#and at the same time is not offering me a reasonable alternative

[calcichel]

Alright, I generally try not to dig into meta stuff, especially mid-read, but I gotta ask (since I don't have a good way to search for posts where this has almost certainly been previously answered). Every other arc of Worm has a female character do/say something suggestive with another female character, and then they immediately go "no homo though!!! promise." I saw this sort of pattern being joked about in various wormblr posts but wasn't sure how much was exaggeration. The prion kiss scene is the most egregious one obviously, but I just read Lisa's "the problem is my relationship with you" chapter, which was immediately followed by the "none of us girls bat for the other team" moment, to Parian of all people. Like this is getting ridiculous.

I obviously don't know anything about what the Worm community was like while this story was being published live. How intense were people about shipping? Was the author inserting these moments to deliberately fuck with the fandom? It happens so often that it seems like it has to be some sort of commentary on his part, but I can't figure out what he's trying to say. I'm personally sympathetic to a "friendships can and should be meaningful without romance involved" statement, but the type of lampshading happening here, specifically the way it seems to mock/tease the audience, doesn't seem compatible with that particular stance.

If anyone can offer me some additional context here (preferably without too many spoilers), I'd appreciate it!

[bookwyrminspiration]

I don't really have a final conclusion for this, I've just been thinking recently that I appreciate the effort Shannon made to say its okay to learn differently than others and have unique needs, however Exillium being the medium through which that message is conveyed in Unlocked falls short (at least for me) because...that's also the punishment school. Having different educational needs and being sent to a different school--not to mention one that's not even part of formal society and is literally in the wild--for poor behavior/choices are two very different things, but they've been lumped together.

Yes, it's entirely okay to learn differently and have unique needs, but that's not why kids get sent to Exillium. It's not a school to help accommodate their learning. Kids are, from what we've seen, sent almost always because they've caused problems and are deemed unfit for the typical schools. Disruptive, problematic, criminal, lesser, etc. So also having it be the alternative learning school kind of implies a correlation between having different needs and making poor choices/having problem behavior. Like none of these students "learn differently" (that we've been told at least) they caused problems (intentional or not) that people didn't want to deal with. Maybe this isn't representative of all Exillium students, but it's all we've seen so far that I can recall.

And yes Exillium is improving and did have a positive initial intention, but as it is right now I find myself (personally, these are my feelings) uncomfortable at it being used to say its okay to learn differently. Because it doesn't feel like it follows through on that message. Having the school where kids with criminal behavior are sent out of sight separate from the rest of society being the school for alternate learning styles just doesn't sit quite right.

And yes, some of the kids sent there were just labeled disruptive/problematic and they didn't actually do anything wrong but be themselves, but their being fucked over by the system doesn't change that that is how the system works.

I'm not really going anywhere with this and it's difficult to articulate (I'm sure I've missed a few clarifying points because I keep debating with myself back and forth) because I do think Shannon meant well, I'm not an expert, and there are always arguments to be made to the contrary (like I said, I've been debating with myself). It's just something I've been thinking about because I always feel icky reading that part of Linh's Exillium commentary, but maybe I'm making a problem out of nothing.

[kaysungshine]

𝓛𝓸𝓯𝓲 𝓛𝓾𝓼𝓽 ♡

{ Pairing } - Producer.bf!Jisung x afab.gf!reader

{ Genre } - NSFW; s/f/d(dark)*, PWP, established relationship

{ Synopsis } - Your boyfriend doesn't know any other method of stress relief, other than creating music. He can get so consumed by it, it can become the stressor. So you decide to present him with a new method. That's how you found yourself walking down the street in nothing but lingerie and a long coat.

{ WC } - 2.9k

{ Warnings & Tags } - 18+ MDNI, *forced orgasm/slight dubcon if you squint, everything is consensual but there is begging for more when reader might be at her limit so that's why I'm including dubcon (for those who may find it triggering)*, use of pet names (baby, angel, mine, my love, good girl & Ji), very lowkey needy/soft dom & romantic sub dynamic, worshipping reader, oral (f. recieving), squirting, overstimulation, unprotected piv (do as I say & not as I write, pee after sex too!), creampie, cum feeding & eating, fingers in mouth, pussy worship, I may just have gotten carried away with oral fixations okay? FORGIVE ME.

{ Disclaimer } - This work is in no way associated or depicting the actual life of the members of SKZ. It is a fictional piece of work, and I do not own Stray Kids. All works of fiction are loosely inspired by SKZ, and in no way am I saying it is true to their character.

{ A/N } - I originally was going to post a Hyunjin oneshot next, but I wanted to finish this one in time for Jiji's birthday! It's 2 am on the 14th where I am heheh. Hopefully you all like it. Han producing music will always be hot asf for me personally lmao. Barely proofread.

The air was cool, seeping underneath your long wool coat. In any other circumstance, on a late fall night, the coat would be enough to keep the chill out. Today however, it wouldn't. But you still kept walking, determined to make it to Jisungs studio. 

You focused on the clicking of the heels on the boots you wore. And the sound of the wind picking up, signalling a blustery night ahead. The small sounds calm your nerves. 

You were anxious about Jisung's reaction, he was in one of his moods again. You understand, you truly do. Juggling everything he has to on his plate, it was no easy feat. There were times he'd just let that dark veil take over, and shut everyone out without even meaning to. 

You knew he was in that state again when you hadn't seen or heard from him in three days. It wasn't for lack of effort on your end either. Every phone call sent to voicemail, every text sent by you was met with the same response;

'At the studio, I'll text you after, angel'.

You knew it was time for intervention when Chan texted you that he was only coming home, at 2 in the morning no less, to shower and change. No eating, no resting, just back to the studio afterwards.

This had happened twice before in the almost year you've been dating. Each time you remember talking with him afterwards, he always said the same thing;

'making music is my stress relief.'

That may be true, but it doesn't change the fact that he is also a workaholic. One who easily gets lost in the creative space he has built a career off of. And once that diligence sets in, it's hard to shake off. 

So here you are, ready to try a new approach. Ready to offer a new kind of relief. An alternative. 

You and Jisungs sex life was far from boring. Far from infrequent, you'd say too. But it surely was more... monotonous. You'd never complain about it, and neither would he. There was nothing wrong with it. It just happened at the 'perfect' times in your relationship. 

Before bed, after date nights, on monthly anniversaries, to express massive amounts of love, etc. 

It was never to celebrate happiness, calm anger, or comfort sadness. Never to relieve stress. 

You were determined to change that. There was no reason you could not help him in any way you could. And in this aspect, you knew you could. 

Still, you were nervous. This would be new, he never did well with new. 

Your footsteps stopped, leaving only the sound of the wind in your ears. Until you pressed your badge against the card reader, listening to the beeps, to the gears unlock. 

Once inside the lobby, the clinking of your heels against the vinyl tile filled your ears. Each step matches the thumping in your heart, you find yourself speed walking.

 You smiled and gave a little wave to the staff in the lobby, and they returned it. 

In the elevator, the sound of its melodic music filled your ears next. The whirring background noise the machinery made, stopped, as you reached your desired floor. 

There was silence when you stepped off. The flooring is carpeted now, and soundproof rooms lined the hallway leaving the night quiet. 

You took a deep breath and made your way to the door you knew was your boyfriend's. It was unlocked, thankfully. 

You let yourself in, seeing the silhouette of your boyfriends back facing the door in the blue lighting. 

He was all about ambiance in this facet of life, having LED's lining the ceiling. The only source of light in the room, besides the glowing screens of his monitors. 

He was sat in his chair, headphones on, hood up, head nodding in tandem with his fingers tapping. 

You took the opportunity to slide your boots off. Opting to keep your coat on, you brushed your hair over one shoulder. You took your badge from around your neck, and tossed it on the leather couch that was against the wall. 

Padding your way over to him, you place your hand on his shoulder lightly. He tenses under your touch, and turns his head. He's frowning when he first faces you, eyebrow furrowed together. 

When he sees you though, he softens. The corners of his mouth slightly upturning to a small smile. 

"Baby..." He whispers, sliding his head phones off. Soft lofi music is filling the room from them. 

He grabs your hand off his shoulder, bringing it to his lips. He's pressing soft kisses to your palm, and placing it on his cheek. 

"It's late my angel, why are you here?" He says in a husky voice with more volume. 

Your heart flutters at his gentleness, and you bend down to press your own lips to the top of his head. A musky, yet spicy vanilla scent fills your nostrils. His scent. 

"I'm here to help you baby." You murmur to him softly. 

That caught his attention. He fully swivelled around to face you, taking both of your hands in his. He gazed up into your eyes, a curious look on his face. 

You smiled down on him, feeling nothing but love for this man. You'd relax him in any way you can. You placed a hand on each side of his face, bending down again. No more words were said as you kissed him. As your hands slid down his neck, his found themselves on yours, pulling you closer to him. Matching your eagerness.

You let your hands fully slide off him, and tilted your head to deepen the kiss. Your trembling fingers were working the buttons on your coat. One by one, releasing the fabric from your bare skin. 

You stood up, letting the coat fall from your shoulders.

Jisung lets out a soft gasp, and licks his lips. 

Exposed to him, was his favorite lingerie you owned. It was a bra and panty set, satin and lace. Revealing. 

All white. 

Your boyfriends favorite part. He always said that the contrast against your melanated skin was a work of art. He joked about commissioning Hyunjin, if he didn't have to see you essentially naked.

So here you stood before him, presenting yourself to him. Silently willing him to do as he pleases. To take your body and use you to decompress. You were too nervous to say it.

He traces the swell of your breast with a finger, curving around the delicate lace. It's a simple touch, but it still sends a shiver down your spine. Goosebumps blooming on your skin. 

"So sexy." He mumbles, eyes roving your whole body. 

He stands up, kissing you desperately, and walking you back to the couch. Your knees hit the back of it, and you're forced to sit. Lips ripping away from his, panting at the desire in his eyes. 

All your nerves were gone. New or not, it would never change the fact that Jisung craved you as much as you craved him. 

He held himself up with his hands on the back of the couch, and hovered above you for a moment looking you in the eyes. 

Then he was sinking to the ground, on his knees, between your legs. His hands smooth over your thighs, making them pliant with soft kisses, before he spreads them open. Your pussy is glistening behind the lace, and he licks his lips again. 

His hand glides from your thigh, to your heat. Thumb brushing against that sensitive bud, the friction eliciting a whine from you. 

His eyes snap up to you, and he holds your gaze as his tongue licks a stripe up your clothed core. The tip of it flicking deliciously against your sensitive clit. 

"Mmmm..." He groaned at the taste of you, "All for me?"

You moan at his tongue swiping against you again, and again, "All for you, my love." 

His fingers hook underneath the band of your underwear, and he peels them off you. He's whimpering, watching as strings of your arousal stick to them. The cool air is hitting your sex, before puffs of hot air from his mouth is. And you're shivering again at the sensation. 

A gasp escapes you when his tongue slides between your folds. Lapping up your juices, and suckling at that bundle of nerves. You listen to the wet sounds his mouth is making against you, along with the broken melody coming from his head set. You get lost in it. 

Your hand finds his hair, and you're grinding against his mouth. He's whimpering and moaning with you, one hand palming at his bulge. The other has fingers teasing your entrance. 

You let out a loud moan when two fingers push into you, and your grasp on his hair loosens. He takes the opportunity to get air, panting, mouth hanging open. His cheeks, chin and lips all shine in the dull blue light. 

His fingers continue to pump into you as he watches your face contort for him. He's smiling with lidded eyes, basking in the fact that he's making you feel so good. 

"Ji..." You moan, needing more.

"My beautiful baby, let me worship you a little longer." And he's diving back down.

His tongue focuses on your clit, and fingers coaxing that gummy spot inside you. He's pulling moan after moan from you, making out with your lower lips, bringing you closer to the edge. Your thighs start trembling around his head, and he has to grip the fleshy part of one of them to stop you from squeezing him before he's finished. 

You're spilling over the edge, body alight and your release coating his fingers, and face. He's lapping up every little bit, determined to taste your pleasure on his tongue. Only when you start to whine from constant overstimulation does he stop. 

He's kissing his way up to your lips, leaving a wet trail behind him that you couldn't bring yourself to care about. 

You're not sure when he managed to discard his pants and boxers, but you feel his hard, bare length pressing against your inner thigh. 

He's rubbing his member against your pussy now, letting your slick and his saliva cover him. Kissing your neck as he's rocking against you, he whispers, "Angel, do you have another one for me?"

Of course you did, you knew you did. You needed to feel him, you needed to please him. So you started nodding fervently, eyes rolling in the back of your head when he sucked lightly near your ear and jaw. 

He had a grasp of his cock now, dragging the head through your folds with added pressure. Each squelch of your juices sounds like music to your ears, anticipation building in your body.

"'Gonna make you feel s'good." He's whining into your neck. 

He has your legs around him now, as he fills you slowly, both of you savoring the sensations it brings. Your pussy spasms around him, and it has him grunting. 

"Always feel so good squeezin' me..." He mumbled, letting you adjust, "...exactly what I needed..." 

Then he was pumping into you, and you felt it. All the frustrations he was holding onto, all the stress, all the vexation. He was translating it into the energy he used to pleasure you. Letting go of it all. 

You couldn't hear the soft lofi music coming from his head set anymore, instead the slapping of skin and heavy breathing mixed with moans were filling the room. You'd never be more thankful for a soundproof space. Neither of you were holding back. 

Your moans only being interrupted by quiet curses, and his being peppered in between praises of how good you feel for him. He made it known he was chasing your high before his, begging you to cum for him. 

"Please angel," he whispers against your lips, "need to feel you cumming on my cock."

His pace became quicker as he kissed you, and his hand slithered down to play with your clit. Your back arched off the couch at that, angling him deeper inside you. He groaned, and his thrusts faltered for a second indicating he was close. 

Regardless he was determined to finish you, and his tone grew more demanding, "Be a good girl... cum for me, angel."

And that was all your body and mind needed to let go, legs locking around him and body shaking. Your hands slid under his hoodie, and nails dug into his back. It was the kind of intense orgasm, that your moan got stuck in your throat, instead a rough growl coming out. 

You sounded absolutely feral for him, and you were. 

That was what pushed him over the edge, a slew of curses leaving his mouth as his hips stuttered. With a final harsh thrust, he cums deep inside you. All of the negativity has dispersed from his body, and he collapsed back to his knees. 

You're both panting, trying to catch your breath. You jolt when you feel his fingers in your folds, over sensitivity taking over yet again. He's spreading you open, hypnotized by the way his cum is drooling out of you. 

"So perfect, fuck." He says as he drags his finger through it. 

He's bringing it up to your lips, and your mouth opens instinctively. You're sucking his finger into your mouth, his essence salty but familiar on your tongue. 

His eyes are locked to yours as you work his finger, licking it clean. He slips a second finger in your mouth, letting you cover them in your saliva before he dips back down for a taste himself. 

You're whining around his fingers when his tongue glides against your clit, and your hips try to retract into the couch. Quickly, he has both hands on your hips, securing you in place so he can continue tasting you. 

"We taste so good together, my love..." He's mumbling against you. 

His words will never fail to coax submission out of you.

Your hand flies back to his hair, as good as it feels you're trying to pull him away. He's just burying his face deeper, tongue dipping into your entrance to make sure he's tasting everything. 

"Ji... s'too much... I can't-" You're pleading, even though you feel yourself succumbing to the overwhelming brushes of his tongue.

He hisses when you finally succeed in pulling him off you, "Please angel," He's begging again, "Just one more. I know you have one more for me." 

"Fuck, Ji, I-" 

He silences you with his tongue flat against you, another lick up to your clit "Please, need to hear you cumming one more time for me." He whines and starts leaving sloppy, wet kisses on your pussy. 

You always knew he was more of a giver. That even though it was you who had cum twice, and he only once. He preferred it that way. Even if he was the one needing the release more, he thrived more on your pleasure.

"Just be gentl-" You try to say, but cut yourself off with a groan. 

He's eagerly slurping at your core. Lost in the moment, all he has is your pussy on his mind now. Messily licking and lapping at every inch. He's shaking his head and moaning into it, keeping you pinned in place by your hips. 

You feel another orgasm starting to build quickly, clenching around nothing. He risks you bucking your hips roughly into his face, and takes a hand off your hip. He's pushing two fingers into you yet again, and you're seeing stars. 

His fingers curl, and his lips close around your clit, sucking lightly. You feel your release slip away from you, and your cumming on his face again. Yelling his name. He only grows more determined.

He leans back so he can watch the beautiful, writhing, mess he reduced you to. The thumb of his other hand is replacing his mouth, continuously flicking your bud. He doesn't slow his movements as you ride out your orgasm, instead picking them up. 

Your world turns white, and you feel yourself squirt on his hands. He's watching you in awe, whispering more praise for you as your juices spray over him. 

"So fucking sexy, my good girl."

"That's it, let go for me, let it all go."

"Knew you had one more in you, all for me."

"My perfect angel."

It's when you start to slip into that floaty space that he finally stops. He doesn't want you too gone, he's limited in the care he can provide here.

He's positioning you to lay on the couch, and he's laying behind you. You're both wet and sticky, and heaving for air. Yet, it's blissful. 

You lay there for what could've been minutes or an hour, you weren't sure. You were content in each other's touch. Your arm reaches back to caress his head, fingers combing through his hair. He's humming. 

"I love you." You finally murmur. 

"I love you more, angel. Thank you for this." He says, and kisses your shoulder. 

"You caught on quickly to my idea." You giggled.

He laughed with you, "I caught on halfway through it, actually. I was just beside myself with desire for you." 

You blushed at that, and you were thankful he couldn't see it. 

"I mean you showed up in my favorite set..." He whispers and starts toying with the lace on your bra, his finger slipping underneath to flick your nipple, "In ONLY my favorite set. How could I not show you how much I admire you." 

You felt his length harden against you again, and he rolled his hips slowly as he gripped your hip. 

You knew the night was far from over. 

As for how you were both going to escape and clean up? Well that was a problem for future you. 

Taglist:

@eczlipse @sailor--sun @maisyyyyyy @jupire @prettiichocolateprincess

@meowmeowminnie @joyofbebbanburg @adieu-lisette @sleeping-beau-tay @staytinyluv

@lookitsjess @majorlymismanaged @kpopsstuffs @helloimacalumgirl @bbokarimenu

@bubblepop-stay @mauvemelon @ohhlittlegirl @ang4lheart @spnwinchestersd

@adieu-lisette @loud-minhoe @juwire @anylady-fics @antisocialties

@nebugalaxy @wowitsafemale

As always, please let me know if you'd like to join the taglist. And if you do, pretty please interact with my fics besides liking (ie; replying/commenting/reblogging). Although I will always appreciate liking as well! Feedback is always cherished! ♡

But again, please be gentle in your criticism! I am but a sensitive soul.

[takaraphoenix]

I saw someone refer to Steter as a comedy relief duo earlier and it just completely sent me, because that's just... so far from what Steter is, in canon?

As I'm currently rewatching the show, it has shot up into being my favorite ship on the show because of the gravitas it has.

It's a ship that highlights Stiles' fearlessness in such intriguing ways, in canon. From the boy who yelled at a feral Alpha in the school, to their first face to face meeting at the hospital, when Peter recognizes him, knows him, acknowledges him ("You must be Stiles", as though Stiles' reputation as the one who figures things out proceeds him, as he is the first one to put together that Peter is the Alpha).

There's nothing comedic about the scene on the lacrosse field, when Stiles is kneelng beside Lydia's unconscious form and Peter... for reasons beyond comprehension... decides to curl his claws beneath Stiles' chin and guide him up. Not grab him by the arm and haul him up, not command him, not demand.

This is... sensual, filled with tension, and I don't even necessarily mean the sexual tension (even though the imagery of Stiles kneeling before Peter and Peter grasping his chin is something that I find hard to not see a sexual read on).

Peter kidnaps Stiles into the parking garage to force the boy to track down Derek and, sure, the "His username is Allison? His password is also Allison?" - "Still want him in your pack?" is absolutely iconic and is comedic... how do you boil that entire exchange down to "comedy relief"?

The way Peter offers Stiles the bite - Peter, who so far, only took whatever he wanted, never asked or offered - and doesn't force when Stiles says "No". Even the way Peter catches Stiles on the lie is a moment of tension and revelation on Stiles' part. The way Peter acknowledges Stiles as the clever one.

The season 1 finale? When Stiles sets the survivor of a horrific house fire on fire? Absolute riot, huh. It's vicious, it's cruel - it's everything.

And when Peter is resurrected? Sure, Stiles sarcastically asks if someone can kill him again and sure, Peter snarks about living in a cave system. But even in that episode, these brief comedic moments are absolutely overshadowed by the way Peter and Stiles work together, figure out what the vault is made of, then call Scott to warn him and Derek, by finishing each other's sentences. Two brilliant minds working together, on the same wavelength.

The next time they interact is when Peter tells Stiles about Paige, explains what the blue eyes mean. It's one of the more heavy and serious moments in the season, aside from all the death scenes. It's a big lore drop and character background on both Peter and Derek. And it's Stiles this information is shared with. It's a serious moment and even as Peter tells it all, Stiles doesn't trust, sees past the silver tongue and that too is part of the appeal.

When Peter and Stiles work together to save Cora's life in the hospital, while the Alpha Pack is hunting them down? Blind trust. Stiles asks Peter to help him and Peter doesn't even ask, much less quip, he just follows Stiles' lead and they work together.

Now, I'll admit, I haven't seen seasons 3B through 6 in six years and hey, maybe they'll be a real Abbott and Costello in season 4 and I'm just not remembering it, but damn it all to hell if the first half of the show doesn't present them as two clever minds challenging each other, with a growth from terror and pain to respect and teamwork.

I understand and respect not liking a ship, but I am genuinely baffled when people deliberately misinterpret a canon to suit their needs. Always makes me wonder what alternate reality's version of the show they were watching, surely not the same as me.

[tinysunshine]

━━━━━ ✧˖° 𝐒𝐖𝐄𝐄𝐓 𝐋𝐈𝐓𝐓𝐋𝐄 𝐒𝐈𝐍𝐍𝐄𝐑

‎ ‎ [ 𝗸𝗹𝗮𝘂𝘀 𝗺𝗶𝗸𝗮𝗲𝗹𝘀𝗼𝗻 𝘅 𝗿𝗲𝗮𝗱𝗲𝗿 ] 𝐩𝐫𝐢𝐞𝐬𝐭/𝐫𝐞𝐥𝐢𝐠𝐢𝐨𝐮𝐬 𝐤𝐢𝐧𝐤

female reader, inclusive language. minors dni.

kinks: priest/religious kink, spanking, punishment, oral sex, corruption kink, degradation, dirty talk, guided masturbation, light dom/sub, sex obviously

warnings and triggers: mentions of past sexual assault, abuse (not by klaus), blood play, literal blasphemy, death and violence, hint of stalking, this is more of a horror story than romance

word count: 12.7k

plot with porn, alternate universe. fic visual.

there’s a legend whispered among the people of your town, about a fallen angel named klaus, who resides in an abandoned gothic church, buried deep within the forest. it’s said that if a sinner is brave enough to make the journey, to admit their sins in a confessional to the supernatural entity and offer up a sacrifice of their blood, they would be absolved of all their sins.

when your name becomes disgraced in town and your parents turn their back on you, you’re out of options and decide to make the trek to the church in the forest. every sunday, you sit in the confessional booth, admit to your sins, while klaus orders you to do things for him so you can be forgiven. dirty things. sinful things. he tells you to come back every week until he deems your soul completely clean.

klaus might be supernatural, but he’s far from an angel. He feeds on the unlucky sinners dumb enough to take his legend for word, and with each passing week, each confessed sin, all the time you spend in god’s forgotten house of worship, worshipping the wrong vessel, you come to realize: that although god may have turned his back on you - at least he left you klaus.

“Why are you here?” He asks, and suddenly the fact that you’re staring into the eyes of a supernatural creature isn’t as scary as the fact that this creature is a man. A man is what got you into this mess, the reason you’re here.

He’s got no wings. No horns. No halo. He looks like the average man in your town, although much more handsome. It’s sort of a let down and a nice surprise all at the same time.

You don’t answer. You can’t. Your mouth opens and closes like you’re a fish out of water, and you must look ridiculous.

He grabs your chin suddenly, as if he can’t wait any longer to know the reason you’re here. You thought there’d be a confession booth for this, so you wouldn’t have to look into someone else’s eyes to admit the worst thing that's ever happened to you.

The worst thing you’ve ever done.

“Tell me why you’re here,” he orders, locking eyes with you - and you can’t stop it. It’s like you’re in a trance, and the words spill out. It feels natural, even though it’s not. It’s wrong, it’s scary, and you have no control over it.

“I’m here to be cleansed of my sins,” you say, words spilling out of your mouth like vomit, but the guilt that’s been festering for weeks goes away with the release of the words. You don’t understand how it’s happening, what sorcery you’re experiencing that’s letting you share so easily.

“What have you done, little sinner?” He asks, curiosity evident in his voice. You’re almost glad to be in this trance, because it proves something to you - that this ‘man’ is the legend you’ve been chasing, and as scary as it is, you’re going to come out of this situation pure again.

It’s all you want.

“I’ve lost my purity,” you say, and then he drops your chin and stops making eye contact. Stands back from you and looks you over, like he’s inspecting an object. Your entire body heats up, and a random headache comes on so strong that you shut your eyes for a second.

When you open them, he’s looking at your face again. He’s wearing a sinister smirk that only highlights how handsome he is, and you grab onto the cross on your neck, scared. It’s a nervous tick. You’d never guess that being under the scrutiny of an angel would feel so…sinful?

“Do you know what I am?” He asks, crossing his arms. His shirt is black and long sleeved, and in the dark lighting of the church it’s hard to see anything, but it’s like he glows. Skin pale, sculpted face. You nod.

“You’re an angel,” you reply simply, and he actually lets out a little laugh. You wonder why.

“Call me Klaus,” he says casually, and the change in his demeanor is confusing to you. He takes a step back and his eyes trail over your body one more time, from your feet up to your face, although his eyes linger on the cross necklace you’re still firmly grasping in your hand. You quickly let it go, and he chuckles lightly one more time.

“You’re going to be fun.” 

────

You walk into the church and head straight to the altar, palm throbbing in anticipation. There’s an offering dish waiting for you, the bowl gold and gleaming, and you swallow hard with anxiety. 

This is your third visit, and you know what to do. Step into the church and walk straight to the altar, where a bowl sits, ready for your offering. Klaus explained it to you during your first visit. Handed you a small pocket knife and told you to give him your blood. 

Your heart races just thinking about it, the sting of the blade, the way his face looked when he heard the drip of your life essence into the offering dish. His nostrils flared as you squeezed your palm, watching your blood slowly cover the bottom of the bowl. “Enough,” he snapped after a few more seconds, directing you to the confessional booth on the other side of the church. You didn’t look behind you as you followed his directions, but you could hear him drinking from the bowl. 

The light ding when he set it back down on the table. The moan it sounded like he made it when he was done drinking your offering. A shiver ran down your spine. 

You know the routine now. You walk into the church and to the table in the front of the room, the pocket knife waiting for you. You cut open your palm with your eyes closed - it hurts more than the first time because your skin is trying to heal itself, not given a chance to scab over, bright pink. You drop some blood into the dish, and make your way to the confessional booth. 

You don’t know where Klaus waits, but he’s always somewhere, because he always arrives at the confessional booth after you. You always hear him. 

Silent until he clears his throat, the sound of his chair screeching against the floor. “Little sinner,” he says, like he’s surprised you come back every single time. You don’t know why - you’re coming back until he says you’re clean. Your palm burns and you press it against your pants to stop the bleeding, letting out a hiss at the rough fabric of your jeans against it. 

“Forgive me, for I have sinned,” you say through clenched teeth. You swear you can hear him smirking on the other side of the booth, although you’re not sure why or how you’d know that. Why he would think any of this is funny. Maybe human pain is silly as an angel, when nobody or nothing can harm them. 

“Forgive you,” he says, humming like this is a casual conversation. Like he’s contemplating if you deserve forgiveness. “What have you done now?” 

You’re not sure how to answer that. “I’m still impure,” you start, speech rehearsed in your head. You try to get all of it out as quickly as possible, not wanting to carry the weight of all your wrongdoings. You wonder how any one else survives on this planet without sinning so horribly, because a week can’t even go by without you fucking up. 

You don’t let this thought hit you, but it’s definitely there. Ever since you stepped foot in this church, you can’t go a week, a day, an hour without thinking about Klaus and the possibility of a gleaming clean soul.

“I’ve upset my parents. Again. I’ve upset my…suitor.” You don’t want to go into details. Maybe if Klaus doesn’t ask, you won’t have to tell him all the ways you fucked up this week. 

That you didn’t remember to recite your prayers after a long day, that your shirt was too low cut and almost gave your mother a heart attack. That you fed yourself first before serving your brother, and that you’ve been ignoring Peter, your suitor’s, apologizes that are, in your father’s words, not necessary.

You don’t understand how he did the same thing as you and his reputation isn’t tarnished. Just yours, but you’re used to life being unfair. 

Klaus doesn’t answer for a second. You wonder if he wants you to continue. His reply is sudden and sharp. “Yes, well,” you hear him standing up, and you get ready to follow him, because it goes without saying that you’re supposed to go with him to the altar. “You shouldn’t be argumentative,” is his response. You want to say I’m not, but you don’t. You just nod, forgetting he can’t see you. 

“Yes,” you reply, voice caught in your throat. 

“Come,” he orders, and you know he means to meet him at the altar. He goes a different way than you, but you follow him all the same. When you get there, you lose your breath, take in what he’s wearing and sit down on the stairs of the stage while he makes sure your offering is in order. 

Klaus is in a short sleeve grey shirt, and when he lifts the bowl to his mouth to drink your blood, a few drops splatter on the material. You wince, because you know how hard blood stains are to take out - you look down at your jeans and know they’re probably done for, thanks to your bloody palm. 

Klaus finishes his drink and sets the bowl down, looks down at you from the step above with a poker face expression. “You’re still bleeding,” he comments, and you nod, thinking he’s going to offer you a bandage or something, but he doesn’t. Instead, he walks down the steps, past you, to the pew that’s right in front of you. He leans back in the seat and looks at you like you’re on stage to perform. 

“You said suitor,” Klaus says, and you furrow your brows, wondering why he’s honing in on that. He knows about Peter. But does he know something you don’t? Can he read your mind, find out about the truth of your unholiness? 

The thought makes your heart rate pick up, anxiety knotting in your gut. You feel like you’ll start sweating, wondering if the truth about what happened will come out. You’d rather have Klaus believe that you chose to debase yourself - not that you tempted someone into sex. That’s even worse, isn’t it? Being so sinful you’re not even aware of it. Like there’s so much bad in your body that it’s just seeping out of your pores. 

You grip your necklace in nervousness, and Klaus notices. He sits up, leans his hands on his knees, and fixes you with a look that makes you look away. You’re scared - of him, and of him doing that weird sorcery thing he did the first time you were here. 

“Take your clothes off,” he says instead, lighting your entire body on fire. You work up the courage to look at him, and you find yourself obeying. Standing up to kick your shoes off, your jeans, your shirt off too. When you’re left in your underwear and panties, you hear him let out a low whistle, the kind you hear whenever you walk around in town with one of the shirts your mother hates. 

You’re not sure why it doesn’t bother you when he makes the same noise as when other men do. Or why Klaus saying, “Beautiful, every inch,” makes you want to show him more, slip the straps of your bra down your shoulders and let him have a show. “So perfect, it’s a shame you’re a filthy sinner,” he’s smirking as he says it, but you don’t see the playfulness because you’re avoiding his eyes. 

“Stop,” he says suddenly, voice low, speeding over to you with a swiftness you know isn’t human. He grabs your hand that’s at your side, and as he does, his knuckles skim over your stomach. You feel your entire body scream with want. Lit up, like fireworks. You’ve never felt anything like it before. Have never met a man who’s gotten this reaction out of you. 

Although, you suppose, you’ve never been this close with a man in this state of undress - aside from Peter. But this feels different. 

“I can smell your blood from here,” he says, picking up your hand and looking it over. It looks disgusting, torn up and scabbing, fresh blood coming out of the half closed up wound - and it’s embarrassing that he can smell it. 

“Who told you to come here?” He finally asks, and you don’t know how to reply. You weren’t expecting that. “My father,” you answer honestly, confusion evident in your tone. Klaus nods, before pressing his thumb into the wound on your hand. You let out a cry, and you swear that for a second you see a dark satisfaction grace his face. 

“Father,” he murmurs, with more weight on his tongue than the word should carry. He’s silent, looking at you, gazing over your body while putting pressure on the wound. His gaze lingers a little too hard at the bruise on your hip, one that came from Peter the other day, shoving by you while you ran into him when buying groceries in town. He’s so rough since you refused to forgive him, always looking for excuses to be cruel to you. 

“Did your father give you that bruise?”

You don’t answer. You look away, once again afraid of the truth spilling out. Because you don’t know Klaus, or anything about him - but you’re frightened that he, someone heavenly, might deem you too imperfect if he knew the truth. You don’t want to answer. 

Klaus is impatient. When he lets go of your hand, he storms out of the room for a quick second, only to enter again with his own wrist all bloody. He grabs the back of your head before you even know what’s happening, and shoves his wrist in your mouth, tells you to suck. 

“You say you want to be cleansed,” he accuses, venom in his voice. “But you won’t talk. You won’t open up and tell the truth,” the taste of his blood in your mouth makes you want to puke, and you wonder if he’s trying to kill you or harm you. You can’t tell, but you cry out against him. It’s hard to breathe. 

“Withholding the truth is just as bad as the sin itself, you know.” He pulls his wrist away from your mouth and focuses on your reaction, but all you can do is look down at your hand. It tingles because the wound heals on its own, so fast you’re suddenly very aware of the fact that you’re in front of a being that's literally magical. You almost start shaking. 

You wonder why he doesn’t just use sorcery again to get the truth out of you. But you begin to understand.

He wants you to stutter. To slip up with your words and make a fool of yourself, so that he’ll have an excuse to punish you. You recall what Klaus said the last time you were there - the more blood, the more pain, the more bruises - the cleaner the soul. You gulp at the reality that you’re about to hurt. 

Klaus sits on the steps of the stage and pulls you over his lap. He manhandles you like you weigh nothing, spanks your ass red and raw, grips your wrists and your hips and your thighs to keep you in place until they’re almost purple with bruises. “How’s this for purity?” He asks, fingers pressing into the cotton of your panties that covers your core. You’re aroused, and if he can smell your blood, you know that he can smell that. Your entire body heats up in shame.

Euphoria too. You’ll never understand how what Peter did to you makes you unholy, but this, with Klaus, somehow makes you pure again.

But with religion, you’ve learned to not ask questions. 

This moment with Klaus tells you that you’re in the right place - because what kind of person gets turned on, feels arousal, when being punished? 

When he’s done beating your behind, he pulls up your panties and practically shoves you to your feet. You’re shaky as you stand and put your clothes on, tears falling down your cheeks. Less from the pain of the punishment - more for the pain in your soul. 

Klaus shakes his head, almost talking to himself. “It’s dark now. You should go. Come here again, next week.” You nod, and try not to show just how scared you are of walking home in the dark again. Whenever you leave the church, you practically run the whole way, wanting to get home fast, the sounds of all the animals at night absolutely terrifying to you.

You slip on your sweater, your other jacket (you learned your lesson after the first visit, how cold it gets), and your pants slowly, all while Klaus watches you for reasons you’re not sure of. You wonder, now that your body is bruised and hurting, if he’ll give you some of his blood again to heal you up. But he doesn’t. 

When he walks away, cold and cruel, you leave the church and begin to walk back home. You’re only halfway home, the moon as your only light, when you see it. 

A massive looking wolf halfway behind a tree, loud as it steps on crunchy leaves and twigs. You freeze, but to your relief, the wolf just walks the other direction. 

You consider yourself lucky, although the rest of the walk home, you swear you hear the sound of something following you. Maybe you’re just paranoid. You spend the rest of your walk home replaying how it felt to be over Klaus’ lap like that - how arousal pools deep in your belly at the feeling of pain. It’s different than when you’re hurt without expecting it. You knew the smacks were coming, and maybe, just maybe -

You can enjoy that you will be free of sin soon. How nice it feels, just to put yourself in Klaus’ hands and not worry about the future of your soul.

You make it home and sneak in through the window. Your parents know you left, but it’s not like they care. They just seem surprised to see you every morning when you join them for breakfast. Maybe because they can’t believe you’re taking this soul cleansing thing so seriously. You’re not sure.

You’re quiet as you change into your pajamas. As you look in the mirror and gaze, although with a wince, at your bruises - you realize that Klaus healed you of the bruise Peter made so he didn’t have to see anyone else’s harm on your body. 

So the mark of his pain would be the only thing on your skin.

You’re flush red at the thought and turn away from the mirror, walking to your bed. You’re just about to turn out the lights when you catch a glimpse of something moving outside your window. It’s a little ways away, but it’s clear what it is. 

The wolf from the forest followed you home.

When you shut off your lights, it walks away.

────

You stand in front of the altar, wondering where Klaus is. You wait for him to call you from a pew, to appear out of nowhere. Maybe he knows you’re expecting him now, know his little tricks, and is coming up with another one. You walk to the confessional booth, the church feeling unusually dark, but then again - you’re here at a later time than usual. 

You’re in the hall that leads to the confessional when you see Klaus. Only - 

He’s not waiting for you. 

Klaus stands against the wall, just a few feet away from the confessional booth. You only see the side of him, but you can tell that he’s smiling, the same kind of grin he gives you when he finally gets you to confess or beg him for some mercy. You think back to your last visit, when he had you over his knee, counting out loud as he spanked you for the sin of lying to one of your friends. For the sin of being impure. 

For the sin of getting aroused while he punished you. 

Something negative stirs in your chest at the thought of Klaus doing that to another woman like you. That he might use his corrective powers to make another woman pure again. To touch her body and look her over, to lick her blood from the offering bowl. 

Only now, you take yourself out of your thoughts and look down to Klaus’ feet. There’s a man on his knees, quietly sobbing, and you realize you know him. He’s a baker from your village, a man that has constantly picked fun at you for years. You remember times you were a few pennies short, or when he just wanted to fuck with you - would tell you he’ll give you bread for your family if you’d just flash him in the baking room. 

You wonder why he’s here. What he could’ve done worse than harassing women to show their breasts for bread. But it seems pretty bad. 

Something inside of you feels pleasure, at the fact that this man that you hate, who’s caused you so much discomfort, is actually hurting. You wonder what Klaus is going to do to him - if he’ll ever be granted salvation. Surely Klaus isn’t going to spank him? 

“Too late for redemption. Pathetic. Up,” Klaus says, voice much louder than necessary. The man stands on shaky legs and wipes his face. It happens so fast, you can hardly make sense of it. Klaus grabs the man by the shoulder and brings him close, lunges for his neck while the man screams. There’s a grotesque sound, one you’ve never heard before, but it’s predatory, the grip Klaus has on him. 

It all clicks, just as the wheels turning in your mind tell you that you need to go. You run, fast, out of the church.

Klaus drinks blood. He drinks your blood. He drinks blood from the neck of the people begging for his forgiveness. 

Panic surges through you as you run through the church. Klaus is not an angel, you realize, and your body breaks out in goosebumps as you run through the forest away from the church. 

The man thats’s been touching you, hurting you, drinking your blood - he’s no angel. He’s not from Heaven at all. 

Whatever Klaus Mikaelson is - it can’t be good. 

The moon makes the graveyard you’re running through look like sharp fucking teeth. You have a feeling that’s similar to the one you felt after the…incident. After your suitor touched you. The reason you’re here in the first place. Because it’s one thing if Klaus is an angel, but taking advantage of you the way he did? 

Why don’t you care more? 

He’s touched your body. He’s seen you naked. He’s -

Right behind you. 

You can feel him. He must’ve finished with the baker and is now following you. You want to keep running but your body freezes in fear. You stop, because he’s closing in. There’s no way you can outrun him, so you decide to hide instead. Make it to a tree and stop there. 

You try to control you breathing, because you’re really scared. Klaus never gave an inkling that he’d kill you, but there’s no way the other man survived that...feed. Maybe Klaus was just waiting for the right moment to hurt you, harm you. 

There’s a crack of something stepping on a twig. 

You close your eyes as he rounds the tree, but when your eyes open after a second it’s not Klaus. Unless…no. It’s a wolf - large, predatory, its eyes glowing in the night. 

You take off running, your mind reeling with the fact that it’s the same wolf you saw outside of your window weeks ago. You run until you hear the wolf growl, stupidly going in the opposite direction of your home, but as long as you get away from the wolf you’re fine. Maybe you can make it up a tree, hideout for the night -

But then you fall, over a log, your body shaking with fear and adrenaline. “Why are you following me?” You cry out. “I didn’t see anything, I,” you realize how dumb that sounds. You obviously saw something to act the way you just did. 

Slowly, the wolf walks towards you. Big, tawny paws, eyes so scary you shut yours. You wait for it to pounce but it never does. Instead, it stops a few feet in front of you. Looks at you, as if contemplating you. 

You look away, but the sound of bones cracking, the horrible sound of muscle rearranging, has you looking again. The wolf’s shape contorts, shrinking, morphing back into the angel you thought you knew. 

Klaus.

He looks normal again, although - he’s completely naked. You don’t know if your heart is racing from his perfect, naked body - the first fully naked man you’ve ever seen, or the fact that he’s no longer a wolf looking to kill you. 

"What are you?" you whisper, barely able to form the words. Klaus is just looking at you laying on the ground, cupping his…package like you haven’t felt it rubbing against you all the those times you were over his lap. 

But if he’s a wolf that means….he was the one following you home? 

“Not an angel, love. That much I’m sure,” he says, like this is funny. Like it’s a joke to you. He steps forward, eyes softening in a way that seems almost affectionate. It makes no sense to you.  

"I'm a hybrid," he answers, voice smooth.

“Hybrid?”

────

You stand at the entrance to the church again, trying to work up the courage to walk inside. It’s funny, how this time your hesitation is not because you’re scared - it’s because you feel pathetic.

Seeing Klaus as he truly is - not an angel - it should make you run. It should make you never come to this church again, should have you knocking on every door of your village at home, warning everyone of the danger that lives so close to home. You don’t know how long this legend has gone on, you don’t know how long Klaus has been making the perfect trap for the people of your village. Like easy food.

You know now, that Klaus doesn’t have the ability to heal your soul of anything. That the things you did with him - maybe they’re just as bad as the things Peter did to you. You wonder, if that’s the case - why it feels so different then.

After what happened with Peter…you felt ashamed. Wanted to cover your body up. Wanted to hide from the world. But being around Klaus - you kind of feel the opposite. Sometimes you even linger in your window, hoping he’s there in his wolf form, slipping your clothes off and taking too long to put on your pajama top, hoping he sees. You don’t know if he does.

You don’t know what’s wrong with you. Why the monster masquerading as a angel doesn’t have you screaming and locking yourself away in your room for good.

All you know, is that the guilt you felt the first day you came to this church, lessens every single time you see Klaus - and you don’t want that feeling to go away. So you’re here, at night, because you weren’t scared this time to walk here. The greatest threat in these forests has walked you home to ensure you safety before. Has had ample opportunity to kill you - and hasn’t.

You push open the church door. Even though you’re choosing to be here, you can’t help but feel like you’re walking into the mouth of the beast. You take a deep breath, pushing the door open, and step inside.

There, standing at the altar, is Klaus. His arms are crossed, and he’s looking right at you, which is different than the usual times you’ve arrived. Normally, Klaus lets you linger before making his presence known.

You’ve never been one interested danger - you’re a good girl through and through. Or, you were, before the incident. But there’s something about Klaus - something dangerous that calls to you in a way you don’t understand. Maybe it’s the fact that this legend being a sham opens up a world of other possibilities.

Maybe the world as you’ve always known it - a world with god - is a sham as well. You know that should make you scared, but all the thought does is send a crazy relief throughout your body.

You’re going to burn in hell.

But Klaus might be there.

“What are you doing here?” His voice is soft, but there’s a meanness in it as well. His tone is an odd mix of surprise and something that could almost be considered a warning.

You step forward, ignoring the rush of anxiety in your chest, the voice that tells you to leave, dummy. But you don’t listen. You don’t want to.

“I wanted to come back,” you say, voice wavering only slightly.

Klaus exhales sharply, shaking his head and doing a laugh you can tell is one that comes from anger. “Why?” he repeats, his voice suddenly booming. “You know what I am. You saw me. And yet you come back, after all of that? Are you stupid, or just more naive than I took you for?”

You take another step. The pull toward him is like a magnetic force that’s impossible to run from. “I don’t care,” you say, though the words are barely audible. “I don’t care what you are. I just...please don’t make me leave.”

Fuck, why are you so pathetic? It’s embrassing, that you came back here. It’s embarrassing, that you hold onto this beast’s every word like gospel.

Why am I not scared? You scream to yourself. As you get closer, a little voice pipes in from the back of your head.

You are, it reminds you, and you like it.

You think that Klaus is going to ask you why. You think that he’s going to kick you out - although, judging by the way he looks at you, with irritation someone only has for something they don’t despise, you know that’s just your anxiety talking.

A sudden burst of confidence explodes in your chest, and you let it carry you. “I feel…light around you,” you try to explain. Klaus won’t even look at you. Whatever dynamic you two have is insane. It’s cold. There’s no warmness from him, and it’s not like you lead anything to even feel like a part of an equation. Klaus is on a pedestal, literally - and you like it that way. You can’t explain why, but you do.

And he might not be an angel, but he’s powerful enough for it to mean something. Supernatural - and maybe it’s not a gift from the heavens, but one from hell, but you’re not even sure if that matters. Magic is magic. Special is special.

And Klaus is the closest thing you’ve ever come to something extraordinary.

You’re standing by the altar now, on the opposite side from Klaus. He looks at you, with something like pity in his eyes. “Light. You know what that feeling is, don’t you?” he asks. You shake your head. “It’s adrenaline.” You’re still at a loss, not understanding what he means.

“You’re scared of me,” he clarifies.

“I want to, can I - can you,” you cannot believe you’re saying this. “Show me more. Please.” You grip your necklace again, a move that you swear makes Klaus almost roll his eyes, but then you think about what your teacher used to say - at least attitude means youn feel comfortable around me. You wonder if that’s how Klaus feels.

He probably thinks you’re so naive. You play into that.

You worry that he’s going to ask you to say more. Describe in detail what you want him to show you - and even though you’re feeling bold today, you’re not that bold.

He doesn’t.

“Have you ever made a man cum with your mouth?” He asks blunty, stepping around the altar and into your space. Your body heats up, your heart speeds up so fast you’re sure you’re going to pass out. He smells woodsy, warm, like the trees outside - and you wonder if that lingers from his wolf form, or is just what he smells like as a person. You breathe him in, feel his strong hands on your hips pushing you against the altar so you’re trapped.

All these weeks, and you haven’t seen his dick, haven’t felt him in a sexual way beyond the feeling of his hard bulge under your thighs when he has you over his lap, or his fingers teasing you about your wetness through your panties. Little touches, but you’ve memorized them. Think about them whenever you have the chance, to be honest.

You shake your head in response to his question.

Klaus lips curl into a dangerous smile. He’s so handsome, it’s unfair. Like the devil knew looks meant something in this world, and sent his prettiest soldier. “Present your offering to me,” he says, you furrow your brows, confused. Weren’t you just talking about giving head?

You look for the bowl, but Klaus grabs you gently by the chin and chuckles. He lets go. “Your mouth can be the offering today,” and fuck. He pushes you to your knees, and you go easy, looking up at him in all his glory.

He really is glorious. Sculpted abs, pale, perfect skin without an imperfection. It makes sense, if his blood that can heal is running through his veins. You’re a little jealous, of what that level of untouchable means.

“You’ve never done this,” he says, and you can’t tell if it’s a question or not. You nod, confirming. “Shame,” he says, “With lips like that it seems like the first thing a girl like you would learn.”

You blush. Again, you’re reminded about how weird it feels to enjoy what he’s saying - because when Peter talked to you like this, all you felt was disgust. But when Klaus says it, you know that wetness is probably pooling in your panties, your knees jello from how turned on, overwhelmed, you are in this situation.

You open your mouth and look up at him, and then Klaus unzips his pants. He’s hard already, and you can’t deny the thought that you’ve been thinking about this ever since you saw him naked in the forest. It’s primal almost, the strength of this man - it makes sense why you, someone weak and totally human, is on your knees in front of him.

You lick your lips, and Klaus wears that delicious smirk again. He pumps his hard cock in his hands a few times, before running the tip all over your lips. His precum wets them like lipgloss, and you wonder what’s got him so aroused since you just walked in.

Another sinner? A woman, that he plays with like a cat with a mouse? The thought makes jealousy and something in you stirs to be better than her. If she even exists.

But then you see his hands. You didn’t notice the blood at first, but his nails are stained red. It only takes a second for you to realize, and then you get it -

Klaus is hard because he killed someone before you arrived.

“Like what you see?” He asks, looking down at you. You widen your eyes, and he teases you by shoving his cock halfway in your mouth, and then pulling it away. His dick grazes the side of your cheek and he chuckles, and the way you feel on the ground is so utterly degraded.

But it’s controlled, if that makes sense. You know it’s happening. It doesn’t feel like you did, walking through your village with your clothes ripped up after dealing with Peter. It’s - safe? in a way.

Klaus takes a step back to look down at you, thumb and pointer finger running over the smooth head of his cock. He looks like he wants to moan at the feeling, but restrains himself, if only for a minute.

He fucks your mouth after that. Lets you suckle on his dick as he gently pushes it between your lips, so you get used to the feeling. Your mouth stretches, and when he hits the back of your throat you nearly panic.

Klaus grips your hair and reminds you to breathe. “That’s it, love,” he says, voice a coo - almost mocking. He cups your face when he gets a little rougher, slips his finger into the side of your mouth to stretch it even more. Like you’re a toy he’s playing with. He licks over his lips.

“Your eyes,” he murmurs, and you open them wider as he says that. “Like an angel.” It’s not a dirty comment - it’s actually kind of sweet, and that takes you off guard. You sputter around his cock because you forget to relax, and then Klaus lets go of your hair.

He leans against the altar and puts his hands on the back of his neck, arms bent at the elbow like he’s stretching. As you look up at him, gagging around his cock in your mouth, you notice that he’s standing in front of the cross on the wall. He’s a ways away from it, but in this position, it makes it look like he’s meant to be there. Perfectly in the center, his hands and arm position like wings on either side of his shoulder.

He said you look like an angel - but you could say the same about him.

────

“I’ve been too easy on you,” Klaus says the next week, when you’re sitting at the confessional booth. You don’t know why sometimes he chooses to have you talk in the booth all proper, and why sometimes he wants you somewhere else in the church. Nothing with Klaus makes sense - in fact, nothing about this situation makes sense.

And you’re not the only one who thinks so. Everyone in town has been acting weird around you. Avoiding you still, yes, but more so than usual. After your first visit with Klaus, when you came through the door early the next morning, your father literally jumped up from the kitchen table where your mother was serving breakfast. Spilled his coffee all over his newspaper and exclaimed, “What on earth are you - doing back so early?”

You didn’t answer. Just walked to your room and closed the door, ate after the rest of your family left the kitchen.

“Easy on me?” You ask, because you have no idea what Klaus means. Nothing he’s told you to do has been easy. You think about it now, squeezing your knees together as you sit on the other side of the booth from him. The spankings, the blowjob that ended in him cumming all over your necklace.

“Playing naive doesn’t make you holy again. Being meek doesn’t make you immune to sin. You need to learn that,” and for the first time, you actually laugh a little. Because what does Klaus actually know about sinning? He admitted the truth of what he was to you. He knows you come here not to be holy again - but to feel free.

“I know,” you reply, and it’s like something in him snaps. When he speaks again, his tone is mean.

“You know? Well, by all means, show me just how confident you are.” You’re confused. You don’t know what he means by that, and luckily, you don’t have to worry about, because he tells you.

“Tell me what you want. I can smell your arousal from here.”

Woah. That takes you off guard. It’s like your body is trained, to be aroused the minute you walk into this church. To crave the feeling of Klaus’ hands all over your body, to crave the feeling of the pain he brings. The feelings he brings out in you, although not right, are more holy and healing than anything you’ve ever experienced before.

It’s addicting, the feeling of slight freedom you get when you come here. Addicting and appealing enough that you’re able to ignore the different faces of god on the walls of the church as you walk inside.

“I don’t know what you mean, Klaus,” you say shyly, squeezing your thighs together for some relief. It’s warmer out today, so you’re wearing a skirt - maybe that’s why you’re so obvious. Klaus chuckles.

“You step foot in this church and immediately are turned on, little sinner. Practically cum all over yourself when I get close to you. You’re not the shy, inexperienced girl you were when you came in. At least  - your throat isn’t. Tell. Me. What. You. Want.”

He punctuates it for effect. Your mind begins reeling, but maybe super religious people are right - not being able to see his face, sitting in your own part of the confessional - it gives your confidence you wouldn’t have face to face.

“I want,” but he cuts you off again.

“Tell me what you think about when you’re under the covers of your bed at home,” he urges, voice low. He’s turned on too. “You really should turn your lamp off at night, by the way. Anyone from the window can see you through the mirror.”

And fuck.

Has he been - ?

“I imagine a mouth,” you admit, cheeks red. Looking down at your hands that you’re playing with in your lap.

“A mouth?” Klaus asks, clicking his tongue. “Or mine?”

“Yours.”

Klaus hums. He’s pleased with your answer.

“Tell me more.”

Your face burns. “I can’t, I, I’ve never done that before. Your…dick in my mouth made me think about what it’d be like…” you trail off.

It’s silent for a moment. You never expressed your desires before, and you feel fucking embrassed. But it’s also empowering. A little spark inside of you burning up the anxiety you always feel about your own needs. You rarely speak your truth. Maybe the shallowness of expressing your desires can be the catalyst for expressing yourself in other ways.

“You want me to lick your pussy, is that it?” Klaus asks, so vulgar you actually choke on some spit. You cough, and can’t see him but you know he’s smirking.

“Don’t be shy, little sinner. You are a sinner, aren’t you? Bad girls ask for what they want, isn’t that right? Haven’t you been raised to be good?” He’s not wrong. “So do the opposite of what you think you should do. Tell me how badly you want me to push that little skirt up and lick you to an orgasm. It’ll be better than your fingers.”

Oh my god. Like a dirty sermon, the words spill out of his mouth. But he’s right.

“I want,” you can’t get it out. Klaus sighs, frustrated.

“You say the words, and I’ll leave my side of the booth and drop to my knees in front of you. I’ve always wondered how you’d taste. Being the first to bring you to the brink of pleasure with my mouth - I’ll never forget it.”

You want this so bad. You sigh, bite your lip, squeeze you legs together again.

“Klaus, I. Please - will you lick me?” God, how fucking embarrassing. How fucking shameless. Your parents would literally dig their own graves if they ever knew you were saying this. You came home with ripped clothes and bruises all over your body after Peter tore your innocence from you even when you said no - and they hate you for it. Imagine how they’d feel now, looking at you begging a creature straight from hell to lick your cunt.

“Good girl,” Klaus says casually, and you feel proud. Nobody has ever said that to you before. You expect to hear the chair squeak, for him to move, to give you what you want now that you did what he said.

Instead, he’s still talking. “Lift up your dress and feel yourself over your panties, sweetheart,” he orders. You do what he says, fingers pressing hard over your pussy through your cotton underwear. It’s painful in a good way, and you’re wet. Probably have a wet spot.

“Tell me. How wet are you? Just from my voice, no?” He’s teasing. Such a cocky, confident bastard. But you nod, and then he reminds you. “Words. Can’t see you.”

“Yes,” you spit out. “Your voice. This place, I,” you rub yourself.

“Take the panties off and touch yourself. How you do at home, with your hands under your covers in your panties and your hand over your mouth.” You open your mouth to ask how he knows this, but you fall short. You do what he says, stand and up to take your panties off, wanting to hear another good girl. After a life without praise, you want that hit of it again.

You sit back down and flip your skirt up, rubbing your clit gently while little moans leave your mouth. “A finger inside. Have you done that? I want you to. For me.”

You’ve never done that. Never tired, but you do what Klaus says and slip a finger inside of yourself.  After so much time so pent up, you’re close already. Really. Just a few minutes rubbing your clit, that’s how backed up you are. Klaus must sense it. Because your pussy clenches around your measly finger like it’s hungry and then there’s a slam and he does that speed thing that lands him in front of you.

Your legs are vulgarly spread wide, and Klaus is on his knees in front of you. It feels wrong, him in a position of worship to someone like you. You almost want to tell him to get up, but you’re not that selfless. Not when his necklace hits your leg as he dives between your legs, his hands spreading your knees even further apart. He looks hungry - similar to how he looks when he drinks your blood from the dish.

“Shame you’re not on your cycle,” he says grossly. “That’d be an offering all in itself.”

Klaus licks between your legs and laps up your slick, his warm, skilled tongue feeling like what you imagine heaven feels like. He moves his tongue from your clit down to your aching core. You don’t know why it aches - have never had more than one person inside of you, but god do you want Klaus.

He makes you cum right there in that confessional booth. Three times. Once, on his tongue, and the next two with his fingers buried inside of you. He says you taste sweet, that you could convince a good man to take a deal of eternal damnation for a taste of you, that he’s never seen a pussy so perfect, and all you can do is whine and moan and call out to god.

Klaus pulls away when you do, handsome face covered in your wetness. Smelling like you. Your heart races as he licks his lips. “Call me Klaus.”

────

You stumble backward as Peter shoves you, his hand pressing sharply against your shoulder. The force of it catches you off guard, and you try to regain your balance, but the ground feels slippery beneath your feet. His laugh rings out, harsh and mocking, and you fall backwards, your hands scrambling for purchase. You can’t believe this is happening in town, with people around you watching this - not giving a shit. 

Your knees hit the pavement with a sickening scrape, the rough concrete cutting into your skin before you even have a chance to break your fall. A sharp sting bursts across your knee, one ten times worse than the feeling of the pocket knife you use for your offering. You bite your lip, trying to hold back the tears that sting your eyes. The pain is immediate and raw, the kind of sting that burns and throbs all at once.

"Oops," Peter sneers, his voice dripping with amusement. He says he cares about you, that he still wants you, yet he can’t stop tormenting you whenever he sees you. Boys will be boys your mother keeps saying, but surely this can’t be what someone does when they want you? You start to cry, trying to sniffle back the tears. 

You glance up, gritting your teeth against the pain, and you meet his eyes. Peter’s smirk widens, and there's no apology in sight - only the cruel satisfaction of someone enjoying the sight of your discomfort. He was bad before the incident, but after it, he’s so much worse. You wish he’d just leave you alone. You can’t believe you ever thought he was handsome - that you were ever excited when he’d come pick you up, or take you out. He’s ugly to you now that you know who he is on the inside. 

"Get up," he snaps, his tone cold and dismissive as if this is some sort of game to him. You try to push yourself up, wincing as your scraped knee protests, but your legs feel unsteady, and there's a humiliated heat creeping up your neck.

"Come on, you're not gonna stay down there forever, are you? Oh, well - maybe you are. Spend enough time on your knees at that church, don’t you?" His voice drips with sarcasm. What he says stings more than the wound on your knee - because you’re only going to the church because of what he did to you. 

On the flip side, you only know Klaus because of him, so maybe things do happen for a reason.

You want to say something, to snap back at him, but the sting of the scrape and the weight of his presence presses down on you, leaving you feeling small, and it’s hard to muster the energy to fight back. He reaches down for your necklace, and for reasons you don’t understand, rips it off of you.

You look down until he waks away - you don’t want to let him see you cry.

────

“What happened to you?”

His voice makes you jump, and you almost stumble over a gravestone that’s half toppled over. You catch yourself and stand steady, but your heart is beating at an alarming rate at your surprise. This is the first time, in all the weeks you’ve been coming to repent, that Klaus is standing outside of the church. 

You’re almost to the front door, but not quite, about to open the door to the broken, barbed gate that was once a protection for the church, but now sits as a reminder of how long it’s been since this place of worship was properly used. Every time you walk past it, you feel something like sorrow in your chest, looking at the locks different couples throughout the years have clasped on the broken fence when it wasn’t so decrepit. 

They probably thought their love would last, you think, something like bile rising in your throat at the thought. It’s pathetic and sad, that anyone could ever think that love or another person could save them. That’s the angry, negative part of your brain. The other part of you, the one that wants to believe in good so bad you can almost taste traces of it when the moment is right - well, it can’t even make the locks romantic. Can’t even turn love that’s frozen in time into something sweet. 

Maybe the couples who put these locks on the fence are still together, your brain reasons, trying to think on the bright side, but your thoughts quickly tumble to the negative as they always do. It doesn’t really matter though, does it? Those couples, even if they stayed together, are dead now anyway. 

So much for a bright sunny day. 

You grip the gate with one hand and lean against it, hoping it doesn’t topple over - but you need something to support you to be in the presence of Klaus this close. He’s in a black, long sleeved shirt, a rosary around his neck, and he looks so angry you worry about your safety. 

“What?” You ask dumbly, so lost in his eyes and the symbol of devotion around the neck of such a monster you don’t even remember what he said when you first walked up to him. You swallow hard when he sighs, obviously irritated, before crouching down and pulling your knee high sock down to your ankle. 

You blush, at Klaus on the ground in front of you. His hair is almost golden where the sun hits it, hands strangely soft where they touch your skin. You think about a story your father used to tell you, about the devil; how he’s not a man with red horns and skin, but a beautiful angel that turned rotten. 

You think that’s accurate, looking down at Klaus. His beauty. When he looks up at you, still frustrated at your lack of response, you finally realize what he’s talking about. 

The white of your sock has a red stained circle where you knee is, some dirt covering it. Your exposed knee burns, now that you focus on it, from when you fell down. 

When you were pushed.

You try to push those thoughts out of your head, because you’re here now, and it’s time for you to repent and move past it all. Isn’t that what your father told you to do, after the fight you had with Peter again? Confess. Repent. Get over it. 

“What happened to you?” Klaus asks again, his patience wearing thin. You’re no vampire, er, hybrid, but you swear you can hear his breathing. Heavy, like he’s angry, like he’s upset, and then he locks his jaw and looks up at you and you realize what he’s really mad at. 

You really can’t go one day without fucking everything up, can you? You made Peter mad today, and now you’re making Klaus mad. Both have the ability to hurt you, one worse than the other. You feel unwanted tears start to burn in your eyes, and you wish more than anything that you’d had a chance to breathe and change your clothes after you fell into the trap that is Peter. 

“I fell,” you say meekly, hating yourself for being mousy, average, annoying. Quiet. So utterly ordinary and useless it makes you want to rip your skin off just to start fresh. Be someone, anyone, new. 

“You wouldn’t skin your knee this bad if you just fell. Someone pushed you,” Klaus replies, hand still on your thigh. You try to focus on that feeling, his hand steadying you, anything to keep you grounded so you don’t cry. It works a little bit, because you don’t even hear the concern in Klaus’ voice. “Tell me who pushed you.”

You shake your head and try to pull your leg out of his grasp. “I fell, Klaus, I swear,” you lie, and you hate yourself even more, if that’s possible. You feel bad, after the vulnerability you’ve shown Klaus before, that you’re acting like this now. Why should you protect Peter?  It’s so wrong. You’re just scared to admit how badly you fucked up today, how you made Peter mad again, when you’re supposed to be getting better. That’s what Klaus has been helping you with, hasn’t he? 

You’re such a failure. 

Klaus doesn’t reply. Instead, he leans forward and licks at the bloody wound on your leg. It’s disgusting, and you hold you breath, the feeling of his wet, warm tongue on the owie on your leg such a horrible sensation…

Until it’s not. 

He cleans off your knee with his mouth, in broad daylight, before standing up. He looks at you all disappointed, because he can see right through you. Knows you’re lying, knows you’re a screw up, and him looking at you with that expression is just too much. 

Your eyes water. You instinctively go to grip the cross on your neck, a nervous tick - only to be reminded that you’re not wearing your necklace. Klaus’ eyes follow the movement. He clicks his tongue, disappointed. 

Not like the amusement he usually has when he makes that noise. The fun he gets, out of making you confess. 

“Come, little sinner,” he orders, a hand on your shoulder to direct you past the run down gate, into the even more worse for wear church. You follow, doing your best not to stumble, wound on your leg still burning despite the way he licked it clean. 

You ignore the other burning you feel, always feel, around Klaus. In this church. Burning of your cheeks, burning of arousal in your core, burning with want in every inch of your body he touches and doesn’t. 

When you’re inside the church, Klaus leads you to the altar and orders you to strip and kneel. 

“But my knee,” you say before thinking it through, another sin for not just obeying. A woman is supposed to obey, you hear your mother’s voice in your head. 

God, you ask, and not as a curse - it’s a genuine plea. A genuine question. Why can I never do anything right? 

“When you tell me the truth about what happened to your knee, you’re free to go. Already got my offering,” he reminds you, referring to the blood he lapped up off of your knee. Klaus is sitting a few pews down to watch as you get your shoes off, pull your socks off, something dark in his eyes that you’re not sure is desire or frustration or something else entirely. 

He looks too beautiful to be watching you be so useless, the sun shining through the stained glass window casting his pale, handsome face in a mosaics of bright colors. What you wouldn’t give, to look like that. Painted by the sun itself. Instead you’re dreary, dumb, a punching bag who can never get anything fucking right. 

You do what Klaus says, get on your knees and stay there until you can’t take it anymore. It hurts, putting all your weight on the wound, but the position is uncomfortable anyway. And Klaus just watches, in the third pew from the stage, while you cry, trying to come up with the words to say what happened without admitting the whole truth to him.

I made Peter mad, you want to say. You want to cry out. I asked him to apologize for what he did to me, and I should’ve left it alone. That’s why he pushed me. Please, just clean my soul of this. 

Nothing comes out. 

Klaus sends you home an hour and a half later, knees bruised, cheeks wet with tears. He brushes them away roughly when he helps you stand, pulls your socks back up your knees and helps you out the door. 

“You waste my time when you lie to me,” he reminds, which you know. “How can I help you if you won’t tell me what what’s wrong?” You don’t hear the pleading in his voice. 

All you hear is how big of a disappointment you are.

────

“Here,” Klaus hands you a box just as you pick up the pocket knife from the altar. He comes out of nowhere, behind you, and you can’t help but think that he chose to make himself known that way so he could press himself against you. Your body burns where he touches you, and you find it funny that he put a nice looking box on the altar where you slit your hand open for him.

“A gift?” You ask. You can count on one hand, the number of gifts you’ve received. Your parents don’t belive in shit like that, but you’re excited nonetheless. You don’t wait to open it, and your surprise when you see what’s inside must show on your face. Klaus does a shy smile, an expression you’ve never seen him wear before.

It’s a necklace. Like the one Peter broke. It’s gold, heavy - the same material as your cross one. Only -

There’s no cross on this one.

Just a K.

For Klaus.

It’s a weird gift. You don’t know what to say to it, because Klaus expects you to wear this? An initial of his name? You’re not sure what’s happening here, only that you feel like this is…serious. Sensitive. What?

He must see your face again. But you don’t want to disappoint him. You grab the necklace and hand it to him, turning around and moving your hair out of the way so he can clip it on you. His hands linger, and then cup the sides of your throat. For a split second you wonder if he’s going to snap your neck, but he doesn’t.

“I want you to wear it, when you’re here,” he says, like an order he knows you’ll obey. “But if you ever wise up and choose to…get out of this town, you could probably sell it for a pretty penny.”

You furrow your brows and then to face him. “Leave? What else is there? More shitty towns?” Klaus looks at you like you’re crazy.

“You’ve got no idea what’s out there, do you?” You shake your head, confused. “It’s part of your appeal, little sinner, that naivety - but there’s so much more out there. Art. Music. Beautiful places, and cities. Places where men don’t,” he pauses, and your breath hitches. You wonder what he’s going to say. “Nevermind.”

“You talk like you’re going to leave,” you say, insecurity showing in your voice. Because you’re not sure what you and Klaus are. Aren’t stupid enough to even think that you’re something. But the thought of him leaving when he’s the only thing in your mind, the only decent thing in your life, is just too much to handle. What’s wrong with you? One man shows you a lick of kindness and suddenly you’re worshipping at his altar?

Klaus steps closer to you, grabs your waist. “I’m not leaving.”

You open your mouth but Klaus cuts you off. Looks at the necklace on your neck, his initial, like a brand. “I want to fuck you,” he says suddenly. Your body responds, you feel your nipples harden and your stomach tighten, turned on with just those few words.

You look down, shake your head. You want Klaus to fuck you - of course you do, but it doesn’t change the fact that the thought of sex makes you freeze up. You’ve done everything else, naughty things with Klaus, yet -

You can’t run from your past.

“Klaus,” you want to explain yourself. You’re ready this time, to tell him what happened to you. Why you come here. You want to share. “There was this man. My suitor. He pushed me and he hurt me and -“

“I’m not going to force you.”

You’re frozen after that. He knows. Even better, he seems to understand what happened to you by the hands of Peter, and he doesn’t seem to blame you.

Klaus bends to his knees and runs his hands down leg. It’s gentle, for no reason other than the fact that he wants to touch you.

“What are you doing?” You whisper, and he doesn’t say anything. Just kisses the scar on your knee, up your thigh, and then pulls your panties down your legs. He stands, gets his own pants off, and when he bends you over the altar and stuffs his cock inside of you, you realize that sex was never the issue at all.

Peter was.

“Beautiful girl,” Klaus murmurs. “You’ve got no idea the power you have.” He grabs your hand as he puts his weight on your back, using the altar to to support you while he fucks into you with slow thrusts. You think he’s just going to hold your hand, but instead he bites into it, takes his own offering while he claims your body. He feels so fucking good, stretching you out. Going slow, tender. You never imagined someone like Klaus would fuck you like he actually has a soul.

When you cum around his cock, you keep your eyes open, locked on the cross in front of you at the back of the room in the center of the wall.

“Klaus,” you call out like a prayer.

────

You walk into the forest with Peter, his friends trailing behind you - and you wish you hadn’t come. When he showed up at your place a few hours ago, your father and mother all but shoved you out the door with him. You don’t understand how or why they’re still pushing you into his arms, but you know they just want to get rid of you. It hurts. 

Their laughter echoes off the trees. They’re all drunk, except for you, and it’s insufferable. Peter keeps pulling on your wrist, trying to grab your hand, and eventually you won’t be able to fight him off.

His hand isn’t Klaus’. And you wish you weren’t such a pushover - wish you stood your ground and never let your parents tell you, a grown woman, what to do and with whom.  You don't want to be here. Not with Peter, and not close to the area where you walk through the forest to see Klaus. You don’t want those memories, the only thing positive in your life, tainted by Peter. 

You zone out, breathing in to try to calm down. If you just get through whatever campfire they want to go to, then you can go home. The air is thick with the smell of pine and earth, and for a moment, it almost feels peaceful. But then, Peter’s voice cuts through the calm, teasing.

Mean. 

“You really went to that church again this Sunday? This is a far walk from home,” he says, his tone dripping with mockery. The others chuckle, and you feel your face heat up. He’s not asking because he cares. He’as asking to make fun of you.

You bite your lip, trying to ignore them. You’ve heard it before, the constant jabs, but it still stings every time.

“I don’t see what’s so funny,” you reply, your voice a little sharper than you intended. You don't know where it comes from, when you’re shaking from being so bold. “It’s important to me.” You want to scarem that he's the reason you have to go, but you refrain. Because these days - he’s not. Not anymore. 

You hate him so fucking much. 

You should just run back home, but the only thing stopping you is the fact that Peter’s holding the only flashlight. You should have brought your own. 

Peter snorts. “Yeah, I get it. You want to be cleansed. You’re all about that holy stuff,” he mutters, and then one of his friends chimes in. “Weren’t so holy when you let Peter pop your cherry though, were you? 

His friends laugh again, and you can feel the heat rise in your face, but you try to hold it together. You don’t want to give them the satisfaction of watching you cry.

You say nothing. Peter tries to wrap an arm around your shoulders, but you’re seething so hard you pull out of his grip. Stupid, maybe, because in retaliation, he shoves you, just a little too hard. 

Your feet slip on the uneven ground, and you lose your balance. It’s a rough part of the woods, and you twist your ankle. The world tilts as you fall back, your hands shooting out to catch yourself, but there’s nothing to stop you. You hit the dirt, your head on a rock, with a sickening thud, the breath knocked out of you.

For a moment, everything is still. Your heart races, panic spreading in your chest. Peter doesn’t move, just watches, face unreadable.

His friends are silent now, their laughter gone, replaced with something else. Something you can't quite read.

You slowly push yourself up, your hands shaking, dusting off your knees. But even as you rise, the hurt from the fall doesn’t compare to the sinking feeling in your stomach. This is more than just a push. You can’t stand up. You can’t move. Everything feels hazy, and then you hear the urgent voices of his friends. You’re not sure how you missed it before, but now, it’s undeniable. Something’s wrong. 

And then everything goes black.

────

You wake up on the hard, cold ground of the forest. Your head is aching something fierce - you’ve never experienced this level of pain before. The minute your eyes are fully open, you let out a cry, laying your head back down on the dirty grass underneath your body. 

“Fuck,” you mutter, covering your eyes with your arm. You breathe in, coughing immediately. You sit up with another cry, your body stiff and heavy feeling, every nerve on edge. 

That’s when you realize the smoke. There’s a fire at a distance, that much you can tell. You smell the charred odor, along with something earthy - but the scariest smell is the smell of something metallic. Sour. 

It’s blood. Coherent enough to look around now, you notice that even in the dark, it’s clear that wherever you’re lying is a crime scene. There’s blood everywhere - but strangely enough, not a lot on your clothes. You know you should stand, but you can’t bring yourself to. The air is too thick, too choking, and your head and your limbs just feel too heavy and  -

“You’re up. Fantastic,” you hear, along with the crunching of leaves that tells you someone is walking towards you. You know that voice anywhere, but you’re not sure why it’s here. 

Klaus. 

The last thing you remember is Peter, and his friends, and walking into the forest together for that stupid bonfire. So how are you here, with Klaus right now? How - what?

Klaus crouches down next to you. 

“There’s enough blood here for a baptization,” he says, voice a little too cheery for this eerie situation. You ignore him, even as he touches the back of your head, like he’s checking something. 

That’s when you realize - the back of your head is covered in blood, hair matted against your sclap. No wonder you’ve got a headache, but even scarier - with this much blood loss, how are you even awake? 

“What? Klaus, I,” he cuts you off. “You’ll feel better once you eat something, little sinner.” He stands up and walks away from you, and you watch him, heart beating too loud and too fast in your chest. You could gag at the smell around you, and your head pounds at every step Klaus takes. Why is it so fucking loud? Why are you feeling so much?

What happened?

Klaus returns with a bloody paper bag. You don’t understand. “What’s going on? Why are you here? Where’s Peter?” But you don’t finish again. Klaus shoves the bag at you, and you open it, a cream threatening to escape your throat when you see what's inside. 

“Now,” Klaus starts, crouching back down. “I would never force you to do anything, but in a few hours, you're going to be feeling worse than you’ve ever felt in your entire life. Hunger, like you’ve never known. I would suggest, love, that you take a bite out of the heart, just to keep your appetite at bay while we find you some clean clothes,” the immediate reaction in your body is to hurl. 

You want to throw the paper bag with a heart inside of it, but instead your own beats faster. It's like your veins throb, your stomach growls, so hungry for this organ that you can barely contain it. What the fuck is happening to you? And why is Klaus so calm? 

“Klaus, explain, please,” you look at him, noticing only now that he’s entirely drenched in blood. Up to his elbows almost, so thick it looks like he’s wearing gloves. Your head spins, making you dizzy, and you stand up because you don’t know what else to do. 

Klaus looks at you like you’re crazy. “That’s a heart. You’ve never seen one before?” As if you've seen an actual heart outside of a body before. You lean your back against a tree, your own heart about to leap out of your chest at the disgust you now feel for yourself - because that heart - why does it smell so good?

“Why?” you manage to get out, and Klaus actually laughs. He’s having fun, you realize. This is the first time in all you’ve known him, that Klaus is actually fucking smiling. 

“That suitor of yours. He pushed you, although I do wonder what you were doing in the woods with him and the others, without your necklace on,” you want to tell him that you keep your necklace somewhere safe, as to not draw suspicion from people in town. But he just keeps talking, on a high that only death can give him, apparently. 

“I tried at first to get him to cut his heart out of his own chest, but as you know - people don’t like to be forced to do things. Even him. So I did it for him. Kind of me, I know.”

Peter is dead. Klaus found you in the forest with him and he killed Peter and the others. 

But more than that - you can’t breathe. Can’t think. Klaus takes a step closer to you and places a bloody hand on your shoulder. You’re full on crying now. 

“Don’t cry,” Klaus says, as if that helps. “He deserved it. Think about what happened. What you last remember. After we were intimate, before you left - I fed you my blood to heal the wound on your hand,” and you remember that. So why does Klaus sound…desperate for you to understand? 

But then everything comes back, and it only takes a second for it to all come together. 

Peter - he pushed you. You had Klaus' blood in your system , and all the vampire facts he told you after you found out he was a hybrid came flooding back. Peter -

He killed you. You must’ve hit your head when you tumbled down the hill. And because Klaus’ blood was in your body you -

You turned. You're a -

“No,” you shout, pushing past Klaus. The fear in your body is enough to push past the pain and stand up. “I can’t be this. I’m going to hell, Klaus.” You've never felt an emotion this devastating. This is horrible. You’ve experienced self hatred before, but nothing quite like this. You have an eternity to accept this disgusting, disgusting truth. 

Klaus actually looks offended. But he doesn’t get it. How could he? You’ve been trying to be someone new, but the beliefs that have been drilled into your head since you were a child are strong. And you’re scared. 

You drop to your knees and plop on your ass, holding your legs to your chest. Klaus comes to you, but not to comfort you. To twist the knife deeper. 

“Look around,” he says, voice loud. You don't want to. To see what - blood, smoke? “You’re already in hell. Your father let that man around you. He told you to come to me. You don’t think he knew what I’d do to you?”

You don’t understand what he’s saying. Your father - ?

“He was hoping I’d kill you. Don’t you see?” You don’t know what to say to that. But it’s all clicking, and you’re going to be sick. Your father sent you here to die. It makes sense why he was surprised every time you came home. You cry even harder, body shaking with sobs. 

“But don’t worry. I took care of it. You’re holy now, you understand?. Safe. Untouchable.” You look in the direction of the smoke and realize it’s coming from your town. Did he - burn the town down? And maybe supernatural sense are even crazier than you thought, because you focus on the scent of char and pinpoint that the scent is coming off of Klaus’ fingertips. 

He grabs the paper bag and sits beside you. You shift away from him. This is too much. You can tell he’s upset by your reaction, but what did he expect? He moves closer to you. “Leave your faith and follow me, and I’ll show you things the Bible never taught you.” But he still drops something on your lap.

It’s your old cross necklace. All bloody. He must’ve got it from Peter. It’s a thought you’ll have to go back to later, to understand - Klaus, giving you back a piece of yourself. Even one he doesn’t agree with.

“I’m going to hell,” you repeat, frozen. You’re looking forward, unsure if you’re even blinking. You can’t process this. You will never, ever get over this. 

Klaus waits a moment, before he opens the bag and hands you the heart. It looks smaller than you imagined, but softer. The smell is so vile it’s good and your stomach rumbles. 

“Welcome to the club, little sinner,” he says, and without looking at him, you grab the heart and bite into it. 

Klaus grabs your free hand and gives it a squeeze.

this fic is a gift for @myklaus ♥︎ thank you for the yaps, the laughs, and the idea!

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Your car spies on you and rats you out to insurance companies

I'm on tour with my new, nationally bestselling novel The Bezzle! Catch me TOMORROW (Mar 13) in SAN FRANCISCO with ROBIN SLOAN, then Toronto, NYC, Anaheim, and more!

Another characteristically brilliant Kashmir Hill story for The New York Times reveals another characteristically terrible fact about modern life: your car secretly records fine-grained telemetry about your driving and sells it to data-brokers, who sell it to insurers, who use it as a pretext to gouge you on premiums:

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/03/11/technology/carmakers-driver-tracking-insurance.html

Almost every car manufacturer does this: Hyundai, Nissan, Ford, Chrysler, etc etc:

https://www.repairerdrivennews.com/2020/09/09/ford-state-farm-ford-metromile-honda-verisk-among-insurer-oem-telematics-connections/

This is true whether you own or lease the car, and it's separate from the "black box" your insurer might have offered to you in exchange for a discount on your premiums. In other words, even if you say no to the insurer's carrot – a surveillance-based discount – they've got a stick in reserve: buying your nonconsensually harvested data on the open market.

I've always hated that saying, "If you're not paying for the product, you're the product," the reason being that it posits decent treatment as a customer reward program, like the little ramekin warm nuts first class passengers get before takeoff. Companies don't treat you well when you pay them. Companies treat you well when they fear the consequences of treating you badly.

Take Apple. The company offers Ios users a one-tap opt-out from commercial surveillance, and more than 96% of users opted out. Presumably, the other 4% were either confused or on Facebook's payroll. Apple – and its army of cultists – insist that this proves that our world's woes can be traced to cheapskate "consumers" who expected to get something for nothing by using advertising-supported products.

But here's the kicker: right after Apple blocked all its rivals from spying on its customers, it began secretly spying on those customers! Apple has a rival surveillance ad network, and even if you opt out of commercial surveillance on your Iphone, Apple still secretly spies on you and uses the data to target you for ads:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/11/14/luxury-surveillance/#liar-liar

Even if you're paying for the product, you're still the product – provided the company can get away with treating you as the product. Apple can absolutely get away with treating you as the product, because it lacks the historical constraints that prevented Apple – and other companies – from treating you as the product.

As I described in my McLuhan lecture on enshittification, tech firms can be constrained by four forces:

I. Competition

II. Regulation

III. Self-help

IV. Labor

https://pluralistic.net/2024/01/30/go-nuts-meine-kerle/#ich-bin-ein-bratapfel

When companies have real competitors – when a sector is composed of dozens or hundreds of roughly evenly matched firms – they have to worry that a maltreated customer might move to a rival. 40 years of antitrust neglect means that corporations were able to buy their way to dominance with predatory mergers and pricing, producing today's inbred, Habsburg capitalism. Apple and Google are a mobile duopoly, Google is a search monopoly, etc. It's not just tech! Every sector looks like this:

https://www.openmarketsinstitute.org/learn/monopoly-by-the-numbers

Eliminating competition doesn't just deprive customers of alternatives, it also empowers corporations. Liberated from "wasteful competition," companies in concentrated industries can extract massive profits. Think of how both Apple and Google have "competitively" arrived at the same 30% app tax on app sales and transactions, a rate that's more than 1,000% higher than the transaction fees extracted by the (bloated, price-gouging) credit-card sector:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/06/07/curatorial-vig/#app-tax

But cartels' power goes beyond the size of their warchest. The real source of a cartel's power is the ease with which a small number of companies can arrive at – and stick to – a common lobbying position. That's where "regulatory capture" comes in: the mobile duopoly has an easier time of capturing its regulators because two companies have an easy time agreeing on how to spend their app-tax billions:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/06/05/regulatory-capture/

Apple – and Google, and Facebook, and your car company – can violate your privacy because they aren't constrained regulation, just as Uber can violate its drivers' labor rights and Amazon can violate your consumer rights. The tech cartels have captured their regulators and convinced them that the law doesn't apply if it's being broken via an app:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/04/18/cursed-are-the-sausagemakers/#how-the-parties-get-to-yes

In other words, Apple can spy on you because it's allowed to spy on you. America's last consumer privacy law was passed in 1988, and it bans video-store clerks from leaking your VHS rental history. Congress has taken no action on consumer privacy since the Reagan years:

https://www.eff.org/tags/video-privacy-protection-act

But tech has some special enshittification-resistant characteristics. The most important of these is interoperability: the fact that computers are universal digital machines that can run any program. HP can design a printer that rejects third-party ink and charge $10,000/gallon for its own colored water, but someone else can write a program that lets you jailbreak your printer so that it accepts any ink cartridge:

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2020/11/ink-stained-wretches-battle-soul-digital-freedom-taking-place-inside-your-printer

Tech companies that contemplated enshittifying their products always had to watch over their shoulders for a rival that might offer a disenshittification tool and use that as a wedge between the company and its customers. If you make your website's ads 20% more obnoxious in anticipation of a 2% increase in gross margins, you have to consider the possibility that 40% of your users will google "how do I block ads?" Because the revenue from a user who blocks ads doesn't stay at 100% of the current levels – it drops to zero, forever (no user ever googles "how do I stop blocking ads?").

The majority of web users are running an ad-blocker:

https://doc.searls.com/2023/11/11/how-is-the-worlds-biggest-boycott-doing/

Web operators made them an offer ("free website in exchange for unlimited surveillance and unfettered intrusions") and they made a counteroffer ("how about 'nah'?"):

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2019/07/adblocking-how-about-nah

Here's the thing: reverse-engineering an app – or any other IP-encumbered technology – is a legal minefield. Just decompiling an app exposes you to felony prosecution: a five year sentence and a $500k fine for violating Section 1201 of the DMCA. But it's not just the DMCA – modern products are surrounded with high-tech tripwires that allow companies to invoke IP law to prevent competitors from augmenting, recongifuring or adapting their products. When a business says it has "IP," it means that it has arranged its legal affairs to allow it to invoke the power of the state to control its customers, critics and competitors:

https://locusmag.com/2020/09/cory-doctorow-ip/

An "app" is just a web-page skinned in enough IP to make it a crime to add an ad-blocker to it. This is what Jay Freeman calls "felony contempt of business model" and it's everywhere. When companies don't have to worry about users deploying self-help measures to disenshittify their products, they are freed from the constraint that prevents them indulging the impulse to shift value from their customers to themselves.

Apple owes its existence to interoperability – its ability to clone Microsoft Office's file formats for Pages, Numbers and Keynote, which saved the company in the early 2000s – and ever since, it has devoted its existence to making sure no one ever does to Apple what Apple did to Microsoft:

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2019/06/adversarial-interoperability-reviving-elegant-weapon-more-civilized-age-slay

Regulatory capture cuts both ways: it's not just about powerful corporations being free to flout the law, it's also about their ability to enlist the law to punish competitors that might constrain their plans for exploiting their workers, customers, suppliers or other stakeholders.

The final historical constraint on tech companies was their own workers. Tech has very low union-density, but that's in part because individual tech workers enjoyed so much bargaining power due to their scarcity. This is why their bosses pampered them with whimsical campuses filled with gourmet cafeterias, fancy gyms and free massages: it allowed tech companies to convince tech workers to work like government mules by flattering them that they were partners on a mission to bring the world to its digital future:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/09/10/the-proletarianization-of-tech-workers/

For tech bosses, this gambit worked well, but failed badly. On the one hand, they were able to get otherwise powerful workers to consent to being "extremely hardcore" by invoking Fobazi Ettarh's spirit of "vocational awe":

https://www.inthelibrarywiththeleadpipe.org/2018/vocational-awe/

On the other hand, when you motivate your workers by appealing to their sense of mission, the downside is that they feel a sense of mission. That means that when you demand that a tech worker enshittifies something they missed their mother's funeral to deliver, they will experience a profound sense of moral injury and refuse, and that worker's bargaining power means that they can make it stick.

Or at least, it did. In this era of mass tech layoffs, when Google can fire 12,000 workers after a $80b stock buyback that would have paid their wages for the next 27 years, tech workers are learning that the answer to "I won't do this and you can't make me" is "don't let the door hit you in the ass on the way out" (AKA "sharpen your blades boys"):

https://techcrunch.com/2022/09/29/elon-musk-texts-discovery-twitter/

With competition, regulation, self-help and labor cleared away, tech firms – and firms that have wrapped their products around the pluripotently malleable core of digital tech, including automotive makers – are no longer constrained from enshittifying their products.

And that's why your car manufacturer has chosen to spy on you and sell your private information to data-brokers and anyone else who wants it. Not because you didn't pay for the product, so you're the product. It's because they can get away with it.

Cars are enshittified. The dozens of chips that auto makers have shoveled into their car design are only incidentally related to delivering a better product. The primary use for those chips is autoenshittification – access to legal strictures ("IP") that allows them to block modifications and repairs that would interfere with the unfettered abuse of their own customers:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/07/24/rent-to-pwn/#kitt-is-a-demon

The fact that it's a felony to reverse-engineer and modify a car's software opens the floodgates to all kinds of shitty scams. Remember when Bay Staters were voting on a ballot measure to impose right-to-repair obligations on automakers in Massachusetts? The only reason they needed to have the law intervene to make right-to-repair viable is that Big Car has figured out that if it encrypts its diagnostic messages, it can felonize third-party diagnosis of a car, because decrypting the messages violates the DMCA:

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2013/11/drm-cars-will-drive-consumers-crazy

Big Car figured out that VIN locking – DRM for engine components and subassemblies – can felonize the production and the installation of third-party spare parts:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/05/08/about-those-kill-switched-ukrainian-tractors/

The fact that you can't legally modify your car means that automakers can go back to their pre-2008 ways, when they transformed themselves into unregulated banks that incidentally manufactured the cars they sold subprime loans for. Subprime auto loans – over $1t worth! – absolutely relies on the fact that borrowers' cars can be remotely controlled by lenders. Miss a payment and your car's stereo turns itself on and blares threatening messages at top volume, which you can't turn off. Break the lease agreement that says you won't drive your car over the county line and it will immobilize itself. Try to change any of this software and you'll commit a felony under Section 1201 of the DMCA:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/04/02/innovation-unlocks-markets/#digital-arm-breakers

Tesla, naturally, has the most advanced anti-features. Long before BMW tried to rent you your seat-heater and Mercedes tried to sell you a monthly subscription to your accelerator pedal, Teslas were demon-haunted nightmare cars. Miss a Tesla payment and the car will immobilize itself and lock you out until the repo man arrives, then it will blare its horn and back itself out of its parking spot. If you "buy" the right to fully charge your car's battery or use the features it came with, you don't own them – they're repossessed when your car changes hands, meaning you get less money on the used market because your car's next owner has to buy these features all over again:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/07/28/edison-not-tesla/#demon-haunted-world

And all this DRM allows your car maker to install spyware that you're not allowed to remove. They really tipped their hand on this when the R2R ballot measure was steaming towards an 80% victory, with wall-to-wall scare ads that revealed that your car collects so much information about you that allowing third parties to access it could lead to your murder (no, really!):

https://pluralistic.net/2020/09/03/rip-david-graeber/#rolling-surveillance-platforms

That's why your car spies on you. Because it can. Because the company that made it lacks constraint, be it market-based, legal, technological or its own workforce's ethics.

One common critique of my enshittification hypothesis is that this is "kind of sensible and normal" because "there’s something off in the consumer mindset that we’ve come to believe that the internet should provide us with amazing products, which bring us joy and happiness and we spend hours of the day on, and should ask nothing back in return":

https://freakonomics.com/podcast/how-to-have-great-conversations/

What this criticism misses is that this isn't the companies bargaining to shift some value from us to them. Enshittification happens when a company can seize all that value, without having to bargain, exploiting law and technology and market power over buyers and sellers to unilaterally alter the way the products and services we rely on work.

A company that doesn't have to fear competitors, regulators, jailbreaking or workers' refusal to enshittify its products doesn't have to bargain, it can take. It's the first lesson they teach you in the Darth Vader MBA: "I am altering the deal. Pray I don't alter it any further":

https://pluralistic.net/2023/10/26/hit-with-a-brick/#graceful-failure

Your car spying on you isn't down to your belief that your carmaker "should provide you with amazing products, which brings your joy and happiness you spend hours of the day on, and should ask nothing back in return." It's not because you didn't pay for the product, so now you're the product. It's because they can get away with it.

The consequences of this spying go much further than mere insurance premium hikes, too. Car telemetry sits at the top of the funnel that the unbelievably sleazy data broker industry uses to collect and sell our data. These are the same companies that sell the fact that you visited an abortion clinic to marketers, bounty hunters, advertisers, or vengeful family members pretending to be one of those:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/05/07/safegraph-spies-and-lies/#theres-no-i-in-uterus

Decades of pro-monopoly policy led to widespread regulatory capture. Corporate cartels use the monopoly profits they extract from us to pay for regulatory inaction, allowing them to extract more profits.

But when it comes to privacy, that period of unchecked corporate power might be coming to an end. The lack of privacy regulation is at the root of so many problems that a pro-privacy movement has an unstoppable constituency working in its favor.

At EFF, we call this "privacy first." Whether you're worried about grifters targeting vulnerable people with conspiracy theories, or teens being targeted with media that harms their mental health, or Americans being spied on by foreign governments, or cops using commercial surveillance data to round up protesters, or your car selling your data to insurance companies, passing that long-overdue privacy legislation would turn off the taps for the data powering all these harms:

https://www.eff.org/wp/privacy-first-better-way-address-online-harms

Traditional economics fails because it thinks about markets without thinking about power. Monopolies lead to more than market power: they produce regulatory capture, power over workers, and state capture, which felonizes competition through IP law. The story that our problems stem from the fact that we just don't spend enough money, or buy the wrong products, only makes sense if you willfully ignore the power that corporations exert over our lives. It's nice to think that you can shop your way out of a monopoly, because that's a lot easier than voting your way out of a monopoly, but no matter how many times you vote with your wallet, the cartels that control the market will always win:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/03/05/the-map-is-not-the-territory/#apor-locksmith

Name your price for 18 of my DRM-free ebooks and support the Electronic Frontier Foundation with the Humble Cory Doctorow Bundle.

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/03/12/market-failure/#car-wars

Image: Cryteria (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:HAL9000.svg

CC BY 3.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/deed.en

[ivygguk]

jeon jungkook fic recs!!

One-shots:-

Campus affairs - @kooktrash

summary: you transferred to a new college during second semester and you didn’t expect much excitement out for. that’s until jungkook came along and what had struggled to be a friendship was becoming so much more.

Cool with you - @kooktrash

summary: your break up from kim taehyung sent you spiraling into what felt like a midlife crisis of tear stained cheeks and tubs of half eaten ice cream with a broken heart. after finding out that your neighbor, jeon jungkook, was eavesdropping on your meltdowns and came to find out that your ex was his old friend, he found himself wanting to comfort you. he knew the kind of guy Taehyung was and he didn’t want to see you beat yourself up over a guy who wasn’t worth it so in the end he helped you through it and was unable to ignore the growing attraction you felt toward each other.

Million dollar darling - @kooktrash

summary: jeon jungkook is well aware of how privileged he is to have been born into the life he was given. it was glamorous and influential yet close-knit and suffocating, something he thought he wanted to escape from. a trip back home to the circle of wealth and snottiness for his best friend’s million dollar wedding has reminded him of all the reasons why he wanted to leave in the first place… and all the reasons he should stay — the main one being you, the spoiled rich girl he knew was utterly perfect for him.

Close the distance - @hearts4joon

summary: two different adults, living two completely separate lives — in the same neighborhood. a guy whose overbearing mother makes him carry the weight of the world on his shoulders. a girl whose parents are all too drawn to her younger siblings to even give her the time of day. while the two fall in an unlikely relationship (very unlikely), they still ravish each and every part of one another in every way — the best of attention, the one they both craved all their lives.

Cat got your tongue - @jessikahathaway

Summary: You were exhausted from schoolwork and just needed a chance to unwind. Jungkook, campus fuckboy, offers his services to help alleviate the stress from studying but is he going to cause more stress than he relieves?

Anpanman - @honeymoonjin

summary: part of the love yourself collab run by yours truly. your best friend jungkook finally convinces you to seek therapy for your failing mental health. the only catch? the one therapist that’s within your price range is an alternative marriage counsellor, jung hoseok, and the only way jungkook managed to get you an appointment was by saying the two of you were married. will couples counselling actually be useful for your wellbeing, or will something that runs much deeper rise to the surface instead?

Paint me naked - @gimmethatagustd

summary: After the mysteriously hot guy in your university class starts taking an interest in you, should you really trust that he’s not like all the other college fuckboys? Especially when his best friend is the guy who broke your heart?  

[theirisianprincess]

Something that really annoys me is that whenever there's an ambiguous depiction of queerness in fiction is that whenever an alternative explanation is given, certain people will assume the alternative to be true despite queerness being just as likely. These explanations aren't even necessarily wrong, it's just that people will run with those if it means not acknowledging that characters might be gay.

Like, for example, they never outright say that Marcille loves Falin, but a lot of people (myself included) believe this to be the case. But the fact that an alternative explanation for their closeness is provided is often used as a reason why it couldn't possibly be romantic. The alternative explanation in this case is that learning that her best friend got eaten forces her to confront her fear of outliving her friends. And that motivates her to try to save her. The problem with this is that it doesn't actually disprove the idea that Marcille loves Falin. Marcille loving Falin is just more motivation for Marcille. And sure, Marcille could be just as motivated if she thought of Falin as her platonic bestie, but why do people use the possibility of that as a reason to discount romance as a possible motivation for her?

Anime fans did the exact same thing with Madoka Magica. They cite Homura's solitude as the reason for her obsession with saving Madoka. But once again, that doesn't contradict romantic attraction. And when it gets confirmed that Homura loves Madoka (and that Sayaka and Kyoko love each other) in Rebellion, people just claimed "fan pandering" and "translation error".

And when an alternative explanation isn't provided, some anime fans will provide one for them. Like, in Watamote, Asuka constantly tries to get closer and closer with Tomoko. Some people suspect that this means she has romantic interest in Tomoko, but others choose to interpret her interest as curiosity and intrigue. Except curiosity doesn't explain the lap pillows or the nude FaceTime or offering her boobs to her or wanting to go to the same college or saying she spends most of her time thinking about Tomoko.

Would this problem be fixed if characters just said they were queer? No.

Dungeon Meshi is complete, so they won't confirm or deny Marcille's feelings. And Homura, Sayaka, and Kyoko had all been confirmed queer, but people still denied it. And Asuka has good reasons not to admit her feelings for Tomoko. Most notably, the world of Watamote is incredibly heteronormative, so people generally won't admit to being queer. And despite Tomoko being in a glass closet, she still doesn't even admit her bisexuality to herself, so it makes sense for Asuka to hold off on telling her anything. I would like Asuka to admit her feelings by the end, but as we are right now, it's better that she doesn't.

Insisting that we must always immediately confirm queerness and that it can never be ambiguous because some people will run with any chance to deny it will greatly limit the kinds of stories that can be told.

[demon-country]

This scene is so interesting to me for a number of reasons, but I want to talk about the eggs and how he said he finds them "off-putting". Now, Stolas is an owl, and like most birds of prey they can and often do eat the eggs of other birds (don't worry Blitz, it isn't cannibalism unless they eat eggs of their own species). So theoretically, eggs shouldn't actually be a problem and it's not like there aren't plenty of fancy foods that involve eggs.

But maybe it's not that deep, and has nothing to do with non-gourmet quality food. Maybe our heavily autistic-coded owl just has an aversion to a lot of breakfast foods. The texture of various types of cooked eggs, in particular, can be quite contentious even for people who aren't neurodivergent, but if you do have texture sensitivities then eggs can be a huge gamble.

The expression on his face in the shot above is exactly the one I'd make if someone tried to make me eat most egg-based dishes, and then I'd probably gag the second it was in my mouth, spit it out, and shudder through the visceral desire to claw my way out of my own skin.

Yeah, kinda like that lol.

Rodents, koi fish, and kale salads are probably safer foods, because there's less ways to cook them and he had a professional chef that would be able to do it the exact same way every time. They definitely are more expensive specialty foods though, so I'm glad he and Blitz were able to find a compromise with regular rats.

And I'm glad that Blitz didn't try to shame Stolas for his food preferences, especially because Stolas looks so awkward and embarrassed just saying them out loud. If he's anything like a lot of autistic folks, he was probably berated for being a picky eater, because even if in his own home with his own staff he could control what was served to him, the same cannot be said for anywhere else that required him to eat something lest he come off as rude. Blitz just takes it in stride though and simply asks about alternatives to vole and kale, because he definitely cannot afford that on a regular basis. And Stolas doesn't make a fuss about it, just tentatively admits that he also likes rats, which Blitz is more than happy to accommodate. Yes, what he offers is back alley feral rats, but Stolas doesn't seem put off by that or demand better quality, he's just alarmed and disturbed by Blitz having his fucking eye chewed on by one.

As someone with a lot of food hypersensitivities, it means a lot to me that Blitz doesn't accuse him of being spoiled or complain about Stolas needing a different diet than him or Loona. It often is hard to accommodate alternative dietary needs - be they because of food sensitivities, allergies, intolerances, or vegan/vegetarianism - when you're on a budget, but Blitz doesn't mind and jumps straight to a non-judgmental "what can you eat?" planning mode.

Like yeah, on the surface his answer to Blitz's initial "so what do you normally eat?" question and the way he gagged from a single, tiny bite of eggs does make him seem kinda spoiled. But his completely unhesitant, unbothered willingness to eat feral fucking rats says to me it wasn't about the fact that he now has to eat "poor people" food prepared by a novice chef, but rather that something about those foods in particular is hard for him to eat in general.

Just one more thing to add to the ever-growing pile of "Stolas is autistic!!" evidence, I guess. And just one more reason why I absolutely adore Blitz.

[cloversnstrawberries]

older brother!platonic yandere!80s slasher & gn!reader w/ dyed hair [headcanons] ! !

intro post | masterlist

additional notes; i'm actually re-dying my hair as i write this, so i think that proves that i'm totally not biased and absolutely not writing this because i yearn for an older brother who'd be willing to do my roots for me so i don't look like i have a big bald spot on the back of my head. because i have blonde hair and it's a very stark contrast to the bright pink. ough. not very yandere in this, but i needed this as a balm to my soul.

warnings; mentions of murder, violence, and killings; zachary's inherent clinginess, slight possessiveness, soft(er) yandere, overprotective behavior, and if there's any more I missed, please let me know!! this is pretty fluffy, actually.

w/c; 1.4k

The first (and only time) you dyed your hair without his help, it was an utter mess. I'm talking hands stained with the dye, if you bleached your hair then the towel was wrecked.

If you lived in a rented property rather than a house owned by your parents; well, lets just say you would've kissed your sweet, sweet deposit goodbye, what the mess you made in your wake.

Whether you bleached it or had hair light enough to just slap the dye on top, did natural or unnatural colors, the result was still the same regardless.

The bathroom was a mess, and he came home from football practice to find you with a plastic Kroger bag over your head; on your hands and knees, trying to scrub the leftover dye from the linoleum tile floor of your shared bathroom. You were in distress over it, if not in tears. Afraid you'd ruined the counter/floor.

You didn't go in blind, per se-- but you only had tips given to you by the few alternative kids, and from the sweet gas station cashier who dyes her hair to cover the fact its graying-- to go off of.

There was both a fear of having decimated your bathroom permanently, and a nagging feeling that you might've goofed up the actual process; damaging your hair indefinitely.

Whether it was the work of a miracle, or just plain old luck-- you didn't damage your hair too much, if it all. You'd missed a couple spots, namely on the back of your head, but other than that you did a pretty damn good job.

The bathroom, however...

When Zachary came home, he immediately started looking for you. Usually you were on the couch, watching TV-- or in the dining room, doing homework. You weren't in either of those spots, and you weren't in your bedroom either.

He knew it was stupid to worry about this-- But the reason behind his anxiety at not finding you immediately wasn't because "oh, what if something happened to them? what if they messed with the wrong kids and got jumped, or they went missing?" (both were unlikely in a town like yours, but not entirely impossible).

No, he was afraid that you'd committed the grave sin of hanging out with someone other than him-- and without his knowledge, to boot. Zachary didn't think you were the type to 'go behind his back' like this, but the fear was still there.

So you can probably imagine the absolute relief he felt when he found you in the bathroom-- but his sigh soon turned to wheezing laughs when he got a look of your sorry state.'

He's still your brother, after all. Siblings were basically made to laugh at each other in situations like these.

Normally, you wouldn't take it too harshly-- but this time around, you couldn't quite handle it. The fear of messing up your hair due to your inexperience, and the idea that your bathroom would forever be stained with your semi-spur-of-the-moment decision...

Well, he was quick to change his tune when you looked about ready to cry-- or started crying harder, if you already were. He stopped laughing, and immediately crouched down beside you, offering some reassurance.

Before heading off to the storage closet out in the hall, grabbing some cleaning stuff and a rag-- you were just trying to use water, which wasn't doing nothing, but that was mostly in part with how hard you'd been scrubbing. The dye wasn't going anywhere with that method.

You two spent about 20 minutes cleaning the bathroom up. By then, the timer you were using to make sure you didn't overdo the dye-time (that you totally didn't nab from the kitchen, but thankfully it'd been one of the few items spared from the wrath of your messy dye job) had already gone off.

Zachary noticed how uneasy you looked, afraid you'd messed up your hair for good. Again, he reassured you, before saying he'd help with the rest of the process.

Your hands were already beyond saving-- but he had enough foresight to go get some latex gloves from the hall closet before coming back to help you.

Then, for the next ten or so minutes, you kneeled beside the bathtub, head bowed over directly under the faucet-- the water was freezing cold, the nice punk girl, Melanie, told you that helped keep the color longer-- so you were taking little breaks when your scalp started hurting from how cold it was.

Eventually, after you were pretty sure he'd gotten all of the extra dye out-- the gloves having gone from clear to almost opaque with your new hair color--, he helped you up and wrapped an old beach towel around your head.

You sat on the lid of the toilet as he took over the duty of cleaning the tub-- telling you to just chill out for a while. once he was done with that, he brought you into his room and you two played on his Atari while your hair dried.

After that whole incident, Zachary borderline threatened you to come to him next time you wanted to dye your hair or anything of the like. Mostly because he didn't like seeing how scared and upset you were when you thought you messed it up :(

Weirdly enough, he'd rather you be mad at him if he messed up-- then see you be mad with yourself for messing it up. Besides, you'd probably forgive him in less then a day.

...Mostly because he's the one who drives you places outside of town, and has the membership card for your local video rental store. You never got one of your own, because he just always let you use his.

Can't really do that if you're giving him the cold shoulder, yeah?

But other than that, he's pretty good with keeping up with it all. It must've been a bit of a funny sight for the old ladies at the local hair shoppes, seeing a boy like Zachary coming in and asking the staff for tips on dying hair. Products to use, what to avoid, how to keep it from transferring-- etc etc.

After the first time, you never spent your own money on the stuff. It was always Zachary who was buying it; you tried getting him to stop that, feeling bad about spending his money on something that was solely for your benefit--

He gave you a withering look that made you immediately shut up and drop the topic, never to pick it up again. In your mind, he was too selfless-- you didn't want to feel like you were using him or anything.

But actually, he was sort of doing it for his own benefit. It let him spend more time with you-- not like he didn't already do that, but it was another sort of bonding activity that could be added to the list of 'our things'. You've never tried to dye your hair alone after the first time, because you knew it'd upset him.

Once he claimed something as an 'our thing', then there was no way to pry it from his grasp-- it'd be cemented in his mind that it was only something you could do with him present or actively participating.

It was just one of those quirks you have to get used to. In this situation, you weren't complaining that much about it, actually. He was very helpful, and it was nice to just be able to sit and do whatever while he did most of the work.

Whether or not you keep with the same color, or change it every week-- he'll help you no matter what, and won't question it. You wanna keep your hair honey brown for 3 consecutive years? cool! you wanna dye your hair different bright, in your face colors every other week? also cool!

He's not one to rag on you about self-expression, however-- if you did choose an unnatural color, you're bound to get stared or gawked at because of it. You were expecting it, and so was Zachary.

That's why he made sure to sharpen his fire hatchet and hunting knife, obviously. There was an uptick in Fools Killer victims after you dyed your hair-- completely unbeknownst to you, Zachary was using your out-of-the-ordinary appearance and the subsequent stares to 'sort out the bad ones',

To find victims who otherwise would've 'hidden their negative intentions towards you'.

[the-fallen-blue]

So of course a very common M/F romance trope is the Grovel™, in which A Guy has done something very wrong and been rejected because of it, and must make a grandiose, ideally self-sacrificial gesture and a heartfelt verbal apology to regain the good graces of the heroine. Very popular, entirely understandable kink. Now, I do not, as a rule, seek out M/F in my fanfic, so it may be that this is a professional phenomenon only, but it has been my experience that when The Groveler is a dude and his partner is a woman, he very consistently earned it. He was a complete asshole who demeaned his girl's expertise and agency, ruined her sister's happiness, and attempted to tear down the magic barrier and ruin the world, and he had better get groveling. Offer her your throat my guy! She has every right to tear it out!

But what's fascinating to me is that I also see people do what is clearly an attempt at the Grovel™ in femslash. And like 90% of the time, it's complete bullshit, actually! Utterly unearned! The Groveler gave the injured party's parents a gift that is perfectly polite and respectful in their mutual culture but which ruined the introduction for reasons the Groveler could not possibly anticipate. The Groveler made a decision in a time-sensitive situation that she has 20 years of experience with without taking the time to listen to and coddle the injured party's obviously incorrect and in fact genuinely detrimental alternate suggestion. The Groveler asserted a completely fair social boundary against a third party, ruining her partner's plans to make them both seem victims for later profit, a plan which the Groveler did not consent to or even know about. The femslash Groveler is mostly making grandiose gestures of denial and self-abasement to atone for doing nothing actually wrong.

I am so compelled by this phenomenon, I feel like it says so much about gender in our society. Is this a direct manifestation of our high demands on women socially, that any emotional injury to another party is treated with the same severity as the most severe, deliberate, and avoidable emotional injury caused by men? Is it a second-order consequence of that phenomenon, because female characters, by and large, must be far more considerate and respectful of other people's opinions and agency than male characters with the same literary role to be liked, and so the worst in-character thing you can get them to do is still undeserving of the trope you're trying to play out? Is it that the bar for forgiveness is different, that writers still want the Grovel™ catharsis but wouldn't be able to enjoy the relationship if there'd been an actual Grovel-worthy crime? Or something else entirely? What is happening here.

[forcedagere]

I personally really like the idea of Bill x Reader x Ford. This one kinda ties into my previous post, but it’s not required reading. I suppose this would be an AU where Ford accepted Bill’s offer during Weirdmaggedon, or something else went wrong resulting in Bill staying in power :)

Contents: forced age regression, yandere, implied mental manipulation

Whereas Bill is far from the best caretaker (though he tries, in his own way), Ford takes care to create a semblance of structure in your life. He doesn’t have tons of practical experience with children or little ones such as you, but he makes up for it with dedication. He takes to caring for you as if it were a newly discovered, fascinating field of study. In other words… He reads many, many books, and tries all kinds of things to figure out what you like best.

Ford is not entirely fond of the kind of dynamic you have with Bill. It's not because he doesn't want to be referred to with parental terms, that's simply a matter of preference, but that he insists on you being friends above anything else. Considering the dynamics at play here, Ford cannot help but view it…

"As simply pedagogically irresponsible, Bill." The triangle in question rolls his eye. "Oh, boohoo! Fancy McFancypants over here knows what’s up!” Bill glances at you from the corner of his eye. Seeing you crack a smile while you’re sketching away with your crayons, he’s encouraged. “You read one book on how to raise a kid, and now you wanna tell me what to do? Get lost. Kid, c'mon, prove him wrong-- I'm your favourite, right?" You look up from your latest piece of art. You are drawing all three of you, in fact. You're usually deaf to their arguments, it's such a constant that you've grown used to the noise and stopped viewing it as a threat. (Your daddy calls it 'bickering'; Billy, when daddy isn't listening, calls it 'flirting'. That makes you giggle.) But you don't like getting involved in it yourself! So you firmly shake your head, and drop the pacifier attached to your necklace to speak. "No favourites… I love you both," you say with the confidence only someone as little as you could have. Billy's eyelid flutters, and your daddy smiles.

To put it simply, Bill is the ‘fun, rule-breaking parent’ and Ford is… A little less that. One should not take Bill Cipher as the benchmark of taking good care of a human, though.

Ford will make sure your meals are more varied than the endless stream of candy that Bill feeds you, and get you tucked in for sleep at regular times, too. Compared to Bill, who enjoys playing games with you and ‘roughhousing’, Ford prefers calmer activities. He’s definitely up for the occasional board game, but, most of the time, he’ll read to you, make drawings upon requests (or give you lessons!), or toy around with science experiments safe for someone who gets the urge to put anything that looks interesting inside their mouth.

He might’ve taken you for an adventure or two outside, but… The world hasn’t been the same since Bill got his hands all over it. He may be technically immortal now. You decidedly are not, as far as he knows. Either way, he doubts that Bill would let you out of this room to begin with. He doesn’t have to ask to be able to know that. If there is any reason he would keep someone locked up the way he does with you, it must be because you have some form of special connection to him. Ford does not believe he would risk that.

Really, Ford isn’t stupid or blind. It’s not that he’s going along with all of this because he is ignorant of Bill’s manipulation of your mental state. Bill can call it a ‘nudge in the right direction’ all he wants. He’s keeping you regressed. But everything has changed. He has changed, and Ford doesn’t know if he made the right decision. He fears he hasn’t. (Somewhere out there, in an alternate universe, a Stanford must live who made a difference decision. Ford hopes he’s happy.)

Spending time in this little contained room, with something dependent on him and eager to be looked after by him, who doesn’t know better and never will… It’s not good, it’s the very definition of selfish, but it’s comforting to him. Grounding, in a sense. With an eternity of time left ahead of him and the foundations of his previous life all but crumbled, he has something steady to return to. It doesn’t matter how much he rationalizes it. It’s twisted and fucked up, plain and simple.

…He supposes he can understand why Bill finds him so amusing, even now.

A little whimper snaps him from the spiral of his thoughts. Your bottle is empty. He should get youa refill, then pull you back on his lap.

[holylulusworld]

Their little maid (Prologue)

Summary: Mafia business is dirty. The brothers need someone to clean up their mess and more.

Pairing: Bucky Barnes x fem!Reader x Nick Fowler

Warnings: shy reader, flirty brothers, mafia business, money trouble, Walker is the worst, injured reader (nothing serious)

Their little maid masterlist

You gnaw at your thumb. Is this the position you want? Cleaning other people’s houses wasn’t the job you dreamed of when you were a kid.

All you ever dreamed of was to open your own bookstore or to work at the library as an alternative. Sadly, the library closed, and you reached the end of the rope. No one wants to hire you, an unemployed librarian.

Sighing deeply, you push the button at the large gate to ask for entrance. An angry voice asks what you want, making you flinch. You’d love to just run and forget about the job, but you’re in desperate need of money.

“Uh—I’m Y/N Y/L/N,” you stammer. “I got an important appointment with Mr. Barnes.” You take a deep breath, waiting for the voice to deny you access or to open the gate.

“You’re two minutes later,” another voice says before the gate slowly opens. “Get inside. I don’t have all day.”

You duck your head and hurriedly walk past the gate. Messing up the first interview you have in weeks is the last thing you want. Before your anxiety can get the best out of you, you walk faster and faster to reach the front door. You cannot allow yourself to mess this chance up if you haven’t already messed it up by being late.

“Finally,” a man opens the door and immediately snarls your name. “I can tell, my bosses don’t like people wasting their time.”

He grabs your right upper arm to drag you inside the mansion, taking you by surprise. You shriek and slip on the floor. The man doesn’t stop your fall. He drops his hand from your arm and watches your knees hit the carpet.

The blonde man smirks down at you. He huffs and crosses his arms over his chest. “Clumsy little bitch. Get up. You don’t have a job yet. Or, stay on your knees,” he chuckles darkly. “Maybe you can get to work right away.” The man cups his crotch, making you sneer.

“Walker!” The man in front of you cringes when someone calls his name. He stiffens and steps away from you. “What happened here?”

“Clumsy thing slipped and fell,” he explains and shrugs.

“Why didn’t you help her up?” The other man walks toward you to offer his hand. You bite your lower lip, chewing on it as you place your smaller hand in his. "Doll, don’t be afraid. I won’t bite. I’m Mr. Barnes, and I’ll interview you for the position we have to offer.”

He flashes you a stunning smile, making you feel warm. His hand is rough, but gentle when he helps you up.

The most stunning blue eyes meet yours as he helps you back on your feet. He carefully grabs your upper arms, looking you up and down to make sure you don’t get hurt.

You hope he doesn’t judge your plain outfit—a pale blue shirt and jeans shorts. His outfit is stunning, just like his eyes and deep voice.

He’s wearing an expensive, dark blue suit and a matching tie. His hair is short and neatly styled, but behind his perfect styling, he hides something wild. You’re sure about it.

“Brother did the maid already arrive?” Another man steps toward you and Mr. Barnes. Your eyes widen, and you gasp because he looks exactly like Mr. Barnes. Same hair, same eyes, same suit. “Oh, she is already here.”

“You look the same,” you stammer, regretting the words the moment Walker snorts at your comment. “I mean…you must be brothers.”

“Guilty, doll,” Mr. Barnes chuckles at your confused look. “We are twins.”

“We didn’t grow up together, sweetness. I’m Mr. Fowler.” He looks you up and down, humming as his eyes land on your bruised knees. “I hope my brother isn’t the reason for your bleeding knees.”

“She’s clumsy, boss. The girl slipped and fell,” Walker repeats. You already figured that he doesn’t like you. “Maybe we should look for someone else.”

You whimper. No. He can’t take the chance away from you.

“You mean we should look for someone new?” Mr. Barnes puts Walker in his place with a glare. “So far, she didn’t do anything telling me I should look for a replacement. Maybe we should look for someone to replace you. A man who doesn’t even offer his hand to a lady in need.”

“Lady—” Your cheeks heat up. No man before called you a lady.

“Buck, stop flirting. We got our hands full today. Let’s get over with the interview... I can hardly wait to tell her about her tasks.

Part 1

Tags in reblog.

[amywritesthings]

seven days. | part one.

( Read on AO3 )

Pairing: armin arlert x gn!reader (attack on titan / shingeki no kyojin) Word Count: 3.9k Summary: Armin gets bamboozled into joining the annual Yeager family beach vacation — and accidentally meets you.

Warnings: 18+ MINORS DNI - alternate universe (modern), beach house, summer vacation, eventual romance, alcohol, partying, Armin deserves a romcom, Eren & Zeke have zero braincells Credits: dividers by @saradika-graphics

part two. | masterlist

“Zeke, you Point Break bitch, did you steal my boogie board?!”

Ah, yes. 

If he was looking for a week of tranquility and peace, then Armin Arlert should have declined the invitation to join the Yeager family for their annual summer vacation.

Time and time again, Eren has begged his best friend to tag along.

As far as he's aware, this has been a family tradition ever since his best friend was a toddler.

One week, the same week, every single year.

Not to mention it's the same beach house merely two blocks away from the boardwalk and sandy shores.

Home away from home.

It’ll be amazing!

(Eren likes to claim.) 

There is so much sick shit we can do!

(His words, not Armin’s.)

You’re gonna sit on your ass and read anyway, so why not do it by a beach?

(...okay, maybe that sold him.)

Then again, nothing is more humbling than standing with your duffle bag in one hand, filled to the brim with ‘maybe’ shirts and ‘just in case’ medicines, and your pillow in another while the Yeager family chaotically dissolves into a panicked army of four battling to even get to said beach in one piece.

Chaos.

It’s their collective middle name.

“Armin, sweetie, do you want any snacks for the road?”

Carla Yeager — doting mother figure and matriarch of the family.

She’s the reason they’re taking two cars this year, too afraid she may forget something important at home.

From fresh tangerines to a plethora of board games, she’s thought of it all.

Shuffling his bag to give his hands some equal soreness — ouch, that's freaking heavy — Armin offers an apologetic smile.

“No, Mrs. Yeager, I’m fine. Thank you.”

“How many times do I need to tell you to call me Carla?” 

Every time, actually.

Although Zeke very easily calls his stepmother by her first name, Armin can't bring himself to do it.

Blah, blah, raised a certain way by his ever-traditional grandfather, blah.

The awkward blonde merely nods once and watches as Carla shuffles by to throw another box of napkins into the trunk.

“Here,” she gestures, waving her arms while she’s in front of the hatchback, “that looks bulky.” 

It is, but he’s a kindred spirit in the name of overpacking.

“I can find a spot for it,” he promises, but relents when the woman gives him that mom look that straightens out her son and stepson. “I— Thank you, Mrs. — Carla.”

Close enough.

He hands her his duffle bag, careful to spot the bottom of it in a sneaky attempt to help her ease his luggage into the first car.

Boom.

The front door bursts open to reveal Zeke and Eren, shoulder to shoulder, frantically fighting to see who can walk out first.

Grunting, Zeke tries to push ahead with his neon-green boogie board against his torso, but Eren manages to dip at the hip and rush down the steps. 

The momentum nearly knocks Zeke’s oval glasses off the bridge of his nose.

“Could you be normal for two seconds?” the blonde groans.

Eren merely answers by sticking his tongue out and holds up a hand, wiggling his thumb and pinkie back and forth. “Fucking loser.”

Carla immediately glares. “Eren, language.”

“Forking, sorry, forking,” Eren corrects with little remorse.

“Seriously?” Zeke laments as he walks by, squinting at his brother. “What are you, ten?”

“Zeke,” a voice chastises softly from the garage. "Be nice to your brother."

Grisha Yeager, father of the year, rolls out a large cooler to bring it towards the second yet-to-be-filled car.

He’s wearing a Margaritavilla button-down, his long hair tied similar to Eren’s. On his forehead is a tie-dye headband.

“We'll be within close quarters of one another for seven whole days," Grisha reminds in that airy tone of his. "We should hold off on the in-fighting until day four at the very least.”

"I'll give it until day three," Zeke mumbles under his breath as he passes by, shoving his boogie board into the first car and smushing Armin's duffle bag down to half its size.

Yeah.

This is what it’s like to vacation with the Yeagers.

Except when your grandfather gets a new girlfriend, and they go to Key West for the summer, you’re stuck without being able to say no to your best friend’s family.

Seven days.

He can handle the Yeagers for seven days.

.

.

— —

.

.

  It took less than three hours for Armin's pale skin to burn like an overcooked egg.

“It’s really not that bad,” chimes in Eren, mouth occupied by the hair tie between his teeth.

Invading his pessimistic mirror space, the taller brunette dips to look at himself while fixing his staple half-up bun hairdo.

The shorter blonde frowns even further as he checks out his tomato-red shoulders, standing shirtless and shoeless in front of him.

“It looks pretty bad, Eren.”

“Nah. Just slap some aloe on it, alright?”

Ruffling sounds behind him.

Glancing over his shoulder in the reflection of the mirror, a bag of potato chips flies into view as Eren carelessly rips it from the cardboard variety pack — courtesy of the emergency snack stash in the corner of the room.

(The emergency snacks are, quote: So that bitch-ass Zeke doesn't steal the goods.)

The sun-kissed boy walks barefoot to the edge of the twin bed and flops down.

Right.

He forgot to mention he’s sharing a room with Eren, which only makes matters forty times worse.

Two twin beds with doily-esque blankets and flat pillows.

Thank god Armin had the sense to pack his own.

“Besides, the alcohol will make it feel better," Eren adds, chewing on a potato chip.

With a noise of defiance, Armin turns from the mirror to stare at his best friend.

“You do realize alcohol dehydrates a person, right?”

“So?”

“So—” Armin protests tightly, “—it’ll make it worse.”

Eren pops another chip in his mouth, shaking his head. 

“Nah.”

Eloquent as always.

Groaning, he slowly — agonizingly — pulls his pastel blue polo over his aching shoulders and breathes out through his nose.

That SPF 50 was supposed to work, but he must have lost track of time binge-reading his first book of the trip.

A spy thriller, actually, that fell flat right around chapter three and nosedived bad just at the cusp of act three.

The wildly out-of-left-field twist made him so mad that he missed his alarm to reapply another coat of sunscreen, and—

Well.

As a result, human lobster is now on the menu tonight.

Regardless, he promised to go out.

It isn't ideal, but a promise is a promise.

About ten or so blocks away from the beach house is the coveted spot known as The Point.

From what he could gather from Google, The Point is a tiki bar boasting high-top bar tables nestled in sand, recreational volleyball courts, and live music all week long.

It’s about the only lively place in this rather family-friendly beach town.

While not technically a dry town, bars are few and far between and there are approximately a whopping zero nighttime entertainment venues, so The Point was about as wild as any college kid stuck on vacation was going to get.

Earlier, Eren spent most of the car ride to the house hyping it up.

Zeke, in surprising fashion, seemed to hold the same sentiment.

(It’s probably the only thing the brothers could agree upon.)

Plus, Zeke apparently had some surfer friends he’d met online that were going on the first night of vacation, so that solidified the night’s plans.

After showering, dressing, and having family dinner with the parents, it's go time.

A little past nine at night, the three boys walk on the sidewalk in a triangle unit, with Armin trailing behind.

Ever a wallflower he keeps quiet, observing carefully as the two brothers figure out their game plan.

Zeke is anti-shots.

Eren wants shots or nothing at all.

“We’re on vacation, why the fuck wouldn’t you do shots?”

“Because,” Zeke explains, “if you start with shots, then you’re setting yourself up for failure.”

“Yeah, if you can’t hold your liquor.”

“Eren, you just turned twenty-one.”

Eren’s nostrils flare. “So?! I had plenty of practice at university!”

“Is he a lightweight, Arlert?”

Wait.

What?

Oh, shit, they’re including him.

“Be honest,” Zeke adds over his shoulder.

Like a deer in headlights, Armin blinks between the brothers. “Uh… sometimes?”

“What?!”

The yell out of his best friend is piercing.

“You goddamn turncoat!”

“You’re not exactly somebody with an iron stomach, Eren,” the blonde reminds softly as if calming a petulant child, only to wince when he's met with a look of pure anger. “But that isn't to say you can't hold a shot down.”

“Or five,” Eren challenges.

“Three at best,” Armin relents.

“Three and a half.”

Armin squints as they turn the corner leading towards the entrance of the bar.

“In what world does half a shot cou—”

“Wait!”

Eren yelps, holding out an arm to stop Zeke in his tracks.

Armin subsequently also stops — as does his wearing patience.

“I have a solution.”

Zeke pushes his glasses up the bridge of his nose. “And what’s that?”

“Look at me, dude.”

The boy with the man bun demands attention, using his pointer and middle finger to gesture between him and his half-brother. 

“You know what I’m thinking. Give it nine seconds.”

Right.

Not ten, because Eren’s favorite number is arbitrarily nine.

Zeke squints with about as much confusion as Armin’s feeling, but Armin knows by now how this is going to go.

Although they’re born with two different mothers, they’re eerily in sync with one another when they want to be extra annoying. 

Some kind of Yeager sixth sense tying them together; they fall silent, staring—

Then the thought strikes.

Like two brain cells clicking together, they simultaneously grin at one another.

“Jagerbombs.”

Great.

So even worse than a shot or a beer.

That’s all it takes for the two to become best buds as they stroll into the tiki bar like they own the place.

The blonde and brunette zero in on an open spot at one of the several pop-up bar locations at this venue—

—leaving Armin in the dust to fumble out his I.D. to the bouncer.

It's nothing new.

Cover charge? Paid.

Hand stamp? Accomplished.

Careful not to get any sand in his sneakers, Armin treads carefully across the uneven landscape towards the same lively bar as his best friend.

Music thumps right into his ribcage. 

Flashing lights threaten to blind him if he so much as looks over his shoulder to the west.

It’s more than he’s used to.

More than he wants, really.

(What happened to the leisure part of vacation again?)

“We got you one!”

Eren.

Blinking back into his body, Armin glances at the shot glass filled to the brim of Jagermeister waggled in his face. Immediately responding with a grimace, he steps back.

“No, I’ll just grab myself a drink, alright? You two enjoy — that.”

“What?” Eren’s frown is immediate. “Seriously? How else are you gonna get wasted with us?”

I’m not, is what he’d like to argue, but he knows Eren by now.

“What do you mean us?” Arnin shouts over the music. “I don’t see Zeke!”

“He got a text from one of his dumbass surfer bros and ditched,” Eren answers, “but to be perfectly honest, I’m thinking of playing the field tonight.”

“The what?”

“The field!”

“Eren, it’s really hard to hear you when they won’t stop mixing Pitbull with ABBA!”

“What?!”

Oh, this is impossible.

He raises his hands to gently push the shot glass towards his best friend’s chest. 

“You take it and show Zeke you can handle it!” Armin calls back at the top of his lungs, his shaggy blonde hair waving in the wind as he nods with encouragement.

That: giving Eren a challenge.

(Works like a charm.)

Determination spreads across his face. Eren nods, hyping himself up for a double-fisted success story. 

Armin simply nods, too, using the chameleon effect to build up Eren’s trust.

(Maybe he shouldn’t be using his psychology notes against his best friend, but desperate times call for desperate measures.)

“Yeah!”

Eren shouts while dropping the shot into the energy drink left perspiring on the bar top.

“I’m gonna!”

“Okay!”

“And then I’m gonna talk to a girl! Or a guy! Or someone!”

Armin’s eyes shoot wide with surprise, but he chooses not to rain on his best friend’s parade because Eren is already chugging the drink, spilling a little of the Jagerbomb down his oversized black tee.

(Good call, wearing dark colors, unlike Armin’s poorly planned pastel.)

Slamming it down on the bar top with a howl of victory, he pats Armin on the arm and trudges forward to the dance floor to do…

Well, that’s between the power of Charli xcx and God.

“Oh, Eren,” Armin mumbles, watching the little man bun bounce in time with the beat of the music until it’s consumed by dancing bodies.

Turning back to the bartenders, the blonde debates.

Agonizes, really.

He doesn’t drink very often.

It’s not really his thing.

But… when on vacation, right?

(Alone, apparently, since Zeke isn’t coming back anytime soon and he’s going to need to deal with dragging Eren’s drunk ass home in the next two hours.)

“Vodka soda, please,” he sighs, rubbing the back of his neck.

The bartender behind the counter nods his way before pulling out a plastic cup. 

Within a few seconds the simple alcoholic beverage is concocted, and he leaves a reluctant ten-dollar bill on the sliver of the bar that isn’t covered in condensation or sloshed liquor.

He reaches—

Oh.

That’s not a cup.

Freezing in his place, his blue eyes zero in on a pair of fingers entwined with his, nestled on the very same cup.

He can feel them tense under his own slender digits.

Dread. Pure, existential dread.

Apologize, apologize—

“Shit—”

“I’m so—”

“Sorry!”

A stranger’s voice yelps with his in unison.

Before he can move, their hand rips away from his, leaving his fingers to meet with the cold plastic.

His neck cranes to his left and—

Oh.

Oh, no.

You.

Blinking several times to get his wits about him, he can feel his mouth growing dry.

The way the blinking lights illuminate off of your face completely force his train of thought off the damn tracks.

Flickers of blues, greens, pinks — they compliment your face so nicely as each shade seems to highlight another feature that he hadn’t noticed a second before.

He shouldn’t stare, but he can’t help it: you’re drop dead gorgeous.

“It’s okay,” Armin breathes out after holding his breath for some time. “That was my bad. I didn’t see you.”

Your eyes are just as wide as his. “No! No, it was my fault. I thought that was my drink.”

“What did you order?”

“Uh, a hard seltzer? I think?” you answer, scrunching your nose as you respond.

Mayday.

That’s a type of adorable he is not equipped to handle in his sunburnt state.

“You think?” he repeats with a small chuckle.

You move your head side to side, tilting with an uncommitted air about it.

“It’s bubbling, right? Means I’m on the right carbonated track.”

“Yeah, but don’t hard seltzers usually come in cans?”

“Not always at this place,” you correct, before pushing the cup towards him. “I also kind of panicked when I ordered, so sorry for almost being a drink stealer.”

“Trust me, I know a thing or two about panic ordering,” Armin admits with a huff, taking the cup into his hands.

“Yeah?”

You give a carefree laugh that causes his stomach to give an Olympian-grade somersault.

“Is that why you got a vodka soda?”

“Guilty as charged.”

“We’ve all been there,” you empathize, briefly pouting your lower lip. “I won’t judge.”

He’s not nearly drunk enough to deal with this (see: at all) but that doesn’t mean Armin is going to waste his opportunity.

He may be a wallflower, but he’s equal parts an opportunist.

“So you’ve been here before?” he tries instead, hoping you don’t suddenly snatch your seltzer can and walk away.

You do get your seltzer from the same bartender — a slender aluminum can, nothing fancy — but you don’t walk away.

The opposite: you angle towards him.

Shit, okay.

He can do this.

“My friends love this place,” you tell him over the music. He finds himself leaning closer, angling his chin down, so he can hear you better. “So I just tagged along to make sure no one got black-out drunk or made out with anyone weird.”

“A noble effort,” Armin teases, and your eyes sparkle with amusement. “My friends dragged me here, too.”

“Dragged?” you catch with a growing smirk as you take a sip. “I said I tagged, not dragged.”

“Oh.”

Idiot.

Recover.

“I mean, it wasn't — yeah, no, I was definitely dragged here,” Armin confesses, sipping his vodka soda for some liquid courage.

No use in lying to seem cool.

That facade would crumble like a house of cards.

“Partying at The Point not your scene?” you ask without judgment laced in your tone.

Armin nods. “I could be sitting on the balcony reading right now.”

Your brows slide high with intrigue. "Reading?"

Yeah, he should have expected a reaction like that.

The blonde shuffles, shrugging his shoulders.

"I know, lame."

"I don't think it's lame at all," you answer instantly.

His eyes widen. "I— no?"

"Uh, no," you snort. "If I had a choice, I'd probably be doing the same thing."

Oh, shit.

Oh... shit.

So he's not lame, and he found a possible fellow bookworm.

Armin sips his drink so fast that a little dribbles out the corner of his mouth.

Liquid courage; he needs it, badly.

"If you could be home right now instead of here, what would you be reading?" he decides to ask, knowing it's the most unsexy question he could offer.

You scrunch your nose again, seriously contemplating the question while bobbing your head to the music.

"I brought maybe two books? I should have brought more."

He nods eagerly, his blue eyes round with interest.

"I have a romance that takes place in the summer — I know. Very on the nose," you relent with a small huff. "And, uh, this thriller? But I'm not crazy about it, so I'm mostly reading the romance book on the beach."

"I brought a thriller, too," he admits. "Bounty Run."

"Shut up, you too?"

"Huh?"

You laugh, and it's a melody that makes the music at this venue pale in comparison.

"I literally bought Bounty Run last month and never got around to it until now! It's so bad!"

To whatever deity is smiling upon him today, Armin has to thank them.

Not only has he met someone who likes reading, but they think Bounty Run sucks.

Maybe he's hallucinating from the burn screaming through his polo right now.

"It's really bad," he agrees breathlessly with a chuckle.

"Like dogshit terrible!"

"I know. What the hell was Tracy thinking in chapter six?"

"Oh my god, when she decided to call the hostage guy?"

"Yes!"

"Like, I'm pretty sure that's not how those situations work."

"Not even close."

You both laugh, and all Armin Arlert wants is to know every miniscule thought of yours.

What other books you may have read.

If you have any recommendations.

If you're single.

Nope.

No.

He's not Eren Yeager.

He is not his best friend— 

"Are you from here?" you ask over the music, breaking his panicked train of thought.

Armin swallows more alcohol, shaking his head. "No, we're not locals. We're just vacationing."

"So are we!"

"With your friends?"

"My friend's family," you correct, leaning closer to stop shouting so loudly.

He can feel his blood pressure spike exponentially.

"I'm with my friend's family, too," Armin tells you. "Our shore house for the week is something like ten blocks from here."

“For the week? Which way’s your house?” you ask, before holding up your free hand. “Not in, like, a mega-stalker way.”

“Oh, I didn’t take it that way,” he promises, earnest intent pouring from his mouth. “It’s, uh… wait where are we — oh! That way.”

He swivels and points, like somehow that’ll triangulate where the beach starts.

Your chin turns, noting the direction. “So near the… beach? No fucking way, our house is that way, too, but more like a seven-block walk from here.”

Oh.

No fucking way, indeed.

"Seriously?" Armin asks, voice cracking just a tad.

"Yeah! Do you guys camp out on the beach by third street, too?"

He nods almost too eagerly. "We were just there this afternoon."

"So were we," you confess with a light laugh. "Small world! We were both being subjected to that god-awful book and could've warned each other to pick a less shitty book."

"Well, I brought about a dozen books if you want one to borrow."

Way to go, mouth.

Armin tenses instantly as the words pour from his mouth.

"I... you know, just in case the romance book doesn't work out! Or if you're a fast reader! Or if you—"

"Promise?"

Your question cuts through like a knife.

He is in awe.

Enamored.

He'll give you all of his goddamn books if it means you'll talk to him after tonight.

Suddenly your chin drops, and your free hand fishes for your phone in the back pocket of your jean shorts.

A frown tugs at the corners of your lips, causing the blonde to simply wait.

Stare.

Don't go.

Don't go, don't go, don't— 

"Shit, mayday with my friend."

You sigh as if you were expecting a disaster.

Hell, he's expecting one, too, but he's selfishly forgotten about saving Eren or finding Zeke.

"Are they alright?"

"Yeah, just..." You trail off, typing back a response. "They pre-gamed before we came here to save money. I told them not to, but... best laid plans, right?"

"I could give you my number?" he blurts, and your attention leaves your phone.

Your eyes round with surprise, and he feels immense shame in even offering.

Yet—

"For the books," he adds hastily. Shakily. "To borrow. O-Or if you ever want to just... talk about them."

"For the books," you agree, biting your lip between your teeth. "Yeah, sure, give me your phone."

His cup is empty, but he almost drops it trying to yank his phone out of his pocket.

Armin holds it out to you, unlocking the screen. He watches as you pocket your own phone and take his, typing your number into a new text chat window.

This is happening.

This is seriously, actually happening.

"Here," you offer, handing his phone back. "I put my name in."

He glances down, memorizing your name with newfound vigor.

"Okay, perfect. Oh — my name. My name is Armin."

"Armin?" You repeat. He nods. "I like that name."

Suddenly, he likes it, too.

"See you around?" he asks hopefully.

With a parting smile, you take a slow step backwards.

"...yeah, Armin. See you around."

You look just as sheepish as he feels when you turn on a heel, disappearing into the crowd.

For a moment he stands there, dumbfounded — phone in hand, slack jawed —

Hopeful.

Maybe...

Maybe Armin Arlert won't hate spending seven days at the Yeager shore house after all.

.

author's note:

Thank you SO much for reading part one of my little summer story! I've been dying to write a proper Armin fic for a while now, and a casual, warm vacation setting felt perfect for him. This is meant to be a cozy read, so I hope you enjoy my love letter to my favorite boy. xo

How are we feeling after part one? Let me know in the replies! (And thank you for any reblogs, likes, engagement, etc. Every comment gives this writer wings.)

[missglaskin]

This happened to me before, when I bring my partner over to stay the night, my parent would give us separated room so...

In a alternative universe where reader married to Cregan, whenever they visited King's Landing the yan!hotd (parents) would not allow Cregan sleep in reader's bedchamber.

Who do you think would do this? (most to least)

There’s a reason why Cregan laments going to King’s landing, I mean not only is the weather and the customs so different, but that he has to deal with the pettiness of your family every single time. One might think to let his wife go to king’s landing by herself, which is one the roads are dangerous and two, Cregan doesn’t trust they will return you to him (trust me, he had to summon himself after the many excuses). Unfortunately to him that pettiness also extends to his nightly time. Cregan, unlike some westeros’ husbands, loved sleeping in the same bed, holding you close. 

Alicent and Otto will claim that you must sleep in separate bedrooms. They won’t even offer you both a choice, informing you that your room is still where it is before informing Cregan of the room they made ready for him. Rhaenyra will even do the same, hell there’s a chance she’ll hold onto your arm as she guides you away from your husband so you can both keep up. Rhaenys hints to Corlys that it’s best for you and Cregan to sleep separately, after all she and Laena want to spend some time with you together. 

One does not need to know Aegon and Aemond do everything in their power to ensure you're not even in the same space as Cregan. Alicent is also petty enough to send Criston inside your room to protect you while you sleep to ensure that Cregan does not sneak his way to you. Rhaenyra may also do the same thing with Harwin, it’s funny enough to imagine both Criston and Harwin being stationed in the same place. 

Daemon is surprisingly one of the few that does not bother himself, he knows you and Cregan have already consummated the marriage, and separating you won’t do anything. But he'll be a pain in the arse during the following day, keeping you all to himself. Viserys is perhaps the only one who’s not trying to separate you both, at this point he just gave up.

[caffedrine]

Keith Howell Sequel 01 - Fan Translation

If you trust me to know what I'm doing, then we have both made a huge mistake. I cannot guarantee accuracy for this fan translation, or even grammatical correctness.

Please support Cybird and pick up this event when it makes it to the English Server

In the neutral country of Jade, there was a useless prince with boundless kindness.

~Flashback~

Keith: "I'm not the kind of person you should worry about. I can't do anything, and I do terrible things without hesitation."

Keith: "Yet, here I am, still smiling."

Keith: "So you shouldn't get involved with me."

Alter!Keith: "Your words can be both poison and medicine to him."

Alter!Keith: "Emma, please kill the useless one."

~Flashback~

The cruel tragedy that struck him birthed an "alternate personality" and turned him into a beast. Haunted by the past, fearing an uncontrollable self, he continued to wish for a living death. The one who brought forth the heart of the beast sinking into the abyss was the only one with the most beautiful heart in Rhodolite—her.

Emma: "…It seems that when it comes to Keith, I become desperate to the point of not seeing anything around me."

Emma: "When I think I don't want to lose Keith, I can't think about anything else…"

Emma: "He's so important to me that I would do anything to not lose him."

She accepted the two personalities, and true love kept both beasts alive.

Keith: "I can't give you normal love. Still, I don't want to let go of your hand. I only want to love you."

Emma: "……………Then, please love me a lot."

Emma: "I will love both sides of Keith with all my heart!"

To make the flower called "happiness" bloom throughout the country, the prince with boundless kindness will protect the country's future.

As time passes, the love between the three deepens.

However, it remains a distorted and abnormal love.

The more happiness they have, the more the balance of their hearts, which seemed stable, secretly tilted.

~Timeshift~

Keith: "…"

The pounding rain soaked him completely and chilled him to the core. The golden eyes peeking through heavy bangs quietly gaze at the person who has been carelessly discarded.

A familiar-shaped ring was fitted on his ring finger.

Kagari: "Keith."

The man with fiery red hair, who appeared silently, followed Keith's gaze.

Kagari: "Have you lost something important again?"

Kagari: "Or is this your first time?"

~Timeshift~

Liam: "Ah…"

Keith: "She's fast asleep, so it's okay."

Keith: "Thank you for the documents. Just leave them there."

Liam quietly closed the room door and placed the documents on the table in front of the sofa where Keith and the other person were sitting.

Naturally, his gaze fell on Emma, who was comfortably sleeping with her head resting on Keith's shoulder. The book on her lap was open, filled with densely written words.

Liam: "Are you studying the history of various countries after practicing archery? As always, Lady Emma is powerful."

Keith: "She’s cute, isn’t she?"

Liam: "Eh? Yes, I guess so...?"

Liam: "I sometimes worry if I'm speaking the same language as you, Keith."

Suddenly showered with affection, Liam looked around the room in astonishment.

—Wanting a room with Emma, he decided to expand.

This spacious room was born from that sentiment

With large windows that let in plenty of sunlight, a large bookshelf that the two book lovers were quite satisfied with, decorative plants that offer healing, and a fluffy sofa with adorable, differently colored deer-pattern cushions.

Although not much time had passed, the room was steadily being filled in by the two—no, the three of them.

Liam: "That's right, she started seriously learning archery after coming to Jade, didn’t she?"

Keith: "Yeah. I haven't heard the reason, but she told me she wanted to learn after the tea party with my sister (Mireille)."

Liam: "It might be because Prince Keith’s mother and Lady Mireille are known archers."

Keith: "Also, maybe she just genuinely wanted to learn a way to protect herself."

Keith: "…Emma wants to protect things together rather than just be protected."

Liam: "Truly powerful indeed."

Keith: "Oh, today's practice was amazing! She hit the target's center in a row, and even when she missed, it was only a few millimeters off."

Keith: "I'm just so happy to see her results reflecting her effort, it feels like my own achievement."

Liam: "That's a delightful thing, but your excitement is making your voice louder."

With his index finger raised in front of his mouth, Liam indicated for Keith to be quiet, and Keith hurriedly covered his mouth, wanting to say that he had made a mistake.

Perhaps because she had entered a deep sleep, Emma still wore a peaceful expression on her face.

Keith: "After she asked me to teach her archery, I was quite happy."

Keith: "After all, I want to be asked a lot of things by the person I love."

Keith: "I need to properly thank my mother for patiently guiding me when I was a clumsy child."

Liam: "Speaking of your mother, I’ve heard that sometimes during their couple fights, arrows would fly from the king's room."

Keith: "Ah… She was generally easygoing and rarely got angry."

Keith: "But without discussion, the king would counter with a sword, so it always escalated. He always ended up being the one to back down."

Liam: "That's the weakness that comes with being in love."

Liam: "I saw that you also showed off by hitting the target multiple times, taking advantage of Lady Emma's request."

Keith lightly cleared his throat, diverting his gaze.

Keith: "I think… what I did was very immature."

Keith: "But the way Emma was so excited at that time was so cute that I’d want to capture it in a painting."

Liam: "…Are you bragging again?"

Emma: "Mmm…"

Keith and Liam: "!"

The two instantly closed their mouths at the faint sound they heard.

Emma shifted and snuggled even closer against Keith.

Emma: “...Keith.”

Keith: “...!”

The name that spilled from her lips made his large body shiver faintly with joy.

As if to say "Did you hear that?", Keith shot a glance at Liam.

Liam: “Please don’t look this way. Also, you look rather foolish with that face.”

Keith: “S-sorry, but Emma said my name in her sleep.”

Keith: “Maybe, even in her dreams, I'm right next to her, just like this…”

Keith: “...No, I can’t go back now. It seems I’m going to be grinning all day.”

Liam: “How pitiful…”

His large hand enveloped her delicate one, intertwining their fingers. Keith gently tilted his head toward Emma, savoring the happiness. The comforting silence filled the room along with the warm breeze coming through the window.

Although incredulous, Liam smiled at the sight of the two.

Liam: “It’s a well-known fact that the future king and queen are affectionate with each other. They are called the healing couple.”

Liam: “Their efforts to improve the country are met with great trust from the citizens.”

Keith: “Healing couple... I feel a bit embarrassed to be called that.”

After smiling gently, Keith looked down as if reminiscing about distant days.

Keith: “Being a person who has never been able to believe in myself, I was very anxious and feared trusting others.”

Keith: “But now it’s different. For the better future of the country and for peace, I want to look forward and respond to this belief.”

Liam: “You’ve changed.”

Keith: “It’s because Emma has accepted this ‘me’ straight on.”

Liam: “That ‘me’ doesn’t seem to improve much, though.”

Keith: “Ah... I’m glad she’s sleeping.”

Keith: “...”

Once again, silence returned.

However, this time it bore a hint of sadness... Realizing what that meant, Liam furrowed his brows.

Keith: “Sorry for worrying you. I want to correct the habit of it showing on my face.”

Liam: “Has it gotten worse?”

Keith: “Just a little. The time has lengthened.”

Liam: “About that…”

Keith: “It seems like there’s no problem for now. Maybe...”

Liam: “If only I could understand the reason…”

Keith: “...”

Liam: “Prince Keith?”

Keith: “No, it’s nothing. I should refrain from speculating."

Keith: “Right. About today’s scheduled diplomatic meeting, I want you to come along.”

Liam: “Of course. I have no reason to refuse.”

Keith: “Thank you. I know I can rely on you.”

Keith: “...I still wish that you wouldn’t notice, but that hasn’t changed since the old days.”

He gently tightened his grip on their intertwined hands. In his golden eyes, filled with affection, there flickered a hint of hesitation.

(This is...?)

On one afternoon—

The greenhouse that I entered escorted by Prince Keith was filled with a sweet aroma different from that of floral nectar.

Steam rose from the cups of tea on the table, which was crowded with flower-shaped cakes and baked goods.

(I didn’t think we had made plans for a tea party...)

Looking up at Keith with a questioning expression, he returned my gaze with a serene expression.

Keith: “I heard it from the head of the royal pharmacy (Yuel), and I couldn’t stay still.”

(Yuel... ah)

Keith: “Congratulations on passing the herbalist promotion exam.”

Emma: “Thank you!”

Emma: “I just received the acceptance letter a moment ago, so I was surprised.”

Keith: “I found out last night.”

(What a surprise! And yet, he prepared such a wonderful celebration...)

As my lips curled into a smile, Keith’s eyes softened too, and warmth filled my chest even more.

(The trigger was seeing Prince Keith talk vibrantly about the plants...)

(With my desire to “be of help” added to that, I got the chance to be recognized for my growth.)

(Along with learning lessons as a queen, I want to continue studying as an herbalist and absorb knowledge,)

(I want to become someone who supports the country.)

Noticing that Prince Keith’s expression had turned thoughtful, I tilted my head.

Keith: “The celebration isn’t enough.”

Emma: “!? That’s not true. If anything, I’ve received more than enough!”

Keith: “If that’s the case—... no, wait.”

(It feels like his eyes are saying "I won't concede.")

I always think that the reasons for Prince Keith's stubbornness are made up of kindness and cuteness.

(If the celebration isn’t enough...)

Emma: “Well then, may I make a request?”

Keith: “Of course! Please say anything.”

Which option will you choose?

Point to your own cheek.

Open your arms wide.

Indicate the cake you want to eat.

Emma: “Keith, I want to eat this tart first.”

I pointed to the plate with a tart topped with juicy fruits.

Keith nodded and seated me in a chair, then served the tart onto a separate plate as I requested...

Keith: "Here you go, Emma. Open your mouth?"

Emma: “Huh...?”

Keith: “Eh...?”

Keith: “Oh... Did I make a huge mistake...?”

(When you cant even just let them eat cake)

Emma: “No, it's just as I requested. I’ll eat it!”

I took the bite-sized tart he offered and popped it into my mouth.

Keith smiled as brightly as a blooming flower and cheerfully began to cut a second piece.

(What I really wanted to request was for him to serve the cake... but somehow, I feel like I’m gaining so much.)

I silently expressed my gratitude to Keith.

More than the sweet and sour fruitiness and the crispy texture, the smile of my beloved made me happy.

After thoroughly enjoying the celebratory tea party, I strolled through the greenhouse with Keith, admiring the colorful flowers.

As the time for public duties approached, a sense of sadness welled up at the thought of parting again, when I was suddenly called by name.

Looking up, I met Keith’s gaze, which was serious this time.

His face belonged not to my fiancé, but rather to the next king bearing the weight of the nation...

Keith: "Actually, Kagari-san..."

Keith: "I received an invitation to a friendship meeting from Prince Kagari Amagase of the Kougyoku (Ruby) Kingdom."

Emma: "At this time of year?"

Keith: "Yes, and that’s why I have many concerns about it."

A short while ago—

Information of significant importance had reached Jade that the three countries of Tanzanite, Achroite, and Kougyoku had formed an alliance, potentially disrupting the balance of power on the continent.

The three countries weren't historically close, nor was there any record of significant interaction between them.

The reason for forming the alliance is unclear, with no clues as to why this would happen.

Receiving an invitation to a friendship meeting from Ruby during such a time must mean there’s some ulterior motive.

Keith: "They say Kougyoku is a country where civil war never ceases,"

Keith: "and currently, three factions are vying for national unification."

Emma: "There are figures among the factions who claim to be king, right?"

Keith: "Yes. It seems that anyone with power, regardless of status, can claim to be one."

Keith: "And as a unique feature not found in other countries, each faction has various nations supporting them."

Keith: "Since Jade has a long history and friendly relations with Ruby, we are supporting the nation, not the factions."

(So, the middle island)

(The complicated state of affairs of the countries makes my head spin the more I learn.)

Emma: "Which faction has formed the alliance...?”

Keith shook his head in distress.

Keith: “Since multiple factions exist, I thought I would hear some information flowing in... but it seems to be difficult.”

Keith: “That’s why the invitation from Kagari is so valuable.”

Emma: “And Kagari ‘san’?”

(I noticed he corrected himself just now, but could it be...?)

Keith: “I’m friends with Kagari.”

Emma: “I see...!”

Learning about Keith’s friendships at such an unexpected moment made me lean forward in interest.

(I shouldn’t get carried away. I want to ask so many things, but I have to hold back for now.)

Keith: “Kagari has originally been part of the royal camp and has achieved numerous victories in battles.”

Keith: “He is feared and called ‘Yasha’ for his unmatched strength...”

Keith: “However, he seems to have defected from the royal family and is now building his own camp in a different faction.”

(That’s why the invitation came from Prince Kagari, the second prince, instead of the first.)

Keith: “Both the three-country alliance and Kagari’s current actions are honestly wrapped in mystery.”

Keith: “Which faction formed the alliance, and what is its purpose?”

Keith: “And the reason why Kagari, who has defected from the royal family, sent the invitation...”

Keith: “I’ve decided to participate in the friendship meeting as his friend to understand whether Ruby will be a country we should watch out for in the future.”

Keith: “So...”

Before Keith could finish his words, I opened my mouth.

Emma: “May I come with you?”

(I know I can’t be much help. Still, I want to face issues that affect the future of the country.)

Keith: “I want to ‘make this country bloom with the beautiful flower of happiness forever.’”

Keith: “I promised my brother that long ago... As the future king and as Emma’s lover—”

Keith: “I want to fulfill that vow together with him, the ‘other side of myself.’”

Emma: “...Keith, can I also be included in that 'promise'?”

(Because I want to continue making the flowers of happiness bloom in Jade alongside Master Keith.)

After a brief silence, his large hand gently took mine.

Keith: “Because you are by my side, we ‘can’ overcome any difficulties and hardships.”

Keith: “...Thank you for saying you want to join.”

Keith: “Ruby is said to be a country of chaos. We don’t know where the dangers lurk.”

Keith: “We will protect you, Emma... no matter what.”

His lips touched the back of my hand as if making a vow.

Emma: “Thank you.”

(I feel the same way as you, Keith.)

I gently stood on my tiptoes and this time, I kissed Master Keith on the cheek.

He turned to me with a smile that seemed to contain all the kindness in the world, warming my heart.

The warmth that flowed between us, the feelings shared, and the words spoken were all genuine and honest.

(But then... I wonder why.)

Keith: “Emma?”

Emma: “Oh, I’m sorry. I was staring too much.”

Keith: “No, I actually welcome that. If anything, I want you to gaze at me even more.”

Keith: “...Just kidding, that was an incredibly creepy response. P-please pretend you didn’t hear that.”

Emma: “That’s unfortunate... I was planning to take advantage of those words and keep staring at you a little longer, Keith.”

Keith: “Ah, I really want you to keep looking at me.”

His immediate response made me smile involuntarily.

(This isn’t the first time.)

(I wonder when I started looking at him like this?)

The faint dark hue that flickered in his golden eyes brought back the lingering anxiety in my heart.

Later in the carriage-

Emma: “Prince Keith... no, that’s not right.”