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soulofapatrick · 2 months ago

Text

Between Battles and Breaths - Bodhi Durran x female reader

Summary: You can’t sleep, terrified of your enemy you’re facing tomorrow in the challenges and you find yourself seeking comfort in Bodhi

Warnings: None

Words: 2.6k

Y/N's POV

I can't sleep. The thought of who I’m up against in tomorrow's challenges has kept my mind racing for hours, churning over every possible scenario. My nerves are a live wire, and the gnawing certainty that this is one I’m not going to win gnashes at me. The others are better, faster, more experienced—and me? I’m just trying to make it through each day without making a fool of myself.

My feet drag across the floor as I pace, the creak of the wooden boards below me a repetitive comfort in the stillness of the night. I know I’ve practically worn a path into the carpet by now, walking the same few steps over and over, but it’s better than lying in bed, staring at the ceiling, waiting for the panic to consume me. With a huff, I finally stop and run a hand through my hair, frustrated.

I can’t do this. Not like this.

Before I can think twice, I grab my flight leathers, pulling them on with shaking hands. It’s reckless, stupid even, to sneak out so close to curfew, but if I stay in this room for one more second, I’ll go mad. The air feels thick, suffocating, and I need to breathe.

The dormitory halls are quiet as I slip out of my room on the first year’s floor, the faint hum of the academy settling for the night, a reminder that I should be too. But instead of heading outside like I’d planned, something draws me upwards, my feet carrying me to the second-year floor before I’ve even realised what I’m doing.

I hesitate at the top of the stairs, wondering what exactly led me here. I’m not even sure how or why I ended up in front of his door—Bodhi Durran’s door. But I stop there, my hand hovering over the handle. The smart thing would be to turn back. He’s the last person I should be bothering right now, with my nerves as raw as they are, but there’s a pull in my chest that won’t let me leave.

Through the narrow gap in the door, I catch a glimpse of him.

Bodhi lies there, his chest rising and falling with deep, even breaths. The dim light from the window barely touches his face, but it’s enough to see the peaceful, almost boyish look that settles over him in sleep. His sharp features, usually so intense, are softened in this moment of calm. Tousled dark hair falls across his forehead, and there’s something about the way his brow is relaxed, the usual storminess in his expression completely at ease, that makes him look younger than usual, more vulnerable.

I should go, I think, taking a step back, but the thought sticks in my throat when he stirs. The slight rustle of the sheets is enough to send my heart skittering, and before I can react, Bodhi’s eyes flutter open, dark and still heavy with sleep.

He squints at me through the dim light, confusion crossing his face as his gaze lands on me standing hesitantly in the doorway. For a second, I don’t think he’s going to say anything at all, and I wonder if I should just leave before he fully wakes up.

But then his voice, rough and gravelly from sleep, cuts through the silence. “What are you doing here?” His tone is low, hoarse, and it sends a shiver down my spine. It’s not accusatory or irritated, just… curious, like he can’t quite believe I’m standing there.

And in this moment, neither can I.

His dark eyes take in my appearance, sweeping over me with a sharpness that leaves me feeling exposed, bare. A crease forms between his brows as he pushes the blankets aside and sits up, the confusion shifting into something else, something that makes my heart beat even faster. Without a word, Bodhi swings his legs over the edge of the bed, the sheets rustling as they fall away, revealing his body—lean and muscular, his chest broad and defined. He’s only wearing boxers, and it takes everything in me not to let my eyes linger on the way his muscles shift under his skin with each step as he moves toward me.

I feel breathless, like the air has been sucked out of the room, replaced with a thick tension that presses against my chest. My throat tightens with nerves, and I force myself to breathe, but it’s hard to focus when he’s so close, when the sight of him leaves my thoughts scattered, my body anxious in all the right ways.

Bodhi stops in front of me, his presence overwhelming, his gaze dark and steady. For a moment, neither of us says anything, and the silence between us feels charged, like the crackle of a storm about to break. Then, slowly, his hand reaches for mine.

The moment his fingers wrap around mine, it feels like I’ve been set on fire. His hand is large and calloused, rough from training and fighting, yet somehow warm and steady. My pulse quickens at the simple touch, the anxiety in my chest twisting into something deeper, more intense. His thumb grazes the back of my hand, sending a shiver racing up my spine, and I bite my lip to keep from gasping aloud.

“Come on,” he murmurs, voice still thick from sleep, tugging me gently into his room. The door closes softly behind me, the click of the latch echoing in the quiet space. His room is dimly lit, the moonlight slipping through the curtains casting long shadows across the floor. It’s sparse, with only a few personal touches—a pile of worn books on the bedside table, his boots kicked off haphazardly near the window—but it feels so undeniably him. Practical. Focused. Just like Bodhi.

He leads me toward his bed, his hand still holding mine, and the closer I get, the more overwhelmed I feel. The air between us is thick with unspoken words, a tension that leaves my thoughts spinning. I’ve always had a crush on Bodhi—who wouldn’t? But I never thought he’d look at me like this, with an intensity that makes my knees weak, that leaves me wanting something I can’t quite put into words.

“Sit,” he says softly, guiding me to the edge of the bed. My legs feel shaky as I lower myself onto the mattress, and Bodhi moves to his knees in front of me. The sight of him kneeling there, his face inches from mine, sends a sharp ache of longing through my chest. It’s a position that feels intimate, almost too intimate, and I have to resist the urge to reach out and touch him, to run my fingers through his dark, tousled hair and pull him closer.

I’m still trying to process what’s happening, still trying to catch my breath, when Bodhi’s hands reach for my boots. He works in silence, deft fingers unlacing the leather with a skill that speaks of years spent in flight leathers himself. When he finally pulls the boots off and sets them aside, his hands return to me, grazing the skintight leathers of my pants legs as he slides his palms slowly, deliberately, up toward my hips.

The touch sends a rush of heat through me, my pulse quickening as his fingers trail higher, a soft, feather-light touch that makes my breath hitch. His hands find their way around my back, moving with purpose but not rushing, until his fingers find the lacings of the dragon armour my brother made for me before I walked the parapet.

He undoes them with practiced ease, and I feel the tension in my chest loosen as the bindings fall away. The weight of the armour lifts, but it’s nothing compared to the weight in my heart, the yearning that’s only grown stronger the closer Bodhi gets.

I’ve wanted him for so long, and now, with him this close, his touch so careful and his gaze so intent, I can’t help but wonder if he’s wanted me too.

Bodhi stands and lifts the now-loosened corset armour from my shoulders, handling it with surprising care before placing it neatly on the chair by his desk. The room feels heavier in the quiet after the sound of the armour settling, my heart beating wildly in the stillness. When he turns back to me, his eyes drop to my waist, his fingers hovering just above my hips. His gaze flickers up to meet mine, and for a moment, everything stills.

He hesitates, his touch light, asking for permission without words.

I nod slightly, barely noticeable, but Bodhi catches it, and as soon as he does, my hips rise instinctively. His fingers deftly find the buttons of my flight leathers, working through each one with an unhurried precision that makes my pulse race. The heat of his touch burns through the leather, and when he finally shimmies the pants down my legs and to the floor, the sensation is almost overwhelming—his hands, warm and firm, feel like fire in my veins.

Once I’m free of the leathers, Bodhi moves away from me, crossing the room toward the washroom. I watch him through half-lidded eyes as he disappears for a moment, only to return with a worn shirt in hand. He approaches me with a soft look in his eyes, holding it out like a peace offering.

The shirt smells like him. There’s a faint woodsy scent, warm and earthy, like pine and leather, mixed with the sharper tang of the wind that always seems to cling to him after a day in the sky. Beneath it all, there’s something uniquely Bodhi, something comforting, steady, that grounds me even as my mind whirls with everything happening between us.

He turns his back to give me some privacy, and I waste no time. My shirt and bra come off quickly, discarded without thought, and I pull his shirt over my head. It’s too big, falling to mid-thigh and swallowing me in its softness, the fabric still warm from his skin. I take a breath, letting the scent of him wrap around me like a second skin, comforting in a way I didn’t expect.

By the time I’m done, Bodhi is already shuffling around me, his movements slow and sleepy, but purposeful. He climbs back under the covers and without hesitation, wraps a strong arm around my waist, pulling me toward him. The warmth of his body presses against mine, the heavy weight of his arm a reassuring presence as he draws the blankets over both of us.

He’s close—so close I can feel the rise and fall of his chest against my back, the heat of him chasing away the lingering chill in the room. His nose brushes against the back of my neck, and I shiver, not from cold but from the sensation of him so near. Bodhi’s thumb rubs slow, soothing circles along my waist, and it’s enough to make my body relax, melting into the space between us.

“What’s got you up in the middle of the night?” he mumbles, his voice soft and rough with sleep. His breath tickles my neck, warm and steady, and I can’t help but smile faintly at the quiet concern in his voice, even half-asleep.

I don’t answer right away, too lost in the feeling of him holding me, the weight of his arm a comfort I didn’t know I needed. The anxiety that had gnawed at me all night is still there, but it’s quieter now, softened by the way Bodhi holds me like I’m something worth protecting.

Finally, I murmur, “Just… tomorrow.” The words are barely more than a whisper, but Bodhi seems to understand, his arm tightening slightly around my waist in silent reassurance.

Bodhi pulls me even closer to his chest, the steady rhythm of his heartbeat resonating against my back, anchoring me in this moment. His voice, still laced with sleep, drops to a low murmur, sending soft vibrations through me. “You’ve got this, you know,” he mumbles, warmth pooling in his words like honey. “You’ll kick their asses tomorrow.”

His confidence in me feels like a shield against the anxiety that had clawed at me all night. I can’t help but smile, feeling the tension in my chest ease just a little.

“And if that other guy tries anything outside the rules,” he continues, his voice dipping even lower, “he’ll have to deal with me.” There’s a protective edge to his tone that makes my heart flutter, the notion of Bodhi standing up for me sending a thrill through my veins.

He rests his chin atop my head, a gentle weight that feels comforting and safe. “You’re stronger than you think,” he adds softly, each word wrapping around me like a warm embrace. “Just remember that, and you’ll be unstoppable.”

In his arms, with his sweet reassurances washing over me, the fears that had once felt so insurmountable start to dissipate, replaced by a sense of calm. I close my eyes, breathing in the scent of him, feeling utterly enveloped in his warmth and unwavering support.

Just as I’m falling asleep in, Bodhi is nudging me gently, urging me to roll over and face him. I comply, shifting so that I’m looking directly into his dark, expressive eyes. His hand finds my cheek, his touch warm and inviting, and heat floods my skin at the contact. It’s as if his palm ignites a fire against my cheek, sending a shiver of warmth spiralling through me.

He studies my face for a moment, a soft smile playing at the corners of his lips, and then he leans down, brushing a barely-there kiss against my lips. It’s sweet, feather-light, and it leaves me wanting more. My heart races, and before I can think, my hands find their way into his dark curls, relishing the silky softness of his hair between my fingers.

But it’s that soft kiss that sends all coherent thoughts flying from my mind, leaving me breathless and craving. Bodhi deepens the kiss, tilting his head to fit us perfectly together, and the world around us fades away. The taste of him is intoxicating—warm, with a hint of mint and something uniquely Bodhi that sends a spark of electricity through me.

His lips move against mine with a gentleness that contrasts the intensity of my racing heart, each brush igniting a heat that spreads through my entire body. It’s as if he’s exploring, learning every curve and contour of my lips, and I’m lost in the sensation.

Every nerve ending tingles as he kisses me properly, the connection between us growing more profound with each passing moment. There’s a sweetness to the way he cradles my face, a tenderness that makes my heart swell. I can feel his warmth radiating through the kiss, wrapping me in a cocoon of safety and longing.

When he finally pulls back, our lips lingering just a breath apart, I can’t help but chase his mouth for just another taste, a whisper of connection that leaves me craving more. The air between us is electric, thick with unspoken feelings, and in that moment, I know I’ve stepped into something beautiful, something I never want to end.

Fourth Wing Masterlist - To be made Comment to be added to tag list

#bodhi durran #bodhi durran x reader #bodhi durran x y/n #bodhi durran x you #bodhi durran smut #bodhi durran fluff #bodhi durran agnst #fourth wing #fourth wing imagines #fourth wing bodhi durran #fourth wing boys #the empyrean #fourth wing x reader #fourth wing bodhi

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1moreff-creator · 2 months ago

Note

Is there some type of masterpost for all the crazy hidden stuff for Despair Time? like the hidden quotes, the Mai stuff, a comprehensive guide to LGI?

Well, there’s been a few really useful posts over the years. There’s the Secret Quotes, “All you have to do…” Page, Mai Quotes, About Page Text masterpost by despairing-disaster, which I must have visited 15000 times; accirax’s episode guide is a great resource even if it’s not exactly what you asked for; and at the risk of sounding a bit arrogant, I think my Mai post and my full LGI analysis video “A Full Vivisection of the David MV” are good for their respective subject, though they're more analysis than "masterpost". But, for the purposes of having it all in one place, here’s my

DRDT SECRETS MASTERPOST

Spoilers up to and including CH2 EP16

-About Page Text

The source code of DRDT's About Page holds (or held at some point?) the following text:

“You don’t understand, do you? I used to be like you. I barely remember, but I used to be like you. I cared so much about people, I cried everytime someone was hurt. I suffered for a long time stuck in here caring about people." "I know what you’re going through. You’re going to hold on as long as you have, with hope that you can make it out of here with everyone. Then you’re going to despair. That lasts a while, too." Then you’ll get bored. Like me. And you’ll wish you were still suffering. Anything else is better than boredom. "I wish I could feel something, anything else, other than being bored. I’m stuck in here for eternity, and I know everything that could possibly happen. I know how everyone reacts to a murder, what makes people turn to despair, what fills people with hope and make them survive until we all run out of food and starve to death." "I wish I could feel terrified, or afraid, or angry. But I can’t anymore. I don’t feel anything at all except boredom." Do you understand, Teacher? "This is why I’m letting you suffer as long as possible. Because it’s better than the alternative." I’m sorry. I don’t envy you. You’ll understand eventually.

(Note: The quotations marks are placed exactly as they are in the code, but the importance of this is debatable)

-Secret Quotes

Quotes hidden in the source code of each character’s personal page. Ordered here by the order in the cast list.

Teruko: It is an equal failing to trust everybody, and to trust no one at all. Xander: survivor guilt(n): feelings of guilt for having survived a catastrophe in which others died. Charles: If you forgot it, then it probably wasn’t important to begin with. None of those memories should ever be kept, anyway. Ace: I don’t know what to do with myself anymore. Arei: Because that’s what friends do. Rose: In the end, the only thing I can do is watch my wretched life go on. Hu: I want to pay for what I’ve done. But even then, I still want to live. Eden: You can’t go back, no matter how hard you try. Levi: I always believed that a person is defined by their actions alone. But maybe that’s just a poor excuse for my heartlessness. Arturo: You hated them, but even that doesn’t justify what you did. Min: I wanted to save you. David: I hate you, I hate you, I hate you. I wish you could just die. Veronika: Once something is broken, it can never be pieced together in quite the same way again. The same goes for people. J: Please don’t call me your daughter ever again. Whit: We tend to idolize the dead. Nico: Why should I own up for the mistakes that someone else made? MonoTV: Her name is Mai Akasaki.

-"All you have to do..." Page

By using MonoTV's quote to get the name, typing in https://danganronpadespairtime.tumblr.com/maiakasaki into search shows a page with this text:

“All you have to do is ask for my hand, and I’ll give it to you. Ask for my life, and I’ll give it to you as well. Don’t apologize for asking. I’ll give you my forgiveness too.”

(Bolded text highlighted for reading comfort)

Source code hides the following text:

“Are you still searching for a secret? For some explanation that will satisfy you? There’s no answer I can give you that will make you happy. Maybe I should have lied instead. I’m sorry.”

The bolded letters in this page gives you the code AOAVIEPKRO, which when typed in the same way as Mai's name (https://danganronpadespairtime.tumblr.com/AOAVIEPKRO) gives you the linked Mai Akasaki character page (you can also just Google it nowadays).

-Mai Quotes

Entering the Mai page displays, at random, one of the following quotes. The source code gives them an order and relates them to a specific character. Ordered here in the same way the code does it.

Teruko: Some years ago, she was searching for someone named 'Teruko Tawaki.' Charles: A girl who loves her family. Rose: She remembers everything that is important to others. Arturo: A girl who sees the beauty in everyone. Levi: A girl with a floral tattoo on her arm. Whit: A girl with many friends. Eden: She kept calling the number, even though no one picked it up. J: She kept it a secret, and told no one. Hu: A girl who wanted to keep everyone safe. Nico: Everyone confided in her. Ace: A girl who had a bright future. Arei: She doesn't like it when her friends fight. Min: An average girl with nothing special at all about her. Xander: She couldn't stand to do nothing. Veronika: A girl who didn't foresee the consequences. David: She forgives everyone. MonoTV: It's all your fault.

-Second Anniversary Secret Code

There are two columns, one with letters, a dot, apostrophes and spaces, across from the other, with numbers. By rearranging the "rows" in order (1-2-3...), you get "It's all your fault." (Dot included).

-Character Playlist

At one point, dev uploaded a playlist of sixteen songs, where each one was meant to be connected to one of the characters in some way. The playlist has been privated/deleted, so here’s a recreation made by venus-is-thinking. Below are listed the songs in the order they show up in the playlist, although it’s unclear if the order means anything or they’re completely randomized. I find the latter more likely btw.

-Diamond is Unbreakable from Jojo's Bizarre Adventure OST -Sing Along by Sturgill Simpson -RUNAWAY by half•alive -cartoons by Louie Zong -asymptotic by Louie Zong, Unofficial Extended Edit by Axolotl Dreams -アイアルの勘違い (A Mistaken Belief of Love) by Niru Kajitsu, cover by yama -春嵐 (Shunran) by John -イヱスマン (Yesman) by NILFRUITS, covered by Noristry and カケリネ (Kakerine) -アンデッドエネミー (Undead Enemy) by Suzumu and Giga-P, covered by 松下 (Matsushita) -Drawing Pins by Nothing but Thieves -ハイファイ進化論 (Hi-fi Evolution Theory) by 稀雨 ("Rare Rain") and ふぁるすてぃ (Farusti) -tip toes by half•alive -ポリゴナル (Polygonal) by ふぁるすてぃ (Farusti) -Spitfire (05 Version) by The Prodigy -desk rotation by HALLEY LABS -Good Grief by Bastille

******

Literature Girl Insane

Naturally this gets a whole section for itself. That said, I will ask that you watch Vivisection (linked above) for every visual detail, piece of text, color connection theory, language theory... basically everything that wouldn't be considered a puzzle or a code in some way.

-Footnotes

Numbers which appear attached to certain parts of text, which are referenced in the video's description to give them extra meaning. Refer to this post for images of all the footnotes, as well as a first impression analysis.

[Footnote Number] Description Text -> Text it's attached to in the video. [Time of appearance and link] {Notes}

[1] In this situation, it is better to use full names over nicknames. Exclude our protagonist—he is not “that person.” -> Now [1:22] {Crosswords puzzle}

[2] Other examples include Drosophila melanogaster and E. coli. -> an albino mouse, arabidopsis. [3:02]

[3] From Title 17 of the United States Code. -> A “derivative work” is a work based upon one or more preexisting works, such as a translation, musical arrangement, dramatization, fictionalization, motion picture version, sound recording, art reproduction, abridgment, condensation, or any other form in which a work may be recast, transformed, or adapted. A work consisting of editorial revisions, annotations, elaborations, or other modifications which, as a whole, represent an original work of authorship, is a “derivative work”. [2:18] {Tumblr why did you remove yellow you're fucking up my color scheme}

[4] The practice of avoiding the number four; it is most common in East Asia. This superstition arises from the fact that the number four can be read similar to the word “death” in multiple languages. -> subtract 4, due to tetraphobia [1:46]

[5] As the translation has been intentionally botched in many parts, it should not be considered accurate. -> (translation needed) [3:10] {The text is "(translation needed)", not that I need a tanslation :v}

[6] (Prayer) -> 🙏 [2:02] {Extremely small and almost invisible, bottom right of the hands}

[7] Seven is considered an auspicious number in many Western cultures. Let's just skip it. -> Mind [2:41]

[8] ‘Tut, tut, child!’ said the Duchess. ‘Everything's got a moral, if only you can find it.’ -/> N/A. This footnote cannot be found, as it is not in the video. [N/A]

[9] no respect for the classics smh -> So sing a degraded copy [2:07]

[10] The Roman numeral for 10 is X -> X [2:00] {Very small, top right of X}

[11] I admit to lying. There is no one named ••••• •••••. I am, and always have been, an only child -> suspicious gaps [1:32] {Still no idea what the hell is going on here}

[12] “Majority rule” is known to be the fairest method of making decisions for a group. That’s why murderers never complained when we voted for them to die -> Tallying votes… [2:02]

[13] 正 -> correct [2:40] {Refer to "Tally 5" for further information}

[14] Hint: word length of 256 -> = [3:52] {Refer to "Footnote 14 Puzzle" for further information}

[15] “Ignorance is bliss” is an idiom used to say that it is better to remain ignorant about certain harsh truths, in order to avoid causing oneself stress. The expression comes from a 1742 Thomas Gray poem (“Ode on a Distant Prospect of Eton College"): “Where ignorance is bliss, 'tis folly to be wise.” -> Remaining ignorant, isn't that "happiness"? [1:47] {Again excuse the lack of yellow}

[16] While it was originally intended to serve as a military march, today it is most commonly recognized for its association with circuses and tomfoolery. -> [sheet of music] [2:49] {The song referenced is "Entry of the Gladiators," so it's presumed that's what the sheet shows. I couldn't find an exact match, but online sheets look similar enough}

[17] Not a real word. Can't be found in any dictionary. -> Democratic-ly [2:00]

[18] A/N: soz not very good at drawing flowers lol!!! -> dandelions (weed) [3:04]

[19] A dialogue between two individuals that serves as a discussion of moral and philosophical issues. -> Will you forget what you've done, I wonder? [3:42]

[20] It is considered by many to be outdated, providing little-to-no insight on human nature. -> The Kübler-Ross model postulates that those who experience grief go through a s[] of five consecutive stages: [1:53]

[21] Deriving from the Latin phrase “Et cetera” : meaning “and other (similar) things”, “and so forth”, or “and the rest (of such things)” : abbreviated to etc., etc, et cet., &c. or &c -> etc. [3:48]

[22] The rest is silence. -> [4:21] {This footnote shows up on its own on a black screen, that's why there's no associated text}

-Roman Numerals

The crosswords attached to footnote 1 can be completed in the following way, attaching each character (minus David plus Mai) to a numeral.

Below are all the numerals, listed in numerical order. Refer to this post for images.

[Numeral] [Character] Text it's attached to *Background text* *Other background text* [Time stamp and link] {Notes}

[I] [Xander] (the world of abnormal sentiment dances) *I have always looked up to you* [3:50] {Refer to "Footnote 14 Puzzle" for further information}

[II] [Rose] Ego cogito ergo (turbatus) sum [1:34] {Translation: I think therefore I am (disturbed)}

[III] [Charles] If you doubt brittle things are broken *And now here’s my secret, a very simple secret. It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye* [1:37]

[IV] [Arei] Right now, why do you cry? [1:39]

[V] [Ace] Right now, why you go insane? *A cat has 9 additional lives* *I am but mad north-northwest. When the wind is southerly, I know a hawk from a handsaw.* [1:42]

[VI] [Arturo] mind exercises 1 2 3 4 [2:41]

[VII] [J] Do it like that, let’s live together! *The Moral La[w] causes the people to be in com[plete accord] with their ruler, so that they wi[ll f]ollo[w] [him] regard[less of] their lives, undis[mayed] by any danger* [2:10]

[VIII] [Nico] even if i try to think, idk!!! [2:44]

[IX] [Levi] look, aside from that, give me the usual medicine *[Extract from a scientific paper on Shoemaker-Levy 9]* [2:46]

[X] [Min] Democratic-ly *In the case of a murder, all survivors must participate in a class trial. During this trial, everyone must discuss and vote for one of the remaining participants as the "blackened" murderer* *👈👈* *👉👉* *🙏* [2:00]

[XI] [Mai] God is dead [1:48]

[XII] [Eden] ???: But you're in my way, aren't you? [2:28]

[XIII] [Teruko] or *Only the eyes belied this assumption. They were small, deep set and crafty. Not only that. As the man, making some remark to his young companion, glanced across the room, his gaze stopped on Poirot for a moment, and just for that second there was a strange malevolence, and unnatural tensity in the glance* *Those are the terms. To exchange all the goodness and grace of every life in Omelas for that single, small improvement: to throw away the happiness of thousands for the chance of happiness of one: that would be to let guilt within the walls indeed.* [1:55]

[XIV] [Veronika] Things like substance of the arts *subtract 4, due to tetraphobia* [1:44]

[XV] [Whit] Remaining ignorant, isn't that "happiness"? *subtract 4, due to tetraphobia* [1:46]

[XVI] [Hu] ???: Go and cry. [2:27]

Windings

At 0:35, windings text flashes on screen. It's the beginning of Never Gonna Give you Up by Rick Astley. Yep.

-"What is the most important thing?"

To this day the best answer we have to this is replacing each question mark with the corresponding letter of "RESOLVE." If you find something else, please tell me.

-Bullet-Finding

The MV tells us to find six bullets, but if you look at the top left book, it says "(hint: no you can't)" Here are the five bullets which can be found.

-Morse Code

At the end of LGI, the following Morse code flashes on screen.

-.-- --- ..- / … - .. .-.. .-.. / -… . .-.. .. . …- . -.. / .. -. / -- . / -.. . … .--. .. - . / . …- . .-. -.-- - …. .. -. --. / .. .----. …- . / -.. --- -. . .-.-.-

-… ..- - / - …. .- - .----. … / .--- ..- … - / ..-. .- -. - .- … -.-- --..-- / .. … -. .----. - / .. - ..--..

.. / … .. -- .--. .-.. -.-- / -.-. …. --- … . / - --- / -… . .-.. .. . …- . / - …. .- - / -.-- --- ..- / -.. .. -.. .-.-.-

.- ..-. - . .-. / .- .-.. .-.. --..-- / .. .----. -- / .. -. -.-. .- .--. .- -… .-.. . / --- ..-. / -… . .. -. --. / … --- -- . --- -. . / .-- .. - …. --- ..- - / -.-- --- ..- .-.-.-

Which translates to:

YOU STILL BELIEVED IN ME DESPITE EVERYTHING I’VE DONE.

BUT THAT’S JUST FANTASY, ISN’T IT?

I SIMPLY CHOSE TO BELIEVE THAT YOU DID.

AFTER ALL, I’M INCAPABLE OF BEING SOMEONE WITHOUT YOU.

-Footnote 14 Puzzle

(Solved by y-prime) (Apologies if I get any of the technicalities wrong, I'm not good with codes)

After Numeral I flashes on screen, you get a bunch of numbers, followed by an ampersand (&), more numbers, an equal symbol (=) attached to footnote 14, and a bunch of question marks. Footnote 14 is "Hint: word length of 256," and 256 is 2^8, which is 8 bits in binary. This tells us we need to get a binary code using the bitwise AND (&). If you're uninformed, I was too, but basically, & first transforms decimal numbers into 5 digit binary, giving the next values:

14631484268173741020143036451175923368636278930404923743082436772069705217326 -> 10000001011001001000000110101001101001011101100110010110101000111100010110110001110111011000010111100111110011001000001110110011101111011011110110101101100101011101000010100001110101011101000010000101111100111011110011000011111001111111110111010100101110

43607886503718811525798764321686495628071353085956330717581498375291444100526 -> 110000001101001001100000110100001100001011101110110010100100000011010010110110001111111011000010111100101110011011100100110110101101111011011110110101101110101011001110010000101111101011100000010100001110100011011110110000001111001011011110111110110101110

Note: The second value is actually 255 digits long in binary, the first is 254 (don't- do not ask me how this happens, it's what the decoder gave me). Arbitrarily, you have to delete the first 1 from the second value.

Then, & compares each number in the binary, and returns 0 if at least one of the values is 0, or 1 if both values are 1. This gives you:

10000001001001001000000110100001100001011101100110010100100000011000010110110001110111011000010111100101110011001000000110110001101111011011110110101101100101011001000010000001110101011100000010000001110100011011110010000001111001011011110111010100101110

Which is 254 characters, you need 256. Arbitrarily, add two 0s at the beginning of that final code. When converted from 8 digit binary to text, you get "I have always looked up to you."

(I hope you appreciate the detailed explanation it took me hours to figure out what y-prime did they're so much better at this than me T_T)

-Tally 5

(Originally solved, to my knowledge, by anderscim)

Although originally we weren't meant to share the solution, I think over a full year after the video, with Part 2 fully out, the embargo is surely over by now.

On the books in LGI, there is a QR code which takes you to https://danganronpadespairtime.tumblr.com/tally5. This page has only a text box where you can input text, and a title asking "Was I correct?"

The "Was I correct?" connects this to the "correct/incorrect" scene attached to footnote 13, which itself is 正, a Chinese symbol which can mean "just" or "correct." Additionally, this is a way that people in eastern countries tally up sets of five, the way you might see someone use something like 卌, which connects it to the infamous "tally5" URL.

Transcribe the text, and separate it in sets of up to five characters (hence the whole "tally 5" thing), and ignore line breaks (the end of line two has four at the end, completed by the d in row three. I more or less followed the line breaks for visual clarity). Pick the first number of each set, as highlighted below.

3aqxw 97pkt c8uki 458fb dpfoa cllex 2f07b f8mg2 4b4mp fx2a(d) c6v3f 5yhxj d8i7s f1l31 2zaj5 1azet 47jod 5jcze c5mvb 6bz2o 59r14 3sf2p e916s czen7 emvbl 55ehe 9iqb2 708tt 83482 c8tw3 c77gn 47ojc a634g bcfz0 0l6s6 47wwl akcn4 6bre1 e0eam 9

Provided you've done everything correctly, you should get39c4dc2f4fc5df2145c653ece5978cc4ab04a6e9. Put that in the "Was I correct?" text box and you get the following image (you will most likely only see the top part, but copying the image and pasting it elsewhere shows the text at the bottom as well):

I became a villain in pursuit of your dream.

I threw away my humanity for an ideal I couldn't understand.

But I don't regret it. To "regret" is to imply that I could have done anything else.

I never told you, but the truth is, I wasn't capable of ever becoming human in the first place.

So in the end, you are always-

****

-Notable Visual Details

This part is mostly subjective. If you feel something shouldn't be here or I missed something, it's because these are just the details I personally consider noteworthy, or I forgot to add something (I'm open to suggestions here). Also I'm ignoring LGI in this section otherwise I would need 15000 screenshots.

+Fork Fun

(From left to right: Pre-prologue scene of bloody hands, Xander's eye wound from the Trial 1 investigation, Eden CG from CH2 Ep13. The first shows a bloody fork on the table, Xander's eye wound is consistent with a slash of a fork, and Eden's hand is bloody, holding a fork)

+Teruko's Mystery Voter

(Voting results in each trial so far. Teruko received two votes in T1, and one in T2)

+Camellias (Unnamed Classmate and Mai connection)

(Left: Mai profile, her tattoo. Right: Bonus episode 2. Same flowers)

+Matching tattoo? (Teruko and Mai)

(Left: CH2 EP2 Teruko changing, a small black line can be seen on her left arm, similar to the stems of the flowers of Mai's tattoo. Right: Jacket off reference, a question mark is shown besides Teruko's left arm)

+Matching phone charms (Teruko and Mai)

(Left: Teruko's Monopad, CH2 Ep1. Right: Unnamed Classmate's phone, from Bonus Episode 1)

+Drawing on Teruko's Floor

(A drawing which appears on the floor of Teruko's room in CH2 EP3, and disappears in CH2 EP7)

+Whit's Hand Behind the Back.

(After the cast learns the elevator won't open after Levi gets shot, Whit pulls out his unhinged sprite, where he has his hand behind his back. Personally I don't find this important, but I'll feel stupid if it is and I didn't add it, so)

+Thanatophobia: Names on the graves.

(From left to right: "Elliot Cuevas", "Felicity Giles", "Taylor Riley." I promise it's easier to see when Tumblr doesn't compress the images. This is the main series way we get the names of Charles' brother, Arturo's sister, and Ace's old friend)

+(AltDRDT) Teacher's ID Card

(Transcript: "This ID card is the property of Hope’s Peak Academy. Use of this ID card by any person other than the rightful holder is prohibited. Report lost or stolen ID cards by contacted 555-483-7367.")

+(AltDRDT) XF and Min's matching pin.

(Yep, matching tie pin. Btw, Min doesn't have it in her Bonus Episode or the Sleepy MV. Did she only get this at the start of the killing game?)

-Potentially Important Posts

Nothing "secret," per say, but a compilation of some of the posts the dev has made which I consider to contain important information.

-CH1 QnA.

-Bonus Episode QnA.

-2 Year Anniversary (Already mentioned).

-Jacket off Reference (Already mentioned).

-CH2 PT1 QnA. Note: Certain answers were deleted. Here's a reblog with some of them, and below is a screenshot of a particularly interesting answer which was not saved by any reblog.

-Teruko's Brother Back Reveal (4 year anniversary).

---

That's everything I currently remember for now. If you feel I missed anything, feel free to tell me about it! I'll try to edit this post to remain up-to-date with all the insane stuff in this series.

Anyways, hope that's enough for the ask! Thanks for giving me an excuse to make this!

#drdt #danganronpa despair time #ask

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jackpiastri · 1 year ago

Text

helping hands – op81

oscar is sore from the race, and you'd do anything to help him feel better.

pairing: gender neutral reader x oscar piastri

genre: fluff

warnings: none

author's note: okay soooo today in an interview after the race, oscar was asked if the race was physical – and he answered "my neck's feeling it". and as you may know by now, i do very very much love his neck. so i thought to myself ".....i volunteer to give him a lil massage 🤭", and then this happened. shoutout to my love arms anon, this one's to us neck lovers (and all of you who we've managed to turn into fans of oscar's neck on our journey) <3

and again, this is not my actual blog. check out @httpiastri for more stuff :)

f1 masterlist

you’re standing in the hotel bathroom, wrapping yourself in a fluffy bathrobe after a long shower, when you hear his voice from the other room.

"can you come here for a second?"

the bedroom is dark when you step into it, the low light from the lamp on your bedside table being the only thing illuminating your lover. oscar is lying on his stomach on the bed, his face pushed deep into a pillow. his back rises and lowers with his breaths, the muscles of his upper body peeking out from the duvet covering his bottom half.

"what’s up?" you ask, sitting down next to him on the bed.

he shuffles a little and soon, his head is sideways on the pillows, eyes looking up at you. "my neck is killing me."

"i don’t think that position is making it better, love."

he lets out a groan, which is then followed by a moment of silence as you wait for him to say something. you let one of your hands drag along his shoulder blades, almost as if to help him speak, and his eyes close from the sensation. "could you help me out?"

your heart softens at the question. "of course." you move a little closer, your hand moving through his newly washed hair as if to tell him that you want him to look down again. once his head is in place, you move one of your legs over his body, settling right above his hips.

your hands slide along his back before reaching his neck. you dig your thumbs along the base of it, going all the way up to the back of his head before moving down again. it's soft at first, but your touches grow firmer as time passes, wanting to force his muscles to relax. you feel oscar easing up under your fingers and he hums, letting go of all stress and pressure of the weekend.

there's something so sweet, yet so sensual, about moments like this with him. the way the room is so still and quiet, except for the low sounds of pleasure leaving his mouth; the way his skin feels under your hands, soft and warm; the way your heart flutters when you remember that no one else gets him like this, only you.

there's something about it that makes you feel so connected to him – and he feels the exact same way about you.

your hands move down right below his neck, and then along to his shoulders, working on the little knots hiding under his well-defined muscles. he lets out a muffled sigh when you press on one specific spot and you smile to yourself.

this is far from the first time he’s asked you to give him some massage after a rough race; the amount of strain his body is put through during a race is obviously very high, so you are always happy to help him out. you would gladly massage him until your hands gave out, but he'd always stop you before they even started to get a little sore. just like now.

as your hands drape along the sides of his spine, he turns his head to the side again. his eyes are still shut, seemingly deep in pleasure even when your hands stop moving. "you are the best, you know?" he says, a slight smile taking over his lips. "thank you."

"you are the best," you counter. "otherwise i wouldn't be doing this."

you can feel the chuckle vibrating through his body before you hear it, and you can't help but grin back at him. he pushes himself up to rest on his elbows and he looks back at you before patting the space next to him on the bed. you climb off his frame, leaning down to lie in the same position as him.

his hand smooths over your cheek, pulling you forward to press your lips onto his. his fingers move down the side of your neck, under your robe, caressing your skin much like you'd done to him just moments before. it's another way for him to thank you.

he's so good to you, so sweet, so perfect – and you are so in love with him.

1K notes · View notes

whimsyfinny · 10 months ago

Text

Pairing: Dean Winchester x Reader

Summary: Charlie discovers the Winchester boys to be struggling with keeping the bunker tidy, looking after themselves and being able to do their job simultaneously. Luckily she has a friend who’s from a Hunter family that is in need of work and can help them with research. Or so she thought that’s what her job would be. When Dean sees your more domesticated side, his head won’t stop swimming with all the wrong ideas.

Slow burn, enemies to lovers, smut

Warnings: SMUT, the forbidden quickie

Chapter Word Count: 3548

—-MDNI—-

A/N: ahhhhhhhh I finally wrote some spice! Sorry it took a while. This is a little tame I guess but we can work up to the extra lewd stuff

——————————————————————

Please read the below first:

Prologue

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

I’m Not Your F*cking Maid

Chapter 6

The following day rolled around quickly and before we knew it there was only an hour remaining until the auction house charity event. The disturbing events of yesterday were pushed to the back of my mind, the boys respecting my wishes on not wanting to talk about it. Sam told us over breakfast that he’d managed to access the auction house database and add our names to the guest list for the party, making it easy for us to attend without getting caught out as uninvited visitors. Now back in my room, I was rummaging through my duffel and pulling out my evening attire: a long black dress made of soft satin that had a slit up to the hip on one side. The neckline was a deep v-plunge and the dress was entirely backless.

“I guess no bra for me tonight then,” I mumbled to myself, also pulling out a clean pair of black lace panties and a pair of closed toe, VERY high black satin heels that had a neat little buckle on the ankle strap. I was already showered and my makeup was already done so I dropped my towel and slipped into the dress, pulling the thin straps over my shoulders. I followed by pulling on my panties, stretching the lace over my hips so it wasn’t visible through the slit in the dress. If you didn’t know any better, it would look like I wasn’t wearing anything at all. I sat on the edge of the bed and put on the heels, securing them in place before standing up and doing a few practice laps of the room - wearing shoes this high was not a common occurrence for me. I finished up by dusting my skin with the same perfume I wore yesterday, breathing in the pleasant smell before tucking the bottle along with my rouge lipstick into my little black clutch. I fussed over myself in the mirror for a few minutes when I heard a knock at the door. Pacing over I flung it open to greet the Winchester boys, and when I did I couldn’t help but do a double take over the oldest brother. I hated to admit it but he looked good. REALLY good. He was dressed head to toe in black: a slim fitted suit, shirt and tie, all of which seemed to flick something on in my brain. His suit jacket hung open and beneath it the shirt was clinging to his well defined torso, the top two buttons straining a little.

“You scrub up well, Dean,” I said to him, trying to sound pleasantly surprised. Instead, I think I sounded incredibly flirtatious. Dean didn’t seem to notice though as I watched his jaw slacken and his eyes flit over my body.

“Uhhh-um yeah, thanks,” he said, clearing his throat a little as he stepped aside to let me out.

“You look great, (Y/n),” Sam said, making such intense eye contact with me like he didn’t know where else to look, his cheeks glowing a little.

“Thanks Sam,” I smiled up at him before locking the motel room door and trying to ignore the fact that Dean didn’t say anything. Back to being an ass I see.

“So (Y/n), you’re with Dean. It should be pretty simple: get in, get the hair pain, get out. With that many people at the event, we don’t want to risk anyone getting hurt so I'll be ready and waiting outside with everything we need to destroy it and put the ghost to rest,” Sam briefed us before carrying on, “I’ll head back to our room to get everything and I’ll meet you there - you guys get going,” he nodded his head to Deans car which was parked out front. Dean said a quick farewell and headed out and I did the same, giving Sam a wave as he turned to leave.

I climbed into the front of the Impala, running my hands over the plush leather seat.

“You really do have great taste in cars Dean,” I said, looking around at the immaculate interior. He hummed in agreement, putting his arm over the back of my seat as he reversed out of the parking spot. Those top two buttons on his shirt were not going to last all night. I crossed my legs, getting comfortable for the short journey into town - the satin of my dress falling open and completely exposing my thigh to Dean. I watched him take his eyes off the road and fixate on my bare skin, his knuckles turning white as he gripped the steering wheel. Returning his eyes to the road I saw his chest rise as he took a deep breath, a small but deep groan emitting from his chest.

“You ok?” I asked, quirking an eyebrow.

“I’m fine,” he rasped.

“Ok… you’re acting strange though,” I said, leaning on the passenger side door to watch the street lamps turn on.

“Can you blame me?”

“What?”

“Nothing.”

There was a few seconds of silence before he flicked on his cassette player and classic rock filled the car, bringing a smile to my ruby lips.

“Good taste in music too? I’ll be damned, you’ve got more of a personality than I thought.”

He scoffed a little before smirking, “there’s more to me than meets the eye sweetheart.” He looked over at me, green eyes piercing into mine with such intensity I suddenly felt a little warm. I looked away, quickly counting my lucky stars when I noticed we’d arrived.

Dean parked up and I reached for the door, however Dean stopped me from opening it.

“Wait,” his tone was authoritative as he reached a hand out to stop me, his rough fingers lightly grazing the soft skin of my thigh. Before I could even respond, he’d hopped out, slamming his door shut before striding around the front of the car to open mine for me. He held his hand out, which I grasped delicately and he pulled me to my feet.

“What was that for?” I asked, puzzled as he closed the passenger side door behind me.

“Just trying to keep up appearances for this shit-show,” he stated bluntly before he walked off ahead of me towards the front door whilst he left me to navigate the uneven cobbles in these death-trap shoes.

“Jerk,” I muttered under my breath, but he must’ve heard me because he turned around, sighed and held out his arm for me to take.

“Just ask if you need help,” he leaned in and said quietly, his face close enough that I could feel his breath on my skin. I sucked in a breath, which was a mistake as he smelt positively divine. He was filling my senses and I didn’t want him to.

We made it into the building with no trouble at all thanks to Sam’s hard work. The inside of the auction house was a grand spectacle indeed; with high ceilings, a chandelier made up of thousands of tiny pieces of crystal and two symmetrical mahogany staircases at the end of the entrance hall. It was busy, lots of people in expensive attire milling about and drinking equally expensive sparkly wine.

“Shall we get some champagne?” I turned and asked Dean, who chuckled slightly.

“You’re already more fun than Sam,” he said before whisking two flute glasses off a passing waiter and handing me one. We chinked glasses, laughing a little at how awkward all of this pomp and ceremony was for us before we both downed the expensive alcohol like shots. Dean winced slightly, handing his now empty flute back to the same waiter who gave him a concerned look.

“Aw damn, those bubbles - that shits wrong.”

“That’s because you’re supposed to sip it,” I laughed at him, placing my empty glass on an old polished oak sideboard.

“Then why did you neck it too if you knew?” He asked, furrowing his eyebrows at me. I shrugged.

“To be honest I don’t know - I guess I wanted to lighten the old-money mood in here.” He nodded, seeming to understand where I was coming from. After that fiasco we made our way towards the immense curved staircases at the end of the room, Deans hand occasionally touching my exposed back as he guided me in front of him, making me shiver involuntarily. We ascended, making our way up and past people who were at the top of the stairs, idly chatting and leaning on the bannister - not paying us any mind as we turned down a quiet corridor. We walked quietly, the hum of chatting remaining behind us as we made our way down the dim corridor, looking out for the room number Sam had given us.

“Room 19, room 19, room 19…” I chanted to myself searching every door until we found the right one. Coming to a stop, Dean quickly knelt down and pulled a lockpick from his pocket. I watched in fascination as he inserted the device, ever so gently manoeuvring it with a look of pure concentration on his face. I couldn’t stop myself from looking over at him whilst he was unaware; looking at those focused and hooded dark green eyes, slightly parted lips that he wet with his tongue and large muscled shoulders that were almost as wide as the doorway. I didn’t want to admit it, but God damn he was attractive. There was a click and he stood up quickly, pocketing the lockpick and opening the door, hurrying me inside. I walked gingerly into the room which looked like a mixture between a study and a museum. There were large bookcases spanning the walls, sideboards boasting an array of intriguing items, all contained in secure glass cabinets, and finally a large leather-topped mahogany desk in the centre of the room. This place smelt old.

I heard Dean close the door behind him as he paced in after me, immediately scanning the room.

“Right,” he said, his tone stern and authoritative, “you take that side and I’ll take this side.” I nodded, immediately scouring every surface for our haunted item.

We must’ve been looking for around ten minutes when Dean called me over.

“Do you think that’s it?” He almost whispered, pointing to an item that I would definitely have described as a jade hairpin.

“Yup,” I whispered back, leaning slightly closer to him so I could get a better look. I felt him draw a sharp breath in before sighing slightly. “Can you pick this lock?” I asked, ignoring his antics and sticking to the business at hand.

“Yeah give me a second and I’ll get it open,” he stepped in front of me. Not wanting to get in his way, I walked into the centre of the room to where the desk was and leant against it, looking around at all of the bizarre items. Surely there are some other haunted things in here other than what we came for. My eyes eventually landed on an old gramophone.

“Oh that bitch is definitely haunted,” I mumbled to myself right as I heard Dean pop the lock on the glass cabinet. I watched as he wrapped the hairpin in a square of fabric before shoving it into his pocket and clicking the cabinet closed.

“Mission complete,” he said, a slight grin on his lips as he walked to stand in front of me. That grin fell from his face though when suddenly there were voices outside the door and keys rattling in the lock. We hadn’t planned for this. He looked at me in a panic.

“Kiss me,” I blurted.

“What?”

“I have a plan: Dean just fucking kiss m-” it was like I didn’t have to tell him twice before he had a hand in my hair and his lips were on mine. My heart started pounding and his mouth was hot against my cool skin. I hummed, sliding my fingers up his chest to grip the lapels on his jacket, pulling him further in towards me. Before I could get sucked into whatever it was that I was feeling, the study door flew open and two older gentlemen in brown tweed suits walked in, stopping in their tracks at the sight of us.

“Good heavens! What are you doing in here?” One of them exclaimed. Dean turned his head to look at the men, a smirk on his face and I couldn’t help but blush furiously at the sight of my lipstick that was now smeared on the corner of his lips.

“So sorry gentlemen, the door was unlocked so we just let ourselves in. I hope you don’t mind…” I watched, my eyes widening a little as he lifted his jacket slightly, showing the gun that was tucked into his belt. The men’s eyes also widened and they backed up towards the door.

“Yes, yes! Of course you did! Please, take your time. Just…” the man paused, his eyes darting to the precious items on his desk, “please try not to make a mess - it’s all I ask.” And with that they both left as quickly as they arrived, closing the door behind them. I let out a sigh of relief, looking up at Dean.

“Thank fuck… Dean I’m so sor-” I didn’t have a chance to think as Deans mouth was back on mine; rough and needy. I sat in shock for a second before being pulled back to reality when Dean held the side of my face, his fingers sliding up to tangle with my hair. I couldn’t stop myself from kissing him back, my mind racing and going blank simultaneously. His free hand ghosted up my exposed leg, touching so gently I could barely feel him. He soon decided though that gentle wasn’t working for him, and he gripped my thigh, his fingers digging into my soft flesh and making me gasp - his hands on my body were already working their magic as I couldn’t stop his name from leaving my lips.

“Dean…” I moaned. I can’t believe it - I had actually moaned his fucking name. He groaned into my mouth, obviously liking the sound of his name rolling off my tongue. Tearing his hand from my hair and gripping my other thigh, without warning and with rushed movements, he lifted me with ease so I was sat atop the desk.

“Wrap your legs around me darlin,” he said with a deep lustful tone against my lips. I whimpered involuntarily as I did as he said. He pried his mouth from mine and started to kiss elsewhere; my cheek, behind my ear… my neck. I ran my hands over his shoulders and up the back of his neck, running my nails over his scalp and making him shiver. I gripped his hair and yanked, forcing his head up. I locked eyes with him, his eyes no longer that brilliant green but now blown and black with lust. My own eyes were probably no different. His gaze fluttered from my eyes to my lips, and before I let him kiss me again I leant forward and pressed my lips to his throat, my tongue on his skin. It was his turn to moan as I reached a hand down and traced a finger up the hard weapon growing in his pants. His large hands moving from my thighs to my ass, gripping tighter than ever before as I seemed to be pushing all the right buttons. He slid me to the edge of the desk so my lace-covered intimates were pressing right against him, friction and pleasure commencing. I pulled my lips from his throat before tugging his face down to mine, instigating the finale. I spoke breathlessly over his lips, already craving the taste of him again.

“Are you gonna fuck me or what, Winchester?”

Dean practically growled, frantically fumbling with moving my dress aside. He hooked a shaky but skilled finger into my underwear, trying to pull it aside but the elastic wouldn’t allow for it. I began to tremble as his digits kept ghosting over my most sensitive area. He soon gave up with his first plan, and his second plan made my eyes roll into the back of my head. Dean pulled a large hunting blade from inside his jacket and slid the flat side against my skin and up my thigh until it was under the lace fabric. The ice cold metal made me shiver before he swiftly sliced the blade up towards him, cutting my panties to shreds as he repeated the motion on the other side.

“Fuck that was hot,” I panted as he put the blade away and captured my lips again, running his tongue over mine. I gasped suddenly when he dipped a finger inside me, curling it and caressing that soft, sensual cushion that was hidden away. When I moaned, he added a second finger, leaning away from me slightly so he could see what a mess I was beneath him. After a few moments of utter bliss, he pulled his fingers out, sticking them straight in his mouth.

“You’re fucking delicious,” he groaned, standing up straight to shimmy out of his jacket. I leant forwards, grasping his belt buckle, undoing it and pulling down his zipper. Slowly I reached in and pulled him out of his boxers, his rock hard manhood hot and heavy in my palm. He closed his eyes as I ran my thumb over the tip, guiding my hand up and down, up and down, again and again until he grabbed my wrist.

“Let go so I can fuck you ‘til you can’t walk,” he practically growled, making me weak. I leant back on my palms, watching as he lined himself up and then disappeared inside me in one earth shattering motion. My eyes rolled back and my lips parted as I locked my ankles instinctively behind his back, my heels catching on the gun still tucked into his pants. He started to set a rhythm as he fucked me into the desk, the wooden structure sliding back with every thrust he made. He had both hands firmly planted on the desk beside me and I gripped his forearms tight, my head starting to spin from the overwhelming pleasure. It didn’t help that Deans head had dropped into the crook of my neck and his heavy breathing was like music to my ears. He kissed the skin there softly, drawing a moan from my lips with the sudden tenderness. The pounding was speeding up, and he suddenly wrapped an arm around my waist, desperately trying to get closer - to get deeper. The need for release was building and I’d lost control of my voice; Deans name tumbling from my lips like a prayer. I pressed his lips to mine feverishly, his breath ragged as he managed to pant out;

“Shit, (Y/n) I’m so close… I’m gonna need you to cum for me…”

I whimpered at the sound of my name on his breathless lips and he let go of my waist, placing his large palm on my stomach and sliding it down until his thumb connected with that bundle of nerves.

“Shit-Dean-,” whining against his mouth I started to feel the tension in the pit of my stomach build - the feeling of him pounding into me and stretching me more than ever before combined with his thumb on the magic button was a recipe for a quick release. And Dean knew that. He was fucking me so hard now that the sound of wet skin on skin echoed around the room and the banging of the desk could surely be heard from out in the corridor- maybe even downstairs. That knot was tightening, and tightening, and tightening until:

“Fuck- Dean I’m gonna cum!”

“Fuck,” was all he managed to groan before I shattered around him, that knot snapping and sending me into probably the best orgasm I’ve ever had. As I tensed up I pulled Dean over the edge with me and he buried his face into my neck, breathing heavily and cursing occasionally.

We stayed like that for a few moments, regaining some clarity and returning to earth. He took a few deep breaths before standing up and pulling out, tucking himself back into his pants and doing up his belt as his cum dripped down my thigh. He couldn't seem to look away, even when he reached for his jacket on the floor and put it back on.

“Stay there,” he said finally, disappearing behind some shelves for a second before returning with a box of tissues. He helped me clean myself up, tossing the tissues in the bin as we attempted to get rid of the evidence.

“Are you ok?” He asked sincerely, concern in his eyes as he offered me his hand. I smiled a little bashfully, placing my palm in his.

“I hate to admit it but I feel great.”

He helped me down off the table, placing a hand on my waist to help steady me on my still trembling legs. We both stood in a comfortable silence for a few moments before realisation hit us both and we looked at each other with wide eyes.

”Oh shit - Sam!”

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Up Next:

Chapter 7

#dean x female!reader #dean winchester x you smut #dean winchester x reader smut #dean x y/n #dean winchester x you #dean winchester x reader #dean x you #dean x reader #dean winchester smut #dean winchester #smut #eventual smut #dean winchester enemies to lovers #enemies to lovers #slow burn

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wreckedandpolemic · 5 months ago

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dancing is a dangerous game - matty healy

(mdni) in which a last-ditch attempt to garner respectability may just hold the key to your lovelorn heart after all... 10910 words.

warnings: fingering, oral (f receiving), period-typical misogyny, excessively purple prose

You snap the Society Papers shut with a huff, glowering at your mama over the top of the paper. As if it weren’t bad enough to be married off to some stranger, must the entire ton know about it? You already know what they’ll say; false compassion murmured behind fans, just loud enough for you to hear. Poor thing. Three seasons out, the family must be getting desperate. That marriage is sure to be a loveless one. Perhaps there’s something… not all there about the girl. Your fists clench, blinding anger rising in you the longer you stew over your predicament. Sold off like cattle to a man you don’t even know, your entire marriage a spectacle in which you’re an unwilling performer.

Well. You know Lord Healy, in much the same way a chamber-maid knows her mistress. You remember him well, his last season your first, every girl in your set tripping over herself to catch his eye. You remember him as handsome, certainly, but little else; not worldly or clever, not remotely interested in propriety or the role he long should have stepped into by now. Content to just lounge about, rakish, his utter lack of interest in taking a wife had only served in making the mamas more ambitious and their daughters more desperate. Then, as the season came to a close, he had announced his distaste for polite society and disappeared, ostensibly to travel the world.

His return had already been sure to cause a stir, not in the least after his mother had sent yours a letter you can only imagine to be pleading for you to take him off their hands. The news had spread fast, gossip travelling faster than wildfire among the gentry, and you can’t imagine the bedlam he’d been greeted with when he docked has made him any more amenable to the idea than you are. And yet, you can hear gravel crunching under wheels and hooves, your skirts splayed out and arranging you into a perfect, demure little picture as the shackles you’ll wear for the rest of your life stroll up the steps to your door.

“You’ve a caller, my lady,” says the maid, curtsying hastily as you wave a hand to have her beckon him in.

Getting to your feet as he enters, your breath catches slightly in your throat. He’s more handsome than you remember, once-cropped curls now loose in a halo around his head, the silver in one ear standing out starkly against the dark backdrop. His sleeves are rolled up, and… good Lord, does he have a tattoo? As if you weren’t enough of a laughing stock to the ton, the only man willing to have you is a pierced, inked rake whose defining characteristic is flagrant disregard for the aristocracy. He holds his hand out to your mama, bowing politely. “Lady Marlowe. A pleasure to see you again.” His voice is smooth and rich, yet tinged bitter, expensive coffee poured over your senses.

You curtsy to him as he turns to face you, taking your hand in his own, calloused from hard work and smudged with ink. “My lord,” you murmur, eyes to the floor as he lifts your hand to his lips, warm where they meet your skin. Something sparks between you, flaring to life as you meet his eyes.

“Miss Marlowe. So lovely to finally make your acquaintance. I was rather… shocked, to return to England and find myself betrothed, but I suppose I ought not see a woman so beautiful as you as anything less than a blessing.” You flush, swallowing hard. Of all the reactions you might have expected from your first meeting, this certainly isn’t a turn of events you could have predicted.

You give a high, tinkling laugh, polite and artificial. “You flatter me so, my lord. I am not deserving of such–”

“You certainly are,” he interrupts, his smile disarming. Your traitorous heart longs to trust in his honeyed words, your rational brain desperately beating out the smoke before anything can catch alight. “Would you care for a turn about the garden? I find it so stifling to be cooped inside on days like this.”

With your mama following at a distance, you loop your arm through his and allow him to lead you through the garden. The last lingering raindrops clinging to the grass wick into your skirts, cold and grounding as they brush against your stockings. “My lord,” you begin, low enough that your mama won’t overhear.

“Matthew, please. I have spent three years travelling the world simply as Matthew, and I’ve taken quite a liking to it. Lord Healy sounds to me like someone rather tiresome.” The nails of your free hand bite into your palm. It’s all very well and good for him to flout every maxim of polite society, scoff and bite his thumb at whomever he likes; you don’t have that luxury.

You’d been perfectly happy to live as a spinster, well-learned in the thin line you’d have to tread for the few remaining years before the season closed its doors on you, and you resent that he has the luxury of walking out of his own volition, that open arms were waiting for his return. “That isn’t proper, my lord,” you reply, clipped and irritable.

Lord Healy’s answering smirk is exactly what you’d expect, louche and irreverent. He leans close, and you shiver. “Fuck proper.” You give a shocked little gasp. “Listen, darling. I can tell there isn’t anywhere in the world you’d like to be less than here, but I’m afraid this is our lot. The way I see it, proper’s what’s trapped us like this. Won’t you break the rules with me? It can be our little secret.”

He smiles earnestly, and you feel a sick sense of guilt even as you swoon. So charming and handsome that he could have had any woman he liked, now saddled with a girl best known for being a lost cause. And yet there’s something undeniable and sincere in his eyes, and you find yourself meeting them boldly. “Very well, Matthew. I suppose a little secrecy never hurt anyone.”

“Well, I’m glad that we settled that. I suppose if we’re to spend our lives bound together in matrimony, we ought get to know each other. Tell me about yourself, love, please.”

You smooth your skirts, the practised spiel springing easily to your lips; the laundry list of qualities that might make you a suitable wife, a successful mother. “I am accomplished on the pianoforte. I am fluent in French. I am talented at needlework.” You don’t even attempt to sound as if you care for any of it.

Matthew makes a short, disparaging noise. “That all sounds… incredibly dull. I feel as though you agree, love. I want to know what you enjoy, not what you think might please me to hear.”

A flush creeps up your chest, a traitorous stain high on your cheeks. You aren’t certain whether that question has been asked of you once in the last ten years. “I am… an amateur novelist, I suppose. I was, in youth, a skilled fencer, although I am out of practice, to say the least.” The admission feels tight as it escapes you, a confession that belongs buried in the drawers of your writing-desk under piles of correspondence and spilled ink.

Matthew smiles, boyish and almost fond. “A fencer. You must remind me to cower behind you, should we ever encounter bandits.”

Scowling, you slip your arm out of his and fold it across your chest. “If you were going to tease, I don’t know why you would ask.” That butterfly of hope you had foolishly allowed to flicker in your chest is snuffed out, and you curse yourself for even letting it take root in the first place.

A warm, concerned hand rests against your arm. “I’m sorry, love. I didn’t mean to be hurtful.” He draws a deep breath, tipping his head back and exhaling slowly before he speaks. “I know this isn’t remotely how either of us pictured spending this time. But, truly, I am trying to make the best of a bad situation. I’d like to make this as painless as possible for the two of us, so I implore you to humour me, just for a little while. And I promise, if the thought of being my wife still reviles you by the time we’re wed, you’ll live out your days wanting for nothing with as much freedom the constraints of society allow you.”

His words are sweet, flowery, surely born from the ink staining his hands. On the surface, it sounds a charmed life, an ideal outcome; to you it’s nothing more than empty words, the bitter taste of arsenic disguised in sweet almond marzipan. You’ve long accepted living without love, made your peace with the pitying looks of the ton, and yet he presents you with further ways you might be humiliated, arranges them on a silver platter like you wouldn’t notice the rotting centre.

You aren’t an imbecile. You understand what such a marriage would mean for your already-tattered reputation. You can practically hear the murmurs, read the gossip rags, feel the prying stares. Can you believe it? The new Lady Healy couldn’t keep her husband’s interest for even a month. I can’t say I’m surprised. Always an odd one, wasn’t she, like a repellent of the opposite sex. Certainly, you’d be free, with your husband in any bed but your own, but free only to wither and rot in the darkness of his country home with only a swaddled heir for company.

It’s been too long since you’ve spoken, Matthew expectant at your elbow. “I don’t believe I have much of a choice, my lord,” you murmur faintly, and his face falls.

Your conversation is stilted, polite but stiff as you make your way back to the house. At the door, Matthew bows to you, lips warm against your hand. “Please, think on what I have said. I eagerly await seeing you again.”

No sooner has he climbed into his carriage than your mama practically accosts you trying to climb the staircase. “Well?” she demands. “What on earth did he say to you?”

You sigh, fighting the urge to bury your face in your hands and scream. “Not an awful lot, mama. That is what happens when you attempt to force a rake and a spinster into matrimony.” Folding your arms across your chest, your mama presses her lips into a thin line, displeasure etched into her features.

“You are not a spinster, dear.”

You scoff. “No thanks to you. I hope that whatever agreement you reached with the Healys is worth the cost of my happiness,” you say bitterly, not staying long enough for your mama to formulate a response and sweeping up the stairs. For the best part of an hour, you sit at your writing-desk, quill poised above parchment, writing and scratching out the same handful of words over and over in a Sisyphean rhythm. By the time you decide to give up and go to bed, ink-stains blotch your hands and bloom across your skirt with nothing at all to show for it.

Your sleep is restless, dreaming of engagement rings looming into shackles, binding at your wrists and ankles. Matthew’s smirk and his honeyed words drift through your dreamscape, a cruel torment disguised as remedy. Relief fills you as sunlight slants across your bed, your eyelids cracking open and letting you shake off the dream. You sluice cold water across your face, scrubbing the sleep from your eyes gratefully. Naturally, though, your relief is short-lived, your mama bustling into your room with three housemaids in tow, far too chipper for the hour.

“Good, you’re awake. Come, we are to the modiste this morning,” she says firmly. Resistance is futile, so you stand, letting yourself be primped and squeezed and poked at until you at least resemble a respectable lady. You rattle through the streets of London, the bustle of the city only serving to feed your longing for the worn paths and quiet streets surrounding your country house.

You hesitate deliberately at the door to the modiste, long enough that your mama scowls in frustration and seizes your arm harshly to drag you inside. The seamstress bustles over, your mama immediately lighting up and engaging her in conversation about the quality of her fabrics. Quickly, you tune it out, wandering idly across the shop floor. A hushed conversation drifts into your ear, and you pretend to be admiring the bolts of fabric stacked to the ceiling as you inch closer to its source.

“...Cannot imagine he’ll stay that way,” says a first voice, high and haughty. “Lord Healy was always the rake of his set, and has since travelled the world, surely… sampling many worldly women on his travels.” She pauses to allow her companion to titter snidely, giving you time to place her voice; it belongs to Evelyn Mountfitchet, a girl your age who had married in her first season, her tongue sharp and cruel, weaponised with her seemingly endless stores of gossip. Her companion, then, must be her sister Elizabeth, surely thrilled to be out in society and now privy to scandal. “I tell you, he’ll take what he wants from that girl, then leave her ruined and without a ring. It wouldn’t even be the first time,” she adds smugly, and you feel a pit open up in your stomach.

You hadn’t even considered the possibility of such a scheme, and now you feel even worse the fool for not seeing it. Everything dichotomous about him clicks into focus as if Evelyn has lifted opera glasses to your eyes. It couldn’t be plainer — his sweetened words, promising what he surely knew he couldn’t provide; his disinterest fading into persuasion as he determined you a desirable, susceptible target. You’re trapped, utterly and completely, worse than you’d thought. Until moments ago, the worst-case scenario had been living with a husband who carried on behind your back, with at least the respect tied to being a lady to cushion the blow. This is worse than you could have imagined. Lord Healy is going to leave you utterly ruined, whether you give yourself up or not: if that is precedent, that will be what the scandal sheets announce, that will become gospel to the ton, leaving you cast out, dishonourable, utterly unmarriageable. You won’t even be able to retire peacefully as a spinster with the stain that will stick to you.

“My goodness!” gasps Elizabeth, shocking you back to the present. “Who is the poor girl?” She sounds eagerly scandalised, a voracious little gossip-monger in the making.

Evelyn makes a non-committal sound. “I know not. The family are being ever so tight-lipped. Although, I suppose I should be, too, knowing my fate was either to have my daughter married off to or ruined by a man like him. Do you know he has tattoos? As if he were a shipyard worker or some other such lowlife,” she scoffs bitingly.

“He is ever so handsome, though. Perhaps the girl is so vile of face that his progeny will save the family from ruin. Or overwhelmingly poor, and they–” Elizabeth’s excited diatribe is cut off by exaggerated hushing, and you slowly sink into a chair as you attempt to process all that you’ve heard.

“You shouldn’t speculate so. Not where anyone could hear, at least.” Evelyn’s smirk is audible. “It is most likely that the family are simply desperate, that the girl failed to capture any man’s attention in her seasons, and must be married before she winds up in spinsterhood.” She pauses to giggle. “Perhaps it is the Marlowe girl.” Your blood runs cold. “Pretty enough, I suppose, but ever so odd. Fits the bill exactly, I’d wager.”

Nausea roils in your stomach. Having the news broken at a debutante ball would have been scarring enough, even with dozens of other girls for the vultures to circle. But having it found out early, allowing the scandal sheets days to pick over you and your history before you even set foot in a ballroom? It’s the stuff of nightmares. Delicate footsteps pick their way toward you and you scramble to stand, ducking around a corner to escape from view. No such luck, though. “Darling, where did you go?” your mama calls, obnoxiously loud. “I must see how this fabric will look against your complexion.” Face flaming, you pick your way back to your mama and the seamstress, letting them drape a delicate lilac silk across your shoulders.

“Oh, how wonderful you shall look, miss,” the seamstress declares. “Your engagement shall be the talk of London, I will make sure of it.” Your heart sinks, so fast and far that you’re sure it lays in two pieces in your slippers, Evelyn and Elizabeth exchanging a proud, shocked glance, and you know for certain you’ll be plastered across every gossip sheet in London the instant they come off the press.

You grit your teeth. “Yes, I am certain it will.” Your voice comes out scraped over gravel, your venomous glare in the sisters’ direction most definitely not helping matters. The dresses you paid for will be beautiful, to be sure, but hardly worth the stinging slap of humiliation you endured to get them.

When Lord Healy calls on you the next evening, you don’t even attempt to hide your scowl, listless as he attempts to ply you with flattery while leading you into the gardens. “News of our engagement will reach the gossip rags by morning,” you warn, tone flat and eyes directly forward, lest he disarm you with that deceptively sweet smile of his.

“Bollocks,” he swears. “Nobody in this godforsaken city can mind their fucking business.” His jaw clenches, furious, and you hate yourself a little for how undeniably attractive you find the emotion on him.

“Must you be so vulgar?” you snap. “Are you not putting me through shame enough for your selfish goals that you think it fair to humiliate me even before this farcical engagement meets its end?” The words come out bitter, corrosive and acrid on your tongue, genuine hurt written across Lord Healy’s face. “My lord,” you add poisonously.

His nails dig into your arm, halting you in your stride and forcing you to face him. “Are we really back to my lord? Damn. I had thought you might be warming up to me.” He throws you a grin that you’re sure makes the women he’s used to weak in the knees. When it doesn’t work, he switches tack. “Look, love. I don’t know what you’ve heard to make you think so lowly of me. I would have thought you of all people would know not to believe the scandal sheets, but–”

“Do not patronise me,” you hiss, wrenching your arm from his grip. “I know that you were engaged before, that you ruined some other poor girl. I know that you plan to do the same to me. I plead that you at least allow me some final months of dignity before you leave me with nothing.” Something sour has rooted in your chest, decaying from the inside out; your insides withering to match your reputation.

To your surprise and disgust, Lord Healy tips his head back and laughs. Revolted, you start to turn away, and he reaches his arm out. “That’s what this is about? Love, you couldn’t be more wrong. I was never engaged, I was courting the girl.”

“Oh, well, I’m ever so glad that was clarified. I suppose it shouldn’t matter, then.” Anger is boiling in your veins, his flippant tone only serving to further enrage you.

Lord Healy takes your hands, his skin soft and warm against yours. “If you’d let me finish,” he scoffs, but there’s fondness colouring his tone. His wide, brown eyes shine earnestly, and something convinces you not to pull away. “That girl was a friend, and I was doing her a favour, I swear it. She needed a way out of the ton, all its rules and restrictions, in order to live and love freely. And she is. Much happier these days, lives a more honest life than this.” He waves his hand, collecting your house and gardens in one insouciant motion. “I’ll take you to meet her someday, if you like. If you won’t be too scandalised by the kind of unsavoury company I keep,” he adds with a smirk, and some of the ice in your veins thaws.

Really, you have no reason to trust Evelyn Mountfitchet over him, spiteful woman that she is. Mollified, you slide your arm back through his, and his relief is palpable. “I’m not such a delicate flower, you know.” You pause, weighing your words carefully. “That was a kind thing to do for her, knowing what the scandal sheets would say.” You’re certain you know what sort of love the girl wanted, to necessitate such a sure and dramatic departure from polite society, and it’s a comfort to know where he stands in regard to such relationships. “I think that, perhaps, if it is til death that we may part, we ought to be friends,” you say cautiously. Matthew’s answering smile is brilliant, so dazzling that your heart melts just a little, like fondant on a hot day.

“I’d like that very much,” he says softly, something like affection in his gaze. “And, it was only the decent thing to do. I hate to see a friend struggling, especially not when I could help. Besides, it was rather mutually beneficial — the ambitious mamas kept away as if I were diseased,” he laughs.

“And now you are saddled with me,” you say. It’s intended as a joke, but it comes out self-deprecating and a little pathetic.

“There are far worse women I could be saddled with,” he says, playful enough that you aren’t offended. He pauses, still and pensive. “Truly. You are a most unique manner of woman, and I mean that in the most earnestly complimentary way possible. If I were the marrying type, I would surely have devoted myself to capturing your affections.” You flush, pressing an embarrassed palm to your heated cheek. “I must commend your skills in deception, to convince so many that you are undesirable. Kind of you to allow the other girls in your set a chance.”

At that, you laugh outright, clapping a hand to your mouth in embarrassment. “It isn’t an act. I simply have no time for such things. Or, had, I suppose. I should have liked to be a spinster and utterly invisible to society, but I see that fate had other plans.” You wander your gaze over him, the soft curve of his mouth, the gentle slope of his cheek, the alluring lines of his body. You wonder, briefly, if maybe your life isn’t over. Maybe, just maybe, Matthew is a gift.

Something must change in your expression, because Matthew mirrors it exactly, a fond smile crossing his face and his hand moving from your arm to low on your waist. The contact is thrilling, scandalous and precious, a thing to be held onto and treasured. “We do make quite the pair, don’t we?” he chuckles. “An aspiring spinster and a rake with the heart of a romantic.” It’s eerily similar to what you said to your mother, yet woven through with the thread of gold that links you; a flimsy, frail thing, but shining nonetheless, and you allow the hope you had killed to flutter back to life, a butterfly beating its wings against your ribcage.

“A romantic, hm?” you begin, circumspect. “I don’t know if I believe that. If you are only playing the rake, you play him very well.” You hope your tone is coming across light and teasing, that you’re only curious at his motivation behind the falsehood, if one exists. “I have seen your behaviour firsthand, you know. Three years past, my first season out. You were quite the catch, and I don’t recall seeing you ever dance with the same girl twice.”

“Do you want the truth?” You nod eagerly. “My first season, I truly looked forward to the prospect of finding love. But there was never any thrill, any excitement, any romance. Every girl just a two-dimensional caricature of what is considered desirable, and most just sold off to the highest bidder. It’s all so proper, and it disgusted me. Earnestly, it reviles me that you haven’t a choice in this arrangement. If I could grant you one, I promise I would in a heartbeat.”

Your chest warms, heart softening with every word, passion spilling over every syllable. “I know,” you say softly, and mean it.

“The reputation as a rake came that year, I suppose. Polly and I came to the arrangement that we would pretend to court, and I would leave her ‘ruined’ and free. The scandal sheets simply ran with the idea, and I didn’t stop them. It kept the expectations off of me, but the more I came to know how the rest of England lives, the more I was overwhelmed by the sheer unfairness of it all. A friend of mine, my best friend, is deeply and irrevocably in love with a woman, a beautiful, kind, intelligent woman. The kind of love that should be shouted about from the parapets and paraded in the streets. And yet, he is forced to love her in secrecy and solitude, because she is not the ‘right kind of woman’ for a man like him.”

You frown, filled with sympathy for these lovers. “It sounds like a love story in a novel I would be forbidden from reading.” He laughs, liquid and mellifluous, the sound worming its way into your chest and cradling your thumping heart. “Well, that explains the rake. When does this supposed romantic heart come into play?”

Snorting, Matthew digs you in the ribs. “I’m getting to that. So impatient, aren’t you?” Something about those words runs cool water down your spine, a feeling you can’t place buzzing to life under your skin. “When I left England, I fell a little bit in love with everyone I met. So many people, so many places, so many lives, all unique and blessed in their own way. The wide world is true poetry, and I suppose that I long for a romanticised place in it.”

Your tongue feels thick and clumsy in your mouth, words you might struggle for hours to pen falling easily and thoughtlessly from his plush lips. For the first time, you notice that your mama has retreated inside, affording you the tiniest moment of snatched privacy. Emboldened, a wave of brazen desire overtakes you, so strong that you go lightheaded. Your mouth opens without permission, words spilling free before you can stop them. “I think I’d like to kiss you.”

Matthew smiles, eyes crinkling as one of his hands comes up to cup your jaw, his thumb brushing softly over your cheek. The simple touch makes you weak in the knees, your gaze curious as he leans down, so close that his lips are a hairsbreadth from yours. He murmurs one simple word. “Please.”

Your lips connect, head spinning as his mouth moves against yours. You’re floundering a little, at a loss in unfamiliar territory. Time slows around you; Matthew’s lips on yours the only feeling you know, your head going hazy like you’ve drunk far too much wine. It feels like you’ve been struck by lightning, like you’ve lived all your life in a sketch and suddenly been ripped into three dimensions.

The world blurs around you, grounded by his hand at your waist, his lips on yours. It’s all top lip, shockingly chaste despite the passion spinning between you, all your desire poured into the kiss. He’s breathing heavily when you pull apart, lips slick and face flushed. “Was that… I… I’ve never…” you trail off, suddenly riveted by the grass beneath your feet.

“Then you are a natural,” he praises, and you flush impossibly redder. “So adept on your first try, darling. I’ll surely die a happy man if you continue to kiss like that.”

“So presumptuous,” you tease, audacious bravado fuelling you. “Who says I’ll continue? Perhaps the desire has been flushed from my system,” you say with a smirk, laughing when he clutches his heart in mock-horror.

“You wound me so,” he laughs, taking your hand. That butterfly seems to have multiplied in your chest, a kaleidoscope of them fighting to burst free from your chest the longer his palm warms yours.

You find yourself forlorn when he leaves, the mere hour you spent in his company having shifted your worldview on its axis. As you had expected, your engagement is plastered across every gossip rag you come across, but you don’t find yourself debilitated by it; you have a confidant in Matthew, at the very least, and a chance for companionship to bloom into something more. You don’t dare tease yourself with the word, refuse to prop open the window for him until you’re certain of what you want.

That night, your pen flies across paper, inspiration flowing free. You even pen a letter to Matthew that will never again see the light of day, a messy, raw untangling of your sudden feelings that bares your soul uncomfortably. Instead of dreaming of shackles and snide words, your head is filled with sparkling jewels and soft lips, hands in your hair and… You wake flushed and sweating, the mirage of his touch still on your skin, certain that you wear your shame plain on your face.

To make matters worse, your mama has invited a dozen respectable, recently-married ladies to pass the morning in your home, insisting that you must become acquainted with your peers in ladyship. Among them, of course, will be Evelyn Mountfitchet, sharp tongue poised to entertain the other ladies with a colourful recounting of your every misstep disguised as concern. Really, it’ll be an open forum to discuss your shortcomings while you’re forced to smile like you’re being lavished with compliments, and you’ll hate every minute of it.

Nonetheless, you are dutiful first and foremost, and knowing now that your married life shan’t be an utter torment buoys your spirits a little as your maid laces you into a sage-green daydress. Sipping at your tea, you peruse the morning’s scandal sheets, grateful that the vultures seem already to have moved on. The day’s transgression appears to be a lord having taken a fancy to a merchant’s daughter, leaving the family horrified when he presented her at dinner. You really ought to stop purchasing the gossip rags, but your curiosity wins out each time your fingers hover over the paper. In all fairness, the gossip is already printed — is there such harm in you being one of the hundreds of readers?

You curtsy idly to the women as they cross into the parlour, mentally reciting their names over and over to save yourself from any faux pas. Tight, awkward smiles and knowing glances thrown at your expense across the table in lieu of conversation, until the silence is miraculously broken. “My compliments to your cook, Miss Marlowe. I don’t know that I have ever been so delighted by tea and cake in my life,” says Mrs Vincent, a woman you remember as having a good, sensible head on her shoulders. You had been rather disappointed when her attentions were captured, hoping that you might have found a friend whose ideals lay in a similar bent to your own, but she and her husband seem a true love match, which is rare enough that you cannot begrudge her for choosing happiness.

“You are most kind,” you say, grateful for a conversation topic that allows you to hold your own. “Our cook comes from France, brings with her the most wonderful French cuisine.”

Evelyn titters snidely behind her hand, and you swivel to face her, annoyed. “Don’t you find it rather fanciful? Personally, I prefer a good, honest English meal. But, I suppose you ought ensure your palate is discerning to the tastes of your betrothed. He has rather a taste for the European, no?” The implication is clear, the other ladies watching with bated breath for your response.

Careful, practised calm holding you still, you take a pointed sip of your lemonade before you reply. “My betrothed is well-travelled, certainly. I could not be satisfied with a man who has no regard or curiosity for the wonders of the Earth beyond our borders.” It’s a simple, dignified response — that doesn’t acknowledge or address her insult. Exactly what the women at the table expect. You can see pity in their faces; they think you haven’t perceived it at all. “Although…” you add, a dozen heads suddenly perked up with interest. “If I recall correctly, your husband took a similar trip just months after you were married. Perhaps you concern yourself with the wrong man’s European… proclivities.” You try not to grin too smugly, eyebrows raised across the room and Evelyn turning an unattractive shade of puce. None of the other women thought you had it in you, and you know it.

Having spent years curbing your tongue, sitting in shadowed alcoves at balls, you’ve enough repressed wit and stockpiled gossip to start your own scandal sheet, should you so choose. Keeping your lips sealed and your cards close had seemed the best option when you were aiming to avoid notice, but with your position changed, you suddenly harbour a most esurient need to make the ton take notice of you. “Would anybody else like to offer their unsolicited opinion of my intended, or should the discussion perhaps turn to something more productive and befitting women of our station, hm?”

Newfound respect is written across their faces, carefully reframing their social games in order to take you seriously as a player. You even enjoy the conversation a little, filing away each new piece of gossip with a grin and accepting invitations to social events you’d never have even glimpsed before today. Proud, satisfied and even a little excited as you wave your guests off politely, your mama stands smugly at your shoulder. “It is lovely to see you engaging willingly in your role, dear. Perhaps you might allow me to gloat a moment, for I recall telling you numerous times that if you would just–”

You square your shoulders. “I shan’t,” you say brusquely. Ordinarily, you’d never speak so bluntly to your mama, but the knowledge that you’ve mere weeks until you’re a lady in your own right emboldens you. “There is a difference between going somewhere willingly, and going there without complaint due to the executioner’s axe at your back. It is fortunate that Lord Healy is a good man, and one I could come to love, yes, but that could easily not have been so. He could have been any manner of man, a gambler, a drunkard, a sinner.” You aren’t yet entirely sure he isn’t the lattermost, if the heat you feel under his gaze is any indication, coiling under your skin and knotting in your chest, working its way down, down, down… Heavens, this is hardly the time! “And nonetheless I would be his wife. So, I implore you, do not mistake my acquiescence for forgiveness. I had made a choice, and you took it from me.” Your mama gapes at you as you leave, stalking into the library to lose yourself and forget all your troubles.

The passage of time escapes you, and you don’t realise how long you’ve been in the library, resting in a patch of sunlight like a house cat with your nose buried in a book until a maid finds you and informs you that you must dress for dinner. In all your distaste of the morning, your evening engagements had entirely escaped your awareness, and you dimly remember dinner with the Healys scheduled for the night.

Your ride is spent in stony, cold silence, your parents looking anywhere but your eyes. It’s not a long journey, thankfully, but it feels like an eternity before your carriage pulls to a stop and a footman helps you to the ground. You dip into a polite curtsy to Matthew’s parents, softening into a smile when you lock eyes with your betrothed. “You look wonderful. Doesn’t she, Matthew?” his mother says, nudging him unsubtly.

Matthew clears his throat, shaking his head as if to clear it. “I— Yes. I don’t quite… have the words for how lovely you look,” he says, his gaze intense as you meet it boldly.

“Thank you, my lord. You are too kind.” It’s a stiff response, measured and polite, born from uncertainty over your company.

His smile is winsome, your mama pinching your back as if to say I told you so, and you bite back a scowl. “I am afraid dinner is not quite ready yet,” he says with a polite nod to your parents. “Perhaps you might like a brief tour of the house, Miss Marlowe. It is soon to be your home, after all.”

Your mama makes a soft noise of protest. “That would be rather improper, no?” she says, casting glances at Matthew’s parents for support she evidently doesn’t find. You conceal a smirk; perhaps if she’d had a care to learn anything about the man she was marrying you off to, she wouldn’t need to be so concerned of what was proper.

“Oh, I do find the rules of propriety so stifling at times, don’t you? They are a young, engaged couple, we ought allow them a few moments of privacy. Come, we will take tea, and the men can have their whiskey and cigars. Dinner shan’t be long,” she says, and though your mama desperately wants to argue, a retort hanging from her lips, her own imposed rules of politeness prevent her — they are the hosts, after all.

Matthew takes you by the hand, the contact sending a pulse of warmth spreading from where his skin touches yours, and leads you deeper into the house. The moment you’re alone, he pulls you against a wall, his hands falling to your hips and grasping tightly. The closeness thrills you, heat prickling under your skin as he watches you with heavy, lidded eyes. “I have thought of nothing but your kiss since your lips left mine. May I kiss you?” he asks, hushed and reverent, and you nod slowly, eyes closing and head tilting up in anticipation. His lips meet yours, sweet and soft and gentle, but interlaced with a foreign, breathtaking hunger.

You melt against him, letting him take control of the kiss, determined but tender. You part your lips eagerly for his tongue, the taste of him suddenly overwhelming your senses. Breathing hard as you pull apart, you look up at him with wide eyes, feeling foolish and lovesick, some unfamiliar feeling of want pulling under your skin. “Is there really going to be a tour, or was that simply a facade to get me alone?” you tease, and Matthew smirks, interlacing his fingers with yours.

“I have often found that mixing an honest goal with an impure one can be… pleasurable… for all involved,” he answers, almost a purr. Something unknown thrills in your belly, licking down to settle in your core, forbidden. Then, his intense gaze breaks into a smile, and the tension breaks. “No, there really was somewhere I wanted to show you.”

Your footsteps echo through the cavernous halls, interspersed with breathless giggles when he pulls you a little too fast and you stumble into his arms, meeting in a sweet kiss before you start off again. You almost can’t believe your luck, that you’ll get to spend your days traipsing through these halls and kissing him whenever you like; you feel as though you’re waiting with bated breath, like pride must come before a fall.

With a dramatic flourish, Matthew comes to a stop before a grand set of double doors, flinging them open to reveal an even grander library. Your jaw drops as you marvel; stacks of shelves that must stretch the entire height of the house press against both walls, light filtering through a pane-glass window and puddling on the floor. He seems to sense your awe, his body warm at your back as he takes hold of your waist. “You seem like the kind of woman to appreciate a good book and some peaceful, private space.” He leans heavily on the word private and mouths at the shell of your ear, a shudder running through your body at his ministrations.

“I do,” you say shakily, though you can’t think of a time you’ve cared less about books than standing here with Matthew’s lips hovering against your neck.

“May I ask you something rather…” he says, slowly spinning you around so you’re face-to-face. “Improper?”

The look in his eyes is familiar, now, but impossible to define, eyes wide and crow-black. “It’s a little late to be seeking my permission for your indecorousness, no?”

Matthew smiles, the expression slow and salacious as it creeps across his face. “Perhaps,” he says, taking your hands and walking you deeper into the library. “But this is a question of a more… intimate… nature.” You’re acutely aware with every step that, should anyone else enter the library, the two of you would stay obscured from view. “I want to know…” he begins, voice low as he pulls you down onto a chaise, tucked neatly away in a shadowed corner. “What do you feel when I kiss you?”

Your heart speeds, stomach swooping as clumsy words stumble to your lips. “I— I don’t… I can’t describe it.” You lower your eyes, looking up at him through your lashes, that same, indecipherable look in his face.

“Would you like to know what I feel?” You nod minutely, breath caught in your chest. The air around you feels charged, like the minutes before a thunderstorm when your hair starts to stand on end. “I feel desire. Have you ever known desire, sweet thing? A quickening in your pulse, heat under your skin, smouldering in your chest.” Matthew inches closer with every word, pressing you back against the cushions until you’re almost prone, rucking up your skirts with one knee.

His every breath against your lips is incendiary, the feeling rushing under your skin finally given a name as you breathe out the word that might be your unmaking. “Yes.” Matthew crashes your lips together, slides a hand into your hair, all pretence at being a gentleman cast aside in favour of a frantic, consuming hunger. His tongue is greedy, his teeth sharp, pulses of pure want skittering down your spine and settling between your legs. The sensation thrills you, illicit and sharp and new, the heat of his body against yours soaking through your clothes.

“I was not entirely honest, before,” he says, and your blood runs cold. Your fear must be evident in his face, because he cups your cheek gently before he speaks. “When I said I had thought of nothing but your kiss. I thought of you constantly, certainly, but in a rather… filthier way.” His low tone washes over you, stomach clenching in some sort of sick anticipation as his lips meet your neck.

“What…” The words catch in your throat, desire clamping your neck like a vice. “What did you think about?”

A gasp slips from your lips as Matthew catches your earlobe between his teeth, kissing softly at your pulse point and pressing a soft hand against your leg. “I thought about you while I pleasured myself,” he murmurs, and you go hot all over, your skin feeling far too small to contain all you’re becoming, your chest tight and pulse racing. “I spilled in my hand with your name on my lips. I thought of how you might look, undressed beneath me, caught in rapture. Have you ever felt pleasure like that, darling?”

His voice is low, raked over gravel. You can sense his restraint, that he longs to teach you. “We cannot. Not now, not here, not before we are married.” You taste regret as you speak, so consumed in desire that you want to discard every carefully-learned edict of society, but the warning bells that chime for this act are too much to ignore.

Matthew huffs a quiet laugh. “So, you haven’t. If you trust me, sweet thing, there are ways I can show you pleasure without fucking you.” He leans heavily on the curse, an answering thrill clenching in your stomach as his fingers find the hem of your chemise. “Would you like that, darling?”

“Please,” you gasp, a breathless invocation from wanton lips. Matthew’s hand creeps up your thigh, higher and higher until… Your eyes fly open, your entire body jolting as a spark of pure sensation catches you alight. “Oh, my God,” you cry, back arching up as he slowly circles with the tip of his finger.

“I also answer to Matty,” he smirks, and though you groan, you’re grateful for the diffused tension. Your hips move of their own accord, chasing the pleasure that spills from his fingertips. “My God, you don’t know what you’re doing to me,” he groans, his gaze fixed on your face as you slip into bliss. “Have you ever touched yourself like this?” You shake your head, whining quietly when he pulls his hand away and takes hold of your wrist. The tips of his fingers are wet where they meet your skin, and you flush crimson. “I’m going to show you how to pleasure yourself, and, tonight, when you’re laying in bed with your lights turned out, I want you to bring yourself to that peak as many times as you want; get to know your body in the most intimate way. And then,” he leans close, whispering into the shell of your ear, his filthy words coiling under your skin and licking deliciously down your thighs. “I want you to tell me all about it. As your husband, I must know exactly what brings my wife to ruin.” In the same moment, he slides two of your fingers into you, the sudden stretch between your thighs unlike anything you’ve ever felt. Matty’s thumb comes up to circle your bundle of sensitive nerves, puppeteering your fingers in and out of you torturously slow. “Can you do that for me, sweet thing?”

It takes a moment for your hazy mind to register what he’s asking, whining as your hips rock up into his touch. “Only if you go faster,” you gasp, choking on a whimper as he speeds his motions, pleasure washing over you and wiping your mind clean.

“Anything you want,” Matty murmurs, tugging on your wrist so your fingers speed up, pressing deep as your eyes roll back in your head. “Curl your fingers for me, love,” he instructs, and you obey unthinkingly, gasping as a shock of pleasure ripples through your body, drool pooling in your mouth as Matty watches you adoringly. “Does that feel good?”

You moan out an affirmative, writhing under his touch and slowly picking up a rhythm of your own, too caught in a haze of pleasure to find words for what he’s making you feel. Tension coils in your belly, your body limp and loose on your bones. “Oh, God, please,” you whimper, not even sure what you’re begging for. He knows, though, somehow able to show you exactly what you need as he slides two of his own fingers alongside yours.

“Oh, love, you’re soaked,” Matty croons, following along with your rhythm and steering you to move faster, every movement sending a ripple of desire pulsing through your veins. “I think you needed this, didn’t you, sweetheart? Needed someone to show you how to feel so fucking good?” His palm is warm against the back of your hand, calluses pressing rough against your skin as your body stretches out around him. Your eyes fall closed, head swimming in slick, gleaming ecstasy. “Come on, love. Watch,” he instructs.

Obediently, your gaze falls to where your hands are joined, your wetness dripping over your fingers and a slick sound embarrassingly audible; sounding in time with the thumps of pleasure rolling over you. You moan helplessly, letting Matty take control as you fall into bliss, his breath coming in hard gasps against your lips. There’s a pulling low in your stomach, a twisting tendril of carnality tugging at every muscle of your body. A final swipe at your bud of nerves sends you pitching over an edge you hadn’t even known you were approaching, biting down hard on your lower lip to keep yourself from crying out wantonly. You flutter around your fingers, gasping and rocking your hips, chasing the high as it fades from your grasp.

“That was… incredible,” you murmur, Matty’s expression at once smug and awed. “I’ve never felt anything like it. I just… fuck,” you breathe, almost a laugh as the curse slips from your lips, the only word that feels fitting for the feeling rolling through your body.

“I promise you, darling, that was barely the beginning. Just you wait until we share a bed.” He smirks down at you, the eye contact deliberate as he slides his wet fingers between his lips, swirling his tongue purposefully, desire spiking in your core all over again. “And you taste so sweet,” he praises. “Go on, have a taste for yourself, love,” Matty urges. Cautiously, you bring your hand up to your lips, softly licking at the pads of your fingers. The taste of you is unfamiliar, but you strangely don’t hate it, pressing an eager kiss against Matty’s lips and licking carelessly into his mouth.

You trade lazy kisses for a few long, sweet moments, breaking away only to giggle against his mouth and gaze deeply into his warm, honey-brown eyes. Eventually, regretfully, you pull apart and climb to your feet, legs shaking a little until Matty loops an arm around your waist to support you. The dinner is lovely, to be sure, and his parents are perfectly pleasant, but you can think of nothing but Matty’s eyes on you, his tongue in your mouth, his fingers stretching you out and pulling you into oblivion. The barest brush of his lips against your hand, a polite goodbye, is almost enough to set you off again, a shudder running through you as a knowing smirk pulls at his lips.

Matty’s gaze meets yours, sharp and challenging, and he mouths think of me just as you leave. A flush creeps up your cheeks, and you look away, the intensity of his eyes too much to bear. And yet, you obey, moonlight slanting across your bed as you push your nightdress up around your waist. Matty’s voice circles your brain, his name sweet on your lips as you drag yourself to that peak countless times. Your body is exhausted but insatiate, an endless well of greed tapped and free-flowing. You can barely stand to clean yourself when you finally give in to lassitude, legs trembling and a voracious cramp in your wrist.

Your mama gasps in horror at the circles under your eyes the next morning, shameful imprints of your long, desire-soaked night. “Goodness gracious,” she gasps. “What on Earth kept you awake all night? Good Lord, you aren’t a child anymore. You simply cannot spend your nights with a candle and your nose in a book any longer. You have responsibilities.” You nod idly, stifling both a yawn and a smirk. “Go back upstairs. Get some rest — you might at least attempt something resembling respectability for the ball this evening.”

Oh. In your daze, you’d utterly forgotten. Ordinarily, you’d refuse out of spite, and your mama gives a long-suffering sigh, expecting a fight. But something thrills you about showing off your engagement so publicly, staking a claim on the man so many debutantes failed to ensnare. The chance that you might slip away with him into a shadowed alcove or a private garden certainly doesn’t hurt either. So, with nothing more than a slight scoff, you go back to bed, snatching a few hours of much-needed sleep. Visions of Matty dressed in full finery fill your head, a surprising, sudden excitement growing in your chest.

You can’t hold back a gasp when your mama produces your gown; you’d never bothered examining the new season’s dresses, already resigned to misery. Your fingers trail gently over the sparkling fabric, running like water under your touch. “You shall be the most spectacular thing in the room, dear,” says your mama smugly.

The word thing hits you like a splash of ice-cold water. Of course. “Yes,” you say faintly, your voice sounding muffled to your own ears. “I must pen a letter of thanks to the modiste,” you add pointedly, your mama’s face falling. She sweeps out of the room without a word as if to say, see how well you’ll look without me.

It turns out, unsurprisingly, that your ladies are even more proficient at their craft without your mama’s hawkish gaze picking and prodding at whatever she pleases. You gaze at yourself in the looking glass, awestruck. Your cheeks hold a healthy glow, dusted with rouge that matches the stain on your lips, and as you smile softly, you realise that, for the first time, you find your reflection pretty.

Even the now-familiar cold silence of your journey fails to dampen your spirits, the glittering warmth of the ballroom enveloping you as you cross the threshold. You search the room for Matty, a little crestfallen when his wild curls aren’t immediately apparent. Of course, you shake off your parents as quickly as possible, surprised by your sudden enjoyment of the atmosphere without the crippling burden of a dance card looped around your wrist.

Lost in the wealth of colour and light surrounding you, you jolt at a gentle touch to your elbow. Expecting to meet Matty’s warm, adoring gaze, you turn eagerly, only to come face-to-face with a lord who’s practically withering into dust where he stands. “Good evening,” he says, a sinister smile revealing half-rotted, missing teeth. “May I have this dance? I don’t believe we’ve met.”

You don’t think so either, but you’d be surprised if the man could remember how to button his own waistcoat. His fingers are like sandpaper against your bare arm, the sensation positively emetic. “I am spoken for, my lord,” you say, without even attempting at politeness. He’ll hardly remember it tomorrow, age-addled as he is. As if on cue, a murmur ripples through the young ladies, eagerness turning to disparagement as it reaches their mamas, and you look up to see three young men burst into the room.

On the left, the most serious-faced one holds up a pocketwatch, evidently admonishing the other two for their more-than-fashionable lateness, while the tallest one laughs him off. In the middle, you watch Matty slyly ribbing the former until he relents, smiling exasperatedly. “Ah!” you say brightly, grateful for the out. “There is my betrothed now. Good evening, sir.” You curtsy politely and blow out a relieved breath as soon as his back is turned, beelining for Matty and his companions.

“Hello, love,” he says warmly, something in your body instinctively relaxing in his presence. He takes your hand, warm in his calloused palm, and brings it to his lips. You smile a little self-consciously, hyperaware of the other two sets of eyes on you. Nodding politely to the other two men, you bite your lip and jerk your head at Matty; it isn’t polite for a lady to introduce herself to a gentleman, and you’ve too much company to publicly flout the rules of conversation.

When he doesn’t pick up the hint, the more solemn one shakes his head with an annoyed yet fond laugh, bowing politely. “Mr. Hann,” he says. “Adam, really.”

It seems to spur the other into action. “George,” he says simply, and you raise an eyebrow. “Lord Daniel, if you must be an utter bore about it.”

You curtsy, but flicker your gaze to the ceiling in the universal gesture of Lord, give me strength. “Great heavens, there’s two of them.”

Adam snickers. “Four, actually. I’m certain it shan’t be long until you discover that for yourself,” he adds with an enigmatic grin that makes you like him all the more.

“Fuck’s sake, Hann,” Matty scoffs, and you still jump a little at the vulgarity and how easily it falls from his lips. “I told you how hard I had to work to get her to like me, don’t go turning her against me now. I’m not all that likeable, you know.” He turns to you, and the full effect of his disarming, fathomless-deep gaze settles on you. You run hot all over. “Would you care for a dance, my lady? Before I allow you to be poisoned any further against me,” he chuckles, and you accept with a gentle smile.

Matty sweeps you into a waltz, leading commanding and effortless, and you can’t keep a smile off your face as you lose yourself in him. “You look radiant, love. Truly, a beauty like yours is mythical.”

Heat floods your cheeks, and you look away, demure and slightly disbelieving. “You’re quite the dancer, my lord,” you say, in an obvious and unconcealed attempt to divert the subject.

Thankfully, he allows it. “You sound surprised,” he says, mock-affronted. “I’m a musician at heart, darling, I could lead a waltz in my sleep.” You smile, but your attentions are drifting; snatches of conversation pass you by, murmured but not so low you can’t hear them. An odd pair… Surely ruin her… Heavens, look at him… Isn’t nearly pretty enough…

Matty is utterly oblivious to the noise, watching your face fall with obvious confusion. “What are we doing here, Matty?” you murmur, suddenly helpless. “Even if we could be happy together, how can that possibly be enough? Endless whispers, following us anytime we set foot in society; this stain stuck to us forever.” Pain is written clearly across his face — he wants to argue, but he’s at least allowing you the courtesy of coming to the point before he does. “You could still leave me,” you say quietly. “Find safety with the devil you know. Play the rake until the perfect girl comes along, one without all the collateral I carry.”

Fittingly, the song draws to an end, Matty pulling you to the edge of the room with eyes full of frustrated consternation. “I’m not going to fucking leave you,” he hisses, crowding breathlessly close. “You want me to go searching for the perfect girl, yes? I have travelled from nation to nation, spent days upon weeks in the open seas, visited wonders on every continent, and yet… if you were to ask me the most beautiful sight I’ve ever seen? That smile, that first real smile you gave me. Without a question or a second thought. Please, darling, let me love you. See yourself the way I see you.”

Your resolve shatters, that greedy, hungry part of you that’s gone starved for love all your life snapping to the forefront in your chest. “How do you see me?” you breathe, low and pleading, hunting for an answer in his eyes.

“I know this house well,” he says, and your brow furrows at the sudden change of subject. “The thought of an audience for the maudlin display I am about to put on is almost too much to bear.” You huff a quiet, disbelieving laugh and let him lead you through a maze of winding, labyrinthine corridors until you come to an empty parlour. The air is still, quiescent, like stepping into a still-life portrait as you sit delicately at the edge of a divan. Matty sinks to his knees in front of you, resting his palms against your skirts over your thighs. “You want to know how I see you? I see a fierce, clever woman, one who has, perhaps, never been truly seen before. I see the woman I want to make a life with, who I want to share my thoughts, fears, dreams with. Who I hope will respond in kind.” Pure, earnest kindness shines in Matty’s gaze, a frail hope you recognise as a twin to the butterfly that perches on your ribs.

You can’t do anything but smile down at him, at a loss for words. “I simply… I just… I cannot…” you stammer, stopping and starting as if you’re hunched over your writing-desk.

“Do you trust me, love?” You nod mutely. “Then trust this, trust what you feel, trust yourself,” Matty urges.

Damn him. Damn him to hell. “Come here and kiss me.”

His wide, adoring smile turns to a slow smirk. “I’m perfectly happy where I am, love.” His hands fall to the hem of your skirt, slowly inching up your legs, familiar heat coiling to life between your thighs. “Now, tell me. Did you do as I asked last night, darling?”

“Yes.” The answer comes rushed, breathy, shameless. Matty gazes up at you, encouraging. “I thought of you, only you. I wished it were your hands bringing me to ruin over and over again, wished I could do the same to you.” His eyes are black with desire and your mouth goes dry. “I know that you have… experiences, and I do not wish to–”

“All that means, darling, is that I have the privilege of being the one to teach you,” Matty insists, pressing a kiss to the side of your knee. Your skirts brush against your heated skin, pushed up until he’s gazing at your exposed, glistening core. Your eyes follow him, questioning, as he leans ever closer. “You’ve felt pleasure by hand, yes, but what I really want is to get my mouth on you. Would you like that, sweet girl?”

You shudder. “Please.” No sooner has the word left your lips than his mouth connects with your core, lapping up your arousal with an ebullient hunger. A moan escapes you, blinding heat flashing across your skin. Your breathing is instantly ragged, pleasure burning in your chest as he buries his tongue deep inside you.

Your hands slide into his hair, anchoring yourself to reality. His answering moan against your skin ripples through you, muscles tensing and loosening in keeping with your hammering heartbeat. “Just like that, darling.” Matty murmurs against your skin. “Good girl.”

The praise draws a long, pleading whine from your lips, a cavalcade of desire marching through your bloodstream. “Matty, oh, fuck,” you gasp. The profanity still feels foreign on your lips, but there truly isn’t another word in your lexicon that can describe the pure ecstasy coursing through you.

Matty presses soft kisses to your inner thighs, smearing your arousal against your skin and licking you clean. A flash of teeth scrape against your tender flesh, pulling a gasp from you as you drag his mouth back to where you need it most. Euphoria winds under your skin, an insistent hum at the base of your skull growing louder with every passing second. His tongue works over you in sure, fast strokes, dragging you higher and higher.

He sucks on your nerves, your legs flailing out helplessly in response. One of his hands creeps up, teasing your nerves as he fills you with his tongue over and over. A filthy sound fills the room, slick and wet and lustful, and you clench your hands into fists in his hair. You clench your thighs around Matty’s head, his tongue driving deep into you as you clench your thighs around his head, whimpered obscenities dripping from your mouth. His pace speeds, slows, never allowing you to get complacent in a rhythm, flames stoked in your core.

You’re half-delirious with it, implorations for something you couldn’t name falling slurred from your lips. Pleasure balls into a fist in your belly, hot and demanding, knocking the wind out of you as it slams into your gut. You gasp out his name in an endless litany, writhing with need as pure bliss rolls over you, loose and free on your bones. “Oh, my God,” you breathe, still pulsing with aftershocks as Matty pulls away, lips and chin soaked when he smiles up at you.

“No God, darling. Just me,” he says smugly, and you scoff. He quirks an eyebrow, licking his lips exaggeratedly. “What? Look around, love. Do you see God in this room? Or do you see a man, bringing you pleasure?” You bite your lip, chest still heaving with the tangible, real evidence of what you felt. “In any case, I am kneeling for you. Not for any God,” he finishes, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, your slick obscenely visible against his alabaster skin.

Matty stands, pulling you with him, and tugs you in for a slow, deep kiss, the taste of you blooming in your mouth. “That’s blasphemy,” you say, appalled and intrigued in equal measure. “You could be prosecuted for that.”

He grins against your mouth. “Are you going to turn me in?”

Your heart thuds where your chest is pressed against his, heartbeats aligning in a perfect, rhythmic duet. “Never.”

#this was soo fucking fun to write Omg #lowkey this is like top 5 most Sweet romantic things ive ever written probably #matty healy x reader #matty healy smut #matty healy imagine #the 1975 fanfic #the 1975 smut #writing #smut #dancing is a dangerous game

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nyxshadowhawk · 6 months ago

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A Retrospective on Harry Potter

Why did I like it in the first place? What about it worked? Where do I go from here?

I have decided to give up Harry Potter.

J.K. Rowling’s reputation now stinks to high heaven. At this point, she is quite indefensible. And even if that weren’t the case, she is not someone that I would want to associate with anyway. Meanwhile, the internet has not only turned against her, but against Harry Potter itself. An innocent question on Reddit, about which Hogwarts Houses the ATLA characters would be in, got downvoted to oblivion. Innumerable Tumblr threads insist that fantasy fans should get into literally anything else (suggestions include Discworld, Earthsea, The Wheel of Time, and Percy Jackson). And now that Harry Potter is no longer a sacred cow, there has been a recent slew of video essays that rip it to shreds, attacking it for its poor worldbuilding, unoriginality, and the problematic ideas baked into the original books (like the whole SPEW thing), etc. Those criticisms always existed, but now they’re getting thrown into the limelight.

It pains me to see such an ignoble downfall of Harry Potter’s reputation. If Rowling had just kept her damn mouth shut, Harry Potter would have aged gracefully, becoming a beloved children’s classic. I'd still plan to introduce it to my own kids one day (after Rowling dies and the dust settles). It’s not surprising that not all aspects of it have aged well, since it’s been more than twenty years since its original publishing date, and everything starts to show its age after that long. I acknowledge that most of the criticisms of the series that I’ve seen lately are valid, and I’ve read plenty of better books. And yet, when I return to the books themselves, even with the knowledge of who JKR really is inside my head, I still really enjoy reading them! There’s still a lot about them that I think works!

None of the other things I’ve read have had as collossal of an impact upon my identity, my values, and my own writing as Harry Potter. It’s hard to move on from it, not just because it’s something I enjoy, but because I have to literally extract my identity from it. I don’t know who I’d be without Harry Potter. I don’t know what my work would look like without Harry Potter. I don’t know how to carry it with me as just another piece of media that I like, as opposed to a filter for who I am as a person. So, with all that in mind, I have to ask myself why I liked Harry Potter so much in the first place. If I’m going to move on from it, then I have to be able to define and isolate the things about it that I want to keep with me. Something about it obviously worked, on a massive scale. So what was it?

It’s not the worldbuilding. The worldbuilding is objectively quite terrible, especially in comparison to that of other fantasy writers who knew what they were doing. At best, it’s inconsistent and poorly thought-out, and at worst it’s insensitive or even racist. Is it the characters? The characters are, in my opinion, one of the stronger parts of the story. But I felt very called-out by one of the many online commentators, who said that anyone who identifies with Harry is too cowardly to write self-insert fic. (I do not remember who said it or even which site it was on, but I distinctly remember the phrase, “Reject Harry Potter, embrace Y/N.”) The reason why people get so invested in Harry Potter’s characters is because they’re easy to project upon, and it’s possible that my love of Harry comes more from over a decade’s worth of projection than anything else. The incessant arguments over characters like Snape, Dumbledore, and James Potter ultimately stem from the fact that these characters do not always come across the way Rowling wanted them to. As for the writing itself, it’s decent, but not spectacular. Harry Potter is something of a sandbox world, with less substance than it appears to have and a crapton of missed opportunities, making it ripe for fanfic. For more than ten years, I’ve been doing precisely that — using Harry Potter as a jumping-off point to fill in the gaps and develop my own ideas, some of which became my original projects.

So what does Harry Potter actually have that sets it apart? Why are people so desperate to be part of Harry Potter’s world if the worldbuilding is bad? What, specifically, is so compelling about it? I think that there’s one answer, one thing that is at the center of Potter-mania, and that has been the underlying drive of my love of it for the past decade and a half: the vibe.

Harry Potter’s vibe is immaculate.

You know what I mean, right? It’s not actually a product of any specific trope, but rather a series of aesthetic elements: The wizarding school in a grand castle, with its pointed windows and torches and suits of armor, ghosts and talking portraits and moving staircases, its Great Hall with floating candles and a ceiling that looks like the night sky, its hundreds of magically-concealed secret doorways. Dumbledore’s Office, behind the gryphon statue, with armillary spheres in every single shot. Deliberate archaisms that evoke the Middle Ages without going as far as a Ren Faire: characters wearing heavy robes, writing with quills and ink on parchment instead of paper, drinking from goblets, decorating with tapestries. Owls, cats, toads. Cauldrons simmering in a dungeon laboratory. Shelves piled with dusty tomes, scrolls, glass vials, crystal balls, hourglasses. Magical candy shaped like insects and amphibians. A library with a restricted section. A forbidden forest full of unicorns and werewolves. That is the Vibe.

There are five armillary spheres just in this shot. They are unequivocally the most Wizard of tabletop decor.

There’s more to it than just the aesthetic, though. The vibe is present in something that writers call soft worldbuilding.

There’s a phrase that writers use to describe magic systems, coined by Brandon Sanderson: hard magic and soft magic. Sanderson’s first law of magic is, “An author’s ability to solve problems with magic is directly proportional to how well the reader understands said magic.” A hard magic system has clearly-defined rules — you know where magic comes from, how it works and under which conditions, how the characters can use it, and what its limitations are. Examples of really good hard magic systems include Avatar: The Last Airbender and Fullmetal Alchemist. If the audience doesn’t understand the conditions under which magic can work, then using magic to get out of any kind of scrape risks feeling like the writer pulled something out of their ass. It begs the question, “Well, if they could do that, then why didn’t they do that before?”

You may come away from that thinking that having clearly-defined rules is always better worldbuilding than not having them, but this isn’t the case. Soft magic isn’t fully explained to the audience, but that doesn’t matter, because it isn’t trying to solve problems — its purpose is to be evocative. Soft magic enhances the atmosphere of a world by creating a sense of wonder. If your everyman protagonist is constantly running into cool magical shit that they don’t understand, then the world feels like it teems with magic, magic that is greater and more powerful than they know, leaving lots of secrets to uncover. Harry Potter, at least in the early books, excels at this. The soft magic in Harry Potter is what got me hooked, and I think it’s what a lot of other people liked about it, too.

The essence of soft magic is best summed up by this scene in the fourth film, in which Harry enters the Weasleys’ tiny tent at the Quidditch World Cup, only to find that it’s much bigger on the inside. His reaction is to smile and say, “I love magic.”

That’s it. That’s the essence of it. You don’t need to know the exact spell that makes the tent bigger on the inside. You don’t need to know how Dumbledore can make the food appear on the table with a flick of a wand, or how he can make a bunch of poofy sleeping bags appear with another flick. You don’t need to know how and why the portraits or wizard cards move. You don’t need to know how wizards can appear and disappear on a whim, or what the Deluminator is, or where the Sword of Gryffindor came from. You don’t need to know how the Room of Requirement works. Knowing these things defeats the purpose. It kills the vibe, that vibe being that there is a large and wondrous magical world around you that will always have more to discover.

One of the best “soft magic” moments in the books comes early in Philosopher’s Stone, when Harry is trying to navigate Hogwarts for the first time:

There were a hundred and forty-two staircases at Hogwarts: wide, sweeping ones; narrow, rickety ones; some that led somewhere different on a Friday; some with a vanishing step halfway up that you had to remember to jump. Then there were doors that wouldn't open unless you asked politely, or tickled them in exactly the right place, and doors that weren't really doors at all, but solid walls just pretending. It was also very hard to remember where anything was, because it all seemed to move around a lot. The people in the portraits kept going to visit each other, and Harry was sure the coats of armor could walk. —Philosopher’s Stone, Chapter 8

Many of these details don’t come back later in the series, which is a shame, because this one paragraph is super evocative! It establishes Hogwarts as an inherently magical place, in which the very architecture doesn’t conform to normal rules. Hogwarts seems like it would be exciting to explore (assuming you weren’t late for class), and it gets even better when you learn about all the secret rooms and passages. The games capitalized on this by building all the secret rooms behind bookcases, mirrors, illusory walls, etc. into the game world, and rewarding you for finding them. The utter fascination that produces is hard to overstate.

Another one of the most evocative moments in the first book is when Harry sees Diagon Alley for the first time, after passing through the magically sealed brick wall (the mechanics of which, again, are never explained). This is your first proper glimpse at the wizarding world and what it has to offer:

Harry wished he had about eight more eyes. He turned his head in every direction as they walked up the street, trying to look at everything at once: the shops, the things outside them, the people doing their shopping. A plump woman outside an Apothecary was shaking her head as they passed, saying, “Dragon liver, seventeen Sickles an ounce, they're mad....” A low, soft hooting came from a dark shop with a sign saying Eeylops Owl Emporium — Tawny, Screech, Barn, Brown, and Snowy. Several boys of about Harry's age had their noses pressed against a window with broomsticks in it. "Look," Harry heard one of them say, "the new Nimbus Two Thousand — fastest ever —" There were shops selling robes, shops selling telescopes and strange silver instruments Harry had never seen before, windows stacked with barrels of bat spleens and eels' eyes, tottering piles of spell books, quills, and rolls of parchment, potion bottles, globes of the moon.... —Philosopher’s Stone, Chapter 5

What works so well here is the magical weirdness of wizardishness juxtaposed against normalcy. Eeylops Owl Emporium is just a pet shop to wizards. A woman makes a very mundane complaint about the price of goods, but the goods happen to be dragon liver. Broomsticks are treated like cars. All of these small moments contribute to the feeling of the wizarding world being alive, inhabited, and also magical. It gets you to ask the question of what your life would be like if you were a wizard. What do wizards wear? What do they eat? What do they haggle over and complain about? What do they do for fun?

In Book 3, Harry enjoys Diagon Alley for a few weeks when he suddenly has free time, and we get to experience the wizarding world in a state of “normalcy,” when he isn’t trying to save the world. He gets free ice creams from Florean Fortescue, gazes longingly at the Firebolt, and engages with delightfully weird people. He’s a wizard, living a (briefly) normal wizard life among other wizards in wizard-land. And that is fun. It’s so fun, that people want that experience for themselves, enough for there to be several theme parks and other immersive experiences dedicated to recreating the world of Harry Potter.

One of the greatest things about Universal was its phenomenal attention to detail. You can hear Moaning Myrtle’s voice in the women’s bathroom, and only the women’s bathroom. The walls of the Three Broomsticks have shadows of a broom sweeping by itself and an owl flying projected against the wall, so convincingly that you’ll do a double take when you see it. Knockturn Alley is down a little secret tunnel off of the main street, and that’s where you have to go to buy Dark Arts-themed stuff. It’s really well done.

Another thing that contributes to the vibe, in my opinion, is that the wizarding world is slightly macabre. They eat candy shaped like frogs, flies, mice, and so forth, and they have gross-tasting jellybeans. In the film’s version of the Diagon Alley sequence above, there’s a random shot of a pet bat available for purchase. In the third film, when Harry is practicing the Patronus Charm with Lupin, the candles are shaped like human spines. In the first book, this is Petunia’s description of Lily’s behavior after she became a witch:

Oh, she got a letter just like that and disappeared off to that-that school, and came home every holiday with her pockets full of frog spawn, turning teacups into rats. I was the only one who saw her for what she was — a freak! —Philosopher’s Stone, Chapter 4

I remember reading this for the first time, and it just kind of made intuitive sense to me. I suppose it fits into the “eye of newt and toe of frog” association between magical people and gross things, but somehow it works. Unfortunately, this is retconned later with the knowledge that wizards can’t use magic outside school, but before that limitation gets imposed, the idea of Lily amusing herself by turning teacups into rats seems like an inherently witchy thing to do.

That association between magic and the macabre shows up elsewhere, as well. In The Owl House, Luz’s interest in gross things is one of the things that marks her as a “weirdo” in the real world. When she goes to the magical world of the Boiling Isles, weird and gross stuff is absolutely everywhere. That world’s vibe leans more towards the macabre than the whimsical, but it works because you sort of expect the gross stuff to exist alongside the concept of witches, and that they would be an intrinsic part of the world they inhabit. You don’t question it, because it’s part of the vibe.

(The Owl House is one of the few things I’ve encountered that has a similar vibe to Harry Potter, but it’s still not the same vibe. In fact, The Owl House outright mocks the expectation that magical worlds be whimsical, and directly mocks Harry Potter more than once. The overall vibe is much closer to Gravity Falls.)

The Harry Potter films utilize a lot of similar soft worldbuilding with the background details, especially in the early films that were still brightly-colored and whimsical. For example, the scene in Flourish and Blotts in the second film has impossibly-stacked piles of books and old-timey looking signs describing their subjects, which include things like “Celestial Studies” and “Unicorns.” When Harry arrives in the Burrow in the same film, one of the first things he sees is dishes washing themselves and knitting needles working by themselves, taking completely mundane things and instantly establishing them as magical. In that Patronus scene with Harry and Lupin, the spine-candles and a bunch of random orbs (and the obligatory giant armillary sphere) float around in the background. One small detail that I personally appreciate is the designs on the walls above the teacher’s table in the Great Hall, which are from an alchemical manuscript called the Ripley Scroll:

It’s all these little things that add up to produce The Vibe.

Obviously, much of the vibe is expressed very well in John Williams’ score for the first three Harry Potter films. The mystical minor key of the main theme, the tinkly glockenspiel, the strings, the rising and falling notes that mimic the fluttering of an owl, the flight of a broomstick, or the waving of a wand. That initial shot of the castle across the lake as the orchestra swells, as the children arrive at their wizarding school:

If you grew up with Harry Potter, just looking at this image gives you The Vibe. The nostalgia hit is definitely part of it, but The Vibe was already there, back when you were a child and you didn’t have nostalgia yet.

In my opinion, only Williams’ score captures this vibe — the later films, though their scores are very good, do not. But the soundtrack of the first two video games, by Jeremy Soule (the same person who did Skyrim) absolutely nails it. This, right here, is Harry Potter’s vibe, condensed and distilled:

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This is why I feel invalidated by the common advice “just read another book.” I have read other books. I’ve read plenty of other books, many of which are wonderfully written and have left an impact on me. But there’s still only one Harry Potter. To date, there’s only other book that has filled me with a similarly intense longing for a fictional place, and that is The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern. That book deliberately prioritized atmosphere over everything else in the story, and actually lampshades this in-universe. The Night Circus has a plot and it has characters, but it’s not about its plot or characters. It’s about the setting and its atmosphere. It swallows you up and transports you to a fictional place that is so evocative and so magical that you just have to be part of it or you’ll die. And even then, The Night Circus has a different kind of vibe from Harry Potter. In this particular capacity, there’s nothing else like Harry Potter.

The thing is, I don’t think Rowling was being as deliberate as Erin Morgenstern. (In fact, given many of Rowling’s recent statements, I question how many of her creative choices were deliberated at all.) She was throwing random magical stuff into the background without thinking too hard about it, which works when you’re writing a kids’ story, but stops working when you try to age it up. Actually, scratch that — soft worldbuilding is definitely not just for kids! The Lord of the Rings has a soft magic system, for crying out loud, and Tolkien is the original archmage of worldbuilding. Don’t listen to anyone who tells you that prioritizing atmosphere over meticulousness is bad worldbuilding. That is a valid way to worldbuild! Not everything needs to be clearly explained, not everything needs to make sense. The problem is that Harry Potter doesn’t balance it well. Certain things do have to be explained in order for the magic to play an active role in the story (and the setting of a magic school lends itself to that kind of explanation), but no rules are ever established for the kinds of magic that need rules. When you begin thinking about the rules, you’re no longer just enjoying the magic for what it is. At worst, you begin running up against the Willing Suspension of Disbelief.

It wasn’t actually the “aging up” of the story that did it in, per se, but rather, the introduction of realism. The early books were heavily stylized, and the later books were less so. A heavily stylized story can more easily maintain the Willing Suspension of Disbelief. That’s why, for example, you don’t ask why the characters are singing in a musical — you just sort of accept the story’s outlandish internal logic, and the inherent melodrama of it doesn’t take you out of the story. Stylized stories are more concerned with being emotionally consistent over being logically consistent. The later Harry Potter books changed their emotional tone, but without changing the worldbuilding style to compensate.

In addition to the more mature themes and darker tone, Harry Potter introduced more realism as it went, but Rowling did not have the worldbuilding chops to pull this off. There’s the basic magic system stuff: When you begin thinking about it too hard, something like a Time-Turner stops being a fun magical device, and starts threatening to break the entire story. Then there’s the characters: Dumbledore leaving Harry on the Dursleys’ doorstep in the first book is an age-old fairy tale trope that goes unquestioned, but with the introduction of realism in the later books, it suddenly becomes abandonment of a child to an abusive family. The exaggerated stereotypes of characters like the Dursleys become tone-deaf. The fun school rivalry of the House system is suddenly lacking in nuance. And then there’s the shift in tone: The wizarding world that we were introduced to as a marvellous place is revealed to be dystopian. You start thinking about how impractical things like owl messengers are, you start wondering if Slytherin is being unjustly punished, the bad history appears glaringly obvious, the quaint archaisms become dangerously regressive. Oh, and the grand feasts are made through slave labor! The wizarding world suddenly feels small and backward instead of grand and marvellous. J.K. Rowling’s bigotry throws it all into an even harsher light.

This is why I’ve always preferred the early books and films to the later ones. There’s a lot of things I like about the later ones, but they’re not as stylized — they don’t have The Vibe. Thinking about things too hard is just a necessary condition of adulthood, but it’s still possible to tell a dark, mature story that is highly stylized. I really think JKR could have better pulled off that shift if she was a more competent worldbuilder. But it is painfully obvious that she did not think things through, and probably didn’t understand why she had to. In her defense, she did not know that her story would end up being one of the most scrutinized of all time. As it stands, her strength in worldbuilding was in the softer, smaller, deliberately unexplained moments of magic that were there just to provide atmosphere. And there were less and less of those as the books went along.

Pretty much all the Harry Potter-related content released since the last film — including Cursed Child, Fantastic Beasts, Hogwarts Mystery, Hogwarts Legacy, Magic Awakened, and that short-lived Pokemon Go thing — have been unsuccessful attempts at recreating The Vibe. In fact, the only piece of supplemental Potter content that I think had that Vibe down pat was the original Pottermore, back when it was more of an interactive game. And of course that got axed. That was right around the time things started going downhill.

Some of the art from Pottermore’s original Sorting quiz.

So what now? Well, that’s the question.

I think I can safely say that The Vibe was the reason I liked Harry Potter. It’s the thing I still like the most about it. I’ve spent years chasing it, like an elusive Patronus through a dark wood. If I can capture and distill that Vibe, and use drops of it in my own work, then perhaps I won’t need Harry Potter anymore.

I'm gonna write the story that I wish Harry Potter was, and when I'm a famous author, I won't become a bigot. I'll see you on the other side.

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