#again: who gets the happy ending with no strings attached?

[mxtxfanatic]

Everytime I see someone in the tgcf fandom says that Xie Lian needed to be humbled and learned a lesson, I get so angry. A lesson for what exactly? Being a 17 year old who was optimistic and idealistic and correct in all of his ideas ? One who just happened to be a prince but wanted to help people with the power he had ? And 800 years of misfortunes is not a lesson, it's just more trauma and his character development in the present is unlearning some of the way he dealt with said trauma during those 800 years.

Also that idea is what Jun Wu has been trying to do to Xie Lian for 800 years, why are we,as a fandom, following the antagonist's lead on that one ?

“Being a 17 year old who was optimistic and idealistic and correct in all of his ideas?”

Yes, this is what people are mad about 😭😭😭 A teen was idealistic about the world and said that people are capable AND willing to do and be better when given the chance and resources and without outside manipulation, the narrative proved him right in every way during every arc, and fandom has hated him ever since.

[azzo0]

See You Later

Inspired by this song: see you later (ten years)

Pairing: Bakugo x f!reader

tw's: angst with happy ending, manga spoilers, bad writing?? (idk bro lmk more in tags)

Summary: In middle school, you see a red string on your finger. It leads you to Bakugo Katsuki, a boy with fire and anger, less than pleased to see you as his soulmate. After several attempts of befriending and getting to know him, he shuns all your efforts to break through. Letting him go, you drift apart.

But the red string of fate hasn't broken yet. Ten years later, you cross paths again.

It had been a week since you moved into the fancy new neighbourhood. Your father had gotten a better job offer here in Musutafu. Of course, that meant a new middle school and new friends. You weren't sure what to expect on your first day of school, but it definitely wasn't seeing a red string on your little finger. 

You were just looking for your class in the early hours of the morning, feeling extremely lost. You frowned, the only one in the hallway, looking sideways for your class. Why was the school so big? Giving up, for the time being, you went down to the little pond with fish you spotted on your way here. You'd just ask someone to help you find your class once there were more students around. 

You kneeled, watching fish of different colours idly swim in the little pond. Were it not for the slight tug you felt on your pinky, you'd probably have stayed there wasting your time. You looked down at your hand, eyes widening, when you saw a crimson string attached to your little finger. Your lips parted in surprise.

You knew your soulmate was somewhere around.

Along with quirks, some people had the gift of recognising their soulmate. You'd heard countless stories of people with tattoos of their soulmate's first words on their bodies or a marking of where their soulmate first touched them. Sure, you had a quirk, but no soulmate marking. 

You slowly stood up, gulping. Who was the person on the other end of the string? Letting out a shaky breath, you followed the string to the school garden. Was your soulmate in the garden? You heard footsteps coming in your direction and then suddenly stopping. You nervously bit your lip, daring to look up.

There he was. A boy with spiky ash-blond hair that pointed in every direction, his eyes just as red as the string connecting you two together, his eyebrows furrowed as he glared at you. You noticed he had two coat and shirt buttons unbuttoned and his tie missing. He was the most handsome guy you met, were it not for the fact that he looked like he was going to murder you and hide your body. 

"Are ya going to gape at me all day or say something?" He snapped, making you jump back, his voice deep and raspy.

"Umm- looks like we're soulmates?!" You cringed when your voice came out squeaky. 

"No shit." 

The red string slowly disappeared after having led you two to each other. You twiddled your thumb nervously, wondering what to say to him. You were surprised when he walked past you like he hadn't just found out you were his soulmate but a random stranger he bumped into. You jogged after him, tightening your grip around your school bag. 

"Hey, wait up! What's your name?"

"Fuck off, shitty extra." 

You stopped in your tracks, taken aback by his snarky reply. Why would he say that when you asked something so simple? Was he unhappy to find out you were his soulmate? Did he not like the idea of you being his soulmate? You opened your mouth to say something but then decided against it. You sadly turned around, walking in the opposite direction.

Unbeknown to you, none of these were the reasons why he brushed you off. Truth was, he couldn't believe he had a soulmate. Whenever the topic of soulmates came up, everyone had mutually agreed that Bakugo Katsuki could never have a soulmate. He was too proud and angry to have one. 

Maybe they were right. 

He was surprised that someone as pretty as you was his soulmate. You wanted to know his name, and he couldn't even give you a proper reply. He wasn't sure how to react to you. Maybe everyone was right. He was too proud and angry to have a soulmate. 

He glanced back to see that the girl with h/c hair had already left. 

Much to your horror, you were placed in the same class as your soulmate. You took a fistful of your skirt as you sat behind him. Was he always going to be mean to you? Was he even going to bother talking to you? He didn't even bat an eye when you passed him to sit in your assigned seat. 

Blinking tears, you flung thoughts of him aside. So what if your shitty soulmate didn't want to talk to you? It wasn't like he was the last person on earth. You decided to leave him be for the time being and try to make new friends.

By the end of the day, you had befriended the shy greenette from your class. He chatted with you animatedly as you packed your bag to leave class. It was difficult to hold a decent conversation with him at first since he kept blushing and turning away, flustered, but you managed to get him to be comfortable. 

And that irked Bakugo to no end.

You tried over and over for that damn Deku hut you couldn't bother even talking to him again? Maybe if you asked his name again, he would have replied. But now you were making him furious. On his way out of the class, he dumped the contents of Deku's pencil case on the floor and stormed off, making sure to at least crack a pen or two under his shoes before leaving. 

"What's with him?!" You scoffed, helping Midoriya pick up his stationery. 

"He's always been like that..." he mumbled. Your fists clenched at your sides, your nails digging into your palm. 

"Are you okay, Y/n?"

"Yeah, it's just that," you looked down at your shoes, confused with the whole soulmate deal, "he's my soulmate."

Midoriya's pencil case fell from his hand, his stationery clattering everywhere. You gave him a deadpan look when he gasped, covering his mouth with his hand. "KACCHAN? YOU? SOULMATES?"

"Announce that in a loudspeaker next time." 

"I can't believe this. Y/n, maybe you can change him!"

"Don't be silly. We can't change anyone."

"But- maybe you're the one that will bring out Kacchan's nicer side!"

"Totally." You rolled your eyes.

In a month, you learned to ignore Bakugo's presence. You regularly hung out with Midoriya, much to bakugo's annoyance. He never talked to you, but I made sure you knew he hated you talking to Midoriya. Either way, you ignored Bakugo and managed to steer away from him and his so-called friends.

That was until Midoriya called in sick one day.

Brooding, you left the school building alone. You heard footsteps and snickering behind you and glanced back to see Bakugo's friends. Your eye twitched in annoyance, and you continued walking ahead. But his friends had other plans. They pulled you back by your backpack, almost making you fall. 

"Hey, you're the one always hanging out with that sore loser." One of them snickered, taking your bag and unzipping it. "Got any cash? Oh, look, candy." 

"Put it back, zip the bag, and hand it over." You said firmly. 

"Or what?" 

You hesitated, unsure of what to do. They tossed your school bag amongst each other as you tried getting it back. Annoyed, you opened your water bottle, manipulating the water to come out and splash them all. They glared at you, their uniforms wet, rolling up their sleeves. You backed away into a pillar, feeling intimidated. 

"What do you fuckers think you're doing?" Bakugo's voice boomed, pushing his 'friends' away from you, stepping in front of you almost protectively. 

"Really Bakugo? You're standing up for that quirkless runt's friend?" One of them said.

"You're not laying a hand on my soulmate." He hissed. Realization dawned on their faces, and they stepped back, apologizing.

"Now screw off." Bakugo barked at them. 

Sure, you and Bakugo never talked, but when he stood up for you, your chest warmed, and the slightest grain of hope was planted in your heart. You had to put some sort of effort for your relationship to work. 

"Uh... Thanks." You mumbled. 

"Whatever." He looked away from you, pretending to be uninterested, but stayed put. You gathered your belongings and faced him, scratching your cheek awkwardly. He glanced at you once and made a move to leave, stopping when you held his sleeve.

"Do you want to hang out sometime?" You asked shyly. He stared at you blankly, eyebrows knitted together. You let go of his sleeve, stepping back a little. "We're soulmates, so I thought it would be a good idea to get to know each other a little bit..." you trailed off. 

I'm so stupid. What made me think he'd want to get to know me? I'm just another extra in his way. He doesn't care that we're soulmates, so why do I?

"Give me your number." He demanded, snapping you out of your thoughts.

"Eh?"

"Are you deaf? Give me your number so we can decide where to meet over the weekend." He grumbled, handing you his phone. 

"O-oh." You took the phone from him with shaky hands, adding your number to his contacts, internally cursing yourself for being this excited. 

But this was progress, right?

You sighed, glancing down at your phone for the millionth time that afternoon, waiting in the café he told you he'd meet you. He was thirty minutes late. You allowed yourself to wait for fifteen minutes more, before getting up from your seat, tears pooling in your eyes.

What made you think he wanted to get to know you? He probably agreed to a meetup so you would get off his nerves for some time.

"I hate this." You mumbled to yourself, walking out of the café. 

"Hate what?" A familiar voice asked. You glanced back with a frown, freezing when you saw Bakugo. 

"I get caught up in the rush hour, and you decide to ditch my ass?" He rolled his eyes, voice sarcastic.

"Can you blame me?" You grumbled, looking away.

"Klutz." He clicked his tongue. You followed him back into the café, sitting across from him. He stared outside the giant glass panes, elbow on the table, chin in his palm. The sun cast a soft glow in his hair, his maroon eyes almost glowing. His gaze turned to you again, a frown replacing his once neutral features.

"Done orderin' yet?"

I was supposed to order? You picked up the menu, feeling flustered. You ordered your favourite drink while he ordered a cup of cinnamon tea. 

"So what's yer quirk?" He asked. 

"Water manipulation," you replied. "I can basically make the water do what I want it to. Pretty lame." You pointed your finger at a glass of water, having drops of water dance around your finger.

"It's not lame. Can you make weapons?" He asked a hint of amusement in his eyes. You nodded, making a small needle. 

"It's perfect for a hero."

"You want to be a hero, right?" You asked, smiling. "Your quirk is really strong."

"Damn right." He crossed his arms across his chest, sporting a devilish grin. "What about you?"

"I don't know, to be honest. I don't think hero-ing is my thing, so I'm just going to see where life takes me." 

Bakugo snorted, and the little confidence you gained to talk to him went crashing down again. You looked down at your hands, wondering why fate had to put two completely opposite people together. You two would never get along. You felt like he was sitting there across from you solely because he felt obliged to since you were soulmates. 

You silently sipped on your drink once it arrived. Bakugo's eye twitched in annoyance as he watched your glum expression. His jaw clenched as he took in your hairstyle and that stupidly cute white colour sundress you wore, a weird feeling surging in his stomach. What irritated him the most was that you barely looked up at him as if you were scared of him. 

"Do I scare you, Y/n?" He asked, his voice surprisingly calm. You almost jumped when he used your name.

"Er- a little bit, I suppose?" You replied honestly.

He let out a 'tch', taking a sip of his tea. "It's not like 'm gonna kill you."

"It's not just that... are we going to be like this forever?"

"Like what?" He raised an eyebrow.

"Ignoring each other, you being unnecessarily rude to me and many other obvious things."

"First of all, you're the one that doesn't bother even looking at me," Bakugo growled. "Stop making it sound like it's my fault."

"Because the first time I asked for your name you snapped at me!" You reminded, glaring at him. He bared his teeth at you in a scowl. You shook your head, leaning back in your chair, looking out of the window. 

"Look," He ruffled his hair, averting his eyes from you, "this is new to me. I don't know how to go on about this soulmate shit, so give me some time to get used to it."

Your eyes shifted up to him, your gaze softening. He was right. You two were suddenly forced together. Two completely opposite strangers. It was going to take some time for both of you to get used to this. 

"Looks like we both need some time to get used to this." 

Bakugo's breath hitched at your smile. He grumbled, looking away with the faintest pink dusting his cheeks. Maybe you weren't that shitty of a soulmate.

He was slowly warming up to you. Slowly, but surely. When you greeted him in the morning, he at least looked at you and grumbled back an incoherent response. He was getting used to your blabbing during free periods and found himself, God forbid, enjoying your voice. 

One random day, he decided to walk home with you, much to your surprise. You walked beside him in silence, stealing happy glances at him now and then. You were finally getting somewhere with him. "Where do you live?" he asked, stopping in front of a modern Japanese-style house. 

"Just around the corner." You replied. "You?"

"Right here, dumbass." He replied, opening the residency gates. 

"Oh. Looks like we live really close." You grinned. His heart almost leapt out of his chest at that stupidly cute grin. 

"Whatever..." He stepped on the other side, slamming the gates shut and disappearing into his house. 

"Sometimes he acts really strange..." you muttered.

Over the months, you two grew even closer. He respected you enough to let you step into his abode, also known as his room. You two would game or do homework together and then laze around together. If it got too late, he'd walk you home. He made sure to flick your forehead and tease you in greeting every morning. 

Even Midoriya noticed. 

His jaw almost dropped to the floor when he saw you talking to him, your hands making exaggerated gestures as you told him something. The Kacchan he knew would usually yell a 'shut up!' and move on with his day.

It seemed to be going perfectly fine until there were ten months left for Bakugo's entrance exam. 

Today, you guys would be filling out forms for the high school you wanted to attend after this academic year was over. Of course, almost everyone in your class wanted to attend hero schools and courses. 

"Oi, where are ya going to be attending?" He asked. You held your form up for him to read the name of the high school. It was a regular high school where students who didn't want to pursue hero careers studied. 

"It's obviously U.A. for you?" 

"Yeah."

Midoriya hopped over to you with his form in hand. The class was almost empty now since the lessons were over. "Y/n! Where are you applying?" He peeked at your form, giving you a beaming smile. "You said wanted to run a business after high school, right?"

"Yup!"

Bakugo glared at Midoriya, a vein popping on his forehead. That damn Deku knew you wanted to attend a business course, but he didn't. Why didn't you ever tell him? Were you scared he'd belittle you? Bakugo stood up, snatching Deku's form. As if on cue, his little minions gathered around him, snickering at Midoriya. 

"Look who's applying to U.A. Did you really think a quirkless fuck like you could get into U.A.?" Bakugo cocked his head at Deku, daring him to speak back.

"Kacchan, please give me my form back."

"You want it back? Beg."

"Katsuki, give it back." You said sternly. Ignoring you, he burnt Midoriya's form to ash.

"You'll never be a hero," One of Bakugo's minions cackled.

"If you want to be a hero so badly, take a swan dive off the roof. Maybe you'll be born with a quirk in your next life." Bakugo snickered as he left, glancing back to give Midoriya a smirk. Your eyes widened at Bakugo's words. Deku glared at Bakugo, the angriest you ever saw your green-haired friend. 

You never intervened in Bakugo's vendetta against Midoriya before. But when Bakugo spat such venomous words, you couldn't hold it back anymore. You marched out of the class, catching up to him. You put a hand on his shoulder, making him glance back questioningly. You took his hand, pulling him away from his friends.

"Oi, what are you doing?" He asked in confusion as you led him to the staircase. You shoved him against the wall, taking him by surprise. 

"What the fuck-" Before he could finish, your palm crashed into his cheek.

"What's wrong with you?!" You screamed. "What would you do if he actually killed himself?!" Bakugo held his cheek in shock, guilt washing over now that he repeated his words to Midoriya in his head. Then rage clouded his senses. You were standing up for Deku instead of him.

"You always do that." He scowled. You furrowed your eyebrows in confusion. "You're always standing up for that fucking Deku! What do you even like about him?! He's just a quirkless nobody!"

"He's my friend!" 

"Well, you clearly care for your damn friend more than your soulmate!" Bakugo yelled. 

"What- where did that come from?!"

"Hah, don't pretend you don't know what I'm talking about. That damn Deku knew you wanted to go in the business course, but you didn't bother telling me?" He took an intimidating step towards you. "Is it because you think I'm so shitty I would have made fun of you for choosing the business course?"

"It's nothing like that." You replied, unfazed by the steps he took towards you. "I never told you because you never asked since you were too busy flaunting your quirk."

"Just tell me how much you fucking hate me at this point." He scowled.

"You're right. I do hate you and your pride you can't put aside for one minute."

He held his head in his hands, pacing back and forth. He glanced at you, dropping his hands to his sides. "This is why I hate soulmates."

"Don't worry. I'm not very happy about being bound to you for the rest of my life either." You snapped. You turned away from him to descend the stairs, glancing behind your shoulder for the last time. "Good luck being a hero with that mindset of yours. Heroes are meant to protect the weak. Not bully them to death."

Bakugo seethed in his place, his fists fuming. "You know what? I wish I had a scissor the day I found you were my soulmate so I could cut that damn string that made me meet you."

Wordlessly, you left him on the staircase.

When you weren't there in class the next day, Bakugo assumed you called in sick. But when the teacher told him you were moving to another school, his blood chilled. Were you transferring schools because of him? 

After school, he found Deku leaving the school building. He ran up to him, stopping the boy. "Why is Y/n changing schools?"

"Umm..." Deku knew the reason you changed schools was Bakugo, but he couldn't say it to his face unless he wanted a fracture in his skull, "she said she found a better school."

Bakugo let Deku go, his eyebrows knitted deep in thought. Were you seriously going to transfer schools without saying a word to him after your fight? Was he a little too harsh? When he paid attention to his surroundings, he realized his feet had taken him to your house. He brought his finger to the doorbell, hesitating. What would he say after the door opened?

I do hate you and your pride you can't put aside for one minute, your voice echoed in his head. He gulped and pressed the doorbell. 

An older woman with the same h/c hair as yours opened the door, "Hello. You are...?"

"I'm Y/n's-" Y/n's what? Friend? Clearly, you guys weren't friends anymore. Soulmate? You both expressed you didn't want each other. "I'm Y/n's classmate."

The woman nodded and called for you. He heard you reply, 'I'm coming!' in the background. You appeared behind your mother, peeking over her shoulder to see who it was, freezing when you saw it was Bakugo. You stepped outside, closing the door behind you so you two could have some privacy. You sat on the porch beside Bakugo, playing with a thread on your pants. 

"Changing schools, huh?" He was the first one to speak, looking anywhere but at you.

"Yeah," you replied, "it's better this way."

There was thick silence between you two, followed by the buzz of the hot afternoon. Bakugo broke the silence first. "Is it because of me?"

You looked up at the deep blue sky, shielding your eyes from the sun. "I don't know," you admitted. "I want to spend the rest of my months in junior high stress-free. This seems like the only appropriate solution to me." 

You met his crimson eyes, giving him a smile, "I want to end this one on a good note. So forgive me for my sharp words yesterday."

Bakugo wished you'd slap him again instead of being so nice to him. He did not deserve this. He did not deserve your kindness. He bit his tongue, trying to ease the surging emotions inside his chest. He wanted to apologise. He really did. But he couldn't.

"Is this goodbye?" He asked. He watched you get up and walk back to your door. He got up, facing you, waiting for a reply. 

"See you later." You smiled as you closed the door. 

That day was the last time you talked to each other.

Bakugo magnificently failed his provisional licence test. He was curled up in his bed, buried under a blanket, his entire body aching after confronting Midoriya earlier. There was too much running in his mind. It was overwhelming. His hunch of Deku getting All Might's quirk proved to be right, and then there was the fact that he was slowly going to rebuild his friendship with Midoriya. There was also you.

He was fixing his mistakes, working towards being a better version of himself, but he never got to fix his relationship with you. It had been so long since he last saw you he was starting to forget what you looked like. The bond between you two was still there. He knew because every time he held his hand up and closed his eyes, he could still see the red string. 

Bakugo got out from under the blanket. After the house arrest, he'd visit his neighbourhood and talk to you again. He wanted you to give him another chance. This time, he wasn't going to let you go.

As soon as his house arrest was lifted, he took the bus and stopped by his neighbourhood. He ran past his house and turned to the corner where your house was. He stopped in his tracks when he saw you standing outside with a guy your guys' age. Your hair had grown longer, and your facial features seemed to have matured from the last time he saw you. You smiled at the mysterious boy standing next to you. Your smile was still pretty as it was before. 

Bakugo's jaw clenched when the boy leaned in and grabbed your waist, pulling you in for a kiss. His heart fell to his stomach. Who was he kidding? Did he really expect you to wait for him all this time? 

He slowly turned back to where he came from, cursing the tears that formed in his eyes. He wiped them away, convincing himself that you deserved someone better than him anyway.

Schools all over Japan shut down due to the war. You were lazing on the couch, re-reading a novel. Every now and then, you tuned in with the news. You found out Katsuki and many other hero students would be on the frontlines. 

If you were being honest, you missed him. Or it was more like you missed the idea of what it would be like if you two remained by each other's side instead of drifting apart. In your freshman year, you got into a relationship with a guy you thought was your type. But you couldn't seem to let your soulmate go, and your ex didn't seem to like the idea of you already having a soulmate. That was the end of your relationship.

You sighed, putting the novel over your face. You suddenly felt a sharp, piercing pain in the left side of your chest. You sat up straight, cupping your breast, trying to breathe the pain away. Unexpectedly, the red string on your little finger appeared again. Your eyes widened, and you stood up. 

This time, you did not have the chance to follow it. Because the red string of fate snapped in two.

You picked up the tray with coffee and cake, setting it on your customer's table with a smile. It had been a few months since you opened this café, and business was booming. 

Ten years had passed since the incident with the red string snapping in two. After the war was over, you found out that Bakugo died for a short period of time due to the rupture in his heart. It was fixed by the Ninja hero, edgeshot. Bakugo was okay. When you closed your eyes, you could still see the red string. It gave you some sort of comfort knowing he was alive.

At the end of the day, you closed the café, dropping the shutters and securing the lock. You yawned, bringing a hand to your mouth to cover it. You were closing awfully late today. You pulled your long coat tighter around your body, shivering in the cold midnight breeze. 

You walked the empty streets, hands in your pockets to keep them warm. You let out a long exhale, watching your breath condense. You felt a slight tug on your little finger and slid your hand out. You stopped breathing when you saw a red colour string around your finger. 

You stood there, staring at your hand. After a few seconds of trying to calm your dancing heart, you looked up, your breath hitching. There he was. Standing a few feet across from you, watching you through his ash-blonde bangs, was Bakugo Katsuki.

Tears pooled in your eyes as you took in your soulmate. He'd grown so tall since the last time you saw him. You were just teenagers then. He had gained more muscle, the streetlamps highlighting his gains hiding behind his winter hero suit. He looked ethereal. 

He gaped at you in disbelief. He thought he was hallucinating when he saw the red string appear again. He took a step towards you, admiring the beautiful woman you blossomed into. How long had it been? Ten years?

You ran up to him, putting all your uncertainty aside and throwing your arms around him. Bakugo put his hands up in surprise, unsure where to put his hands. 

"I missed you, Katsuki." You whispered, your ear on his chest, eyes closed. You felt strong arms wrap around you, pulling you closer to him. 

"I missed you too, Y/n" He breathed, his voice reverberating in his chest.

You pulled away, admiring his vermillion eyes shining in the streetlight. He looked so different yet the same. You put some distance between you two, clearing your throat. 

"What're you doing out here so late?"

"Patrol. What about you?"

"Just closed the café. I got busy with the transactions and lost track of time." You finished with a small laugh. Bakugo's chest warmed at that sound.

"Opened your own café, huh?" He smirked. 

"Yeah," You smiled. 

You guys stood across from each other with so much to say, yet no words would form. You shifted on your feet, putting a hand behind your neck, averting your gaze. "I thought... I'd never see you again. When you almost died in the war... it scared me, Katsuki."

"Sorry..." He mumbled.

You shook your head, taking his hands. "I'm sorry, Katsuki. I never gave you a chance. I- I left after saying some pretty mean things. I'm so sorry."

"Shh," His big, calloused hands cupped your cheek, wiping the tear under your eye before it rolled down. He wanted you to know he was a changed man. Sure, he was still a little quick to temper, but his rage had calmed down over the years. 

"I'm sorry too, Y/n," He murmured, bringing his forehead to yours. "I said some pretty messed up shit too. I never got a chance to apologize. I'm sorry. Im sorry I pushed you away."

"It's alright, Katsuki," you said, holding the hand cupping your cheek, "we were both immature teenagers. It's okay."

"Will you... will you give me another chance?" He asked, watching your expressions carefully. "Unless you're still with that guy."

"Eh?" You tilted your head in confusion. "Which guy?"

Bakugo's face went beet red, and he stepped back from you, coughing. "You know... that guy you kissed."

Your mouth formed an 'O' in realization. You burst out laughing, making Bakugo sweatdrop. "I didn't even last a week with that guy!" You wheezed, wiping a tear from your eye.

"Whatever..." He blushed, scratching his cheek.

"How did you find out though?"

Bakugo huffed, a small pout on his lips. "I wanted to apologize, but when I saw him kiss you, I wasn't sure you wanted me anymore."

You smiled up at him, your eyes softening. "I'll give you another chance, Katsuki. So please give me a chance, too. Let's fix this together."

He brushed the hair away from your face, tucking some away behind your ears. His index and thumb came down to your chin, tilting your head, eyes drifting down to your lips. You leaned closer to him, your eyelashes fluttering shut. He pressed his lips to yours, his heart racing at the feeling of your soft and warm lips on his. 

You went on tiptoes, finding it difficult to crane your neck for him. He smiled against your lips, lowering his back so it would be easier for you. You pulled back for a few seconds, your hands on his shoulders, your cheeks flushed. He dived in for another kiss, this time with more passion. Your back arched when you felt his tongue in your mouth, your hand travelling up to his hair to gently tug on it, his hand behind your neck. 

Time might have not been your favour previously, but time doesn't stay the same forever. Both of you were willing to redo everything and close the decade-long gap away from each other. It wasn't too late yet. 

Your intimate moment with Bakugo was broken when his pager cracked to life. He almost jumped, pulling away from the kiss. "Dynamight, are you still in the area?" A voice asked, "We need backup."

"I'm comin'" He replied. 

He looked down at you, his cheeks red. It was cute. "So, uh- Looks like I gotta go."

"It's alright." You replied, breathless from the kiss. 

"Give me your number." He unlocked his phone, handing it to you. You took it from him, saving your contact number. 

"See you later, Katsuki." You smiled, handing him his phone. 

Bakugo took his phone, feeling content. He pressed another quick kiss to your lips before taking off with explosions, his heart thrumming in his chest. He finally felt at ease after years of wanting to chase you. 'See you later.' You said that ten years ago as well. Bakugo knew it wasn't goodbye this time. Because you would be there with him every day from here on.

[beetelbabes]

Lydia's Guilt

Hi hello so I made a post a little while back talking about how the ending to the wedding scene is Lydia's manifestation of her guilt and her coming to terms with what she's lost.

This is all my opinion and my wild theories so! LETS GO

Firstly, lets talk about the wedding scene. Coming into it Lydia says "Rory loves me, that's gotta be enough" Lydia doesn't truly love Rory, just like Rory doesn't love her - Rory is using her and Lydia is allowing it to happen because she is being manipulated and she feels like she isn't going to get anyone in her life who truly understands her so it has to be enough she knows it won't ever be what she is looking for in life but she's given up at this point on finding her own happiness and resigned for "just enough"

Secondly, Rory has no respect for Lydia. It's shown extremely clearly in this scene as he breaks his promise to her about a "small" wedding, he has no respect for her wishes, just her fame. He wants her fame, he wants the attention she gets.

Thirdly, and here's where my beetlebabes heart SOARS. Lydia knows that Beej won't hurt her. There are so many subtle hints towards this, after Rory admits the truth - her first instinct is to move CLOSER to Beej, he is a safety net that she finds herself drawn to. He showed her the truth because he wanted her to make her own choices.

He knows what she needs in the moment & He respects her. Lydia is used to having her own emotions brushed off by Rory, she's used to being ignored and to tuck it all away for the show - Betelgeuse allows her to feel. Instead of invalidating her anger, her gives her an outlet for it in his own way, something that works for them both, he gets to have fun - she gets to let her anger out.

To add to this: he respects her. He banishes everyone in the church, whether he knew that Lydia would want something small or not, he still manages to get her the quiet wedding she was talking about. They just understand each other in a way Lydia's never had before.

HE IS IN LOVE WITH HER. every time he looks at her it's with adoration and love. He loves her. and this is something that HE didn't expect, he didn't expect to fall in love with Lydia but he did and now he knows he can't let that go. He continues to wait and wait and wait for her, he never pushes himself onto her - he just waits for her and that's enough for him. He will wait for centuries for her and he knows this.

Which brings me on to my next point of...

Lydia realises he truly loves her during this scene. All the times before, she had assumed that it was all for show, just like her relationship with Rory - she assumes that no one could ACTUALLY love her but during this scene is when she realises. She realises he truly does actually love her but that she won't be able to have this, she knows that Delia and Astrid will not understand, she knows that by the end she will have to banish him. She argues with her own thoughts because in front of her in a man willing to give her the life she wants and she isn't allowed it.

Beej has a similar realisation. He isn't stupid, he knew bringing Lydia into the afterlife was a violation - you can't prove me wrong that he didn't know. HE DID. he did it because he knew Lydia wouldn't understand that he just wanted to help her with no strings attached, this was his way of doing it. But he did also want to marry Lydia because he does love her. His realisation was that he lost her again, that it was over and he was going to be alone again.

WHICH BRINGS ME TO MY FINAL POINT

Lydia feels guilty for banishing him. THIS expression stuck with me throughout all my rewatches of this film. She looks resigned, she knew it had to be this way. She knew she had to banish him even if she'd realised that he loved her for HER in a way no one else has before.

She holds this expression for a few seconds, its not a fleeting moment. She truly is resigned. She only smiles again once Delia touches her and brings her back to the present.

SHE STILL DREAMS OF HIM. We don't know how long this scene is after the wedding scene but she still thinks of him, she still feels guilty. The guilt clearly keeps her up at night and MAYBE she misses him, realising that no one else will understand why she thinks of him still. No one will understand, just like no one would've understood if she hadn't banished him.

ANYWAY thats my long ass post, I've wanted to analyse the small emotions in these scenes for so long, and as said above - its all my thoughts! I'm a silly shipper so maybe I'm looking too into it I just love them

[yourdarlingalina]

is it new years yet? | jack hughes

synopsis: y/n's new years kiss is the last person she expected, her former fuck buddy pairing: jack hughes x fem!reader word count: 2.7k warnings: slightly steamy, heavy making out, mentions of sex, a bit angsty, not properly proofread is it new years yet? - sabrina carpenter

What's the best way to forget about your fuck buddy who broke things off with you a week before Christmas? Who you definitely don't have feelings for and who definitely didn't find out about said feelings by accident?

From a responsible person's point of view, it was the correct decision. I fell for someone who just wanted no strings attached sex. He doesn't want a relationship, and it is supposed to save me from being hurt even worse in the future. But I am not a responsible person. A responsible person wouldn't have been talking about their feelings with friends when they knew that the person they had feelings for was also in the same bar.

Which is how I ended up in my current situation. A glass of champagne in one hand while the other holds onto a random guy's shoulder as we sway and grind to the upbeat tempo blasting through the club's speakers. The best way to get over a guy is to get under a new one, right? At least, that's what my friends were telling me as they convinced me to go out with them for New Year's Eve.

"Start the new year off with someone new."

And start the new year off with someone new I will. The guy in front of me is decent looking, he's no Jack but he'd do. His hands were at least doing all the right things, one gripping my hip to pull me closer as the other was pushing my hair out of the way of my neck so that he could leave sloppy open mouthed kisses to my skin. Hands roamed down my body as I brought the champagne flute closer to my lips, this night would require copious amounts of alcohol if I am to make it to midnight. He pawed his hands down from my hips to my ass, gripping and squeezing in ways that should be making me want to push my body harder against his. His mouth trailing from my neck down to cleavage, nipping and sucking at the exposed flesh.

He was doing everything right to my body, but it just didn't feel right. I wanted it to be Jack who was brave enough to handle me this way in the middle of a crowded club, not ashamed to be seen with me, but it wasn't. He made it very clear that he only wanted me in private, with no one knowing that I was his on those nights and that he was mine, even if it was only for a short time. It was like he knew my body better than I did, knew what buttons to press to make me cry out his name. How he made me come undone again and again. The kisses that gave me full body shivers and touches that left my skin feeling like it was set alight.

I was not getting those feelings with the man attached to my body. He seemed like he'd be a great lover for a night, but not in the way I needed. Perhaps if I met him before everything, I could be happy with him but it felt like I had been ruined.

A party popper would end up becoming my hero of the night when one went off right next to my ear causing the glass in my hand to tumble down, splashing champagne on the man as it made its way down to shatter on the floor.

"Oh God! I am so sorry!" I profusely apologize as the man whose name I can't quite remember jumps away from me.

"It's alright, suppose I was gonna end up sticky tonight anyway. I'll be back." He shoots me a wink as he makes off in the direction of the bathrooms. I take the brief moment to escape to the bar, being careful to not slip on the alcohol or broken glass scattering the floor.

I push past the glitter and sweat coated bodies, pushing myself into a corner where I don't think my former dance partner will find me. One of the bartenders comes over to take my drink order not long after I get into my seat.

"What can I get for you?" The man asks quickly, obviously on the verge of losing it due to the new year's rush tonight.

"She'll have a vodka cranberry and I'll have a beer." A voice says from behind me, a voice I know extremely well. I didn't know he was going to be here tonight. Not a single person thought to mention that to me? The bartender makes a move to speak but the man behind me continues, "Brand doesn't matter, just whatever you have." The bartender just nods then scurries off to get our drinks.

I slowly turn on my stool to face him.

"Jack." I say, acknowledging him.

"y/n." He says back, sending shivers down my spine with just how he says my name. He moves closer, keeping me between the counter and his body. Leaning over his body almost touches mine, he keeps his eyes on me, his face getting closer, and for just a second I think he's about to kiss me, but his fingers wrap around the beer bottle that was placed on the counter and suddenly he's back where he was originally standing. "You seem to be having fun tonight."

"You've been watching me?" I blurt out before I could think. Instead, grabbing my drink, putting it to my mouth before I could say anything else.

"Hard not to when you're basically letting whoever that was fuck you in front of everyone." He bitterly spits out. He's jealous? He's not allowed to be jealous. He doesn't want me, I got that loud and clear.

"So? Why do you care?" His eyes snap to me. "I'm not yours, I never was." I break my eyes away from his, suddenly thinking about how interesting my drink looks. He smirks at my sudden movement, his fingers grip my chin and force me to look at him. His face is so close to mine again, I can feel his breath on my face, can smell the alcohol off his lips. He's intoxicating. I clench my thighs together at the small act. Even like this he still has so much power over me. I am undoubtedly his.

His eyes flick from my eyes down to my clenched thighs to my eyes again to the countdown clock behind me and finally back to my eyes. "Thirty minutes till midnight. Meet me on the balcony upstairs in fifteen?" He's asking but it comes out as more of a command.

"Why would I do that?" I push back. I can at least hold onto a little bit of my dignity during this. Can't I? Might be debatable.

"Because I made a mistake two weeks ago." He whispers against my lips. My eyes flutter shut, he's gone when I open them.

◈   ◈   ◈   ◈   ◈   ◈   ◈   ◈   ◈

Fifteen minutes went by quicker than I would've liked for them to. I still haven't made up mind on if I should talk to him or not, but my body decided that I'd still go. I slowly made my way up, giving myself more time to collect my thoughts. I hadn't talked to him properly since that night.

It was a night out after a big win, Jack had invited me and some friends to go out with him and the team. Teasing remarks were thrown at me about how I look at Jack like I was in love. I never did hide my staring well. He had noticed too, how when he looked over at me, my eyes were already on him. Adoration was obvious in my eyes when they were on him. When I got quiet and didn't make any attempt to shoot down the accusations they all got loud. "You love Jack!" They shouted over and over. My cheeks flushed, embarrassment flooded up veins, I had to get away from it.

He heard. I turned to leave the group and he was behind me, eyes wide and jaw slack in shock. He was frozen, a deer in headlights. Me whispering his name snapped him out of his daze causing him to walk off in the opposite direction. I made the mistake of going after him.

"We said no strings attached." He said after the door slammed behind me, his back still facing me.

"I know." My words came out whispered, I was terrified of this. This was never meant to happen. Feelings were never supposed to happen. He was never supposed to find out that one of our few rules were broken.

"We can't continue like this." He finally turned and faced me. He showed no emotion, he was so goddamn hard to read. His blank facial expressions would be the bane of my existence.

"I know." I whispered again, the only words I could get out. I fucked up, by catching feelings, by continuing this when I knew I caught feelings. I tried to push them down and pretend that they didn't exist, but it just wasn't enough.

"I don't love you." I squeezed my eyes shut, feeling the tears start to well up and not daring to let them have the chance of escaping. I knew how he felt, but hearing it was a completely different feeling.

"I know." I sobbed out. He was gone by the time I opened my eyes.

Here I was, yet again, going after him. I somehow made it to the top of the stairs and through the crowd of dancing bodies. There he was, standing on the balcony, leaning over the railing and looking out at the Hudson. I stood there for a good minute, just staring at him, debating on if it was even worth listening to him. Did he really make a mistake or was he just feeling guilty that he didn't reciprocate my feelings?

"What was the mistake?" I finally ask.

His head whips around so fast that I almost think that he's about to give himself whiplash. A small laugh like huff comes out as I walk further out onto the balcony.

"I almost thought you weren't gonna come." His voice is softer, careful, like he was actually scared of the thought that I wouldn't meet him. I look back at the countdown clock on the wall, ten minutes to midnight.

"I like to be fashionably late." He lets a small laugh escape at my comment. God, I love that sound.

"You always have." He turns away again, hands gripping the railing, knuckles turning white from the tension.

"You still haven't answered my question." I say, waiting for him to finally tell me what the mistake was. Was he regretting ending us or how he spoke to me?

"That night." He starts to say before cutting himself off, lips pursed into a thin line.

"Yes?" I nudge his leg with the tip of my heel. He looks at me, eyes scanning my face like he's trying to read my thoughts. Trying to get any idea of what I'm thinking.

"I lied to you." No. "I said I didn't love you." No. "I lied." No.

I should be wanting to hear this, but I don't. I never thought I'd be the type of person to run back to a man just because he gives me a pretty apology and I will not start now, especially when I know it's not true.

"You don't love me, you just miss the sex. Don't worry, you'll find someone else to suck your dick." I move to walk away before I feel this hand come up to grip my arm. He was not going to make this easy for me. All I want to do is go home and crawl under my blankets, forget that all of this even happened in the first place.

"Please, just hear me out." I turn my head to look at him and goddamn those eyes that make me want to melt. He's looking at me so sweetly, I've never seen him look at anyone like this.

"Make it quick." I brush off his hand and lean back towards the railing.

"Oh come on, you know I don't do quickies." He attempts to make a joke, a playful smile pulling on his lips. It quickly fades though as he get serious again. "I broke our rule before we even made it." My head snaps up at his words. What?

"I loved you before we slept together that first time." He can't be telling me the truth. No, our first night together was a drunken mess that was just meant to be a one night stand. The relationship that came after was just mutually beneficial, he didn't have to worry about someone running to the tabloids and I got someone who touched me in a way I didn't think was possible.

"Stop lying to me." I choke out. I don't need a pity confession from him, especially when I just want to leave him behind next year which is in, I quickly check the clock, three minutes.

"I'm not!" He counters back just as the words leave my mouth.

"If you loved me you wouldn't have reacted like that." My eyes are brimming with tears, this is not how I wanted my night to go. I just wanted to find a new guy to kiss at midnight to make me forget about Jack.

"I never thought you'd feel the same." How he could think that is astounding. I don't think he realizes just how magnetic he is, and not just because he's Jack Hughes, hockey star. No, he was much more than that. A good friend, a shoulder to lean on, someone that listens when you really need it, a respectful person who makes you feel like you're floating when his attention is on you. "I'm not good at expressing my emotions."

"Yeah, no shit!" I nearly scream at him. "What do you expect me to do with this?"

"I want to start fresh next year." He admits, his eyes lock back onto mine. "If you gave me another chance, I promise, I won't fuck it up again." He's not lying, he's being genuine. I can see it written all over his face, the softening of his eyes, the breaking down of his walls. He's having a hard time even attempting to be vulnerable about this.

The shouting from the party starts to get louder. "Ten!" Maybe I should give him another chance. "Nine!" If I get hurt again then it's on me. "Eight!" He is who I want to be with. "Seven!" Why not? Is this not what I wanted just hours ago? "Six!"

"Kiss me." I tell him.

"Five!"

"What?" He sputters out.

"Four!"

"You heard me." I say, giving him a soft smile so that he knows I truly mean it.

"Three!" He shifts his body to be parallel mine. "Two!" His hands cup my cheeks. "One!" His lips meet mine as literal fireworks go off. "Happy New Year!" People shout around us. But my mind is just on him. As he's pulling me as close as humanly possible but it's still not enough.

My hands snake up with his abdomen, fingers gripping at anything they can. His hands move to my hair, to my neck, down my chest, caressing softly down to my hips, pulling and pleading to get as close as possible. My body was being set alight, the familiar feeling I've been yearning for. He's pulling sounds out from me that I've never made before. It's from the feeling that he's fully mine now, no hesitancy in his movements, he's confident and proud in what he's doing. 

My fingers move up to curl around strands of his hair, pulling his face fully flush to mine, lips melding and moving against each other at a fiery pace. We break away unfortunately to catch our breath, our smiling faces still touching, neither one of us making an attempt to move farther away. In fact, he's nuzzling his face even closer into mine, if that was even possible.

"What are you going to do with me now?" I ask against his lips, looking up into those beautiful, mind melting, ocean like eyes.

"Start the year off right, by apologizing in so many ways." He says then capturing my lips again before dragging me through the crowd of bodies, down the stairs, and out of the door.

[msmk11]

Heyyy, I just saw that you were taking requests for Tangerine x Readers, and I was wondering if you could write something like Tangerine and reader being fwb before the whole bullet train thingy, and she catches feelings but he's super distant (bro has serious attachment issues) so he pushes her away and is a bitchy manchild about it (LOTS AND LOTS OF ANGST but it has a fluffy ending) (smutty too if ur comfortable with it) ofc u can ignore this request if u don't want to, and I'd write it myself but I have zero motivation rn and I js wanna cry and then giggle😭🫶

And I Have To Live With It, For the Rest of My Life

Tangerine x fem!reader

WC: 3.4k

CW: HEAVY ANGST; slut shaming; booze/being drunk; fighting; cursing; lack of aftercare; mentions of sex; Tangerine is a HUGE asshole. Tiny fluff ending.

A/n: Hi love! Thanks for requesting! Sorry this took so long I just needed to find inspo. I’m also sorry for the lack of smut (and fluff tbh,) I just don’t take smut requests. As for fluff, I did want a “happy ending” but it felt cheap to try and go from ANGST to “everything is perfect again” in such few words. Maybe I’m just traumatized, but I have a hard time forgiving quickly lol and I think that shows here.

Everything was really, really good.

So of course you had to go and ruin it.

People say you can’t control matters of the heart and you think that it’s a load of bullcrap. Why not? Why couldn’t you have control over your heart?

And why did you have to catch feelings for Tangerine?

It isn’t part of the deal. Tangerine is a business partner. An acquaintance. A friend. A friend you occasionally fuck.

Your relationship with Tangerine was always supposed to be casual. No strings attached- business was simply business and fucking simply fucking. But then your heart got involved.

What’s one supposed to do?

Certainly not keep going back to the captor of one’s heart.

So of course that’s exactly what you do.

You’re laying in your hotel bed, completely naked, covers pooled around your waist. You and Tangerine just finished having sex and he’s already up and moving about, throwing on his clothes that had been discarded on the floor somewhere in your flurry of lust. Instead of saying anything, you just watch him in all his glory. You admire his tousled post-sex hair, curls askew, the way his back muscles ripple as he bends down to sweep his shirt up off the ground, and the way his fingers deftly button up his shirt.

“Got a meeting to head off to?” You ask casually.

Translation: Please don’t run off so soon if you don’t have to. Stay.

Tangerine’s eyes flit to yours briefly before he bends down to tie his shoes, “something like that.”

“Mhmm.”

You pull the covers up to your neck, suddenly feeling very vulnerable so bare and exposed to Tangerine who’s nearly fully dressed.

“You got a comb?” the brunette asks you gruffly as he straightens his suit jacket.

You nod towards the bathroom, “yeah, in there.”

He gives you no reply, only walking into the bathroom and shutting the door with a resounding thud.

Your stomach clenches painfully and your heart aches. The indifference with which Tangerine treats you hurts so badly. You���d rather him hate you then act like this. At least you’d know that he felt something, anything.

Is it too early for a drink?

The bathroom door opens again and Tangerine walks out, looking as though nothing ever happened. To him, nothing probably has. Nothing of consequence, at least.

“Well, I’m heading out. See you for our debrief tonight at nine.”

Tangerine begins to walk towards the door.

“Wait!” you call out.

You stop him just in time, his hand frozen on the handle. You swear he visibly tenses at your words, “what?”

“Could- could you at least get me a towel? Please?”

He doesn’t even look at you before nodding, “Yeah.”

He disappears into the bathroom for a moment before reappearing with a towel in hand. Tangerine, it seems, doesn’t even have the decency to walk the towel over to you. Instead, he tosses it across the room, almost hitting you in the face.

“Thanks.”

Shame pools in your stomach and you keep your gaze on the towel in your hands.

Tangerine grumbles a reply and then makes for the door so quickly that there’s no chance for you to say anything more.

Your heart sinks at the possibility that Tangerine might know you have feelings for him.

*****

You’ve already found a secluded spot in the hotel lounge and have a drink in hand when the twins appear downstairs. They take a seat across from you wordlessly and Tangerine lifts his hand in the air gracefully, motioning for a cocktail waitress to come take his order. Lemon and him order their drinks, and you ask for a second. It bothers you severely when you catch Tangerine winking at the waitress out of the corner of your eye.

You down the rest of your drink in one gulp and ignore how it burns your throat.

“Right, so the job’s done. When are we getting out of here?” Lemon asks tiredly.

“We,” Tangerine says, pointing between him and his brother, “are out of here first thing in the morning, “I’ve booked our tickets for a 5 am flight.”

“And her?” Lemon responds, pointing to you.

Tangerine barely glances at you, but you can see his jaw tense, “the job’s done. Figured she’s a fucking big girl who can handle getting herself home. Isn’t that right, love?”

Condescension drips from Tangerine’s words and it makes your stomach drop. You refrain from saying what you really want to and instead assume a relaxed persona, “mhmm, always right you are. I arranged for my travel last night.”

You, luckily, weren’t lying, though you had ordered a car big enough for three. More room for you, you guess.

The waitress comes back with your drinks and you eagerly take yours. When she asks if you need anything else, you can tell that she’s really only talking to Tangerine. Still, you tell her yes, asking for a third drink.

Lemon eyes you, “you haven’t even touched your second drink and now you’re ordering a third?”

You shrug your shoulders nonchalantly and lean back in your chair, “I’ve got the money to spend on it now that we each just made what, nearly 12,000 pounds?”

Lemon smirks in celebration and holds out his drink to you, “cheers.”

You clink glasses but Tangerine doesn’t join in, a perpetual frown gracing his face.

“Ya really wanna get fucking sloshed before ya travel tomorrow?” the brunette suddenly chimes in- rather judgmentally, you might add.

“Who said anything about sloshed, Tangerine? I can hold more than you think.”

While your answer is confident, even combative, on the inside, your heart leaps into your throat and pounds desperately. You think you might explode.

“Still, ya certainly don’t have any self-control. Not over ya drinks, your mouth, and most importantly….” Tangerine’s eyes narrow at you, “not over ya emotions.”

Your heart sinks in your chest.

So Tangerine did know about your feelings. Worse? He’s being a right fucking prick about it too. There’s no emotional sensitivity, no respect for privacy, nothing. Serves you right for fucking a cold-blooded assassin.

Unfortunately for you, tears spring to your eyes despite the fury boiling in your stomach, “you wanna talk about control, Tangerine? Let’s talk about how you have so little control over your own feelings that you lash out at others and make them feel like shit, even your own brother, so that you feel better. Let’s talk about how you can’t keep your dick in your pants because you’d rather fuck anything that looks at you than deal with anything real. Let’s talk about how what’s happened between us has made you feel so out of control that you’re willing to go low enough to hash this out in fucking public. You’re a walking disaster, Tangerine, and I feel right fucking sorry for you, I really do.”

You stand up harshly and purposely knock his drink onto his expensive suit. You start to walk away and then turn back, batting your eyelashes innocently, “oh wait, should I get you a fucking towel to clean up? Or would you rather beg me for it?”

You don’t wait for a response and grab a dry towel off a random cleaning rack, throwing it right in his fucking face.

*****

Tangerine glares after you as you storm off.

“What the bloody fuck was that all about?” Lemon protests.

Tangerine ignores Lemon and instead curses loudly before chasing after you. He could not let you have the last fucking word. He catches you right in time, hand stopping the doors of the elevator you’re in.

You look up at him startled, and your shocked expression is quickly replaced with an angry one.

“What the fuck, Tangerine? Get out of here!”

“Ya don’t get to fucking talk to me like that and spill my drink all over me and then just walk away.”

“Why not,” you scoff, “you ran away as soon as you were done using me to jack off. It only seems fair.”

The elevator doors slide shut and the car begins to move upwards slowly.

“Yeah, well that’s usually what happens when ya casually fuck someone. But I don’t think ya have a casual bone in your body- always stomping around being a dramatic attention-whore.”

Tangerine watches your eyes narrow and jaw harden, “there’s a difference between being causal and being a huge dick, Tangerine. I should’ve known you’d be the latter.”

“And I should’ve known not to mess around with a fucking slut like you.”

Your eyes widen in shock and even Tangerine knows that he’s taken things a little too far. While your effort to fight back your tears is valiant, it’s fruitless, and they begin to stream down your face.

“Fuck you, Tangerine. You know, I never expected you to return my feelings, and I’m sorry I crossed a line by falling for you. Swear to fucking god I wish I didn’t. But you- you’ve just crossed an unforgivable line, and I never want to see you again. Have a fucking nice life.”

The elevator doors slide open and you scurry out. This time, Tangerine doesn’t follow you.

*****

After everything that happened with Tangerine on your last mission, you decided to take an indefinite hiatus from work and just focus on yourself.

One of your goals? Fuck your feelings for Tangerine out of you. So of course, you’d been spending a lot of nights out at the bars, seducing all the eligible bachelors of the city into your bed.

You hope that it’s working.

Tonight is no different from the rest- you dressed up in one of your sexy outfits sitting at the bar of some new local pub. You’ve already eyed a muscular blonde about your age from across the bar and motion for him to come over.

He complies and makes his way to you, a cocky smirk on his face.

“Hey gorgeous,” you tease, looking him up and down.

The man takes a seat next to you, “Hullo, love. What’s a pretty girl like you doing sitting at the bar all by herself?”

You shrug nonchalantly, “looking for a handsome man. Like you, I suppose.”

He cocks his eyebrow at you, “you suppose?”

“Always hard to tell in this type of lighting.”

The blonde bites his lip and eyes you, “I can promise you I’m handsome.”

“We’ll see.”

“I’m Matt,” he says, extending his hand.

You respond with your name and grasp his hand. You’re expecting a handshake, but instead he brings your knuckles to his lips and kisses them softly.

“Pleasure to meet you.”

Damn this man is smooth.

“Really, the pleasure is all mine, Matt,” you respond, trying not to appear too flustered.

“Can I get you a drink?”

“Yeah, sure. Surprise me though.”

Matt orders the two of you drinks and you take the time to ogle him. He’s perfect.

But not as per-

Nope.

No, you don’t have time to think about him.

Matt hands you the mysterious concoction and you eye him, “what is it?”

“Just drink,” he nods, “promise it’s good.”

You take a small sip and it’s sweet. It’s yummy, and you take another, larger sip.

“Oh shit, this is good.”

“Told you.”

“Can I know what it is now?”

“No way. Need to hold this above you so you keep coming back to me to ask for another.”

You chuckle and look down, “okay Mr. Smooth-Talker. That was pretty good.”

“I can do a lot more than that,” he says seductively. His hand slides out casually and finds a home on your thigh.

You inhale sharply in pleasant surprise and lean towards him, “oh really?”

Matt leans in towards you too, “yeah, like-“

Just as you’re about to kiss him you hear a loud shout.

“Hey, get your hands off her!”

You startle at the sound and turn to see who could possibly be yelling like a maniac inside this bar. You’re also curious to know who’s the one getting yelled at.

Your stomach drops when you realize that you’re the target. And the yeller?

Tangerine.

“Oh my fucking God,” you curse, resting your forehead in your hands.

Tangerine comes stalking towards you.

“Uh, who the fuck is that?” Matt asks warily.

“My ex….fuck-buddy? Friend-with-benefits? I don’t know, it was complicated. But a piece of shit- that’s what he is.”

“What the fuck are you doing, mate?” Tangerine yells at Matt when he approaches you two. His words slur together and you can tell he’s really, really drunk.

“I could ask you the same thing,” Matt says gruffly.

“I’m not the one getting handsy with someone else’s girl,” the brunette snarls.

You scoff loudly, “Your girl? That’s rich Tangerine. Last I recall I was just a slut you fucked.”

Tangerine’s expression softens just the slightest and you almost think you clock regret in his eyes.

“Look, mate, you’re drunk. So get your ass out of here before I hand it to you,” Matt threatens.

Tangerine is sent back into his rage and steps toward Matt menacingly, “you little fucking,”

“Okay,” you shout, stepping in between them and putting a hand on each of their chests, “that’s enough.”

“Tangerine, go. home,” you growl.

“Yeah fucking right I-“

“Just let me take him,” Matt interrupts.

You scan his tense body, “Look, I appreciate it, but you’re not gonna win. Tangerine here is, well, trained. And I don’t want anything to happen to your pretty face. I’ll take care of him.”

“But he’s definitely stronger than you,” Matt protests.

You side eye Tangerine, “he won’t hurt me.”

The blonde’s eyes narrow.

“Physically, at least.”

Matt finally sighs and steps back, “I’ll be waiting here for you.”

You send him a half smile and then turn to the brunette with a glare, “Let’s. Go.”

Then, you literally grab him by the ear and drag him outside the bar. Tangerine lets out a string of curses and tries to fight back a little before he finally gives up.

When you get outside you let go of his ear and shove him, “What the fuck was that, Tangerine?”

“I was trying to protect you from that git,” he slurs.

“Tangerine, you’re the git. You’re the one that hurt me. It’s you I need protection from.”

Tangerine’s tough guy facade crumbles right before your eyes into one of remorse. He suddenly looks years beyond his age and crumples down onto the sidewalk, back pressed to the wall.

You look down at him with disgust. His hair is all over the place, his clothes are a complete mess, and he reeks of booze.

“I’m calling Lemon.”

With shaky hands you dial his number.

He picks up rather quickly and you can hear the confusion in his voice when he answers, “uh, hello?”

“Lemon, come get your fucking brother.”

*****

Although Matt was everything you could’ve hoped for, your night was ruined after Tangerine left. Luckily, Matt was understanding, and you’d exchanged numbers to meet up another day.

When you’d gotten home from the bar, you’d broken down completely. All of the anger, betrayal, frustration and sadness that had been pent up within you for weeks burst forth like a raging storm. You’d sobbed and screamed and even pitched a picture frame of you, Tangerine, and Lemon across the room, shattering it. The broken glass was a problem for later-you, and you’d ended up falling asleep on your couch, still in your bar clothes.

Loud bangs are what startle you awake hours later, and you curse as you flail off the couch. You hit the floor with a thud and groan. Now, not only is your head pounding, but your back will be all beat up too.

The pounding on your door continues and you curse whoever is making a ruckus this early.

You yank the door open, “what the fuck do you want?”

The last person you expect to see is on the other side.

Tangerine.

“Fuck off,” you spit before swinging the door shut resoundly.

Except the door doesn’t close because Tangerine’s foot catches it.

“Fuck me,” he groans in pain.

The brunette shoves the door back open and you smirk, “that’s what you get for being in places you don’t belong. Now get the hell out of my apartment.”

“Wait, wait. Please, just give me a chance to talk to ya. And then, if ya want, you never have to fucking see my face again.”

You don’t reward him with a response and instead just walk away, sighing.

Tangerine takes this as an invitation and walks inside your apartment, letting the door shut gently behind him. You beeline straight to where you left off on the couch, paying him no mind.

The idiot must not be paying attention because you hear the crackle of glass beneath his shoes and a quiet curse.

Tangerine goes silent and you stiffen, listening closely. You hear the pings of shattered glass being sifted through and then his footsteps as he nears your spot on the couch.

“I forgot about this picture,” he rasps.

“Well you can fucking have it. I don’t want it anymore.”

“Can I- can I sit?”

You briefly glance over at Tangerine and look him up and down. You don’t respond, only nodding.

Though he, like you, is still in his clothes from last night, he looks ten times worse. The purple bags under his eyes are heavy and dark, his hair and mustache aren’t groomed, his button up is missing a few buttons, and his shoes are untied. Maybe it’s bad to say, but you revel in how miserable and pathetic he looks.

“You look fucking awful,” you remark, venom heavy in your tone.

“And ya look like you’ve been crying.”

“Well no shit, Tangerine. Sort of happens when someone you thought was your friend turns out to be a big fucking prick. “

He looks down at his feet and shuffles awkwardly, “I know. I’ve uh, that’s why I came here to talk to ya. To apologize.”

You scoff and look at him with disbelief, “okay now you want to apologize? Only when you’ve fucking hit rock bottom you wanna mend things?”

“Love, no I, I’ve been wanting to since that night in the fucking elevator I-“

“Don’t call me that,” you whisper angrily, lip wobbling in spite of yourself.

“I’m not your love, I’m not your friend, I’m not your anything anymore. We’re done Tangerine, this is over.”

It’s then that the boy you’ve known for almost five years does something you never would have imagined.

He grovels.

He literally gets on his knees before you and grabs your hands tightly, looking up at you with pleading eyes.

“Just listen to me for a second. Please. I want ya to know how fucking sorry I am. Not just for last night, but for everything. I’m sorry I called ya a slut. I’m sorry I was rude, and distant, and an asshole. I’m sorry for fucking you like some piece of meat and then just leaving you behind with no aftercare, no attention, nothing. I’m sorry for being a terrible friend and I’m sorry for not telling you that I love you sooner.”

Tears shine in Tangerine’s blue eyes and he chokes on his next words, “Christ, I love ya so fucking much. And I know I’ve gone and fucked things up now, and that it’s too late. And I have to accept every day for the rest of my life that it’s my fault. I have to live with that. And I will, even though it could kill me. But I don’t know what I would’ve done if I couldn’t tell ya at least once.”

Tangerine’s forehead falls to your knees and his body begins to shake in quiet sobs.

He inhales sharply through his nose, trying to hold back more tears, and looks up at you so sadly. “You’re the best girl out there, and you deserve the best. You deserve to find that with someone. Someone who isn’t me.”

Tears of your own begin to drip from your face and your heart throbs in your chest.

You reach out and cup Tangerine’s jaw so gently it’s as if he could crumble under your fingertips at any second.

“Tangerine,” you whisper.

You search his eyes for any sign of insincerity, of some sign that he’s going to break your heart again. But all you see is true, genuine adoration and vulnerability. Consciously or not, your heart returns to the hands of the one who holds and you pull him in, kissing him softly.

The kiss is sloppy, and salty and wet, but you don’t care, because every peck and sigh and bite is punctuated by what you both know- I love you. I love you. I love you.

[hereforthehitsbaby]

Now Connecting... Cooper Adams/Abbott x F!Reader

Synopsis: Maybe the mysterious stranger next door isn't as grumpy, or shy as you thought.

Warnings: Smut, Mutual Masturbation, Sex Toys, Language, Angst, Shy/Grumpy Cooper at First,

Rating: M

Author's Note: Hey, what’s that over there? *runs away*

Word Count: 3K

Tagging: @rubyfruitjungle @cherryinterlude @lilly3434 @amethystblackkchaos @rosaleelovesdilfs @babygorewhore @dirtylittlefairytales @redpillbluepill @strangererotica

If you would like to be tagged for my fics, please fill this out

Vacations are suppose to be things of relaxation, not worrying about the mundane day to day. A time where you can let loose and be who you are, without judgement or differences. No one knows you, in fact you're almost like a ghost - here one day and gone the next It's fun, really fun to be that way - seeing people that you'll never see again. There is a rush being so close to strangers you have no idea what they will do, or what they will think - seeing you as a regular walker of life. Maybe the licks of confidence could be from the establishment where you were staying, or it could be from the mysterious people who wandered the halls like zombies. Suits, dresses, cases upon cases travelled up and down those carpeted halls - the echo's of business and pleasure radiating all around. There is no telling in where life will lead you all but, for some reason you are in this exact moment together - experiencing the same ticks and tricks with one another, though you may be rooms apart. Behind those closed doors, no one understands what each other are capable of - no how could they when it is all a mystery in the end? Business may be what brings them but, was it always as cracked up as it seemed? Was it really the type of business that you thought? No, of course not, it never was and it never would be in hindsight. But at the end of the day it was never your business, just move on and go forth with your time.

Getting the down time to take this vacation was the equivalent of pulling teeth. Your employer did not want to do anything in their power to let their best asset go for a period of time, then proceeded to get mad when you did not use your vacation time. It was a shit time all around - no matter what you had done it was like there was no pleasing the higher ups in a way. Not wanting to pay you out at the end of the year but still wanting you to take it - left you more confused and let down most days. Alas everything happens for a reason - right? It is possible to imagine the happiness and smirk on their face when you decided to take some well needed time off - leaving you to the suffices of the mortal realm rather than the hell hole you were about to crawl out of. For once it felt so nice to be free from all constraints of your job and be one with reality, not having to see the numbers or statistics of the bunch haunting your dreams like a demonic entity was enticing, calling your name further and further down in the end. You felt so relieved knowing you could walk away with no strings attached; No bosses weighing you down with out of work problems, or even being on call when jackass Todd wants to call out for another sporting event, (fuck you Todd!) This was your time now, one where you can remain vigilant and carefree; A life you have been destined to have. Your paradise was going to be in the shape of the United States. Specifically, Pennsylvania.

Philadelphia wasn't your top fifteen choices but, if you didn't visit your college roommate then she would've murdered you. Ever since the two of you graduated from your master’s program it was like the tides shifted per say; She had a new swanky job working as a full time pharmacist whilst you were working a 9-5 software job - building and breaking code - essentially being like Neo, but without sentient program agents trying to kill you. All of the excitement she thought this would be for you, she wanted to hear - in typical Marianna fashion after all. You agreed of course, and yet when you did you never anticipated the fact that she could get sick - especially for this day and age. It would be okay though, in hindsight it kind of needed to be per-say.

 The Embassy Suites would be your home for the next few weeks but that would be okay - everything was going to work out - it had to. In the back of your uber you watched as the blue skies molded into beauty with the sheer clouds - light speckles of greys and coal lacing the plush scenery; It would either snow or rain, a perfect lazy day in.

Disembarking from the car you waved your driver off, making sure to check out your ride whilst walking back to the hotel. Between the valet greeting you and the the concierge, you felt important, special in the eyes of strangers, a feeling so foreign to you. Out of the corner as you waltzed to the elevator's you could see the outline of a broad man; Chestnut hair in color, straight and slicked back, his jawline could cut glass. His autumn-colored sweater and mustard yellow jacket was something so basic, yet so enticing; Damn he could pull it off – he could make anything look good. Pads of boots could be heard striking the linoleum right in tandem with yours, causing your heart to race. For a moment you wished it was that mystery man residing at the check in desk with his suitcase - but then again you felt as if you were going to be too shy in the matter. Clicking the up button for the elevator you waited patiently, tucking your arms around your chest as you hum quietly. The footsteps stopped directly beside you, a pale skin form taking the same space up. Pulling your lip into a small smirk you swayed softly to this man's side, tilting your chin up to his tall form; "It's a good color on you," you spoke with sincerity, looking up at his gorgeous hazelnut eyes - wanting to dive into the journey of exploring them. Fuck, the fact that he had these little lines around his eyes when he smiled was so special - pulling you in closer as he flashes his toothy grin, the cutest gap sitting between. Nudging your shoulder with his upper arm, he spoke with conviction; "Thank you. Not as good as that blue though." The mystery man had a wink cascading over his form as the elevator doors open, his eyes once flicking to your exposed cleavage.

Following suit with his steps you pushed yourself into the metallic box after him - pressing yourself against the back corner as one does. Looking up at the numbered buttons you could see every single detail of this man's very large hands, causing you to swallow that pool of lust in your mouth; How would it feel to have his hands wrapped around your throat, or buried deep within you? Shaking those thoughts from your mind, you felt his intense gaze shine upon you - sending a warmth down your spine, noticing he was waiting for your floor number. "Uh, 15 please." You managed to choke out, not realizing how out of break you suddenly sounded. The man laughed as he nodded, clicking only the floor 15 button. "Well, looks like we are neighbors then. I'm Cooper." Holding his hand out for you, instantly you took it with a gentle grasp - shaking his hand up and down like a normal civilian, reciting your name for himself. Dropping it out of your own grasp softly, you giggled as you focused forward again, trying to keep your cool. "It is lovely to meet you, Cooper." Before he could respond, the double doors opened wide to reveal the plethora of rows where the elevators stood. Cream and burgundy colored carpeting stretched right up to the ends of every hallway, the soft material against your feet feeling like utter magic. It was a quickened shift when Cooper exited the elevator, nudging his head for you to follow.

"What room is yours?" It came out so naturally and free-falling, there was no pressure to shoo him away or even be weary of his intentions. Biting the inside of your lip you motioned to the left side of the hall, pointing to the 1500-1530 bracket, which caused Cooper to laugh. "Me too, room 1528." Your heart stopped in that moment, this had to be a fucking coincidence. "1527; Damn good job universe." It was a naturalized laugh that slipped from the mouth of Cooper, not forced or awkward in any way. It was nice to see a genuine human being after so many months of fake people coming through the wood works. The one thing that you did not like about this trek was that it was too short; Cooper and you came to your respected rooms far quicker than you anticipated. This was for certain that you would see him again - there wasn't a day in hell where you were going to let this man slip on by. Sliding your keycard over the tap screen, you sent Cooper a wink and closed the door, hearing his remain closed for a moment. There was a hefty sigh that was accompanied by thick words - ones that shot a spiral of heat into your aching sex; "Nice one Adams, way to ruin it with that cutie," Biting your lip at the phrase you pushed the deadbolt back into place, sighing out as you tossed yourself onto the bed. Staring up at the popcorned ceiling your mind could not help but wander at the thought of your next door neighbor; Those thick fingers so skilled and precise. His dialect so particular and pointed, the sways of his tongue with every syllable he annunciates. The small sweat breaking out on your forehead was enough proof that this man had taken over your mind, body and soul within minutes. The essences leaking from your clothed slit was not aiding in the fantasies.

Rolling over to your undone suitcase, you grabbed out your newest toy you managed to snag through TSA - smiling at how easy it was to conceal. You had always heard amazing things about the Satisfyer but now, getting to test it out, good lord you were excited. The enjoyment was bubbling more due to how this was app controlled - meaning anyone across the world could help make you cum. Turning on the device easily, you waited until the double buzz came to light before watching it connect - seeing the plethora of horny people piling in through your friend request. There was one specific name that caught your eye, one that really made your curious in the whole bunch. CA. The name itself was basic enough but, could it possibly be him? Curiosity piqued your interest when the message bubble came up quick after only a minute of accepting his request. Placing the air pulse hole directly onto your clit - you took deep breaths to calm yourself down, the excitement too much to handle. "Call?" The message read, causing your fingers to shake. With these apps you never really know who is behind the screen so to secure your identity, you hid your camera and mic - only planning to use it when you were so close to coming undone. Hitting that white button up top you waited and waited three rings, wondering if he would actually answer. "So, come here often?" the voice rang out, causing your cunt to become slick. It was YOUR Cooper. The smirk radiating through your mouth was enough to make a grown woman blush - devious in nature. Quickly you forked over the control of your vibe - only for it to be cancelled. It was just then that you were having the invite of mutual control, the equivalent of coming at the same time. Once you hit accept, it was over.

The slow buzzing of the vibration mixed with the soft punches of the air pulse caused your mouth to slightly hang open, accidentally unmuting yourself in the process. A softened whimper slipped through the phone as you upped the vibration a slight bit, hearing a guttural groan coming not from your phone, but next door. "Fuck sweetheart, you're so good. Faster, f-fuck faster please." The raw natured begging had you hitting another wave of arousal in no time at all, moving the device up an inch in the pink and blue - watching the gorgeous gradients melt into one another. It's when you slid your finger up to do so that you got see the camera angle of what he was seeing - his thickened cock slick with his own spit, the flesh light sliding up and down in waves onto his length. His cock was a bit darker than his skin tone but good god, you felt yourself almost coming undone just at that picture alone. "Aw, come on Cooper - be a good boy for me." You had no idea where that came from, something else possessing you in the moment. For a moment Cooper stopped moving the flesh light and flipped the camera to face him - obsidian eyes and a snarl lining the sight as you flicked your own camera on - showing him how your nipples were like rocks against the sheen of your tank top. Quickly you flipped the image to show you soaking wet cunt, dribbling onto the bed as he fucked with the vibrations quickly. "I should've known - Princess. You fucking knew how hard you made me on that elevator."

Something evil glinted in your eye as you focused on his face - how his face pulled up into an orgasmic stance, ready to blow his load. Seeing him so vulnerable and soft for you, it caused your whole body to tense. "Mhm, wish you pressed me against the walls and fucked me. Would've been screaming Cooper all day long." Toying with Cooper like this made you feel so fucking good, it was having the power over a man who was the epitome of sex in shoes that made you feel immaculate. Pressing Cooper’s flesh light up to the highest vibration and air pulse setting, you could see how his balls pulled up against his body - threatening to spill his load within the toy itself. You were not too far behind at this rate - your clit was being beaten like a drum and vibrating beyond belief. The white hot pleasure burned deep within the roots of your veins and you felt like you were going to fly. It took Cooper four good pumps before he was snarling, growling out at you - aiding you in your own release. With a quick few circular movements of your vibe - both of you were screaming in ecstasy. It felt as if a freight train hit the two of you, rocking your cores to the max level they could even ponder. Both of you were tossed from your own bodies, streaks of glistening lights flew around you in circles; Cooper’s cum shot so deep into his toy that it started to seep out around the edges. As for you, it was a quick work of drenching the bedsheets below you - thighs quivering with every passing second that you left the vibrator on your clit.

When the vibrations died down, all that could be heard across both of your rooms was panting - breathless motions as you tried to come back down from your highs. To say you both felt alive was an understatement - an outer body experience of this caliber was needed for two worry warts. Cooper was the first to break the panting silence, gulping down to alleviate the dryness in his throat. "That was...holy shit," Cooper let out with a small laugh, moaning as he straightened his back out against the memory foam mattress. You nodded in agreement due to your lack of being able to speak. The more Cooper exposed his neck and clamped his eyes shut - the more you wanted him, to feel him pulse between your legs, to ravish you for all that you are worth. So, as one does, you coaxed him forward with a proposal. Standing up from your mattress with only a tank top on, you started to glide straight towards the hotel room door, playing around with the deadbolt to catch Cooper’s attention. Like a puppy his head tilted and ears perked up, a sly smirk falling onto the corner of his mouth; "What do you think you're doing?" Cooper stated as he leaned onto his elbows, taking in the lighting against your complexion. Opening your door you quickly ran over to room 1528, knocking on the door with a grin - watching how Cooper scrambled to open the door. Upon arrival, Cooper quickly whisked you away inside - tossing your phone to the floor. Your arms came to wrap around his neck as his came to encircle your waist - not letting you go. "You ready for round two?" With that, you slotted your mouth against Cooper’s letting the door slam from behind you.

It was a fact that you would not be able to walk straight for the next four days, but boy would it be worth it. But what you failed to realize was the bug in your phone, the screensharing mode always active during your app usage. Your flight miraculously did not have anyone on it except you. Meeting Cooper wasn’t a chance, hell he lived in Philadelphia. No, it was calculated – it was meant to be. That’s because Cooper Adams didn’t just meet you – he has been watching you for months; Controlling your narrative of why you wanted to go to Philly. Your friend wasn’t sick, she didn’t even live in Pennsylvania…anymore. She wasn’t even alive at all. Just a pretty face in her camera roll, he knew you were the one for him.

[itz-mfkn-de]

mattheo x hufflepuff innocent naive type reader 🫡

AHH I LOVE THESE TWO TG🥳🥳 I hope you wanted a toxic Mattheo because that’s what my brain envisions so 🤗 for some reason I couldn’t think of like a story line so I kinda did like headcanons but at the same time it’s like not??? Idk I just hope you like it 😭

Warnings: toxic! Mattheo, manipulations, cussing, power play, black mail.

—

Mattheo riddle who’s never really cared for any of the girls he’d fuck, all of them were just trophies on his wall. (Quite literally, toxic! Mattheo steals a bra from every girl he fucks and puts the up on his wall.)

He saw sex as an outlet, a way to destress, so sex with no strings attached was a common thing in his everyday life to say the least.

That was until he’d saw you.

He could’ve sworn in that moment his heart dropped —to his dick. He was enamored by your pure innocence. The way your hair framed your face, your eyes, everything screamed…virgin. To be completely honest, Mattheo didn’t really care for inexperienced girls; he found such a waste of time. But you? You were a different case.

Toxic! Mattheo who follows you into the library one evening and sees you studying for an upcoming test.

He took only a few long strides too reach you, quick to feign a friendly look.

“Hello, I couldn’t help but notice you were going over some test notes.” He stated while he loomed over your smaller frame.

All you could offer him in response was a meek “yes”.

He quickly inserted himself into your everyday life after that. Study parter, seating chart, shoulder to lean on, you name it and he was there right next to you.

He sugar coated his entire persona, never once lashing out or showing any red flags.

And then you got together. And on boy, did all hell break lose.

Mattheo was controlling. You wanted to go to a study group with some friends? Why, it’s not like he was there? You just want to leave him. He ould feed these thoughts into your head until you’d feel too guilty to leave him.

Not only was he controlling but he was manipulative. You wouldn’t leave your dorm if he didn’t thrill your outfit was appropriate. You belonged to him, so why were you trying to impress other guys? Why did you want him to get angry at you, he just can’t stay happy when you ‘go out dressed Like a slut.’ And you being the sweet, naive, girlfriend you were, you’d go change and beg for his forgiveness. Hoe could you have been so selfish and hurt him like that?

He knew just how to make you bend to his every word, he’d sweet yell and talk down at you just to shower you in affection. He knew you loved him, you relied on him. And he was right, you did.

He’d pressure you to leave your friends if they suggested leaving him, because ‘they just want to tear us apart, why can’t you see that?’. You just wanted your boyfriend to be happy :(

You’d beg him to stop smoking which would only lead to him screaming at you for acting like his mother. You don’t control him, don’t act like you do. You’d walk away crying which hed coo at you for, walking up to you to wipe your tears and comfort you for the pain he caused.

You’d become so isolated from your friends that you’d depend solely on him, your feeling and thoughts all controlled by Mattheo. You were his angel, and he made sure it was known you were his, fighting any guy who’d even dare to look at you. You tried reasoning with him once and it ended in him not taking to you for the entire day.

You were never allowed to talk to other guys, unless it was his best friends which even then, had to be supervised. He was all you needed.

Oh and don’t you ever think of leaving him. He’d be the kind of guy to take pictures of you while you were fucking, and if you tried to leave him he’d threaten to send it to every body in the school. You’d never mention leaving him again. W

At the end of the day, you were the sweet Hufflepuff girl who Mattheo riddle had absolutely ruined.

[mattsdolll]

𝐜𝐚𝐬𝐮𝐚𝐥? - 𝐦𝐚𝐭𝐭 𝐬𝐭𝐮𝐫𝐧𝐢𝐨𝐥𝐨

𝐢𝐧 𝐰𝐡𝐢𝐜𝐡 . . friends with benefits? not really. was it casual when matt kissed you with no strings attached? was it casual when you were tangled in each others bedsheets every night without apprehension? was it casual when you were in love? and nobody even knew. angst with a happy ending !!, i tried to write this with as dramatic as possible cus😁 pls pretend the header matches the fic

"dream of us in a year , maybe we'd have an apartment"

2.1k words

enjoy🤍

you dreaded the day this would happen, it was bound to. you fell hard and fast. pathetically, you were infatuated by him. you stirred out of your unconsciousness, staring at the cracked ceiling paint, you were supposed to fix that months ago, he was supposed to fix it with you. that emptiness in your heart was something only he ever fulfilled. warm summer nights faded into grey snowy evenings, alone in your bed. you hated it, but you could never hate him.

his lips pressed into yours gently, his touch tender. he worked his way down to your neck, evoking a gasp from you. he had such a way of putting you in a lovesick daze, it was sickening. you watched the boy prod and push his lips into your flesh admiringly, you marveled at his features. he pulled his head out of your neck, staring down at you lovingly. he smiled sheepishly, causing you to chuckle. he always had this stupid smile on his face when he was with you, like a little kid at a toy shop. it didn't last long, though.

you scrolled through your messages, tears running down your cheeks as you re-read old texts from him.

9:43am. "I love you soo much, I hope you have the best day ever, can't wait to take you to the beach later, the ocean brings out your eyes a lot"

you threw your phone down on your bed, a teary mess. your mascara flooded from your clamped eyelashes, spilling down your cheeks. you couldn't take this heartbreak, it was killing you. that day, he brought you to the beach knowing how much you adored it. you played in the waves like you would do as a child. he brought out the best in you. he watched the sunset with you, he kissed you. your gaze was fixed upon the sky as you watched the sun slowly begin to set, the sky lit orange and pink. when the sun went down, he was looking at you. he tilted your jaw to face him and mouthed a soft "i love you" before connecting your lips. you kissed him back with just as much pressure.

you ended up making out under the sunset for ages, his hands firmly on your waist as he brought you on his lap. he didn't want sex, he didn't want anything, he just wanted to be with you, to hold you close. he loved you so deeply he couldn't even view you under a lustful gaze. that night he took you home, he washed your hair for you, brushed it out and made you dinner. did i mention it was casual? you felt sick to your stomach at the thought of it.

the same boy who used to wipe your tears when you cried, the same boy who comforted you when things were rough at home, was the same boy who drifted furthest from you. it was momentary, it wasn't healthy at the time. you weren't ready for a relationship, you didn't know how to love. he sat you down one night on your bed, explaining how he felt. the words still lingered in your thoughts, bleeding into your once fond memories of him.

"listen, i don't know what we are, okay? i like you, a lot. i don't wanna lose you sweet girl but i can't be all you have, you need to rely on other things to make you feel better, 's not healthy..i know its hard, but we need to take a break, find yourself, go out and see the world f'me, yeah? i'm gonna find you again, we just need to take things slower."

you hated to admit he was right. you both rushed things and fell too hard. you were too attached. the tears stung your eyes as you barely responded,

"i know, i know, i can't keep running to you for every little problem i just- things are really hard, i'm gonna get better, okay? promise you'll wait for me?"

"promise."

he promised.

he gave you one last long, emotional hug before cutting contact for months. months.

it had been nearly three months since you'd seen your favorite boy, the grief eating you alive. you wished you'd held that kiss a few seconds longer, held him a little tighter, loved him better. you had to get better, for yourself and for him. you held your phone shaky in your hands, the screen slippery from your tears that leaked from your eyes as you typed. he hadn't blocked you, how could he ever leave you? you typed out a rough paragraph, you felt pathetic. you hit send, sitting anxiously in your bed. it had been too long, you craved his touch. you saw the message say delivered, now you had to wait.

you had felt unwell for weeks, your apartment a mess, dishes crowding the kitchen sink whenever you found the energy to cook for yourself instead of ordering yet again another takeout. you were miserable, to say the least.

your phone lit up, vibrating repeatedly, you scrambled to pick it up, checking your notifications. you almost couldn't believe he'd replied. not that he had a reason not to, it was just nostalgic. you read the notification, a simple message illuminating your screen.

"i can come over in a half hour, is that okay?" you replied with a 'yes' and put the phone down. you instantly began anxiously pacing around your apartment. did he wait? does he still love me? am i good enough for him? the thoughts raced through your head, the only thing snapping you out of them was your doorbell ringing.

you didn't even care how you looked, or if you were in pajamas with messy hair. you nearly stumbled into the door, shakily twisting the gold colored door knob. you were met by his blue iris, his gaze gentle. his hair was a little messy, he clearly rushed out the house. his hair was cut slightly shorter, it framed his face a lot. you exhaled deeply as his arms flew around your waist into a soft embrace. you hugged him back, around his neck. he gently picked you up off the ground, squeezing you against his body. "oh, pretty i missed you."

you felt at peace, he provided a sense of solace that soothed your mind. you hadn't felt this comforted in months, gently holding him closer. matt didn't try to kiss you, touch you, or anything. he just went straight for a hug, it was all he needed and he knew it was the same for you. some would consider it toxic, how you'd called him after nearly half a year of no contact, but today you could barely even hold yourself together, you needed him to hold you and tell you everything was going to be okay.

matt knew you struggled with severe anxiety, worse than his. your brain would spiral and it would become unbearable to the point you couldn't even speak. he would sit you down, hold you in his embrace and soothe your thoughts. you couldn't go a day without having yet another flare up or panic attack, it only worsened when he left. you choked up slightly at the feel of his touch, he gently walked you to your room, still hugging you.

"look at you" he mumbled to himself, he didn't find your disheveled state unattractive or ugly, instead he found this side of you perfect. it was natural, it was human. he felt some sort of awe knowing that you only went to him in times like these, that you had created such a safe space with him, no matter what terms you were on. maybe you weren't together or sneaking into each other windows anymore, you never really were together, anyways. but there was still so much love. he sighed to himself, laying you down in bed and getting in next to you, wrapping an arm gently around your shoulder. it killed you that it wasn't skin to skin, cuddling, his head in your neck, but then again you couldn't expect that of him, right?

wrong.

he tugged you on top of his chest, snuggling into your neck since he knew you hated people touching your hair. he made sure to drape the blanket over you just the way you liked it. you gazed up at him. "why are you doing this for me? i don't get it" he chuckled. how could you? "you think i don't know how you are by now? i know you, pretty." pretty. that nickname was your favorite, it was your favorite because only he got to call you that. he stared at you lovingly, not with lust or desire, with pure adoration and innocence. he was the embodiment of gentleness.

"i left you, matt. i threw away everything we had." you choked out, tears instantly forming in your eyes. he wiped them instantly, shushing you. "shh,and i don't care, okay? that doesn't change how i feel about you, i know it was for the best..i forgive you, i'm not mad at you, you're allowed to feel, okay?" you nearly shattered then and there. after all this time, he still loved you despite everything. "i left you too, remember? it's not your fault i love you." he whispered, comforting your cries.

he placed a soft gentle kiss to the crown of your head. were you ready for this? were you "better"? you weren't sure, but you wanted his presence, his sweet touch. you desperately craved him. your love for matt ran deeper than the cells beneath your skin, you could never hate him, more so you had a particular illusion of hatred toward yourself.

a now familiar warmth filled your chest as he clasped your frame in his arms, he stroked his hands up and down your back as you erupted into a fit of sobs. nothing about this was casual to you nor him, you practically dated, just without a label. you only began calming down after nearly half an hour.

"you're okay, i'm sorry." he whispered. how was he sorry? he had nothing to be sorry for, it was your fault, you hated yourself for this very reason. matt didn't see you that way. he never perceived you the way the rest of the world did. he saw something special in you that not even you could see. "i hate that i let this drag on so long, i wish i never walked away." you whispered, a soft almost plea for him to forgive you. he grasped your chin, bringing your lips to his. you eased into his mouth, melting together. the kiss was much softer than anything you had before with him. no, he was never rough with you, he wouldn't dream of it, but something about this was so consolatory.

"you know what? fuck this, yeah? let's start over, you and me, pretty. we can forget everything and start again" he mumbled, brushing a strand of hair behind your ear. you thought over what he said, honestly it wasn't a terrible idea. it was methodical, however you couldn't just forget everything, the smiles and laughs, the sobs and sorrows, every single second spent together with matt felt like an eternity. you put your thoughts aside, nodding your head. he didn't mean to forget, just to forgive and take a step forward.

"yeah? you wanna?" he beamed, giggling softly. oh how you missed that smile. you nodded once again, causing him to launch on top of you, smothering you in kisses.

"gosh pretty i missed you—missed this" he murmured against your flesh. you were one again, body and soul. you were filled by that familiar sense of relief, you missed him more. you laid tangled between the sheets for what felt like decades, just holding each other, talking. you loved him, things couldn't get more perfect.

or could they?

just a few months later, you found yourself in his bed. you had moved out of your shitty apartment, and into his small place near the beach. the air was crisp, salty. you crawled out of bed, making a cup of coffee, you could just be. you spent your days with matt, bathing in sunlight, your life was enliven.

you sat on the porch, watching the waves. matt scurried out of the house, eager to sit with you. he placed your drinks down—two glasses of wine. he snuggled up next to you, his head resting on your chest. you draped a shabby throw-over atop your bodies, leaning against him.

"so pretty, so so pretty" he mumbled softly, as you were staring out at the sunset before you, he was looking at you. you diverted your attention to him with a small smile, leaning down to press a small kiss to his wine stained lips.

just mere weeks ago you both would dream of times like these. you were finally happy.

. . .

tags !

@mattscoquette @blahbel668 @emely9274 @pearlzier @wompwomp-1 @bernardsgfs @sturnsxplr-25 @jetaimevous @aesthetixhoe @alyrasturnz @adorsturns @cvntytiger

[gg-pedro]

spin worlds - joel miller x reader oneshot

masterlist

summary: strings attached are easy enough to ignore when you're only trying to survive. when joel gets hurt, the world stops spinning, and you realize that you matter more to each other than you ever let yourselves believe.

warnings: 18+ MDNI, post outbreak!joel, boston!era, joel x reader, AFAB!reader, protective!joel, implied age gap, non-established relationship, set a few years before tlou hbo, hurt/comfort, non-gratuitous descriptions of a wound, hurt!joel, unprotected piv, fingering, end of the world sex, rough!joel, heavy on the petnames, drug/alcohol use, lots of feelings, its boston QZ joel so, angst with a happy ending, angst with fluff

words: 3.6k

a/n: is this what i really think the people want? maybe! is this what I want? absolutely yes!!!!!!!!!

-

Hundreds of nights spent with Joel since you’d been in Boston. Thousands of hours, words spoken to each other, yearning to stay in his arms longer and say more. 

The time you had with each other used to feel fleeting. Always after dark, sneaking around the QZ like you were teenagers together. It was a strictly private thing. It was almost like the two of you kept it a secret to feel a kind of thrill again, something from a past life, as if there was still right and wrong in the world and a little bit of something wrong was all you had left. 

That thrill wore off eventually, and you were with Joel for more than just the adrenaline hit. He made things more bearable and cut you deeper all at the same time. 

Flattened on his bed for yet another night, you got the feeling that something was bothering him. 

The sensation of cotton sheets was rough against your skin, acting as a futile means to abate the cold that was swirling through the apartment and raising the hairs on your arms. Your view was of his back, and the long, jagged scar that ran close to his spine. You reached your hand out to touch him and he flinched away.

“‘M goin’ out tomorrow. Without you,” he said, before you even had to ask. “Too many close calls lately.”

His voice was quiet and rough, sore from the dry air. You tried your luck at smoothing a hand across his shoulder, and this time he let himself lean into it.

“Doesn’t seem like that means you should go alone.” You pressed a kiss against his shoulder blade.

He turned his head to the side, not far enough to look you in the eye but far enough to confirm that you were there and not some twisted hallucination that he had dreamed up. “I’ll come back fine. I always do.”

Joel had this talent of convincing others that his word was his bond. He hardly had to try. When he spoke, it was like everyone sensed that they were in the presence of a kind of profit, and that he was privy to some knowledge or confidence that could keep people alive.

It didn’t help that he seemed to hold all of the knowledge in the world– knowledge about the important things. He could fix the leaky faucet in your bathroom blindfolded. Always knew what direction he was going in. Knew how to tie a million useless knots. Could look up to the night sky and point to Polaris like he was pointing to a map of Austin, showing you his old favorite diner that he went to every Saturday. I’ll come back fine. I always do. 

But Joel didn’t know anything. You’d been close enough to see that. He was just as frightened as you. But now more than ever, you wanted to trust him. Turn your back and fall, bet on the fact that he would stop the world from spinning to be there in time to catch you. 

Perhaps you were too easy, too willing to take what he gave. It was still heaven. Heaven, in a crumbling apartment building, sometimes with your restless mind placated by downers, draped across his silhouette. Sometimes you wondered, between the two of you, who deserved this life less. When you thought about it for too long, the answer was always Joel.

“Who are you meeting?”

He rubbed his palm against his forehead in slow circles. “One of my guys. Said he wasn’t gonna smuggle into the QZ anymore, son of a bitch.”

You only hummed in response, working your thumb into the knot in his shoulder. “And you trust him?”

“No.” He turned fully this time, his big hands roaming to the small of your waist and his lips to your jawline. “Sure as fuckin’ hell not enough to bring you out there this time.”

You grinned and smoothed his hair back off his forehead when he looked at you again. “Don’t have any faith in me, Miller?”

“You know that ain’t it, baby doll,” he whispered. “Don’t wanna take any chances with you.”

“Oh, yeah?” You laughed as he pulled you up onto his lap, looking deep in thought as he deliberated over where to plant kisses across your face and neck. “As if you’re ever careful with me.”

“I could be,” he said. “If you wanted.”

“Mmh, I don’t think I do.”

You looped your arms around his neck and he took your face fully into his hands. You felt almost engulfed as he kissed you. There was a fire blazing between you, and it felt like your clothes had melted away rather than been taken off with how quickly they disappeared. Your skin buzzed with desire, blood flowing to your most sensitive points. You felt limp like putty, lying in wait to be sculpted with the rough smearing of his hands across your body.

He was unrestrained in the way that he removed your roaming hands and pinned both arms above your head against the bed. “Y’think this isn’t gentle, princess? Yeah, let me show you rough.”

He split your legs apart, hand traveling to your warmed and wet entrance like a magnet. Three of his fingers were pumping short rhythms into you before you could even breathe, and your vision nearly went white. You writhed, helpless to the desperate moaning that was slipping past your lips until Joel pressed his hand against your mouth.

It all hurt so good. The sparking pleasure came and went so quickly with his movements that it felt like a continuous wave of ecstasy, even if he was stretching you close to your limit. 

He wouldn’t stop murmuring things in your ear throughout. “Think I’m gonna let you out there? Get you hurt? No, baby. I only hurt you ‘cause y’let me. Don’t you, hm? Can’t have you screaming, not with the neighbors.”

Despite his best efforts, he was only muffling the litany of sounds that you were producing as he finger fucked you raw.

After he could tell that he had brought you close to your tipping point, rough hands grabbed your waist and forced you to flip over. He pulled you up on your knees, and he turned your head to the side before forcing it down against the bed.

With one hand he fumbled with his belt, cursing in desperation as he struggled with it for a few moments. He went silent for a beat before white hot pleasure shot through your, and all you could hear was the rough slapping of your bare bodies connecting with each other. 

He was not gentle. It was clear that his pace and frequent position changes were to fulfill only his desires, and your own intense satisfaction was just a byproduct. You couldn’t complain. In fact, it would be foolish to complain. If this is what he was offering, then you would take all that he would give. 

He came quickly. He always did on nights like these, when you had given him some sort of permission to just use you for a while. You stared out to your left, looking for Orion in the cluster of stars outside his apartment’s window. You felt warm liquid spill into you and begin to drip onto your thighs as he continued thrusting. Tears blurred your vision as you followed suit, unraveling into a perfect little mess beneath him. 

“Knew you could take it, honey. You feel okay?”

“Mhm,” you said in a high-pitched tone, biting back tears as he sat you up.

He gathered your naked form into his arms and held you there for a while. He kissed the top of your head, and you wished you could’ve watched the starlight reflecting in his eyes for a little while longer.

“C’mon, I’ll get you cleaned up. Shower,” he said, more of a command than anything.

You followed his directions without responding. It wasn’t him that hurt you, not really. It wasn’t the vulnerability that stung you too deep. It was just the reminder that your relationship with Joel was far from merciful, cut from desperation and an utter decimation of the people you used to be. In another life, you knew that this wasn’t the way you could’ve loved each other.

After a luke-warm shower and a poor attempt of washing yourself clean of sin, you sat at the kitchen table in nothing but one of Joel’s denim flannels. Your hair was heavy and wet with water, leaving dark blue trails down the back of the button-up.

He smoothed an errant strand back from your forehead as he sat in the chair across from you, pouring whiskey from his decanter into two glasses. You suspected he had been drinking before you came over, but you never said anything.

You took a long drink before speaking. “When’re you planning on leaving?”

“Early.” You watched him pop a few white pills in his mouth and down the entirety of his glass. “Back before dark.”

“Could’ve just used water,” you mused. “Do you want me here when you get back?”

He looked over at you fully, that lazy smile and those sweltering brown eyes. “Hard times, darlin’. Hard times.” He removed his gaze to shake a couple more pills out of the cloudy plastic bag, leaning over the table to drop them next to your half-empty cup. “And yeah, I do. Stay.”

You stared blankly at what was in front of you, shaking your head. “Let me come, Joel.”

“You can’t negotiate with me on this. It’s a hard no.”

“Just don’t be an idiot. Please,” you bargained. “This doesn’t feel right.”

You watched him stand and walk over to you, resting a large hand on your upper back. “I’ll be back before dark,” he said again.

You looked up at him. “And if not?”

“I’ll be back.” He leaned down to kiss your temple. “I will be.”

You nodded. “I’ll be here.”

“Good,” he all but whispered. “Good, that’s all I want.”

-

True to his word, Joel was out early. 

Doubly true, with blood and sweat dripping from his hairline and into his eyes, Joel dragged himself forward as the sun set over the harbor.

November in Boston. Brutal, wintery wind whipped past his face and stung the open wounds that had been hashed into his skin. His vision swam, and he brought his sleeve up to his head again to try and stop some of the bleeding coming from the left side of his head.

You were right. Always right about nearly everything, you were. It was a trap. Maybe he could’ve taken the three guys that met him at the deal site if you had been there too, but he razed each one alone and hardly made it out alive.

You. He would’ve stopped a few miles ago if it weren’t for you. In the moment he could’ve cursed your name and damned you to hell for what you drove him to do. He could’ve sat on the curb, rested his aching back against that old lamppost with moss and flora to cushion his injured head. Shut his eyes and die already, a death that would’ve been so easy, one that he begged for a million times.

You. He stared up to the sky, praying to something that his directions were right as his eyes landed on the north star. A mile or two east, and he’d be at the QZ. His blurred vision made the light astigmatic, so he could only hope.

The pistol in his back pocket felt red hot as he stumbled eastward. The only force driving him forward was the thought of putting a bullet through the head of anyone that touched you.

This was his fault, afterall. He should’ve taken someone. Maybe it was your fault then, for mattering so much to him that nothing could bring him to put you in even the slightest bit of danger. No, none of it was your fault. Nothing was. You deserved a whole world that Joel couldn’t give you.

He’d get to you. He would.

-

Making good on his promise, you woke up cold in his empty bed.

You could’ve sworn you saw your own breath freeze in the air, through sunlight that shone through the infinite planes of the apartment. You reached a bare arm up towards the ceiling, trying to catch some of the warmth that it gave.

You had an entire day of work ahead of you, likely doing maintenance on the water system or making house calls to troubleshoot issues with the electricity. Life here had made you more useful and skilled than you had ever been before, and sometimes work felt like a welcome distraction. 

You got yourself up and dressed, picking up around his place before you made it out the door. The discarded pills on the kitchen table swirled down the sink along with yesterday morning’s coffee.

You knew how to take care of yourself more than he did. You weren’t sure why Joel fought you so hard on some things.

On the return trip to his apartment far past dinner time, you were smeared with dried sweat and soot. Your eyes passed the stars, and you repeated a silent prayer to yourself that Joel had already beat you home. 

Scaling the stairs to the third floor, you saw that fate had cruelly twisted your own wishes.

“... My fucking god, J– what happened? Hey, hey, look up at me, please–”

You were crouched before Joel’s slumped figure, barely aware enough to respond to your voice or your touch. His flannel shirt was torn, exposing a bloodied white undershirt rising and falling along with his rapid breathing.

He had a hand almost glued to this side of his head, stained with dried blood. He made a strained groaning noise as you pried it away to reveal a nasty gash to the area. You could’ve screamed yourself at the mere sight of the state he was in.

It was clear that he only had the strength to drag himself to his own front door because you had been idiotic to lock it before you’d left that morning. A stupid force of habit left over from a lifetime where locked doors and tidied apartments actually mattered. 

“Don’t… don’t, m’hurt, just…” his voice trailed off as his glassy gaze passed over your face. He was still trying to catalog you, ensure that you were still in one piece even while he was in stitches.

“I know, I know… you have to get up with me, Joel. Give me something here, fucking hell– on three, okay?”

You managed to get him to his feet as you jammed the key into the door and shoved it open. You were shouldering most of his body weight as you helped him to the first available chair at the kitchen table. Aside from his head, there was no other major injury to his body– it was mostly fine grazes and blossoming bruises on his chest and arms. You filled a glass with water and poured it over the wound on the left hemisphere of his head, trying to clear away some of the dried blood that had matted down his curls.

He writhed in his seat and you tried to soothe him with gentle words and touch as often as you could. It was deep, as if he’d been hit with something dull, but not deep enough to be fatal itself. You exhaled at that conclusion and begged to the ceiling that you were correct about it. 

You sterilized the area with whiskey poured onto a kitchen rag and bit your lip as Joel hissed and swore in response. You made him hold the cloth there as you scavenged the apartment for something, anything that could be considered proper to wrap the area with.

“Bad deal… it went bad, baby, I tried… thought they were gonna hurt you here…” he mumbled to you once you returned with a t-shirt you had begun to shred into ribbons.

“Hurt me? I’m fine, and god, you aren’t. I’m fine. Nobody’s gonna hurt me. Us,” you added quietly, slowly removing his hand from his head again.

“Mkay… ow, you’re killin’ me, darlin’, s’fine, you don’t gotta do all that,” he said weakly.

You said nothing as you tried wrapping the makeshift gauze tightly enough to still apply pressure around his head. Realistically, he needed stitches, or at the very least some sort of proper medical assessment. Curfew had already passed and doctors were few and far between to begin with, so you could only hope that this would be enough to stop the bleeding. Keep him awake and alive.

When you were finished, you slumped down in the chair next to him, your hand still gripping tightly onto his shoulder. “What’s your birthday?”

“Why’re you–”

“–Answer me, Joel, I swear to god–”

He squeezed your hand limply. “September 26th. It’s November now, ‘18, I think? What, you want me to say my ABC’s too, or…”

Your laugh cut him off, shaky and very nearly turning into a sob. “I hate you. I hate you so much, you know that? I told you not to be an idiot, and you…” your voice trailed off, and he took both of your hands into his.

“I know. Hate you too, baby… can’t believe you patched me up.”

You couldn’t believe it either, or the fact that he cared enough about you to drag himself from the city back to the QZ out of fear that whoever had hurt him was going to hurt you, too. If that wasn’t the closest thing to love you’d ever been shown, you didn’t know what was.

He slept very carefully in your arms for a few hours that night, after you had gently washed the rest of his body and cleaned some more of the noticeable wounds. You couldn’t sleep at all, kept awake by a compulsion to check the bleeding on his head and make sure that he was still breathing through all of it. 

Despite it all, the two of you didn’t feel fragile. Something unspoken was heavy in the air, something that said you both cared for each other so deeply that no circumstance could stop you from taking care of each other. Joel would do it for you, too. In the meantime, you were glad he didn’t have to.

-

In the morning Joel explained how he’d been jumped by his supplier and a few of his friends, and how he’d lost both the ammunition he was trading and the opiates and cigarettes. You thought that was a small price to pay for escaping with his life, but his stubbornness fought you on that point. 

You paid a sort of friend of yours– a former nurse– all of your ration cards from the last week to stitch up his head the following afternoon, much to Joel’s utter dismay and protest.

“It’s already done. I already paid,” you had told him, staring into his eyes with a hand cupped to his cheek. “Please just let him. Please.”

For you, your words said. For you, I would. 

He said nothing, but he sat for the few minutes of what must’ve white-knuckling pain to let the wound be sewn shut. I would, too, he echoed back. For you. You held his hand through it, even if that comfort was more for you than it was for him.

You forced him to just rest with you for the rest of the afternoon, hoping that the expired antibiotics you had been saving would nip the traces of the fever he had started to run. If that didn’t work, you promised him you would look for something that did.

Staring up at you in bed, he tucked your hair behind your ears and looked as if he wanted to say something but couldn’t. “You didn’t have to do all this, y’know. It was my own fault.”

“I did, though,” you replied as you smoothed your thumb across his cheek. “I  couldn’t do all of this without you.”

He cracked a smile. “Don’t flatter me just ‘cause I’m dyin’ over here. You’re better than me at ‘all of this’.”

You had hoped that your effort to keep him alive would’ve told him that you did in fact need him, almost more than anything, but in the moment it was fine. You would show him a million times over if that's what it took.

Instead, you rolled your eyes. “You aren’t dying. Don’t be an asshole. I do need you. How else would I spend my time if I didn’t have you to worry about?”

“Don’t know.” He grinned up at you. “You’d be a hell of a lot richer, I think. Not wasting all your rations on some old man.”

“Mmh, maybe, but I like to spoil you,” you said through a smile.

He pulled you down next to him with a soft c’mere, and you laughed as he tucked you in close to him and he buried his face in the space between your neck and shoulder. You could tell the wear on his body was making him achy when he tensed before having to let you go.

You smoothed his hair off his forehead, your fingers brushing against the clean bandages wrapped around his head. “I’ll run you a bath, if you want.”

He shut his eyes against the cool touch of your hand and nodded. “That’d be nice, honey. Real nice.”

That’s all he would ever have to say. Even less and you’d still do anything for him. He would never even have to ask.

-

[wasteddmoondust]

the universe || sirius black

pairing: sirius black x reader 1.2k words, soulmate au, angst (i tried, really), happy ending, some language from this request! :) a/n: AHH i hope you really like this, i haven't written this much before but i think it was a good challenge!

Sirius feels like he shouldn't have looked. But he stares at the four little paw prints tattooed on your left shoulder blade, identical to the one he has.

But that was the thing with soulmates, wasn't it? One can never control how it happens, they just do. It was already written. He was meant to see this, and he's meant to do something about it.

There's a sinking feeling in his chest. He's not sure if he wants to do something about it.

Sirius doesn't believe in soulmates. At least that's what he wants himself to think.

It's too much commitment, he usually says to himself. Why can't I choose who I want to be with?

I've been following rules my whole life. What does the universe know about me and who I'm meant to be with? For the rest of my life? Who would want to be with me that long?

I'm not a good enough person, let alone for Y/N.

Who would even want to love someone like me?

That's usually where the thinking stops.

So he decides for himself. Going out to parties to pick and choose which girls to make out with. No strings attached, just his physical desires to be satisfied.

He knows it's massed up, even more so when you're at said parties, keeping a lookout for someone with your matching tattoo. And so Sirius keeps his shoulder covered. You don't know he's your soulmate, and a part of his never wants you to.

Unfortunately, you're good friends, and he doesn't want you getting hurt over the fact he doesn't want a soulmate.

By the time he's done sticking his tongue down another girl's throat, he usually hears that you've decided to call it an early night.

It all comes crashing down one New Year's Day.

It's the adrenaline of counting down in the very crowded room, and the feeling of someone grabbing him to be their New Year's kiss. Everyone welcomes the start of a new era with a cheer.

The party goes well into the night before Sirius decides to finally crash in his room. He immediately falls asleep as his head hits the pillow.

He wakes up with the usual hangover headache, but nothing a bowl of ice water can't fix. A quick shower and a carton of juice later, he checks his phone for his missed notifications.

Moony: wake up, get to the hospital now. Moony: Sirius where are you??? Moony: we're outside room 402 when you get here. Prongs: Y/N's sick again, we're heading home Prongs: she won't stop throwing up idk what to do Prongs: we're going to the emergency room Prongs: call me when you see this Lilypad: James and i are going to the hospital with Y/N, call us when you see this Lilypad: Sirius if you do not wake the fuck up right now i will actually come for your throat.

Sirius doesn't think he's gotten ready so quickly in his life. To be fair, he was still in his pyjamas, just adding his leather jacket and running out of the door with his keys, wallet and phone in hand.

When he arrives, he sees his three friends outside of the room you're in.

"What happened?" he asks, panting from all the running.

"They don't for sure know yet," Remus says, arms crossed and leaning against the wall.

Lily is sitting on the chair, her hair is tied messily in a ponytail. "They think it's soul-repelling."

Sirius furrows his brows, "What does that mean?"

"My parents talked about it once," James says from his seat next to Lily. "They used to talk about stories of people who constantly reject the soul bond they had with their soulmate, which would cause the other person to be very sick. Or in worse cases, die."

Lily visibly hates the way James says it, and he knows it. He tries to comfort her by holding her hand, their matching flower tattoos on their hands side-by-side.

"...But she doesn't know her soulmate yet?" Sirius asks carefully, trying to sound normal.

James shrugs. "She may not, but they say the way her body is reacting means her soulmates knows it's her."

Sirius feels his breath knock out, his heart pounding, realising what he's done. He's been rejecting their bond the entire time. All the while he thought he was doing himself a favour, he made her suffer for his selfish needs.

The ache in his heart is undeniable. He grabs the fabric that covers his heart and feels his breath get heavier.

"Sirius?" Remus calls, noticing his actions.

"It's- it's my fault..." Sirius feels tears start to prick at his eyes.

"What?"

"It was me," he starts to remove his jacket and shirt, showing the tattoo on his shoulder for the first time. "It's me-" his voice cracks. He turns to the door, "I need to get in there."

"Woah wait- Sirius!"

But he bursts through the door to the ward. He runs in and the first thing he notices is you staring at him, paler than he's ever seen you before. You have eyebags and you're heaving, as if you'd just thrown up before he came in.

The nurse next to you speaks up, "Sir, you can't be in here yet-"

"I'm sorry!" he yells, grabbing your hand and bending over the bed. He buries his face in your chest.

"Sirius?" you whisper, confused, but you finally see the print on his shoulder. "Oh."

"I've known for the longest time and that was so selfish of me. And it's still so selfish of me to want you still," tears are fully flowing down his cheeks now. "I've realised I cannot lose you. But would you allow me to be selfish one more time and ask for you to forgive me?"

If anything, you're too stunned to speak. One minute you were throwing your guts up and suddenly your best friend is crying in front of you and he's also your soulmate.

But at the same time, you start to feel your body be at ease. The nausea is already starting to subside. His warm hand in your cold one feels nice. Like two puzzle pieces finding each other.

You cough, feeling your throat finally clear. You look down, and SIrius is still crying, his question still hangs in the air. He waits for your answer.

"I hope you know you have a lot of making up to do after this," you say softly, smiling.

He heaves the biggest sigh of relief. He leans towards your hands and kisses them. "Of course, anything for you. Oh thank god."

You chuckle. "I'm so glad it's you, actually. I had a feeling."

He looks up at you, "Really? How'd you know?"

You shrug. "Just a feeling I guess. Probably a soulmate thing."

He smiles, the universe has his back, he thinks. "Can I kiss you?" He asks.

"Sirius I just threw up, I'm not letting you taste whatever is in my mouth right now," you say. "But the rest of my face is available."

He opts to kiss your cheek instead. And something in him clicks. It feels normal, it feels right.

Yeah, the universe definitely knew what they were doing.

[soradragon]

Don't Trust Anyone

Warnings: Angst, mentions of Astarion's past, mentions of his scars and past abuse

Astarion x GN! Tav

summary: "Don't trust anyone." It's a mantra he repeats to himself. Because trusting will end up with him back in Cazador's hands. And Astarion will do anything to prevent that from happening. He just didn't expect to get attached to the company's goodie-two-shoes leader.

~~~~~~

“Don’t trust anyone.” He’s been muttering this sentence at night again and again to himself for as long as he can afford to remember. Thinking back any further and his back will begin to ache. Or more specifically, those horrid brandings that had been slowly, meticulously yet somehow still messily carved into his back. He can still hear his own agonizing, throat burning screams ringing in his ears of that night if he thinks too much about it. A twisted memento to remind him that trusting someone…anyone at all, will make him end up like that once more…

“Don’t trust anyone…”

…

Staring at their ‘leader’ of their ragtag group of misfits from a slight distance makes Astarion scowl, if not want to gag - if he had any contents to empty his stomach with. 

Of course he had to end up joining a goody-two-shoes who ‘aids anyone in need’ after finally escaping the cruel strings of his master, and not by the help of anyone,  but squid-like aliens who held out a hand not so much to give aid as to create a newborn of their own species from his own very hide. Astarion doesn’t know which situation is worse, if he thinks about it…

Remaining an obedient spawn to his master, turning into an ugly brain-eating squid, or being forced to watch and begrudgingly join this company’s leader need to be hero to everyone in need.

…

Where were they when he needed them most? When he begged to any god and goddess for one? Why help others when none had helped him? The thought makes him sick.

Let them all suffer the way he had for all he cares. Let them face the reality that no one cares for them if they can't offer the right price. Let them open their eyes that the only thing they can trust in is themselves and the pain the lashes will give their body.

“Don’t trust anyone.”

After watching Tav go above and beyond for everyone - even providing gale with useful enchanted artifacts to absorb for godssake - and have them stand up for him when everyone found out about his vampiric condition, a little plan formed inside Astarion’s mind.

At least there’s one use to that goody-two-shoes leader of their party and that is that they're easy to manipulate. If they end up caring enough about him to want to protect him, he won’t have to worry about the others trying to kick him out. Because what their ‘heroic leader’ says goes. 

All Astarion will have to do is make them fall, which is a feat easy enough to accomplish. He’s been doing it for over two hundred years. And it’s obvious they got an interest in his body…Carnal desires, that’s easy enough to provide.

His nice and simple plan is practically already in motion with the way they hang onto Astarion’s practiced, honey coated purrs. The only thing Astarion will need to do, is give them a little nudge.

Lo and behold, their dear leader Tav was all too happy to indulge in their carnal desires. Soon enough he’ll have this naive little thing in the palm of his hand. A perfect shield to protect him from Cazador. A perfect sacrifice for his freedom. A delicious little snack to keep him fed when there’s no enemies to feed on. A body to keep his cold one warm

…

“…Don’t trust anyone…”

Astarion is disappointed to - yet never would say it out loud - admit that he’s getting used to Tav’s goody goody behavior. They’re…Not all that bad…putting that infuriating behavior aside. There may be some good qualities to them yet. 

And the way they smile at and joke with him. Smirking slightly at his snarking remarks and openly joining in on the banter, it’s…refreshing…to be taken seriously and have someone listen and care…

“…Don’t trust anyone…”

Who knew Tav could be so expressive? The little twitches in their eyes and lips, the micro expressions...Who knew there’s so much behind their eyes? Who knew that he would feel comfortable and secure with Tav covering him in battle? 

Who knew…That Astarion’s been getting more genuine with his actions and words of concern for their well being?

Karlach mentioned he’s been looking at Tav often…she understands wrong, of course. Why in the nine hells would he look at Tav with eyes begging for them to look back? Looking at them as if they hung the stars into the sky itself, as if they are the one that brings rise to the sun every morning. Please, Astarion doesn’t care. Caring-....trust in others is what led him to that night full of agonizing, throat burning screams.

…

Karlach never mentioned that he looks at them with adoration…

…

”…Don’t…Don’t you dare trust anyone.”

Astarion feels his undead heart clench. His throat is dry. He feels sick. Afraid.

What is he supposed to do? What is he feeling? Why isn’t his survival and freedom the only thing he prioritizes anymore? Why is the thought of Tav as his shield so unsatisfying to think about? The thought of them hurt, hurts him...Why?

Astarion longs for their touch. Longs for their eyes to gaze at him with a smile like a man longs for oxygen when having drowned. He gets angry whenever an enemy spills Tav’s precious life blood. It belongs inside them or in his mouth, being tasted with his tongue. Not on the wasteful, dirty ground. He longs to keep Tav safe by any means necessary, and it scares him.

But the thought of Tav finding out he’s been lying…deceiving…manipulating and playing with their feelings terrifies him the most.

…

“…don’t…don’t…trust…anyone…” This sentence was something that Astarion has been muttering to himself for ages. For as long as he can afford to remember. Thinking back any further and his back will begin to ache. The agonizing, throat burning screams that had been ripped from his throat that night will ring in his ears. It’s supposed to be a reminder to why he can’t trust anyone.

…

But Tav has wormed their way into his dead heart. Their warm hands touch him with such care like a healing balm. Their eyes so soft and full of adoration towards him. Their lips…oh gods their lips…like a drug to his bloodstream. He wants them.  Gods, what a fool he is. 

Such  a simple plan he had. And all he had to do, the only fucking thing he had to do was not fall.

…

“…Don’t-…ah…fuck…”

[azzibuckets]

Paper Rings [Part 5/10 | Paige Bueckers]

paige bueckers x fem!reader

summary: the morning after

a/n: i love making people cry so some pretty angsty stuff up ahead 😁 forgive me for turning paige into a slight asshole

word count: 1.8k

masterlist w/ all parts

FLASHBACK: 1 YEAR AGO

The green LED light on Paige’s alarm clock blinked 3:07 AM. Paige had been up for the past two hours. Tossing and turning seemed like the right phrase, but she didn’t want to wake you, so all the turmoil stayed inside her head.

A burst of warmth ran through her body and flooded her senses whenever she looked at you. You were curled up against her side, lightly snoring. You looked so soft in the moonlight, and Paige wanted to take a photo of you like this and ingrain it inside her brain. But her mind’s been running non stop for the past 120 minutes, overcome with regret over what you two had just done.

Paige had always known of her tendencies. She wouldn’t call herself a player, because she never intentionally led girls on. She always made it clear to her one night stands what they were - a hookup, with no strings attached. But some girls never seemed to get it. Every so often there would be someone who got attached to Paige after just one night together and ended up leaving her apartment in tears, cursing her name. She hated when that happened, hated seeing them cry.

So she vowed to herself never to sleep with you. Not because she didn’t want you, because God knows how many sleepless nights she spent in this very bed, dreaming about the pink of your lips and the curve of your hips. But because she knew how complicated things would get. Your friendship was the one thing that had remained stable in Paige’s life the past few years. There mere thought of losing you made her heart pound and head throb.

So Paige had stayed strong. Never mind all those moments where her hands had lingered on your waist a little too long, or the fact that the wallpaper of her lock screen and home screen were both pictures with you, or the fact that you were the only person pinned on her messages app besides her family. She knew she couldn’t have you.

Paige brushed a strand of hair from your eyes, letting the pad of her thumb trail down your cheek. You stirred in your sleep, a smile drifting faintly across your lips, and shifted closer to her, burying your face in her abdomen. And in that moment, Paige realized two things.

#1. She was in love with you. Yeah, she’d always loved you as a friend. You were thoughtful and supportive, a best friend a person could ask for. But beyond that, you made her feel seen. To you, Paige wasn’t just a basketball player or a pretty face. You had broken through her barriers and made the effort to know her on every level, and that was what Paige in love with you.

#2. She didn’t deserve you. Paige thought back to all those times she’d canceled on movie nights because somehow she’d ended up again at the bar with her teammates, flirting with pretty girls while the prettiest girl sat alone in her room. Or when she’d briefly dated Anna, who had apparently been cold to you for their entire relationship, always making snide comments when Paige wasn’t around. But you had saw how happy Paige was (but not as happy as she was whenever she was with you), and had kept silent, not wanting to ruin Paige’s relationship. And even though Paige had broken up with Anna as soon as she’d found out about her behavior, she couldn’t quiet the voices in her head blaming her for letting someone treat you like that. You were the best person in the world, Paige thought. And you deserve someone who can give you all of that. Not me.

So after having come to those two conclusions, Paige knew what she had to do.

——————————-

You woke up in a daze. Checking your phone, you realized it was only 8 AM. Tired, you slumped back into the pilllow. The events of last night only came back to you when you moved the sheets of Paige’s bed and saw your bra.

You couldn’t help but smile as memories of fisted sheets, shaking legs, and hands intertwined in each other’s hairs came flooding back. You pressed your fingers to your lips, the lips that Paige had kissed over and over again just hours before. You and Paige had slept together, and everything had felt so right. And god, that was the best head you’d ever gotten.

Getting up, you heard clattering in the kitchen and footsteps outside. Assuming it was Paige, you didn’t bother to cover up when the door swung open, but your mouth fell open when you came face to face with Azzi.

“Oh my god!” Azzi shrieked. Both of you stared at each other for a second before you grabbed the comforter off Paige’s bed to cover your body. “Get out, get out, get out!” you yelled.

Azzi slammed the door. Heart beating fast, you rushed to find your clothes. “Did I just see what I thought I saw?” Azzi yelled from the other side of the door.

“Azzi Fudd, I will smack you,” you yelled back as you started to pull on your jeans.

“Did you and Paige sleep together?” She screamed. “Oh my god, she’ll kill me if she finds out I walked in on you like this.”

You fiddled with the buttons on your jeans. “That’s why we’re gonna keep this a secret. You’re not gonna tell anyone we slept together.”

“What?! But now Aaliyah and Nika owe me twenty dollars,” she complained.

You tugged on your shirt. “I’m gonna pretend that you didn’t just tell me that three of our closest friends made a bet on us sleeping together.” You opened the door and glared at a sheepish Azzi. “Now where the hell is Paige?”

“I dunno. I heard her leaving an hour ago. I thought I was home alone. You scared the shit out of me,” Azzi side eyed your sex and bed hair, and you ran your hand through it, trying to make it look less messy. “So, how was it?” Azzi leaned towards you with a sly smirk on her face. “Was it good?”

“Oh my god, Azzi.” You pushed her out of the way and grabbed your purse from the couch. “I’m leaving. You better keep your mouth shut.”

“No promises!” Azzi called after you, cackling as you left the apartment.

—————————

5 DAYS LATER

“Open the fucking door, Bueckers.” You rapped on the door of Paige’s apartment, impatiently tapping your foot as you waited.

After you heard noises from inside but she still refused to open the door, you knocked even harder. “I know you’re in there, asshole. Azzi told me you’ve been in here the entire day.”

Finally the door swung open, and I laid eyes on Paige for the first time since we’d slept together 5 days ago. Her hair was in a messy low bun, and she was wearing her grey UConn sweatpants and a sports bra. You ignored the blush that rose from your neck from seeing her bare abdomen, all sculpted and taut, and instead glared at her.

“What the fuck, Paige? You haven’t responded to any of my texts and calls in the last week. Are you seriously ghosting me?” You pushed past her into the apartment.

Paige stared at you, still not saying anything. The last five days had been hell. You knew that sleeping with your best friend would change things. It would be awkward, and unsure, but you and Paige have always been able to figure everything out. So you didn’t expect for her to drop all communication with you, leaving you alone in bed the morning after and then ignoring all your attempts to talk to her after.

Paige smirked at you, but it wasn’t tantalizing and seductive like the last time you saw her. It was sharp, calculated, like she knew something that you didn’t. “Damn, I was that good, wasn’t I?”

“Paige, I need you to be serious right now.” Your voice was rising in pitch, your frustration showing. “We need to talk about us.”

Paige folded her arms, and she had never looked so distant. “What is there to talk about?”

You pushed her, not hard, but enough for her to stumble back. “Okay, so you fucked your best friend, and now you don’t even wanna talk about it?”

Paige swallowed, and she looked away. “We lost in the Final Four that night.”

“Yeah, so?” Your face was flushed red with anger, and you felt hot all over. “What’s that gotta do with anything?”

She turned back to look at you. Her face was impassive now, and you wondered at who this girl in front of you was. It seemed like you didn’t even know her, this version of Paige. “It was a tough game,” she said curtly. “I needed to blow off some steam, and you were there.”

I needed to blow off some steam, and you were there.

You physically recoiled. Those words resounded in your mind, ricocheting from every corner, repeating itself until you went numb. You tasted something bitter in your mouth, a confirmation of what you had been worrying yourself sick about 24/7 for the past several days. “Are you fucking serious right now?”

Paige regarded you coolly. “I’m starting to get the feeling that you thought that night was a declaration of love or something. I mean yeah, you weren’t bad for your first time, but it was just sex.”

A jumble of something terrible and bitter began brewing in your stomach. It was a mixture of anger, and horror, and shock and pain, threatening to spill over. You didn’t know whether you wanted to sob or throw up. That night you had basically admitted to Paige that you had wanted her for so long but…had you been so foolish to believe that she actually liked you back?

“You’re really nothing but a slut, huh,” you scoffed. You felt like a dagger was stabbing you, brutally piercing you in the heart as those words were spit from your mouth, but you were so angry, so furious, you couldn’t stop. “You don’t care about anything but getting laid. You’re so fucking shallow.”

For a moment, you thought you saw hurt flash through Paige’s eyes. But she quickly recovered, and her face turned stony again. “I’m not the one who was like a little fan girl, so desperate that you jumped on me as soon as I gave you the chance.” Her lip curled.

We, whatever we were, were over, and we both knew it. We were throwing out insults, maiming each other in an attempt to mollify our own hurt. We were drowning, and you knew it, god you knew it, your lungs felt on fire and you felt like you were losing everything in my life all at once. And you were too weak to stop it. Too cowardly to apologize, to take all your words back, to tell her you loved her so much, that you would be willing to stay friends and only friends and ignore the fact that you were heads over heels for her, just so she would stay in your life and you could go back to what you were before you made the most stupid decision of your lives.

But none of that came out. Instead, you said words that you didn’t mean.

“Don’t talk to me ever again, Bueckers. I fucking hate you.”

“Gladly.”

[diamondcitydarlin]

----LOTS OF SPOILERS FOR THE FILM BELOW BE AWARE---

The thing that's driving me kinda CRAZY about the sequel though is how perfectly it sets up a personal arc for Lydia to be intertwined with Beej's. Like I said in my reaction post after seeing the film last night, I feel like Lydia as a character doesn't really get much of an arc or a resolution by the end of the story, as most of the plot is focused on repairing her relationship with her daughter, with Delia, maybe even her ex-husband to a certain extent, and for as much as she's rid of someone actually preying on her (Rory) we have no reason to believe she's found inner peace or really discovered herself or isn't still constantly popping pills to help with the 'gift' of sight she still has to deal with. There's so much about her left unresolved that Tim is either going to have to make another film about or I will have to fanfic about. But again, what's also fascinating is the way the beats of Lydia's story become tangled up with Beej's by the end of this, and also the ambiguous suggestion that there might be some kind of red string of fate linking them together across life and death and centuries (my kingdom for Beej saying "I've crossed oceans of time to find you" in a deep sexy Dracula voice and Lydia being like "plz shut the fuck up" LMAO)

Like, the 'psychic connection'. The thing that makes Lydia able to see and interact with Beej in places other than the house/model in Winter River. At first I think we're led to believe these are genuine hallucinations she's having, but ofc that's debunked when Beej reveals he's aware of these sightings and has been participating in them on purpose. Does this suggest that their first marriage may have been binding in some way that didn't release him from death, but allowed him more range to manifest so long as he was attached to her? That's not really addressed or explained, but I feel like it opens the possibility of being a thing (as so many fanfics have had happen before, I LOVE it tbh)

Also, the parallel of them both having had predatory exes that tricked them into 'selling their souls' (one in a figurative sense, the other literally lmao). I'm honestly shocked more conclusions weren't drawn from that conspicuous parallel in the film itself, because it's VERY interesting. It seems almost to suggest they're both meant to safeguard each other's souls (which is why I'm still bitter we didn't get Lydia defending him from Delores, I think that would've been a nice follow up to Beej saving her from Rory, even if she was just doing it out of a sense of obligation).

And idk, on the whole I feel a lot of Lydia's personal struggle at this point in her life is defined by a need to feel 'normal'. I get how that can seem odd coming from the teen girl that confidently described herself as 'strange and unusual', but this is 30 years later, after several failed relationships, after becoming a mom and struggling with a strained relationship with her daughter because of her oddity, idk, I think it's a good case study on how society forces women to conform lest they be a bad daughter or a bad mom or a bad wife, etc, but I think it's obvious she's just fighting her 'strange and unusual' nature and the more she does that, the more difficult her life will be.

To me, that suggests her path to happiness has actually a lot to do with Beej, or very well could. Who else is going to understand her true nature the way he does? Who else is going to unashamedly encourage her to be balls to the wall weirdo like she REALLY is??? Who else can truly set her free that way??? Like I'm gnawing on wires here yall, if nothing else Tim gave us SO much fanfic material to work with on this one.

[itwasntimethatdidit40]

Do think I’m your babygirl? I think the fuck not.

Pairing/au: Joel Miller x afab!reader, no outbreak

Words count: 4095

Rating: +18, NSFW, minors please don’t interact

Warnings/Tags: pov second person, smut with very little plot, angst, casual sex, no use of y/n, reader is described having breasts and vagina and wearing a dress and heels, no other description of her is given, reader’s thoughts in italics, mention of infidelity, swearing, pet names (babygirl, good boy, baby, princess), reader is bad at feelings (she has her reasons though), soft!Joel, brief mention of Sarah, a lot of kissing, fingering (f receiving), oral (m receiving), unprotected p in v (reader is on the pill but still, do better irl, please!), reverse cowgirl, balls grabbing, a little of bit of scolding during sex 😈, plot twist, neck kissing, nipples play, teasing… I think it’s all? If I realize I forgot something I'll add it right away.

A/N: First of all, if you happened to read something similar but badly written on AO3 don't worry, it's still me, no one stole anything from me and I didn't steal anything from anyone lol

I've been wanting to rewrite this for a long time and I think I'm pretty happy with how it came out this time. I really hope you like it too. As always, English is not my first language, I don't have beta and I finished writing it last night at 3am (ops, I did it again!), so please forgive me if you find any mistakes.

To anyone reading this, thank you for your time! I added a brief A/N at the end, see you there!

“Should we get out of here?” he whispers in your ear and you nod “where?”

“My house”

You give him a quick kiss on the lips agreeing “okay”.

You just met him but he’s the most handsome man to ever approach you in a bar so you don’t care.

You’ve already been the good girl, the one to introduce to someone’s parents, the one who’s always kind and modest, who never says a word too much and does everything in her power to make her man happy.

Turns out it didn’t do you any good.

You were engaged, a year ago.

You and Mark had the whole plan.

The wedding, a house with a white picket fence, a nice yard, a dog, a big family.

It was all decided, until you found out he was cheating on you with one of his coworkers.

All those “babygirl, I’m going to be late”, “babygirl, don’t wait for me for dinner, that asshole of my boss gave me a ton more paperwork to deal with”, “babygirl, tell John I’m sorry I couldn’t come to his party today but I still have a million things to do here at the office”, “I miss you, I wish I didn’t have to work so much” texts…all bullshit.

One day you came home early from a work trip and found him on the couch of the house you had rented and where you had lived together for two years with his dick stuck in his colleague’s pussy.

What a piece of shit.

You spent four years of your life with him and yet it felt like you had never really known him. You wondered how he had managed to lie so well, for so long, without even flinching.

You cried, you screamed as he made up some lame excuse to justify himself, you wondered how you had wasted all those years with someone like that. How come you hadn't noticed before how fake and manipulative he was? How come you hadn't noticed that every time you argued he tried to make you feel guilty even though he was the one who was completely in the wrong?

Oh yeah, you were in love. Blind, dazed, completely drunk with love.

Love that chews you up and spits you out.

What a huge scam.

Never again, you thought.

Mark could have gone to hell with his colleague, you were done.

You would no longer let feelings get the better of you.

Sure, men were still nice. When they were quiet and fucked you good and then went back home, no strings attached.

He says his name is Joel.

You put a finger over his mouth to silence him when he tries to add his last name. “I don’t need it,” you tell him.

“Whatever you say, beautiful,” he replies.

His voice is definitely a plus. Deep, husky, charming. It goes straight to your cunt.

Even his beard brushing your cheek as he speaks in your ear to make himself heard over the chaos of the bar isn’t bad at all.

A small talk later you decide he is the perfect one night stand.

He’s wearing a pair of dark jeans and a gray T-shirt with a plaid shirt over it.

His hand is wrapped around your waist in a delicious way, just above your hip. Big, expert hand. His brown eyes are staring at you, intense and piercing. Chocolate eyes, and you've always liked chocolate.

His plushy lips curve into a smirk when you say “let’s go cowboy, it’s time to show me what you got”

He chuckles, reaching down and squeezing your butt.

“After you, princess”

You roll your eyes at the pet name but he’s too gorgeous to back down.

He walks you to his pick up truck, in the parking lot.

He drives to a nice neighborhood, full of small houses with well-kept yards and safe streets where you imagine kids riding bikes and playing softball. The contrast between him and what’s around you makes you laugh. Joel doesn’t seem like a friendly neighbor, a candidate for trick-or-treating on Halloween, or the life of the block parties. He seems distant, a man of few words, a grouch. Which is perfect as far as you are concerned. You had stopped caring about men’s chatter.

When you were talking at the bar you noticed that his hands are calloused, rough, you were about to ask him what job he did but you decided you weren't interested.

Who cares, this guy will be out of my life after tonight.

You look at his profile in the truck, his expression when you put your hand on his thigh while he’s driving, his lips that twitch slightly, his Adam’s apple that jump in his throat, his hand that grips the steering wheel a little tighter. Really, truly, delicious.

You like him. His thick raven hair with just a few streaks of gray, his high forehead, his aquiline nose, his strong jaw. Your best friend sent you a tiktok a while ago about her favorite actor with a little song that said Girl dinner playing in the background. Watching Joel in the car you think of that. Except he isn’t just dinner but a six-course meal at a fancy restaurant.

By now your opinion of men is that they are all assholes and cheaters and the guys you met after Mark only supported that theory.

When you met someone cute your new philosophy was legs open, heart closed.

You wouldn't have opened your heart for Joel, but your legs yes, very willingly.

He parks in front of a cute little house, with a rose bush climbing up a trellis to one side and an impeccable lawn.

A small porch with a rocking chair and pots of geraniums complete the picture. “Jesus,” you think “This guy and his house have nothing to do with each other”

Joel has a worn-out, 90s rock star look in a flannel shirt and combat boots, a guy like him could have lived in a shitty loft with a mattress on the floor and wooden crates for nightstands.

“Here we are, princess” he says. He got out of the pick up and come to open the door for you.

“Quaint neighborhood,” you observe.

“See, I’m unmarried but I have a daughter” You stop him right away. “Nah, too much information.”

He has a daughter. You didn’t expect that either. And you don’t want to know, you don’t want to know a damn thing about him other than how good he fucks.

“Okay” he mutters, shrugging. He seems a little confused by all your restrictions but it is essential for you to keep your distance.

Knowing this already bothers you, you should have taken him to some motel instead of his house. He has a daughter, so he's a responsible family man? A guy who never does things like pick up a stranger in a bar? What if he hasn't gotten laid since Bush was president?

You don’t have time to waste on foreplay and cuddles, he’s not the “let’s talk first” type, is he? He doesn't seem like it but at this point you're not sure of anything anymore.

You enter his house and look around. It's a nice place, comfortable, simply furnished, there's too much brown around for your taste but it's okay.

You don't have a chance to process the photos hanging on the wall and scattered around on the tables and bookshelves before he pins you against the wall and kisses you.

It's a hungry, sloppy, passionate kiss, his lips moving over yours as if he wanted to devour you in one bite.

“Great job” you think, at least you were right about something, he is a man who doesn't waste time on ceremony.

His tongue slides warm into your mouth and it tastes like whiskey, his hands run over your body, caressing you.

First the neck, tightening slightly against your throat, then on your shoulders where he slides the straps of your dress. Then on your chest, to pull down the fabric just enough to uncover your bra. He cups one of your breast with his hand, squeezing it. He pulls down the bra and uncovers your already hard nipples. He leaves a trail of kisses and small bites on your jaw and all the way down the column of your neck, until he reaches your chest taking one of your buds into his mouth, you feel the warmth of his tongue and lips, licking greedily at it and then sucking it slowly, his beard tickling on your skin.

Fuck, this guy knows what he's doing.


You mentally apologize to him for doubting it, as you throw away your heels, kicking them to the floor.

You moan loudly as his heavy hand lifts the hem of your dress and covers your entire pussy. He presses hard on your clit and your body tenses like a violin string, you arch your back seeking more friction. He places his other hand on your hip, caging you between him and the wall. He continues to kiss you, while he dip in your slit through the now completely soggy fabric.

He grunts in your ear “so fucking great mmm pussy is dripping on my floor, isn’t she?” 
You don't even have the energy to cringe about him using pronouns for your cunt as he pulls your panties aside and dip two fingers into your slit, moving up towards your clit, rubbing it.

His eyes are settled in yours, you feel hypnotized by his gaze, so overwhelming and beautiful. It pierces you to the wall. 
His fingers stroke your clit in small circles, slowly and then faster, applying pressure every now and then. His smile widens as he watches you needily and hotly arch into his palm.

“Yeah, you like that, huh?”
You desperately clench around his thick fingers when he slides his index and middle into your hole. When he begins to slowly sink inside you you feel like you can’t hold his gaze anymore, it’s almost like he’s digging into your soul, your head crush into the crook of his neck and your arm tightens around his shoulders. 
Your brain is completely clouded with pleasure and its scent, wood and leather with a fresh clean undertone. He smells so good. It’s intoxicating.

Your dress is bunched up around your waist, just enough to allow his hands to feast on you.
His fingers keeps getting in and out of you reaching your most sensitive spot while his other hand goes back on your tit, playing with one of your nipples, twisting and gently pulling it between his fingers. 
You can no longer hold back your whines, they mix with his hoarse grunts, filling the air in the room.
“Fuck, it feels so good” you wail and he grumbles “yeah…such a nice cunt, fuck, so tight” 
He pumps even harder into you, scissoring a bit, hitting your g-spot again and again, his thumb on your clit and you feel your peak building up from your tummy and raising hot into your chest, you’re gasping for air as he bites in the tender skin of your neck and lowers his mouth back on your nipple. 
“mmm I would never stop sucking your tits, God, they are so - fuck” His voice dies in his throat as you clench hard around his fingers whining “don’t stop please don’t stop oh fuck sogoodsogoodsogoodsogood”, you sound almost like you’re on the verge of crying. 
He gently urges you “let go, gorgeous, give it to me, drench my fucking fingers” 
And you come, as much as you hate being told what to do he’s having the best of you. It’s basically the only moment in which you give yourself the chance to get lost, when your climax starts shuttering all over your body, wave after wave, washing away your control over yourself. 
He holds you down as your body shakes uncontrollably.

His mouth leaves small kisses on your sweaty skin, cradling you through your orgasm along with his hands that gently cup your ass, squeezing it. You moan against his neck, clinging to his flannel shirt.

His fingers slide out of you and he brings them to your mouth, he runs them over your lower lip, wetting it with your pleasure and then gliding them over your tongue to his knuckles, you lick them greedily under his satisfied gaze.

You stay hugged against the wall for a while, not saying anything, just breathing on each other's skin.

“Are you okay?” he asks softly when he feels your breathing return to normal. “I’ve never felt better.” You answer, finally looking into his eyes again and running a hand through his hair, ruffling it.

He's cute, too cute, his eyes look at you sweetly and he caresses your cheek, brushing his thumb on your skin.

This is no good, this is no good at all, you think.

You have to do something before you make the terrible mistake of melting like ice cream in the sun for this man. You can't afford that. So you take matters into your own hands.

You push him against the wall in turn and his wide eyes tell you he wasn't expecting it.

You give him a smile as you lower your hand to his pants, feeling him hard under your touch. He’s big. Much bigger than you expected even though you just got a preview of him pressing against your thigh as he finger-fucked you.

Your hands quickly fumble with his jeans, unbuttoning them. You make room in his underwear to reach his cock. Joel grumbles “oh fuck, yes”

“Take off your clothes” you order. Joel undresses in a second, throwing his clothes and boots on the floor. You lick your lips at the sight of his bulging boxers. You move back against him, massaging him from above the fabric, feeling a large stain spreading across the front. He’s dripping profusely, which makes you even more hungry and eager to try him.

You smile at him as you lower yourself to your knees, bringing his boxers down with you.

His cock springs free right before your eyes, hard, uncut, and impossibly perfect. Your hand slides over the line of hair leading to his crotch, slightly beaded with sweat, and wraps around his base. He doesn’t stop staring at you, enraptured.

Your hand moves up and down his length, lingering at the tip, collecting his precum and spreading it out.

You feel your saliva building up in your mouth and as much as it annoys you to admit it your clit twitch, you can’t wait to taste it. Your mind is fighting against this guy, but your body knows exactly what it wants and doesn’t care if it gets carried away.

You place your tongue on the tip, swirling it around and then sliding it flat down his shaft, over his throbbing, engorged vein, down to where your hand encircles him.

You hear him grunt and your mouth twists involuntarily into a smirk.

His musky flavor coats your tongue as you continue to work his length, you look up and there he is, hair tousled, eyebrows furrowed, mouth agape, eyes like ebony that sparkle with lust, beautiful as a painting. He almost hurts your eyes. You squeeze them shut, concentrating only on the heat in your mouth and your movements on his red and swollen tip.

You slurp greedily increasing the pace as you feel him throbbing more and more intensely.

You are enjoying the silence filled only by the sound of your obscene lapping and his hoarse moans when he decides to speak.

“Fuck, babygirl, you’re incredible”

Your blood runs cold, it’s like an unconditioned reflex you can’t escape. An uncontrolled anger rises from the pit of your stomach, you stop and let it out through your mouth. His face becomes confused, you take a deep breath to try to calm the fire that burns inside you and ask him sharply: “what did you call me?”

Mark's face materialized before your eyes, vivid as it hadn't been in a long time. It’s terrible.

He hesitates for a moment before saying “babygirl” in a garbled whisper.

“Don’t ever do that again” you tell him in a firm voice before moving closer to his cock and he mutters “no one has ever complained”

You stop again “It gives me the ick. So if you want me to continue I suggest you stop nagging like a child. Otherwise I can always walk out that door and let you finish with your hand”

“It’s just a pet name” he says, rolling his eyes, like it were no big deal, as if it didn't mean you were going back to where you started, to when you were too blind to realize how much of a liar your fiancé was, to when your heart was in pieces.

He can’t know, that’s true, so you haven’t completely blurted out. But that annoyance still rises in your throat. And you can’t cry, you really can’t. So sarcasm creeps in. “You think I’m a little girl? A princess who needs saving? Fucking Snow White?”

His cock is still standing between you two, waiting for attention. You might laugh at the situation, maybe make a joke about how well he holds his erection, but you're not really in the mood.

His Adam's apple moves in his throat, he gulps air before answering: “no, but…I mean, it’s just a word”

You shrug, looking at him with reproach and resignation at the same time, and try to answer with all the nonchalance you can muster. “Okay. It will mean that pornhub will take care of you, I don’t give a damn” If he can’t compromise then he’s not worth your time, just like every other man.

You start to get up and he stops you, a slight panic in his eyes “oh no, come on, don’t be like that. Ok, ok, I won’t say it again”

You lower yourself again and are about to start over in silence when it occurs to you to teasing him a little, just a little and only because he ruined the moment for you. He did it unintentionally but still. You don't mind the rough play and you think this big guy in front of you can take it.
“Let's try” you think “I can always stop”

It’s not like you’re going to hurt him badly, just teasing.

So you look him in the eyes with all the candor you can, taking one of his balls in your hand. You squeeze it and say “Are you going to be a good boy? Are you going to shut the fuck up for me?” 
“Yes” he murmurs. 
“I’m not your fucking babygirl, we clear?” 
“Yes” 
“Say it.”
“You’re not my babygirl” he whispers.
You squeeze hard on his ball, seeing his lower lip twitching with pleasure, his eyes dark with lust.
Yeah, he likes that, it’s clearly painted all over his face.
“Louder”
“You’re not my babygirl” his voice breaking in the attempt as you put your mouth on his ball sucking hard on it.
You let go with a satisfied smile “Perfect”
You take his shaft back into your mouth, squeezing the other ball gently with your hand and he leans against the wall, eyes shut and whimpering.
It’s so good to hear him like that, your clit is throbbing between your leg and your arousal is dripping all over your inner thighs.
You stop when you feel him on the edge, another few licks on his red and angry tip would be enough to send him over but you’re craving him into your cunt. And also, you like seeing him all pent up and needy for you.

He’s basically babbling at this point, begging you and swearing, eyes desperate for a release, all his body tense and covered in a light layer of sweat.

He’s totally gorgeous and you’re not done yet.

“Don’t cry baby, I will give you what you want” you coo, your lips curved into a smirk.

You get up and take his hand, guiding him on the couch in his living room.

It’s a nice brown leather couch, there is a little hollow in one of the pillows and you imagine that is where he usually sits to watch tv. This is also unnecessary information that makes him much more human and cute than you would like.

You can see him on Sundays, sprawled out there, his feet up on the coffee table placed in front, a beer in his hand, watching football.

No, that’s too much.

You sit him down in the center, caressing his cheek. You pinch one of his nipples and he lets out a groan. You take off the dress that at this point is practically dangling uselessly from your waist, your now soaked panties and your bra which he took care of pulling down earlier making it useless as well.

You’re finally completely naked before his eyes.

You throw everything aside on the floor, feeling incredibly vulnerable but trying not to show it.

Joel is silent but you can see his eyes feasting on your body, lusting over every curve before settling on your pussy that glistens with your juices.

You move closer and lean him against the back of the couch and sit on him, holding his cock with one hand and gently pushing it into your hole. You are incredibly wet but you proceed with caution anyway, he is too big to take in one thrust.

He pants beneath you, lacing his hands on your hips and guiding you gently. You can't see his eyes anymore, which is good for you, he's already made you feel exposed enough. It’s better this way, you can take what you want from his body without letting him affect you too much.

When you are fully seated on him you start to move, bouncing on his thighs, swinging your hips, he tries to keep up with your pace, thrusting into you as deep as he can, sinking into your wetness.

One of his hands moves to one of your breasts, cupping it and squeezing it, brushing your nipple with his palm and then taking it between his fingers.

You lean forward slightly to let him reach that soft spot inside you that always makes you see stars. Your ears are filled with his moans, the sound you like to hear when a man fucks you.

Nothing more than his natural, delirious, desire-filled sounds.

You throw your head on his shoulder and he kisses you, you cry into his mouth as you feel his hand move from your breast to your clit and begin to rub it furiously.

His tongue is warm and delicious in your mouth, a small trickle of saliva runs down your chin as you try to chase it and dance with it.

He's at his peak now, you feel him pulsing hard inside you, his moans muffled on your lips.

“Come inside, I’m on the pill” you only manage to whisper.

His pubic hair tickles your ass as he slams into you repeatedly, until you feel long, hot streaks of his cum painting your walls.

You continue to rock on his hips, lacing one hand around his neck, kissing him, until everything gets confusing, blurry, overwhelming in a way you can't explain. You reach him in a state of bliss, sweaty and exhausted but never as satisfied as you are now.

You pull his cock out of you and sit on the couch, he is on your neck in an instant, leaving a trail of small hungry kisses as you both try to catch your breath. You close your eyes so as not to see his, probably softened and vulnerable, nothing more wrong than letting yourself be taken by the tenderness after sex.

After a while he gets up and disappears into the kitchen without saying anything. He returns with a glass of water and hands it to you. “Thank you,” you say, before quickly swallowing it to ease the dryness in your throat. You set it on the coffee table and stand up before he tries to say something stupid.

You gather your clothes, getting dressed as he watches you from the couch, you feel his eyes on you the whole time.

You lean in to give him a kiss and his hand on your hip feels like a silent request to stay.

You don't say anything, there's no need to say anything.

You walk out the door without looking back.

You're not a babygirl.

A/N: I personally don't mind being called "babygirl" and Joel could call me anything, really. LOL I just wanted to try something different, hope you all liked it. Thanks again for reading, comments and reblogs are very much appreciated ❤️

[windvexer]

the intersection of divination and unintentional spirit contact

Generally I'd say, no - divination (tarot cards, spirit/"ouija" boards, black mirrors, crystal balls, etc etc) in and of itself does not automatically conjure or evoke spirits.

If a spirit is already not in the space where you're performing divination, an act of divination will not spontaneously make spirits appear.

That being said, I have experienced and seen others experience increases in spiritual contact, activity, and awareness after "getting into" divination.

My goal in this post isn't to try to make people fearful of divination (which they should not be) but to try and highlight some of the nuances I've experienced at the intersection of divination and unintentional spirit contact.

Generally, we can divide these experiences into two categories.

There's a specific spirit who is already around, and they'd love an opportunity to chat, and,

"Hey spirit chums, isn't it neat that there's a new practitioner in town who's developing a consistent practice? Let's go over next time divination is open and say hi!"

You'll notice a distinct lack of a third category, "the demons you learned about in your nondenominational Protestant Sunday shool spontaneously appear and your house will one day be featured in a string of Amityville spinoffs."

Of course, not all divination occurs in unintended spirit contact. I'd hazard that a minority of all divinatory attempts end up this way.

So, what kind of specific spirits might already be around, wanting to chat?

I believe (and I'm not so unique in this belief) that spirits are just around us and within things, all the time. A person may have spirits in their home and yard; have spirits attached to family heirlooms; be watched over by ancestors, guides, angels, or protectors; or, in the case of many Seekers, have obtained the attention of various gods or other allies.

When a reader shuffles their tarot cards with the intent to access information they would not be able to have if not for magic, we can conceptualize that the reader is opening a little window and peering into the beyond. If spirits are "beyond," and wandering past the window, they have the ability to wave back and say howdy.

Sometimes - and, in my experience, rarely - these spirits will jut in and "take over" a reading in order to deliver some important message.

Much more often, spirits who push their way into a reading don't have anything important to say at all. They're not there because they're big, powerful, important, or relevant - they're there because it's something to do.

Many random spirits who are already around and like to show up to readings are just curious, don't particularly care about you, and are happy to be very weaselly if it means they get more attention from you. These spirits may be thrilled to claim that they are powerful demons, top-tier angels, faerie kings, your hitherto-unknown familiar spirit, and so forth.

A major giveaway is that they will often not reveal this identity until you specifically ask them if they are a faerie king, or whatever, and they'll agree that they are because to them this is Omegle and it's fun to have you on the hook.

These spirits are easy to get rid of, because they have exactly as much power over you during and after a reading as they had before the reading - which is to say, zero.

If these spirits are already not affecting your life, they will continue to not affect it once the reading is over. The fact that a reading occurred does not "magically" give them power or influence over you.

And again - while a reader worth their salt can intentionally petition helper spirits and ask to receive messages, it is pretty dang uncommon for a person's guides to force their ways into readings. More likely than not, you're dealing with some rando.

Now, all that being said - from time to time, various spirits demand attention and will use a reading as an excuse to get that attention. In my experience, this is a problem often experienced by people who are specifically spirit workers (although it can happen to others).

In circumstances like these, it's not a random curious spirit who's taking the opportunity to chat, nor is it a guide giving advice. Rather, a spirit has figured out that someone nearby can hear it, and it would like to engage your services.

It's not unheard of for a spirit worker (or very spiritually sensitive person) to take home a unique little trinket from the thrift shop, something that just catches their eye, something that makes them feel ways about things, and ignore it, and ignore it, and ignore it...

Until they open up the spirit board to try and do a meditation on the meanings of the runes, and the thrift shop spirit barges in and demands a proper shrine and maybe an offering every now and then.

Again, this isn't summoning, or conjuring, or whatever. The act of divination didn't cause the spirit to appear - it just created an opportunity for a spirit to speak.

The solution to getting rid of such a spirit is often to help it out, or respectfully remove it from the premises, or so on. That's spirit working stuff, and not a facet of divination.

But, what about people who experience an increase in general spiritual activity after readings?

Well, it's a bit like buying a new house and becoming very active in the neighborhood. The neighbors take notice of you. That attention doesn't stop the second the cookout ends and you go back inside.

I'm much less inclined to believe that divination alone will cause you to be an active member in your spiritual neighborhood. But many diviners are witches, pagans, or practitioners. They're not just reading cards, but also practicing spells, praying to gods, and modifying their own spiritual environment.

A witch who is attempting meditations to find their spirit guides, experimenting with full moon rituals, casting spells, and trying to take care of their local environment, should not really be that surprised if spirits start showing up wanting to hang out.

It doesn't mean that witch has special spirit-drawing powers (sorry), and it doesn't mean the runes you bought off Etsy are summoning demons - it means you're integrating with the spiritual reality around you.

Of course, people who don't desire random spirit contact don't have to just deal with it. There is a big difference between throwing a neighborhood bbq where anyone is invited, and having a private cookout for friends in the yard.

Spirits, by and large, often don't bother people who don't want to be bothered. Hang a big no solicitors sign on your spiritual house, and a lot of spirits just won't bother.

Again, I doubt that just reading tarot (even if you do it a lot) is going to suddenly inspire tons of spiritual contact. A lot of people work very hard to get spirits to talk to them. It's usually not as easy as coming into contact with spiritual tools.

Even direct divination that actively seeks contact with spirits (like, trying to channel someone's ancestors for them) often does not bring the spirit into the space - it's more like a two-way phone call. It doesn't actually bring the spirit to where you are and then set it loose.

Anyway. Unintended spirit contact while using divinatory tools does happen, but it's... usually not a big deal. It's often the equivalent of someone walking past your picnic at the park and saying, "some weather we're having!"

And in the random instances I've encountered where the spirit contact is actually a Situation, nine times out of ten, the spirit just wants a spirit worker to help them with someone so they can get on with their life.

[year2000electronics]

What is Reverse Ford's relationship like with Stan and the Twins post weirdmageddon?

ford's in a bit of an interesting position post-weirdmageddon.

see, because ford never gets a metal plate for himself, there's not really any sort of twin switcheroo that can happen, so instead, the one who gets their memories all zapped away is ford. and he went in there genuinely believing he wouldnt come back- much like stan- but for HIM, that's because he had become the same sort of monster that deserved to burn like will was. that he had abandoned everything in the selfish pursuit of power. so when he started remembering things again and realizing it was because his family was actively putting in the work to get him back (with NO strings attached this time), he was. STUNNED to say the least.

he kinda doesn't know what to do with himself. the kids are working on undoing what short damage theyve done in the time theyve just been kids growing up, stan's even turning a new leaf, but him? he was the one who made the apocalypse happen and helped urge on mabel to get the rift. he tried getting mason to join him, he kept will locked in a deal for years, he threatened stan into getting his house back, he lost fiddleford's friendship... all that.

he's pretty quiet for the first few weeks because, like, mason and mabel, they can still learn to be regular kids instead of performers. stan was always a failiure in their parents' eyes, so he never put TOO much stock into the whole 'put on a show' thing. but ford has been constantly charming people into getting what he wants, and hasnt stopped since the moment his mom handed him the phone and went "here. read the lady's fortune. make sure to include how happy and prosperous she'll be if she buys our tarot deck". it's hard to turn that off. so for a while he just chooses not to try at all.

i imagine it isn't until he reconnects with fiddleford that he actually ends up trying to get closer to stan and the kids, because fidds is like "youve been handed the best thing you could ever have on a platter: a new beginning. dont go wastin it now!"

stan and ford are slowly but steadily learning how to actually be brothers again and express how much they matter to each other (cos they spent a LONG time trying to usurp and use the other), ford is trying to explore mabel's various hobbies and they talk fashion ALLL day, but i think the one ford is really concerned for is mason. he sees a lot of himself in that kid and wants to make sure he knows that ford regrets all of the stuff he did and not to be like him. yknow since mason was REALLY into all that magic stuff

at the end of the day, hey, it could always be worse! he could be in some sort of therapy-prism! but that's ridiculous right.