#also yeah i admit i did used to just eat the soup all concentrated like that

[transingthoseformers]

The Megatron and Starscream dynamic is like a can of chicken noodle soup: you're supposed to dilute it with a cup of water, but not everyone knows that

[bokutosbubblebutt]

A little help

from us students

- Since Sensei Y/N joined team 7, the three students noticed that their usual teacher behaved a bit weird, weirder than normal! So they assumed that Kakashi had a little crush on their new teammate and they tried everything to help him out

Pairing: Kakashi x fem!reader

Words: 2540

Genre: fluff, a bit 16+

- a/n: This was fr so much fun to write and I‘m honestly really proud if it lmao

—————————————

„Okay, guys! We need to talk!“ Sakura sat down next to Naruto and Sasuke. The three we’re eating ramen together after their training session with Sensei Kakashi and Sensei Y/N.

„I was watching him now for a really long time and I came to the conclusion that Sensei Kakashi has a crush on Sensei Y/N!“ she said and ordered some ramen with pork.

„Hu? What do you mean, Sakura?“ Naruto asked confused and raised one of his eyebrows. Even Sasuke turned his head and started to think about it.

„Haven’t you noticed? He’s been acting really weird the last few weeks since she joined us. Well, weirder than usual.“ - „I noticed that he doesn’t read his book when she’s with us.“ - „Yeah, and when we have training with her, he’s always on time, sometimes even earlier.“ - „And when we had this fight with the rain Ninjas, he had a nose bleed after that even though he didn’t got hit.“

„But when I think about it, Y/N likes him too, in my opinion.“ Naruto said and put his chopsticks down. „She’s always with him! Since she joined us, you barely see them alone.“

„They even do personal training with each other, although they are both extremely strong!“ - „And she’s always laughing at his jokes!“

„I remember Sensei Guy eyeing them and he made some weird facial expressions towards Kakashi when we met him.“ Sasuke laughed and drank the left over soup.

„Thats it! It’s obviously that they like each other! Everyone notices that but not themselves.“

„We could help them out a little bit? I think they are pretty cute together and Sensei Kakashi just needs a girlfriend. Maybe he will stop reading these weird books!“ Sakura suggested and looked at her teammates. They all agreed on doing that and started to make some plans on how to get them together.

-Plan 1-

It was a casual trainings day and everyone did their own personal exercises. Sensei Kakashi and you were watching over the three, gave them tips and helped them out. Everything was normal and you all minded your own business.

Naruto was standing on a tree he just walked up with chakra in his feet. „Y/N! Look I made it!“ he screamed over to you and you just threw a thumbs up at him.

„Good Job! Now try to walk down again!“

That was the signal for the first plan they came up with. Now it’s was Narutos job to bring you up on the tree. „Uhm, Y/N Sensei! Can you please help me a bit? I‘m scared that I fall.“ he screamed down to you and tried to make a nervous face.

„I think you should try it on your own Naruto! I believe in you!“ - „But I‘m scared that I fall on my face! You probably don’t want me to get into the hospital, do you?“

Annoyed you rolled your eyes and walked up on that tree to the student. He simply thanked you and then made his first step downwards. „See? You can do it! You have nothing to worry about.“

Naruto casually walked down the tree and looked over to Sakura and Sasuke. The girl was training to put a certain amount of chacra in her Kunias with which she simply can hurt her enemies and paralyze them, a special technique she wanted to learn from Sensei Y/N.

You were about to walk the tree down as well right after Naruto. Kakashi was sitting on the ground and watching you doing this simple task.

Sakura was about to throw one of the chacra knives at a dummy but suddenly Sasuke screamed her name. Of course, this was all planed and the little girl stopped paying attention to where she was throwing the knife and looked over to her teammate. Sakura threw the kunai ”accidentally“ in your direction and managed to hit both of your ankles.

Since this technique caused paralyzed body parts and prevented the chacra flow in some certain areas, both of your feet turned numb and you weren’t able to concentrate chacra to walk down the tree. Slowly your feet started to slide and you fell. With a scream you expected to hit the hard ground and break your bones but this didn’t happen.

You fell into two strong arms which catched you bridal style in the right moment. Immediately your cheeks turned bright red and you tried to avoid eye contact with Kakashi, who catched you. He just stood there and smiled slightly. „Th-,Thank you.“ you stuttered and covered your eyes with your arm.

Kakashi looked down at you and scanned your facial features. Once again he noticed how pretty and cute you were. Slowly he sat you down to check your ankles.

„Oh my god! I‘m so sorry, Sensei Y/N! I‘m so sorry, it’s all my fault!“ Sakura tried to make it look like an accident and apologized immediately. Sasuke and Naruto gave each other a secret high five and then walked up to their teachers with a faked concerned look.

„Dont worry! At least you got it right. It’s wasn’t a big amount of chacra anyways.“ you said and tried to brush it off.

„Next time you better pay attention to where are you throwing your kunai!“ Kakashi warned her and then slightly touched the cut on your feet. The bandage, which was tied around your ankles, was covered in blood and a slight cut was visible. „Does it hurt? Can you move them?“ he asked and put one of his hands on your thigh.

„I can’t feel anything in them, they are numb.“ you answered and massaged the bridge of your nose.

„Kakashi, I think you have to carry her to the hospital when she can’t walk!“ - „Yeah, I guess I have to do that!“ Both of you just looked at each other and blushed. Carefully he placed one arm under your knees and the other on your back. His left hand rested on your hip and pulled you close.

They probably would never admit it but they secretly liked it how close they were to each other. The physical contact wasn’t uncomfortable, more like the opposite and they enyojed each others touch.

-Plan 2-

A week later your ankles were completely healed and you could move them normally again. Now it was time for their second plan, which was well, less painful.

The friends noticed that Kakashi visited you almost every day and brought you flowers. When you got released it was time for the second part.

You five were walking trough the village and talked to each other. „Uhm, Sensei Y/N! We wanted to invite you for dinner as an apologize and we will pay, together.“ Sakura said shyly and hit Naruto slightly in the side. He just nodded and agreed to what she said.

„You don’t have to. It’s okay“ you simply answered and smiled. „We won’t take a no! And we are already here.“ Sasuke threw in and walked towards the restaurant.

It was their favorite ramen noodle shop and Sasuke hold up the sheet for the others. „Hmm, when we are already here.“

Quickly the three picked their seats and made a gap for their senseis so they had to sit next to each other. Normally you sat down and put your hands on the table.

The nice lady took your order and then they started to make your food. As always you ordered ramen with lots of veggies and your favorite drink.

„Do you know what our next mission is going to be? Hopefully something cool, I wanna see Sensei Y/N fighting again!“ Naruto laughed and looked over to Kakashi. Naruto sat besides you and Sasuke sat next to Kakashi.

„Yeah, she is really good, right Kaksahi? The way she does her genjutsu is amazing.“ Sakura mentioned and smiled at their Senseis.

„Hu? Uhm, yeah! I-, I also think your fighting skill is pretty good. It’s, uhm, nice to watch you.“ Kakashi stuttered and tried to hide that he was blushing.

Finally the soup was ready to eat and you all started seating silently. Suddenly Naruto reached over to Sasuke with the intention to get a towel to clean his face.

Accidentally he managed to push against your arm and make you spill your drink all over yourself. Now your shirt and pants were soaking wet and it felt disgusting.

„Oh my god! I‘m sorry Sensei Y/N! I‘m so sorry!“ he started to apologize and looked shocked at you. Sasuke and Sakura gave each other a little high five and just giggled a bit.

Annoyed you looked at your student and then at your wet disgusting clothes. „It’s okay, just be careful next time!“ You tried to brush it off.

Kakashi asked the nice Lady for a towel and she gave it to him. „Wait, let me help you.“ he said and started to gently pet the towel on your wet clothes to dry them a bit.

Carefully he pat it on your torso and on your boobs. You didn’t even realized it at first what he did because you just thanked him for helping you but after a while you noticed the gentle touches. Your face turned bright red and you tried to cover it with your hands. „Th-, thank you!“ you stuttered and looked away. „This is so embarrassing.“

„I can give you my jacket!“ he offered and immediately took it off, although you haven’t answered yet. Now he just sat there with a tshirt and his mask. Slightly he threw it over you and closed it for you. Again you thanked him quietly and smiled.

His jacket smelled good. It smelled like him. Not what you expected, even better what you expected. He smelt like the forest after a rainy day and a hint of wet dog. Maybe he had washed his dogs while wearing it.

-Plan 3-

Your team planned instead of training to do a day off and just hang out and spend some time together. And the tree students had the idea to relax a bit and go to the public bath together.

„You are really exited, aren’t you?“ you giggled because the three rushed immediately into the building. Together you and Kakashi paid for their bath and said „see you later“ to each other since the bathes were separated into men and women sections.

While humming a little melody, you took off your clothes and wrapped a towel around your body. After that you went outside and made your way to the hot bath. You didnt even look in which part you went because you knew the women bath was right and the men bath was left. Suddenly Sasuke stopped you.

This was their third plan.

„Uhm, Y/N Sensei, this is the men bath you are walking in!“ he said and pointed towards the sign. A little figure which looks like a boy was on it. „I think they changed it, I almost walked into the girls bath.“

„Oh! Thank you, Sasuke.“ you smiled and looked at the sign again. Weird, you thought but went through the other door.

Little did you know that they changed the signs before you could walk in. Kakashi went into the right bath and then they changed it. Exited the looked trough a little hole to see what happens.

„If this doesn’t work, than they are both too stupid. A better plan doesn’t exist“ naruto laughed.

Unbothered you walked into the bath, dropped your towel halfway through and threw it over a stone. Slowly you walked into the water and let your body react to the hot steamy atmosphere around you. The hot water hugged your body and relaxed you sat down and finally closed your eyes.

After a while you opened them again and looked around. Where is Sakura?

Quietly you heard a embarrassed male voice which cleared his throat. „Uhm, Y/N, I think you are in the wrong bath room.“ he said calmly and slightly smiled at you amused.

„Oh, fuck! Kakashi!“ you screamed and pulled your legs closer to hide your body. Why does this always happen to you?

„Don’t worry, I haven’t seen anything.“ he said and tried to avoid eye contact with you. His hair was down and he didn’t wear his mask. That was probably the first time you saw his full face and, and he was beautiful and hot. You have fantasized about how he looks several times and this just topped your expectations. He was really attractive.

„But, but even Sasuke told me that I have to go in here.“ you whined and tried to hide your bright red face in your knees. This was so embarrassing!

„Dont worry, it’s not like that I don’t know how a female body looks.“ he giggled and slowly swum into your direction. With distance he placed himself next to you and quickly scanned your body.

You were beautiful in his opinion. Your skin looked so soft and the little rolls your stomach formed, were adorable. The wet hair and your blushed skin caused him to not taking his eyes from you.

„You don’t have to hide your body.“ he calmly said and grabbed your chin to make you look into his face. „I-, I think you are really pretty, Y/N. And I’ve liked you since the first day you joined us.“

„You, you really do?“ you asked and looked into his blushed face. Slightly he nodded and then started to pull your face closer to his.

Finally it’s happening.

At first he gave you a gentle kiss, just a little one to make sure you were into it. After that he smiled and pulled you closer again. This kiss was way more exiting and got heated pretty quickly. Slowly he placed his hand on your waist right under your boobs.

After a minute you pulled away and you smiled but immediately started to laugh at him. „Kakashi, you got a nose bleed!“ - „Oh shit! It’s quite a long time ago since I kissed someone.“ he giggled and tried to make it stop.

~Time skip~

After you two spent sometime together in the bath and talked about the last few things that happened you went outside to face your students.

„Okay! First of all, that was evil and very inappropriate! We are really disappointed and you three will get cleaning duty!“ Kakashi said and looked down at his students.

„We‘ve noticed that you three were acting really weird in the last few weeks and now you have to tell us. Of course it wasn’t an accident that Naruto pushed me and Sakura "accidentally" threw her knives at me! Explain!“ you wanted to know angrily and crossed your arms in from if your chest.

The three looked at each other and then finally they explained everything to you. „We noticed that Kakashi might has a crush on you Y/N Sensei! And, and we know that he is, well, a bit stupid when it comes to girls and love in general.“ Sakura started to tell the story. „And so we decided to help you a bit with that and made these plans.“

„And we guess it worked out, right?“ Naruto smirked.

Masterlist

[moonlightdreamzz]

Cozy — Jeon Jungkook

A glimpse into you and Jungkook’s love.

Request: Hi! I saw your writing and I enjoyed reading your works. I saw that you needed some request so here I am. I was wondering if you could write an imagine with BTS’s Jungkook where he comes home to the reader online shopping or something, and it’s a very touchy, lusty, feel. But lots of soft and subtle gestures towards one another. Sorry if it’s a bit much, it took me a lot to request 😬 but thank you for hearing me out! 🤗

Jungkook doesn’t understand why he gets like this doing something he does everyday. I mean, with all of his other daily routines he didn’t get nervous. Singing, dancing, speaking infront of others; these were all things that he just couldn’t get nervous about doing even if he tried.

But right now he’s standing infront of the door to his own apartment, and he finds himself taking deep breaths. His hand is on the keypad, but they’re not moving to type the code in.

“You’ve been dating this girl for almost two years now.” He chuckles to himself, knowing this was ridiculous. “She’s your girlfriend, and you see her practically everyday. Go inside.”

And as always, he listens to himself. He puts the code into his keypad, and steps in quickly. His shoes slip off his feet with ease as all he had to do today was re-record some things for the new album; no dancing.

Before he creeps around the corner, where he knows he’ll find you either asleep on the couch, or scrolling through your phone as you wait for him to come and kiss you all over, he always likes to listen. Sometimes you’ll hum, and it has to be the most beautiful sound he’s ever heard. You always say you can’t sing, but he’s listened in to your little concerts too many times to count, and knows it’s the opposite.

Sometimes, you’ll even be watching tv. He has a little guessing game he plays with himself to see if he can guess what you’re viewing, and he has to admit, he’s getting better at it. His favorite though was to hear you laugh. You always kept him up to date with twitter slang, and what was considered funny between his fans and such, but when he would hear you burst into a fit of chuckles and heavy sighs; it was music to his ears.

The house is silent right now, but not so silent that he can assume that you’re deep in slumber. He’s trying his best to keep the wood floor from making too much noise, as if the alarm didn’t already inform you someone was in your home.

He finally makes it around the corner, where he finds you. His heart always increases in speed whenever you grace him with your presence, and right now is no different. Your laptop is secured onto your legs, and he can see just how concentrated you are based off how your eyebrows are making you look like an upset child.

“Hi.”

Immediately your head snaps up, and the smile on your face tells him everything he needs to know. You missed him too. You still loved him even after a couple hours of space. Your hair was still wrapped up in the scarf he gifted your for your birthday. Funny enough, it’s red and yellow undertones were complementing his white walls very nicely. This whole scenery was so beautiful to him.

“Hi baby. You look tired.” You accuse with a raised eyebrow. You hated to see him like this; a weak walk dragging across his floors, and the color tainted from his cheeks. “Have you eaten today?”

“Just had dinner with Yoongi.”

There’s a silence, featuring the two of you making eye contact. You’re looking him up and down, trying to find the lie within his words, but based on the slight swelling in his fingers you know he’s being honest.

“Are you full? I can cook you something.” You offer, standing up promptly, but Jungkook steps towards you, gently setting you back down where you were sitting.

“Have a seat.” He smiles. It’s at this moment where he realizes he hasn’t kissed you since yesterday. He also realizes that you know exactly what he’s thinking, so he seizes his opportunity.

The kiss is loving, but also filled with the kind of lust that only the two of you could have. You both agreed a long time ago that your lips were made for eachother, but even so, you always giggled when your lips pressed together. It was always magic.

He has one knee on the couch as he hovers over you, hands moving up your neck, to the side of your cheeks, and then to your ears as he allows this to calm him down. Even your breathing is in synch as the two of you just enjoy this moment.

Just when Jungkook was starting to feel his heartbeat increase to a deadly pace, and his blood rush to his face, and all the other familiar places, you break the kiss. He can’t help but to follow your plump lips, pressing another peck before resting his forehead on yours.

“What?” He questions, still hovering on top of your body that was now laid on the sofa.

“No can do tonight sir.” You sigh in disappointment, hands finding themselves rubbing circles into his fat cheeks.

“No.” He wines, and not because he needs it so bad. He just hated when you had to be bothered with such a demon. “The red sea?”

“The red sea, baby.” You confirm, and now the two of you are laughing. Once again, the kisses start, except, this time they’re much more sweet and slow. With his lips he’s telling a million stories. He’s telling you that this morning, he was really upset that you weren’t awake as he couldn’t properly embrace you. He’s telling you that while he was singing songs of heartbreak in the studio, he found it hilarious because that would never be the two of you. He’s confessing that he missed you so much, and this taste, and this feeling.

His lips move to your neck, and his hands are rubbing all over your comfort zones such as your legs, and your shoulders, and your back. He then stops his actions, looking right into your eyes. He loves doing this. He can always see how nervous you get. Your pupils start to twitch, as you’re trying your best to be a big girl and handle all the love that rests in his eyes, but at the same time wanting to look away because it’s too much.

“How did I get so lucky?” He questions, kissing you once more. Your scent is so distinct. Castor oil and black girl magic, as you would describe it.

“I think you must have been an important man in your past life.”

“Like Malcolm X?”

And now you’re screeching; that laugh that can make any man fall to his knees in an instant. It’s shaking every part of his body, and he loves you. Your little snorts are the icing on the cake; a recipe for his red cheeks.

“You’re funny.” Is all you can manage as you finally calm down.

“And you’re beautiful.” Jungkook finally stands up, placing his hand infront of you to grab. “You ate, right?”

You grab his hand that was calling out to you, standing up with a slight hiss. “Had a little soup. You know I can’t eat much when I’m bleeding to death.”

“You sure you don’t want anything else? Ice pack?”

“Just you.” Your smile is dazzling, even when your eyes seem a little weary. He doesn’t know if you’re worried about him, your day wasn’t the best, or both, but he knows he can turn it all around.

Setting the alarm, and turning off all the lights to the rooms you walked passed, he leads you to your shared bedroom. As always, the bed is exactly how you two left it in the morning. You both agreed that making a bed was pointless when you were just going to get back in it.

Jungkook pushes you forward, making you fall gently on the mattress. He then begins to remove his clothing one by one, followed by whistles coming from you.

“Oh how I wish I wasn’t about to throw up.” You call, now resting on your elbow in a seductive manner. You’re already in your pajamas, which consisted of nothing but a tank top. You’re comfortable, and he always loves to see you like this.

“You can still enjoy the show.” He winks, before stepping into the bathroom.

“You don’t have to take a shower, you know.” You offer, rubbing his spot in repeated circles. “You didn’t even do anything today.”

“And how do you know that?”

“Because your hair isn’t dripping all over your floor from sweat.”

“Our floor.” He corrects.

“Our floor.” You smile. “I just want to Netflix and chill with you, baby.”

“You mean just Netflix?”

“Shut up.” You chuckle.

Of course, he takes your advice. He switches his boxers, and leaves it at that as he jumps on his high set bed. You always have Netflix ready; the horror section waiting to be surfed.

“Your scarf.” He whispers, using his hands to pull it down so your edges would be protected. He presses a light kiss to the cloth, before allowing you to nuzzle into his large arms. Your hand immediately finds the wrist that holds his tatted sleeve, and it’s caressing it ever so gently. “I love you.”

“I love you more.”

“I get really nervous before I come home.” He confesses, not really knowing why. It just comes out.

You mute the tv, looking up at him now. “Why?”

“You just...make me nervous as hell. Never in a million years did I think I’d find you.”

“Am I that great?” You question, tilting your head as best you could. “All I do is eat your food.”

“And you also support me in everything I do. You’re always there and you always know what to say. You always can make my days better. You’re the greatest gift.”

“You’re being really nice to me today.” You’re squinting at him, clearly suspicious. “What did you do?”

“Absolutely nothing.” He assures with a laugh.

“Yeah yeah.” You brush, but he knows you’re enjoying every bit of this. This extra love he’s giving you right now.

His body is always warm, clothed or not, and the feeling of your skin on his is too good. Too pleasant. You had been so excited to watch a good movie and fall asleep, but neither of you had picked up the remote. Your hands were just playing with eachother’s, observing the way you fit together so perfectly.

“How are the boys?”

“They’re good, I hope. It’s kind of funny, but we’ve been spending so much time together getting ready for the comeback, as soon as we’re free we run away from eachother.

“Are you excited?” You ask.

“Yeah...yeah.”

You notice the hesitation in his answer. “Why the pause?”

“I’m always excited to see the fans and stuff, but I’m never going to be happy about having to leave you. It sucks.”

You slide up his body just a tad, kissing him gently before allowing yourself to be the big spoon. Your hands find themselves entangled in his locs, and you can hear the way his breathing is calming down just from the motions.

“I know, baby. I know.” You assure. “But you love it. I promise I’ll be here when you come back. I always am.”

“It’s like—we’ve done this a thousand times. I’m gone, and you’re here. You would think I know how to cope with it, but it gets worse everytime. I’m going to think about you the whole tour.”

“That’s a good thing.”

“How?”

“That means you really do love me more each day.”

That makes him chuckle and smile all at the same time, as he remembers the times when you were heavily insecure about your relationship. You always questioned yourself, but now you were the complete opposite. You were giving him the peptalk.

“I told you I meant it.”

The night continues like this; you massaging his scalp with love and care while you talk about everything and nothing at the same time. The two of you doze off in this position, Netflix still blaring at your eyes.

[fantasticstoryteller]

New Amsterdam Chapter 60

Matt felt slightly ill at the description of the stuff Peter had put up with (you don’t understand, I signed with his mother and his mother was the sweetest, most wonderful person you could ever meet) from his landlord. Things like his utilities suddenly being separate from his rent, when they were all included before. Things like calling for someone to fix his heater, being told if he wasn’t there to let the maintenance guy in it wouldn't get fixed, and then not sending the maintenance guy for three days—when it was negative ten degrees Fahrenheit outside. Things like the electricity in his apartment being ���randomly” cut off—shortly before it was time for him to pay his rent. Then this latest stunt—changing the date of rent collection with two day’s notice.

He was also surprised at Peter’s attitude about it. As far as he could tell, the young man thought the shitty behavior he was experiencing was just stuff that happened to him, and Matt would desperately like to know why he thought that way. He was also shocked that Peter—Peter actually seemed to like and trust Deadpool. And Deadpool showed a side around Peter that Matt suspected no one else got to see; he was gentle and loving. And teasing, Matt recalled about the ball.

It was—odd, to say the least. Deadpool was explosion, noise and chaos. He was still those things around Peter but—they were softer, muted somehow. And Matt could not for the life of him figure out how the unassuming young man in front of him had possibly gotten that reaction out of Deadpool.

Matt could also tell that the feelings were mutual. Peter’s heartbeat slowed and his breathing evened out when Deadpool touched him. Even when he was scolding Deadpool his heartbeat had that slow, loving pattern. He relaxed around the murderous mercenary—and had even, at one point, called the man a hero. Which Deadpool, with a modesty that Matt couldn't quite credit even though he’d heard it with his own ears, had denied.

There was also something disturbingly familiar about the young man that Matt couldn't place, like a nostalgic taste on his tongue he couldn't quite recognize. He tried to set the sensation aside as he concentrated on the conversation and made mental notes even as he (with Peter’s permission) recorded it to go over it again later (with his law partner this time). He would bring the full force of the law down on the man—and if that didn’t work, if he managed to squeak away through a legal loophole somehow, well—Daredevil could pay him a visit.

At the end of the conversation, Matt turned off the recording device (an old cassette player—not as convenient as digital, but harder to hack and, more importantly, had grooves on the different buttons in shapes designed to tell what those buttons were for) and put it in his bag. “Thank you, Mr. Parker,” Matt said, having learned the young man’s full name over the course of the gentle interrogation—and over the dinner where Wade flirted shamelessly with his boyfriend and his boyfriend clumsily flirted back.

The fact that Deadpool, the same manic man that had literally blown himself up to take out a drug cartel dabbling in human trafficking, had a boyfriend that loved him was just a little mind-blowing. And a little thought provoking. One of the things that had happened when they were eating was Wade and Peter sitting, back to back, on the couch. After a moment Matt realized why—Wade didn’t want to show his skin (even Matt knew that the merc was sensitive about it)—and Peter respected that. They were an oddly good match. An oddly endearing match.

Matt hoped to Hell that they managed to find and stop whomever put the hit out on Peter, because if anything happened to that young man Deadpool would raze the city to the ground.

After dinner Deadpool gave Peter a quick hug and and cuddle and said he was going to walk Matt home; make sure he got home safely. Matt almost said something—until he realized that Deadpool was simply reinforcing the helpless persona that Matt wore as his civilian disguise. He didn’t believe that Deadpool was really going to walk him home—and was surprised when the guy stopped at a taco truck and ordered a huge amount of food.

“Did you not get enough to eat?” asked Matt.

“Of course I did,” Deadpool said as he went to pay the vendor—who waved it off.

“No payments from you, Senor Pool,” the man said with a heavy accent. “If not for you, who knows what happen to my sister, eh?”

“Just a masked madman doing my duty to protect the city!” Deadpool replied in the same voice he’d used before jumping off the catwalk above the gang.

They walked a little ways away, the smell of the food hanging around them before Matt made himself ask, “What is the food for?”

“A summoning spell,” said Deadpool.

Matt stopped walking. He could tell, from the tone of voice and steady heartbeat, that Deadpool was absolutely serious. “This I have got to see,” he said firmly. Deadpool started laughing and Matt half-heartedly smacked the merc with his cane. “Come on,” he said as he ducked into an alley and climbed up the side of the building—only to be overtaken by Wade who used a retractable grappling hook to get to the top. “All right,” said Matt when they were at the roof. “What are you doing?”

“I told you,” said Deadpool as the paper bag around the Mexican food crinkled several times. “I’m summoning!”

“You could try calling,” a dry voice announced behind them. Matt whirled, dropping into defensive stance. There were only two people that could come upon him unannounced like that—and both of them had tried to kill him. “Cute,” said the voice.

The feminine voice. The young, familiar feminine voice. Matt slowly pulled himself out of his stance as he listened for something from the girl’s direction. Then, realization dawned. “How’s Dora?” he asked as he (partially) relaxed.

“Ponyo!”

“Dora says ‘hi’,” the girl responded.

“I didn’t call, because you never gave me your name.”

“I didn’t?” A pause. “I didn’t. Well, I can’t, but I’m going by Angel for now.” Matt heard the rustle of wings. “What did you want me for, Deadpool?” There was the crinkling sound of the bag being opened and the familiar sounds of mastication as the girl began to eat.

“Can you cook?”

“Yeah, Dad and Papa made sure I could.” The sound of fingers being licked as something moved along the girl’s chest with an odd sound—like it was rasping over metal? “I can do pancakes, most Mexican and Italian—don’t ask me to do tamales, they never come out right for some reason, but yeah. I can cook.” More chewing noises.

“Great! I want you to watch over Peter!”

“That might be a good idea,” Matt admitted. “The young man made soup explode.”

A pause. “Really?” the girl asked. She sounded a cross between impressed and horrified.

“Really,” confirmed Deadpool.

“Huh.” More chewing. A swallow. Then, “I can do it, but it won’t be free.”

“I figured that. Whatcha need, Baby Girl?”

Matt, expecting a cash amount, was mildly surprised when the girl said, “A new sketchbook and colored pencils.”

“Right. One drawing pad and crayons.”

“Pencils.”

“What’s wrong with crayons?”

A rustle of feathers in what Matt assumed was the winged girl’s version of a shrug. “Nothing’s wrong with crayons. I use pencils.”

“Deal.”

“Deal. So, what brings you out to this negotiation? Are you here to draw up an official contract?” The girl sounded curious, as opposed to offended.

Matt felt a slight chill. The girl knew he was a lawyer. How? He hadn’t told her what he did, he hadn’t had much of a conversation with her before at all. She was also, he knew from the theater incident, aware of Daredevil to the point that she even knew his turf of protection. He knew better than to ask, however. “Deadpool’s boyfriend has a landlord that is pulling some illegal stunts, and he’s hired me to fix it—legally,” he added as he calmly explained.

He sensed the girl nod. “Do you want me to read the contract to you?” she asked. “I speak legalese, one of my uncles made sure I could.”

“Why would your uncle make sure you could?” asked Matt with curiosity.

Both the girl and Deadpool burst out laughing. After a full, solid minute of laughter the girl gasped and sighed. “Oh! Tell you what,” and Matt could tell from the tone that she was grinning, “if you can guess who I am, I’ll tell you everything I know.” Deadpool, amazingly, managed to laugh harder and Matt heard his body hit the roof as he doubled over with mirth.

The girl simply took another bite of food, and began to chew.

[aerynwrites]

The Hidden (8)

Chapter 8: What The Future Holds

Author’s Note: okay y’all so Tumblr’s being a little bitch and making formatting a living hell for me lol. first it wouldn’t recognize the paragraph breaks from my word document so u had to fix that and NOW it won’t let me add a read more cut-off so i’m frustrated lol. BUT, I am happy with how this chapter turned out and I hope you guys are too! As always feedback is greatly appreciated, and i hope you guys enjoy! <3 (Apologies for any grammar errors, I’m at work and didn’t have time to fully proofread!)

Word count: 3.1k

Warnings: fluff

Chapters: One, Two, Three, Four, Five, Six, Seven, Eight (here)

/////////

It had been almost two months since the whole commotion with the bounty hunters and your injury, and everyone seemed to be settled back in nicely. You were almost completely healed, but still felt some pain if you moved to violently, but with Dyn being by your side the whole time, it made things a lot easier. He had seemed more relaxed since that night, since you both kissed, and the following night when you did a bit more. You flushed at the memory of Dyn slipping the blindfold over your eyes. You were brought from your thoughts when the high pitched squeal of a child pierced the air. You quickly looked down from the pot of stew you were preparing over the fire and saw the child reaching his little hands towards you.

“What?” you asked, a smile adorning your features.

The child just smile up at you and babbles while vaguely grasping at the spoon in your hand, “Ah, you want to taste the food?” you chuckle and spoon out a small amount of soup from the pot and blow on it before leaning down and feeding him some, “here you go -hey!” you were not prepared for the child to take the spoon in his mouth and latch on like it was his life line.

He starts to toddle away as fast as his little legs will carry him. you have to stifle the giggle as you reach out your hand using the force to stop the child mid-step. You hear him let out a muffled noise of surprise as you hold him a few feet from the ground and walk towards him. you grab hold of him, releasing your invisible grip on him and tug the spoon from his mouth.

“It’s not going to disappear little one,” you assure as you sit him down once again to return to the stew, “It will be ready soon.”

You are about to return to stirring the meal when you feel something keeping you from moving the spoon any further. You furrow your brows together and go to move your hand again but it won’t budge. You look behind you to see the kid with his hand extended and eyes closed in concentration. You laugh at his antics and it seems to snap him out of his focus. He releases his grip on you and lets out a loud giggle as he falls back to the ground. You quickly scoop him up and let him watch as you continue to cook.

“He’s getting better,” a familiar voice speaks from behind you.

You turn around, a soft smile adorning your face as you see Dyn coming to crouch by you. you stop stirring and run your fingers over the child’s ears gently, “Yeah, he is. Since I’ve been trying to teach him he seems to have more endurance when it comes to using the Force.” You comment.

Since you had started to heal, and your secret was out to the other villagers since the attack you had been using your powers more flippantly, not feeling that you had to hide anymore. You had also been attempting to teach the child, which proved difficult when he couldn’t speak, but you were making progress. As you looked down at the large eyed child in your arms you were suddenly hyper aware of the fact he doesn’t have a name.

“We should give him a name,” you say looking over at Dyn.

You hear him heave a sigh, “I know, but I’ve never…done anything like this before.”

You chuckle and look back down at the green creature who is now tugging at you hair, “I was thinking the name Faylen, fits him well.” You say wincing slightly as he gives a particularly hard tug.

Dyn nods slowly, “Faylen,” he test out the name, “I like it,” he brushes a gloved finger along the child’s head which earns him a happy gurgle, “so now I guess I have to stop calling him womp rat?”

You let out a loud laugh head falling back slightly, “Yes, I think that would be best.”

You obviously can’t see him through the helmet, but Dyn’s features soften as you laugh, still entranced by each and every thing you do. Your laugh, your smile, the way you scrunch your nose when your frustrated, everything about you makes Dyn fall more in love each day. It also makes him dread the reason he came over here to speak with you. as if you read his thoughts you spoke up.

“Oh, did you need something love?” you turned to face him once again.

Dyn let out a soft sigh, “I think we need to leave,” he said finally, a hint of sadness behind his words.

Your eyebrows knit together and your heart clenches, “But why? It’s safe here, we’ve been fine here for the last few months and nothing has happened,” you tried to reason.

He shook his head and grasped your free hand in his own leather clad one, “I know but-“ he paused knowing that you liked it here, hell you had been living here for many years, “they know we’re here now and I’m just afraid that they won’t stop coming and they will come more prepared next time. I don’t want to put your people in danger any longer. And if-“ he has to force the lump in his throat away, “if you want to stay I understand, but I won’t put anyone else in danger because of my selfishness.”

You don’t say anything for a long time, you just look down at the child, and for a moment Dyn is worried that you won’t go with him, and all his plans for the future would turn to ashes. You finally look up at him a smile once again adorning your features and you squeeze his hand, “I’ve never truly felt at home here Dyn, I mean I have Ariah but she’s truly the only one who ever treated me as fully accepted here,” You glance around the small village as people mill about their days, you look back to the man you love and press a quick kiss to the metal of his helmet, “of course I’ll go with you Dyn.”

Dyn releases a huge breath as a giant smile crossed his face under his helmet, he pulls you into a tight hug causing you to let out a laugh once more, “I’m glad,” he says finally pulling away from you.

You squeeze his hand again before returning to stirring the stew, “When were you thinking we’d leave?”

“Within the week, at least give you time to say goodbye and pack.”

You nodded, a smile still stuck in your face, “Dinner will be ready soon, why don’t you go wash up? I don’t want stinky farm hands in my house.” You tease lightly.

A chuckle escapes Dyn’s lips and he stands sending you a mock salute, “Yes ma’am,” he says before retreating to the home.

You roll your eyes and look down at the child again, before grabbing the pot from above the fire and following Dyn to the house, “What am I going to do with him?” the child just lets out a curious sound, “Yeah I don’t know either.”

///

At first, after you and Dyn had finally confirmed your relationship, it was odd to eat in separate rooms or facing different directions. However now it was normal, as you and Dyn sat with your backs touching and facing opposite directions. You knew it took a lot of trust on his part to do this, to be in the same room with another person without his helmet and trusting that they won’t try to look. You both ate in silence only the occasional sound of clinking silverware and sounds from the child interrupting the silence, so you were surprised when you heard Dyn moving around behind you.

“Are you done eating already?” you had just dished out the stew so he must have been hungry.

The only response you received was two arms snaking around your waist. You gasped and quickly snapped your eyes shut as one of the hands took your bowl and set it aside, “Dyn, what are you doing?”

He doesn’t say anything as he lifts you up as if you weighed nothing and positioned you so you straddled his lap, “I just care about you so much,” he finally offers, voice cracking slightly.

With your eyes still shut you wrap your arms tightly around his midsection and lay your head in the crook of his neck, finally able to open your eyes. he speaks up again.

“I never thought that would have this,” he admits, pulling you tighter against him, “I never thought that I could wake up every day happy and excited to spend it with someone.”

You felt tears burn behind your eyes and you buried your face in his neck, “Oh Dyn,” you whispered leaving a chaste kiss to his neck, “I love you too.”

Dyn had yet to return the words, but he told you in other ways. In the words he said, or the things he did for you, or the quick kisses he would give you before you woke in the morning. You knew he loved you even if he didn’t say it directly. You continued to stay tangled together for several moments, relishing in the rare intimate moments you got to share before Faylen’s cooing brought you back to reality. You closed your eyes as he pulled away from you and donned his helmet once more. You frowned slightly as you opened your eyes and were met with the same beskar you had come to know. While you we’re not upset with him in anyway and you understood that it was The Way, you still longed to actually see the man you love. But you don’t push the subject. You look over to Faylen to see him holding his empty bowl out to you, you smiled and spooned a second helping into the small bowl and giggled as the child cooed happily.

“You know, for a tiny little thing he eats more than you do,” you comment.

Dyn lets out a chuckle and nods, “Yes he does, and I don’t even want to know what his appetite will look like when he gets older.”

You feign a shiver, “we’ll go broke trying to feed our kid,” you joked but stopped short when you say Dyn go rigid. You look to him questioningly.

“Our kid?”

Your eyes widen at the realization of what you said but then relaxed and you shrugged, “Well yeah. We’re together and we both take care of him, we’ve basically adopted him so…” you trailed off now self-conscious of your slip up.

But Dyn just hums lowly before picking up Faylen careful not to spill his food, “our kid…I could get used to the sound of that.”

You blush and duck to start cleaning up the dishes, silently admitting that you liked the sound of it as well.

///

The end of the week had come sooner than you had anticipated and you watched with a slightly heavy yet hopeful heart as Jaleer and some of the other villagers helped Dyn load up the razor crest with your belongings. You had donned your cloak, staff slung over your shoulder.

“I’m going to miss you so much!” Ariah nearly knocks you over as she throws her arms around you, squeezing the life out of you. you hug her back just as fiercely, “There’s nothing that says we won’t visit, or that you can’t visit us.” You assure.

You friend pulls away tears in her eyes, “I know…but now who’s going to help me put Jaleer in his place?” she whines.

You laugh and see Jaleer approach from the ship and sling an arm your shoulders, he had seemed to warm up to both you and Dyn after the whole Chroig ordeal.

“Well I for one am thankful for one less pest hanging around,” he jests rubbing your head playfully. You groan and shove his arms off of you, “Whatever you say Jaleer, I know you’re secretly going to cry when I leave.”

Jaleer rolled his eyes but brought you into a hug anyway, “You know you will always have a home here. If you ever need it.”

You nodded as you pulled away from Jaleer, not missing the newfound respect in his eyes, “I know.”

Dyn walks over and places a hand your waist, “Everything’s ready to go,” he looks over to Jaleer, “thank you again for letting me stay here, and I’m sorry for any ill I may have caused.”

Jaleer shook his head and shook the Mandalorians hand firmly, “Like I said, you both are welcome back anytime. Don’t be strangers.”

Dyn just nods before he looks to you, “You ready?”

You nod a smile creeping onto your face as you hug Ariah one last time before walking with Dyn onto the ship. You wave to the other villagers as they call out various well wishes before the ramp to the ship hisses closed, a certain finality behind it. You let out a small sigh and turn to see Dyn climbing up a ladder and you follow suit, you had never been on his ship until now surprisingly. You watched as he took a seat in the piolets chair and started up the ship. You looked around spotting Faylen sitting in one of the chairs and smiled before picking him up and placing him on your lap as you took his seat.

“So where are we headed? How long will it take us to get there?” you ask.

“It’s actually fairly close, but it’s a surprise.”

“Oh a surprise?” you wiggled your eyebrows, “What has come over you Dyn?”

The Mandalorian just shrugged his shoulders not giving you a definite answer before the ships lifts from the ground. You look out the window as the trees and landscape shrinks further and further away until you are among the stars. Even though you had been in space several times it never ceased to amaze you. You watched as the stars turned into blue-sliver streaks as the ship launched into hyperdrive and it felt like mere seconds before you were dropping out of it. When in reality it had been close to an hour, you were just too deep in though to realize. The planet you were approaching was not as green as you previous planet but it still had some green, with some brown and orange mixed in. And if you thought it couldn’t get any better your breath was sucked from your lungs as Dyn landed the ship near a small cottage nestled among rolling hills and plains. You held onto the child as Dyn grasped your hand and led you from the ship and towards the small, what looked to be a farm. As you approached the small cottage you felt tears well in your eyes, you had never seen a planet so beautiful and calm before. Apparently Faylen agreed because he seemed to let out and awe filled gasp.

“How did you – where did you-“you stumbled over your words, still In shock as you looked at the man beside you.

He shuffled nervously under your gaze, “I still have some connections with a friend that’s still with the Mandalorian’s and she was able to do this for me, for us.” You saw him raise his hands and grasp the rim of the helmet to remove it.

You once again close your eyes, confused as to why he was doing this now. You held Faylen tightly as you grasped for Dyn blindly, unable to find him.

“Dyn what are you doing?” You hear shuffling for a brief moment before a short stint of silence.

“Open your eyes.” his unmodulated voice meets your ears and confusion flow through you.

“But your helmet Dyn, I can’t-“

“Just open them,” he insists, “Please.”

You feel your heart racing, blood rushing in your ears. You were about to see Dyn, actually see him, and for a moment you were scared. This would ruin The Way. He wouldn’t be able to put the helmet back on again. But he’s asking you -no – begging you to look.

So you do.

You slowly peel your eyes open and your hand immediately shoots to your mouth to stifle the gasp that slips out. You quickly scan his face and immediately feel your heart flutter at the handsome man kneeling in front of you. His brown locks tousled from removing his helmet, and dark stubble adorning his face and warm brown eyes looking up at you, a nervous fear in his eyes – wait – Kneeling!

Your brain finally registers what is happening as you see the simple silver rings held delicately between two ungloved fingers. You look from the ring back to Dyn, your brain still trying to catch up with what is happening. But Dyn speaks before you can.

“(Y/N), I had a whole speech planned out, but as soon as you looked at me it flew out the window,” he chuckled nervously before clearing his throat, “You are the love of my life, you have brought me so much happiness and life since the day you saved me in those woods, and I know that we haven’t known each other that –“

“Oh shut up, you idiot, “ you blubber past your tears, “Of course I will!” you throw your free arm around him careful not to squish Faylen, as you nearly knock the man over.

Tears are streaming down your face as Dyn gently pulls away from you, his thumbs wiping away the wet tracks on your face. A watery smile crosses his face as he takes your hand in his own, slipping the ring over your finger.  You let out a breathy chuckle before looking at you future husband and crash your lips to his for what felt like the first time. Dyn smiles into the kiss as your lips move in sync, and it feels like fire is running through his veins. He pulls away from you somewhat reluctantly and rest his forehead on your own, and you rest your newly decorated hand on his cheek, a wide smile on your face once more.

“I love you Dyn Jarren.”

And for the first time Dyn says it back.

///// Tags: @readsalot73 @theforceofdarkandlight @stylelovechild @amazingiam00 @so-chee @candipuff​ @stillreadingfantasy​ @taman-a​ @kaelyn-lobrutto24​ @maryan028​ @cateyesinlove​ @dizzydazed​ @the-silentium​ @sinon36​ @somehow-lovable-trash​ @lirinchi​ @katialvi @junkersandroadies-son​ @osric-the-l3m0n-l0v3-demon​ @arwallace​ @tiredjedi @duckqueenzoe​ @mxrvel-fxnxtic​ @livasaurasrex​ (For some reason it won’t let me tag some people, I’m sorry!)

[ezrisdax-archive]

Franmaya sickfic for the bingo prompts?

for my sapphic september bingo card and also over here on ao3

~~

Franziska was awoken by the heavy thump at her door followed by a yelp and a scrambling noise that didn’t make sense to her muddled brain.

Determinedly with only the resolve a Von Karma could have she forced her bleary eyes open and made herself sit up. The room swayed as she did, making her wish to fall back into her pillows but the threat of an intruder loomed large.

Shuffling noises sounded down the hall and Franziska reached over for her phone, ready to call even Gumshoe if the situation deteriorated.

The door to her room creaked open and Franziska blinked at the sudden light, not noticing how dark her room had been until then.

“Oh! You are up!” A familiar voice said and Franziska kept blinking away the spots of light to focus until Maya Fey came into view. “Edgeworth said you were probably still sleeping, I was trying to be quiet just in case, guess I didn’t do a very good job hunh? Good thing I’m a spirit medium and not a ninja. All though…I could be a samurai I’ll bet…” Maya continued onwards, her blathering making Franziska’s head spin.

“Maya Fey.” Franziska bit out but it lacked any harshness with how raspy her voice was.

Maya winced at the noise and dug into the over large bag at her side.

“Here.” She said, pulling out a bottle of apple juice and handing it to Franziska.

When Franziska just stared at it Maya took it back and popped the lid off, handing it back.

“I am not an invalid.” Franziska bristled slightly.

“I didn’t think you were. But Edgeworth said you were feeling terrible. Guess we can’t recover from colds so fast like Nick does. All though he did say he wasn’t as good at it when he was my age.” Maya tilted her head up in thought. “Maybe we’ll get better at it then too.” She set the bag down at the door and then flopped onto the bed covers, nearly hitting Franziska’s leg in the process.

“What?” Franziska asked, taking a sip of the juice only because it was cold and soothing to her throat.

“You know, like we’ll develop a super immune system and be able to fall off bridges with only a cold.”

“I believe that is just a condition limited to Phoenix Wright.”

“He is special that way.” Maya admitted lightly, laughing.

“What are you doing here, Maya Fey?” Franziska asked after she remembered to, not because she’d been sidetracked by Maya laughing or anything ridiculous such as that.

“Oh! Well Edgeworth called our office to say you weren’t doing well, I guess spending all the time in a freezing cold temple trying to get me out wasn’t good for you after all.”

“It wasn’t even you.” Franziska muttered.

“But you thought it was me! And it’s the thought that counts!” Maya insisted. “I just wanted to return the favour so here I am, ready to help you get better! I got the key from Edgeworth, he said ‘tell Franziska not to do anything foolish’.”

Franziska scoffed. “Says the foolish fool himself.”

Maya laughed again. “He said you’d say something like that. I brought everything you need to feel better.” She stood up and walked over to her bag and began pulling things out. “Pearly made you chicken noodle soup and I brought over my Pink Princess DVDs so we can watch them together and here.” Maya pulled out a purple blanket. “My sis bought me this, it always makes me feel better.” She draped it over Franziska without another word.

It smelled vaguely like cedar and incense that Franziska suspected they burned at the temple Maya worked at, strong enough that it could get through even her clogged senses. Except it was making her sneeze.

A box of tissues was shoved in her face and Franziska took them with as much dignity she could muster.

“This isn’t necessary.” Franziska started but was waved off by Maya.

“Don’t be silly, you risked your life for me so it’s the least I can do. Besides, I hate being alone when I’m sick.”

“I am not sick.” Franziska finally denied. “It is merely…a foolish allergy.”

Maya stared at her.

Franziska stared back.

Or tried to which was hard because her eyelids felt to heavy and her head kept drooping .

“Okay…an allergy.” Maya said doubtfully. “Well, either way I’m here for you. Now where’s your TV?”

“I do not have a TV. They are for the foolish.” Franziska muttered.

“What?! You don’t have one?!” Maya groaned. “I guess I could ask Nick to bring me over his…” Maya muttered.

Whatever else she was going to say was lost as Franziska slumped back and sleep over took her again.

~~

When she woke up it was to the sound of swords clinking together, or rather how television shows assumed swords sounded.

“That is incorrect.” Franziska said groggily.

“You’re awake!”

The noise paused as Maya hovered over her, beaming down at Franziska.

“What is that foolish racket?”

“Pink Princess: Warrior of Little Olde Tokyo, episode seven, Our Swords Clash with Thunder! It introduces her sidekick, Oyster.”

“Swords do not create thunder.” Franziska said, trying to focus on what made sense which was really none of it.

“Of course they don’t.” Maya agreed. “But they do clash!”

Franziska opened her mouth for a rebuttal but her stomach grumbled. Maya scrambled off the bed she’d been lying on next to Franziska and scurried off. Franziska watched her go with confusion, wondering if perhaps her brain had just imagined this. Like a terrible painting done by one of Wright’s friends.

The paused picture on the now installed TV before her bed suggested otherwise. The pink was making her a little nauseous and she turned her head to bury into the purple blanket still covering her, a much more elegant colour.

It didn’t feel like long before Maya was back in the room, balancing a tray in her hands that she set down in Franziska’s lap. On the tray was a bowl of chicken noodle soup and a bottle of medicine accompanied by a glass of water. Franziska took the water and medicine, ignoring the Cold Killer X printed on the bottle.

She stared at the soup a little suspiciously.

“Don’t worry, Pearly made it, she’s much better at this than I am.” Maya said, noticing her staring.

Franziska started, realizing she’d been a little rude and she could see Maya twitching a little. She kept smoothing down the sleeves of her acolyte clothes and glancing between Franziska and the soup.

With a little trepidation Franziska picked up the spoon and took a bite. To her relief it didn’t taste bad though that could have been her stuffed up nose allowing her not to notice.

“See.” Maya said when she noticed Franziska not spitting it out. “Not bad right? I still haven’t really mastered that but one thing at a time. After all, I’ve got to get spirit medium-ing down first.”

“I do not believe that is a word.”

“Well are you a spirit medium?” Maya asked, her voice teasing. “Because we have our own lingo. Just ask Pearly, or I can channel my sister…”

“Please don’t.”

“Aw you only need my company, I get it.” Maya flopped onto the bed again, bouncing lightly and making soup spill over the edges of the bowl. “Oops.” She made a face. “I guess I haven’t mastered taking care of someone when sick either.”

“You are not doing a terrible job.” Franziska said idly, eating more of her soup before she lost it to Maya trying something else.

“Coming from you that means a lot, Franzy.”

“You will refer to me as Franziska Von Karma.” Franziska said and glared but was certain it lost it’s effect when she sniffled.

“Nah, that’s too long and boring.”

Franziska sputtered, her defense of the Von Karma name at the tip of her tongue.

“Besides, friends call each other nicknames.”

Franziska stopped, taken aback. “We are friends?”

“You stayed up at a temple trying to rescue me and helped Edgeworth get the trial going for Nick, I’d say that makes us friends.” Maya was fiddling with her sleeves again, her face turned away and slightly and buried in a pillow. “I thought coming over here would solidify it.”

Franziska opened her mouth and shut it with a click. “Ah.” She picked up her water and took a sip. “Very well, it would be foolish to admit otherwise I see.” She purposefully avoided looking at Maya as she said it but it was hard not to notice the glee on Maya’s face when she shot up, completely spilling what was left over in the bowl.

“Oh no, sorry Franzy!” Maya rushed to mop it up, pulling at tissues at the box. “I’ll get you a fresh one.” She took the tray and slipped out of the room without another word.

Franziska stared at the glass of water still in her hand despite the commotion.

“Friends.” She repeated, arching an eyebrow at the water.

“Did that water do something to you, are you going to question it on the stand?” Maya asked as she came back in to see Franziska still looking at the water. She set a new bowl of soup down in front of Franziska with much more care than she had previously

“Perhaps. It would certainly be better than when Phoenix Wright questioned a parrot.”

“Oh you heard about that!” Maya giggled at the memory. “Yeah we certainly seem to get some strange things happened on the stand…”

“I’ve noticed.” Franziska said drily and took the spoon once more to finish her soup as fast as she could while still portraying perfection. Which she did of course, because she was a Von Karma.

“I think it makes things more interesting. You just gotta have some fun with some of these cases.” Maya swallowed hard. “The last one was…”

Franziska watched her from the corner of her eyes, seeing Maya’s shoulders fall, and cleared her throat. “I believe we were watching…what was it again… ‘Pink Princess: Warrior of Little Olde Tokyo’.”

Maya brightened again, a much better look on her, and clapped her hands. “That’s right, you haven’t seen a full episode still! I can rewind it, don’t worry, I don’t mind watching it again. It’s really one of the best episodes. I hope they end up doing a crossover with the Steel Samurai soon, it’ll be nice to see those characters again..” Maya continued on but Franziska couldn’t concentrate much on her words.

The TV started again and Maya took her seat next to Franziska on the bed.

Franziska set her spoon down in the bowl with a clink and finished her glass of water, letting Maya reach over to set the tray on the floor despite every fiber of her being insisting that it should go to the kitchen right away. She was feeling too tired to argue it, perhaps she was a little sick after all.

“Thank you, for coming here.” Franziska said after a few moments, looking away from the TV when the colours swam in her vision too much. “It is…nice. To have friends.”

Maya looked over, grinning widely, “I’ll be here whenever you’re in town. You can even come to the village. Just don’t arrest me for murder next time.”

Franziska’s cheeks burned which she blamed on her fever and not on how Maya’s shoulder brushed against her own as Maya laughed.

“I will endeavor not to do so. Though you do seem to be caught in these cases quite a bit, Maya Fey.”

“Just Maya. And just my luck. But it’s not all bad.” Maya hadn’t moved from where she was pressing against Franziska. “I got to meet Nick and Edgeworth and Gumshoe and you.”

Franziska hummed, “You are not so bad at this, perhaps you will master taking care of someone who is…”

“Having allergies?” Maya teased.

“Yes.” Franziska said quickly and then broke off into a yawn.

“Aw you’re gonna miss the rest of the episode.” Maya was saying but Franziska couldn’t see the pout she was certain Maya was wearing, her eyes had shut without much prompting.

“Another time then, Maya Fey.”

“Just Maya!”

Franziska hummed again and let sleep take her, her head resting against the warmth of Maya shoulder.

~~

(Seven years later)

The door slammed opened making Franziska groan at the noise.

“Franzy!” Maya came in like she always did, a whirlwind of purple robes and ruckus. She stopped seeing Franziska resting on the couch and smiled softly, speaking quieter. “Well this brings back memories.”

Franziska sighed, sitting up on her propped pillows. “I am not sick, despite what Miles Edgeworth claims.”

“Uh hunh, I’ve heard that before too.” Maya came over, setting her bag down and Franziska was willing to bet there would be soup made by Pearl and Trucy in the bag.

“There had better not be any Pink Princess in that bag.” Franziska eyed it with suspicion.

“Don’t worry, this time I brought the Iron Infant: Warrior of Neo Olde Tokyo.”

“That foolish title still makes no sense.”

Maya was still snickering as she bent down to press a kiss to Franziska’s forehead.

“Maya Fey do not be so foolish yourself, you will get sick.” Franziska scolded.

“I thought you weren’t sick.” Maya shot back, ignoring Franziska’s spluttering to press another quick kiss to her cheek this time. “Besides, if I do I guess you’ll just have to take care of me.”

“If I must.” Franziska said but her tone was softened as she reached out to take Maya’s hand and squeeze it in thanks.

Maya beamed at her, a sight Franziska never tired of and then reluctantly pulled away to get set up.

She shut her eyes as Maya rambled on about the Kurain Village and Trucy’s latest magic tricks and a new defender that Phoenix had picked up. She let Maya’s voice lull her to sleep knowing Maya would still be there when she woke up.

“Hey Franzy,” Maya whispered, close enough again now that Franziska could pick up the sharp incense off her robes. “I love you.”

Von Karma’s did not mumbled so Franziska certainly didn’t as she said back, “I love you too, Maya.”

She didn’t have to open her eyes to know Maya was smiling again, as bright and happy as ever, but it did warm her to know she was the cause of it.

While she wasn’t sick and didn’t need the coddling perhaps it wouldn’t be so bad if she was.

[werezmastarbucks]

Whitmore Guy - xenomorph

Whitmore Guy masterlist 

word count: 3076

warnings: things get serious

Four days later Y/N decided she should visit Mal and see how he is. Lord knows how he’s going to cope with all this. Elena suggested, in a flare of her classical empathy stroke, to help out with compelling if they find out the guy’s not doing good. Y/N went chilly inside upon imagining a sociopath derived of feelings, forgetting why there’s a whole in his mind.

Before showing up on his doorstep, she dropped by at the shop and bought him some ice cream. She didn’t recall talking about ice cream with Mal, which was strange, but she put all her faith in that bubble gum flavor would do good. It was her favorite, and the two of them had it all similar, plus, Mal was really into chemical, artificial stuff to put in his mouth. A big bucket of bright blue frozen mass held neatly under her arms, she entered the block of flats and got to the fourth floor. Just as she was about to knock on the door, it swung open, so energetically, as usual, like there was a tornado behind it.

Mal let his scruff grow, and now he looked about five years older, and even more handsome. His hands still had dark small cuts from the debris of the table.

“Oh my god!” he exclaimed. Y/N eyed him carefully. The dude was wearing his jean jacket and sweatpants, and he looked smashing, but also, not pale enough. He didn’t even have swollen eyes or grey bruises around them. He looked perfectly healthy, mature, and happy to see her.

“Y/N, are you reading my mind?” he took the ice cream bucket from her and pushed the door, letting her in.

She entered his place with curiosity. Y/N hasn’t been inside yet; should she happen to give him a lift, she usually let him out of the car outside and drove away.

It was messy as hell, like a normal dude’s apartment. The only neatly organized space was kitchen, where all the cutting boards, knives and plates lay in their places, all the ketlery seemingly kept in one color palette.

His room, though, was an expression of his temper. Bed was full of candy packages, and his clothes, his pastel and black hoodies, jeans and t-shirts scattered around the floor. He wasn’t completely mental though: his jackets and coats were hung in the closet, on hangers. The big TV was on, prepped against the wall right opposite his bed; Netflix was paused indicating that he’s been watching Alien.

“This is perfect”, he puffed, pulling his jacket off and throwing in onto a chair. “I was just about to go out for the ice cream, and there you are, like a little fairy, granting my deepest desires”.

He crashed back on bed, his lively black eyes fixated on her. Y/N stood above it, unsure what to do.

“Are you doing okay, Mal?”

He opened his mouth, looking at her, while he lay in his bed, stomach up, like a cat.

“Yeah, what do you mean?”

Two seconds passed until a bulb lit up in the depths of his brain.

“Oh, yes, of course. Martha’s dead. Love of my life is gone and I will never see her again. But I’m fine”.

Y/N took off her leather jacket and threw it on the same chair, to pair it with Mal’s. Thing was, she didn’t mind mess much as long as it wasn’t completely biologically hazardous. Clean kitchen did that for her.

“Care to elaborate? How did you manage to cope with it in four days? I thought you’d need a lot of support, quite frankly”.

She put the bucket on the nighstand and opened it with her nails.

“Do you have a spoon?”

Mal looked down his bed and then put his arm under the pillow, looked around the room and finally spotted a spoon on the stand under the TV. Y/N took it and stabbed the stone-frozen blue stuff. She sat on the bed, thanking heavens that Mal thought to move to give her some space. He took the bucket from her and unpaused the movie.

“You’ve seen this?”

“You kidding?”

She prepped herself against the pillow and sat comfortably.

“I had such a big crush on Sigourney Weaver when it first came out…” there were traces of tenderness in Mal’s voice.

“Repeat that, slower”, Y/N eyed him as he took a spoonful in his mouth.

“Well, obviously, I mean when it came out, like, for me. Don’t pick on my words, I’m mourning”.

“You don’t look like you are”.

“God, you’re lucky you’re cute and bring me food, lady”, Mal shook his head slowly, never looking away from the TV. “Hold on, he’s gonna start feeding now”.

They both allowed all their concentration into the movie. To be honest, Y/N loved that one.

“I love him so much”, she whispered under her breath as the Xenomorph jumped down from the ceiling, sweeping a guy away so fast it was almost like when vampires did it.

“Yeah?” Mal smiled. “You want some?”

Y/N nodded and took the spoon.

“He’s fast, and he’s perfect. He never talks too much, he just feeds and kills, you know. Even Predators admitted that Aliens were the best hunting prey and that they had a kind of respect for them because how awesome they are. Look at him. He’s so stealthy and pitch black, he’s flawless”.

“You wanna fuck a Xenomorph?” he asked with uncertainty.

“I guess I like all things terrible”.

Mal nodded with understanding.

The plot went on as they were slowly consuming ice cream, like a couple of disgruntled schoolchildren, only, they were both way too adult to be dramatic.

“So, what have you been doing here these days?” Y/N took another swing at trying to open him up.

Mal sighed.

“You know, stuff. Cried a little, cooked, ate a lot, slept. Then I remembered our conversation about movies and how you once said that you watch stuff that makes you happy when you’re down”.

“So, you decided to go with Alien”.

“Nah, sorry, monster fucker, but cenobites are my all-time favorites. I started with Hellraiser, yesterday. Rewatched all parts”.

“Damn it”.

“What?”

“I should’ve come yesterday. What are you going to do now?”

“Uh, Alien franchise?” he eyed her with confusion as he shoved the spoon in his mouth. He was eating it like a bear, without even looking, like it was soup. Mal had incredible stomach for sure, made of titan or such.

“No, I mean, you’ll have to return to work eventually. And live on”.

“Come on, it’s been four days. Give me a break. Plus, I don’t have to return to work – I moved in here because of my girlfriend, and now she’s dead, so technically I don’t have to work”.

“Fair enough”.

Y/N shivered at the thought of never seeing him at the college again. After nearly two months of being as thick as thieves she couldn’t imagine going on completely alone in that madhouse.

Was it weird that Mal seemed so indifferent? Yes and no. Y/N learned not to question the weird long time ago. She was surrounded by them. She was just alarmed at what he might do or feel when it finally hits him that Martha is really gone.

She left it alone. Y/N slid down a little, shook her head negatively when Mal tried to feed her; by the end of the first part they were spread on the bed like two starfish. The second chapter of Ripley’s blood freezing adventures began at about Five PM, and Y/N only realized she was almost drifting away when her phone rang.

“Hey”, she hung from Mal’s bed and grabbed her phone. It was Damon.

“Is he alive?”

“Yep”.

“Is he raging?”

“No, everything’s fine”.

She looked around and looked at the guy; the bucket in his hands was half-empty. Her eyebrows went up.

“Although I think he’s a bit suicidal”.

“Cool, hit me up if anything”.

Damon hung up.

“Who was it?”

“Mal, you shouldn’t eat it all at once, you’ll poison yourself”.

“I’m fine. Was it Damon?”

Mal embraced his bucket in case she tries to pull it away from him.

“No”.

His eyes narrowed.

“Why are you lying?”

Y/N clicked her tongue, falling back and crossing her legs.

“Because I don’t want you to think about him”.

Mal stared at her, thinking about something. Y/N looked at the birth mark on his neck and thought to herself that she lost completely. She couldn’t resist it anymore, the urge to be close to him, to hear what he says, gain the little smiles as she mused out loud. Her inner guts warmed up as she looked at this young man, and there was nothing she could do about this unyielding attraction, about the sheer feeling of liberty she experienced under his testing glance.

“You wanna see her pictures?” he asked suddenly.

“I thought you deleted them all”.

“No, I wanted to do it, but…” he shrugged, “you know how it is, I got really soft over the years we’ve been together”.

Y/N ran her hand through her hair.

“Sure”.

He took his phone, putting the bucket between their thighs. Y/N tried to snatch it away, but Mal caught her wrist.

“I’m eating it”.

“Mal, it’s really bad for you”.

“I know what I’m doing, mum”.

The film was going on, but they leaned to each other, looking at the screen of his smartphone. Mal didn’t delete shit, she thought, and discovered, she was angry. For heaven’s sake, Y/N, she thought, the girl’s died four days ago.

“That’s us in Carolina. We rented a little house”.

Martha was standing in the kitchen in a pretty dress, much like one Y/N had herself. But then again, it was a very fashionable model one summer, so a lot of girls had it. Think rationally.

“You travelled a lot?”

“Yeah, well, mainly in America”.

“And you’re from Ohio?”

“Uh-huh”.

Y/N looked at their picture in which they were sitting on the bank of a river.

“Where is it?”

“New Orleans. She loved that city, Martha. Tried to get me to move in there”.

“She’s got a good taste. Architecture in New Orleans is amazing”.

“She was also very much into home interiors. You know, sinks, bath tubs. I’ve never met a person before, who’d be so interested in fucking acrylic”.

Y/N looked up and they met eyes. Mal looked very serious.

“She was also very kind. You couldn’t tell at first, people used to say she was wicked. But compared to me, she was an angel. Maybe not the most people’s person, but she sure was unique”.

He blinked slowly, and his gaze went blank. Uh-oh, Y/N gathered, there it goes. Well, her arms are attached and she’s capable of holding him for as long as he needed.

“Have you ever been in love so hard it annoyed the hell out of you?” he asked.

Y/N tried to think of all the times she has been in love. In truth, she didn’t fall for somebody too often and easily, and the way this black-eyed boy made her feel was rather unusual.

She’s been in love with her classmate, Ashton, for about seven years, in and out. Never approached him. Never let him know. It was a simple teenage crush, with all the teenage drama, while Ashton was dating other girls.

She’s been in love with Damon so helplessly, so fully, it was painful. There was a time in her life when she thought she never needed anything else, that she could grab the whole bunch of the planet and throw it away, just to be with him. But he was unreachable, unimaginable. He was a titan, and she was a girl in a brown dress. She loved him loyally and openly, and he never budged, because Damon Salvatore, to his honor, only loved one woman in his very long life. And it wasn’t Y/N.

“I’ve been hurt”, she said, “and I’ve been rejected, but not annoyed, I don’t think so”.

Mal nodded coyly, his straight thin nose diving down as he looked at his phone laying in her palm.

“I was never supposed to get into that trap. I’m not the kind of person who is capable of…” he winced, as if remembering something, “loving, caring, all the human things. That was always bad for me. I never even had the urge. And then it turned out she was crafted for me, and I hoped, I – for her. All the things I thought I knew were just crashed, my brain couldn’t even cope. You know, Martha had a stamina, because those first months we’ve got together for real I hurt her a lot”.

Y/N stiffened a little.

“I confused everything I felt. I wanted to hold her, and squeezed her so hard she had bruises. I had this eerie feeling like I was crumbling down in pieces, and then realized it was my guards falling down. She completely destroyed the portrait of the person I thought I was”.

“Who did you think you were?”

Mal looked at her and said in such a tone as if it was obvious,

“A mistake”.

There were people at some point so vile that they completely convinced this pretty boy that he was unwanted, that he was supposed to be unmade. How do you fuck your child up so bad? Y/N wanted to ask what mental issues his parents must have had, and then decided she didn’t have the emotional capacity for it.

She considered it a little and then put her hand on Mal’s head, covering his left ear with her palm.

“Look at them”.

They both turned to the screen. There stood a Xenomorph, its jet black skin glistening like oil, slender flexible limbs standing firmly, elongated head and exquisitely made spine, like a handle of a harp.

“He’s perfect. And so are you, Mal”.

He bit his lower lip and suddenly dropped his head, bursting into giggles.

His large hands encircled her waist and pulled her close. Mal smelled like ice cream, and his skin, having its own scent, was warm under his soft shirt. Y/N couldn’t fight him as he sat back on the pillows, cradling her in his arms and putting his chin onto the top of her head.

“I know, Y/N. Now I know, I’m just saying, there was a time when I really believed all that crap my dad fed me. But Martha came along and, grossly, saved my dirty, black, violent soul”.

She put her head on Mal’s shoulder and outstretched her legs, feeling so cozy it threatened to put her to sleep again. Mal sighed, and his chest went up and down, and she rolled her eyes, savoring these moments, because she knew she couldn’t keep going.

“But then, of course, Damon took my girlfriend away”, he added.

She sat up so harshly he lifted both his hands for a second.

“Mal. You know it was someone else, right? She attacked him, but somebody had turned her before, and compelled her to try and kill Damon”.

Mal did it again. A second ago he was as fluffy as a bear, and now there was poison in the very air he exhaled from his nostrils.

“But it was him who ripped her heart out of her chest, right? Or are you going to tell me I should ignore it, too, like I did with her parents?”

“We need to find that… vampire who’s behind all these killings first”.

“I don’t care about them”, Mal waved his hand, “people die every day. In packs. My girl and what Damon did to her – that’s my focus. Are you going to stop me?”

They looked at each other, worms stirring in Y/N’s belly.

“You really don’t understand what’s wrong with this plan, do you?”

“I really think you keep trying to protect him because you still have feelings for him”.

She fell back on the pillows with a swing – and ceiling swayed for a moment. She could feel Mal’s eyes following her, drilling into her face.

“I really don’t”.

“You’re lying to yourself”.

His voice was dry like sand. Then he took the bucket from the stand and continued to eat, as if nothing happened.

By the end of Aliens Y/N fell asleep and woke up again when it was already dark. Mal turned on a night shade, and was still watching movies.

She opened her eyes and adjusted them, staring into the TV while laying on her side. Having completely come to her senses, she sat up, causing Mal to turn his head to her.

“You really blacked out”, he said with deep admiration.

She rubbed her neck and face, feeling even heavier than before.

“Oh god, why did you let me sleep… how long has it been?”

“A movie and a half”.

“I have to go”.

“Okay”.

Her glance travelled around the room and stopped at the empty bucket.

“You mental patient”, she hissed, “you really wanna kill yourself?”

He just smirked.

She got up from the bed, stretching her limbs and back, and yawned.

“You know, I think I will return to work”, Mal said.

“That’s a good idea, Mal. You’ll keep busy and won’t have to think about anything”.

He nodded.

Mal didn’t get up to close the door after her, so she had to “just bang it harder” herself. As she left the building, the warm summer air started to put things in order in her mind.

She drove to her house and was standing in front of the mirror in her room in thirty minutes. Her hand lay on her throat as she was examining herself. She wasn’t going crazy, was she? She remembered putting on her necklace that morning, a pretty one, wrapping tightly around her neck. Now, it wasn’t on her desk, and it wasn’t on her, so? She took off her shirt and checked for any kinds of marks on her skin. There was nothing. All the things with Mal were so intense, so sexual and strange, she couldn’t put her mind to rest. She didn’t know why she didn’t phone him right away, and she didn’t know why she wouldn’t believe his deeply sad eyes even after he showed her their pictures with Martha.

She also didn’t remember ever telling him about the movies that make her feel happy.

[elizacornwall]

Vengeance is an Idiot's Game - Chapter 24 - After Effects

Read all the published chapters here. -------------------------------------------------- Her head was pounding something fierce. Waking up later than usual, the sun was glaring into Eliza’s face and all she wanted to do was to cover herself with her blanket, disappearing from life. She felt sick and hungry at the same time, not sure which feeling should take priority. Turning away from the painful blazing ball in the sky, she pulled the blanket over her head, not ready to face the day yet. How much did she drink last night? She had a couple beers before the dance, then there was whiskey at the campfire… The dance. She could feel her face flush red as the memory came back. Dutch’s initial invitation and then Sadie, practically throwing her into Arthur’s arms. Sure, Sadie had done it in a very elegant way, an elegance she wouldn’t have attributed the woman before, yet she still… What, passed her on? Set her up? For the last ten years of her life, this was what she had tried to escape. Her father wanting to fix her up with some man of his choosing, and now Sadie Adler was playing matchmaker too? It was infuriating, humiliating. Knowing what she did about Eliza’s feelings towards her father, how could she have done this to her? Yet… Dancing with Arthur had certainly been preferable to dancing with Dutch. Maybe she had just wanted to spare her from Molly’s anger… She had admitted to Sadie that all she’d gotten from the pretty redhead was angry glances and cold silence whenever she had tried to talk to her. The pounding in her temples intensified and she decided not to think about this conflict in her mind anymore for the time being. It was bad enough to wake up as if she had been rolled over by a stagecoach, she didn’t need to ponder over whether she’d been thrown in front of it by someone she trusted too. Bottom line was, she had liked dancing with Morgan and thinking back to the way he’d gently held her waist… Her stomach lurched as the strange sensation bubbled up again, and she could just about throw off her cover and stumble around Sadie’s wagon before she involuntarily emptied the contents of her gut onto the ground behind it. She felt dizzy and the whole world was still spinning. Keeping herself upright by desperately clutching onto the wagon next to her, she managed to shuffle back to her cot. The sunlight still hurt her eyes, and she groaned loudly as she let herself fall on the edge, annoyed to have let it get that far.

“Welcome back to the livin’, little Miss Sunshine”, Sadie’s hoarse voice sounded from her right, the grin on her lips audible without needing to see her face. “You sleep well?” The blonde woman was leaning against the wagon, taking in her undoubtedly pitiful appearance. Eliza was even wearing the same clothes as last night, boots included. Her answer only consisted in another pained groan and she buried her head in her palms, elbows resting on the knees. She was not ready to welcome the world right now. She ignored the approaching footsteps, wishing everyone would just go away. “You’re awake! Here, I got some yarrow off Charles, I’mma make you some tea with it. Should help with your head.” With great effort she lifted her head, squinting up at Morgan who was holding out a bunch of pretty red flowers in front of her face. She couldn’t help but cock one eyebrow, smiling slyly. “I thought you’re supposed to bring the lady flowers before you ask her to dance.” The range of expressions on his face was all worth it, surprise at her quick thinking quickly transforming into a bashful glance, then there was a trace of embarrassment and finally concluding in an eye roll of annoyance. She stifled a laugh. “I ain’t asked you to dance”, he just muttered, but the colour in his cheeks betrayed his overly blasé tone. “If you’re well enough to go spewing sarcasm I wonder if ya need this tea at all.” So, he was shy too, as well as a gentleman. How in the world was he a murdering, thieving outlaw again…? Eliza laughed, wincing as it sent a fresh jolt of throbbing pain through her head. “Thank you, and my apologies. Some tea would be lovely”, she answered, eyes closed and rubbing her fingers against her temples in a fruitless attempt to ease the headache. He returned a few minutes later, passing her a cup with steaming water. The flowers were now submerged at the bottom, releasing a touch of orange colour and a strange, astringent smell. Morgan sat down on the little stool, Sadie had taken up the space next to her on the cot. Eliza bowed her head, stretching her neck out slowly. “Thanks guys. You can head off and do whatever, I’ll be fine. There’s no use in sitting here mothering me”, she murmured, half irritated and half ashamed by their overprotective manner towards her self-inflicted misery. Sadie chuckled. “We ain’t goin’ anywhere, might not look like I’m dyin’ like you do, but I ain’t feelin’ like a spring chicken either.” Arthur hummed in agreement. “Where’s your flower soup then?” Eliza replied in slight jest, lifting the cup to her lips. It was still too hot to drink, so she blew on the surface. She tried a careful sip to taste, but ended up singing the tip of her tongue anyway. What was a little extra discomfort in her current state. It was bitter, with a hint of a heavy sweetness in it and she pulled her face into a grimace. “Couldn’t you get some nicer tasting flowers?” “Hmm, might have, but they wouldn’t help ya with the headache, Miss.” Grumbling, she shot Arthur a dark look. Tea against headache, she didn’t quite believe in it, but there would hardly be any Laudanum to be found in an outlaw camp who’s only drug addict recently decided to come clean. Curse the Reverend and his righteous virtues. Morgan was observing her, a measuring look in his eyes. “When’s the last time you’ve eaten?” His question caught her off guard, she couldn’t remember being put on the spot like that. She could feel him exchanging a glance over her head with Sadie. “Err, yesterday morning, I think? I was out on my walk for the rest of the day, didn’t think to take anything with me.” Sadie gave her a little clap on the head which immediately flared up in a new wave of pulsating pain. “Ow, Sadie! What was that for?!” “No wonder you’re feelin’ so darned lousy girl! You’re s’posed to eat before you’re downing beers an’ whiskey like ya did!” Sadie’s volume exceeded her temporarily very low noise tolerance and she shrugged her head between the shoulders like a tortoise. The blonde woman tutted but Arthur was already on it, picking some

food from the kitchen wagon, ignoring the complaining Pearson. Eliza would have to bring him an extra fat kill soon to thank him. Her stomach didn’t feel as bad as it had done earlier, but the thought of food made her a bit queasy. Nibbling at the oat cake he passed her, she tried to think of an excuse for them to leave her company, she didn’t fancy being babysitted too much. Arthur spoke up, pulling her out of her thoughts. “How much do you remember? You wasn’t shy drinking down that whiskey at the fire.” She could see him looking at her out of the corner of her eyes and avoided his gaze, concentrating intensely on the cookie in her hand. “A fair bit I think. Everything up to the campfire, the songs there and… didn’t you pull me away? Because of something the boys said?” Frowning, she tried to recall the events of last night at the fire. There was a bit of flirting, an argument, then Arthur and her sat at the cliff. “Oh. I got angry at you. I’m sorry”, she murmured, still not looking at the man. “’t’s alright, you was drunk. I been yelled at before, don’t bother me much no more”, he laughed, making her feel a bit better. “You weren’t entirely wrong either I suppose. I ain’t the best explaining myself, don't think I worded things the right way.” She stole a shy look at him through the strands of her hair that had fallen out of the plait in the night. He smiled a warm smile, but his eyes had a sadness in them. Clearly he wasn’t happy about his inability to express himself. He didn’t strike Eliza as someone who couldn’t put things into words however, even if he was a bit blunt at times. She had always liked blunt honesty better than sweet lies. “I also remember you showing me the north star”, she said gently in an effort to make him feel better. It worked, a little at least, and his smile widened. “Yeah? We gotta be careful what we’re getting’ up to, you seem to remember an awful lot for having been in such a state last night”, he chuckled. “At least you won’t be gettin’ lost anytime soon.” Sadie gave a hearty kackle when a loud voice sounded from halfway across the camp. It was the Irish lad that had come home last night, Sean. “And t‘ere she is, the famous lady Cornwall! Fallen out ‘er pop’s hands into ours!” He approached with wide steps, coming to a standstill in front of her and taking her hand into his with a bow, planting a kiss on the back of it. “Name’s Sean MacGuire mylady, pleasure ta make your acquaintance!” Learned politeness made her smile and nod as she stared up at him. The volume he spoke in hurt her head and he was no less energetic now than last night when he had been drunk. She ignored her inner groan and stood up, giving him a little curtsy to play along with his overly flamboyant introduction. “Please, call me Eliza. I’m not overly fond of my father’s name I’m afraid. How do you do?” She put on her thickest English accent and had to swallow her giggle at the look on the faces of Sadie and Arthur. Now that was entertainment. “An’ you’re from the island! Ain’t she a wonderful sight. Never seen a fairer lass in all of the old kingdom If ye allow me to be so blunt.” He grinned at her, quite handsomely she had to admit to herself, with his boyish charisma. She faked a high pitched titter and held her hand in front of her face as if to hide a flattered blush. “She’s a right catch, ain’t she! Don’t you go and fish in the wrong pond now boy.” Karen had appeared in her night gown still, even though the sun was way past it’s highest point now. Her voice was light and playful but had a warning tone to it which Sean too seemed to notice as he stepped back quickly, letting go of Eliza’s hand. The blonde girl flung her arm around his shoulders, and he held her waist. “Don’t you go get a crush on the bastard here, he’s broken many hearts and none of ‘em deserved it. Well, maybe some did”, Karen mused, “but you wouldn’t. He likes putting on his charm with beautiful women.” She still sounded light hearted, but her body language was stiff and almost possessive, gripping Sean’s shoulder tightly. Eliza

let her lips curl into a slanted smile and shook her head. “Don’t worry, my mother taught me not to trust Irishmen, no matter how charming”, she replied, hearing Sadie give a chuckle in the background. Sean was appalled, but he didn’t speak. “Besides, I wouldn’t dare cross you, you can be well scary did you know?” Karen gave a barking laugh and seemed to ease up a bit. Sean gave her an uncertain smile, visibly relieved. “I just had to welcome our newest member, always good to ‘ave some new blood on board ain’t it! No big deal”, he justified, a bit too quick for it to be natural. Karen steered him around, pulling him away. “Well you met her now, let’s go before Sadie knocks you out again. She ain’t looking too happy and I can’t blame her, you bein’ such a loudmouth all the time. Sorry ya had to deal with him”, she added, directed towards them, “He just gets excited every time he sees a new pair of knockers. We’ll leave ya in peace now.” And with that he was pushed towards the girls’ tents. Eliza let herself fall back down onto the cot with a sigh. “How do you do, ey?”, Sadie mocked. “I see we’ve got to work on your language yet!” “You’ve got something against my accent? At least one of us can speak English properly!” Eliza replied, laughing. Sadie jostled her elbow into her ribs. “You mean fancy speech, with lots’a words and no meaning behind ‘em. Don’t seem so proper to me, don’t you agree Arthur?” The man had sat there in silence for a few minutes now, quietly watching the exchange with Sean and Karen unfold. He hummed. “I don’t mind it, think it sounds quite nice.” Sadie threw the butt of her cigarette at him in protest. Eliza just laughed as they squabbled and sipped the rest of her yarrow tea. It made her face scrunch up in distaste, but if Charles reckoned this helped with headache it was worth a try, he had yet to let her down with his knowledge of the nature all around them. She might ask him to accompany her on another hunt if he could spare the time, would be good to feel useful once more. One day she would have to find her own way of making money for the camp, doing daily chores wasn’t exactly her idea of an exciting life running with an outlaw gang. If she asked nicely, he might show her how to hunt bison, one of those beasts would feed the entire gang for a week! Sadie’s loud exclamation snapped her back into reality. “How dare you Morgan! I ain’t never been unfaithful to my Jakey. Not in life and not in death!” She crossed her arms and puffed up her cheeks. Eliza set her empty cup on the dirt before her and looked anxiously from one to the other, trying to figure out why on earth Arthur would make such an insulting suggestion. It wasn’t long before Sadie’s lips twitched however and betrayed her act. Arthur just sat there, eyebrows raised expectantly, giving her a quick look and eyeroll that made her chuckle. “You’ll have to forgive her behaviour, she’s a bit of an actress, our Miss Adler. Don’t like to make it easy for anyone to understand her.” He stretched indulgently and groaned, getting to his feet. “I better get on some task or other, Dutch’s gonna chew me out if I don’t do anythin’ useful today.” Sadie gave up her play at this, her face suddenly fierce with excitement. “Got anything in mind, cowboy?” “Nah, Hosea mentioned he might have a lead on somethin’. Figured I’d check up with him. You stay here and sleep off yer bottle ache.” He collected his hat and made to leave, when he seemed to think of something and stopped, turning to look at the younger woman. “Hosea also said something ‘bout it possibly involving you, I’ll see what he has to say and let ya know when we got a plan, alright?” Her heartbeat quickened at the prospect of a job. She swallowed and nodded, suddenly half excited and half terrified. He let his eyes linger on her for a moment before he set off towards the horses, where Hosea was brushing his Silver Dollar. Sadie cleared her throat and got to her feet as well. “Imma go try and sleep off this nasty day, you should do the same. Little doe like you needs all her

strength for a job!” The blonde grinned at her, but Eliza thought it looked rather kind. Her idea of some more sleep sounded like exactly the thing she felt up to right now.

[pandoraimperatrix]

brvceselina replied to your post “I’m in a bad mood and I want to write fluff people Please send me...”

gotham!verse batcat where bruce tries to teach selina how to cook would be super cute :´) (maybe around s3??)

Baby BatCat | 2k | Fluff | Same universe as Four Names for Love | Read on AO3

Bruce looked over his table when he heard Selina stir, she had climbed over his window around eleven and basically ignored him, walking straight to the sofa and falling asleep face down almost immediately.

Two years ago, maybe less than that, Selina ignoring him like he was a piece of furniture would have hurt, but after living with her he learnt a lot, and that sometimes ignoring him would be her way to show intimacy. In her world Selina had to be always hyper-aware of her surroundings, ignoring something or someone meant carelessness, meant danger, meant harm or even death. He knew she could have crashed anywhere else, his house was far from being the more convenient place for her to take a catnap, far away from the dark alleys where she pranced. He always wondered how she managed to get to the mansion by feet. No wonder she was so tired.

She hummed softly, eyes still closed, he rested his chin on his hand, looking at her, the research all over his desk forgotten.

Selina sighed, one hand pushing her curls from her eyes.

“Stop staring, you weirdo.”

Bruce’s chair squeaked when he jumped surprised, he turned his gaze away and tried to mask his reaction with a fit of coughs.

“What?”

“Geeez.” She made in a judgemental tone, her eyes were open when he dared to look at her again, her face had a red mark made by the sofa, he felt a jolt of fondness. “I’m hungry.”

“I think there is still bouillabaisse in the fridge.”

“What?”

“Bouillabaisse.”

“Bless you.”

Bruce had to bite the insides of his cheeks to not laugh at the face she was doing.

“It’s soup. Fish soup.”

It might have been the light but she looked slightly green.

“Why do you choose to live like that, kid?”

“I thought cats liked fish.” He mumbled.

“What did you say?”

“Me? Nothing. What do you want to eat? I could make you a PBJ sandwich.”

“No thanks. Last time you gave me something made with a green bread and it tasted like dirt.” And yet she ate the entire matcha bread sandwich that he actually had made for himself before she invaded his house uninvited again. “Don’t you have any pizza?”

“They don’t deliver here and it’s” he looked at his watch “three a.m.”

She looked so sad he actually felt his heart break.

“We could make it.” He blurted.

She straightened her back, attention grabbed, but she still didn’t look convinced.

“Do you know how to make pizza?”

“You’ve eaten more complicated dishes cooked by me.” He retorted slightly offended.

“Yeah, but you had help from your butler before.”

“I did not!” Now he was far from being slightly to be full offended.

She stood up from the sofa and walked in his direction until she was leaning over his desk.

“Prove it, then.”

Bruce swallowed hard, Selina noticed that his Adam’s apple was beginning to show.

“Alright.” He stood up too and she drew back a step, he was a couple inches taller than her now, how the hell did that happen?

He had such a decided look on his face as he pushed his sleeves to his elbows and marched to the kitchen that she had to press her lips hard to stop the smile trying to colonize her face like he had done with her heart.

 She jumped on the counter and watched as he separated the various ingredients from the cupboards.

“Regular pizza dough will take forever because you have to let it rise for at least an hour, so we’ll have to make a different version. It doesn’t taste as good.”

“As long it’s eatable… What will be the toppings? Do you have any cheese?”

“Let me see…” She averted her eyes blushing softly when he bended over to look farther inside the fridge and a silver of his lower back appeared beneath his ever-present black turtleneck jumper. “I think we only have feta… I think we could pair it with some cherry tomatoes, olives and spinach.”

“You are not putting spinach on my pizza.”

He sighed.

“I’ll put on my half of it.”

“As long as I don’t have to eat it.” She answered and then added in a lower tone “spinach on pizza… Ridiculous.”

Bruce pretended he didn’t listen, hiding his smile to not show how he actually enjoyed their banter.

“Right, I have everything but the tomato sauce, I think that’s on the pantry. I’ll be right back.”

Selina’s belly made a hungry sound. She took a piece of the cheese Bruce left on the counter. It was white and smelt more milky than greasy. She put in her mouth. It didn’t taste bad, but she still preferred good old yellow American cheese.

She was on her third piece when Bruce was back with a mason jar.

“It’s homemade by Alfred.”

Selina shrugged. It was all the same to her. She didn’t even was sure about the difference between tomato sauce, tomato soup and ketchup.

“Let’s get it started.”

“Are you sure you know you’re doing?”

“Yes. Do you want to learn?”

“I’m not really the cooking type…”

“Come on, Selina. It’s fun. I promise you.”

She still looked unsure but jumped off the counter and took off her jacket, hanging it behind a chair as she went to wash her hands on the sink. Selina’s body shocked against Bruce’s when she gave a little jump of surprise when she felt him tie an apron behind her.

“So you won’t get flour stains.” He said, so close and the goosebumps had nothing to do with her jumpy reactions.

Selina just hummed in agreement and Bruce walked away, she supressed the urge to sigh. Despite Bruce’s insistence that they were boyfriend and girlfriend now they haven’t kissed or done anything like that since the day on the roof, and it wasn’t like she wanted to. She wasn’t weird! But sometimes he would look at her and she felt heat brewing inside, or he would touch her hair softly or caress her hand and she would let him.

“Don’t you need to read from a recipe book or something?”

“Uh uh” he made absently organizing the ingredients before them in a line “I have the recipe here” he taped his temple “my mom taught me.”

“Oh…”

“She wasn’t the greatest cook, couldn’t make anything complicated or fancy, but she did a lot of voluntary work abroad before she married my dad. She joked that she was a chef in all kinds of college kid’s cuisine.”

He almost never talked about his parents, and she could only imagine how painful it could be.

“Bruce… You don’t need to do this. I can have the fish soup.”

“What? No. Let’s do it! It will be fun.”

Selina looked at him for a while, searching any signs of deceit, then she gave him a small smile.

“Show me.”

“First you have to mix the water, the flour and the baking powder for the crust.” He poured the water slowly in the bowl with the four and the baking powder “we start mixing with a spatula and then we can use our hands.”

“Urgh, it’s sticking on my hands!” She complained.

Bruce grinned.

“Needs more flour.” He poured a little more on her hands. “Be gentle. If you work the dough too much it will be too heavy.”

“Alright, geez.” Kneading the dough made her thing about her cats, how somehow they would offer her their bellies to trick her into petting them only to get a bite or a scratch.

“Now we use a rolling pin to stretch the dough.”

“Can you do that spinning thing with you finger like a cartoon?” She teased.

“I can try… But we might ending have to explain why there in dough on the celling to Alfred.”  

“You mean you might have too.”

“Would you betray me like that, Selina?”

“You’re so naïve…” She said in a mocking baby voice. “it’s cute. But also dumb.”

He gave her a large smile.

“So you think I’m cute?”

She scoffed, but her face was bright red.

“That is what you get from what I said?”

“Well, you did say I’m cute.”

“I said that you ignorance was cute and also that you are dumb.”

“You say mean thing about me all the time, Selina, I filter most of it.”

She really looked amused by that.

“Where is this sass coming from?”

“I learnt from the best. Now, let’s put the dough on the pan.”

They giggled as they moulded the dough into a round shape, their fingers competing to press the loft material to the tin pan.

“What now?”

“Alfred’s red sauce.” He said struggling to open the lid. “This stuff is really good.”

Selina rolled her eyes and took the mason jar from him, opening effortlessly.

“It’s just tomatoes.”

“Nothing is only just, Selina. And Alfred this sauce from scratch, he even grows the tomatoes himself.”

“You can get ketchup for like tree bucks.”

“You will get it later.”

“Whatever. How do I put it on the pizza? Just pouring?”

“No, use a spoon.” He handed her on. “And spread it evenly.”

He watched transfixed as she worked. Her brows furred, the sliver of the tip of her tongue out in concentration.

“Done.”

“Now the cheese. I think we can just crumb it with our hands.”

They did the work and Selina stole a few more pieces. She was licking her fingers when he finished their task with the cherry tomatoes and olives, the spinach on his side of the pizza and sprinkled oregano.

“Now all we have to do it put it inside the oven and wait.”

“It wasn’t hard.” She admitted. “But I still think buying one ready is better. I don’t even have an oven.”

“But making it is more fun, isn’t it? And if you like it we can make more often when you visit.”

Maybe it was the way he looked at her, so hopeful, or how he went out of his way to make her happy, but Selina felt warmth pooling inside her. She welcomed herself into Bruce’s personal space and raised a hand to his chin

“You got a bit of flour…”

Bruce first looked at her with eyes opened wide, his eyebrows almost touching the roots of his hair, but as her hand lingered, he relaxed, and cupped her hand against his face, his lid trembling shut.

“Selina…” He sighed her name.

“Yes?” She answered softly.

He opened his eyes, still holding her hand.

“Can I?”

She swallowed hard and nodded wordlessly.

Bruce dipped to meet her in the middle, her lips were soft and warm as he pressed his against them gently. The kitchen was filled with the comforting smell of baking pizza. They parted and Bruce opened his eyes to find her, huge, green so dark. She threw her hands around his neck and kissed him again, it was different from the other times, she was tentatively moving her lips over his now. His hands went to her waist as he tried to keep up, but he was scared he would do something wrong and she would never kiss him again. When he noticed that he had been frozen she already broken the kiss again. Her brows furred in confusion, she was detaching herself from him when he leaned into her in a desperate move tried to capture her lips again, but his miscalculated move made their teeth clink painfully.

“Ouch.”

“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry!” He exclaimed horrified.

But when he looked at her she didn’t seen annoyed, and one hand even remained on his neck playing with his hair as she rubbed her mouth with the other before they exchanged a look and fell in a fit of giggles.

“Did I hurt you?”

“No, you dum dum. I’m fine.”

“I just… I have never…”

“I know. Me neither.”

“You know what would help?”

“What?”

“Practice.”

Selina playfully rolled her eyes and walked out from their embrace.

“Isn’t that pizza ready already?”

Bruce sighed.

“Yeah, I think so. Let’s eat!”

 Selina smiled at her seven years old daughter as she devoured a slice of homemade pizza. Then rubbed off the flour stain on her chin.

“What is it, mommy?” Asked Helena noticing her mother’s eyes become distant and watery.

“Nothing, honey. I just remembered something.”

“Something sad?”

“No. It was something fun.”

“So why are you sad?”

“I’m not.”

“Mommy…”

Selina sighed.

“Alright. You will get it when you grow up but, sometimes, the nice memories are the ones that hurt the most.”

“Oh… Because you miss those times?”

“Exactly, you are very smart. Now, you can have just one more slice, you already had plenty and Holly will be hungry later when she comes back.”

“Can I call Babs?”

“Didn’t you see each other earlier at school?”

 “Oh my god, Dick! No! Dad! Tell Dick he can’t put chocolate on the pizza!”

“It’s my pizza, Lena! You don’t have to eat it.”

“But you are desecrating the sanctity of pizza!”

Dick and Selina groaned.

Alfred who was sitting with his cuppa, watching and forbidden from helping snorted.

“Goodness, Miss Helena!”

“Ignore her, Alfred. She got her flair for dramatics from her father.”

“How come I am the one getting insults?” Mumbled Bruce “Dick is the one putting candy on pizza.”

“Thank you for defending me, B.” Said Dick in a mocking offended tone.

“See! Dad gets it!”

Selina smiled at Dick.

“I think Dick’s pizza will taste good.”

He hugged her by the waist grinning.

“So you’re both weird.” Said Helena failing in hiding her jealousy.

“Said the girl with spinach on her pizza.” Retorted Dick.

Alfred sighed loudly.

“Can you stop judging each other tastes and just finish this? You said you would make dinner tonight and I said yes as long as everything was clean afterwards, but I’m starting to think you will find a stupid reason to fight and leave my kitchen in chaos.”

“Geez, Alfie!”

“Yeah, you have such little faith in us, Al.”

“I just happen know each and every one of you very well.”

A little ball of dough hit Alfred on his forehead.

“Oops.” But Bruce didn’t look sorry at all.

“That’s it!” Said the butler getting up.

They all screamed and laughed as Bruce tried to run away from Alfred. Selina coming to Bruce’s aid and the kids taking Alfred’s side as pizza night turned into food fight night.

[buckyownsmyheart]

Duty [4/12]

CHAPTER 4: Getting Dolled Up

Pairing: Bucky Barnes x Reader

Word Count: another 2.3k (next week is longer, promise!)

Warnings: A mouthy Sam, groping and a smooch or two

Series Summary: Ex-army doctor, and now on-mission-for-the-Avengers doctor, Major (Y/n) (Y/l/n), had prepared herself for anything. That was, of course, until she met a devastatingly charming Sergeant from Brooklyn with a quick wit and a kind smile. I wonder what will happen.

Series Masterlist

Chapter 3

You always liked to think that you were pretty prepared for anything that might be thrown your way, you had, however, not considered James Buchanan Barnes in an all-black velvet suit. Good god that man did things to you.

“Might want to close your mouth there, Doc,” he smirked at you, “You’ll catch flies.”

You shut your mouth quickly and swallowed, ignoring his smug look.

The team had been summoned by the New York mayor to oversee a gala at an art gallery. Intel suggested that there was going to be an art thief operating that evening, trying to steal one of the pieces of artwork, named “The Power of Reciprocity”, in a more concealed room down a corridor outside of the main room, and the thief would be using the gala as a cover to steal a piece. On the floor would be Tony, posing as himself, and then you and Bucky as undercover guests. In a van nearby would be Sam and Nat, as Steve was currently in New Jersey scoping out a newly reformed gang.

This was how you found yourself eating a bowl of Lucky Charms (because these events only ever have canapés, and you’ll be damned if you were going to go hungry), with half of your make-up on, wearing sweats and trying very hard not to obviously drool over Bucky Barnes as he stood there in his full suited glory.

You placed your now empty bowl in the dishwasher and turned back to Bucky, “I’ll admit, you scrub up nicely Barnes.” This was a small understatement, he did a lot more than scrub up nicely, he might actually be perfect, but there was no way he’d hear you say that. You walked up to Bucky, and continued, “Best I go get dressed and show you up before your head gets so big it needs external support.” You patted him on the chest, partly to satisfy the itch your fingers had to run themselves over every part of him, but also for effect as you walked towards your room.

Nat had tasked herself with finding you the perfect outfit, her reasoning being that she knows what can kill a man, both figuratively and literally. Per Nat’s styling advice, your hair was in a delicate up-do with a few strands framing your face, Wanda had done your makeup to bring out your eyes and the dress you pulled from some vastly expensive shop did wonders for your figure. In the end, you had both agreed on a floor length royal blue dress with jewelled detailing around the waist and the neckline. Nat had also supplied you with a knife thigh holster, as a gun would be too obvious in the dress. She had also bequeathed you one of her favourite knives, but not before adding a quick, “If you lose this, I will end you and everything you care about.” You also had on some heels that were a little too high for you, but you were just there to look pretty, so had thought why not?

You knew you looked good from the bolstering that the girls had given you, but that didn’t remove the butterflies that fluttered gently in your stomach. Ignoring them, you walked out into the kitchen, swaying your hips a little more than usual. The click of your shoes caught the attention of the team gathered there, and silence fell immediately.

“You ready boys?” You called out to them winking at Nat, as she chuckled at everyone eyeballing you. Bucky wandered over to you and gave you a not-so-subtle once over, and then a twice over.

He offered his arm, “Shall we?”

“Lead the way, Robocop.”

You took his arm and walked out with what had been becoming a permanent smile across your face.

“Hey lovebirds, give us a smile!” You heard Nat shout,

You and Bucky turned your heads at the same time before the undeniable ‘click’ of a camera. You turned back shaking your head, Bucky laughed gently beside you. You gave them all the bird as you both walked away, and they eventually made a move to follow you.

-

You perched your elbows on one of the high tables skirting the side-lines, waiting for someone to get hurt. What a great job you have. The champagne flute you held managed to stop you wringing your hands nervously.

“Hi, sweetheart,” A louche voice breathed in your ear as a hand moved far lower than you appreciated, following your curves. You were not in the mood to be dealing with this tonight. You grabbed the hand, twisting it and slamming it on the table. You looked up to the man.

“Do that to me again sweetheart,” you mimicked, “and I’m going to shove your balls so far up your ass that they’ll hang either side of your tongue instead.”

You put your glass down and strode away, trying to find Bucky to ease your mind, and hoped that he looked murderous enough that any glare he sent would put anyone who looked at you the wrong way off. Before you could find him, you heard Sam’s voice in your ear.

“Remind me never to get on your bad side.”

Nat also spoke up, her silky voice full of barely concealed laughter, “I fully endorse any form of violence you wish to inflict upon that man.”

You chuckled, feeling your anger dissipate, and whispered, “Tash, you’d endorse any form of violence no matter the context,”

There was laughter filling your ear, and a buzzing of agreement. You scanned the room, subconsciously checking if Bucky was still okay when he appeared beside you.

“You okay?” His eyes scanned your face, and you gave a smile, a breath you didn’t know you’d been holding was released.

“Yeah, I’m all good, Buck. I doubt that guy will ever try that again though,” you breathed out, a whisper of a laugh present. A scowl had formed on his face, and you knew he needed a distraction before he got too caught up in planning someone’s murder, “Come on, let’s dance.”

“Dance?” He questioned.

“Yeah, you know, you move your feet in time with music, maybe even smile?”

“A smile? Don’t get ahead of yourself Doc,” Sam’s voice filled your ear once more.

“Butt out, birdbrain,” Bucky growled.

“Come on Sarge, whaddya say? For recon purposes.” You grinned at him,

“For recon purposes? Well, I can’t say no to that.” he offered his hand to you, a bright smile lightened his features before he put his own glass down and pulled you onto the dancefloor. You were focussing intently on not rolling your ankle because your knees had gone a little wobbly at his warm hand and warmer gaze that had fixed intently upon you. What you didn’t know was that it had been on you the whole evening, and he couldn’t quite get himself to stop.

On the dancefloor, you were acutely aware of Bucky’s gloved hand on your waist and his thighs brushing against yours as he expertly led you around, weaving between the other guests. Wow, you needed to get your head out of the gutter. Tony caught your eye whilst he was talking to the mayor and winked. Why did he seem to always know what was going on? Trying to concentrate on what you were actually here for, and not the movement of Bucky’s shoulder under your hand, or the tickle of his breath on your neck.

“Uh, Buck?” He hummed against you, his chest vibrating against yours, “Is it normal for people to stare unblinkingly at us?” He froze, “There’s someone at your 7 o’clock, light blue suit.”

Bucky spun you both around slowly, and spoke quietly, “I think he might have recognised me, Sam, Nat? How should we proceed?”

Your ear filled with static and then Nat’s voice, “I think you know what to do, Barnes, think Cap Pre-Berlin 2014, the mall.”

You pulled back and glanced at Bucky, “What happened in 2014?”

Bucky’s face was completely unreadable, “Sorry about this Major.”

And suddenly his lips were on yours, his right hand had moved from holding yours to on your cheek, whilst his left squeezed your waist. Automatically your left hand moved to the nape of his neck, and your lips moved against his. His unique sandalwood scent, the scent of him, filled your senses and everywhere he touched you felt like it was on fire. Before you had fully processed the kiss, and far too early for your liking, he pulled away. His ears were a bit pink, and he looked at his shoes sheepishly. You opened your mouth to say something, but Sam interrupted.

“Think you put him off alright, put me off my damn soup, jeez! You’re paying for my therapy after that!” He gave a chuckle, “Stark and Barnes, you’re on. He's headed through the door to the painting.”

You looked back up at Bucky, “You got a bit of uh- “, you swiped your thumb over his lip, “Um, lipstick,” you clarified, trying not to stumble fully over your sentence

“Bad guy, Barnes, pick up your chin”

“Thanks, Tony,” grumbled Bucky, but he still didn’t move, his eyes not leaving your face and you could almost see the cogs whirring in his brain.

You whispered to him, pushing lightly on his chest, “Go catch the bad guy, Sarge, I’m not going anywhere.”

“Right, bad guy, yeah,” and he went to the door with purpose, and you had to prevent yourself from saying something else you might regret. You knew there was something between you, there was attraction (you had caught him looking more than once), but you’re scared if you begin to care a whole lot more, that it might break you when he got hurt. Maybe it would change the team dynamic, or you could be used as leverage and a ploy against him. There were many potential downfalls if you admitted your feelings. It also terrified you that someone might be able to see underneath your toughened exterior. He might be attracted to the idea of you, the person on the outside, without knowing what he's getting on the inside.

“Hey Doc,” Nat’s voice cut through your downward spiral, “Think they might need some help down in the side room.”

You walked as quickly as you could without arousing suspicion towards the corridor. As the noise of the main hall died down, the clicks of your heels felt obnoxiously loud, something was off.

“Bucky? Tony?” you called out down the corridor, wondering where they had gone. If only you had looked at the blueprints before, guess that’s karma for not paying attention during the briefing. Tony would have your ass later. A large forearm closed around your neck, crushing your windpipe, and you convulsed, trying to get some air into your lungs.

A deep voice rumbled behind you. "No time for that. " His voice reverberated through your body, making you shudder at its malice. As your vision started to tunnel, Nat’s voice was in your ear, saying something you couldn’t work out. It sounded like you were underwater. Nat. Her knife. You moved your hand to your holster and pulled out the knife, sharply jabbing it into the guys leg, aiming for any artery you could find. He yelled out in pain and dropped you. Falling to your knees you gasped for air, taking long deep breaths and trying to calm yourself. The guy was now lying next to you, twitching. You knew in a couple of minutes he would bleed out and die, but at this point you were too thankful to care. When he finally lay still, you reached over and pulled out the knife, trying not to look at his paled face and shocked eyes. You had never quite got used to taking a life, no matter how necessary, it was never a pleasant ordeal. You were in the business of saving them, felt upside down doing the opposite. As you stood up Bucky hurled around the corner.

“What happened? Are you okay? Who’s this guy? Natasha said you weren’t answering comms and we got scared. I thought something might have happened to you,” he stopped, looked at the bloody knife in your hands and his face moved slowly back to your face, more questioning now, “Where did that come from?”

“A woman never tells,” you winked, hiding your fear behind a façade of calm, and slowly slid the knife back into its place on your thigh. Tony rounded the corner.

“Bad guy won’t be getting away, that’s for sure,” he regarded the body at your feet with a look of surprise and mild amusement, “I’m going to tell Sam he really doesn’t want to mess with you.” He brushed past you and Bucky, before adding finally, “Cops are on their way, I’m going to enjoy the free booze!” And with a wave, he was out of sight.

You wrung your hands and said to Bucky, not quite looking at him, “I’m going to head home, you’re more than welcome to stay here though.”

“Nah, I’ve outdone my social interaction quota for the month, I’ll drive you.”

Once more, you heard Sam pipe up in your ear, “Anyone still bothering you Major? I can come in and kick their ass for you, I’ve been told I’m quite adept at it.”

“Just a one old man, around 6”2? 260lbs? He has a bionic arm, but I reckon I can handle him Wilson, thanks for the offer.”

“Yes ma’am,” came the reply.

Bucky feigned offense before taking your hand, squeezing it twice before wrapping his arm around your shoulder and helping you in the direction of the car. You leaned on his shoulder, thankful for the solidity of it and its ever-present stability for you. As he placed a soft kiss on the crown of your head you decided that your feelings for him were a problem for future you, present you was going to enjoy his company without feeling guilty.

New York Times

Art thief found tied upside down with his own trousers, is now threatening to sue the Avengers and well-known billionaire Tony Stark. More on page 4.

  Chapter 5

 tags (message me if you want to be added!!):

@broco8​ @nerd-without-a-cause​ @sebbbystaaan​ @mcubuckyandsteve @cutiepiemimi13 ​ @velvetwonderbucky​

[izumitate]

missed the last train back to me&you

kurodai week day 2: post-breakup

I think this is the only kurodai fic I’ll ever write where they don’t eventually get together. :(

French vanilla with two teaspoons of sugar and a dash of cream, just the way Daichi likes it. Served in the same worn yellow mug that Kuroo used to always save for him whenever he was over.

(“It reminds me of you, that’s why,” Kuroo explains, smiling to himself as he dries the dishes Daichi hands over.

“Because it’s butter-colored?” Daichi teases, memorizing the way surprise settles in Kuroo’s eyes like a summer moth on a lantern before it flits away.

“No! No, it’s- god, this is cheesy. It’s not butter-colored, you goof. It’s sunshine-colored. So, uh. That’s why.”

“That’s...really sweet, actually. You’re cute in unexpected ways, Tetsurou.” With careful hands Daichi picks up the sunshine mug, washing the soap bubbles away. When he passes it over, their fingers brush, and he glances down, hiding his flushed face by concentrating on scrubbing the next plate.)

The coffee is bittersweet.

Light splashes the kitchen table from the high skylight window the way it always did, but there’s a glass mobile hanging there now that catches the sunbeams and scatters them in rainbow shards across the room. Kuroo still takes the stool directly beneath the window, leaving the other one for Daichi, in the shade the way he likes it.

He had also hung Daichi’s coat on the hook farthest from the door, and put out the cream-filled biscuits they used to buy at the corner grocery for a mid-morning snack. They’re the kind of minutiae that he wouldn’t expect someone to know unless they had lived together for quite some time.

It’s not that Daichi is surprised Kuroo still remembers the little details after all these years. It’s just that it aches more than he expected, this reminder that they used to be more than what they are now.

That they used to be in love.

“So you’re still at the same university then?” Kuroo asks after Daichi puts his cup back on its coaster. Those are new: round little silicone things covered in abstract designs and noisy colors. It’s not an aesthetic Daichi would’ve expected to see in Kuroo’s home. Then again, it isn’t just his home anymore.

The blue checkered cotton hand towels in the bathroom. Bottles of sparkling water in the fridge. Frog slippers at the entryway. New chair, new carpet, new curtains. New bedsheets. New indentation on Daichi’s- no, on the other side of the bed.

Kuroo’s house belongs to two people now. Kuroo’s life belongs to two people now, and Daichi isn’t one of them. And it doesn’t hurt to know this, but there remains a hollow spot in Daichi’s heart reserved for the feelings he used to hold for Kuroo that can never be filled.

“Yeah, well, I’m just two years away from tenure and I like my colleagues and my tiny office, so I figured I might as well stick around. And professors get free coffee on Thursday mornings at the uni cafe, so there’s that too.”

Kuroo’s dreadful laugh is the same, all cackle and no panache, and it brings a smile to Daichi’s lips as easily as it ever did. He looks much the same as he did back in high school, in college, and after. Untamable hair, shrewd eyes, and the sweetest smile when the lights are low and sunrise still hours away.

“Sounds like you’ve got a good gig. The hospital caf is the literal worst; I wouldn’t eat there even if they paid me to. And they’re definitely not paying me to.”

“I hope you’re not skipping meals again.”

“Aw, you’re still a worrier, Daichi. Don’t worry, I bring homemade bentos now. No more skipping.”

“Oh! That’s great. Healthy and delicious.” God, Daichi feels like he’s stumbling over a conversation that should be easy, tongue-tied by a few implications that should have been obvious. Home-cooked lunch. That’s good. Kuroo spends so much time taking care of other people that he forgets about himself. It’s good he found someone who pays attention to him the way he deserves.

(“Shit, we’re so late,” Kuroo laughs as he shoves Daichi’s papers into his bag. With one hand he catches the umbrella that Daichi throws his way. Outside, the rain patters down in a spring shower, leaving droplets behind on every budding branch.

“Not if we catch the 6:10 train, we’re not. C’mon, let’s go, let’s go.” Daichi gets one foot into his shoe before Kuroo lets out a wail and backtracks into the house.

“Lunch, we forgot lunch!”

“Of course we did,” Daichi groans. He kicks his shoe off, accidentally flinging it into the door as he scrambles back inside as well. Their bags lie abandoned on the wooden floor.

They find a scavenger’s meal in their fridge: an apple for each of them, leftover soup and old rice, some scraps of sausage and boiled vegetables that they hurriedly scoop into a thermos. Daichi drops a sausage on the ground and Kuroo immediately bends down and crams it in his own mouth.

“Don’t waste food,” he admonishes Daichi, who’s laughing too hard to be able to properly clean the spot of sauce off the kitchen tiles.

“Don’t keep pressing snooze on the alarm clock!”

“That’s a different issue.”

“We have a lot of issues,” Daichi says as he hustles them out the door. “Like owning only one umbrella.”

“We’ll share, Daichi. It’s more romantic that way, eh?” Kuroo links his arm with Daichi’s as they head down the street, which becomes a liability when they start running to catch the train, umbrella almost flying out of Kuroo’s hand as they sprint down the sidewalk soaked by rain.)

“So,” Kuroo says almost bashfully once they’ve made the requisite amount of small talk before gossiping about the people they know for fifteen minutes. “You’re probably wondering why I called you here. Or you already know. I mean, of course you know; you’re smart, you must have pieced it together-”

“You’re rambling again, Tetsu,” and it’s unfair to sound as fond as he does, but he can’t help himself. “I received the invitation. It was lovely, by the way. You have better taste than I remembered.”

“No, I’m exactly the same,” Kuroo admits. “I had minimal input on the decor. Food and music were more my thing.”

“Oh, no. That’s even worse. Please spare us,” Daichi says in monotone, and Kuroo rolls his eyes good-naturedly.

“Sure, get your laughs in now, jerk. You won’t be laughing when I withhold cake from you.” Kuroo’s smile slips for a second into nervousness and he tugs at the cowlick on the back of his head. The one that appears when he showers before going to sleep, leaving his hair extra birdlike in the morning. “Which brings me to what I wanted to ask you. I know it’s not usually good form to invite your- um, your ex to your wedding, but we talked it over and...I mean, you and I are still friends, aren’t we?”

Friends, former rivals, former lovers. Something else.

“Of course we are, you dork,” Daichi says, shaking his head like Kuroo’s foolish for even asking.

It’s not that they’d been avoiding each other. It was just a consequence of growing older, Daichi presumed. They’d never had a falling out, or anything so dramatic. Their lives had just started to unwind from one another’s, each of them branching toward something incompatible with the other person’s growth, and sometimes, love stretches too distant to sustain itself.

“Right, and I know we dated, but that was ages ago, and I don’t want that to supercede the friendship we’ve always had. Aki and I discussed it already, and we’re okay with whatever happens, so I don’t want you to think there’s any awkwardness on our end, but I don’t want to pressure you either-”

“Kuroo,” Daichi has to say with gentle firmness, “it’s okay. You can ask your question.”

For the slightest of moments, it seems like Kuroo is going to say something else, his amber eyes caught on Daichi’s the way they used to when they were walking home from the bar and circling around each other in another silly argument over something trivial just for the thrill of the fight. But it passes just as quickly, and he rakes a hand through his bangs before nodding.

“Yeah, you know how I get when I’m anxious. Um, yeah, so I just wanted to ask you in person if you’d like to come to the wedding. With a plus one if you want, of course. I feel like we’ve fallen out of touch recently, and it felt too impersonal to start reaching out again over a piece of paper.” He glances down at the table, just a flicker of his eyes betraying his nerves, before he gathers the iron resolve Daichi has always known him to have and meeting Daichi’s gaze again.

Daichi had always admired that willpower, had come to love it. Some part of him still does, perhaps.

“I’d love to. I’m happy for you, Tetsurou,” Daichi says warmly, and the worst part is that it’s true. He really is happy that Kuroo could find the person he was meant to be with. “Aki seems wonderful, and I’m looking forward to the chance to finally meet.”

Kuroo still brightens with the same glow as he always did whenever receiving good news. “Yeah? That’s great! It’ll be awesome to have you there; Bokuto and the others will be stoked. I missed this – hanging out with you. It’s been too long.”

“Hey, we’ve both been busy. But you’re right, we could make more of an effort. How about after all the excitement from your honeymoon period dies down a little? We’ll get together with the old group.”

“Well, be careful who you invite. Some of them are lightweights in their old age now.”

“I think I’m more scared of the ones who can still party as hard as they used to,” Daichi says with a grin. Kuroo gives another awful laugh, and some uneven part of their relationship slips back into place where it should be, where it had always been.

(There’s no way they can see the meteor shower in Tokyo, but they climb up to the roof of their apartment anyway, hoping to catch silver dust glimpses streaking across the sky before blinking out of existence.

The night is already warm as it is, for an early summer day, but Daichi lies close to Kuroo anyway, their bare arms pressed right against each other on top of the blanket they’d thrown across the hard roof tile.

A few times, they sit up in excitement, thinking they’d caught a falling star, but it would almost always turn out to be a star of the city’s making instead: lamps and lights reflecting into the sky. Now, they’re just lying still, trading stories about what they used to think they could find in space when they were children.

“Tetsurou,” Daichi whispers, trying not to disturb the patterns of quiet and noise that mesh together to make the city ambience that surrounds them. Overhead, another fleeting sparkle of white vanishes before Daichi can even realize he saw it.

“Daichi,” Kuroo whispers back, squeezing his hand once. His eyes glow like autumn in the dark, more real than any light in the city. “What’s up?”

“I think...I think that I could stay here with you forever.”

Beneath the canvas of Tokyo’s lights, Kuroo leans over to kiss Daichi ever so softly at the corner of his mouth.

“I’d like that.”)

[deer-tokki]

If u take requests atm, could u please write an onho fic in modern time with merman onew and fisherman Minho. Onew gets stuck in minhos net and then a relationship blossoms lol. Also, pink hair onew from odd era please❤️❤️🙏🏻

Firstly I want to apologize for taking so long, I’ve never wrote a story about merman before so took me some time and I think I have wrote too much… heheSecondly, I have changed a little you’re prompt, I hope you don’t mind… Instead of Jinki getting stuck in Minho’s net, he saves Minho’s life…I hope you like. ^^

Minho closed his eyes for a moment feeling the cool breeze wash over hisface. The sun was setting, fading and giving way to the moon and stars thatbegan to dot the sky.

The day had been so tiring physically, yet Minho couldn’t sleep. It wasone of those days where he just could not relax enough to actually get any shuteye. He knew if he tried to lay down he would just wind up staring at theceiling of his bedroom until the sun reemerged.

Sitting there on the small pier with his feet in the water, Minho simplybreathed deeply, feeling the fresh air fill his lungs. That is until a soundcaught his ear, causing him to open his eyes again and look around with afurrowed brow. What was that?

The sound grew louder and Minho could tell with certainty that it wassomeone singing, but who?

Minho lived in a small town, within a small house built by his latefather. It was near the sea, the pier at the back of the house led tocrystalline waters licking the rocks that were on the coast. There were notmany people around his home and Minho had to admit that sometimes he was alittle lonely. Given the rarity of people around the home, plus the currentlylate hour of the day, made him even more intrigued when he continued to hearthe melodic singing.

Getting up from where he was sitting and jumping down from the pier,Minho cautiously walked along the rocks until his feet stepped on sand that wasilluminated from the reflection of the moon.

The voice grew louder with every step Minho took, and his heart beatsped up inside his chest. The voice was really beautiful, a voice he had neverheard before.

A man was in the calm waters, his lower half covered by the soft lappingwaves while his torso, that was leaning on a large rock, glowed in themoonlight. The droplets of water on his skin and hair looking like diamondsagainst the light of the stars. Minho stood frozen there, as if hypnotized bythe man, mesmerized by the soft voice that sang in a different language,something he had never heard before.

He does not know how long he stood there listening to the man sing, butat some point the man stopped singing and looked up. He did not appear to seeMinho, but instead focused on the moon with a smile on his lips and finally thetrance seemed to be broken. He should not have just stood there when he knew therewas a strange, unknown man swimming just off the shore.

“Hey,” Minho said drawing the man’s attention. “Who areyou?”

The man looked back, his eyes wide with fear and without saying anythingelse, he dove, disappearing from the surface.

Minho began to worry when after a few minutes the man did not return tothe surface. Even if this man could hold his breath for long enough, it wasreaching a dangerous point. Without thinking twice, he took off his shoes andran into the sea, diving and searching for the man.

Minutes later Minho sat on the sand, wet and panting. The man had simplydisappeared and Minho had no clue how or what to do. Maybe he should call thepolice and report that a man had disappeared into the sea.

Frowning, Minho rubbed his hand over his face and sighed. This wholeevening seemed crazy even to him. Maybe he was just too tired and imagined itall…after all, there was no way anyone could stay so long underwater andthere was no way that someone would just disappear like that.

“I’m going crazy.” he murmured to himself, standing up andheading toward his house.

—-

It was still dark out when Minho sat at the table for breakfast, hisbowls of rice and soup totally forgotten as he stared out the window, staringout at the sea. The waters that were calm last night, were now agitated andchoppy, which was almost never a good sign for fishermen.

The worst part was that Minho had not managed to sleep at all lastnight, worried about the strange man who had disappeared into the sea. Hetossed and turned all night think about every possible option. Could he reallyhave imagined all of that? Was it all in his head? Could he have dreamed such amagical voice as the one he heard by the water’s edge?

“What’s going on?” Jonghyun asked entering the kitchen,startling Minho, who almost threw his rice bowl at the intruder.

“Jesus Christ! Don’t you know how to knock before entering?”

Jonghyun snorted, taking a mug from the cupboard and filling it withfresh coffee. “I did knock, twice, and you didn’t even blink when I firstwalked in here. You seemed to be too busy looking out the window…thoughtful.”

Minho sighed. “There’s nothing going on, I just didn’t sleep muchlast night and I’m tired.”

The older man nodded, leaning his hip against the counter and sippinghis coffee. “You should go to the doctor, maybe get a prescription to helpyou sleep. This is dangerous, especially for those who work on a boat.”

“I’m fine,” he said shaking his head and standing up.“I’m worried about the weather. It looks like it’s going to rain, orworse.”

“Yeah, that’s why I think we’d better…”

“No,” Minho said cutting him off. “We have to go, most ofthe town depends on the fish we catch. They need this…”

“Minho-ah, if anything happens…”

“Nothing will happen, hyung. How many years have we been doingthis? We know very well what to do if a storm blows up on us.”

Jonghyun sighed but said nothing more, knowing that he would not be ableto convince Minho of anything, the younger man was just stubborn like that.

—-

The wind was strong, swaying the boat, the waves crashing against thehull. Everything seemed to be trying to knock the men on deck down. To theircredit, they were doing their best to collect the last net from it’s droplocation.

“Shit,” Jonghyun said through his teeth, trying to help Minho.“We’re going to die here.”

“Don’t be dramatic, we’re fine and we just have to pull up thislast net. Then we can leave.” he said, feeling sweat trickling down histemples, putting more force than normal into pulling.

“Something is wrong, the net must be stuck somewhere.”

Grinding his teeth and placing one of his feet against the side of theboat, Minho tried to pull the net again, but it wouldn’t budge. The boat shookagain as the waves hit it and began tilting at an angle from the men pulling atthe stuck gear. Before anyone had even knew what happened, before Minho orJonghyun could react to the situation, Minho felt his body fly forward, out ofthe boat, falling into the icy water.

This was not the first time that Minho fell into the sea, this was notthe first time he felt the salt water enter through his nose and mouth, fillinghis lungs. It was not the first time he felt the despair of drowning andthinking he was going to die. Not after what happened a few year ago and how hehad lost his own father to the same fate as the older man worked to save him.However, this time he was going to fight, he was already an adult and was notgoing to indulge easily. His father had given his own life to keep Minho aliveand he was not about to waste his sacrifice.

Trying to calm down, Minho closed his mouth and concentrated onswimming, pushing his body up with all the strength he had. The waders andboots he wore for work were heavy and swimming with all that gear on was evenmore difficult. The lack of air was beginning to make his head spin and why inhell hadn’t  Jonghyun come to help yet?

Opening his mouth unintentionally, Minho gasped as the water rushed inand everything went black.

—-

Minho felt a sudden pain in his chest, it was as if someone was punchinghim and he gasped, coughing water, feeling his throat, nose and entire bodyburn. Opening his eyes, he blinked away the blurry sights a few times, stillcoughing up more water. He took a deep breathe and stared up at the sky thatwas dark, heavy gray clouds rolling across the sky.

“Oh! Thank God you’re alive!” the voice to his side soundedchoked up and rough as if it had been crying.

Trying to clear the last of his haze away, Minho blinked a few moretimes and looked to the side. A man was kneeling beside him, cheeks red andface a bit puffy from emotion. Frowning Minho first realized that the man had astrange hair color…it looked pink, like what a k-pop idol would do to theirhair.

“Are you okay?” he asked worriedly. “You swallowed a lotof water.”

Looking up again, Minho took a deep breath a few times, his whole bodywas aching and even breathing hurt. “I think I’m fine.” he saidhoarsely.

“What a relief,” the man said with a small smile on his lips.“For a moment I thought you weren’t going to wake up.”

With some difficulty, Minho sat up and looked around, not recognizingwhere they were. “What is this pla…” as his eyes settled on the manbeside him, Minho felt his face burn before he looked away. “Better question,why are you naked?”

“Oh,” he looked down and blushed, his face becoming darkerthan his hair. “I… I don’t…” he stuttered, standing up, trying tocover himself with his hands.

Minho looked down and started to pulling off the t-shirt he was wearing.Since it was still a bit wet and his arms were still weak from the previousexertion, it was hard to remove, but after a few moments he finally managed topull the fabric over his head and offered it to the cherry red faced stranger.

“W-what?” he asked with wide eyes, looking at the t-shirt asif it was going to eat him or something.

“Just put it on,” he said, still holding the shirt out.“So you don’t have to stay naked.”

The man hesitated for a moment but eventually took the t-shirt, stilltrying to hide himself from Minho by using his hands “T-thank you.”

The strange man was kind of sexy, Minho had to admit.

When he looked at the man again, he was pulling the t-shirt down, whichwas a little short, showing off his thighs, but still hiding his privates.“I’m the one who should thank you, for saving me.”

“You don’t have to thank me,” he said, shaking his hands.“I couldn’t leave you there, it was too dangerous.”

He snorted, coughing from the ache in his throat and lungs once more.“You don’t have to convince me of that. I almost died and that’s why I’mthanking you, you saved my life.“

The man smiled happily, a slight blush on his face. “I’m glad Icould save you, you seem to be a nice guy and… and despite your work, you’rekind to the fish and the sea, just fishing what you need and not wasting likeother fishermen.”

Minho frowned. “You know me?”

“Oh… I… who doesn’t, right?!” he said laughing, hisfingers picking at invisible dirt on the wet t-shirt he now wore.

Well, in a way that was true, the town where they lived was small andeveryone knew each other, but Minho had never seen the man before him.

“You’re right about that, but I’ve never seen you here, are you newto town?”

“I live close by, but not in the actual town…” he said,biting his lower lip. “That’s why you’ve never seen me.”

He smiled and nodded. “Anyway, where are we?” he asked,looking around.

“Close to the port,” he said, pointing to his right side.“Very close.”

“Maybe we should go now,” Minho said looking up, for the waythe heavy, dark clouds were beginning to loom again, it was going to rain soon.“Before it rains.”

The man looked up and bit his lip. “Yes, seems like it. You shouldgo then.”

“You’re not coming?”

“I need to go that way.” he said, pointing the opposite way ofport.

“But…”

“I’ll be fine and…” he said looking down. “I’ll returnyour t-shirt later, if you don’t mind.”

“No, no. Of course, you take it.”

It was better than the man walking around naked. Minho had not even beenable to understand why the man was naked in the first place.

“Okay.” he said, smiling lightly.

Minho stood up, standing there for a few seconds, hypnotized by thestrange man’s smile.

“Your voice is familiar,” he murmured, still looking at theman without even blinking. “I just can’t remember from where…”

The man’s eyes widened, fear crossing his face. “I-I don’t thinkwe’ve met before.” he said, shaking his head.

Frowning, Minho found the other man’s reaction a little strange.“Are you sure?”

“Yes, absolutely. I… I need to go.” he said, turning hisback to Minho and hurrying along the sand.

“Hey,” Minho called, causing the other man to turn around andwalk backwards. “Can I at least know your name?”

“Oh, I’m… I’m Jinki.” he said smiling.

He smiled back. “Thank you for saving me Jinki-ssi. I’m ChoiMinho.” he called, this time getting louder as Jinki wasn’t next to himanymore.

Jinki turned once again and smiled broadly, showing his shiny teeth. Helooked happy. “I know.” he said before turning around and practicallyrunning across the sand once again, body eventually fading behind a rock.

“How does he know my name?” he asked with a frown,half-worried and half-happy, for some reason.

After another few minutes of standing there, Minho shook his head andturned in the direction Jinki had pointed out. The port really was close by andsoon he noticed Jonghyun, whose eyes were puffy and red and he could tell wasvery emotional. The shorter man came running towards him, his eyes full oftears once again and voice shaking from emotion.

“Where were you? I… I could not find you and I thought… Ithought…” he couldn’t bring himself to say the word.

Minho let Jonghyun hug him, basically sobbing against his chest like afrightened child. “I’m fine,” he said patting his back. “Someonesaved me.”

“Who?” Jonghyun asked pulling away from his chest.

“I don’t know him, but he said his name was Jinki.”

“Jinki? What’s his last name?”

“He didn’t say,” Minho said with a shrug. “But he’scute.”

“Cute? How…” Minho felt his cheeks warm slightly as his onceemotional friend was quick yo interrogate him.

“Hyung, I really want to go home to change these clothes, I’mtired.”

Jonghyun looked at Minho and raised an eyebrow. “Where’s yourt-shirt?”

Shrugging, Minho smiled. “Bye, hyung.”

—-

“Can you stop?”

Kibum crossed his arms and snorted. “You need to eat and…”

“And I already ate, I’m full and yet you keep pushing more food onme. I can’t eat anything else or I’m going to pop.”

“You are exaggerating.”

“No, I’m not.” Minho said, crossing his arms. Sometimes Kibumand his motherly instinct could be more stubborn than both him and Jonghyun puttogether.

“I’m just worried, okay?”

“I’m fine and as much as I love your cooking, I definitely don’tneed to eat anymore.”

“You… you almost died,” Kibum said with a sigh and emotionevident in his voice. He sat in the chair next to Minho. “I do not knowwhat else to do.”

“Kibum-ah,” he said taking Kibum’s hand in his. “Thankyou for bringing me food, thank you for caring about me, but I’m really fine,just a little tired.”

Kibum nodded, sighing once more. “Then promise me one thing.Promise me you will not go out on the open sea tomorrow. You need to rest Choi…rest. ”

“Kibum-ah…”

“No, listen to me. In the news, they said that there would beanother storm tomorrow. You almost drowned and the storm hadn’t even fully hitat that time. I don’t even want to think what can happen not only with you butwith Jonghyun too, if you go out in that tomorrow.”

Seeing how Kibum was worried and the obvious emotion on the boy’s faceand in his voice, Minho nodded.

“Okay, we’ll stay at home tomorrow. I need to fix some things,anyway.”

“Good,” he said, smiling contentedly. “Tomorrow I’ll cookfor you, come to the restaurant at lunchtime.”

“Can I bring Jonghyun with me?”

“Even if I say no, you’re going to just bring him anyway… orhe’ll follow you there like a puppy.” he said, snorting dramatically andmaking Minho laugh. “Just don’t be late.”

“Yes sir,” he said, saluting and making Kibum laugh again.

Lying on the bed, staring at the ceiling, Minho let himself think aboutwhat had happened, let himself think of Jinki who had saved him from drowning,who had saved his life.

He had never seen anyone like Jinki before, not someone so beautiful. Helooked like a manhwa character, someone drawn by an artist with perfectcharacteristics, proportions and hair.

A smile formed on Minho’s lips, who closed his eyes, trying to remember thedetails of Jinki’s face, how the blush rose over his face as Minho mentionedthat he was naked.

Minho certainly wanted to see Jinki again.

—-

It had been a few weeks, Minho had not seen Jinki anywhere, and he hadactually worked to search for the man. He tried to find him in the small crowdsas he walked the streets of town, or trying to find him inside a shop orrestaurant when he would go out. Everything had been in vain.

No one he talked to about Jinki had seen or knew about him and Minhostarted to worry and second guess himself. Thinking he had hallucinated thewhole thing and that Minho had somehow escaped from drowning by himself.

Although there was Minho’s missing t-shirt, the one he left home wearingand returned home without. The t-shirt he had given Jinki.

Determined, Minho decided that he would go to the beach, the place wherehe had woken up after the drowning, in the exact place where he saw Jinki thatday. Maybe he could find some answers or at least a helpful clue.

The place was as Minho remembered, the sand seemed to be whiter, theflowing water quieter and the shells glittering in the sunlight. Lookingaround, Minho saw that place was like a refuge, a hidden place nobody else knewabout.

Closing his eyes, Minho felt the breeze pass around him, until he heardthat voice, the same voice he had heard that night near his house. Opening hiseyes, Minho began walking along the beach, trying to discover where that voicewas coming from, who owned such a beautiful and smooth sound.

Then Minho saw Jinki walking along the beach distracted, wearing thet-shirt he had borrowed that day and very short shorts, showing his fleshythighs that Minho had had the pleasure of noticing the day Jinki had saved him.

“Jinki!” he called, smiling relieved to have finally foundhim.

Jinki smiled happily and then blushed when he looked down, seeing thathe was wearing Minho’s t-shirt. “Hello,” he murmured. “I’m…I’m sorry for wearing your shirt again, I should have returned it, but…”

“It’s okay, the t-shirt looks good and you. You can keep it.”

Jinki’s eyes sparkled. “Are you serious?”

“Yes, it’s a gift.”

“Thank you, Choi Minho-ssi.”

He nodded, still smiling at Jinki. “I was looking for you.”

“W-were you?” Jinki asked looking at him with wide eyes.

“Yes, but no one knew about you, no one had ever seen you, and Ibegan to think I had dreamt everything that happened.” he said, laughinguneasily.

“Oh, I…”

“It’s weird, isn’t it? There’s no way someone wouldn’t haveremembered meeting you.”

It made Jinki blush even more and Minho chuckled. “Do youthink?”

“Of course,” Minho said, nodding. “After that day I couldnot stop thinking about you and how I wanted to meet you again.”

“W-why?”

Minho blinked, realizing that he was speaking without thinking again. IfKibum were there, he would be rolling on the floor laughing at him.

“Hmm… because… I wanted to thank you properly for saving me. Myfriend owns a Korean food restaurant, the best we have around, and I wanted totake you there.”

“Oh, okay,” he said, nodding, smiling sheepishly. “I wouldlike that.”

“Great,” Minho said excitedly. “We could meet…”

“Can we go now?” Jinki asked looking back over his shoulder,seemingly stepping out of the way of each incoming wave and biting his lowerlip.

Minho hadn’t planned on taking Jinki to the restaurant today, but hewouldn’t say no. The tone of the other man’s voice had made him a bit worried.Was Jinki running away or hiding from the water? Or was it that he was lookingout for someone?

“Yeah, we can go now. I still don’t know if…”

A yelp made Minho stop talking and he felt Jinki’s fingers brush againsthis arm, somehow trying to catch himself as he fell on his face with a grunt,taking Minho down with him.

“Are you okay?” he asked turning to Jinki who looked at himthe same moment a small wave washed up on to the shore, covering his lowerhalve in water.

He watched as Jinki’s eyes widened, shock and terror shining there assomething shone and enveloped his body, making Minho blind for a few seconds.

Blinking to clear the vision, Minho looked down and gasped, taking astep back unconsciously.

Laying there in front of him was Jinki, wet and coughing a bit on thesalty water, but what was making Minho’s heart beat faster was that instead ofthe legs, Jinki had a tail, a fish tail like a mermaid… or merman?

Jinki whimpered, taking Minho out of his own thoughts and he realizedthat the other man, merman, was scared and simply lying in the sand afterrolling away from him. The tail that was covered with green, pearly scales thatglistened with the sun, flapping lightly, literally like a fish out of water.

“A-are you a merman?” he asked stupidly, not knowing what todo or talk.

“Yes,” Jinki murmured, looking down, pulling his tail closeras if trying to hide from Minho’s eyes.

Frowning, Minho realized that Jinki was scared of his reaction.“You don’t need to be afraid of me,” he said with a sigh. “I…I’m just shocked, I’m sorry.”

Lowering himself to the side of Jinki, who cringed even more in worry,he made himself look at the merman more closely. He could see that Jinki’s skinwas different in this form, brighter and clearer, also that his tail wasbeautiful, fascinating, hypnotizing even.

“You’re so beautiful.” he murmured, looking into Jinki’s eyes,and reaching out to caress his cheek. Jinki could only blink, blushing at theyoungers words.

“Yes, we all are,” he said head down. “All mer-people areconsidered beautiful by human standards.”

“I don’t know about the others,” Minho said with a shrug.“But I’m sure none of them are more breathtaking than you.”

“Y-you… you’ve never seen another mer-person before, so you can’tpossibly know…”

He laughed, getting up. “You’re right, but even though they mustall be beautiful, I’m sure you’re the most exquisite.”

Jinki looked down and Minho tried to calm down, calm his head that wasfull of questions, full of things he didn’t know how to ask, or if it was rudeof him to ask.

“So,” he said, startling Jinki who looked at him. “Whenyou get wet, it makes your tail appear?”

“Yes. When I am wet or in water, my tail appears. Likewise when Iam dry, my human legs appear. We can all do that after a mermaid called Ligeiamade a deal with a god so she could stay with her lover, many generationsago.”

Minho nodded, choosing to understand this later and keep asking.“So you can live among humans?”

“Not quite,” Jinki said with a sigh. “I… I promise toexplain everything to you later.”

Jinki looked distressed and Minho realized that he was only making themerman uncomfortable with those questions.

“Of course, of course. We can talk anytime you want.”

“Tonight, at your house?”

“Do you know where I…” he stopped talking, realizing thatyes, Jinki knew very well where he lived. “I will wait for you.”

—-

When Jinki appeared at Minho’s door later that night, still wearing theclothes that he was wearing earlier today, he had to admit he was surprised.But it’s not as if Jinki were to appear as a merman, Minho had seen how Jinkihad become uncomfortable and scared to appear in his true form in front of him.

After the shock and fascination with having discovered that mer-peoplereally existed and that the lovely man who had saved Minho from drowning wasindeed a merman had settled, Minho didn’t know what to do. All the questionsthat had been in his head earlier had disappeared, and he found himselfstanding there in his living room, not knowing what to say.

Jinki was sitting on the couch, looking with curious eyes at everything,as if he was a child and Minho realized that maybe he was. That maybe this wasthe first time the merman had entered someone’s house, a human’s house.

“I’m sorry I came here,” Jinki said suddenly. “But Icouldn’t talk to you there, actually I shouldn’t even be here.”

“Why not?”

“One of our rules, one of the most important rule, is that in orderto be able to stay in the human world, we can’t tell the truth about ourselves,we can’t show our true form, and I have broken that. There is fear among themer-people of what would happen to us should humans know of ourexistence.”

“You didn’t do it on purpose.” Minho said finally sittingfacing Jinki.

“I didn’t, but I can’t say that I regret it. I mean… it’s been along time since I… I wanted to talk to you.”

“What do you mean?” he asked confused.

“It’s been months since I’ve started following you, watching youwhenever I could.” he murmured, looking down to his own hands.

Minho blinked. “What?”

“I’m sorry, I really didn’t want to scare you or weird you out…and I know how I look now, saying this, but I just wanted to look at you fromafar and came to the shore to see you at night, that’s all, I swear!” hesaid desperately.

Not really knowing what to say, or how to act after hearing Jinki’sconfession, Minho sat silent. It was kind of weird to know that someone waslurking around his house, but at the same time, Minho realized he didn’t carethat much, it was Jinki, and Jinki did not seem like a bad person… badmerman, that would do any harm.

“I believe you,” he said after some time in silence. “Butwhy?”

“I… I don’t know,” he murmured. “I think I fell in lovewith you.” he said, biting his lower lip.

Sure enough, it was pretty bold of Jinki to have confessed that, butMinho could see that despite everything, the merman was blushing red andstaring at the wooden floor of his house.

“Okay…” he said slowly, trying to think of what to say.Minho was a bit shocked by the confession.

“I’m sorry,” Jinki said getting up suddenly. “I… I’mleaving now.”

“Wait…”

Quickly Jinki walked to the door, the tips of his ears red. “I’msorry.”

“Come back another day,” Minho said getting up from the couch.“Don’t just look from afar.”

Jinki turned to him slowly, his face red with embarrassment, but ahopeful look in his eyes. “Okay.” he whispered before opening thedoor and sliding out, closing it right behind him.

Minho sat down again on the couch and let out the breath he didn’trealize he was holding. A lot had happened in less than twelve hours. He stillwas not sure if he believed in everything he had seen and heard, it was toomuch to comprehend and then there was Jinki’s confession…

It’s not that Minho had never dated other men before, he really did notcare much about gender, all that mattered to him is if they were attractive inhis eyes and compatible together.

Then again, Jinki was not human, though Minho still had troublebelieving everything.

He had heard his father tell stories about mermaids when he was a littlekid, about creatures who lived in the depths of the sea together with all typesof fish and other underwater species. Beautiful creatures who deceived andbewitched humans with beauty and elegant voices that would make any singer jealous,so that they could kill the human later. Minho remembered asking his father whythey did such a thing, why the mermaids were so evil and his father said it wassimply their nature. Kill or be killed, they needed to protect themselves.

Was this what Jinki wanted from the beginning? Did the merman want tolure Minho to kill him later?

Although that didn’t make sense, since Jinki had saved his life. Sothere was only one option he could figure out. That Jinki really was really inlove with Minho.

—-

Three days later, as Minho had asked, Jinki came to his house again. Heappeared a little uncertain and looking a bit ashamed, but Minho was actuallyhappy that the merman was back, that they could talk and then he would getanswers to the questions that had not been answered the first night.

Even though Minho could see that he was still a little embarrassed,Jinki did not say anything about his confession and slowly they began to knoweach other better, talking every night about their lives and answering eachothers’ questions. Minho was able to know more about Jinki, learning more aboutthe merman and his people.

Jinki said that all the mer-people had different colored hair, so hishair was pink like a cherry blossom, just as Taemin, his younger brother, hadpurple hair. All mer-people had characteristics that set them apart fromhumans, but not many actually lived among humans on land, so it was easier tostay hidden.

Most mer-people were still afraid of humans and had many examples of whythey should stay that way, far away from the other species. Humans could nothandle the differences and thought they had the right to capture, study,mistreat and even kill the mer-people they didn’t understand about. Thus, thereare very few who ventured to try and have a human life. In the end, mer-people,even those unafraid of humans, still had to return to the water. To live intheir natural environment, just as humans did.

Jinki would show up every night now, dry off and wear Minho’s clothes.He had to admit, they were big on the merman and Jinki look even cuter. Theytalked about random things or just sat there on the pier at the back of Minho’shouse, watching the waves crash into the rocks in silence, enjoying the peace.

“I like it here,” Jinki said with his eyes closed, feeling thebreeze hit his face. “It’s so calm.”

Minho looked around and then turned back to Jinki. “Yes, it’s myfavorite place. My father built the house and this pier. My mother kept watchfor him here everyday.” he let out a small sigh, thinking back to hisyouth.

“Can I ask what happened to your mother?”

“To be honest, I don’t know either. She died when I was still ababy. All my father ever mentioned is she had become very sick. He never toldme what exactly happened. Every time I brought up the subject, he becameextremely sad. So one day I just stopped asking.”

“So when your father died…”

“Yes, I was alone. It was alright though, I was already fourteenand knew how to live by myself since my father was out fishing often. After Irecuperated from the boat accident and left the hospital, Jonghyun’s familytook care of me and then Kibum showed up. He likes to act like my mothersometimes.” he said snorting.

Jinki chuckled. “I’m relieved to know that you have them in yourlife.”

“Yes, it was difficult when I woke up alone in the hospital anddiscovered that my father had died… and left me behind. He drowned trying tosave me from drowning…he couldn’t save himself. He gave his life to saveme.” Minho said looking down into the water.

“I’m so sorry.” Jinki place his hand on the other’s bicep andunconsciously began rubbing it in support and comfort.

Minho shook his head, smiling a little. “It’s okay, it happenedover ten years ago. I’ve kind of learned to accept what happened and come topeace with it all.”

“I don’t know how you feel, but I’m getting ready to live away frommy family. To be without them too.”

“What do you mean by that?”

“I like my life, I love my family, but I need to go after myhappiness.”

“Where is your happiness?”

“I still don’t know,” he said looking at Minho and thenlooking away. “…but I know it’s not down there.”

“You mean your happiness is here, with the human world?”

“Actually I think my happiness may be right here.” he saidlooking back at Minho.

Minho looked at Jinki and he understood very well what the merman wassaying, the remembrance of the first confession still fresh in his memory.Minho just couldn’t tell if what he felt every time he saw Jinki was because hewas bewitched by the merman or not. It was still a bit confusing.

“Maybe it is.” he said, nodding, looking briefly at Jinki whosmiled, coming a little closer to him.

It was still a little confusing, but maybe Minho shouldn’t resist Jinkior the feelings he knew were inside him.

“Are you sure?”

“Not yet,” Minho said moving closer to Jinki who blinked.“But I’ll never know what’s right or wrong if I don’t try.”

“I… can I kiss you then? I’ve been waiting for so long.”Jinki whispered, shaking a little when Minho cupped his cheek, sliding histhumb over his soft skin, glowing softly from the reflection of the moonlight.

“Yeah, you can.” he said, pulling Jinki lightly forward andwaiting for the merman to take the initiative.

Shyly Jinki leaned forward and Minho smiled a little when he feltJinki’s trembling lips against his. Deciding he should take the reins sinceJinki was afraid, he slid his fingers into Jinki’s soft hair bringing themerman closer, pressing their lips together again and sliding the other handdown his back. Jinki whimpered against Minho’s lips, wrapping his arms aroundhis neck, pressing their chests together and creating a tight squeeze betweenthe two of them.

Jinki’s whimper made Minho’s head spin and he got greedy, sucking thebottom lip of the merman and biting lightly. Jinki shuddered and let out anairy gasp. Those noises were all he needed to be even bolder, slipping histongue into the merman’s mouth. Jinki sank his nails into the skin of Minho’sneck, kissing him desperately.

When they pulled away, they were both panting and Minho leaned over,brushing Jinki’s chin and quickly pecking his lips.

“Yeah,” he whispered against Jinki’s lips. “I think wecan definitely try this.”

The merman then smiled happily, his eyes almost disappearing. Minho felthis chest fill with a strong warmth that made him happy, a warmth and sensationlike he’d never felt before.

This had been their first kiss and all Minho could think of was that hewanted more, he wanted everything, but he held himself back.

Sighing happily, he brought Jinki into his arms, feeling the warm of themerman’s skin against his. It was still too soon for anything major, especiallysince he still was not sure what he was feeling, but Minho certainly felt hecould get used to this.

—-

Without even realizing it, the days went by quickly and the relationshipbetween Minho and Jinki grew in such a way that when he finally realized howfar they had come, they were sitting on the sofa in the living room, cuddling.

“There’s something I’m curious about.” Minho said playing withJinki’s hair, still a little amazed by the pink color, amazed of how well itmatched with the warm tone of the merman’s skin.

“What is it?” Jinki asked, a little sleepy and cuddling evenmore against Minho’s side.

“You once told me about the mermaid who made a deal so she couldstay with her beloved who was a human.”

“Yes, Ligeia. What about her?”

“Were they able to stay together in the end?”

Jinki pulled away from Minho and sighed. “No, she couldn’t stayaway from the sea for too long but was stubborn to go back… I think she wasafraid of go back… so she died.”

Minho frowned. "So you…”

“No, I’m different and now we know our limits and how we can’t stayaway from the sea for long. I also don’t have to be afraid. It’s not like myfamily would lock me up if I went back and forth.”

“It’s still dangerous. You told me it was against the rules to showthe true form to a human, so how could a relationship like this work?”

“You’ve already seen my true form, Minho-ah.” he said with asigh.

“Yes, and you were terrified when I did.”

“I know, but you also showed acceptance and didn’t judge me at thattime. You showed me it was alright. I don’t want to let anything push me awayfrom you or keep me from what I want to do. Don’t push me away because of yourworry for me, please.”

He shook his head. “I’m not going to push you away, but I amworried.”

“Don’t be, I know how to take care of myself and I’ll do everythingI can to live in my happiness.”

There was that feeling again, the warmth spreading through his body andMinho realized that it was indeed happiness, not momentary happiness either. Itwas like a fulfilling happiness that told him this was where he needed to beand with whom he needed to be with. He really was worrying for nothing.

“Come here,” he said, pulling Jinki closer and kissing themerman, wrapping his arms around him and twisting their bodies until he waspressing Jinki against the couch.

Jinki whimpered against Minho’s lips, something he always did when theywere kissing, making Minho go crazy.

“Minho-ah…” he said breathlessly as the younger pulled away enoughto catch his breath, and then he grabbed Minho by the back of the neck andproceeded to kiss him again.

"Who do you think you are?” Kibum shouted slamming the doorclosed and stormed over. “How can you just disap…” his words lefthim, suddenly speechless as his eyes landed on the two men tangled up together.

The merman squealed, pushing Minho off of him, who snorted as if insarcastic thanks, and sat on the couch looking at Kibum who was staring at themboth, jaw on the floor.

“What the hell, Kibum-ah!”

Kibum looked at Minho and then at Jinki who was curled up on the couch,his face red with embarrassment. Kibum posed the only question he could thinkof at the moment, “Who is he?”

Minho wanted more than anything to kick Kibum out of there and continuewhat he was doing, but he knew he was being unfair. In the last few weeks, ashe began spending more and more time with Jinki, he had neglected his friends.He simply wanted to have the merman for himself in every way and perhaps deepdown he was afraid to introduce Jinki to them and they find out who Jinkireally was.

“This is Jinki, you know, the guy who saved me that time.”

Kibum’s eyes flashed with understanding and he smiled. “So youreally did find him, huh?”

“Yes, a few weeks ago.”

“That’s good, but you did not have to disappear. He’s cute and allbut we won’t steal him from you.” Kibum said with his hands on his hips.

Jinki got even redder and Minho laughed, pulling the merman up from thecouch with him. “This is Kibum, my friend.”

“N-nice to meet you.”

Kibum smiled, taking Jinki’s hand. “It’s my pleasure and I need tothank you for saving this stupid giant here.”

“Yah!”

Jinki chuckled. “No need to thank me, I’m glad I could actuallysave him.”

Kibum could see the happiness between them as Jinki looked up at Minhoafter making his comment, eyes shining and his entire being thrumming withpositive energy.

“I can see that.” Kibum said with a smirk, looking at the twostill holding their hands together.

Minho interlaced their fingers together even more and pulled Jinki alittle closer. The older man now completely on his lap. “Sorry to be soabsent, we were taking some time to get to know each other better.”

He did not even feel ashamed when he said this. He was proud of himselffor having Jinki by his side.

“Oh I bet you were… so when I asked about you and Jonghyun saidyou were too busy these days, he meant it seriously. Wait a minute… healready knew about this and didn’t tell me anything?!”

Minho shrugged. “We worked together, of course he knew.”

“I’m going to beat that guy…. and you! You could have told me,okay?” Kibum said in annoyance and Minho sighed.

“You’re exaggerating and don’t act like my mother.” he said ina warning tone.

Sometimes, alright, a lot of times Kibum exaggerated and occasionally itirritated Minho.

“It would be nice if we had dinner together,” Jinki said,trying to smile. “I can cook.”

“Let’s go to my restaurant,” Kibum said excitedly. “I betyou anything Jonghyun is already there, and we can all eat together.”

“Yes, we could do that.”

"Are you sure? Don’t you have to head home?” Minho asked alittle worriedly, knowing that Jinki could not stay too long from the water andthe merman had already spent all day at his house.

“I can stay here a little longer.” Jinki said with a smile,kissing the side of Minho’s mouth.

“So let’s go!” Kibum said pulling Jinki by the arm, causinghim to let go of Minho’s hand, who snorted.

“You’re already stealing him from me!” Minho whined, makingboth of them to laugh.

—-

They returned late to Minho’s house, the small dinner they had turnedout much better than Minho had imagined it would. Jinki was happy and that madeMinho happy.

They may have had a bit too much alcohol and Jinki was a bit tipsy,stumbling on his own feet and giggling all the way home.

Minho pinned Jinki against the wall as soon as they entered the house,kissing the merman deeply. His cute giggles and adorable clumsiness was simplythe final straw for Minho.

“I wish you did not have to leave.” he said breathlesslyagainst Jinki’s lips.

Jinki looked at him through his lashes, his lips red from the kiss.“I don’t need to, I can stay.”

“Are you sure?” he asked already sliding a hand down his back,bringing Jinki’s body flush against his and rubbing their crotches togetherlightly.

“Yes,” he whispered in a small moan, pushing to wedge his handbeneath Minho’s t-shirt. “I’m sure.”

Minho kissed him deep, nibbling on Jinki’s soft lips, feeling themerman’s trembling body in his hands, feeling the warm of Jinki’s skin againsthis.

Jinki whimpered, pulling Minho’s t-shirt out of the way, lightlyscratching at his skin as Minho sucked at his neck, licking and nibbling at hisskin, his hands began kneading Jinki’s butt. They both craved nothing more thanto be together, to feel the skin on skin only the other could supply.

“Let’s go to the bedroom.” Minho panted out in a whisperagainst his ear, lightly biting the lobe.

“Okay.” Jinki whispered back, his face bright red and hislittle pants ghosting out over Minho’s skin. Looking at the elder below him,panting, flushed and half naked, only made Minho more aroused.

He wanted to devour Jinki and tonight, nothing was going to stop him.

—-

The next morning Minho woke up to an empty bed, the side where Jinki hadslept last night curled up against him, was cold. Only the crumpled sheet toldof someone being there the night before.

A splashing noise from the bathroom caught his attention as he stood upquickly, grabbing his underwear from the floor and putting them on. When Minhomanaged to make it through the bathroom door, Jinki was inside the tub with hiseyes closed. He seemed quite content. Then Minho noticed the scales of his tailglowing with the sunlight streaming through the window.

Minho stood there looking at the beauty of Jinki, his beauty Jinki.Sometimes he wondered if this was all real, if he was indeed dating a merman, acreature as mystical, as beautiful, and as perfect as Jinki could be.

Jinki opened his eyes and smiled at Minho who felt his heart beatquicken. “Did I wake you up?”

“No,” he said shaking his head and going to the sink to washhis face, his facial hair was beginning to sprout again. He made a mental noteto shave sometime today. “Have you been awake for long?” he askedlooking at Jinki through the mirror reflection.

“I don’t know,” he said with a light laugh, making Minho’sheart swell. “I sort of lost track of time. Sorry if I’m using your tubwithout asking, I just needed to get wet.”

He turned to Jinki, concern evident on his face. “Are you alright?”

“Don’t worry, I’m fine. I won’t die if I stay out of the sea for awhile. Just as long as I get wet at least once a day.”

Releasing the air he didn’t even realize he was holding and feelingimmediately relieved, Minho nodded. "I just don’t want anything bad tohappen to you.”

“Help me out then.” Jinki said, holding out his arms.

Minho pondered for a moment how he would do that, could he hold a mermanin his arms?

“How?”

“Just hold my arms, I swear it’s not that difficult. I’m not thatheavy.” Jinki said laughing.

Well, it really wasn’t difficult but it was not easy either. Minhomanaged to get Jinki out of the water and put him on the edge of the tub.

Handing him a towel, Jinki began to dry his body and Minho stood therewatching the magic happen.

After a few minutes of Jinki drying himself, the scales began to becometransparent and to disappear giving place to the white and milky skin of thelegs Minho knew. The tail disappeared and legs that Minho loved, especiallyaround his waist… as he discovered last night… appeared fully.

“That still surprises me.” he murmured, staring at Jinki’slegs, who laughed.

“You’ll get used to it, I guess.” he said with a shrug.“It will depend on how long you want keep me around.”

At that moment Minho thought to himself that if it were up to him, hewould have Jinki next to him forever and that it would be great if they couldlive together in his family home. He wanted them to sleep and wake up together,spending as many minutes, hours and days together as they did in the pastforty-eight hours. Minho knew it was not that easy though and that it was toosoon to dream and wish for all of those things.

He could wait. He could be patient.

“If it’s up to me I’ll be happy to keep you around forever.”he said smiling, pleased with the reaction that Jinki had with his words as hesaw the older man blush and smile brighter than the sunshine sneaking in thewindow behind them.

“Help me into bed? It takes a little while after my change for mylegs to be ready to stand on.” Jinki said, his face still red.

Grinning, Minho took Jinki in his arms, carrying him to the bed. As soonas he put Jinki down, he pecked his lips one, two, three times, pressing hislips against the soft ones of the merman who smiled against Minho’s mouth.

—-

Minho smiled as the cool breeze hit his face. The sun was rising on thehorizon, brightening the sky, swallowing the last remaining stars. As hewatched it became a beautiful shade of orange and yellow that blended with theemerging blue.

He felt that he would never grow tired of the sunrise views, the colorsand its magnificence.

“One more day till we break, huh?” Jonghyun said beside him,squinting against the brightening sunlight.

“Yeah, let’s get to work.” he said patting Jonghyun’sshoulder, who nodded at him.

Before turning around, he saw a flash of green and white in the water,and Minho smiled. “See you at home, baby.” he whispered.

“Come on Minho-ah!” Jonghyun called and he chuckled.

Looking one last time to the water, Minho felt his heart full of happinessand he knew it was because later, after he finished work and had docked theship for the night, he would be able to have Jinki in his arms once again. Thatwas definitely the best part of his day.

—-

While they were gathering their gear and heading back to the pier, Minhosaw a flash of blue and white in the water. It was too bright to be the wateritself and quickly caught his attention. He frowned slightly and thought tohimself, another mermaid?

“What is it?” Jonghyun asked, peering into the water, tryingto see what had caught the younger’s attention.

“It’s nothing,” he said shaking his head. “I was justreminding myself that I have to fix some of the gear at home this weekend.”

"Need help? I’m free all weekend.”

“I’m sure you are, but you don’t have to. I’ll take care ofit.” Minho said laughing and dodging when Jonghyun threatened to throw thenet they had just collected, on him.

—-

Minho was cleaning and organizing the fishing equipment while Jinki wasin the kitchen, cooking something for dinner. Then again by the smell of it,Minho wasn’t sure if it was cooking so much as Jinki seemed to be burning theirnext meal.

“You know,” Minho said, catching Jinki’s attention, who turnedto him. “I think I saw another mermaid or merman today.”

“Did you?” Jinki asked frowning. "Are you sure?”

“Yeah, it was blue, I guess… too blue to be the water or arock.”

Jinki snorted and almost fell over laughing. “So Taemin is watchingover you…”

“Taemin? Your little brother?”

“Yeah, he’s suspicious of something from what I can see. It lookslike he found out why I have been disappearing every night.”

“You didn’t tell your family about us?”

“Not yet,” Jinki said as he walked over to Minho who waswatching him. “It’s not that I don’t want them to know or that I’m afraidor ashamed of dating a human, I’m just waiting for the right moment.”

He sighed. “You should tell them, baby. You can’t hide it forever.It’s been four months since we started dating, it’s time to come out and say it.”

“I know, I’ll do it, I promise. ” he said pecking Minho’slips. “Now let’s eat.”

Looking at the kitchen, Minho wrinkled his nose. “You burned thefood again, don’t you?”

“Did I?” he asked, tilting his head in a lovely way.

Laughing, Minho rose from his chair and went into the kitchen. Today’sdinner was burnt so bad, Minho wasn’t even sure what it was supposed to havebeen. Sighing, he opened the refrigerator and looked in. Thank goodness therewas still food that Kibum had brought earlier in the week.

“I’m not good at cooking,” Jinki said pouting. “I’msorry.”

“Don’t worry about it,” he said, wrapping his arms aroundJinki and bringing him closer. “You’ll learn someday.”

“That’s so romantic, but kind of disgusting.” Jonghyun saidwalking into the kitchen, beaming at them, but also making a face at the two.

Minho made a mental not to himself. He really should start locking thedoor when Jinki’s over.

“What is it now?” he asked moving away from Jinki who smiledat Jonghyun.

“Let’s go drink. Kibum is closing the restaurant and will meet usat the bar when he’s done.”

“We haven’t even had dinner yet,” Minho said gruffly.“We’ll go later.”

“Oh come on, don’t be a pain in the ass, you can eat somethingthere.”

“You’re a pain in the ass.” Minho said annoyed and madeJonghyun laugh.

“Minho-ah,” Jinki said quietly, placing a hand on hisshoulder. “Let’s just drink and eat with our friends.”

Listening to Jinki refer to them as his friends too made Minho ecstatic.He realized there was no turning back, he was done.

“Okay, okay, let’s go.”

“Great.” Jonghyun said with a smile.

The night was cooler and the four of them were having fun, sitting in asmall bar, eating chicken and drinking soju. Jonghyun was telling Jinki storiesabout when they were little and how Minho Jonghyun and Kibum used to playtogether after they left school, running around the neighborhood.

Kibum reminisced about how they always got fresh breads when they passedby the bakery and that he was simply addicted to the egg bread. Even now Kibumwent there to buy some on occasion, but not many or often because he was on adiet.

“Oh man, I remember the hodugwaja bread, was so good,”Jonghyun said dreamily. “Do they still sell it?”

“Of course they do.” Kibum snorted.

“What was your favorite, Minho-ah?” Jinki asked curiously.

“Hm, I think sora bread, I’ve always been addicted to coffee.”Minho smiled.

“I want to try these breads, too…” Jinki muttered.

“Haven’t you ever eaten bakery breads?” Jonghyun asked insurprise.

Jinki shook his head. “No but…”

“Hyung!”

The four of them lifted their heads and Jinki froze in place. Standingnext to their table was a man with white and purple hair, like an onion, and assoon as Minho looked at him, he realized he was a merman. He was gorgeous,almost as pretty as Jinki. Thank goodness he was at least wearing clothes.

“T-Taemin-ah?”

“There you are,” Taemin said placing his hand on his hips.“Do you know how long I’ve been looking for you?”

Kibum leaned across the table, kicking Minho lightly to get hisattention. “Who is he?” he asked, just moving his mouth.

Minho looked at Jinki and sighed. “Maybe you should talkoutside?” he said quietly, but apparently not quietly enough, becauseTaemin snorted.

Jinki nodded and stood up, taking his brother’s arm. “Let’s gooutside, Taemin-ah.”

“What’s going on?” Kibum asked as the other two left the bar.

“Taemin is Jinki’s younger brother, I don’t know why he’s here orwhy he’s mad, though.”

“He’s beautiful…” Jonghyun murmured as if in a daze, stilllooking at Taemin through the bar window.

“Well, he really is beautiful.” Kibum nodded and Minhofrowned.

He was not in a position to tell Jonghyun to not mess with Taemin, butMinho didn’t think it was a good idea.

Jinki came in a few minutes later, his face red and his expression angry.“Can we go?”

“You can go.” Kibum said nodding and Minho murmured athank-you.

As they left the bar, Minho saw that Taemin was standing with his armscrossed against his chest, waiting for them.

“What’s going on, Jinki-ah?”

“Can we talk at home?” he asked and Minho nodded. “CanTaemin come too?”

“Of course he can.”

“Do I need authorization from a human now?” Taemin askedirritably.

“It’s his house,” when Taemin opened his mouth to answer,Jinki snorted. “Just let’s go.”

It was extremely awkward and Minho could see that Jinki was angry. Hedidn’t know what was going on, but he was sure the two were fighting.

“Are you okay?” Minho asked entwining their fingers togetherand Jinki took a deep breath.

“Yeah, he’s just being annoying.”

“I’m not being annoying, you’re being irresponsible!” Taeminbarked at the two who were walking a little further in front of him.

“This is about you dating me, isn’t it?”

“Yeah,” Jinki said looking at Taemin with a small glare.“That’s exactly why.”

“Human, hyung, a human!” Taemin said throwing his hands up andwaving them around.

Minho decided to walk faster, it was better to have that conversation athome and not where other people could overhear them.

Even though Minho was trying to ignore the conversation of the two inthe living room, it was a bit difficult since Taemin and Jinki were talkingvery loudly, upset and irritated with each other.

Taemin was not happy at all that Jinki was dating a human, a human whoat one time or other would betray Jinki’s trust and reveal their people’ssecrets to everyone. Jinki would suffer the consequences of dating Minho.

This was unfair because Minho would never do that, but he also knew thatTaemin was just scared and trying to care for his older brother’s safety.

He just sat there on the porch of his house, staring at the starry skyas the other two talked. He could still hear both mermen, even from outside thehome.

Jinki defended Minho, saying that Minho wouldn’t reveal anything becausethey loved each other, and that stopped Taemin all together.

Minho smiled pleased and happy to know that Jinki trusted him so much,that he could rely on the love he felt for the merman. No matter what otherswould say about them, the important thing was that Jinki trusted Minho andMinho trusted Jinki. In a relationship, trust was everything.

After a few minutes in silence, Minho decided to go back inside andfound Jinki and Taemin sitting on the couch, the two looked mentally exhausted.

“Is everything okay in here?”

Taemin got up first, looking directly into Minho’s eyes. “Do youreally love my hyung?”

Minho looked briefly at Jinki who was biting his lower lip and thenlooked at Taemin. “Yes, I love him and I will never do anything to hurthim.”

Looking at Jinki who had a happy smile on his lips, Taemin sighed.“Alright, so… I guess this is all okay, but that doesn’t mean I acceptthis situation! It’s still dangerous!”

"I know,” Minho said nodding. “I know what we have seemslike a mistake, but when it comes to love, there is no right or wrong. We feelwhat we feel and when love is true, nothing else seems as important. We’ll dealwith whatever comes up when and if it happens.”

“Minho-ah…” Jinki said almost crying, practically runninginto his arms, burying his face against his chest. “I love you.”

“I love you too,” he said, chuckling and wrapping his armsaround Jinki. “We’re going to make it work. I promise.”

Taemin sighed. “I think you’re right about love and if you feelthat way, nothing and no one can stop you both.”

“Thank you, Taemin-ah,” Jinki said smiling to his brother,pulling away from Minho’s arms and placing a hand on his shoulder. “I knowyou’re just worried and I really do love you.” Jinki pulled the youngestinto a small hug to show his thanks.

Taemin wrapped his arms tightly around his brother. “Hyung, I justwant you to be safe and happy.”

Jinki laughed. “Does it look like I’m going to run away orsomething? I’m coming home later.”

“Yeah,” Taemin laughed embarrassed and kicking at the edge ofthe living room carpet now. “I guess so. I’ll be leaving then.”

“You can come back whenever you want,” Minho said. “Youare always welcome.”

Taemin nodded and smiled. “Goodbye.”

As the door closed, Jinki let out a long sigh, all but falling intoMinho’s body. “That was intense.”

“Indeed.” Minho laughed lightly, wrapping his arms around theshorter man.

“Sorry for all this. I didn’t think Taemin would react the way hedid.”

“It’s okay,” Minho said as he sat on the couch and pulledJinki into his lap, who curling up against his chest. “He’s your family,it’s normal to worry.”

“I really love you.” he said, pecking Minho’s lips.

“Great, because if not this whole fight would have beenpointless.” Minho dramatically threw his hands up and smiled when Jinkistarted laughing.

Once his laughter had calmed down, Jinki began running his fingersthrough Minho’s hair. “Silly.”

As Minho had told Taemin, the only thing he was sure of was the love hefelt for Jinki. Of course, love was not everything, but when the difficultthings in life appear, and he knows they will, they will be ready to protectwhat they have.

Deep down, inside the deepest part of his heart, Minho knew they wouldstay together as long as they both existed, no matter what.

a/n: thank you Kimmi, my dear beta, for editing this story. ♡

[onlyjihoons]

collegebf!woojin

a/n; a really really belated birthday present for my wifey,, @perkwoojin jas!! happy belated bday bby✨💖and im sorry if this is so short omg;-;

major: dance

minor: agriculture(?) bc he once helped out in sungwoon grandpa’s farm and fell in love w planting

wanted to go for sports science but had no stamina for a marathon...

one of the most versatile dancers in his years, able to pull off many genres, from classical ballet to hip hop

looks cold but honestly a rlly soft bean who will guide his juniors

a great tutor, will adjust his speed of teaching acc to your level of dance

sometimes hangs out at the ecology department to visit ecologist!sungwoon, and help out in the nursery to check up on the new hybrid plants formulated

a regular at the dance physiologist, but knows how to take care of himself well

often doubts his visuals and always gets shy when people compliment him

but honestly have they seen his past lmao is that still a visual

but ok looks rlly attractive when concentrated in choreographing a new piece of dance, red headphones firmly planted on his head and eyebrows furrowed in concentration

everyone has the unspoken rule that woojin gets the whole dance studio to himself when choreographing, lest he gets distracted and his masterpiece is not at its prime

one of the better dancer fashion out of his classmates

although his clothes are often dark, sometimes he would sport pink fashion

aka pink sausage outfit

though he dances for almost the whole school day, he does go for lessons sometimes

if he’s not tired from training the previous day

passable grades though, but not the best either

you’ve been transferred to woojin’s school because they offered a scholarship

it was lowkey weird bc it was in the middle of the school term lmao

but anyhow, you were honoured as the school had notable alumni and very talented students too

you were also worried because, you might be a big tuna in the freshwater but a small fry in the big sea

on the first day, you were introduced to your roomate, tasha

i love tasha guys #singaporeanpride

she was a senior in college, and happens to be majoring in dance too

she took really good care of you, making sure that you were comfortable 

it was a new environment but you felt like home

how you met woojin,,,, w e l l

the first time the both of you met was when you were carrying the laundry to the laundry room

and you bumped into a dancing woojin, music going at full blast in his ear

his eyes widened, and immediately picking up your clothes, which was stinky from practice

“oh my god, im so sorry, are you okay?” he apologised as he helped to pick up your clothes

“yeah i’m fine, thank you” you bowed, as you snatched your clothes from his grasp and ran off 

“what’s with her?” woojin thought, scratching his head

he shrugged it off in the end, not wanting to think too much

but he met you a second time

it was during one of those days where he had the choreographing feels and had the studio all to himself

obviously, as a new student, you didnt hear or know of the unspoken rule

so you just shared a space with woojin, as you also danced with earphones on

woojin was so into it that he didn’t notice you, until his music stopped

you were, too,engrossed in the music and not paying attention to woojin staring at you in awe

your body movements, step sequence, made him look at you like a deer in headlights

you soon noticed something looking at you, and that was when you whipped your head around and your eyes met woojin’s

suddenly the floor was so interesting as he continued with his choreography

you shyly approached him, and tapped him on the shoulder

“could you teach me your choreography some day? it’s really pretty.”

woojin was shocked, to say the least, bc it was only his first draft

“ah y-yes sure.”

“i’m y/n. nice to meet you! im new here too.”

“i’m woojin, i’m a freshman.”

“me too!”

and your conversations just escalated from there, discussing several interests in dancing etc.

you immediately had a liking to woojin... he was just so cute and charming

when he told you about his hobby of planting, you were even more attracted to him, and you found it cool too

you and woojin were in different classes, but the both of you would always meet up to walk to the dorms together

tasha would often smirk, teasing who was the one often walking to the dorms with you

through the weeks your friendship with woojin blossomed, from shy dance dates to lunch dates to study dates to movie dates

would actually join you in your ballet modules and do rlly well lmao

one day, he invited you over to watch his dance team, Wanna One’s showcase

you readily agreed, as you looked forward to seeing woojin’s solo piece

as expected, the auditorium was filled to the brim with many excited fangirls students

even your dance teacher was there to watch them, you knew they were good

it was cool, they used their self-composed songs as their dance pieces, you would totally buy their album if they released it

you also thoroughly enjoyed their performances

lastly it was woojin’s performance 

you were really excited to watch him perform, as you have seen him practice it for months

before he started on the performance, he took the mic from the emcee and you could tell that he was very nervous

“firstly i would like to thank everyone who has made this showcase possible, from the wanna one members to the backstage staff to all of you right here, thank you so much.”

“secondly, i would like to dedicate this entire song and choreography to Y/N, who has been a really good companion in the choreography process. this song is about unrequited love, and the choreography shows how a boys yearns to get a girl’s heart. and in this case... i really really really like Y/N, and i would like to show it to her through dance.”

you were stunned, as the exact same choreography you have seen come to life right on stage, and you even nearly cried

when he finished his performance he ran off stage, and towards the audience to drag you on stage

“y/n... i am very thankful to have you in my life, will you be my girlfriend?”

everyone was cheering, “accept!”

and of course you did

everyone cheered, including the dance teacher

dancer bf!woojin would always join you for your warm up classes

surprisingly flexible(re: wanna one go; zero base ep 4)

and you would also join him for his hiphop classes

doesn’t want to admit that he wants the both of you dressed similarly when going for classes

he’ll just shyly push to you an outfit from your wardrobe that looks oddly similar to what he was wearing

“woojin...do you want us to be matching??”

“n-no! i just t-thought this c-colour looked g-good on you.”

plant shopping issa date thing

i mean, who doesn’t like looking at aesthetic plants

he would explain to you how the different plant and flowers mean

on your 100th day, he gave you a bouquet of white carnations and daisies

it was really sweet, he even gave it to you in the middle of lesson

couple mirror selcas are a thing

him back-hugging you and snuggling his head in the crook of your neck,,

stay loyal stay loyal stay loyal

pizza for breakfast? woojin is up for that

despite eating unhealthy food 60% of the time, he knows how to keep a balanced diet and eats his fruits and veggies

he will make you eat them too, because he doesnt want you to get sick

even though you do listen to him, you happen to have a really weak immune system

which causes you to fall sick during the change of seasons

woojin often gets worried and will visit your dorm when he learns that you are sick

medicine, heat pack, ice pack, hot soup, everything

would still cuddle you when you’re running a 38 degree fever

also would spend the night beside you, constantly measuring your temperature etc.

a really chill bf tbh, wouldnt get jealous over nothing

please love woojin

[speedybaeandbirdiebae]

Found Out

Pietro is bored in the hospital after Cadence leaves so he decides to go out and find her. But he causes havoc at the New Avengers Facility. 

Warnings: None (Maybe mild pissing Tony Stark off)

Pairings: Pietro x Cadence Wilson (OC)

Words: 3,721

           Cadence blinked as she poked her head into the hospital room, she looked around a moment and smiled softly at the sight of Pietro still laying in bed and looking up at the ceiling. She could tell he was either bored or eager to leave the bed. However, it was still too early for him to even think about leave the bed. He still hadn’t fully recovered yet from his injuries. The slightest wrong move could make his recovery take twice as long.

           “Pietro,” Cadence called as she entered the room. “I’m back, I hope you weren’t too bored without me.”

           Pietro looked up with a bright smile upon his face and he sat up quickly so to see her better. “Candi, you came back.”

           “I told you I would,” Cadence proceeded to check the machines and the readouts that were printed out from the machine. “You seem to be doing well and while I don’t know this medical jargon, but it seems good if there are no errors.”  

           “So, I can leave this bed?” Pietro asked in hope. “I don’t like sitting for too long.”

           “I’m not sure about that yet,” Cadence said gently. “But you can ask Dr. Cho when she comes in tomorrow morning.”

           “Mmn, I see.” Pietro went silent as he watched Cadence lean over and fluff his pillows. “Candi…”

           “Yes Pietro?” Cadence asked. “Do you need me to get you something? Oh, right it’s close to dinner time, I’ll see if they’ve sent you some food up.”

           She moved away from him and went over to the wall, she pressed a button as it opened, and she saw it wasn’t soup this time but something a little heavier. She grabbed the tray out and closed the door before walking back to where Pietro sat. “Guess you eating two bowls of soup was enough to convince the doctors that you can eat something heavier.”

           Pietro’s face lit up in happiness. “I can?” he asked. “What is it?”

           Cadence laughed softly. “It’s chicken, mashed potatoes and I think some peas.” She said. “Standard hospital food but I bet it’s good, they event sent up some lime Jell-O.”

           Pietro laughed. “That’s better than soup,” he eagerly went to grab the fork and knife but quickly dropped them when he saw his hands were still too shaky to hold anything. He looked up at Cadence like a wounded puppy. “Help.”

           “I know I know,” Cadence laughed softly as she took the fork and knife as she began cutting the chicken up for him. “You’ll need me to do this for you until your hands stop shaking.”

           Pietro nodded as he allowed Cadence to feed him.  He admired the way her eyes lit up when she giggled or the way she’d reach up to wipe his mouth with a napkin. “Candi, how was your day? After you left I mean.”

           “Boring,” Cadence admitted.   “Paperwork, helping Fury with other things and making sure to keep a close eye on the other Avengers.”  

           “You do all of that?” Pietro asked. “You must be very good at your job and very smart too.”

           “It pays the bills,” Cadence waved a dismissive hand. “I would much rather be out in the field doing more exciting missions.”

           “You go out and fight too?” Pietro asked. “Like the Avengers?”

           Cadence nodded. “Yeah, I may look like I’m a cream puff, but I am a pretty good fighter, I’ve been on missions with Sam and I have done a few on my own.”

           Pietro stayed silent and began thinking about how much danger Cadence put herself into but also admired how she was able to talk about it as if it wasn’t anything big.

           “At the end of the day my job to help out as much as I can, it’s what makes me happy,” Cadence said. “Pietro?”

           “Sorry, I was just taking in everything you told me,” Pietro said forcing a smile.  “You do so much to help people, even if you don’t have any powers.”

           “Yeah, I guess I do.” Cadence sat down the fork on the tray and proceeded to open the cup of apple juice. She held it up for him and laughed softly. “Drink.”

           Pietro once again did as he was told as he drank the juice. He stared at Cadence’s face and saw her eyes were soft with what he assumed was compassion.

           “Alright, you managed to eat everything,” Cadence noted. “All that’s left is the Jell-O, that’s your dessert.”

           “I don’t like lime Jell-O,” Pietro mumbled. “It reminds me of slime.”

           “You don’t?” Cadence asked. “Well that’s fine, I’m sure that everyone down in the kitchen will send you up another flavor if they see that you didn’t eat it.”

           “You can have it,” Pietro said. “I don’t want it to go to waste.” 

           “Thank you but I’m getting something to eat when I leave here,” Cadence said sitting the Jell-O on the tray as she got up and went to go send it back down to the kitchen. “There is this place that Tony told me about that has amazing Shawarma.”

           “What is Shawarma?”

           “I don’t know but I want to try it,” Cadence walked back to Pietro’s bedside and sat down. “If it’s any good I’ll let you know, maybe we can have lunch there sometime when you’re able to leave.”

           “Ok, I look forward to it prinţesă.”

           “What did you just call me?” Cadence asked in surprise.

           “I called you…princess…in Sokovian.” Pietro blushed and silently cursed himself for letting it slip. He looked away from Cadence. “Sorry.”

           “No that’s fine, it’s cute.” Cadence laughed. “But maybe save the pet names for someone else that you end up dating.”

           “Candi…”

           “Oh, look at the time it’s five,” Cadence stood up and smiled softly. “I have to get going, but I’ll see you tomorrow morning Pietro.”

           “You’re coming back?”

           “Yeah, you’re who I am assigned to look after remember?” Cadence asked. “I’m going home to change and then go grab some food, but I’ll see you tomorrow morning ok?”

           Pietro nodded silently feeling a little disappointed that she was going to leave already. With a sigh, he looked up at her with a forced smile. “Yeah. See you tomorrow Candi.”

           Cadence gave him a sweet smile and ran a hand through his hair before she left the room shutting the door behind her quietly. “He looked a little sad when I said I was leaving,” She whispered to herself. “But I need to go home…I’ll see him tomorrow.”

------------

           “Sam, I’m home now!” Cadence called out as she entered the Avengers base, she took her jacket off and laid it on one of the bar stools. “Hey is anyone here?”

           “Miss Wilson, welcome home.”

           Cadence nearly jumped a mile at the sight of Vision phasing through the wall. She stared at the Android and laughed nervously. “Hey Vision, you’re the only one here?”

           Vision nodded. “I am,” he said. “All of the others left to go on a mission, I volunteered to stay behind so you could have someone to welcome you back home.”

           “Thank you but you didn’t need to do that,” Cadence laughed softly and went over to the refrigerator. “I was going out for the evening, you want to come with?”

           “You’re inviting me to be your travel companion?” Vision asked in confusion. “Miss Wilson, I don’t normally leave unless it’s to help the other Avengers.”

           “Come on robo dude, you have to learn how fun it is to let your hair dow—uh I mean unwind and relax.” Cadence grabbed two cans of soda and tossed one to Vision. “You know that there is more to life than being cooped up in here.”  

           Vision looked down at the can of soda and then at Cadence. “I should go out more?” he asked. “Miss Wilson, if anyone saw me walking around, they’ll be afraid.”

           “Dude, you’re fine,” Cadence laughed. “And please call me Cadence not Miss Wilson….it makes me sound like I’m old.”

           Vision went to say something more but shook his head.

           “Anyway, if you change your mind I’ll be in my room getting ready,” Cadence said. “Also, try to lighten up more dude, your programming will turn into old man programming if you worry too much.” She walked down the hallway all the while drinking her soda.

           He was bored, extremely bored, nothing in the room seemed worth looking at and If he had to count the tiles on the ceiling again he’d go insane.  Pietro sat up and sighed heavily, he wanted nothing more than to leave this room and explore the city and maybe find Cadence.

           “I’m going to this awesome Shawarma place in town, you should check it out when you get out of here.”

           Pietro groaned quietly and in annoyance, as he finally had enough of sitting around, he looked down at his arm and began removing the IVs from his arms and unplugging himself from the machines. He wasn’t going to stay in here and die of boredom.

           Getting up on shaky legs he slowly started walking around so to gather his bearings. He managed to feel his unused muscles flex as he moved his legs to wake them up. He looked down at his hands and concentrated so they’d’ stop shaking.  With a small smile, he felt himself slowly get used to standing as he finally stood up straight.

           “I’m not staying here,” he said to himself and went to the door, he opened it and saw many doctors and nurses walking around tending to other duties. He could run out of the room unnoticed and look for Cadence and maybe even find Wanda.  He seized the opportunity and ran out of the room unnoticed by anyone.

           “Yo Vision,” Cadence called walking out of her room dressed in a pair of jeans and a crop top with purple A on the front. “Did you decide if you want to hang out with me?”

           Vision looked at Cadence. “I’ve decided to stay here and wait until the other Avengers return home.” He said. “Someone has to welcome them.”

           “You sure?” Cadence asked as she shrugged. “Alright, I’ll bring you back a doggy bag.”

           “I don’t see how having a pet would help me Miss Wilson. Vision sad.

           “No, a do---nevermind I’ll bring you back something to eat.” Cadence laughed as she headed down the stairs and to the garage where the cars that Tony left for the Avengers to use were. She walked towards the car that belonged to Sam and pulled out the keys from her pocket. “I feel kind of bad leaving him alone…especially after the last time he poured grease down the sink.”

           The sound of a can falling to the floor was heard as Cadence looked down and raised an eyebrow when it rolled near her foot.

           “Really dude?” She called annoyed. “Vision, you don’t want to go with me, yet you decide to play a prank on me? Seriously what the hell!?”

           A blur of blue sped from behind one of the parked cars and behind a stack of boxes. With an annoyed sigh, Cadence readied herself for a fight. She focused on the place where she had seen the blur run over to.

           “Come on out, I am warning you,” she said. “If you’re a Hydra agent trying to break in you’re one stupid ass agent.”

           “Candi?”

           Cadence kept her fighting stance staring wide-eyed at the person behind the boxes. She couldn’t believe it.

           “Pietro!?” she screamed before quieting down and staring at him. “Why in the world are you out of bed? Wait why are you out of the hospital?!”

           “I was bored,” Pietro said quietly. “I wanted to go with you for that shawarma stuff you mentioned.”

           “Pietro, I’m not going to let you keel over here and I am sure as hell not going to let you stay here,” Cadence said looking him up and down. “And you’re still in your hospital gown.”

           “My clothes weren’t in my room,” Pietro mumbled as he looked down at his feet almost like a guilty child that had been caught doing something wrong. “I’m sorry.”

           “No no, it’s ok,” Cadence groaned. “Come on, let’s go inside and find you some clothes to wear since I doubt you’ll go unnoticed in a hospital gown.”

           “Thank you Prinţesă.”

           “Yeah yeah,” Cadence sighed pulling him by the arm and towards the elevator to reach the main living area. She was grateful no one else but Vision was hanging around. “Oh shit, I forgot about Vision!”

           “Who?”

           “The…uh nevermind,” Cadence look at him. “Pietro listen to me carefully, I’m going to need you to follow close to me. If you see a red guy that’s just one of the other Avengers ok? His name is Vision…but he cannot see you or else he’ll try to kill you.”

           Pietro nodded. “I’ll stay out of sight prinţesă.”

           “You better,” Cadence heard the bell ding indicating they were on the floor where the Avengers lived. She looked around and saw no sign of Vision and quickly took Pietro’s hand and leading him down the hallway to her bedroom.

           “This is where you live?” Pietro asked looking around the hallway he was being led down. “It’s quite nice.”

           “I live here with all of the Avengers,” Cadence explained as she opened the door to her bedroom and shoved Pietro into the room. She looked at him and put a finger to her lips. “Stay in here and I’ll get you some clothes…maybe you can fit some of Cap’s or Tony’s clothes…I doubt you could fit anything Sam has…maybe Thor left some clothes around.”

           At those words, Cadence walked out of the room as she shut the door and locked it behind her in case Pietro tried to get out. She looked up and called out. “Friday, could you make it, so my door doesn’t open from the inside?”

           “I need your confirmation code, Miss Wilson,”  FRIDAY said.

           Cadence groaned in annoyance and let out a curse at the confirmation code she’d been given. “The confirmation is Falconette.” She visibly cringed as the words left her mouth. She heard beeping and locking.

           “The doors have been locked, Miss Wilson.”  

           “Thank you,” Cadence then added. “Friday make sure to remind me to punch Tony when he comes back.”

           “Noted Miss Wilson.”

           Cadence headed down the hallway towards Steve’s room as she opened the door and began looking around the room for anything that would fit Pietro. “How many sweaters does one man need?” she mumbled to herself.  “Ok let’s see…I’ll just take this one and maybe a pair of jeans too.” She grabbed a pair of Jeans that were folded neatly on the bed and walked out of the room before going to the next room across the hallway.

           “Ok, let’s see…Tony’s clothes are…in the closet?” Cadence began opening doors trying to find some of Tony’s clothes. “Ugh, seriously? Can a man be obsessed with himself more?” She shut the closet and opened another door as she held back a laugh. “Ok blackmail material.” She quickly snapped a picture with her phone and went back to searching. “This is impossible, where does Tony keep his clothes?! Friday help me!”

           “Mr. Stark’s clothes are in the closet, I’ll open the doors for you,” Friday said.

           Cadence saw the door to the closet open revealing various clothes. She smiled and walked inside and grabbed the nearest thing she could. “Well, it’s not like Tony would miss this.” She walked out of the closet and the room.

           “Here, I hope you can fit some of these,” Cadence tossed the clothes to Pietro and sat on her bed. “I managed to find something of everyone’s in here, but I am not sure who’s clothes you can fit.”

           “It’s fine Prinţesă.” Pietro began undressing and started pulling on a pair of pants he had gotten from the pile on the bed. “I can handle wearing these until I can buy my own clothes.”

           “Alright.” Cadence blushed turning away. “So, you ran all the way here to find me because you were bored? That’s sweet of you.”

           “I don’t like sitting in one place,” Pietro answered as he buttoned the front of the shirt. He glanced at Cadence and saw her reddened face. “Is something wrong?”

           “No…no…it’s just.” Cadence looked at him a moment and snorted. “You don’t look good in a button up, here put this on instead.” She tossed him a black sweater. “You can keep the other stuff, however.”

           “Where did you get these anyway?”

           “From Tony and Steve’s rooms,” Cadence said. “I couldn’t get into Dr. Banner’s room and I doubt you’d want to wear any of Sam’s clothes.”

           “Oh,” Pietro pulled the sweater on before he straightened it and then grabbed the jacket off the bed. “Kind of ironic, I’m wearing Tony Stark’s clothes.”

           “And Captain America’s.” Candance began laughing quietly. “You look good dressed like that, I think you’d make a pretty fine playboy billionaire.”

           “Thanks.” Pietro rolled his eyes before running a hand through his hair and he stopped before looking into the mirror. “I don’t look half bad do I?”

           “Nope,” Cadence smiled softly. “Come on, we’ll go for Shawarma now.” She opened the door and looked around the hallway. She heard voices coming from down the hallway and she knew that meant only one thing…all the Avengers had come back.

           “Pietro, on second thought, stay here,” Cadence walked out of the room and shut the door behind her. She trekked down the hallway and immediately saw that all the others were there including Pepper.

           “Cadence, you’re home?” Sam asked with a smile. “What happened to going out with your friend?”

           “I was going out but I…umn…wanted to stay and welcome you home.” Cadence lied. “Oh, you guys picked up dinner too?”

           “Miss Wilson, I assumed you left already,” Vision said. “You said you were heading out. Did something happen?”

           “No no, nothing,” Cadence said. “So, you guys are going grab your food and go to your rooms, right?”

           “We’re doing a post-briefing of the mission,” Steve said. “And some of us are going to spend some time training.”

           “Oh.”

           “Cadence you look pale,” Natasha noted. “Are you sick?”

           “No, I’m fine, just a rough day at work.” Cadence lied again. “Fury worked me a lot, I’m fine though.”

           “Are you sure?” Wanda noticed the way Cadence’s eyes were holding a look of fear. She began probing her mind to find out why.

           Cadence began trying to clear her thoughts so Wanda wouldn’t find out why she was so nervous. She prayed that she wouldn’t find out anything about Pietro being hidden in her room. “Umn… say, Wanda, how did you like sightseeing around New York this morning?”

           “It was interesting,” Wanda said deciding to give up on reading Cadence’s mind. “I wish that Pietro was here to see everything.”

           “Umn…yeah he’d probably like it.” Cadence sighed heavily as she finally felt the cloud of suspicion coming from the other Avengers being lifted.  Maybe she was in the clear and could get away with sneaking Pietro out when everyone else was asleep.

           “WHERE THE HELL IS MY DAVID AUGUST SUIT?!”

           “Damn it…so close.”

           Everyone looked up and saw a furious Tony holding a hanger in his hand. He looked around the room with fiery eyes as he settled on each of the other male Avengers. “Who!? Who took it?!”

           “Don’t look at me,” Steve shrugged. “I don’t know what a David August anything is, and I don’t do designer.”

           “Obviously not Capsicle.” Tony turned to Vision and Sam. “Which one you took it?”

           “I don’t have a need for your clothes Mr. Stark.” Vision said simply.

           “I wouldn’t be able to fit in anything you own,” Sam began laughing. “Why are you getting bent out of shape about a suit anyway?”

           “It’s my suit, we have to respect each other’s property,” Tony said. “That includes borrowing clothes without permission. I know that all of you admire what I wear but I stealing it isn’t a way to capture my superior style.”

           “Cocky bastard,” Cadence mumbled. “Maybe you misplaced it?”

           “I’ll get to the bottom of this,” Tony said. “Friday playback security footage from the last hour of my bedroom.”

           Cadence let out a silent curse as she saw a screen come down and it played the video of her going into each of the male Avengers’ rooms save for Visions looking for clothes.

           “Falconette, you’re the last person I suspected to steal clothes from me,” Tony said raising an eyebrow. “If you wanted to borrow something to sleep in you could’ve asked me.”

           “Candi, why did you do it?” Sam asked. “Do you have a thing for Stark? Or a thing for Steve? Or maybe you like Banner?”

           “No no, it’s not it!” Cadence said. “I can explain ok!”

           “Go on and tell us,” Steve said with a small smile. “We won’t be mad, I think it’s sweet you want to wear something that belongs to one of us.”

           “I just…umn…well I….”

           “Prinţesă! Are you done now? Can I come out?”

           Cadence let out a small squeak and could feel the heat rise in her cheeks, she heard the other Avengers get up from their seats and rush down the hallway to her room.

           “Friday catch the intruder,” Tony ordered as Cadence’s room was covered in bright red lasers around Pietro.

           “Isn’t that…?”

           “It’s Speedy!”

           “Pietro!?”

           Pietro stood perfectly still so not to be hurt by the lasers, he looked at the group staring at him before he gave a nervous chuckle. “Surprise?”

           “He’s alive!” Wanda squealed happily. “Oh, brother I missed you!”

           “Well I’ll be damned,” Natasha gave a small smile. “I’ll go call Clint and tell him that the quick little bastard is alive after all.”

           “This is all well and good but he’s wearing my suit!” Tony shouted in anger. “With a sweater of all things!”

           “The prinţesă gave me these clothes,” Pietro explained looking directly at Cadence. “Right Candi?”

           “Cadence you know him!?”

           Cadence sighed and didn’t say anything more as she slid to the floor with her head in her hands and quietly groaning from how stupid she had been to let everyone find out the truth.

[breeeliss]

[Miraculous Ladybug]: Sweet Deliveries

day 1 and already im like an hour late but fuck it what else is new?

first up is all of the week 1 prompts for @thinkoutsidethelovesquare ! im trying to warm up to nathanael as a character and i’ve also been meaning to push out more mlm in this fandom, so consider this me killing two birds with one stone. hope you enjoy~

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Link to Archive of Our Own: [AO3]

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Prompt: Day 1 - “Wrong Number” Pairing: Adrinath (Adrien x Nathanael) Title: Sweet Deliveries Summary: Wrong Number AU in which a sick Nathanael tries to ask Rose for things to help his cold and calls Adrien instead. Adrien, of course, exceeds all expectations.

Sweet Deliveries

“Are you sure you’re going to be fine taking the bus home?”

Rose was standing on her tippy toes, pressing the backs of her hands to Nathanael’s cheeks and forehead, frowning at the heat that was burning her skin. He smiled weakly — wincing against his sore throat — and zipped his sweatshirt all the way up to his chin. “It’s only a fifteen minute ride. I don’t want maman to have to take time off work just to come get me.”

“You’re running a fever you silly!”

“It’s just a tiny one,” Nathanael assured her, even as he began to feel lightheaded the longer he stayed on his feet. “I’ll rest up for the rest of the day and be back at school tomorrow.”

Rose frowned and gently smacked his elbow. “I better not see you in school tomorrow, Nathanael. I’ll march you right home!”

“It’s already so hard to concentrate in class, I don’t want to miss even more by being absent.”

“Maybe if you put that sketchbook of yours down for more than two minutes at a time….”

Nathanael jutted out his bottom lip and stared at her pitifully while Rose rolled her eyes half-heartedly. “Come on, give me your hand.”

“What for?”

She pulled out a pink pen and scribbled some numbers on the back of his hand. “When is your mother going to be home?”

“Late probably,” Nathanael admitted. “Late shift tonight.”

“Alright. I want you to call me when school finishes and let me know if you need anything,” she explained. “I have soup, medicine, tea, and snacks at my house and I can run them over quick. You only live a few blocks from me so it’s no trouble.”

Nathanael smiled softly. “You don’t have to do that, Rose.”

“Oh, let me fret over you a little,” she grinned, tapping him on the nose with the end of her pen. “You were looking so faint in class just now, it puts my mind at ease to lend a hand.”

They walked to the entrance of the school and Rose reached up to pull Nathanael’s hood up so that his ears wouldn’t get cold. He checked his pockets to make sure he had enough for the bus and waved over his shoulder. “Thanks for walking me to the nurse. I appreciate it.”

“Just make sure you come back healthy, okay? Juleka and I will take notes for you!”

Nathanael tucked his hands into the pockets of his sweater and shivered against his fever as he made his way across the street to wait for the bus back home. Luckily his timing was good because he only had to wait a couple of minutes before the mostly empty bus rolled up to the stop and left him with a double seater that he could use to prop his legs up. Usually he liked to use the bus ride home to get some sketching done, but his nose was so stuffed and his body was so hot that he merely rested his bag on his lap and used it as a pillow as he rested the entire ride home.

Mme. Mendeleiev had already sent notes home to his mother about the fact that he was slipping behind in physics because of his lack of attention in class. Nathanael tried to explain that it was more than that — the lessons went by so quickly and it was hard for him to keep his attention on all of the equations and demonstrations without switching to his pencils and sketching across his notes. His mother understood, but he had promised her to bring his grades up and prove himself to his teachers soon. He couldn’t very well do that by missing school, but he supposed that sitting in class with a fever wasn’t going to do anyone good.

When the bus finally reached his stop, Nathanael had gotten up from his seat and felt the dizziness hit him all at once, finally convincing him that maybe he was more sick than he’d thought. It felt like ages before he got to his building, thankful that his apartment was on the first floor of the walk-up.

His mother was on a double shift at the café until dinner, which meant he was on his own as far as taking care of himself, but he hoped that sleeping off the fever would be enough. He walked straight to his room, replaced his jeans with sweatpants, and crawled into his bed, falling asleep the minute his head hit the pillow.

About four hours later, he woke up and felt like complete death. A headache, a worsened sore throat, a persistent fever, and violent chills made him think that maybe Rose was onto something when she mentioned him staying home tomorrow. He checked his cellphone and saw that school had let out about five minutes ago and figured that it might be a good idea to take Rose up on her offer. He didn’t think there was any medicine left in the kitchen and he wasn’t sure if he was up to making himself some warm soup anyway.

Bundling the blankets around him into a warm cocoon, Nathanael copied Rose’s number from his hand into his phone. Her writing was really loopy and hard to make out at spots — was that a 5 or a 6? A 4 or a 9? — but he did his best and got sent to her voicemail.

“Hey Rose,” Nathanael croaked, his voice coming out scratchy and pained. “It’s Nathanael. I think I might need some things after all. Not much! But, uh….if you could pick up some medicine for a fever, some tea, and maybe some soup, I’d really appreciate it. I’ll pay you back for all of it, but I really don’t feel up to getting out of bed at the moment. Take your time! No rush! Uh….thanks.”

Normally he wouldn’t dream of putting anyone out of their way like this, but Nathanael was desperate and alone in his house with a sickness he was convinced was going to keep him bed bound for at least the next twenty four hours, so he tried to reign in the guilty feeling as best he could.

Nathanael turned the television on in his room and watched through some old re-runs of a few cartoons and sitcoms that he liked watching until he heard the doorbell ring. Perfect. That must be Rose. Medicine and soup sounded absolutely heavenly right about now. He wrapped all his blankets around him until he was covered up to his nose, forced himself out of bed, and padded across the apartment to the front door.

Of course the very last person he expected to be standing on his welcome mat was Adrien Agreste.

Nathanael suddenly felt silly showing up to the door with all his blankets tied around him like this.

“A-Adrien?!” Nathanael asked in surprise. “Um….hi? What are you doing here?”

Adrien was standing there as if it was the most natural thing in the world for him to be visiting Nathanael as his home. He lowered the scarf away from his mouth and frowned at the sight of Nathanael. “Aw, buddy, you look awful! Do you have the flu or something?”

Nathanael blinked and looked down at his feet self-consciously. “I’m not sure,” he admitted. “Might just be a nasty cold, or strep throat. Sorry, uh….what are you doing here exactly?”

“Oh, right!” Adrien grinned. He picked up the two shopping bags that were sitting at his feet and thrust them forward. “You mentioned that you needed some things to help with your cold, so I went and picked them up for you!”

“Things?” Nathanael frowned. “Wait, I thought….Rose was going to get that stuff for me. I left her a message. Could she not make it?”

Adrien chuckled. “I think you might’ve typed in her number wrong. You called me.”

Nathanael’s eyes widened. He’d called the wrong number? “Are you sure?”

“I mean, I can play the voicemail for you if you want, but yeah I’m sure,” Adrien laughed.

“Oh, no,” Nathanael groaned, hiding his face in his blankets. “I’m such an idiot, I’m so sorry about that.”

“Don’t even worry about it,” Adrien waved off. “That sort of thing happens all the time. Mind if I come in, by the way? It’s a little chilly out here and I forgot my gloves at home.”

“Y-yeah sure!” Nathanael stumbled, moving aside the umbrella stand to give Adrien room to come inside. “Sorry about that. Maman isn’t home yet so make yourself comfortable I guess.”

Adrien respectfully toed off his shoes to leave by the door and made his way to the kitchen while Nathanael locked the door behind him. He sneezed into his blankets and climbed up on top of one of the chairs in the kitchen while Adrien busily unpacked his shopping bags and organized all of the contents on the table. He stared incredulously at all of the purchases and swallowed to soothe his throat. “What is all this?”

“Well, I wasn’t sure what was wrong with you, so I got a little bit of everything? I hope you don’t mind.” Adrien folded up the bags and left them on the countertop while he pointed at each thing left on the table. “So here’s some ibuprofen for your fever. I also grabbed some cold medicine — drowsy and non-drowsy because I wasn’t sure which one you liked best. I got you some ginger tea and honey too in case your throat is feeling a little bad. I went to the café near my house and picked up some chicken soup for you too. There’s two servings here so that you’ll have some leftover to heat up later.”

Nathanael felt himself gaping. “Wait just a min—”

“I grabbed some bananas and apples since maman always gave those to me when I was sick to snack on. But I know that’s boring so I also had Marinette pack me some chocolate croissants for you to eat when you get better. I also grabbed all of the books from your locker that you’d need for our homework — sorry I hope that wasn’t weird or anything — oh, and I also made copies of my notes in the library real quick so that you wouldn’t miss anything.” He stepped back from the table with a proud grin stretching the apples of his cheeks as high as they would go and clasped his hands behind his back. “Yeah! So, uh….hope that’s everything you needed.”

Nathanael twisted around the tins of tea that Adrien had bought him and gaped at the expensive brand written across the side. “You didn’t have to go and get all this!”

“I mean, I couldn’t find Rose after school, and you sounded so miserable over the phone when you left that message, I couldn’t just ignore it,” Adrien replied. “It was the least I could do, honest.”

“I don’t know how to pay you back for all of this though.”

“Is that what you’re worried about?” Adrien frowned. “Don’t even worry about that, paying for all of this stuff was nothing.” He blinked at the wording. “Er, sorry. That sounded a little elitist, didn’t it? I just meant that I was happy to help you out and get this stuff for you. You honestly don’t have to worry about paying me back.”

“But you went through all the trouble.”

“It wasn’t trouble in the least,” Adrien said. “I’m always eager to help a friend.”

Nathanael couldn’t tell if he coughed in surprise or whether he had to add cough to his list of symptoms. “Friend?”

“Of course. How could I just leave you suffering here like this?”

To be fair, when Adrien put it like that, it seemed like the only option was for him to come over with probably one of the biggest care packages Nathanael had ever received in his life. But he was sure that anyone else would’ve just called back and told him he had the wrong number so that he could figure out where he went wrong dialing Rose. To actually go out to stores, cafés, and bakeries for him — especially when Adrien and Nathanael didn’t really talk all that much — seemed so baffling and so touching that Nathanael didn’t quite know what he was supposed to do or say.

“I….thank you,” he finally said. “This is way more than I ever expected anyone to do for me. I really appreciate it.”

Adrien took off his scarf and jacket and hung it over the backs of one of the kitchen chairs. “Want me to make some tea and heat up the soup for you? My Chinese lessons don’t start for another half hour so I can hang around for a short bit.”

“Oh, you don’t have to….” Nathanael trailed off, because it seemed like Adrien didn’t mean for what he said to be posed as an actual question. He was already looking through the dishwasher for a clean kettle and filling it with water from the sink.

Figuring that there was no sense in arguing with Adrien at this point — he was already in his house and it was hard to stare at that sunny smile of his and dare to tell him no — Nathanael pulled his knees up to his chest and pointed out where the pots and mugs were.

It was almost endearing to see Adrien move around the kitchen. It didn’t seem like he spent much time in the kitchen himself — he struggled turning on the stovetop burners and he burned his finger on the handle of the pot when he went to stir the soup — but he was whistling while he moved around and kept asking Nathanael questions about the history project they had to turn in next week and what he got on their last visual arts assignment. They never really spent time talking much during class, but Adrien was a very simple, honest person. It didn’t take much effort to share a space with him. He brought up easy topics, and when Nathanael didn’t feel like talking he took the silence with ease. Nathanael had a smile on his face right up until Adrien brought his tea, soup, and medicine over on a tray.

“Do you like any sugar or milk in your tea?” Adrien asked.

“No just honey’s fine.”

Adrien carefully stirred in a spoonful of honey, slid the tray in front of Nathanael, and sat in the chair across from him. “Take the medicine first, you look like you’re about to pass out.”

Nathanael sighed and made a show of picking up the bottle of ibuprofen and shaking out two pills. “It’s probably one of those twenty four hour things. I’ll be fine for tomorrow.”

Adrien leaned his cheek against his hand. “Are you sure? I think you should stay home tomorrow. I’ll bring all your notes and homework again if you want.”

“Oh, you don’t have to do that, but thanks for the thought,” Nathanael smiled, and gosh he realized he’d been smiling ever since Adrien started boiling water for his tea. “I just hate missing school, you know?”

“Yeah, I understand,” Adrien laughed. “I came into school one day with a chest cold because I didn’t want to miss school and Nino all but pulled me by my ear to the nurse’s office halfway through our first class.”

“I remember that. He kept scolding you for the rest of the school day.”

“Yeah, that sounds a lot like Nino,” Adrien grumbled. “He gave me a lecture about not infecting the rest of the class with my sick. I didn’t think of that. But, I dunno, I guess when you’ve been homeschooled for most of your life you don’t want to miss out on actual school, you know? Where you get to walk to classes and have lockers and sit next to your friends and stuff.”

Nathanael didn’t much see what the big deal was about walking and lockers, and sitting next to friends wasn’t really why he prioritized coming into school everyday. But Marinette told him during visual arts one day about how Adrien pitched a fit to his father about getting the chance to go to public school after being homeschooled with very little friends before this. Someone as vibrant as Adrien didn’t really seem the type to thrive in a homeschooled setting anyway. Someone who splurged on soup for someone he didn’t really know well needed to be around people.

“I just don’t want to get marked down for any reason,” Nathanael mumbled in between sips of soup. “I already get in trouble for not paying attention in class. I don’t want to make it worse by not being there at all.”

“Do you not like the subjects?”

“It’s not that. It’s just really hard to concentrate sometimes. Especially in physics. Mme. Mendeleiev is always watching me to make sure I’m taking notes, and I try. But sometimes she just talks too quickly and it’s all gobbledygook to me. So I just draw and do other homework and try to catch up at home.”

Adrien pouted his bottom lip. “I’m sorry. I didn’t know physics gave you such a hard time.”

Nathanael shrugged. “I try not to make a big deal about it. It’s my fault anyway.”

“It’s not your fault at all,” Adrien insisted, pointing to Nathanael’s mug of tea to make sure he was drinking it. “I imagine it’s frustrating to try and pay attention in a class when things don’t make sense.”

“I was never much of a math or science person,” Nathanael admitted. “It’s always been like that.”

Adrien’s shoulders were slumped and his face was pulled into a deep frown, making him look more like a kicked puppy to Nathanael than anything else. It was almost strange to think that Adrien would be so upset on his behalf. Even Nathanael didn’t think it was too much of an issue, just inconvenient more than anything else. But suddenly Adrien’s face lit up, and he smacked his hands on the table so hard that he almost made the tea in Nathanael’s mug spill over. “What if I helped you?”

“Huh?”

“I’m really good at physics!” Adrien said excitedly. “Well. I mean. I do well in it. I like it, I mean. Not to brag or anything, God no! Just that I….well, anyway. If you needed help with assignments or with the material I could totally give you a hand.”

Yup, a puppy was definitely a good descriptor for Adrien. Nathanael could almost picture drawing ears and a wagging tail on Adrien right now and being perfectly content with the results. “You don’t know what you’re signing up for,” Nathanael insisted. “Honest. I’m probably hopeless.”

“I’m sure that’s not true,” Adrien waved off. “Look, you don’t have to say anything now. Just think about it. You have my number now. Just text me if you ever need any help. I’ll try to explain it slower than Mme. Mendeleiev does.”

There was no way that Nathanael could brush off that kind of kindness — and Adrien really was pulling out all the stops without even realizing the weight of what it was he was doing — so he nodded and ducked his face down towards his soup. “Alright,” he decided. “I’ll think about it.”

Adrien was only able to stay with Nathanael for a few minutes before he had to leave for his Chinese lessons. It was mostly Adrien talking about something silly that happened with him, Marinette, Alya, and Nino during lunch that afternoon, but Nathanael was fine to just listen and watch Adrien gesticulate through the whole story. Nathanael was slurping the last of his soup and feeling the medicine improve his fever a little bit when Adrien pulled his jacket on again. He stared at Nathanael for a moment looking pensive and unsure, but he shrugged his shoulders and pulled Nathanael into a brief hug.

“For good luck!” Adrien said as he pulled back and helped wrap Nathanael’s blankets around him again. “Let me know if you need anything else okay? I know your mother is coming back soon but still. Just in case.”

“I will,” Nathanael promised. “And….thanks again for all of this. I’m starting to feel a lot better.”

Adrien waved goodbye with both hands as he let himself out and locked the door behind him. Now that the apartment was empty, Nathanael couldn’t help but burst out into laughter, the tight bundle of warmth sitting in his chest the entire time finally unravelling and making him feel a lot less like the sack of garbage he felt like before. He finished up his lunch, shoved everything in the sink, and crawled back into his bed to try and rest off the cold.

He hugged his pillow to his chest and smiled into it before he fell asleep.

Nathanael had been one of the people who’d been in the class the longest, but he was perfectly fine with feeling like he didn’t strongly fit in anywhere.

He and Marinette had been drawing partners since they were six, Nino had been his back row buddy for as long as he can remember, and Kim had always been the one chasing bullies across the park to steal back the colored pencils they’d taken from him. But those young friendships weren’t nearly as deep as some of the others he’d seen. Marinette and Alya were practically inseparable, Kim and Max had more inside jokes than Nathanael even thought was possible, and Nino and Adrien were always huddled together by their desks coming up with secret handshakes and sharing headphones before class.

It never interested him to try and insert himself into those dynamics, and even though Rose insisted that wanting to be friends with people who already had established friend groups wasn’t intrusive in the lease, Nathanael stood by his word. He enjoyed the time he spent keeping to himself, and genuine kindness from his classmates was all he ever asked of anyone.

Of course Adrien Agreste went and took that normal brand of genuine kindness, injected steroids into it, and handed it back to Nathanael in a show of sincerity that he still felt undeserving of.

Adrien was an enigma. Nathanael watched him on first day of school as he did most of their classmates who joined them for the first time. Chloe was hanging off of his arm, he seemed to struggle making friends, and he stumbled around for a bit as he tried to figure out how this public school thing worked. But by his third day, Nino and Adrien were laughing with each other like they’d known the other for years. Everyone came up to his desk in the mornings to say hi not because he was a famous model, but just because he had a kind word and a warm smile for anyone who passed him. He was brilliant, excelled in his classes, did so much after school, and still had time to prove to everyone that there was nothing intimidating or reserved about him.

It was a wonder how someone’s presence could be so assuming and light up a room so brilliantly that people couldn’t help but be attracted to it. Nathanael wanted to chalk it up to natural magnetism, but he was really good at seeing beautiful and precious things in unlikely places and transferring them to all of his sketchpads. Adrien was something special, and Nathanael never thought that he’d be able to see that kind of specialness up close and personal in a way that left Nathanael’s head feel like it was swirling.

But….it was a nice kind of swirling. Sort of like when you spun around in circles for too long and left yourself feeling dizzy at the end of it, but still marveled at the way all the colors around you melded together into something breathtaking. It was overwhelming, but Nathanael wouldn’t necessarily mind more of that kindness.

Which led to Nathanael sitting in his room, thumb hovering over Adrien’s phone number in his cellphone.

His fever was gone, but his sore throat was still bothering him and he still felt generally weak and tired. So he decided to follow Rose and Adrien’s advice and stay home another day, which worked wonders since it meant he had a long weekend ahead of him. But he was looking through the physics homework that Adrien had brought him yesterday, and he kind of wanted to cry.

Adrien had the highest physics scores in the class, and he already offered to help Nathanael study. It seemed silly to say no to the help.

Nathanael took a huge breath, opened his texts, and deleted his message seven times before he sent it.

 nathanael: hey adrien, it’s nathanael! i hope school went well today. are you busy today? i was wondering if i could take you up on your offer to help me with physics? yesterdays homework isn’t making much sense.

 He carded his fingers through his hair, got up from his chair, and practically canon balled into his bed, hiding his head under his pillow.

Why was he nervous ? It wasn’t like Adrien was difficult to talk to or too intimidating to even look at. That couldn’t be even further from the truth, and it was evidenced by the fact that everyone always seemed to be at ease just by being around him. So why did Nathanael feel like his heart was about to burst out of his chest just from asking him for some private study lessons? It didn’t make any sense, but it certainly didn’t stop Nathanael from peeking out from underneath his pillow and waiting for the phone on his desk to illuminate with a new text message.

The moment it vibrated, he leaped out of his bed and unlocked his phone

 adrien: hey nath! are you feeling better? fencing practice was cancelled so i can come visit if you want.

 Visit? Have him come here again? Two days in a row?

 nathanael: oh gosh you really don’t have to if it’s too much trouble. im sure i can figure it out over text

adrien: lol it’s no trouble if im offering :P only if it’s ok with you ofc

nathanael: i mean i am feeling a lot better

nathanael: and i imagine this stuffs easier to explain in person?

adrien: haha so is that a yes? :D

nathanael: i guess so?

adrien: alright cool! i can come over in about an hour if you want. i just have to stop by my house and leave my fencing stuff. do you need notes and homework?

nathanael: actually that’d be amazing thanks

adrien: notes, homework, and your own personal study buddy coming right up! ;)

 Nathanael laughed at the long string of thumbs up emojis that Adrien decided to tag onto the end of the message, and he was almost positive that he didn’t know a single person in the world who could possibly get this excited about sitting down for an entire afternoon just to go over a pile of physics homework. He wondered if it was similar to the way Nathanael wished he could just take French and visual arts classes all day and got excited whenever he saw a nice charcoal set in the store.

When Adrien finally knocked on his door, he was practically bouncing on his toes and holding two boxes of pastries from the Dupain-Cheng bakery with a blinding smile on his face. “Hey!” he greeted. “Wow, you’re looking so much better. It was the soup, wasn’t it? It works wonders, I tell you.” He gently shook the boxes he was holding. “I brought more snacks!”

Nathanael raised a brow. “That’s….a lot of snacks.”

“I said the same thing,” he frowned in thought. “Marinette sort of pushed them on me when she heard I was coming over. She was really adamant about it too.” Adrien cleared his throat and shook his head a little. “Uh, anyway! They’re palmiers and opera cakes. I hope that’s okay? They were on sale.”

“That’s fine,” Nathanael chuckled. Something about Adrien’s enthusiasm was exasperating in a really sweet way. Even though it was a lot, he was sure Adrien didn’t even realize he was doing it. “I’ll get us some water. We can study in my room if you want.”

Nathanael hung up Adrien’s jacket, grabbed some water bottles from the fridge, and led them into his room that he spent most of the morning cleaning. The moment they stepped inside, Adrien immediately dropped his bag on the floor by Nathanael’s bed and sprawled across his carpet, his limbs thrown about as if he were at a close friend’s house. He dug through his things and handed off a folder filled with papers and post-its. “Here’s all the notes and homework assignments for today. Let me know if you can’t read anything.”

“Thanks,” Nathanael said, accepting the folder and breathing a sigh of relief when he saw how little homework there was for this weekend. “So, brutally honest opinion, on a scale of one to ten. How impossible was the homework from yesterday?"

“A 3 max. Not that bad, I promise,” Adrien assured.

“Says the physics nerd.”

“Excuse me, I prefer the term physics connoisseur,” Adrien winked with a smile.

“I guess I’m lucky if I get to borrow your help for a bit.”

“Nah, don’t think of it like that. I think I’m pretty lucky to get to study with you. We don’t hang out much and I’ve always wanted to talk to you more.”

Nathanael’s back straightened up almost immediately and he couldn’t pretend that that didn’t make his heart flutter just a little bit. “Y-You’ve been wanting to talk to me?”

“Yeah,” Adrien said. “For a while actually. I just wasn’t sure how to go up to you and just….ask if you wanted to hang out. I didn’t want to be awkward about it.”

“You? Awkward about making friends?” Nathanael snorted. “You’re so popular! Everyone talks to you.”

“I’ve never really had to make friends before this,” Adrien admitted. “I mean, I was lucky where Nino was concerned. He reached out first, and he’s just the best. But everyone else I guess just came up to me and started being nice, and I only ever knew how to be nice back and just put on a smile, and making friends after that just sort of came naturally. It’s been working so far, but I’m still kinda bad at starting conversations.”

Nathanael furrowed his brows. “I don’t know if I believe that….”

“I’m serious!” Adrien insisted. “You for example! I’ve never known how to talk to you. You always seemed to want to be left alone and I never wanted to bother you.”

“I mean…I’m not really the best at socializing,” Nathanael said. “People sort of already know that so they tend to give me a lot of breathing room so to speak. But….it’s not like I don’t want people to bother me.”

Adrien reached out Nathanael’s hands. “I didn’t mean to offend you! It was just what was going through my head, I wasn’t trying to make assumptions.”

“It’s okay,” Nathanael laughed. “To be fair, I kinda thought you were really unattainable. Like you sort of give off all this positive energy and make it look so easy. I didn’t know how to talk to you .”

“Sounds like we’ve both been wasting a lot of time,” Adrien said. “I’ll admit, that’s kind of why I rushed over here yesterday.”

“Because you didn’t want to waste time?”

“No, because I thought it’d be the perfect chance to talk to you. I mean, it was mainly to help you because you looked miserable yesterday, but it was also just a great chance to get to talk with you. I-I hope that’s not weird or anything.”

Nathanael’s fingers were tangling themselves up in his lap. “No. That’s….actually really refreshing. I don’t think anyone’s ever told me they were that eager to talk to me. It’s not like I take up a lot of space.”

Adrien shrugged. “You don’t have to. I noticed you without you having to do that.”

Nathanael took a shaky breath in and was suddenly heavily aware of Adrien’s hands that were still gently braced around his wrists. He stared at him as if he hadn’t just admitted something that was making Nathanael think terribly indulgent but horribly silly thoughts that he was doing best to keep locked up tight in his head so as not to ruin the moment. Adrien had only been in their class for a few months and it was hard to believe that he’d been wondering how to talk to him of all people. But it was hard not to let his insides melt a little when Adrien smiled at him, and it was then that he realized that maybe this whole physics studying thing was a really bad idea.

He swallowed the lump in his throat and could literally feel the heat radiating off his face. “G-Good to know.”

Adrien must have realized that he was still holding onto him, because he moved back and rubbed his hands on the carpet underneath him. “Right! Yeah! So, physics! Uh….do you have the homework sheets.”

Adrien was a really patient teacher. He was good about letting them take breaks so that they could plan hangman and tic-tac-toe in the corners, and Adrien seemed to get a kick out of the fact that Nathanael was making silly comics of people running away in fear from his physics equations and interacting with all of the diagrams in the problems. It made focusing on the really complicated equations a lot easier, and Adrien was great at explaining everything in a way that was much more simple than what Mme. Mendeleiev liked to rattle off in class. It was the quickest he’d ever gone through his physics homework, and he even felt confident enough to try and do this weekend’s homework without any help. They managed to get through all of the problems together and rewarded themselves with pastries every time they got a problem right. It wasn’t often that Nathanael got to do homework with friends and he didn’t think that he’d ever find himself spread out across his carpet and laughing with Adrien while they stuffed themselves with sweets. It seemed like a strange dream that he didn’t quite know how he entered but wasn’t about to wake himself up from.

When they were finally finished with their physics homework, they were both laying on their backs next to each other, each with a box of pastries sitting on their stomachs, Nathanael allowed his giddiness to give him the courage to speak. “Can I ask you something? And you promise to answer honestly?”

“I’ll do my best.”

“Why did you want to talk to me so bad?”

Adrien kept his eyes on the ceiling and spoke around a mouthful. “I….don’t really know. I had a feeling you were a really interesting person, and I was right. And you just caught my eye I guess.”

“Why though?” Nathanael asked.

Adrien smiled nervously and didn’t turn his head to look at Nathanael. “You’re going to laugh. And I don’t want to make you uncomfortable.”

“Is it bad?”

“No! Not bad!” Adrien promised. “Just….well. I was really excited when you called me by accident. More excited than I thought I’d be. I guess.”

Nathanael moved his box, propped himself up on his elbow, looked down at Adrien. “Why were you excited?”

“I’m serious, you’re going to laugh.”

Nathanael bit his lip. “Try me. I might not laugh.”

Adrien blinked and for the first time looked like he was perfectly planning what he was going to say in his head. “What do you mean you might not? You don’t know what I’m going to say.”

“I don’t,” Nathanael admitted. “I know what I’m hoping you’ll say.”

“What are you hoping I’ll say?”

“I asked first.”

Adrien’s shoulders shook with laughter. “Fair enough.” He sat up from the floor and turned around so that he was facing Nathanael. “Just….promise that if I don’t say what you’re hoping I’ll say we can just go back to making jokes and eating junk food.”

Nathanael really really hoped that wouldn’t be the case. “Promise.”

Adrien took a huge breath and raked his fingers through his head as if to psych himself up. “Well, during the first week or so of school, my driver had forgotten to get used to my schedule and remember that he had to pick me up after school. There was a time where I was just sitting out on the stoop waiting for him to come pick me up and I saw you listening to music, humming to yourself, and sketching in your binder. I don’t know if you remember that.”

Nathanael liked to stick around after school a lot to sketch when he wanted to enjoy the nice weather a bit before going home. “I tend to do that a lot. But keep going.”

“I knew that you were in my class and I sort of remembered your name, but I like I said, I didn’t really know how to go up and talk to you. Plus I didn’t want to bother you.” Adrien stared down in his lap and smiled. “I, uh….well the first thought that popped into my head was that you were really cute.”

Adrien squinted his eyes shut and turned his head away as if preparing himself for a blow, but all Nathanael could do was hope that all of the sudden joy that was rushing from his head all the way down to the tips of his toes wasn’t too obvious. “W-Wait. Do you mean….?”

“Aw, don’t make me say it, it’s embarrassing and I didn’t rehearse,” Adrien groaned.

“So you do mean that!”

“I-I’m not making you uncomfortable, am I?”

Nathanael’s head dropped in relief as he shook his head. “No. No way. Quite the opposite, actually.”

“Wait, really?”

“I’m just as surprised as you are.”

Adrien still looked at Nathanael like he was starstruck. “Wait, there’s no way this is happening….”

“That makes two of us.”

Adrien licked his lips and scooted closer to Nathanael so that their knees were touching. “Can I try something?”

Nathanael nodded. “Uh. Sure. What is it?”

Adrien’s eyes darted down to Nathanael’s lips before dropping back down to his lap out of nerves, and suddenly Nathanael felt as if he were going to faint. Surely that’s not what he meant? This was just the over imaginative parts of Nathanael’s imagination getting away from him and making him anticipate things that weren’t actually coming his way. But Adrien finished surprising him that afternoon by buckling up all the courage inside of him and leaning forward to give Nathanael a sweet, short kiss on his lips, so short that Nathanael only had time to inhale sharply through his nose before it was over and Adrien was keeping his shoulders bunched up to his ears and keeping his eyes turned to the ceiling.

“Sorry,” he whispered out. “I panicked.”

“It’s okay,” Nathanael chuckled. “Do….do you want to try again?”

Adrien scrubbed his hands over his face. “I’m so bad at this.”

Maybe it was because Nathanael thought it was so sweet to see someone as personable as Adrien suddenly look like he wasn’t sure what to do with his hands or where to drop his gaze that Nathanael decided to take Adrien’s hands, lower them away from his face, and try to go something brave for once. He kept his hands around Adrien’s wrists as he leaned in and left a softer, slower kiss on Adrien’s lips, waiting patiently for Adrien to relax and gently open his mouth to kiss him back.

It wasn’t Nathanael’s first kiss, but it was his longest one — long enough for him to pick up little details about Adrien that he hadn’t noticed before. He had long eyelashes, his lips were a little chapped, and his bangs were long enough to tickle Nathanael’s temples when he tilted his head just slightly. He was also a really sweet kisser, one that made his toes curl in his socks and all his sighs come spilling into Adrien’s mouth. He wasn’t sure how long it had lasted, but he was practically counting the seconds that passed the moment Adrien ended the kiss and kept his lips just half an inch away from Nathanael’s, his breathes furling and mixing with his own.

“Man,” Adrien muttered. “Nino is never going to believe me.”

Nathanael couldn’t help it. He laughed with his whole body and felt like there was almost too much happiness running through his body. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to distract us.”

“Please. That was a great distraction.”

Nathanael tilted his head back towards their books. “Should we try and do the rest of it? Aside from the physics.”

Adrien winced. “Ehhh. I mean. It’s Friday. There’s no rush.”

Nathanael smirked. “And I’m guessing you don’t want to head home yet.”

“Kissing is more fun than homework.”

Nathanael blinked and cursed under his breath. “Aw, shoot. I might still be contagious. I’m sorry.”

Adrien shrugged. “Worth it. Besides, if I get sick, I can always leave you a message by accident so you can bring soup to my house.”

Nathanael rolled his eyes when Adrien cupped his cheeks and pulled him in for another kiss. He supposed that after all of this, taking care of Adrien tomorrow when he inevitably got sick would be fair turnabout anyway.

[xiajin]

tiny (ao3) sugakookie; i dont know how 2 explain this sorry???; part of a larger fic LOL

/

yoongi’s morning starts out - all things considered - fairly normal. he doesn’t think he’s too much of a complicated guy; all he his wants are kind of meshed into one another until he’s looking down at the papers and pressures of his own goals, sinking into his skin. yoongi thinks that friends are underrated. he’d like some, yeah, but that doesn’t mean that he’ll go out looking. he’s not shy, but he’s not - outgoing. he prefers some things more than others, and staying in his apartment on a saturday night is more appealing than visiting a club and only getting more drunk. he’s not fond of alcohol because of the way he likes things too much after a stiff drink.

instead, his choice of poison has to do with caffeine - at first it was coffee, but then it changed. no longer could just the bitter taste of it settle his nerves; into his repertoire he added fizzy drinks, sodas, espressos, those cold cans of coffee shots, juices, and sugary drinks. sometimes tea is an okay substitute. he keeps tea leaves in his kitchen cabinet but never uses them.

it’s one day - it’s 7am, he’s up too early, his head is blaring with an aching pain - that he realizes that he’s out of instant coffee. the container is completely empty. he has no other types of instant coffee either, and he’s pretty sure he hasn’t gone out of his apartment in a couple of days - other than for the most obvious of things - because he has a due date in three days that’s hanging over his head. yoongi bites his lower lip and groans, forehead thumping against the fridge (he keeps his instant coffee on top of the fridge) and feeling the pain double behind his eyes. he just wants - relief. this might be a problem.

it’s then that he remembers he still has a cabinet full of tea leaves. bullshit stuff, he thinks. tea is sweeter, with a different flavor palette that yoongi isn’t fond of. it reminds him of his mother and grandmother and of all other old people, with their stiff peppermint perfumes and - this, this was it - their smell of warm, hot tea. never too good. herbal, medicinal, like a burning in the nose. that’s the type that seokjin buys, too; it makes sense, because he was raised by his grandmother and so has a lot of her odds and quirks, but goodness. how is yoongi supposed to survive on herbal tea? if it was at least those - those damn british blends that he always wants to turn his nose up at - it would be okay but? herbal?

there’s no other choice. he has to be cognizant enough to write a song, but he feels like he can’t even turn on the shower if he tried. the knobs and their directions would probably confuse him.

yoongi fumbles around for the correct cabinet. he comes across shelves of paper plates and nice dishes that must have been housewarming gifts long ago. there are also a couple of them with ramen packets, instant curry, and other types of ready-to-make foods (he’s not too great at cooking anything other than that). finally, at the very end, there’s a shelf of porcelain cups that he barely uses, seeing as how those are for company - and, well, yoongi rarely has company he’d think of giving porcelain cups to - and another with a box of herbal tea packets. yoongi picks out the box and sighs, pinching the bridge of his nose, and then - frowns.

it’s light. lighter than he expected. he knows that seokjin gave this box to him two months ago, and since then, seokjin has been the only one to take from it. yoongi’s always managed to restore his coffee supplies before things got too desperate. as he’s holding the box, however, he knows - he knows - that this was heavier when he last got it. seokjin came over once before he had to go back to thailand for whatever research on food he was doing. yoongi opens it up and - there are at least a whole row of them missing, seven of them gone. now that’s weird; yoongi doesn’t know anyone that would want to steal herbal tea, of all things.

“what the fuck,” is the first thing is voice croaks in the morning, and he frowns at how shitty he sounds. damn, he really needs something for his throat; maybe he’ll order out warm soup.

but seriously; who has been taking this shit? everything else in his goddamn house is fine. his fridge is still empty, his ramen noodles are all accounted for, when did this just suddenly disappear?

not that he’s complaining, it wasn’t like he’s choosing this form of caffeine because he wants to. this is pure last resort, but things like this - they bug him.

yoongi slowly puts the box back, wondering idly if he’s going some sort of crazy, and then decides that it’s about due time. he’s about to close the cabinet and just give up - maybe drag himself to get overpriced coffee at the nearest cafe - when something catches his eye.

at first he thinks it’s a blur. there’s a slight ringing in his ears that he’s always had, ever since he was a teenager and blared music so loud it created an endless sonata of ringing in his eardrums, but this is different. it’s almost like a little tinkle, maybe sort of like a finger running across chimes. a blur. and - in between dusty bone-white cups with delicate gold rims, all of them are standing upright, their handles turned to the left.

except - except.

the very last cup on the right. it’s upside down, and nowhere near as dusty. it’s left a little far off from the others as well. there’s nothing unusual about a cup in a line of cups - hell, yoongi could have done that himself and just not realized - but he doesn’t...he just -

reaching out, he grabs the cup by the bottom and lifts it up.

there’s nothing underneath.

yoongi feels his face twitch. he’s going fucking insane, he swears. letting out a sigh that turns into a groan, he leans back and leaves the cup clattering back into it’s original position, swearing all the while. he’s going fucking insane over a cup. a cup. he’s going to get himself admitted at this rate. maybe he really does need to sleep. maybe he really does need to go and take a break. namjoon will be overjoyed he’s not working himself to death.

he thinks it’s a good idea, starting to close the cabinet door when the slightest movement of the same godfucking cup catches his attention. at whiplash speed, he reaches forward and tugs it aside, and -

there’s a yelp, a small figure no bigger than possible five inches tall falls to the ground in front of them. yoongi blinks, incredulous, as his eyes go over tiny limbs, fingers and bare feet, dark hair. he has to lean in close to understand what the fuck he’s looking at, and when he does, all he can utter is, “what the hell.”

“oh no,” yoongi hears the tiny - what is that? he? what? - say. he - he? stands up and dusts off his pants. he’s wearing miniature pants and a black shirt. the most appalling part of the entire little figure are the two, thin and lace like wings sprouting out of his - his back. for a moment the tiny thing flutters with his - his? yoongi really needs to be sure - wings down, stepping behind the teacup. he’s just about the same size. “you weren’t supposed to see me.”

yoongi stares.

two pale spots of pink appear high on his ears. the creature clears their throat. “could you close the door,” they start, sounding a bit out of place and almost embarrassed, “it’s kinda chilly, and i dont have any leaves.”

“what are you,” yoongi blurts, suddenly wide awake. he’s blinking and looking at a tiny human being in his cupboard.

for some reason he feels like he’s been transported to an alternate reality. this isn’t him right now; it’s one of namjoon’s psychoanalytical sessions, where he tries to get yoongi to be his test subject and yoongi says yes because one: he has no time for namjoon’s antics and two: he’s an idiot. the second one more than the first. that’s what’s going on - he’s dreaming, or, or going crazy, maybe this is the effects of drinking coffee for too long? if namjoon ever goes back to the science field of acadamia maybe he can write a fucking thesis on this -

“i’m jungkook,” says the tiny human being named jungkook with his wings - dear lord his wings - fluttering. “i was kinda sent to make you happy, but.” he shrugs here, and yoongi swears he can hear something tinkling again. he peers at his cabinet once more. “you’re boring.”

“boring,” yoongi repeats flatly. he can’t believe his ears. “a tiny pixie thing is eating my herbal tea and hiding in a teacup and telling me i’m boring.” he really needs to sleep.

“what’s a pixie?” jungkook asks, confused, and yoongi is amazed he can even hear him. despite being a couple of inches tall, he’s got a big voice. yoongi can hear him just fine, even if he’s not concentrating well. “anyways, i was just going to stay here for a while until i got a master plan, but all you do is stay inside and work on your music,” jungkook yawns here, walking to sit cross-legged in front of the overturned teacup. “and then i started to forget what i was doing and slept here for a long time. i think i woke up a couple weeks ago,” with a shy shrug, he goes, “sorry.”

“it’s okay,” yoongi says faintly, still confused as all hell. “so you’re. you’re real.”

jungkook blinks at him like he’s stupid.

yoongi allows his head to smack against the cabinet door. just this one time.

/

it takes a bit of time, but yoongi eventually convinces himself that this isn’t some hallucination - no, he didn’t smoke anything but his cigarettes last night, no, this is not some sick hangover delusion, there really is a tiny human being with wings that doesn’t know what a ‘pixie’ is but that’s the only word that pops up in yoongi’s brain when referring to him. he kind of reminds yoongi of that disney character in that one movie about lost kids. he’s sure that the name is somewhere in there, but he can’t seem to recall it right now.

jungkook tells him that he’s been wasting his herbal tea with a little bit of a stern voice. apparently he eats a lot of leaves and plants, and having a huge collection of them in yoongi’s cabinet was enough to keep him fed all these weeks. yoongi thinks that if he had to, he would finish those tea leaves in about an hour. jungkook is just about the size of his hand, dark hair quite soft, his little feet padding across yoongi’s palm tickling his skin when yoongi offers out a hand for him numbly.

he doesn’t touch his wings; they’re folded down, pointing toward the back of his knees, and he looks comfortable without spreading them out. yoongi sets jungkook down on the counter and he hops off his hand - his hand - before wincing at how cold the marble countertop is.

“you have roaches in here,” jungkook starts, edging away from something near the wall that yoongi can’t really see, “don’t you ever clean? they’re super scary.”

“you’re afraid of bugs?”

“not all bugs,” jungkook says in a defensive voice that really means yes i’m afraid of all bugs. “just. roaches are mean. a couple of them came into my cabinet and i had to push them out with stems. it was really annoying, because they kept clinging - “

and it hits yoongi; the roaches must be the size of dogs for jungkook. the image of it wants to make him laugh hysterically. he sits down on a spare chair in the kitchen from where he used it to get on top of the fridge recently to grab trash bags, and lets jungkook finish his story about the cockroaches. honestly. what is his life. what’s happening. in the last few minutes, jungkook has both talked a lot and none at all. whenever he’s not explaining anything, he falls into a silence accompanied by shifting feet and hands. almost like he’s nervous, or shy.

finally clearing his throat, jungkook runs a little so he can stand in front of yoongi. he kneels, like he’s looking down at a child, and goes, “do you feel okay?”

“do i what,” yoongi asks, startled out of his own thoughts.

“i mean,” jungkook says, and the two iridescent wings at his back give a little flutter, “you look like you’re about to faint, or something.”

“i’m fine,” yoongi mumbles, but even then, it sounds like he’s just saying the words to say them.

jungkook remains silent then, almost like he’s waiting for yoongi to truly be fine. he blinks and settles, cross legged, at the edge of the table as yoongi puts his head in his hands and takes in a deep breath. he blinks numerous times, squeezing his eyes open and shut, but when he looks up the tiny pixie creature is still there. yoongi pulls away and blinks at jungkook, suddenly feeling exhausted.

jungkook’s wings flitter. “how long has it been since you last slept, yoongi-ssi?”

yoongi swallows dryly. “i.”

jungkook trips a little as he takes into air, shaking his left wing as if he’s got something stuck in it. when he reaches up to somewhere near yoongi’s nose, he puts his tiny hands on yoongi’s forehead. something itches yoongi’s nose and he ignores the urge to sneeze. jungkook mumbles something too low for either of them to hear, and by the time yoongi is trying to figure out what happened, something in him almost - shifts.

jungkook pulls away, his hands fluttering over yoongi’s cheeks for a brief moment before he hovers in midair. there’s a curious, almost cautious look on his face; when yoongi focuses on him again, he finds that he can see jungkook much more clearly than he ever did before.

his eyes are wide and dark, big and brown. his honey brown hair falls in soft tufts across his forehead and his face is dotted with small moles - yoongi counts one underneath his lip, another near his eye - and he has a spatter of freckles across his nose. there’s an imperfect scar on his cheek that serves to highlight the soft curve of hair that falls that way. one moment is all it takes for the image to be burned into his mind; mouth pressed thin with worry, hand outstretched, almost like yoongi is there - life sized, standing right in front of him - before it disappears. he blinks and jungkook’s facial features are too small for him to see clearly once more; he only sees the far away likeness of a small person rather than the flaws of someone who is close enough for him to count moles.

yoongi’s shoulders slump. he feels - relaxed, almost, none of the disheartening tension in his shoulders. for the first time in a long while he feels like he can go to sleep peacefully without anything bothering him, without restlessness to take place in his bones. it’s not a lethargic peace he feels, but rather one of contentment. for a moment, there’s nothing wrong with the world.

“sorry,” jungkook says, his wings dipping a little with his supposed shame, “i haven’t been a good guardian fairy, have i.”

“huh,” yoongi mumbles, before snorting. “really?”

“yes, really,” jungkook says, not an ounce of sarcasm in his voice. he looks all genuine, sincere eyes and body motions. his hands fiddle behind his back. “i really shouldn’t have been away for so long. i’m sorry, yoongi-ssi.”

yoongi blinks. “honestly,” he starts, a little wry, “it’s okay.” he wants to say i barely even noticed but he thinks that that wouldn’t be a proper response as the moment.

“well,” jungkook starts, fidgeting a little, “it was my job, anyway, and i didn’t do it...”

yoongi doesn’t want to hear it. he sighs and squeezes his eyes shut, wondering what he deserved, exactly, to be here and experience this, but he doesn’t think he wants to know the answer. why does he need to assure a tiny human being that he’s fine, okay, with his existence? well he might have not been at first, but he’s gotten over himself. really.

jungkook flutters in front of him, and yoongi sets his hand out again. jungkook lands on it with a small moment. “hey, listen, i’m really fine. i didn’t really care - can’t really care about someone leaving if you never knew they were there in first place, right?”

jungkook nods a little, looking hesitant. his eyes move back toward the cabinet, almost like he wants to go back into his teacup. in the small moment of quietness and hesitation that follows, yoongi reaches out and takes the overturned teacup, setting it down next to jungkook. jungkook smiles.