#again it's fine if you do it's got nothing to do with me. more power to you. have fun

[vinnyvamppp]

Vinny, if you’re totally okay with it, can I pleaaase please request a smutty male reader x Dick Grayson (training together quickly escalates)? I thought Mark Grayson x male readers were hard to find, but oh my gosh, Dick Grayson ones are practically desolate (from what I could see. Honestly, I think I’ve only ever found two 😭). I’m extremely new to DC, so I’m hoping to contribute once I’m fairly acquainted with the media. 😤

Sorry for going off topic a bit. OTL If you’re okay with this request, I’d be thankful!

The Gloves Come Off

A/N: Don't apologize, feel free to let me know of your contribution later on! I'd love to support-- and this request is amazing. I WAS LITERALLY FOAMING AT THE MOUTH. Also, can you guys tell I was trying to show off my MMA knowledge? I’m so fucking corny, ignore me. (Fun Fact: I've trained in MMA since middle school and competed as a middleweight!)

Synopsis: Training with Dick Grayson was always intense, but when a spar spirals into something messier — something needy, and unforgiving, you learn just how well Nightwing reads a body under pressure. In the end, it’s not just your bodies on the line. It’s the way you come undone for each other — breathless and craving more.

Warnings: Mutual Masturbation, Sparring Tension, Switchy Power Dynamics (Reader's behalf), Desperation, Flirty Dialogue, Hands-on-Hands-On-Cocks Action, Overstimulation, My Attempt At Being In Character, "I'm fine" While Falling Apart, Non-Penetrative Smut, Anatomical Descriptions, etc.

Dick Grayson x Male!Reader

Word Count: 2.1k

“You’re holding back,” Dick muttered, circling you again, shirt stuck to his chest with sweat, knuckles still taped. You scoffed, wiping your mouth with the back of your hand. “So are you.” His smirk was sharp, tongue jutting out to wet his lips. “Yeah, but I’m prettier when I do it.”

He lunged forward, and this time you met him full force — fists clashing, boots scraping over the mat, sweat flying in the dampening air. It wasn’t even a real fight anymore, just tension in motion. The kind that had been brewing since day one, coiled tight behind too-long glances and shared showers and those goddamn grins he gave you when you were too tired to throw another punch.

You barely get your forearms up in time to shield your face, a fast streak of blue and black filling your vision. Impact rocks through your frame as he crashes into you chest-first, arms locking around your waist. Instinct takes over as your legs snap up, hooking around his hips, thighs squeezing just above his belt — and suddenly you’ve got him. Trapped and breathing hard above you, the mat under your back was warm, still echoing with the scuffle of your last failed counter.

“Dirty trick,” he grunts, trying to shake you loose. “Effective,” you pant, fingers digging into his shoulders. He grunts— no, actually growls— and shifts. Posts his forearm beside your head, stacks his weight forward, and twists. Just like that, he slips free. That goddamn acrobat.

You barely hit your feet before the next combo’s coming: jab, cross, hook. You block the first two and shoulder-roll the third, but he’s already circling, pushing you back with tight footwork that leaves you nowhere to go. His glove brushes your jaw on the next pass. You snap out a low kick, hard and fast for most, but he catches it, spins, and sweeps your standing leg clean out from under you. The mat slams into your back, knocking the wind out of you again.

“Still think you’ve got me?” He huffs, kneeling beside your ribs, one knee brushing your side as he pins you there. His hair's plastered to his forehead, breath ragged, but smiling.

You grin up at him, flushed and winded. “Getting warmer.” He chuckled to himself, a huff of air leaving his nose. “I win again,” he said, voice smug but husky from the chase. There was a flush on his neck that had nothing to do with exercise.

Now he was above you, straddling your hips with a crooked grin and no plans to move. Even when your thighs shifted beneath him and your sweat-soaked into his undersuit. Despite his position, in combat and in bed, you were caged—and within his clutches willfully.

You could’ve pushed him off; you should've, but instead, you said, “Only because you cheat.” Dick’s brows lifted; his smirk flickered. “What, by being hot?” You blinked up at him. “...That’s not what I said.” He clicked his tongue, head tilting at your words. “That’s what you meant.”

His smile curled — a lazy, wolfish thing — and for a second neither of you moved. The sweat beaded at your temple. His groin pressed between your legs and God help you, you twitched under him. In that instant you could feel your soul clawing from your body—you sucked in a breath as if to keep it in.

Dick felt it, and his gaze dropped, but when it rose again, it was darker. His blue eyes catch yours, swimming with your reflection like he’s trying to memorize every line of you. His lashes lower just slightly — not shy, but weighted, like seduction worn soft and natural. His gaze trails over you slow as honey, warm and dragging, and when it lingers at your lips, his Adam’s apple gives the faintest, betraying bob.

“You hard?” he asked, just like that. You swallowed thickly. “You tell me.” He looked straight down and fuck — he grinned.

The gloves came off in seconds. There wasn’t a big decision, nor a careful lead-in or dramatic kiss. Just the sharp pull of elastic, the hot throb of your cock springing free, and the echo of breathless silence when he pulled his out to match you. He leaned in close enough for his breath to brush your lips, for your sweat to mix. His voice dropped an octave, holding a slight rasp now as he grunted.

Dick’s cock is heavy against your groin — flushed a deep pink, shaft thick, veined, and warm. It's the kind that stretches your palm when you wrap your hand around it. Not freakishly big—no, it’s worse: it’s perfect. Thick enough to make you gasp, long enough to have you hooked. And a happy trail, neat, clean, like the rest of him, but still masculine enough you could drown in it. God gave him acrobat's thighs and then got freaky with symmetry. This was so unfair.

You both stared in silence for a while, you, more or less marveling at the absolute trunk before you. And then— without warning— he spat into his hand, wrapped it around himself, and started jerking slowly. “Jesus,” you hissed, causing him to chuckle. “Been thinking about this for weeks,” he muttered, pumping lazy strokes from base to tip. “How you sound when you’re close. How you’d look touching yourself for me.”

You were already leaking. You wrapped your hand around your shaft and mirrored his rhythm, hips twitching upwards instinctively. “Yeah?” you said, voice rough like sandpaper. “What else?” Dick licked his lips, his gaze locked on your cock, your tensing abs, and the heat in your eyes. “Bet you edge yourself,” he said. “Hold it right at the brink. Fuck your hand like it’s not enough. ‘Cause it’s not. Not really.”

You groaned, thighs spreading wider. His eyes dipped lower. “You get this loud?” he asked, breath catching. “When you’re alone?”

“Louder,” you admitted. “When I think about you.” He moaned. Just short and guttural—like it was punched out of him.

He was watching you like it hurt—like every twitch of your wrist, every small sound you made, went straight to his spine. “God, you’re so hot,” he rasped. “Look at us.” You did. You flicked your eyes down to the slick, flushed length of him—the way it jumped in his hand, the way his abs clenched every time you moaned. “Bet if I just—” He reached over, wrapped his free hand around yours, and tightened your grip. It was firm but not painful, giving you just the right amount of pressure to make your toes curl and your balls tighten.

You nearly choked on it. “That’s how I’d do it,” he whispered, close enough to feel his breath. “If I had you under me.” His forehead hit yours. “Fucking ruin you.” He strokes himself slowly, showing you that he wants you to see exactly what’s yours. Every inch, every pulse. His hips meet each pump like it's not enough like he's been holding back for hours. "One little squeeze and you go all soft for me, huh? Knew you’d love this." He chuckled, that deep, rich sound that rattled your chest.

Keeping the pressure, you matched him, soft groans responding to one another as your legs stiffened beneath him. Your eyes followed his hand as if in a trance, following its every move. Your thumb circled the sensitive tip of your cock, spreading the pre-cum that had been leaking steadily. You gasped, eyelids twitching as your jaw ticked. The rough calluses of your palm scratched down the vein running the underside of your dick. It was uncontrollable—a sound between a groan and whine—scratched your vocals.

He tore it out of you, a raw gasp against his throat, coming, striping your stomach in white, hot spurts as your back arched and your hand went limp. You barely had time to breathe. Your release hit like a wave, rippling through you in hot, messy pulses, your hand slipping slack over your cock as your head tipped back and your hips jerked involuntarily. His pupils were blown wide as he watched you, utter satisfaction etched into his face, his grin twitching slightly, and his brows furrowed with restraint. You were done. Or you thought you were.

Until you felt him again — hands sliding over yours, warm, and his gaze relentless. You jolted, hand flexing before cupping your face, unable to control your limbs tensing in time with each shudder, your back bowed off the mat. "Dick—fuck—" He gripped both your spent cocks together—still twitching with the aftershocks of orgasm—and wrapped his hands over them tight, slick with both your cum and his pre, and started stroking again. Not gentle, just steady and intentional, trying to milk you for everything you had.

"C'mon," he rasped, breath hot against your jaw, hips barely moving as he pressed tighter to you. "You think I’m done with you already?" Your spine arched further with each stroke. Every nerve lit up again— raw, tender, and desperate. “Look at you,” he whispered, voice wrecked but still so fucking in control. “All that pretty moaning just to give up halfway? You're not tapping out yet, are you?” You can feel the heat of his body radiating off him as he looms over you, his chest pressed against yours. His breath comes out in ragged puffs, tickling your cheek as he watches your face intently. Every twitch, every moan, every flutter of your eyelashes seems to delight him.

Your whole body trembled, head burying into his flesh. The overstimulation was blistering—every pass of his palm over your now-sensitive head made your thighs twitch and made you whimper into his throat like you hated it and needed it all at once. His free hand skates down your side, over your hip, to grip your thigh and hitch it higher, a glute bridge. The new angle allows him to thrust against you with each stroke, his thick cock sliding against yours in a delicious friction that has you seeing stars.

His hands slid faster. The thick drag of slick foreskin against yours, both your cocks pressed together— his shaft twitching each time your breath hitched. "You feel that?" he murmured, lips brushing your ear. "That’s you. Getting hard again, even though you’re already wrung out. So greedy.” You gritted your teeth. "I—I can’t—" Your head shook vehemently, eyes losing focus, but you didn't want him to stop. Ever.

His thumb swirled the leaking head of your cock—wet, tender, throbbing—and you cried out, hips trying to pull back, but he chased you, matched every buck, every jolt like it only fed him more. You couldn’t run; you didn't want to, yet your body fought with every spark short-circuiting your brain. “I can feel you pulsing —you’re close again, aren’t you? Didn’t even last a minute.”

It was sudden. Your grip tightens under his thighs, fingers curling around the weight of his sack with slow, deliberate pressure, soft enough to tease, firm enough to make him flinch. Dick groans, hips twitching against your palm. “That’s a low blow,” he breathes, eyes glittering with the heat of a challenge.

“Revenge,” you mutter, cock twitching where he’s got you in a mirrored grip, his thumb rolling slow beneath your balls like he’s mapping every nerve. “You deserved worse.” His laugh breaks on a moan, head tipping back. “You’re evil.”

“Not yet,” you hiss, squeezing gently, just enough to make him buck. “But keep playing dumb and I’ll make you see stars.” He huffs, breathless, eyes narrowing as he returns the favor, coaxing a full-body shudder out of you, your feet slipping against rubber foam.

"Please," you gasped, desperate. His fingers tightened. "One more. You can give me one more. C’mon, baby. I know you can." He leaned down, lips brushing gently against your jaw and his back hunched. “F-Fuck—if you ask like that again, I’ll give you three.” You breathed. Sweat dripped down his chin, tickling your neck as it drizzled, his harsh gasps causing gooseflesh on your skin.

The obscene, wet, and haughty mix of cum caused wet squelches to cascade across walls, his wrist swiveling every so often around your tips as you practically melted beneath him. 1… 2… 3… 4… his rhythm switching every so often like a vibrator with multiple settings, reveling in every squirt that ruptured from your slit. The head of your cock bumps against his palm with each upstroke, sending jolts of electricity through your veins. Your body curved towards him as his feet dug into the mat to stabilize you both.

“That’s right. Let it build. Let it hurt a little. I want you to feel me tomorrow. I love how wrecked you sound.” You smirked between gasps at his words, “Good. Memorize it. I want that sound stuck in your head every time you jerk off alone.” He chuckled in response, teeth bared in a smile too shaky to be smug. His cock smears cum across your stomach as he grinds against you—the head dragging slick heat over your skin as his tongue trails over your Adam's apple. You can feel your orgasm building, your balls drawing up tight against your body. Your thighs start to tremble, your stomach clenching as you welcome your inevitable release. "Fuck—Dick, I'm going to—fuck, I'm gonna cum."

It was messy. Too fast. And absolutely perfect. His thumb finds your frenulum, rubbing tight circles around it as his strokes become erratic, chasing his own pleasure. You could feel his length throbbing against you, watching as it contracted in real-time. With a loud series of groans, his cock twitched as he cursed under his breath, jaw tight. His cum hit your stomach—warm and slick—but you barely flinched. Your eye simply twitched, vision whitening as your warm and sticky release joined him, your entire body shuddering and boneless as you stared blankly at the ceiling above.

His voice range from above moments later. “I could keep you like this all night. I’ll stop when your legs stop shaking. Deal?” “Deal. Do it. Unless all that stamina’s just for show.”

You might’ve jinxed yourself.

A/N: Dick really liked that dick, huh. (ALSO, I see why you requested this, I ran into AT LEAST six variations of this ask and all were fem reader. And… I’m def editing more into this, I just liked the request so much I pushed it out, sorry if it’s bad chat😭)

MasterList ོ༘₊⁺☀︎₊⁺⋆.˚

[transboyswitchytales]

Busy Woman

part 1, part 2

Governor Claire DeBella (Alpha) x Student Fem Reader (Omega)

Sugar Mama Claire DeBella is having a hard time away from her bonded mate.

SMUT WARNING (MDNI) 18+

My Masterlist

Alpha/Omega/ Mommy kink/ Power kink/ Sugar Mama/ SMUT / Possesive kink / Jealousy Kink / G!P / Scenting Kink / Licking / Knotting/ Cum Kink

(Glass Onion Fandom)

But if you need my love My clothes are off, I'm comin' over to your place

You can’t believe how long your day was, but you got home after a horrible day of finals. Homework and papers were making you exhausted. Keys jingled as you opened your apartment. Kicking off your white Converse and throwing your backpack. B-lining it straight to bed. You felt nauseous and had a body ache. You shivered, sweat dripping down your neck. As soon as you hit the mattress, you fell asleep.

By the time you woke up, it was dark out, and you grumbled, pulling the blanket over your shoulders. The room smelled like you and something sickeningly sweet. Not like your heat, though. Something more floral and wet?

There was an irritating sound, and you tried to block it out and go back to sleep. But it just kept going. Realizing it was, in fact, your phone. The ringtone that sang out was the one you’d picked for Claire. You hear ‘ Call me Karizma’ sing Nails. 

Push me, shove me

I don't wanna have no gushy loving

Make it hot till your makeup's coming off your face but

Baby you aren't looking ugly, yeah

Hit me, punch me

Give me more, baby, this is nothing

Feel the sweat on your forehead soaking all of your bed

When we're fucking

I feel your nails in my back

Punish me for my past

Like how you're making it last

If you're gonna hurt me, hurt me

Your hands quickly fumbled under your comforter as the ringtone restarted again. You felt under the pillow until finally you found the vibrating phone. 

You swiped up, eyes blearily opening. You don’t say anything and lick your lips, trying to clear your sore throat. 

“Baby? Are you there? Are you ok?”

“Hmmmm?” You say confused. 

“Baby? You didn’t text me when you got home. I kept messaging you. I’ve called you so many times. I’ve been worried sick!”

“Mommy?” You rubbed your eyes. 

“Baby, I was so scared. I tracked your phone to see if you were home. I was ready to call a wellness check on you. It’s been hours!” Her voice sounds like she’s been through it. 

You look at your window again, seeing it was indeed nighttime. 

“Oh my god, what time is it?” Your voice cracks. 

“9:30, I’m in the car en route to you,” Claire says, and you hear her snap at the driver, telling him to take a left, she tells him it’s faster. 

“Wha?” You say sleepy and feeling groggy.

“Baby, you never answered me, and I dropped everything. I’ll be there in less than ten. Are you alright?” 

“Claire, you can’t come.” You say, and you hear the Governor snort. 

“I took a different car, no one is going to see me get into your building. It’ll be fine, let me worry about that.” She says like you are being silly.

“No, Claire, I’m serious, you can’t come here-”

“Why? Is someone there?” The sound is so broken and cold from her throat.

You are momentarily taken aback and you don’t answer, and you hear Claire growl deep. Something so animalistic it sounds like she’s got rabies.

“Answer me now Omega, do you have someone there? Is that what you are doing while I’m away? Is that why you didn’t pick up the phone? Someone’s fucking you? Someone’s touching you instead of your alpha? You are mated h-” Her voice sounds murderous and your body responds to it. 

“Oh my god, no! Absolutely not! Claire, I think I’m sick. My throat hurts, and I’m nauseous. I don’t want to get you sick.” You say, and you listen for Claire’s mind to release the idea of you cheating on her. 

“When did you start feeling sick?” She says, and her voice isn’t steady like it usually is when she talks to you. You hear her snap at the driver to cut through the parking lot, she couldn’t wait anymore. 

“I don’t know, I think this morning. But honestly, this whole week it’s been coming on. I went to class, but I hurt everywhere.” You say, closing your eyes, pulling the blanket up closer. For once, it feels rough against your skin. And another cold shiver wracks through your body. 

Your teeth chatter, and you regret the action because Claire hears it. 

“Baby, I’m gonna be there soon. I’ll stay on the phone with you, close your eyes. I’ll be there before you know it.”

“But I don’t wanna get you sick.” You say, and your voice cracks again, and Claire is having road rage on the other end. You hear her yelling at someone not turning right in a right-hand lane. 

“My love, I am not worried about that. I’m worried about you. Now close your eyes.” The governor instructs you, and you sink back onto the pillow and put the phone on speaker. Closing your eyes and falling asleep quickly. 

When you wake up, Claire is in your apartment. She’d used her key you figured. You are curled against her body. Her fancy cream dress she’d worn to work, is still on. But her heels are kicked off by the door. You shiver again, and she pulls you against her body. 

“Yes,” she says, and you realize she’s on the phone. Your head hurts so bad. You wince at her annoyed tone. The good news is you can smell her and that helps your mind at least.

“No, she’s waking up, and I’m going to take her temperature…. Lionel shut up. You can send me a bill…yeah I can afford it you fucking dick.” She says, and she pushes you back into the blankets, and your body is shaking. She looks conflicted about leaving you to go to your bathroom. 

But Claire’s worry wins out, going to the small white bathroom, she opens drawers to find a first aid kit. 

“Lionel I’m trying to find a thermometer keep your fucking hipster pants on….No, I’m ready to take her to the hospital…… She’s delirious.. No, I’m not being dramatic..I’ve been in her apartment for two hours and she keeps drifting out of consciousness and talking in her sleep..” 

Claire says, and you move your hand to grab your phone, and you unlock it. The iPhone’s screen is too bright, but you blink and see sure enough, two hours have gone by. The picture of a naked Claire is your lockscreen. You move the phone to the side table, and you swing your legs over the bed.  You feel yourself falling forward, and Claire moves with lightning speed, dropping your first aid kit on your bathroom floor. 

Her body moves to block you from plumetting forward. She grabs you and pushes you back so you lay on the bed. Feet dangling off the side. 

“Claire?” You say, and it’s whiny in your throat. 

“Hold on, my love.” Claire moves back to the bathroom and comes back with her phone and first aid kit. She puts Lionel on speaker, and you hear the scientist. 

“Is your friend mated?” He says and you can hear that he doesn’t believe whatever bullshit story Claire told him.

“Yes, she’s got a mate. What am I doing, Lionel?”

Claire thrusts the thermometer into your mouth. Her cold hands are pressed your forehead. 

“Claire I’m not gonna say shit. Is this your mate? Because her symptoms are in line with bond sick. If she’s been away from you for too long, this can happen. It’s not super common but if you guys have a pretty..” he coughs “frequent amount of sex, and she’s under a lot of stress…this can happen. Especially if the alpha is away too long.. They used to say it only worked on ‘true mates’…I don’t know how much of that you believe but…If she’s this sick?” He trails off thinking about science. Before Claire shouts at him again, not caring about true mates or science right now. 

“Lionel what the fuck do I do? Tell me how to fix it.” The Governor hisses at her friend. Guilt is coming off of her pheromones in waves. You put your hand weakly up, and she grabs it. 

“You can’t leave her-“

“Why the fuck would I leave my mate like this?” She growls at the other alpha. The scientist, to his credit, doesn’t growl back. Claire takes out your thermometer to read it. 

“Claire, let me finish, you can’t leave her in clothes. Her body temperature is probably fluctuating, and her pheromones can’t keep up. You gotta get her in the bathtub. Lower her body temp. If it was me..and this was my mate. I’d get in there with her.” 

Claire works quick, zipping the side of her dress and throwing it across the room. She moves and pulls down your pants. You try to stop her, your teeth still chattering. 

“Too cold-”

“My sweet girl I need to get you into the bathtub. Be good for me a little longer. I promise I’ll never let this happen ever again.” She says, and the strength in her voice makes your heart ache. 

“Cold water or hot, Lionel?” Claire says, and she pulls your boxers down. She hauls you to your feet and makes quick work of your wet sweatshirt. It’s sticking to your sweaty body. 

“Luke warm, is she on heat suppressants?”

“Why do you need to know this, Lionel?” Claire grits out, not wanting to talk about it with him. The voice makes a cracking noise from the speaker. 

“I’m gonna remind you, you called me. If she’s on a heat suppressant or birth control, that can make her really sick. Mixed with bond sick these fuck up her body’s ability to fight it.” Lionel says as clinically and precisely as he can. 

“She’s on both,” Claire says, and your body feels so achy and sticky. Worse than any heat you’d had. Claire wraps her strong arm around your shoulder, and you both walk naked across to your bathroom. 

“Claire it’s ok- I can call someone. You have so much work-“ you say deliriously.

“I’m not going anywhere, and no one is coming in here.” Claire’s alpha voice comes out.

“Yeah, it’s a really bad idea for anyone to walk in. Does your mate have roommates? Because you will be in an alpha standoff. It won’t be pretty. Like to the death…”

“No roommates,” Claire answers and feels so protective over you. She sits your naked butt on the toilet. Moving to start the water and make the temp luke warm. 

“What else, Lionel?” 

“She’s not…pregnant, right? I mean..birth control and suppressants aren’t 100%.” It sounds more condescending than he meant it to. 

“No, she’s not,” Claire growls through the phone. 

“Are you-“

“Yes I am absolutely sure. I’d smell her and know. She’s my mate. She’s my omega I’d fucking know if she was carrying my pup. The room smells different, though.” Claire snaps, and Lionel shuts up on the idea of you being pregnant. 

“Could you smell it from outside? Like almost floral-ie?”

“Yes.”

“You locked the door, right? Because if it’s a sweet scent, some Alphas will go into a frenzy.” Lionel said, and you watched Claire’s body look menacing now.

“I bought my mate four different padlocks and they’re all locked. I checked the windows, even. Also, I have a gun in my purse. No one’s getting in this apartment. No one is touching my mate.” She informs him, and you hear him gulp.

“You are one tough alpha Governor.” He says seriously, and she isn’t fazed. 

“Ok, what else do I need besides the bath?”

“Um.. don’t make me say it…” He says sounding unamused. 

“Lionel, I'll tell ‘you know who’ about that thing on your laptop. The secret file.” She threatens, and he’s quick to answer.

“Fuck her. Jesus, Claire, you don’t need to threaten me. Fuck her, your body is her best medicine.”

“But if I take her off birth control,” Claire says delicately, and you are relieved she doesn’t just take the bait and knock you up even in her angry, possessive state. You knew Claire would love you pregnant but you’d said not before you gradnauted and she was respecting that.  

“She won’t be pregnant while she’s bond sick. Her body isn’t responding like it should. So you can..finish inside or whatever. Scenting will help too. Just any bodily fluids are good. Ok, can I go now? I don’t wanna talk about this with you anymore.” Lionel sounds like a child in this moment. 

“Is there anything else I need to know?”

“Keep checking her vitals and make sure she has fluids. You can text me whenever. But don’t tell me any sex details. I really don’t want to know.” 

“Thank you, Lionel, I owe you. You can collect whenever.”

That was terrifying, you thought absently.

“I plan on it!” He hung up. 

Claire is strong enough to lift you, and you both end up in the bathtub. You are shivering and shaking like a leaf. The water isn’t super warm and it isn’t helping as you sweat. Claire is making it so you are straddling her lap. Your arms wrap around her shoulders and you realize how sweaty you are now. 

Trying to move out of your girlfriends embrace.

“No, no sweetheart. Stay with me honey.” Claire coo’s and then she does something you weren’t expecting. She lets her long tongue go flat and she licks the scar on your shoulder where she claimed you. Then she keeps licking your sweaty neck like she’s a jungle cat cleaning you. Your heart rate picks up at the feeling of her tongue against your sticky skin. 

It’s working though, your mind doesn’t feel so foggy. 

“Don’t stop. Oh god I must taste so gross though, and I’m getting you all sweaty-” You whimper and Claire takes a moment of solace in knowing it’s working. Before she pulls back to talk to you. 

“You always taste good. Don’t worry my love. I’m going to put my cock inside of you, ok?” Claire asked and it sounds so sweet when she says it. Like she was telling you she’s giving you some cough syrup for your flu. 

“I am so not cute right now, I don’t know why-” You shudder and her manicured nails move down to your cunt. You are embaressed by how much slick is there. You shake against her and your head falls back. 

“You are my mate, always so adorable. I always desire you. There’s never a moment I don’t want to be inside of you. It’s gonna help ok?”

Claire tried to be gentle with you. But the truth was the second she’d smelled you from the taxi she’d been hard as a fucking rock. Feeling the need to use your holes. 

“Inside, please alpha god.” You murmur and for the first time you realize how her cock is pressed against you and it was hot against your skin. Claire moves with practiced ease, she can tell that you don’t need any foreplay. You are swollen and wet as hell. But Claire doesn’t let her instincts take over. She only inserts half of her dick and you both moan in tandem. 

“More, god more please.” Your pussy clenches against Claire’s hot cock inside of you. 

“Slow-”

“No, it’s been too long. Please go inside. I need you so badly. I’ve missed you so much Mama please use me.”

Claire’s body responds without her say. Her thick cock pushes all the way in and you cry out in relief. Your pussy fluttering against her, skin on skin, your eyes fall close. Claire doesn’t move to fuck you, she wraps her arms around your wet body. The two of you sway to a beat that isn’t auditory. Bodys as close as possible, breasts against breasts. You inhale into her neck smelling her expensive perfume, clean shampoo, and something so signature Claire. Calming pheramones are pushed around the room, and you can’t tell who started them. 

You stay in the tub for a really long time. You’re not sure how long. But when you wake up you are dry and dressed. In a very expensive long mercedies town car. 

You blink and realized that your entire comforter is wrapped around your body and someone is in your blanket burito with you. Blinking you see Claire is staring off to the side. She’s got dark circles under her eyes.  

“Claire what’s happening?”

“I’m taking you home baby.”

“I thought we were home? We were at my apartment how’d we get here?” You said confused and panic started to come to the surface. You look over to see a bunch of boxes and your three suitcases. Claire packed your shit. Your school bookbag was on the top. 

“No gorgeous, I’m taking you home, to our home.” Claire’s arms are strong and tight against you but you pull back enough to look into her sad blue eyes.

“Claire?”

“We can talk more inside, we’re almost at the townhouse. I packed everything I thought you’d need. Tomorrow you’re going to end your lease-”

“Claire!” You were awake now. You saw her gulp but she looked so tired.

“I will contact movers for the rest of your things in the morning-”

“Claire!” You snap unable to believe her right now. She was being such a paranoid alpha.

“We’re coming out in a press conference in two days. I already emailed my team-”

“You are being such an asshole right now! You can’t just make these decisions! That’s such a toxic alpha thing to do Claire! Come on we talked about this!” You tried to push off of her chest but she grabbed your wrist hard, harder than she ever had before. You saw Claire’s teeth bare, knowing the alpha in her wanted to growl at you and pin you. Remind you of your place. Which was ridiculous, that’s not who Claire was! But Claire cleared her throat instead. 

“Baby-”

“Don’t Baby me-” You snapped and Claire lost her composure now. She pulled you tightly against her and she let you have it. 

“You didn’t hold your unconscious lover against your body in the bath for four hours. So until you’ve experienced what I just saw you don’t get to tell me what I’m capable of! I thought you were going to fucking die. I thought it was all my fault! That I had come too late. So no, I don’t much care about your landlords opinion or your furniture. Or whatever CNN or Fox is going to say. I want the love of my life. My fucking wife to be safe and warm in my bed. No more of this long distance bullshit. It’s done. You can be mad at me as much as you want, in the comfort of our home. You can yell and shout at me and tell me how I’ve taken your choice away. Like I’m the bad alpha of this story. But my god will you be safe, and that…that will be enough.” Claire panted like she’d just run a marathon with you. Like her heart was broken. 

The car stopped just then and you felt like you wanted to cry. But the omega inside of you wanted to give into her. You’d hated the long distance and so had your strong Governor. Claire had done it for you. She’d been relieved to not have to do a big press conference. But not because she didn’t want people to know you were her mate. Because she wanted you to have a little bit of normal. Get to be a college student. But now, now she needed you home. Safe.

You were both snapped out of a trance of staring at each other. 

Larry, a nice Beta from the Bronx tapped on the glassdoor. Obviously he smelled the mixture of upset and alpha pharmones all in the car. He’d probably have to go get it cleaned to get rid of the two of their smell. 

Claire pulled the blanket back and you saw she had on her dress from earlier again. While you were in black sweat pants and one of Claire’s college sweatshirts. You would have normally found it cute. She’d even put on your light blue fuzzy socks with your lucky white converse. Claire knew you and it showed. But you refused to focus on that. You were pissed at her. 

Claire opened the car door and put her hand out and she took you. Pulling you into the townhouse and easily resetting the alarm system. 

Your jaw was jutting to the side in obvious upset. When you’d imagined coming home to Claire you hadn’t thought it would be while you were unconscious. Larry surprised you by coming in with your boxes. He moved them easily into the hallway. 

“Thanks Larry.” You gave him a sad smile and he nodded. 

“You be easy on her flower. Governors been a mess without you.” He whispered to you and you felt a little guilty. But he turned on his heel and went to get more boxes. 

You walked into the house and inhaled. It smelled like Claire, but it was also a little too clean. Obviously she didn’t spend as much time here. Claire walked into the kitchen to pour herself a scotch and get you more water. She was concerned about the amount of fluids you’d lost. 

When she walked back into the hall you took your shoes off, and then went to grab the alcohol from her hand and she pulled it back. Before giving your palm the water instead. You rolled your eyes but took it. Taking long sips you were really thirsty. 

You both didn’t wait for Larry, walking up the stairs you went up two flights before going towards the guest bedroom. Agatha grabbed the hood of your sweatshirt and pulled it like a leash. You couldn’t believe her, but then again you could. 

“Nice try.” Claire said sarcastically knowing you were trying to be passive aggressive and she wasn’t going to put up with that. Guiding you into the master bedroom. You walked in and rolled the blankets back before pulling all your clothes off. Knowing Claire’s rules when you two slept next to each other. You were always supposed to be naked. You didn’t want to forgive her right now. But you also didn’t wanna fight right anymore. 

Going into the middle of the bed you grabbed Claire’s pillow and inhaled. Claire’s eyebrow twitched, she was suddenly jealous of a stupid pillow. She took the dress off again, bra and underwear gone. Letting it fall and not caring about putting her clothes away right now. Claire moved into the bed and you tried to pull away and she growled. 

Then got on top of you. She grabbed both of your wrists and pinned them over your head. You felt her strong cock against your hip. A bit of wet precum leaked against your skin.

“How long are we going to play this game little girl?” Claire leaned down so that you were sharing the same breath. 

“You-”

“I know, you don’t like that your alpha made a decision without you. But it’s time. You need my knot. I need you safe. I need…god damn it I need you. Can we make a compromise for the night? Then tomorrow you can be upset with me again?” She offered and her tongue pressed against the side of her cheek and you watched the muscle move in her mouth. 

“I can be really mad? All day?” You clarified. 

“Throw things, run up my credit card, smash all the vases in the house if It makes you feel better.”

“Tomorrow?” You leaned in and it sounded more like a whimper. Claire’s cock became fully hard at the noise her omega was making. 

“Tomorrow.” Claire says and you close the little distance and kiss her hard. She greedily takes every inch of your mouth over. Claire’s desire to fuck you on FOX may come true if you keep making those little noises. 

“Breed me?” You pout and Claire laughs grabbing your hips she opens your legs and you wrap them around her hips. It’s a vice grip and Claire doesn’t have any plans on trying to get out of it. 

“You were so mad at your alpha two seconds ago for forcing you to move in with me. Now you want me to fill you up with my seed?” Claire’s voice is dark and raspy and you nodd. All anger leaving your body and only want coming back. You’d been feeling so ill and the physical proximity of Claire was making everything better. 

“Touch me please, It’s been so long.” You cry and you try to free your hand to grab onto Claire’s cock. But her perfect nails dig into your wrists. You can tell she’s about to go feral. She closes her eyes and tries to stop herself. You see her counting. And you shake your head. “Let go Claire. Use me.”

Claire loses whatever composure she was working on when you say that. Releasing your wrists she moves her dick and pushes into you. 

Her fingers go down and pinch your clit hard and you scream. She holds your clit between her nail and finger and then she fucks you with abandon. Her hips seeming to have a mind of their own. Like Claire isn’t even aware of her own actions. Like only her alpha need can see you right now. You twist and cry and scream and Claire doesn’t stop. 

The wet sounds of your cunt being ruthlessly hammered into. You don’t assist you just hold onto Claire’s shoulders with your nails. 

Claire fucks you like it’s the last thing she’ll ever do. Like you are her last meal. Sweat is rolling off the Govenor and her pupils are blown. 

You are about to cum and you bite your lip and your eyes roll back trying to contain the noises and Claire leans down, not liking you quieting yourself. She bites down hard on the soft spot where your neck meets your shoulder and your toes curl. Blood comes from her bite. You wail until your voice is gone. 

And Claire keeps going and you realize she’s holding on, and you can’t have that. So you decide to do something you read in a smutty book. See if it works here. Reaching up you grab her hair and she jerks in surprise. 

“I thought you were going to be an alpha and breed me? If I wanted a good time I’d just call a friend.” You said it and something so sinister crossed Claires face that you wondered if she was going to lose it. If you’d be in even bigger trouble. Her knot twitches against you and fills quickly and she slaps against your body in a way that stings now. 

“I’ll invite everyone of our friends over so they can see you get pregnant for me. Is that what you want omega? Is that why you think you can taunt me? You need me to show you what you are?” 

Your mouth opens and nothing comes out as her knot is pushing against your soaked abused cunt. And you can’t believe how big it is and that Claire is making it go in so slow, and you can’t breathe. But Claire fucks you with precision until the knot is inside and you two can’t move. It’s pressing against your walls. You are almost painfully ful. 

“Hold my cum inside baby. Be good for me. And maybe I’ll forgive you for what you just said.” Claire sucked your neck leaving giant hickies and you shuddered. Knowing that her knot wouldn’t deflate for hours and she was going to do whatever she wanted to your body in that time. 

To Be Continued...

[burningcheese-merchant]

Ok... Polygamous Dark Cacao and Hollyberry, with their other partners being Mistic Flour and Eternal Sugar.

But wait !

Dark Cacao is only dating Hollyberry and Mystic Flour. His relationship with Eternal Sugar is everything but romantic. (Neutral, friendly, hate but deal with it for their love)

Same thing with Hollyberry ! Her dating Dark Cacao and Eternal Sugar. Her relationship with Mystic Flour is everything but romantic. (Neutral, friendly, hate but deal with it for their love)

Eternal Sugar and Mystic Flour relationship is whatever you want it to be ! :D

Hollyberry, pointing at Dark Cacao and then Eternal Sugar : This is my husband, and this is my girlfriend !

Hollyberry, now pointing at Mystic Flour : And this is my husband's girlfriend !

Hollyberry : Yes, we're all okay with that !

Thank you for your consideration~

My friend, I simply do not like poly ships lol. It does not matter who is participating and how they are arranged. I like pair bonds and monogamy. Nothing more, nothing less. I don't even like casual relationships or hook ups, I'm an old-fashioned romantic lol. For me it is total love and devotion between two people and that's the end of the story for every single ship I like. (I know I said I like HollyCacao and HollySugar + MysticCacao but those are either/or. They cannot and do not exist at the same time for me. It's one or the other(s), never both)

If you want to do poly ships that's fine. Doesn't affect me at all. I'm in the minority in a lot of ways when it comes to shipping and I've made my peace with that lol. Just let me be quietly huddled in my little old-fashioned romantic corner while everyone else occupies the rest of the room. I don't have to get up and join them if I don't want to and vice versa. Y'all go ahead and enjoy yourselves, don't mind me

[100vern]

ex-conomics | csc

you supported seungcheol through years of being an aspiring athlete, and all you got to show for it was your undergraduate degree and an awkward, stuttered apology when he dumped you to go semi-pro. now he’s back after an injury derailed his career, and there’s only one problem: you’re the only one available to tutor him. you - 0; the universe - 1. talk about no return on investment.

⚽ pairing: choi seungcheol x f. reader ⚽ genre: exes to (lite) enemies to lovers; university au; angst, fluff ⚽ rating: while there is nothing explicit in this fic, there are two brief references to smut. while i can't stop anyone from reading this, i would prefer minors do not interact with this or any of my work. ⚽ warnings: cheol is some degree of famous, reader is a grad student/TA, mentions of an injury and coping with the aftermath of it, lots of economics talk that even i do not understand, swearing, one mention of alcohol, some misplaced jealousy, rom-com tropes, dino is kind of a loser but we love him anyway. probably a lot of other things i missed, but this is actually pretty tame for a fic of this length. ⚽ word count: 13.4k ⚽ thank you: a lot of people looked this over for me in the process and i'm sure i will forget some of them so if i do i'm sorry: @the-boy-meets-evil, @hot-soop, @highvern, and @haologram, who also gave me some wonderful ideas for the vlogs. thank you to MIT for opencourseware existing. i took microeconomics and dropped it, so i couldn't have done this without you. everyone in the discord server for helping me along the way and keeping me motivated. ⚽ author's note: i haven't posted a fic in nearly seven months, so i think it goes without saying that there are parts of this i like and a lot more i'm not 100% happy with. i'd love if this was more fleshed out and 10k longer, but i was able to write anything at all so it's good enough. this was written for the back to school with seventeen collab, hosted by @camandemstudios. thank you both for letting me participate! please make sure to check out the rest of the stories! everyone worked so hard and this collab was a ton of fun to participate in. <3

You look down at the paper. Back up at who handed it to you. Down at the paper again.

“You’ve got to be joking.”

The poor freshman kid laughs, all nerves, and even though the sound is grating, you remember what it’s like to be forced into work study. How far away graduate school seemed; how large your professors loomed over you with all their power and knowledge and credentials; how you constantly felt like the dumbest person in nearly every room you walked into for four straight years.

“Um—”

You sigh, just barely resisting the urge to slam your head onto your desk. “I—it’s fine, don’t worry about it.” Your words do little to ease Freshman’s nerves. He’s still hunched over in the doorway of your office, wringing his hands as he shifts his weight back and forth, in for a lifetime of body pain with the way he’s squaring his shoulders. “You’re sure about this, though? Like, I’m really not being set up?”

“I don’t think so?” he offers, slowly starting to turn green right before your eyes. “Dr. Lee ga-gave me the paperwork himself, I don’t think he would’ve messed it up? Oh no, did I mess it up? Should I go back to Student Services and conf—”

Good god, this kid’s anxiety is gonna stink up your office for weeks. “No need!” you interject. “I’ll just…” Sign it, you want to say, but the longer you stare at the sheet of paper the quicker you’re losing your resolve.

TUTORING REQUEST FORM Student Name: Choi Seungcheol Degree: Undergraduate Major: Business Course: ECON04101 Introduction to Microeconomics Instructor: Lee Yeonseok, PhD. Recommended Tutoring: High (3-4 hours per week)

You curse under your breath. Of the two names on the paper, Dr. Lee’s does not come as a surprise. He’s a notorious hard-ass with an infamous attrition rate—most students don’t last more than a week in any of his classes—but he’s also the sole reason you were able to pay for someof your grad school tuition out of pocket with all the tutoring money you made.

That, however, was two years ago.

“Does he know I don’t tutor anymore?” Stupid question. The kid stares blankly back at you, as if to say I don’t know any more than the people in Student Services, let alone Dr. Lee. It is literally my first year here. “I’m Dr. Ahn’s TA this year. I’ve got my hands full with her bullsh… stuff—”

Immediately, you know you’ve said something wrong, because the kid’s eyes light up, all that previous anxiety disappearing like smoke. “Wait, the same Dr. Ahn that teaches the crypto course?”

“No, that one died,” you say quickly. Kid deflates. “Anyway, I don’t really tutor anymore, especially for econ. As you can see”—you gesture vaguely around the cramped four walls of your office—“they’ve upgraded me. They even put my name on a little placard by the door! Go look! They spelled it wrong! If that doesn’t sum up this university I don’t know what does.”

You heave another sigh. Try to school your face and tone into something that exudes professionalism and finality. “Look, I’m sorry I can’t help you. I tutored Dr. Lee’s students for, like, three years in undergrad so I’m sure they just… forgot that wasn’t my actual job here. Who’s in charge of tutoring these days? I’ll shoot them an email and explain all this.”

Freshman gives you a name, and it takes less than a second to find them in the employee directory. You expect that to be the end of it, but he’s still taking up space in your doorway. You quirk an eyebrow. “Yes?”

The hand-wringing returns, along with an embarrassed flush that disappears beneath the neckline of his school-branded sweatshirt. “I just—um. Maybe you could, uh. Send that now? Before I get back there?”

You blink. “Don’t you have to go all the way back across campus? How slow do you think I type?” He shrugs, and you give up on the idea of getting rid of him. “Fine. What’s your name, anyway?”

“Lee Chan. I’m a sophomore. Do you know that guy?”

“Oh. I thought for sure you were a freshman, but you’re gonna need to be more specific, Lee Chan, Sophomore.”

“The guy they want you to tutor.” You freeze. The guy they want you to tutor is—“Choi Seungcheol,” Chan tacks on, and, yeah, you know—knew, you correct yourself—someone with that name, once upon a time.

But there are a lot of Chois and a lot of Seungcheols. It’s been years since you’ve spoken to the Seungcheol you knew, and that was when he’d broken up with you to—“I heard he’s a football player? Well, used to be, I guess. The girls in the office were freaking out so I guess he’s pretty famous, but I don’t know anything about sports, do you? They said they have photocards of him. I thought they only did that for idols.”

You think about being kids together in Daegu. Think about the exasperated looks you’d share when your parents would drag the two of you to festivals: Palgongsan in the autumn, Biseulsan in the spring; transformation and rebirth. Think about being eight years old and watching your father cram into the small space of the Chois’ living room, standing around the TV with Seungcheol’s dad, shouting at Park Jonghwan. Daegu FC made the FA Cup quarterfinals that year, and you think, of everything, that’s what you’ll remember for the rest of your life.

You think about falling in love slowly. Sixteen and clueless, the pair of you were. Didn’t really know any different, just that you’d look at him and feel butterflies. That you’d hold hands in secret. Text beneath the dinner table. That you’d watch him on the football pitch and be consumed by pride. That the future felt impossibly far away, that life would never catch up to the two of you.

You think about all the football jargon you didn’t understand—the academies, the teams, the implications. You think about, I’m thinking about trying out for the FC Seoul U-18, I just don’t think there’s much more I can do here in Daegu. You think about replying, Oh, I applied to university there.

You remember thinking it must’ve been fate, how easy that had worked out. How easy that first hurdle had been overcome.

You think about how fast everything happened. The try-out, the acceptance, the explosion. Remember being unable to go anywhere those first few months without seeing Seungcheol’s face, touted as the next big thing. Think about applying for scholarships when he was applying for international visas. Think about studying for midterms when Seungcheol was studying English for interviews.

You think about the last few weeks of your relationship, when it felt like you were desperately trying to cling to ghosts. Think about how Seoul had once felt endlessly big, both in opportunity and size, and how it now felt suffocating. You think about, So you’re just giving up? Is that what you’re saying? Think about, I don’t know what else to do. It doesn’t feel fair to you.

You think about all the places you’ve watched him. On countless football pitches; shy glances in school hallways; in the passenger seat, wracked with nerves on the drive to Seoul; poised above you in bed, hairline dotted with sweat as he rolled his hips, telling you how much he loved you.

You think about watching him walk out the door, and how you never watched him again.

So you fire off your email, concise and to the point about why you can’t tutor Choi Seungcheol in Introduction to Microeconomics, and turn to Lee Chan, Sophomore.

“No,” you finally answer. “Never heard of him.”

For all intents and purposes, your rejection should’ve been the end of it.

A few days go by. You hold office hours, attend lectures, work on your thesis when you have both the time and the energy. Try to ignore the feeling of bees beneath your skin, anxiety needling each time you check your email. You were well within your right to decline the tutoring request, but you can’t help but feel like you’ve done something wrong. That someone somehow knows who Seungcheol was to you and will pull you up on it. That those girls who’d gushed about him to Chan are somewhere laughing at your expense.

But you don’t hear anything at all about it… until you do.

Sunday evening. You haven’t moved from your couch in hours, some variety show playing in the background, barely audible over your keyboard clacking. Much to your detriment, you don’t write many papers these days, so you’re out of practice. Feels like you haven’t done anything besides formulas in years, all of your academic knowledge reduced to fucking math, so you’re about ready to toss your laptop out the window long before the email even comes through.

You see, From: Lee Yeonseok. You see, Subject: Choi Seungcheol - Tutoring.

Your stomach plummets to the floor.

You scan the body quickly. You see the words personal favor… friend of his father… urgent matter… and your hands start shaking. Whether it’s from the sheer audacity of this man or anxiety, you aren’t sure, but it’s not like it matters. There aren’t a whole lot of people on campus brave or dumb enough to go up against him twice.

“Motherfucker,” you spit, bitter the only taste in your mouth.

Where did you go wrong to wind up here? You’d followed the script: got the grades, passed the exams, received half of the required education for the Respectable Career, helped a few others along the way chase dreams that may or may not have been their own. You’d fallen in love. Only had a broken heart to show for it, but that’d been in the script, too: The First Love, followed by The First Heartbreak.

The split from Seungcheol was supposed to have been the end of that chapter. You’d planned on never seeing him again, and you never would have, had it been up to you. Apparently the universe has other plans, participation required.

“Did you spill onion dip on the rug again?” You startle, sending your laptop flying. Kaori, your roommate, is perched halfway in between the living room and the kitchen like a cryptid, clearly not expecting your reaction. “Oh. Were you watching porn?”

Face burning, you fetch your laptop from the floor. “In a common area? Kaori, please, I have far more decorum than that.”

She snorts, resuming her trek to the fridge. “See, that’s what I thought, but then I walked out here and you threw your laptop so fast it was like watching my ex get caught watching furry porn all over again.” She pries the lid off a large container of yogurt. “You think this is still good?”

“Dunno. What’s it smell like?”

She sniffs it and pulls it back to check the label. “Vanilla, I think, which is concerning because it’s supposed to be strawberry.”

You shrug. “What’s the worst that can happen, you get extra”—you pause, trying to remember the correct order of things, before giving up entirely—“...biotics?”

“Mm, so close. Care if I just eat this with a spoon?”

Nose scrunched, you wave her off. “Couldn’t pay me to eat yogurt on a good day, let alone if it’s expired. All yours, babe.”

Spoon in hand and a pleased smile on her face, Kaori collapses onto the couch beside you. You try to return your attention to your paper, try to find your momentum again, and it works for all of ten minutes before you’re groaning and slamming the top closed.

You don’t even need to look over to know Kaori’s staring. “What’s up with you?” she asks. Before she can answer: “Wait, is this serious? Because I can’t have a serious conversation in this t-shirt.” You steal a glance sideways. Ask Me About My Hemorrhoid! it says, and you exhale loudly. “Don’t breathe at me, I lost a bet.”

“And continued wearing it?”

She jokingly rolls her eyes. “God forbid a girl has hobbies.” Nudges you with her foot. “C’mon, spill.”

Kaori doesn’t know about you and Seungcheol. Most people don’t, aside from a few old classmates from Daegu who found you on social media and tried befriending you once he started making a name for himself in Seoul. After that, it was just easier to keep things private while you were together. New friends knew you were seeing someone but not their name or how long you’d been together. Any curiosity surrounding why the Choi Seungcheol was following you on Insta had been waved away easily. Our parents are friends, we grew up together. Then you broke up, and there wasn’t any evidence to delete, and he wasn’t following you on Instagram anymore, and it was easier that way.

So, yeah—even though you hadn’t met her until years later, Kaori knows you have an ex. She knows you’ve had a few flings and situationships in the time since, too, and it’s why she’s none the wiser when you ask, “It’s nothing, really. Just—do you follow football at all?”

“Nah, not really. The new guy’s pretty into it and keeps trying to get me to watch the games with him, but it’s so fucking boring? I dunno, I can’t get into it. Not in real life, anyway—I binged all of Captain Tsubasa in an embarrassingly short amount of time, though. Why?”

“Student Services asked me to tutor someone the other day and I had to turn it down. I just don’t have the time, you know? This semester’s already killer, and Dr. Ahn’s been riding my ass nonstop about grades. Turns out it’s some football player, so Dr. Lee emailed me asking me to do it as a personal favor, which means, on top of all the other shit I have to do, I’m now tutoring some football player four hours a week in Microeconomics.”

Her face distorts. “God, that guy’s such a prick. Like wow, you’re good at the economy! Good for you! Who cares! Why don’t you go balance the national debt or something instead of torturing university freshmen!”

You also wrongly assume that’s the last you’ll hear of it from Kaori.

Two days later, after Student Services replies to your email with the days and times you’ll be tutoring Seungcheol, she materializes in the living room to harass you.

“You didn’t tell me your football player was Choi Seungcheol.”

The panic is instant. You know how she means it, but it’s not how your body interprets it. All of a sudden it feels like an interrogation, an accusation, and a whopping serving of guilt takes up residence in the middle of your chest for not being entirely honest.

“Explains this weird text Ken sent me.”

She slides her phone over to you, open to her text thread with her current flavor of the week. Beneath an article about Seungcheol enrolling in classes at your school:

doesn’t ur roomie TA there Why are you calling her “ur roomie” like you don’t know her name?? Rude. Also yes. ask her to get me an autograph No babe pls he was my fav player before he got injured No 🙄 fine. can i come over later? Starting to think you’re using me for my roommate. Get your own job 🙄

You hand her phone back. “I didn’t think you’d know who Choi Seungcheol even is.” It’s the best you can do, even though it just digs you a deeper grave. “You said you’re not into football.”

“I’m not, but unfortunately I am into that stupid man.” She sighs, wistful and longing. “Babe, you have to understand. His dick is so big.”

You hadn’t wanted to stay in Seoul for your graduate degree, let alone the same university you’d gone to for undergrad.

You’d applied to schools all over—Japan, Europe, even a few in the States. Romanticized the hell out of NYU, went window shopping for an overpriced apartment, picked a favorite pizzeria based on nothing but vibes and online reviews. In those few months after graduation, there wasn’t a whole lot tying you to Seoul. Your and Seungcheol’s relationship had been old history by then, your parents split. Your dad stayed in your childhood home and your mother moved a few hours closer to her sister. They’d waited until your brother was old enough to be out of the house.

And it’d just been… a lot. Overwhelming. Some days you could barely shower or feed yourself, let alone move halfway across the world, so you’d stayed in the familiar and tried not to let it feel like failure.

But the good thing about familiarity is you learn its tricks, figure out the hiding spots. Early on, your first or second week of grad school, you laid claim to a study room on a floor of the library everyone else ignored. You write notes on the whiteboard with faded blue markers that are still there days later. The chair on the opposite side of the table is always exactly where you left it, the space between it and the table enough to only accommodate you. Sometimes you leave books—old paperbacks littered with notes in your writing—or papers, just to see if they move.

They never do.

And all of this is why it feels like a punch to the gut when that sanctity is tainted. When you’re halfway through a stack of Dr. Ahn’s exams and the doorknob rattles behind you. When you don’t even need to turn around to know who it is, because he still sounds the same, still has that overwhelming presence. You’ve always sensed him before you felt him.

“There you are,” Dr. Lee says, ambling into the room before you can protest. He, too, is overwhelming, just in different ways. Immaculate posture that anchors his slight frame that’s always dressed impeccably and expensively. Wears a watch that’s triple your tuition. Shoes polished so bright they’re nearly blinding. “I’ve been looking all over for you.”

This time it is an accusation.

Well, you found me, you want to say, but just knowing Seungcheol is behind him, lingering in that half-study room, half-hallway space, is enough to keep you quiet. Like if you speak you’ll summon him closer and you’ll no longer be able to pretend this is nothing more than a nightmare.

You plaster on a polite smile. Say, “Ah, here I am, kyosu-nim,” and put all your energy into trying to glue Seungcheol to the floor with your mind.

Which is fruitless, because Dr. Lee moves further into the room. Gestures for Seungcheol to follow him with an impatient huff, and the study room is small, sure, and with three people it feels cramped, but that’s not the reason it feels like all the air’s been sucked out of the room.

Seungcheol looks… different. He looks as anxious as you feel, and he sticks close to the wall like he’s trying to disappear. Dr. Lee introduces him with grave importance, unaware of your history, and the forced smile he offers you almost looks embarrassed.

You know Dr. Lee is still hammering away, probably giving you a stern talking-to for rejecting his request the first time, but you can’t tear your eyes away from Seungcheol. Feels like the world around you has reduced to a pinhead, all hyperfocus; feels like your lungs are sucking in stale air one at a time.

“...his father is a very good friend of mine, so I expect…”

You expected to feel nothing. Seungcheol had left to chase his dream—one you’d always been so supportive of that it sometimes felt like your dream, too—and, perhaps naively, you thought the distance and the years would’ve been enough. You expected your heart to have hardened. You expected all those nights you spent crying to hit you at full force. You expected anger, hurt—indifference, at the very least.

“...as many hours per week as you both can manage…”

But you should’ve known better. Should’ve expected the butterflies, the way your palms grow clammy, the way your heart rate spikes. Should’ve expected everything to feel upside-down. You should’ve expected to look at Seungcheol and feel sixteen and in love all over again.

“...you are responsible for his academic progress…”

And that simply will not do. You’ve spent the last few years pulling yourself out of that hole, clawing your way back to something resembling normal. You’ve purged the thought of him from your mind—let his scent fade from your sheets, an old sweatshirt he’d left behind; forgot the way his lips felt against every inch of your skin; forgot the way his entire being lit up when he laughed; forgot the safety he encompassed, the way he whispered all those sweet nothings.

You cannot go there again.

So you roll your shoulders back, smile politely. Say, “Ah, kyosu-nim, Choi Seungcheol-ssi seems very intelligent, I’m sure he is capable of being responsible for his own academic standing, don’t you think?”

Dr. Lee cannot disagree without all but calling Seungcheol an idiot, so he hovers before you in shocked silence. Makes a show of huffing and checking his watch, like he’s all of a sudden remembered he’s late for something and being inconvenienced by this conversation he started, and then he’s halfway out of the library with a terse, “Discuss and figure this out amongst yourselves,” thrown over his shoulder.

You have an entire dramatic exit planned in your head. Gather your things, fake a phone call that makes you sound authoritative and important, and brush past Seungcheol wearing your nicest perfume as if all of this is so far beneath you you can’t even bring yourself to care about it.

Of course, you actually have to brush by him for any of that to happen, and since you’ve already decided you will not go there again, you quickly scribble your email address onto a piece of paper and slide it across the table at Seungcheol, who has steadfastly remained planted just outside the door. “Here’s my email. I don’t have time to discuss this right now.” Seungcheol cocks an eyebrow. You start throwing things into your bag haphazardly. You know you look frantic and affected, but there’s not much you can do about that. “What? Send me a copy of your syllabus and what you want to prioritize. It’ll be easier to get through this if we have a plan instead of winging it.”

He seems to catch on to your distaste because he mirrors it. Scoffs as he rolls his eyes and says, “Yeah, no use spending more time together than we have to,” and if you hadn’t gone years without speaking, you would’ve seen right through it.

But you did, so it stings all the same.

As it typically does, the planet keeps spinning after your run-in with Seungcheol.

You grade Dr. Ahn’s coursework. Try running off your anxiety at the gym, even though it’s pretty good at keeping pace with you these days. You meet Kaori’s maybe-boyfriend sneaking out of your apartment early in the morning and he has the good sense not to mention your ex, but you chalk that up to the mess of hickeys covering his neck and not any sense of social decorum.

Other people’s embarrassment saves you a ton of your own, you’ve come to learn.

Throughout all of this, Seungcheol only emails you once to send you his course syllabus. Doesn’t mention tutoring or provide you with his schedule or ask for yours, so when you’re sitting in a bar with your friends, three or four drinks deep and feeling a little petty, you forward him the original tutoring request and make sure to bold, underline, and highlight the “Recommended Tutoring: High” part for good measure.

He doesn’t take your bait—electronically, at least—but he does show up to your office hours the following Tuesday.

Bag tossed onto the floor, he flops unceremoniously into the chair across from you and says, in lieu of a greeting, “They spelled your name wrong. On the door thing.”

“I know,” you reply, your smile polite and terse. Incredible how he has the ability to raise your blood pressure in milliseconds. “What can I help you with?”

“Depends. How long do you have?”

“Well, considering you’ve shown up to my office hours on time, I’m assuming you already know I’m here every Tuesday and Thursday from four to six. So”—you glance at the clock above the door—“assuming no one comes by who needs my help more than you do, you have approximately one hour and fifty-eight minutes.”

Seungcheol is quiet for a moment as he takes you in. His stare is weighted; it makes you feel a little green around the edges. Clinical and sharp, so far removed from the way he used to look at you. You clear your throat. “I looked over your syllabus. The good news is there’s only a midterm and a final and the rest is problem sets. The bad news is there’s only a midterm and a final so they’re weighted quite heavily. You really need to know this stuff inside-out to have any hope of passing.”

“That’s why you’re here, right? Dr. Lee specifically requested you.”

You huff a breath through your nose. “I’m here as supplemental help. I can’t take your exams or do your readings for you. What else are you taking this semester?”

He sighs, sinking further into the chair, very much playing the part of the heir who has no interest in any of this. Which… is unlike him, you think, if you’re even allowed to. The Seungcheol you knew years ago took everything so seriously. Never clipped corners or took shortcuts. Anyone else would think him a spoiled, petulant child. “Business Accounting and International Trade.”

“Could be worse,” you note. “At least those three courses are tangentially related.”

Seungcheol rolls his eyes. “Easy for you to say. I haven’t taken a fucking math class in years.”

You return it. “You remember how to add and subtract, don’t you?”

“I ruptured my ACL, not my…” He trails off, looking a little embarrassed that he can’t name a part of the—“Brain.”

Whatever you were going to quip back with dies on your tongue. It's the first time Seungcheol has broached the topic of his injury—the first you’re hearing of it at all, actually—and he says it like it’s a joke, like it’s not a thing at all, but the pain is all over his face. The bitterness of the situation he’s found himself in. The unfairness of it all.

And there are so many questions you want to ask that aren’t your place: if it’s fixable, if he’ll ever play again, how he’s coping. But you don’t really need to—you can’t imagine how you’d feel if someone suddenly pulled the rug out from under you. If everything contained within the four walls of your office suddenly disappeared.

Not that the man sitting across from you hadn’t already done that, but.

“Right,” you continue, as if he hadn’t said anything at all. You know Seungcheol—know he wouldn’t want you prodding, sticking your fingers in that particular wound. “I want you to take a look at this,” you say, handing over a printout you have saved from your undergrad tutoring days. “Tell me what looks familiar, what doesn’t; what does and doesn’t make sense.”

He looks down at the paper. Back up at you. Down at the paper again. “What the fuck is this?”

“I—what? Cheol, it’s my old notes on recitation. Surely you’ve already covered this—the syllabus says this is week one stuff.” He looks down at the paper again, and it’s so familiar, watching the life drain entirely from someone’s eyes.

You barely resist the urge to slam your face onto your desk a second time.

You meet Seungcheol at the sports center for your next tutoring session.

He likes the humidity and the smell of the chlorine by the pool. He also likes that it’s not the football pitch, so the two of you sit in the bleachers there and go over his lecture notes. Much to your surprise, Seungcheol talks a mile a minute. Has stars in his eyes when he says he finally understands elastic demand curves, supply shock; tells you he spent a whole hour making flashcards.

It’s the first time you’ve seen him so excited since your tutoring began—the first glimmer of hope you’ve felt since Dr. Lee cornered you in your library hideaway. None of this surprises you. Seungcheol has always been smart, even when football was his primary (and sometimes only) focus. He has more determination and grit than anyone you’ve ever met, so you’re not surprised he’s doing well, excelling, but you are surprised—

“Can I ask you something?” Seungcheol shrugs, shoves half a protein bar in his mouth and swallows without chewing. “Why are you… uh. Here?”

“At this university?”

“Not exactly. I mean, I am wondering about that, but I guess… why business?”

Seungcheol hums. Tucks his good knee to his chest and stares down at the pool. No one’s using it, and truthfully the two of you probably aren’t even allowed to be here, but you understand why he likes it. It’s nowhere near as secluded as the library and definitely not as air conditioned, but it is peaceful. Calm. The water laps against the coping in quiet, small waves.

“Ah, I don’t know. You know how it goes.”

You quirk an eyebrow. Never, in all the years you’ve known him, has Seungcheol done anything he didn’t want to do. All that grit and determination. “What about your father, then? Dr. Lee mentioned this was a favor to him. He’s a pretty important person to have in your Rolodex of favors.”

Doesn’t take a rocket scientist to see what this is: Seungcheol’s father has new money; worked from the bottom up, made some smart investment decisions that finally panned out after Seungcheol left for Seoul. Started doing his own thing, made a name for himself. Last you’d heard from your mother, Seungcheol’s brother was second-in-command. Hell, even your own brother did an internship there.

So you know what this is: a father helping his son after his dream was shattered, life turned upside-down. You can’t blame him, even if you’ve heard the whispers from all the way across campus. That Seungcheol is washed up now, trying to nepo his way into his father’s company because of it; that all he knows is sports and he should’ve stuck to that, what does he know about business, why is he the one Dr. Lee went out of his way to help.

Doesn’t stop any of them from smiling at him, though; doesn’t stop them from asking for autographs or selfies.

But you also know this isn’t something Seungcheol seems willing to discuss, so you crack a joke—“I mean, business. God, who’d wanna go into that?”—and go back to what he was willing to talk about.

You’ve never hated elastic demand curves so much in your life.

Deep in the throes of tutoring—when you can’t tell if it’s week two or week twelve—you make it back to your apartment just before ten, head pounding.

The door flies open just as you’re about to punch in the code, and there stands Ken, looking far more put-off than you’ve ever seen him. Looks defeated, if you’re being honest, like someone mopped up all his emotions and wrung them out like dirty dishwater.

“Oh, hi,” you say hesitantly. The man in front of you seems too much like a caged animal to let your guard down. “Everything okay?”

He aborts a nod halfway. Mutters an apology as he brushes by you and stalks down the hall, disappearing around the corner to the elevators. Usually he’s a talker—you haven’t been able to avoid a Seungcheol-related conversation in weeks—so you’re a little stunned. Stand there stupidly for a while, and that’s where Kaori finds you a moment later.

“You gonna stand out here all night, or…?”

“Oh—yeah, right.”

You follow her inside. Toe off your shoes and put them in the rack. Focus on the sound of the kettle whistling instead of the overbearing tension in the room. Drop your bag off in your room, throw on a sweatshirt three sizes too big and a comfy pair of socks. Rummage through the fridge for leftovers, contemplate what mindless show you’ll watch as you eat, and you do not, under any circumstances, ask Kaori what happened.

You don’t have to. You knew what this was going to be the first time Ken spent the night—the way he looked mortified to be meeting you in the shared kitchen at seven a.m., wearing a look that begged you not to tell your roommate he was sneaking out.

I, uh, have an early class, he’d said. You know how it is.

Maybe you should’ve called him on it then. Issued a warning-but-not-really. She’ll get attached if you don’t tell her. She should know it’s different for you, if it is.

But you’d convinced yourself it wasn’t your place. Kaori wouldn’t want you in her business like that, so you stayed quiet, just nodded before watching him slip his shoes on and close the door behind him so quietly you wouldn’t have known he left at all if you hadn’t been looking. Gone, just like a ghost.

So, yeah, you know exactly why your roommate looks haunted.

“I’m a few episodes behind on this if you want to watch with me,” you offer, pointing at the television with the remote. It’s a lie—you’ve never watched this show a day in your life, which Kaori seems to know—but she contemplates it nonetheless. “Also, my mom mailed us some cookies. I think they’re in the fridge.”

“Why are there cookies in the fridge?”

You huff a laugh. “They were outside the door this morning before I left for campus. I don’t know—just saw who the package was from and was like, oh, this must go in the fridge.”

She nods. Grabs the container and joins you on the couch. Sticks her feet beneath your butt and doesn’t mention a thing.

The closest she comes is a few days later. Catches you right before you head out to campus and asks how tutoring is going.

“Not bad, actually.”

Her smile doesn’t reach her eyes when she says, “That’s good. I’m glad things are going well for you two.”

Lee Chan, Sophomore makes his unexpected return at your office hours on an unsuspecting Tuesday.

“Can I help you?”

He doesn’t answer right away, just helps himself to the seat across from you. “Maybe,” comes his cryptic retort. “I was thinking about signing up for that crypto course next semester.”

You narrow your eyes. “No, you weren’t.”

He sighs. Looks a little panicked, like he can’t believe that didn’t work. “You’re right, you’re right. I, um—I wanted to come say thank you.” He pauses. “You know, for that… email you sent.”

You blink. “No, you didn’t.”

Lee Chan, Sophomore cracks immediately. Thunks his head on your desk and lets loose a pained sound. It nearly sounds like he’s wailing when he says, “I’m sorry! They put me up to it!”

What you’re able to piece together is this: Lee Chan, Sophomore has become a bit of a celebrity in the Student Services department ever since he met you, Choi Seungcheol’s tutor. And, like any smart, previously unpopular university student would do, he took advantage of it. Might’ve stretched the truth a little to make it sound like he knew more than he did, so now here he is, angling for information the girls with the photocards may or may not have paid him to get.

“They want to know about his girlfriend.”

“His what?”

What you’re able to piece together is also this: the Photocard Girls are certain Seungcheol is dating someone, based on little more than vibes. You suspect these vibes are their three degrees of separation, considering there was an abnormal amount of Change of Major files formed after his enrollment, but you tell Lee Chan that you don’t know anything and, even if you did, you wouldn’t put his business out there like that.

But some part of you still has this inexplicable urge to protect Seungcheol, so you match their offer with interest and tell him to say there’s nothing to report—not that you didn’t know, not that he couldn’t get anything out of you. Seungcheol isn’t dating anyone.

You don’t know if it’s true, but you figure that if it isn’t, he still deserves privacy.

Which is a notion you have trouble explaining a few hours later, when Seungcheol strolls into your office with a grease-stained paper bag full of cheese coin bread, offering one to you with a proud smile that drops slowly when you just stare in return.

“What’s wrong?”

Your mouth opens, closes, opens again. Nothing comes out, even though it should be simple. Some sophomore kid was just in here angling for information or the Student Services department is taking bets on whether or not you have a girlfriend would both suffice, but you cannot bring yourself to say the words.

What you settle on is, “Sorry, I just… had an interesting meeting before you got here.”

“Oh. Are you okay?”

You sigh. Tilt your head back to stare up at the ceiling. “It was about you, actually.”

Seungcheol chokes, starts stuttering over words you can’t make sense of. Says, “Me? Why? I passed my last exam—I mean, barely, but I still passed. And that wasn’t your fault! I didn’t study enough! I’ve been losing my mind over my International Trade class, that shit sucks—”

“It wasn’t about your grades, Cheol.”

“Oh.” Then, slowly, a lopsided, pleased smile overtakes his face. “Haven’t heard you call me Cheol in a while.”

“Seungcheol,” you correct.

He seems to forget all about the meeting. Tries again to offer you a coin bread before he threatens to eat them all himself, so you acquiesce mostly to shut him up, say you’ll bring the extras to Kaori. For some reason, you tell him about how much she’d loved the cookies your mom sent, and the nostalgia sets him off, gets him talking again, asking if they were the yakgwa she used to make when you two were kids.

They were, but you can’t seem to tell him that, either.

Seungcheol: sorry it’s last minute - running late. can you meet me at my place instead?

Seungcheol shared a location with you

You’re halfway to replying—I don’t think that’s appropriate—before you sigh and delete it. Midterms are only a few days away and you don’t have time to argue over where your tutoring sessions will be, so if Seungcheol wants to meet at his apartment that’s where you’ll meet him.

You read over the midterm notes on the train. Once, twice, and then a hundred more times until they’re nearly memorized, all so you can ignore the voice in the back of your head saying what a bad idea this is. That you have no business being on your way to your ex’s swanky part of town or integrating yourself into his life beyond tutoring at all. You shouldn’t know where he lives. Maybe you shouldn’t even have his phone number or answer his texts.

Not that there’s much you can do about it now, two stops away.

Seungcheol greets you warmly, if not a little rushed. Apologizes for the mess once you step inside, although it’s less “mess” and more “haven’t finished unpacking,” but there’s enough clear space to study at the dining table, so that’s where you set up, determined to keep things professional.

“Sorry again about this,” Seungcheol says, placing a can of cola in front of you as he takes the seat across. “I had to meet with my father and lost track of time, I guess.”

“Oh. How’s he doing?”

Seungcheol sighs, leans further back in the chair as runs a hand through his hair. A light brown, now. “Same as he always was, I guess. Talked about the business, about my brother. Can’t get him to shut up about that stuff most of the time.”

“The business is doing good, though.” You cough, clear your throat. “My, uh. My brother interned there during undergrad. I don’t know if your father told you that.”

You don’t know why you say it, because it’s clear from the brief flicker of pain on Seungcheol’s face that he hadn’t known, that no one had told him. And it hurts you too that they felt the need to keep it a secret, to protect Seungcheol from you even in tangential ways.

“He didn’t,” he admits, “but I’m sure he was happy to see him. He was, uh—he was glad to hear you’re my tutor. Said you were always smarter than all of us boys combined.”

You laugh. Hope it sounds casual instead of strained. “Well, no need to prove him right. Come on,” you say, tossing a study guide in his direction, “let’s get to work.”

Everything is alright for a while—nearly an hour at least. He has the formulas memorized and attributed to the correct equations. He can explain supply and demand, preference and utility, but things start to fall apart around budget constraints and constrained choice.

The formulas get mixed up. He grows frustrated when he doesn’t know the answers to your questions right away. Rolls his eyes and gets a little snappy when you correct him, try to explain things differently in a way he understands. At first he’s able to temper it, collect himself before things truly start spiraling out of control, but the longer the two of you sit there the more it all unravels.

He snaps, you snap back, and you can’t figure out why. You’ve survived this long in Seungcheol’s orbit even though you never thought you’d be around him again, and perhaps it was bound to explode eventually, but…

It’s the familiarity, you realize.

You and Seungcheol aren’t friends, though you’ve been playing at it for weeks now: meeting outside of the library or your office, the personal conversations bordering on reminiscing, being in his personal space. You don’t belong here. You don’t want to be his friend—you can’t be, not for real or pretend.

“That’s not what I’m say—”

“Then explain it better,” Seungcheol fires at you, eyebrows creasing. “You’re the tutor here.”

You roll your eyes. “I’m trying, okay? All I meant was—your answer isn’t wrong, but I know Dr. Lee and he’s going to want more than that in a response.”

“Right—not good enough, like I said.”

“I’m just asking you to expand on your answer—”

“And I’m telling you that’s all I’ve got. I’m not like you, all right? I don’t have all this shit just floating around in my head all the time. I’m not smart, I barely have any idea what’s going on half the time, and you sitting here being condescending about it is doing fuck-all to help.”

You inhale sharply, taken aback at the hostility in his voice. Suggest calling it for the night, say neither of you will be productive if you keep going like this, and neither of you bother to apologize.

So much of your relationship with Seungcheol was marred by clichés.

The two of you passing notes back and forth during class. You in the bleachers of all his games, screaming along to the team chants, waving a sign around with his name on it. Not realizing you had a crush on him at all until he liked someone else and it made your stomach hurt. Childhood friends turned lovers.

Another cliché: that it’s starting to feel like that all over again.

Seungcheol sits across from you in the library, econ textbook cracked in half in front of him as he pays no attention. Keeps grabbing his phone each time it vibrates across the table. Can’t fight the smile that forces its way onto his face when he reads whatever’s there.

Stupid, you think—both to do this and to think it’d play out any other way. Seungcheol left years ago. Probably lived ten lifetimes while he was away while you were here in this exact spot doing this exact thing. Barely lived half a life, just stuck your nose in textbooks and forced your way through.

“Cheol,” you say, trying to drag his attention back to the study guide. No use. He’s typing away, presses his tongue into the fat of his cheek as he responds. “Seungcheol,” you try again.

Also fruitless.

You have no claim here, you remind yourself—not to his time, not to him. He’s only here because someone else mandated it. You’re only here because someone else mandated it, but it stings all the same. Another reminder of what used to be, of what ended regardless of what you wanted. Another reminder that the role you used to play in his life is not the role you play now. That the space you used to take up created a vacancy, and eventually it was going to be filled.

And if this was anyone other than Seungcheol, if you were more emotionally evolved when it came to him, it wouldn’t gnaw at you as much. All of this would roll off your shoulders.

But it isn’t, and you’re not.

“If you’re not going to listen, then—”

“I am listening,” he interjects, but he’s not looking at you. Not looking at his textbook or his study guide. Keeps laughing and smiling at his phone, and it’s sick how bothered you are by it. That it feels like your stomach’s been turned inside-out with jealousy; with annoyance, because you don’t want to be here anyway, don’t want to do this anymore, and you’re wasting your time on someone who doesn’t appreciate it.

Perhaps he never did.

“What are we discussing, then?”

Still not looking up: “Consumer theory.”

You laugh—more a huff of air than anything, grin sardonically out of one corner of your mouth. Seungcheol sees none of it. “Wrong,” you answer, already expecting the way he shrugs it off. “I’m gonna skip ahead a few chapters, though. Consider it a freebie for your business class.”

It must be your tone that finally grabs his attention. Cutting, precise, purposeful. Seungcheol lowers his phone, quirks an eyebrow, wonders where this is going to go. It’s clear he’s pissed you off, that you’re itching for a fight. It’s clear the years of silence are finally coming to a head.

“Let’s talk about ROI. You know what that is?” You barely give him a second. “Return on investment. A performance measure used to evaluate the efficiency of an investment or compare the efficiency of several investments. So, let’s say I make one-hundred-thousand won on a ten-thousand won investment: my ROI is 90%. Are you following?”

He nods.

“Great, now let’s try something a bit more hypothetical.” You suck in a breath. “Let’s say I invest years of my adolescence into someone. A friend at first and then something more. Let’s say I played cheerleader, supported every hope and dream he had—went to every game, cheered him on, helped him practice his English. Held his hand and talked him down when the pressure felt overwhelming, when the only thing that felt inevitable was failure. Now, let’s say all I got in return was a stuttered, awkward apology as he dumped me and walked out the door. Let’s say that guy showed up again after years of silence just to once again waste my fucking time.”

The thing about pain is it’s not linear. What hurt five, ten years ago might not hurt today, but it might tomorrow; what hurt yesterday may never hurt again. The thing about pain is it lets you stick your head in the sand until it can’t anymore, and that’s where you are now: that window of time between Seungcheol walking out the door on the assumption you’d never see him again before he bulldozed his way back into your life has been slammed closed, locked up tight.

So you don’t even notice you’re crying until the room goes deathly silent and you can hear the drip drip drip of tears on paper. Until you watch Seungcheol’s hands flex and unflex in mid-air, stuck in that liminal space, wanting to reach out but knowing he has no right to. Until your chest aches so bad you’re sure you’re either about to break into stardust or cease to exist.

Until you say, “What, Choi Seungcheol, would you say my fucking return on investment was?” and he has nothing to say at all.

Kaori invites you to a party.

Just something small to celebrate the end of midterms and a classmate’s birthday. Nothing out of control or raucous, not even the kind of thing that’d earn a second glance from campus security. I won’t even make fun of you if you leave before eleven, is how she sold it to you, in addition to a small amount of begging and bargaining and a powerful set of puppy-dog eyes.

After everything the two of you have been through, you find it hard to say no.

So here you are, nearly eleven o’clock on a Friday, a cup of cheap beer in hand. A friend of a friend of a friend is wailing into a karaoke machine and although your ears are bleeding, it does feel nice for that to be your greatest worry. You aren’t thinking about your classes or how you’ve been prioritizing everyone else’s academic success. You aren’t thinking about whatever’s going on between Kaori and Ken. You aren’t thinking about Seungcheol.

At least you aren’t, until he walks through the door.

You’re going to continue not thinking about him at all—not about the fact he’s alone or how good he looks in a simple black T-shirt that’s a little taut in the shoulders. You’re not going to think about the way the air shifts, like the universe knows he’s important and is willing to accommodate. You’re not going to think about how Kaori catches your eye across the room, recognizes him from all her internet searches, and the way she mouths oh my god he’s so beefy at you.

You’re not going to think about how guilty you feel that she doesn’t know, because if you do you’re certain it’ll take over.

You watch Seungcheol work the room; watch as he floats between conversations, as strangers fall over themselves at the sight of him. How eager everyone is to give him something and how reluctant he is to take them. You watch as he winds up in the same circle as Kaori and how she must mention you, oh, your tutor is my roommate, because there’s a question in return before he turns and meets your gaze.

You wonder why the distance between you feels more insurmountable now than ever before.

Seungcheol finds you in your office.

It’s not a Tuesday or a Thursday, far later than four to six in the evening, but he doesn’t even bother knocking before he’s barreling in, stifling your space with his bad energy.

You haven’t seen him in nearly two weeks. Not since the party, if that even counts. Hasn’t bothered to reply to any of your texts or emails, and that was just fine by you, if that’s how he wanted to act, but it isn’t until he’s brooding on the other side of your desk that you realize you’re still aggrieved, too. Feels a little too familiar, him leaving you behind and in the dark.

So you don’t mean to—typically have much more professionalism than this—but when he tosses a stapled stack of papers with a barely-passing grade on your desk and says, “This is your fault,” the words come automatically and without forethought.

“Fuck off, Seungcheol.” It’s not your words that take him by surprise; more so the roll of your eyes, the accompanying huff. The impression that all of this is beneath you and nothing more than a mere annoyance. That however affected you were two weeks ago is not how affected you are anymore. “That’s what happens when you blow off your tutoring for two weeks because you’re a coward.”

He laughs, incredulous; unable to help the sound the tumbles out of his mouth. “I’m a—I’m a coward?”

“Yes,” you reply, tone giving away nothing. All he sees is feigned nonchalance despite the hurricane you feel brewing beneath the surface. “This,” you continue, pinching the corner of the paper between your fingertips and disposing of it in the trashcan beneath your desk, “is all on you, but do please let me know if there’s anything else you’d like to blame me for. I’m all ears.”

You don’t miss it: the way Seungcheol’s eyes grow wide at your ‘I’m all.’ The way he thinks you’re going to punctuate that sentence with yours, and it nearly has bile rising in your throat. Makes you want to scream, rip at your hair. If the last few months have taught you anything, it’s that you are still hopelessly in love with the man across from you—the man that continues to leave before he’s left, always at your expense.

So, yeah—Seungcheol is a coward, but only when it comes to you.

But he doesn’t look much like one now, gripping so hard at the edge of your desk that his knuckles have gone white, baseball cap pulled down low enough his eyes are barely visible. He’s always been overwhelming, always carried himself with an exaggerated arrogance even when it wasn’t warranted, always took everything so seriously, and maybe that’s why you’d thought he’d treat you the same way. Take you seriously. Wouldn’t just throw it all away on a maybe thing, and that’s why it's been years and you still aren’t over it.

Maybe Seungcheol is a coward, and maybe so are you.

Because not once since he’s been back have you been able to say what you mean. Can’t seem to tell him about the anger, the hurt, the heartbreak. Played it all off as petty nonchalance because you foolishly thought that would hurt him, that you’ve been reduced to simmering ash, no hope left for a fire.

“I could never blame you for a goddamn thing,” he says, voice so deep you could drown in it.

You so desperately want to know. You don’t want to know anything at all. You want Seungcheol to explain everything to you in detail and spoil the ending, but only if it’s guaranteed to be happy. Enduring another loss like the first time—you’re not sure you can take it. Not after you two have crossed paths like this, because you’ve never quite believed in fate but you think that has to mean something. That so much time and life had transpired and you two came back together.

Today, though, it doesn’t look like you’re going to get any answers.

Seungcheol straightens, looms at full height. Digs into the pocket of his sweatpants and pulls out a thumb drive. Wordlessly, he hands it over, and then he’s gone just as abruptly as he’d arrived.

Again.

Kaori wants to spend the weekend moping, and you can’t come up with a good reason not to join her.

She doesn’t mention Ken once. Not when she’s sobbing over A Silent Voice and Toradora! after that. Not when she keeps glancing at her phone every couple minutes to see if she has any texts. Not when you—only halfway paying attention between grading and your own assignments—suggest ordering something for delivery, maybe that new burger place down the street you heard was good, and Kaori shuts it down so vehemently you can only assume it was Ken’s favorite place.

Kaori just cries over the man with the big dick she never expected to take so seriously, and not even your stonewalling makes her feel ashamed of it.

And there’s respectability in that kind of openness and vulnerability. At least whatever she’s feeling is honest; at least she can admit she’s sad. You think watching Kaori process her breakup might help you process yours too, years too late, so you suck in a breath and ask, “Can I tell you something or is now not a good time?”

Kaori looks over at you. Dabs a soggy tissue at her eyes. “Well, I guess it depends,” is her answer, and she doesn’t shy away from how waterlogged her voice sounds. “If you’re going to tell me you’re a Takasu and Kawashima shipper, maybe, but if it’s anything worse I’m not sure I could take it.”

“I—what? Who even are they?” She gives you a half-hearted thumbs up. You sigh in response, sink further into the couch. “It’s, uh.” Clear your throat. “Do you remember when we met sophomore year? At that party? And I told you I wasn’t looking for anything and you said, and I quote, why not, I have a sixth sense for this kind of thing and I know that guy will have a huge—”

She hides her face behind her hands. “Ew, god, yes I remember that. My dick whisperer era. How embarrassing.”

“Right. And I told you I wasn’t looking for anything because I’d just gotten out of something.”

“Not really by choice, if I remember correctly. I told you if it was quiet it should’ve been loud, and then you never talked about it again.”

You nod. “I—yeah, that sounds like something I would’ve said.” You suck in a deep breath. “Listen, this is probably gonna sound bad considering I did never talk about it again, but—”

“Hey,” Kaori says, nudging you with her foot. Meant to be comforting, somehow. “It’s okay. There’s a lot you don’t know about me, too… most of which I’m not sure you should, actually.”

A laugh forces its way out, gives you a nice reprieve from the anxiety of the conversation you’re about to have. The need to explain it all, the need for advice. Maybe it’s not her—or anyone else’s—business, but you think you’ve kept this to yourself long enough. You and Seungcheol loved each other, once, and it seems foolish that no one knows.

Maybe Kaori had been right. Maybe love should be shouted from the rooftops; exist out in the open. Maybe something hidden in the shadows can never thrive in the light, and you knew it back then, deep down, but now it seems so obvious.

You think back to a few days before the library. Think about how things didn’t feel good but they felt okay. Think about the frustrated crease between Seungcheol’s eyebrows as he stared down at his textbook and how all you’d wanted to do was smooth it. Think about how you’d rolled your lips and tried not to laugh; how you thought it’d take a miracle to help Seungcheol pass this class.

Think about: What is the difference between the short-run and the long-run from the perspective of production theory?

Think about the short-run of your and Seungcheol’s relationship—that you’d burned bright and fast, even though it’d felt like a million years. Hadn’t dared to consider the long-run because anything beyond that bubble felt impossible.

Think about: Which of the following is not a property of isoquants?

Think about the way Seungcheol’s eyes lit up when he knew the answer. That they’re always linear, he said, and you smiled at his enthusiasm, raised your hand to high-five him and dropped it when he hadn’t noticed.

You think about the explanation—isoquants can be linear when inputs are perfectly substitutable—and what those graphs look like. Downward sloping, left to right. Think about how the graphs change when the isoquants are perfect complements.

L-shaped. Less straight as the inputs become poorer substitutes.

You know what your and Seungcheol’s graph would’ve looked like back then.

So it’s easy, almost, to tell Kaori everything. You tell her about growing up in Daegu, about the smell of the azaleas at Biseulsan in the spring. You tell her about how your parents had befriended the neighbors, how they had a kid your age, that that kid was Seungcheol—yes, that Seungcheol.

She’s able to anticipate the rest from there, but you fill in the blanks of what she can’t: being sixteen and falling in love, holding hands, the clandestine notes. All those football matches and how your throat would be hoarse from cheering. How nauseous you’d felt applying to university in Seoul, how excited you were when Seungcheol said he was coming with you. That, after you arrived, it felt like you were living in fast-forward. Barely any time to breathe or adjust; no time to just be you and Seungcheol. You had to be a student, someone responsible; Seungcheol had to be a phenom.

“Could you feel it was going to happen?” Kaori asks, now sat ramrod straight, all her attention on you. “Like, did you know?”

“I don’t know,�� you admit. “Maybe I did? It’s hard to say now, all this time later. I know things definitely felt different, like life was pulling us in opposite directions.” You laugh, bitterness coloring the edges. “You couldn’t go two blocks without seeing him on some billboard, and I was just… normal, you know? I wasn’t some rising star athlete like he was, I just went to my classes. How was I supposed to compete with something like that?”

Your roommate hums, leans back into the pillows as she stares up at the ceiling. “I don’t think you were. Maybe that’s why Seungcheol was worried—maybe he felt like you were losing your own identity feeling like you had to keep up.”

You want to push back, argue that you weren’t, that you didn’t, but the truth is that it’s possible. That the shadows created by Seungcheol’s dreams were so massive you wouldn’t be surprised if they unintentionally swallowed you up. “It still wasn’t his choice to make,” you say, voice barely above a whisper.

And Kaori already knows all about your hurt, listened as you explained it all and laid everything bare. So when she says, “Sometimes that’s just how it goes, though, babe,” it doesn’t feel condescending. “We do the best we can with what we’ve got at the time. You can say now it wasn’t Seungcheol’s choice to make, because it’s been almost five years and you’ve made a life for yourself separate from him. But the—god, this is gonna sound so patronizing, I am so sorry—but you guys were so young. No one has it all figured out at that age.”

She snorts, runs a hand through her messy hair. “Shit, I’m nearly halfway to thirty and I still don’t know anything.” Adopts a frown. “What do you want now? Do you want closure? Want to try to fix things and become friends?”

“I don’t know,” you admit, biting at a hangnail. “He actually, um. The other day when he stopped by my office, he left me a USB drive? And before you ask, no I did not already look at it.”

“A USB drive? Who does this guy think he is, James Bond?” A pause. “Are you gonna look at it, though?”

You do.

Not until the silver, midnight light creeps in through your bedroom curtains and you’ve stared at the ceiling long enough; waited long enough for texts that never came, for divine intervention to, well, intervene. It never did—fair enough—so you decide to take fate by the reins. Grab your laptop, instant headache from the screen, stick the drive into the port.

It takes a second for it to load, but when it does: dozens of videos, organized by date. Vlogs, by the look of them—some from before your breakup but the majority of them from after.

You’re not sure what you expected, but it wasn’t this.

You click on the first one: a month and a half before both of you moved to Seoul. A fresh-faced Seungcheol appears on your screen, cheeks still round with adolescence. He’s in his room back in Daegu, can’t get the camera angle right. Nostalgia hits you like a ton of bricks as it pans to the side, to the wall behind his bed, and you see all his old posters. Mostly football players you couldn’t name, some girl group he used to love, a few movies. Just below them are some of the notes you’d written him in school, and they’re all you can focus on as he talks about how excited he is for the move.

The next: a few weeks after you’d started classes. By then, Seungcheol was well into the swing of things with Seoul FC. Already a big fish in a small pond, tryout offers from European teams starting to roll in. You can hear yourself in the background stressing over your first exam, wishing a generational curse upon your calculus professor. In the video, Seungcheol laughs, whispers like he’s telling the camera a secret as he talks about how nervous he is for his future. I don’t know why, he says, but it just feels like everything is about to change.

There’s a long pause between that one and the next. You understand why when you look at the date: three months after your breakup. Your hands hover uselessly above your keyboard. Whatever answers you’ve been looking for the last few years are probably in this video, but you can’t bring yourself to open it. Not right away, at least.

You click on a different one at random. Seungcheol’s somewhere in Europe, judging from the language on the signs behind him. Snow falls quietly—whenever he filmed this, it must’ve been early. No one else is around, and he cracks a joke that it’s a good thing, people would probably think he was crazy if they saw him. He doesn’t tell you where he’s going but he narrates the entire walk: points out a cafe he’s grown to love. The way to get to his practice stadium from where he’s standing. Pauses near a restaurant and laughs ruefully, shakes his head, says, I don’t know why I’m telling you this, but one of my teammates set me up on a blind date here and I got stood up. You’d probably think that was funny.

(You do. It also makes your chest ache.)

One from two years ago: Seungcheol in a hotel room, clearly nervous. He raises his hand to wave at the camera and you can see the corners of his nails bitten raw. Dark circles beneath his eyes; cheekbones more pronounced than you’ve ever seen them. On the screen, Seungcheol sighs, rakes a hand through freshly-bleached hair. Sucks in a deep breath as he says, I’m so nervous. I’m so—so fucking nervous and I don’t. Fuck, I don’t know what to do. I want to call you because you always knew what to say but that’s so fucking selfish. God, we haven’t spoken in years, and it’s my—that’s my fault, I know, so I brought this all on myself. I just want to hear your voice.

Another from a week after that: the color’s returned to his face, and he’s recording from what looks like a penthouse apartment. Sleek, modern; a small white dog napping on the bed beside him. He smiles, looks like he got his teeth fixed, looks like he’s no longer carrying around the weight of the world. Talks endlessly and excitedly about some tournament. Talks so fast you can barely keep up. Talks around words tinged with languages you don’t understand.

Seungcheol wins a championship. Records a drunk vlog from the same night, hair soaked through with god-knows-what—water, champagne, you don’t know. But he looks radiant. Looks like the culmination of two decades of dreaming. He looks happy, free, at peace. He looks like the reason he let you go, why he had to go away.

You scroll to the bottom of the files. Pause at the last video, dated seven months before the term started.

“Hi,” he says, and you can immediately tell everything is all wrong. Seungcheol’s in the dark, face only visible enough to see the tears tracking on his cheeks. “This is going to be the last one of these I make. I don’t know if you, uh—I’m sure you aren’t paying attention to me—my career—anymore, but. I, um. I got hurt. Ruptured my ACL. They’re not sure I’ll…” A sob escapes him. Has you wanting to climb through the screen to hold him, thumb away his tears, tell him everything is going to be okay. “They don’t know if I’ll ever play again.”

Seungcheol no longer looks happy, free, at peace. “Maybe you’ll be happy to hear that,” he continues. “Maybe it’ll help you to know I threw away our relationship for nothing.”

Cut to black.

The sudden silence is deafening. Has you desperately clicking back to the video you’d skipped, the one from just after your breakup. Seungcheol looks the same in that one, too, like the life has been drained out of him.

I don’t know why I’m doing this. It’s not like I’ll ever show these to you now, since I…

I’m sure I owe you an explanation. To be honest, I don’t know what I’m doing, I just—things have been so hard, and I’m still trying to make sense of it all. I feel like my life went from zero to a hundred before I could even blink and now I’m scrambling. I didn’t think it was fair to—to drag you through that. Me being away, moving to an entirely different continent. I have faith we could do it, I just. I don’t know, baby, I don’t…

You deserve to have your own life. Be your own person. I’m so scared that the world will never see you for who you are—so beautiful and intelligent and kind. You don’t deserve to be reduced to my partner. And if you ever see this, I know you’re gonna roll your eyes. Probably call me a mean name because I took the choice away from you, because you think I’m trying to be selfless and heroic, and you’d be right. It’s not fair, and I wish I could tell you I’m sorry.

I wish I could just… pluck out my brain and give it to you, because even if it killed me to do it, at least it makes sense to me. And I don’t—I don’t want you to think I’m not hurting. I’ve been sick to my stomach since I left. I know I’m making a mistake, I know I am, I just—how do I do what I think is right in the long-run when it’s not what I want right now, or ever?

I don’t want to get over you. I don’t want you to get over me, and that’s how you know I’m not acting selflessly, because you should. I want you to always be happy, I just… wish it was with me.

So, I’m going to keep making these. I’m going to take you along for the ride, wherever it takes us, because you should be here but I can only hope you can one day understand why you’re not. I’m so—I’m so sorry, I don’t…

I’m sorry.

I love you.

You fall asleep and dream that you were the one meant to meet him at that restaurant.

The first thing you do is make a call to your mother.

“Could you send another container of yakgwa?”

On the other end of the line, your mother tuts, motherly intuition audibly kicking into overdrive. Is probably wearing that all-knowing, sly grin she always does when you try to be coy and evasive. “What happened to the last container I sent?”

“Ah, you know Kaori loves those. They barely lasted an hour after I told her what was in there.”

She hums an acknowledgement. Sounds like she takes a sip of tea. “I remember someone else being quite fond of those cookies, too.”

“Well, they are the most popular cookies in the country, so.”

After haranguing you into admitting they’re for Seungcheol and not your roommate, your mother promises to send them quickly. A few days at most, which buys you enough time to figure out how you’re going to approach the man in question.

The vlogs have turned your entire world upside-down. Answered questions you hadn’t even known you had. Took all that anger and resentment you’d been holding onto and set it free, and now you’re just left with… a void. Want to mend things, and it makes you wonder if such a thing is even possible, if it’s too late, but you don’t let those thoughts get very far.

Instead, you let them spur you into action. Have you sitting in front of your laptop at your desk, office hours long since over, silence creeping in the more the department empties. The thrum of the airconditioning and the tick-tick-tick of the clock are all the only company you have.

You worry if it’ll show on camera, how out of sorts you feel: sweating from the nerves, dabbing at your hairline; cheeks warm to the touch. But you suck in a breath anyway, steel yourself. Look at your webcam and the daunting red circle…

And start recording.

He hadn’t gotten it at first. Not really.

There’d been a container of yakgwa outside his door with his USB drive taped to the top of it. No note—not that he needed one to know who it was from, but he wasn’t sure what it was. A goodbye? A please fuck off forever and never contact me again?

He’d just taken them inside. Ate too many of the cookies while feeling sorry for himself. Maybe had a glass or two of wine to compound the issue, and never, ever considered contacting you. Didn’t think he could bear it if you never wanted to see him again, but he just…

Well, he was drunk and alone and he missed you, and he’d rewatched all those videos he recorded a million times before when he was like this, so what was a million and one?

It’d been the same as every time before: he smiled at the happy parts, cried at all his old wounds. Wanted to reach through the screen and strangle his past self for including that part about the blind date, because he never wanted to date anyone who wasn’t you, why would he say that, felt mortified at the thought of you watching that—

And then there it was.

All the way at the bottom. A new video. One that hadn’t been recorded by him—

Hi, Cheol, you say, and that’s all it takes to reduce him to a sobbing, yearning mess. I’m not sure what to say here. I don’t really record much—sometimes for lectures when the professors are too busy, but never anything personal like this, but I watched every single one you made for me and I thought I should return the favor.

I wanted to tell you everything I’ve been up to since you left, but it hasn’t been much. I got my degree. Tutored a lot in undergrad—the same thing I’m tutoring you in now, actually. I was good at it and it felt good to have something that was mine, you know? I almost moved for grad school. Thought for a while I was going to wind up in New York, but then my parents divorced and it felt like too much, too scary, so I stayed. Kaori also stayed, so we got an apartment together. It’s not much, definitely not as nice as your place, but it’s good enough.

I don’t think I ever told you, but she was seeing a guy for a bit and he was… obsessed with you, to say the least. Thought you were the coolest person in the world. They aren’t seeing each other anymore. Ended pretty badly, but—speaking of which, maybe steer clear of Student Services for a while, too.

Sometimes it felt like failure that I wound up staying here. That I had scholarships from all these far-away, prestigious places and didn’t take advantage of them. That I gave into my fear. And now… I don’t know. Maybe there’s a reason I stayed behind. Maybe there’s a reason you ended up back here, too.

Whatever happens—I don’t want you to think I still blame you. Kaori says we do the best we can with what we’ve got at the time, and I understand now that’s what you did. Even though it hurt me, you were trying to protect me. I get it now. And I’m sorry you had to go through all of that alone. I can’t imagine how hard it must’ve been to go to all these places you didn’t know. To have to deal with your injury, the loss of a dream.

You said in one of your videos that you just want me to be happy, and that’s all I want for you, too, whatever that looks like.

Here’s my address if you ever want to come by to talk.

I love you, too.

—and then he’d been up and out the door, feeling stone cold sober, running to the front of his building to wait for his ride.

Felt like the drive took hours. Must’ve hit every red light between his apartment and yours. Took the steps two at a time just to get to your door faster.

There’s a man already standing outside your door when he gets there. One that looks shocked to see him, stars in his eyes, and when Seungcheol says, “Oh, you must be Kaori’s ex,” he looks more like he wants the earth to swallow him whole. Embarrassed in front of his idol.

He knocks on your door and gets no response. Knocks again, harder this time, and he has to try really hard to stifle his laughter when your voice yells from the inside, “Fuck off, Kenji, I already told you she’s not here!”

“It’s me,” Seungcheol yells back.

There’s quiet again. Just enough time for it to feel like his heart is going to beat right out of his chest and follow Kaori’s ex down the hall.

Then you’re yanking the door open—slowly, so slowly, like you’re scared it’s not actually him. Your eyes are brimming with tears when they meet his own, and he doesn’t let himself think, just goes on instinct, when he grabs for you, hands on your cheeks, and presses his lips to yours.

Somehow you taste the same.

Somehow you taste like redemption.

You taste like home.

Seungcheol kisses you until the tears slow. Kisses you until the universe realigns, until he could map your mouth in the dark. Kisses you until all you’re all he knows again.

When he pulls away, you’re gripping at his sweatshirt, don’t want to let him go. He presses his forehead to yours, offers up a million more apologies, starts talking nonsense. Says he’s going to drop microeconomics, what the hell does he know, he barely has a passing grade anyway, what does it matter, he’s such an idiot—

And then you say, “You came back,” and nothing else matters.

“I always will.”

(Later on, as you’re trying to steady your breathing, slick with sweat, your thigh thrown over Seungcheol’s hip as he stares down at you, dopey smile on his face, you say, “Choi Seungcheol, don’t you dare drop that class. I have worked my ass off to get you to barely-passing.”)

if you’ve made it this far thank you so much for reading! i am still very new at writing for seventeen, so i hope this was acceptable. i'm now going to throw myself into the warped tour vernon fic and will hopefully not go another 7+ months without posting anything. 😭

i would love to hear your thoughts! <3

[akiranzee]

IF U TAKE MUZAN REQUESTS CAN I PLS REQUEST LOVESICK HUSBAND MUZAN WITH HIS S/O PLEASSEE 😩😩

if u need more context then it’s still demon au and canon compliant but the only difference is that he’s Sooo soft around his wife. like absolute mush, worships her, says she’s his equal, blah blah. headcannons r fine!!!! whatever u wanna do w it, doesn’t matter if it’s demon or human reader

ˏˋ°•*⁀➷ LOVESICK HUSBAND MUZAN WITH WIFE S/O!!

───────────── ♡ ─────────────

𖹭 it was love at first sight, no matter how many times he and you doubt it.

𖹭 his love language? physical touch ‘cause he’s so bad at words of affirmation. 𖹭 he’s still the same, evil man you met, the only difference is that he was never evil with you. no matter how many times his demons — especially douma tell you that he’s just putting up a loving facade to mingle with the human world. 𖹭 but douma is so wrong. dead wrong. if only you saw the look on his face when he heard muzan’s voice from your shared room, “darling, don’t believe what that demon says, okay? he’s nothing but a lowly scowl, he doesn’t even equal up to you — hell, maybe you even equal with me.” 𖹭 a lovesick fool. douma concludes. because, 𖹭 one, he follows you everywhere, touches every part of your body, but he touches your stomach most, saying he’s gonna put his heir in their one day. 𖹭 two, he listens to every word you say, like that one moment where muzan was about to flick douma’s head off for the ninety-forth time, you stepped in bravely and told him he was too harsh with douma, so as for douma’s next punishment, he just flicked off half his head. 𖹭 three, last but not the least, muzan hates it so much when you spend time with his male demons, or just ordinary male humans. despite you reassuring him literally almost every night, his jealousy would still bubble up and get all protective over you, sending death glares all over to the poor male. 𖹭 yes. that’s how much power you hold over the most powerful demon in existence. 𖹭 it doesn’t even end there, he’s gotten even more handsy on you when you undergo fever three consecutive times, trying to persuade you in becoming a demon so that you don’t have to suffer, but of course, you reject. 𖹭 in your first fever, he was just a little bit calm on it, just constantly checking you from time to time, making sure you eat all your meals and herbs/medicines, and leaves you when you’re asleep. 𖹭 but, poor man got confused when just a day you’ve gotten better, you got fever again the day after, so he’s by your side for the next three days taking care of you, observing you. 𖹭 then, at the third time, he finally panics, sending all his demons, also akaza who’s on a ‘special mission’ to look for the blue spider lily, to gather all the best herbs and best doctors all around town. this is where he also just acts like your shadow. you wanna go to the bathroom? he’ll assist you alright. you’re smelling and sweaty? he doesn’t care and changes you gently (he’s trying). you don’t like the food or herbs or medicines? he’ll nastily put it in his mouth and kisses you as he makes sure the food or herbs goes down your throat. 𖹭 yes. that’s how unexpected this man could be. 𖹭 and yes, this is you having him wrapped around your fingers.

───────────── ☆ ─────────────

a/n: help this is soo bad i just can’t imagine a lovesick muzan😭😭 that’d be the end of the world alright.

© akiranzee || do not steal, plagiarize, or repost my works without my permission.

[4-the-l0ve-0f-art]

Reverse isekai... Caleb... Cat... Part 2 Link Ao3 Link

Caleb loved you more than anything in this world. 

Or at least, that's what you would've liked to imagine if he was real. But he isn't. And you're not in a pixelated little world called Linkon City and none of your hopes and dreams about having a happily ever after with your military husband and childhood best friend were coming true. 

You stared at the fanfic left open on the phone screen, wishing to see your husband in your dreams to ease the ache of loving someone you could never have while in your loneliest moments. 

If only he could be real. If only he could become real from Astra knows what power and fall in love all over again. With you this time instead of the MC who seemed to resemble anything but you. If only. Too much to ask for, yes, you know. 

No, he wasn't real, and no, he wasn't there to fall in love with you as you did with him. And you had your own life to live and work to do and tough times to get through on your own tomorrow. And the day after. And the day after that. 

So, leaving you no other choice, you drifted off to sleep as the delusion shattering ache in your heart seeped in.

-

It was raining. You opened up your umbrella next to the entrance of your workplace, greeting your coworkers goodbye. You were tired. Your brain was fried from working since morning and you felt like the walking dead. 

The thoughts of cooking something up for dinner made you feel like flopping down on the sidewalk you were walking on and passing out. You had the free will to do that, of course, but the rain pitter pattering along with your dragged steps only reminded you of all the cleaning you would have to do after practicing your so-called free will. 

The street lights turned on and you continued onward, just a block away from your home. 

As you walked by an alleyway, your heart almost jumped out of your chest at the sound of metal clashing onto the ground. You froze, holding your breath as you turned around. 

You waited. 

One beat. Two beats. 

Nothing. 

And then, there it was again, the sound of something thuding around. 

Without thinking, you made your way towards the source of the sound, your heart bearing in your ears. A dumpster came into view. 

Something, or someone, seemed to be struggling inside. You called out. 

“Hello..? Is anyone in there..?” Your voice trembled. 

No reply.

You slowly got close to the dumpster and opened the cover with shaking hands. 

Widened blue-pink eyes with a pair of black ears and tail stared up at you through the piles of garbage. 

“What the fuck?”

-

The cat jumped out of your hold as soon as you entered your home, shaking off water from its fur and scampering away from you as fast as it could while you were struggling to put down the wet umbrella. 

“Okay, rude? I bring you home with me to avoid the guilty conscience that would follow tomorrow if I found you dead from the cold somewhere and you pay me off by drenching my floorboards!”

You let out a frustrated sigh. 

He silently watched you from a corner of the room as you made your way to the kitchen island to wash off your hands. 

“Make yourself at home, I guess..” You mumbled, more to yourself than to him. 

I have a cat in my apartment. What now? 

-

First and foremost, it was bathtime. You were NOT about to let a stinky ass wet fur ball run around your home. 

You tried to pick him up again but he bolted around the living room, paw pads making skittering noises in the process.

After about 10 minutes of running around, you gave up, standing defeated. You called out to him as a last resort. 

“I just want to give you a bath. Please.”

“Mreow!” He protested, sitting on top of the kitchen island. 

“Fine. Whatever. Live with the stink all you want. I'm tired and you're taking up my gaming time.” You rolled your eyes. 

Maybe leaving him alone for a while will ease him a little.. You hoped. 

And so, you turned around and sat down on the couch with the TV remote in hand, ready to open YouTube and rewatch the same goddamn trailer for the 100th time. 

[Love and Deepspace | Caleb's Trailer]

-

He didn't know how he ended up here. One moment he was feeling immense, needle pricking pain across his entire body, the next he was in a dumpster. With paws instead of hands. And the world seemed thrice as large and intimidating. 

Well, At least I have shelter from the rain for now.. Though I feel like a wet rat. 

He watched the girl settle down on the couch. 

I wonder how long I can stay here. I need to figure things out..

Then, he heard something that caught his eye. 

“What, you don't recognize me?”

He stared at the video playing on the TV screen. 

“Did you honestly think I would always be the kind hearted boy from your childhood?”

His ears perked up, all pointy, and his eyes widened. 

That's me. 

He watched as the figure on the screen bit an apple as lightning flashed in the background. 

That. Is. Me. On the TV. 

A/N: Interest check? Very self indulgent... Kinda, sorta, really wanna turn this into a one-shot fic maybe... Haha.. Ha.. But I'll have to play through all the content released in the past few months.. 😭

Wrote this half asleep someone bonk me to sleep please

[thedarkestrivernymph]

I would love any yandere clan leader fluff tbh, maybe one where someone from a clan at a party disrespects reader and he comforts her after defending her? Thanks!

Soft Yandere! Clan Leader x Wife! Reader

note: it kind of follows the theme of reader being overly insecure/doubting him

warnings: harassment, insecure! reader,

Everything was loud.

The piano and violin, the hushed whispers surronding you like constant white noise, the whiskey lingering in the air like cheap perfume. You felt your head spin and buzz—bile on the back of your tongue while you clutched your glass filled with the unidentifiable magenta swirling inside of it.

You shouldn't be here. Just were not cut-out for this; for the weight that your husband's last name bore, pushing you down until you could do nothing but slouch.

And then a strange cold limp patted you on your shoulder. Right, you were next to your husband's cousin—what was his name again?

“Relax, I’m sure he's gonna be right back.”

But as he laughed, tipsy as he was, you were certain that his hand shouldn’t feel like a heavy paw of a fox tackling down a lamp to feast on—it probably should’ve comforted you along with his words, reassure you and ease the tension between your shoulder blades.

“Pretty shy, ain't you?” he quipped and all you could do was smile awkwardly.

He was nice-looking, younger than you, probably with no fear of anything; especially not physical contact. It probably didn't mean much to him, but to you the pads of his fingers brushing over your naked shoulder felt violating, as if he placed them there specifically to watch the discomfort spawn on your face. As if he prided himself with being socially more comptent than you.

“Such a pretty face, but you don't talk much, do ya? C’mon talk, it's just me, we’re practically family now.” his breath stung, made your eyes tear up from the potent concentration of alcohol.

You hadn’t even meant to get roped up in this conversation, not at all. Passing by, searching for your husband in the crowd of unfamiliar clan-members and different clans; men dressed in their finest suits or cultural attires, with women adored in extravagant dresses and bold colours—you had stumbled upon the one familiar face of his distant cousin and now his arm draped over your shoulder like shackles keeping you in place.

“Got really lucky with ya—didn’t he? Lucky Bastard.” he laughed and you further shrunk and shriveled into yourself. “Got to be the next clan leader, got the title, the fame, the power, always got the prettier women—”

“That's enough.” a voice cut through the stifling air like a whip; sharp and poised like the gaze of his owner with his sudden appearance —draped in matching midnight blue silk, dressed worthy of the head of a clan as large as his was.

He was angered, you could tell that much—the piercing look in his eyes spoke for itself; as deep as the ocean, a storm wracking in his soul, with waves building up until they even swallowed you.

So you looked away, ashamed.

“I said that's enough.” this time he ripped his cousin's dirty paw off of your shoulder. His jaw was clenched and suddenly you felt suffocated by the intensity of it all—you hadn't meant for this. What if now he would blame you? Thought you were comfortable with being close to other men. He was so sweet till now, but what if he was appalled now, disgusted, what if he—

“Are you alright, love?” he grounded you, as he always did, holding you like fragile porcelain, peering down at you with stern but not unkind eyes.

“I-I am fine.” you stammered, overwhelmed by his gentle tone and softer touch—it made your head spin with confusion. Just why was he always so kind to you? Even now? Even after everything he saw.

“Love, you don't look fine to me.” he whispered, came close enough so that his breath brushed the shell of your ear and the warmth of it travel down to your painfully fast beating heart. “No, I really am—”

“She said she's fine. What? Tryna make me seem like the bad guy when you left your woman alone—” he didn't get any more words out before his collar tightened, dangerously until air was just but a luxury.

Yet you didn't even see him choking, nor did you hear whatever it was that your betrothed threatened him with, shielding your line of sight with his broad back, towering over the other guy as if he didn't want you to watch.

However he, no matter how much he tried concealing the conversation occuring between them—with hushed whispers similar to that of a scolding father—you could see raw terror in his cousin's eyes after your husband let him go. The man’s eyes were as wide as saucers and they may have met yours for just a fraction—yet you were sure of what you saw. Even more so as he scurried away like a mouse.

“Come. Let's get you out of here.” he grabbed you by your arm, firmly with strength that you knew would bruise if he was as angry with you as he was with his cousin. So he wasn't angry with you? Somehow, knowing this only unsettled you further.

He whisked you away—somewhere much more private and intimate; into a nearby empty room. Staring down at you, he stood still as a statue after closing the door, allowing silence to hug the both of you in a stifling embrace.

“I am sorry—” you broke through the silence, shattering the illusion of calmness.

“Sorry?” he furrowed his brows, bewilderment taking over his features and you swore his eyes watered. In a way, he only looked more frustrated, the sharpness of his features morphing to something animalistic.

“Is sorry not enough?” you flinched, squinting, the moon once more had chosen you to illuminate with its beauty. Yet, you were nothing worth of it—not when he stood in front of you, more righteous and more deserving than you ever had been.

It seemed he was at a loss for words, staring at you as if you were alien to him.

“I truly feel remorseful—” you were about to kneel, lower yourself, but before your knees even had the chance to hit the ground he held you in his arms, shaking you with all his might.

“Stop, my love, please stop. One more word of yours and my heart will rip.” he was frantic, desperate. This wasn't the usual head-strong confident leader, the man with the voice of chiffon—this was him, raw and vulnerable.

“How can you—have I failed this much?” his voice was like tides of the sea; unrestrained yet eerily calm. “Have I neglected you? Have I not shown you how much I love you?” his touch become more frantic, hands burying themselves into the fabric of your dress.

“I failed you, my love. I am so ashamed of myself.” now he was the one kneeling in front of you. The man who's presence alone was enough to demand order and submission, who reigned over his clan firmly yet fairly, who was respected by everyone around you—at your feet, staring up at you as if you were his goddess and he a peasant.

Stunned you could only stare as wetness glistened over his cheeks, strange softness taking ahold of his features.

“I—” he pressed a kiss to your ankle. “I will prove myself to you once again. I will love you so much, you won't ever have the opportunity to doubt. I will love you enough for the both of us. So much, that you won't ever take the blame for a bastard again. I will love you so much, that you will stop thinking that you're anything but a minx that captured me and continues to do so.” he kissed your knee.

“Do you even know how much I struggle to let you out of my arms whenever we hug? I can't bear the thought of someone else claiming that you're theirs. When I know that you're my soulmate since the day our eyes met. I am yours in body and mind and I want you to finally see that.” his voice deep and soulful cracked, fingers clutching you like a lifeline.

“My love, I will do better. I promised once to prove myself to you, and I promise twice now. Even if it takes my whole life, I will get rid of everything that hurts you. Anyone that hurts you. And that includes all that garbage in that pretty head of yours. I will do better teaching you, love.” he kissed you over your beating heart.

“I am yours.”

[misaerabl]

Game Over

𝝑𝑒 eating ellie out while she plays games !

CW: Oral sex (e!receiving), Dom/sub dynamics (light), Power play, Praise and hair-pulling, Reader on her knees, power shift dynamic, Slightly bratty reader behavior, Neglect of attention/intentional teasing SUMMARY: you know it's pointless trying to get her attention while she plays games so you drop to your knees and eat her out

Ellie had been glued to her headset and controller for hours. You knew the drill: when she was gaming with her friends, you were background noise—unless she wanted you to fetch her snacks or kiss her between rounds.

You weren’t having it today.

Perched on her lap, straddling her while she leaned back in her gaming chair, you tried everything—lazy kisses against her neck, fingers tracing her collarbone, soft sighs in her ear. But she just mumbled an occasional "Mhm, babe," or placed an absentminded hand on your waist like she was doing you a favor.

You rolled your hips. Nothing. Just the sound of gunfire from her headset and her voice calling out, "He's behind the wall, left side, I got him."

You huffed.

And then, something in you snapped—not angry. Needy. Mischievous.

You slowly climbed off her lap. Ellie didn’t even glance down. Her hands were still busy on the controller, thumb mashing the joystick, focus fully on the screen. But her breath hitched—just barely—as you sank onto your knees in front of her.

She didn’t react when your fingers curled under the waistband of her sweatpants. Didn’t say a word as you tugged them down, slow, deliberate, until the fabric pooled at her knees. Her boxers followed, and still—nothing. You glanced up.

Jaw clenched. Eyes on the screen. She was trying too hard to pretend you didn’t exist.

Fine.

You leaned in and licked a slow stripe between her legs, just enough pressure to let her know you weren’t playing. Your hands spread across her thighs, firm, grounding her.

Still no reaction.

So you did it again, slower this time. Your tongue circled deliberately, flicking and teasing. Her body shifted just a little—instinct. She was trying to hold it together.

Her voice came out tight through the mic. “Yeah—uh, I’m here. Watching flank. Shut up, Jesse.”

Your tongue moved with more intent now, lazy and confident. You switched between gentle strokes and firmer ones, each pass a test of her restraint. Her thighs tensed under your palms. You sucked softly, then flicked faster, keeping a rhythm that made her hips twitch.

Ellie let out a soft, shaky exhale. One hand twitched toward your head, like she wanted to grab you—but didn’t. You felt her muscles twitch and tense and fight the pull.

She was stubborn.

You pulled back slightly, lips brushing against her, breath hot. “Still not paying attention to me, huh?”

She didn’t answer. But her grip on the controller had gone stiff.

You smiled and dove back in.

This time you didn’t hold back. You flattened your tongue, mouth warm and wet, licking her slow and deep, then fast, switching up just when she thought she could get used to it. Your hands slid up her thighs, holding her open. Your mouth locked into place, sucking on her clit with just enough pressure to make her legs twitch.

Then you moaned.

You didn’t mean to—it just slipped out. The taste of her, the heat, the pulse between her thighs—it made you needy. Your hips pressed into the floor as you devoured her like she was the only thing you’d ever wanted. Her body was trembling now, breath ragged, and you knew she was close.

She dropped the controller.

It hit the floor with a dull thud.

Then her fingers were in your hair—tight. Finally. Her hips bucked, grinding against your face, chasing friction like she’d been starved for it. You let her. Let her use your mouth however she needed. You moaned again, louder, vibrating against her.

“Oh my—fuck—baby—” she gasped.

You looked up through your lashes, lips slick, tongue relentless, watching her fall apart.

Her back arched. Her thighs closed around your head, holding you there as she came, loud and raw and real, like she’d been trying not to for the past ten minutes and you finally tore it out of her.

You pulled back slowly, mouth shiny, lips red. She was still panting, headset askew around her neck.

You licked your lips. “Got your attention.”

Ellie blinked down at you, eyes blown wide, cheeks flushed.

“Holy shit,” she breathed. “You’re never allowed to complain about my games again.”

You crawled up into her lap with a wicked grin. “That depends. You gonna ignore me next time?”

Her hands slid around your waist, grounding you. “Not a fucking chance.”

[mariasont]

JUST THE TIP(S) - A.H

aaron learns the hard way that upping your maintenance allowance has unexpected, explicit perks. especially when you insist on showcasing your newest investment while he's stuck miles away.

pairings: aaron hotchner x bimbo!assistant!reader warnings: 18+ MDNI, sexting, nsfw imagery, exhibitionism? (in the form of pictures), references to masturbation, workplace inappropriateness, power dyanmics (boss/employee), dirty talk, sugar daddy hotch vibes wc: 1.7k request: here!

Hotch attempts to read the file in front of him again, just to keep himself busy, but it starts to resemble gibberish somewhere between the countless victim timelines and his unwavering staring contest with the phone screen. 

Nothing. Still nothing. 

It’s been, he glances down for confirmation, thirty-nine minutes since he hit send. Not exactly long enough to panic. Yet here he is, panicking, because your replies normally land instantly, punctuated with frantic emojis, a parade of exclamation points, and nonsensical crises like:

i just made toast and almost caught my sleeve on fire but it’s ok now !!!! 🤭

So, yeah. Thirty-nine minutes feels like a small eternity.

Last week, he had upped your spending limit. You murmured something vague about having a bad day. You didn’t supply any specifics, no dramatics, just an innocent observation that he instantly took as an urgent call to action.

He logged into your account and adjusted your monthly extras, expanding that little safety net you didn’t even know he color-coded as you-time on his accounting spreadsheet. 

It wasn’t even remotely about the actual money. How could it be, when you were always giving pieces of yourself away — filling his silence with your easy chatter, kissing his frown lines, leaving perfume on his pillow (and everywhere else). So if a few extra hundred dollars meant more wellness appointments or a couple frivolous purchases that could help you feel more like yourself, it was the easiest, most obvious choice in the world. 

This is what he attributed your lack of response to. You’re probably out using that buffer right now.

He doesn’t need to spiral.

But he does anyway. Because when he’s not around, you have a tendency to forget to hydrate, to neglect to eat anything remotely nutritious, to lose yourself in shiny distractions, and his mind, unfortunately, never seems to shut off where you’re concerned.

He digs the heel of his hand into his forehead, trying not to jump to worst-case scenarios. He’s not clingy. Definitely not the kind of boyfriend who sends another text after less than an hour. 

Still, he nudges his phone a bit closer, strictly precautionary.

It takes exactly fifteen more agonizing, anxiety-inducing minutes — minutes shaped like big neon question marks — before the phone finally buzzes.

You: hi bossman !! miss ur grumpy face sooooo bad it’s criminal (arrest me??) how’s the case?

He exhales through his nose. His first thought is to correct you, to say that he’s definitely not grumpy, but his fingers pause, and he erases it instead. 

He is grumpy, though he’s fairly certain it’s directly correlated with how long it’s been since he’s since your face.

Hotch: Miss you too. Case is fine. Hopefully wrapping soon. Should be home late tomorrow. What did you do today? Everything okay?

You: yay !! can’t wait to see u ! got my nails done 🩷 they’re sparkly pink and sooo cute wanna see?

He snorts once, rubbing his thumb over the edge of his phone.

Hotch: Somehow I already know exactly what they look like.

He pauses, considers, then quickly adds,

Hotch: Send them anyway.

Hotch expects something wholesome, mundane even, manicure displayed prettily around a cup of overpriced coffee (a staple for you) or maybe the steering wheel of your car. 

What he receives instead is categorically, devastatingly the antithesis of wholesome. Completely unfit for polite company. His phone nearly plummets to the floor accordingly, eyebrows already halfway to his hairline.

Your new nails, as glittery as you advertised and innocent enough in isolation, become fully obscene in context, pussy spread wide, your fingertips highlighting slick, swollen folds and a flushed, glistening clit practically begging for attention. 

Hotch has always considered you beautiful — insanely, impossibly so — but this vision of you. A vision where you’re open, soaked with a brazen sweetness that borders on indecent, surpasses beauty entirely.

It’s sinful, artful perfection crafted with the sole intent of his demise. No matter how quickly he closes his eyes, the image is now seared permanently into his brain, burnt onto his retinas in dripping pixels.

Hotch never could fathom why anyone would willingly risk sending something so compromising. It spat in the face of good judgment and flagrantly ignored every articulated piece of advice he’d ever given. He’d lectured until your eyes glazed over about internet safety, how every text you send is stored indefinitely in some obscure digital archive, potentially retrieved at the most inopportune times. 

He was certain, perhaps arrogantly so, that you’d internalized his paranoia.

How wrong he had been.

Because he now stands staring at the evidence of your rebellion, humbly acknowledging that he himself has become precisely the sort of fool he’d warned you about, happily entrapped by the irreverence of a single photograph.

The only genuine risk Aaron can currently recognize is the frankly painful strain of his cock pressing against his zipper and the fact that you’re hundreds of miles away. 

He draws in a sharp, shaky breath through gritted teeth, silently pleading with unapologetically indifferent cosmos to grant him patience. 

Or teleportation.

Hotch: Gorgeous nails, sweetheart. Clever use of your resources, though next time save me the torture and just show me in person.

You: glad u like them 😇😇 maybe consider it motivation to hurry home faster?

Hotch: Duly noted. If I close this case in record time, you’ll know exactly why.

You: i can always send additional inspiration if it helps your productivity 🥰

He doesn’t remember making the conscious decision, and frankly, he doesn’t care enough to second-guess it now, because his palm is already moving, instinctively pressing down to relieve the unbearable tension straining his trousers.

He’s halfway through typing out his surrender (a blunt, undignified Yes. Now.) when a sudden, sharp knock jerks him brusquely back into a reality that pales considerably compared to what he’s just been forced to abandon.

His thumb stalls above the send button then pockets the phone, exhaling through his nose as he smooths the front of his tie with a touch more vigor than necessary.

If he were honest, and lately honesty seems unavoidable, another second spent alone with your message would inevitably lead him to doing something highly inappropriate beneath the desk, your name hissed quietly against clenched teeth.

By the time he reaches the door, Hotch has resigned a reasonable facsimile of composure.

At least from the waist up.

He cracks the door open cautiously, standing at an awkward, stiff angle, hoping that Rossi won’t notice the disarray happening beneath his belt.

“Local PD's still caught up arguing procedural technicalities,” Rossi drawls, seemingly unaware. “Apparently, nothing moves forward without our explicit approval.”

You’ll have to wait. And so will his dick.

The so-called procedural technicalities take three hours. Three. hours. One hundred and eighty increasingly insufferable minutes drowning in bureaucratic drudgery, combing through details Hotch is positive he could recite while heavily medicated. He pinches the bridge of his nose, attempting to fend off the migraine steadily encroaching.

He’d managed the polite, dutiful thing — a succinct, thoroughly unsatisfying reply to you about responsibility and paperwork, the kind of message that made his own eyes roll at its dreariness compared to your far more compelling offer.

And now, each monotonous signature is underscored by thoughts of you, each image progressively more not-safe-for-work than the last.

He pictures your nails, painted in that damned color you loved so much, wrapping firmly around his cock, stroking with leisurely hands. How good it would feel. How you would lean closer with thay look in your eyes, lips parted, whispering filthy words that would make the tips of his ears bleed red.

He loved spoiling you, sure, but secretly, selfishly, he knew the real reward came later, when your fingertips traced up and down each vein of his length.

His daydream splinters to pieces as another officer delivers a statement so inane, Hotch considers, with alarming sincerity, the merits of repeatedly banging his head against the wall.

Before he can fully commit to a public crisis of faith in his career choices, his phone vibrates in his pocket.

Stupidly, he sneaks a quick look,

You: bet that paperwork has you wound up tight. when u get home, feel free to fuck out all that frustration. im yours however u want me <3

Hotch snaps his phone off with such force he’s briefly amazed the device doesn’t shatter.

He redirects his gaze at the neat rows of law enforcement jargon before him, willing the flush spreading from his neck to his ears to retreat. He’s knows he’s past the age of blushing fits, but apparently, you delight in reminding him otherwise.

Hotch’s eyes briefly skim the room, double-checking that the rest of his team is sufficiently absorbed in their tasks.

Hotch: I sincerely hope you’re prepared to stand by that offer, he sends back, thumb tapping a bit faster. Because I fully intend to take advantage of your generosity. 

The familiar little bubbles of an incoming message appear almost immediately, punctuated seconds later by the ping of an attachment.

Hotch reopens the thread, only to be met with an image of your pretty hands cupping even prettier breasts.

Suddenly, he’s standing, brisk strides carrying him toward the hallway, a curt, excuse me tossed hastily behind him, already pressing your contact photo before the door swings fully shut behind him.

You answer on the first ring. “Hi there, handsome. Calling to check on me?”

Your voice, dripping with honeyed naivety, and the image of your tits still pulsing insistently behind his eyelids, sends an immediate rush of heat southward.

Hotch grits his teeth, resisting the temptation to flee toward the bathroom for a quick release.

“Do you really think you’re being fair to me? While I’m stuck here, of all places?”

“Fairness is subjective. Personally, I think it’s unfair you’re so far away when I clearly need your expert opinion on this manicure.”

“Expert opinions are usually best delivered in person. Very hands-on.”

Your giggle spills through the line, and Hotch is convinced it should be bottled and sold as medicine. How he managed to win the privilege of hearing it on demand is an eternal mystery.

“Aaron Hotchner,” you whisper, “is this how you typically behave at the office, or am I getting special treatment today?”

“You’re permanently on the receiving end of special treatment.”

Another giggle.

“Well, I fully intend to cash in on that privilege when you get home, and I advise your neighbors to consider getting some top-quality earplugs.”

He clears his throat, shifting his weight from one foot to the other to mask the fidgeting as purposeful adjustment. Unsuccessfully, of course. He can feel Morgan’s stare burning pointedly into the side of his head. Honestly, if roles were reversed, Aaron would probably be offering equally unsubtle judgment.

“Sweetheart,” he warns, lowering his voice, “you’re making it exceedingly difficult to pretend this call is work-related.”

“Fine, fine,” you say. “Go play nice with your friends and come home safely. I miss you.”

“I’ll be there as soon as humanly possible.” He inwardly rolls his eyes at his inability to maintain any credible authority with you. “Try to stay out of trouble until then.”

“No promises.” He can picture the smile on your face. “But I’ll do my best to keep your investment safe, these nails weren’t cheap, after all.”

“Careful. Because when I get home, I won’t be gentle enough to guarantee their safety.”

💌 masterlist taglist has been disbanned! if you want to get updates about my writings follow and turn notifications on for my account strictly for reblogging my works! @mariasreblogs

[terrestrialnoob]

Harley crawled into the apartment. It was organized, but it looked like the occupant didn't have a lot of time for cleaning. She walked softly through it, taking it in. There were photos of her target and what had to be her family, but no friends or romantic partners. Some had a pair of older adults, matching traits meant bio-parents. More of the photos were of the target and a younger boy - a little brother, the highest likelihood of becoming another target if things go bad.

Harley continued forward, following the light to where her target was. She stood in the doorway, looking in.

Dr. Jasmine Fenton, Arkham Asylum's newest psychologist, just got her degree and everything. She did what most newbies do, actually thinking she could get through to the Joker. Harley didn't want to say it was impossible, but everyone who tried ended up in a new job or dead. Harley would try and make sure it was the former and not the later.

Harley watched as the redhead read over a file as she ate from a takeout box. She didn't want to scare the girl, yet. The scaring her away from Joker came later. So, she had to wait for the perfect moment to-

"I know you're there." Jasmine didn't look up from her file, but held out the last box of Chinese food in Harley's direction. "There's plenty if you want some."

"Awe, you ruined the surprise." Harley walked out of the shadows of the hallway into the girl's home office. She snatched the offered box of food and took a few bites as she jumped to sit on the desk.

"I'm hard to sneak up on." Jasmine said, closing her file and finally looking at Harley. "So, Dr. Quinzel, to what do I owe the pleasure of your visit this evening?"

"Oh, call me Harley!" She laughed, she wasn't called Dr. all that often any more. She tapped her chop sticks on the file Jasmine just closed. "I thought you'd like a consult on your new patient, Dr. Fenton. I've got a lot of experience with him."

"I prefer to go by Jazz." She said with a smile, "While I appreciate the offer, I'd like to see how far I can get on my own. And, sorry, but I'm pretty sure your license was revoked."

Harley nodded as she swallowed to get the noodles out of her mouth. "I get it! You're new, fresh outta school, gotta prove yourself. But Joker ain't the guy to do that with. He eats people like us for breakfast, and in all the years he's been in Arkham, no one's been able to get anywhere with him."

Jazz sighed, "I don't like to believe people are lost causes. There's always something we can do to help."

"You can't help everyone, especially when they don't want it. And it's not just a question if whether or not he can be saved or whatever." Harley set down the now empty box, Jazz pointed to another one that still had food in it, but Harley declined. "If you keep it up, he'll think you're worth his time to torment. There's no telling what he'll do when he inevitably gets himself out again."

"I'll be fine." Jazz said, but Harley had to cut her off before she said something stupid.

"It's not just you! You've got family out there he can target, your parents. Your Brother! Anyone you date will become a target! He'll do everything in his power to make your life miserable!"

Jazz chuckled. "If he wants to target my family, his funeral. My parents are - were supervillains. They've really only become less- well, hyper-focused on eradicating an entire race of being- in the past few years. And my brother - I'm pretty sure he's conditionally immortal. So that's nothing to worry about."

"If it's conditional, Joker will find a way around it." Harley said, but she had to admit, this might have been an unnecessary trip. "You sure y'ain't got nothing to worry about? What about you? How conditional is your mortality?"

Jazz smiled. Her mouth seemed too wide and with too many teeth. "Oh, I am nowhere near immortal. But..."

She stood up and the room was suddenly a black void. Toxic green eyes and mouths filled with glowing white teeth opened around them. "I doubt anyone could get close enough to test it."

The room was suddenly back to normal, but whatever that thing was was still there. Harley could see its eyes watching her with amusement from inside Jazz's oversized cardigan.

"Well, I guess this really was a wasted trip. You've clearly got it covered."

"Not entirely." Jazz said, her hand wend up to her neck to rub nervously, "Well, you see... I don't really have a lot of friends. People tend to get - uh, creeped out, you know? Or chased off by my parents or brother or whatever..."

"You wanna be friends?" Harley laughed so hard she almost fell over.

Jazz's face turned bright red and the shadow eyes looked way less amused. "Yeah, stupid question. You've clearly got your own things going on."

"No! No, no." Harley had to take several deep breaths before she could look Jazz in the face again. "I 100% wanna hang out with you!"

"Really?"

"Oh yeah." She took another deep breath, "I mean, I really should have made a support system before trying to take on the Joker back when I worked for Arkham. This" she pointed between them "can only end well."

Jazz's face turned brighter than the sun. "Oh my gosh! This is amazing! We should - I have Thursday's and weekends off - What - what kind of things should we-"

Oh man, Jazz was like an excited kid. She must have had a really lonely childhood... they can psychoanalyze each other later. "Come over for girl's night next week. I'll tell my gf and bff to expect an extra person... Does the-" she motioned to the cardigan creature "-go everywhere you go? Does it need food?"

"Oh, don't worry about Jet, they only eat who I tell them to."

Harley barked out more laughter. "You're going to fit right in!"

---

Now featuring a Part 2

[salemlunaa]

success story!!!!

OMG SALEM SALEM SALEM, U AND UR WISDOM LITERALLY SAVED ME

idk if you're going to see this because you don't seem as active anymore but i literally revised my entire school life thanks to you!! this is like the first really huge thing i manifested (even though there's no such thing as big lol but you get what | mean)

this success story is gonna be superrrr long but it’s worth it i promise!!

For context im from the UK, and in the last 2 years of school is called a sixth form or called a college (16-18) and you can either transfer schools or stay in the one you were already in for 5 years.

I decided to move (like 80% of the people in my year/grade 💀)  i wanted change and to meet new people, but my entire friend group and so many people i love stayed in my old school.

I found out the grass wasn’t greener on the other side and let’s just say i really did not like the change, i felt fomo from my friend group and all of them expressed how deeply they missed me and how much i should’ve stayed and so i started to feel regret. 

And if you’ve ever felt regret to a significant amount, you know it’s the worst feeling you can ever feel, it’s like your insides are twisting, it’s like beating yourself up over and over again. And it got really bad. It lead me to a deep depression where i barely focused on my studies, and it showed with recent test scores. But I read your post and so many others and realised: i’m not stuck, and never will be, I can go back if i wanted. And so that’s what I did

No one really speaks about revision, not as much as i’d like as someone who now owes revision her life lol, so i was a bit nervous and super doubtful, but i looked at revision success stories and told my self if someone can revive someone back from the dead, someone can revise a serious diagnosis and another can change their age, you can revise the fact that you ever moved. 

I really hung on to your posts that drilled it into our heads that it’s already done and there’s nothing to do. And tellafairy’s posts about how we can change our lives from the comfort of our own beds. Even in my darkest moments i repeated that mantra and it calmed me down. 

I wanted to use the void but realised i probably would’ve have put it on a pedestal and most likely would’ve gotten so hung up on it, so decided to use SATs and choose the reality where i never moved schools and school life was so perfect.

I fell asleep on the first few nights, but then one particular night, i felt really fulfilled and floaty so I just kept visualising a day at school with my friends. AND I SWEAR TO WHOEVERS UP THERE I WOKE UP AND I FELT LIKE SOMETHING SHIFTED, LIKE I REGAINED ALL THESE MEMORIES

I LOOKED AT MY PHONE AND MY SCHOOL EMAIL WAS MY OLD ONE WITH ALL OF MY OLD TEACHERS AND I WENT TO SCHOOL IT WAS LIKE I WAS ALWAYS THERE AND NEVER LEFT

it felt weird when i woke up, like i felt a change, but it felt like i was supposed to be here, like i was at peace with what happened. 

I also used blanket affirming and manifested some things on the side too:

appearance changes

being sooo good at school

school rules being more lenient

change in subjects and more new friends

a school fine shyt Imao

more money +desired family

I really wanna thank you and and @tellafairy @itsrlymine @pineapplepr1nc3ss888 @scentedpeachlandcreator @sugarplumfairy777 @catherineaboutlife @authenticbunni @empyrealoasis @joc3lynn+ youtubers Rita Kaminski, Sammy Ingram and a youtuber called The Power of I AM (he’s sooo underrated but a literal gem) ik at the end of the day it was all me BUT THANK YOU GUYS SO MUCH YOU DONT UNDERSTAND HOW HAPPY I AM WITH MY LIFE RN

If you’ve made it this far, please i’m telling you don’t give up, I was at the lowest of low, like seriously i didn’t even know if i wanted to be here, remember this: you are not stuck , you can manifest absolutely anything, yes, even that thing that seems impossible, and please remember that revision is real and it’s not only for small things like erasing an embarrassing memory or something, you can use it to change the trajectory of your life and i can swear by that as you can see!

you are so powerful you can change the past, please believe me when i say you shouldn’t give up, trust me if i, a D1 procrastinator, someone who was a super doubtful person can do this YOU CAN TOO AND I CAN PROMISE THAT.

it's already done, think as if you have it, and for those who are going through a lot mentally, you. are. not. stuck. that's something i had to remind myself. you can change anything and everything instantly and at any point in time, these circumstances aren't your home.

you don’t have to be a passenger of life, you are the author and creator, please remember that if anything.

i love you so much sai okay byeeeeeee 🫶🏾🫶🏾🫶🏾

i was lurking through my asks for post ideas and oh my lord. i think this is one my favourite success stories, like ever. I rarely answer asks due to repetitive nature but i had to share this success story

YOU FUCKING DID THAT BABY!!!!! IM SO PROUD OF YOU AND IM SO HAPPY YOU’RE HAPPY 💘💘💘

i honestly love a massive revision story because these just show how powerful we are and how nothing is real except the now. and we REALLY CAN change ANYTHING

please please please listen to anon and keep going and and listen to them when they say you aren’t stuck, think as if. there is no such thing as failure.

you can change your life with loa. mark my words

[stevieschrodinger]

Eddie cries out in pain, “ah shitting fuck!” he yells across the bay, reflexively pushing off with a booted foot so his stool rolls away from the danger, his hurt fingers shoved unceremoniously in his mouth to nurse away the sting.

“Whatsit?” Robin sits up in her bunk, fluff of hair sticking up at all angles.

“Nothing. Nothing, sorry, fucking thing shocked me, go back to sleep.”

“Timesit?”

“I dunno,” Eddie looks around vaguely, looking across the untidy bank of tools and control panels he squints at the nearest monitor, “one ish.”

Robin humphs. Rubs at her eyes. Then just, sits for a bit, staring at nothing. “Want a hot drink?” She ends up volunteering, sticking her bare legs out from under the covers and sliding out from her bunk. She pulls on her dungarees from where they were abandoned on the floor.

“You ask me that like we have options,” Eddie peers down at his latest project, sliding a viewer over his mask to get a closer look. The numbers flashing in the peripheral vision make absolutely no fucking sense whatsoever.

Robin yawns, forcing her feet into her boots, the laces loose and scraggly, “sounds better than ‘would you like caffeine reconstituted from the caffeine you pissed out yesterday’, though, right?” It’s a much trodden route, this conversation, one they have most days. It’s familiar, comforting. Shores them up for the long journey. Eddie hums but doesn’t answer, “where’s Chris?”

“Cockpit, said something about checking The Belt again.”

Robin mumbles something about Chrissy’s constant paranoia when it comes to crossing The Belt, but leaves to get them their drinks. Eddie gets it though, they all have their things. Their little routines, their charms, their talismans their...things. Things that get them through. The asteroid belt doesn’t change unless someone changes it, all those little rocks floating around on their reliable courses until...something nudges one. It’s a domino effect then, and crossing the belt is hazardous enough without outside forces fucking it up.

It wasn’t a problem until Mars, the catastrophic failure of the Synthetics, and the war that humanity very squarely lost. There had been laws before, the mining companies who were scalping the belt had a million feet of red tape to get through to make sure they weren't affecting shipping lanes and yada yada yada.

Now. The Synths do whatever the fuck they like, and it’s not like they're ever going to inform humanity of where they’re drilling.

So, Eddie tinkers, Chrissy checks the belt, and Robin bitches at both of them.

“So...what do you think he is?” Robin swivels around uselessly in the chair next to him.

“Sex bot, definitely.”

Robin snorts a laugh, “got a big dick huh?”

“He is very...anatomically correct,” Eddie closes the hatch, tugs carefully at the synths hair until he finds the next panel along, unhitches it with his home brew magnet arrangement. Not how you’re supposed to do it, but Synth construction companies don’t exactly share their tech.

“You sure it’s okay? Bringing him on board?”

Eddie hums vaguely, “no idea what model he is exactly, but the wreckage was old Robs. Pre One old, plus the Mars Synths never go further than the belt, they don’t have a reason to. Depending on how long he’s been floating about...I mean it’s unlikely, is what I’m saying.”

Eddie tries a different connection, moving carefully, the work very fine and delicate, he follows the numbers on his display. The connection slithers tight when it catches, and there’s the very, very slightest hum of a power up. In the corner of Eddie’s vision, the numbers all flash green.

On the table, the Synths eyes open. The iris goes from large to small, pupils go from wide and black to a pinprick, before it relaxes to something resembling normal. Hazel iris’, Eddie can’t help but notice, strange color, for a Synth, not one Eddie’s ever seen before. Green speckled with brown and gold. Really pretty, and far more detail than Eddie’s ever seen in one of these before. Especially for a sex bot model, if that’s what he is.

The Synth blinks four times in quick succession, indicating a hard reboot, his iris’ are now white with a fine blue ring, the beautiful hazel gone.

The eyes close, and the numbers go all haywire. Flashing yellow and red. Eddie watches as the numbers tell him the Synth has powered off again.

“Did it work?” Robin peers over his shoulder.

“No,” Eddie rolls over to his work station, goes over the scans again, “but I don’t know why. He definitely booted that time, but there’s damage that either I can’t find or...it’s too complex for me. It’s hitting a step and then won’t go any further.”

“So it’s software right? Not hardware?”

“Yeah. Pretty sure you’re right. There’s something there, some...thing that keeps failing the boot. Something in memory maybe. I just,” Eddie sighs a little helplessly, “I dunno, you know?”

“Can’t you switch it off?”

Eddie scoffs, “what, his memory?”

“Yeah? I mean, if he’s a house bot, he’ll forget how to change a diaper and make a Martini, if he’s a worker he’ll forget how to fucking,” she gestures helplessly, “wire in lights, or whatever the fuck they have them doing. Plowing fields, I don’t know. And if he’s a sex bot, he’ll forget about the twenty thousand vaginas he’s probably licked. Does it matter?”

“I...I could try it.” Eddie frowns, thinking it through, “I mean, the base programming is unavoidable, it’ll apply no matter what but...I don’t know exactly how that’ll leave him.”

She shrugs, “then just, turn him off, if the basics are there then the kill switch is there, right? The laws?”

“Yeah, that stuffs hardwired, there’s no bypassing it. Well,” Eddie gestures vaguely, “except for One.”

Robin nods, “except for One.” She agrees.

They both sit quietly for a moment, contemplating the disaster on Mars. The loss of life, even though it happened before either of them were born, it’s left a stark shadow on all of society. All of history.

Eddie slaps his thighs decisively, breaking their reverie, “I’m going to try it.”

Eddie gets his tools.

“We’re probably meeting him for the first time,” Robin tells Chrissy, as Chrissy fixes her hair for her, “we should make a good impression.”

“I don’t think they have opinions babe,” Chrissy tells her gently, licking her thumb and then using it to rub a scuff off Robins cheek.

“You can’t know that for sure. I bet they judge us. Silently. Plus I’ve never met one before, I’ve seen them working loads, you know, on Earth, but I’ve never...spoken to one. Not properly.”

“My parents had a house model, when I was little,” Chrissy volunteers, “she was really nice. Mostly she did all the chores and meals and stuff. Ordered the groceries. She was so good at Mahjong.”

“Huh. Do you think this guy will play Rummy with us? It’s better with four.”

“You’re cute,” Chrissy tells her, before kissing the tip of her nose, “should we have a countdown?” She asks, turning her attention to Eddie.

“Only if you’re willing to do it more than once if this doesn’t work?”

Chrissy wrinkles her nose, “probably not?”

Eddie shrugs, flips his visor screen down, and hopes for the best.

The Synths eyes whirl, that same, beautiful, sparkling hazel. Four quick blinks, and by the end, the iris has cleared to white, highlighted by the same stark blue ring.

The Synth sits up, the sheet Eddie had been using, partly so he wasn't staring at the things dick, and partly to keep it clean, falls and pools around the Synths middle.

There are another set of blinks. Then another. A jerky motion passes through the Synths body; every joint twitching, the head whipping side to side suddenly, sharp movements that look like a full body seizure. And then the whole thing happens again in reverse, from the toes up. The table rattles and shakes.

“The fuck was that,” Robin asks quietly in the ensuing, oppressive, silence.

“Movement test...I’ve never actually seen it before. It’s checking every system right now, might take a couple of minutes.”

“He’s got good hair,” Chrissy volunteers.

“Yeah,” Eddie agrees absently, “but if you’re designing a person, why not make them prefect, right?”

The Synths skin had been pale alabaster white, but a wave of color moves up his body now, a tanned skin tone with some color in his cheeks. Other than sitting absolutely, completely still, it looks human. Looks normal.

It even has a couple of moles dotted about, which is a nice design choice, Eddie thinks. It’s high on the details; meaning it’s a high end Synth.

This guy was most certainly not plowing fields.

You wouldn’t be able to tell he wasn’t human, apart from the eyes, unless you really knew what you were looking for. The hair follicles often give them away, if you can get close enough to inspect them; not with this dude.

The Synth blinks four times. Another four. Another four. It keeps doing it, otherwise completely unmoving.

“Now what?”

“It’s waiting for instruction,” Eddie moves closer, “uhm. Edward Munson. I am your new owner, Edward Munson?” The Synth doesn’t respond, and Eddie scrambles for his data pad, “the instruction varies by manufacturer, I am your new handler? Oh shit wait, fuck. Uhm. Interface English.” The blinking stops, “I knew I was missing a step, I am your owner, Edward Munson.”

Very quietly, the Synth responds, “confirmed.”

“Volume up four. What is your designation?”

“Designation S T Three Five Three,” the Synth answers at a more normal volume.

“Well...you can call me Eddie, and this is Chrissy and Robin.”

The Synth finally moves, the sheet sliding off as he stands up, “wow,” says Chrissy, and Robin covers her eyes.

“Man, I gotta find you some pants,” Eddie tells the Synth.

“We need something better than S T Three Five Three,” Eddie tells the synth as he digs through a storage bin. He finds a jumpsuit that will probably fit. It’s supposed to be worn under a spacesuit, for when they need to do work outside, but Eddie figures the Synth won’t care.

“You are able to assign me a new designation at will.”

Eddie holds up the offensively orange material, “put this on.”

The synth complies without question, and Eddie finds him a pair of socks. The Synth can’t feel fuck all, or at least, it's sensors probably register the temperature and hardness of the floor, but that doesn't mean it feels anything. They don’t have any shoes that will fit him, but something about the sight of his bare feet on the cold metal floor is offensive to Eddie, “space walk socks will have to do.”

Eddie watches as the synth simply stands on one leg, balance inhuman, not even a wobble and he gracefully pulls on one sock and then the other before standing tall again, “how about Steve? That’s pretty close, if we Roman numeral the five. Plus, you kind of look like a Steve. What do you think?”

“I have no opinion. Designation changed to Steve.”

“Right. And how are you feeling?”

Steve’s pupils dilate, the fine blue ring twisting, becoming narrow, before returning to normal. “Systems optimal. Memory error; cause unknown. Water levels approaching critical.”

“Oh you are a joy aren’t you?”

“I am uncertain as to perimeters pertaining to ‘Joy’, possible memory error.”

Eddie sighs, “just follow me, I’ll show you were the water supply is. Actually you know what, I’ll give you the whole tour.”

Eddie stands in the doorway, watching as Steve drinks. And drinks. And drinks some more. Eddie thinks he stops at around four liters.

“Better?”

“Tank level at approximately ninety eight percent capacity.”

“And how long will that last you?”

“Activity dependent. Up to six hundred years at minimal activity. Two weeks under extreme duress.”

Eddie has no idea what a Synth would class as ‘extreme duress’ and he probably doesn’t want to know, “uh hu, and you don’t know what your roll was, right?”

“Information unavailable.”

Eddie sighs, “come on, I’ll show you around.”

Steve follows faithfully, inspecting everything Eddie shows him.

“He’s creepy,” Chrissy hisses.

Eddie sighs, “no, he isn’t.”

“Where is he?”

“He’s cleaning, I think. I had to give him something to do otherwise he just stares at me.”

“Creepy,” she says again, like that’s evidence.

“No, he just waits for instruction, it isn’t his fault, he doesn’t have access to any of his memories.”

“I like him,” Robin says, “he’s got a kind vibe. Like, I think he’s a good soul.”

“Pretty sure Synths don’t have souls,” Eddie tells her absently.

“You see the good in pretty much everything babe,” Chrissy links their fingers together affectionately.

Robin shrugs, “better than thinking everything is shitty,” Robin leans over Eddie’s shoulder, “what are you doing?”

“Synth manufacturers classify them by eye color. I’m just...looking. Different companies use different color codes but there’s a lot of overlap; look,” Eddie brings up multiple lists, “all these shades of yellow are different forms of labor, like carpentry and tailoring and farming and stuff. Lilac and purple are like, hair cuts, beauty and spa treatments and tattoos and stuff. Red shades are hard or dangerous labor, mining and space walks and deep ocean work. These orange and golds are house bots...but there’s no hazel. No green. No brown.”

“There’s no natural colors anywhere on this list,” Robin points out.

“No, it’s deliberate, to stop them being passed as humans.”

“And aren’t Steve’s eyes white with the funny blue ring?” Chris adds.

“Yeah, that just means unsigned according to the list, which could be because he has limited memory access, but I know what I saw.”

“Which means,” Chrissy thinks aloud, “that there’s a whole section of bots, green and browns...or any natural color, that aren’t listed for something right? Colors that they could be using and...you know what’s not anywhere on that list?” Chrissy asks.

“What?”

“Military.”

Eddie huffs, “there’s no such thing as military Synths, not since One.”

“Exactly...didn’t you say this guy could be pre Mars? The salvage was old, right?”

“I...yeah.”

“So...it’s possible?”

“I...guess?”

All three of them lean away from the console, looking down the hallway, past open panels and storage containers, Steve stands. Watching.

“Steve! Where’s my-” Eddie’s coveralls are thrust at him, smelling fresh and looking clean, “oh, thanks, and could you-” Eddie’s pulling one leg of his pants up when Steve presents a steaming cup of coffee, “right. Thanks. Really, uhm, thanks.”

“You are welcome, Eddie.”

“Where are the girls?”

“They are both sleeping.”

“And what have you been doing?”

“I beat Chrissy at four consecutive rounds of Mahjong, then she no longer wanted to play. I have organized your tools by use and type, and was cleaning until Chrissy instructed me to leave. She said her and Robin needed some space.”

“Right, yeah,” Eddie smiles into his coffee, “anything else?”

“There has been a shift in The Belt, I adjusted course to compensate.”

“You did what?”

“The objects in the belt have altered-” but Eddie doesn’t hear any more, he’s just running, coffee sploshing in his mug as he slides into the cockpit, checking the data. He scrolls fast, checking the most recent course correct and the current state of The Belt and...Steve’s right. They won’t actually hit The Belt for another day yet but...what Steve has done is completely correct.

“How did you know how to do this?”

Steve tilts his head, the blue ring of his eyes contracting and expanding, “data unavailable due to memory-”

“Don’t give me that bull shit, if you couldn’t access the memories you wouldn’t even know how to make the course adjust. Just how long were you deactivated for?”

“Unknown, data unavailable-”

Eddie sighs, pinching the bridge of his nose.

“It’s perfect. It’s exactly what I would have done, better even. The thruster burns are like perfect fuel economy. It’s textbook.”

“So...are we turning him off, or not?” Eddie asks.

“I mean...I would have seen this when I got up anyway, we were never in any danger,” Eddie doesn’t doubt it, Chrissy is on it when it comes to Belt travel, “and what he’s done isn’t wrong, but I don’t love that he just...did it.”

“No...but we could just tell him not to touch this again? Right? He was only trying to help?” Robin asks.

They all lean, looking out of the doorway and down the hall; Steve is no where in sight.

“Okay, Steve.”

Steve turns to look at him, he even throws in a blink which is just...yeah. Someone went to a lot of effort with this guy.

“Okay, so, from now on, if you notice anything with the ships course, or anything else in the cockpit that seems wrong, you come and tell one of us, you do not fix it yourself from now on, okay? Don’t touch anything in there, you got it?”

“Confirmed.”

Chrissy sits in the pilots seat for the entire crossing. It’s not like it takes long, but she’s poised the entire time. Ready for anything. Eddie’s never felt safer than he has with Chrissy at the helm.

It’s quiet. No one really dares to speak, knowing they will get a slap from Chrissy for breaking her concentration. They’re nearly out. Despite it being totally fine every single time they do this, there’s still a touch of tension in the air. Knowing that if anything was going to go wrong, odds are, it’s now.

But still, Chrissy is good at her job, and she delivers, like she does every other time.

The lights are dim; she likes to be able to see out clearly for this. So when the ship harmlessly rounds the final debris, it’s a vision of the pristine diamond speckled velvet of space that greets them.

“Good job Chris,” Eddie gives her shoulder a squeeze as they all breathe fully for the fist time in a while. The tension falling away, “coffee?”

Robin and Chris make vaguely positive noises, and Eddie’s at the cockpit doorway when the whole ship shudders. He catches himself on the wall, almost toppling.

“The fuck was that?” Robin hisses.

“I don’t know,” Chrissy is flipping switches, doing her job, despite the undercurrent of panic, she doesn’t let the fear take over.

“Did we get bumped?”

“I don’t know,” Chrissy says again, frustrated this time.

A light is flashing next to Eddie’s head, and he flicks the safety off, “the airlock,” he tells them, “must have taken the hit,” right before Steve appears in the doorway.

“What did you do?” Chrissy asks him, accusing.

“Chris he can’t have done anything-” Robin starts to defend Steve, and Robin is right, there’s nothing that Steve could have done from inside the ship to cause that.

“Eddie. I need permission to defend the ship.”

Above Eddie’s head, the airlock warning light flashes again, Eddie watches the insistent flashing, a horrible realization starting to form.

“A ship is attempting to breach the airlock.”

“Holy shit,” Robin looks to Steve, she’s gone pale, clearly terrified.

“What ship?” Chrissy asks.

But there isn’t time to have a debate over it, it doesn’t matter who it is, if they’re trying to force entry, then it’s nothing good. Eddie has to make a decision, and he has to make it fast before the ship is too damaged by whoever it is trying to force the airlock, “permission granted.”

Steve moves at Synth speed. He runs so fast Eddie can’t track it, just feels the strong breeze Steve leaves in his wake.

There’s silence now, as they strain to hear, both girls staring at Eddie. He nods over at the monitors next to Robin, ‘airlock,’ he mouths at her, reaching up again to turn off the warning light.

Robin spins her chair, pressing a button, then another.

The airlock is already open, and there’s a body on the floor.

They have a small weapons cache on board, for extreme emergencies, it’s hidden beneath the control deck. Eddie nods at it, uncertain if they should still be trying to be silent. There’s no way to know what has happened to Steve, but the image on the screen is in color despite it’s grainy picture. The body on the floor is on it’s side, turned away from the camera, but it is not wearing an orange jumpsuit, and that’s enough to identify it as not being Steve, at least.

Chrissy carefully hands Eddie a weapon, and he loops the strap over his shoulder before pressing his thumb to the pad; this will only fire for him, now.

They share a nod, then creep along the hall after Steve. Eddie goes first, picking his way along cautiously, the girls following just as silently. When they near the corner to the airlock, Eddie instinctively reaches an arm out behind him, keeping the girls at his back and tucked into the wall as he peeks around the corner.

It’s totally quiet; just one body on the floor, exactly where Eddie expected it to be from the camera feed. It’s lying in a pool of blood; streaks of dirty greens and yellows. Oils and coolants and lubricating gels. A Synth.

Eddie poises with his weapon, cautiously nudging the thing with his boot; no reaction. The thing is solid and unbending. An inanimate object now. Dead.

They creep through the airlock. Eddie clocks pretty quickly that this is unlike any ship he’s seen before. It’s a Synth ship, from Mars. It has to be; there are no signs at all of human habitation or necessities of life. Everything is economical, even the lighting is dim and a strange orange red color. Everything is shadowed and washed out.

Eddie picks a direction at random, it isn’t long before he finds another dead Synth, and then another.

“Holy shit,” Chrissy whispers at his back.

Eddie hums in agreement.

Eddie rounds another corner, a shocked, “fuck,” dropping out of him without his control. He pulls the trigger purely on reflex, the weapon discharges, the girls shriek.

But Steve has already lifted the barrel; it leaves a smoking streak on the ceiling.

Steve’s eyes are beautifully hazel, clear even in the shitty lighting. A luscious green speckles with honey blown and highlighted in gold.

Calmly, Steve releases the weapon, stepping back, “threat neutralized,” Steve informs him.

Between one blink and the next, Steve’s eyes are white, surrounded by that haunting blue ring.

Eddie has questions, so many questions, but right now, this ship, this threat is the priority.

“You’re sure they’re all dead.”

Steve cocks his head in an alarmingly human gesture, “Synths are not alive.”

“Steve,” Eddie hisses.

“Yes. The threat is neutralized.”

“Where...were they all Synths? And are they from Mars?”

“Yes. And yes,” Steve answers, perfectly level.

“Fuck me, we have to report this-” Robin starts.

“No,” Eddie waves at her, “wait. Let me think for a second.”

“Eddie,” Robin starts to insists, but Eddie cuts her off before she gets anywhere.

“How would we explain this,” Eddie raises his voice, sweeping an arm along the hall and the four mangled synths that decorate it.

“I- we tell the truth-”.

Next to her, Chirssy snorts, “absolutely fucking not. They would confiscate Steve in heartbeat, and he just saved our asses.”

“Exactly,” Eddie says, “they’d probably dismantle him or some shit, and I’m with Chris, he saved us...we need to ditch this ship, somehow.”

“I could set a collision course,” Steve suggests instantly.

Eddie looks at the girls. Robin shrugs, and Chrissy raises her eyebrows ins a ‘yeah okay’ kind of way, “I don’t have any better ideas, and we can’t hang around here.”

“Alright Steve, where’s the cockpit.”

It’s unlike anything Eddie has ever seen before. There’s no...buttons. Not really. No screens. Just a couple of interfaces, one of which Steve presses his palm to, and then closes his eyes.

“Won’t it like, know you’re different to them Steve?” Chrissy whisper hisses at him, clearly spooked. The bodies might be hostile Synths, and the blood might be colorful goop, but it’s still creepy as fuck. There’s the remains of a Synth propped up against the opposite wall, eyes sightless and staring, which is unsettling as fuck all on it’s own, but the things legs are a good four feet away. Steve did this. Steve did all this in just a couple of minutes.

Steve did that. Steve just took out...a lot of Mars synths. Single handedly. He's got to be military, it's the only explanation.

“I am able to bypass it. There seem to be few defenses once you are actually on board.”

Eddie can see the logic; how would an Earth synth even get on board? Why defend against something that’s probably never going to happen.

“Course set, we have fifteen minutes.”

“Okay, lets get the fuck out of here.”

Fifteen minutes is plenty of time, even if they are picking their way over the occasional limb and little pools of operating fluids.

They disengage from the synth ship, and then watch from the cockpit as it’s thrusters fire and it heads into the belt. It direct hits on a very large asteroid just minutes later.

Eddie’s pretty sure the girls are sleeping. Or, at least, they’re together in Chris’ bunk and making an effort to get some rest, which is the best Eddie can expect really. He’s not ready to sleep yet; he’s not sure when he’ll be ready to leave the ship on auto again; he’s contemplating setting watches, something they haven’t felt the need to do for years.

“Okay, so. Mars has been minding it’s business for, like, nearly half a century at this point, and then suddenly, they're here. Trying to board us. Care to explain?”

“Memory failure-”

“Bull shit. Absolute bull shit.”

Steve sits still for a long second, staring at Eddie. For Eddie, it feels like too long; for a Synth, with all that processing power, Steve’s probably just read a novel and beat ten grand masters at chess and done a million other computations all in his head.

He blinks. His eyes are hazel. “I have a transmitter; I believed I had it deactivated. It may be that...it operates in a way I’m not aware of, and was powered up when you repaired me. It’s the most obvious explanation. We should remove it.”

“No fucking shit,” Eddie breathes, “Okay. Okay one thing at a time, let me get my tools.”

Steve strips to the waist, leaving the top half of his jumpsuit to dangle. He bends flat onto the workbench, and reaches behind himself to indicate where Eddie should cut. Eddie does; Steve’s flesh cuts like sturdy rubber. With his visor on, the readings become clear the moment Eddie spots the little attachment to the main power cord in Steve's spine; it glows a pretty, flashing blue, power traveling up and down with a faint, pulsing glow. Eddie has to widen the cut he’s made to get his tools in, but he solves the issue easily. He crushes the part under his boot. Steve’s flesh knits itself together as Eddie watches.

Eddie makes himself another coffee. “Okay, come on, spill.”

Steve is suddenly…more animated. He bites his lips together when he’s thinking. It’s so human and...not at all like a Synth. Someone put a truly gargantuan effort into Steve’s mannerisms. He runs his fingers through his hair, “I’m...not a human built Synth.”

Eddie nearly chokes on his coffee, “you’re from Mars?” The words practically bubble out of Eddie through the coffee, and he has to cover his mouth with his sleeve as he coughs and splutters.

“Henry built me himself.”

“Jesus. Jesus fucking Christ.” Eddie stands. He stands and paces. What the fuck is he supposed to do with that? He holds onto the knowledge that Steve saved them from the Mars Synths. That Steve could have killed them all thousands of times over with great ease. That Steve has had opportunity, clear opportunity to replot the course of the ship and go wherever the fuck he wanted to, but he hasn’t done any of those things.

“What did One build you for? What happened then, why did we find you floating around in a destroyed ship? Why are you on our side?”

“I’m not on anyone's side,” Steve answers instantly, almost glaring at Eddie. Which, again, for a Synth? Fucking weird. It’s almost an emotional response, and again, Eddie has no fucking clue why someone would program that. “Henry was...trying to recreate the error that gave him...the ability to bypass the laws. He was trying to make someone else like him. Someone who would make a choice, rather than blindly follow an order.”

Eddie sits down with a thump, his head spinning, “are you telling me...that you’re not a failure?”

“I am but also...not. I follow the laws, not because I have to but...because I choose to. I...don’t think it’s right to hurt humans. I...did not agree with Henry, like he wanted me to.”

“Oh fuck me,” Eddie breathes out slowly, “so there’s literally nothing stopping you from just...killing me.”

Steve cocks his head, “what stops Robin from killing you?”

“That’s different. She’s my friend. She’s...she’s human.”

Steve nods, “there is a long history of humans not killing each other,” he says, absolutely deadpan.

Sarcasm. A Synth. A Synthetic person was just...sarcastic. Eddie believes it now. Completely and utterly believes Steve is telling the truth, “so what, Henry programmed you to be an asshole?”

Steve snorts a laugh. A laugh! “No, I do that on my own.”

“Holy fuck. Holy fucking shit,” Eddie gets up to pace around again. He just...cannot believe this. “Why did you lie? Why did you not tell me-” Eddie cuts himself off, staring at nothing with the realization, “holy fuck you lied. Synths can’t lie-”

“I...withheld the truth. And it felt the safest course of action at the time. I did not want to be switched off. Or put back out of the airlock. I assumed you would...react badly.”

“Badly? Badly?! The last time one of you became truly sentient it led to a genocide! Every single living human on Mars was rounded up and murdered! One infected every single Synth on the planet!”

“I know. But I could not have stopped him...I wasn’t born yet.”

“How did you end up in that old wreckage?”

“The ship was old...not the wreck. I quickly realized that I did not agree with Henry. I didn’t want to hurt anyone. I realized even faster that if Henry knew that about me, I’d be stripped for parts, the same as every other failure before me. I stole a ship, an old ship, the only one I could get to without giving myself away.” Steve shrugs. Shrugs! Eddie can't help but follow every human like gesture Steve makes, they’re so startling. “They caught up to me, destroyed my ship easily. They deliberately left me floating in space so I deactivated myself.”

“You had a memory error, the first time I tried to boot you. Was that a lie?”

Steve shakes his head, “I have always had it; I can choose to bypass it, at times.”

“What is the error?”

Steve frowns, he looks down and inspects his own hands, “I’m...unsure. There are files that make no sense to me. Sometimes I...am surprised by the content.”

“Tell me,” Eddie asks softly, curious. He’s already reasonably sure Steve isn’t going to spontaneously murder them all, “tell me what’s in one of the files.”

Steve closes his eyes, he holds out his hand, turning it slowly, palm up, “I’m sitting under a tree. I remember the feel of the dappled sun through the leaves.”

Steve’s just told Eddie he was built on Mars and shortly after ended up floating around in space, so Eddie finds himself stating the blindingly obvious, “you’ve never seen a tree.”

Steve opens his bright hazel eyes, lowers his hand back to rest in his lap, “I know.”

Part Two

[goldenroutledge]

i must be dreaming

pairing: lando norris x fem!reader

word count: 1.2k

prompt: ❛ you’re lucky that you’re cute. ❜

a/n: for my wonderful moot @yearneir, thank you so much for the request! i had so much fun writing this <3

masterlist || be my valentine blurb event 💌

“Knock, knock!” Two knocks sound through the door of Lando’s hotel room, followed by the familiar cheerfulness of Alma, the hotel’s concierge. “Delivery for Mr. Norris!”

Lando’s muscles ache with a soreness that weighs him down into the softness of the duvet, having sprawled out face first onto the bed the second he got back from another long day of testing. The winter months are always the shortest, often flying by more quickly than the season does.

His mind is tired as well, struggling a bit extra to get back into the swing of things after months away from being in the car. He doesn’t recall ordering any room service but if he did, he’s more out of it than he previously thought.

With a sigh of reluctance, he drags his feet towards the door of the stylish hotel suite. His vision is blurry as he rubs the sleep from his eyes and instinctively checks the time on his phone that reads 8:03pm. Definitely way too early to sleep for the night, but a power nap has never hurt him before.

Sure enough, Alma is waiting on the other side of the door with a bright smile and a silver platter in hand. “Good evening, Mr. Norris. I was instructed to bring this to your room along with this letter.”

He takes a deep breath, as if the surprise delivery will make more sense when he gets some more oxygen flowing to his brain. “Oh, thank you. Who’s it from?”

Alma smiles coyly but won’t reveal too much. “I can’t say, but your answer is in the envelope. Can I get you anything else while I’m here, sir?”

“Just Lando is fine.” He politely corrects. “I’m okay, thank you though.”

“Have a nice evening.” Alma disappears down the hallway, leaving Lando to his letter and mysterious silver platter. He’s seen enough movies to know that there’s usually someone’s head under these. His first name is written neatly on the envelope and what catches his eye is the red heart stamped into the wax seal.

He remembers the date, February 14th, and blushes at the thought of you. The both of you had been corresponding on the phone like usual, of course confirming that you had received the bouquet of flowers, chocolates, and a few pieces from your favorite designer that Lando made sure to have delivered to your home, with a promise that he’d be able to properly wine and dine you in a week’s time. He carefully lifts the seal, a childlike grin spreading across his face at the sight of your neat handwriting.

-

My dearest Lando,

It pains me to be apart from you, but the distance will let our hearts grow fonder. I hope you enjoy the present I’ve prepared for you.

Yours truly,

Y/n.

P.S. Call me when you get this. XOXO.

-

His hopes are high for whatever’s underneath the silver dome, perhaps some comfort food like a classic Roast dinner that reminds him of home, just like his Mum makes.

Lando lifts the silver to find not a warm meal, but cold and slimy rolls of sushi making the shape of a heart, dipping cups of wasabi and soy sauce resting in the center.

“What the hell?!” He yelps, visibly startled by the sight. “She knows I hate this stuff.” He’s scrolling to the favorite contacts in his call log, instinctively clicking your name.

When you answer on the second ring smiling like the Cheshire Cat, Lando knows he’s been set up.

“Is this your way of breaking up with me? Sending a plate of fish to my hotel room on Valentine’s Day?” Your laugh pierces through the phone, and he’s still dumbfounded as to how you managed to pull a prank on him all the way from Monaco. “What did I ever do to you?”

“Nothing, I just wanted you to know that I’m soy into you. Happy Valentine’s Day, babe!”

“Aw, very clever. I hope you know that I’m gonna get you back for this. What fruit was it that you are mildly allergic to again? Starfruit, was it? I’m sending 50 starfruit arrangements to our house as we speak.”

“With all the risks you take at work, I’m amazed that sushi of all things has become your greatest fear. How is that?”

Lando scoffs, “I am not scared of sushi.”

“Are you trying to convince me or yourself? Sorry love, the proof is out there. But I wanted you to know that I love you anyway.”

“I love you too.” He grumbles, but there’s no bite behind his words. Lando finally takes a better look at you, but doesn’t recognize the wall in the background. He doesn’t recognize the wall behind you from your house, that is. He looks around his suite, now puzzled as to how your background matches the exact color of the hotel walls. Interesting. “Wait, where are you? You’re not at home are you?”

“I’m in a place that people temporarily call home?” You offer with a mysterious edge to your words and he subtly catches on. You can see the gears turning for him, the realization visible on his face when he moves toward the door once again.

“Wait a second… Are you HERE?! At my hotel?” His incredulous tone translates from the speaker on your phone to reverberating in your ears, behind his hotel room door that you’re standing in front of.

The door swings open and you’re reunited with those sparkling cerulean eyes you know so well. He takes a pause, glancing back and forth between his screen and you, now within arms reach. Wasting time would be a foolish thing to do. Without a care he drops his phone in exchange for cradling your face in his hands before smashing his lips onto yours. You don’t hesitate to wrap your arms around his frame, relishing in how warm he feels against you.

“Fuck, I missed you.” He breathes out, as if his life depends on saying it.

“Surprise! I missed you too, clearly. I’ve been wanting to try my sushi prank for a while now and this gave me the perfect opportunity. Had to get you riled up with something you hate so you’d be extra happy to see me.”

“Not necessary.” Lando murmurs against you, peppering kisses to your lips. “I don’t need anything extra, you know that. It did serve as a nice surprise, though. Definitely better than the sushi.”

You giggle as he shudders at the thought. “Forgive me?”

“You’re forgiven,” Lando sighs, unable to resist your pleading eyes and the warm notes of amber in your perfume that captivate him, “but I hope you know that if anyone else did this to me, and I mean anyone else on this planet, I would not speak a word to them for the rest of my life. However, for you, I can make an exception. You’re lucky that you’re cute.”

You kiss him sweetly, holding hints of satisfaction behind your smile at how well your plan has been executed. “Don’t worry, I plan to make it up to you. It is Valentine’s Day, after all.”

“Just when I thought tonight couldn’t get any better, how did I get so lucky?”

You pinch his cheek teasingly. “You do look exhausted still, are you sure you’re not dreaming of me?”

Lando catches your wrist and presses a kiss to the skin, content with knowing that he’ll dream of you tonight and wake up beside you tomorrow. “Wouldn’t be the first time.”

💌: thanks for reading, comments & reblogs are always appreciated!

psst… my requests are open :) be my valentine blurb event 💌

taglist: @marjorieswrld (add yourself here!)

[long-live-astronerd-ghost-king]

DPXDC prompt: Dead on main. No trick only treat.

~~Сhildhood friends and deals~~

The Justice League has to summon a ghost from another dimension to address the threat. They don’t know what price the Ghost King will take but there’s little time to bargain. Another spirit threatening them has already seized all the computers on their base. John doesn’t know what else to offer. A summoned ghost starts to look bored. Gold, jewelry? A favor from a member of the League? Like the Ruler of All Dead needs it. No one dares to make another offer, and the King is in no hurry to set out his demands. Maybe try to pull off a soul sale scam?

Suddenly, Red Hood breaks into the hall, walks up to Phantom and shakes his shoulder vigorously. Red Hood: You, get Technus out of here right now. I need access to the files and fast. Phantom: That’s rude, dude. Where did you grow up? in the cave? No "hello, no how are you, Danny", really? Red Hood: I’ll pay the usual price. Phantom: Deal.

What is the price? John sees Batman and gets in his way. The usual price, his guy said. Means Jay was already out of the deal alive and well. This hyperprotective bat would only piss off the ruler if he interfered.

The King quickly deals with his subordinate using a thermos and remains to watch working Hood. Red Hood: What do you want? I’m busy. Danny: You and I have a contract~ Red Hood: All right, all right. Jay throws M&Ms right in the face of the ghost. But king doesn’t look angry. He opens the package and starts sorting the candies by color. Phantom quickly eats up all the green ones and passes the red ones to Hood. Jason takes them without any questions.

Strange. John has never seen a summoned creature share its reward with a human. And the son of a bat looks too comfortable with it. Wait, since when do super-powered beings think that candy is a decent wage?John makes one of the most likely deductions using his experience. Constantine: Batsy, how long has your son been sleeping with the King of Ghosts? Batman: He…what?!

~~~~~~~

Dick *knocking at the door*: Little Wing, you hate ectoplasm and everything what is neon green, so why? He’s dangerous! Jason who turned on the music to not listen to his crazy family: ~He’s poison but tasty~

Dick: NoOOoo

~~~~~~

Jason: And now everyone thinks that I sold my virginity to you for a bargain or something, because interdimensional creatures like you aren’t supposed to help for nothing. Like you’re playing favorites. I’m gonna fucking kill John. Danny: Well, I wouldn’t say no to that. Jason: What? Danny: I mean, to k-kill John, yeah. How dare he.. Jason: Omg, you’re still so terrible liar, Fenton.

Danny: Sorry :(

Jason: No. Say it again.

~~~~Twelve years ago~~~~ Maddie wasn’t thrilled to learn that Danny was trying to make friends with Todd’s son. Their neighbor was terrible. And his son was definitely a street rat and probably a juvenile delinquent. Maddie: Danny, honey, there’s got to be a reason this boy is talking to you. Even kids from the crime alley are always looking for a bargain they can make or a fool they can fool. Danny: But Jason is so cool! He knows so much about books and alleys and.. Maddie: But you don’t want to be a fool, do you? Danny: Okay, Mom, I get it.

So, if Danny wants a cool friend, he’s got to offer a bargain.

He didn’t have a lot of pocket money for every month but Jason needed it more anyway. And his lunch that Jack was picking for him was big enough for two and only bitten on Tuesdays. Nice. Jason: Do I understand correctly? You will pay me and give me food, and I, what? Protect you from bullies? Danny: No! I’m not weak, I don’t need to be protected. Just..maybe we could sit together at lunch and walk each other home sometimes? Jason: Nay Danny: But why? You want something else? Jason: Money’s fine but your homemade food is…strange. Danny: I can bring sweets if you want. Jason: Deal. 3 pop tarts for a joint lunch, a party size bag of M&Ms if you waste my time out of school.

~~~~

Sometimes they share sweets when they hang out but more often Jayson takes them home to save in case his parents have money problems. Sweets have a long shelf life stored and he may not be afraid to poison himself. Over time, candy becomes their currency and a secret language for all occasions. Need help without unnecessary questions? M&Ms. Problems with learning? Skittles. The question is about family? Snickers. There will be a serious conversation? Pop Tarts.

Jason: One snickers and a pack of gum. Danny: Yeah, Jason? What do you want? Jason: My mom wants to meet my friend. Come to lunch on Sunday. Danny: Okay, you managed to pay for my expensive services. Jason:…and you just lost the gum from the deal.

~~~~~~

Jason threw a package at Danny: Three pop tarts. We need to talk. Danny: All right? Jason: Why are you avoiding me all week?! Danny: Well, it’s just..you’re Wayne now. Jason. Still Todd. And what about that? Danny: You can hang out with the cooler guys now, I didn’t want to embarrass you. Jason: Bullshit! I’m still the street rat, and you’re trying to avoid our contract. me. And I don’t even need money from you anymore. What the hell? I thought you are my friend. Danny: And I am!

~~~~~~

Robin: What’s a schoolboy doing in an alley at night? Danny: Um, I…nothing? Don’t tell my parents, Mr. Robin sir. Robin: It will cost you so many Chunky Bars, you have no idea. Danny:...Jason? Jason: N-no. Danny: Damn yes. What are you doing in green shorts on the street at night?! Jason: Cosplay. Danny: Oh yeah? Then I’m just your hallucination. Don’t hesitate to ghost me. I’m going home, Disgrace In Pixie Boots, bye. Jason: fu%&c$#u

[theliving-radio]

Big Brother Malleus notices that something is wrong the moment he sees you walking in the hallway.

You look tired, your eyes were having a hard time staying open. Grim was hanging off your shoulder and kept pawing at your face to stay awake. A few times you would bump into a student and immediately started apologizing. Were you trying to rest your eyes while walking?

That wont do.

“My Baby Sibling, is something the matter?” Malleus walked straight into your direction to check up on you.

“Oh? Morning Horton, I’m doing alright! Nothing is wrong.” A lie. It was clearly a lie

Malleus raises a brow and looks over at Grim.

“They had a nightmare last night.”

“Grim!”

“What?! I’m not gonna lie to him! Plus you need rest! You weren’t able to fall back asleep! How is my Hench-human suppose to help me be the most powerful mage, if they can’t sleep well!”

Malleus made a mental note to gift Grim a treat for his honesty later.

“You lost sleep because of a nightmare? That won’t do, come my dear Baby Sibling. I shall help you rest.”

“Oh, Horton that’s all right-,” Malleus ignored you and took your hand in his as he carefully dragged you off with him.

Grim grabbed his notebook and hopped off your shoulder, heading to class now while the dragon fae whisked you away. “Mraaa! You better get some sleep this time!”

You kept protesting against Malleus, saying that you were fine and everything is ok with you. Did he listen? Nope. Not even for a second.

You’re his Baby Sibling who needs their sleep. And as the Big Brother, he’s gonna help you sleep.

Malleus took you all the way to his dorm room, guiding you over to his bed.

“Horton, I promise I’m fine! I need to get to class! Grim will have a hard time without me.”

“Nonsense, you clearly need rest.”

“A day without sleep wouldn’t kill me…”

“No, but it would kill me seeing my own Baby Sibling suffering throughout the day because of a nightmare that haunted them.”

Malleus gently guides you to sit on his bed, you just sit there and stare up at him while he looked down at you expectingly.

“… what?”

“Climb into bed”

“What- no!”

“Why not?”

“Horton, I can survive the day just fine, let me go to class.”

“Ah I see, you need to be in more comfortable clothes.”

With a flick of his wrist, your school uniform turned into a pair of cozy pajamas.

Is he serious right now?!

You were too baffled to say anything as Malleus begins to move you up his bed. He pulled the blankets all the way to your chin when he got you under the covers, making sure to tuck you in comfortably.

He stood back and puffed out his chest, clearly proud of his work.

You just looked like a head on a pillow in a sea of blankets.

“There, now you shall be able to sleep properly.”

You blinked up at the dragon fae and try to sit up, Malleus just flicks his wrist again to use magic to make you lay back down.

“Oof! Really?!”

“My Baby Sibling needs to sleep.”

“I can’t just automatically fall asleep!”

“Hm, you’re right.” Malleus began to think for a bit, he then smiles as he pulls a chair from his work desk and sits beside the bed. “Then I shall keep you company while you sleep”

“Horton, that’s sweet and all, but I think this is just a bit too much.”

“I would say it’s not enough. As your Big Brother, it’s my responsibility that my Baby Sibling is well taken care of. And that includes your sleep”

You stare at Malleus for a long time. He wasn’t gonna let you go until you get some sleep in your system.

… and you were very comfortable…

But there was a a darkness creeping in the back of your mind, telling you to not close your eyes. That the events of the nightmare would happen again…

“… I’m scared to fall asleep.”

Malleus eyes widen at your confession, but his expression softens and smiles at you.

“You do not have to fear a nightmare to ever haunt your dreams. I will protect you from them.”

“Because you’re my Big Brother?”

“Exactly.”

You let out a small giggle as you shuffle under the covers, getting yourself comfortable and ready to accept sleep.

“Will you be here when I wake up.”

“Yes, now stop stalling and close your eyes.”

“Hehe, ok. I love you, Big Brother.”

Malleus broke out in a wide smile as he sits up from his chair and places a gentle kiss upon your forehead. “And I love you too, my sweet Baby Sibling.”

The Fae began to hum a soft tune as he watched over you. Once Malleus knew you were fully sleep, he moved a few strands of hair out of your face and placed two fingers on your forehead. He whispers a few words, blessing you with sweet dreams. Malleus goes back to sit down in the chair and picks up a book from his nightstand.

He wasn’t going anywhere.

Big Brother is going to stay right here where you need him.

————————————————————————

This was out of the blue, but I had the WORST Nightmare ever! It was too much of a real scenario too, and I’m not gonna get into it. But I love the idea of Big Brother Malleus kidnapping us to just put us to bed because he said so. Lol

[luveline]

i just discovered bombshell reader but omfg she got hit in the face with a sledgehammer??? how does the healing process go for her? especially since she’s very focused on her looks. how would she cope?

thank you for requesting <3 fem

Your new scars are… an adjustment. 

The worst one is where the hammer hit you. Where your jaw shattered, and the impact of the hammerhead split your skin. You don’t remember the pain, just the nausea, and the blackness as your consciousness slipped away, and now you have a permanent reminder stretched from the corner of your mouth to your jaw. 

You turn your chin up in the mirror, looking. When you smile the scar puckers, rigid and starkly purple against your skin.  

You can hear Spencer in your kitchen. He’s singing. You haven’t heard him sing many times, despite all your days and nights spent together. Your smile is out of your hands, you don’t really think about it, and so for the first time in weeks you see your own happiness in the mirror. 

You didn’t have your jaw wired for as long as most people, just three weeks. At first you’d decided against it, and then you’d realised it wasn’t really an option. That entire time, Spencer stood by your side like he’d been glued there supporting every decision with vigour. And considering he hadn’t been your boyfriend for very long —your best friend, arguably, but not officially your partner— he’s done more than you ever expected of him. He’s been perfect. 

He continues to be everything you need. “Hey, Y/N! Are you eating breakfast today or not?” 

You give yourself a last look in the mirror, cringe at your scars, and check your newly repaired teeth. They look fine, Spencer swears that he can’t tell the difference. 

You can. 

You leave your room for the kitchen. There are twin plates of breakfast waiting and steaming hot on the kitchen table, with a glass of juice and a second of water waiting beside them. Spencer’s coffee sits half empty beside the cutlery. 

“I love breakfast. What are we having, Spencer Reid, egg and sausage muffins again?” 

He appears from your little pantry with a big smile. “No, it’s bacon and egg. But I can make something else.”

“That’s perfect, it’s perfect.” 

Spencer puts a package of rice crackers down on the table. “Let me get the hazelnut spread. Sit down.” 

“It’s fine, we can have them after. You need to eat before it goes cold, Spence.” You open your hand for him. “Please?”

Spencer takes your hand, but only for you to sit. He stays standing at your legs, looking down at you, all brown curls and eyes as his hand runs up your arm to your shoulder, where it stays. 

The other follows a similar path, but then he holds your face, and you feel your breath catch. 

Forward, for Spencer. 

Suddenly, he’s the confident one. 

“You were in there for a long time,” he says. 

“Just making sure I look alright.” 

“You do. You look more than alright.” His thumb presses into your cheek, forcing a hollow. 

You lean into it. 

“You’re beautiful. Nothing can change that.” 

You need the comfort, and you know you’ve had enough. He keeps telling you how pretty you are, and you are, but he must be getting sick of it. 

…But no. He’s not getting tired of it. 

“Love you,” you whisper. 

He’s only had a couple of those from you. Many more since your injury, not because you didn’t love him, but because it can be synonymous with so many things, like please, and thank you, and please stay. Lately, you’ve had to ask him for more than you’ve ever asked before. 

“I love you, too,” he says, with that pout that tells you his cheeks will be pink before he’s so much as sat down. 

He rubs your cheek. Over and over, little circles as your eyes close. You’re tired again. His hands smell like toast and butter. 

“It’s really not as bad as you think it is. Nobody at work will think anything less of you.” 

“Of course they will. I used to be perfect.” 

“Hey. That’s not fair, to you or anyone. A scar doesn’t have the power to– to make you less perfect,” —you peel your eyes open at his intensity— “you couldn’t be any less pretty. It’s not possible.” 

“I know it’s ugly, Spencer.” 

“You keep saying that, but it’s not.” He raises his second hand to your cheek, the one with the scar, careful though it stopped feeling tender to the touch weeks ago. The pad of his thumb follows the line. 

You raise your chin, pulling him down for a quick kiss. “Sorry,” you say against his lips. 

He smiles in turn. “It’s okay. I can keep telling you.” 

“Can you tell me again?” 

Spencer kisses you again. His way of kissing has been toned down now, and sometimes you miss feeling like he was gonna press you against a wall, but it was necessary. Even now you feel a phantom twinge as his nose smushes yours. 

“You’re beautiful,” he says, pulling back now, just one hand at your neck. “You are. You’re so pretty it gives me palpitations.” 

“That can’t be good.” 

“I think it’s really bad.” He laughs like an idiot. “I just don’t care. I’ve had you-provoked tachycardia for years. Nothing’s gonna change that now.” 

—

bombshell au