#Warning: Long tags ahead (2 topics)

[stopper-my-heart]

Nothing like Heartstopper S2E8 removing some of Taylor Swift's "seven" lyrics just so that the singing can specifically come back in at "Or hide in the closet" while Isaac is processing difficult emotions related to the book he's reading (i.e., Ace: What Asexuality Reveals About Desire, Society, and the Meaning of Sex by Angela Chen).

Did I mention "Or hide in the closet" hits just as the camera focus finishes shifting away from Isaac?

This is fine

[narrycherries]

ivy: an incandescent glow

She just wants to have a fun night out, but Harry has a tendency to ruin things..

[part 2]

masterlist // ivy series

word count: 10.9k

warnings/tags: enemies to lovers, harry x fem oc, angst

Although the week had been quite packed with things at work, Ivy had decided that maybe it would be best if she did go out for the night. It would only be for a few hours, and Niall had assured her when he came over the other night for dinner that it would be a good time. Emma begged a few times, of course, and she didn’t want to admit to giving in to her, but she did.. It wasn’t out of the ordinary for her to go out, it had simply been a while.

“Is Niall riding with us?” She asked Emma when she popped in Ivy’s room to borrow a pair of earrings that would better match her outfit.

“No, he’s going with Zayn. They usually go early to meet with the owner and stuff.” She explained as she looked in the mirror, slipping the earrings into her piercing holes. “He might ride back.. I’m not going to drink very much, probably just one drink when we first get there. He’ll want to celebrate after and you know how he is.”

“He definitely doesn’t need to be in a driver’s seat.”

Emma sighed. “He doesn’t even need to do that when he’s sober. He pays horrible attention to the road.”

“Your dress is cute. I love the red on you.”

“Thanks! I love your skirt.. even though it covers your ass too much.” She joked with a grin.

Ivy rolled her eyes. “I don’t want my ass hanging out all the time.”

“When it looks that good.. you should.”

“Do I need to change?”

Emma smacked her lips and grabbed Ivy’s hand, knocking the makeup brush out of her grip. “Stop! You look perfect, Ivy, I’m only teasing because your ass is nice and mine is nowhere near as big.” A laugh fell from her lips as she wrapped her arms around Ivy. “You’re hot, girl.”

“Am not.” She huffed back, embracing Emma just as tight. “But thanks.”

“The skirt is hot. The style is cute on you, plus the sparkles on your shirt are going to shine so much in the bar. Like a disco ball.. all eyes on you, sugar.”

Ivy chuckled at Emma’s flattering statements. She was glad to have an encouraging friend like her. Before all the joking, she did have a thought or two about the skirt and the bright orange shirt covered in fake rectangular gemstones. The straps were thin, and the necklace was low but straight across, covering any opportunity for cleavage to show. It was definitely not a shirt someone would wear on a daily basis, but it was perfect for going out.

“Are you wearing heels?” Emma asked, looking down to see her shoeless feet.

“Probably the chunky ones with the straps, the black ones. Are you?”

She nodded back. “I’ll make Niall rub my feet tonight.”

Ivy snickered. “I’ll make you rub mine.”

“I mean, I will. You’re my best friend.. as long as you aren’t sweaty.” Emma’s lashes hit her cheek as she winked.

“Don’t you need to finish getting ready?” Ivy said as she turned back towards the mirror to work on her makeup.

Emma was notorious for being late, and it took everything in Ivy to wrangle her up and out of the door when they were going places together. Niall didn’t give them a specific time to be at the bar, but he did say when the band would start. Emma needed to get ready quick if they wanted to make it on time.

The car ride was full of quick conversations with random topics in between their performances of some of their favorite songs. They had hit a karaoke stage as a duo before, plenty of times, so they were confident in their list of songs. In between the belting and off key singing, they had a few longer talks. Emma asked if Ivy was nervous about going to a bar she’d never been to before, in which she said ‘no, I’m excited’ and then let Emma tell her all about the layout of the place.

“You said something about.. Niall celebrating after?”

Emma nodded as she kept her eyes on the road ahead of them. “They don’t play the entire night. Usually have about two hours until closing. Depends on if there’s any requests.”

“Requests?” Ivy lifted her brows, surprised by the seemingly popularity Niall’s crew had. “They must be really good?”

Although she had seen videos of Niall, she hadn’t seen any of his band. Emma didn’t really use social media a lot, so she never posted anything or shared posts about their shows. Ivy was going to be completely surprised by whatever was to come tonight. She knew it would be good though. If they could continue to book the same venue time and time again, then they must bring in a good audience.

When the silence rose between them, Ivy took the opportunity to look at Emma’s outfit. She was humming softly to the song playing on the radio as she drove, her concentration on the road and not on her friend’s gazing eyes. Emma had such pretty dark hair that Ivy thought was perfectly placed strand by stand on her head. It had a natural wave to it that was easy to style, whereas Ivy had to place heated curls into her long, straight hair whenever she wanted it to look cute. Emma had a slimmer build than she did, her legs were longer despite them being a similar height. No matter how hard she tried not to look, her eyes always naturally fell to catch a glimpse at the gap between Emma’s legs. She never looked at it in a weird way, like she was attracted to her, but in an envious way. When she stared down at her own thighs or burned holes through her mirror, she always frowned and swallowed harshly as her skin pressed together - the inside of her thighs always touching. It wasn’t the biggest deal to her, but it was noticeable in her eyes, so she assumed it was.. noticeable for everyone else. Emma had small boobs, but they fit perfectly on her frame. While Ivy had a small cup size, they didn’t necessarily match her body, she believed. Her hips were wider, her ass fuller - as Emma reminded her often - and her stomach was pudgy. She wasn’t skinny, nor tall and lanky. She was short, plump, and her thighs touched.. She never thought she was unattractive but she figured she wasn’t conventionally attractive, she didn’t possess those things that society craved and demanded of women.

Emma’s outfit tonight was perfectly sculpted to her slim body. The red dress had a satin finish to it as it draped carefully over her cleavage, the swell of her breasts peeking out just enough to keep someone guessing. Her tanned skin was littered with delicate gold jewelry - her signature flower ring on her right hand was accompanied by a few random ones, and a ruby necklace hung over her collarbones, Niall gifted that to her for Christmas.

Ivy was confident in her outfit for the night, she was comfortable in the articles of clothing. She was very used to wearing heels when going out, she believed they made the outfits even better, so her feet weren’t going to be hurting that bad later on. She thought her makeup was done nicely, a dark grey smokey eye with a shimmery white covering her lid and a pink nude gloss over her thick lips. Her lips, that was the one thing she was confident in each and every time she looked at her reflection. They were plump, full, and much thicker than the average person’s. She had been told several times that her lips would do wonders - although, she hadn’t gotten to that with anyone yet. She had kissed a few people, though, and they told her it was heavenly. She took the praise to heart and was proud of it. Her thighs might touch and her hair might dry straight, but she had pretty lips.. that would surely be enough to attract someone one of these days, right?

After a couple of minutes of silence, more than Ivy had realized, Emma spoke up. “Are you feeling okay?”

Ivy stuck her tongue out to wet her lips, smearing her lip gloss in the process. “Yeah. Why?”

Emma shrugged. “You’re quiet.. you seem like you’re thinking about something.”

“I’m fine, promise.”

They became quiet again. She knew that sometimes she became mute when she was anxious or thinking thoroughly about something, and she hated when people noticed or pointed it out. She wasn’t intentionally trying to be that way, it just happened. She assumed it was normal, but perhaps she did it too much?

“Ivy, if you’re worrying about your outfit, please don’t. You look hot. You always do.” Emma suddenly said, a smile laced in her words. “There’s gonna be guys dropping to your feet tonight, like they always do.”

“They don’t drop to my feet.” She huffed, pursing her lips at the thought. “They just want to hook up with me.”

Emma smirked. “It’s your ass, I’m telling you. They love it.”

“Emma, please.” Ivy was fighting back a chuckle.

“I promise, swear on every little thing, Ivy, your outfit is perfect and you look perfect.”

A weighted sigh escaped through her lips as she relaxed in the seat, her eyes shifting to look out of the window. “Thanks, Em.”

While Ivy had never been to the establishment they arrived at, she was no stranger to a bar or club setting. Emma no longer seemed to be worried or concerned about any lingering doubts Ivy might have about her outfit or how the night would go. They strolled to the door, hand in hand with giggles pouring from their mouths as Emma joked about how excited she was for what Niall was going to give her after the show. Apparently, performing gave him a boost of confidence, energy, and testosterone. Emma was not shy about telling every detail and making sure Ivy knew all the craziest parts.

“There’s a good bit of people here.” Ivy said as she raised her brows, looking at the good sized line forming to the door.

“Yeah, it’s always packed out. This is one of the best places around. Decent prices, good djs and bands, obviously.” Emma grinned at her own comment. “And the food is actually great. I never came before I got with Niall though.”

“Yeah, I’m kinda surprised we never popped in here during school.”

Emma’s smile turned to a smirk. “They couldn’t handle our karaoke performances.”

Once they paid the cover charge and made a quick trip to the restroom before getting settled anywhere, they headed to the bar, still hand in hand as they weaved through the crowd of people already dancing. Ivy took notice of the interior as they waited for the bartender to come over to them.

The place was pretty big for what it was. The main room had a large dance floor space, a stage lined the back wall. Apparently, the place always had live performers or guest djs. It used to be a small theater that was renovated - the seating ripped out to transform the venue, but the stage remained untouched. Along the left side of the huge open room were tables with booth style benches shaped in half circles. Most of them were already occupied, but she could tell it was more of a casual thing - instead of a ‘being seated and waited on’ space. There was a doorway close to the opposite end of the bar covered with a long, sparkling beaded curtain. The sign next to the door read ‘VIP’. She pursed her lips at the idea of this place being so popular that they had a special seating area. Her eyes darted to the bartender as she heard Emma start saying her order. Ivy ordered a drink consisting of rum and pineapple juice, intending to get something stronger later once the show started.

“Hey there, strangers.” A familiar voice called out over the music.

“Oh, hi, Niall!” Emma was cheerful as he sat down on the stool closest to them. They had been standing, though, not wanting to claim a seat at the bar. “What are you doing out here?”

He shrugged. “We’ve got a few minutes to kill. Getting started?” He nodded his head towards the drink in Emma’s hand.

“Yeah, just having one.. since you’ll be drinking whatever’s left at the bar later.”

Ivy laughed at their banter, which caught Niall’s attention. “I expect you, missy, to have fun tonight. I want everyone to experience how wild you can get.”

“I told her she needs to have fun!” Emma exclaimed, reaching over to grab Ivy’s elbow and give it a squeeze.

“I’ll have a few.. but I’m not going to go crazy.”

They both gave her a dramatic eye roll, Niall adding a huff to his reaction. “C’mon, Ivy, live a little!”

“Yeah, a little, not a lot.” She smiled back, amused by their mix of excitement and disappointment.

“I’ll make sure you have a few rounds of tequila later. On me, of course.” Niall said, looking from her to Emma. “If you don’t drink yours.. then I’ll take it, babe.”

“Are you guys doing requests tonight?” Emma changed the topic after shaking her head at him.

He slowly lifted his head in a nod. “From what I was told. As long as we know it.. we’ll play it.”

“Do my song, okay?” Emma begged with a pout of her lips.

He shaped a grin on his. “It’s on the set list, baby.”

“What kind of music do you play?” Ivy asked, genuinely curious about it. Emma hadn’t really given her much of an idea about what to expect, just a guarantee that she’d love it and have fun.

“Mostly rock.. We do a lot of nineties.. early two thousands songs. Bunch of classic rock, though. Little bit of grunge, dad rock.. if that’s what you wanna call it. Sometimes we branch out.. but mostly stick to that stuff.” Niall said as he stood from the stool, a sigh following his final words as he ran a hand through his puffed up dark hair.

“Time to get ready?” Emma pouted, her free hand slipping onto his waist.

“Yeah, gotta round up the lads.” He breathed out, his eyes focusing on Emma now. “I’ll be watching you, babe. Make sure ya dance for me, yeah?” He teased with a lick of his lips, which clearly fell downward to meet hers.

Ivy swallowed a sip of her drink and let her eyes move to the floor. She wasn’t grossed out by their display of affection, she just felt like she was intruding. Emma was always so open with her about the things she did with Niall and others before he came along, but she never had those kinds of stories to tell back to her. She had been with one person, the summer before university began, and it was terrible. Aside from that, kissing people was the extent of her experience. She enjoyed most of the times she had almost gone far with people, but it never got to that point.

Emma hugged Niall quickly as he said something about needing to go. When he disappeared in the crowd, Emma turned to face Ivy again.

“Niall might stay over tonight.” She said, taking a sip of her drink. “Just to let you know.”

“Alright, that’s fine.”

Emma slid her gaze around the room, taking in the familiar setting, before looking back to Ivy. “I hope you like the music. There’s a bunch of songs you definitely know on the set.”

“M’sure I will.”

“Are you good?” Emma smiled sweetly, not trying to pry or seem too nosy, but she noticed how Ivy had shied away from her and Niall just before he left.

“I’m fine. You worry too much.”

Ivy sighed lightly as Emma took her hand. “Maybe we can find you a hot guy tonight. I know you know how to use those lips.”

“Don’t say it like that!” Ivy laughed, covering her mouth as her cheeks blushed.

“Kissing, I mean! But I’m sure you can do the other stuff, too.” Emma just smirked, knowing that her attempt at making Ivy feel better was working.

They didn’t have to wait too much longer for everything to start. But as they stood next to the bar, partially resting on the stools, the place filled up to more than capacity. It was like a big name musician was in town. Emma told Ivy about the popularity of the bar again and how it was always sold out and packed floor to ceiling with people. She was very impressed by the crowd that had formed around them, and she wondered how much of that was just from the place’s atmosphere and how much was for the live show.

Just as the guy who was normally over the music appeared on the stage to announce that the show was about to begin, Emma grabbed Ivy’s hand and they shoved their way to the front of the crowd, not quite in the center but close enough. Emma wanted to be in front of where Niall would be standing. The lights dimmed, replaced with flashing colorful lights and white strobing flashes. Emma was cheering with the crowd while Ivy waited in anticipation. She was excited to see Niall perform live, but she was more interested in seeing the rest of the band.

A small group flooded the stage suddenly, instruments in a few of their hands, including Niall’s. The lights were purposely not flashing on to the stage yet, so it was too dark for her to tell. She thought she recognized the person getting behind the drum set, but she wasn't sure. Emma let out a piercing squeal as the show finally began.

Ivy happily smiled and started to sway her hips from side to side as a familiar opening instrumental of a song started to fill the room. The lights on the floor of the stage popped on, lighting up the band as the singer started the first verse of “Come As You Are”. She was nodding her head to the music as she watched Niall pluck the strings on the guitar, he was pursing his lips and seeming to be enjoying what he was doing. His eyes shot up and he gave them a quick grin before focusing back on the guitar in his hands and the microphone placed near his mouth. Emma had told her that he sings backup vocals sometimes, depending on the song. She let her eyes roam over the rest of the band. She kept getting a bright red light shot into her eye from one of the stage lights above them, so it was difficult to see at first.

“Oh, Zayn!” She yelled out over the music, hitting Emma on her arm. She hadn’t told her that he was in the band - in fact, she didn’t know much about the band at all.

There were two other people she didn’t recognize, one was a girl playing a keyboard and a guy with dark blond hair playing a bass guitar. Another gasp came from her as she finally got to clearly see the person tightly gripping the microphone. She truly didn’t expect to recognize more than just Niall and Zayn. There stood before her, in the middle of the stage with two big hands wrapped around the microphone and the top of the stand was a third familiar face. Sweat was already rolling down from his hairline, his long curly hair was messy on his head as he jerked around while singing. A white t-shirt hugged his body, sticking to him like glue, and a pair of dark jeans over his legs. The jet black ink of the snake tattoo stood out against his skin as the lights flashed over it, the creature wrapping perfectly around his arm. It was Harry.

The next song started almost immediately and it was another one that she recognized right off the top of the first note played. Ivy’s dad had a thing for rock music, and she knew the start of “Highway to Hell” like the back of her hand. She was impressed by the vocal range Harry was able to belt out into the microphone. Niall and the other guy she didn’t know the name of were singing the chorus with him. Emma was dancing like it was the actual band performing the song, but her behavior made Ivy more comfortable and soon she was doing the same.

Every now and then, Niall would flash them a toothy grin and give them a nod of his head, approving of their performance and dancing. Ivy was on her second drink, this one they grabbed soon after Niall left them and it was stronger than the first. She was feeling the blood rushing to her cheeks, and not from the dancing or close quarters of the crowd. It had been a while since she went out, so she was starting to feel that sensation flood through her - she wanted to have fun tonight.

For almost an hour, Ivy and Emma danced with each other, screaming out the lyrics they knew to different songs. They would do an impersonation of Niall every now and when he'd look towards them, air guitars and rock star head bangs acted out - all of which made him throw his head back and laugh. Like they usually did when they went out together, they’d grab onto each other and hug while singing or playfully run their hands down each other’s sides. It was all in fun, of course, and the alcohol contributed.

They both let go of their embrace as the music dialed down, twisting so they could face the stage. Niall was guzzling a bottle of water as Harry shoved his hand through his hair, pushing it out of his face. The bass player grabbed a stool from the back of the stage and brought it to Harry. Emma was familiar with this portion of the show, so she grabbed Ivy’s forearm to get her attention.

“I’m gonna get some water, do you want another drink?” Emma asked as she took a deep breath, exhausted from trying to outdo the performance on the stage.

“Yeah, get me another one of these.” Ivy nodded as she passed her empty cup, knowing she’d toss in the bin for her. Emma disappeared into the crowd to fight her way to the bar just as Harry adjusted the microphone stand and sat on the stool.

He was holding a bottle of water as he leaned into the microphone. “We’re gone slow it down for a bit.” His deep voice rattled through the speakers, a quick smirk shaping to his lips before he put the bottle to them.

Ivy couldn’t help but watch him as he swallowed half the contents of the bottle. It sloshed out, spilling over the corners of his mouth and running down his chin. Water droplets soaked and trailed down the fabric of his shirt. She was still so shocked by the fact he was the singer in Niall’s band. Maybe Emma just didn’t tell her because she knew they didn’t know each other. They met once, but they were strangers. He tossed the half empty water bottle on the ground, some of it spilled out since the top wasn’t screwed all the way on. His eyes roamed over the crowd as he grabbed the microphone. He glanced over his shoulder towards Niall, who gave him a nod and started up the next song.

Ivy had thoughts spinning in her head, the buzz from her drinks wasn’t helping her concentrate on just one thing. She wondered what songs they would do next. What kind of slower songs did they prefer to do? She figured it would be some of the same artists and bands they had covered thus far. Her eyes were glued to the floor, thoughts circling her mind at a hundred miles an hour. Had that second drink really been that strong or was she dizzy from being so close to the speakers?

She lifted her head the moment she realized what song was being played. She shot her gaze to Niall, then over to the bass guitarist. She knew those chords better than any other song that existed. All those running thoughts vanished in her head as Harry’s voice dropped low with the first verse of the song. The way he sang the words just as slow as they originally were done made her heart skip a beat. This song was special to her. This was something she wasn’t even sure Emma knew. She talked about losing her mom quite often with Emma, but her brother was a different story. And as his favorite song was being sung, she couldn’t help but feel a sadness creep over her joyful mood. All the energy she had jolting through her veins like lightning had slowed to a dull pulse. She gulped as she glanced next to her, Emma hadn’t returned yet. Niall was too busy focusing on the chords he was playing to give her any looks. She felt like she was about to pass out, not from the heat built up from the crowd or the alcohol in her system - but from the overwhelming feelings washing through her. Ivy’s strained blue eyes flicked to Harry, and for just a split second he locked his gaze on her. It was gone before she could understand what was happening. She was sure he didn’t notice her, and if he did then he didn’t recognize her or care to remember the glimpse of her face he got at the tattoo shop.

She thought maybe watching Niall would distract her, but witnessing him playing the music she so easily knew was making it worse. She wasn’t sure how long she had been standing there with her eyes glued to the floor. The song wasn’t over yet, that’s all she was sure of.

“Oh, this is new! They’ve never done this one before!” Emma suddenly appeared next to her, a smile over her lips as she passed Ivy the drink.

She turned her head, glad to see that her friend had returned but sort of upset that she left in the first place. Emma couldn’t have known what song was going to be next, clearly she was unaware of it, and she didn’t know the intense attachment Ivy had to it. She couldn’t blame Emma for anything.

“Thanks. I’m running.. to the restroom!” She yelled over the speaker that was extremely close to them.

Emma gave her a thumbs up and a quick ‘be careful’. Before Emma could drop her arm, Ivy was pushing her way through the crowd towards the restroom, well she actually wasn’t sure where she was heading. She had to get away from that stage. She had to disappear for a few minutes to collect herself. It wasn’t the performance that bothered her - Niall was amazing, as were the others playing instruments, and Harry was doing the song justice. It was just her mind. Sweaty bodies bumped into her as she elbowed through everyone. She felt like she was drowning in a sea of people. It was so loud in the place that her ears were ringing. She couldn’t even hear the music anymore, she was unaware the song had finished and a new one was being played. She broke through the crowd, sucking in a quick breath as she realized she was free of the constraints of people around her.

The restroom was close by, and she stopped just outside the door to chug the alcohol from the cup Emma had just brought her. It was gone within a few seconds. She didn’t care about the sticky drops landing on her chest or the few rolling down her lips, smudging her lip gloss and tracing light lines in her makeup. The bathroom was cold, arctic cold at that. It was a feeling of utter relief to be free of the music, the crowd, the lights.

She stumbled to the sinks, almost forgetting the height of her shoes. Her hands gripped the cold porcelain of the sink in the farthest corner of the bathroom. The fuzzy feeling in her head hadn’t faded yet. She stared at the sink bowl, the silver lined drain gazing back up at her. Ivy spent far longer in the restroom than she meant to.

After ten minutes of her being gone, Emma decided she was going to check on Ivy. She was in still in the restroom, and after Emma asked her several times if she was alright or feeling upset, they chose to return to the front of the crowd. Ivy convinced her friend that she was just having an upset stomach from the drinks, despite them stopping by the bar so she could get another before they got back to the stage. Emma didn’t think anything of it and just assumed that since it had been a while since Ivy had alcohol, maybe she really was just having a stomach ache.

The band continued on for a while longer, taking a few breaks here and there to drink water and take requests. Ivy considered submitting a song to Niall, but she was hesitant to. Besides, several other songs had been yelled out from the crowd, along with some people pushing their way to the front to the stage to call out a song title. She assumed this wouldn’t be the last time Emma drug her out to one of Niall’s shows, so she’d just request something next time. Instead of waiting around for the final song, she returned to the bar on her own and ordered a shot. The memories of her brother were faded by now, but she was determined to flood them out with alcohol. Tonight was supposed to be fun anyway, not filled with sadness.

Emma cheered loud for the band as they finished their last song and said a quick thank you to everyone. Ivy was perched on a bar stool, her eyes filling with stars as she stared at the bar, trying to stay awake. The usual dj returned to the stage to get the music going for the patrons of the bar. It was obvious that some people only showed for the live music because a good bit exited out the door once the set was over, but it was still a pretty big crowd in the building.

“Hey! There you are!” Emma shouted as she walked to the bar, her hand reaching out to take Ivy’s. “Feeling okay?”

“Yeah. Just got some water.” She presented a drunken smile as she held up the small cup of ice water.

“Good! You need to take a break.” Emma grinned back, glad to see that Ivy was enjoying herself, but wary of how much she had consumed. “C’mon, Niall and the others are gonna be in the back room for the rest of the night.”

“Okay.” Ivy didn’t really have a choice on what to do as Emma yanked her off the bar stool and towards the beaded curtain she noticed earlier. It was sparkling from the lights reflecting on the crystals. “Where are we going?”

Emma gave her a laugh, amused by her obvious buzzed behavior, and just pulled her through the curtain. Ivy smacked a few strands of beads away from her face as they tried to tangle up in her hair. The same music that was playing in the main room was also playing in this one. She was intrigued by the new setting, curious to know what kind of important people would be filling it. Was it just for the bar’s usual customers or did you have to have some kind of pass? She wasn’t sure, the disco ball hanging from the ceiling distracted her and made the thoughts dissipate. Her eyes shifted around the room as she took in the new sights. Heavy velvet curtains dripped from the ceilings, covering the walls but not actually any windows they were simply decorations. There were three big, fancy leather sectionals placed in the room - two in each corner and one in the middle of the wall. Curtains hung to separate them, but they appeared to be pulled back tonight. Glowing purple lights centered on short tables in the middle of each couch lit up the leather, making everything seem magical and ethereal. She couldn’t miss the stripper’s pole that was in the middle of the small dance floor, elevated a few feet off the ground on an even smaller stage.

“Hi, Emma!” A girl appeared in front of them, and Ivy recognized her as the girl who was playing the keyboard on stage. The girl’s natural red hair was glowing under the mix of lights flashing in the room. “Who’s this beauty?”

Emma grinned, letting go of Ivy’s hand so she could gesture to her. “This is my friend, Ivy. We live together.”

“Oh, nice to meet you!”

Ivy mustered up a polite smile and a small wave. “Hi.”

“This is Michelle.” Emma said, glancing at Ivy to make sure she was okay.

“You were awesome on stage.” She said to the girl who’s eyes she found to be pretty, the piercing icy blue lighting up even in the dark room.

“Thank you!” She nodded towards the table in the back corner. “I think we’ve claimed that one for the night if you girls wanna sit.”

“Sure!” Emma followed behind her, which led Ivy to do the same.

Michelle and Emma plopped down on the leather couch, immediately starting up a conversation as Ivy sat next to them, but not as close as they were together. She let her eyes move around the room again, searching for a familiar face. There were a handful of people already in the room, most of which were talking to a girl to place their drink orders. She moved her head a little, trying to see past someone. In that same moment, a security guard pulled back the beaded strings and let a group of people in. By the way they were dressed and how some of them had a smug look on their faces, she assumed these were the higher paying patrons of the establishment. Emerging from behind that crowd, Ivy saw Niall brush past the beads. His eyes roamed around until he spotted them in the back.

“Oh, there’s the guys.” Michelle nudged Emma to get her attention as she pointed towards them.

“Finally!” Emma jumped up as Niall got closer to them, she was ready to pounce on him. Their eyes met and he put on a big smirk for her, just as excited as she was to finally get his hands on her.

“Have you met everyone else?” Michelle asked as she slid over next to Ivy, their thighs touching as she offered a kind smile.

“I’ve met Zayn.” She said with a soft sigh. “Kinda met Harry, but not really.”

“Oh, well, that’s Cory!” Michelle pointed to the guy that walked past Niall and Emma as they hugged and twirled each other around. “He plays bass.”

Ivy gave her a nod, silently letting her know she was paying attention. The guy approached the couch before Niall did, since Emma was holding things up with her pecks to his cheeks and lips. He gave Michelle a smile and shot his eyes to Ivy His brows furrowed and he held his hand out in a loosely pointing gesture towards her.

“Don’t think we’ve met.” He said, his confused look morphing to a smile as he sat in the spot across from her. “Niall told me Emma had a friend coming. Ivy, right?”

“Yeah, that’s me.” She turned her lips up, giving him a gentle nod of her head.

“Not drinking tonight?” Michelle asked him with a cock of her brow as she noticed his empty hands.

He laughed back. “Harry’s bringing us a round.”

“Oh, of course he is.”

“Hey, Ivy!” Niall greeted her with a loud voice, happy to see that she was finally apart of their small crew. “How was the show?”

Emma took a seat on the opposite side of the coach, letting Niall claim the place closest to Cory. “I think she loved it!”

“It was so good. You guys are amazing.”

“Saw me shredding the fuck out of that guitar, yeah?” He joked, getting a laugh out as everyone rolled their eyes and smiled at him.

“You killed it, for sure.” ivy took a sip of her water, wishing she had more than that was left in the cup.

“What are you drinking?” Michelle asked curiously.

She pushed out a breath. “Just water right now. I.. had a few already.”

“Your outfit is stunning. I love the top.”

Emma beamed as she heard the compliment. “I told you, Ivy, you look so hot tonight!”

“I’ll say.” Michelle teased just as her phone buzzed in her hand, her eyes falling down to check the message.

Ivy felt a bit of uneasiness building in her stomach as she realized she was feeling out of place all of a sudden. Cory was also focused on his phone while Emma had thrown her leg over Niall’s lap and her arm around his neck, pulling him in for a kiss. While she wasn’t with complete strangers, she didn’t really know Michelle and Cory. The only other person she knew hadn’t come over here yet, Zayn wasn’t anywhere near that she could see. Emma was distracted with Niall, leaving Ivy to fend for herself. She swallowed a lump that was forming in her throat and ran her hand over the ends of her skirt, adjusting it on the tops of her thighs. She reverted back to those insecure thoughts she had while on the drive here. Michelle was skinnier than Emma was, leaving her to feel even more vulnerable and uncomfortable. She tried to ignore it by picking up her head, wanting her eyes to catch something interesting to stare at for a bit - but instead she saw someone she recognized coming their way, two people actually.

“The party’s here!” Michelle announced as she, too, looked up and saw what was heading their way.

Everyone looked up to see Zayn walking to them, a girl on his arm, and Harry leading one of the bartenders from the front room to the table. The woman had a tray of beers balanced on her palm. Zayn sat down next to Niall, the woman holding onto his elbow sitting beside him. Ivy figured that was Alyssa - Emma had mentioned her several times while telling stories. The bartender sat the tray down and replied as Niall and Cory both thanked her for bringing them out. She disappeared, leaving them to all to reach for a cup.

“Take one, take one. Drink this damn shit.” Harry yelled with a joyful tone as he grabbed a cup before taking the space next to Michelle.

“Shit, I forgot to tell Harry about Ivy.” Niall said with a groan, glancing at Emma as he got them each a cup.

“What?” Harry smacked his lips as he heard his name, not sure what Niall was referring to.

“My friend, Ivy. She was with me at the shop when I got my tattoo.” Emma said, motioning her hand to where Ivy was sitting.

Harry leaned up to look past Michelle towards the person he had only briefly laid his eyes on before. He shrugged his shoulders, seemingly not concerned with her presence.

“I got the usual number, so she’s shit out of luck.” He casually said the harsh words.

Emma stood up to pass the drink to Ivy. “She can have mine! Here, Ivy, I’m not drinking anything else.”

She gladly took it and brought the cup to her lips, taking just a sip. That caught Zayn’s attention. He jolted up, pointing towards her with a grin on his face.

“Hey! I need to see you chug that since you’re so good at it.”

Emma clapped her hands together, remembering that she’s mentioned Ivy’s secret talent to him before. “C’mon, Ivy! Show ‘em how it’s done.”

“No, no. Not tonight.” Ivy let out a nervous laugh and slowly sipped the beer. It wasn’t her favorite drink, but she wasn’t going to be rude and turn down the offer.

Niall let a smirk grow on his lips. “I need to witness this, too. C’mon, we’ll get ya another one.”

She shook her head again. “I can’t, I might throw up. I’ve had a few.”

“What is it, can she chug quick?” Cory asked, leaning his elbow on his knee as he was now curious with the excitement coming from them.

“Fast as fuck, Cory. I swear, she’s insane.” Emma said with a proud smile.

“She’s exaggerating.” Ivy shook her head, trying to hide her flushing cheeks by turning her head.

Niall stood up, his cup still full, and stepped around the table to where Ivy was sitting. He grabbed her hand and yanked her up to her feet, laughing as she stumbled but quickly caught herself. Emma was cheering her on, knowing that Niall was about to challenge her.

“C’mon! Let’s see who can finish first.” Niall said, hitting his cup against hers, the liquid sloshing around in the clear plastic.

She let out a heavy sigh and rolled her eyes at them, aware that she wouldn’t hear the end of it if she chose not to do it. She cleared her throat, took a deep breath, and nodded.

“Fine.”

Niall boasted with excitement, screaming like his favorite team just won a game. Emma watched with a wide grin, her hands clasped together - she hadn’t seen Ivy have this much fun in a while, so she was ecstatic over it. Cory counted them down from three. Ivy relaxed her throat and let the liquid flow into her mouth. She closed her eyes, trying to dissociate herself so that she didn’t think about drinking quickly. The trick was to forget what you were actually doing and just.. do it. She was fairly good at the trick, seeming to perfect it. Niall still had about a third of his beer left when she dropped the cup on the table, not a single drop let.

Michelle jumped up and raised her hands high, screeching loud as she felt like she witnessed a miracle. Emma was laughing hard at the drop of Cory’s jaw and the impressed smirk on Zayn’s face.

“Fuck.” Niall choked out as he finished, his hand covering his stomach as he felt the beer rushing down his body.

“It’s all in the throat.” Ivy joked as she gave him a playful shove.

Niall chuckled, patting her on the back as if she achieved something so great. “M’glad you’re better with your throat than I am with mine.”

“Wait, wait. Now I’m feeling competitive.” Cory said with a laugh, glancing at his own drink that was still full.

“I can do one more, but that’s it.” Ivy said, her stomach bubbling from the contents filling it.

“Here. I barely drank any.” Michelle offered up her beer, more focused on the entertainment than drinking it herself.

“C’mon, let’s do it.” Cory jumped up, ready to put his previous years of being in a fraternity to the test.

Niall led the count this time, and as soon as the word ‘go’ left his mouth, Ivy had her lips on the rim of the cup, tipping it back into her mouth. Everyone watched again with amazement as laughter and cheers filled the space they shared. Well, all but one let out a joyful noise. Harry was sitting against the back of the couch with his arm over his chest, watching but seeming to not be amused by it. He thought Cory was being a flirt and Niall was just weak because he couldn’t get it down quicker than this girl.

“Damn, you’re good.” Cory couldn’t even finish his drink, he just gave up.

Ivy sat back down next to Michelle, who was definitely her newest cheerleader. Michelle had heard some positive things about Ivy, so she was glad she was enjoying her company.

“I told you she was good.” Emma said with a smirk as if she had placed bets and won.

“Got a throat on you, for sure.” Cory sighed out as he fell against the couch, his gut churning.

Harry scoffed to himself. “Throat like a whore.”

Niall heard the comment, but he wasn’t sure who else did. He shot Harry a stern glare, but he obviously didn’t care. Michelle slid her arm around Ivy’s back and tightly gripped her shoulder, pulling them closer together.

“This girl is a champ.” She declared. “Welcome to the group, Ivy. You’re officially one of the girls.”

Cory lifted his hand in a pretend toast. “It was an honor to get my ass kicked.”

“That’s a talent right there.” Zayn added, having not said that much tonight but he was definitely paying attention.

“That’s kind of gross.” Harry added to the conversation, a cocky smirk on his lips as he looked away from Ivy.

She furrowed her brows lightly, catching what he said this time. “You’re probably just scared I’d beat you, too.”

It was most definitely the alcohol that was causing her to speak so freely to the person she knew the least about in the group of people surrounding her. Sure, she was confident in herself when she wasn’t sober and she wouldn’t let a rude comment slide by unnoticed, but she was ready to spit out another line if he tested her patience.

Harry snarled his lip up, not liking that she was speaking to him in that manner. “Please, you wish.”

Michelle was never one to shy away from talking back to Harry, so when she added a few words, Ivy was pleased to know she wasn’t fighting this battle alone. “You’re such a douche. You’d probably cry if she out drank you.”

Harry shot her a glance, but he wasn’t concerned with his friend’s comment. He wasn’t too content with the idea of some random girl he didn’t know coming into his circle of friends and grabbing all the attention. Maybe he was jealous, or maybe he really was just a douche.

“I wouldn’t be braggin’ about a loose throat.” He sat up, his elbows hitting his knees as he eyed Ivy with a cold stare. “Probably take down dicks faster than beer.”

Ivy didn’t feel comfortable with him staring at her like he wanted to throw his fists into her body. She pursed her lips in an effort to let it go, not wanting to start any unwanted drama among her newfound friends - well, some of them were friends. Emma nudged Niall and mumbled to him about controlling his friend, but Niall knew there wasn’t much he could do.

“Give it a rest, Harry.” He sighed out, knowing that if he didn’t at least try then Emma would be upset with him.

Harry let out an unamused laugh. “Truth hurts, Horan.”

“Y’don’t have to be a dick about it, Harry. Give the girl some respect.” Zayn added, taking a sip of his drink after. He was staring at the table, not even wanting to give Harry the extra attention of a spared glance.

“All m’saying is it’s not that impressive.” Harry shrugged, standing up so he could make an exit from the group and go occupy himself with something else. But before he walked away, he stopped in front of Michelle and let his eyes fall down to the girl he knew nothing about. “Does your mother know you drink like a grown man?”

“Har-“ Emma tried to quickly intervene, but it was too late. Ivy was already responding to him.

“My mom’s dead. So, no, probably not.” Her cold tone and narrowed eyes made

Harry gently furrowed his brows. He heard exactly what she said, but he didn’t seem to care. Niall got up to grab his elbow, knowing that he should do something before any more hurtful comments were made.

“C’mon.” He pulled Harry away from the seating area, mumbling something about him needing to relax.

“Sorry about him.” Cory was the first to apologize as Niall and Harry disappeared into the small crowd.

Ivy fell back against the couch, her arms crossing over her chest. She licked her lips and nodded to him, not wanting to talk for fear of losing control of her emotions. Michelle gently rested her hand atop Ivy’s thigh, not wanting to be too overbearing but hoping to give her some comfort.

“I’m sorry, Ivy. I told Niall to make sure he was nice tonight.” Emma frowned, knowing that the comment Harry made would haunt Ivy for the next few days, if not longer.

“Yeah, he’s a bit of a dick.” Michelle said, a disappointment expression covering her features. “He doesn’t do well with change and.. I guess you being here is changing things. But it’s not your fault.”

“It’s fine. I.. I’m just going to ignore it.”

Ivy felt a burn in her chest that wasn’t from the drinks she downed minutes ago. This was a type of feeling erupting from the insults she caught. She was so upset with what was said to her, not just the thing about her mother, but more than that.. she was confused as to what she did that warranted that sort of treatment. Had she been rude to him by not greeting him like she did the others? He was so standoffish though, he didn’t appear to want to be spoken to. He acted like she wasn’t even sitting there when he walked up, even though he looked at her when he saw her next to Michelle. Was something said about her to him from someone else that he didn’t find appealing? Had Zayn not liked her when they met the second time, perhaps he made a comment to Harry? No, she shook that thought off. Zayn seemed to enjoy her company.

Cory mentioned something about getting a few shots, to which Ivy just nodded and agreed that it would be fun. He left the girls and Zayn alone, which made Zayn start up a conversation. Ivy was listening, but she wasn’t contributing. All she could think about was the rude behavior Harry displayed towards her. Surely, there must have been something she did to him. She couldn’t stop thinking about it.

Over towards the beaded curtain that was rattling from the vibrations of the music pounding through the building, Niall stood in front of Harry with a clearly irritated look on his face. Harry leaned against the wall, listening with a blank stare as Niall scolded him.

“Are you fucking serious? Why are you so rude?” Niall spat out, throwing his hands up in the air as the disbelief stuck in his mind. “Emma invited her out, you have no right to be such a dick to her.”

“I don’t fuckin’ know the chick.” Harry shrugged, not caring to listen to Niall’s parenting but he knew he couldn’t escape just yet.

“It doesn’t matter, Harry. I told you she was going to be here tonight and to be fuckin’ polite to her. At least treat her like she’s a person and not a piece of garbage.”

Harry huffed and moved his eyes to Niall’s. “I don’t know her. I don’t care about being polite to her.”

Niall shook his head, not believing what he was hearing. “Get to fuckin’ know her then. She’s not going anywhere, that’s Emma’s friend. Act like you have sense.”

“Look, I didn’t fuckin’ know her mom was dead.”

Niall wanted to wring his neck, he wasn’t getting the point. “It doesn’t matter! Act nice. Pretend to have a fuckin’ heart for once.”

Harry pushed himself off the wall, the conversation now boring him. He gave Niall a wave before deciding it was best if he just found a distraction for the rest of the night. Niall couldn’t quite understand why he was being so rude to Ivy, but there was nothing else that he could say. If his words worked, then that would be a miracle.

Ivy sat there quietly for a handful of minutes, ignoring the small talk that was going on around the table. Her eyes were roaming out through the crowd that had thickened since Niall stormed off with Harry in tow. The pole fixed to the ceiling was now occupied by a dancer in a lace bodysuit, strategically placed rips and holes scattered on the fabric. She seemed to have some of the people’s attention. One person she didn’t have, though, was Harry, and Ivy took notice of that only because she saw him with his forearm secured around some woman’s waist. He had pulled her close to him, smirking and biting his lips as the woman spoke to him.

Ivy wasn’t intending on finding him in the crowd to gaze at him, it just sort of happened. She was unfamiliar with the surroundings, so her eyes fixated on something she recognized - even if it wasn’t the nicest person she’d ever met. He was completely unaware of anything happening around him, all he was concerned with was what lived between that woman’s legs. The sight of him groping her ass and leaning down to whisper things in her ear left a nasty taste in Ivy’s mouth. She found it unpleasant to witness. That sort of thing should be private.

Michelle suddenly interrupted her trance with a pat to her leg before she stood up. “Do you wanna dance?”

Ivy looked up and let out a nervous laugh. “I think I’m okay sitting here for a bit.”

Michelle groaned and grabbed her hand, tugging her up with all her strength. “C’mon! Let’s go have some fun!”

She couldn’t stop Michelle from dragging her into the crowd, so she just let it happen. Emma gave her an encouraging cheer before they vanished from the table. The girls were shoving between people to find a more open spot on the dance floor, and once Michelle was pleased with where they ended up, she turned towards Ivy and grabbed onto her waist. She decided it was best to just let all those thoughts about the things Harry said and the way he acted go. Tonight was meant for fun, not dwelling. She relaxed her body and began swaying to the music with Michelle.

“That ass!” Michelle teased in a loud shout as Ivy shook her hips to the song that was blasting through the ceiling.

All she could do was laugh as a layer of blush covered her cheeks. The music was rattling the building and the alcohol was still cycling through her veins. She was enjoying herself again, no longer fixated on that song or those comments. It wasn’t long until Emma and Niall appeared next to them. Emma turned towards them while Niall placed himself behind her, hands secured on her waist. The three of them danced and sang along with the music while Niall mostly laughed and kept his hands on Emma.

Ivy had been nervous about going out tonight - not only going to a new place, but meeting a group of new people. She was worried that her first impression wouldn’t be good, that they wouldn’t like the energy she brought. It was obvious that all of them, aside from Harry, actually enjoyed her company. Even though she didn’t get a chance to talk to a few of them, like Alyssa, the way she did Michelle, she was confident that her impression was well made. The pulsing of the music through her ears pushed out the thoughts regarding Harry. Maybe he was just in a bad mood, or maybe he was just a bitter person. She didn’t know for sure, and she didn’t care that much anymore.

Niall disappeared to get himself a beer, leaving Emma to take Ivy’s hand and lift it in the air, jumping to the beat of the song and screaming the lyrics. Michelle was thrilled to have another girl to be around, and she hoped that it wouldn’t be the last time they saw each other. She knew she’d have to beg Emma to let her and Ivy get together again. Ivy wasn’t surprised by Emma’s energetic, sober performance. She didn’t need alcohol running in her system to enjoy a good song. The night was starting to feel endless and free, in the best way. That wouldn’t last too long, though.

At some point, her eyes were absentmindedly looking over Michelle’s shoulder and were pretty much out of focus until her brain registered that familiar face again. Harry. She tried to look away, but she couldn’t force herself to as she saw that same woman he was with earlier place her lips on his. Something deep inside of her gut churned and she furrowed her brows at her own thoughts. She shook her head lightly and cut her eyes away from them. Almost as if there was a gravitational pull she couldn’t stop, her eyes shifted back to him after a few seconds.

His hair was slick with sweat, his curls shining under the flashing lights. The sweat on his skin shined like diamonds as the woman ran her hand down his forearm. Her nails scratched over the tattoo he showed off at the shop, veins popped out and skin tight around his muscles. It was like she noticed every single thing about him. Someone got in her way, blocking her view entirely. She huffed and looked towards Emma, who was still singing happily to the song playing.

Ivy was genuinely confused as to why she was thinking about him so much. Why did she care what he was doing? Why did she care who he was with? She hardly knew him. She rolled her eyes to herself and lifted her head in time to see Niall walking up, three drinks in his hand. He offered one to her and one to Michelle. They cheered together, laughing as Niall stumbled his way back to Emma. She jumped back into the song and started singing again, enjoying herself for the rest of the night.

—•—

When morning rolled over, Ivy didn’t move an inch in her bed until well after eleven o’clock. She knew Emma would sleep in with Niall, so she didn’t bother trying to be up before them. Niall stayed over every now and then, and of course he always requested a meal be made if the girls were up for it. Ivy was put on breakfast duty since Emma said she’s better at it. Niall slurred a quick beg to her last night before Emma drug him to the bedroom to get changed and tucked in. Ivy agreed to it, despite knowing her head would be pounding in the morning.

And it most definitely was. She groaned as she squeezed her eyes shut, the sunlight peeking through the curtains was enough to blind her. There was no point in sleeping any more of the day away, so she reluctantly got out of the bed after taking a few minutes to compose herself. Her arms stretched high above her head, her back popping as she twisted slightly. She sighed in relief, a weight was lifted from her as her body contorted with her stretches and groans.

Her trip to the bathroom presented her with a horrific reflection in the mirror. Her makeup had not been properly removed before she fell into her bed last night, and her hair was a wreck. She debated on taking a shower, but eventually decided it would be best to get it over with. Emma and Niall were still passed out down the hall, so she wasn’t worried about waking anyone or not having the food done in time. Niall would definitely still want breakfast no matter the time.

After her quick shower, she got changed into a set of loungewear and headed to the kitchen. She gathered all the items from the refrigerator and the cabinets, staying mindful of Niall’s large appetite. He did say he would throw in some money on their next grocery run, so she wasn’t concerned with rationing any particular item. She wasn’t in there very long by herself. Emma strolled in after a few minutes, having smelled the food starting to cook.

“Good morning, sunshine.” Ivy smirked as she saw Emma’s tired expression and tangled hair.

“Morning.” She mumbled back. “Niall slept like an animal last night.”

“Did he move around a lot?”

Emma groaned. “A lot? He moved constantly. Usually he doesn’t. I’m so tired.”

Ivy held back a laugh and just smiled. Emma sat down at the dining table, her eyes focused on what Ivy was doing. She just watched in silence for a while, too tired to say anything. They were by themselves for the majority of the cooking process. The bedroom door opened down the hall, but the bathroom door shut moments after. Niall spent a bit of time in the bathroom, which made Emma groan and hope that he wasn’t throwing up or suffering a bad hangover. He had quite a few drinks.

Eventually, almost the same time the food was ready, he walked in the kitchen with a smile on his face. Emma rolled her eyes as he tried to give her a kiss and a hug, and an apology about sleeping so roughly. Ivy let out a chuckle as he threw his hands up in defeat.

“Thanks for cooking, Ivy.” Niall said once he fixed his plate and sat down at the table with them.

“You’re welcome.”

Emma looked up from her plate and gave Niall a stern glare. He was confused at first, but when she shot her gaze to Ivy, he miraculously remembered the conversation they had in the middle of the night when he woke Emma up complaining about his head hurting. It took them a while to fall back asleep, so they just talked for a bit.

He cleared his throat after taking a sip of his water. “Um, Ivy.”

She looked his way. “Yeah?”

Niall took in a deep breath and slowly pushed it out. He seemed a bit hesitant at first, but he was trying to figure out what to say. He licked his lips and leaned back in his chair, forgetting the food for now.

“I want to apologize to you.”

Ivy dropped her brows, spared Emma a glance, then looked back to him. “What?”

He lightly sighed. “Harry.”

She was still unsure what Niall meant for a few moments, but suddenly everything came crashing back into her mind. She adjusted herself in the chair and started picking at the pancake with her fork, not really wanting to bring it back up but knowing she can’t avoid it now.

“It’s fine, Niall.”

“No, it isn’t.” Emma said, just as embarrassed by the situation as Niall was.

“He said some shitty things to you.. and I’m sorry. I.. I didn’t want that to happen, none of us did. Zayn sent me a text this morning telling me to tell you he was sorry, too.”

Ivy a wallowed gently, surprised that someone else had reached out about the situation. She thought what happened was unfortunate, but she didn’t think she’d receive such a reaction from them. Emma had a frown fixed on her lips as she kept her eyes on Niall, waiting for him to continue.

“The last thing Emma and I wanted was for you to think our friends didn’t like you. They do, they really do. I can’t speak for him but.. the rest of us are sorry.”

“Niall, it’s not that big of a deal, I promise.” Ivy tried to sail past it, but it wasn’t going to go down that easy.

“Yes it is, Ivy.” He breathed out. “He’s an ass and he says some messed up things. We’re all used to it.. and you aren’t. You shouldn’t have been spoken to that way.”

For a second, she was just ready to ignore it all again, but she changed her mind. Niall was genuinely upset and trying his best to make up for it, and she could tell Emma felt the same way. She remembered how everyone reacted when Harry said what he said last night. She thought about the way she saw Cory pinch his nose and shake his head in disbelief, and how Alyssa smacked Zayn’s arm in an attempt to get him to intervene. She remembered all the little things each of them did and how they all seemed to be in shock, embarrassed, or annoyed with it.

“Okay.. I accept the apology.” She finally said, trying to give him the best smile she could. “I promise, it’s okay.”

“I’ll beat his ass if he says something like that to you again.” Emma crossed her arms over her chest and huffed.

Niall couldn’t resist laughing at her, and Ivy quickly joined her. Although the previous night had a rollercoaster of events, she was glad that she had this new group of people to consider as her friends. For now, she’d just forget about Harry and focus on the positive memories she was able to create. As far as she was concerned, she would be perfectly fine if she never saw him again.

[a/n: I’ve been very sick these past few days but I wanted to get this out so pls ignore any spelling mistakes and all that, I’ll fix them later. if you want to be on the taglist, let me know! anyways, hope you enjoy this! love uuu! Also just a reminder that while this is lhh, he’s older in this series than actual lhh was]

** if you’re here for a reread, i did change this character to an oc so she has a name now!!

taglist: @walkingintheheartbreaksatellite @victoriasigaard @ariiscringe @harlowsgirl l @lomllover @haniaaa04 @sideboobrry11 @tenaciousperfectionunknown @fangirl509east @fruity-harry @sassamanda77 @lizsogolden @prettygurl-2009 @boopookie @mypolicemanharryyy

[sungbeam]

BIRDS OF PREY — four

nonidol!kim hongjoong x f!reader

living in gray areas of your city, out of the way of gangs and mafia territories, could only keep you safe for so long. it was only a matter of time before you began running into problems, or rather, problems began running into you.

▷ genre, warnings. nc-17, strangers 2 lovers, slow burn, mafia au, angst, swearing, mentions of alcohol, mentions of death/murder, mentions of being blacklisted

▷ word count. 5.6k

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CHAPTER FOUR: WHERE DANGER FOLLOWS

HIS NAME WAS WOOYOUNG, the staff member who had come down from the upper decks of the Shipwreck and who received your request for parley. He told you as much because he didn't have a name tag, but he seemed to enjoy chatting. 

“Yn, isn't it?” He peered over his shoulder from a couple steps ahead upon the metal, spiral staircase. He had a boyish grin splitting his face and it was an expression that made you feel at ease, but also uncertain, all at once. 

You paused. Did everyone at this damn place know your name? “Uhm yeah…”

He had agreed to take you up to his boss, which meant coming behind the bar with him and up the stairs. His eyes seemed to turn upward even more at your response, if that was possible. “You're kinda famous around here,” he chirped, continuing up the stairs with you following after him. 

Your eyes widened. “Famous?” What was that supposed to mean?

“Yeah,” he replied easily. He disappeared onto the floor above before he could continue, and you hurried up to catch his next words. “For saving our Ca—our boss's life three times. It's pretty crazy how much street cred you've racked up and this is only your first time in Hala Town.”

For a moment, you were at a loss of words. Then you fully processed what he said. “Wait… how do you know this is my first time in Hala Town?”

“I'm a great guesser,” he said, then threw a cheeky wink over his shoulder. 

Though unconvinced, you said nothing else on the topic. 

The spiral stairs led up onto a middle deck where a small kitchen was installed toward the bow of the boat, as well as a casual seating area on the stern side. At the center was a set of stairs that led up and out onto the main deck. 

You brushed your hair out of your eyes as you and Wooyoung emerged onto the main deck. The sea breeze was front and center to your olfactory senses once more, and you glanced up at the sliver of sun peering through the overcast sky. You shivered when a particularly chilly gust of wind brushed past, and you wondered how Wooyoung looked so comfortable in his rather thin dress shirt. 

“His office is the old captain's quarters” —another grin thrown over his shoulder, paired with a twinkling in his eyes— “fitting, right?”

“Yeah…” Why did it feel like everything he said came with an underlying message you weren't picking up? There was a massive piece of the puzzle missing from the context you were unaware of. 

You swept the thought aside; perhaps that was just his nature of speaking. 

Wooyoung walked you up to the door and promptly knocked on its wooden surface. It was only a courtesy knock, it seemed, because he invited himself in without waiting for a reply. 

“You have a visitor, hyung,” Wooyoung said, holding the door open to present you to the room. 

The voices that had been talking amongst themselves came to a halt. The person you recognized was Hongjoong, the one seated behind the grand mahogany desk at the center of the office. There was another man standing just beside him with dark, wavy hair that curtained around his sculpted face. He straightened from his position where he had leaned over to peer at whatever papers were on the desk. 

Wait… you'd definitely seen this man before, too. Hadn't it been at the bank explosion?

You saw the recognition, followed by the curiosity, as it appeared on both their faces. 

The man you didn't know was quick to sweep the papers off the desk before Hongjoong laced his fingers over the surface. “Yn, what a surprise.”

“Hi,” you murmured, taking an experimental step into the room. “Are we interrupting?”

Hongjoong waved his hand in dismissal. “Oh, no. Don't worry about it; just business things.” He gestured to the man at his side, who passed you a polite smile and nod. “This is my right-hand man, Seonghwa.”

“Hello, Yn,” Seonghwa greeted softly. “Nice to finally meet you.”

You decided to hold back on confronting him about being one of the security guards at the bank that day. Maybe he just worked multiple jobs. “Nice to meet you, too.”

“Wooyoung-ah, we need to discuss some things,” Seonghwa said, straightening the papers against the desk before nodding his chin out toward the exit. 

“Sure!” Wooyoung sent you one last reassuring grin. “See ya, Yn.”

You stepped aside to let Seonghwa walk past you out of the office, and he closed the door as he did so. That left you and Hongjoong. 

You took this moment to soak in your surroundings. The captain's quarters were rather spacious with a bookshelf pressed up against the wall to your right, an armchair and coat rack to the left, and a large window making up most of the space behind Hongjoong looking out the ship's stern side. The man himself became even more regal behind the desk. 

This was his domain, his kingdom, to some degree. You were on his turf now. 

“Well,” Hongjoong drawled, leaning back in his seat and dragging a hand through his hair, “won't you please sit?” He gestured a hand toward the empty chair across the table. “I won't bite.”

Right. You willed yourself to move toward the seat, lowering yourself onto it and setting your bag onto the floor by your feet. A wave of déjà vu crested over you—this felt awfully familiar, him across the desk from you. 

“I'm not sure if I should be pleasantly surprised to see you or worried,” he mused. “Usually when I see you, I'm in some kind of trouble.”

You let out a small laugh, half of it being at the irony as to why you were here in the first place. “Heh… yeah. But you don't have to worry. I'm not here because you're in any danger or anything—that I know of, at least.”

Hongjoong tilted his head slightly, eyes narrowing as the corners of his lips turned upward. “That's good to hear. I didn't think I'd ever hear from you again after that night. Are you holding up alright?”

“I, uh,” you stammered, fidgeting with the end of your scarf, before deeming that it was far too warm in here. You began unwrapping the fabric from around your neck, bundling up into a neat lump to hold in your lap. “That's actually why I'm here.”

“Oh?”

“I know you said that, uh—for saving your life, you would owe me?”

Understanding came onto his face. “Ah, I see. The life debt.”

“Yes, the life debt,” you said, as if those words tasted sour on your tongue. Why did saying it like that make it sound so much more unsavory? “After the bar burned down, I've been trying to look for alternate places of work, and I haven't had much luck.”

Hongjoong considered you for a moment, his hand coming up toward his chin to mindlessly massage his jaw. “You want money then.”

“I want a job,” you corrected. Then added, “Here, I mean. I have waitressing experience—you already know. And I brought a copy of my résumé if you need that. I just need something to keep me afloat for the time being.” You pressed your lips together and prayed you didn't sound as desperate as you thought you did. Or maybe sounding more desperate would help your case. 

You watched him slowly nod his head. “Okay, I can do that. I trust that you'll be a great addition to our team here.”

You were still holding your breath, though, waiting for the other shoe to fall—if there was one. “You… you're just gonna hire me?” It couldn't be that easy.

“Yes,” he said simply. “For some reason, I feel like I can trust you. Maybe it's because you've saved me from certain death three times,” he chuckled. With a flick of his wrist, he continued, “I do have a question for you, Miss Yn.”

“Sure.”

Hongjoong licked his lips, then pressed them together. He laced his fingers together with his elbows against the table top. “Why here? Why all the way in Hala Town when I'm sure you are more than competent for the bars and restaurants in the gray areas.”

Oh. 

Beneath the fabric of your scarf, your hands wrung each other out. Should you be honest or should you suck up to him? There was an itchy feeling at the back of your brain that it would help you more to be honest, in this case. Hongjoong didn't seem like the type of person to go back on his word. 

You exhaled. “To be honest? It's not for lack of trying—as I mentioned before, I haven't had much luck anywhere in the gray areas. At this point, I think I've been blacklisted,” you added the comment at the end in a way you hoped sounded like a joke, even if you were dead serious. 

His mouth curled down into a frown, and for a moment, your heartbeat slipped. Was that the wrong thing to say?

“Blacklisted?” he echoed. 

“I'm sure it's something else entirely,” you quickly amended. “I don't—I’m still working on my college degree, and I—wait, no. I definitely wouldn't understand if that's a deal breaker; I am still just as capable as a person with a college degree for this position.”

Hongjoong dipped his head in another nod. “I agree, and no, it's not a deal breaker. When can you start?”

“Today—tonight. The sooner the better.”

His lips pulled into a smile. “Excellent. I'll call one of my staff members to get you started with our onboarding process.” He paused for a beat, like he was mentally debating something. His eyes flickered back to you. “I do have one more question.”

You nodded. “'Course.”

“The man you heard with Ms. Iwazaki that night—do you remember what he looked like? What he sounded like?”

You blinked; that was the last thing you expected to be asked. The image of your late boss's dead expression flickered into the forefront of your mind and you shuddered, then you shuddered again, recalling the Mr. Young character from that night. To the best of your ability, you recalled to Hongjoong what he looked like, what he sounded like, and what he had said. He hung onto every word you said, a pensive furrow between his brows. 

At the end of your report, you queried, “But what can we even do with this info? I don't think the authorities would try to look for him either, especially if he's associated with the Captain.”

Something you said made Hongjoong's shoulders stiffen. The movement wasn't incredibly obvious, but you were focused wholly on him. “Right,” he drawled. “The Captain.”

“Yeah, the note the authorities found in the fire debris,” you said carefully. “It said ‘Tribute to the Pirate King.’ I figured Mr. Young might have been working for the Captain, but I can't understand why he was coming after you.”

Hongjoong relaxed his posture and his expression, carding a hand through his hair. “I'm sure it's nothing much to worry about.”

Your brows wrinkled together. “You could still be in danger, Hongjoong.”

“And I appreciate your concern,” he replied firmly, but not unkindly. There was a reassuring strength to his voice that made your chest warm. He shot you a small smile. “I'll be fine. And besides—now that you're here, I'll know danger as soon as it arrives.”

You weren't sure how he could be so relaxed about his life always being in danger, but you supposed it came with living in a non-gray area. 

When you finalized logistical and red tape business regarding your employment at the Shipwreck, Hongjoong summoned one of his staff members, San, to begin your training. 

That left Hongjoong alone in his office again, a headache beginning to manifest in his temples. He pushed out a breath from his lips—you were blacklisted from gray area establishments and you believed the Captain was behind the demise of your former workplace. Not to mention how you also thought Hongjoong's alter ego was trying to kill him. 

Too much to think about. 

Right before you'd come in, he and Seonghwa had been discussing certain locations of interest within the east corner to place infiltration groups. It was just to monitor the situation, especially with the council meeting approaching at the end of this week. 

Hongjoong pressed his lips against his clasped hands to let himself think. 

A moment later, he reached for the phone seated on the corner of his desk, picking up the receiver and dialing a certain number. 

“Aye, Cap'n!” came Wooyoung's cheerful reply from the other end. 

Hongjoong used his free hand to massage the space between his eyes. “Hey, could you look into the gray area business association's blacklist records for Ln Yn?”

A hum of confusion. “Ln Yn? Like the one we just met?”

“That's the one.” He had a sneaking suspicion this was partly his fault. 

Truthfully, he didn't know why he cared so much—why he cared so much about your being blacklisted or why he cared so much about you. 

It had to be because he still owed you. His conscience wouldn't leave him nor you alone until those two remaining life debts were taken care of. 

He could hear the sounds of keys clacking from the other end of the receiver. Seonghwa must have finished discussing the plans with him if Hongjoong couldn't hear him there with Wooyoung. 

“Ah, yeah,” he could hear the wince in his friend's voice. “She's there alright. How'd she get added to this thing anyway?” It took less than a minute for Wooyoung to pull up the brief file under your name, and he scoffed. “Oh, it's bullshit, hyung.”

Hongjoong straightened. “What? Tell me.”

“It just says 'Associated with the Ateez mafia—danger to the public.’ It's bullshit.”

He knew it. 

Hongjoong jammed his tongue into his cheek, a chilling calm falling over him. “Okay. Thanks, Wooyoung. That'll be all.”

“Sure, Captain.”

The phone fell against the receiver and Hongjoong clasped his hands together once more. Whoever this Mr. Young was not only attempted to burn him, Jongho, and you alive, but also was pulling some kind of string to mess with your life. That had to be it. 

As if this situation had befallen one of his own family, it made his jaw clench and blood simmer. In a way, you were a part of the family—

No. You were here out of necessity, not to join his mafia group. This was all a whole load of horseshit that was just unfortunate circumstances on your end. He wasn't about to make it worse. You didn't choose this. 

But the more he thought about it, the more a sinking feeling began to pool in his gut… that the burned-down building, the blacklisting—all of it was still only the beginning of your involvement, whether either of you liked it or not. 

Your first evening on the job, you were triple-managed by Wooyoung, San, and Yeosang, the latter of whom you met about three hours after you first arrived at the Shipwreck. San fixed you up with a company T-shirt with the logo on it and a waist apron for the time being, but promised that once you got more comfortable here, you would be switched into something closer to what he wore. His and his friends’ uniforms consisted of white dress shirts and dark colored vests and pants—garments a pirate or a cowboy or any racketeering bad boy from the past would supposedly wear. 

Suffice to say, you stuck out like a sore thumb, dress-wise. But it didn't matter, as long as you could do your job well enough. 

Yeosang was as beautifully built as his friends were, but much quieter. He mainly dipped his head in a cordial greeting at the beginning of his shift before joining San behind the bar. Like Seonghwa, it became apparent to you that you'd seen him before—at the bank, as a teller, the day of the explosion. Could it be a coincidence? Again, perhaps he was holding onto multiple jobs at once; who were you to pry despite your… curiosity?

You and Wooyoung were in charge of the floor for the night, which meant catering to the patrons seated on the gambling level below or the raised platform. Wooyoung, much more accustomed to the environment and the kinds of people who frequented the Shipwreck, spared you and let you stick to the people on the upper floor for the time being. 

Once you got into the swing of things, the flow became much easier to navigate. The customers here weren’t so different from your previous job. 

You were hurrying back over to the bar on the starboard side of the ship when you realized Hongjoong and Seonghwa now sat at the far end of the bar, chatting with San as he shook something in his cocktail shaker. It was about two-thirds of the way into the night since your shift would end at two tonight—had Hongjoong and Seonghwa both been upstairs this whole time? They had to be workaholics at heart or something. 

As you approached their end of the bar, Hongjoong must have felt your eyes on him, and he lifted his head up to catch your gaze. He had been midway through a laugh, and you saw the way his eyes turned upward and his mouth stretched into a dazzling smile. If you didn’t have previous experience, you might have tripped over your own feet on your way over, but you were able to keep steady. 

“Yn, this is for table seven,” San said in greeting, his chin inclining in the direction behind you where you had just come from. He strained the frothy clear liquid into a coup glass, nestling a lime along its edge. 

You carefully transferred the drink onto your tray. “Thanks. Also, I need another round of dirty martinis for table two. Two olives for one and just one for the other.”

“You got it,” he nodded, already pulling a pair of clean martini glasses from the rack beneath the counter. 

You exchanged glances with Hongjoong and Seonghwa once before heading over to table five with their beverage. 

As you left, Hongjoong’s eyes followed, observing the natural service smile plastered on your face as you deftly set the coup glass onto the table for the customer. He and Seonghwa had only just come down from the upper decks to escape from work for just a moment. He blindly lifted his glass of whiskey on the rocks to his lips, the liquid burning a path down the back of his throat. 

From what he could see thus far, you seemed to fit right in here. Maybe you thought you had something to prove with how hard you worked—or maybe that was thinking about it too much. You had a good work ethic; you’d worked in a similar environment before. 

“She’s good at what she does, Captain,” San murmured under his breath, he and Seonghwa following Hongjoong’s gaze to where you immediately attended to the newcomers who just walked into the hold. “I see why you hired her.”

“She didn’t apply in the conventional way, though.” Seonghwa passed Hongjoong a sidelong glance. “Would you have let her stay if she was bad at it?” he mused. 

Hongjoong lifted a shoulder nonchalantly, turning around on his barstool to face San again. “Who knows? But nothing to report to me about her, San? Nothing to be worried about?”

The bartender gave a shake of his head before setting the finished martini glasses onto the bar top. He raised a hand to catch your gaze and bring you back to the bar to pick them up. “Nothing alarming. As I’ve said, she’s good. So how did she come to be here? I thought the fire would have scared her off.”

“Necessity,” Hongjoong answered with an exhale. “Someone’s gotten her blacklisted from all of the gray area establishments, so she asked a favor of me.”

Something troubled creased between San’s brows, his movements wiping down a damp glass slowing but not stilling. “Blacklisted? Who the fuck…” Something like realization dawned in his eyes. “Poor kid,” he muttered, eyes shifting to the side just as you returned to the bar.

An easy smile came onto San’s lips to replace the look of concern that used to be there. “Anything else for the queue?” he asked, leaning across the bar to swap the dirty glasses you brought back with the fresh drinks. 

“A rum and coke, and two beers,” you reported. You shook the hair from your eyes. “And they asked for a Blue Bird? Do we do those here?”

San nodded. “Oh yeah, it’s one of our specialities. I’ll have those ready for you in a few, Yn.”

Your eyes slipped over to Hongjoong and Seonghwa again, the two of them passing small nods in acknowledgment. “Thanks, San. I’ll be back.” 

When you were out of earshot, Hongjoong dumped the remainder of the liquid in his glass down his throat. He hadn’t looked into your situation at all after that call to Wooyoung to confirm that you were in fact on the blacklist. The rest of the time he was holed up in his office, he’d spent completing administration tasks for the Shipwreck. If he wasn't here, he would have been at the warehouse or out on the streets to take care of his other occupation’s tasks. 

What was he going to do about you? 

He felt a light nudge in his side. San had shifted away to engage with a customer who’d come to sit a few stools away, so it left Hongjoong and Seonghwa to their own devices. “You seem in your head, Captain,” Seonghwa said as he lifted his glass to his mouth. “The girl will be fine here.”

“I’m not worried about that—well, not necessarily.” He sighed, then asked his friend, “Why did she end up here? What was the purpose?”

Seonghwa blinked. “You extended an offer of assistance to her in exchange for saving your life; she is now taking you up on that offer because she has nowhere else to go.”

“That, Hwa. That is what’s bothering me.” Hongjoong massaged his jawline in thought, his brows pursing together. It would be easy to target you, even inadvertently. You were vulnerable, as the blacklisting debacle proved. “Her hand was forced, Seonghwa. So what was the purpose of cornering her here?”

“‘Cornering’ is a strong word to use,” he replied with raised brows. 

Hongjoong’s lips pressed together. “That’s just what this feels like.” He didn’t glance over at you when you came back to pick up your next order, only deigning to look up when your back was turned. He never liked getting civilians involved in their affairs, but was it really your fault that you ended up here? Only someone desperate would leave the safety of the gray area to run into the arms of a gang. 

You had become his opponent’s pawn, but for what purpose? 

Then there was the matter of your beliefs about the Captain. That was another headache on its own; it didn't bother him that some people might think of his alter ego negatively because that came with the job. Respect and fear sometimes worked in similar ways. 

“Do you think she suspects who you are?” Seonghwa asked. “Especially after that first night?”

Hongjoong shook his head. “She thinks that we are two different people entirely, but I don't doubt that she's suspicious of me. She's likely more concerned about her own livelihood now though.” How much did you fear him? It at least seemed that you were concerned for his well being, based on your actions and questions. Why did you care? Why did he care? 

Hongjoong cleared his throat and broke his gaze away from you. “Any news from the others about their statuses?”

With such an abrupt change of topic, Seonghwa knew not to press the previous subject any further, at least for the time being. He swallowed the rest of his drink, leaning his elbows against the countertop. “Nothing particular from my people yet. They’ll be moving into position around the east corner throughout the week. Jongho and Yunho say that the authorities haven’t heard anything interesting either. It’s strange… it’s almost too quiet.”

Hongjoong’s brows furrowed again. Though some claimed that no news was good news, this only muddied Hongjoong’s concerns even further. As he counted the days until this goddamn council meeting, he didn't need anything else to heighten the tension in his spine. 

He watched you at the farther end of the bar out of the corner of his eye, requesting a flurry of drinks from both San and Yeosang's combined efforts. There was a certain quality to your instincts, he was slowly coming to realize. 

Would it be so bad if you knew who he was? Would you not be an asset to him if you were by—on his side, where he had one more pair of eyes looking out for danger?

Hongjoong swirled the melting bits of ice at the bottom of his glass. He said to Seonghwa, as he gazed into the liquid like they were prophetic tea leaves, “I think I'm tipsy.”

“After one drink?” his counterpart chuckled. 

“I have to be,” he muttered, now turning to watch you leave the bar again. This had to be the fifth time within the hour that he stole a glance your way. “Because I'm getting stupid, stupid ideas.”

When two in the morning rolled around, you were dismissed for the night. You smelled like a drunk man with all the booze smell clinging to your clothes, but for the first time in a week, the tension in your shoulders was from focus and not stress. 

Your coworkers (because that was what they were to you now) bid you farewell after you all had a hand in cleaning and closing up together. Hongjoong and Seonghwa had departed from the premises a couple hours earlier, and you hadn't seen either of them since. 

As your feet hit the pier below, you mustered up the energy and courage to make the trek home. Before, going home took much less time since you lived only a few metro stops away. Being deep into Hala Town was different. You didn't know these streets, let alone in the dark, and your commute would be at least double what it was before. 

“Hey Yn!” You glanced back to find Wooyoung jogging down the gangway toward you with his hand raised. Behind him, San and Yeosang were locking up the door to access the hold. “Did you drive?”

You shook your head. “Nah, I took the train.”

He frowned slightly, falling into step with you. The direction of the small parking lot nearby and the metro station were in the same direction. “It's a long way home for you, isn't it, if you live in Sector 1? Do you want a ride back instead?”

The thought sounded appealing. You'd had a couple coworkers offer you rides before, but you usually declined. Sometimes train rides home were tiring, but you were just as tired. It allowed you time to sit with your thoughts. “Oh, uh, that's okay. Thanks for the offer though.”

“What if I walk you then? Just to the station.”

You didn't have any reason to deny him that, at least, and having someone you kind of knew would ease your worries until you got back onto familiar land. 

Wooyoung shouted back to his friends that they shouldn't wait up for him, and you and he bounded across the street to the business district. 

The night, as it was in the day, was chilly. You tugged your jacket closer to your body, the bottom half of your face shoved into the warmth of your scarf. Beside you, Wooyoung seemed more acclimated to it, wearing only a light hoodie with his hands tucked into his pockets. 

“So,” he piped up, “what'd you think of your first night on the job?”

You hummed. “It was good. It's just relieving to know that I have a job again, I guess.”

“That's understandable,” he nodded in reply. “You seemed to be right in your element.”

“Thanks,” you chuckled. “It's an environment I'm definitely used to.”

“Hongjoong hyung seemed pleased with how you were getting on.”

Funny he should mention him… You tucked your bottom lip between your teeth. “Are you… are you close to Hongjoong? You all seem to be pretty tightly-knit.”

Wooyoung glanced over at you. “Oh, yeah. I suppose you could say we're like found family,” he smiled slightly to himself. “He takes care of us.”

That seemed to be within his nature, you thought, especially with the way he came to you at the bar weeks ago to thank you for saving his life, and with his graciousness in giving you a position here in your desperation. You didn't know how you got so wrapped up in his affairs, but you were here nonetheless. You weren't quite sure what to make of it.

Your counterpart considered you again. “Is something on your mind?”

Should you ask him? It wouldn't hurt, right? “I think,” you began, “I'm concerned about Hongjoong. Earlier in the office, he dismissed my concern about his still being in danger and that the Captain might have something against him.”

“The Captain?” His tone was incredulous. “I don't think he has something against Hongjoong. They hardly” —he coughed— “they don't cross paths or anything.”

You turned your gaze toward him with your mouth twisted into a frown. “But the bar burned down as a tribute to him, and it would have only been saved in exchange for Hongjoong—whatever he wanted with him. I just can't understand why Hongjoong's so dismissive about his own safety.”

Though, when you thought back to the night you first met him, he likely could take care of himself. Those five men must have never seen him coming. You shivered, playing it off as a cold gust of wind making it past your outerwear. 

Wooyoung sighed. “Yeah, hyung can be like that sometimes. Seonghwa also gets annoyed when Hongjoong dismisses his own safety, but that's just who he is.”

“That's not very reassuring.”

“I know,” he bit his cheek. “But Hongjoong can take care of himself.”

“That,” you said, staring pointedly at the sidewalk, “I know.” 

Wooyoung laughed. “As for the Captain… don't believe every vile thing you hear about him.”

“Oh?” 

His shoulders lifted and dropped in a half-hearted shrug. “Most of the people here feel better about him being in power than the previous reigning family. Maybe I'm just biased, but” —he stopped himself; you just arrived in front of the metro station entrance, yet he lingered. “I'm not saying he's a saint,” he amended carefully, “I'm just saying that there are people in this city who are far worse.”

You didn't know what to do with this information. This was coming from a man whom you only just met a little over twelve hours ago. You needed time to let all of this register in your exhausted brain before you could even begin to make any more judgments. 

You shoved your cold hands into the warmth under your arms. “Do you know why Hongjoong's being targeted recently?” you asked quietly. That was what you should have cared more about. 

He seemed a little surprised that you brought the conversation back to your boss, his eyes fluttering with a blink. “I'm not sure I should tell you, to be honest.”

Your forehead creased. “Ah…”

“It's just not for me to say,” he said helplessly. 

“I'm guessing you won't tell me who he really is then either?”

Wooyoung cocked his head to the side. “I'm not sure I follow…”

You wanted to call bullshit, but the exhaustion was seeping into your joints now that the adrenaline was gone. After everything you witnessed regarding Kim Hongjoong, you couldn't possibly be expected to buy the fact that he was only the owner of a bar and miniature casino. There had to be something else to him, something that was making him attract danger like opposite poles of a magnet. 

“Whatever,” you waved your question away with a tired huff. “What time should I be here tomorrow?”

That seemed to make Wooyoung's posture loosen. “If you could clock in at five, that'd be great.”

“Gotcha.” You began to turn toward the metro station. “Night, Wooyoung.”

“Night, Yn. Take care of yourself, alright?”

Your hand met the stairs railing as you peered over your shoulder at him. “You, too.”

You descended into the metro station proper without much else delay. There came an eagerness to your step at the thought of going home triumphant for once—that you were no longer unemployed. You no longer felt like a burden to Ryujin despite her constant reassurance that you weren't. 

You'd been through much the last few weeks, and you couldn't wait until things got back to normal. (If that same level of “normal” could still be achieved.)

As you collapsed into a seat inside a subway car, you attempted to make sense of the amount of information you received today. There was a tie between Hongjoong and the Captain, one that Wooyoung refused to divulge and one that wasn't blatantly apparent to you just yet. 

All of this made your head spin and your stomach twist uncomfortably. Maybe it was better if you didn't think about it. 

When you arrived at your home stop, you picked yourself up off the bench and trudged up the stairs. The route to your apartment was a familiar one, so you strode through side streets and back ways to get home the fastest, not necessarily the safest and most illuminated. 

You passed by a dark alleyway that always made your pulse leap, even if you knew the only dangerous thing in there were rats and fly larvae. 

Thump. 

You nearly tripped over your feet, heart stuttering in your chest. 

The glance you stole down the alleyway was out of instinct. There was no one there that you could see, but even as you continued on your way home, you couldn't shake the feeling of something watching you from the shadows. 

a/n: pls remember to reblog if you enjoyed!

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[unlimitedlust]

Bite Me - Eric Draven (AU) x Reader | Part. 2

(The image above does not belong to me, all credits belong to its owner)

Summary:

They were childhood rivals who hadn’t spoken in years, until a wedding reunion throws them back into each other’s orbit. With tension simmering beneath every glance, one weekend turns into a series of unexpected moments, sharp words, and almosts that linger long after the party ends. But when fate keeps bringing them back together, the line between hate and something far more irresistible begins to blur.

Author’s note:

Thank you very much to everyone who liked, shared and commented on the first part, it makes me so so so happy and so hyped that I already got the second part down for you, have fun 🫶🏻

Tags: @malenoradgn @muchwita

Masterlist

Disclaimers:

As the story progresses I’ll let you know if the chapters has any sensitive topics beforehand.

This story will have smut scenes in the future, but you’ll be warned!

English is not my first language, so forgive me for any mistakes I eventually skipped while proof-reading it.

This is a AU Eric Draven!!!

If you enjoy this, please let me know if I should continue this, your feedback is precious for me 🫶🏻

End of Author’s note.

The road stretched endlessly ahead, two narrow lanes cutting through forests dense enough to block out half the sun. Y/N tapped the steering wheel to the beat of whatever song was playing, though she hadn’t really heard a single note. Her focus had been splintered since the wedding. Or more accurately, since she saw him again after so many years.

She took another sip of her now watery iced coffee and sighed. She knew this weekend was a terrible idea, but still she couldn’t say no to one of her closest friends.

Alex, the bride from the wedding, would move abroad with her now husband Jeff in a couple of days so they set up a post-wedding getaway at a lake house with their closest and oldest friends. Y/N and Eric were part of that inner circle, she on Alex’s side and Eric on Jeff’s.

“Everyone’s coming,” her friend had said a few days before, eyes too bright, voice too innocent. “It’ll be a couples’ trip, kind of. You’ll have so much fun you won’t even remember he’s around”

That’s what she said, followed just by a winking and heart emoji in the bridesmaids group chat and a time to show up.

Y/N had wanted to go, truthfully. She liked the idea of quiet mornings, barbecue afternoons and wine nights by the lake, nostalgia with old friends. And she liked everyone who’d be there, except him, but she would survive, she’s been through worse moments in her life for sure. 

Two more miles and she’d be at the lake house. Stuck for a weekend with Eric. Possibly sleeping on a couch or, if she was unlucky, across the hall from him.

The house was beautiful. Lakeside, two stories, all wooden yet modern, huge windows and wrap-around porches. She pulled up behind three other cars, already recognizing a few from the wedding.

Laughter drifted from the back deck. Music hummed low and someone had already taken over the grill, the delicious smell of barbecue dancing in the air.

And when the front door creaked open, there Alex was, glowing as usual, barefoot and smug.

“You made it!” her friend beamed, running down the steps.

“Of course I did, anything for you” They hugged tightly “I’ll miss you so much”

“That’ll be just another reason for you to come visit us soon”

They laughed it off and for a second it was easy again. Easy to forget why her stomach was so tight on her way there.

Inside, the house was all warm lighting and rustic luxury. A candle burned faintly somewhere, citrus and cedar. People moved in and out of rooms with drinks in hand, and someone yelled from the kitchen asking if anyone wanted a beer.

“You’ve got the room upstairs at the end of the hall,” her friend said, grabbing her bag like a helpful angel. “Come on, I’ll show you.”

Y/N followed without hesitation, until they reached the room and she saw another duffel bag already sitting by the bed.

She stopped by the door. “Wait… Whose stuff is that?”

Alex blinked innocently, but miserably failing to hide a devious smirk. “Oh. Eric’s.”

Y/N laughed. It was the kind of laugh you let out when you think someone’s joking but you’re already sweating. “No, seriously.”

“He’s your roommate,” Alex said sweetly. “We ran out of space. You’re the only two single ones… A weekend won’t kill you.”

Y/N stared, but her friend was already backing away, her smile unwavering. “Just don’t kill each other. Or do. I don’t care. Lunch’s in an hour!”

And with that, she was gone.

Y/N stood there for a full five seconds, willing herself not to lose it, until she felt a presence lingering around.

“Well,” a voice drawled from behind her, smooth as ever. “You didn’t think you’d have this huge bed all to yourself, did you?”

She turned slowly. Eric leaned against the doorframe, arms crossed over his chest, the tattoos on his arms on full display. His shirt clung slightly from the heat outside, and his shit-eating grin made her want to throw something at him.

“I’m not sleeping in the same bed as you.”

He smirked. “What, afraid you’ll dream about me?”

“I’ve had worse nightmares”

“Fair,” he said, stepping past her and tossing himself onto the bed like he owned it. “I’ll take the left side. Unless that’s a problem, princess.”

She rolled her eyes at the situation and, mostly, at the ridiculous nickname. “Fine.”

“And don’t worry, I won’t tempt you by any means, you’re not my type”

She gritted her teeth, eyes flicking over him like he was a stain on otherwise perfect sheets. 

“Even if I was, I don’t waste my time with small dicks”

Eric stilled, then let out an amused chuckle.

“Sounds like someone’s had a string of disappointments.” He got up from the bed and stepped closer, his voice dropping just enough that it curled against her skin. “Keep telling yourself that if it helps you sleep.”

~0~

Lunch was loud, hazy with sun and summer air. People lounged with plates of grilled food, the smell of charred meat and spices curling around the deck. Glasses clinked, laughter bubbled, and someone was already half a bottle into tequila by the time she stepped outside.

She kept to the edge of the group, sipping slowly, sunglasses on. 

Eric wandered out of the kitchen, bottle of beer in hand, his voice easy and charming as he joked with someone behind him. And when he finally stepped onto the deck and shrugged off his shirt like it was nothing, her glass nearly slipped in her hand and her throat went dry.

As far as she remembered, he was just a tall skinny teenager back then. But now? His body had no business looking like that. 

Tattoos ran down his arms, chest and abs that were sharp enough to cut glass. But it was the one on his lower stomach that gave her pause, from afar it looked like a black centipede inked just above his waistband, its segmented body vanishing beneath his shorts.

He tipped the beer to his lips, throat working with each swallow. And then he looked at her. Straight at her and didn’t look away, a knowing smile curling up the corners of his lips.

She rolled her eyes immediately, pretending she hadn’t noticed. Pretending the blush across her chest was caused by a sunburn. She turned away, busying herself with whatever appetizer tray was closest.

As the afternoon went on the group moved toward the lake. Swimsuits on and clothes off, towels were slung over shoulders, and someone cranked the volume on the speaker. 

Y/N took off her clothes and revealed her white - and maybe a little too small - bikini, and headed toward the dock with her friends.

Eric had been mid-conversation when he spotted her and suddenly, he wasn’t saying a word. His eyes dragged over her like a starved man, shamelessly, not bothering to hide how stunned he was by her and her body.

His thoughts wandered over her curves and for a moment, he thought about all the ways he could fuck that sassiness out of her, before his friend brought him back to the conversation.

In the distance, Y/N smirked to herself, she could feel his gaze burning on her but she paid him no mind, after all, he could never and would never have her.

She laughed at something her friend said, slipping her feet into the cool water as she sat on the edge of the dock. The lake glowed gold beneath the setting sun, and for a while, the tension beneath her skin felt distant, almost forgettable.

Almost. She didn’t have to look to know he was still watching. She could feel it, thick as the heat in the air, dragging across her bare skin like a touch that hadn’t happened yet.

So she smiled. Just a little. Just for herself. Because the sun was dipping lower, the drinks were flowing, they still had a long night ahead, and something told her it was going to be a very interesting night.

[trigun98watchparty]

Alrighty!! So poll results are out (thank you so much!!!) and I'm taking it as a go-ahead for this event! Lurker majority, welcome~!

So, the tag will be #tri98watchparty, @ this blog and I will find you immediately in case your post doesn't show on the tumblr tags.

The duration of the event will be monitored (softly) from now until the first week of August (because that is 26 weeks for those who'd like the time), and primarily during the month of April (where the event will follow one episode per day for 26 days).

The prompts are set up so that anyone can build their own watch party experience however way fits them best, and of course the prompts are just there as suggestion ideas for topics and everyone is free to ignore them entirely.

The main goal of this is to have fun with your friends, on your own, with the community. Interact or lurk, we are all sharing the love and appreciating the media we were given.

It goes without saying that the main rule is to not be mean or aggressively negative towards anyone. Everyone is allowed to like and dislike something so long as no one is hurting another. I'm excited for discussions and banter!

All of this being said, if you would all like me to make a trigger warning list for each episode, please let me know!!! I've seen some out there, but I'd be happy to double check for any specific triggers that anyone has, and I can post a list with time stamps if preferred. Just specify the triggers you want flagged.

Without further delay, prompts below, and fun away!

Episode 1: The Stampede Episode 2: Water / Resources

Episode 1&2: The Legend, No Man’s Land

Episode 3: Frank / Brandon Marlon Episode 4: Derringer

Episode 3&4: Guns / Weapons, A Haunting Past / Then and Now, Forgiveness

Episode 5: Ideals / Community Episode 6: Survivor

Episode 5&6: Necessity / The Will to Survive, July

Episode 7: Memory Episode 8: Principles

Episode 7&8: Keeping a Promise, Atonement

Episode 9: Wolfwood / Kindness Episode 10: A gunman / Wit Episode 11: Milly / Strength

Episode 9&10&11: Burden / White, Black, and Gray

Episode 12: Anger, Diablo Episode 13: Complexity Episode 14: Family

Episode 12&13&14: Meryl & Milly, Mercy / Peace, Value

Episode 15: Gung-Ho Guns Episode 16: Fifth Moon

Episode 15&16: Legato, The Body / Autonomy

Episode 17: Childhood Episode 18: Anonymity / Eriks

Episode 17&18: Safety / Rem

Episode 19: To not kill Episode 20: Home Episode 21: Death

Episode 19&20&21: Brad, Loss of innocence

Episode 22: Orphanage Episode 23: Paradise

Episode 22&23: The quartet, Journey to Eden / The price to pay

Episode 24: Sacrifice Episode 25: Life / Love Episode 26: Brothers / Peace / Forgiveness

Episode 24&25&26: Healing / Love & Peace, Paradise & Redemption / The price to pay

[the-crafty-unicorn]

"Hi...! I'm CraftyCorn! Wanna help me with my painting? :)"

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Last Edit: February 9th (Changed some favorite Crafty pictures to new official ones)

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[Hello there! I'm Mod Tune! Pleasure to meet you all! I'll be running this blog to go with the other Smiling Critters!! Just know, this character is not mine and belongs to the creators of Poppy Playtime!! All art comes from there, too, but I will be making my own as well as fanart and reaction images!!]

[This ask blog currently consists of both Craftycorn and Bigger Craftycorn, as well as BB Crafty's mini critters! So go ahead and shoot any of them some asks! Crafty has her own tags while both BB Crafty and the mini critters share some tags. All of my designs for the characters here are all underneath the cut at the end of the main things on this post, so check those out!]

[This blog will include topics such as depression, loss of sanity, swearing (mostly from mod), harmful thoughts, some acts of violence, and few other topics I cannot name at the time. Interact at your own risk, you have been warned]

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RULES OF THE BLOG!

1. No inappropriate asks! This is a PG-13 blog!

2. Some violent asks are okay, like basic acts to harm her, but please just do not go overboard with them. As in, do not graphically explain them or have it result in missing limbs. It hurts to read.

3. Ask me before involving me in anything! I've been having issues with this for a few days now, and I need to finally bring it up.

4. No forced roleplaying! Aka, don't narrate my characters for me! Please! I've had one or two asks/reblogs like this, and it really doesn't make me motivated to answer them! Roleplaying characters means I play my characters, and you play yours, don't decide what my characters do for me.

5. Don't spam my inbox/notes often. I have a life outside of this blog, so if I don't answer asks or reblogs, I need you to be patient with me.

6. Do not judge me for my headcanons, roleplay threads, or what friends I have here. It's a very cruel thing to judge, and I'd rather you not.

7. Please, don't steal/repost my art. It may not be much compared to other artists, but I'd like my art to stay my own. Please and thank you.

8. Magic anons are okay!! You're allowed to send them as long as I can understand them and they make sense for the Poppy Playtime universe

9. This is an extension of rule 5. I'm not obligated to answer every ask, so if I don't answer something, please don't repeatedly send things asking for me to answer. You can remind me of an ask, yes, but for most asks I don't answer, they either make me uncomfortable, are from someone/about someone I don't wish to associate myself with, or I can't figure out any type of response.

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"Normal speech"

Thinking!! Hmmm...

"YELLING!!!!"

"Shh... quiet..."

-Lights, camera, ACTION!-

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The other Smiling Critters!! [GO FOLLOW THE OTHER COOL PEOPLE 🫵]

Dogday (big & small) - @that-sunny-pup (both) & @dogday-shines-bright

Kickin' - @the-cool-chicken

Bubba - @bubba-bubbaphant & @bubbathe-bubbaphant

Hoppy - @hoppyhopscotch1 & @bunny-go-hop-hop

Bobby - @lil-miss-bearhug & @bearhugs-from-bobby

Picky - @picky-piggy

Catnap (big & small) - @acat-foryournap & @catnaplovesnaptime

[And here are the Nightmare Critters!!!]

Baba - @baba-chops-emo-sheep

Rabie - @rabie-baby-bat

Simon - @simon-the-dragon

Allister - @allister-the-procrastigator

Poe - @poe-the-crow

[Mod's HC design of the girl:]

[My bigger body Crafty design!]

[My mini critters' designs!!]

[My favorite Crafty art!]

[theeccentricraven]

Writemas Day 1

Thank you for the tag here @kitty-is-writing 💚Thank you for creating this series of prompts @agirlandherquill ❤️The original post gives the details here. This post is in response to the Day 1 post here

My chosen prompts are both Warmth and A brush of a finger.

SENSITIVE TOPIC WARNING I wrote this for Draft 2 of my dystopian novel The Blood Cleaners, which deals with the topic of child labor.

Justin tasted the ping of blood before the boy cried. He didn’t remember the name of this boy - Sam or Tom he believed - about seven years old and crying over his smashed, bleeding fingers under his sledgehammer. Justin promptly morphed as did Joselyn, arriving on the scene in seconds. Joselyn took the cleaning supplies from her belt and kit. Justin held the boy’s hands. The child worker supervisor, a scrawny woman named Lana, ran up, yelling in her walkie talkie in Spanish, no doubt for the emergency crew to respond. Justin took out the thick hand towel from his kit, wrapping it around the boy’s hand. “We need soap and an ice pack!” Justin exclaimed. Joselyn looked to Lana. “¡Jabón! ¡Una bolsa de hielo!” As Lana ran off, Justin applied pressure to the boy’s hands. “Take it easy,” Justin said softly. “Take deep breaths. Calm down. EMTs will get you to the hospital. You’ll be good as new.” The boy’s good fingers touched the top of Justin’s hand. His touch was warm and rough, skin worn and hardened by holding the hammer for life. Justin turned his hand around to hold the boy’s fingers. Their fingers rubbed each other, one hand desperate for comfort, the other hand desperate to channel the comfort. “Hey, want some jokes?” Justin forced a smile. “What do you call a sleeping bull? A bulldozer! What did the janitor say when he jumped out of the closet? Supplies! Why can’t your nose be 12 inches long? Because then it would be a foot!” The boy whimpered. Joselyn sprayed the area of blood, letting the UD sit and do its work. Justin handed her the bloody towel. She sprayed it, too. He grabbed the second towel from his kit, quickly recovering the crushed fingers. He hoped more adults would respond soon with more towels. Knowing that bloody towels attracted the lils, blood cleaners and EMT’s had to be one step ahead. They would have to replenish and disinfect plenty of towels while applying pressure to the bleeding. “Harvey!” shouted a woman who ran up to the boy. She wrapped her arms around his shoulders. “Mami,” the boy uttered. Justin was off on the name, but held the boy’s hand tightly as he said, “See, Mami’s here. You’ll be fine.” As Justin was touched by the mother’s rapid breathing, he thought about how her son wouldn’t be able to add to the family’s income while he recovered in the hospital. As her short stubby fingers rubbed her son’s face, Justin caught a picture of when she experienced the injury herself, likely as a child. It wasn’t enough to stop her from picking up the shovel to continue work in the quarry for the rest of her life. The life her son still had ahead of him. Justin looked at Joselyn for a moment, seeing her glower while she wiped the spots of blood from the ground. She was no more happy than he was about this. Less happy about how the Fists let this go on and on. For every quarry worker. For every generation. Something had to be done. Something had to change. As Justin touched the warmth of Harvey’s hand in his, he was reminded of the warmth he felt whenever he talked with the broom and the light switches. Perhaps there was something he could do.

Tagging anyone who might like to join: @kaylinalexanderbooks @buffythevampirelover @rickie-the-storyteller @raevenlywrites @winterandwords @happypup-kitcat24 @the-golden-comet @poethill @ddgraywrites and OPEN 🎅🤶❄️🎄🎁⛄

[thosewickedlovelies]

Private Eye, chapter 2 | Tim Rockford/Marcus Moreno x F!Reader

Summary: With too much evidence and not enough progress, you and “Agent Rockford” go and meet the neighbors. But you’ll need a more creative solution to get into the rest of the mansion…

Tags: vague murder(?) mystery; workplace romance; we meet Marcus's powers 👀

Word count: 5,460

Note: welcome to chapter 2! I've lost perspective on this one honestly, but please enjoy the promised sneaking around in the dark 🥷🏻

ch 1 | Masterlist

It’s clear from the get-go that you and Marcus make an effective team. Your strengths balance the other’s weaknesses. You’re both thorough and driven to make something of this strange case- but you’re drowning in evidence, and the potentialities pull you every which way.

“We need a board,” Marcus declares.

It’s day three since his arrival, and he’s made himself at home at a desk in the basement. So have you, for that matter- it’s easier to keep everything related to the case in one place, so you drag a spare desk next to his and divvy up the paperwork. The wood-paneled walls are about 30 years out of style and the space is full of old metal filing cabinets, but it could be worse. There’s some natural light. Plus, you have the bathrooms all to yourselves.

At his pronouncement, you glance at the clock. “It’ll make a late night to start it now,” you point out.

“I don’t care, I can’t make sense of anything while it’s all piles of paper.” Marcus groans, sitting up and rolling his neck. 

He sees your expression and falters. “You don’t have to stay. I don’t mind doing it. Or starting it, anyway.”

Your sigh flutters the documents strewn over your joined desks. “There’s a drawer of takeout menus upstairs. Any preferences?”

His face lifts, and it honestly defies logic that a man can look simultaneously so rugged and so adorable.

“Do you have a good Chinese?”

--

Marcus is surprisingly adept with chopsticks, making you wonder how many evenings he’s spent like this. Maybe he just really likes Chinese food? You’re adamant about separating food and work- taking an actual dinner break- and he seems perfectly happy to follow your lead.

He makes a good dinner date, easily balancing personal chitchat with lighter topics. Despite the looming task ahead, it’s a refreshing change from your normal quiet evenings alone.

After tracking down the promised corkboard, thumbtacks, and enough red yarn to commit a murder yourself, you’re ready to carve a path into the uncharted jungle that is this case.

“Okay,” Marcus finally sighs. “If we’re gonna do this, I need to show you something. And you can’t laugh,” he warns.

His tone gives you pause. You regard him warily, until he takes out…a glasses case?

From the case Marcus removes a pair of glasses with dark, round frames, and lifts them to his face with exaggerated reluctance. He looks for all the world like a schoolboy sitting in the principal’s office. Laughter begins to bubble beneath your ribs.

As if he can sense it, he pins you with a warning look.

You clap your hands over your mouth, but the giggles spill out regardless. “Oh my god, is this why you’ve left your sunglasses on every time we’ve gone to the mansion? Are they prescription?”

“Yes,” Marcus sulks. His pouty lower lip only enhances the schoolboy effect, and your laughter redoubles.

“I can see why you don’t wear them around the other officers. They’re so cute,” you tease. “I just want to pinch your cheeks.” You don’t, but you pinch the air toward him for effect.

At your words Marcus ducks his head. Is that a hint of color in his cheeks?

You clear your throat, quelling your amusement. “Okay, sorry, I‘m done. They are cute though. Very…suburban dad.”

The glasses lend him a perfectly harmless air. With his suit jacket long since shucked off and his tie loosened after-hours, you could easily imagine him waiting on a little girl after soccer practice, arms open for an energetic hug. He’d be the heartthrob of the soccer moms with his handsome face and old-school manners, you think wryly. His shoulders in that gun holster don’t hurt either.

Marcus snorts. “Huh. Well, you got me there. That’s my other job.” He says it with perfect nonchalance, but your mouth parts. Marcus avoids your gaze, suggesting that he’s well aware of the trust he’s placing in you by sharing such information. You’d wondered at his ring, but still…

As if reading your mind, he holds up his left hand. The matte silver ring on the third finger glints in the light. “Widower, though. So, no one to come after you for flirting.”

You sputter and choke on your noodles. Marcus laughs.

--

“Do it again,” you beg. “Pleeeease.” 

Two days later, and you’re considering bringing down another corkboard. The one across the room is nearly covered already. Newspaper clippings, photographs, evidence files, interview notes. All overlapping and criss-crossed with red string in an array that would make a conspiracy theorist proud.

Marcus tsks. Despite himself, he lifts your proffered thumbtack into the air with a point of his finger. It hovers between you, yellow plastic glinting around the metal barb- until with a flick, Marcus embeds it into the corkboard on the opposite wall.

You had inquired only briefly about Marcus’s powers the first day you met. “Metal manipulation,” he’d replied, still sitting beside you at the captain’s desk.

“Must be useful against bullets,” was all you’d said.

But today, watching him remove and rearrange the bestringed tacks in the board like a conductor before a symphony- you had to ask for more details.

With a quick glance at the stairwell, he’d reached into his jacket and removed the gun from his holster. “Actually carrying around a gun is mostly for other people’s benefit. It can be anything I need it to be.” Marcus then proceeded to crumple the metal into a ball, stretch it back out into a crowbar, form tiny fragments into keys with which he unlocked every lock in the room, and finally, with his eyes closed in concentration, returned the pistol to its original form. 

Your mouth hung open.

Marcus offered the reborn gun to you for inspection. 

“Wow.” The metal was faintly warm to the touch. You turned it over, opening the chamber and clicking the trigger, but everything seemed to be exactly the right shape it should. “So you’re basically a metalbender. Like from that kid’s show.” 

Marcus’s laughter warmed the air. “Exactly. My daughter loves that show. When she was little she was obsessed with Toph, because she was ‘just like me.’”

His smile was infectious, full of pride in and love for his daughter. Suburban dad heartthrob strikes again, you thought, your cheeks warming.

“I can do other, less flashy things, too. That’s kind of the point of my branch of the FBI. They train us to use our powers in ways you wouldn’t immediately consider. For instance, I can tell you the elemental composition of every metal object in this room, just by concentrating. I can usually tell if there’s foreign material in or on metal things, too, even trace amounts.”

You thought about what that could mean. “So if someone didn’t clean a piece of evidence well enough, you’d be able to tell even if forensics failed?”

“That’s right,” Marcus confirmed. He looked strangely somber about it, as if the morality of his powers was a question whose weight never lightened. 

“Huh.” 

That was something to chew on. There was a stretch of silence while you mulled over all he’d shared.

It didn’t last long, though, as if Marcus was afraid of what conclusions you might come to.

“It also means I can do stuff like this-” and then he’d levitated a thumbtack and shot it across the room like a bullet.

“No more, now,” he says, stern but apologetic. “We have to be careful at work.” Still, a conspiratorial light twinkled in his eyes.

Marcus stands from his desk with a stretch and a groan. He approaches the board you’d just had him flinging thumbtacks at and regards it.

“Who are we missing here? Is there anyone else involved who could be a suspect?” The stubble on his cheeks scrapes audibly at his thoughtful scratch. He’s squinting slightly- his glasses lay half-covered by an evidence bag on his desk.

A knock sounds from the top of the staircase. “Detective? Agent Rockford? Some new data for you.” 

“Come on down,” you call.

“Don’t tell me it’s more knives,” Marcus groans.

The junior officer, Richards, falters at the base of the stairs, clearly cowed by the sight of the big bad FBI agent turning his scowl from the corkboard to him.

You stifle a laugh. Scowl, your ass- how no one has ever clocked that for the myopic squint it is is beyond you.

“Stand down, Agent,” you drawl. Pointedly, you rustle the bag hiding his glasses as you stand. “Thanks, Richards.”

The officer hesitates, glancing between the file he’d just handed you and the corkboard Marcus is studying. 

“...Did you have some thoughts on the case?” you prompt.

Marcus looks over alertly, and the officer scampers. “No, no, not until I read up on it some more. See you around!”

You snigger as you head over to the board, skimming the file as you go.

“Friendly guy,” Marcus remarks, although his glance toward the staircase is bemused. 

Your snicker turns into a full-belly laugh. “Normally he is friendly, Rockford. If you didn’t always look like you’re suspicious of everyone, he’d probably ask you out.”

“What?” Marcus’s brow furrows.

You exaggeratedly imitate his grumpy-looking squint, putting an elderly pucker in your lips for good measure. You plant your face about an inch from the corkboard.

“Oh.” Marcus grimaces. “I know, it’s a terrible habit. Missy is always warning me I’m going to get even more wrinkles.” He sighs in resignation.

You hide a smile, your glance skipping over the fine lines around his eyes and mouth- signs of age that a child wouldn’t understand the appeal of. “I hope your FBI team has a super-powered eye surgeon.”

“Actually- uh.” Marcus cuts himself off, his mouth turning down. “That’s probably classified,” he mumbles.

--

“Any plans for the weekend, Agent Rockford?” You make an effort to use Marcus’s fake name every so often, so you won’t forget and slip up around others.

Marcus leans back in his chair. “Nothing exciting. I thought I might check out the mansion again, maybe see if the neighbors are in. Get some interviews.”

You look at him. 

After a second, he realizes that you haven’t responded, and looks over. “…What?”

“People usually make non work-related plans on the weekends, Marcus.”

“Oh. Well…” Marcus shrugs, fidgeting. “Missy’s going to be at a school thing, so I won’t have anything else to do. And we haven’t made much progress with the neighbors,” he points out.

He’s right, but still.

You hesitate. You don’t have any exciting plans either, and people might be more likely to be home during the day on a weekend…

“All right. Let’s do it.” 

Marcus looks confused. 

“I’ll come with you to interview some neighbors this weekend. It’s a good idea,” you clarify.

“Oh, I wasn’t suggesting that you had to come with me,” Marcus says hastily. “Just that..I don’t mind, and, you know, I’m not doing anything else.” He shrugs again, looking away.

“I know. I’m saying that I don’t mind either, and you’re right that we need to interview the neighbors. They might be home on a weekend. We can get a feel for the neighborhood.”

His mouth opens and shuts. Marcus hesitates, like he thinks he should argue but can’t think of anything convincing. He settles on a grateful smile. “Okay.”

--

It’s a sunny day. The sky is clear, and you have a great view from the top of the hill, which is, naturally, where the mansion sits.

It’s not a very tall hill, but it’s enough of a slope that one could easily feel superior looking down from atop it. The residents of the houses below would be unable to avoid seeing the mansion whenever they looked up. The old New England houses echo the style of the mansion, albeit on a smaller scale- stately, grand and yet sort of homey at once. Highlights include spires topped with weathervanes featuring quirky animals and turrets with children’s drawings taped in the windows.

The air smells of greenery- all the hedges in the garden, probably. And something else; the odd smoky whiff of a weekend barbeque, interspersed with something…sweeter. Mom with oven mitts inside while Dad lights the charcoal outside. Apple pie America, indeed.

You survey the suburbia laid out below. You and Marcus agreed to meet at the mansion and strike out on foot from there, and now you’re deciding on a plan of attack.

“I say we canvas this street,” he’s saying, pointing to the uppermost houses, “maybe the next one, and see what the vibe is like from there.”

“What the vibe is like?” you repeat, amused. “Did you pick that up from Missy?”

Marcus coughs and shuffles a bit. “Did I use it right?” he asks, sheepish behind his glasses. The normal ones today- the round lenses made him seem sweet and trustworthy. 

It’s impossible not to laugh. “Technically, I guess. Come on then, hip guy.”

The hill isn’t very wide, or steep. These streets make up just one small subdivision venturing up into the woods, branching off the two-lane highway. There are others further along, clustered more densely closer to the town. The houses here are arrayed like a waterfall, with the mansion as its source.

The top street, in fact, is only four houses long. The first two are uneventful. One man answers the door with barbeque tongs in hand, his New Balance sneakers gleaming as white as his smile. He offers you and Marcus burgers to go, which you politely decline. You glimpse a woman coming up behind him as the door closes; her face is as stiff as her husband’s was welcoming. Interesting.

Things get even more interesting at the third house. 

“Oh, you’ll want to talk to the neighbor if you’re looking into Ursula.” The young person on the threshold nods their head to the only house you haven’t been to. “She can go on about her for hours, especially if you mention the pie.” They roll their eyes in a long-suffering expression.

You and Marcus exchange a look. “The pie?” Marcus slowly starts to reach for the small notebook he keeps in his jacket pocket.

“Yeah. Ursula liked to bake. Won the county fair pie competitions almost every year. Winter and summer, even after they made it anonymous and started rotating the judges.”

The neighbor and resident of the fourth house introduces herself as Olivia Tate. A woman with a somewhat jowly resemblance to a bulldog, she nearly starts slavering when your questions turn to Ursula’s pies. Her kitchen is the source of the sweet smell you caught from the top of the hill- a picture-perfect, lattice-topped pie bakes in the oven, which, Olivia laments, you could have sampled if you’d arrived half an hour later. 

Her jaw clenches at your implications about Ursula’s baking. “I’ve been baking pies 30, 40 years, and I’ve never had anything taste like hers. That’s the real mystery- what she puts in them!”

Her voice pitches higher the more you probe about Ursula and her pies, and the fledgling business around them she had apparently just started.

At the end of the street, Marcus jots hurriedly in his notebook, noting everything you had learned at Olivia’s house. When he’s done, you turn your head toward the top of the hill. “Should we go back to the mansion and have a closer look around the kitchen? This is the first we’ve heard of the pie business. It could be a fresh perspective.”

The mansion’s main kitchen is an enormous, envy-inducing affair. A stunning tile backsplash, an island bigger than your kitchen table, and a stove nearly as big as the island. At first glance, the single knife block and magnetic rack above it appear perfectly in order- there’s nothing to indicate the volume of knives the department had found stashed in the rest of the house, some of them nearly the size of machetes.

With fresh motivation, you start opening cabinets, nudging aside canned goods and tubs of flour. You and Marcus have hardly begun, however, when a thumping gait sounds from within the house, clearly getting closer. You exchange an alarmed glance.

A white-haired, wide-shouldered figure swings open the door. Mud flakes off the galoshes on his feet. Long gardening gloves sheath his hands. The man stands still for a long moment, silently measuring you.

“May I ask what you’re doing in Boulton house?” His voice is coarse with age, but his tone is unmistakably flat.

--

After being unceremoniously removed from the mansion, you stand by your patrol car, fuming. “Can you believe that guy? We’re investigating a crime scene. You can’t tell me he doesn’t know something.”

The groundskeeper had, of course been interviewed straightaway upon the breaking of the case. He hadn’t had much useful to say, and you’d released him thinking that you’d try again once you had more context in which to question him. But for him to claim now that your searching was out of bounds..!

“Probably. But he is within his rights to kick us out.” Marcus watches you cautiously. 

Leaning against your car, you face the street below, both lost in your own thoughts. From this height you have an unobstructed view of Olivia Tate’s house. It’s close enough, you realize, to make out her silhouette bobbing at a window, presumably rolling out her umpteenth pie crust. 

Marcus seems to realize it too. Gesturing to the window, he starts speaking again as if you’d been mid-conversation. “So these women could have easily watched each other from their kitchens while they baked. I bet on a good day you could even smell the pies from the other house. Every year they compete at the county fairs, and their rivalry gets worse. One day the neighbor snaps?” His eyebrows lift.

“A little unlikely,” you say. “Since there’s a clear view down the drive, she’d have to come at night, or by some secret back way. And she’s barely younger than the grandma.”

“True. But that means they’d be at even odds,” Marcus points out.

You concede that it’s technically a viable theory.

Glancing around, you indicate for Marcus to get in your car. 

An anticipatory silence grows while you consider your words, longer and louder until it’s drowned out only by the metallic creaking of the car itself. Marcus clenches his hands into fists to stop their fidgeting. 

“So,” you finally say. “We have to come back, right? Investigate this place properly.”

Marcus exhales. He looks pensive. “Yes. But how?”

“Look, I don’t like it, but I think we’ll have to do this slightly…off-books.”

You make a plan. By day, you’d return and continue to examine the inhabited portions of the house with the rest of the team. But by night…

“We can’t ignore the possibility that our culprit is using the closed-off parts of the house. It’s a perfect excuse- ‘nobody goes there, it’s falling down, it’s dangerous’. We can’t risk not searching it.”

You and Marcus agree to meet back at the mansion in a few nights- long enough for the groundskeeper to relax his guard.

--

On what little hill rises above the mansion, there’s an old hiking viewpoint jutting out of the forest. Although you’re sure people still use it for hiking during the day, by night, well…there was enough sniggering and elbow jabbing amongst your townie colleagues for you to figure out what it was used for at night.

It’s about a half hour hike from the viewpoint to the mansion. You and Marcus will be starting your nighttime searching from there, since parking or walking from anywhere else would get you spotted. 

You sit in the passenger seat of Marcus’s car while he drives. It smells like him, clean and masculine- probably nothing more than a combination of his laundry detergent and a no-nonsense deodorant, yet in such confined quarters it makes you light-headed the longer you sit in it. To distract yourself, you take a discreet look around. 

There’s not much to see. No trash or trinkets, just a road atlas in the pocket on the back of the driver’s seat. Except- sticking out from under the backseat is the crinkled corner of a magazine cover emblazoned with pink and yellow headlines and, just visible, the swoop of a youthful hairdo. The evidence of Marcus’s daughter makes you smile.

Gravel crunches under the tires as Marcus turns into the lot. His headlights reveal another car on the far side, with condensation glimmering on its windows.

“Didn’t expect to find anyone else doing night hiking,” Marcus mutters.

He continues his slow route toward the other car, to your mounting horror. “Don’t park next to them!” you hiss.

“What? Why?” Marcus’s question is utterly guileless. But he obeys, turning the car smoothly and ending up parking roughly in the center of the line of spots. 

You sigh. “I mean first of all, parking right next to the only other car in an empty lot, at night? That’s weird. Second of all, those aren’t night hikers.”

“Then what…” Marcus turns his furrowed brow toward the other car. Under the still moonlight, he finally seems to put all the pieces together- the short drive from town, the isolated location, the car’s fogged up windows. “...Oh.”

You can’t help but laugh at Marcus’s mortified expression. His full lips turn down, his cheeks darkening with a blush. “Well…now what do we do?”

“Let’s just go. The path is on this side, anyway.” You nod your head toward the end of the viewpoint that’s not currently occupied.

You and Marcus gather your small packs and exit the car. The slam of the door is like a shout in the silence and he winces, darting glances to the other car all the while. You cough to cover your laughter. “Great conditions for some night hiking, right?” You say loudly.

Marcus looks at you, startled. You widen your eyes at him meaningfully. “Oh, yeah,” he says, catching on. “Sure is.”

You grin. “Come on, this way.” You lead your partner away from the lot and the scene of his embarrassment. 

Your hike is quiet. These trails are unfamiliar to both of you, especially in the dark, but you keep your headlamps on low, wary of being spotted- more so the larger the mansion looms through the trees. 

A low brick wall marks the edge of the property. There’s no gate nearby that you can see, but it’s an easy task to pull yourself over it- probably the least risky activity you’ll undertake tonight.  

The gardens are slightly too overgrown to pretend you’re on a romantic nighttime stroll. “This reminds me of a corn maze; you know, the kind you get at pumpkin patches in the fall,” Marcus says, low and hushed. 

It’s an apt comparison. Tidily partitioned squares of greenery, once neatly groomed, had sprouted out of control, spilling onto the paths and obstructing your view. Wire towers for climbing vines now resemble buildings in an apocalypse movie- so thickly smothered with vines that their original structures are no longer visible, their trailing tendrils now falling to sway in your faces as you pass.

“Ha, I see what you mean. I’m not sure that makes it more or less creepy.” Another thought makes you shiver. “As long as nobody with a chainsaw starts running after us,” you mutter.

Marcus lets out an unexpected, loud bark of laughter. You look at him in astonishment, and he slaps a hand over his mouth. “Sorry, it’s just...” He clears his throat. “If you remind me of this later I’ll tell you why that was funny.”

At the mansion’s back entrance, you glance around quickly, then let yourselves in with the key. Safely inside, you stand in silence for several moments. 

“Nobody’s here,” Marcus whispers.

The house is silent, and dark. Without any neighbors, there are minimal streetlamps to provide light from outside. Most of the windows are framed by heavy, ornate curtains as well, blocking what meager moonlight falls in. Only the beams of your headlamps illuminate the dark wood floors and wall panelings.

You make your way toward a door at the end of the hall, stepping quietly, just in case. “How far do your powers reach?” you ask Marcus. “Like, you’re definitely sure there’s no one in this whole house?”

It’s slightly difficult to look at Marcus without blinding him with your headlamp. If you twist your neck and look sideways, you can make out the thoughtful press of his lips. 

“I can sense the rough outline and structure of the house thanks to all the little metal things- nails, window fittings, doorknobs. Any metal object within those bounds, I can reach. But sensing blood is tricky to begin with. It’s such a tiny amount of iron, in such a weird form…I can sense your blood just fine, because you’re right next to me. Somebody across the room would be no problem, likely even somebody in the next room, but across a whole house?” Marcus shakes his head. “Blood moves, so that tends to give it away. That sense of flow is primarily what I look for. But to answer your question…” Marcus does the same sort of neck twist to look at you. Beneath the white light emanating from his forehead, his face is serious. “I can’t be one hundred percent sure this place is empty.”

Interesting, if not entirely reassuring. “Well, I guess keep your eyes open then. Or not your eyes, but your..senses? You know what I mean.”

“I think the official term is ‘spidey sense’,” Marcus quips.

You laugh at that, and it eases the tension that had crept up alongside you like mist in a haunted house.

It doesn’t take long to reach your goal. The innocuous door looks like all the rest that line the hall- it could just as likely hold a fancy sitting room as a dilapidated once-home. 

You adjust your headlamp determinedly. “Ready?”

“Lead the way, Boss.” There’s a playful quirk to Marcus’s lips as he repeats his words from the day you first met.

You snort, ignoring an odd little flutter in your belly. “Sure, ladies first, they say, step right up to the dangerous door…”

“You can tell me to go first, if you want,” Marcus suggests. “Perks of being the boss.”

“Am I your boss?”

You’re stalling, is what you are. But it is something you’ve wondered. If push came to shove, would Marcus have to obey you?

“I could probably go over your head if I felt it was necessary,” Marcus admits. “But practically, we’re supposed to follow local jurisdiction. Supplement your abilities, not..take over.”

He meets your gaze. “I’m not worried about questioning your orders.”

Before you can react, Marcus continues cheerfully, “You’re stalling, Boss. Come on.” He lifts his hand, and the door swings open.

You brace yourself; for what, you’re not sure. But all that happens is a gust of dusty air hits you, and you have to stifle a sneeze. 

It’s nearly pitch-black. Marcus lifts his hand higher, and a tinny screech comes from across the room, where metal rings scrape against a curtain rod, dragging open a tall set of drapes. There’s still not much light, but the room now appears more gray than black.

The carpet runner beneath your feet is thick with dust, its pattern blurred. The room you’ve entered looks like it was indeed once a sitting room or living room of some kind. Dust covers in the shape of couches squat around a table on the far side of the room. Other furniture against the walls has also been covered. In the gray darkness, lit only by the swinging beams of your headlamps, it’s impossible not to think of ghosts and horror stories. 

“Do you sense anything?” you whisper to Marcus.

He lowers his hand. “No. No one hiding, and a normal amount of metal for an old living room.”

You let out a tense breath. “I’ll admit, this is creepier than I thought it would be.”

Marcus laughs softly. “Tell me about it. I don’t even like scary movies.”

It’s reassuring, at least, to have Marcus’s powers on your side. You tell yourself firmly that nothing bad can happen with him around, and it mostly quiets the part of your brain dwelling on every zombie movie you’ve ever seen. Mostly.

You set to searching the room. You pull off dust covers and lift cushions, but all you get for your troubles are grimy hands and some disgruntled spiders. 

The next room is more of the same, only there’s even less to search. The open space contains little more than an ornate fireplace and a bar built into one end of the room. You stand in the center and spin slowly, your hands on your hips. “Are we missing something?”

“It’s here.” Marcus is standing at a section of wall blank except for squares of wood molding. 

“Huh?”

He reaches up and pushes a small section of the molding. It clicks, and the whole portion of wall slides sideways like a door. 

“Whoa!” You hurry over, the solid blackness of the opening sucking up your headlamp’s beam until you get closer.

“A servants’ kitchen, maybe,” Marcus says. “I’ve been doing some research on the history of this house, and other houses from the same period.”

The disused kitchen is barely the size of a closet and smells faintly of mildew. You follow Marcus, your mind turning. “A big old house like this…it’s got to have like, secret passages, right? Real ones, I mean, not just servant shortcuts like this.”

Marcus’s face wears a thoughtful grimace. “More likely than not. I already found one in the central dining room.”

“Wait, you have?” This is the first you’ve heard of it.

“It wasn’t anything dramatic. Just a passage to the kitchen, a shortcut for staff. The housekeeper was still showing us around when I found it, so she told us. She didn’t look too happy about it thought…I bet she knows where they all are.” Marcus trails off in thought.

“Shouldn’t you be able to sense them?” you ask.

“Well…yes and no.” Marcus looks vaguely uncomfortable. “House walls have metal in them anyway- all the nails and whatnot- and sometimes construction companies do weird things, so it can be tricky to sense when there’s metal out of place. That goes double for old places like this, where all sorts of random stuff has been stuck in the walls over the years. I tried pulling on something the very first day and nearly brought down that massive portrait over the fireplace- you know the one of the guy with the-” he makes a gesture near his face. “Turns out I was pulling on some convoluted hanging system.”

Marcus rolls his eyes, eloquently expressing his frustration with the entire situation. You wonder if the blueprints to house are accessible somewhere. They’d be in the city planning archives, surely…

As you step back through the doorway, you hear a click. The sliding door rumbles toward you with surprising speed, and you freeze for a split second before your muscles tense to leap out of the way-

But before you can, a strong grip encircles your wrist, and you’re yanked back and held tight against a wide, solid mass. The mass is warm, and expanding and deflating rapidly, and nearly crushing you to it with the steel strength of his arms. 

The door thuds closed with a force that makes you flinch. The thin beams of your headlamps seem insubstantial against the sudden near-complete darkness. 

You twist your neck to look at Marcus, your eyes wide with surprise. He does the same to look at you. His hold and the angle of your heads puts your faces only inches apart- far closer than either of you anticipated. 

He releases you immediately, taking a step back for good measure. “Sorry. It was a reflex.” One hand comes up to rub the back of his neck.

The warmth of him still clings to you. “I do have several years on the force under my belt,” you point out mildly. You reach out and squeeze his arm. “But thank you.”

You turn back to the door. The flat, featureless door that looked remarkably wall-like again. 

“Um,” you say. “Can you get us out?”

Marcus chuckles. “Now that I know it’s there…” There’s a click and a rumble, and the wall slides aside again. “Yes.”

Gray light pours in, so dark before but like sunlight after being trapped in the windowless kitchen. You breathe deeply of the air in the open room.

“I think that’s enough for tonight.”

Thanks for reading! ❤️

Masterlist

[phantomram-b00]

Imma use my hottake post to explain it since I felt I should give more context with this take to explain myself why I have this opinion on the topic of this.

For those who don’t know or don’t wanna look back with the link, it basically that my hottake is that I don’t like the theory of what Crowley’s angel name was/could’ve been. I know this might be a bit controversial since I think everyone in this fandom (not to assume ofc), and whilst I get the curiously since Crowley almost never talk about his time over at heaven, mostly for valid reason that I’ll get to. Before I get into this, I know it been month but I wanna still give that this haunted blog/post does contain heavy spoilers so if your planning to watch good omens or haven’t seen season two yet go watch it and come back here, or you can still read— what can I say, I’m only a phantom that have lot to say about good omens and making it everyone else’s problem. But still spoiler warning ahead! So without further or do,

let get into it and talk about our favorite snake demon and a good old fashion lover boy/girl/enby—

So, okay, seeing Angel Crowley, that’s cool and honestly wholesome— despite the poor trauma he’s going to endure and will sauntered vaguely downward for. I remember hearing the theory about how his name could be Raphael, seen some AO3 tags of Crowley used to be Raphael or just people buzzing what his name could’ve been (even some saying it could be Castiel or Cassiel). And while the curiously of it all is cool, for a while I couldn’t really pin it at first as to why I personally didn’t like it. And Idk if that make be boring or a bitch for not wanting to know, it just to me, I felt why does it matter if Crowley himself don’t even want to remember about his time at heaven?

Sure season 2 when he didn’t even say it might have been what spiked it, but i think the whole point about him is the fact that he clearly moved on from it. Does he still hold resentment? Of course, why wouldn’t he be? And from unfair circumstances too:

But, as we’ve seen from most of the flashback, he moved on from it. He using hell as long as he can (lonely? Yep, which is a perfect parallel to how Aziraphale following heaven—), he doesn’t want to remember the angel he is before, he even said it to Aziraphale when he tried to stop him from killing Job’s kids. But I think of how he’s dealt with is how his trauma grew seeing how he doesn’t want to be considered nice or kind; I feel it goes deeper than just because he’s a demon now, I believe (and this is just my observation), he rather not remember the kinder side he was once before because of how the “light” casted him away and how heaven runs things. So why would he want to be associated with those word when it remind him of his time, he rather not remember it (or in a case run away from heaven as much as he can), he rather associate himself from being mean or remember himself as a demon now rather than an angel he once was. (Even though, he is very kind and I wish to hug him. Don’t start-).

Plus, he more comfortable with his new name now, that’s why he even changed it back at the flashback of the crucifixion of Jesus as his named used to be Crawly (which honestly real.) and changed it to Crowley (now technically he changed it again to Anthony J Crowley, but we hardly heart anyone even Aziraphale say it outside from the blitz flashback, so I kinda wanna count it but I’mma not just incase, but I like the name tho-), and since then, he’ve wore that name proudly and never look back, and Aziraphale an ally he is suppose him and call him by his prefer name. That is him saying “I’m not whoever I was before, so I’m going to change my name to move on from my past”, and honestly I stand, I love the fact he want to move on from his time as an angel/move away from his deadname to be the person he is today, proud of the wily serpent ^v^

“But phantom, that still doesn’t explain why you dislike it?”

You’re right, it still doesn’t so imma explain it a bit more, I just feel it shouldn’t matter what his name was, it really up to his (or Neil’s but this is Crowley we’re talking about) own terms, it him that should be able to say his deadname. And if it never reveal, I wouldn’t care since Good Omens from both season shown, Crowley moved on from his angelic past even if he have the grudges he have now after 6000 years he rather accepts his life now and hopefully with the Angel that have supported him and stood by him. And I know the finally is making it seem like Azirapahel want to change him, but like I said here that I don’t think that the case, I don’t think he would ever want him to revert back to the person he was once before, he could never ask Crowley to do such a thing knowing the progress he made. Like I said and will say again, I think this was Azirapahle (in a poor way given the situation and that their communication is the equivalent of a ghost (invisible as fuck)) to give Crowley a change to fix the broken and toxic system heaven been running on since the dawn of time, to give Crowley the chance to fix what need to be fixed with Aziraphale, and Crowley said no, and I think rightly so in his point of view, heaven did treated everyone especially Crowley poorly and is the main source of his trauma, so I’m happy he said no, it not his place to fix the one thing that in his eyes was broken and have always been. So good jobs Crowley for standing your grounds.

But I’m getting ahead of myself, my point is that, Crowley have moved on and it shouldn’t matter what his deadname was, I think we should all respect that when it come to not just his but everyone’s deadname. Crowley clearly doesn’t have to remember his time on heaven, and I gotta respect that. Because if I was in his shoes, I wouldn’t neither if I was a bit braver than he was.

“But phantom what if it was revealed anyway?”

Again I wouldn’t care, like the commenter said (I don’t know how they feel about tagging so I won’t just to be respectful) and I do agree, if it had to be revealed it should be on his own terms. And I do agree, it is up to Crowley, he should be able to say it as it could garner the impactful moment, especially if he does say like “I’m not *this name* anymore” or whatever he’ll say in season 3, (which please let it be greenlit, I’m begging atp).

And honestly, I don’t doubt it really, it seem it might be revealed, which, fine, this is Neil’s work so gotta respect. Just I hope it on his term, and that no one else say it, I don’t even want aziraphale to say it. Just him. He deserve it.

But that’s my take on it. That’s my spew on this. Might be boring or lame to not be curious, but honestly like I said, he’ve going down a path away from heaven and accepted what happen to him. May not be in a healthiest way but regardless I love this demon and I am happy he moved on and I can’t wait to see him again in season 3, David Tennant a perfect Crowley and I wouldn’t have it any other way ^v^

But I hope you enjoy my yet another insane ramble of this show, frankly this show is becoming my life atp and I don’t hate it. I love this show, it my comfort, I’m happy to have this show; if you want to ask me any other questions you can in the AMA box or comments, but also tell me what do you guys think of this theory? Do you love it? Have qualms with it? Or anything? Tell me in the comments or reblog. As always this is phantom, imma go haunt somewhere else.

[nyandela-catalogue]

︵︵୨୧ PINNED POST ୨୧︵︵

Gonna make this short and simple:

[edit: We post stuff that’s ~16+ rating max, so do with that what you will.]

Main fronters (lately) are Mark, Cesar, Adam, and Jonah

Bodily an adult (2002)

Alters will tag with their names (if they want to)

If you want to see our cool and pawsome vrchat/3d model-related tiktoks, you can go here: TikTok Page

We try to add subtitles when we can in our videos, and we’ll try to add good or adequate alt text to any photos we post on here.

Further links/info to where you can find other things we do are in one of the pinned posts on that page :)

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pronouns + emojis

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small statement on Alex Kister situation (HAS BEEN EDITED)

important post <-addresses harassment

blogs lore lol

post abt The Singing Reindeer

(more info below readmore since i dont want this to be 13 miles long -Mark📕)

———

Do not come to us asking for medical/system/relationship/etc advice, that’s not what we’re here for

We will post Mandela Catalogue and AU-related stuff here, as well as source-related posts.

We will not be seeking external sourcemates, as we have everybody we need.

However, if you wanna talk to us, go ahead- just make sure you clarify who you’re talking to.

We don’t do the “doubles dni” thing bc A) gatekeeping alters/sources isn’t something we believe in, and B) we don’t judge who you are. Just be nice lol

We block fairly freely. Don’t take it personal. Or, if you do take it personal, keep it to yourself honestly. We don’t need more bullying or harassment over misunderstandings.

Anyway, we’ll tag things as necessary and will always put warnings for flashing lights, fast movements, and/or other possible necessary warnings.

If you have any questions or concerns, feel free to drop them in the askbox :)

ANOTHER COUPLE IMPORTANT THINGS:

1 - Playful “flirting” is okay(as long as you’re of-age), but don’t try to date us. We don’t date outside of our system anymore bc of repeated trauma 🙃

edit: above boundary made more clear

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3 - Don’t tell us what we can and can’t do. We likely don’t know you, so your opinion isn’t going to be held to the same value as someone we do know.

I think that’s everything for now… Thanks for reading. I hope you enjoy our blog~

-(Alt) Cesar🥀

[chromaticcs]

Who is the father? Tales of Arise Edition

So Tales of Arise DLC has been annouced and I'm sure people are wondering (probably not), which Renan Lord is Nazamil related to?

(Yes, I'm aware I'm pretty late to the party on this, Reddit has already talked a bit about it, but I don't really care and shouting into the void is cathartic)

So here is a (rather long) anaylsis of who I think it has the highest chance of being and why.

MAJOR story spoilers and talks of unpleasant topics below: mentions of r*pe, slavery and the rest of the bs that happens when people procreate when there's a power inbalance: Mentions are rather clinical and there are no graphic details.

(Also if I've missed any warning tags, please let me know!)

Onwards! (Warning, long long read ahead, I've done a lot of thinking over this. Maybe too much :p )

So, let's start with trying to fit Nazamil into the Tales of Arise (ToA) timeline that will help us to determine who the father could be. We only have five (three, really) choices, as the developer did mention that it was a lord who oposed Alphen in ToA (so not Dohalim). Also within the translations I found of her profile, her father is the Renan lord and her mother was Dahnan (so not Almeidrea). Our top choices are Balseph, Ganabelt and Vholran. I will still be including Dohalim and Almeidrea, just because I want to and we can see whether or not it makes sense even if the developer didn't tell us the above.

Nazamil is a young-ish girl, bordering looking around Rinwell/Law's age, which is stated to be 14/16 respectively, according to ToA. She looks similiar to Rinwell, so around 14, which would be a fair assumption. Min age 14 at the beginning of Beyond the Dawn (BtD), minus two when ToA starts (since BtD is stated to take place about 1-2 years after the ending of ToA), so let's say Nazamil is 11/12 when ToA starts. Assumption one.

This implies that the lord would have had to been on Dahna during the last crown contest. This would also imply that the lord had been on Dahna for the last seventeen years (ten years from the last contest and seven for the contest that is going on in ToA). This immediately rules out Dohalim, due to his age being 28 (sourced from the wiki), and with the current contest having been running for 7 years already, he would have been 21 when it started, and at maximum 18 if he were to be Nazamil's parent. Which...is a pretty big assumption as the story in ToA also tells us that Dohalim was on Lenegis during the last crown contest with his whole backstory with his violin quartet.

That and a few other things I'll point out later, Dohalim is probably 99% not Nazamil's parent.

For the other four, Balseph had confirmed to be at least the lord for the last twenty-seven years, as Ganabelt comments early on in ToA that Balseph had lost the last two Crown Contests. So he's a possibility, as he would be at least forty-five (I'm making another assumption here that to become a lord, the candidate has to have a min age of eighteen. I'm using the age of 'adult' that is commonly portrayed in our world).

We know he was not the lord at the very least in the last Crown Contest, because the last 'sovereign' that won the constest was the previous Lord of Cyslodia. Of course they don't give much context for the Lords, in terms of whether it's possible for one to be lord of one one region one contest and then switch regions the next contest. There's no evidence to support that, so we'll assume that Ganabelt was not a lord in the last Crown Contest. Of course, this doesn't confirm or reject whether or not he was on Dahna during the last contest.

Ganabelt also has a relatively older look in the game, giving the impression of at least a mid-30s to mid-40s man. His voice actor in japanese does make him sound older, which I would personally push to early-40s to late-40s. But his english voice actor sounds like a snotty young noble, dropping him down to at minimum Dohalim's age to mid-30s.

This is very estimate and assumption heavy as there is nothing that hints to his age, other than looks and age. But I would put him as a safe bet for possibly being Nazamil's parent.

Almeidrea, well, I would estimate her age as being thirty to forty? Again, no exact numbers I can find, but if there was little information on Ganabelt, there's almost next to nothing about Almeidrea.

Finally we have Vholran. Which I saw a source about him being around twenty-four at the start of ToA, cannot find the official source of that, but I'll assume him to be around Alphen's age. Alphen is said to be twenty-one, so I doubt Vholran is younger so I would put Vholran to be twenty to late-twenties at oldest. The issue is it's implied that he was only sent to Dahna during the current crown contest (less than seven years). The previous lord was killed by Vholran and the Rena on Lenegis seem to confirm that, in that Vholran wasn't choosen to be a lord, and that the kill happened during the time when the previous lord was already on Dahna.

So this would imply that Vholran would already have been turned into a Renan before procreating, which as implied by the previous part, would not fit our initial timeline of Nazamil having to be 12-13 at least. But he's still in the running, I'll explain later.

(Another side note: This of course assumes that Nazamil was birthed by 'normal' means, as in parents has some intercourse be it consensual or not. No test-tube, Renan magic bs, not yet at least)

Next, traits. We know nothing about her abilities, apart from being cursed with this mask thing, which doesn't seem to a hereditary thing in this case, whereas Shionne's thorns were hereditary (to some extent).

From my experience in playing videos games and character design (especially with JRPGs), we can usually use the hair and eye color to see who she might match the best. Nazamil has heterochromia, her left eye's yellow and the her right eye blue. Her hair, a silvery white.

We can then safely put Almeidrea down as unlikely to be Nazamil's parent, due to her having green eyes and red hair. It's not that she couldn't have birthed Nazamil, but I would say by character design-wise, it ain't giving off the same vibes. Nazamil's design just doesn't hint towards Almeidrea. Dohalim, likewise, same argument. Red hair and dark skin, doesn't fit Nazamil character look.

Then let's focus on the eyes, and the final three lords, Balseph has yellow eyes, Ganabelt blue and Vholran yellow as well. Vholran is the only one with his eye color called out in the wiki, but this may be due to him having more attention in the spotlight than other lords, as well as being a very major character in the plot of Arise.

So based off of eye color, it could be either three. The assumption here is that both eye colors come from her parents, as there seems to be nothing (yet) that points to her having one color that is from an event that happened after her birth.

Then hair color, it's obviously Ganabelt who matches with her the best, with Balseph having brown hair (his beard) and Vholran having black. But note that Vholran also is stated to have white tips, so let's give that a half-check instead of a complete match, especially since there's no way to tell if turning him into the sovereign did something to his hair.

(and if it did turn white, that would mean that the procedures to finish the sovereign-fication would have had to be done before Nazamil's birth, assuming that it's somewhat genetic, which is a fair assumption due to the genetic nature of the 'Renans' in general, which again, look at Vholran's timeline argument)

This doesn't completely knock out Balseph, though, but he is now a weaker candidate for Nazamil's parent.

So, now we have two possible people it could be, Vholran and Ganabelt. And if we look at the rest of Nazamil's character design, nothing seems to scream either of them directly. Color scheme wise, she doesn't fit either of them exactly, with her supporting a light blue, white and purple scheme. Ganabelt is more of a dark, navy blue, and white scheme, whereas Vholran is just blue and black.

Her dress also contains snowflake like patterns, seen more easily here, but that could hint to both Cyslodia being the land of ice and snow, or Vholran's water-based artes which are more ice than water.

Another part of character design is the character personality. Nazamil has a very closed off personality, the profile mentions that she has basically closed off her heart, and good at pretending to be indifferent and apathetic.

In my opinion, this is a bit hard to pin down. Because she's still a child, and has endured a lot of trauma (being hunted down, everyone hates her etc), the personality is a bit more up in the air. We could say that she's similar to Vholran because of the apathetic mask, the indifference, but it is specifically called out to be a mask. There is also the argument that Nazamil mentions about erasing differences, but I would not link that to either Vholran or Ganabelt.

The masking portion, it could be similiar to Ganabelt being good at tricking others, but in the end I am going to discard that bit about her personality, as there is too many factors to be able to get a clear read on who she's most similar too. Both are a draw for me.

Then finally, we get to motive. Vholran doesn't care so he's probably fine with taking an unwilling participant to bed, considering how he kidnapped Shionne in ToA and it was pointed out that he seemed to almost enjoy the struggle she was putting up during that scene.

Ganabelt is basically the snobby noble in the game, the one who represents the 'best' of Renan society, so I really doubt he would willingly touch a Dahnan in that manner with a ten-foot pole. Pure bloodline and all that bs.

Finally there are a few other factors here that may swing the vote to Vholran to being Nazamil's parent.

One, Vholran's face was the one that popped up in the trailer. In a not so subtle manner. They're bringing him back somehow and I would suspect that Nazamil is the tie-in somehow.

Two, people are very aware that Nazamil is half-Renan and half-Dahnan. In fact, they seem to have known from who she was from when she was born. Which puts the Ganabelt-as-Meneck as her parent theory as a bit weak as Meneck was only exposed as Ganabelt in ToA. Of course, trauma doesn't take long to develop and it could be actually that after the events of ToA that Nazamil gets hated on, since BtD is said to take place two years after ToA. Two years of being persucuted is more than enough to cause Nazamil's trauma.

Three, when Nazamil holds the mask up to her face in the trailer, it covers the blue eye, showing only the yellow one. It seems to emphasize that one, which lends more credence to Vholran being her parent.

Four, why would it be Ganabelt? And this has more to do with the story and how they setup Arise, but the other lords barely get a mention outside of their arcs. Balseph was there to setup the beginning. Ganabelt was there to develop Law's story and motive, and Almeidrea was literally just fodder for Rinwell's backstory. The three lords were very 2-dimensional, when compared to the main characters and Vholran, which would lead me to believe that they wouldn't make Nazamil's parent either of those three, unless they plan on expanding on the other lords (which wouldn't be a bad thing).

Five, in the exculsive first clip, the area where Nazamil is running through looks like Mahag Saar, note the windmill in the back and ruined buildings. So it wouldn't be a stretch to say that she used to be from Ganath Haros, but hard to tell.

But...In the same clip, when Nazamil uses astral energy, the eye that glows is the blue one. Which is Ganabelt's eye color. I would usually take that to mean that the eye that glows is the one that belonged to the Renan parent. But I will note that the glow in her eye mimics Vholran's Sovereign glow more than it does for the other Renans in the series, especially since it's in the right eye, where the sovereign crest resides in both Vholran and Alphen.

Then finally, in the pre-order trailer, we have this

Look at that crest behind her, it's not the sovereign crest, rather something different, but it appears in the same manner, which at this point, I am willing to call it as Vholran being her parent, but I'm not going to call it done and dusted.

Regardless, a good amount of the evidence does lean very heavily towards Vholran being Nazamil's parent, a close second being Ganabelt. If they pull a complete plot twist and it's Balseph, oh boi am I going to have fun with analysing that.

The one tiny minor issue that I have is the first point that I made in the very beginning. Vholran doesn't completely fit the timeline and with assumption that Nazamil is 12-13 at the start of ToA. And since it's implied that intercourse was involved, either Nazamil is younger or Vholran is older than I had assumed.

Of course this can easily explained away (as in why it doesn't fit nicely by the developers) by the fact that the DLC was (presumably) not planned when ToA came out. Most likely when they made ToA, they didn't have Nazamil's story out yet in any form, so ToA was made with the assumption that the story was finished, there wasn't more that was planned.

So is that it? Yeah, basically, until we get more information about Nazamil and BtD, we're still in a limbo. But the DLC is a little more than a month out (from time of posting this) so hopefully we'll get some more information (or maybe they'll just tell us, who knows, ToA did do a crap ton of info-dumping during the second half of the game)

Thanks for reading!

Sources: Official Annoucement Trailer Exclusive First Clip Pre-Order Trailer

[beelovesreading]

Book Review #2

I'm going to start posting some of my older proper reviews on here! This one was written May 26th 2024.

I don’t know how Andrew Joseph White keeps doing it, but each book is better than the last.

Disclaimer: I received an ARC of this via NetGalley. This does not affect my review. Thank you PeachTree teen for approving my first ever arc on NetGalley, I am so thankful it can be used on a book as excellent as this.

This book masterfully weaves several storylines and themes: worker's rights and leftism; queer identity (both trans and later aromantic); autism; Appalachia; and a long-standing blood feud. All topics lead into each other and allow complexity and deepening of each one individually. It is a fantastic read and I highly recommend it; if White's previous books were too gore-heavy for you, I find that this one leaned more into the suspense and didn't describe things as graphically.

On that topic of suspense, the book wonderfully split intense moments into short paragraph chapters, which really helped with the pacing and I found fit perfectly.

I also liked that each first page of chapters was black with white text! Small detail but I found it fun.

This is a very heavy book, and there are a lot of warnings for the content that one should be aware of before going in. The author lists it in his Goodreads review, but I'll list them again here (with a few of my own): Graphic violence and gore; politically motivated abuse of power, particularly of law enforcement; transphobia (public outing, misgendering, deadnaming, unaccepting family (resolved)); internalised aphobia, drug dependency and its effects (cigarettes and opioids, main character also undergoes opioid withdrawal after quitting without medical supervision); ableism (internalised and external); vomiting, animal harm (off page harm to a dog, butchering of deer on page); abuse from an intimate partner (physical/emotional); mentions in passing of recordings of a child in the shower by an antagonist (shown as wrong but it made me feel viscerally so I'm warning about it here).

Slight spoilers ahead, if you don't want any don't read the next part!

Early on in the book, our main character, Miles, is beaten up by several boys involved in the blood feud. This injury is described with several chapters like "I don't remember what they did." "Only that there was a lot of blood, and all of it was mine." While this could have been tagged on at the end of the last chapter, having them as two separate chapters really worked for me and is a great example of how the writing in this book was phenomenal.

This book in unashamedly leftist and queer, which is so refreshing to see, especially in YA fiction.

I also really love the end of the book so I will end my review with the final few lines (I hope that's okay :) )

"But while you're here, officer, why don't you hold this railroad spike for me? Hold it in your hand and tell me how heavy it is. Tell me which one of us you'd use it on. See what happens if you try."

Photo ID: The book cover for Compound Fracture by Andrew Joseph White. It features a boy with short hair wearing a red bandana and clutching his bleeding left eye and a dog. They are framed by railroad spikes along the bottom and antlers at the top, and the background is a dusty green.

[digital-learning-point]

Digital Marketing

Best SEO Tools for Bloggers Looking to Increase Traffic

Maintaining a blog is a significant endeavor. The days of being able to log in and write on whatever topic you wanted to are long gone. These days, staying ahead of the competition requires in-depth research and constant plan optimization.

Thankfully, you're not by yourself. You might do site audits, study the competition, conduct keyword research, and much more with the help of many tools. You may go back to the top of the search engine results page or recover a lost rank with any of the techniques listed below. The top 5 SEO tools for bloggers are listed below.

Yoast SEO

Pro bloggers using WordPress all across the world vouch for Yoast SEO. This multifunctional tool operates as a quick and free WordPress plug-in to evaluate and make recommendations for enhancements to each post and page on your website. It also provides real-time support when you upload new material. Are you using overly lengthy or short titles? Yoast will notify you. Is keyword density very aggressive? It will be detected by Yoast before you press the publish button.

The ability to optimize your SEO approach to the tiniest detail is the main advantage of utilizing Yoast. The tool offers suggestions for improvements that might elevate your SEO writing while maintaining a close eye on readability. It's hard enough to come up with keyword and content strategies, so why should you have trouble pushing material live?

Yoast SEO not only has per-post functionality, but it also keeps an eye out for site-wide problems that might hurt your SEO rank. Duplicate content and breadcrumb errors have been mostly eradicated. Even if you're not an expert on robots.txt files, sitemaps, or permalink URL best practices, Yoast can guide you through their world. This is due to their ability to offer direction without becoming unduly technical.

The greatest all-around tool for enhancing the SEO of your site is Yoast SEO. You almost can't live without it when you include features like site modifications, search previews, and keyword optimization, but the writing insights alone make it worthwhile.

2. Netpeak Spider

And what about the content that is already on your website? Many SEO tools focus on backlinks, keywords, organic search results, and link-building opportunities. You could be surprised at the number of issues with your website that you were unaware of.

This is when the use of Netpeak Spider is necessary. It searches the URLs on your website, much like a search engine robot, and thoroughly audits any SEO issues it finds. Based on the level of SEO severity, the problems are divided into three categories: errors, warnings, and notices. This makes it clear which issues need to be addressed immediately.

In addition to looking for broken links, duplicate content, canonical problems, missing titles and descriptions, links with incorrect URL formats, dead-end pages, pages prohibited by the X-Robots-Tag, and many other issues, the Spider also analyzes incoming and outgoing internal links on websites.

You have the option to store or export your data, so you can work on it later. You may choose to have your entire website crawled, just a certain page, or use custom rules to scan only a portion of your site.

Currently only compatible with Windows, Netpeak Spider is a desktop program that will soon be accessible on Linux and macOS as well.

3. Majestic

A versatile backlink checker, site explorer, and all-around link profiler are all included in the Majestic SEO toolbox. Majestic acts as a kind of spy on the backlink profiles of your competitors, in addition to providing you with information about your own blog's statistics. What better way to advance than to imitate and elevate your peers, after all?

Majestic offers an extensive toolbox that includes various tools such as flow measurements, domain comparisons, keyword checkers, and a site explorer. For the most part, this is very ordinary stuff in terms of SEO services. Majestic's superior link analysis is where it truly shines. The website has indexed about 500,000,000,000 distinct URLs and has historical information dating back to 2013. Few, if any, rival programs

can accomplish what this one does: check and trace the backlink history of any given domain.

4. Cognitive SEO

You most likely already know about cognitive SEO and that it provides an advanced, all-inclusive SEO toolset that is built in Europe if you work as an SEO professional, webmaster, or digital marketer. The outcomes are worth the work, even though there is a severe learning curve.

It provides you with advanced tracking and analysis tools, suggestions for improvements, and explanations, all packaged into a clear interface with interactive charts. The creators of the application promise that you will get top ranks in three easy steps: keyword research, ranking analysis, and content enhancement.

complex site audits for both your site and your competitors

easy to comprehend and visualize data, along with recommendations on how to fix the issues on your site

check for broken links both internal and external

keyword and content optimization; the tool analyzes all your site’s pages and posts and provides you with a content performance score based on keywords and also a readability score

in-depth backlinks analysis

detect unnatural links that led to Google penalties

desktop, mobile, and local rank tracking for all locations and languages

analyze content visibility based on social shares

check Google algorithm changes: CognitiveSEO tracks how Google rankings fluctuate daily and provides you with an illustrative chart where you can see when there were significant changes made in SERPs. If you suddenly notice a significant drop for one of your pages, you can check their chart to see if it corresponds with a change in Google’s algorithms.

track Google Analytics metrics directly from the Cognitive SEO interface

schedule reports to be sent automatically to your clients

Competitor Analysis: uncover the Google visibility of your competition as well as understand their marketing strategies: link building, content marketing strategy, and many more

They also offer free, limited use of 3 of their SEO tools: Site Explorer, Keyword Tool, and Google Algorithm Changes.

5. Readability Test Tool

Backlinks and keyword density are two of the most talked-about topics in search engine optimization. In the end, though, what matters most is whether or not readers find your work interesting and instructive. By emphasizing readability—making your content as legible as possible—you may increase the number of people who visit your website, both domestically and internationally, and attract a wider audience in this area.

A quick and easy service, the Readability Test Tool evaluates the material on your website and returns a results score that indicates the youngest reader age at which the information might be read and understood. For example, 9–10-year-olds might readily understand material at grade level 4. Although grade levels between six and eight are ideal, you'll be OK as long as you don't go too high.

To read more blogs visit our website digitallearning point.

[sttoru]

DO NOT INTERACT IF: you fit the basic dni criteria \\ you support israel \\ can’t discuss things (like differing opinions) maturely \\ you are a pro-shipper \\ you are a porn link poster \\ you write smut for minors (aging them up with no canon time skip is also not welcome) \\ you don’t reblog fics or support artists and/or writers on tumblr dot com \\ you’re a man

FOR THE MINORS: i don’t care that you’re on my page reading my works. you’re the one taking the risks and the responsibility of what you’re going to read is all yours. just don’t interact because any visible age under 17, gets blocked.

HATE ASKS get either completely ridiculed & clowned or instantly blocked & deleted, no in-between. idc abt what you say (especially on anon). you got something to say about me, say it to me directly please !

this blog is mostly jjk-centred. however, i do publish genshin, hsr or l&dps related fics from time to time.

empty blogs will get blocked. inactive blogs too. use your accounts. spam liking will also get you blocked.

i use the block button how i please. if i block you, i have a reason. if we were mutuals, i hard block most of the time. if you decide to block me & we were mutuals: please hardblock me, not soft block.

this is not an only writing blog. i talk, vent and reblog stuff to my liking. i also talk about my own selfships. if you don’t like it, don’t complain. just block.

english is not my first language. don’t expect perfect english grammar — unasked criticism is not needed.

i do not indulge myself in personal discourse nor do i entertain it, unless i (or a mutual of mine) was offended first. when that happens & you do not want to see it, filter ‘cw discourse’.

most works are self-centred / self-indulgent: meaning, they are all female centred. reader is always portrayed as a woman & is shorter than the characters most of the time. though, no further descriptions are added (skin tone, body type etc.) unless i specify so in the tags.

i’m a misandrist and don’t like men, fyi ! if that bothers you, block me

this blog is not spoiler free. i also may forget to put spoiler warnings every now and then. don’t hesitate to politely remind me to add them if that happens.

Q&A

can i dm you to talk or ask something?

yes! as long as you stay respectful, my dms are always open. mutuals can ask for my discord any time as well.

you’ve blocked me, what did i do?

i use the block button how i like. if you’re blocked, you’re either one of the ppl in my dni or a blank/ageless/empty blog with no posts. or, it’s just that i didn’t feel comfortable with something you posted or said. orrrrr, it’s because of your own do not interact criteria and i went ahead and blocked you to spare you the trouble :)

can i vent to you in your inbox?

depends. if you want advice on a simple situation, sure. if it’s to rant about triggering topics (such as suicidal thoughts, depression, sexual assault, or other dark stuff) please seek a therapist for that — not just a random writer on the internet.

why do you block inactive and/or empty blogs that interact with you or follow you?

simply because some of you need to learn that tumblr works on reblogs. plus, empty blogs (and especially with the default tumblr layout) look like bots. lurkers are also not welcome. if you want to keep reading the amazing fictional works on this app, then you need to help your creators out by reblogging their content. it shows support, even if you don’t add any tags to it.

you haven’t posted a fic in a while. when are you publishing one?

i’m a slow writer sometimes. do not expect a fic each day or even each week / two to three weeks. i have a social life outside of this tumblr account i started just for fun (plus university) — no pressuring me into or asking for a part 2 / fic either or you’re blocked.

[fazbears-horror-attraction]

Hello !!! That was me ( Mod Phantom Mangle ( or Phantom for short ), thank you for your time to answer this, i really appreciate it !

I Do have low spoons so i will be very very slow (i still have 2 month old requests in my inbox and slowly working on my own things) How ever if you or any followers have any Factive specific requests you can go ahead and send! This is a hobby for me and i do enjoy it when i can ! /gen

I'll update our rules etc at some point, but as of right now i will do:

IRL pictures of *most people (*as long as their face has been consenually in pictures or videos (ex: Youtubers (Markiplier, Dawko etc)

*i WILL do History and True Crime folks by using actors/actresses and picrews!!!

What i do for those who don't know:

Simple Moodboards

Icons (pride, aesthetic or plain (no editing)( less likely to do this FIRST if i have to make a transparent)

Genders / Terms (Kenochoric, Agere, IRL, Kinnic, Alder etc. I will NOT make Radqueer terms). I rather not say, make "Markipliersexual" unless its like "Markiplierace: When being Markiplier in some way while being Asexual"

And for my bodily older folks i have an After Dark MOGAI / Plural etc blog ( Minors DNI ) @succubus-help-corner where i do similar requests with more mature topics (kink, after dark mogai, etc)

Fair warning i have had no spoons to do ID but once i do i can try my best.

My only thing i ask for in return is to use tone tags with me (@ anyone not just you op /gen)

I started responding and then saved the draft and now tumblr won't let me finish it so:

Image ID: An anonymous ask that says: "Hello!! I run a mogai blog and I do things for plural folks, and introjects (or I try to, I know, admittingly I leaned fictive thinking only but to be fair. I was still learning ).

Do you have annly tips/ideas on what I should do/add that's very inclusive for all headmates and/or factives?

Like should I open icon requests for irl folks (youtubers etc). And if so I was wondering if not using TC (true crime) pictures but maybe picrews, or would that still be disrespectful etc.

I want to be as inclusive as possible without crossing other lines /gen" END ID]

This is a very good question, so thanks for thinking to reach out and ask me. I'll start by saying that, like I said, not every blog is meant for every system. Like I've said, just blogs are just for fictives, and if there is a reason for that, then it's okay. I once came across a blog the beyond only doing requests for fictional identities/characters, they wouldn't do your request if it was for a character played by a love action actor. Clearly, their content wasn't including of factives, plenty of fictives were excluded including the fictive we were looking to request content for, but that was their boundary, and it was valid.

I say this because I dont know what kind of content your blog makes. For example, are you making identies based off of character or are you putting identities on characters? For example, Alvin from Alvin and the Chipmunks gender or Alvin from Alvin and the Chipmunks is Insert mogaigender

Both of those types of posts may make you uncomfortable to make regarding real people if that's what you're doing. And that's completely valid

But let's say the content your posting wouldn't make you uncomfortable to add fact identities to. Opening requests for icons of real life people is an absolute wonderful place to start. It's really hard to reccomend things when I don’t know what all you're posting, but some things that blogs I follow do are moodboards, icon edits, "steal his look", and self care packages. Those are things that could be done for any type of introject. Even octives or songtives given the requester gives you enough information to go off of. (Though the steal the look may just be more of a general fashion suggestions)

Really, whatever you're doing, if you feel comfortable enough to attack the face or name of a real person to, do-- that's the best way to be inclusive of factives.

As for TC factives, I can easily say that we dont expect much. Very few if any at all will hate you because you were uncomfortable doing a request for anyone TC. Like I've said before, it's a perfectly valid boundary to have. Being willing to even use picrew versions of us is so much more than we could ever ask for or expect from anyone. It would be an incredible compromise, and I don't think it would hurt anyone. It's a question of your boundaries though.

I hope the little bit of what I was able to say could help, feel free to privately message me or send another ask with your blog, I'd love to see it.

Thanks for taking the time to try to be more all inclusive!!

[anisespice]

“ the fuck-it list ” || hq! pt. 2

one || three || four || five

synopsis: there’s a list going around consisting of hot guys on campus that are deemed “fuckable” with theories as to what they’d be like in bed. it’s all fun and games until somehow your boyfriend ends up on this list. 

pairing: various x gn!reader [ hinata, bokuto, kuroo ]

warnings: cursing, suggestive language, hinata’s is SUPER long lol mild objectification, bo and kuroo’s are criminally the shortest ones i’ve written so far ugh (but they get the point across), and I think that’s it :D

notes: first of all, can i just say THANK Y'ALL SO MUCH ♡♡♡ i did not expect that headcanon to blow up, so i will do my very best to make the following ones just as juicy and entertaining for y'all :))) special thanks to @melanatedkink for helping out with this, she helps bring out my inner whore lol hope you guys enjoy !!

notes ii: didn't want the situations to get too repetitive, so these may take me a little longer for the other characters i do in the future, but i appreciate the love and patience for the series thus far !!! you guys are awesome

tagged: @daedaep69 , @ahahadumbo , @viktoryn , @mdsb , @ourgoddessathena , @ushygushybaby , @hyori2 , @lumpywolf , @fantasycantasy

HINATA knew all about the list. Being the social butterfly he was, it would be impossible for the topic not to come up in conversation, especially since a lot of his friends were on it. He found it interesting, to say the least, but never really took the whole thing too seriously. It was just for shits and giggles after all, right?

During a water break in the gym, Hinata aimed for his mouth while squeezing the bottle. Most made it inside, but the rest dripped down his chin. Thinking nothing of it, the spiker used the bottom of his jersey to wipe his face dry, be it water or sweat. And even though it was for a split second, it was more than enough time for the damage to be done to the hearts of those chilling up by the railing on the first level. Beneath the LEDs, in all their sinful glory, were Shoyo Hinata’s nipple piercings. 

The gates of heaven have opened, and the choir sings a hymn. But, along came Satan, as he rubbed his seedy hands together in mischief. The groupies were shellshocked and knew they must alert the masses, eyeing their prey all the way until the end of practice. This caught the attention of a certain blonde setter, who brought it to Hinata’s attention right off the bat as they cleaned up the court.

“Oi. Don’t wanna alarm ya or anythin’, but…those spectators up there been eye-ballin’ you for quite a while. Could be trouble.”

The tangerine gave a confused grin, looking over his shoulder in their direction. Sure enough, their eyes never wavered, not even after being caught. However, he merely shrugged it off. “It’s probably nothing.”

Atsumu hummed, skeptically. Though, he didn’t push it any further.

Once they were dismissed and sent to the showers, by the time Hinata was done he'd be the only one left in the locker room. He had to take his time and be extra careful not to bump his piercings, still kinda sensitive. Kageyama offered to stay behind so they could walk back together, "HINATA-BOKE, HURRY UP BEFORE I LEAVE YOUR SLOW ASS IN HERE."

But, Hinata politely declined. "SUCK A DICK, BAKAYAMA. I'm going over [_____]'s tonight, so go on ahead!"

With a nod, the stoic setter took his leave. "Cool. Tell 'em I said hey. See you tomorrow."

"See ya tomorrow!"

And then, all was quiet.

The only sounds filling the space were the running water, his humming, and the flickering overhead lights. When he stepped out with a towel wrapped snuggly around his waist, Hinata heard the sound of his phone ringing in his bag. His tired expression soon melted into joy at the cheesy love song he used as your ringtone.

Pressing the answer button, Hinata greeted you with his face all in the camera, and a bright, "Hi, [_____]!!~ You here already?"

Your eyes were on the road but you grinned, adoringly. "Hi, Sho. And, no, almost there though. I stopped by the canteen to grab some dinner. Know how hungry you get after practice."

"Mmm, starved. You're an angel, angel."

Staying on the call as he changed, the two of you conversed about each other's day as normal. However, when the topic of those groupies eventually came up, it instantly made you tense. Even though most of his fans were harmless, there were still a few rotten apples in the bunch that made you wary. "God, don’t tell me they asked you to spike their ass like a ball again."

Hinata snorted, throwing on a clean shirt, "That wasn't me, remember? That was Sakusa-san. Never seen him look so horrified." You laughed, having recalled. "But, according to 'tsumu-san, they hardly took their eyes off me tonight.”

“That’s old news, babe. Those vultures are always watching you.”

“Not always-”

"ALWAYS." You affirmed, pulling up to the building. Parking outside the doors, you teasingly said, "We can continue talking about how wrong you are in the car, I’m outside. And hurry, the food's gonna get cold."

"Yes, boss," he chuckled, gathering up his things. Throwing the duffle over his shoulder, Hinata made haste for the lobby, making sure to turn the lights off behind him. “See you in a minute, sunshine.~”

With that he hung up, walking with a spring in his step. He had a surprise for you, and couldn’t wait to finally show them off later. Now that the piercings had healed enough, Hinata couldn’t fight the obscene images clouding his mind of all the things you’d do once you saw them. It made him dizzy just thinking about it…

Unfortunately, someone would beat him to the punch. Or, more specifically, something.

‘Shoyo Hinata. 5’6ft sweetheart, and a ball of energy who’ll light up any room he walks into. He may look all innocent, but clearly, we’ve been underestimating him. Kinda has everyone wondering what other piercings he may be hiding…and where.~ What he may lack in height, he makes up for in girth. Expect to go for several rounds back to back, ‘cause he’s got STAMINA. This man will also be very vocal—Talk you through an orgasm, how good you make him feel, dirty-talk, begging, you name it—He is BIG on communication. He's also a cuddler, after-care will be disgustingly sweet, and pillow talk will be a must. 100/10.’

Wow. You suspected those parasites were up to no good, but never would’ve expected this. The picture attached to the thread was of your boyfriend, mid-air from blocking a ball, with his arms straight up. As he was coming down, his shirt was coming up, exposing his whole torso. It was a little blurry, but whoever took the photo zoomed in enough to where you could easily make out the silver on his nipples.

You pursed your lips, uncertain on how to feel. On one hand, you were kinda annoyed they, let alone the whole campus, got to see them before you even knew about them. But, on the horny hand…

“Hey, gorgeous!” Hinata exclaimed, startling you out of your thoughts. He had opened the back door, and threw his bag on the seat before eagerly joining you in the front. Leaning across the console to give you a kiss, he was taken aback when you stopped him, placing a finger on his lips. “Mmm?”

You gave him a blank look, making him a little nervous. He was just on the phone with you and things were totally fine, what could’ve possibly changed in the five minutes it took him to get to the car? Hinata didn’t have to ponder for long, though. Not when you used that very same finger to hook around his collar, yanking it downward. He yelped, pulling away in the last second, but his reflexes couldn’t save him this time.

You confirmed it with your own eyes now.

“I uh—…T-Those are…,” he spluttered, scratching his cheek. You happily watched him squirm, arms crossed with a knowing grin on your face. Hinata sweat-dropped. “I-I was gonna t-tell you, I swear, but I wanted them to heal a little before I did, so that you could…”

“Could what, Sho?”

His face was pure vermilion. With a huff, Hinata whined, “How’d you even find out? I had a whole thing planned and everything! Was it Bakayama? Did he tell you?? Dammit, I knew I should’ve asked someone else to come with me to the appointment!”

You chuckled, shaking your head. “No, it wasn’t Kageyama. I told you so, those vultures are always watching.”

“Huh?”

“I’ll tell you later. For now,” you reached over again, this time with both hands as lithe fingertips slid underneath the thin cotton of his shirt, trailing up the smooth skin until you brushed against the perked nubs. Hinata twitched, immediately biting back a moan as you began teasing them at once. If he got any redder, he’d surely pass out from all the blood rushing to his head. Luckily, it was also rushing elsewhere. “Let’s hurry and get you back to mine’s, hm?"

"...S-So I uhn," he keened when you lightly tugged on one, hand reflexively grabbing your wrist, but not to stop you. His eyes fluttered as he let you feel him up as much as you pleased, mouth hung open as he began panting like a dog. "...I take it y-you like them, then?"

"Oh, baby, I love 'em. Best investment ever, honestly. Can't wait to put them in my mouth," you sighed dreamily, gently pinching to elicit a moan from the ginger. Music to your ears. From the look on his face, he could probably cum from this feeling alone. You pulled away at the thought, smirking as he instantly began protesting.

"Aht, not so fast, we still gotta eat. But, don't worry. You'll get your dessert."

Homie nodded so quick, you were sure he gave himself whiplash. Adorable.

By the end of a very long night full of debauchery, you eventually told him about the list and how exactly you found out about the piercings. And you know what? He couldn’t even be mad. At least it wasn't Kageyama.

“Oh! He says ‘hey’ by the way.”

Now, BOKUTO thought he knew about the list. But after the whole…misunderstanding with Akaashi, it turned out he knew absolutely nothing. Granted, how he felt about it didn’t really change after his friends spent over an hour explaining it to him. If anything, it fueled his distaste for it even more. When he showed up on your doorstep looking absolutely distraught, fat tears rolling down his face as he proclaimed his unwavering devotion to you, you only needed one guess. 

‘Kotaro Bokuto. 6’2ft of GAWD DAMN. He's sweet, confident, and R E S P E C T F U L?? We love a triple threat. Not to mention how MASSIVE he is, and don’t even get me started on his ass. Would literally be unable to keep my hands to myself, just saying. Like how you see him dominate the volleyball court, the same could be said for the bedroom, without a doubt. Bokuto loves to give, but he’s also a taker. Definitely gives off Switch with service Dom tendencies. Plus he’s greedy. He doesn’t care if you already came four times, give him some more!!! ∞/10. He is beyond the standard. Argue with the wall.’ 

You remembered reading it while taking a break from studying, merely brushing it off. It was only a matter of time he’d end up on their radar, you had prepared for it since the list first started circulating around campus. Frankly, you had completely forgotten about it; up until now. 

“Ko, baby, please calm down-”

“I don’t care how many people wanna touch my ass! They can’t have it, it’s for you to touch and nobody else!” 

You quickly pulled him into your room before he screamed any more embarrassing stuff in the hallway, knowing your neighbors probably recognized his voice by now. The last thing you wanted was another noise complaint, your RA already despised his visits enough to consider banning him altogether–Whether or not they had the authority, you’d rather not find out today. 

Once behind the safety of a closed door, the behemoth of a man came crashing down to his knees, arms circling around your midriff as he buried himself in your stomach. You jumped slightly as your room shook from the sudden action, deeply exhaling in order to reconfigure your thinning patience. Taking a page from Akaashi’s book, you knew getting snippy with Bokuto while he was in this state would only worsen it, so you approached cautiously. 

“Ko,” you cooed, reaching down to caress his deflated hair. He sniffled, hugging you closer in response. Gently, you pushed him far enough to see his face, wiping away the tears as you offered him a soft smile. “Look at me, do I look upset to you?”

Bokuto took a moment to search your eyes, then shook his head.

“Exactly. Which means you don’t need to be, you’ve done nothing wrong. Now stand up, I’m sure that drop hurt your knees, didn’t it?” 

He sniffled once more, then nodded. Slightly embarrassed, Bokuto stumbled back up to his full height, and sure enough, his knees were red. You tsked, gesturing to your desk chair for him to sit on while you fetched an ice pack from your fridge. 

“Although I appreciate the reassurance, I already knew you were on the list, babe.” 

Bokuto’s head shot up from looking at the floor, mood instantly doing a one-eighty as he gaped at you in shock. “HUH? Why didn’t you say anything to me about it?”

“I didn’t think you cared,” you replied, chuckling. “It’s been up for weeks. I figured you saw it and just ignored it, or something. Besides, I’ve gotten used to people openly expressing their attraction to you, so it wasn’t anything new.” 

“You shouldn’t have to get used to it! People need to respect our relationship, no matter how fantastic I am!” 

You snorted, but couldn’t help the chuckle. Returning with an ice pack, you kneeled by his legs and placed the cooling relief upon the irritated skin. “Mm, you are pretty fantastic. But, I don’t mind the attention you get, Ko. Because I know I’m the lucky one who gets you all to myself.” 

Bokuto beamed down at you, lower lip quivering at the praise. 

Effortlessly, he swooped you up from the floor and held you in his lap, the ice pack long forgotten as it slipped out your hands. With a loving squeeze, Bokuto nuzzled into the side of your neck, forcing soft giggles out of you from the ticklish feeling as you hugged him back. You felt so warm in his embrace, and he smelled like home. Even if you’d never say such corny things out loud, the way you melted in his arms was enough for him to know exactly how you felt; it was mutual.

"Plus, you can get a bit intense. They wouldn't last the night."

"Hey, hey, hey, you got that right," Bokuto grinned, smugly. "No one could ever handle me as well as you do, baby owl..." he purred, warm breath fanning over the skin of your shoulder, signaling goosebumps up your arms. You hummed in thought, snuggling in closer, whilst also not-so-accidentally grinding back against the flag pole in his sweats. He grunted, hips jerking upward in surprise.

"Hm, I dunno. It's been a while, I may have forgotten how."

Bokuto chuckled at the tease, the vibrations deep within his chest as he squeezed you a little tighter. You bit your lip to hold in your giddiness as his large hands began to wander, feeling a different kind of warmth as he began to overwhelm your senses. Trailing wet kisses from your shoulder to the side of your face, he playfully nipped at your cheek, eliciting a tiny squeal from you as you wiggled in his hold. And doing so only made you grind back on him even more.

His breathing grew heavier with each passing second, letting out a guttural groan before he flipped you around, making you straddle him. To anyone else, experiencing his sudden mood changes would've given them whiplash. Just moments prior, he'd been on his knees, crying with his head buried in your stomach like it was the end of the world. Now, he looked about five seconds from being on his knees for a different reason. For you, it was just another Wednesday.

"That so? How 'bout I remind you then?"

KUROO thought the list was the most hilarious thing to ever occur on campus, hands down one of his go-to's for entertainment when he’s bored. 

Like right now. 

The lecture dragged on for what felt like forever, the professor mumbling about absolutely nothing of value as everyone in the class busied themselves with whatever would keep them awake. Some played games on their laptops pretending to take notes, while others blatantly chatted with their deskmates.

With an airpod in, Kuroo had you on facetime in the corner of his screen so that you could keep each other company while he scrolled through social media, and you put away dishes. You tried to convince him to leave the class early, "Clearly you aren't paying attention, so you might as well."

"Unfortunately, he only counts attendance if you sign your name on the exit sheet at the very end of the lecture. So leaving early's out of the question." He muttered. You hummed in understanding, then chortled.

"Oh. Sucks to be you, then."

Kuroo glared half-heartedly at you, but it completely softened at the sound of your laughter, despite it being at his expense. He kissed his teeth after checking the time, mildly annoyed that he still had less than ten minutes. “Why’d you even take the course if you couldn’t care less about it?”

“I needed another elective. And…Kenma was the one who recommended it. Said it’d be an easy pass.”

“And you believed him?” Cue another round of your laughter.

He grumbled, off-screen for you but clearly pouting as he chose to ignore your question. No matter, his silence was answer enough.

With a mere shake of your head, you continued putting away dishes on your end. Kuroo, on the other hand, found himself stumbling upon something that perked him up instantly. After refreshing the feed for more mindless content, the user-handle he knew all too well showed itself like a beacon of hope, beckoning him with the promise of filling the next ten minutes with something way more interesting than…whatever this class was about.

@/FckIt22.

After the last fiasco with Bokuto, then later on Kenma, the ravenette contemplated blocking them. As golden as those situations were, something told him that deep down he could be next. But, it was days like this he was glad he didn’t. His boredom was becoming unbearable…and it was so tempting. What harm could it do to look at this one little upda—“HAH?!”

‘Tetsurou Kuroo. 6’2ft gentleman that you’d proudly take home to mom, and even get your father’s approval. With his charm and roguish good looks, it's no wonder his reputation screams 'playboy'. But, he can’t fool me. I know what he is. A whole SUB, no sandwich. I’m sure being as tall as he is, and how he carries himself, people automatically assume he’s a Dom. False. If you’re looking to be dominated, keep looking. Kuroo wants to be babied, told he’s a good boy, and edged until he nearly passes out. Definitely a little brat, but his hair defies gravity for a reason, PULL ON IT. Boss him around, take control, and watch him literally melt in your hands. 8/10 because he's also a stubborn mofo. Literally would pay to see this man cry from overstimulation ugh.’ 

Kuroo shot out of his seat, practically piercing right through the air of humdrum. He not only startled you, but the entire lecture hall including the professor. Comically slapping a hand over his mouth, Kuroo’s face immediately began to burn from not only his outburst but also at the fact that his karma came way sooner than he was prepared for...

He wanted nothing more than for the ceiling to collapse on him and him only.

“Tetsu?? Are you okay, what happened?? Hello??”

"U-Uh, I'll call you back." He squeaked, double-tapping his airpod to end the call.

The professor crossed his arms, "Mr. Tetsurou. I understand that my lecture may not be the most enjoyable part of your day, but I would appreciate it if you endured it for just," the professor checks his watch, "six more minutes. Is that alright with you?"

Before he could even open his mouth to give an excuse, a chorus of vibrations, dings, and whistles from various phones instantly made the business major shrivel up. Next thing he knew, what used to be a room full of the undead was now livelier than ever before. Kuroo could feel every single one of their searing gazes; like being an insect under a microscope.

"Bro, this you?" A student sitting behind him leaned forward, phone in hand as he shoved it in Kuroo's face. The picture stared back at him, smugly grinning and shirtless as he ironically thirst-trapped the camera. Out of all the pictures…

He internally cringed. "U-Uhh..."

"Please, everyone settle down, so we can continue-" The professor attempted to redirect focus, but he had already lost it way before all this happened. A few more students jumped straight into bombarding him with questions, eager to push for more info now that this supposed new side of him had been revealed.

“Whoa, how much of this is true??”

“Kuroo-san, I’ll happily baby you!~”

“Aw man, thought for sure you’d be the type to take control, not give it up. What a bummer. No offense.”

He absolutely took offense to that.

With no help from the professor, as he tried and failed to recollect everyone's attention, Kuroo thought of the next best course of action to get him out of this sticky situation. Jumping out a two-story window didn't sound so bad, and the broken bones would be a great distraction from the suffocating feeling of public humiliation.

In the midst of all the theories and queries being thrown at him from every angle, his phone went off multiple times. Mostly from you, but the rest were no doubt the groupchat clowning him once they caught wind of the news. The guys weren't gonna let him live this one down, that's for certain. And to make matters worse...he still had four long minutes left in the class.

He exhaled, "Should've blocked 'em when I had the chance..."

Gathering up his stuff, Kuroo used his long legs to evade the ever-growing crowd of prodding students, all most likely not even caring about the post itself, but more so just wanting to kill class time; he refused to be a scapegoat.

Marching right up to the professor, who gave up trying to round up the class, the rooster-head mustered up the most pathetic look possible to evoke sympathy outta the wrinkly man. "Hey, so uh… may I please be excused a little early for this one time, sir? I'd really hate to be such a distraction from your insightful lecture-"

"Just go, Mr. Tetsurou." Didn't need to tell him twice.

As soon as he made it to your dorm, you could imagine his shock that his friends were already there, waiting as if they knew he'd come running straight to you. You offered him a teasing grin, shrugging as you said, “They came for…emotional support.”

He didn't know if he was mortified or mortified—Yaku, Yamamoto, Bokuto, Akaashi, hell, even Kenma rolled out of bed, wrapped in a blanket burrito and all, just to see the look on his best friend's face. He grinned, sardonically, then patted the empty spot on the couch right next to him. "Welcome to the club. We've been expecting you."

Oh, he was definitely blocking that godforsaken list now. And finding a new elective.

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