#actually I think it may depend. some kneel. but I have seen them lay flat

[solargeist]

The Watchers are vaguely Catholic when I write them, specifically like nuns, like a convent.

When nuns take their vows, they lay face down against the floor, legs together, feet pointed, palms down under their foreheads.

I think anytime Grian messes up enough, breaks a rule, he’s forced to apologize in this manner. Typically to an older/higher Watcher.

At first he absolutely refuses to do this, he doesn’t even know what he did wrong ! They put an enchantment on him so he can’t sleep, just until he cracks, just until he presses his nose against the floor.

[strawberriestyles]

Part 4: Pentagram

(BANNER MADE BY MY TALENTED SWEETIE PIE @adashofniallandasprinkleoflunacy)

Harry X Reader (AU)

In which you’re persuaded to help a young witch named Harry.

Read previous parts here.

Word count: 5.1k+

Author’s note: HEY HI HELLO. There will be one more part and a short epilogue after this. WE’RE NEARING THE END. I’ve had and am still having so much fun with this series. Fantasy is my favorite thing to read, and to be able to blend that with fanfiction has been super cool and experimental. I hope you guys enjoy it as much as I do. PLEASE LIKE, REBLOG, LEAVE FEEDBACK. It’s super helpful to writers and can also aid in motivating them. Xx

“Hello, dove.”

When you glance up from your books, you’re unsurprised to find Harry standing at your table. You’ve been wondering when he would show up. But you start at his use of that pet name. He holds a steaming coffee in one hand and an entire meal in the other, and he doesn’t ask permission before he slips into the booth across from you, setting his refreshments down on the tabletop, laying the plate of food on top of your book.

“Had a lot o’ trouble finding yeh today."

“Why’s that?” you ask as you sift your way through the contents of the sandwich he’s placed before you.

“Dunno. Maybe whatever magic’s in your blood is sparkin’ up. Yeh’re gettin’ hard to trace.”

“You trace me?”

“Not with a spell or anythin’,” he says with a shake of his head. “Jus’ been pretty easy to kind o’ feel out your presence. Air feels weird around yeh.”

“Well, that makes me feel good about myself,” you mumble with a thick sigh. “Why did you buy me a panini? I’m not hungry. And how do you know that you picked something I like?”

“Well, I was guessing based on what I know about yeh, but yeh could have said thank you.” Harry sips his coffee and leans his head against the back of the booth. "Or yeh could at least not act rude about it. Just thought yeh could use a good meal right about now. Wha’s wrong?”

You sigh again and settle your chin into your palm, picking at the sandwich bread with your free fingers.

“I have all these midterms coming up. And they’re not for my major-required classes they’re just general classes that everyone needs to graduate. Which is stupid because why do I need to take a college-level math course as a Latin major? That makes no sense. Any career that I end up—“

“I get it,” Harry says with a soft chuckle. “But it might come in handy. I liked t’skip out on my Latin studies when I was younger, and look where that got me. I need a mortal t’help me perform fuckin’ spells.”

“Well, first of all, I’m not all mortal,” you tell him with a frown.

“Mortal enough,” he mutters, twirling his coffee cup to stir its contents. You ignore him for the time being.

“And second of all, that was rude of you. Are you upset that you need me? Because I can just stop helping you at any time.”

“No, Y/N, no.” Harry smiles that annoyingly amused smile of his. “Not upset that I need yeh t’help me with translations. Just upset that I can’ do ‘em myself. Makes my mum crazy proud o’ me, I’ll tell yeh that much. Eat your food, please.”

Despite your prior statement, you do find your stomach aching for the panini he’s ordered you. It’s nearing eight thirty in the campus library. The other students that have been working throughout the day have already trickled out in search of their own dinners or a Netflix recovery session from all the studying they’ve suffered through. You wish you could join them. The fluorescent lights above you haven’t helped to keep you peppy and motivated.

You cave and take a grateful bite.

“Thank you,” you whisper to him when you’ve finished chewing. “I actually haven’t eaten for about six hours. I’m just stressed out.”

“Well,” he says, leaning forward with a quirk to his lips, clearly smug, “tha's perfectly fine, because I think I have the perfect way to relieve your stress. Yeh ‘bout ready t’be done for the night?”

There are surely mountains of work for you left to do, preparations to make, papers to map out—but with your mouth full, you give him a desperate nod.

***

“Was that your first time on campus?” you ask.

Your voice quivers with a faint wariness. Nicks, for whatever strange reason, has decided that she doesn’t mind a close proximity to you. At least for today. She’s sitting on the arm of the couch, just a foot or so from your elbow. Granted, she’s not paying you much attention at all, but it’s a start.

“No.” Harry is laying down a large, thick black cloth. It’s stitched with a white design that only becomes clear as he pulls the fabric out flat—a pentagram. Like a satanic blanket. “I took a few classes a couple years ago. Just t’see what you mortals learn in your higher education.”

“Not a mortal,” you remind him. “Speaking of…”

As Harry skims a page full of his notes from the spell in his book, you remember the warning he gave you that first time you ever helped him. It’ll burn the eyes right outta your skull.

“Can I actually look in the book? If I’m not fully mortal, I mean.”

“No.”

You sigh and Harry begins to lay items out around the edges of the cloth, just outside of the pentagram’s circle. Closed jars and bottles, a bowl of ground up somethings that you’re not sure you want to ask about, something that looks like criss-crossed bones tied together with twine.

“What are we doing?” you ask. “I thought the spell wasn’t going to happen until tomorrow night.”

“’S not,” he says, sprinkling some red powder over the inside of the pentagram. When he stands up he hands you a different sheet of paper with his usual translations and begins to arrange the candles that the two of you made last week at the five points of the pentagram. “This is just a preparation.”

You frown as you lower your eyes to the Latin scribbled out in front of you. They’re odd commands about the arrangement of the items around the pentagram. You glance up at the cloth intermittently to second check Harry’s placements.

“Um,” you mutter after a few minutes, “this says something about a human fingernail.”

“Yeah. Where does it go?”

“Is there any point in me asking you where the human fingernail came from?”

“No.”

You shake your head as you point toward the pentagram. “It’s supposed to go where those bones are right now. And the bones are supposed to be two places counterclockwise.”

Harry rearranges his items while you scan over the rest of the Latin, right up until the words make you freeze. As he stands back up to survey his work, you toss the page to the other end of the couch.

“’S that it?” Harry asks when he turns around again. He travels back toward his shelves and pulls down the jar of Hellfire that the two of you prepared a few weeks ago, still burning dark and ominous, even with its lack of oxygen. He reaches his hand inside and scoops the flames out, kneeling down to light each of the candles and then returning the remainder of the fire to its glass jar and replacing it on the shelf where he found it. He glances up at you when you still haven’t answered him.

You nod your head, perhaps too vigorously, and he sits down beside you, his ringed fingers splayed out over your thigh.

“Harry, I…”

Your voice trails off as he settles his cheek into your shoulder, his lips prodding at the curve of your jaw. You let your eyes fall closed for only a short moment before throwing yourself onto your feet. At the sudden motion, Nicks hightails it from the room.

“What are you doing?” you demand, pressing your lips together as you stand before him.

“Says we’ve gotta fuck, righ’?” Harry asks. So nonchalant. "I may be shit at Latin, but I do know the word for orgasm.”

“Harry.” You let out a disbelieving, airy laugh and shake your head. "You’re just assuming I’ll have sex with you because some dusty book says so?”

“Well, I was hopin’ yeh’d want to.” He gives you that signature smug look that often makes your blood run with heat and his arms settle over the back of the couch. Then he raises an amused eyebrow. “Wha’? D’yeh want it t’be more romantic? I’ve already got candles lit and everythin’.”

“Those are ritual candles burning at the points of a pentagram, Harry.”

“Good observations.”

Your jaw tightens and you turn toward the door. “I’m leaving.”

“Y/N, stop.”

“No, you can’t just expect—"

“Please.” Harry’s footsteps follow you. He doesn’t touch you as you reach the door, but the tone of his voice makes you stop. You fiddle with the zipper of your jacket slung over your forearm. “I need your help. Can yeh help me?"

Your teeth close around your lower lip as you stare at the front door. Candlelight flickers against the walls, painting Harry’s shadow just beside yours. “How do I know this is what the book actually says and that you’re not just making it up?”

“I guess yeh’ll just have t’trust me,” Harry answers. You hear him lean against the wall. "Would it be so bad if I wasmakin’ it up? That I’d wanna have sex with yeh even if the book didn’ say so?”

Your eyes close. He has a point. Haven’t you been drawn to him from the beginning? Didn’t his kiss from last week leave you reeling for days afterward? What would be the harm, really?

When you turn around you’re still hesitant, but Harry stays where he is, his eyes steady as he watches you.

“You make me a little uneasy,” you whisper.

“‘M sorry.” Harry straightens up just by a little bit and smiles very softly. It’s not an expression that you’ve seen on him before. “Get that a lot, actually.”

“It’s not anything you do, really,” you assure him. “It’s just…”

“Yeah. The witch part.”

You bite at the corner of your mouth to keep your laugh at bay. When he smiles at you again, you close the few steps between you and rise up onto your toes, pressing a kiss to his lips with almost the same amount of confidence that he kissed you with last time.

“Yeh trust me?” Harry mutters when your mouths part for a short moment. You fall back on your heels and he looks at you, all hazy-eyed.

“Depends,” you reply. “Are you gonna slit my throat in the middle of this and make me a sacrifice to the devil?”

Harry chuckles to himself and grasps your hips. His fingers press into your skin and you drop your jacket as he pulls you sharply forward. “Not today, dove.”

You fold. Harry gathers you up in his arms and kisses you hard, hands roaming, lips feverish. You lower your fingers to the hem of his shirt and he lets you go only long enough to peel the layer away from his skin.

The trip back down the hall is a mess of clashing teeth, bruising lips, stumbling over each other’s feet. By the time the two of you reach the couch, you’re in your bra and underwear but Harry is somehow still wearing pants. You fumble with the button and zipper of his jeans as he leans against the arm of the sofa. He distracts you with wet kisses that trail down your jaw, fingertips that pluck at the straps of your bra. His pants pool at his feet and he wastes no time shedding his boxers right along with them.

It’s almost as though Harry can sense your persisting wariness as he kisses at the top of your chest and toys with the clasp of your bra. You see his free hand lift beside you and then lower, palm toward the floor, slowly, in time with the dimming of the candles lit around the living room. You sputter out a laugh that makes his teeth scrape against your sternum. Your bra falls to the floor beside his pants and boxers. He sits back on the couch’s arm, that smirk on his face, unashamed, waiting for you to slip out of your underwear.

“You swear this isn’t some weird sacrificial ceremony or something?” you ask him, thumbs poised in the sides of your panties. “You’re not gonna hurt me?”

“Not unless yeh want me to, dove.”

Harry grasps your wrists and pulls them toward your knees, dragging your underwear down with them. His eyes lick back up your body like flames until he’s focused on your face again, and you swear that for a moment they glow that electric blue. But then he’s standing straight again, hands hot against your bare waist, lips prodding at yours, and he’s walking backward with a confidence that you can feel in every step. He begins lowering himself to the ground, dragging you down on top of him, and it’s only when you break the kiss that you find the two of you are positioned in the center of the pentagram, surrounded by odd relics and candles, their wicks lit with Hellfire but their wax still unmelted.

Harry lays back on the blanket, his head positioned in the center of one of the pentagram’s triangular spokes. You’re perched on his hips, very aware of every bit of bare skin that touches him. His fingers curl around the thickest part of your thighs and he says nothing, only blinks lazily up at you.

You pull your lower lip between your teeth as you shift, reaching between you to wrap your fingers around his hard dick. You guide him to your entrance and all of your nerves diminish when he’s inside of you. His hands tighten on your flesh as you sit back. Slowly. Gently.

You settle your palms over his ribs, fingertips curling into the tattoo of a butterfly painted there. The light in the room flickers as you roll your hips to acquaint yourself with this experience—Harry sprawled out on the floor, his hair mussed from your hands as he draws his tongue in a stripe across his lip. You don’t know if it’s the pentagram or Harry or if it’s only your imagination, but your senses feel heightened. A brush of his thumb over the bend in your hip makes your entire body shiver. Like he knows exactly where to press. But it’s still all so foreign.

“Go ‘head, dove,” he whispers, as though he knows exactly what you’re thinking. He stretches out his neck and gives you that smug look—it’s the familiar in this uncharted territory that you needed. A touchstone. “Fuck me.”

Your fingers curl further until you can feel your nails digging into his skin. Harry only flutters his eyes closed. You lift your hips up, forward, feel his cock dragging against your walls, lower yourself back down. Harry lets out a huff of air. He pushes against your thighs, urging you on. It’s easy to fall into a rhythm once you ground yourself to the feeling of him inside of you, thick enough to make you ache. Your body works for you without the need for thought.

“More,” Harry mutters after a minute. It’s not gentle. It’s demanding. One of his hands drift up your stomach to spread across the area between your breasts. Your belly lurches as the fingers of his other hand grip into your waist with a bruising strength, and you whimper, picking up your pace.

“There yeh go,” he praises. He lifts his head up far enough to watch your hips meeting, to see the way your legs quiver. His hand sneaks back to grab at your ass. There’s no question to his movements, only a dauntless fluidity that makes a thin sheen of sweat collect at your hairline. He kneads your cheek and tips his head back against the pentagram. His own skin is growing slick beneath your hands. “Yeh’ve gotta come, dove. Can’ do that if yeh’re holdin’ back on me, yeah?”

Harry lapses back into silence as you find a beat in this candlelit room, quickened by the pressure of his fingers, by the draw of his unsteady breath, by the urgent pulse of his heart beneath your hands. Your knees are chafing against the cloth laid out under the two of you, but you don’t slow. Sweat trails along your scalp and into the tracks of your hair as you tilt your head back. You close your eyes and find the image of Harry’s face imprinted there, cut into slivers between the glint of regular candlelight and the shadow of Hellfire.

You’re jolted out of your own mind when Harry delivers a harsh smack to your ass. You can feel yourself tensing around his cock, even as he rubs soothingly at the sore area of your bum. You’ve stilled on top of him, your chest heaving, a guttural moan poised at your lips. It’s translated into a gasp as he flips the two of you around, settling your head gently within the pentagram where his was positioned. He’s slipped out of you and you don’t think going without food for a week could leave you feeling this empty.

“Let go for a second,” he whispers when you’ve latched onto his arms where they frame your head. “Wanna try somethin’.”

You loose your fingers from his biceps and settle back against the cloth beneath you as Harry reaches to the perimeter of the pentagram’s circle to grab a candle. The Hellfire burns steady and straight, unswayed by any air flow. The wax around the wick looks melted, liquid, but it doesn’t run down the sides. It’s unnerving. Especially when Harry leans back and tips the candle over your chest. Hot wax spills and stings the skin between your breasts. You gasp, pushing Harry’s hand and the candle away, stomach thrashing up against him, but he surrounds you like a cage.

“Hey, relax,” Harry says, settling his hips between yours at last. He leans down to kiss you for the first time since the two of you have entered the pentagram. His lips graze down your neck after leaving your lips, along your collarbone to your shoulder, a peck to the outside of your breast. He lets out an airy chuckle. “Yeh like it, don’ yeh?”

“What?” you mutter, tilting your head forward. The wax has hardened and begun to cool on your chest. He still holds the candle in his hand.

“Nipples are hard,” he observes, raising a brow. “Yeh like it. Hurts for just a second, yeah? A good pain?”

Your response is swallowed back down your throat as Harry tongues your hardened nipple, teeth grazing along your skin. The fingers of your right hand tangle up in his hair, yank at the roots as he sucks your nipple into his mouth. More hot candle wax spills across your skin, this time along your upper belly. You shy away from the quick sting but it only lasts for a moment and you find yourself moaning as the wax dribbles up the side of your body, heats your other breast. The flame of Hellfire still doesn’t sway. It also doesn’t burn up toward the ceiling as a regular flame would. It remains in line with the candle.

Harry sighs at the sound of your moan and hurries to return the candle to its place on the pentagram. He reaches down to stroke his cock once, twice, and then thrusts into you without a warning.

“Jesus,” you gasp out. It feels different when he’s the one moving. He takes no time to find a rhythm, just fucks into you with all of the force of his hips. Your ankles curl around the backs of his knees and the hand not buried in his hair grapples for a hold on his back.

“There’s no Jesus here,” Harry mutters, lowering his face into the crook of your neck. His teeth tease at your pulse. “Yeh feel like a fuckin’ goddess, though—fuck. Tha’s what I wanna feel.”

He moans when your walls clench around him. His thrusts drive deeper, arms trembling on either side of you. One hand lifts to lay across your side, over your ribs, and you can feel the dried wax there heating up, dripping down to pool beneath your back.

“Wanna fuck yeh harder,” Harry groans. “D’yeh want it harder? Can I fuck yeh harder?”

“Please,” you breathe out, “please.”

The air is forced from your lungs as Harry’s hips smack back into yours. Your body is tingling beneath the weight of him, thighs aching at the stretch of his hips between them. The skin behind your ear heats with pain as he sets his teeth into it. And he’s fucking you relentlessly, desperately, so urgently its making your mind grow fuzzy.

“I—” You can’t even finish your words. The pits of your stomach are coiling up like a spring. The fuzz in your mind is making your vision grow dark around the edges as you stare up at the wooden ceiling. All you can do is squeeze at Harry’s back, tighten your hand in his hair.

“Yes, fuck yes,” he grates out. The hand covered in melted wax snaps to the back of your thigh, angling your hips up and yanking you to meet his thrusts as he fights to finish himself off. “‘M gonna come.”

Your throat is thick with words that can’t escape as he fucks you over the edge. One hand falls to the blanket at your side and curls into the fabric. You let out only a strangled moan. Harry grunts as he feels you coming around him. He pulls his face out of your neck and props himself up on his arms, tipping his head back against his own shoulders until he’s jerking into you, swearing into the silence of the house. This time you’re positive that you see that blue glow around his irises before his eyes close. You shake while he empties himself inside of you and all at once the flames around the room are snuffed out.

Harry huffs out a breath of exhaustion and lowers himself back down on top of you, forehead smearing sweat along your shoulder. You can see almost nothing at all while you gasp for breath. Your body still buzzes in the darkness. You can smell the subtle sweetness of smoke from the extinguished candles.

There’s a pressing silence filled with nothing but heavy breathing. Harry’s become almost a dead weight on top of you. You can feel liquid leaking from you, his skin sticky where it meets yours. The knowledge somehow doesn’t worry you.

“Thank you, dove,” Harry whispers right into your ear. His lips plant a wet kiss to the edge of your shoulder, waxy hand thumbing at your hip.

The moon peeks out from behind a thick layer of gray clouds. It seeps through the grimy window above your heads, filters through the wisps of smoke that hang about the room, illuminate the drops of sweat that linger on Harry’s back. You close your eyes for a moment—only a moment—and when you open them there is a face at the edge of the pentagram, just beyond it. An entire body mere inches from your feet. His eyes are wide, still, staring down at the two of you, graying hair frazzled around the lines of his frozen face.

Air is drawn loudly into your lungs but then it traps itself. You can’t scream. You can’t exhale. Your body tenses, fingers pressing into Harry’s spine, his scalp. He feels the shift and lifts his head to look down at you. Blocking your view of the stranger. But you can still see him behind your eyelids as you blink.

“Wha’s wrong?” he asks when he sees the wild look in your eyes. His brows pull together, fingers smoothing up your jaw. “What?”

The face looms up again behind the mess of Harry’s hair, leaning over the two of you, its expression still frozen in place, and the air finally finds a way to escape your chest.

You scream, shoving at Harry’s body, scrambling out from under him. He doubles back for a moment before you reach the edge of the pentagram and he catches at your knee, pulling you back toward him. The cloth is pulled beneath you. Candles topple over and the twined bones are sent scattering across the wooden floor. “Stop—” You swipe at his hand and he catches your wrist too. “Stop, Y/N, stop!”

Your lungs are heaving as you struggle against his grip and spin your head to survey the room. It’s empty. There’s no one else here. Not even a suspicious shadow.

“I thought—” You stop struggling and shake your head. Your fingers are trembling. “There was a man standing right there,” you whisper to him, pointing to the spot just outside the circle. You sound crazy. At least you think you do for just a moment before you remember that Harry is a witch and the two of you just had sex inside of a pentagram, surrounded by candles burning with flames from Hell. You squeeze your eyes shut. You can feel a headache coming on.

“Okay, okay.” Harry shifts onto his knees and wraps his fingers around the back of your neck, nodding. “Okay. He’s gone now though, right?”

“You believe me?”

“Of course I believe yeh. Why wouldn’ I?” Harry leans in to kiss your forehead. It’s so gentle, so sincere. You can feel your pulse beginning to slow when he pulls back and you tip your face into his chest. He slides his hand down your spine and rubs at your lower back, still slick with sweat.

“I’m sorry,” you mumble.

“Don’ be.” He pulls you away from his chest and kisses you with a slowness that you find gratefully comforting. “’S dark in here. How ‘bout we get some candles lit and get yeh cleaned up, yeah?”

You nod and let Harry help you up to your feet. He steps gingerly out of the pentagram and makes his way to the nearest candle, on the wall by the hall to the kitchen. His fingers close over the wick until it sparks to life and illuminates his flushed face. He gives you a soft smile and reaches for his boxers by the side of the couch.

“C’mon, dove,” he says once he has them pulled on, "I’ll make yeh some tea.”

***

“Yeh okay?” Harry asks as he comes back into the room. He’s carrying a hot mug of tea. You notice the way his hair is still standing up around the sides, where your fingers have left it tousled.

You give him a short nod and continue peeling at the dried black wax encasing your ribs, holding your shirt up with one hand. Harry sets the tea on the floor in front of the couch and then sits down, turning your body away from him. He picks at the wax on the back of your thigh, in the vague shape of his hand.

The room is much brighter around you. Harry has lit every candle in the vicinity that wasn’t meant for rituals and spells. But you still find yourself glancing cautiously into the corners every few minutes. You can still see that jarring face whenever you close your eyes.

“Hey.”

“Sorry,” you whisper, turning your attention to Harry when he’s finished ridding your thigh of wax. He shakes his head and helps you finish with the wax coating your side.

“No, yeh’re spooked. ’S okay.”

You chew on your lip. Harry finishes and brushes his thumb over your skin.

“Was that supposed to happen? Did you know that was going to happen?”

“What, the guy?” Harry asks. He allows his hand to fall to his lap as you take a step back from him and shakes his head. “No, I didn’ know that was gonna happen.”

“Well, do you know who it was?” You pull your shirt—Harry’s shirt—back down your abdomen to meet the line of your underwear.

“Think I might.” He says nothing more and you shake your head.

“You’re not gonna tell me? Really?”

“I can’ right now, dove. ‘M sorry.”

“No you’re not.” You let out a dry laugh and rub at your tired eyes. You know he’s not going to give you any more information. You’ve grown used to his secrets and mysteries. It’s really no use pushing. “Do you get spooked?” you ask him instead.

Harry sits back and lets out a soft sigh. “Not really. Not anymore, at least. Used to when I was a li’l bit younger.”

“Right.” You sit down beside Harry, close to his side. You hate to admit it but touching him really is comforting when you’re this shook up. His hand falls to your opposite arm and rubs gently at your skin. “You haven’t really told me about when you were younger. Do you have siblings?”

“Have an older sister.” He gives you a tight smile. "She’s a much better witch than me.”

“You always say things like that but I don’t think you’re bad at any of this.”

“Yeh should tell m’mum that.”

Something topples over onto the floor and you jump, hand finding Harry’s in your panic. When you turn your head, you find Nicks prowling around the edges of the pentagram, pawing at the items the two of you haven’t cleaned up yet. Harry chuckles quietly.

“Drink some tea, dove.”

You shake your head in an effort to clear it as you lean forward to grab the mug off of the ground. It’s warm and sweet-smelling as usual. For the first time since he’s begun brewing the tea for you, you sip it without hesitation. Harry kisses your temple.

“Do you not like your mom, then?” you ask, settling your cheek against his shoulder.

“Like her just fine. I just happen to disappoint her. Sucked at Latin because I thought it was borin’. Fucked up a bunch of spells. Tha’s part of the reason I moved across the fuckin’ Atlantic.”

“I’m sorry,” you whisper out. You feel dizzy. Maybe it’s just everything that’s happened in the past few hours.

“’S okay. Pretty close to provin’ I’m not entirely useless. Thank yeh for that.”

Your vision suddenly blurs, so quick and so sudden that you have to close your eyes. The mug falls from your hands, crashing to the floor. Harry catches you as your body slumps forward.

“Shh, shh,” he hushes when you try to speak.

Your limbs all but melt as he lays you back on the couch. All of your senses begin to fade against your will, and you don’t even have enough energy to panic.

“‘M sorry, dove,” he mutters into your ear. “I really am. Hope yeh can forgive me.”

And then you’re pulled into unconsciousness.

Part 5: All Hallows’ Eve

[crinkled-emotions]

A heart defect (Bondi Rescue)

When y/n’s summer day is interrupted by her dodgy heart kicking up, she seeks the help of some of Australia’s favourite lifeguards.

Completed for @shayleefischer as she approached me and I was so keen to write this! Thank you so much for feeling like I could do you justice, I really hope I did :)

Is that the best way to describe this? Hm. Probably not.

Note: I can’t write fem!Reader whump. Like at all. This is probably going to be a flop. Sorryyyyyyyy!!

A friend of mine from school has a heart condition where she can’t do a lot of exercise because it makes her heart skip a beat and they just about have to reset it whenever it happens. It’s awful and I feel for her so much, but this time it may have come in handy as I’ve witnessed a couple of these episodes. Watch me fuck this up, fam.

 Everyone gathered in the shed for Hop’s debrief, Hoppo himself standing beside the whiteboard.

“Box what are we looking at today?”

“It’s gonna be fuckin’ hot today boys, so we need to be on high alert for heat stroke and the elderly as well as young kids. We’re expecting a top of 47°C so everyone keep an eye out.”

“Great, thanks mate. Has anyone got anything to add?”

“Does everyone know where they’re stationed on first?” Reidy piped up, everyone nodding. Maxi glanced around in confusion, a frown coming to his face.

“Hang on, where’s-“

“-your best buddy is on his death bed,” Hoppo explained shortly, in reference to Maxi’s Kiwi best friend/ ex roommate. Maxi ahhhh’ed and then nodded.

“Okay, then I think we’re good.”

 Harries and Maxi were patrolling, Reidy doing the med jobs as people appeared with various issues ranging from heat stroke to cuts and blue bottle stings. He’d care for them and treat what he could before sending them on their way- if it had been any other day he would have let them hang around depending on the severity but the casualties just kept coming- especially with Jesse on the jetski occasionally bringing up someone who had copped a concussion or something.

 There was a knock on the door just as Reidy was in the middle of something, him groaning.

“Maxi or Harries, please,” he called. Maxi got up, heading down the stairs and opening the door.

There stood a young woman who had gone completely beet red in the face, and she half smiled.

“D-do you think I could… could I get some ice?”

 30 Minutes Before

 None of my friends had wanted to come to the beach in the heat; they preferred to be inside under the air-conditioning in their expensive apartments sipping expensive water that was no different to the cheap stuff. Note: I love my friends. Don’t tell them I just talked shit.

Anyway.

Bondi Beach is always packed but I’ve never seen it like this before, even as a local. I wasn’t a surfer or a body boarder so I couldn’t tell you about the swell but it looked fucking huge to me. Was this a good thing?

Beats me.

The sun beat down on me, its rays heating up my skin all over and I closed my eyes despite the fact they were protected by my sunglasses, grimacing.

“Holy shit it’s hot,” I muttered to myself. I reached for my phone and covered it with my rapidly drying towel to keep it relatively cool, opening up the weather app.

“Shit.”

It was barely 11am and the temperature had already reached 43°C. I winced, trying to think about whether it was safe for me to stay out. I have a heart defect that I was born with, and it can be dangerous for me to stay out in the sun when it’s really hot. Sometimes I have to be treated in hospital if I do exercise and it’s too hot for my heart, so I have to be careful.

 “Miss? Hey, it’s okay I’m a lifeguard. You alright?”

My eyes opened slowly and I was faced by someone kneeling down beside me, their hand on my shoulder. I tried to sit up but he shook his head, stopping me.

“Just hang on a sec, you might be dehydrated.”

“I- I’m fine… must have fallen asleep. Sorry, I didn’t mean to scare you.”

“No, no that’s okay. I’m Ryan but everyone calls me Whippet, are you from around here?”

“Yeah, I grew up here. Nice to meet you Ryan, I’m y/n.”

“Well y/n, I’ve been driving past for the past thirty minutes and I just wanted to check if you were okay. It’s a really hot day today, make sure you stay hydrated.”

“Will do, thanks Whippet.”

He went to get back on his quad bike but paused, gesturing to the tower.

“There’s three guys up there at the moment so they can spare someone to help you if you need it. Just say I sent you if they get tetchy.”

“Okay, cheers.”

He disappeared down the beach when his radio crackled to life, and I lay back down. My entire body felt weak and I yawned, moving to grab my phone again from under my now dry towel.

46°C at 2pm. Great.

 As I lay there reading I began to feel more lethargic and my heart was occasionally having an arrhythmia- something that I already knew was a heads up it wasn’t coping. I sighed and put my book into my bag, reaching to tuck my phone into the waistband of my shorts. I hefted my bag on to my shoulder and peered through my sunglasses as I got up from the sand, trying to locate the tower. It stuck out like a sore thumb usually, but against the crowds I could barely see it.

 One knock.

Two.

Three.

 Present Time

“Yeah, what’s up- woah c’mon in, you don’t look so good.”

“D-do you think I could… could I get some ice?”

“I think you should come inside first up.”

A tall, tanned blonde guy offered me a hand and I accepted the help, nearly collapsing against him as he helped me to sit on the blue gurney beside some guy who was groaning a lot, another lifeguard sighing. His voice held very little sympathy as he bandaged something, gesturing to the door.

“That’ll teach you for jumping off Flat Rock, mate. Be more careful next time, aye?”

“Sure. Thanks Reidy.”

“No problem mate.”

The man limped out of the tower and the lifeguard who had helped me in turned to his colleague.

“Reidy, do you think she’s got heatstroke?”

“Hi mate I’m Andrew Reid and this is Trent Maxwell. I’m Reidy and he’s Maxi if that helps. You’re feelin’ a little hot are ya?”

“Mmhmm.”

I nodded and Reidy poked his head up, calling to someone up the staircase.

“Hey Harries mate, d’you think you could grab us some ice?”

Maxi meanwhile wandered upstairs, this third guy appearing after a couple minutes with a black bag in hand.

“Here mate. I’m Harries.”

“Hey. I’m y/n.”

I felt my heart ‘skip’ a beat again and winced, clutching it. Harries frowned, hand on my shoulder.

“Are you okay?”

“Oh- uh, yeah. I just- uhm, I just- I have a heart defect, I was born with it… and sometimes it kicks up when it gets really hot and I can’t cool down fast enough.”

“Here.”

Harries handed me some ice and took off his blue long-sleeve so I could put it over my bikini, offering me some modesty. I accepted, thanking him quietly as I slipped the bag of ice on to my back. Maxi suddenly reappeared, carrying a couple more bags.

“Should I call the ambo’s?” He asked, and Reidy shook his head.

“Not yet. Get back on patrol, call someone to give you a hand if you need to.”

“I’m good mate.”

Maxi gave my arm a sympathetic squeeze, heading up the stairs. I felt a wave of dizziness wash over me and as I lay down Reidy answered the door to someone else, going to help them outside. Harries brushed a hand over my forehead, frowning as he picked up one of the ice bags Maxi had dumped.

“Here, this should help.”

He placed one under each armpit, followed by around my neck which apparently would cool me down fast. He cracked open a cold bottle of water and offered it over, sending me a sympathetic smile.

“Here, slow sips though. Just in case.”

“Thanks.”

I followed his instructions, trying to keep my breathing steady. My heart’s latest skip was only just calming down and I was exhausted, closing my eyes. I could hear the three lifeguards talking around me, Reidy calling to Maxi at one point.

“Mate, d’you think you could grab us an ambo?”

“Yeah, gotcha.”

I tried to sit up but my heart protested and Harries held me to lie back down, shaking his head.

“Just stay with us, okay? We’re gonna get you checked out, I can tell the ticker’s playin’ up a bit so we just want to make sure you’re good to walk out of here without collapsing a couple metres away. S’not a good look on us, I’ll be honest.”

I was too tired to laugh.

 “Hi y/n, I’m Michael. What seems to be happening today?”

“Hey mate.”

Harries was sitting on the end of the gurney, a steady hand on my leg as I felt my entire body shaking. It was exhausting just to lift an arm and wave.

“What’s the story Harries?”

Michael turned to the lifeguard, who quickly filled him in on what I’d told them and what he and Reidy had noticed while I’d been there. I realised they’d redone the ice and Maxi was now sitting quietly in the corner, observing. Reidy was filling out some paperwork and I realised there was another lifeguard in the tower now, watching out over the water.

“Oh, I- I uhm, I don’t- you guys don’t have to watch me,” I mumbled, and Maxi shook his head.

“Pretend I’m not here, I’m trying to learn from the pros.”

“Cheers mate,” Reidy replied, clicking his pen once and chucking it to the side as he knelt down beside my head.

“Listen, if you’re feeling crowded we can leave you with Michael. We don’t mind; don’t be embarrassed to speak up.”

I nodded, closing my eyes as I took a deep breath.

“Harries?”

“Mm darlin’?”

“D-do you- would you mind staying? J-just- just you?”

“Course.”

I heard Maxi getting up and opened my eyes just in time to see him wave at me before heading up the stairs, relieving whoever was up there patrolling. Reidy sent me a half smile and waved too before following after Maxi. It was now just me, Harries and the paramedic, who was quietly doing his job of checking me over.

 “So, Harries, got kids?”

“Hm? Oh, yeah actually. Five and three, two boys.”

“I thought I detected a fatherly tone to you.”

He laughed, looking up when Michael hummed.

“Yeah, something’s not right. Would you consent to us taking you into hospital, Miss y/n?”

I nodded and he sent me a sympathetic smile.

“Okay then. Can you walk to the ambulance, it’s parked nearby.”

“I- I don’t- I don’t think so.”

Harries stood then, offering me a hand.

“C’mon, I’ll help ya. Maxi mate, come take her other side.”

Maxi appeared from buttfuck nowhere, helping me to stand. He and Harries took a side of me each, slinging my arms over their shoulders to help me walk. Michael packed everything up and gestured to the door.

“Follow me.”

 Finally loaded up and lying down with an IV, I thanked the two men who had been a huge help.

“Seriously, you guys have been so generous and I’m really grateful.”

“It’s our job,” Harries replied. I remembered I was still wearing his shirt and went to take it off when he stopped me.

“Come by when you’re better and drop it off, okay?”

“Sure. Thanks.”

He stepped back and I weakly hugged Maxi, whispering a thank you in his ear.

“Nah, don’t worry about it. As Harries said, it’s our job. Besides, who could leave a damsel in distress?”

I laughed at this, just as Michael appeared.

“Okay, we’re good to go.”

“Thanks again, guys,” I smiled, waving until the door closed.

 4 Days Later

One knock.

Two.

Three-

“Hey what can I help you with toda- y/n!”

Reidy broke into a huge grin and I blushed, smiling.

“Hey, Reidy. Are the other two around?”

“Mmhmm, two seconds.”

He grabbed his radio and held it to his mouth.

“Maxi and Harries, you two better come up to the tower, our heartbreak girl has finally returned.”

“Oh shit, on our way!”

I heard Maxi and burst out laughing, another lifeguard appearing from upstairs. He was tall and tanned, but his hair was a brown with sun-bleached blonde ends. I raised an eyebrow at Reidy, who just smiled.

“This is Maxi’s best friend and fellow lifeguard Harrison Reid. Huxy, this is that girl we helped with heat stroke.”

“Oh, right! Yeah, I’ve heard a lot about you.”

His accent was clearly Kiwi with Australian undertones- the two accents are very close, but sometimes Kiwi’s have a different tone.

“Sure, sure. All about how I nearly passed out because I couldn’t handle my own health, hm?”

“Not at all,” Harrison replied with a smile that made me believe him.

“Actually, Maxi kept going on about how brave you were. Your heart was quite literally trying to give up and you were still laughing and cracking jokes. That’s incredible.”

“I heard my name.”

Maxi appeared through the door and Harrison grinned, rushing over to him. I assumed he was going to hug him but I was slightly shocked when Maxi wrapped his arms around him and kissed Harrison, square on the lips. I tried to stop my jaw from dropping, glancing around.

“I-“

“-oh, yeah… uh, best friend’s kind of an understatement.”

I burst out laughing when Harrison ran a hand through his hair awkwardly, Maxi’s hand on his hip. I held in the coo threatening to escape, shaking my head.

“You guys are so cute. I ship.”

“Thanks, y/n.”

“Y/n!”

Harries came through the upstairs door and rushed down the stairs to hug me, wrapping me up in a hug I’d detect as fatherly protection. I smiled, hugging back.

“Hey, Harries!”

“How are ya darlin’?”

I shrugged, blushing at all the attention on me in the small room. Harrison, sensing my awkwardness, gave Maxi a pat on the ass, waved at me, and went back to patrol. I smiled at him, shrugging at the others. Reidy grinned at me, shaking his head.

“It’s really good to see you doing well, y/n. We were worried; I don’t think I’ve ever treated someone with a heart defect.”

“I was born with it. It’s not usually an issue but during the summer I have to be careful and I guess I got lazy. It’s my own fault.”

“It happens, honestly,” Harries spoke up, holding my shoulder. I turned and smiled at him, grateful.

“Thanks.”

“You’re okay though? Nothing serious come from it?” Maxi asked. I shook my head, gesturing to my heart.

“Nah, it just got tired. Slept for over 24 hours in hospital though. They were scared too, but when I woke up I felt a lot better and they agreed that sleeping did help my heart recover.”

“Wow. That’s incredible.”

Reidy was now standing to the back of the room and I reached for my bag, opening it.

“As a thank you gift, I got you a little something… I’m sure you guys get this all the time, but it’s the least I can do. You guys kept calm when I was freaking out inside. If you hadn’t been calm things could have really taken a turn for the worst.”

I pulled out three boxes of Favourites, handing them out. Maxi grinned, thanking me before dashing up the stairs.

“Hux, we’ve got chocolate!”

The two older lifeguards chuckled, both giving me a hug.

“You didn’t need to do that, but thank you. Really appreciate it.”

I nodded at Harries, checking the time.

“Well, I have to go, but thank you all so much. You really do an incredible job down here and I hope others can see that.”

 I’d make sure of it.