the place, the man before me caused trouble wherever he went, having very little regard for anything that didn’t concern himself, and yet expecting everyone else to show him the respect he lacked for them. He had actually been in South Park longer than I did, but apparently what was said held true: you can’t take the Jersey out of someone.

“M-My apologies… Kyley-B,” I tried my best to abide by his request and use his nickname in a sentence no matter how ridiculous it sounded, while still typing on the computer to avoid enhancing his anger in any way, “It’s all set. Feel free to peruse the collection if you’d like to borrow something else.” Please don’t was the thought that came right after.

He nodded curtly, taking the card from me to put it back in his pocket, and I noticed his shoulders relaxing a little. Apparently, me being polite and understanding appeased him greatly, like he had understood that I wasn’t one of the assholes trying to get him pissed or something. For as long as I was respectful, I’d stay out of the path of destruction. I could swear I saw the intensity in his eyes shift a bit - but I avoided staring too long, both in fear of getting him angry again and in slight embarrassment at the thought that he might notice me doing that. “Thanks. I think I will.”

Leaning back in my chair and picking my book back up in my hands, I figured that was that. Kyley-B would go off somewhere looking for trouble and I’d be back to my silence and my reading. Yet I didn’t hear the same noises I had when he arrived; no cursing, no loud shoes, no nothing. When I raised my eyes again, he was still there - leaning towards me with his forearms on the counter and a curious expression on his face.

“Do you… Need any help?” I inquired, slowly placing the book on my lap and rolling the chair closer to the desk so he wouldn’t believe for a second that he didn’t have my attention.

A smirk curved his lips as he eyed me up and down. “Nah, just… Perusing.” 

Well, now that’s a word I would never hear out of the mouth of a Jersey guy.

“Okay…” My fingers nervously tapped the cover of my book. “If there’s anything I can do for you, then-”

“There is, actually,” his body swayed slightly as he shifted his weight on his feet, “Has to do with my phone. You can put your number in it.”

Another jolt of bewilderment crossed my features. Allowing myself to focus my eyes on his again, I then understood what it was I saw on them earlier. Attraction. Now that he wasn’t angry anymore, Kyley-B was allowing himself to see me as a woman instead of Personal Enemy Number Ten Thousand. And he made no attempt to hide that he liked what he saw. The blood ran to my cheeks and ears before I could compose myself, my body clearly not accustomed to such unabashed interest. “E-Excuse me?”

“Your number, baby,” he repeats as if it’s nothing, “Could say I’m tryna make a movie with you here, but you clearly rather have your erotica in book form.”

What kind of Jersey asshole even knows about the word ‘erotica’? “I-I don’t know what you’re talking about…”

A ring-adorned index finger pointed towards the book on my lap and I froze. I had deliberately chosen the version of this book - a rather obscure piece of erotic literature, the first of a series - that had a more passable cover, absolutely nothing in it that could give away its themes, in a way that they could only be known by someone who already knew the title. And there was no way Kyley did, right?

“I’ll tell you right now, stop at the first one. The sequels are garbage.” Kyley did. He shook his head with his own advice, like the memories of having to go through the continuations of that book brought stress back to his mind again.

My hands quickly grabbed the book and tried to hide it behind my computer monitor, away from his eyes, but the damage had been done. I tried to retort, but the words got stuck in my throat, coming out as gasps that enhanced further my petrified face, my wide eyes and the intensifying blush in my cheeks and ears. 

“Cat get ya tongue?” Kyley teased as if reading my mind, his upper body leaning over the counter so his pointing finger could brush softly against my cheek, “Don’t worry, your secret is safe with me. I’m no blabbermouth.”

Still I took a bit to relax and believe his words. This was a small town, gossip spread as easily as the snow fell, it would be hard to show my face anywhere without having jokes hurled towards me about being a ‘closeted freak’. Which was extremely far from the truth, to be honest - that genre of book was not amongst my most read, I was as vanilla as they came, it was literally an unfortunate circumstance that led to anyone finding out about this.

The fact that Kyley-B was so uncharacteristically decent and understanding about it too, despite the initial teasing when he was hitting on me, threw me off even more. He had no reason to help me, and he was notorious for being unhelpful, so this was odd behavior on his part. My mind raced with reasons as to why that would be, trying to make sense of the madness - maybe he had secrets of his own, or maybe he just understood how it was to be the subject of unsavory discussions everywhere he passed. Either way, I found myself thankful for his actions.

Eventually, I let out a deep sigh, my lungs almost hurting as I did. “Thank you… Kyley.” I murmured, nodding slowly, my eyes shining with the gratitude that I couldn’t express with words without sounding corny.

He brought his hand back to himself, and I looked at his face again, seeing the exact same intense expression as before. Maybe, in my slight delirium of trying to build up Kyley-B as an actual human being with thoughts and feelings instead of your stereotypical Jersey playboy, I had imagined it faltering.

“That’s something I like to hear,” the flirtatious tone of voice was back with a vengeance, “Now, about that phone number of yours...”

And just like that, I was avoiding his eyes once more, my hands drifting down to fidget with the hem of my skirt absentmindedly, making me look even more suspicious. “I… I don’t know if that would be appropriate.”

“We only have to get inappropriate if you want me to,” his smirk grew. His voice didn’t even drop in volume as he said this, like he was completely comfortable with talking to unknown women like that - which he probably was, “We can just go party, have a couple drinks, make some noise, shit, whatever it is you like.”

Whatever it was I liked did not involve any of the things he mentioned. “I… I’m afraid I might not be the ideal person for that.” As I tried to let him down easy, I felt a striking pain in my chest; like the act of refusing made me uncomfortable, like I somehow wanted to accept it, even though it didn’t belong to me at all. “But thank you for the offer.”

“‘Not ideal’? What the fuck is that about?” He retorted, and for a moment I thought I might’ve riled him up again - but, although he was still loud, he didn’t seem angrier. More so confused about what I said rather than the circumstances of it. “I’m inviting ya, ain’t I? How the fuck is that not ideal?”

“It’s not the invitation!” I was quick to respond, “It’s just I don’t think I’m the right kind of company for all that… I’m sure there’s better people in town who would love to go clubbing with you.”

“Well, I’m not inviting those other people, I’m inviting you!” It was clear the insistence would not wane anytime soon. He rubbed his eyes with his palms for a bit, his mind trying to come up with a solution, before taking a deep breath and looking at me again. “How about some coffee, or tea, then? You into that?”

My eyes widened in surprise and he probably knew he struck gold there. A coffee shop was much more up my alley, but never in a million years would I imagine the likes of Kyley-B in such an environment - somewhere with no alcohol, no loud music, and where fighting was not tolerated. “I… I am, yes.”

“Coffee it is, then,” his tone was every bit as comfortable as he was when he mentioned partying, “Just gotta avoid that one place near the movie theater. Tastes like shit and the owner is a piece of garbage.”

A small giggle left my mouth. I had been to that coffee shop and knew its owner personally, it wasn’t hard considering the town was pretty small. For once in his life, Kyley-B was right, even if I personally wouldn’t phrase it all like he did. The business was probably only kept standing due to the fact people were too used to it by now, but it was the one place where I wouldn’t mind seeing a Jersey-level rage outburst take place. 

My reaction was stifled by a glare Kyley shot at me, his eyebrows furrowing as he tried to understand if I was laughing at him or with him. “I’m sorry! It’s just… I don’t like that place either.” I admitted, immediately scanning the library hall with wide eyes, trying to see if there was anyone around that could’ve heard me say that. 

His expression relaxed and he nodded. “You ain’t gotta be so shy, you know,” he commented, his tone slightly more serious, “If you have your truth, then you gotta just say it. It’s how we do it in Jersey, and it works!”

It didn’t really work, but I wasn’t about to question him, not when the structure of his message was in the right place. My whole existence happened inside strict lines ever since I was a kid, I was one to keep my opinions to myself and rein in my actions to keep myself palatable to the people around me. This lifestyle had me sheltered to a fault, but until that moment I was fine with it; going through life avoiding trouble kept me healthy and safe, and I didn’t want to jeopardize that. However, Kyley-B’s advice still held some sort of water, and I found myself willing to hear more, even though it came from such an unreliable narrator.

“I know, I know… I just didn’t want anyone to hear me say that. It feels weird.” I shrugged.

“Well, maybe if that place wasn’t so trashy, you wouldn’t have to complain about it, it’s exactly what I am saying!” He retorted, the serious edge in his voice gone and replaced by the usual annoyance. “And I keep telling people that, but they won’t listen!”

With every passing millisecond, Kyley-B managed to confuse me more. While a part of me was stuck on the still present image of the annoying jerk who only knows how to pick fights and be rude to others, another part slowly took form; one that was intrigued about that man, knowing that although he could be a little too much, he was still completely true to himself, which is more than what can be said about a lot of the people around me. Right now, he carried his actions like a motorcycle zig-zagging through the traffic of my mind. Its destination? The inside of my skirt. 

“I’ll keep that in mind… Thank you.”

Kyley-B nodded with a smirk, content that I wasn’t disputing him like people usually seemed to do. Though something told me that even if I did, I still wouldn’t be subjected to the same type of verbal abuse others would if they tried that. “Now, back to that coffee…” 

I then managed to notice that we weren’t alone in our conversation anymore when a hand sneaked from behind the Jersey man, tapping his shoulder a bit. Immediately my brain was blaring sirens, the word ‘DANGER’ being transmitted by every one of my neurons. “Excuse me, sir?” Another male voice called out, well-mannered enough, yet still firm.

Kyley-B immediately turned to face the unknown third party, his eyebrows furrowing and whole expression hardening into anger. “What the fuck do you want? Can’t you see I’m in the middle of something here?”

Apparently the stranger had very little regard for his life, because he didn’t back out from the rude display, their tone instead becoming louder and more insistent in retaliation. “Well, your ‘something’ needs to happen somewhere else, because I have to check out this book and this is the only counter available!” He lifted his hand to show Kyley the book he was holding, as if that would drill the information into his skull.

All it did was make him more angry. He quickly snatched the book from the client’s hand, throwing it with such force it managed to hit the wall farthest from us, before stepping closer to the stranger and crossing his arms in front of his chest. “What the fuck did you just say to me?”

The client was stunned for a second, both from his book being thrown and from the sudden inferred physical threat. “What the fuck is wrong with you, dude?” Through his shock he still managed to spit back, trying his best to mirror Kyley’s body language and tone; but it’s hard to be as violent as a guy from Jersey. “Can’t you see you’re fucking wrong? Back off!”

“No, you back off!” Kyley used both his hands to push his adversary away - the other guy stumbled backwards a few feet, but luckily didn’t fall. However, the Jersey man was quick to breach the freshly created distance with hard steps. “I’ll fucking teach garbage like you not to mess with me!”

Right in front of the stranger again, Kyley cracked his knuckles and squared his shoulders. The other guy straightened his posture and balled both fists at his sides, prepared to strike the Jersey threat right back if it came to that.

Mustering the small courage I had in me and having to force my fear-frozen legs to move, I ran from behind the counter towards the two men, putting my hands on their shoulders and praying to all deities that my presence would make them back off instead of turning me into a casualty of the upcoming brawl. “G-Gentlemen, please, don’t…” My voice was thin and desperate, reflecting the state of my mind as I tried to diffuse this situation to the best of my abilities, “There’s no need for any of this! Please, calm down!”

Luckily, they heard me well enough, and my guess is having to acknowledge the presence of a woman put a damper, however small, in their urge to clash. For a moment, our little group was completely silent except for the heavy breathing noises coming from the three of us - the two men furious like bulls about to strike, and me in terrified anxiety over the situation. They maintained a quiet staredown for what felt like forever, and I knew that if they were telepaths, the offenses they’d be mentally hurling at each other would contain curse words that could make a sailor blush. Then Kyley-B did something I didn’t even think he could physically do - he took a step back from a fight.

“Screw this noise,” he huffed, before turning his face to me again and making a gesture with his arm that beckoned me to accompany him somewhere, “Come on, can’t fucking talk in here without a shithead butting in.”

“W-What? Come on where?” My hands gestured desperately towards both my counter and the client in front of Kyley, who the redhead was now clearly ignoring as if he was nothing more than a decorative piece of the library, much to the other’s confusion, “I mean, I’m working right now!”

Before I could stop him, he walked back to the reception and reached over to the space of my desk, his hand clumsily scattering a bunch of the items on it before he could retrieve what he wanted - a small desk sign that just said ‘Be Back Soon’. He placed it firmly on top of the counter, the text facing him. “There. Now you ain’t.”

Kyley-B didn’t even allow me to put my shoes back on before he grabbed me by the wrist and started taking me away from the reception. I sent the other client one last apologetic look over my shoulder as Kyley dragged me, his sneakers louder than ever as he brought a barefooted me all the way to the farthest hallways of the library, down the always empty and slightly dusty Latin Literature section. His hand only loosened its hold when we stopped walking completely. Place was empty except for me, him and one of the trustworthy metal library carts, containing an assortment of books that needed to be delivered back into their proper shelves.

When he put both his hands in his pockets, I realized that now, away from the reception counter, I could see the lower half of his body. Even though he wore a belt, his acid wash denim jeans still hung a bit low on his hips - when his shirt shifted slightly, I could see the top of his boxers’ waistband peeking out. A look that normally would have given me pause when it came to a guy, but at that moment, what paused was my gaze, that I had to forcefully tear away from the region as I imagined what he looked like minus the outfit.

“Fucking finally. Can’t stand those hicks sticking their nose in business that ain’t theirs.” He spat, looking over his shoulder a bit towards the direction from which we came, like he was still trying to send his message to the other man who couldn’t even hear him anymore. 

“I guess...” I didn’t really want to continue dwelling on what just transpired; Kyley’s anger was still fresh - was it ever not? - and the last thing I wanted was for him to decide to head back and finally start what he was about to before I intervened. Besides, from our small interaction in the reception desk, I had learnt that he had a ‘not complete jerk’ side to him that was much more tolerable to be around.

“I swear, people in this town stress me the fuck out. Gahbage, all of them.“ He shook his head and with that, finally turned his face back to me - his expression was still intense, but at least he wasn’t completely pissed off anymore, and a hint of that cocky flirtatious grin had returned to his lips. “Well, not all. But enough about that bullshit. What do they call you around these parts?”

The way he asked for my name sounded weird to me, but I guess that’s the type of sentence someone’s got to use when their name is ‘Kyley-B’ and they refuse to be referred to as anything else. “I’m Y/N.”

‘Y/N, huh? That’s hot.”

Of all the adjectives he could have chosen, he went for the one I had never seen used before to describe a name, especially mine. “What do you mean by that?”

Kyley frowned a bit in confusion. “I mean it’s hot, what of it?” The answer came with a dismissive shrug, as if it was obvious and I was dumb for even having something to question. “Your name is hot, you’re hot, there’s not much else to say.”

My mouth spoke before my mind could catch the words this time. “Well, that’s a surprise.”

His frown intensified and I put my hands over my lips, the mistake getting to me. “And what do you mean by that?”

“Well, it’s just, I’ve seen you around,” my brain cells worked themselves into overdrive trying to find a way to say it that didn’t sound accusatory, “With some girls, and…”

Lively laughter that almost seemed to rumble the books on the nearby shelves interrupted my train of thought. “Oh, so that’s what this is about?” Kyley ran his fingers through his own hair - it almost didn’t even move due to the sheer amount of hair gel. “Don’t ya worry about it, baby. I like the covered up look too. You’re really pretty.” 

He eyed me up and down slowly, still grinning, as if he truly appreciated what he saw. I looked down at myself as well, taking in my outfit - a loose-fitting blouse, a skirt that ended just barely above my knees, my bare feet that were earlier covered by a pair of flats. Miles away from the style of the women that I’d seen Kyley-B have in his arms - women who wore clothes with much less fabric, shoes with much higher heels, makeup with much more vibrant colors. Women that dressed like they wanted the attention, in the way that Kyley’s personality denounced the same thing.

Yet that Jersey man still looked at me like he wanted me in a much worse way than he’d want any of those girls, beyond just flirting for the hell of it or so he could add another number to his body count. And I was eating it up despite myself - having the undivided attention of Kyley-B in a somewhat private setting like this, instead of fighting other women for it at a club or something, was deliciously feeding into my ego, and it took everything in my mind for me to remind myself that this was my job and I was working and there is no way anything can happen and oh my lord his eyes are so gorgeous.

My eyes drifted to the floor, suddenly very interested in the nail polish on my toes and the small creases on Kyley’s Jordans. “Thank you…”

 “See? This is what I’m talking about.” One of his hands made its way to my chin, tilting it upwards just enough to bring my attention towards his face again.“That’s the fourth time you’ve thanked me now. Makes me wanna actually give you something to be thankful for.”

Now forced to look at him - honestly, I don’t know how ‘forced’ I really was, considering I made no attempt to dodge my head away from his hold -, the fire reddening my face was on full display for Kyley, a sight that made his smirk widen.

“There’s no need for that,” I murmured, though the little vain monster in my heart yearned for him to continue talking about me like that, to continue making me feel actually interesting, “It’s just… who I am.”

He stepped closer, keeping his eyes on mine. “Who you are? I wanna know all about that… Inside and out.”

My nervous hard swallow was audible. I was sure I could boil a kettle using only the heat radiating from me at that moment. His voice was dripping with desire; the double entendre almost making the air around us crackle with how charged it was. Despite my whole body presenting all my real feelings, my personality still clamored for some semblance of that decorum that Kyley-B was trying to make slip away. "I don’t know… I don’t think we should…”

“Why not?” This time, there was no anger in his voice as he questioned me; its volume had dropped lower, matching the ‘private’ nature of the conversation. “I’m into it, you’re into it, I don’t see the issue.”

I could’ve denied, said he understood everything wrong and I was just being polite, thanked him for his time and left that place with my decency intact. But I was always a very bad liar, and there was no denying the way my heart beated like a drum with his proximity, how my face got beet red just from our simple conversations, or the way I eagerly paid attention to every word that came out of his mouth.

Why was I feeling so drawn to his offer anyway? Was it the forbidden aspect of it all, the knowledge that I’d be going wild and letting loose while still maintaining the looks of a productive member of society? Did I internally enjoy the attention of someone who usually went for women that had nothing to do with me in either appearance or personality? Was the savior complex acting up again, the ‘I can change him’ mentality? All of the above would lead to the same outcome.

Another thing that really led me towards the path of surrendering to Kyley was the fact that, during all of this, he still hadn’t touched me in any way that was inherently sexual, despite all of his verbal advances. He was still waiting for my consent, exhibiting atypical patience, which made me believe he would’ve been okay even if I legitimately rejected him - the thing he couldn’t take was me hiding myself from the both of us, my attempts at masking my interest, and that’s why he was still pressing the issue. He wanted to take me, but he also had to make sure I wanted to be taken.

“Come on, baby… Talk to me…” His voice dropped even lower as he took the final step towards me, our bodies inches from each other now, “Wanna know what’s going on in that pretty little mind…”

The deep shuddering breath I took brought to me the smells of old books and some very strong cologne, the latter of which I could easily imagine on my pillow. “Need you…”

His hands grabbed both sides of my face and he pulled me into a fierce kiss, groaning into my mouth once we collided. His lips were surprisingly soft, likely due to a religious application of chapstick, but the kiss as a whole was still rough in a figurative sense; tough, possessive, everything that man was now being transferred to me through the clashing of our mouths, basically demanding me to respond in kind.

Which was something I didn’t even know I could do. I wasn’t necessarily a virgin, but that doesn’t mean I was all that seasoned, either. My years in university weren’t necessarily the great breeding ground for sexual experience that they seemed to be for everyone else - turns out all the other English majors were more interested in reading about steamy affection and whirlwind romances rather than actually living them. 

So that moment with Kyley-B, in the back of my workplace, was the first moment of my life I actually felt desired - like my whole presence did something for the man in front of me, something he couldn’t ignore. And I found myself in equal measure wanting him as well, entranced by his untamed nature, like a tiny wild side of me I didn’t even know existed was slowly coming to life now that he was close enough.

We needed to have each other. So, letting my last sliver of rational thought become dust and settle on the books in the shelves around us, I kissed him back, my hands resting on his shoulders and gently bringing him even closer. Kyley’s hands tightened around my waist and he pushed me backwards until I felt my ass lightly hit the library cart, hearing the faint squeak of the wheels as they moved a bit from the slight impact. His tongue led mine in a sensual dance, one that I initially didn’t know the moves to, but that quickly became second nature under his expert tutoring. His hips pressed against me and I was a bit glad to notice he was clearly affected too, seeking whatever friction he could get by grinding his bulge against my lower abdomen. 

Both of us had our chests heaving heavily when we pulled back in need of air, and that’s when I realized my whole body was trembling with a mix of nerves and anticipation. “Please…” was all I could manage to say, and I didn’t even know what I was begging for; for Kyley-B to calm down, to keep going, to do more, to bring me somewhere else or take me right there. Just whatever it was that would calm down the heat on my lower abdomen, since I knew only he could take care of that now.

“You really know your magic words, what a good girl,” Kyley murmured with his mouth still inches from mine, his words teasing, but with an undertone of praise. One of his hands slowly drifted down from my waist, pulling up the fabric of my skirt a bit just so it could slide under, a feather-light touch making its way towards my inner thighs until it settled right over my clothed pussy - the material already thoroughly damp from just his previous contact.

Two of his fingers traced my slit over my panties before they stopped right on top of my clit, applying slight pressure to it before rubbing tight firm circles over it, the fabric of my underwear providing even more friction against my extra sensitive bundle of nerves. My teeth dug into my lower lip as I stifled my whimpers, squirming quietly under Kyley’s teasing moves.

“You’re real wet, ya know that?” He moved his head so that he could whisper in my ear, his teeth grazing my earlobe. The tip of his tongue then slowly traced the outline of my ear, a seductive gesture that sent goosebumps through my whole body. “Love to see it. Basically dripping for me.”

His digits moved back lower between my thighs, tracing me yet again, but the pressure on my clit wasn’t missed for long, as his palm was now flat against it, applying a bit of pressure and moving just barely to still keep me sensitive. He pushed my very damp panties to the side, a finger now circling my entrance, the small wet sounds it made almost deafening to me, proving Kyley’s previous claim without a doubt.

When he pushed his index in, I grabbed hard on the library cart handle, making it rattle a bit with the sudden movement. My breath hitched with the sudden intrusion, and Kyley chuckled in satisfaction, his face lowering to my neck. The pleasurable pain of the bites he started to place on the sensitive skin came in tandem with his middle finger also plunging inside of me, all the way to the last knuckle.

Kyley-B wasted no time before curling his fingers in a come hither motion, pumping them in and out with a type of strength that made my whole body shake with each push inward. My hips moved towards his palm in sync with his ministrations, subconsciously trying to get extra friction on my clit. 

Despite never having seen me before, it was like he had a complete map of my body in his mind. He knew exactly what to do at all times to make me feel good, and handled my body with a type of care that I would never expect from the likes of him. My worries about his nature or his intentions were gone with the wind; he could be whoever he wanted, as long as he’d continue laying his passion on all the neglected erotic parts of both my body and spirit. Soon my nails started making scraping noises against the metal of the handle, like I wasn’t just holding on to it, but also to the last little bit of my sanity before Kyley-B would kick me right into the deepest ends of pleasure.

Then suddenly, it stopped. His fingers withdrew from me and he took them to his mouth, cleaning my whole arousal out of those digits as he sucked on them. Not saying a word, he then used both of his hands to hike up my skirt completely so that it would be bunched up on my waist, immediately pressing his body against me again while his fingers drifted to the side of my panties. With a fierce tug that would’ve made me lose balance if not for his presence, he tore the damp fabric clean off, dropping it on the floor near our feet.

“What… Why did you…” I stuttered a bit as I looked up at him with my mouth hanging slightly open, looking every bit needy and desperate for him, absolutely pathetic in my yearning for the touch of that man.

His response came as a series of quick yet sensual kisses, the last one prolonged by the soft pulling of my bottom lip between his teeth. “Think we’re both gonna like it a lot more if you cum on my cock, baby,” he cooed, “And ya want it too, right? Don’t think you’d want to come all the way here just to get two fingers in.”

My head moved in a meek nod. My brain would’ve normally scolded me for agreeing so easily to words like these, so overtly sexually charged, but I couldn’t exactly lie to Kyley, either. I wanted him to fill me up. Taking in my agreement, he pulled back just a bit so he could make quick work of the belt and buttons in his jeans and pulled both them and his boxers slightly down, just enough for his cock to spring free. 

A lot of times, when people see feisty men with boisterous personalities, they like to say that those men are compensating for a lack of something. Kyley-B absolutely was not. He had the inches and the girth to back up every single aggressive display and explicit word that left his mouth. I pressed my thighs together, both in a gesture of fear for my poor pussy and also as a way to create some sort of pressure in the area that could calm me down until he would finally give it all to me.

My light squirming did not go unnoticed by his ever observant olive eyes. For all his violent behavior, he was still a really sharp individual. “You can take it,” he stated in a way that left no room for questioning, “I’ll make sure of it.”

Kyley took my lips back in his as his hands then moved from my waist to my ass, the unfamiliar sensation making me gasp against his mouth. He kneaded the soft flesh a bit, feeling it around. Then, without warning, both his hands delivered hard smacks to each side of my bottom, and I broke the kiss with a loud high-pitched yelp - the sounds almost echoed in the quiet library. He immediately started rubbing circles with his palms on the areas he slapped, as if trying to soothe them, contented groans rumbling in his chest. His next sentence came as an order. “Turn around. Need to feel this ass on me.”

I spun 180 degrees on my feet without a second thought and he pushed my back unceremoniously, making me bend over the library cart in front of me before shoving my head down towards it so that my back would be even lower and my ass would be in a more prominent position. My face landed on its side on one of the books that I was supposed to put back in place - Don Quixote. I had the feeling that by the end of my encounter with Kyley-B I too would be crazy enough to fight windmills.

I could only hear the noises his shoes made as he settled properly behind me, the hand he had used to shove me now placed at my back, putting slight pressure to keep me bent. He held his cock with the other one, giving a few light taps with it on my ass, and I just knew his gaze was burning into me as he watched the soft flesh jiggle a bit. When he positioned himself to start dragging the head across my slit, gathering up my already plentiful arousal and spreading it around even more, I whined and bucked back a little with my hips, the library cart under me rolling a bit as well. 

Immediately the hand that had been resting on my back moved to my ass and grabbed it fiercely. “Damn desperate for my cock, are ya, baby?” I could almost hear the smirk in his lips as he said those words, “Don’t worry, Imma give it to ya… And you ain’t even gonna need to thank me for it…”

Fortunately Kyley-B did not make me wait much longer after that. He was all about that instant gratification, and my submissive behaviour fed right into it. He traced my slit a few more times with the tip of his cock before pushing it fully inside of me in one swift motion, taking advantage of my wetness buildup. 

Another yelp from deep within my throat, this time accompanied by a deep grunt from Kyley-B’s. Both his hands grabbed my hips with such ferocity it felt like he was trying to get his fingers to break through my skin - but he’d have to settle for them just leaving a couple bruises. The stinging sensation deep in my walls as they stretched around his cock was like nothing I had ever felt before; worse than it felt when I lost my virginity, yet it was better, as in, actually good. I took a deep breath, hoping the air coming inside my lungs might help ease the burning somehow.

“Fuck, you’re so fuckin’ tight,” Kyley-B grunted behind me, his tone of voice faltering for a moment, becoming less brutish than usual - he was lost in the feeling of being inside me just as much as I was on the feeling of taking him. “Gonna end up ruining ya… If I’m not careful…”

He already had.

His grip steadied on my hips as he pulled away from me, before slamming all the way back in, giving me no time to calm down as he quickly settled into a steady pace, each thrust burying his cock to the hilt inside of my cunt. He was so big I could feel his tip hitting my cervix, constant jolts of pain coursing through my lower abdomen with each hit - yet I didn’t feel any urge to bring myself away from it or make it stop. It was the best pain I had ever felt in my life, which is a sentence I never thought I’d put together. 

Before I knew it I was letting out loud pleasure whines, my perception of the environment around me slowly being lost. Kyley still seemed to maintain his for a bit, though - to stifle my noises, he quickly shoved his index and middle finger inside of my mouth, almost all the way to the third knuckle. As if on cue, I started sucking on those digits and swirling my tongue around them like it was second nature.

“Fuck, girl,” he groaned with a husky voice, “If ya pussy wasn’t this fuckin’ good I’d be using my cock on this great tongue ya got instead.”

His other hand grabbed a fistful of my hair and pulled it with reasonable strength, making me gasp and bringing my head up - my mouth opened wider and I could now taste the brass of his fake rings on my tongue as he pushed his fingers all the way inside, having the surprising care of positioning them in such a way that they wouldn’t make me gag, while I continued to work on them.

He didn’t keep my noises muffled like this for long. Soon he seemed to realize it was of no use and we were already loud anyway; so he let go of my hair and my face immediately fell forward, his fingers leaving my mouth with a wet noise and slight pain to me as his rings clumsily hit my teeth from the sudden movement. His hands slapped both sides of my ass again and I yelled with full force of my lungs - now that I was free to make noise, he seemed interested in testing my ability of it, and I could swear the squelching noises my pussy made with each of his thrusts became louder as he sped up a bit.

With each potent snap of his hips against my ass, my whole body would jerk forward and cause the library cart to hit the tall wooden bookshelf right in front of me, shaking the whole thing up and making it bang against the wall behind it. Heavy hardcover books rained from the shelves, hitting the parquet floor with loud thuds.

Completely immersed in the pleasure the Jersey man was giving me, I failed to notice the danger I was in, of a book striking my head and knocking me out cold. I only realized that situation when all of a sudden Kyley-B had the whole weight of his upper body against my back, his harsh breathing on my neck sending shivers down my spine while his arm moved at the speed of light to backhand a falling book out of its path towards our bodies, sending it flying a few feet away like it was nothing. He hissed between his teeth, likely from the pain of the smack, but didn’t voice any complaints besides that, his pounding against me not faltering for even a second.

I adored the new sensation. Though I was almost fully trapped against the library cart, him leaning on top of me like this was strangely comforting, seeing all of that oppressive strength being used for my protection. Kyley-B clearly took care of what was his, and at that moment, that’s exactly what I was.

Best as I could, I sneaked one of my arms over my shoulder, my hand clumsily grabbing a fistful of his gelled up hair. He grunted roughly against my neck, apparently not used to being touched like that - maybe it was usually the other way around - but making no move to stop my awkward attempt at a caress either. His thrusts slowed a bit as he stayed like this for a moment or two, before he straightened his posture back up with his chest away from my back and gave my ass another slap, picking up speed again - maybe that was his way of taking for himself the smallest bit of control over the situation I held for a bit. 

Not that I minded. Him taking charge was all that I wanted at that moment. Not a single useful thought graced my brain while he fucked me senseless, all of my neurons hyper-aware of how his cock felt when it pushed against the most sensitive spots inside of me and not much else. Everything was Kyley-B, the world around us irrelevant, merely a void environment that could absorb all of my moans and screams of pleasure, as well as the squelching and slapping noises of his thrusts, with no repercussion. Even the swear words he grunted every so often now sounded like music to me; because it came from a place of intense pleasure, which I was giving him, so he could curse as much as he wanted near me as long as he’d do it in that lascivious tone.

Kyley’s thrusts became even quicker and more erratic, as if he couldn’t bear to have a single inch of himself not buried inside of me for any amount of time. He bullied my walls and my cervix with wild abandon, and I felt myself tensing up under his chest, my toes curling against the hardwood floor as my body braced for the impact of the release that his cock was about to give to me. 

He noticed the physical aspects of my buildup and a hoarse chuckle cut through the sounds of his hips slapping against me. “Gonna cum for me now, are ya, babe?” He murmured huskily, giving the lightest of taps to my ass, an action that felt weirdly reassuring. “Told ya it was gonna be better with my cock… Go on, let me see ya…”

My eyes rolled almost to the back of my head and I let out a cry that made my whole throat quiver as the most intense orgasm of my life crashed on me like a tsunami, my spine arching and making my upper body press even more against the cart under me. While I whimpered and trembled through the ripples of pleasure in my system, Kyley-B grabbed my hair again, pulling my head back some more as he used the newfound reins to jackhammer into me with my cunt clamping fiercely against his cock, trying to make it a permanent attachment to my body - a very smart decision on its part, really.

Despite riding my climax out to the fullest, I did not get any time to catch my breath - Kyley-B’s attack on my walls had already started to cross the line into overstimulation, making me whimper from the continuing massage on the extra sensitive region, before he suddenly withdrew from me. Although I already had way too much everything considered, that action surprisingly made me legitimately angry for half a second - I missed him inside of me. His breathing shook and faltered while thick jets spilled over my ass and lower back, his seed warm against my skin.

As he came down from his high and his breathing became more steady, I heard him reach inside of his pocket again, then felt the slightly rough sensation of lace being rubbed against me - he was cleaning up his release with the very same panties he tore away. Seemed thorough about it, too, as he took his time and by the end of it I didn’t feel sticky anymore. Yet, the knowledge of what we did had painted my body forever, the warm sensation still very much psychologically present, even if I was physically ‘clean’.

I looked over my shoulder just in time to see him stuff the panties in his pocket. The normal confusion I’d exhibit if seeing such an act did not grace my features, either because I was too fucked out to care or because I actually liked it.

He tucked his softening cock back inside of his boxers and closed the buttons and belt on his jeans before leaning towards me again, this time to put his nose to the side of my neck, inhaling my scent sharply while his arms wrapped around my waist.

”Did so fucking well for me, baby. You were so damn good.” Kyley-B whispered against my skin, his voice once more taking that less rowdy tone I heard earlier. Hearing it again, in a full sentence this time, sent shivers down my spine - different shivers from the ones that had coursed through my body earlier. Like I could catch a glimpse of the man behind the fake tan. He made sure to leave one tiny nip at my skin before pressing a kiss right on top of that region - a surprisingly soft kiss, like he was now trying to be careful with me.

He stayed like this for a little more before straightening up again and letting go of my body, giving my ass one last playful slap, chuckling as he watched it jiggle. “You’re the real deal, Y/N,” the Jersey playboy voice was back at full force, “Let’s go out sometime. I’ll call you.”

Which was a weird thing to say, considering I hadn’t given him my number at all, but for some reason I just knew that was the least of his problems. He knew where I worked. He’d find a way, and I’d give him as much direction as I could for that.

As soon as I couldn’t hear his footsteps anymore, my knees gave in, and I fell right on them, letting the library cart hit the now much less packed bookcase a final time. My hands clung to the side of it with what little strength I had in my body, that still felt like it was made of jelly. I could’ve fallen asleep right then and there, the exhaustion from the unfamiliar ‘exercise’ getting to me. Dozens of books laid around me on the floor, waiting to be put back in their places, but I decided to just make that a problem for future me, instead choosing to let my muscles catch a break.

When I finally managed to pull myself together enough to return, alone, to the reception desk, I realized I was in deep shit. Every single set of eyes in the location turned to me, wide and horrified; apparently, the whole time I was with Kyley-B back there, my clients at the library were frozen in place listening to the whole thing. I tried to avoid my shame by looking elsewhere, but then my eyes rested on a decorative piece of mirrored glass at the wall; I could now see myself clearly. My hair was messed up beyond belief from all of Kyley-B’s pulling, my whole makeup was smudged - with special attention to the huge pink blur of lipstick around my very kiss-swollen lips -, my shirt was creased everywhere. Not to mention that now my underwear was hanging out in a New Jersey man’s pocket, leaving me totally commando. And I had a few more hours of my shift ahead of me.

It didn’t affect me as much as it should.

༝༚༝༚༝༚༝༚༝༚༝༚𓆩♡𓆪༝༚༝༚༝༚༝༚༝༚༝༚

Surprisingly enough, I did not get fired from my job after that. My guess was they knew they couldn’t find anyone else who could put up with the extra work that had nothing to do with my appointed position, not for the money I was paid. So I got to stay.

What did happen was the influx of people at the library augmented significantly. This did not mean a proportional increase in the number of books checked out, however - it just meant way too many people were suddenly interested in Latin Literature, and my workplace became a lot noisier.

Dividers by @cafekitsune

[deoidesign]

Wearing your boyfriend's jacket

[riverside-lavender]

i could write an essay on how the character’s clothes in one piece show their emotional journey. i think about it so much.

[chronurgy]

Okay since it looks like we're really actually genuinely going to (probably) get a new dragon age game soon, here's some (specifically story) stuff I'm hoping to see:

Kal Sharok - either a companion from there or a chance to go there, please please please I HAVE to learn what their deal is

Anderfels companion, especially a warden one - I'd love to get into messy warden politics in the country they rule but don't technically rule

Minrathous - I've needed this city injected into my veins ever since I saw that neon lit, floating building concept art and learned they host laser light shows there it looks sick as hell and I can't wait to see them contrast the barbaric south with the enlightened north and the horrible bloodshed that sustains it 🖤

Par vollen or any sort of permanent qunari settlement - more information about everyday life under the qun please! It's obviously hard to do that when the qunari don't make alliances as a rule and also they're actively at war with the imperium and the rest of thedas, but still

A religious schism within the qun - the qun is all about things following their proper nature, but who decides what the proper nature of things is? People, of course! And people will always disagree. It'd be interesting to meet an offshoot who claim that they're the ones following the "true" qun and it's actually the rest of qunari society that has failed to follow the correct path (I know this will never happen, no one else in the world would actually want to play religious schism simulator 4)

A foreign born mage who came to tevinter to avoid or escape the circle could be fascinating - I think there's a lot of conflict embedded in that character that could be used to great effect. What's their social class in tevinter? How do they justify the things they see? Do they even try?

Sick fucked up red lyrium magic - lyrium potions restore mana, what do red lyrium potions do? Hopefully let you do horrible and fucked up magic. Red lyrium was so cool in da2 and I'd be ecstatic if they'd return to those roots for it

Antiva - a plutocracy with a haunted marsh? Sign me the fuck up

The half destroyed ruins of a city decimated during a past blight - make the blight scary! Remind us of all that has been lost, and let us see some of that history firsthand

Just ANY followup on the lore from the descent dlc - can we get more about the titans please???

A diversity of opinions on Solas and his plan among the dalish - please let them be people with conflicting beliefs and desires and not just one monolithic group I'm begging

Related to the point above - a dalish companion would be excellent, especially if they could help bring that insight to the party

I wanted to get this out before we see the trailer and gameplay so I'm definitely forgetting some stuff. This is also just my personal list of things I'd like to see. I'll probably do another one focusing on more gameplay and mechanical things.

[july-19th-club]

me age seven being sat down in front of the school’s district child psych lady and being given strange, simple spatial puzzles to solve and then long, complicated worksheets and hammering my way through them at the speed of light while having zero comprehension what their purpose was or why i was here: this is urgent! i have to get a good grade in Weird Puzzles, Or Else, something that is both normal to want and possible to achieve,

[keeps-ache]

my brother keeps taking my dang water cup c'mon man ! !

[m4niackkyun]

Hi. (Announcement in the tags)

[neverendingford]

.

[skrunksthatwunk]

jumpscared by least favorite seasonal chore

[pepprs]

STILL wide awake! i did not put down my phone! and now im hungry. so i will not be sleeping tonight ♥️