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theskywithin · 3 days ago

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SOUL ASTROLOGY - The Second House Through The Signs

From a soul perspective, this house carries the imprint of embodiment, not just living in a body, but belonging to it. The sign on the cusp show the test your soul willingly walked into. The environment it chose to re-enter in order to unlearn what it once believed was true. This house becomes the field where you rewire those beliefs, slowly, gently, in real time. It asks you to come back into the body not just as a vessel, but as a place worth living in. And to remember that you don’t have to earn what’s already yours.

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Second House Aries

There’s a pace inside you that never fully lands, a heartbeat that listens for footsteps long after the room is quiet. You were shaped in places where stillness meant vulnerability, where the slowest one lost what mattered most. And so now, even safety feels like something you must take, fast, before it disappears. But here, the war is over and your body hasn’t quite believed it yet. This house asks you to stop running long enough to feel the ground beneath your weight. To let your grip loosen, even if the past says, “that’s how the pain gets in” You don’t have to prove your right to belong by outpacing the threat, you don’t have to build a fortress around your hunger, you don’t have to win every time you need to feel safe. Your survival taught you motion. But staying will teach you something else, something slower, something quieter. Like the first time you notice your jaw isn’t clenched. Like the moment your breath doesn’t brace before it lands. Like fingers that forget they were ever fists.

Second House Taurus

There’s a silence you crave but don’t quite believe in, a silence your body can’t fully unclench into. You’ve lived through the illusion of permanence before: hands that promised to stay, homes that held you just long enough to deepen the ache when they broke open. Now, stillness makes you suspicious, beauty makes you brace. You take your time because you know exactly how fast things can disappear once you trust them. So, you move like someone measuring every step against a memory. You keep what’s yours close, not possessively, but tenderly, like a child holding something already half-gone. This is the kind of slowness that doesn’t come from comfort, but from survival. A soul learning to touch what it loves without tightening. This house doesn’t ask you to be solid. It asks you to stay soft in the presence of what lasts. To let something be good without preparing to lose it. To feel the weight of enough without wondering what it will cost. Trust here isn’t a leap, it’s a pattern. A thousand quiet moments where nothing is taken.

Second House Gemini

You knew how to become what the moment needed before the moment arrived. A self built in fragments, shifting mid-sentence, scanning for the right tone, the safe version, the answer that wouldn’t cost you too much. You’ve lived through rooms where silence was dangerous, where not knowing meant exile. And so you sharpened your mind until it could outrun the risk. You reach for meaning before the moment finishes unfolding. You narrate your needs before you feel them. You joke before the ache settles in. Because somewhere in you is a pattern that says: If I name it first, I won’t be caught off guard. If I speak it fast enough, I won’t be hurt for needing it. But safety here doesn’t come from being understood. It comes from not translating yourself at all. From letting the world meet you in the pauses Let your value arrive without explanation. Let your worth speak without having to say a word.

Second House Cancer

You came back with your hands still offering, even when you’re the one who’s hungry, even when the bowl is empty. You’ve known lifetimes where love meant self-erasure, where being needed was the only way to be kept close. You gave and gave, warmth, attention, energy, silence, until you forgot what it felt like to want something just for yourself. Now, the body doesn't trust comfort unless it costs you something. You soften, but only when it’s safe. You ask, but only after making sure no one else needs it first. There’s a part of you that still confuses deserving with being useful. But this house doesn’t want your offerings. It wants you to sit down and eat. To let something stay in your life long enough to nourish you without being turned into a gift for someone else. To let your needs rise without apology. To take up space, not with caretaking, but with belonging. There is a tenderness in you that was never meant to be traded for closeness. It was meant to stay inside your ribs and feed you first.

Second House Leo

You learned to give more light than you had because the silence that followed your stillness felt like abandonment. There were lives where being seen was your only safety. So you kept shining, kept smiling, kept reaching for love with your hands full of offerings, even when no one reached back. But here, in this house, something quieter is asked of you. Not to prove your worth through presence, but to let worth arrive in your absence. Not to perform the self, but to feel it when there is no stage, no gaze, no gold star waiting at the end of effort. This is not a house that wants your charisma, it wants your consent to receive. To take in warmth without giving it all back, to enjoy without entertaining. To be wanted, not for what you do, but for what you are when you stop doing. And yes, it may ache at first. The stillness, the intimacy, the mirror with no audience. But slowly, something in you softens. Like silk loosening where the armor used to be. Like warmth returning to a part of you that forgot it had blood.

Second House Virgo

You came back trying to earn your right to stay. Not through effort, but refinement, the way you track every shift in tone, every detail in the room, every crack in the silence that might grow if left unnoticed. There were lives where the smallest mistake cost too much. Where being careful was the only way to be kept. Where chaos fell on your shoulders because someone had to clean it up, and you were already reaching for the broom. Now, the body flinches when things don’t align. The breath tightens when needs feel disorganized. There’s a quiet voice in you that says: if I can just keep everything in place, maybe I won’t be left again. But this house doesn’t want your precision, it wants your permission to let things be a little undone. To let your hunger show before it’s fully articulated. To let the mess stay on the table without rushing to turn it into meaning. You’re not here to master the system this time, you’re here to feel safe even when the system fails. And yes, it may feel like unraveling. But slowly, something in you begins to breathe again, like thread that no longer pulls too tight, like a stitch that holds even when no one’s tugging.

Second House Libra

You came back with your edges filed down. There were lives where tension meant abandonment, where preference meant punishment, where asking for anything tipped the balance toward loss. So you adjusted, you smiled, you made yourself smooth and manageable. Not because you didn’t have needs, but because you learned that having them made things harder. Now, your nervous system still listens for shifts before they speak, you clip your wants like over-sharp nails before they scratch the surface of someone else’s calm, you swallow the volume of your truth so it doesn’t crack the delicate silence you were trained to protect. You give in small, beautiful ways and often forget to receive at all. But this house is not a mirror, it’s a container, a place where you stop performing agreement and start practicing desire. Where value isn’t decided by how well you keep the peace, but by how deeply you stay with yourself when peace is nowhere in sight. There is no aesthetic here. No perfect tone. No pleasing your way into worth. Only the radical truth that your needs are not a disruption. They are the pulse your body has been holding its breath to hear again.

Second House Scorpio

You came back remembering what it cost to trust the ground beneath you. There were lives where you held still just long enough to be broken open. Where the moment you let your guard down, the moment you softened, the thing you loved was taken. Safety, here, feels suspicious. Because stillness was once a trap, and comfort was currency used to extract what you weren’t ready to give. So you grip tightly now, not out of greed, but grief. You test what stays, you watch how things move when you’re no longer performing stillness. There’s a part of you that wants to believe in permanence, but can’t stop scanning for the moment it disappears. But this house doesn’t want your vigilance. It wants your presence, the version of you that doesn't brace before receiving. It wants the body before it flinches, the breath before it holds, the hand before it pulls back. And yes, it may ache at first, to feel safe without preparing for loss. But eventually, the threat becomes memory and you learn how to hold what’s yours without bleeding to keep it. Like learning how to drink water without expecting it to drown you. Like sleeping with both eyes closed for the first time in lifetimes.

Second House Sagittarius

You came back fluent in meaning, but unsure how to hold anything without turning it into a lesson. There were lives where understanding became your shield, where you built belief systems around your pain because you didn’t have the tools to sit inside it. When something hurt, you turned it into metaphor. When something stayed, you asked what it was teaching you. Not out of curiosity but out of reflex. Because staying still once left you empty, and you promised yourself you’d never feel that small again. Now, your instinct is to climb out of the moment before it closes around you. You reach for insight when your body asks for comfort. You make philosophy out of longing instead of letting it touch you. You’ve learned how to carry truth like a torch but not yet how to let it warm you. This house doesn’t want your wisdom, it wants your weight. It wants you inside your life not describing it from above. The ache doesn’t vanish but it no longer burns through you like urgency. It stays low, steady, like coals under skin: heat that no longer needs a destination.

Second House Capricorn

You came back remembering that nothing was ever simply yours. That worth had to be constructed, brick by careful brick, because no one would hand it to you. There were lives where you carried too much, too soon, where survival depended on being competent, composed, capable of withstanding anything. You learned how to meet need with strategy. How to make longing efficient. How to hold the weight of other people’s failures and call it strength. Now, your instinct is to earn your place before claiming it, to build the scaffolding before standing inside the life that was already meant for you. But this house is asking you to remember what stability feels like in the body, to let worth live in the spine, not in the story, to let yourself receive without keeping score. And yes, it will feel exposed, at first, to stand still without achievement to prop you up. But slowly, something in you will begin to settle, like stone warmed by sun instead of carved by effort, like ground that holds even when you stop holding it up.

Second House Aquarius

You came back a little out of sync with your own hunger. Not because you don’t feel it, but because you learned not to trust what happened after. There were lives where needing something made you vulnerable to loss. Where your longing was met with cold hands. Where being different wasn’t the wound, being unmet was. So you adjusted. You rose above it. You learned how to watch your desires like weather: shifting, distant, mostly passing through. You’ve built entire realities where the body is a background hum, not a home. But this house asks you to come back inside. Not for comfort, for contact. Not to understand the self, but to feel it without a system, without a cause, without editing the need before it arrives. And no, there is no ceremony here. No breakthrough. No brilliance. Just this: a hand on a warm mug, your weight in a chair that doesn’t move, the small strangeness of staying long enough to call it yours.

Second House Pisces

You came back with a softness that once cost you everything. There were lives where letting go was safer than holding on. Where certainty never lasted, and so you learned to reach for what couldn’t break, the dream, the meaning, the feeling of being close to something larger than the body. You trusted what was vast because the tangible always slipped away. Now, the body feels like a question you’re not sure how to answer. Presence feels too sharp. Wanting feels too loud. You’ve been trained to find value in what dissolves, in sacrifice, in surrender, in what you can offer instead of what you can keep. But this house isn’t asking you to disappear. It’s asking you to stay with the ordinary. To trust what’s in your hands. To let a good thing repeat without needing to turn it into something holy. This is where you learn that devotion can live in small routines. In making the same cup of tea every morning. In naming your needs before they turn into longing. In letting your body be the place the sacred shows up, not the thing you give away to find it. There’s no transcendence here. Just rhythm. Just breath. Just the quiet act of keeping what you used to let go of first.

#astrology #astro community #astro observations #astro notes #natal astrology #birth chart #astrology tumblr #natal chart #natal aspects #astrology blog #astrology book #astrology observations

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booksandteaandtears · 20 hours ago

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Makeshift veterinarian

Dr. Jack Abbot x f!cop!reader

Summary: a day that starts bad ends up better because of a certain grumpy trauma doctor. but mostly because of a cat.

genre: fluff, jack doesn't like cats

content warnings: a cat gets hurt and underage drinking

about 2.1k words

masterlist

Some days as a cop were really bad. Some days were pretty good. Some were in between. And some, were actually fantastic.

Now this day hadn't started out fantastic. You had an evening shift, which you hated 'cause it meant dealing with drunk youngsters. You did not get to team up with your preferred partner because they were on vacation. And on top of everything, you had new boots on because someone had puked all over your old ones yesterday and you could not get the smell or the stains out. Bad week.

The new boots were a problem. Not only because you could already feel the blisters coming up, but mostly because new boots meant problems. You'd picked out the pattern years ago: anytime you got new boots and people commented on them, you'd have the worst shift of that year.

So you and your rookie were hiding out in the suburbs, en route to a concerned neighbour that wanted the teens kicked out of the yard a couple houses over. Your partner tonight was basically a teen himself, fresh out of the academy.

"Just left here," Said Cooper while you were driving into a suburb not too far from the city centre. “And then it should be number 88, on your right hand side." You parked the car and both of you stepped out, checking your belt before closing the door. "Right Cooper, this one's yours. Should be an easy one, just tell the neighbour we'll ask them to quiet down and it should be solved easily." He knocked on the door, and it took a minute for a calm face to open it. You couldn't help but notice how handsome he was.

"Mr. Abbot?" Cooper asked. The man nodded and gestured for the two of you to come in. The house was a little cluttered and not too big, filled with books, an old leather sofa and a beat up police scanner was laying on an otherwise empty cabinet. A crutch was placed next to the door and he picked it up when he followed you into the house, leaning on it when he lifted his left leg up, putting his weight on the crutch instead of his right leg. You took a moment to take a closer look at him. His brown greyish hair was messy, like he'd raked his hand trough it a lot. The shadows on his chin and neck were slightly messy, but not unkempt. "It's the neighbourhood kids," he started to explain. "They're making a bunch of noise, which is fine by me, I'm working night shifts over at PTMC anyway. I'm just concerned they're drinking too much. I'd go over there myself but they don't really listen to me." Cooper nodded. He looked at you expectantly. You looked straight back at him. That boy did not know how to take the lead in anything. When the silence got a little too long and unbearable you stepped in. "Sir, any reason you're worried about exuberant alcohol intake, did you see any of the kids? We're not about to walk in there just on a hunch." Mr. Abbot smiled at you, making intense eye contact. "They're screaming about chugging approximately every 7 minutes. There's about 15 boys there, based on the cars in front, maybe a couple girls. If they've been keeping this tempo up since earlier they will all be at least a good couple of beers in at this point. And they're young, about 16 or so, so alcohol poisoning will creep up fast. I hooked two of the kids up to an IV last week, when the neighbour's' kid came around because his friends wouldn't stop puking. I'd rather prevent myself the trouble this week. I’d walk over there myself, but my prosthetic has been acting up and II doubt they’d listen to me anyway." Abbot pointed to the prosthetic in the corner. Cooper was trying to jot down what Abbot was saying, but he was missing half of it.

You decided to end the painful encounter on Cooper's part and promised Mr. Abbot you'd try to reason with the kids. Cooper tried to save face by saying "Thank you for your concern, Mr. Abbot!" a little too loudly. Abbot nodded, but when Cooper turned around he grunted, "Dr. Abbot actually, but I think that's too much information for the kid too remember." Your hand shot to your face, trying not to laugh at your partner, and at least conceal it when you did. Dr. Abbot smirked at you. "Good luck with that one." He winked at you. "Thanks." You whispered back. You could feel your face turning red.

When you arrived at the kid's house, it was more quiet than you expected. You knocked on the door, but when there was no answer you let yourself and Cooper into the garden 'round the back. It seemed the reason for the quiet was that around half of the kids had fallen asleep and the other half was busy making out. Cooper blinked and stared at you. You sighed at him. "Are you going to take charge of this one, or is it up to me again." The blinking continued. "Right." You muttered. "New shoes day and an incapable rookie. What could go wrong."

"Hello there!" You shouted into the garden, trying to assert authority. "Everybody up and at ‘em, cups on the floor, tongues out of each other's mouthes! Look lively!" The kids scrambled up and the sound of red cups dropping filled the air. "So, whose parents am I going to call for the mess around here?" A couple kids pointed towards a dark haired boy on the right, that has just been kissing with a blonde girl. You scanned him quickly. "This is your parents' house?" "Yes, ma'am." The boy answered. "Do they know you and your friends were out drinking here?" He swallowed. "They know about the friends, not about the drinking." You hummed. "That's what I thought. All right, here's what we'll do. Firstly, all this drink is going to get thrown out. You three on the right can get started on that. Secondly you're going to clean this mess up, so your friend won't get busted by his parents. And I'm taking ID's while you do that, so don't thinks you'll get off easy. I'm writing you all down, and next time anything happens you might just be spending a night in jail. I'm guessing you don't want to have to explain that to your parents, now do you?." The kids nodded fiercely. "Then you're all going to go back to your houses to hit the hay. I don't want you driving, so either get someone to pick you up or sleep over here and drive home sober in the morning. Monday afternoon, after school, you'll all be reporting at the women's shelter downtown, and you're going to get put to work. Is that clear to you all?" They nodded again. "I asked, is it clear?" A choir of "yes ma'am" filled the lawn. "Good, and don't entertain the thought that I won't find out whether you've been by the shelter, 'cause I will. Now Cooper, get to writing down names." Cooper opened his notepad and somehow got ink al over his hands from his pen. "Yes ma'am." This was bound to be a long night.

Half an hour later you were headed back towards the car, the kids were dealt with. You were trying to explain to Cooper why you had chosen to deal with the evening as you had when you heard a noise on the street beside you. You stopped walking and turned towards the sound. An orange cat lay on the street, blood dripping from his left hind leg. You hurried towards it immediately. "Oh you poor thing, did someone hit you and run? Oh darling." You stroked the cat's head and a dishearteningly quiet meow escaped it. "Oh, you sweet, your leg hurts, I know. We'll make it better." You picked the poor thing up and turned towards Cooper. His eyes were big as he asked you, "What are we going to do with that now?"

"The cat's broken its leg." Is what you decided to start the conversation with. Dr. Abbot stood in front of you, staring you in the face. "And you brought it to me to fix up? Saw my leg and thought I might feel for the thing? I don't like cats. Try someone else." "You're a doctor, you're supposed to help. Don't be so grumpy about it." "I am a doctor, yes, for humans. Not for furry things with claws. You need a vet for that." Your eyes dropped to the Dog Tags that were hanging out of his V-neck shirt. "You are a vet." You sighed and pushed past him, into the house. He grabbed your shoulder to stop you and looked you in the eyes, again. "Wrong kind of vet, kid. Take the fur ball to a real one." You shook the hand off and placed the cat on his kitchen table. "Just take a quick peek at the poor thing. It's shivering already and I'm sure you know how to fix it. If you just set the leg we can drop the poor boy of at a shelter afterwards. The vet won't take him in if no one's paying."

Dr. Abbot circled the table. "Girl." He said. "Pardon me?" "It's a girl," he said, gesturing between the cat's leg, "There's just a tail between those legs, nothing else." A smirk crossed your face. "You're going to help her then?" Abbot looked back at you. "I'll see what I can do. But I make no promises." You smiled. "Thank you, Dr. Abbot." He turned to the sofa and grabbed a bag. "Just Jack will do for now, I'm not treating any human patients anyhow."

Half an hour later the cat was treated with about half the contains of Jack's go-bag, and she was snoozing happily in a towel on the table. You had thought him handsome before, but it had somehow multiplied while watching him hunched over the cat, all his focus on trying to help the poor thing. It didn't help that his arms had looked amazing while doing it. You swallowed your thoughts. "Thank you Jack, I know I pushed you into that, you didn't have to do it." Jack scoffed. "You act like there was any choice, you just barged in here with that girl. I can't say not to a pretty lady bossing me around. Pretty sure you'd have called the cops on me if I had refused." His eyes twinkled with amusement. A smirk touched the corners of your lips. "I won't comment on that. I'm just a good judge of character, I knew you wouldn't say no in the end.” You picked up the jacket that you had shrugged off to assist in keeping the car still. “Cooper's just going to get the car and then we will be on our way with the poor thing." A sigh escaped Jack and he started mumbling. You blinked at him, you couldn't hear what he said. He sighed again and repeated himself. "I'll keep the thing here for now. I just spent 30 minutes saving its leg, it would be a waste is she was just going to get an infection at the shelter now." You raised your eyebrow. "You're going to take care of her?" He nodded and petted the cat's head. "Sure, though I don't really know how." You avoided his attentive eyes by petting the cat as well. Your finger brushed against his and your heart skipped a beat. "I'll come by after my shift." You answered, probably sounding a bit too eager. "I'll get some cat food and a scratch pole, I'll help you figure it out." Jack nodded and smiled at you. "Sure, I'd like that. It's a date." You looked up from the cat and returned his smile. “Don’t get your hopes up, Jack Abbot. I’m only coming for the cat.”

Your new shoes had no impact the rest of the night, and the next morning, when you came to help him with the cat, Jack had breakfast waiting for you. Best shift of your life.

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mournaeve · 21 hours ago

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❝ almost, always ❞

paring : yeon si-eun (weak hero) × gn!reader

genre : fluff, mild angst/hurt-comfort, emotional miscommunication, slow burn

warnings : mentions of emotional exhaustion/burn out, emotional whiplash but make it quiet and poetic, excessive eye contact with a emotionally constipated boy, 9/10 confession (where's the last 1, no one knows)

synopsis : Two people, both quiet in different ways, six missed chances, one almost-confession—and a love that grows in the silence between what’s said and what’s meant.

joy speaks : hi, and welcome to my first fic <3 genuinely hope you like it. don't be a silent reader!

1. The first time you met Si-eun, you were stealing Baku's snack and threatening to bite Gotak. Not seriously, of course, but with the kind of conviction that only came from a lack of shame and too little sleep.

Your mouth still tasted like instant noodles and regret. Your hair was a chaos theory. Your hoodie?—stolen from Baku, smelled faintly of laundry detergent and sweat, like a boy who lived his life in motion and never washed anything properly and also had a giant yellow pikachu on the front.

You didn't notice him at first.

No, at first you were too busy lying on the classroom floor, narrating your slow descent into madness because Gotak had, in your words, 'emotionally betrayed you' by siding with Baku over what was clearly your bag of chips. Baku, naturally, just sat on your back and told you to accept death with dignity.

Then you saw a pair of shoes. Clean, white, very still. Not fidgety like Gotak's or scuffed like Humin's.

You tilted your head up, squinting from the floor like a raccoon caught under fluorescent light, and there he was.

Expression unreadable. Face sharp in that quiet way—like something drawn in pencil and not yet colored in. Si-eun. Yeon Si-eun. You knew his name only because Gotak had once whispered it like he was talking about a ghost who might hear him.

He didn’t say anything. Just looked down at the mess on the floor, you, mostly, and blinked.

You, still on your stomach, gave a small wave.

"Hey. I swear I'm not usually like this."

He didn’t laugh. Not even a twitch of the mouth. But you swore later, swore, that his eyes lingered for half a second too long. Like he was trying to decide whether to ignore you or classify you as some new species.

Maybe both.

That was the first time. You didn’t know yet that it would become a pattern—him appearing silently, you saying something ridiculous, the two of you orbiting each other like mismatched planets with slightly wrong gravity.

But in that moment, on the floor of a classroom you barely stayed awake in, with Baku sitting on your back and Gotak looking vaguely concerned for everyone’s sanity—

—you thought, 'huh'

He’s kind of cute when he looks confused.

◎⫘◎

2. You didn't expect to see him again. Not so soon, not without the buffer of Baku's laughter or Gotak's nervous commentary or the chaos of you being your usual, spiraling self. But there he was, outside the convenience store, earphones in, staring at the gum rack like it had personally offended him.

You stopped short. He didn't look up.

And for reasons you couldn’t explain even under emotional duress, you didn't keep walking. You hovered.

Like an idiot.

"Didn't peg you for a mint guy," you said finally, voice casual, like you hadn’t just debated crossing the street to avoid standing next to him and his inexplicably intense aura.

He looked up, slow. Blank expression unreadable. Those same pencil drawn beautiful eyes.

Then, flatly, "I'm not."

You blinked. Looked at the gum in his hand. "You've been holding that for like three minutes."

"I was spacing out."

"Oh."

Beat.

You nodded, like that explained the universe, and turned to grab a bottle of water. Behind you, you could feel his silence — not heavy, just… neutral. Like air that hadn’t decided if it was humid or cold.

"I wasn't following you, by the way," you added without being prompted, twisting the bottle cap as you rejoined him at the register. "In case your survival instincts kicked in."

Another pause. He looked at you.

"I didn't think you were."

You laughed — too loud, too fast — and instantly regretted it. "Right. Cool. Great. Just clearing that up, y'know, for the record."

"I don’t think about you that much."

And there it was.

You froze mid-step, plastic bottle crinkling in your hand. A second too slow, your brain tried to patch the damage: he didn't mean it like that. Probably. Hopefully?

"Oh," you said, smile cracking just slightly. "No offense taken. I also don't, like, catalogue your whereabouts or anything. That would be psychotic."

He gave you a look, like he was either very confused or wondering if you were having a stroke.

You both stood there, the cashier watching, deeply done with both your energies.

Si-eun finally paid for his gum. That he definitely didn’t want.

And you stood holding a bottle of water and the first bruise of misunderstanding, shaped like a boy who said things without malice but still managed to dig a little too deep.

Later that night, Baku asked why you were chewing mint gum with a dramatic sigh.

You told him it was an aesthetic choice. You didn't mention Si-eun. Not yet.

◎⫘◎

3. It happened because Gotak's mom called.

Loudly. On speaker. In the middle of the table, right as he was halfway through explaining some physics concept that sounded like witchcraft. He panicked, unplugged his charger wrong, and blew the socket.

And just like that, the lights went out in Baku's room.

Chaos. Swearing. Baku tripping over a dumbbell. You, laughing until your ribs hurt. Gotak apologizing to the socket like it had feelings. Juntae being all flustered while trying to keep the others in check.

Eventually, they both left to 'buy snacks and air out their humiliation.' You were too tired to follow.

And Si-eun didn't leave.

He stayed sitting on the floor, back against Baku’s bed frame, eyes unreadable. You weren’t sure if he didn't move because he was comfortable or because inertia had claimed him.

You sat across from him, the silence sitting with you like a third presence. It wasn't uncomfortable. It just… was.

You cleared your throat. "You always this quiet?"

He didn’t answer immediately. Then: "Do you always talk this much?"

Your jaw dropped. "Are you saying I talk too much?"

"No," he said, and blinked, slowly, "I'm saying I wasn't aware human lungs could handle this level of dialogue per minute."

You gawked at him.

He didn’t look smug. Or mean. Just… factual. As if he were reading weather data.

You threw a pillow at his face.

He caught it with both hands, unimpressed.

"I'm gonna take that as a yes," you muttered, curling into a cross-legged huff.

Silence again.

You should’ve let it drop. But something in you always needed to make sense of things. Of people.

"You don't like me, do you?" you asked.

He looked up at that. Not startled. Just puzzled.

"Why would you say that?"

You mentally snorted 'I wonder why."

"I don't know. The gum comment. The lungs comment. The general 'I'm enduring your presence like a particularly inconvenient fire drill' energy."

His brows furrowed slightly.

"That's not what I meant," he said. "I don’t dislike you."

"But you don't like me."

He looked at you for a moment too long.

"I don’t not like you."

It was the kind of answer that made your brain run into a wall. You opened your mouth. Closed it.

"…Wow," you said. "Poetry."

He frowned faintly, clearly confused why you sounded so sarcastic.

You didn't push it. But when Baku and Gotak returned and flopped dramatically into the room with ice cream and shame, you laughed louder than you meant to.

And you refused to meet Si-eun’s eyes for the rest of the night.

◎⫘◎

4. You were wearing another hoodie.

Not Baku's this time — a different one. Slightly too big. Worn in the elbows. Charcoal gray with a weird bleach stain near the zipper. Not your usual look.

Si-eun noticed it immediately.

He didn't say anything, of course. He just stared.

You were too busy trying to untangle Gotak's wired earphones (how did they still exist?) while sitting on the cafeteria bench, ranting about something inconsequential — probably the school vending machine robbing you again. Baku was making jokes, as usual. Gotak laughed too loudly, as usual. Juntae was swinging his legs adorably like a child waiting for his mother to provide him with candy.

Then a boy walked past. Said your name. Smiled.

You looked up. "Oh—hey. Thanks again for the hoodie."

Si-eun's gaze didn't shift. He didn't ask. He didn't need to.

You caught it in the twitch of his fingers, the flick of his eyes, the way his entire body went very, very still.

Later, in the hallway, he stopped next to you. Not with you — next to. A detail you couldn’t unfeel.

"Is that your boyfriend?" he asked, tone flat.

You blinked. "Who?"

"The guy. With the hoodie. The one you smiled at like he invented oxygen."

You snorted. "No. He just lent me this when I spilled coffee on my shirt this morning."

He nodded. Slowly. You waited for a follow-up. It didn’t come.

Instead, he walked away with his hands in his pockets, shoulders hunched, that silent wall rising like it always did when he didn't understand what he was feeling.

You stared after him, eyebrows pulled together.

You weren't his. He wasn't yours.

But still, you wanted to yell down the hallway,

'I would tressure your hoodie, if you ever offered it.'

◎⫘◎

5. It was raining the way it only rains in cities—sideways, rude, unforgiving. You hadn't meant to forget your umbrella. You were just late, and your brain had been full of other things. Like him. Like the hoodie thing. Like the way he hadn't spoken to you in two days. You were treading recklessly on the thin line between friends and strangers who know each other because of their mutual friends. No matter what you tried, attempted at, maybe to bring you both closer and not be strangers or just be his friend- he would always retract. Push you away with words or build walls around his heart that were too big and impossible not to notice.

You were soaked through by the time you reached the courtyard gate. Shoes squeaking, hair clinging to your face, hoodie (not his, not anyone's) weighing you down like a wet dog sweater.

Your heavy wet eyes widened at the sight before you.

Si-eun.

Standing under a small blue umbrella like the sky had personally chosen to leave him untouched.

You stopped. He didn't wave, or smile, or call out. Just lifted the umbrella a little higher.

You stared. Your heart twisted sideways.

"…Are you offering me that?" you asked, cautious.

"I wouldn't be standing here if I wasn't."

You blinked. Walked over. Shoulders tense.

He didn't say anything. Just turned slightly, so the umbrella covered half of your body. His half was still mostly dry. You were dripping.

After a minute, you exhaled. "You didn’t have to wait."

"I know."

"…I thought you were mad at me."

"I'm not."

"I thought you didn't want to talk to me anymore."

"I do."

You were quiet.

Then you whispered it. Half a joke, half a plea:

"So this is... pity, huh?"

He didn’t answer right away. Just looked at you, eyes sharp and unreadable.

You couldn't hold the silence.

You stepped out from under the umbrella. "Forget it. I'm fine."

Rain hit your skin like needles. Cold. Fast. Real.

He didn't follow. You didn't look back. And by the time you got home, soaked to the bone and furious with yourself, it was too late to ask him what he really meant.

◎⫘◎

6. It was late.

Too late to be in the library. Too late for the lights to still hum this way, for the floor to be cold against your knee pits as you sat between shelves with your hoodie bunched up beneath you like a failed pillow.

You weren't crying.

But you were close. That tight-throated silence. That wet weight behind the eyes that made everything feel distant. The kind of sad that didn"t have a name. The kind that didn't explode — just leaked.

He found you anyway.

You didn't ask how.

Si-eun stood there, backpack still on, hair a little rumpled, shirt collar tugged loose like he'd either run or paced in circles before finding you.

He didn’t ask what was wrong. He just sat beside you. Close, but not close enough to touch.

After a long, long moment, he said, low,

"I'm not good at this."

You blinked. "At what?"

"This. Talking. Reading people. Knowing the right thing to say."

You looked at him, sharp, surprised. His voice didn't waver, but it wasn't calm. It was something else — strained. Steady, but brittle at the edges.

He went on, "I don't realize when I'm being too blunt, or too distant. I've… ruined a lot of things that way."

You didn’t speak.

He stared at his hands.

"I used to think it didn’t matter. Not anymore. That being quiet kept things simple. But you—"

He stopped. Swallowed. "You confuse the hell out of me."

Your breath hitched.

"You talk like your words are racing to escape you. You say things I don’t know how to answer. You make me feel like I’m always three steps behind and—and I hate it."

The silence rang.

Then, quieter:

"But I hate it more when you're not around."

You didn't move.

You didn't say anything.

Your brain tripped over itself. Every version of you — the loud one, the jokey one, the brave one — went silent. And in that stretch of hesitation, Si-eun stood.

He didn't look at you.

"I shouldn't have said that," he murmured. "I knew it would come out wrong."

He walked away before you could tell him it didn't.

Later, lying in your bed, face buried in a damp hoodie, you whispered it,

'But it didn’t come out wrong at all.'

◎⫘◎

6. It started with silence.

Not the usual kind — not Si-eun's quiet that felt full of thinking, full of weight. This was emptier. Distant. Clean, like someone had wiped the board.

He'd stopped showing up to group study sessions. Stopped responding to your messages. Left early from lunch. Didn't make eye contact in the hall.

You told yourself he was just busy. That midterms had fried his brain. That he'd drop a deadpan one-liner in your DMs any second now.

He didn't.

When you finally cornered Baku and asked what was going on, he just shrugged — unconvincingly.

And so, armed with indignation and mild sleep deprivation, you found Si-eun after school, outside the campus gates, hoodie up, hands in pockets, looking like a ghost of himself.

"You’re avoiding me," you said.

His eyes flicked up. Then away. "No, I'm not."

"You are." You laughed — humorless. "Jesus, Si-eun, at least lie with conviction."

He was quiet for a beat. He exhaled quietly, "I thought you might want space."

"From you?"

"You looked uncomfortable. Last time. When I said… all that."

You stared. Mouth open. Head buzzing.

"That’s why?" you whispered. “You thought I was uncomfortable?”

He didn’t meet your eyes. "You didn't say anything. So, I figured I'd made things weird."

You exhaled, slow. Almost a laugh. Almost a scream.

"You idiot," you said, soft.

He flinched — just slightly. Gazing up with his eyes, 'god damn his eyes, were they always this beautiful?'

You looked away before your voice could crack. "You didn't make it weird. I did. I didn't know what to say, but that doesn't mean I didn't want to say something."

He didn't answer.

The wind was cold. The sky was turning gray, like it couldn't make up its mind.

You looked at him again.

"You always do that," you said. "Assume how people feel and then act like it's confirmed data."

"It's easier than asking."

"Well, maybe next time, ask."

He looked at you then.

Like he heard you for the first time.

But still, he didn't move. And neither did you.

The moment passed like a train that didn't stop.

You both walked away feeling like you’d missed something important.

Because you had.

◎◎⫘◎◎

1. It didn't happen at some climactic hour, in some big cinematic way.

There was no rainstorm this time, no bruised hallway lighting, no tension humming between the inches of silence.

Just a classroom. Late. Empty. Gold evening light spilling sideways through the windows, dust drifting in slow motion. The kind of warmth that didn't burn — just sat in your bones like an old memory.

You hadn't meant to fall asleep.

You'd only meant to rest your eyes. Just for a second. But the warmth got to you — the sunlight, the still air, the safety of a quiet room without anyone needing anything from you. You drifted.

When you opened your eyes again, Si-eun was there.

Sitting on a chair beside the desk. Back against the wall. Book in his lap. Head tilted slightly toward you.

Not watching. Just being.

Your first instinct was to speak. Crack a joke. Break the softness with your usual deflection.

But for once, you didn't. You just looked at him. Let the quiet stretch.

He closed the book.

"Bad dream?" he asked, voice like a whisper folded in linen.

You blinked the sleep out of your eyes. "Not really. Just... weird."

A pause.

"Felt like I was floating."

He nodded. Like he understood.

You sat up slowly, wincing a little at the crick in your neck.

He reached into his bag and passed you a water bottle without a word.

You took it. Sipped.

He didn't fill the silence. He didn't shrink from it either. Just sat there with you, like he had nowhere else to be, no one else to become in that moment.

And then—"Thank you," you said.

He looked at you, eyebrows lifting just slightly. "For what?"

"For... not leaving."

It came out so softly you weren't sure it even reached him.

But his eyes held yours, steady.

You took in his eyes, his eyes were a study in contradiction — sharp in thought, but soft in shape, always watching like they were learning you in real time. Slightly wide, dark, and quietly luminous, like they held whole libraries of things left unsaid. They didn’t flicker much when he spoke — they lingered, honest in a way his voice never quite managed.

And when he looked at you, really looked, it felt like standing barefoot in the middle of something sacred.

Like silence could be tender. Like you could finally stop explaining yourself. Those eyes didn’t ask for words. They just understood.

Then he added, not quickly, but like it had been waiting:

"I wasn't going to."

Nothing more. No sudden hand grabs, no confessions, no dizzying declarations. Just that.

For the first time, there was nothing to correct. Nothing to fix.

You both stayed there. In the gold-lit quiet. In the stillness that didn't ask for answers. Just presence.

And this time — finally — you both understood.

◎◎⫘◎◎

2. It was dark by the time the rooftop emptied out.

The others had gone. Baku, Gotak, Juntae— loud footsteps, louder laughter, the crunch of snack wrappers left behind. The kind of after-school chaos that made everything feel alive. But now it was quiet. That dusky, hush-hour kind of quiet, where even the wind didn't bother to speak.

You stayed behind to clean up. He stayed behind for... something else.

Neither of you said it.

Si-eun was leaning against the railing, hood pulled halfway up, hair catching in the breeze. You were stacking drink cans into neat, metallic towers and pretending not to feel the weight of his gaze on your back.

"You always do that," he said.

You blinked. "Do what?"

"Stay behind. Fix things no one notices."

You smiled — crooked, tired. "Someone has to."

Silence again. Not heavy. Just full.

"I used to think I was fine alone," he said. Quiet. Almost to himself. "That being alone meant being safe. That silence meant control."

You straightened. Slowly.

He didn’t look at you. Just kept talking, eyes on the horizon where the sky bled orange into navy.

"But it’s not quiet when you're gone. It's louder. It’s—"

He cut himself off. Bit his lip. Exhaled sharp.

You waited.

"I don't know how to say it right," he admitted.

"You don’t have to."

"I want to," he said. "I—"

He turned then. Finally looked at you.

"I think about you. All the time. In the middle of things that don’t matter. Like math problems and weather reports and the noise in the hallway. You just show up. In my head."

Your throat tightened.

He stepped forward — one pace. No more.

"If you asked me what we are," he said, "I don't have the word. But I know what I want it to be."

You didn't breathe.

"-and if you don’t feel the same, that’s fine. I'll try to not think of it" His voice cracked slightly, "But I don't want to keep pretending this is nothing."

You looked at him.

"I feel it too."

He smiled.

Actually smiled.

Not the polite curl of the corners of his lips he wore in passing, but the real one, the one that came slow and reluctant, like it wasn't used to being let out. It broke across his face like sunlight through fog, fleeting and precious, the kind of thing you only caught if you were paying attention.

Now that it happened, everything softened: the edges of his jaw, the tension in his shoulders, the guarded quiet in his eyes. It was a smile that felt like a secret, like you’d been trusted with something he didn’t give away easily. A quiet admission that, for a moment, he let himself feel joy — and let you see it.

And in that soft rooftop dark, with cans clinking quietly in your hands and the wind threading through your sleeves, you realized something simple:

There was no misunderstanding anymore.

There was just you.

And him.

And everything you hadn’t said — finally, beautifully heard.

◎◎⫘◎◎

@mournaeve 2025, I don't allow translations or reposting of my work however reblogging is fine :)

#weak hero class 1 #weak hero class x reader #weak hero #weak hero x reader #weak hero class two #yeon sieun #yeon sieun x reader #ahn suho x reader #weak hero class 1 x reader #weak hero class 2 x reader #fluff #oneshot #mournaeve

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nyaruelle-designs · 2 days ago

Text

🦄 Mane 6 Redesign! 🦄

Aaaaaa my first redesign post!! I had so much making this and been looking forward to finally share it. (but my hand hurts right now from drawing lolol)

To those new to me: I do this thing where I redesign characters as a challenge (+ have fun being creative with design tweaks (✿◠‿◠)) , I don't dislike any of the OG designs, I just like to give myself something fun to do :'D

Keep reading below for design notes! :D

OK so starting off with species differences:

I make it a point to make each species unique from one another with different tail + ear shape for each kind of pony

in order to explain away how do ponies in this iteration get conveniently matching body markings, I imagine that fillies are born without markings but slowly get them after receiving their cutie mark. the markings slowly leaves changes on the coat/mane as they grow into adulthood :D

also gave all species hoof markings, the shape of the hoof corresponds with the pony's cutie mark

for unicorns– they also have horn markings that correspond with their cutie mark. OH and, horn magic color corresponds with the color of the pony's eyes

for pegasi– the tips of their wings would match with the color of their manes

not mentioned in the images attached but the eye light shape also corresponds with the ponies' cutie mark >_< (fillies just have regular circles until after they get their cutie marks-)

misc feature: ponies may or may not have leg tuffs, like with some ponies you'll see below, some may have fuller leg tuffs that goes all the way around.

Alright now that you know more about the species design notes, I'll get into each ponies' design choices

Pinkie Pie

Starting off with Pinkie, I made her coat fluffy, matching her mane, her mane was shorten a bit and also gave her a white streak in her bangs + added a hair accessory + confetti in her hair from throwing parties (my headcanon is that she doesn't bother to pick them out so she just leaves em there)

she has pebble shaped markings on her face and coat running down her back. In her pink form, those markings are commonly mistaken as large freckles

her desaturated form takes inspo from how she looks as a filly, also her mane shape may or may not have been inspired by the shape of pinata paper strips.

Among all the ponies, Pinkie is also the shortest. I try my best to give each pony a different height, hope that was noticeable haha

Applejack

Next up, Applejack, now for her design (+ most of the mane 6's designs) there isn't too much change. For her, I gave her coat more texture akin to actual patterns from real horses. Similar to pinkie, Applejack's back has pebble-shaped spots (feel free to believe that I intentionally added it there to link AJ + Pinkie as distant relatives haha)

In comparison to pinkie though, I used a lot of sharp lines while drawing AJ, also made her look more muscular / "box" shaped compared to the other ponies. (which fits too as I imagine her farm work made her pretty fit)

As mentioned, AJ's hoof tuffs go all around

Twilight Sparkle

For twilight, I tweaked her colors to be more Purple and included a bit of orange to create a small contrast as I noticed her OG palette was a lot of Purple. (cool colors) + I wanted her palette to resemble more of a twilight color (?)

I also noted that some other people felt that Twilight doesn't match the archetype she was meant to represent so I gave her glasses in an attempt to make her appear more "studious"

Her unicorn form is also shorter compared to her alicorn form. (gave her slightly shorter horn + legs)

Rarity

Okay Rarity's has to be my favourite redesign HAHA. I also have a feeling a lot of you will point out she resembles the last unicorn a lot 🥲 to that, i'm deeply sorryy

Anyway, for Rarity I changed her palette a lot more compared to the others because I wanted her palette to match her name sake 'Rarity', so what better way to set her apart as being a pony with a different mane/tail color!! + heterochromia which means her horn magic is 2 different colors. (that's my headcanon of what might constitute as 'rare' in pony genetics. ALSO off topic but is it just me or has there never been a pony in the show that actually has heterochromia? 🤔 tbh I can't remember)

I also gave her some gem accessories that she wears as a necklace, oh and a matching earring as well

Fluttershy

ah yes, my other favourite design. For Fluttershy, I softened her colors and also added some green

also, among rainbow and twilight, Fluttershy's wings are purposely designed to be fluffier. I imagine as opposed to rainbow who actively trains her wings for athletic flying > sharpens them to become aerodynamic, when fluttershy flies, she takes her time, so they aren't as worn down as RD's.

I imagine Fluttershy uses floral-scented shampoo that she handmakes with flowers from her own garden which attracts the butterflies that rest in her mane

I also purposely designed fluttershy's ears to be down on default, playing into her 'shyness'

Rainbow Dash

last but not least, rainbow underwent a few changes. Firstly you'll notice I shortened her hair + added white streak bangs & side tendrils that cup her face. (now that I'm looking at it, her hair resembles the pony life RD 😭)

Additionally, RD's wings are sharper, more chipped due to active use.

also among the rest of the ponies, Rainbow is also on the shorter side but she's also more lean/fit. I took into consideration her being an athlete (and a flyer at that) would influence her body shape, I feel that in order for her to fly fast, her body shape suited her nicely.

I also gave RD some googles as accessories.

Anyway, congrats on making it to the end! here's a height lineup ref for the mane 6!!

Thanks for reading all my design notes :'D I'll definitely be drawing more. (I definitely wanna draw secondary characters and also the mane 6's families soon)

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clementineinn · 1 day ago

Text

listen to the bookman!

abstract: two BAU agents find themselves caught in a different kind of tension — not the kind that cracks cases, but the kind that lingers in glances and slips between the lines of shared quotes.

pairing: spencer reid x fem!reader (usage of Y/N)

genre: fluuuuuff

word count: 8.5k

note: i've been writing sm, but i haven't posted anything bc lowk i feel like my stories suck lol, but i'm just gonna pull the trigger and post this one. it is fluffy, which, sorry, i can't help myself, but i do have some angsty pieces in the works! enjoy!

The rain had started just after nine.

Not with thunder, not with fanfare. No lightning stitched across the sky, no windswept leaves gathering like whispers in the gutter. Just the quiet insistence of it — that slow, silver curtain descending from nowhere in particular. It arrived without urgency, as if it had always meant to come, as if it had only been waiting for the world to quiet down enough to notice it. A soft percussion, delicate and steady, like fingers drumming idly along a windowsill — not to fill the silence, but to settle into it.

Each drop struck the windshield with the hush of intention, tiny cymbals against glass. They gathered at the edges of the wiper blades, collecting into trembling rivulets before slipping downward in uncertain paths, distorting the view beyond until the whole street looked underwater — houses sagging in reflection, lamplight warping into golden haze. Time itself seemed to slow beneath the weightless repetition of it. Not stopping. Just stretching, the way long nights tend to do when nothing moves and everything matters.

The wipers stirred only now and then, slow as breath, like they too had fallen under the spell of the storm. Each sweep was reluctant — a lazy gesture through the fogged glass that cleared a temporary view before the rain returned, gentler still, like it meant to stay. Outside, the town had curled into itself: porches darkened, curtains drawn, the world behind doors gone still. What little light remained flickered in warm, amber pools across wet pavement, refracted in puddles that looked deep enough to fall into and dream.

Inside the car, the rain made a kind of silence that had nothing to do with sound. A hush that lived beneath the noise, pressing in close, like a held breath waiting to be released.

Their SUV sat parked along a narrow, tree-lined street — the kind where the sidewalks cracked in quiet places and the air still carried the faint scent of cut grass and wet bark. The federal government plate gleamed dully beneath a film of rain and road grit, a muted badge among leaves clinging to the bumper like the last breath of autumn. The vehicle itself had become part of the scenery now: quiet, unmoving, patient.

The Bureau had been called in days earlier, summoned like a needle to thread together the frayed edge of a town unraveling. A string of disappearances — ordinary people, vanished in the soft blind spots of routine. No witnesses. No patterns that held. No certainty. Only shadows, and the kind of silence that pressed too close to the bone. And so tonight: surveillance. One house under suspicion. Two agents in the field. Spencer and Y/N, seated side by side in the long, slow hush of a stakeout that had yielded nothing but hours and the strange intimacy of shared breath.

It had been hours already — the kind of time that stopped meaning anything. The kind that crept into your bones and curled there.

Across the street, the suspect’s house sat inert, draped in a stillness that felt almost deliberate. Its windows were dim behind gauzy curtains, pale rectangles of nothing. No movement. No flicker of motion behind glass. Only a single porch light humming softly in the rain, casting its weak yellow glow over the sagging porch steps and the glint of wet shingles. A weathervane spun once above the roof — a slow, indecisive turn, more gesture than warning — then stilled again, as if it too had grown bored of waiting.

The rest of the neighborhood had long since folded into sleep. Porch lights clicked off, one by one. Televisions flickered behind drawn blinds, scenes playing to no one. Cars glistened in parked rows like resting beasts, their hoods wet and gleaming. Everything had gone hushed. Held.

At the far end of the block, a lone red bulb blinked on a motion sensor, pulsing faintly against the damp concrete of a driveway slick with rain. It flared, then dimmed, then flared again, like a slow heartbeat echoing down the empty street.

Somewhere deeper in the neighborhood — faint, almost imagined — a wind chime stirred. Not with wind, but with memory. A sound delicate and eerie in the stillness, like the echo of something forgotten.

It was the kind of street that, on nights like this, made even trained minds question what was real. The kind of quiet that softened the shape of fear. That made the air feel too gentle for anything to go wrong.

And yet.

They watched. Because danger never did ask permission. It simply waited, like they did now — cloaked in rain and silence, eyes fixed forward, hearts just a little louder in the quiet.

Inside the car, the air held the slow warmth of people who had stopped pretending they weren’t tired. It was the kind of warmth that built over hours — gathered from breath, from body heat, from shared silence that had nowhere else to go. It clung faintly to the glass, fogging in soft curves around the edges of the windshield, curling up along the side windows where no one had spoken for a while. The scent was a mix of things that didn’t quite belong together but somehow fit: the faint sharpness of old paper, the damp wool of Spencer’s sweater sleeves, and the thin, bitter ghost of gas station coffee steeping in the bottom of two stainless steel travel mugs in the console.

The dashboard lights glowed a dim green, casting soft geometric shadows over the interior — across the grain of the steering wheel, the uneven crease of Spencer’s slouched coat, the glint of rainwater still clinging to the doorframe. The SUV felt like its own small world now, floating somewhere just outside of real time.

Spencer sat in the driver’s seat, his posture relaxed in that very particular way of someone who never truly let his guard down. A worn paperback was open across his knee, its spine softened from too many readings, the corners curled. His fingers moved absently along the edge of the page, not turning it yet, just holding the weight of it. A pen was tucked behind his ear — not needed but always there. The sleeves of his cardigan were shoved to the crook of his elbows, revealing the pale, fine angles of his wrists, the delicate bones that made him look more scholar than federal agent. His coat was balled up behind him, crushed into the space between his seat and the door. It looked like insulation. Or a comfort he hadn’t realized he needed.

Y/N sat sideways in the passenger seat, curled toward the window like she’d grown into that shape — one leg folded beneath her, the other stretched lazily out, her socked foot resting against the center console in a quiet, unconscious nudge. Her boots were somewhere on the floor, long forgotten. The rhythm of her breath fogged the glass just slightly. Her head tilted, chin propped in her hand as she followed the rain across the windowpane — not watching the house, not really watching anything. Just letting the storm draw soft, meandering shapes down the glass, like an artist sketching something only she could see.

Outside, time moved on without them — steady, indifferent, marked by the soft blink of porch lights switching off and the deepening hush of a town folding itself into sleep. The world beyond the windshield turned in its usual way, unaware that anything was waiting.

Spencer turned a page.

The sound was nearly silent — just the faint rasp of paper moving against paper, the quietest breath of motion in a space that had forgotten what sound was. The overhead light remained off — too conspicuous, too artificial — but the dashboard cast a low, steady glow across his lap, enough for his eyes to follow the words without strain. In that dimness, he looked almost like a ghost of himself: all sharp planes and soft lines, caught somewhere between thought and presence.

He looked oddly comfortable for a man halfway through a ten-hour surveillance shift. But then again, Spencer Reid had never needed comfort to look at ease — only stillness. And this night, at least on the surface, had given him plenty of it.

Across from him, in the passenger seat, Y/N shifted.

It was the kind of movement that drew the eye without trying — slow, unhurried, the kind of stretch you made only when your body had started to mold itself into the shape of a seat. She drew her knees up onto the leather, curling into herself, not out of tension but out of familiarity. One hand rested lightly at the base of her neck; the other dangled off her knee, fingers relaxed, half-curled.

Her gaze still followed the long, translucent trails the rain carved down the glass — eyes tracking them like someone reading a foreign language slowly, line by line. Outside, the world blurred into shape and color: yellow porch light, dark trees, the soft distortion of reflections in wet pavement. But her eyes didn’t flinch from the blur. She just watched, quiet and still, like she might stay that way until morning.

They hadn’t spoken in some time.

But silence, here, was not a gap to be filled — it was a rhythm. A heartbeat. A third presence in the car, curling around them, holding everything that hadn’t been said.

Until—

“Any movement?” she asked, voice low — not tense, not expectant, just soft, like a thread being tugged out of habit more than hope.

Spencer didn’t answer right away. He glanced toward the house across the street, his gaze cutting through the layers of fog on the windshield and the distortion of raindrops sliding down the glass in lazy, luminous streaks.

Nothing.

No lights. No shift behind the curtains. No silhouettes pacing in backlit windows. Just the soft, constant hush of the storm and a porch that had grown too still to feel natural.

He shook his head, eyes drifting back to his page. “Nope. Not since the cat around eight-forty.”

That pulled a sound from her — not quite a laugh, more like a small, amused exhale. A puff of disbelief softened by affection. She turned toward him, one brow arched in gentle accusation.

“You logged the cat?”

Spencer didn’t look up. Just flipped a corner of the page with the back of his knuckle, as if this were the most obvious response in the world.

“He was orange. Limped on the right paw. Could be important.”

She smiled then — faint, but real. Not at the cat. Not even really at the joke.

At him.

At the way he said it with no trace of irony. At the way he watched the world like every detail might hold the thread that could unravel everything. At the way his voice had settled low for the night, mellow and worn like the spine of the book in his hands.

It was barely anything.

And still, she found herself holding on to it.

For a while, neither of them spoke.

But it wasn’t the kind of silence that demanded explanation. It wasn’t brittle or impatient. It simply stretched between them, soft and steady, the way old friends might fall into rhythm without needing to fill it with sound. The rain had become a background hum — steady, hypnotic — wrapping the SUV in a cocoon of warmth and fog. Every so often, the wipers traced a slow arc across the windshield, a half-hearted attempt at clarity.

Spencer flipped a page with the careful precision of someone who didn’t just read — someone who studied, who inhabited, who listened to the echo of every sentence long after it was gone. The movement was unhurried, like time didn’t touch him here.

Y/N leaned her head back against the seat, the curve of her neck exposed in the dashboard’s low green glow. Her eyes slipped closed, lashes brushing the skin beneath her brow. Not sleep. Just stillness. The kind that only found her when the storm outside was louder than the one inside her mind.

Then — a pause, a breath, a beat too long.

Her voice broke the hush like a pebble tossed into a still lake.

“What are you reading?”

Spencer didn’t glance up. Just lifted the book slightly, eyes still scanning the page.

“Persuasion. Austen.”

That made her lift her head again, brow raised, an amused spark catching behind her gaze.

“Seriously? I pegged you more as a Brontë man.”

“I like the Brontës,” he said easily. “But Austen’s prose is more psychologically nuanced. And Anne Elliot is arguably one of the most emotionally complex heroines in English literature.”

Y/N blinked once, slowly.

“Okay, but does she walk across moors dramatically in the rain?”

Spencer arched a brow at that, finally looking up, mouth twitching at the edge.

“You do know it’s raining right now, right?”

She smiled — wide this time, unguarded, the kind of smile that curled at the corners and didn’t rush away. She stretched her legs out, shifting in her seat until her sock-clad foot nudged his knee lightly — a small, familiar touch that didn’t feel like much until it did.

“Fine. Read me something.”

He hesitated, thumb holding his place on the page.

“From this?”

She gave him a look, dry and warm.

“No, from your weather log. Yes, from that.”

He didn’t ask why.

Didn’t smirk or prod or ask if she was serious. He just flipped back a few pages, slow and unhurried, his thumb dragging lightly over the paper as though reacquainting himself with the rhythm of the words before they even met the air. A quiet breath slipped past his lips — not a sigh, not nervous — something centered. Then he cleared his throat gently, and began to read.

“My idea of good company is the company of clever, well-informed people who have a great deal of conversation.”

His voice was softer when reading — less clinical, less tightly wound than usual. Like the cadence of someone telling a story they remembered too well. It slipped easily into the space between them, filling it with something light but tangible. Familiar. Almost fond.

She smiled again, but this time it was smaller — quieter. The kind of smile that tugged at one side of her mouth, just enough to mean something, just enough to give her away. It wasn’t for him, not fully. It was for the moment. For the sound of his voice. For the line.

“And is that why you’re stuck in a car with me?”

Spencer looked over at her, gaze steady, not blinking. Not teasing.

“It certainly doesn’t hurt.”

Y/N gave him a look — half-amused, half-skeptical, but undeniably warm — then turned back toward the window with a faint shake of her head, lips still curled. Her breath touched the cold glass in front of her, fogging it just enough to leave a small, crescent bloom where her exhale had landed.

For a while, the only sound was the rain — a steady hush against the roof, soft and constant. Like the sky had decided to whisper all night and had no plans of stopping.

Time passed like that — not fast, not particularly slow, but in that strange, viscous way time has when nothing moves and everything feels like it might. The kind of time that didn't announce itself, only lingered in the stillness, tucking itself into corners: the curve of a seatbelt, the soft click of a shifting jaw, the rhythmic sweep of wipers.

Outside, the street held its breath. Inside, the car did too.

Spencer had already read two chapters. Probably more, if she was being honest. His eyes flicked across the pages with that impossibly fast rhythm she’d grown used to, but still found quietly bewildering. He turned each one with the same reverent calm, the motion so habitual it was almost unconscious — as if his hands knew the story before his eyes did. Not a single sentence read aloud since the last one she’d asked for. But the air still felt full of his voice.

The silence had begun to thicken. Not unpleasantly. Just noticeably. The kind of quiet that made you suddenly aware of the sounds your own body made — the shallow pull of breath through your nose, the slow shift of fabric over your knee, the faint, traitorous beat of your pulse.

It was sometime past ten.

Y/N had already counted the porch lights on the block — seven, two dimmer than the rest. She’d played a mental guessing game with the silhouettes behind living room curtains: game show, drama, rerun of something laugh-tracked. She’d reorganized the snack bag in the backseat by color, then by noise level, then by expiration date. Her left sock was bunched and bothering her, but not enough to fix. Her boot had begun to tilt inward from where it sat abandoned under the dash.

Meanwhile, Spencer remained exactly as he’d been: spine straight, expression unreadable, a small vertical crease between his brows — not from stress, but from focus. That peculiar kind of stillness that only sharpened his edges.

And it was all just a little too much.

She couldn't take it anymore.

“Okay,” she said at last, her voice slicing softly through the quiet — not a jolt, but a ripple. Like a pebble skipping across still water, breaking the surface just enough to catch his attention. “Let’s play a game.”

Spencer glanced up from his book. The low green light from the dash slid across the lenses of his glasses, catching on the faint smudge of a fingerprint. His pen was still poised between his fingers, tucked neatly into the crease of the page like a placeholder he hadn’t meant to use. He blinked once, slow, thoughtful.

“What kind of game?”

Y/N turned toward him more fully now, folding her leg up beneath her, sock brushing the console. She narrowed her eyes with a mock-serious squint, the dramatic tension undercut by the small smirk that tugged at the corner of her mouth.

“Quote battle. You read a line, I name the book, and vice versa.”

Spencer tilted his head — that precise, birdlike angle she’d come to recognize as curiosity. He looked at her as if analyzing the strategic value of her challenge, weighing outcomes and probabilities in real time.

“What do I get if I win?”

Her grin widened, sharp and playful, lighting her face like something just a little dangerous. “What do you want?”

He blinked once — visibly computing, as if she’d just asked him to solve something unexpectedly complex. His eyes darted slightly, then settled.

“Control of your iPod on the jet for a week.”

“Deal,” she said immediately, hand flicking outward like she was signing a contract in the air. “And if I win, you buy me coffee every morning until next Friday.”

Spencer considered this with the seriousness of a man preparing to enter diplomatic negotiations.

“So… eight days?”

Her brows arched, delighted. “You already did the math?”

His mouth twitched — just slightly. “You challenged me.”

She gestured toward the book in his lap, chin tilted like a dare.

“Go on then. Hit me.”

He flipped a few pages back, fingertips grazing the dog-eared edges with the ease of someone who had memorized the landscape of a book — its weight, its breath, the way the spine folded in his palm like it belonged there. His eyes moved fast, scanning the text like wind moving through leaves. Then he found it. He cleared his throat quietly, a low sound that somehow deepened the stillness between them, and read aloud:

“She had the kind of beauty that hurt to look at—sharp, aching, and likely fatal if mishandled.”

His voice dipped naturally into the rhythm of the line — not performative, not dramatic, just soft and sure, shaped by memory and admiration. The words seemed to hang in the warm air of the car long after he stopped speaking.

Y/N squinted, angling her head toward him like she was turning a puzzle over in her mind.

“That’s not Austen.”

“No,” he said, a faint smile tugging at the corners of his mouth, equal parts pleased and impressed. “It’s Tana French.”

She hummed, a low sound of appreciation, her eyes narrowing thoughtfully.

“Well played.”

“My turn?” she asked, already shifting her weight, her voice curling with anticipation.

He nodded once, resting the book lightly against his knee. “Hit me.”

She didn’t hesitate.

Her voice was steady, quiet, but carried the weight of something familiar — a line so worn it gleamed like glass:

“I am no bird; and no net ensnares me: I am a free human being with an independent will.”

Spencer blinked. Once. Then again — not out of surprise, but recognition.

“Jane Eyre.”

“Too easy,” she sighed, the corners of her mouth twitching with mock disappointment. “Fine. You go.”

He thumbed through another page, slow and deliberate now, though his eyes still moved with that rapid, uncanny rhythm — like he wasn’t just reading but indexing, cataloging, selecting the perfect thread to pull. His fingers paused near the middle of a chapter, pressed gently to the margin like he needed to feel the weight of the words before he let them leave his mouth.

When he read, his voice was casual — too casual. That smooth, practiced kind of nonchalance that only ever meant someone was trying very hard not to reveal too much.

“You must allow me to tell you how ardently I admire and love you.”

The words drifted out into the warm hush of the car like smoke — slow and curling, heavy with implication. And for a beat, they just hung there. Not long. Not really.

But it pressed.

Pressed into the stillness. Pressed into her.

Y/N turned to look at him — slowly, like she already knew what she’d find. Her lips curved upward just enough, not a full smile but something sly and edged with disbelief.

“Are you quoting Pride and Prejudice at me right now?”

Spencer kept his gaze trained on the page in front of him, but the corner of his mouth twitched — a single, unspoken tell.

“Would it be weird if I was?”

“Only if you keep using Mr. Darcy’s lines on me.” She nudged his knee with her socked foot — not hard, just enough to feel him there, solid and warm beside her in the dark. “That man proposed like he was submitting a complaint to management.”

That did it.

Spencer finally looked up — really looked — and smiled in a way he rarely did. Wide, teeth showing, the kind of grin that cracked across his usually composed face like sunlight through drawn curtains. His dimples appeared, sharp and genuine, softening the angles of him until he looked startlingly young. He wasn’t trying to hide it. Not tonight. Not from her.

“And yet,” he said, tone rich with mock solemnity, “he’s one of the most beloved romantic heroes of all time.”

“Yeah, well,” she said, letting the words tumble out on a half-laugh, half-breath, “everyone loves a man who can’t express emotion without sounding like he’s about to faint.”

Spencer tilted his head, still smiling, eyes never leaving hers.

“That likely depends on whether you’re Elizabeth or Lady Catherine de Bourgh.”

She let out a laugh — not loud, not sharp, but quiet. Contained. The kind of sound that stayed close to the chest. The kind that wasn’t just amusement, but recognition. Affection. A small flare of something bright held carefully in her hands.

“You know,” she said, nudging his knee again — gentler this time — “this whole thing is starting to feel suspiciously like flirting.”

Spencer looked up slowly.

His smile stretched wider this time — all teeth and dimples, that rare, utterly unguarded kind of grin he only seemed to wear around her. It softened everything. His posture, his face, the ever-present weight between his brows. He looked… happy. Genuinely so. And that alone made the moment tip slightly, like the air around them had taken one breath too deep.

“Only suspiciously?”

She tilted her head, eyes narrowing in exaggerated thoughtfulness.

“Well, if it is,” she said, her tone lilting with amusement, “you’re doing it very… academically.”

“That’s the only way I know how.”

“I figured.” Her lips quirked, but there was affection behind it now — warmer, quieter. She shifted in her seat again, drawing her knees back up beneath her, curling into the corner like she meant to stay there. Her shoulder bumped the inside of the door; the toe of her sock pressed softly to the edge of the console.

“Next quote, Doctor Reid.”

He turned another page, but this time his fingers slowed at the edge — like they were no longer moving just to move. His eyes flicked down the page, scanning, not quickly now, but deliberately. He stopped halfway down, and when he spoke, his voice was lower. Smoother.

“There could have been no two hearts so open, no tastes so similar, no feelings so in unison.”

The quote settled in the warm dark between them like smoke. Light, but dense. Fragrant with intention.

She didn’t guess this one.

Didn’t even try.

Instead, she watched him — not startled or shy, just there with him in the moment, fully. Her gaze held steady on his face for a second too long, her expression unreadable but soft, like she was seeing something she hadn’t let herself look at before. Then she turned her head slightly, eyes drifting out the windshield toward the still-dark house.

Her voice followed a moment later — quieter now, but not hesitant.

“You always pick the romantic ones when it’s just me.”

Spencer didn’t reply.

Didn’t have to.

The words didn’t need answering. They weren’t a question. They were something else entirely — a thread unspooling gently in the hush between them, tying things together she hadn’t named until now.

They hung in the air — not heavy, not awkward, just suspended. Like a truth neither of them had to rush to touch.

And still, it pulsed there. Quiet. Unspoken. Real.

Outside, the rain picked up.

Not all at once. Not with drama or force. Just a slow thickening — a soft insistence in the air, the kind of weight that settled gently over rooftops and sidewalks until the world seemed wrapped in water. The drops came heavier now, tracing long, uninterrupted streaks down the windshield like tears that didn’t know they’d fallen. The rhythm changed — not frantic, but full. A lullaby in another room, low and constant, the sound of the earth exhaling.

Thunder murmured somewhere in the distance, too far to startle, too soft to fear. It rolled low and wide, more suggestion than presence — a storm that circled like a thought you couldn’t quite finish.

Inside the car, the change was quieter still.

But it was there — the kind of shift you felt more than saw. In the way her hands stilled completely in her lap. In the way his thumb lingered on the edge of a page, but never turned it. In the way he closed the book softly, without ceremony, and let it rest across his thigh like something that had given him all it could for the night.

The space between them wasn’t wide. It hadn’t been for hours. But now it felt different — a kind of nearness that didn’t ask for attention, only acknowledgment. A quiet hum building beneath the sound of rain, shaped like something waiting to be named.

Y/N stretched again, slow and languid, like the warmth of the car had melted into her bones. Her jacket was folded between her seat and the door, a makeshift pillow that carried the faint scent of wet wool and worn leather. One leg tucked beneath her, the other lazily extended until her knee nudged against Spencer’s on the console — light, casual, but not accidental.

“You look comfortable,” he said, voice low and edged with something that wasn’t quite a smile, but close. The corner of his mouth tilted up, that soft glint in his eyes reserved only for her.

She shrugged, gaze still half on the glass, where the rain stitched silver threads across the surface.

“We’ve been here for hours. I’m adapting. Survival of the fittest and all that.”

Spencer glanced toward the house again, letting the moment breathe.

Still no movement.

“It’s not like you to go stir-crazy,” he said, voice soft, shaped around the edge of a smile.

Y/N turned her head toward him, slow and deliberate, the overhead glow catching the curve of her cheek. Her voice was quieter now, touched with teasing, but threaded through with something gentler.

“Yeah, well,” she murmured, mouth curving, “you’ve been reading Austen aloud like it’s bedtime, and frankly, I’m beginning to feel a little wooed.”

Spencer blinked, caught somewhere between amusement and mild academic protest.

“Austen is statistically one of the most romantic authors in the Western canon.”

She grinned, shifting her weight just enough for her knee to bump against the console again — light and unthinking, like contact was instinct by now.

“That’s what I’m saying. I feel like I should be fanning myself.”

He turned slightly in his seat, angling toward her without seeming to think about it — the space between them closing in degrees, subtle and slow. His hands rested in his lap, but his focus was fully hers now.

“Would you prefer I quote something less romantic?” he asked. “Something clinical?”

She narrowed her eyes, the corner of her mouth twitching as she stared him down.

“If you quote a math theorem at me, I’m getting out of the car.”

“In this weather?” he deadpanned, glancing meaningfully toward the rain-streaked glass.

“Dramatic exits don’t wait for ideal conditions.”

That pulled another smile from him — unguarded, his dimples deepening as his features softened in the glow of it. He looked younger that way. Brighter. Like someone who had just been handed permission to be seen.

And then, quieter:

“I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable.”

Her brows pulled together immediately, the shift in tone catching her with something almost like concern.

“You didn’t.”

Spencer looked down briefly, then back up, his voice a little steadier now — like it mattered to say it right.

“I just… wasn’t sure if the quoting thing was crossing a line.”

Y/N tilted her head slightly, eyes still on his face, watching him with the kind of attention that always made him feel like she saw more than he said. The light from the dashboard cut softly across his features — caught the edge of his jaw, the hollow of his throat, the almost imperceptible movement as he swallowed.

And still, her gaze didn’t waver.

She caught the flicker in his eyes — the way his gaze dropped for a beat too long, as if a thought had slipped loose before he could catch it. Just a brief shift, but enough. Enough to feel the weight behind the silence. Enough to see that he was second-guessing something, maybe everything.

So she leaned in. Not dramatically, not to close a distance, just slightly. The kind of movement you made when you didn’t want to startle a bird. Her voice was low when it came, warm and unhurried — teasing in that familiar, sideways way that made space instead of closing it.

“Relax, Romeo,” she murmured, the smile tugging at the corner of her mouth easy, natural, hers. “If I didn’t like it, I would’ve made you switch to case reports an hour ago.”

That earned his attention.

Spencer glanced over at her — and this time, he didn’t just look. He saw. Really saw her. Not as the agent beside him. Not as the person he’d been sitting with for hours. But as something else. Something specific.

It was the kind of gaze he usually reserved for the rare things — uncrackable ciphers, strange celestial maps, pages too dense for most to decipher. But it was softer now. Focused. Unflinching.

And all of it was hers.

Y/N held his gaze, still smiling, still pretending — barely — that her heart wasn’t crashing against her ribs like it had just realized it had skin to break through. She didn’t drop her eyes. Didn’t tease further. Just let the quiet bloom around them.

And then, a little quieter, more honest than before:

“You don’t do it with anyone else. Just me.”

The pause that followed wasn’t long.

But it held.

Not because he didn’t have something to say — but because she’d already said enough.

Then she huffed a breath and leaned back again, her body folding into the curve of the seat like she was trying to retreat from the tension she’d just sewn into the air. She reached for levity — not to deflect, but to steady the moment, to give it room to breathe. Her voice dropped just enough to sound offhanded, even as something more trembled just beneath the surface.

“You’re going to make someone very confused one day, Spencer. Using Austen as a flirtation tactic is very dangerous.”

He turned to her fully now, one brow arching with exaggerated skepticism, the edge of his mouth fighting a smile.

“Dangerous?”

“Highly.” She waved a hand vaguely in the space between them, her tone mock-serious, but her gaze held steady on his face. “All this charm and intellect and emotional repression—it’s a lot.”

Spencer laughed — really laughed. The sound burst out of him light and breathless, and it startled even him a little. He tipped his head back, shoulders shaking for a beat, that rare, beautiful sound filling the car like light through fogged glass.

“That’s… an interesting interpretation.”

She smiled too, lopsided and knowing. A little crooked, a little fond. The kind of smile that came from watching someone unravel gently, willingly.

“I’m just saying,” she said, voice softer now but still playfully edged, “if you keep quoting Persuasion at girls in the dark, someone’s gonna fall in love with you.”

This time, he didn’t laugh.

But the smile lingered — soft and shaped with something quieter. Something he didn’t need to dress up in humor or hide behind logic. It tugged faintly at the corner of his mouth like a secret wanting out.

He just looked at her.

And said, voice barely above a whisper:

“You say that like it hasn’t already happened.”

That was when the air changed.

Not in a loud, crashing way — but in the way the atmosphere does before a storm rolls in. The kind of shift you feel before you see. Pressure dropping. Something pulling low and deep in your chest. The hush before lightning splits the sky.

Her heart stuttered once — a quiet, startled rhythm behind her ribs.

But she didn’t move.

Neither did he.

They just sat there.

Knees brushing. Shoulders angled slightly toward each other. Breath held just below the surface. The thunder rolled again, low and blooming in the distance, but it felt closer now — not in the sky, but in the space between them.

And the silence that followed wasn’t empty.

It was brimming with everything they hadn’t said. Everything they almost had.

They didn’t speak for a while after that.

Not because there was nothing left to say — but because whatever had just passed between them was still in the room, still in the air, like dust lit by a headlight beam. It hovered. It clung. It needed space to settle.

And when the quiet returned, it wasn’t the same as before. It wasn’t companionable or easy. It was charged. Dense with possibility. Like a radio dial turned just off-center — all static and hum, vibrating with the shape of words that hadn’t been spoken but still somehow filled the space.

Neither of them moved.

Not at first.

The rain whispered steadily against the windows, carving glass into trembling river lines. The cabin of the SUV had grown warmer, breath-fog softening the edges of the world beyond it. The outside was blurred. The inside was bright with everything they weren’t saying.

Eventually, Y/N shifted — slowly, like she didn’t want to startle the moment. Like she was wading through it. A deer through tall grass.

She stretched her legs down from the seat, her sock brushing the base of the console as she moved. Not restless — just closer. Her spine curved slightly inward, instinctive, unconsciously tilted in his direction. Her hand dropped into her lap, fingers tapping out a rhythm that didn’t match the rain, didn’t match anything at all — except maybe the quick, uneven beat of her pulse.

She glanced sideways, not quite meeting his eyes, her voice soft — but edged with mischief, like a spark under velvet.

“So,” she said, drawing the word out like a thread between her fingers, the kind that unraveled slowly just to see where it led, “how long have you been using Regency-era romance as a seduction technique?”

Spencer blinked — once, then again, as though her question had short-circuited some internal circuit he’d previously thought infallible.

“Excuse me?”

She smirked, lips curling with the satisfaction of someone who’d just set off a particularly elegant trap. Her gaze slid sideways, head tilted, playful but precise — like she was enjoying watching him squirm just a little.

“You heard me. You’re weaponizing Austen, Reid.”

“I’m not—” He stopped, mid-breath, brows drawing together in a furrow of genuine confusion. His tone shifted, caught somewhere between defense and self-doubt, like he was suddenly evaluating all his life choices. “I’m not weaponizing anything.”

“You say that,” she murmured, voice softer now, eyes narrowing with mock scrutiny. She leaned in just enough to make it feel like a secret. “But you’ve been sitting over there all night quoting Anne Elliot like it’s nothing.”

Spencer’s hands lifted slightly, as if ready to explain himself with a logical breakdown and supporting footnotes.

“It was relevant to our conversation.”

“Mhm. Sure.” She nodded, slowly, exaggerating the motion like she was humoring him. “Totally casual. Just a normal thing you do with coworkers during a federal surveillance op.”

Spencer opened his mouth to respond, then shut it again — the movement small but visible, the rhythm of a man realizing too late that he’d walked right into a thesis statement he hadn’t prepared for. He looked at her, a little wide-eyed, somewhere between horrified and completely disarmed.

And she was still smiling.

That same knowing smile that always made him feel like she could see straight through him — not in a threatening way, but like a flashlight through fog.

She leaned forward slightly, elbow resting on the console between them like she was settling into a chess match she already knew she was winning. The space narrowed — not dramatically, just enough that she could feel the heat radiating from him, see the faintest shift in his expression as she moved closer.

Her voice dropped, teasing and low, her words brushed with deliberate mischief.

“Be honest—do you quote Virginia Woolf to Hotch when you’re trying to butter him up?”

Spencer blinked at her, visibly startled — then gave her a look so affronted, so utterly scandalized, it made her laugh under her breath. It was the kind of expression he reserved for things like inaccurate statistics or poorly alphabetized books.

“Absolutely not.”

“Okay,” she said, pressing now, enjoying the way the tips of his ears turned just a shade darker in the dim light. “So what’s my category?”

Her eyes gleamed as she listed them off, slow and deliberate, watching the way he tried not to react.

“Austen? Brontë? Bit of Plath if I’m cranky?”

He was trying not to smile. She could see it — the twitch at the corner of his mouth, the fight behind his eyes, the way his shoulders tensed ever so slightly like holding in laughter required muscle.

“You’re being ridiculous.”

“I’m being thorough,” she corrected, tapping the side of her temple like it was all part of a formal diagnostic process. “Profiling, remember?”

He shook his head once, but it was hopeless now — the shape of his mouth gave him away. That soft, helpless curve he only wore when it was her.

And then, quieter. So quiet she almost missed it, but not quite:

“You say that like it’s a theory,” he murmured, “but it sounds a lot like hope.”

Y/N’s breath caught.

Not loudly. Not visibly. But it caught — sharp and low in her chest — and her whole body stilled for just a fraction too long, like something delicate had been named.

The space between them had grown impossibly small.

Inches. Maybe less. The console between their seats felt like a formality now — a boundary that had once meant something, back when lines were clearer. But those lines had smudged hours ago, and now the air between them pulsed with everything that had risen in the silence.

Every glance. Every quote. Every moment of not looking away.

Y/N blinked — just once — suddenly uncertain of her footing, like the room had tilted and she wasn’t quite sure what her next step would do. So she did what she always did when the ground started to shift beneath her.

She reached for levity.

“Alright, then. If you were going to write me a love letter, would it be annotated?”

Spencer huffed out a breath — something between a laugh and a sigh of relief, like she’d just let the air back in.

“Only lightly,” he said, the corners of his mouth curving again. “A few citations. Footnotes. Maybe a reference table.”

“Oh, good,” she breathed, the smile tugging at her lips returning with a softness that hadn’t been there before. “I love when romance comes with appendices.”

He turned toward her fully now — not just his head, but his whole body, his knees brushing hers again, their shoulders angled like a conversation only they could hear.

“You joke,” he said, voice lower now, intimate in a way that made the walls of the SUV feel smaller, closer, “but I could quote you half a dozen passages from 19th century literature that remind me of you.”

She blinked once. Quick. Like her breath had caught behind her ribs.

“…Name one.”

But he didn’t.

Didn’t flinch. Didn’t reach for the book. Didn’t chase the question back with logic or wit.

He just looked at her.

And the look was a thing unto itself — unguarded and direct, like a thought that had lived too long in the dark and was finally stepping into the light. His mouth parted slightly, like he might speak, but no words came. His fingers curled tighter around the edge of his seat, as if he needed something solid to hold onto.

The silence between them swelled, not awkward, not unsure — just full. Brimming. Close enough to touch.

And neither of them moved.

Because if they did — if even one of them leaned closer — it wouldn’t be silence anymore.

It would be everything.

Because the truth of it—that aching, unnamed thing that had stretched and shimmered between them all night—was louder than anything he could have quoted.

It hung in the air now, full and real, vibrating like a string pulled too tight.

The windows had begun to fog.

Not completely. Just at the corners, where their breath mingled in the air, warm and quiet. The edges of the world blurred out, as if even the SUV had started to breathe slower. Everything inside the car felt thick with weight—with them—their bodies no longer separated by anything that mattered.

Outside, the street was still. No footsteps. No shadows in the house across the way. Just the hush of rain, soft and constant, and the low purr of the engine like a heartbeat they’d both forgotten to hear.

It was too much. Too quiet. Too full.

So Y/N broke it—because she had to. Because it was either that, or let it swallow her whole.

“So,” she said lightly, trying for teasing but not quite reaching it, the word catching slightly at the edges, “was that the part where you were going to kiss me or just emotionally devastate me with more well-placed metaphors?”

Spencer turned his head.

Slowly.

Like he’d been waiting for permission.

Like he’d been still all this time not out of hesitation, but out of reverence—like he knew this wasn’t something you rushed.

“You talk a lot when you’re nervous,” he said, so softly it nearly dissolved into the air between them.

She blinked.

“I’m not—” she started, but her voice caught—right on the edge of certainty. She cleared her throat and tried again, masking the tremble with a crooked smile. “I’m not nervous. I just didn’t want to ruin your perfectly curated quote-to-eye-contact ratio.”

Spencer’s lips twitched.

But the look in his eyes didn’t shift.

It stayed steady. Bare. The kind of gaze that didn’t flinch from the truth anymore. It held her without demand, like he was showing her the most vulnerable part of himself and trusting her not to look away.

And she didn’t.

Couldn’t.

He didn’t laugh. Didn’t dodge. Didn’t retreat into metaphor or distraction or some clever turn of phrase.

He just looked at her.

The kind of look that reached deeper than words. The kind that unraveled things. The kind that said I see you — and always have.

“I’ve been in love with you,” he said, quiet as a breath, “since your first case.”

No dramatic pause. No swelling music. Just a soft truth offered in the smallest of spaces. No less earth-shaking for its gentleness.

Outside, the rain kept falling — slow and constant, threading silver down the windshield like time deciding not to move.

The windows continued to fog, blurring the world beyond them until it was gone entirely. Only the inside remained now. Only this space. Only them.

Inside the car, the world stilled.

Y/N felt it in her chest first — a quiet catch of breath that slipped beneath her ribs and stayed there, trembling. Something had shifted — tectonic, deep beneath the surface — and everything realigned around it.

Her pulse fluttered. Her fingers curled in her lap, grounding her in the fabric of her jeans, the grain of the seat beneath her. But she didn’t pull away. Didn’t look down.

She didn’t ask if he meant it.

She didn’t joke. Didn’t tease.

She just looked at him.

And the silence between them wasn’t silence anymore.

It was something whole.

She moved towards him, unhurried and certain, as though the moment had long since been ordained. There was no fanfare in the gesture, no trembling flourish — only the quiet conviction of a woman who had made up her mind. Her hand came to rest at his neck, her fingers light and reverent, and then — with the gentleness of breath and the steadiness of affection long harboured — her lips found his.

It was not a kiss of passion unbridled, nor of haste or vanity. It was a confession, tender and unspoken, offered in the only language she could summon. And he received it as such — returning the kiss with the astonishment of a man long denied happiness, scarcely daring to trust that it had come at last.

When they parted — for breath, for sense, for the sweet necessity of drawing nearer still — her hand lingered at his jaw, thumb brushing the fine curve of it with something very near reverence.

His eyes opened slowly, as though waking from some long, aching dream.

“I wasn’t planning on saying it like that,” he whispered, breathless.

A smile touched her lips — quiet, wry, and altogether disarming. “How were you planning to say it?”

He shrugged slightly. “I was… maybe going to write it in the margin of a book and pretend you found it by accident.”

Her laugh then was soft and genuine, surprised by joy. It caught in the air like a lark in morning light.

“You still can,” she said. “I’ll pretend I didn’t hear it. For dramatic effect.”

They remained there, foreheads pressed together in the hush that follows great change — the kind of silence that no longer feels empty, but earned. Rain murmured against the glass. The world around them faded to stillness.

And though neither dared to say more in that moment, it was understood between them — wholly and without embellishment — that the waiting was over.

And then — through the fogged glass, through the hush that had wrapped itself around them like a secret — a light blinked on across the street.

They both turned, instinct kicking in hard and fast, muscle memory overriding everything else. Adrenaline over romance. Duty over daydream.

Spencer reached for the binoculars. Y/N grabbed the radio. Their movements overlapped — smooth, practiced, nearly synchronized.

It was like slipping back into step. The rhythm of a thousand stakeouts before. The urgency. The protocol. The clarity of purpose. Familiar. Rehearsed.

But when her shoulder brushed his—

when her fingers lingered just a moment too long on the gear shift—

when he looked at her and couldn’t help the way his smile pulled, unbidden, real—

It wasn’t the same.

Not even close.

The rain had finally let up by the time they made it back to the precinct.

It was early — the kind of early that belonged more to the night than the day, sky still a gray-blue smear above the rooftops, low and hesitant. The pavement glistened, slick with the memory of rain, and steam curled in lazy tendrils from the sewer grates. Every surface gleamed like it had just woken up. So had they.

Y/N still felt the ghost of his lips on hers.

They walked side by side, steps in quiet sync. A little too close.

Their shoulders bumped once. Neither of them moved away.

She glanced up at him, trying — and failing — to bite down a smile. “You’re being weird.”

Spencer blinked, eyes wide in theatrical offense. “I’m being weird?”

“You keep doing that soft smile thing.”

“I always smile.”

“You smile in footnotes. This is new.”

He tried to school his face into something neutral. Failed miserably.

“Okay,” he admitted, voice low. “I don’t know how to do this yet.”

“Me neither.”

And then, grinning: “It’s kind of fun watching you short-circuit.”

He opened the precinct door for her with a small shake of his head, but his cheeks were unmistakably pink.

Inside, the station was half-asleep. Fluorescent lights hummed low. Agents drifted through the bullpen like ghosts with paperwork — coffee in hand, conversations murmured over case files, the scrape of chairs against tile. It smelled like burnt espresso and printer toner.

Emily looked up from her laptop as they stepped in, her brow immediately furrowing.

“You two look… suspiciously chipper for a stakeout,” she said slowly, tone sharp with amusement.

From behind her, Morgan appeared with a mug in hand. “Right? You catch the unsub or just catch up on some really good conversation?”

Y/N paused mid-step. Spencer made a sound that could only be described as an intellectual cough.

“We—uh,” he started, eyes darting toward the coffee station like it might offer rescue.

“Read Austen,” Y/N said quickly, deadpan. “He read. I listened. Riveting stuff.”

Emily narrowed her eyes.

Morgan lifted a brow. “Austen, huh?”

Spencer nodded. “She likes the metaphors.”

Y/N shrugged. “They hold up.”

There was a beat of silence, heavy with implication.

JJ passed them on her way to the coffee pot, casting a glance sharp enough to cut paper.

“Cute,” she murmured, just loud enough to be heard — and kept walking.

Spencer looked like he might spontaneously combust. Y/N just smiled, hands in her pockets, a quiet glow still tucked behind her eyes.

Maybe they were terrible at hiding it.

Maybe they never really stood a chance.

But for the first time in a long time, she didn’t want to hide anything at all.

#spencer reid #spencer reid fanfic #spencer fic #reid fic #spencer reid fic #spencer x reader #spencer reid imagine #spencer reid x reader #criminal minds #criminal minds x reader #criminal minds fic #criminal minds imagine #criminal minds fanfic #spencer reid x you #spencer reid fluff

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aventurineswife · 2 days ago

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since sahsrau is open, heres mine :)

sagau and sahsrau: creator constantly writing unsent letters to someone they clearly love/admire, even being very poetic (lemme quote dua lipa here) “I see in blue, see in blue, see in blue, oh, how you see everything in red.” Maybe this can reflect the differences in personalities between creator and the person they admire. I imagine the sahsrau and sagau cast would go mad tryna piece together who it is (though I think it would be someone who is not from either world) lol

Oh this is the kind of angst-laced poetry that devours both SAGAU and SAHSRAU from the inside out—slow and graceful, like getting wrapped in silk only to realize it’s a noose. The Creator, someone divine and powerful, quietly writing unsent letters, dripping with longing and poetic intimacy? It shakes them. Not just because of the vulnerability, but because the letters are so clearly not for them.

And worse?

They can’t even figure out who they're for.

SAGAU

They stumble upon these letters—maybe one slips from your notes, or they catch sight of it while you’re “communing” with the world (aka writing irl). The prose is beautiful. Haunting. There's something so achingly mortal about the way you write:

"I speak in stars, you dream in fire. I see in blue... oh, how you see everything in red."

The Archons feel shaken by the sheer emotional weight of it. Venti especially is a wreck—he lives for poetry, for lyrical confessions—and now he’s realizing your love is already somewhere else. Zhongli reads them like sacred scripture, trying to decode, convinced it’s a long-lost being or entity that predates Teyvat. Ei? Quietly furious—your words belong to someone else and she doesn’t know how to cope with that.

Albedo and Lisa, etc are immediately trying to uncover patterns. “Who sees in red? Who walks in flame? Is it Diluc?” “No, no, not fiery enough in spirit—too brooding.” They start cross-referencing every line with historical and metaphysical profiles.

Diluc, Kaeya, Cyno, etc. assume it must be one of the others. They won’t admit it, but it eats away at them. Diluc stares longer into the fire now. Cyno pretends not to care, but his jokes get worse. Kaeya pretends to laugh it off, but then drinks alone more often. The worst part? You never send them.

Because they're not meant for this world.

SAHSRAU

The HSR crew? Oh, they spiral quick. There’s already an undercurrent in this AU of “Creator’s presence = profound cosmic weight,” so when you reveal this soft, aching part of yourself… it ruins them.

Caelus is just sitting there in stunned silence. “Wait. You love someone? Already?” He's hurt, but doesn't even know why. You’re a being above worlds—but your heart is so human. He starts wondering if maybe he should try to be more like them, whoever they are.

Kafka and Silver Wolf? Investigate mode: ON. They’re like—

"Red symbolism. Cold imagery. You’ve written thirty-seven letters over the past month, all with this cryptic flavor. Who the hell is it?"

They start theorizing it's an Aeon. Maybe someone you lost in a previous cycle. Maybe Akivili? Maybe the Garden of Recollection holds your memories of them?

Dan Heng reads one of the letters and has to leave the room. That kind of intimacy—that quiet, soul-baring ache—he doesn’t know how to handle it. It’s beautiful, and it’s not for him. That kills him more than anger ever could.

Jing Yuan? He smiles... a little too softly. That wise, “I understand more than I say” smile. But he watches you closer after that. “What kind of god mourns?” he wonders. And then, “What kind of man would you mourn for?”

Phainon? Oh he despises it. Not because he’s jealous—though, okay, a little—but because he feels your ache in his chest. It’s the kind of love that consumes quietly. “Why didn’t they ever write back?” he wonders. “Or worse… what if they never existed to begin with?”

What messes them up the most isn’t the poetry or the mystery.

It’s the loneliness.

Because these letters?

They’re unsent.

Unshared.

Unread.

Like you're holding onto a love that no one else could ever possibly understand.

And that means there's a part of you no one in Teyvat or the Astral Express can ever truly reach.

So they try harder.

They look for red. They paint skies blue. They echo back your words when you least expect it.

Because if they can't be that person…

They’ll try to be the one who finally gets a letter meant for them.

#x reader #honkai star rail #hsr #honkai star rail x reader #hsr x reader #genshin x reader #genshin x you #sagau #sahsrau

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4thegays · 2 days ago

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I keep saying this but why Abby was so mean to Max is because I think she resents her in a lot of ways and just internalizes that. While she’s not in the right, she’s not completely in the wrong with doing so.

From what we see of there dynamic is that max is always the centre of everything her problems are big and dramatic and full every inch of the room. While Abby has trouble even expressing her feelings and wants so badly for someone to notice but it has to be on her terms.

But Abby is mean and internalizes things a lot so somethings that internal resentment directs at some people (season one Ginny and season two kinda Norah). She feels abandons because the divorce of her parents and directs that into mang, then she is abandoned by max and Norah so that just makes it worse. She makes the comment about max being a brat because she’s in a similar situation to Marcus (she probably also wants someone to point out her drinking and stuff), she so used to max making things about herself that she doesn’t take it seriously anymore.

Now max is trying to be a good friend so bad but she’s dealing with Marcus and then mang being weird and being alone for the first time that she is rightfully upset but I also think because she’s so focused on Marcus she doesn’t take a closer look at mang and just sees the surface level problems. Max can be ignorant to things going on around her, so when Abby’s being distant and bitchy this is just normal kinda she knows something up but she’s distracted by other things that keep piling on.

Back to Abby every time she makes a mean comment or has a mood swing she’s either drunk, relapsed (with her Ed), or dealing with her parents. Especially at the beginning I don’t think she meant to leave max out and just feels she has a safer place to talk with Ginny. The party comments she is very drunk (some say drunk words are sober thoughts) but Abby internalizes things a lot hates herself so she hates on other people. There friendship has been probably like this for a long time so dramatic shifts like these create rifts and anger and resentment.

Idk that’s just my thoughts on this. I do think they love each other very much and may be in love with each other but these are just patterns I noticed.

#abby littman #maxine baker #abbymax #there so angsty and I’m honestly glad they included it #I also think Abby needs a lot of help mentally due to everything #and she projects it a lot of the time #max needs to both meet them where they are and talk about her needs and have a serious coversation #I don’t know if taking a break from the friendship would be good #since we saw where that led #I love both of them dearly #ginny and georgia

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mummyemmatojames · 2 days ago

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54. The End of James’s Punishment: A Bittersweet Wrap-Up

Hello, dear community! Emma here, your Mummy-in-training, with an update on our MDLB and FLR journey as James’s week-long grounding comes to a close. It’s been hard on both of us, but the pull-ups became so special for me—adding a layer to our dynamic I adored. Our check-in as equals revealed he’s not on the same page, though, and I’m gutted. I’d love your help figuring out how to bring my soggy little monster back in a way that works for us both.

The Grounding Recap: A Tough Week

The week of toddler rules—7:30 PM bedtime, permission for everything, pull-ups at night—ended last night. It was a consequence for James’s drunken chaos at our friends’ dinner, and I held firm: two water bottles, nursing, formula before bed to ensure he used the Drynites, changing him each morning. For me, it was transformative—seeing him soggy and vulnerable, waiting for Mummy to care for him, lit up my nurturing side. I couldn’t get enough, scrolling endlessly online for cute patterns and finding excuses to keep him in them—like insisting he wear one for his naps, which he took a few times this week. It added so much to the dynamic for me, deepening that tender, in-charge feeling I love.

But it was hard on James. Night seven wrapped with him still compliant but visibly worn—sulky at the early bedtime, quiet under the permission rules, and tense when I’d slide the pull-ups on. He didn’t fight me outright, but I could feel his frustration building. I softened it where I could—cuddles after good behavior, praise for his chore chart—but the punishment hit him hard, just as I’d intended.

The Check-In: His Anger, My Disappointment

Yesterday was our monthly check-in as equals (early than normal due to the grounding), tea in hand on the couch, and James let it all out. He was very direct — “The toddler rules were so difficult, Emma,” he said, voice tight. “I hated asking for everything, the early bedtime was brutal, and the pull-ups… they were humiliating.” He brought up the store trip specifically—standing in the baby aisle, picking out Toy Story pull-ups while I browsed—calling it “embarrassing” and saying he felt exposed, even if no one said anything. “I know it was a punishment,” he added, “but it was a lot.” He didn’t mention the drinking that started this—just focused on how rough the week felt for him.

I listened, letting him vent, then reminded him why it happened: “You acted like a drunken toddler that night, James, embarrassing us both. The grounding was meant to reset you—it was a consequence, not fun.” He nodded, sheepish, and admitted he gets why I did it— “I messed up, I know”—but said the pull-ups are very embarrassing. That gutted me inside—I’d been soaring on how special they felt, and he was sinking under the weight of it.

I told him I’d loved that part— “Seeing you in pull-ups, waiting for Mummy, was so cute and vulnerable for me”—hoping he’d see my side. He softened a bit, saying he likes when I care for him, but it was hard being “soggy and helpless.” We ended the check-in on a quieter note—our usual adult closeness bringing some warmth back—but I’m disappointed. The pull-ups lit something in me, and he’s not there with me on it.

Where We’re At: Back to Normal, But I Want More

Tonight, he’s back to his usual routine—7:30 PM bath, nursing (no formula tonight, just me), 8:30 lights out, no pull-ups. He’s relieved, I can tell but I’m missing my soggy little monster already. The grounding worked—he’s reset, humbled, and alcohol’s firmly off-limits now (we agreed on that)—but I’m gutted to lose that pull-up magic. It’s not about punishment anymore; it’s about how it made me feel as Mummy—nurturing him in this raw, dependent way. I need to find ways to get that back fast, but in a way he can handle.

I’m thinking of easing them in outside punishment—maybe a “Mummy’s choice” night once a week, framing it as comfort instead of consequence. I’ve got the right size now (after the Toy Story flop), and I could pair it with extra cuddles or his favorite Lego time to soften it. But after his check-in anger, I’m not sure he’s ready—or if he’ll ever be.

What Do You Think?

I’d love some wisdom from the community—how do you bridge a gap when you love something in the dynamic that your partner doesn’t? Have you brought pull-ups back after a punishment, making them a positive instead of a negative—how did you sell it? For those whose little ones found them humiliating, did they warm up over time, or did you let it go? And if you’ve got ideas for recreating that soggy, vulnerable vibe without pull-ups—something James might lean into—I’m all ears. I’m gutted he’s not on the same page, but I want us both fulfilled in this.

Thank you for being here through this rollercoaster week. James is still my little boy, thriving and sweet—I just need my soggy monster back in a way he loves too.

With all my love (and a bit of longing), Emma (aka Mummy) 💕

#mdlb relationship #mdlbmommy #ab dl mommy #ab dl lifestyle #diapered little #ab dl diaper #goodnites

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azialways · 5 hours ago

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ronin x reader whos really heavy on physical touch? Like is constantly holding his hand or hugging/kissing him all the time, I love your writing!

that feeling is holy

ronin x touchy!reader

cws: none!

You loved your boyfriend, you loved everything about him. Every flaw and imperfection, you adored it. He was a serial killer? Who cares, not you. He was perfect in every way possible to you, and nobody could tell you otherwise. You fell in love with him from that first call, that charm he had? It drew you in from the very first word. He wanted to corrupt you, and you couldn’t care less. You’d let him corrupt you, as long as it meant you could have him by your side.

And now, he was out at work, and you missed him beyond belief. It was honestly a problem how much you loved him. So you went and texted him, not caring if he was busy.

————————————————————

Ronin 💕💕

you: i miss you

you: a lot

ronin 💕💕 is typing

ronin 💕💕: awh already?

ronin 💕💕: darlin I just left

you: i know but i still miss u

ronin 💕💕: i gotta Work baby

ronin 💕💕: how else Am i gonna pay Rent?

you: kill people for hire like misaki?

ronin 💕💕: ha, nah.

ronin 💕💕: not my style, my Love. yk that.

you: i guess. i’ll just sit here and wait.

So you did, and you missed him every second you did. You ended up stealing one of his favorite tshirts, because you wanted to feel closer to him. The smell of cologne and cigarettes came to your nose, and you sighed happily. It smelled like home. To entertain yourself while he was gone, you went between joining VC in the slaughterhouse, or you played pokemon on his gameboy, sitting by the bed curled up in the blankets. Right now, you were on his PC, sitting on his chair, on VC with the group.

“_____, why are you on Ronin’s account?” Angel asked, and you just laughed in response.

“Eh, why not? He has the better setup anyways.” You shrugged, responding to her.

“Valid, his setup is pretty good.” She agreed, laughing softly.

“Right? And he refuses to help me get a setup.” You complained, but you actually didn’t care that much.

“Really? Why is that?”

“He thinks I’m not enough of a gamer to need one, which is true, but cmon.” You chuckled, and then Misaki chimed in.

“Is he saying pokemon and minecraft aren’t gamer enough? Rude.” They commented.

You and the server members continued to have conversations for what felt like a short amount of time. You talked about various topics, killings, recent victim stories, and general life stories. You heard about Misaki’s transfer pattern art idea, and it shockingly didn’t seem like a horrible idea, even if the concept was weird. V talked about his latest animal rescue, and how he’s currently raising a kitty, and Angel complained about her manager being a douchebag. Of course, everyone offered to kill him off, but she would always refuse. It reminded you of Ronin’s stubbornness in a way, how he always insisted on doing things himself. God even talking to people made you think of him. You missed him.

ding

ronin 💕💕: coming home early, manager decided to close up early.

ronin 💕💕: be home in 10, darling.

You smiled at the message, thanking his manager telepathically for bringing him home to you early. You had been thinking about him all day, craving his touch. Not even in the sexual way, but you just wanted to be in his arms again. You wanted to feel his heart beat on your back as you cuddled, you wanted to hear his breathing slow once he was comfortable. All the small little niche romantic moments, you wanted those with him. Luckily for you, Ronin is equally as touchy as you were, so it never was much of an ask, if he wasn’t already touching you. You typically didn’t have to ask, which you loved.

Eventually, you heard the door creak open and click shut, but so you stood up, but just as you were getting out of his chair, the bedroom door creaked open.

“Didja miss me?” He chuckled, leaning against the doorframe. You stood up and walked over to him, going to hug him, but he already knew and wrapped his arms around your waist. Your arms went around his neck, and for a moment, you stayed like that. You stayed wrapped up in his touch, rocking back and forth gently. You bury your head in his neck, taking in the smell of gasoline mixed with his cologne. It felt familiar, like home. He then picked you up off your feet, making you gasp softly before placing you gently on the bed.

“Hey.” He smirked, looking down at you. He took in the way your cheeks flushed and your breathing quickened as he positioned himself on top of you, holding you up against the pillow.

“Hey yourself.” You responded, looking at him with those big, enamored eyes. He then placed himself between your thighs, resting his head on your chest.

“Long day?” You murmured, your hands going to his hair, gently raking through the red strands.

“Too many annoying customers.” He mumbled against your neck. He left a kiss under your jaw, and it made you smile. He was so cute like this, tired after a long day made for a clingy, touchy Ronin, which you loved.

“I’m sorry babe. I’m here now, and you can just relax and take a nap if you want.” You suggested, stroking patterns in his hair.

“Yeah…I jus’ might.” He yawned, cuddling up against you and pulled the covers over him. He then came up for a kiss, leaning in slowly, giving you a chance to say no if you wanted, but you didn’t. you wanted to taste his lips, to kiss him again. So you leaned in as well, slotting your lips between his, and he immediately perked up. He came up from his place on your chest, and leaned over you, his arms encasing you against the bedframe. You moaned softly at the feeling of his weight still on you as he kissed you. He kissed you like it was the first time again, like you were back in purgatory, with his knife against your throat and his tongue in your mouth. He was gentler, though. He was soft and tender in his kiss, his hand gently caressing your cheek as he pulled away, to then rest his forehead on yours.

“I love ya…yknow that?” He mumbled.

“Mmm, I don’t know. You might have to prove it.” You teased, smirking at him.

“I just might.” He chuckled, teasing your lips of another kiss.

“Be my guest.”

#killer chat #killer chat ronin #ronin beaufort #ronin #ronin x reader #killer chat x reader #fanfiction #killer chat vn #fluff #i love him

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rotagnus · 2 hours ago

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wounds u need to heal. . . 💮

[ this reading will focus on issues that may be recurring patterns within your life, and methods you can take to heal them. this is probably one of my heaviest readings yet, so please beware. many triggering things are mentioned. ]

[ ☆*: .｡. o(≧▽≦)o .｡.:*☆ ^_____^ enjoy!!! ]

pile 1.

yeah so with this pile, a lot of u absorb other people's traumas and pains like a sponge. you're loyal to the end, even if it means that you yourself drown along with others. many of you stay in toxic relationships (not just romantic ones...) because you still see the good version/idealized self of the other person, and you truly do believe in their potential very deeply.

you guys also have a lot of issues with fitting in. you can't fathom the fact that anyone would like you for the real you, and you only feel comfortable being the real you when you're alone in your room. sometimes you wonder where it all went wrong, and you imagine your little child self staring at you with something similar to disappointment. when did you start seeking attention from people you couldn't care less about?

i think that a lot of the things that you guys will heal will come from being alone. many are terrified of this and that's why you comb yourself and create a specific persona that's catered to whoever you surround yourself with. many of you will grow in phases of your life that require you to be alone, and i think a lot of you may be going through that right now. many will have to use affirmations, and listen to music with good vibes, and generally remove any clutter that serves you no purpose (things that make you want to compare yourself to others). as well as people. many of you will only really feel free after cutting toxic people off!!!

pile 2..

a lot of you have parental issues, specifically with feminine figures (not necessarily a mom, but can be a grandma, or any female figure in your life). if not that, then with femininity itself. you guys could have hypersexualized yourself from a young age, or been extremely modest. many of you just want to be beautiful and you feel like the rest of your life will be spent proving that right, because you can never be beautiful with your simple existence; you must act a certain way, speak a certain way, you can never be 'you' and be beautiful.

for most of you i think that this'll be healed when things that aren't meant to be in your life will just fall out. you may notice things disappearing and you mourn them very deeply, but this'll actually be a good thing. a lot of you are also very worried about losing yourself. you understand what a deep, genuine person you are, and you do see your goodness. but you're worried that with all the tests that the universe gives you, you'll break apart into pieces.

you'll heal by truly allowing yourself to feel things. by letting yourself be, without putting labels onto yourself. you're just you, at the end of the day. beautiful, sweet, tender, genuine you. you don't need to be a certain thing to be any of those qualities, they just come along with the existence of your soul, and you cannot refute them. also, by nurturing yourself. many of you never got a chance to be taken care of and you believe there is something fundamentally wrong with you that you must fix. this is wrong. the moment you start being soft with yourself, is the moment that all your wounds begin to heal.

pile 3...

aww my poor babies :( a lot of you have attachment issues and periods of time where you seek nostalgia even if the past is a very bitter place for a lot of you. many experienced trauma but you still seek patterns from there because it feels safer than the future, because you know you somehow SURVIVED and COPED with that...but the future is uncharted territory that terrifies you. you would rather fall into old habits than carve new ones out, even though you know that there is a tender sweetness in the future.

mmm for a lot of you your healing will come from living things. many are going to make a garden later on in life, or plant a tree, or nurture something that's alive. it'll make your nervous system feel much safer, and you'll be able to regain trust in people and other things. it'll take time and a lot of self-reflection, but things that you associate with trauma and such a deep, fractured pain, will blossom into something truly beautiful. you guys already know you deserve the world; the other part of your life will be spent proving that, with the universe's help :).

also a lot of you will definitely heal by pursuing your craft. so many of you express yourself through certain things; sports, art, tarot, etc. and when you are in a bad mental place, you shut those resources out for yourself or you become manic with them, so when you truly learn how to balance this out without giving too much of yourself away, you'll know that you're really on the path to healing. you guys are much stronger than you think, and i 100% believe in your recovery. stay sweet and soft, my loves. there are good things coming.

#love reading #pac reading #pick a picture #tarotblr #intuitive reading #divine guidance #tarot reading #pick a pile #pick a card #rotagnus

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brasshighway-579 · 1 day ago

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Why’d You Only Call Me When You’re High? | Theo Nott

Author’s Note: 1st part of a set of AM inspired Theo fics!!! I hope you enjoy <3

Warnings: Reader uses substances (weed and alcohol)

Word Count: 766

3:00 AM

-14 missed calls from: Y/N-

Theo sighs and rolls over as he sees his phone ring yet again. Just as before, it’s you- his not-quite-friend, not-quite-lover.

He had humored you the first several times you called, repeating over and over that he had to be up early and couldn’t go out, but you, in your heightened state, kept calling and insisting you missed him terribly. He knew, of course, that you weren’t sober- it was obvious from your slowed pattern of speech, your dramatism, your clingier behavior. After about 7 such conversations, he grew terribly frustrated, and stopped picking up entirely.

It was quite difficult to sleep, of course, when every few minutes his entire bedside table would shake with your call. The calls grew increasingly frequent, driving Theo to the brink of madness. Next call, he decided, as the current call faded away. The next time they call, I’ll be very blunt. I have to sleep.

Theo watched his phone intently, determined to talk to you as quickly as possible and to get to sleep. Less than two minutes later, of course, his phone rang again, and this time it was answered before the first ring could fully complete itself.

“Teddyyyyy! Baby, there you are, I’ve been missing you so much… Why'd you stop answering? I got so nervous, Theo…”

“I told you before. I have an early wake up tomorrow. It’s already 3am, and I shouldn’t be calling you. I need to sleep. Please stop calling me.”

Not being fully alert, you hadn’t anticipated the bite that would come with Theo’s tone, nor had you expected the way it would upset your heart. In your own mind, you had committed no crime, unless one counted adoration as a sin, but the harshness in Theo’s tone indicated he was much more upset than you had bargained for.

“I just… I just wanted to talk, Teddy. I didn’t mean to upset you.”

Theo realized at the way your tone had dramatically softened that he had hurt you, which was far from what he ever wanted to do. The idea that he was the reason you were at all in pain was absolutely miserable to him, and he felt all his prior resolve slip away.

“I’m not upset that you wanted to talk, dolcezza,” he replied, this time barely above a whisper. “I just wish it meant something.”

“It does mean something, Theo, you mean the world to me, that’s why I want to talk to you. You’re my best friend, and…”

“I just wish you were sober,” he interrupted. “I wish you wanted to talk when you were yourself, not when you’re… like this.” He felt himself tense, this time with genuine hurt at your silence, further confirming that you were out tonight to smoke and drink, as he expected. Usually, when you went out together, he was the only thing stopping you from getting wasted, so it figured that the night he wasn’t babysitting you was the night you were on the verge of greening out.

“Why’d you only call me when you’re high?” he asked, so quiet you could barely make out his words over the phone from your crowded location.

“Theo…” you choked, on the verge of tears realizing how upset he was. To him, you were only interested in talking to him because you needed him to take care of you. In reality, he had no idea how many hours out of the day you had spent cancelling on Pansy and the rest of your friends all together simply to spend time with Theo. You found him taking up almost all of the space in your brain these days, and had truthfully called him hoping to change his mind about coming out tonight. You didn’t need a smoking buddy or even a babysitter, you just needed to be around him. That by itself was enough to make you feel safe.

“I need to be up early,” he said, gently. “I… I need to sleep.”

Both of you sat in your silence for a moment.

“Can I come over?”

A pause. Then: “Yeah. That’d be a good compromise, I think.”

By 4, you were curled up in Theo’s bed, much to your relief and his content acceptance. Pansy was very disappointed by your “early” departure, but agreed to hail you a cab to ensure you made it to Theo’s safely. By the time you fell asleep, you felt so safe under his covers, it forced you to wonder why you even wanted to go out in the first place.

#harry potter #theodore nott #theodore nott x reader #theo nott #slytherin #slytherin boys #theo nott au #theo nott x fem!reader #theodore nott x y/n #theodore nott x you #theo nott x reader #theodore nott imagine #arctic monkeys #why’d you only call me when you’re high

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djpepitaqueenforpresident · 8 hours ago

Text

𐦍༘⋆ Mnemonics - B.Barnes

‘The air could not be filled with Winters vocals, but his ears worked better than fine, and instead of hearing someone he could not remember the name of beg in his skull, he listened to you.’

Summary: In which Bucky walks the path of regaining his memories, and he has to figure out wether you are real or just an apparition of hope his own mind conjured up to help him push through the hard ways of Winter.

Warnings: Ptsd, blood, violence, guns, swearing, murder, sad Bucky

A/N: English is not my first language!:)

Teehee

Rusted [verb]; to become or cause something to become covered with rust.

Metal was metal, and a bullet was a bullet.

Would it matter who it came from?

You had imagined it different.

Actually, you had never imagined it at all.

Maybe with a grey haired lover by your side, petting the equally grey feline that was lounging in between your legs. Basking in the sun without sunscreen because what could skin cancer do that old age didn’t already?

You’d visit your friends over Christmas and recall the story of your love like you did every year.

But, Christmas is dead and your friends are ghosts.

A childhood thrown in the gutter.

Metal is metal, and a bullet is a bullet.

Still, you suppose you’d prefer his arm to do the job. At least then it’d be somewhat poetic.

With the hot end pressed straight against your temple, and your trainer busy with his own attackers, panic set in.

And panic wasn’t good.

Because, if there is place for anxiety, there isn’t any for control.

And that was exactly what a situation like this required.

You didn’t know wether the click came from the pistol or from his mind, but either how, two seconds later, he collapsed. Like a ragdoll he went down, folding into his own body, his gun clattered out of his hand, sliding down until it collided with the heel of your boot.

The tingling of the energy surged out of your body the same moment his head met the pavement. Dead.

With trembling knees, you stepped back, your eyes locked onto the dark fluids flowing from every entry point. You couldn’t feel him anymore.

You wished it wasn’t so quiet.

“Oh my God,” you were sobbing, choking out strangled words. “Oh my God he’s dead. I killed him.”

Your hands were shaking, almost reaching out for something, anything, to hold on to.

The only thing in your reach was him, but you weren’t allowed to touch him like that.

It was a grotesque scene all around you, something belonging in a renaissance war painting.

The metallic scent entering your senses even as you breathed through your nose.

Why was every macabre thing made of metal?

Your hiccups continued, and Winter grew rather wary of your cries.

“Stop.”

The one Russian word he uttered seemed to make its affect, for you quieted down until only your hesitant breaths were heard, like a switch, a lever that can be pulled only by him.

The drops still flowing from the man his ears and nose made for a deformed pattern on the concrete.

It wasn’t supposed to do that.

One man, that was the initial target.

Now, there were about a dozen devoid of life.

His silver arm caught the blinking lights from above, but it didn’t shine like it usually did. No, it was too red to reflect the light.

They’d clean it tonight and it would glimmer again tomorrow. Their ends would make the papers, but his arm would be wiped and their blood erased, and life would go on.

Well, not theirs.

He only gave a grunt, before giving one nudge with his head. You knew what it meant, and followed without further response.

Metal is metal, and a bullet is an arm.

It was something you still thought about, that night.

You knew you should be grateful. Staring down the eye of a gun while equally torturous moans swirled your ears usually meant you were next.

Eat or be eaten, right?

Even when your teeth are rotting and your stomach convulsing, eat.

Until your throat overflows and pukes everything up again, coating your tongue in thick, warm blood while your fingers dig into flesh and muscle and bone, never stopping.

It was one night. One ‘accident’.

But it had already left you feeling like you stood in the garden of Eden, waiting for judgement because you just couldn’t keep off of the snake.

You didn’t even want to think how he felt.

With his pretty eyes and downturned lips, he was the epitome of trapped sunlight.

A firefly stuck in a jar, shining his light for the wrong people, always stuck in the dark, while a graveyard grew under his shelf.

The wooden log pierced into your legs, and every now and then you swiped the bottom of your thighs, paranoid for getting splinters.

Every time your hand came up empty, because HYDRA didn’t do things halfway.

The black fabric wasn’t exactly bulletproof, but it did it’s job for keeping out any unwanted disturbances. Now, the only thing the mosquitoes could do were buzz around your head with a suicidal persistent.

You did your best to ignore the pathetic looking piece of meat that was pierced on the end of your stick, swallowing down your growing nauseousness.

You were pretty sure the ends were already charred, the small rabbit sitting directly into the fire, instead of hanging above. You’ve never been camping before.

The orange flames made dancing shadows across his face, his blue irises almost invisible, his pupil taking up most of the space as he gazed into the warmth.

You wanted to ask what he was thinking about, but you’ve never gotten a solid response before.

Pulling the stick out the fire, you turned it over in your hand, inspecting the dead animal. You’ve never been a vegetarian, but having seen its tiny legs struggling under his hold and hearing that one, quick snap, you consider turning into a herbivore after all this is over.

You couldn’t tell if its brown eyes were begging for your help or trying to mark your face as a last reminder of Death, as if it was your cold hand around its neck.

It had gotten a merciful end, though, you suppose. Its meat still held a purpose after its departure from this life. A purpose you weren’t sure you would have gotten.

They had made clear multiple times what would happen with runners. The things they would do to those who were foolish enough to consider disobedience.

You would not even get the privilege of maggots. You’d be pulled apart, crushed into parts for someone else to take. You would serve under a different name, making what was yours into theirs while you couldn’t even do as much as rot. You’d be dead like a haunting ghost was dead.

The rabbit was still jumping inside, from one organ to the next, but it would never again be remembered.

Wether your eyes were watering from the flames or the brutality of the situation, you didn’t know. You didn’t know anything anymore. And still, here you were, under the stars and in between the trees, sitting across an erased soul while Death held one of your hands, and one of his. You’d feared it would all crumble if He were to let go of one of you.

Winter couldn’t even talk. Couldn’t think for himself and didn’t move unless you’d tell him to. All you wanted for him was to be free, but the only thing you’ve done was simply transfer the strings from one hand to your own.

You’d tell yourself it was still better than before. No more lifeless cells, no more Russian kill orders and no more bracing for impact from bloodied fists.

The only thing you shared with his former handlers was the poking inside his mind. Not that you were very successful, yet. But you hadn’t exactly been at this for very long, and were only improvising. Something that you’d knew could only set him back further.

“This is disgusting,” you muttered, throwing the burned remnants of your meal into the dark. He only glanced up for a moment, before staring into the fire again. His skewered hare was already gone.

He was always so far away. You only needed to stretch out your right arm to touch him. But, you know you’d never reach him. There was a fire in the way.

“You think they will find us?”

Occasionally a flap of wings sounded overhead, the quiet movement of a bat reaching your ears.

It was the only sound you heard.

“Or, maybe they’ll only find our cold, lifeless vessels. Having perished in this God forsaken forest in fucking nowhere land.”

You were sniffling now, feeling the drops trace against your cheeks, rolling down your chin and following the curve of your throat. No one was here to see it, anyways. Winter was too busy trying not to be Winter to pay any attention to you.

“What’d you think is better? Getting eating by a bear or die of hypothermia? Everything’s better than them, I suppose.”

Your vision was tainted red and orange, a bright hue glowing in your tears that you were too lazy to wipe away. Keeping the fire alive, you throw a single stick into it every few seconds. You were pretty sure you were doing the opposite of tending to it, but silence has never felt this heavy, and overfeeding the only source of warmth you two had seemed like a good option. Destroying it like other hands had destroyed you.

“At least we’re not in the Appalachian mountains,” you were mumbling now, a distraction. Wether it was for him or for yourself, you weren’t sure. “I don’t think I could handle any Skinwalkers right now.“

You stared at him, pondering wether shutting up or hitting him was better. His lashes were long legs under his eyes, a spider creeping up his bags. His brown hair shined black in the night, only its true color being illuminated by the flames. It hung in strands at the sides of his face. Dirty and long and neglected. He needed a shave, desperately. His scruff clung to his jaws, a ghost of the mask he was once forced to wear, like it never left him. An imprint that will always remind everyone that he was just a dog.

Suddenly, running away with one of the most dangerous and most unstable soldier on your leash, didn’t sound like such a good idea, anymore.

Still, you stayed.

You threw the last wood into the fire, shuffled down from your seating place and slowly laid down. Knees drawn up to your chest and hands tucked under your chin. He didn’t regard you for a second. He didn’t make any indication of moving himself. He only stared ahead, quiet as ever.

You’d dream of him. Of both of you. A place different than this, a life well deserved. Were you would have never met him, and he would have never met them.

But, in the morning, when the sun once again urged you to move, reminding you of the troubles you’d left behind, you wake up and your Winter was still here.

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